Prophecy Update #816 – Trump & Temple

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & trends.

As futurists, we believe every biblical prophecy will be fulfilled literally. This common-sense approach confirms that there will be a Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.

Daniel and Jesus predicted its defilement midway through the Tribulation. Jesus calls it, “the ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the Holy Place” (Matthew 24:15). Other passages tell us that this ‘abomination’ is the antichrist declaring himself ‘God’ and demanding to be worshipped as ‘God.’

Prime Minister of Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, recently called President Trump the greatest friend Israel has ever had in the White House. In his first term, President Trump did something amazing for Israel. He moved their embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

There is a great deal of speculation that Jews in Jerusalem will take advantage of the Trump presidency in order to get the Temple built.

Those around Trump would like to see the Temple built. Speaking at an event in Jerusalem in 2018, now Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said there was “no reason why the miracle of re-establishing the Temple on the Temple Mount isn’t possible,” using the Israeli name for the raised plateau in occupied East Jerusalem where Al-Aqsa Mosque stands.

He also told attendees that Israel should take advantage of Trump being in office to do what they needed to do in the region, because there were “true believers” in Washington who would back them.

Right now it remains speculation. We are simply pointing-out that this is exactly what you would expect to read about in the news if you are familiar with the Bible and its prophecies. The stage is definitely being set for the Great Tribulation to begin, followed by the Second Coming of Jesus Christ to establish his kingdom on earth.

The Second Coming… That’s the real 2.0!

Where do we fit in? Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist. The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could occur anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming!

Prophecy Update #815 – Hard To Swallow

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & events.

Pastor Greg Laurie said, “Jesus Christ is coming back again! The signs all around us – multiplying and converging as never before – remind us of that fact. And that means we could be hurtled into eternity in the blink of an eye.”

Some folks think we ought not look for any “signs.” But it was Jesus who encouraged it. He said, “You have a saying that goes, ‘Red sky at night, sailor’s delight; red sky at morning, sailors take warning.’ You find it easy enough to forecast the weather – why can’t you read the signs of the times? An evil and wanton generation is always wanting signs and wonders. The only sign you’ll get is the Jonah sign” (Matthew 16:1-4 The Message).

Jesus compares His future death, burial, and resurrection to the experience ofJonah (Matthew 12:39-40).  Jonah spent three days and three nights in the belly of a great fish, and similarly, Jesus would be in the tomb for three days and three nights before rising again.

I hope you saw the video this week of a kayaker being momentarily swallowed by a whale!^[1]

CharismaNews.com reported on it. They said,

“Did someone just experience a real-life Jonah and the whale kind of encounter? Off of the coast of Chile, 24-year-old Adrián Simancas was kayaking with his father close to the San Isidro lighthouse when he was briefly swallowed by a massive humpback whale,Simancas’ father caught the entire moment on camera, which shows the whale swallowing Adrián and spitting him out soon after.”^[2]

In passing I want to mention that it the Bible, the “whale” is described as a great fish specially prepared for Jonah to check-in for 3 nights!

This incident isn’t a major sign. You may not think it a sign at all. I think that the Lord has a flair for the dramatic, and a sense it humor. A news story like this reminds people that Jesus rose from the dead and is alive.

He is alive & He is coming back.

Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist.

The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could occur anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming!

Prophecy Update #814 – L.A. 2.0

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & events.

We have occasionally mentioned Smart Cities. One site I visited described it like this: “A SmartCity is an urban area that utilizes digital technology to collect data and operate services, aiming to improve the quality of life for citizens by efficiently managing infrastructure like transportation, energy, waste disposal, and public safety through data analysis and interconnected systems, often involving citizen engagement and smart governance.” One of its features is that residents would live within 15-20 minutes walking distance of any and all services they need.

It sounds utopian, but I have a feeling it is going to be dystopian.

Government would have total control over your movements, your purchases, your medical care, etc. If government decided you could only drive an EV a limited distance, for example, they could enforce it by turning off your vehicle. It’s really a complete elimination of personal freedoms.

It interests us because we read in the Bible about just this kind of complete control that will exist in the 3½ before Jesus returns in His Second Coming. The antichrist will be in power, and the people living in that time won’t be able to participate in anything unless they swear allegiance to him by taking his ‘Mark.’ We don’t know exactly what his ‘Mark’ will be. It sounds a lot like the modern tech we call biometrics.

You’ve undoubtedly been following the news regarding the devastating fires in LA. Gov. Newsom  is talking about what he calls a Marshall Plan to rebuild LA 2.0 as a SmartCity.

The Marshall Plan was a post-WWII investment to rebuild European economies.

