Join us on a journey through the scriptures to unlock the secrets of Pentecost, also known as the Feast of Firstfruits. This episode uncovers the prophetic dimensions of this ancient holy day, highlighting its significance from the days of the Temple to its fulfillment in the early church. Analyze the visions shared by Peter and Joel and their vital messages for Christians today, all set against the backdrop of a fascinating historical and theological narrative.
SPEAKER 01 :
Today is the seventh Sabbath of the Pentecost cycle. In Leviticus 23, in verse 15, it says, You shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day you brought the sheaf of the wave offering, seven Sabbaths shall be complete. Even to the morrow after the seventh Sabbath shall you number fifty days and offer a new meal offering to the Lord. This is an interesting little passage, and it’s something that is occupied… the technicians, as it were, of the church for many years. The question about Pentecost, when Pentecost should be observed, the meaning behind Pentecost, the meaning of the days leading up to Pentecost. But it’s really an interesting little passage, and it’s not that difficult to understand. The holy days in Israel were, as all of us by now understand, prophetic. They look forward, they picture God’s plan, they actually carry out in a little image, as it were, on the stage of the temple. an annual cycle that showed forth God’s plan and what God was doing, a plan which some people understood better, some people understood less, but I don’t think anyone in Old Testament times understood all that well. The fact is that the Holy Days have more meaning, I think, for Christians than they ever had for Israel of old, and it’s important to us to understand. But in the scheme of things, the Israelite festivals were all organized around the harvest season. And the idea was that this spring harvest that began during the days of unleavened bread, you were not supposed to eat any of that until after you had offered the first little first fruits of it to God. That was the wave sheaf, a little basket full of grain that was taken from a sheaf that was harvested, that was taken into the temple and presented before God. And after that, you could then eat the harvest and begin to do the harvest. And it ushered in a straight seven weeks of work. As the instructions come, there would be seven weeks complete. You’d work six days, rest the seventh, work six days, and rest the seventh. It was a harvest time. And by the time you come to what we call Pentecost, which is probably better called the Feast of Firstfruits, you have reached the completion of the Firstfruits harvest. The whole thing is all in, and you come before God to thank God for the harvest just passed. And so the festival, tomorrow’s festival of Pentecost, or the Feast of Firstfruits, is We tend to forget a little bit where it comes from because we have gotten divorced from our roots of the land. But nevertheless, it was a festival of thanksgiving for a harvest past. And it was called the Feast of the Firstfruits. The period of time… of these seven weeks of harvest. And I’ve gone over the aspects of this from the New Testament in so many different sermons in the past, I’ll just have to refer you back to some of those. If you’re listening to this on tape later, you’ll be able to check with the tape department and they’ll send you something along that’ll fill you in on these things. But the Feast of Firstfruits, that is the seven weeks leading up to the Feast of Firstfruits, actually represent the work of the Messiah from the time he was accepted to God as the first of the Firstfruits. until his return and his institution really of his kingdom and the beginning of the kingdom of God. So that we understand then the seven weeks leading up to today were a time of work. And since they were a time of work, they had to be punctuated by periods of rest. And so there were the seven Sabbaths that lead up to Pentecost. And they represent in the prophetic scheme of things the fact that there would be a long period of time in which Christ would work gathering in his firstfruits, and then that that would culminate in the feast of firstfruits or the return of Christ. Now, if you’ll turn back to the book of Acts, we can perhaps understand then from this perspective the importance of the festival and how it played out and why Peter said some of the things that he said. In years gone by, we were sort of locked into a certain way of looking at these festivals. The time sequence of them had us a little bit buffaloed in the sense that we thought that the Passover, of course, represented Christ’s sacrifice and the Days of Unleavened Bread putting sin out of our lives. And then came Pentecost, which represented receiving the Holy Spirit. And it’s, you know, that’s a logical presumption considering what happened on the Feast of Pentecost. Then the Feast of Trumpets, the Return of Christ, the Day of Atonement, the Binding of Satan, and then finally the Feast of Tabernacles. But what is oftentimes, I think, almost entirely overlooked in the past was the prophetic significance of Pentecost and what it really looked forward to. Not merely what it had looked back upon, the receiving of the Holy Spirit, but what it looked forward to. Now, in this second chapter of Acts, we’re told when the day of Pentecost was fully come, the 50th day had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven like a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them distributed tongues like fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other languages as the Spirit gave them utterance. Now, there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men out of every nation under heaven. So when it was noised abroad, well, all these men come rolling into the temple to find out what’s happened down here. There’s been a rather spectacular display, and all of a sudden, a group of rather ignorant men are beginning to speak in foreign languages, and we are beginning to understand them in the languages wherein we were born. Unlearned men who had never heard a thing. It’d be like, you know, a group of us, who all we speak is