Monday, July 21, 2008

Isaiah's End Times Timeline - an explanation

I know it has been a while since I posted, and I'm sorry for that. Our family has been dealing with some issues and the enemy has tried to silence me because of that, but I am not giving up and our family will overcome these matters. I ask that you would pray for reconciliation and a change of heart for all of us. Thanks!

Now, I wanted to get back to "Isaiah's End Times Timeline" but before I continued the timeline, I wanted to give you more explanation of why I believe there is a timeline. Well, while studying the nation Israel and all that happened to them as they were established as a people and a Kingdom and how they related to God and His response to them, I started to see a pattern, or cycle, that they would continually repeat.

God would provide for His people in His Kingdom and would make them successful and prosperous, but then the people would get too comfortable and prideful and then would forget God and His Law, wanting to live their lives their own way. Then they would seek after other gods, wanting to be more like their worldly neighbors, provoking God to anger. God would send a prophet to speak His Word to them to remind them who He is, His love for them, and what He had done for them so that they would repent, but the people wouldn't listen. So, to punish them for their disobedience and to bring them to repentance, He would send the sword, captivity, famine, and disease upon them. Some people would repent and return to Him, but those who didn't eventually perished. God would then take the remnant of those who were faithful and those who repented and would use them to build up His city and Kingdom again.

Now, I know that God hasn't changed who He is and how He feels about disobedience and idolatry. Unfortunately, though, human nature hasn't changed, either. God still provides and propers His people, but if we aren't careful to walk in His Spirit and His ways, we too forget about Him and how He wants us to live. We then start doing what we think is best and start lusting after the ways of the world, thinking that we can still be a Christian but do what everybody else is doing. Jesus, God's Word, will speak to our spirit, but we will drown out His voice because what He is saying is too uncomfortable to hear. He will send others to speak His Words of love to us, but we will either ignore them or get defensive, telling them that they are judging us. Then we go after what we want, enjoying it for a time, but we end up falling into a trap. We become addicted and go far into debt so that we eventually lose everything we had and are left all alone. We are broken and bruised and our lives our filled with pain. We are captives to the life that we have chosen to live. But, in the midst of the darkest night, Jesus is there and He sheds His light over everything. He has already made a way of escape, but it is our choice to repent and follow Him. Some people do repent at that point, but others harden their hearts because they don't understand how a God of love would let them get to this point, and they reject Him and eventually perish. Those who repent and have been faithful to King Jesus then go on to help build up His Kingdom.

So, with that being said, why do we think that the end times, His return, and the establishment of His Kingdom and the New Jerusalem will go any other way?

What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun. (Ecc 1:9 ESV)

Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure: (Isa 46:9-10 KJV)

I have foretold the former things from the beginning; and they went out of My mouth; and I made them hear; I acted suddenly; and they came about. Because I knew that you are obstinate, and your neck is an iron sinew and your brow bronze. And I declared it to you from the beginning. Before it happened I revealed it to you; lest you should say, My idol has done them, and my graven image, and my molten image, has commanded them. You heard; see it all; and will you not declare? I have shown you new things from this time, even hidden things, and you did not know them. They are created now, and not from the beginning; even before the day when you did not hear them; lest you should say, Behold, I knew them. Yea, you did not hear; yea, you did not know; yea, from the time that your ear was not opened; for I surely know that you will betray and trespass; from the womb it was called to you. For My name's sake I will put off My anger, and for My praise I will hold back for you, that I do not cut you off. Behold, I have refined you, but not with silver; I have chosen you in the furnace of affliction. For my sake, for My sake I will do it; for why should My name be defiled? And I will not give My glory to another. Listen to me, O Jacob and Israel, My called; I am He; I am the first, I also am the last. My hand also has laid the foundation of the earth, and My right hand has stretched out the heavens. I called; they stood up together. Let all of you gather and hear; who among them has declared these things? Jehovah has loved him; He will do His pleasure on Babylon, and His arm shall be on the Chaldeans. I, I, have spoken; yea, I have called him; I brought him and he makes his way succeed. Come near to Me, hear this; I have not spoken in secret from the beginning. From its being, I was there; and now the Lord Jehovah, and His Spirit, has sent Me. So says Jehovah, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, I am Jehovah your God who teaches you to profit, who leads you by the way that you should go. Oh that you had paid attention to My commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea. And your seed would have been like the sand, and the offspring of your bowels like its grain; his name would not have been cut off nor destroyed from before Me. Go out of Babylon; flee from the Chaldeans. Tell it with a voice of singing, let this be heard, let it go out to the end of the earth; say, Jehovah has redeemed His servant Jacob. And they did not thirst when He led them through the deserts; He caused the waters to flow out of the rock for them; He cut open the rock also, and the waters gushed out. There is no peace, says Jehovah, to the wicked.
(Isa 48:3-22 MKJV)

Is there anybody else out there who can see the cycle that we are in?

1 comments:

Rabbi Lars Shalom said...

yes!! please read for jesus