Our seven year old grandson was visiting over the weekend and when he came into our home he asked what the square footage of our house was compared to his other grandparent's house....'Gee....I have a lot of other answers that I can give you....but I'm not too good on calculating square footage.' I'm glad he didn't press the issue....I'm lucky I know how many rooms we have.
I would rather he asked something like....'When is Jesus coming back?' I could answer that. I wouldn't even need a calculator....for I could do the math in my head....1948 started the countdown. It gets a little hazy after that but countdowns aren't long.
Charles Spurgeon and J. C. Ryle and other stalwarts knew that Israel had to come back as a nation before Jesus would return. Spurgeon was hoping that it would be soon. It turned out that it was only a decade or so after he preached that that Zionism was taking form.
I think that Hal Lindsey did a great service to the church with his 1970 book The Late Great Planet Earth. I'm sure his book played a part in the revival atmosphere that would sweep over America....and lead to 1976 being known as The Year Of The Evangelical....of which I was one of those shown mercy! Jonathan Cahn's 2011 The Harbinger gave a much needed warning on America's impending judgment. Cahn unfortunately went on to ignore Paul's warning in 1 Timothy 1:4..."not to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations....(Trump as Jehu)....rather than the stewardship of God's work, which is by faith."
I may disagree with many if not most of Lindsey's doctrinal conclusions....and he was wrong in that he thought that Jesus would return before 1988....but his book sold 28 million copies by 1990....and a mid-70s primetime special was watched by 17 million people. I booted up last evening and watched the 1978 docudrama of the same name as the book....narrated by Orson Welles. I wouldn't recommend it....but Hal Lindsey had already served a purpose by drawing attention to the importance of 1948.
It is not conceivable to me that God would reestablish Israel as a state without it being a sign. So what are my qualifications for saying that? Well....let me start with a bit of humor that Billy Graham used while accepting an honorary doctorate. He told of a man who took a hunting trip down South....and when he arrived at the hunting lodge asked the proprietor if they had a hunting dog named Preacher. The proprietor said...."No...no....I don't believe that we have a hunting dog named Preacher." Of which the man responded...."Are you sure....I was told that you had a great hunting dog named Preacher?" The proprietor then said...."Oh yes.....we did have a good hunting dog named Preacher.....and then someone came down here and called him....Doctor....and he ain't been a lick a good since."
So I may not have a doctorate....but then I have something better....I can only name three Pittsburgh Pirates....and I couldn't care less if the Steelers ever win another game. That's a harsh way of putting it....but friends....if you truly realize what went on on Golgotha and in that empty tomb....and fully understand where you were headed for eternity before your heart was regenerated where you could then believe....then how....intellectually and logically speaking....can these pastimes hold the place in our lives that they do? Ask yourself....do you know more about the Steelers...or any other team....or any one of multiple topics....than God's prophetic word to us? This is the age we live in. This is why evangelicalism got sucked in by a false prophet! This is no small thing. This is disaster to the church! Did not Paul write...."No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him."? 2 Timothy 2:4
What has gone on in America and the world in the past nine years....with the pandemic....the aftermath of the pandemic....Trump and Biden....and Putin....and the Sukkot barbarism....rising hatred of the Jews....and the reaction to Israel's response....(folks....proportionally....if there were similar deaths in an attack upon America it would have been forty to fifty thousand)....not to mention artificial intelligence where 2024 has 1984 dystopia written all over it....and a church upon which the words of Jesus seem directed...."when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth".....with all this insanity and more....and full-fledged rebellion to Almighty God....to not believe that surely our Lord and our King and our Savior is already mounted along with his mighty angels....would be laziness at best....blindness due to those things that really interest us....or worse....an outright disdain for Jesus to come back now.
Addendum: I have a stack of R. C. Sproul's monthly Tabletalk magazines going back over thirty years. His....first books and then VHS....and then cassette....and then CD teaching tools were a staple in our home that whole time. He was a Pittsburgher....and his teaching ministry began to grow in Ligonier, Pennsylvania....about an hour SE on the famous Pennsylvania Turnpike. This great teacher was a big Steeler fan....and mentioned the Steelers many times over the years as a teaching tool. This emanated from his view of the Lord's Day....which was one great error in an otherwise extraordinary ministry to the church around the world. I highly recommend a biography on him from Stephen Nichols titled....R. C. Sproul, A Life....but there is something that I want to recommend more....the last sermon that he gave.....on November 26, 2017....eighteen days before he went to be with his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. His voice is raspy in the sermon....the title of which was....A Great Salvation. Steeler fan or no Steeler fan....the emphasis in this his final sermon is on a warning not to neglect so great a salvation! By Googling this you can either listen to it or read the transcript. I've listened at least a dozen times over these few short years....and as I was reading the transcript tonight I could hear his voice.....intonations and all. My point in this post is that this that God has blessed us with is truly....A....Great.....Salvation....to be guarded with all of our mental and spiritual acuities. So it's not....'don't be an NFL fan'....but don't let something as inane as this be the catalyst....for neglecting such a....GREAT SALVATION!
