The Antichrist, Pt. 4

Announcer: It's time now for Bible Talk. Join our hosts Gary Gibbs and John Bradshaw, speakers for the Amazing Facts ministry. As they now open the bible and discuss themes that affect your life today. Stay tuned because the next 15 minutes will deepen your understanding of God's word.

John Bradshaw: Hi, friends and welcome again to Bible Talk. were we talk about what the bible has to say to us today. And with me again is Gary Gibbs. Hi Gary.

Gary Gibbs: Hi, John. Today we have an exciting topic. We're talking about the Anti-Christ again.

John: And we've been dealing with this the last few subjects here on Bible Talk. We've studied we've looked at the identification of the Anti-Christ. Found out just who that is, where it fits in, in human history. And today I think we ought to go ahead and discuss one of those subjects that's very popular among Christians today.

Gary: In fact let's talk about the great tribulation. Because when we talk about the Anti-Christ, you can't escape really the central focus is on the rapture. We're going to be raptured out of here before the Anti-Christ comes. And when all the Christians leave and go back with Christ to heaven in the rapture, then the Anti-Christ will set up his kingdom in Jerusalem. The temple will be rebuilt. Sacrificial system will be reinstated. The Anti-Christ will break the covenant that he's made with the Jews.

John: OK.

Gary: And he'll desecrate the temple and he'll start a persecution that will be unparalleled in the history of mankind.

John: Now the interesting thing about this thing here, you've talked about the seven-years of tribulation. Now I've read my bible and so have you. And perhaps the vast majority of people listening to us right now read their bibles. I going to tell you I haven't and you haven't and nobody else has found anywhere in the bible that talks about seven-years of tribulation.

Gary: Now John I'm sure there are people sitting out there saying, "Now, wait a minute. I've read it. I've heard preachers preach it." We have preachers listening to us and they're saying, " Wait a minute. I preach that all the time. There is the seven-year tribulation in the bible."

John: The fact that preachers preach it doesn't mean that it is true and doesn't mean that it exists in the bible. If we can find it in the bible then that's OK. If we can't, let's just give it up and let it go and go with what the bible says.

Gary: Well, John I'm going to then take you then to a text that talks about the seven-year period.

John: Oh, then this had better be good.

Gary: And it's the text that everybody turns to and I'm going to voice their view here. The seven-year period of tribulation when the Anti-Christ confirms the covenant with the Jews and the temple's rebuilt. And then we have the abomination and desolation that desecrates it.

John: All right, where do we find this seven years of tribulation talked about?

Gary: You're going to find it in the book of Daniel, a prophetic book. Daniel, Chapter 9.

John: And that's good. Daniel and Revelation are companion books. Study one in the light of the other. Daniel nine . . .

Gary: And we're looking there, John, at Daniel nine and Verse 27.

John: OK. Now, now will you allow me to place this in some kind of context here?

Gary: Well, why don't we just read it though? Just begin with it and see where it goes.

John: Well, why don't we back up a couple of . . . No, OK. I'll play your game we'll read this verse and then we'll look at it in context.

Gary: If I were preaching on the seven-year tribulation, I just would start right here.

John: I know you would.

Gary: It says. 'And he will confirm the covenant with many for one week. And in the midst of the week, the Anti-Christ will cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease. And for the over spreading of the abominations, he shall make it desolate.' So the Anti-Christ will have this covenant for one week. Now in bible prophecy, a day equals a year.

John: Now hang on. I've got to stop you here. In case . . . just I've got to stop you here. You said, 'So the Anti-Christ.' It doesn't say that, it says, 'And he shall confirm the . . .' It does not say, 'And the Anti-Christ shall confirm the covenant.' It says, 'he'.

Gary: That's right. And that's where if you do go back the other verse, people who do believe in the seven-year tribulation period will say that it's the prince that shall come, the Anti-Christ prince.

John: All Right.

