Samuel F. B Morse took the words from Numbers 23:23...."What Hath God Wrought....in 1844....in this the first electronic communication over any sizable distance. Those Magnificent Men In Their Flying Machines....to use that movie title....changed the world in 1903....the year which also saw the first World Series....with Pittsburgh being one of the teams....and then also in Pittsburgh....East Pittsburgh to be exact....in November of 1920....atop a Westinghouse building where both of my grandfathers may have been working at the time...for both families were Westinghouse people....the first commercial radio broadcast was the presidential election results between the Harding/Coolidge and Cox/Roosevelt (FDR) tickets.
The world....over a short period of time....had undergone a paradigm change. We are pushing for another paradigm change right now with artificial intelligence....and we will continue until AI pushes humans out of the way to complete that paradigm change.
Oh yes there were world wars in the past century....and probably rumors of wars....if we knew exactly what that phrase meant....but in all of this....the year 1948 was the key....with the start of the greatest paradigm change yet....as Israel miraculously became a nation unto itself once again. John MacArthur correctly stated....sometime in the past...that with Israel established...."God had put the world on notice!" His Second Coming was nigh.
We in the reformed faith....as it is known....tend to focus so much....and rightfully so....on that glorious Nicene Creed....finalized in form in 381 A.D....that we tend to limit God....as if being unchangeable....means that He has no specific timetables....and will not in His perfect will....in due time....remove veils on the end-times.
That Nicene Creed was a rock of doctrinal truth that had to and has to be affirmed even before we look to the Second Coming....for what good would the Second Coming be....if we were not firm in the faith....and secure in our salvation....based on those truths. But we are firm and secure in the knowledge that the blood of Jesus Christ....shed on the cross....on that hill....has paid that which we could not pay!
So we know....or rather we can know if we desire to know....(if helps to know)....that 1948 and Israel was the beginning of the....end of the end. We just did not nor do we now know how long it would be from the beginning of the end....to the end....although we are not totally clueless. It's not going to be a hundred years! That would make no sense in line with how God has worked His perfect timing in the past....as for instance....when the people of Jerusalem were taken captive to Babylon....and then later...in God's perfect timing again....Daniel sees that the captivity will last seventy years!
Personally....(we are allowed opinion are we not....and we are allowed to express our opinion....right or wrong....are we not?)....I think right now that once again....seventy was God's chosen time frame....as 2018 began a tumultuous series of events in which we are tumbling right now as in an electric dryer!
The five books within Psalms....have a chronological progression to them....as O. Palmer Robertson described in his wonderful book....The Flow of the Psalms....Discovering Their Structure and Theology....from Confrontation to Communication to Devastation to Maturation to....where we are today....Psalms 107 to 150....Consummation!
Psalm 117 is the shortest chapter in the entire Bible....
"Oh....praise the LORD....all you Gentiles!....Laud Him....all you peoples! For His merciful kindness is great toward us....and the truth of the LORD endures forever....Praise the LORD!"
Psalm 118....is a Messianic Psalm....just as was the 18th Psalm....followed by Psalm 119....a Torah Psalm....just as was the 19th Psalm! And then comes the....Psalms of Ascents....Psalms 120 to 134....of which we can only speculate the exact meaning....but we should acknowledge this....that the pandemic of 2020 changed the world...and October 7 of 2023....the last day of the Jewish Sukkot....(another pattern that God seems to follow....major events on Jewish feats and fast days)....set this world on fire.
If you don't believe these patterns...that's fine....you may very well be right....but as for me....I'm just....as Tyndale would put it...."a boy that driveth the plow"....but I see these patterns....just as I also saw that....the emperor has no clothes!
We have been given warnings....very specific warnings....for God always warns His people....and they may indeed portend calamities ahead....but they also bring a great visceral hope...an awakening of the hope that we always had by knowing the truth....that Jesus is coming back for His bride....and that bride will be purified in those calamities!
