Prophecies of Daniel - Prophecies fulfilled, and yet to be fulfilled

Throwing shade on Prophecy

Jul 6, 2017 · by Mark McMillion · In: Daniel videos and texts, Insights

I’m convinced that one of the objects Satan targets the most is prophecy. And it sadly seems that the wicked one has been largely successful in destroying the knowledge of Biblical prophecy in our world today. Bible prophecy is such an incredible, irrefutable and almost tangible proof of the existence of God. So of course Satan and his coworkers will attack the phenomenon of Bible prophecy with a vehemence worthy of its importance in the revelation of God and His Will.

The angel told John in Revelation 19:10, “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” After I was changed from a hardened skeptic and atheist to a surprised believer by the miraculous power of God, it was the existence of Bible prophecy that had one of the most shocking affects on me. Why had I never been told about this?

Why was I not told about this in public school or at least in university? But this only underlined the truth that our present world and most of the systems of this world as we know it now are not operating under the power and guidance of the God of Abraham. Rather, they are operating “according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience.” (Ephesians 2:2)

You talk about conspiracy theories. Try that one. What if I was to tell you that this world as we know it now is held under the power of a dark, imperial universe of hellish spiritual beings? But that the true heir and rightful Lord is in the process of retaking this very earth with plans to restore it to its original ways that He and His spiritual realm have ordained?

You’d say I’ve been reading too much Harry Potter or watching too much “Lord of the Rings” kinds of fantasies. And yet… and yet this is the picture that the Bible has been telling mankind for hundreds and even thousands of years. And fulfilled Bible prophecy has been one of the most sanguine, verifiable proofs of the validity of this that we can find. So of course “the prince of this world” (John 16:11), Satan will do all in his power to try to negate, pooh-pooh, mock and push aside the evidence of Bible prophecy and how it is the overriding narrative of the past and future state of our species and our very earth.

If any of this holds any interest to you, instead of getting into any specifics of individual Bible prophecies here, I offer you to view one or two of the short, illustrated videos I’ve done on the basics of what can be found in the prophecies of the prophets. Much of my life’s work in the last 10 to 15 years has been based around an effort to put into what hopefully are clear, concise videos the pith and essences of Bible prophecy. My aim has been towards those who are new to the subject.

It seems perhaps the second video I did may have turned out better than the first. It’s the one that presents the prophet Daniel’s strange encounter with the head of the super power of his day, Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. And Daniel was perhaps no more than 14 at the time of the event.

But Daniel’s chapter 2 is I believe the simplest entrance point into the world and sphere of prophetic revelation as presented by the God of Abraham. Here’s the link to the Daniel 2 video; I’ve put my heart into trying to make it as intelligible and understandable as possible to those to whom this is all new.

But the first video I did was an attempt to present the phenomenon of Bible prophecy against the backdrop of the history of ancient Israel. I learned a lot in doing this video. And while I believe the content is strong, the narrative is not as compelling as the actual chapters in the Bible that I began to do videos on after this first one. Still, it presents a lot of interesting prophetic Bible verses which have already been fulfilled in history and which might be a surprise to many. Here’s the link to that video.

But, let me tell you, just as sure as darkness fights the light, the powers of unbelief will fight you if you turn your attention towards the prophetic truths of God’s Word. Because those prophetic truths are so strong. They have such an ability to alter your very foundation of the understanding of the world we live in.

If there is a God who has put this whole world into motion and into being, and He has a course along which it is moving, preordained from the beginning by Him, then it so strongly behooves each of us to find out what that overall plan and future is which He has ahead of us all. This is the realm and world of Bible prophecy. Satan hates our having any knowledge of it. I do hope and pray you’ll let God’s Spirit draw you towards His truth which are found in the Words of His prophets. “Believe in the Lord your God, so shall you be established. Believe His prophets, so shall you prosper.” (II Chronicles 20:20)

“Is it not a little one?”

