By Rick Lange
http://bibleprophecybyricklange.blogspot.com/
Posted with authors permission
The book of Joel is believed by most prophecy teachers to be a book devoted to last day events. Even as Peter quoted Joel on the first Pentecost in which the church was conceived, we see elements in Joel’s prophecy that did not apply to that time. He talks about wonders in the sky and on the earth…blood and fire and columns of smoke. Then he goes on to describe the sun turning into darkness and the moon into blood BEFORE THE GREAT AND AWESOME DAY OF THE LORD.
Now, the Day of the Lord is not the coming of the Lord or the rapture of the church as some would suppose. If you look up “Day of the Lord” in Strong’s you will find many references to it and they nearly all speak of disaster and chaos, a time of thick darkness and gloom, of upheavals in nations and kingdoms and in nature itself. The day of the Lord is the tribulation.
I believe that we are witnessing the beginning of these things now. I also believe that the tetrad of blood moons that occurred on Passover and Tabernacles 2 years in a row in 2014 and 2015, along with significant eclipses and signs in the stars such as the return of the Bethlehem star after 2000 years and the celestial sign described in Revelation 12, as well as the rare blood moon on January 20/21 are all signals that the day of the Lord is imminent.
I believe that if Hillary had made president, America and the world would have plunged directly into the New World Order and thus the beginning of the Tribulation. I also believe that God signaled the four angels of Revelation 7 to hold back the winds of strife until His servants are sealed in their foreheads. Therefore God used Trump, (a completely unexpected wild card) to delay the Tribulation and that we as God’s people should be in an intense time of preparation for what comes next, in fasting and prayer and repentance and full devotion to God.
This says nothing about whether Trump is good or bad. God uses whom He will. He is in complete control of end time events and they will occur according to His timing and not the New World Order’s timing. But it may actually be God who initiates the Tribulation period rather than man, for some prophecy teachers are now saying that 2019 is a highly significant year and they are actually predicting that the tribulation may be kicked off by a major earthquake… this spring no less.
I am always leery of elaborate schemes to figure out biblical timing, but there is some truth to the fact that throughout the Bible certain epics were kicked off with major earthquakes. Isaiah mentions one such event in the year of King Uzziah, in Isaiah chapter 6.
But regardless of variously constructed time lines, I do believe that we are extremely close to earth’s final events. I believe that the blood moons and eclipses of 2014 and 15 and onward are the signs referred to in Joel that come BEFORE the great and awesome day of the Lord. Joel finishes chapter 2 by saying that whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be rescued or saved and he goes on to say: “For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be those who escape as the Lord has said, even among the survivors whom the Lord calls.
So apparently this big earthquake will affect Israel as well as America and in fact it may be a global earthquake being caused by cosmic events, perhaps even caused by the near flyby of a rogue planet or something that disturbs the balance of our solar system. (Actually NASA is talking about that nowadays too, the tilting of our earth, the solar minimum that has weakened our magnetosphere as well as the approach of something called planet x for which NASA is now beginning to provide soft disclosure.
Now, in chapter 3 of Joel, and within the context of last day events Joel says:
“For behold in those days and at that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, I will gather all nations and bring them down to the valley of Jeshoshaphat and I will enter into judgment with them there on behalf of My people and My inheritance, Israel whom they have scattered among the nations and they have divided up My land.” Joel 3:1-2
Joel then goes on to describe the time of Jacob’s trouble. He talks in verse 12, 13 about God’s judgment of the surrounding nations. He talks about treading the winepress which refers to His wrath. He talks about the great wickedness on the earth and warns that the Day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision.
Now Joel talks about blood moons and eclipses again, which may correspond with Revelation 6. He says, “The sun and the moon grow dark and the stars lose their brightness and the Lord roars from Zion and the heavens and the earth tremble. But the Lord is a refuge for His people and a stronghold for the sons of Israel.”
Then he goes on into a brief description of the millennial reign of Christ saying: “Then you will know that I am the Lord your God dwelling in Zion, My holy mountain. So Jerusalem will be holy and strangers will pass through it no more.” Joel 3:17
Joel speaks about the brooks of Israel being refreshed and refilled, and he also speaks about a spring that will go out from the houses of the Lord… which I believe refers to the temple of Ezekiel which Ezekiel begins to describe right after talking about God’s judgments in Ez. 39. Then in chapter 40 and onward he describes in great detail the temple that the Lord will build during the millennium.
Ezekiel says in 39:28: “Then they will know that I am the Lord their God because I made them go into exile among the nations and then gathered them again to their own land; and I will leave none of them there any longer. And I will not hide My face from them any longer for I shall have poured out My Spirit on the house of Israel declares the Lord.”
