But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that aught be written unto you.
For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.
When they are saying, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall in no wise escape.
But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.
For ye are all sons of light, and sons of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness.
So then let us not sleep, as do the rest, but let us watch and be sober.
For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that are drunken are drunken in the night.
But let us, since we are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for a helmet, the hope of salvation.
For God appointed us not unto wrath, but unto the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,
Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.
Wherefore exhort one another, and build each other up, even as also ye do.
Now from the fig tree learn her parable: when her branch is now become tender, and putteth forth its leaves, ye know that the summer is nigh;
Even so ye also, when ye see these things coming to pass, know ye that He is nigh, even at the door.
Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, until all these things be accomplished.
Heaven and earth shall pass away: but My words shall not pass away.
But of that day or that hour knoweth no one, not even the angels in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father.
Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the time is.
It is as when a man, sojourning in another country, having left his house, and given authority to his servants, to each one his work, commanded also the porter to watch.
Watch therefore: for ye know not when the Lord of the house cometh, whether at even, or at midnight, or at cockcrowing, or in the morning;
Lest, coming suddenly, He find you sleeping.
And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch.
Shall we bow together in a word of prayer?
Heavenly Father, we want to thank You this morning that we are here in Your presence, and we thank You for all that is ours in the Lord Jesus. We thank You that You have a design and a plan for this day, and we praise You for Your power and ability to fulfil that design.
Father, none of us wants to get in Your way. We want just to be instruments in Your hand for the fulfilment of that plan. For this morning, we commit ourselves to You, Lord.
Will You fill this time with Your anointing, so that, Lord, we really do hear You, and Your word comes not just into our heads, but into our hearts; that something may happen within our lives, Lord, that will, as it were, bring us face to face with realities and enable us to understand the time in which we are living, and the urgency of the hour.
We ask all this with thanksgiving, in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
In this passage in 1 Thessalonians 5, the apostle Paul, by the Holy Spirit, says in verse 4:
But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.
Would to God that every child of God were really alive to the hour in which we are now living. But it is a sad fact that a large number of the Lord’s people, including those who have some knowledge of prophecy, are asleep.
I remember years ago an incident that has always remained in my mind and memory. I was only in the very beginning of my teens—I think I was about twelve years of age. My mother and stepfather were away, and we were in the tender mercies of an aunt.
Suddenly, at about two o’clock in the night, she burst into my room and said, “Lance, Lance, get up quickly! The whole avenue is filled with police cars and police dogs. Someone must be burgled.”
So, leaping out of bed, I followed her across the landing into the big front bedroom and across the bedroom to the window. There my sister was already hanging out at the window, watching all the movements of cars purring almost silently up and down—black limousines and what we call in Britain, black Marias. Those are the things they keep locked up whoever they catch in them.
In and out of the gardens were going policemen with torches and great Alsatian dogs—you know, I think you call them here German shepherd dogs. Very quietly, just little whispers; we could not hear what was going on.
My aunt was hanging out the window with my sister, and they were both saying, “I wonder who it is.” Our aunt would say, “I’m sure it’s so-and-so.” Then my sister would say, “No, no, no. I think it’s so-and-so.” “I don’t think it’s so-and-so,” because they had been in and out of that house three times and had not got anyone.
So they watched, and then, all of a sudden, after about twenty-five minutes, my aunt said, “Oh, I am thirsty. I think I’ll go downstairs and make myself a cocoa.” So she trotted off down the stairs.
Well, in a few moments, we heard a shriek that could raise the dead in the parish graveyard two miles across the River Thames on the other side. She was up on that landing faster than one of your rockets takes off from Cape Canaveral.
Shaking like a leaf, white as snow, she stood on the landing and said, “He’s in our kitchen.”
So we both gawked at her and said, “What? The thief is in our kitchen?”
“Yes,” she said. “He was sitting at the kitchen table eating one of your mother’s blancmanges.”
“Really?”
And she said, “When I went in, he said, ‘Good evening, madam.’”
She did not wait to pass the time of day—or night—with him, but fled upstairs as fast as possible. Of course, we were told later, because they never did get him, that on that occasion he was a famous cat burglar. He had been in thirteen houses that night, one after another, in that whole area.
He went out the way he came in, having had his blancmange. He did not take anything else, and went off into the night. But the thing that always tickled my perverted sense of humour was that we were trying to find in which neighbour’s house the thief had made a visit, and he was sitting in her own kitchen.
I have often wondered whether that is exactly what will happen to many, many Christians when the Lord comes. They are so busy thinking, “So-and-so should wake up. That group should hear this. That group should hear that,” but they themselves are unaware that the thief might be in their own kitchen.
