Great Tribulation

[Diaste]

18 hours ago, JohnR7 said:

There is nothing cherry picked about the fact that Adam and Jesus were born 4,000 years apart. This is simply an observation. There is nothing cherry picked about the church age being 2,000 years and there is nothing cherry picked about the 1,000 year reign of Christ being 1,000 years in length. "The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with Him for a thousand years." (Revelation 20:7)

""Go tell that fox, 'I will keep on driving out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will reach my goal.'" (Luke 13:32)

"On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance." (Genesis 22:4)

From a distance Abraham saw a time when the Kingdoms of the World will become the Kingdom of God. (Rev 11:15)

16Instead, they were longing for a better country, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them. 17By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac on the altar. He who had received the promises was ready to offer his one and only son, 18even though God had said to him, “Through Isaac your offspring will be reckoned.” 19Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead, and in a sense, he did receive Isaac back from death. (Hebrews 11) 

Again, 

"For in Your sight a thousand years are but a day that passes, or a watch of the night" - Psalm 90

"...or a watch of the night."

I don't care how far apart some person was born from some other person. The psalm says a thousand years is also like a 2-6 hour period of the night.

It can't be both. Therefore a day is not equivalent to 1000 years. Nor is it equivalent to 2-6 hours. Moses is saying God's reckoning of time is not the same as ours. God is eternal and not a slave to time like we are. 

The cherry picking is when the conclusion is a day=1000 years and this part, "...or a watch in the night." is ignored. That just would not fit the narrative. Ergo, cherry picked.

 

 

[Uriah]

3 hours ago, Diaste said:

Again, 

"For in Your sight a thousand years are but a day that passes, or a watch of the night" - Psalm 90

"...or a watch of the night."

I don't care how far apart some person was born from some other person. The psalm says a thousand years is also like a 2-6 hour period of the night.

It can't be both. Therefore a day is not equivalent to 1000 years. Nor is it equivalent to 2-6 hours. Moses is saying God's reckoning of time is not the same as ours. God is eternal and not a slave to time like we are. 

The cherry picking is when the conclusion is a day=1000 years and this part, "...or a watch in the night." is ignored. That just would not fit the narrative. Ergo, cherry picked.

 

 

I concur.  A day with the Lord is as a thousand years. We are not with the Lord just yet. So, here on Earth is still a thousand years.

[JohnR7]

13 hours ago, Diaste said:

The cherry picking

There are 22 Hebrew letters and they all have INFINITE symbolic value. I take a very expository approach to the Bible. Not just one sentence or not just one word but the first letter of the first word has very profound value & meaning when it come to the word of God. This is all about the word DAY and what does the word DAY mean. How do we define this word and more important how does God define this word. First of all a DAY is a literal 24 hour day. But even that is not accurate, a day is ABOUT  about 23 hours, 56 minutes, 4 seconds. There is some wobble and even this is not consistent. Also the days are getting longer. We are told there will be a "perfect" day. Perhaps this is a reference to when a day is a literal exact 24 hour day. 

Then we get into the symbolic meaning of a day. They say that a day in genesis is a literal 24 hours but also a day contains all time and all ages. According to Gerald Schroeder PhD MIT the universe is 13.8 Billion years old. He is OED (old earth creationism) and for him each day is HALF the length of the previous day. Then the Bible lines up with what is known from Science. This is a vast improvement over the day age theory. So the first "DAY" in the Bible is 6.9 billion years, the second day is 3.45 billion years, the third days is 1.75 billion years and so on. 

Next a day is 1,000 years. Again we are looking at the dictionary definition. Then you want to talk about how a DAY is 3 hours. So perhaps you would like to explain the meaning of that scripture: "For in Your sight a thousand years are but a day that passes, or a watch of the night." Notice 1,000 years is symbolically a day. Also 1000 years is symbolically a "watch of the night" or three hours. 

 We know there are four night watches. In the army a night watch is only an hour. I remember having a night watch once and I did not have a watch to know what time it was to wake up the next guy to take over for me. Finally I found some guy that was sleeping and looked at his watch.

As far as the Bible is concerned I do not know what Moses is talking about when he says: "a watch of the night".  I know what a literal night watch is but I do not know the symbolic meaning of this part of the passage.  You want to know so you need to pray and ask God to help you to understand. I can not help you with this right now no matter how many times you ask me to explain to you want this part of the Bible means. 

