And the elders of the Jews builded, and they prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. And they builded and finished it, according to the commandment of the God of Israel, and according to the commandment of Cyrus and Darius, and Artaxerxes King of Persia. Ezra 6:14
When a new four-lane highway was completed in New Brunswick, the government of the day determined that the best way to pay for that road was through tolls. So a toll booth was set up on the highway and began to collect tolls. But an election campaign was on the horizon, and the opposition party pledged that, if elected, they would remove the tolls. The opposition party won the election, and promptly removed the tolls; you can’t even tell now where the toll booth once stood. But as economic times keep changing, there is occasional talk about reimposing a toll on that road. That’s the way governments often work, with succeeding administrations overturning the decisions of the former. But when we look at the order of King Cyrus concerning the temple of God in Jerusalem, his successors upheld and sanctioned his decision. That’s because it was also the commandment of God.
We live in a day of dismissal of the Bible’s teaching and prophecy. People don’t care what the Bible has to say about immorality and decency. And they don’t believe what it says about the events outlined in Bible prophecy. But we know that God has not relaxed His moral standards, and has not changed His plans concerning the future of this world. Man’s laws and man’s rejection have nothing to do with what God declares to be true. As far as prophecy is concerned, God’s programme is settled and certain.
While we can’t be certain that the future events outlined in the Bible are in the immediate future, we can get some hint that they may well be near, based on the world conditions around us. We can see the heightening Middle East tensions, the economic conditions that could foreshadow the antichrist’s appearance, and the increased number of natural catastrophes in our world. But you would never find a world leader in any major field – politics, business, academic, or religious – who would accept such a possibility as a Rapture that may be about to occur. Does that negate the likelihood? No. God’s programme is set and His timetable is absolute. Take, for example, the current concern about global warming come climate change and its so-called catastrophic effects on our planet. Do we see anything resembling that in Scripture? I don’t. Unless you do and let me know, I am going to dismiss it as another foolish error of man.
God says it; I believe it; that settles it. -Jim MacIntosh