“You, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.” The Lord has given so many warnings to His disciples:
Take heed. Watch and pray.
And what I say unto you I say unto all, Watch.
If our Lord was so emphatic in this matter, there must be a very real possibility of some kind of loss if we do not take heed to His advice.
If we are so stupid as to believe that we are ready when maybe we are not ready, and that everyone else needs to get ready except myself, we could be found out when the Lord comes.
It is a very interesting thing what the apostle Paul says here. He says, in verse 6:
So then let us not sleep, as do the rest, but let us watch and be sober.
For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that are drunken are drunken in the night.
Now, sleep—which, just at present, I am not having too great an experience of—is a state of inertia, is it not? Immobility. You are horizontal. Now, it does not mean, of course, that you do not move around a bit and so on, but basically sleep is a state of inertia.
I think many Christians are in this state—inertia. They are not moving. They have not moved for years. Of course, up here they can get moving, but in here nothing happens. They are in a state of inertia. Their kind of Christian service is a sleepwalking routine.
It is quite automatic. It is something that they do not have to think about. It does not cost them too much. It is a routine.
What is drunkenness? Drunkenness is a form of escapism. When a person takes to drink, they are running away from something. Normally, they are running away from their circumstances, or from relationships, or from some complex problem they have inherited in their own temperament, and they cannot face up to it. So they take to drink and somehow try to put themselves into a position where they do not know.
Now, it is a tragedy, but it is possible to use even the things of God as a means of escapism. We can use meetings. We can use our singing. We can use music. We can use even Bible study.
We can use all these things as a means of escapism, because it is a very interesting thing: some people will only dwell on the things that they feel are rosy, pleasant, and nice. It is a form of escapism. They will not face up to harsh realities, but the harsh realities will, in the end, catch up with them.
So you and I, we need to take heed to this word: “Brethren, ye are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. We are all sons of light, and sons of the day. We are not of the night, nor of darkness.”
So then let us not sleep, as do the rest; but let us watch and be sober.
For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that are drunken are drunken in the night.
But let us, since we are of the day, put on the breastplate of faith and love.
Is it not an interesting thing that there are two matters which we are told in the word of God will characterise the end time? One is that the love of the many will wax cold. The other is that the Lord Jesus said, “When the Son of Man cometh, shall He find faith?”
Now, He did not mean, “Shall He find saving faith?” Because if you look at the story He told, it is overcoming faith, enduring faith, importunate faith.
Because of this, believers have thrown in the glove and said, “Oh dear, dear, dear, dear, dear. So the time of the end is going to be no love; everybody’s love is going to grow cold, and there is going to be no faith.”
The Lord Jesus never said that. He said, “The love of the many will wax cold,” not the love of everyone. So why just relegate yourself to the majority?
Why not be amongst that remnant that at least knows something of a love growing more and more unto the day of His appearing? And when the Lord spoke about finding faith, He asked the question, “Shall the Son of Man find faith when He comes to the earth?” Well, we should answer that, “By Your grace, Lord, You will find it in me.”
Here is the answer. Speaking about the last days, the end time, the apostle says, “Do not let us sleep, as do the rest. For they that sleep sleep in the night, and those that are drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, since we are of the day, put on the breastplate of faith and love.”
We can put on the breastplate—the thing that keeps our heart—the breastplate of faith and love; and for a helmet, the thing that guards our mind, the hope of salvation.
Now, I say this is all-important, this matter of the prophetic word. Because here the apostle Paul says in this first verse of chapter 5, “But concerning the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that aught be written unto you.”
In other words, he felt that these Thessalonian believers were entirely clear as to the times and seasons. They, in fact, of course, as a result of this letter got into a bit of a problem, and he had to write another letter to get them out of the problem.
But nevertheless, the fact is, he says here, “But concerning the times and seasons”—times, that is, the larger periods, and seasons, that is, the smaller phases within those times—“you do not need anything to be written unto you.” Are you clear about the times and epochs?
I spoke last night about the times of the Gentiles. They began with the Babylonian Empire, and as far as I can see, because it is a term which speaks of the subjugation of the Jewish people, it means their subservience to Gentile domination. With the emergence of a sovereign Jewish state, those times should have ended.
On May 14, 1948, a sovereign Jewish state, whatever people may feel about it, emerged amongst the nations of the world. As far as I can see, this means the times of the Gentiles are over.
Some believe that the reference of our Lord Jesus to Jerusalem being trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled means simply trodden down by unbelievers, and therefore those times will go on until His appearance.
But my point is this: when He spoke to them, He clearly spoke of the loss of their land, the loss of their statehood, their dispersion into all the nations of the earth; and then He said that there would come a time when the domination of Jerusalem by non-Jews would be over.
Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.
This means, therefore, that not only the emergence of the Jewish state in 1948, but also the reuniting of Jerusalem and the proclamation of it as the capital of Israel, denotes that the times of the Gentiles are finished.
This means, if I am right, that we have passed out of one of the great major times of world history into a last period—however long it lasts—a last phase of world history as we know it, which will culminate with the coming of the Lord Jesus.
What a privilege to be alive. There are people who have longed down through the centuries to be alive in this era, to actually see with their physical eyes the fulfilments of God’s prophetic word. You and I have been so privileged.
So it is true: there are dark things. There are evil things. There are things that are horrifying. But it is a tremendous privilege to be alive in these days, and to know God’s delivering power, God’s enabling power, and God’s anointing grace for us to overcome in these days.
If the times of the Gentiles are over, we have passed into a last phase which we can describe as the last days, the end times, or the threshold of the Messiah’s appearing. It will be characterised by certain features.
I am only going to take up one this morning and another this evening, and then tomorrow we will conclude, so I cannot do very much. But these are the features you might like to consider in your own heart.
Israel—the state of Israel—will be at the centre of the world stage right through this last phase of human history to the coming of the Messiah. She will not only be at the heart of the world, the centre of the world’s stage; she will be the focal point of colossal conflict and antagonism on the part of the other nations.
We are already witnessing that. That is the thing that the Book has predicted for some two thousand six hundred years, and we are witnessing it in our generation.
A second feature: there will be a period of unparalleled shaking on every single level of life—whether physical, political, military, economic, religious, or even spiritual. On every single level of life, there will be a shaking unparalleled in the history of mankind. I may say something about that tonight.
A third feature is this: there will be an emergence of a world order increasingly antichrist in its social, moral, educational, political, and religious concepts and attitudes.
We shall witness a revolution in morality, a revolution in education, a revolution in social behaviour and conduct, and a revolution in religious concept. This is a new world order which is going to emerge and which already we have begun to see.
A fourth feature of this last phase will be the arrival of a false and prostituted church, which will not belong to any one particular denomination, nor, in my estimation, will it actually be Christian.
It will have Christianity at its base, but it will be a conglomeration of all the faiths of the world: Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Spiritism, Shintoism, Confucianism—everything the world has known wrapped into one, with Christianity at its base.
This will be a worldwide religion which will satisfy the needs of a new age, so it will be said.
The fifth feature of this time will be the appearance of a great saviour heading up this new order, and he will seek to destroy any true knowledge of God. This is the man who is described in the Bible as the Antichrist, or the man of sin, or, more blessedly described, the man destined to destruction.
Last, there will be a preparation of the redeemed for the coming of the Messiah. I believe that we shall see, in the last phase, multitudes of people coming to know the Lord Jesus Christ.
In all the war, upheaval, strife, economic recession, inflationary spiral, and all the rest of it, men and women, with their confidence shaken in things, will seek to find an answer to their lives. Many will find the Lord—multitudes, multitudes, in the valley of decision. There is no doubt in my mind about that.
Also, it says the gospel will be preached in the whole world for a testimony. It is almost in the whole world now. By modern means, we can reach almost the whole world. Thank God for that, for that gospel is to be preached right through to the end by those who are faithful, in every part of the world, in every nation, for a testimony. Then the end will come.
On top of that, there will be a preparation of the bride for the coming of the Messiah. Praise God for that.
Do you think the Lord Jesus, who said, “Upon this rock I will build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it,” will throw in the glove at the last point of time and say, “The enemy has proved too strong. He has defeated My work in building the church”? Never, never, never.
The Lord Jesus’ word stands forever. Upon this rock of Myself, I will build My church—not their church, not their churches, not a denominational thing, not an institutional thing, but His church. Upon that rock, He will build His church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
It is incumbent upon every true believer, every child of God, every member of the body of our Lord Jesus, to rise up in faith and be with Him in this matter.
Why should we say, “Oh dear, dear, dear, the night comes when no man can work. Oh, there is going to come a time when the love of the many is going to grow cold. There will be no faith in these days. We might as well finish now”?
And many are. They just withdraw, withdraw, and withdraw into a holy huddle, waiting to be caught up to be with the Lord.
Oh, dear friends, that is not the church—not the church I know. She is a militant church. She is a church terrible as an army with banners. She is an overcoming church.
Do you think that the Lord began with a bang and ends with a squeak? At Pentecost, He did something absolutely marvellous, and at the end of the age the whole thing is going to fizzle out into some little peep that one can hardly hear? Never, never.