A study of the Hebrew letters may help us here: the word like a day for the 1,000 years is kə-yō-wm the word for like a night watch is wə-’aš-mū-rāh. As you can see these are TWO different words. One begins with כְּ bet and the other וְ begins with a vav. We have to study the dictionary meaning of these Hebrew words because context is not a very big help to understand their meaning. 

Again the passage is telling us that 1000 years is like a day and like a three hour watch. So 1000 years is also 3 hours, just like 1000 years is a day in the Bible. If we do a study on all the scriptures for a third day that will help us to understand. Or we can do a study on the seventh day. That will give us a lot to work with. 

I have read whole books on how a day is 1,000 years. I could write a whole book on this. So I can go on talking about this as long as you want and still not run out of something to add to the conversation. All of the word of God is infinite. If a letter is infinite then how much more does each word that God speaks have infinite meaning and value. 

וְאַשְׁמוּרָ֥ה

כְּי֣וֹם

Edited September 25, 2020 by JohnR7

[R. Hartono]

On 9/10/2020 at 4:31 AM, JohnR7 said:

 just wonder how the Great Tribulation of 70 AD relates to us today?  There is just not that much in the way of scripture talking about a Great Trib. I know lots of pastors preach lots of stuff but I want scripture and I want to know what the Bible says. 

You failed to see the history of the Hebrew, the Bar Kothba war which took place CA 120 AD was much bigger and took much more victims of the Hebrew n the Roman soldier n this is what caused the Hebrew dispersed from Israel.

[Diaste]

On 9/25/2020 at 4:24 PM, JohnR7 said:

 

Next a day is 1,000 years. Again we are looking at the dictionary definition. Then you want to talk about how a DAY is 3 hours. So perhaps you would like to explain the meaning of that scripture: "For in Your sight a thousand years are but a day that passes, or a watch of the night." Notice 1,000 years is symbolically a day. Also 1000 years is symbolically a "watch of the night" or three hours. 

 We know there are four night watches. In the army a night watch is only an hour. I remember having a night watch once and I did not have a watch to know what time it was to wake up the next guy to take over for me. Finally I found some guy that was sleeping and looked at his watch.

As far as the Bible is concerned I do not know what Moses is talking about when he says: "a watch of the night".  I know what a literal night watch is but I do not know the symbolic meaning of this part of the passage.  You want to know so you need to pray and ask God to help you to understand. I can not help you with this right now no matter how many times you ask me to explain to you want this part of the Bible means. 

A hundred authors could write 10 thousand books and we still rely on this as truth. "What if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God’s faithfulness? Certainly not! Let God be true and every man a liar."

I don't want to know. I do know. It's simple. Both are true. That means it's neither. A day is NOT 1000 years and a day is NOT a watch in the night. The truth is God is eternal and time as we see it is meaningless to the eternal. Time as in the seasons and the clock is a way of organizing and ordering. God created time. 

"3And God said, “Let there be light,”a and there was light. 4And God saw that the light was good, and He separated the light from the darkness. 5God called the light “day,” and the darkness He called “night.”"

14And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to distinguish between the day and the night, and let them be signs to mark the seasons and days and years. 15And let them serve as lights in the expanse of the sky to shine upon the earth.” And it was so.

16God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night. And He made the stars as well.

17God set these lights in the expanse of the sky to shine upon the earth, 18to preside over the day and the night, and to separate the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good."

If God created time He is outside time, before time, He is not time and affects time and is in control of time. 

Psalm 90 tells us God does not see time as we do. Maybe a day really does equal 1000 years but it's not proven by Psalm 90 nor 2 Peter 3.

Edited September 27, 2020 by Diaste

[JohnR7]

7 hours ago, Diaste said:

A day is NOT 1000 years and a day is NOT a watch in the night.

The point is we have almost 2,000 years of church age behind us. We have 1,000 year reign of Christ before us when we will rule and reign with Christ for 1,000 years. Do you think there is more than a 7 year period of time between the church age and the kingdom age?  As much as people seem to debate the rapture they all seem to agree on a 7 year tribulation period that we seem to be getting very close to. If the virus and the civil unrest is any indication of what is to come. 

