 |
| E. Gillespie |
The Times of the Gentiles
The Two Witnesses
Revelation 11:1-2
1. And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein.
2. But the court which is without the temple leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months.
In this chapter, God is about to take possession of what belongs to Him. The earth is the Lord’s, it was created by Him and for Him - but it has been under Satanic control for more than six thousand years. God gave Adam dominion over all creation and made him dictator of the universe - but! Adam sold out to the devil. God gave him a command which he deliberately disobeyed, thereby losing everything God had entrusted to him. One of these glorious days the second Adam (Christ) will redeem all that the first Adam lost, including the earth and all creation. Today the devil is the prince of the power of the air, he is the god of this age (Ephesians 2:1-3, II Corinthians 4:3,4). One day soon Jesus will personally put the devil into the lake of fire and brimstone, and he will deceive the nations no more. When that day comes, “the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea” (Isaiah 11:9). Revelation 11 describes the beginning of the last three and one-half years of the Great Tribulation. During this time the Gentiles will make their last strong attempt to frustrate God’s plan and purpose. The “times of the Gentiles” began with the captivity of Judah under Nebuchadnezzar (II Chronicles 36:1-7). From that day until May 1948, Jerusalem was under Gentile rule. Today the city is still protected because of Gentile power.
Were it not for America, England, and other free nations, the Communists would take the new state of Israel.
The Arabs next door to Israel hate the Jew as he has never been hated, and were it not for fear of the freedom-loving peoples of earth (and If God would permit it) the Arabs would wipe the Jew from the face of the earth! The “times of the Gentiles” will come to an everlasting end when Jesus comes in power and great glory, and destroys Antichrist and his armies. The account is found in Revelation 19:11-21. Therefore, even an attempt to spiritualize the Jewish people is an attempt to destroy the prophecies of the Bible.
In the last verse in chapter ten, John was informed that he must prophesy again of many peoples, tongues, and nations. As we look into this a bit further, we learn that John begins that ministry in our present chapter.
To prophesy is not merely to foretell events of the future it is also to exercise the functions of a witness for God. All true Bible preachers are prophets in a sense. To declare the message and the will of God, to act as God’s ambassador and mouthpiece, is to fulfill the office of a prophet. Aaron was Moses’ prophet; he was spokesman for Moses because Moses had an impediment of speech. God has always had such witnesses here on earth and He always will have. Every true Christian who witnesses against wickedness, lifts up righteousness, points men and women to the Lamb of God - is a prophet, and after the Rapture of the Church will sit with Jesus as He judges unrighteousness.
“Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world?” (I Corinthians 6:2). Saints have never before judged the world, but they will judge with Jesus, our High Priest and Righteous Judge: “Let the saints be joyful in glory: let them sing aloud upon their beds. Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a twoedged sword In then hand; to execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people; to bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron; to execute upon them the judgment written: This honor have all his saints. . .” (Psalm 149:5-9). Read those verses in your Bible - and see the great honor God has placed upon His children, the true believers. Revelation 11:1 begins with a conjunction: “. . . and” thus connecting this verse with the last verse in chapter ten. John is here beginning the prophecy mentioned in the preceding verse. To John was given a reed like unto a rod, and the Angel said, “Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. But the court which is without the temple, leave out, and measure it not, for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months.” (Forty-two months add up to three and one-half years . . . the last half of Daniel’s seventieth week . . . the part of the Tribulation period known as the GREAT Tribulation.)
These words set forth the initial progress of the actual taking possession of the earth by our victorious Redeemer - the Lord Jesus. Like judgment administrations as a whole, this taking possession of earth is a gradual work which passes through different stages, involving particular times, places, and persons. This is the beginning of the taking-over of all things by the rightful Heir to all things - the Lord Jesus Christ. John was given a reed “like unto a rod.” (We would call it a measuring stick.) It was an instrument used in taking measurements, and it was ten feet long. (Read Ezekiel 40:3 and Zechariah 1:16.) The temple, the altar and the worshippers were included in the measurements.
This suggests that God will preserve and protect the temple, the altar, and those who worship there. Revelation 21:15 tells of an angel with a golden reed measuring the glorified Church - or the Pearly white City. Israel is an earthly people with earthly promises. They have to do with earthly blessings throughout all eternity.
But the Church (the Bride) is a heavenly people with heavenly promises, and will be on display in the heavenlies, showing forth the exceeding riches of God’s grace (Ephesians 2:6). John had been only a spectator until now, but with Israel, his own brethren, in the picture, he becomes the main actor. The Angel instructed him to “Rise and measure.” He is roused into speedy activity by the divine command, and he measures the temple, the altar, and the worshippers as he was instructed to do. When the Jews asked Pilate to release Barabbas and crucify Jesus, they asked that His Blood be upon them and upon their children. God set Israel aside for a season.
He did not cast them away, but gave them up to blindness until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in. Jewish worship ceased, the Christian era began - and will continue until the Rapture, when the Church will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. When true worship is set up again, it will be Jewish worship after the manner of Israel. Believers have no specific place of worship - but the Jew could not worship without the temple. Christians have no temple on earth (I Corinthians 6:19; II Corinthians 6:16). “God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth” (John 4:21-24; Hebrews 10:19-22). The sanctuary above is the only place of worship for true believers. Christian sacrifices are praises to God (Hebrews 13:15, 16).
