So bottom line is, Gentiles and Jews who believe in Jesus
Speaker:become part of the Israel of God.
Speaker:They're the ones that are going to be under assault by
Speaker:the devil in the final days.
Speaker:And if we, trust the Lord and he's with us and we believe in him, we follow his word.
Speaker:Our home is the new Jerusalem and the earthly Jerusalem has no role in
Speaker:the book of revelation, not one text.
Speaker:It's just like seven years of tribulation, not one text disappearing Christians,
Speaker:not one text, the Jewish state in the book of revelation, not one text.
Speaker:it's a mammoth, system.
Speaker:of illusion and delusion.
Speaker:Um, uh,
Speaker:How does our understanding of biblical end times shape our daily lives
Speaker:and decision making today on seek, go create the leadership journey.
Speaker:We explore this question with Steve Wahlberg, director of white horse
Speaker:media and author of in time delusions.
Speaker:The Rapture, the Antichrist, Israel, and the End of the World.
Speaker:As a prolific writer and speaker who has graced over 500 radio and TV shows,
Speaker:and even spoken at the Pentagon and U.
Speaker:S.
Speaker:Senate, Steve brings a wealth of knowledge and a unique
Speaker:perspective to our discussion.
Speaker:Join us as we explore how End Times theology not only informs
Speaker:our spiritual outlook, but actively influences our real world engagements.
Speaker:choices, Steve, welcome to seek, go create,
Speaker:Thank you, Tim.
Speaker:I've been looking forward to this interview and now it has arrived.
Speaker:thank you for having me.
Speaker:it is arrived.
Speaker:I will typically do a decent amount of prep, you know, I'll listen to
Speaker:a few things and I'll read a few things, Steve, I may have done
Speaker:more prep for this than I've done for just about any interview I've
Speaker:Well,
Speaker:And, I'll just say this and then I'll dive into my few basic questions.
Speaker:I like to start with, I think it's been my personal journey for
Speaker:about the last year and a half.
Speaker:I have been going down a lot of rabbit holes, a lot of
Speaker:trails and things like that.
Speaker:I love that you came across my desk and I've got your book here.
Speaker:We're going to discuss.
Speaker:I just finished reading it.
Speaker:I will say the last portion, I had to read a little faster than I would
Speaker:typically want to, but we're going to have some good discussions here.
Speaker:But.
Speaker:Steve, before we get started, I'd like to kind of like do an
Speaker:icebreaker question to start off with.
Speaker:and it's really the question that I would ask if you and I were
Speaker:out about out and about on an airplane or something like that.
Speaker:And we bumped into each other, I would say, Hey, Steve, great to meet you.
Speaker:What you do?
Speaker:So if somebody asks you what you do, what's your answer?
Speaker:Yeah, that's a challenging, simple question because I do so many
Speaker:different things, so simple answer.
Speaker:I would tell somebody that I'm a minister.
Speaker:I'm the director of Whitehorse Media.
Speaker:I write books.
Speaker:I give seminars.
Speaker:We have a big YouTube channel.
Speaker:We produce programs and we're all about the Bible and trying to
Speaker:help people find hope and to find Jesus and to have a better life.
Speaker:So that's kind of the, you know, in a nutshell, there's
Speaker:a lot of other moving parts.
Speaker:I'm also a husband and I'm a dad.
Speaker:I'm a gardener.
Speaker:I like my orchard.
Speaker:My apples are just ready to pick off the tree right now.
Speaker:I think I'll wait a little bit more till farther into October, but, um,
Speaker:I do a lot of things, but bottom line is I'm here to help people to
Speaker:know the Bible and to find what I found, which is really, really good.
Speaker:Very nice.
Speaker:You mentioned gardener.
Speaker:My wife is down cleaning out our garden where we spend our summers
Speaker:here in hills is it's today's the day to have the garden cleaned out
Speaker:So picking the last tomatoes on the vines and herbs and things like that.
Speaker:So
Speaker:I did that yesterday.
Speaker:I'm a laborer and I water
Speaker:Yeah, I picked my tomatoes yesterday because my app on
Speaker:my phone said, freeze warning.
Speaker:Time to pull them in so I do want to jump back to that.
Speaker:You know that what you do question What kind of responses do you
Speaker:get from people that might be?
Speaker:Let's say you're not in a church setting or a spiritual setting or anything like
Speaker:that and you respond that way What what are people responding when you say that?