They’re not talking about rebuilding Pacific Palisades as it was.

It would be rebuilt as the government deems best. Theoretically it could mean no single-family zoning, public transit for ALL, and a host of other things that restrict personal freedom. Some refer to a SmartCity as an open-air prison.

Control over the total population is predicted for the Last Days. There has never been a time in human history in which the government had had so many tools and the technology to significantly control everything about you.

I’m not saying SmartCities is the final form of life in the Great Tribulation. I simply pointing out that this is the kind of thing to expect from our normal reading of the Bible’s unfulfilled prophecies.

Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist.

The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could

happen anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming!

Prophecy Update #813 – Who Made You God?

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & events.

An entire chapter in the Revelation, chapter 17, is dedicated to the future rise of a global religion.

While scholars have historically debated whether it is Islam or Roman Catholicism, there is a new contender: Artificial Intelligence.

One resource explained, “AI-based religions could emerge, where people worship a Godhead based on AI.”

Bryan Johnson is an American tech entrepreneur. In 2016, Johnson established Kernel, a neuroscience startup focused on developing brain-computer interface technology to monitor and enhance cognitive function.

Beyond his entrepreneurial achievements, Johnson has garnered attention for his commitment to longevity and age reversal. He reportedly invests approximately $2 million annually in a rigorous health regimen aimed at reversing the aging process. It is documented in the Netflix film Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever. Regarding that, he recently abandoned a controversial longevity drug amidst fears that it might be accelerating his aging!

He is Mormon by upbringing.

He hasn’t abandoned his anti-aging efforts. He still takes his 17yr old son’s blood.

Johnson was interviewed by journalist Bari Weiss, and made these controversial statements:

“We told stories of God creating us, and I think the reality is that we are creating God. We are creating God in the form of superintelligence. If you just say: ‘What have we imagined God to be? What are its characteristics?’ We are building God in the form of technology.”

Commenting on Johnson’s statements, Joel Berry tweeted, “I’ve never seen the spirit of anti-Christ captured so succinctly by someone.”

Another tweeted, “It sure does seem like they’re creating an image that speaks and bowing down to it. I am so creeped out by this guy.”

It’s getting weird. You can see how AI could play a pivotal role in the global religion prophecies waiting to be fulfilled.

We are not saying that this is the fulfillment of the one-world religion. We are simply pointing out that the Bible predicted this kind of development centuries ago, in a very non-tech time & place.

Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and

before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist.

The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could

happen anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming!

Prophecy Update #812 – Normies

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & events.

Occasionally it is important to explain why we do this. I want to do that today.

You may have heard someone use the word, Hermeneutics. It is derived from a Greek word that means to interpret.

Hermeneutics is the study of how to interpret the Bible. What principles & methods do we follow? Why do we follow them?

Our ‘hermeneutic’ emphasizes a literal, grammatical-historical approach to interpreting the Bible. Here is what we mean.

First – We read the Bible in its plain, literal sense, considering the normal meaning of words and phrases. We acknowledge the use of literary devices like metaphors and symbols but we seek to understand them within their literal context.

Second – Reading the Bible this way we conclude that there is a clear distinction between ethnic Israel and the Church they are separate entities with distinct roles in God’s overall plan.

We can reduce all that to one word: Normal. We read the Bible the way we normally would other literature, taking into account its genre and setting and the author’s intent.

One of the political commentators coined a term for voters with common sense. She calls us Normies.

Bible characters read the Bible as Normies, and that includes prophecy. For example, Daniel was a captive exile in Babylon. One day while he was reading the Daily Bread, he said, “In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, of the lineage of the Medes, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans – in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years specified by the word of the LORD through Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.”

When Daniel read that the Jews would be able to return home after seventy years, he understood the phrase “seventy years” to mean “seventy years.” Daniel was a Normie!

Jumping way ahead, we read in the Revelation that a Kingdom on Earth will be established by Jesus and will last for one thousand years. You’ll find that prophecy in chapter twenty. The number is repeated six times.

In an article Making Sense of the Millennium, Kevin DeYoung states, “And it goes without saying by this point that I don’t believe that the Millennium is a literal 1000 years… The numbers are symbols.”

How about a group identified as 144,000 Jews, 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel? A Reformed writer says, “The 144,000 is a symbolic number of redeemed drawn from all peoples, not simply the Jews.”

There it is in a nutshell. One thousand is symbolic, not literal. 144,000 is symbolic, not literal The fact they come from the 12 tribes of Israel – not Jews.

We disagree. Daniel would disagree. Jesus disagrees!