This is quite different from Jewish worship, both in the past and that which is to come. Both the temple and the altar are essential and imperative to Jewish worship. That is the reason the Jews became so angry when Jesus said, “Destroy this temple and I will raise it up in three days.” He was speaking of His body, but they thought he spoke of the beautiful temple in Jerusalem. The temple will be rebuilt in Jerusalem by the Jews after the Rapture of the Church. The temple has been rebuilt many times, but it will be rebuilt when the Jews construct it after the Rapture. It will be built where the Mosque of Omar now stands. Below is a list of some of the temples that have been destroyed:
1. Solomon’s Temple (I Kings, chapter 7). This temple was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar in 588 B. C.
2. Zerubbabel’s Temple (Ezra 3:12), pillaged and dedicated to the heathen god, Jupiter, by Antiochus Epiphanes, 170 B. C.
3. Herod’s Temple (John 2:20) was very beautiful. Its building was begun in 17 B. C., and it was destroyed by Titus in 70 A. D.
Two future temples:
1. The temple to be rebuilt during the first three and one-half years of the reign of the Antichrist (I Thessalonians 2:4). Judah will then be back in her own land and will rebuild this temple.
2. The Millennial Temple - the temple of Jesus (Acts 15:16). Read Ezekiel 40, and you will find the description of its magnificence.
In I Corinthians 3:16 and 6:19, the body made up of born again, blood-washed believers is called “the temple of God.” Jerusalem is the only city on earth where the temple of stone is divinely sanctioned and honored by the Lord.
In Revelation 11:2 we learn that the Holy City shall be trodden under foot for forty and two months - the last half of the seven years of Tribulation. Jerusalem is the Holy City spoken of throughout the Bible. Read Nehemiah 11:1-18; Isaiah 52:1 and Daniel 9:24. This period is mentioned in Revelation 11:3 and 12:6 as “1,260 days.” In Revelation 12:14 and Daniel 9:27, it is spoken of as “time, times, and half-time.” The statements all refer to the three and one-half years which comprise the last half of the Tribulation period. Bible months having to do with prophecy are always months of thirty days each. There are no twenty-eight-day nor thirty-one day months in Bible prophecy. For 1,260 days, the Gentiles will tread down the people in
Jerusalem as mire in the streets (Isaiah 10:6).
The anti-Christian nations will befriend the Jew during the first half of the reign of the Antichrist - the time of peace when he rides out with a bow but no arrow. However, these same people will turn and in vengeance and horrible terror the Jews “shall be left together unto the fowls of the mountains and the beasts of the earth. The fowls shall summer upon them and all the beasts of the earth shall winter upon them” (Isaiah 18:6). Thus the Gentile enemies will turn loose their fury upon Judah . . . Israel, God’s chosen people.
GOD’S TWO WITNESSES
Revelation 11:3-12
3. And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days, clothed in sackcloth.
4. These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth.
5. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth, out of their mouth and devoureth their enemies: and If any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.
6. These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy: and have power over waters to turn them to blood and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will.
7. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them and shall overcome them, and kill them.
8. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.
9. And they of the people and kindreds and tongues and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves.
10. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another; because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.
11. And after three days and an half the spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them.
12. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them.
We are dealing with Jews in this passage, and Jewish law demanded two witnesses to give competent evidence concerning matters of law, religion, or the dealings of men with one another (Deuteronomy 17:6; 19:15). (You will recall that two angels were in the tomb of Jesus the morning of His resurrection - John 20:12. Two men appeared to the disciples at the Lord’s ascension - Acts 1:10. In Luke 10:1 the seventy were sent out two by two.) So God sends TWO witnesses - and they prophesy exactly 1,260 days - no more, no less. Who are these two witnesses? Bible scholars differ as to their identity. Some say they are Elijah and Enoch, basing their decision on Hebrews 9:27: “ . . . It is appointed unto men once to die.” This leads them to conclude that since Enoch and Elijah were the only two men to leave this world without dying, they must be the two witnesses. But may I remind you that at the Rapture of the Church a great number will ascend to Heaven without dying: I Thessalonians 4:16b-17: “ . . . and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air . . . .” The statement in Hebrews cannot mean every individual - but man as a race.
Personally, I believe Enoch is a type of the New Testament Church when raptured. Enoch lived in the darkest hour just before the judgment of God fell by way of the flood. He walked with God - and one day in that dark hour he went home to be with God - without dying. The Church is living in the darkest hour of man’s history . . . and it will be even darker before we are caught up to meet Jesus in the clouds. Just as Enoch was caught up from this earth into God’s presence, so shall the Church be caught up to meet the Lord in the air (I Thessalonians 4:13-17; I Corinthians 15:50-55). Others believe the witnesses will be Elijah and Moses. Moses had much to do with Israel. He was the one to whom God gave the Law: “The law came by Moses.” He is the only man for whom God ever came down in order to personally supervise his funeral (Deuteronomy 34:6).
I believe that the evidence in harmony with the remainder of Revelation proves that not Enoch, but Moses, was the other witness. There is no question that Elijah was one of these two witnesses. The Old Testament - and also the Lord Jesus Himself - tells us plainly that Elijah will come again before the coming of Jesus in power and great glory. Revelation 11:5 also identifies this prophet of fire. “And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth, and devoureth their enemies: and if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.”
Verse 6 also identifies Elijah: “These have power to shut up heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy: and have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will.” The miracles described in the first part of this verse are certainly characteristic of Elijah, the chief of prophets, who called fire down from Heaven and shut up the heavens so that it rained not for the space of three and one-half years during the reign of wicked Ahab. Elijah appeared to Israel during the darkest day of their spiritual bondage here on earth. The nation departed from the Lord under the reign of Ahab and Jezebel, and God sent Elijah, the mighty prophet of fire, to deliver Israel from spiritual bondage after the same fashion Moses delivered them from physical bondage.