There is a group called The Third Day that wrote a lot of songs. There are about five scriptures that talk about a third day. For example: 

 

At that very hour, some Pharisees came to Jesus and told Him, “Leave this place and get away, because Herod wants to kill You.” But Jesus replied, “And He said to them, “Go, tell that fox, ‘Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected.’ Nevertheless, I must keep going today and tomorrow and the next day, for it is not admissible for a prophet to perish outside of Jerusalem. (Luke 13:3132,33) 

We all know the literal meaning of this passage. The question is there a symbolic meaning for the church today?  Does this third day when Jesus is perfected represent the 1,000 year reign of christ that we read about in: Revelation: 20:6 Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection! The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with Him for a thousand years.

I am just doing a Bible study, so you are free to tell me what you think these passages mean. You tell us what you do not believe without bringing anything to the table about what you do believe. So I try to keep the discussion clear for whoever wants to join in. 

The fact remains the Bible is literal, symbolic and numerical. That is the universal accepted view for "Jewish" Rabbi's and for Christians. You can reject Gematria if you want but you would pretty much be the first person I ever talked to that rejects it. So you may want to be careful you do not cause anyone to stumble by saying the Bible does not have a numerical understanding or interpretation. Even though there is very little chance of a misunderstanding because the Bible does have a numerical value.

"And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to distinguish between the day and the night, and let them be signs to mark the seasons and days and years." (Genesis 1:14)  

[Diaste]

13 hours ago, JohnR7 said:

The point is we have almost 2,000 years of church age behind us. We have 1,000 year reign of Christ before us when we will rule and reign with Christ for 1,000 years. Do you think there is more than a 7 year period of time between the church age and the kingdom age?  As much as people seem to debate the rapture they all seem to agree on a 7 year tribulation period that we seem to be getting very close to. If the virus and the civil unrest is any indication of what is to come. 

People believe? That's not the barometer of veracity.

13 hours ago, JohnR7 said:

There is a group called The Third Day that wrote a lot of songs. There are about five scriptures that talk about a third day. For example: 

 

At that very hour, some Pharisees came to Jesus and told Him, “Leave this place and get away, because Herod wants to kill You.” But Jesus replied, “And He said to them, “Go, tell that fox, ‘Behold, I cast out demons and perform cures today and tomorrow, and the third day I shall be perfected.’ Nevertheless, I must keep going today and tomorrow and the next day, for it is not admissible for a prophet to perish outside of Jerusalem. (Luke 13:3132,33) 

I'm pretty sure I said I don't believe in the word of mankind over the word of the Lord. Songs, books, pamphlets, lectures...all weak in the light of the truth of the Lord.

13 hours ago, JohnR7 said:

We all know the literal meaning of this passage. The question is there a symbolic meaning for the church today?  Does this third day when Jesus is perfected represent the 1,000 year reign of christ that we read about in: Revelation: 20:6 Blessed and holy are those who share in the first resurrection! The second death has no power over them, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and will reign with Him for a thousand years.

Doesn't mean 1000 years equates to a day. It could, but there is no proof.

13 hours ago, JohnR7 said:

I am just doing a Bible study, so you are free to tell me what you think these passages mean. You tell us what you do not believe without bringing anything to the table about what you do believe. So I try to keep the discussion clear for whoever wants to join in. 

This sort of disparagement is not convincing. "You tell us what you do not believe without bringing anything to the table about what you do believe." I'm pretty sure you understand I do not hold to the 1000 years=a day from this direct quote;

22 hours ago, Diaste said:

I don't want to know. I do know. It's simple. Both are true. That means it's neither. A day is NOT 1000 years and a day is NOT a watch in the night. The truth is God is eternal and time as we see it is meaningless to the eternal. Time as in the seasons and the clock is a way of organizing and ordering. God created time. 

So whatever your doing is not clear though it feels like gross misrepresentation of what I have clearly stated.

13 hours ago, JohnR7 said:

The fact remains the Bible is literal, symbolic and numerical. That is the universal accepted view for "Jewish" Rabbi's and for Christians. You can reject Gematria if you want but you would pretty much be the first person I ever talked to that rejects it. So you may want to be careful you do not cause anyone to stumble by saying the Bible does not have a numerical understanding or interpretation. Even though there is very little chance of a misunderstanding because the Bible does have a numerical value.

Appealing to the consensus and authority? Facts. There are none to support your argument so you rely on what other people think to make arguments. 

I love the shaming too. That's usually super convincing. "You better not say that or you'll cause others to stumble." You would rather the people believe mankind or God? 

 

 

[JohnR7]

12 hours ago, Diaste said:

I'm pretty sure I said I don't believe in the word of mankind over the word of the Lord.