I am not talking about some universal worldwide gathering together into some Christian system of every believer. God forbid. What I am talking about is the preparation, by the Spirit of God, of believers—whatever name or denominational label they might have—all over the world for the coming of the Messiah.
Faithful men and women, filled and anointed with the Holy Spirit, will be able to do exploits for the Lord because they have understanding of the times in which they live, and who in the last breath will overcome because of the grace of God which is given to them and which they have appropriated to the full.
Do not let us be pessimists. Do not let us be fearful. Do not let us be negative people, withdrawing, withdrawing, withdrawing, as we see all the increasing immorality and paganism of Western society and the strength of these great monolithic systems in other parts of the world.
Why should we fear? The Most High ruleth in the affairs of men, and Mr. Brezhnev is in the Kremlin only by the ordination of God. When the finger of God has finished with him, he will fall flat and return to dust.
Look at Mao. How powerful Mao was. They spouted morning, noon, and night Chairman Mao’s thoughts. And what is he now? Dust. He is dust. He is just the same kind of dust as one of those Chinese beggars who died at the same time. That is all.
In his day, he had supreme power, just like Stalin. Why, they put his body in the Red Square, in the Kremlin, and pumped all those things into him to keep him sort of there like some deep-frozen chicken.
What is he? What is he? He is only dust. He came from the dust. He has gone back to the dust. He awaits his final judgment before the great white throne of God.
But every real believer has more than Stalin or Mao ever had. They have living within their mortal bodies the risen, glorified Son of God.
Mao never had that. Stalin never had that. Brezhnev never has that, nor do the other world rulers have that. You, by the grace of God, have God dwelling in you. You have been made one with the eternal God in our Lord Jesus by the Spirit of God.
What a privilege. Why should we fear? God is working out His purpose. If there has to come a night before the day of the Lord appears, so be it. The night will be terrible, but it has an end.
And the day-star can arise in our hearts, touching us with glory, touching us with that blessed hope of His appearing, touching us with renewed vitality and faith, that we might be enabled to do the works of God in our generation until He comes.
Now, my dear ones, when you really look at the word of God, we have all these things that are going to be features of this last day. I would like just to dwell on one of these features this morning for a little while, and that feature is the state of Israel.
The Lord Jesus said, “From the fig tree learn its lesson,” or, “Learn the parable of the fig tree.” What did He mean?
Did He simply mean, as He went on to say, “When you see these things come to pass, know ye that He is nigh, even at the door”? Is the lesson of the fig tree that, as you see the fig tree putting out its leaves, its branches becoming tender and green, filled with sap, so you will know that when these things begin to come to pass, His coming is right at the door?
It is an interesting thing, for those of you who are Bible students—and I hope all of you are, or at least those of you young in the Lord are beginning to become such—that the fig tree in Israel is not the harbinger or herald of spring. It is the harbinger and herald of summer.
The first tree to put out its leaves in Israel is the almond tree. When the almond tree puts out its leaves, normally at the beginning of February, we know that summer is about two months away.
But when the fig tree puts out its leaves, we know that within a week or two, summer is suddenly going to descend upon us. Do you understand that?
So when the Lord Jesus spoke of the fig tree, He did not mean, “You have three months.” I am not giving actual time; you understand what I mean. He was not saying, “You have a whole longer period of time in which to get ready and do everything and get prepared.”
He was actually saying, “When the fig tree puts forth its leaves, the Lord is right near. He is at the door. He is at the door. He is on the threshold.” He is not coming up the street. He is not just arriving, as it were, at the other side of town. He is on the threshold. He is at the door, about to come in.
We have very little time, therefore. But let me ask again: what is this parable of the fig tree?
It is a most interesting thing. Obviously, the Lord Jesus, summing up the whole of this discourse—which, by the way, is the major discourse the Lord ever gave on the events of the end and of His coming—it is interesting that He says in all three Synoptic Gospels, “Learn the lesson of the fig tree.”
There are those who feel, because Luke in Luke 21, when he records it—and Luke is not afraid to put in a commentary now and again for our understanding—put it like this: “When you see the fig tree and all the trees putting forth their leaves, know ye that He is nigh, even at the door.”
Some people have said, “You see, Luke was trying to destroy the idea that this fig tree had anything to do with the Jewish people.” But I would say that the way Luke puts it makes it even more emphatic.
Because if he had said, “When you see all the trees putting forth their leaves,” then I would have said, “Ah, Luke is helping us understand this statement of the Lord Jesus.” But he did not say that.
He said there are two things in this fig tree: first of all, the fig tree itself; and secondly, the bursting out of leaves, which is common to all trees. You get it? So we have a twofold significance in this lesson.