Speaker:it's all across the board.
Speaker:And I don't always say all those things, you know, I'm saying those things to you.
Speaker:I'm a minister and I, try to help people understand the Bible.
Speaker:so it depends.
Speaker:And I'm just curious if you don't mind my asking a question to you.
Speaker:You said that, it's been about a year and a half that you've become
Speaker:interested in end time prophecy.
Speaker:Could you just fill that in a little bit for me?
Speaker:What prompted you?
Speaker:I mean, obviously you're, you know, you look at your mouth the same age as I am.
Speaker:So a year and a half, I've been studying property for 45 years.
Speaker:So what happened to you?
Speaker:We got you interested.
Speaker:Yeah, that, that's actually a great lead in, I think, to the discussion here.
Speaker:my background, I've been a follower of Christ now for 30 plus years in my late
Speaker:twenties, I'm 60, I'm about to be 61.
Speaker:So, and I think you're a couple of years older maybe,
Speaker:65.
Speaker:I do want to.
Speaker:Yeah, I do want to say for anyone just listening to the audio, these
Speaker:are two really handsome, good looking, very youngish looking men
Speaker:that are on this video right here.
Speaker:you.
Speaker:We take good care of ourselves,
Speaker:try.
Speaker:All
Speaker:I grew up in a home that we popped in and out of church just
Speaker:outside of the Atlanta area.
Speaker:We popped in and out some, but I wouldn't say it was a deeply spiritual
Speaker:home, but we're in the Bible belt.
Speaker:I vividly remember a book on my parents shelves called The Late Great Planet
Speaker:Earth by a guy named Hal Lindsey that we may discuss a little bit of
Speaker:that theory and all in just a moment.
Speaker:late 80s, got married and, saved, met Jesus Christ, became
Speaker:a follower of Christ, and started going through a good bit of study.
Speaker:And I've been studying the Word since that time, almost on a daily basis.
Speaker:So, it's not as if I know nothing, I always sort of stayed away from
Speaker:that, let's call it the revelation and the end times discussion.
Speaker:Until sometime in the mid 90s, there was these books that came out.
Speaker:that were the left behind books.
Speaker:And, I got those and I read them from cover to cover almost the
Speaker:day they came out until about the seventh or eighth book in.
Speaker:And I realized that in all likelihood, I was just reading a soap opera that
Speaker:had a few scriptures that it was.
Speaker:basing those, those stories on.
Speaker:so I kind of set aside what we will call eschatology or end
Speaker:times still doing a lot of study.
Speaker:I mean, I've done tremendous studies on the kingdom of God.
Speaker:I've gone to Bible school for a few years.
Speaker:I've done a lot of studies, but towards the tail end of last year, I felt as if
Speaker:the Lord was nudging me to understand.
Speaker:He was, there's a word he kept dropping in both my wife and I, that
Speaker:was just more of an eternal mindset.
Speaker:He wanted us to understand an eternal mindset.
Speaker:So, that's kind of what started me on just some studies that
Speaker:were a little bit deeper.
Speaker:There was a lot of things going on in the world that really bothered me
Speaker:what we will term the dispensational theory, that theory that goes back to.
Speaker:we will say, the late great planet earth.
Speaker:And so there were a lot of political things and all of that.
Speaker:So I say all that to kind of lead into kind of my first big question for you.
Speaker:And that is this, there are a lot, I know in just a moment, we're probably
Speaker:going to talk about the three lenses.
Speaker:That's what your book talks about.
Speaker:The three lenses that we can
Speaker:right.
Speaker:I actually, I'm not going to disagree with that, but I believe there's a
Speaker:lot of lenses that we could look at.
Speaker:When we start reading scripture I'll give a few of them and then I'll let you
Speaker:respond and talk a little bit about that.
Speaker:I think we can look at it from the lenses of what I just talked to you about,
Speaker:how I was raised, where I was raised, the country I'm in, things like that.
Speaker:I also am noticing, and this is something that bothers me.
Speaker:A lot of people are reading this with their political lens.
Speaker:putting on their political hat or their politics and they're reading the Bible,
Speaker:attempting to pull scriptures or ideas or theories or whatever related to that.
Speaker:Also our churches denominations and things like that feed into it.
Speaker:I think, and I don't know if this is where you want to go into the three lenses
Speaker:that you talk about, but talk about how.
