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#1. Understanding of Bible Prophecy
Knowing the unfolding of prophecy for the last days was Daniel’s most profound question (Daniel 12:4; 8-10). The Bible specifically says we cannot know the exact time of the Lord’s return for His true church.
Matthew 25:13 “Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming.”
But the Scriptures make it equally clear that we can know the season of the Lord’s return!
Luke 21:28 “Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near. (cf. 1 Thessalonians 5:2-6).
Furthermore, the Scriptures give us many signs to watch for, signs that will signal that Jesus is ready to return. The wise follower of the Lord will give serious study to, and know what time it is on God’s prophetic clock. The writer of the Hebrew letter referred to these signs when he proclaimed that believers should encourage one another when they see the “Day” of His glorious return drawing near (Hebrews 10:25-27).
#2. The Miraculous Return of Israel
The Bible distinctly predicts the return of the Jewish people, against all odds, to their ancient homeland in the last days, which the Lord has supernaturally orchestrated.
Jeremiah 16:14-15 “’Therefore behold, the days are coming,’ says the LORD, “that it shall no more be said, ‘The LORD lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt,’ but, ‘The LORD lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north and from all the lands where He had driven them.’ For I will bring them back into their land which I gave to their fathers.
- Regathering of the Jews foretold (Isaiah 11:10-12)
- Reclamation of the land of Israel (Ezekiel 36:34-35)
- Sovereignty of Jerusalem once again (Luke 21:24)
- Epicenter of world politics on Israel (Zechariah 12:3)
- Russian, Iran, and Turkey threat to Israel (Ezekiel 38-39)
- The testimony of divine intervention (Ezekiel 39:7)
Promise of God: Israel will never be removed
Amos 9:14-15 “’I will bring my people Israel back from exile… I will plant Israel in their own land, never again to be uprooted from the land I have given them,’ says the LORD your God.”
#3. Love of Many Growing Cold
All you have to do is look at the news to see how lovers of self and haters of others has exploded in our world! Jesus spoke explicitly of this sign expanding worldwide at the end of this age (see Matthew 24:13).
The last days will be a time loveless delusion and deceit.
2 Timothy 3:2-4 “People will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.”
Still, our primary calling remains to grow in our love for the Lord while striving to share His great mercy with others.
Revelation 2:4-5 “But I have this complaint against you. You don’t love me or each other as you did at first! Look how far you have fallen! Turn back to me and do the works you did at first.”
#4. The Rise of False Teachers Corrupting The ‘Church’…Along with a Revival Outpouring Worldwide
The Last Days will bring about a “falling away” from core Biblical Christianity, denying the key doctrines of our faith!
2 Peter 3:3-4 “Above all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, ‘Where is this coming he promised? Ever since our ancestors died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation” (cf. Romans 1:18-22).
- Denial of the Second Coming of Christ
- Denial of the Pending Judgments of God
The Last Days will also be evidenced by the greatest move of God our world has ever witnessed!
Preaching and Receiving of the Gospel worldwide
Matthew 24:14 “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.”
Revival Outpouring (*Luke 14:15-24, just before the Tribulation; *Joel 2:28-29, during the Tribulation).
#5. The Falling Away
2 Thessalonians 2:3 “Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first.”
1 Timothy 4:1-2 “The Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons…”
There has undoubtedly been a falling away from the faith; just look at plummeting church attendance. There is also a falling away from the truth of the Bible by those who have distorted and twisted Scripture, falling into serious error, and many are being led astray.
1 John 2:19 “These people left our churches, but they never really belonged with us; otherwise they would have stayed with us. When they left, it proved that they did not belong with us.”
#6. Increase of Lawlessness
The “mystery of lawlessness” was active in Paul’s day, as it is in our world today, and will expand significantly as we approach the return of King Jesus!
2 Thessalonians 2:7-8 “For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way.”
Today, many who profess Christ do not even seek to keep the commandments. And, although we can’t be saved by the commandments, those who are saved strive to do so.
1 John 3:6 “No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.”
The true church of these last days stands in stark contrast with the false apostate ‘church’ by its passion to live for and honor Christ.
Titus 2:14 “Who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.”
#7. Increasing Decay of Our Culture
Jesus and the inspired writers of the scripture provide us a myriad of social indicators that we are living in the last days!
2 Timothy 3:1-5 “But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power.”
- Increasing despair (2 Timothy 3:1)
- Increasing materialism (2 Timothy 3:2)
- Increasing influence of Humanism (2 Timothy 3:2)
- Calling evil good and good evil (2 Timothy 3:3)
- Increasing hedonism (2 Timothy 3:4)
- A false form of spirituality (2 Timothy 3:5)
#8. Global Technological Delusions
The advancements of mankind will culminate in a utopian tyranny and destructive global implosion.
Transhumanism rebellion… self-deification, a world without God.
Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it? (cf. Psalm 14:1).
High-speed transportation and knowledge explosion
Daniel 12:4 “But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.”
Computer and laser technology
Revelation 13:16-17 “He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast.”
Television/satellite transmission
Revelation 11:9-10 “Then those from the peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations will see their dead bodies three-and-a-half days, and not allow their dead bodies to be put into graves.”
#9. A World Overwhelmed
In the Last Days, people will experience the constant sensation of feeling overcome by circumstances while living daily in a quandary by what is happening in our world.
Luke 21:25-26 “And there will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring; men’s hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.”
Disasters, of nature and man-made, will encompass all the world!
- Wars and rumors of wars
- Increasing famine
- Overwhelming pestilence
- Earthquakes of unprecedented destruction (Matthew 24:6-8; Luke 21:10-11; Mark 13:7-8)
Globalism preparing the way for the rise of Antichrist.
- Restoration of the ‘Roman Empire’ into a final Beast system (Daniel 2 & 7; cf. 9:27)
- Movement toward world government (Daniel 7:23-26)
The promise of the return of Jesus Christ to end this age of evil and destruction
Matthew 24:22 “And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect’s sake those days will be shortened.”
Daniel 7:26-27 “But the court will sit, and his power will be taken away and completely destroyed forever. Then the sovereignty, power and greatness of all the kingdoms under heaven will be handed over to the holy people of the Most High. His kingdom will be an everlasting kingdom, and all rulers will worship and obey him.”
#10. God’s Final Word: The Messiah’s Triumph and Kingdom
Psalm 2:1-12 “Why do the nations rage, and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying, ‘Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.’ He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision.
“Then he will speak to them in his wrath, and terrify them in his fury, saying, ‘As for me, I have set my King on Zion, my holy hill.’ I will tell of the decree: The LORD said to me, ‘You are my Son; today I have begotten you. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron and dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.’ Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him.”
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