Even more interesting, if you are following me: in Mark’s Gospel, chapters 11, 12, and 13—those three chapters cover only the period of two days. Two days. Have you got that clear? Three chapters covering two actual days of time.
On the first of those days, Jesus saw a fig tree, and He acted out a parable over it. Do you remember? He went up to the fig tree. He went through the charade of looking for fruit.
Some people tell us, “Ah, well now, you see, you can tell whether a fig tree is going to bear fruit because it has little buds right where the leaf comes into the stem. If they are there, you know it is going to bear fruit.”
May I tell you something? These are a Spanish form of fig tree which was not known in Israel in the time of Jesus. The fig tree which is common and indigenous to the land of Israel does not have those little nodules next to the stem.
So it is no good trying to excuse the Lord Jesus. People say, “Oh, what a dreadful thing to do. He went over there and He looked at it all and could not find anything to eat, and then He cursed it in a fit of anger.”
Those who are liberals and modernists tell us, “Well, you know, when people are hungry, they get irritable.” Now, this is true. It is down in black and white. It is printed in certain theological books.
“Jesus was a man like the rest of us,” they say. How comforting. “And because He was very hungry at this time”—strange enough, He had only just had breakfast, never mind—“because He was very hungry, He went through the charade of looking through the tree, and then He cursed it in a fit of irritation and anger.”
Do you believe the Lord Jesus is like that? I do not. Do you think the Lord Jesus is as dim as that? I do not. Not the Lord Jesus I know.
As if the Lord Jesus was taken in by the fig tree. When He went over to that fig tree, it was like His school lesson of biology. He acted out a parable on that fig tree. He looked for the fruit. He said, “Can you find any fruit?” Nobody could find any fruit.
The disciples recorded it and put it in for our instruction: “For it was not the season for figs.” In other words, He was doing it deliberately.
Then He said, “No man eat fruit from thee henceforward for ever.” He went into the temple, and do you remember what happened in the temple? He met the authorities in the temple, overturned all the money-changers’ tables, released the doves, led out the oxen, and so on, and caused a tremendous turmoil in the temple.
He made a whip of cords and drove them all out of the temple, saying:
My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations;
But ye have made it a den of robbers.
Then they went back to stay the night in Bethany. The next morning, going over the same path, Peter said, “Master, Rabbi, look! The fig tree has withered from its roots.”
Jesus said it was a matter of faith—not meaning that if you have faith, you can curse fig trees, but meaning that the reason why that tree was fruitless and had withered from its roots was unbelief.
He then went into the temple and had His confrontation with the three major religious and political groups of the nation: first the Herodians, the royal party; then the Sadducees; and then the Pharisees. Do you remember?
It ended with the greatest message of denunciation Jesus ever uttered, those words He concluded with:
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that killeth the prophets, and stoneth them that are sent unto her!
How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!
Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.
For I say unto you, Ye shall not see Me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.
Then He went out of the temple gate, down into the Kidron Valley, and up onto the Mount of Olives. As they went out, the disciples said, “Master, isn’t this an amazing building? They have been building it for forty-three years, and it is still not finished.”
And He said, “Do you see it? Not one stone shall remain upon another in the day of its judgment.”
Down they went into the Kidron, up onto the Mount of Olives, and leaving eight of them somewhere lower down, probably in what we now know as the Garden of Gethsemane in that area, He went right up higher, where He sat down with four of the inner circle: Andrew, Peter, James, and John.
Then they said to Him, “Master, when will these things be? When will this temple be destroyed? And what will be the sign of Your coming and the end of the age?”
Then He began masterfully, in a few words, to describe certain things which can be applied both to the destruction of the temple and the dispersion of the Jewish people, and to the end of the age at the same time.
At the end of it all, He said, “Now learn the parable of the fig tree.” Do you mean to tell me that in those men’s minds, those four disciples’ minds, that fig tree which had been judged the day before, and which Peter had riveted in their attention that morning because it had withered—not from without, but from within; not by a blight, but from something in its roots—that they did not have that in their mind when Jesus said to them, “Now, from the fig tree learn its lesson”?
In other words, the Lord Jesus—please, if you have not followed me thus far, get this point, because at least this will help you—what the Lord Jesus was saying is this: there are two things.
When you see these things I have spoken about—the gospel being preached in all the nations, worldwide persecution, the emergence of the Antichrist, the abomination of desolation standing where it ought not to stand, wars and rumours of wars, kingdom rising against kingdom, nation against nation, famines, not just famines of food but of energy and basic raw materials, earthquakes in many places—when you see all these things, they are like the fig tree bursting into leaves.