Gary: He's going to be the one that does this covenant.

John: OK. Well, now we're going to back up to Verse 25. 'Know therefore and understand that from the going forth of the commandment, to restore and to build Jerusalem, unto Messiah the . . . what?

Gary: Well, Messiah, the prince.

John: OK. Who is that? That's clearly only one individual.

Gary: Well, it has to be Jesus.

John: OK. Seven weeks and sixty-two weeks. And you touched on something a second ago, let's do it justice. You mentioned how this seventieth week is akin to seven-years because a week is seven days, right?

Gary: That's right and so in bible prophecy a day equals a year. Ezekiel 4:6, Numbers 14:34 tells us that. So seven days for a week equals seven prophetic years.

John: OK. So here we've got a period of seven-years with the seventieth week. No doubt about it. It says, 'After sixty-two weeks Messiah will shall be cut off.' So we're dealing with in Verse 25, Messiah the prince. That's Jesus. Verse 26, Jesus again. 'But not for himself and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary and so on.' Now who is the prince all the way through here?

Gary: Well, right here those who teach the seventieth week refers to the Anti-Christ will say, "That's the Anti-Christ." That right there, after it says, 'But not for himself . . .' Right there, that stops with Jesus.

John: Yeah, now you're leaping out of context. If you do that they're on to you. Because Verse 25, prince is Messiah. Verse 26 the prince is Messiah again. The key verse is Verse 27, 'And he . . .' Verse 25, Jesus. Verse 26, Jesus. Verse 27, 'He-Jesus shall confirm the covenant with many for one week.' That's seven-years. No doubt about it. Tell me anywhere in the bible that the Anti-Christ has a covenant with anybody?

Gary: Well, I'd be hard pressed to find one except right here.

John: Yeah, you see it's not there. The only covenant in the bible that we read about is the covenant made by God with his people. Jesus confirmed that covenant with the chosen ones, the nation of Israel for a week or seven-years. See he was baptized in 27 AD. And he said, "OK, I'm giving you another week." This contract, this agreement extends for another seven-year period. In the middle of that week the sacrificial system ended. Now the Anti-Christ is said to initiate and then put an end to some sacrificial thing. But it was God who initiated the sacrificial system. And that Jesus' death on the cross happened to show us that the sacrificial system was obsolete now.

Gary: Well there was something that happened in the temple the very moment, the precise moment that Jesus died on the cross. The veil in the temple was torn into two from top to bottom.

John: Right, Mark 15 says that.

Gary: That's right. God showing that he was putting an end to the Old Testament's sanctuary service.

John: It became obsolete from that moment on, didn't it?

Gary: It really did.

John: No more sacrificial system. So this 7-year period is the week of years the 7-year time when Jesus confirmed the covenant with the nation of Israel. Nothing to do with the Antichrist, nothing to do with the Tribulation period, nothing at all.

Gary: So, John, if the tribulation isn't going to be a 7-year period, does that mean that there's absolutely no tribulation whatsoever?

John: Well, you know, I wish I could say that that was true. Part of me wants to say, "Yes, no Tribulation". But the Bible doesn't say that, and this is Bible Talk, so let's stick with the Bible.

Gary: So there will be a Tribulation.

John: Daniel says there was coming a time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation.

Gary: As Daniel, chapter 12?

John: Chapter 12, that's right.

Gary: Verse 2, I believe. Jesus said the same thing in Matthew 24:21. So there's a time of Tribulation.

John: There's no doubt about it.

Gary: Now, we might be able to agree on this then, as Christians who look at the Tribulation. Maybe we'll say, "OK, there's not a 7-year period, it's an indefinite time."

John: That's true.

Gary: But we're going to be raptured out of here before the Tribulation.

John: OK, so it's something we don't need to worry about because we get an early out.

Gary: Jesus says, "I will keep you from the hour of trial and temptation."