We are talking about the Bible scriptures that refer to the "third day" and our understanding of those scriptures. This reminds me of what I told a friend today. It is like we have a puzzle with 1,000 pieces. Each individual has a different piece of the puzzle. So people are running around saying your piece looks different than mine.  Some day we will be gathered together and we will understand then how all the different pieces fit together in the puzzle. Peter said we are living stones to be fit and joined together. (1 Peter 2:5) When we are finished then God will gather us together. When the last person comes to a saving knowledge of the truth. In the meantime God is patient not wanting any to perish. (2 Peter 3:9) You will notice I give the scripture I am talking about. In case your understanding of that scripture is different than mine. Again the Bible is literal, symbolic & numerical. If your JUST looking at the literal Bible then you are not going to see the symbolic or numerical meaning of the Bible. 

[JohnR7]

13 hours ago, Diaste said:

So whatever your doing is not clear though it feels like gross misrepresentation of what I have clearly stated.

So you admit then that you are misrepresenting what I am saying. Good to know. It is good to have feedback to know if people understand what I am saying or not. I took four teacher training classes at the Bible college so that is all a part of what they taught us. 

[Retrobyter]

On 9/25/2020 at 6:24 PM, JohnR7 said:

There are 22 Hebrew letters and they all have INFINITE symbolic value. I take a very expository approach to the Bible. Not just one sentence or not just one word but the first letter of the first word has very profound value & meaning when it come to the word of God. This is all about the word DAY and what does the word DAY mean. How do we define this word and more important how does God define this word. First of all a DAY is a literal 24 hour day. But even that is not accurate, a day is ABOUT  about 23 hours, 56 minutes, 4 seconds. There is some wobble and even this is not consistent. Also the days are getting longer. We are told there will be a "perfect" day. Perhaps this is a reference to when a day is a literal exact 24 hour day. 

Shalom, JohnR7.

Sorry, but the 22 letters are just that: 22 letters! They are all consonants in the Hebrew alefbet, and they do NOT "all have INFINITE symbolic value!" They are the names of things and concepts that can be identified by the name of the letters. For instance, the "alef" is a "bull" or an "ox." That's what the word means. The "bet" is a "house." The "gimmel" is a "square." The "dalet" is a "door." The "hei" is a man "rejoicing." The "vav" is a "hook" or a "tent peg." And, the list goes on.

The Hebrew word for day is "yowm." spelled "yud-vav-mem sofit." (The word "sofit" in Hebrew means "ending" and refers to the letter drawn differently at the end of the word.) Its primary meaning is the cycle of darkness and light, from one evening at sundown (defined by the sighting of the first three stars) to the next evening at sundown. "The evening (ereV) and the morning (boqer) were the first day (yowm echad)." (Genesis 1:5)

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Then we get into the symbolic meaning of a day. ...

DON'T go getting into "the symbolic meaning of a day!" Just leave it the way it is! Symbolism is "the path to the dark side" of theology! It gets into the allegorical method of Bible interpretation and that takes one away from the simple grammatical-historical interpretation. Leave it as it is, and you will stay close to how God intended it to be interpreted!

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They say that a day in genesis is a literal 24 hours but also a day contains all time and all ages.

 

Nobody who wants to adhere to the Scriptures says the second part of this sentence! It is just a literal 24-hour day. The ONLY time that will change is when the Messiah comes back in GOD'S glory and His glow LITERALLY will outshine the sun!

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According to Gerald Schroeder PhD MIT the universe is 13.8 Billion years old. He is OED (old earth creationism) and for him each day is HALF the length of the previous day. Then the Bible lines up with what is known from Science. This is a vast improvement over the day age theory. So the first "DAY" in the Bible is 6.9 billion years, the second day is 3.45 billion years, the third days is 1.75 billion years and so on.

Well, what we have here is that Gerald Schroeder has been duped by prior Evolutionists into thinking that these ages are correct. It's still a form of the day-age theory, and it exhibits the same flaws as the day-age theory does.

The first and GREATEST flaw is that we would have a history marked with death BEFORE there was sin in the world. Decay and death are the BY-PRODUCTS of sin! And, the whole Creation groans with those by-products until the Messiah has eliminated death. This theory attempts to ALTER the Scriptures to fit the "facts!"