Jun 16, 2017 · by Mark McMillion · In: Angels, Miracles and the spirit world, Basic Christianity, Insights, My past

Jesus said that the very endtime would be like “the days of Lot” (Luke 17:28). So what can we learn from that? Lot had just been rescued and delivered from the fiery judgments of God which He had rained down on Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot, his wife and two daughters had to be led by the hand out of Sodom, being warned by the angels to not even look back. Famously, Lot’s wife did look back and was turned into a pillar of salt. That might be hard to believe but evidently Jesus Christ believed it. See Luke 17:32.

You might think all this would be an incredible shake-up for Lot. My gosh, that guy is going to walk the straight and narrow the rest of his life, no? Evidently not. And it’s a watershed moment in the history of sin when we read what happened next. Lot turned to the angels as they passed by another heathen town of wickedness and said to the angel, “Behold, this city is near to flee unto, and it is a little one. Oh, let me escape thither; is it not a little one? And my soul shall have rest.” (Genesis 19:20)

Folks, you can get the soul out of the worldly satanic system, whether it be Sodom of old or the satanic amalgam of metropolises that now dominate the earth. But just like with Lot, it’s not easy to get the satanic system out of the soul. God had “delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked.” (II Peter 2:7) But was Lot all contrite and trembling before the Lord? Did Lot make a bee line to his Godly uncle Abraham and his family up in the hills and highlands of God, begging to be taken back in like a prequel to the Prodigal son?

Nope, Lot immediately tried to cut a deal with the angels, “reasoning” with them that another little Babylon-like city not far from Sodom would do just fine and he’d really like to get back to some system preserving compromises and worldliness, even after God had just destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah literally right before their eyes.

“Ah,” you say, “this happened 4000 years ago and things are different today.” Really? If you think that, I’ve got some bad news for you. It’s like Jeremiah said, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it?” (Jeremiah 17:9) As difficult as it was to go through, I’m thankful that God made about as plain to me as He could just how hopelessly sinful and lost I was long ago. My own ignorance, my own willful darkness very nearly took my life except for the totally undeserved, almost strange mercy of God who brought light to my soul when I was writhing in the agonies of the afterlife without God.

“Oh, Mark! Why did God do that to you?! Why did He treat you like that? Why does a God of love send us to hell?!!” Sister or brother, you got it wrong there. God doesn’t send us to hell. We send ourselves to hell through our willful, stubborn ignorance and choosing the wrong path, away from the presence of God to live in the presence of our choices which we made against His truth and light.

He didn’t have to plead with the angels to let him go to a new manifestation of the worldly system of his day. Lot could have asked to have a place at his uncle Abraham’s table and to learn more fully of the ways of God as evidently Lot did believe in the Lord. But it’s just like how it is for millions and billions of people: sin does have dominion over them. And except for the mercy of God, sin will and does have dominion over every one of us. Lot was like the Prodigal Son but who never “came to himself” (Luke 15:17). And sadly there are a lot of those it seems.

In the last book in the Bible, we are told of “Babylon the Great”, pictured as a wretched prostitute which sits upon many nations and rules over the kings of the earth. And God says, “Come out of her, My people, that you partake not of her sins or receive of her plagues.” (Revelation 18:4) But God in a sense has been saying that for thousands of years. He even had the angels take Lot and his family out of the Babylon of his day by the hand. And in the last days before the setting up of God’s kingdom on earth, He is going to destroy the final Babylon the Great, this final Sodom and Gomorrah that has now spread across the earth. Whether or not any of His people will get the message and “come out of her” remains to be seen.

We need to acknowledge our sinful nature and ways every single day and pray desperately and sincerely that God will “withhold you from sinning against Me.” (Genesis 20:6) Because as sure as your garden will start turning up weeds if you don’t diligent tend it, your own human heart and nature will rise up against your Christian convictions and character if you don’t daily “keep your heart with all diligence.” (Proverbs 4:23)

“Oh Mark, I’m not going to read your blog posts anymore! I’m going back to Joel Osteen and his lovely wife. They’re so sweet and positive, always encouraging and uplifting, not like you!” Friends, I’m all for being loving, positive and uplifting. But I’m just telling you from extremely hard experience that none of us had better ever get to the place where we forget how much we need the Lord , how much we should be able to say with the Apostle Paul, “Oh wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?!” (Romans 7:24)

Don’t be like Lot. If the Lord has delivered you from your Sodom and Gomorrah, don’t beg the angels to let you off at the next hellish place just down the road so you can continue in the compromised worldliness that is anathema to God’s highest and best in your life. Instead, be like Moses who “forsook Egypt” (Hebrews 11:27) because “he had respect unto the recompense of the reward.” (Hebrews 11:26) What Egypt, Sodom or Babylon is God calling you out of?