Speaker:Culture,
Speaker:the world we're in, the country we grew up in, talk a little bit about how those
Speaker:things the discussion of end times.
Speaker:And then maybe we'll go into those lenses that you talk about.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:And, it's, it's interesting that the late great planet earth by how Lindsay was
Speaker:the first Christian book I ever read.
Speaker:So, you know, I can relate to that when I was not even, I
Speaker:was not a Christian in 1979.
Speaker:I was living in the North Hollywood, Hollywood area started to search and
Speaker:that was the first book that I read.
Speaker:you mentioned lenses in my, in my book, end time delusions.
Speaker:I do talk about the three major lenses through which we can understand the book.
Speaker:But your, your point is, is very valid that we all come to
Speaker:the Bible with our own lenses.
Speaker:So there's a lot of other lenses based on how people just view life.
Speaker:you know, people.
Speaker:Depending upon where you live, how you grew up, what you've been taught,
Speaker:there's all kinds of factors, that influence a person's thinking.
Speaker:So from that perspective, there's a lot of different lenses through which
Speaker:people see as they read the Bible.
Speaker:So, yeah, I totally agree with that.
Speaker:that kind of brings up, the one I'd love for you to maybe just talk a little bit
Speaker:more about, and this is not, I want to say, I'm not trying to be controversial.
Speaker:We're in an interesting topic, but I think the politics.
Speaker:Of the day are interesting to me with relation to this, and this is going to
Speaker:get into, one of those lenses, which I think you titled the futurist lens, but it
Speaker:appears as if there's quite a few people that are looking at current headlines.
Speaker:They're looking at current people running for office and different things.
Speaker:Things like that, and they're attempting to take scripture to either
Speaker:explain it or justify their beliefs.
Speaker:I'll say it in that strong way.
Speaker:do you want to say anything about that?
Speaker:I don't know when this releases.
Speaker:It could be releasing close to the time of election in the United States.
Speaker:You know, I'm not really wanting to come out and speak much on that, but just
Speaker:what, what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker:Especially someone who's been around this for 40 plus years.
Speaker:the political lens is very real.
Speaker:People look at.
Speaker:At politics, or at the Bible through the eyes of their political preferences.
Speaker:so there's, you know, there's lots of different views.
Speaker:the idea of Christian nationalism, you know, that's a whole other topic.
Speaker:People look at revelation through those eyes, look at
Speaker:the Bible through those eyes.
Speaker:People, there's just all kinds of eyes.
Speaker:I think you've heard, you've heard the, the expression,
Speaker:they're kind of technical terms.
Speaker:When I was in the seminary, I learned these things.
Speaker:I don't use these words a lot, but there's what's called exegesis and iso Jesus.
Speaker:And exegesis is actually bringing out what's in the text.
Speaker:What does the Bible say?
Speaker:And I see Jesus is where you read, you read into the text
Speaker:what you want it to say.
Speaker:And so I think we all.
Speaker:Whatever our backgrounds, we all need to make a conscious effort to put our own
Speaker:preconceived ideas, our own biases, our own, you know, background perceptions and
Speaker:lay those aside and then say, Lord, you teach me and the principle of humility.
Speaker:To me is, is very, very important that we need, we all need to, as the Bible
Speaker:says, humble yourself in the sight of the Lord, and he will lift you up.
Speaker:Jesus said, those who exalt themselves will be humbled.
Speaker:Those who humble themselves will be exalted.
Speaker:And we all need to humble ourselves and say, Lord, give me the Holy
Speaker:Spirit and help me to understand.
Speaker:What you are trying to say in the Bible rather than what I want the Bible to say
Speaker:or what I've been taught, you know, we have to lay aside preconceived opinions
Speaker:and that was the challenge with, with the disciples, even in the time of Jesus,
Speaker:they became followers of Christ, but they had a lot of preconceived ideas
Speaker:that they had been taught by the rabbis.
Speaker:the rabbis see this a whole other topic.
Speaker:they were very religious people.
Speaker:They were committed to the scriptures.
Speaker:And yet they had a certain track of what they thought the Messiah
Speaker:was going to do when he came.
Speaker:They had very definite ideas and they believe Messiah is going to come.
Speaker:He's going to conquer the Romans.
Speaker:The hated Romans, he's going to sit on the throne, in Jerusalem.
Speaker:He's going to rule.
Speaker:He's going to exalt us as the leaders of Israel.
