God and the
Calendars
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Welcome to this new section! Let's pray together:
Heavenly Father,
Since we began this set of lessons about Bible prophecy, we have studied many periods of
time, many prophetic calendars.
Today, we ask You to show us why these calendars are important for our understanding of
the prophetic message You want to give us.
In the name of Jesus Christ we pray.
Amen.
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2 Peter 3:8
But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the
Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
Many sincere people believe that, since God is not subject to the notion of
time, He doesn't attach any importance to the day and hour the events of our lives take
place on earth.
This lesson will demonstrate that, on the contrary, God has a very precise calendar, on
which the fulfillment of His prophecies is based.
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Genesis 1:14
Then God said,
«Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens to divide the day from the night;
and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years.»
1 Corinthians 14:33
For God is not the author of confusion.
First, the Bible says that God is orderly.
Out of His infinite wisdom, He established laws and principles so that His creation may
function with harmony and regularity.
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Acts 17:26
[God] has made from one blood every nation of men to
dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the
boundaries of their habitation.
Ecclesiastes 3:1
To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose
under heaven.
The order God established also affects the dimension of time.
The chronology of events is not the result of chance: God intervenes at precise moments in
history, so that His prophetic calendar may be fulfilled.
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2 Thessalonians 2:3,6
Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will
not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of
perdition (...).
And now you know what is restraining, that he may be revealed in his own time.
God's prophetic calendar is not only accurate as to the length of foretold
events, but also as for the order in which they will take place.
So far, our lessons have always attached great importance to the chronological order of
prophecies.
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Galatians 4:4
When the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth
His Son, born of a woman, born under the law.
Mark 1:14,15
Jesus came to Galilee, preaching the gospel of the
kingdom of God, and saying,
«The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand.»
Jesus' life is an excellent illustration of God's calendar.
The Bible often says that the events of His life on earth took place at a precise moment, «when the fullness of the time had come».
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The life of Jesus on earth indeed followed a very precise calendar:
«These words Jesus spoke in the treasury, as He taught
in the temple; and no one laid hands on Him, for His hour had not yet come.» (JOHN 8:20)
«Then Jesus said to them, "My time has not yet come, but your time is always ready.
You go up to this feast. I am not yet going up to this feast, for My time has not yet
fully come."» (JOHN 7:6,8)
«Now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that His hour had come that He
should depart from this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world,
He loved them to the end.» (JOHN 13:1)
«Are you still sleeping and resting? Behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is
being betrayed into the hands of sinners.» (MATTHEW 26:45)
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Acts 1:6,7
«Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to
Israel?»
And He said to them, «It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put
in His own authority.»
Matthew 24:36
But of that day and hour no one knows, no, not even the
angels of heaven, but My Father only.
Just like His first coming, the second coming of Jesus will take place at a
very precise moment, set by the Father and known by Him alone.
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2 Peter 3:9
The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some
count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but
that all should come to repentance.
Ephesians 1:9,10
[God has] made known to us the mystery of His will,
according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Himself, that in the dispensation of
the fullness of the times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which
are in heaven and which are on earth - in Him.
Because of our impatience, we might think the return of Jesus is delayed.
But, in fact, Jesus will return exactly at the appointed moment.
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The Bible is clear: God has set a date for the end of time.
«Look, I am making known to you what shall happen in the
latter time of the indignation; for at the appointed time the end shall be.» (DANIEL
8:19)
«Both these kings' hearts shall be bent on evil, and they shall speak lies at the same
table; but it shall not prosper, for the end will still be at the appointed time.»
(DANIEL 11:27)
«Some of those of understanding shall fall, to refine them, purge them, and make them
white, until the time of the end; because it is still for the appointed time.» (DANIEL
11:35)
«But you, Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many
shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.» (DANIEL 12:4)
«Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those
things which are written in it; for the time is near.» (REVELATION 1:3)
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The day of judgment is also fixed in God's calendar:
«Truly, these times of ignorance God overlooked, but now
commands all men everywhere to repent, because He has appointed a day on which He will
judge the world in righteousness by the Man whom He has ordained. He has given assurance
of this to all by raising Him from the dead.» (ACTS 17:30,31)
«God shall judge the righteous and the wicked, for there shall be a time there for every
purpose and for every work.» (ECCLESIASTES 3:17)
«The nations were angry, and Your wrath has come, and the time of the dead, that they
should be judged, and that You should reward Your servants the prophets and the saints,
and those who fear Your name, small and great, and should destroy those who destroy the
earth.» (REVELATION 11:18)
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Daniel 2:44
In the days of these kings the God of heaven will set up
a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; and the kingdom shall not be left to other
people; it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand
forevert.
Daniel 7:21,22
I was watching; and the same horn was making war against
the saints, and prevailing against them, until the Ancient of Days came, and a judgment
was made in favor of the saints of the Most High, and the time came for the saints to
possess the kingdom.
Finally, God has also set the day when His eternal kingdom is established.
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Jeremiah 25:12
«Then it shall come to pass, when seventy years are
completed, that I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the
Chaldeans, for their iniquity», says the Lord.
Daniel 9:2,3
I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the
years specified by the word of the Lord, given through Jeremiah the prophet, that He would
accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.
Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications.
Daniel, a captive in Babylon, knew the importance of God's calendar.