But there is a sign which is the confirmation of these other events. Do not be taken in, because there will be wars and rumours of wars all through the thousands of years that lie ahead. There will be earthquakes. There will be famines. There will be persecution. There will be many of these things.
There will be tyrants who may appear to be the Antichrist. Do not be taken in by any of these things, for there is one sign which validates the rest, and that sign is to do with the Jewish people.
When they return to their land, when a sovereign Jewish state re-emerges, then know that, in conjunction with these other signs, the last period of human history has arrived.
One of the reasons why people despise the prophetic word, or ignore the prophetic word, is that all through the years there have been people who plead that their generation is going to see the coming of the Lord. Is that not true? We hear it again and again.
I remember speaking to theological professors and doctors, not so very far from here, on one occasion. They put scorn on it. They said, “Listen, we have heard this.” One of them said, “When I was a boy, we heard this. It has not happened.”
Another one said, “You know, the apostle Paul thought Jesus was coming back, and He did not in his day.” So people say, “But you see, why are they at sea?”
Think for a while. Be honest. Be realistic. When has this world been without war and rumours of war? The only reason we do not know about it is that we never had television and radio. That is right.
When there was an enormous war in the Far East, the people in the Far West did not know anything about it for months, months, months, months. Earthquakes? Famines? These things have been part of human life all through these thousands of years.
There is only one sign which has never been fulfilled in all those two thousand years, and that is this: in the last two millennia, there has never been the recreation of a sovereign Jewish state with Jerusalem as its capital. That has been in this generation.
Now do you begin to understand? It is that sign which is the confirmation of all the others.
In other words, when we have wars and rumours of wars, and earthquakes, and famines, and pestilences, and persecution, and at the same time a sovereign Jewish state emerges amongst the nations of the world, that fig tree which had withered from its roots has now suddenly been resurrected.
It has been, as it were, renewed. Sap has come up into the dead branches, and in a miraculous way leaves have started to come out on the tree. When that happens, know that He is nigh, even at the door.
Well now, dear friends, you see how quickly time goes, especially when I get on this subject. It goes so quickly. But I want just to say three other things that I believe will be of help to you.
You see, Israel is God’s divine time clock. God’s divine time clock.
In other words, I want to tell you, I feel desperately sorry for those Christians who consider this whole matter of Israel as the fulfilment of God’s word to be fanciful nonsense. I feel desperately sorry for them.
They remove from themselves the only means by which we can tell at what hour we are. In every other generation, people could have taken some of these signs and said, “You know, I think the Lord is coming.”
But this matter of the Jewish people in Israel is the one sign which is infallible and validates the rest. By what is happening with the Jewish people, what is happening with Israel, we can tell exactly where we are in God’s divine programme.
Altogether apart from that, those who believe this is nonsense are in error. They remove from themselves a source of tremendous confidence and encouragement in the relevance and accuracy of God’s word.
I have trodden in towns and cities and villages which, for two thousand six hundred—in some cases three thousand—years, have been under the sand, and now are rebuilt and reinhabited with gardens and trees and parks and squares, exactly as God said it would be.
They shall build the old waste cities,
They shall raise up the former desolations,
And they shall repair the waste cities,
The desolations of many generations.
What an encouragement to faith it is.
When God said in Zephaniah 2—and I am not taking you to all these Scriptures because of time—that the remnant of the house of Judah shall lie down in the houses of Ashkelon in the evening, and that the coast of Ashkelon and Ashdod shall be for the remnant of the house of Judah, they shall keep their flocks there and shall possess the land—what a thrill it is to walk into the rebuilt city of Ashkelon and into the main square of Afridar at its heart, and see there in Hebrew, on a stone, the words of Zephaniah the prophet.
For this place of Ashkelon was never inhabited by Jews when they returned from Babylon. They avoided it because it was so Gentile. In the times of the Lord Jesus, He never visited Ashkelon, because Herod the Great was born there, and it was considered to be too pagan and too Gentile, just as He never went into Tiberias, the city, for the same reason.
Now, for the first time in history, in 1957, Ashkelon has been rebuilt as an entirely Jewish city, of some seventy-five to eighty thousand inhabitants. There in its central square, on a rock engraved in Hebrew, are the words of Zephaniah the prophet: “The remnant of the house of Judah shall lie down in the houses of Ashkelon at evening.”
It has been literally fulfilled. It speaks of Ashdod and Ekron, these Philistine cities, becoming Jewish homes, Jewish cities. Ashdod is now the main major port of Israel, a totally Jewish city of one hundred thousand people.
Gath of Goliath’s stone, the great Philistine city, is now the centre of Israeli weaving industry, the textile industry—a totally Jewish city. Ekron is still a small village, but at least it has been rebuilt. The only place that has not got a big Jewish population is Gaza.