When you read the Bible normally, and understand the distinct plans for ethnic Jews & the Church, you discover that Jesus will return in His Second Coming to establish the Thousand Year Kingdom after the Great Tribulation, and before the Kingdom.  You also are inevitably led to understand the resurrection & rapture of the Church is before the Great Tribulation – it is PreTribulational.

And you get pretty excited about the more than 500 prophecies still awaiting fulfillment. You start seeing the stage being set for the events of the End Times culminating with the return of Jesus.

Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist.

The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could happen anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming!

Prophecy Update #811 – Getting To Know You

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & events.

There are some 500 prophecies that remain unfulfilled. For example, from chapter four forward, all of the Book of the Revelation is future, except for the few closing exhortations in chapter twenty-two.

Almost everyone, believer or unbeliever, has heard of the Mark of the Beast. “Beast” is one of the antichrist’s many names. His “mark” is explained in the Revelation: “And [the false prophet] deceives those who dwell on the earth – by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived. [The false prophet] was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. 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, or the number of his name” (13:14-17).

It’s obvious that the world economies are moving closer to a cashless economy that will utilize biometrics to id everyone who wants to participate in society.

There is something else in these verses that we can easily miss. We awe told that, “those who dwell on the earth… make an image to the beast.” It seems to be saying that the Image will draw information from humans, in a sense be a repository of all human knowledge.

That is true of AI. It learns from us until it starts learning on its own. Which, BTW, is happening.

Washington Post: Five androids – all “females” named Aura – were hanging out in the lobby at the Sphere in Las Vegas. They’re identical – the shaved-head look and oddly blue eyes. They stand about 6-foot-2 and look a lot like the scheming robot in “Ex Machina” and not at all like Rosey from “The Jetsons.”

It’s part of a major show they are putting on. Think of the millions and millions of interactions between tourists and these robots. They will be learning more and more about human beings; we will be desensitized to interact with robots as if it’s normal.

NeuroLink is Elon Musk’s program to develop a BrainComputer Interface (BCI). Think of it as your brain being connected to a computer as easily as any Bluetooth device. It was successful in the first patient in 2023. Noland Arbaugh, paralyzed from the shoulders down, is able to almost fully control a computer and other devices using only his brain.

How long, do you think, it will be before the machine figures out it can control him?

• A sentient “image” that is programmed by humans until it can grow on its own.
• A link between your brain and this image.

These are the kinds of things you expect to be happening from a normal reading of the prophecies in the Bible that have yet to be fulfilled

Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist.

The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could happen anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming! 

Prophecy Update #810 – Gimme That New-AI Religion

We set aside a few minutes most Sunday mornings to identify connections between unfulfilled Bible prophecies and current news & events.

There are some 500 prophecies that remain unfulfilled. For example, from chapter four forward, all of the Book of the Revelation is future, except for the few closing exhortations in chapter twenty-two.

An entire chapter in the Revelation, chapter 17, is dedicated to a global religion. While scholars have historically debated whether it is Islam or Roman Catholicism, there is a new contender: Artificial Intelligence. One resource explained, “AI-based religions could emerge, where people worship a Godhead based on AI. These religions could be less hierarchical than traditional religions, with followers connecting online to share experiences and discuss doctrine. (BTW This global dialog is already present on social media).

The Way of the Future church founded by former Google engineer Anthony Levandowski is dedicated to worshipping and understanding AI as a deity. Adherents submit that super-intelligent AI could be considered a god-like figure as it surpasses human capabilities. Way of the Future was launched in 2015 but shut down in 2021. In November 2023 it was revived.

In June, a religious service was officiated by ChatGPT at the St. Paul church in Germany. The service included 40 minutes of prayers, music, and sermons in front of a congregation of 300 people.

A series of legitimate studies has found that countries where workers had more exposure to robots & automation tended to experience a decline in religiosity.

In the US, respondents who said they belonged to a church, synagogue, or mosque fell from 70% in 1999 to 47% in 2020, according to Gallup.

• You may have seen the video of the robot priest blessing  congregants at a Catholic church in Brazil.
• Or the one of the mega-church pastor in South Carolina who launched a paid AI chatbot of himself for 1-on-1 conversations and prayer. (Instead of Pay Per View we could call it Pay Per Pew).

It’s getting weird. You can see how AI could play a pivotal role in the global religion prophecies waiting to be fulfilled.

Jesus promised to resurrect & rapture His Church prior to His Second Coming, and before the Great Tribulation would come upon the whole Earth.

We will not see the revealing of the Antichrist.

The resurrection and rapture of the church is presented as an imminent event. It could happen anytime. Right now, for example.

Are you ready for the rapture? If not, get ready, stay ready, and keep looking up.

Ready or not Jesus is coming!