English, finding ourselves in a multilingual society where there are all sorts of people there, and suddenly one of us is speaking German, another is speaking French, another is speaking one of the dialects of India, or whatever language it was where people had come from to be with us. And to be able to speak fluently in those languages the wonderful works of God and be understood by people who were there. It was a remarkable occurrence, to say the least. What happened on this day is not that difficult to understand. The work, the 2,000-year work, which we can look back and understand was a 2,000-year or more work, because these gentlemen, they didn’t know how long they had. But the work, the 2,000-year work, was beginning, and they were being empowered to do the work. It was necessary, since they… would not have or not be going out into a world that was as multilingual as ours, or with the capacity for electronic dissemination of the gospel as ours, they were going to have to go places and speak to people in their own languages. And so these men were empowered to go out and do that job. Now, everybody who came and watched this and saw the spectacle, it was unusual enough in appearance, to say the least, that they said, well, what’s going on? Are these guys drunk? Well, Peter stood up with the eleven and lifted up his voice and said to them, Men of Judea, and all you that dwell at Jerusalem, be this known to you and listen to my words. These are not drunken, as you suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day. But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. Now, what is fascinating about this is that Peter understands fully what he is saying. I mean, Peter, there’s been much made over the years that the apostles said, really understood or relieved, I should say, that Christ would come back in their lifetime. They did not believe they had 2,000 years of work to look forward to. In fact, I think it would have been very defeating to them had they imagined that they had 2,000 years ahead of them. They had no idea. They had heard Jesus say, no man knows the day or the hour, and so they did not know the day or the hour. But they had the instructions also from Christ that they were to be ready all the time, and they were to be pursuing it all the time. And there are little hints in their work that they really anticipated that it would take place within their own generation. They had reason to feel that way about it. And so Peter, understanding the implication of this, speaks of the culmination of the Feast of Pentecost, not the inception of the Feast of Pentecost. In other words, Pentecost originally was a simple agricultural festival, a harvest festival of thanksgiving to God for what had been given. In its prophetic sense, though, it meant much more than that. In its immediate sense for the church, it meant being empowered to do the work, receiving the Holy Spirit, but not merely receiving the Holy Spirit, being empowered by the Holy Spirit to actually preach in whatever language is necessary. And, of course, that power also included the power to heal, the power to cast out demons, and the general other things that were the work of the ministry. But Peter fully understood that there was a prophetic element of Pentecost that looked well ahead into the future. And it was much more than the simple agricultural festival and much more than merely the receiving of the Holy Spirit, much more than a display of spiritual gifts for whatever reason. The idea that we should all speak in tongues perhaps and dance around here under the Spirit would be an interesting display and everyone might enjoy it and feel uplifted by it. But that’s not what Pentecost was about, as Peter well understood. His response to it and him telling them that the fulfillment of it comes straight out of the prophet Joel is significant. This is what was said by the prophet Joel. It shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. And on my servants and my handmaids I will pour out in those days of my Spirit, and they will prophesy. What is fascinating is that there’s not one word there to suggest that they would speak in tongues. How then is this a fulfillment of this? The point is that the tongues were not what was important. They were prophesying in other languages. It was fulfilled not in the tongues. The tongues were merely a means to an end. The end was the prophecy that they were making and the prophesying that they were doing. Peter went on, I will show wonders in heaven above, signs in the earth beneath, blood and fire, vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness and the moon into blood before that great and notable day of the Lord come. And it shall come to pass that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. So here is what Peter understood to be coming down in this. He understood that the ultimate fulfillment was Joel’s prophecy. And that what was taking place on this particular day he saw as an introduction to or a stepping into, or a type of, what was ultimately going to be fulfilled on Pentecost, which was a leading up to and culminating in the day of the Lord. Now, Pentecost is the terminus, the end, of a seven-week work period. In type, it’s the terminus of this age. the terminus of the work of this age, the terminus of the time in which the Messiah would be calling out the firstfruits, and it brings us into the day of the Lord. Now, I want you to compare this with what Joel and Peter had to say, with what we find in Revelation, the sixth chapter. Now, Revelation, the sixth chapter, is interesting. Of course, all of Revelation is interesting. It’s been a source of great fascination to people down through generations. This is the time where John has seen one come out, the Lamb, who has this scroll with seven seals. And at first he was very disturbed, wondering who could open them, who could possibly let them see what was inside. And, of course, the Lamb was found worthy to open the seals and reveal what was going to take place. In chapter 6 it says, I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were, the voice of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see. Other