These words have been fulfilled.
It is a milestone we have passed. Hear me again: it is a divine milestone that we have passed in the recreation of the Jewish state on May 14, 1948, against all odds.
We have passed a milestone in the divine programme. By this milestone, we can tell where we are. We have now passed irreversibly into the last days of the age. Praise God. It means it will not be long before we see our Messiah face to face.
There is much more I could say on this matter. When I take these many Scriptures, I think of those that you know so well in Isaiah 43, where it says:
Fear not; for I am with thee:
I will bring thy seed from the east,
And gather thee from the west;
I will say to the north, Give up;
And to the south, Keep not back:
Bring My sons from far,
And My daughters from the end of the earth.
You know, they have come from at least eighty-seven different countries of the world, as far apart as New Zealand is from Alaska and Chile is from Siberia. Even from China they have come back. We have whole kibbutzim of Chinese Jews.
They have come back from every part of the earth. For those who say, “Oh, but you must spiritualise these things,” yes, I believe in getting every bit of spiritual value we can. God is gathering His people into one, is He not? From the ends of the earth, He is bringing us into the oneness of the Lord Jesus.
But there is a literal fulfilment too. Let me give you a Scripture in Isaiah 49:12, if you are argumentative:
Lo, these shall come from far;
And, lo, these from the north and from the west;
And these from the land of Sinim.
How do you spiritualise the land of Sinim? I have never heard a message on those from the land of Sinim. And yet it is there in the word of God. Then why is it in the word of God?
Has God sort of gone to sleep for a moment and a little phrase got into the word which ought not to be there, that has no relevance for anybody in any time? “These from the land of Sinim.”
Modernists tell us that it must be something to do with northern Egypt or Phoenicia—that is, Lebanon. Oh, it is nonsense. Gesenius, the great Hebrew Jewish scholar, says, “Sinim: this is China.”
In modern Hebrew, we speak of Sin—that is China; Sinim—that is the Chinese; Sinit is the Chinese language. Any Israeli reading his Bible in Hebrew reads, “And these from the land of the Chinese.”
Do you know how many returned from the land of the Chinese to Israel at its creation? Thirty thousand became Israeli citizens in 1948. They were not, of course, Chinese. Most of them were from Western Europe, but had lived for many centuries in the ports of China. They came back, and the word was literally fulfilled.
In Jeremiah 30:21, it says, “Their prince shall be of themselves, and their ruler shall proceed from the midst of them.” In two thousand years, we have not had Jewish presidents, Jewish kings, Jewish rulers, a Jewish government, or a Jewish army. We have never heard such a thing.
We have always been under foreign kings, foreign rulers, non-Jewish emperors. Always their armies have been non-Jewish. That is where we have always been.
But in this last thirty-five years, we have a Jewish president, a Jewish prime minister, a Jewish cabinet, a Jewish government, a Jewish house of parliament, and a Jewish navy, air force, and army.
You know, in Micah it says, “I will make her that halted a remnant, and her that was cast far off a strong nation.” Israel is only four million people, and yet may I say to you that she has become an amazing little nation that has caught the attention of the whole world.
Open your newspaper: you will find Israel somewhere on the front page. Turn on the television: Israel will be somewhere in the news, even in American news. Turn on the radio: somewhere you will find Israel.
Is it not always so that a Jewish prime minister is coming to see a president of the United States? Quite often, I think. A little nation.
Take that famous debating hall, the United Nations Organisation. It seems to spend most of its time debating this little nation of four million people, with a territory the size of the state of Indiana. What has happened?
Forty years ago there was no Israel. Think: forty years ago there was no Israel. Eighty years ago, people would have laughed themselves silly if you had said, “There is going to be a Jewish state with a Jewish president and a Jewish prime minister, and the whole world will be talking about it.” People would have laughed at you.
Now the miracle has happened in this generation, and this little state has become a strong nation.
It is an amazing thing to me—not something I would personally glory in—but it is an amazing thing to me that the Israeli Defence Forces are third in strength behind the United States and the Soviet Union, greater than the military strength of Britain or France.
We have more tanks than France, Germany, Holland, and Belgium put together. And we have more planes. Of course, you Americans will say, “Well, we supplied them.” But anyway, whether that is so or not, the fact remains that God’s word says, “I will make the afflicted and the lame a strong nation.” It has come to pass.
Well, dear friends, you see our time has gone. I could go on talking and talking. I could talk to you about coincidences—seeming coincidences.
You know, in 1897, Theodore Herzl, at the first Congress of the Zionists, said this: “Today we are here to lay the foundation stone of the structure that will house the Jewish nation.”