Speaker:And when Jesus came, he didn't fit that sequence.
Speaker:He didn't fit that model.
Speaker:He didn't come to do those things.
Speaker:And so they misinterpreted the scriptures, and Jesus tried to work with them, and
Speaker:even his own disciples had received so many of those ideas that they were in
Speaker:their heads, and it took a long time for Jesus to get those ideas out of their
Speaker:heads, and the rabbis, a lot of them, most of them, just, became set in their ways.
Speaker:And so we also there's the.
Speaker:The principle of pride and opinion and then humbling ourselves and seeing
Speaker:what God actually has to say and it's a journey, you know, we all have a lot to
Speaker:learn and we all have a lot to unlearn.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I.
Speaker:just think to myself at times because my mind, I don't want to say dogmatic,
Speaker:but I can be, I can get to places where I really truly believe I'm right.
Speaker:My wife tells me this often.
Speaker:And, I want to say with, especially even with this topic that we're talking about,
Speaker:that I approach this topic, even with great deal of humility, because there's
Speaker:just a lot here that, I think our lenses can be impacted by, I think the thing I'd
Speaker:love to ask now, Steve, maybe related to that, I know, you were born into a Jewish
Speaker:family going to ask you to talk just a little bit more about that, but I'd love
Speaker:for you to kind of give a little bit of your background and maybe as you're doing
Speaker:it, talk a little bit about, Possibly some of those paradigms or lenses maybe that
Speaker:you've had to work through over the years that you've now done your study and all
Speaker:of that because I'm sure kind of like me.
Speaker:I grew up in the bible belt I've had to kind of push some of those aside So I
Speaker:guess this is my way of saying tell me a little bit more about your background
Speaker:But as you're doing it some of the things hurdles you've had to overcome
Speaker:related to You know some of the lenses or paradigms you needed to push through
Speaker:Yeah, it's interesting that when my background.
Speaker:Well, let me back up.
Speaker:As you mentioned, I'm Jewish.
Speaker:I come from a Jewish home in Southern California in the Hollywood Hills.
Speaker:But our Jewish home was very, very secular.
Speaker:We were really cultural Jews.
Speaker:So there was no religion.
Speaker:There was no prayer.
Speaker:There was no Bible study.
Speaker:I did not grow up learning the story of Noah or Moses or David.
Speaker:I knew nothing about those things.
Speaker:So we didn't go to synagogue.
Speaker:We didn't go to church.
Speaker:We kept Hanukkah and Christmas, which was great because I'd
Speaker:get presents on both days.
Speaker:And that was about the extent of my Judaism.
Speaker:You know, it was Passover with some friends, neighbors, we'd celebrate
Speaker:Passover, but it was all just a Jewish cultural thing, lox, cream
Speaker:cheese, bagels, but there was no spiritual relationship with God.
Speaker:So when I.
Speaker:Entered my teen years.
Speaker:I got lost in the world of drugs and wild living and the rock
Speaker:and roll concerts in the 70s.
Speaker:And that was just what my friends did.
Speaker:So that's what I did.
Speaker:And then when I was 19 or 20, I started feeling a need for something in my life.
Speaker:And I began to run into Christians who began to plant seeds saying,
Speaker:Hey, you need to read the Bible.
Speaker:So I started, I picked up a Bible and started reading it.
Speaker:And at that point, I really didn't have a lot to I didn't have a
Speaker:major lens to give up because I was pretty much a blank slate.
Speaker:And so, when I started reading the Bible for the 1st time and read, eventually
Speaker:got to the New Testament, read about Jesus as as the Messiah and as the
Speaker:Savior, I didn't have a whole lot of.
Speaker:Judaism inside of me saying Christians or you know, Christians are weird
Speaker:and Jews can't believe in Jesus because that's a different religion.
Speaker:There was none of that.
Speaker:It was just a blank slate.
Speaker:And I just was drawn to Jesus, especially seeing him suffering in the garden
Speaker:of Gethsemane and then dying on the cross and then rising from the dead.
Speaker:it just, I just realized this is the man that I need in my life.
Speaker:He's got something that I've, I've never seen.
Speaker:So I got on my knees, Asked him to come into my heart and forgive my sins.
Speaker:He did.
Speaker:He changed my life.
Speaker:I began to feel this peace that I'd never known.