than follows the visions of the opening of the first four seals and the four horsemen of the apocalypse, the fifth seal, which was a time of persecution and look, you know, it’s a thing that has happened to the church in the first century in which they were going to experience in spades in the next few years. And of course, would also culminate in what would happen to the church at the end time. When it becomes interesting for us today is in this verse 12. I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal. And there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black like sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood, and the stars of heaven fell to the earth like a fig tree casts her untimely figs when she’s shaken of a mighty wind. I’ve heard that. You can be around and the wind blows through and all of a sudden you’re plop, plop, plop, plop, plop as things come off the tree onto the ground. It’s hard to imagine. Stars, and of course I’m sure in a sense it means meteors, falling to the earth like a fig tree having shaken itself and figs falling all over the ground around you. And the heaven departed like a scroll when it’s rolled together, and every mountain and island were moved out of their place. And the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bondman and every free man hid themselves in the dens and the rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, hide us from the face of him that sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb, because the great day of his wrath is come, and who shall be able to stand? This is basically the time that Joel was talking about in his prophecy. And it’s the time that since Peter decided to quote Joel, that what was happening on the day of Pentecost, this is that spoken by the prophet Joel. The sun’s going to be darkened, the moon turned into blood, there’s going to be earthquakes and stars falling out of the heavens. It’s going to be quite an exciting time to be anywhere on the face of the earth. Then comes chapter 8, where the seventh seal is opened. When he had opened the seventh seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour, and then he saw seven angels handed seven trumpets. Now, just to pause and think about what we’re looking at in a moment, I’m not going to take the time today to go through all the seals, trumpets, and the things of Revelation, because that’s not the point. Pentecost, and really the seventh Sabbath leading up to Pentecost, is the point of what I want to talk about today. But in the pattern that we see developing, looking at the sequence of the holy days during the year and their prophetic sequence, naturally the Passover is a time of our having sin put out of our lives by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And the Passover and the seven days of the Passover festival, which we call the Days of Unleavened Bread, have their role in the redemption of Christ. The next step down the road after we, well, first of all comes the wave sheep offering, that is the acceptance of Christ before the Father, and then the beginning of seven weeks of work. So there’s a long period of time in which work is done. The work is a harvest. The work is a harvest of people. It’s a harvest of the first fruits to God and the Lamb, of the people who are being baptized, who are receiving God’s Spirit, who are going to live out their lives and, of course, ultimately be in the first resurrection when they are finally harvested and presented before God. So this period of time follows down then to Pentecost, which if we’re to take the verbiage used by Peter and by Joel and compare it with Revelation, we conclude then that Pentecost seems to be associated with the sixth seal. Then it does make sense because the very next holy day is the Feast of Trumpets, which is associated with the seventh seal. So, work your way through that little prophetic cycle, and you see the sort of thing that begins to happen. Now, if you’ll page back the Old Testament again to Amos, Amos the 8th chapter. Here in Amos 8, there’s a fascinating little passage that many of us have pondered, looked at, thought about. Amos the 8th chapter, and beginning in verse 9. In that day it shall come to pass, saith the Lord, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I’ll darken the earth in the clear day. Once again, the same sort of pattern that Peter described relative to the fulfillment of Pentecost, that Joel described as the day of the Lord, and that Revelation 6 and the sixth seal describes the day of the Lord. I will turn your feasts into mourning and all your songs into lamentation. And I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins and baldness upon every head. And I will make it as the mourning of an only, the mourning, that is the wearing of black for an only son. That’s the death of an only son. And the end thereof is a bitter day. Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land. Not a famine of bread and not a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north to the east. They shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, and they shall not find it. Now, for all the years that I have been in the church, every once in a while this will come up in someone’s sermon on prophecy. That as we get down toward the time of the end, in the latter days, somehow in connection with the day of the Lord, there is going to come a time when people are still here doing whatever people do. And they’re going to be looking for the word of God. And they will go from coast to coast and from north to south and from place to place looking for some word from God and will not be able to find it. There will be a famine of hearing the word of God. And I have always wondered when I read that, where am I? Where am I? Where are you? Where is the church of If there is to be a famine of hearing of the word of God on this earth, I mean those of us who have been called of God, who are commissioned of God, who believe in God, who understand Christ’s word, have an imperative. That imperative is, go into all the world, you know, and to make disciples of all nations, baptize them, teach them to observe all things