Welcome to another Thursday Update! This past weekend and week felt a little more routine than the last time we talked. We were able to get back to church, served in kid’s ministry, and our church series finally returned to the Daniel series. They took off about a month from the series while our pastor was at the SEB conference.
As we enter back into Daniel, we begin studying the prophecy section of Daniel. It is great timing as Taylor and I just finished studying Revelation! It will be cool to see all the many connections that take place, as well as learn more about the beauty of the end times. That’s right, beauty. One of the many things Tay and I learned while studying Revelation is that the end times are not a scary thing. They are motivating for sure because for those that don’t know Jesus, it will be a scary time. But to see the sheer magnificence of God’s power and Jesus Christ’s glory will be amazing! Words cannot describe them.
We also learned a new perspective of God’s wrath and judgement. I think I’ve always been a little fearful of it, but it really is beautiful and holy like all of God. Oftentimes we focus God’s final judgement on all these people on earth being killed and think, “how cruel.” I thought that sometimes. My answer was to just trust God and know he is just. However, in studying Revelation, we noticed something. In the early chapters, the saints and martyrs are seen in Heaven asking God to send His final judgement, begging him to do it. God tells them to wait until the time is right. This shows me 2 things:
God has immense patience and mercy. The people that will die in His final judgement are not blindsided by it. They are given opportunity after opportunity to the point that I believe the only ones to die will be the ones that know, recognize, and still oppose God.
His judgement is something to look forward to. When I take a step back and look at His judgement, I realize what it is. God’s final judgement will end sin and death forever. Wow! The thing I’ve been looking forward to most about Heaven is a sinless life in a sinless world. This will be accomplished through God’s final judgement, and I now find myself excited for it too!
Anyways, that was a side tangent, but needless to say, we are excited to study Daniel. Our pastor is shining a light on it in a really interesting way to help us understand what we should do and act with these prophecies here and now.
One really cool idea he shared was that these prophecies have been and will be fulfilled. In other words, there are near fulfillments, but there are also later fulfillments in the end times. In his example, Daniel prophesied about a new ruler that would rise up out of Greece’s ruins and be stronger than Rome and oppress God’s people more than anyone before. There is a lot of evidence that a man named Antiochus Elpiphanes fulfilled that exact role. However, later in the gospels, about 200 years after Atiochus died, Jesus and his apostles say that this passage in Daniel actually refers to the antichrist.
Thus, Antiochus is the near fulfillment of the prophecy, but the antichrist is the later fulfillment.
Another example is God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12. He promises that all nations will be blessed through Abraham’s offspring. We see this fulfilled many times as the people of Israel help bless other nations. For example, Joseph was able to rise up in Egypt and help prepare them for the 7 year famine, most likely saving the lives of the nation of Egypt. A fulfillment of the promise for sure. However, we also know that the ultimate fulfillment of God’s promise in Genesis 12 is through Jesus Christ.
This idea of near fulfillment and far fulfillment has really opened my eyes to the many confusing prophecies in Revelation.
This has added to another conviction of ours. We feel like we want to be better equipped in studying God’s word, sharing His word in a strategic and smart way, and being prepared to travel this world. We both love traveling, but we only want to travel if it will bring God glory. One way to do that is by sharing the gospel with complete strangers. As total introverts, starting up conversations with random people is not our forte. We have felt convicted about this for a little bit, and we have finally decided to get some training. As such, we are about to start taking some classes with Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. Our first one is hermeneutics, which will help us really dive in and study the word of God.
Since finishing Revelation, our next book we’re tackling is Exodus. This is partly because this is the next book we’re going to be tackling with Biblit once Genesis is over. We have about 5 weeks left of Genesis, so now is the time to start spreading the word on Exodus! We’re hoping this class will really help us as we write about God’s powerful work through Exodus.