2017 – Volume 28
Laodicea, The Indifferent Church
“As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me” (Revelation 3:19‑20). There is no city whose spirit and nature are more difficult to describe than Laodicea. [...]
A Bone of Him Shall Not Be Broken
“For these things were done, that the scripture should be fulfilled, A bone of him shall not be broken” (John 19:36). “There are pictures of the Church which represent her as participating with the Lord in his sacrifice; but the Passover type is not one of these. The Passover lamb represented our Lord Jesus Christ as ‘the Lamb of God, which taketh away the [...]
Remembering Israel’s Six-Day War
Fulfilling Prophecy June 5-10, 2017, marked the 50th Anniversary of Israel’s momentous victory against a massive Arab attack in the 1967 Six-Day War. What had been the cry of the Jews for centuries, “Next year in Jerusalem,” in 1967 became the cry, “Now and forever in Jerusalem!” The effects of this amazing event in Israel’s history still impacts the world today. Under the prompting [...]
“Here I Stand”
The Reformation and its Aftermath In Germany, Wittenberg’s nobility still took Medieval pride in their collection of relics from the saints. Fittingly, these were set off in gold and silver artwork and — to maintain the mystery — viewing was permitted only during the great feast day of “All Saints.” A small admission fee permitted the faithful to view “a fragment of Noah’s ark, [...]
Prophecies Against Rome Addressed to Tyre
TIRAS, THE ETRUSCANS, ROME The list of first‑generation nations from Japheth ends with Tiras. Their homeland was at the west and southwest of the Black Sea, where Romanians today call it Thracia, and in English we slur it to Thrace. Its capital was called Troy, or Troas, and the people were called Trojans. Like other seafaring nations, these people established colonies on faraway shores, [...]
Forsaken Love, The Letter to Ephesus
“Thou canst not bear them which are evil: and thou hast tried them which say they are apostles, and are not, and hast found them liars” (Revelation 2:2). Christianity probably came first to Ephesus with Aquila and Priscilla when Paul made a brief stop there on his second missionary journey (Acts 18:18,19). On his third journey he stayed in the city for about three [...]
Zephaniah and a Pure Language
“The word of the LORD which came unto Zephaniah the son of Cushi, the son of Gedaliah, the son of Amariah, the son of Hezekiah, in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah” (Zephaniah 1:1). Frequently, we might pass over the opening lines of a book in the Bible that list lineages of the prophet. In Zephaniah it is unusual [...]
The Papal Millennium
THE MILLENNIUM IN JEWISH BELIEF On Pentecost Sunday the apostle Peter spoke of the Times of Restitution, as a season of blessing and refreshment (Acts 3:19-21). For his Jewish audience he was presenting a familiar belief that held the 6,000 years from creation would be followed by a special 1,000 year Sabbath “day.” This belief goes back to before the destruction of the second [...]
David’s Mighty Men
“These be the names of the mighty men whom David had ... thirty and seven in all” (2 Samuel 23:8, 39). Saul, David, and Solomon, the first three kings of Israel, conspicuously each reigned the same number of years, 40 in each case. Forty is a symbol in Scriptures of trial or testing, and in this case reflects that the reigns of these three [...]
Pure Nard, Very Costly
John 12:2-11, Mark 14:3-9, Matthew 14:3-9 It was Jesus’ last Sunday on earth when he and the twelve disciples arrived at Bethany, to the home of Simon the leper. (“Six days before the Passover,” John 12:1. That would be Sunday, six days before the Passover feast the following Saturday.) It is thought likely Simon the leper had died, and his heirs lived there: Martha, [...]
A King’s Desire for His Young Son
“Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding” (Proverbs 3:13). As King David approached the end of his life, he was to give a final admonition to his people and to his son Solomon, the designated heir to the throne of Israel. Having called all the princes, officers, and valiant men to Jerusalem, David spoke his last official words [...]
Translating the Rosetta Stone
The right help, at the right time. As Thomas Young was struggling to decipher the Rosetta Stone, a traveler gave him a parcel of Egyptian manuscripts. Among the baffling hieroglyphics he noted three names written in Greek: Apollonius, Antigonus, and Antimachus. As he was puzzling over the rest, a friend gave him some papyri he had purchased at Thebes in 1820. Two of these [...]
The Faith of Habakkuk
“Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls: Yet I will rejoice in Jehovah, I will joy in the God of my salvation” (Habakkuk 3:17,18). Habakkuk [...]