which I have commanded you. That is, as long as we have breath and strength and power and whatever it takes to do it, there is an imperative upon those of us who call ourselves by the name of Christ to evangelize, to reach out to people. And yet we are told there will come a time when that will not be done. I thought about that when I realized that right at the end of the sixth seal, and when I write the time the seventh seal is to be broken, that there is silence in heaven for the space of half an hour. And I I have often read that. People toss around their jokes about it. And what’s going on? Why is there silence for the space of half an hour? Does God have nothing to say? Do the angels have nothing to say? Do the 24 elders have nothing to say? Is there just total silence all over heaven for half an hour? Or is God silent to man? for the space of about half an hour. Understanding, if you do as we do, that the book of Revelation is all in symbol, and that when we’re talking about an hour or a day or a year, that we may be talking about some indeterminate time, short time, small time, long time, not necessarily that 144,000 does not speak to us mathematically from the book of Revelation. Nor does 1260 days. Nor do many of these things that we read. People take them and try to approach them with calendars and math and calculators. They are not intended really to speak to us mathematically. And nor is this half hour silence in heaven supposed to speak to us on your wristwatch. There is going to come a period of time when there is going to be absolute silence in heaven and from heaven. Amos calls a time a famine of hearing of the Word of God, that there is simply nothing being heard by man. You know, there have been times in the history of man when God has been absolutely silent. We don’t know of all of them, I am sure, although there are times right now when one almost wonders, well, where and how is God speaking to man even now? But there was a time, for example… After Samuel had been given to serve in the tabernacle, his mother had been bitter because of not having had any children and had gone up to pray. And she’d made a promise that if God would give her a son, she would give him to God for all of his life. So God gave her a son, and she did her work, kept as good as her word. When the son was weaned, she brought him back and gave him to God. And the priests took this baby, which must have seemed strange, I suppose, this child, I should say, and raised this child. And finally, as Samuel began to come of age, it tells us in 1 Samuel 3 and verse 1, I won’t bother turning to it, it said that there was no frequent vision from God in those days. God was essentially silent. Samuel was in his bed one night. It tells us, ere the light had gone out in the temple, and whether it meant that that light, which is never supposed to go out, was about to go out, symbolizing maybe even the light of God’s word going out among these people, I don’t know. What is interesting about it is that for a long time, there had been no open vision, no frequent word, nobody had been hearing a thing from God. Up until the moment of Samuel, God had, for a time, been silent to these people. And then comes a voice out of the dark, Samuel. And Samuel, not being habituated, nor was anybody else habituated for that matter, to assume that voice was from God because he hadn’t been speaking, went to Eli and said, Did you call me? I didn’t call you. Go back and lie down. The story goes on from there, and of course Samuel becomes a great judge and a great prophet of God, and God speaks to him and through him to Israel for many, many years to follow. Jesus came. at the end of a long period when God had been silent to man. In Matthew, the fourth chapter, I hope I have my right reference on this. Matthew, the fourth chapter, and I’ll begin reading in verse 13, if I’m in the right place, and I am. Leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is on the sea coast and the borders of Zebulun and Naphtalim. that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali by the way of the sea beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light. And to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up. From that time, Jesus began to preach and to say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. There was a long time in which God did not talk, did not speak, did not talk to these people. carried no message. And then finally, at the end of a long period of darkness, Jesus came on the scene and began to preach, saying, Repent, the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And so he went through his period of time, or his ministry, and then came his death, his sacrifice for us. Then came the Feast of Pentecost. Then entered on a long period of time of the work of the church, that is the work of Christ through the church, of reaching out to the world, of taking the gospel into the four corners of the world, of Paul going to Europe, of preaching all over the place. I wonder, over the years that have followed since that time, how many times have there been when the church, for one reason or another, went quiet? When there was no real work being done? When God was not moving in the hearts of men to go out and preach? That when perhaps persecution had driven the church underground in which they would not be able to preach, would not be able to do anything. Because there were such times. God used persecution in some cases to scatter the church. In other cases, he used persecution to silence the church. Yeah, to silence the church. Now we’re given the suggestion that perhaps somewhere, all the way down at the very end time, the church will be silenced again. You want to turn back with me to Joel? Because there is an interesting thing to understand out of this prophecy, or it’s worth looking at. Since Peter quoted it the way that he did, telling us this is that which is spoken by the prophet Joel, connecting it to the Feast of Pentecost. I’m going to begin reading in Joel, the second chapter, verse 1. Blow the trumpet in Zion. Now, you’re almost immediately tempted to connect this to the Feast of Trumpets, but a trumpet is simply an alarm of war. It’s an alarm. They were blown in Israel at more times than during the festivals. Blow the trumpet in Zion. Sound an alarm in my holy mountain. Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord comes. It is near at hand. It’s a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, like the morning spread upon the mountains. A great people and strong. There has never been the like before it. There won’t be any other after it for years of many generations. A fire devours before them. Behind them a flame burns, and the land is like the Garden of Eden before them. And behind them it is a desolate wilderness. He talks about these people as a great army sent by God to carry out a punishment upon a people. They’ll run to and fro on the wall, in the city, it says, verse 9. They’ll run upon the wall, climb into the houses, enter into the windows like a thief. The earth will quake before them. The heavens will tremble. The sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. We’ve moved right in again to what Peter talked about when he said, this is that spoken by the prophet Joel. And the Lord shall utter his voice before his great army. His camp is very great, for he is strong that executes his word. For the day of the Lord is great and very terrible. Who can abide it? Therefore turn to me, saith the Lord, with all your heart and with fasting and with weeping and mourning. Rend your heart and not your garments and turn to the Lord your God. For he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and of great kindness, and repents him of the evil. God has no interest whatsoever in seeing a people come to this pass. God has no desire to see it come to that. And you know, the role of the prophet, as we find him again and again and again throughout the pages of the Bible, is not simply to foretell the future. It is to give meaning to the future. It is to tell people what’s going to happen, but not merely what, why it’s going to happen. And the reason they are told why is to give them some slack. Not slack to keep doing what they’re doing, but slack to turn their life around. To turn to God with weeping. To rend their hearts and not their garments. To find some way of beginning to change their life. The whole point of prophecies is not just to satisfy our curiosity about what’s going to happen next month, next week, next year, or to give us the number of days so we can count them off from the time this heavenly sign takes place to the time that heavenly sign takes place. It’s so that we will know that God’s hand is in history. So that we will know that God’s word is true. So that we will have time to change our lives. times to set our feet in the path of rightness and to live a different way. This is the reason why these prophecies are given to us. You know, as I thought about the fact that this is the seventh Sabbath, and as I thought about the connection between Pentecost and the day of the Lord, it seemed timely in a way to think about this day in the sense that perhaps this day, the seventh Sabbath, may well represent the very last day Silence before the return of Christ. The last rest that is given to his people, the last time that God closes things down so that the next moment that he speaks is the day of the Lord. It was very sobering to me to think about this last night and this morning as I was pondering what I would talk about today and pondering the significance of these seven weeks or seven Sabbaths leading up to this day and to realize that That what lies ahead of us and what we have long preached, that is the kingdom of God, you cannot get from here to there. That is from where you and I are today, sitting here on beautiful Lake Palestine, looking out at a sunshiny day with a calm lake outside, with summer ahead of us and all the summer’s activities, with our jobs to go back to the first of the week, with this world that you and I live in right now. Then there is the world of the kingdom of God with Christ being here and ruling the nations and bringing peace on earth. There is no way to get from here to there without passing through the day of the Lord. With all that it means. With all that it’s going to entail. With all of the catastrophe. With all of the fright. With all of the fear. To the place to where I… You know, men’s hearts just… It tells us failing them. They just quit. because of what they’re actually seeing with their eyes and hearing with their ears. And the ones who still are there and their hearts are surviving are calling upon rocks and mountains to fall on them, to hide them from the face of the Lamb. And not some awesome, fearsome demon, but from the face of the Lamb, because of who they are, of what they are, of what they have done with their life. You just can’t get from here to there without passing through the day of the Lord with all that that means. And also, you cannot pass from here to there without going through a time of a famine of hearing the Word of God. I wonder where we are. You know, you think back that every generation of the church… I feel quite safe in saying, have believed that they are living in the last days. The first century, they believed it. The second century, I’m sure they believed it. The third, fourth, fifth, I bet you could have found a preacher in any century of man who was proclaiming that Jesus Christ will return to this earth in our lifetime. That the world will come to an end in our lifetime. But of course, there was a work to be done. But they did not know how long that work would go on. They did not know how long they personally would be able to do it. They did not know how long their own life would last. They had no idea whether Christ would come within their lifetime or within their son’s lifetime or how long it might be. I can imagine how discouraging, how profoundly discouraging it would be to think that we had another 500 years to go. I, in one sense, I suppose many people would be relieved that, oh boy, it’s not going to come in my lifetime. I’m just as happy as I can be that I don’t have to face or go through those things. And I can understand that perspective, that frame of mind. And yet one wonders, doesn’t one, where