In his diary that night, he wrote, “Today I have founded the Jewish state. If I were to say this out loud, it would be greeted with howls of laughter by the whole world. But in five years, perhaps certainly within fifty, the whole world will know it.”
It was exactly fifty years. In November 1947, by a two-thirds majority vote in the United Nations, Israel was recognised as a sovereign state amongst the states of the world. Jubilee—fifty years, jubilee.
What began with an anthem, began with a flag, and began with an ideal—with no territory, no state, no army, and no government—in fifty years, God brought it to pass.
In 1967, the Israeli Defence Forces, in a lightning move, took the old city of Jerusalem and reunited it with the west of Jerusalem. What was happening?
It is an amazing thing. In December 1917, on the eleventh of December, General Allenby of the Allied Forces went into Jerusalem bareheaded to receive the surrender of the Turkish armies. For the first time in seven hundred years, Islam had given up Jerusalem.
Do you know the thrill that went through the great Jewish population of Jerusalem? It is a fallacy that there was only a majority of Jews in Jerusalem in the last few years. Two-thirds of the population was Jewish in 1917.
Do you know the thrill that went through them? Why? Because it happened to be—oh, it was coincidence—it happened to be the first day of Hanukkah.
Hanukkah is the festival of freedom in which we celebrate the great divine deliverance through the Maccabees over the original Antichrist, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, in 165 BC. Can you believe that it happened on that day, after seven hundred years of Islamic domination?
And do you know? Fifty years later—listen, fifty years later—in June 1967, in a lightning move, Jerusalem became Jewish. The year of Jubilee, in which all territory and property returns to its rightful owner.
Is it a coincidence, or is God speaking? Is it another milestone we have passed, so that we know the times of the Gentiles really are over?
On October 6, 1973, a war was launched suddenly upon Israel on two fronts that should have meant the destruction of the Jewish state. In a miraculous intervention of God, Israel was delivered. It was the Yom Kippur War.
I believed at that time—for I was in it and part of it—what I witnessed and what I felt as I saw it all happening before my eyes. I felt in my bones, “We have passed now another milestone. The world will never again be the same.”
I went everywhere telling people, “The world will never be the same.” Many Christian leaders laughed at me. They said, “Do not talk nonsense.”
I do not think people laugh today. The growth of international terrorism, the enormous inflationary spiral, the recessions that the whole free world is staggering from one after another, the deteriorating international situation, the nearness of a global conflict—all these things have started with 1973.
We have passed into an era of oil used as a blackmail weapon, as the gold that the Arab nations have used to pressure the whole world and hold it hostage.
We are in the run-up to far more serious wars and conflicts, in my estimation. Now, there are those who believe we shall not see them; we shall be raptured before that comes. I suspect that we will see them—at least one further world war before—but I may be wrong.
It does not worry me so long as we are all ready. For if we are taken up to be with the Lord, thank God, you can come to me and say, “Brother Lance, you were wrong,” and I shall smile from ear to ear.
But if, by chance, we have to go through another global conflict and we are ready, thank God for that. We are not sleeping as the rest sleep in the night, nor are we drunk as the rest are drunken in the night. We are of the day. We have woken up.
Three milestones, and we have passed them. We know, at least in principle, where we are. We have passed into the last phase of world history.
Dear people of God, let us rise up. Let us not be defeatist. Let us not be negative. Let us not be fearful. Let us rise up and let the Holy Spirit do His work in us and upon us, to make us those that He can use in these days, to bring others to know the Lord Jesus Christ, to build up the body of our Lord Jesus, and to equip us for what lies ahead.
May the Lord help us.
We have been given the word of prophecy as a lamp shining in a dark place, whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, until the day dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts.
Shall we pray?
Heavenly Father, You know just where we are. You know every one of our hearts. You know, Lord, our state of readiness or unreadiness.
Have mercy upon us, Lord. We are so weak, and so dim at times, and so easily misled. Sometimes, Lord, those who misinterpret things—have mercy, Lord, upon us.
In Your wonderful grace, reach every single person. May we be challenged, Lord, simply to put things right.
May we be those, Lord, in whose lives all the issues have been settled, who have surrendered to Yourself in totality, who are being prepared and made ready for the days that lie ahead.
Oh, Lord, may we be energised to build one another up in our most holy faith. May we become functioning members of the body of our Lord Jesus Christ.
May we become a community, wherever we are found as believers, that holds forth the word of life to the dying multitudes around us.
Oh, Heavenly Father, use this time this morning to further Your own interests and fulfil Your own plan for us. We ask it in the name of Jesus. Amen.