This all fits with Romans 11, when the times of the Gentiles is fulfilled and God begins His final work with Israel again to fulfill His irrevocable promises to them which He had given to Abraham.
Ezekiel 37 talks about the valley of dry bones and God asks Ezekiel saying: “Son of man, can these bones live? So, God asks Ezekiel to prophesy over the bones and they come together to form a great army.
Then in verse 21 it says: “Thus says the Lord God, “Behold I will take the sons of Israel from among the nations where they have gone and I will gather them from every side and bring them into their own land and I will make them one nation in the land on the mountains of Israel; and one king will be king for all of them and they will no longer be two nations and they will no longer be divided into two kingdoms.”
Then in verse 24 God says that His servant David will be king over them and they will all have one Shepherd…” and then in verse 26, God says: “And I will make a covenant of peace with them; it will be AN EVERLASTING COVENANT with them. And I will place them and multiply them and will set My sanctuary in their midst forever. My dwelling place also will be with them and I will be their God and they will be My people. And the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, WHEN MY SANCTUARY IS IN THEIR MIDST FOREVER.” Ez. 37:26-28.
Now I don’t believe that Ezekiel is talking about the third temple that they are now seeking to build, but the one, the true temple that Ezekiel describes from chapter 40 on and it will be built by the Messiah and not by the antichrist.
In Ezekiel chapter 38, God talks about sending a great earthquake to the land of Israel to destroy the armies of the Magog invasion and 38:12 tells us that it will take 7 months for Israel to bury all of the bones of their enemies.
So there are reasons why the tribulation is called the time of Jacob’s trouble and I wish I could tell you exactly how these things unfold. All I can say is what Paul says in Romans 11.
Paul says under the inspiration of God that there is a time coming when the fullness of the Gentiles has come in, when God will begin to work with Israel again and unless we understand this part of the end time scenario, we can’t fully understand God’s agenda for the last days. And whether the church is caught up to meet the Lord in the air at the time when the fullness of the gentiles has come in, or if we remain here through a part of this time of trouble I can’t say with great certainty.
One thing I do know and that is that we will not be here when the wrath of God is being poured out. That much we have been promised. (Rev. 3:10, Rom. 5:9, 1Thess. 1:10, and 1 Thess. 5:9 for starters)
My ministry as a watchman is not so much about facts and figures as it is about calling us to repentance, and holy and righteous living. It has become a very unpopular subject in many churches today, but we must be sanctified if we want to see the Lord, for the writer of Hebrews says:
“Pursue peace with all men and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.” Heb. 12:14. And we have been predestined and called to be conformed to the image of God’s Son, as per Romans 8:29 and the purpose of the church and its ministry is to “equip the saints for service, to build up the Body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of then knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.” Eph. 4:12, 13.
As such, much of the church’s teaching on grace these days is a false message. Grace is not tolerance… Grace is the power of God working in and through our lives to bring us into the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
When He comes, we will be like Him… and to the extent that we fall short of that likeness we will have to go through some stuff to refine and purify us.
In our Saturday morning time with my son Zach yesterday, I mentioned that there are two ways to be purified… either by suffering, or by choice. We can choose to enter into Christ’s death by faith and then to be raised up by the power of His resurrection by faith, to walk in newness of life. As such, then Jesus promises to keep that which we have committed unto Him against that day. He is faithful and He will bring it to pass through His exceedingly great and precious promises (2Peter 1:4and the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit shed abroad in our hearts. For He is “able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all that we ask or think according to the power that works within us.” Eph. 3:20
This is a glorious walk my friends… full of adventure and excitement and awesomeness, especially as the Day of the Lord approaches… especially as we see prophetic events unfolding right before our eyes. But we need not be afraid. We are already dead to this body of flesh and alive unto Christ. We do not fear the loss of our property and our stuff, because it already belongs to God. We need not fear persecution or death, for the disciples and the saints before us considered it an honor to suffer for Christ. And who knows but what that suffering will finish the work of sanctification in us?
We just need to establish in our hearts that our eternal destiny is to live and reign with Christ forever.
“But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus.”
So if you don’t particularly agree with my interpretation of last day events, I may be wrong about some of it. Everyone is wrong about something or there wouldn’t be so many interpretations of prophecy. But the part to which you must pay close attention to is what the Spirit is saying to the churches. All of His promises are offered to those who overcome and our goal in all of this is to be conformed to the image of Christ… and you dare not let anybody else tell you differently. We must be like Him when He comes and this is the inward working of the Holy Spirit and the Word in our lives.
Is your Bible gathering dust? Is your prayer life lacking? Have you received the infilling of the Holy Spirit? If you answer is “No” to any of these then you are not ready and you are not getting ready.
It’s all a matter of priority in our lives. It’s worth it even if you have to get up at 3:00AM. Jesus did and if He needed it, how much more us?
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