Leviticus 25

¹ The LORD said to Moses at Mount Sinai, ² “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When you enter the land I am going to give you, the land itself must observe a sabbath to the LORD.

 

God's clock started ticking when the Jews entered the land.  It might be prudent to consider the possibility that God's clock started ticking again on May 15th in 1948 when the Jews were restored to the promised land.  In fact, since that date in 1948 it appears that the whole prophetic sequence of events started after a 1,878 year interlude.  (See my reasoning below).

 

On May 15th this year, it will mark 63 years since Israel was declared a nation.  If God's clock started ticking in 1948, as I believe it did, then May 15th might be profoundly significant. 

 

I must not assume... I cannot assume that I am wise enough to figure out God's plans.  There are too many factors and possibilities.  And frankly, I'm just not that smart.  But, I think that rationally it might be very prudent to carefully watch May 15th.   Please pray about it and for God to give us wisdom and understanding.  Unless we are all in agreement, I don't think it could be by the Holy Spirit's guiding. 

I think only the Holy Spirit could give us mutual consent and confirmation. 

 

For now, I think there are several possibly significant days to watch before May 15th.  But, if they come and go, then May 15th could be the day we enter the promised land.  I hope it is sooner... and I hope it is not later.

 

YBIC Bruce Baber

 

The last fulfilled prophecy prior to 1948 occurred in 70 A.D. with the destruction of the temple. Matthew 24 says, "And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple. ²And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

 

From history we know that Jesus' words came true when Roman soldiers tore down the temple in 70 A.D. And then the prophecies grew silent for 1,878 years. Not one single prophecy saw fulfillment in all that time. Before you start leafing through books, or try racking your brain to think of an exception, let me say that there indeed were events that had biblical significance prophetically. However, not one literal fulfillment of a specific prophecy until 1948. I think that's why so many churches stopped preaching and teaching the prophecies.

 

As everyone knows the Jews became a nation in 1948 in miraculous circumstances. By becoming a nation in "one day", they fulfilled Isaiah 66:8. "Who hath heard such a thing? who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? or shall a nation be born at once? for as soon as Zion travailed, she brought forth her children."

 

Leviticus 26: 7,8 says. "And ye shall chase your enemies, and they shall fall before you by the sword.

⁸And five of you shall chase an hundred, and an hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight: and your enemies shall fall before you by the sword.

Within hours of Israel's declaration of independence in 1948, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon invaded Israel. The combined population of those countries was at least 20 million people. Israel had fewer than 1 million Jews. Even so, the Jews won the war and expanded the size of Israel by 50 percent. The Jews won a miraculous victory with a handful of antiquated weapons and a few soldiers against vastly superior forces.

 

Did you know that another prophecy was filled concerning the Jews in 1948? The rebirth of their ancient language fulfilled Zephaniah 3:9. For then will I turn to the people a pure language, that they may all call upon the name of the LORD, to serve him with one consent." The Hebrew language as we know it today had been a dead language for centuries. Yiddish was spoken by European Jews and it was a mixture of different languages. In the early 1900s, only a few Jewish scholars had any knowledge of original Hebrew. Up until the state of Israel declared pure Hebrew the de facto language of the nation in 1948, it was an unfulfilled prophecy.

 

What else has happened in the span of this generation? The Ethiopian Jews returned to Israel. Zephaniah 3:10 says, "From beyond the rivers of Ethiopia my suppliants, even the daughter of my dispersed, shall bring mine offering."

 

There is more. Isaiah 27:6 says, "He shall cause them that come of Jacob to take root: Israel shall blossom and bud, and fill the face of the world with fruit." The land of Israel was a dry and barren desert. A wasteland!

Mark Twain's visit to Lebanon, Syria, and the Holy Land in 1867 was published in "The Innocents Abroad", where he described Palestine as follows:

"..... A desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds... a silent mournful expanse.... a desolation.... we never saw a human being on the whole route.... hardly a tree or shrub anywhere. Even the olive tree and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, had almost deserted the country." The Innocents Abroad, p. 361-362)

Today Israel is the fruit basket of Europe. Fruit is one of their leading exports in one of the fulfillments of prophecies that have occurred since 1948.

In 1967, we all know what happened in the fulfillment of a prophecy. The Jews reclaimed Jerusalem. Zechariah 8: 7,8 says, "Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Behold, I will save my people from the east country, and from the west country; And I will bring them, and they shall dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God, in truth and in righteousness."

 

Prophecy after prophecy started being fulfilled in the years since 1948 wheras before that eventful year the Bible was silent regarding fulfilled prophecies for almost two thousand years. It was like God started a countdown.

Wars and rumors of wars, distress of nations, roaring waves, earthquakes in diverse places... they are all happening with greater and greater frequency. I haven't even listed all of the prophecies that have been fulfilled since 1948.

 

If you agree that the end-time countdown might have started in 1948, then add seventy years for the span of this generation and you come to 2018. Subtract the seven years of tribulation, and you can see that the most likely window for the rapture is the spring of 2011... providing that you believe in a pretribulation rapture.

We can roll over and pretend that these things are all just a coincidence. Or you can believe that we will go through hell on earth during the next seven years. Or you can accept the fact that Jesus is coming very, very soon to call us up to meet Him in the air.