Rhodes - The End Times in Chronological Order

HARVEST HOUSE PUBLISHERS

EUGENE, OREGON

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Verses marked NIV are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version NIV . Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Verses marked NASB are taken from the New American Standard Bible, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org)

Verses marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

All emphasis in Scripture quotations is added by the author.

Cover photo Fotolia/sdecoret

Cover by Dugan Design Group, Bloomington, Minnesota

THE END TIMES IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

Copyright 2012 by Ron Rhodes

Published by Harvest House Publishers

Eugene, Oregon 97402

www.harvesthousepublishers.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Rhodes, Ron.

The end times in chronological order / Ron Rhodes.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references (p. ).

ISBN 978-0-7369-3778-8 (pbk.)

ISBN 978-0-7369-4263-8 (eBook)

1. BiblePropheciesEnd of the world. 2. End of the worldBiblical teaching. 3. BiblePropheciesChronology. I. Title.

BS649.E63R52 2012

236'.9dc23

2011042310

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, digital, photocopy, recording, or any otherexcept for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

To my son, David

I wish to publicly acknowledge and thank the late Dr. John F. Walvoord, my primary prophecy mentor at Dallas Theological Seminary (DTS) in the 1980s. I also continue to appreciate Dr. J. Dwight Pentecost at DTS for his comprehensive courses on the prophetic books of Daniel and Revelation. The insightful teachings of Walvoord and Pentecost played a significant role in shaping my views on biblical prophecy.

I am also brimming with gratitude for my wife, Kerri, not only for the blessing she is in my life today but also for the blessing she was during my seven years of graduate study at DTS. From the very beginning, she has faithfully stood by me and my work, and I could not have engaged in this life of ministry without her.

Finally, I remain eternally grateful to the Lord for blessing Kerri and me with two wonderful childrenDavid and Kylie, both now grownwhose lives and Christian commitment are never-ending sources of inspiration. Even as I write, David is busy taking seminary courses, and Kylie just returned from missionary work in Ghana.

Praise to the Lord for His many blessings!

T hank you for reading this book. I hope it proves to be a blessing to you!

To get the most out of it, you need to understand its layout. Each chapter deals with the events in a particular time period in Gods prophetic plan, and the chapters are in chronological order. The specific prophetic events within each chapter are also arranged chronologically. The opening page of each chapter lists the events in the chapter, so navigating through the book is easy. The book is designed to be a user-friendly chronological guide to end-times biblical prophecy.

In some cases, the actual chronology of a prophetic event is based more on theological inferences than on explicit biblical statements. In view of this, there is room for some disagreement among Christians regarding the timing of some prophetic events. The chronology expressed in this book is faithful to the biblical text, based on a literal interpretation of prophecy, and held by many devout believers in Gods Word.

My prayer is that this book will help you to understand Gods plan for the ages. I hope it will also help you get excited about Gods Word!

Ron Rhodes
Frisco, TX
2011

We are living in strange times. One very popular and influential authoran Emergent Christiansays we cannot be certain about anything, including such biblical doctrines as prophecy. We should therefore dismiss any concern for such things as evidence, proof, debate, and arguing for one position over another. All is ambiguous, we are told.

As I read this authors book, it struck me that one paragraph after another was brimming with self-defeating arguments. For example, he seemed completely certain that he was correct about his position that we cannot be certain about anything.

He also asserted that there are no good reasons for what we believeand then provided what he considered to be good reasons for holding that there are no good reasons for what we believe. This kind of sloppy thinking is a reflection of our current culture.

In the Scriptures, God has provided everything He wants us to know about Him and how we can have a relationship with Him. God is the one who caused the Bible to be written. Through it He speaks to us today just as He spoke to people in ancient times when its words were first given.

We are to receive the Bible as Gods words to us and revere and obey them as such. As we submit to the Bibles authority, we place ourselves under the authority of the living God.

The Bible is not merely a human productit is God-inspired. Inspiration does not mean simply that the biblical writer felt enthusiastic, like the composer of the Star Spangled Banner. The biblical Greek word for inspiration literally means God-breathed. Because Scripture is breathed out by Godbecause it originates from Himit is true.

Biblical inspiration may be defined as Gods superintending of the human authors so that, using their own individual personalities and even their writing styles, they composed and recorded without error His revelation to humankind in the words of the original manuscripts. In other words, the original documents of the Bible were written by men who were permitted to exercise their own personalities and literary talents but who wrote under the control and guidance of the Holy Spirit, the result being a perfect and errorless recording of the exact message God desired to give to humankind.

Both the Old and New Testaments repeatedly claim to be of divine origin. In Zechariah 7:12, for example, the prophet refers to the law and the words that the L ORD of hosts had sent by his Spirit through the former prophets. This is a claim that the writings (words) of Moses and the Old Testament prophets were of divine origin.

Likewise, in 2 Samuel 23:2, David wrote, The Spirit of the L ORD speaks by me; his word is on my tongue. Both the divine origin and the human instrument of Scripture are mentioned here. The writings came from God but were mediated through a prophet of God.

The apostle Paul in 2 Timothy 3:16-17 likewise affirms that Scripture comes from God: All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. Several things are important in this text. First, Paul refers to all Scripture (the entire Old Testament), which Timothy learned from his Jewish parentage (verse 15). Second, the actual written text has divine authoritythe Scripture (Greek: grapha ). Third, these writings were inspired, or more literally, God-breathed. Finally, they have divine authority for faith and practice. Because they are the Word of God, they are authoritative for the people of God.