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 Next a day is 1,000 years. Again we are looking at the dictionary definition. Then you want to talk about how a DAY is 3 hours. So perhaps you would like to explain the meaning of that scripture: "For in Your sight a thousand years are but a day that passes, or a watch of the night." Notice 1,000 years is symbolically a day. Also 1000 years is symbolically a "watch of the night" or three hours. 

When, Yeshua` the Messiah has returned in God's glory (God's BRIGHTNESS), THEN we will have a day that is 1,000 years long. There won't BE a night while He reigns in Old Jerusalem for that thousand years.

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 We know there are four night watches. In the army a night watch is only an hour. I remember having a night watch once and I did not have a watch to know what time it was to wake up the next guy to take over for me. Finally I found some guy that was sleeping and looked at his watch.

As far as the Bible is concerned I do not know what Moses is talking about when he says: "a watch of the night".  I know what a literal night watch is but I do not know the symbolic meaning of this part of the passage.  You want to know so you need to pray and ask God to help you to understand. I can not help you with this right now no matter how many times you ask me to explain to you want this part of the Bible means. 

A "night watch" can be ANY length of time one can stay awake and be on guard so that there's always somebody ready who can wake the others in case of a surprise attack by the enemy. Thus, the night watch can be divided between those who can be trusted to stay awake and alert for whatever time length upon which the leaders decide, and that length of time can be decided by how many reliable troops are in the army.

Thus, we MAY find that there are "four night watches" divided into approximately 3-hour shifts. Furthermore, it would be wise to OVERLAP these watches so as to provide a smooth transition between guards.

 

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A study of the Hebrew letters may help us here: the word like a day for the 1,000 years is kə-yō-wm the word for like a night watch is wə-’aš-mū-rāh. As you can see these are TWO different words. One begins with כְּ bet and the other וְ begins with a vav. We have to study the dictionary meaning of these Hebrew words because context is not a very big help to understand their meaning. 

Sure it is IF you knew Hebrew. The Hebrew word for "day," again, is "yowm" (Strong's H:3117). Prefixes in Hebrew can translate to whole words in English, particularly the connective "vav-," transliterated as "v-," meaning "and," and the prepositional prefixes of "kaf-," "k-," meaning "like" or "as,"  "bet-," "b-," meaning "in," and "lamed-," "l-," meaning "to" or "for." There's also the definite article which is connected as a prefix "hei-," "h-." Thus, "k-yowm," that you have written "kə-yō-wm," means "like a-day" or "as a-day." (Since there's no definite article involved, we can write "A day," as opposed to "THE day.")

The other word you have shown is the word " 'ashmorah" (Strong's H:821) which comes from "shamar" (Strong's H:8104). The word "shamar" means "to watch, guard, keep, protect." With the addition of the feminine ending "-h," one has made this a noun by adding the "alef," " ' ," at the beginning, that means "a watch." When one adds the vav connective (v-), all one has done is add the word "and." The vowel pointing changes with the part of speech.

Something I think you will find very useful are the Hebrew and Greek pages of BibleHub.com. Simply look up a verse, like Exodus 14:24, and click on the "Hebrew" button above the verse. It'll give you the Strong's number, the Hebrew, the English, and the Morphology of the word for each word in that verse! I believe you will pick up on how to use the program very quickly. Having done so, I found the 4th word in the verse is listed as "b'ashmoret," which has added the "b-" prefix, meaning "in," and changes the "-h" feminine suffix to a "-t" (or "-th") suffix to combine with another noun in what is called a "noun construct state." Therefore, the word means "in [the] watch." ("The" is not there, but it can be added because there's only one such watch in a night.)

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Again the passage is telling us that 1000 years is like a day and like a three hour watch. So 1000 years is also 3 hours, just like 1000 years is a day in the Bible. If we do a study on all the scriptures for a third day that will help us to understand. Or we can do a study on the seventh day. That will give us a lot to work with. 

I have read whole books on how a day is 1,000 years. I could write a whole book on this. So I can go on talking about this as long as you want and still not run out of something to add to the conversation. All of the word of God is infinite. If a letter is infinite then how much more does each word that God speaks have infinite meaning and value. 

וְאַשְׁמוּרָ֥ה

כְּי֣וֹם

Yeah, but 1,000 years is like a day and a day is like a thousand years when the Messiah returns and sets up His Kingdom. THAT'S the truth of Scripture. All the rest is fluff that the writers add (without biblical support).

Hope all this helps.

Edited October 4, 2020 by Retrobyter
to change back an "autocorrected" word