The object of this article is to show that God has revealed from His Word what He is about to do regarding Israel and the nations, and to encourage believers who are going through trials while awaiting the promised return of our Lord Jesus Christ for His own. "He made known His ways unto Moses, His acts unto the children of Israel." Psa. 103:7.
We believe that it has been for a specific reason that God has used certain numbers over and over again in regard to His governmental ways with His people down through the ages. As all numbers used in this way in Scripture have a special significance, it seems necessary for the purpose of this article to point out first the meaning of some of them as plainly seen from their usage in the Word of God.
The number one: Supremacy, exclusiveness: one Jehovah, one God and Father, one Holy Spirit, one body, and one faith.
The number two: Distinctness, adequate testimony: relation to the two days of God's grace.
The number three: Divine fullness, completeness: perfectness in testimony, millennial blessing.
The number four: Completeness in that which is created or ordained of God: four winds, four living creatures, four horsemen, etc.
The number five: Human weakness in its appreciation of obligation: five wise and five foolish virgins in Matt. 25.
The number six: Incompleteness, imperfection, (one short of perfection): six steps to Solomon's throne, the number of the imperial beast of Rev. 13 is 666, etc.
The number seven: Spiritual completeness, generally in good but occasionally in evil. The compound of 3 and 4. Seven creation days, hence seven days per week. Every seventh year the land of Israel was to rest. 7 times 7 years brought in the jubilee, the fiftieth year, the times of the restoration of the inheritance. The number 7 appears many times in the Revelation Forgiveness was to be 70 times 7 times (Matt. 18:22). Israel's captivity was seventy years. Daniel's seventy weeks, etc.
The number eight: A new departure outside of, but connected with creation-order: resurrection of Christ, going beyond what God established as Jeroboam did. (1 Kings 12:32, 33.)
The number ten: Complete ground of human responsibility.
The number twelve: Completeness in administration in what is set forth or displayed man-ward: twelve tribes, twelve apostles.
The number forty: 4 times 10. Complete probation to bring to light good or evil. Moses had three times of testing of forty years each, as well as two periods of forty days each on the mount of God. (See Acts 7:23, 30, 36, 42.) Twelve spies searched the land forty days (Num. 13). Because of Israel's unbelief in God's power and promises, and having tempted Him ten times, they were tested for forty years in the wilderness.
Decree of the United Nations
The nation of Israel was set aside as God's testimony in A.D. 70, when Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed by the Roman Emperor Titus, forty years after their rejection of Jesus as their Messiah at the very beginning of His ministry. (John 1:11; 5:15, 16; Matt. 9:3, 4, 34; Mark 3:6; Luke 4:28, Their status before 29 etc.) Their status before God is still unchanged, but they were granted a national charter by decree of the United Nations on May 14, 1948, over 38 years ago. This put them in the position assigned to them prophetically for the events of the end time.
During this time there has been no recognition by Israel, as a nation, that Jesus was their rejected Messiah. They have been fulfilling Hos. 3:4: "For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim [idols]." At this late date, judicially blinded by Jehovah (see Isa. 6:9-13; Acts 28:25-28, etc.), they are seeking to restore that which was only "the example and shadow of heavenly things." Heb. 8:5.
The first six verses of Isa. 66 give God's thoughts, by the Spirit through His prophet, of His reaction to this sacrilege and insult to their Messiah. This will lead to the unclean spirit of idolatry that characterized much of the early history of Israel, returning to a house "empty, swept, and garnished" but devoid of the sanctifying presence of Jehovah. Then the unclean spirit "taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first." Matt. 12:44, 45. Thus shall it be to this wicked generation (Israel) also!
“When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the [what is a] holy place," etc. Matt. 24:15. Note that the indefinite article before "holy" means that it is holy only to the Jews of that day, not sanctified by Jehovah.
According to Old Testament prophecy, the next phase of God's dealings with Israel will be the beginning again of God's governmental dealings with that nation. Has this already begun?
“I will go and return to My place, till they acknowledge their offense, and seek My face: in their affliction they will seek Me early." Hos. 5:15. This must first take place before their national, public restoration.
One Day As 1000 Years
Then Hos. 6:2, 3; "After two days will He revive us: in the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live in His sight. Then we shall know, if we follow on to know the Lord." In 2 Peter 3:8 it says, "But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." (See also Psa. 90:4.) So we see from these scriptures that Israel's two days of Hos. 6:2 are almost fulfilled. Afterward comes the third day, the 1000 years reign of Messiah and the full blessing of Israel and the nations. (Rev. 20:1-6.)
There are many Scriptures that tell us that Israel will be gathered again and after God's dealings with them, "they shall look upon Me whom they have pierced.... In that day shall there be a great mourning in Jerusalem," etc. Zech. 12:10, 11.
The last week (seven years), of Daniel's well-known prophecy of the seventy weeks, will begin sometime during the turbulent time just ahead for this "scattered and peeled" nation. Afterward they will be completely gathered from among the nations and the prophecy of Ezek. 20:33-44 will take place. Then the prophecy of Hos. 6:2,3 will be fulfilled in the glorious reign of Christ. The book of Revelation has much to say regarding this last week, and especially the last half, variously designated as three and one half years, or twelve hundred sixty days, or forty-two months. Daniel's seventieth week (see Dan. 9:24-27), is better known to Bible students as the great tribulation (though it is the last three and one half years of it that is the "great" part).
Revived Roman Empire
This last week that is determined upon "thy people" (notice how God had disowned them as "His" for a time) will mark the end of God's dealings with Israel because of their rejection of the One who came "to confirm the promises made unto the fathers." Rom. 15:8. We learn from Daniel 9:27, "And he [the prince of the same revived Roman Empire] shall confirm the covenant with many [the rulers of the nation of
Israel] for one week: and in the midst of the week [seven years] he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations [idolatry] he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate [on Israel under God's judgment]." The Lord Jesus refers to this verse in Matt. 24:15-22 as the beginning of the "great" tribulation. Just how quickly the last week of Daniel, the great tribulation, will follow Israel's present testing period of forty years as a nation (which will be completed May 14, 1988) is a question.
There has been a rise in recent years of the teaching of humanism in schools and colleges coupled with plans for a workable system of world government without God. Indications are that the European Common Market governing body is developing into a strong political unit which will soon be ready to assume the last or "revived" stage of the ancient Roman Empire, when a strong leader will appear, who will apparently have at least a seven-year career. This leader and empire are described in Rev. 13:1-10. A second beast, contemporary with him, will be the religious leader called elsewhere "the false prophet" or "the antichrist" or "the king" in Dan. 11:36. The rapid development of computer technology and a dependable system of world-wide communications has made man's long dream of world government with the aid of a false religion, seemingly attainable. The stage will then be set for the fulfillment of Matt. 24:15-22, when this man of sin will be manifested in his true character (see 2 Thess. 2:3,4). Israel still has to pass through the seventieth week of Daniel, better known to us as the seven years of tribulation.
The Lord's coming for the Church (known as the rapture) may take place at any moment and is our present hope as believers, but we can gather from Israel's present history that the end of this dispensation of grace is at hand. Our Julian calendar has an error of four years, or perhaps five. Chronology shows the birth of Christ as 5 A.D. That makes the real date of our 1987 calendar to be 1991 or 1992. "Surely I come quickly: Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." Rev. 22:20. L. Huff