THE BEGINNING OF SORROWSMatthew 24:6-8 "And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars.See that you are not troubled;for all these things must come to pass,but the end is not yet.For nation will rise against nation,and kingdom against kingdom.And there will be famines,pestilences,and earthquakes in various places.All these are the beginning of sorrows"
"And they gathered them together to the place called in Hebrew,Armageddon"(Revelation 16:16)
Its been over 2000 years since the Lord Jesus Christ has prophetically spoken about His second coming and about the initial signs of the End Times.I can hear this same great question today being ask even among the ministers of God :"
Tell us,when will these things be?And what will be the sign of Your coming,and of the end of age?"(Matt 24:3).Some present apostle even emailed me saying "Its kind of ridiculous then to say that the last days has lasted 2000 years. So how is it we continue to say we are in the last days/end times. I think sometimes we have been so used to using an expression for so many years (myself included) that we don't even think why we use it anymore. After several years of very in depth study of eschatology again, if I really wanted to be honest with scripture and utilize one of the principal
hermeneutic of first century audience relevance, I had to come to different conclusions than I had preached for so many years."
In response to this email,I quoted the word of the Apostle Peter and emphasis that to the LORD,a thousand year is as one day. God in His great mercy and patience want to give all mankind a chance to repent before the coming of the Lord Jesus. 2 Peter 3:3-4,8-9 says "
Knowing this first:that scoffers will come in the LAST DAYS,walking according to their own lust,and saying,"Where is the promise of His coming?For since the fathers fell asleep,all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation"But,beloved do not forget this one thing,that with the Lord, one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day.(Verse 8-9)"The Lord is not slack concerning His promise,but is long suffering towards us,not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance"If we are to follow the calendar of God,2000 years has been only two days.God's time is timeless and eternal. To me we are living in a borrowed time and its very important to use this
opportunity to share the Gospel of Salvation that many will come into repentance and escape from the wrath of God that is about to come.However for the last 2000 years ,the world has been experiencing countless of prophetic events just as Jesus has predicted.Wars,rumors of wars,
Earthquakes,famine and pestilences have
occurred all over the globe reminding us that God permit those great
catastrophes to
warn us that just before the coming of the Lord,things will turn from bad to worse.Jesus said that these events are only the beginning of sorrow just like the first sign of birth pang of a pregnant woman. The "D-Day"of the Christ's coming is at hand,be it His imminent return to rapture His Church or the "D-Day" of His glorious appearance,His
literal second coming down to earth.
"Then the sign of the Son of Man,will appear in heaven,and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn,and they will see the Son of Man coming with clouds of heaven with power and great glory"(Matt 24:30).Jesus in this verse is pointing to His second coming,His glorious appearance where together with the His saints,will come down to earth as the Judge and King to set up His
Millennial Kingdom.
The Bible clearly mentioned that Christ's second coming will be just after the seven year Tribulation and His coming will not be without a great
resistant.As the matter of fact,the Antichrist with the host of his millions armies will gather at a place called "Armageddon"in the land of the present Israel to make a war against Christ and His armies.
"
And I saw the beast,the kings, of the earth,and their armies,gathered together to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against His army"(Rev 19:20).In this Armageddon war,the Antichrist and his false prophet will be captured and be cast alive into into hell and all his armies will be killed .(Rev 19:20-21).The Armageddon war will be the greatest world war to occur in the human history of wars.This war will be the final end of the last evil dictator,the Antichrist and will the final battleground between the forces of good and evil.
"
Armageddon"which is also
literally transliterated "
Har-
Magedon"is the Hebrew
expression of the "Mount
Meggido"that refers to the ancient fortress of
Megiddo that controlled the Valley of
Jezreel.
Armageddon is therefore came to be applied to the Valley of
Jezreel that lies in front of
Har-
Magedon, running slantingly across Israel from Haifa to the Jordan River.Great generals including
Napolean Bornaparte (A.D.1799-against Turkish "Army of Damascus") have fought in this great valley and it was claimed that this valley is the most natural battleground on earth.Looking into the war history,we will learn that over a dozen of conflict wars had
occurred there.