are we? And what are we? And what are we supposed to do? The fact is that there is, it seems, a schedule. There is a clock that is running. When people asked Jesus about this thing, Jesus said, no man knows of the day or the hour. In fact, no one has any idea of it but my Father only. One of the first things that cult leaders want to do is deny that scripture. They believe that they have come to the place where they know. I don’t know whether Jesus will come in my lifetime or not. I would say that those people who think that he will not, well, you have his word that says I’m going to come in a time when you think not. So I’m always afraid to have an opinion on the subject one way or the other. And I think that’s probably just as well. But one thing I do know, that we have been at this thing for quite a long time now. We have been preaching this word for a long time. I don’t mean in my lifetime or Herbert Armstrong’s lifetime or Andrew Duggar’s lifetime or whatever preacher you may want to follow the line back through down through all these generations. But there have, after all, there has been a long time. And there have been sort of Sabbaths in which not much was being done by anybody, by any church in preaching the word. There have been times when everything was shut down by persecution. And so it is that Those weeks have been passing. How many of them, one wonders, have actually gone by? In Luke, the 21st chapter, Jesus says some interesting things in this regard. In Luke 21 and verse 5, as some spoke of the temple, how it was adorned with goodly stones and gifts, he said, As for these things you behold, the days will come in which there shall not be left one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down. And they ask him, saying, Master, but when shall these things be, and what sign will there be when these things will come to pass? He said, Take heed that you be not deceived, for many shall come in my name, saying that I am Christ, and the time draws near. Go ye not after them, but when you shall hear of wars and commotions, be not terrified, for these things must first come to pass, but the end is not by and by. You know, this is a funny thing. I grew up believing that one of the signs of the end was earthquakes in various places and wars and rumors of wars. Did you ever hear that sometime in the past? Jesus said, you’re going to hear about that, but the end is not yet. And in fact, there has never been a generation of man when there haven’t been earthquakes. And there has never been a time in man when there haven’t been wars and rumors of wars. Then he said to them, nation shall arise against nation, kingdom against kingdoms, great earthquakes in various places, famines, pestilences, fearful sights, great signs shall there be from heaven. But before all these, they’ll lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you to the synagogues and into prisons, being brought before kings and rulers for my sake. And it shall turn to you for a testimony. So persecution will come even before a lot of the earthquakes and wars that are going to be coming. Settle it, therefore, in your hearts not to meditate before what you shall answer. Now, there are some rather useful things for those of us who are going to live out our lives under the shadow of the time of the end because the suspicion, the signs are there, the things that can happen are there, and the constant thought is there. One of us generations who look for Christ in our lifetime will be right. How do you live it? First of all, he says, don’t meditate in your heart what you’re going to answer. Don’t worry about that. If you’re arrested, persecuted, put in a slammer because of what you’re doing for me, I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to gainsay or to resist. And you shall be betrayed both by parents, brethren, kinsfolk, and friends. And some of you they will cause to be put to death. And you shall be hated of all men for my name’s sake. but there shall not a hair of your head perish. My goodness, isn’t that interesting? All these terrible things are going to happen, but there will not a hair of your head perish? Well, folks, I was under the impression that a lot of people died for the faith down through the years. I sort of was given the understanding that some of them were strapped up against a stake with wood underneath them, and it was set on fire, and they were burned to ashes. Hair and all. I sort of thought that happened. What’s he talking about? One of two things. One of them is that he may be talking about the fact that even though you go through all these things, you will not perish. That is in the sense of being utterly and completely and finally lost. On the other hand, he may be talking about a category of people who at the very end time will be persecuted, drawn up before governors and kings for his namesake, and who will be given what to say at that time, and not a hair of their head will perish. In other words, end time witnesses who are called for the purpose of going through some of these things. In your patience, possess you your souls. When you shall see Jerusalem encompassed about with armies, then you know that the desolation of it is close. Then let them which are in Judea flee into the mountains. And we have talked so much over the years about fleeing, you know, from Pennsylvania or fleeing from Pittsburgh or fleeing from Houston. It says when those who are in Judea flee into the mountains. Let them that are in the midst depart out of it, and don’t let them that are in the countries enter in. It has to do with what’s about to happen in Jerusalem. For these be the days of vengeance, that all things that are written may be fulfilled. All those prophecies in the Old Testament about what was going to happen to Jerusalem are going to come to pass at Jerusalem. And if you’re in that area, well, it would be well not to be in that area when these things start. Woe unto them that are with child, and them that give suck in those days, for there shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon this people. They’ll fall by the edge of the sword, they’ll be led away captive to all