John: Well, that's true He does say that, but to say that that means that He's going to get us out before the Tribulation, they ought to know. Why don't we look in two Thessalonians? This is a Tribulation/Rapture/Antichrist passage of Scripture. 2 Thessalonians 2:1, "Now, we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord, Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto Him." What time are we talking about here?

Gary: That's the second coming. The rapture, Jesus comes and gathers His people together to Him.

John: Amen. Paul says, "Don't be soon shaken in mind or be troubled, neither by spirit or by word or even as though a letter was written from us as that the day of Christ is at hand." He says, "Don't worry that Christ's coming is right here upon us, because, " he says, in verse three, "Let no man deceive you by any means, for that day shall..."

Gary: Not come.

John: That is the coming of Christ, shall what?

Gary: Not come.

John: OK. "Except there will be a falling away first and that man of sin be revealed the son of perdition." He says as plain as the nose on your face. The coming of Christ will not take place until there has been a falling away and the Antichrist, the man of sin, is revealed.

Gary: So the man of sin comes on the scene of action while we're still here?

John: A hundred percent absolutely right.

Gary: John, I was studying with a lady I'll never forget. She started asking me, "Are we going to be here during the Tribulation?". I would say, "We'll study that later." Every week, she was the woman who was like dripping water that you read about in Proverbs.

John: OK.

Gary: Finally, she said, "Listen, I will not be upset if we're here, if that's what the Bible says, that's what I want to know, it's no problem with me. Tell me, what does the Bible say?" So I said, "OK. The Bible says, according to 2 Thessalonians 2 that we will be here during the tribulation."

John: Now, what did she say to that?

Gary: She jumped up out of her seat, she shouted, she yelled, she pointed her finger in my face. She said, "You may be here during the Tribulation, but I'm not going to be. I'm going to up in the rapture."

John: Well, she had in mind made up, didn't she? Well, that would be nice if that's what the Bible taught, but the Bible doesn't teach that, you understand. Have a look at Biblical characters from history. Daniel went in to the lion's den, but Jesus sent an angel and then He shut the lion's mouth. The three Hebrew wordings went into the furnace of fire, but the Bible says that really God stood right in there with them and delivered them in the midst of that, and that's God's plan.

Gary: But that's the Old Testament, John. Who wants to go through the Tribulation, the greatest trial period in the history of mankind?

John: You know what? I know that anybody sort of wants to, but it's God's plan that He would try us like gold. In that time, that's what's going to take place. In fact, if you look in Revelation 16, I'll just delude to this briefly, you read that five plagues are being put out. You read about five plagues, even six plagues, being put out, and Jesus says, "Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watches and keeps his garments", and so on. In other words, after six plagues, Jesus has not returned. He says, "Hold fast, keep the faith. I'm coming back for you soon."

Gary: I believe there's a reason a lot of people want to get out of here before the Tribulation is because Preachers are using the Tribulation as their means to motivate and scare people into conversion today.

John: No doubt it's a scare tactic.

Gary: So, there's no wonder that people need this doctrine and they don't want to believe what the Bible says.

John: A guy came to me one day and he brought a painting, that he had painted, he was an accomplished artist. He said, "This is a picture of the Tribulation." Let me tell you, it was awful. I mean, there were horrors, unimaginable in there.

Gary: Planes crashing with pilots who'd been raptured out of it and all sorts of things.

John: Oh, man, people being cruelly treated and tortured. All you've got to do is hold this picture up to someone and say, "That's what it's like unless you get out first." Man, they're begging for them to be raptured before this seven years of Tribulation time.

Gary: But you're saying, according to the Bible, we will be here but we don't need to fear it because God will be with His people during that time.

John: And thank God that that is true. Friend, you can look to Jesus, you can trust in Jesus, and know that He will be with us. You've got to get our Bible Study Antichrist is Alive Today, call our toll free number and get that. Join us for more on this subject next time here on Bible Talk. [music]

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