The Rapture

Apr 8, 2017 · by Mark McMillion · In: Basic Christianity, The Future and Endtime

One of the most principle beliefs of Christians for 2000 years is that Jesus of Nazareth will return to this world to rule it as the Son of God and God-ordained King of Heaven. This is a clear and essential belief of Bible-based Christianity. In fact, Jesus spoke repeatedly about this and at least two whole chapters, Matthew 24 and Mark 13, are Jesus’ words to His disciples to describe this occasion of His coming and events immediately prior to that.

And the Bible even gets down to some fine details of His return, one of the most famous events being what’s been called “the rapture”. That word is not found in the Bible but it is described in detail by the Apostle Paul, perhaps most clearly in I Thessalonians 4, verses 16 and 17. Speaking of Christ’s return to this world, Paul says, “For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God. And the dead in Christ shall rise first. Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with Him in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord.”

For those who study this subject, a world of questions immediately arise when the Rapture is talked about. “When, where, who, how”? And on and on. But it’s good to pause to remember and establish that, if you’re a believer in the Word of God, at least we shouldn’t be asking “if” this is true or going to happen. It is. Jesus said in John 14, “I go to prepare a place for you… (and)…I will come again…” John 14:1-3.

But with all the huge controversy and even confusion on this subject, it seems wise to try to proceed rather slowly and to find a path on it all by following the Scriptures. As Isaiah said, doctrine must be “line upon line, precept upon precept” (Isaiah 28:10). For me, some of the most certain verses that we can be sure of as accompanying these ones about the Rapture in I Thessalonians are what Paul spoke of in I Corinthians 15.

The Corinthian church evidently had a question about what kind of body we will have in heaven. Here’s what Paul told them about this, very closely echoing what he told the Thessalonians, except in this case focusing more on what kind of body the believers will have in the hereafter. Paul told them, “Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep [die] but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in a twinkling of the eye, at the last trump. For the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall be raised incorruptible. And we shall be changed.” (I Corinthians 15:51 & 52)

These verses are talking about the same event as the ones in I Thessalonians, only looking at a different aspect of that climatic event. You’ll note that in Thessalonians Paul spoke of the Lord’s return “with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God”. Here in I Corinthians he says, “In a moment, in a twinkling of the eye, at the last trump.” It’s curious and noteworthy that this seminal event in the history of mankind is almost invariable linked to something called “the sound of a trumpet”.

And when Jesus Himself spoke of this future moment, He too referred to a trumpet being sounded at the final moment of His return. This event is most clearly spoken of by Jesus in Matthew 24:29-31. In Matthew 24:31 Jesus spoke of Himself, “And He shall send forth His angels with a great sound of a trumpet. And He shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.”

There should be no doubt, from looking to Scripture, that the future event of the return of Jesus is spoken of with certainty and a surprising degree of detail. We do ourselves no service to, in any way, doubt or dispute that this will happen, if we truly look to God’s Word for our lives and the future to come.

But of course there are many, many questions about this future event. Can Jesus return at any moment? Are there any events prophesied in the Word which immediately precede His return? Some even wonder if there is any way this has already happened. Perhaps these questions could be looked at in another post.

But hopefully those of us who believe in Him and in God’s Word can at least agree on this: He said He would return to this earth and the Bible has a number of clear and unambiguous verses which state this and give us understanding of what is to come. Let us at least be of the same mind in agreement on these fundamentals of the subject of Christ’s second coming.

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