Speaker:And that's what launched me into my Christian life, which was like
Speaker:night and day, no more drugs, no more rock and roll, no more parties,
Speaker:no more discos, no more going out at three in the morning and no more
Speaker:hangovers, you know, all that changed.
Speaker:And so, as I began to read the Bible and became a Christian, then I began
Speaker:to, you know, study the Bible more.
Speaker:And then I realized that Jesus.
Speaker:Not only came once in fulfillment of prophecy, but that he was coming
Speaker:back again, and that's what launched me into a study of revelation and
Speaker:prophecy, Daniel revelation, because I wanted to learn more about what's
Speaker:going to happen before he comes again.
Speaker:And when he comes again, and after he comes again.
Speaker:So all of that, those were all factors.
Speaker:And so I think I came into it pretty much with a blank slate.
Speaker:And the more I learned, and I think there's, you know, sometimes you can
Speaker:have a lot of things, ideas in your head.
Speaker:And if they're good ideas, that's good.
Speaker:But if they're not ideas, then you have a lot to unlearn.
Speaker:And it's hard sometimes to give up what we've previously
Speaker:learned, which may not be true.
Speaker:But it's easier if you don't have all those ideas in your
Speaker:head, you have a blank slate.
Speaker:And that was me.
Speaker:So now it's been 45 years, I've been studying the Bible.
Speaker:the Lord has just, he's led me step by step into ministry and seminars, teaching.
Speaker:And now with White Horse Media up in North Idaho, we have a staff here.
Speaker:There's about eight of us.
Speaker:We have a big studio.
Speaker:We have a YouTube channel that's growing rapidly and just a
Speaker:lot of good things happening.
Speaker:it's been a long journey, a lot of ups and downs, but that's
Speaker:kind of the long and short of it.
Speaker:Nice.
Speaker:And well, you did have to give, get all that disco music out of
Speaker:your head that actually could have
Speaker:Yeah, You're right.
Speaker:I had to give up.
Speaker:say, you did say you read that late, great planet earth early
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:probably was
Speaker:All I remember was just the horns and the beasts and the dragon and I
Speaker:really didn't comprehend any of that.
Speaker:So it wasn't like I believed it and then had to give it up.
Speaker:I just didn't really understand it.
Speaker:so would you say that your study of this topic?
Speaker:Was pretty close to started at that time, I mean, a lot of
Speaker:people go through some different,
Speaker:topics when they first come to know the Lord, but you kind
Speaker:of were gravitating towards
Speaker:Right away.
Speaker:It wasn't long.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And like you said, you kind of were nudged.
Speaker:The Lord nudged you.
Speaker:I think that was the word you used to start studying in that times.
Speaker:It was not a nudge for me.
Speaker:It was like, do this.
Speaker:You've got to do this.
Speaker:I'm calling you to do this.
Speaker:And so, I've always felt a calling to study prophecy.
Speaker:and the more I did that, then I realized that there were different views out there.
Speaker:Mm
Speaker:the more I studied things became clearer and clearer and clearer.
Speaker:I think if you get the right, for me, it was a matter of reading the right books.
Speaker:if you read all the wrong books, you may believe them and get off track, but if
Speaker:you get the right books, you can then begin to see and things make sense.
Speaker:Yes,
Speaker:involved with a church or denomination or anything like that?
Speaker:Because I know you also went to seminary, so what seminary did
Speaker:you go to, and are you part of a denominational church or anything, yeah?
Speaker:I went to Andrews University, which is, a Seventh day Adventist, seminary.
Speaker:And in my early days, I bounced around.
Speaker:I went to a lot of different churches.
Speaker:I went to a Baptist church.
Speaker:I went to Methodist church, Calvary Chapel.
Speaker:Knocked on the door of the synagogue trying to talk to the rabbi.
Speaker:He wasn't there that day.
Speaker:So I bounced around and then I turned on a tv set one day and saw an adventist
Speaker:minister He had a program called it is written and he was giving a bible
Speaker:study and it interested me and I thought well I'll check out the adventists.
Speaker:So I went to the adventist church and what they taught To me, it made sense.
Speaker:It was based on the Bible.
Speaker:It fit, especially the idea of the Ten Commandments, because I remember I was
Speaker:very confused at one point, and then when I realized that God wrote Ten
Speaker:Commandments with his own finger on stone, I remember distinctly thinking to
Speaker:myself, I'm very confused about religion at that point, but something tells me
Speaker:if I stick to the Ten Commandments, I'm gonna be on the right track.