nations, and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. And there shall be signs in the sun, the moon, the stars upon the earth, distress of nations and perplexity, the sea and waves rolling, men’s hearts failing them for fear, and looking after those things which are coming upon the earth, for the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. That’s what Pentecost is about. In the prophetic sense, this is what Peter said Pentecost was looking forward to, this day. Then shall they see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. When these things begin to come to pass, look up, lift up your heads, your redemption draws near. I don’t know how to feel about it, to live through this time, realizing that not a hair of your head was going to perish. It would have to be one of the most exciting times ever to be on the face of this earth. I don’t know, though, that I’d want to see with my eyes what is going to be happening around me at that time. I am of two minds regarding so much of the things that are talked about here. He said, look up, lift up your head, your redemption draws nigh. And I would think that with all of the fear and the fright that’s going on, the ability to know what God is doing would be the only thing that would stand between you and losing your mind. He spoke to them a parable. Behold the fig tree and all trees. When they shoot forth and you see, you know of your own selves that summer is now near at hand. So likewise, when you see these things come to pass, know that the kingdom of God is near at hand. Verily I say unto you, this generation, that is the generation that sees these things begin, shall not pass till everything is fulfilled. Once it starts, it will pass, it will be finished in a generation. Heaven and earth shall not pass away, may pass away, but my word shall not pass away. And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, that’s overeating, and with drunkenness, that’s overdrinking. and the cares of this life, and that day come upon you unawares. You know, this is really interesting because it does not seem to suggest to us that simply by the study of prophecy and by knowing all these things about prophecy and having full understanding of the 1,335 days and the 1,260 days and the 360-day year and the years a day, it doesn’t even suggest that by knowing all of these things that you will avoid having this come upon you. It says, beware lest your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, drunkenness, and the cares of this life. And boy, is that easy to do. Even if you manage to keep the eating and drinking under control, the cares of this life are a bag in themselves to have to carry and to keep track of and to know about. And you can become so absorbed in them and so distracted by them that you miss what’s going on around you. For as a snare it will come upon all them that dwell upon the face of the whole earth. Watch therefore and pray always that you may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass and to stand before the Son of Man. Watch and pray that you may be accounted worthy to, of all things, escape. So there is such a thing as an escape. After all, you know, I think in years gone by, we probably did a lot of harm with the old Petra doctrine. For those of you who were never in the worldwide church of God, you may or may not know very much about what that was. But in years gone by, the church gave a great deal of emphasis to prophecy, a great deal of emphasis to the end time. Of course, we believed that we were living in the end time. And we even, you know, got to the place to where we sort of backed into setting dates. It wasn’t as though somebody came out and said, well, Jesus didn’t know what he was talking about, let’s set a date. People started talking about it. It was such a simple, such an odd thing. Mr. Herbert Armstrong saw a book entitled, you know, what the world was going to be like in 1975. And it was this fabulous, wonderful utopia, all the scientific inventions and things that were going to be. So he decided to write a book entitled 1975 in Prophecy. in which he drew a scenario that he believed that Christ would have returned by then. But by the time they got to 1975, they would be into the day of the Lord, and all these terrible things would be coming down. They had all illustrated with terrible, gruesome pictures and so forth to impress that upon people’s minds. He didn’t really start out himself to set that as a date, he said. It was a response to this book, and he kind of felt that Christ’s return would probably be before that time. Well, once you put something like that in print, it takes on a life of its own. And so the preachers and the membership and all that began to find all kinds of places in the Bible that would match up with 1975. So that you could back up three and a half years from 1975 and you got to 1972. So 1972 became the year of Christ’s return. And then you go on, and I’m sorry, the end of this age or the beginning of the Great Tribulation. 75 was the year of Christ’s return. And then other people began to find other things in prophecy to kind of work their way around that. Of course, then you look at escape. And there was this talking about escape for a while. And then somebody made a trip to a place called Petra, which is down in southern Jordan. It’s an old city down there. And they wrote an article in the Good News about the rose-red city of Petra. And somebody said, well, wouldn’t it be wonderful, or maybe it would be, that God would take us to a place like that. And that took on a life of its own. And so the first thing you know, then people are talking about, well, when we go to Petra, and when we flee, and we’re all going to run out of here. And whole doctrines and scenarios and ideas got built up around it, that we were all going to flee. and be taken to Petra, and we would walk part of the way and go by ship part of the way, or whatever it would be. There would be some way, or I think that in later years the theory got to be that some of these abandoned D.C. tents that were not in good shape, that God would protect us and we would all fly across in the D.C. tents. You know, these ideas just