Jeremiah David - Jesus Final Warning: Hearing Christs voice in the midst of chaos

Jesus
Final
Warning

Jesus
Final
Warning

HEARING THE SAVIORS
VOICE IN THE MIDST OF CHAOS

David Jeremiah

1999 by David Jeremiah.

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from THE NEW KING JAMES VERSION. Copyright 1979, 1980, 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Scripture quotations noted KJV are from the KING JAMES VERSION of the Bible.

Scripture quotations noted MSG are from The Message: The New Testament in Contemporary English. Copyright 1993 by Eugene H. Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

Scripture quotations noted NASB are from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE, Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977. Used by permission.

Scripture quotations noted NIV are from the HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations noted PHILLIPS are from J. B. Phillips: The New Testament in Modern English, Revised Edition. Copyright J. B. Phillips 1958,1960,1972. Used by permission of Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.

Scripture quotations noted TLB are from The Living Bible, Copyright 1971. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Jeremiah, David.
Jesus' final warning: hearing the Savior's voice in the midst of chaos / David Jeremiah.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-8499-1518-X
1. Jesus ChristProphecies. I. Title.
BT370.J47 1999
232.9'54dc21

99-24305
CIP

Dedication

To my father, Dr. James T. Jeremiah who for over sixty years has faithfully proclaimed the Word of God.

Contents

First of all, at the center of my life is my wonderful Savior who gives me life energy and motivation, whose written Word fills my mind and heart with thoughts that I cannot keep to myself.

My wife, Donna, knows my passion to communicate the Word of God and during the long hours in which a book is being created, she not only understands, she cheers me on. This has been her consistent practice for the thirty-six years of our marriage. How blessed I am!

Our team at Shadow Mountain Community Church and at the Turning Point Ministries have also encouraged me. Glenda Parker, my administrative assistant at the church has served me in this capacity for eighteen years and continues to handle the myriads of details that could clutter up my mind and keep me from the uninterrupted periods of study that are the making of messages and books.

Helen Barnhart serves in a similar capacity at Turning Point. She keeps things organized in my office there and her giftedness with the computer saves me hours of time both in preparation of the manuscript and coordination of its publication.

Once again, Steve Halliday and Larry Libby of Crown Media have added their elegant touch to the editing of the manuscript.

Sealy Yates, my personal friend and literary agent, wonderfully represents me to our publishers and faithfully represents them to me as well.

Finally I want to express my appreciation to the people at Word Publishing for their continued confidence and trust. To Ernie Owen, Joey Paul, Lee Gessner, and the rest of the team at Word... thank you for praying for me these last months and for working so hard to make Jesus'Fznal Warning a project that will bring honor and glory to our Lord!

David Jeremiah
April, 1999

One
HEARING THE MASTERS VOICE IN
THE MIDST OF MILLENNIAL MADNESS

At regular intervals throughout world history, fear of what might happen in the future has prompted many individuals to latch onto a particular date and plan some radical action to take on or before that date.

Back in 1843, for example, a New Englander named William Miller came to ardently believe in the imminent return of Jesus Christ. Unfortunately, he began to speculate about the date of that return using some dubious mathematical calculations. He collected mounds of data, analyzed it, and was certain he had made no mistakes. He therefore confidently announced to his followers that on March 21, 1843, Jesus Christ would return to the earth.

Historical records tell us that a comet streaking across the night sky helped to confirm Miller in his delusions. At midnight on the appointed day, his devoted followers donned their ascension robes, trekked into the mountains, and climbed towering trees to get as high as possible so they would have less distance to travel through the air when the Lord returned to take them home.

But the day came and went. The Lord did not return. And the trees became awfully uncomfortable.

And so a dejected band of Millerites trudged home to a late breakfast on March 22, accompanied by the jeers and catcalls of their neighbors and friends. It was a sad and bitter day for these deeply disappointed men and women.

But William Miller was not a man to give up easily. He immediately went back to the Scriptures and found a mistake in his calculations. Why, he had miscounted by one year! So it was that, 365 days later, the Millerites once again robed themselves, climbed trees, and awaited the Lords return.

And once again, they were disappointed.

By this point, the angry Millerites had had enough. You can clean twigs out of your hair and bear vicious mocking for only so long. William Millers followers quickly dwindled to almost nothing. Most of his disciples turned their hearts away from their sincere but deluded leaderand infinitely more tragic, turned their hearts away from God.

To his credit, Miller himself soon repented of his date-setting and publicly admitted he had made a terrible error not merely in his calculations, but in his foolish attempts to name the date of Christs return. But by then, of course, he had demolished his credibility along with the faith of many of his erstwhile followers.

The Story Continues

Our own generation has seen many important dates come and go. The fortieth anniversary of Israels founding as a modern nation occurred in 1988, and that event seemed to spur a number of predictions about the imminent end of the world. Certain individuals insisted that a biblical generation consisted of forty years, then pointed to our Lords prediction in Matthew 24 that He would return before the demise of the generation that saw the rebirth of Israel (Matthew 24:32-34).

Edgar Whisenant picked up on this bit of speculative reasoning and published a little book titled 88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988. He used a peculiar mix of facts about ancient Israels major feasts and data about ancient and modern calendars to conclude that Christ would return that September. His book created a furor of interest and sold 4.5 million copies in this country, plus an unknown number in several foreign language editions. I somehow got on this mans mailing list and received five copies of his book.

But that book is no longer on the shelves of any library. Why not? Because 1988 came and went, and the Lord Jesus did not return.

This obvious and discouraging fact did not deter Whisenant, however. Taking a page from Millers book, Whisenant announced that he had miscalculated by one year and quickly wrote another book, Final Shout, in which he predicted Jesus would return in 1989.

Of course, he was wrong again. (But at least his followers didnt have to yank twigs out of their hair.)