When he saw that the seventy years of Babylon's domination were about to end, he prayed
God, to remind Him of that promise upon which he depended so much.
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2 Chronicles 36:20-22
Those who escaped from the sword [King Nebuchadnezzar]
carried away to Babylon, where they became servants to him and his sons until the reign of
the kingdom of Persia, to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, (...) to
fulfill seventy years.
Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the Lord spoken by the
mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of
Persia.
After seventy years, God intervened, just as He had promised.
He gave rise to the Medes and Persians, in order to bring about the fall of Babylon.
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Isaiah 60:21,22
Also your people shall all be righteous; they shall
inherit the land forever, the branch of My planting, the work of My hands, that I may be
glorified. A little one shall become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation.
I, the Lord, will hasten it in its time.
Acts 7:17
But when the time of the promise drew near which God had
sworn to Abraham, the people grew and multiplied in Egypt.
God often intervened in history, so that His prophetic calendar might be
fulfilled, according to the promises He had made to His faithful people.
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Daniel 5:26,30,31
«God has numbered your kingdom, and finished it.» (...)
That very night Belshazzar, king of the Chaldeans, was slain. And Darius the Mede received
the kingdom.
Revelation 17:17
For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill His
purpose, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God
are fulfilled.
At the appointed date, God brought about the fall of Babylon.
At the end of times, He will do likewise for spiritual Babylon, the apostate Church.
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John 7:30
Then they sought to take [Jesus]; but no one laid a hand
on Him, because His hour had not yet come.
Proverbs 19:21
There are many plans in a man's heart, nevertheless the
Lord's counsel - that will stand.
We see that, although God gives men freedom of choice and deed, He reserves the
right to intervene at precise moments so that His prophetic calendar may be fulfilled as
planned.
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God's calendar will always have precedence over that of the nations:
«The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing;
He makes the plans of the peoples of no effect. The counsel of the Lord stands forever,
the plans of His heart to all generations.» (PSALM 33:10,11)
«Take counsel together, but it will come to nothing; speak the word, but it will not
stand, for God is with us.» (ISAIAH 8:10)
«[I am] declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not
yet done, saying, "My counsel shall stand, and I will do all My pleasure."»
(ISAIAH 46:10)
«The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord, like the rivers of water; He turns it
wherever He wishes.» (PROVERBS 21:1)
«There are many plans in a man's heart, nevertheless the Lord's counsel - that will
stand.» (PROVERBS 19:21)
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Numbers 23:19
God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man,
that He should repent.
Has He said, and will He not do it? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?
Revelation 9:15
So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour
and day and month and year, were released to kill a third of mankind.
In light of God's unyielding faithfulness toward His prophetic calendar, we
must give it our undivided attention, and thorough study.
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Psalm 102:13
You will arise and have mercy on Zion; for the time to
favor her, yes, the set time, has come.
Luke 21:24
And they will fall by the edge of the sword, and be led
away captive into all nations.
And Jerusalem will be trampled by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.
The study of God's calendar is all the more important since the fulfillment of
the very last prophecies is imminent.
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Revelation 12:12
Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them!
Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and the sea! For the devil has come down to you,
having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time.
Matthew 8:29
Suddenly [the demons] cried out, saying,
«What have we to do with You, Jesus, You Son of God? Have You come here to torment us
before the time?»
Satan and his angels, as for them, know that God's calendar is always accurate,
and that, according to this calendar, they have a very short time left.
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Revelation 10:6,7
[The angel] swore by Him who lives forever and ever, who
created heaven and the things that are in it, the earth and the things that are in it, and
the sea and the things that are in it, that there should be delay no longer, but in the
days of the sounding of the seventh angel, when he is about to sound, the mystery of God
would be finished, as He declared to His servants the prophets.
In fact, very soon «there will be delay no longer».
The seventh trumpet will sound, announcing the long-awaited return of Jesus, our Savior.
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Habakkuk 2:2,3
Then the Lord answered me and said:
«Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it.
For the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not
lie.
Though it tarries, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.»
As we wait for this glorious event, let's work with perseverance in God's
harvest.
If the return of Jesus seems to delay, let's not be discouraged, «for
the vision is yet for an appointed time; but at the end it will speak, and it will not
lie».
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Let's thank God for all His blessings:
Lord God,
This world is definitely soiled with sin in all its forms.
But Your inspired Word teaches us that, in spite of the influence of evil and men's bad
decisions, You have a precise calendar which will be fulfilled exactly as You foretold.
We heartily thank You for not having left us to our sad fate, but offering us salvation in
Jesus Christ.
In His precious name we pray.
Amen.
Source of the Pictures of this Lesson
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SSGP1879.JPG. Screen 2: In: «Photo Gallery 25,000» by Media Graphics
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Association, p.23. Table of Screen 20: First picture: CONVERSE, James.
In: «God Cares, volume 1» (MAXWELL, C. Mervyn), Pacific Press Publishing Association,
1981, p.124. Second picture: «Orion Nebula». In: «Microsoft Encarta 98 Deluxe». Third
picture: «Tree Locust». In: «Microsoft Encarta 98 Deluxe». Screen 21: Photo
by NAZARIO, Steve. In: «CORDmagazine» (Special Edition 2000), Union College, front cover.
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(MAXWELL, Arthur S.), Press Publishing Association, p.333. Screen 25: In:
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The test of Lesson 48 is waiting for you!