get going. Like I say, they take on a life of their own. The fact is, though, that the approach that’s taken of The world’s going to get beat up real bad, but all of us who are a part of this group, we are all going to move away. We’re going to flee or be taken or get away to a place of safety, a fortress, someplace in the wilderness like Petra, and we’re going to be protected there is essentially a cultic idea. It is a cultic idea. The fact, actually, and one of the problems involved in it is it creates an atmosphere of fear. which gives to certain people who control the group that will be going to the place of safety control over the people who are in that group. And so that inclusion or exclusion from that group becomes a very powerful factor among the people who use it. But the fact that God will get you out, that God will get you out, or that God will protect you in place is not cultic. It has nothing to do with somebody controlling you or directing you. I want you to turn back to the 91st Psalm, a beautiful psalm that has to do with people whom God loves and whom God cares about. There is, after all, a healthy fear. I mean, to realize, to read the Bible, to believe prophecy, and to know that we can’t get from this world in which we are living today into the world to come. without going through the time of the greatest trouble that’s ever been on the face of this planet, ought to cause us a healthy kind of fear. Now, when you turn back again to the 91st Psalm, this is a psalm that is about a people whom God loves and about a people for whom he cares and what he intends to do for them in a time of trouble. “‘He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.'” I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in Him will I trust. It was a silly thing to allow the transfer of God as a rock to a city that had the name of a rock, Petra, that was supposed to be an impregnable fortress because you had this narrow little defile that you had to go through to get there. But nobody bothered to mention it. The backside of it was wide open. That anybody could come in from the backside of the thing. But the idea was a transfer away from God as our fortress and our refuge to Petra as a fortress and a refuge. Surely he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the noisome pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers. Under his wings you shall trust. His truth shall be your shield and buckler. You shall not be afraid for the terror by night nor for the arrow that flies by day. nor for the pestilence that walks in darkness, nor for the destruction that wastes at noonday. These are things which the prophets tell us in no uncertain terms, from all the way from the earliest of Elijah to Isaiah, Jeremiah, to Ezekiel, to the minor prophets to Revelation. This type of thing is going to be coming down in spades at the very end time. All hell is going to break loose. But you don’t have to be afraid of the disease epidemics. No need to be afraid of the wars. No need to be afraid of the destruction that waits at noonday. A thousand shall fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. Now that’s a promise to live with. And it isn’t a question of being away somewhere. It isn’t a question of being tucked off in the wilderness. It isn’t a question of being in Ayers Rock in Australia or being down in Petra in Jordan. It says a thousand will fall at your side. Ten thousand at your right hand. It will not come near you. Only with your eyes you shall behold and see the reward of the wicked. How in the world can you see it if you’re somewhere else and been taken away? Because you have made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most high your habitation, there shall no evil befall you, neither shall any plague come near your dwelling. Now, if you kind of figure that in the years to come there are going to be plagues, if you kind of think that in the possible years to come there are going to be some heavy-duty, serious wars, if you do feel that there are going to be a lot of people dying of famine, then it might not be a bad idea to give some thought to what it means to make God your refuge and the Most High your habitation. He shall give his angels charge over you to keep you in all your ways. They will bear you up in their hands, lest you dash your foot against a stone. This is the scripture that the devil used concerning Christ, trying to tempt him to do a display of his power, of who he was. But it has to do with the person who is faithful to God, who makes God his refuge. God is his rock. God is his protector, who hides under the shadow of the Almighty, who is under the feathers, as it were, of God, like a little chick under the feathers of a mother hen. This is the one who is in this range of protection. You shall tread upon the lion and the adder, the young lion, the dragon, shall you trample under feet, because he has set his love upon me. Therefore, I will deliver him. I will set him on high because he has known my name. Now, isn’t that something to think about? The reason why God protects a man, a woman, a child, is because he has set his love upon me. It is a little spooky to think that This day-to-day kind of represents almost like a transitional period that we have to go through to get from this world to the next. But to realize that those who have set their love on God can be protected is a tremendous encouragement. He shall call upon me, I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him, I will honor him. With long life I will satisfy him, and I will show him my salvation. Tomorrow is the Feast of Firstfruits, a time that pictures really, in its own way, the resurrection from the dead, the harvest of the firstfruits from the earth. That it is finished, that it’s done, that we will move into God’s kingdom. It precedes the blowing of the trumpets and the return of Christ, but it has to do with our being harvested into God’s own family. And it’s good to know that during the last little transition into that period of times, which is a time which could be very frightening for all who are in the world. There can be, for those who set their love on God, a day of rest.