Many great war generals have fought there such as
Thothemes (1500 B.C.),Rameses (1350 B.C.), Sargon (722 B.C.), Sennacherib (710 B.C.), Nebuchadnezzar (606 B.C.), Ptolemy (197 B.C.),
Antiochus Epiphanes (168 B.C.), Pompeii (63 B.C.), Titus (A.D.70),
Khosru, the Persian King (A.D. 614), Omar ( 637 A.D.), the Crusades under St.Louis of
France (A.D. 909), Saladin,who conquered Richard the Lion-hearted (A.D.1187), the Ottoman forces (A.D.1616) .
(Source :Book:"The Battles of Armageddon", Eric H.Cline,2002.2003).However,the greatest
Armageddon war will be the last great battle between the the greatest evil dictator and general,the Antichrist and the greatest King and Lord,Jesus Christ.
This will be a very confusing but unique world war which I call it world war IV,because according to the scripture,the armies from the East (Most likely China and Asian armies-Rev 16:12) and the north(Most likely the reconstituted rebellious Russian armies) will also gather at this valley (Daniel 11:44) who initially into war conflict with the Antichrist but later joined with him to stage a war against the Lord Jesus Christ and His armies . This battle quickly ended as Christ will just speak a supernatural word,and all the armies are instantly destroyed
The road to the future great prophetic"Armageddon world war"was tainted with many wars,exactly like what Jesus has prophesied.Many great wars have come to pass and many more rumors of wars to come since the day when Jesus spoke over 2000 years ago.Remembering the word of Jesus again,that
"..you will hears wars and rumors of wars.See that you are not troubled;for all these things must come to pass,but the end is not yet"(Matt 24:6)
Let us examine more of these historical wars and more prophetic war to come.
For over 2000 years,many wars throughout the world have
occurred but the greatest casualties of war ever recorded in the history was the war of 1914 and 1939 which qualify to be called as "world war I" and "world war II". Both world war have recorded a total amount of approximately 85 million casualties.Therefore,I will focus my writing on such major wars that is about to happen according to the scripture.I got this information from
Wikipedia,the website Encyclopedia as follows:
WORLD WAR I (1914-1918)"World War I was a military conflict that lasted from 1914 to 1918 and involved most of the world's great powers,assembled in two opposing alliances:the Allies (centered around the Triple Entente) and the Central Powers.More than 70 million military personnel,including 60 million Europeans, were mobilized in one of the largest wars in history.More than
15 million people were killed, making it one of the deadliest conflicts in history.This war (abbreviated as WW-I, WWI, or WW1) is also known as the First World War, the Great War, the World War (prior to the outbreak of the Second World War), and the War to End All Wars.
The assassination on 28 June 1914 of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria,the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, is seen as the immediate trigger of the war,though long-term causes, such as imperialistic foreign policy,played a major role. Ferdinand's assassination at the hands of Serbian nationalist
Gavrilo Princip resulted in demands against the Kingdom of Serbia.Several alliances that had been formed over the past decades were invoked, so within weeks the major powers were at war;with all having colonies, the conflict soon spread around the world.
(SOURCE:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I)
WORLD WAR II(1939-1945)"World War II,or the Second World War(often abbreviated WWII or WW2),was a global military conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945 which involved most of the world's nations,including all great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, with more than 100 million military personnel mobilised.In a state of "total war," the major participants placed their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities at the service of the war effort, erasing the distinction between civilian and military resources. Marked by significant action against civilians, including The Holocaust and the first use of nuclear weapons in warfare, it was the deadliest conflict in human history,with over
seventy million casualties"
(SOURCE:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II)
These two world war has
occurred before I was born, but just by reading this historical fact,I just can't imagine how terrible would it have been living in those days.Since then,the only wars that I have observed was the Falkland war and the gulf war.Yet,the Bible tell us that there will be more prophetic wars to come and I will record this on my next
writing in this blog.
Maranatha!