Speaker:And then ultimately also if I follow Jesus and make sure that I know he's my savior.
Speaker:I'm saved by his grace.
Speaker:And so anyway, that's basically what happened.
Speaker:and I want to put an exclamation point on that statement you just made, that
Speaker:when we discuss a number of these items here, I do believe they're
Speaker:critical and they're important, but that aspect of Jesus Christ that
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:that what he did on
Speaker:that's right,
Speaker:me,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:everything in the biblical story revolves around that.
Speaker:Me too.
Speaker:And the reason I bring that up, Steve, is I think sometimes with this topic, we
Speaker:can kind of start arguing a few little points one way or the other and forget
Speaker:and lose fact of like, hey, these folks still believe that Christ died for
Speaker:their sins and he's went to the cross.
Speaker:I am okay having discussion, but to remember that.
Speaker:I also want to remember the biblical story.
Speaker:You know, we're moving towards a new heaven and a new earth and a new creation.
Speaker:what we're discussing here are the things between here and there.
Speaker:And
Speaker:right.
Speaker:Is that roughly what we're talking about?
Speaker:Completely.
Speaker:And I want to put my own exclamation point on the cross, because I know in
Speaker:my soul, I mean, the 10 commandments appeal to me because it was something
Speaker:solid that would give me some guidance on What's right and what's wrong.
Speaker:But I also realized completely that I was a sinner and that there's no
Speaker:way that I'm going to save myself.
Speaker:And that and the cross, Gethsemane is what really reached me.
Speaker:And then the cross and Jesus, you know, his suffering for my sins.
Speaker:If it wasn't for Jesus dying on the cross to pay the price for every single sin I've
Speaker:ever committed, I would have no hope, and he is everything to me, you know, looking
Speaker:to Jesus, the author and finisher of your faith, he who believes in him should
Speaker:not perish, but have everlasting life.
Speaker:So the cross is the center of my life.
Speaker:it's the center of everybody that's going to be saved is where, you
Speaker:know, we're not saved by our works, but by grace and we're washed from
Speaker:our sins in the blood of the lamb.
Speaker:and I see that in the book of revelation to a lot of people
Speaker:are scared of revelation.
Speaker:They think, well, it's scary.
Speaker:It's got all these dragons and beasts and plagues and, you know,
Speaker:things that are frightening, but there's so much of the cross.
Speaker:and the lamb and the blood in the book of Revelation, and it gives
Speaker:me, you know, Revelation 1 verse 5 says to him who loved us and washed
Speaker:us from our sins in his own blood.
Speaker:And so, the idea of we're between here and the end, and then the new earth.
Speaker:I totally agree with that.
Speaker:And there's going to be trials ahead of us.
Speaker:but if we have Jesus, and if we, Stick with him.
Speaker:He said, I'm with you always, even to the end of the world.
Speaker:the ultimate hope is on the other side of this, there'll be no more
Speaker:deaths, sorrow, crying, pain.
Speaker:There'll be a new heaven and a new earth.
Speaker:we'll get to be with Jesus forever and with his people.
Speaker:that's what I'm looking forward to.
Speaker:That's what gives me hope.
Speaker:yeah, that's exciting.
Speaker:That's even what I have out on my Bible here is, Revelation 21,
Speaker:22 is that all things made new.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:All right, so we're all on the same page there.
Speaker:I want to go to, and I hadn't planned on doing this, but, it's kind of, The
Speaker:next good step for us is to just talk about why this topic of eschatology
Speaker:or end times is important One of the things I did and I didn't think much
Speaker:about it I was reading your book over the weekend and I just put a picture up.
Speaker:I said, hey i'm interviewing this guy on monday see am I having questions?
Speaker:Well, a few questions came in and a buddy of mine brian from facebook
Speaker:says why Is eschatology important?
Speaker:And so I think I want us to kind of start this next 30, 45 minutes
Speaker:conversation on why is this important?
Speaker:Why does anyone need to know more about this topic?
Speaker:Yeah, good question.
Speaker:And it's interesting.
Speaker:On another interview that I was in, Java with Jen, she put a note on Facebook
Speaker:before I, we got into the interview and she said, you have any questions?
Speaker:And she got a slew of questions.
Speaker:few more too.
Speaker:We might get to some of these, like what's the Antichrist, Rapture, all
Speaker:yeah,
Speaker:if we
Speaker:that's what she asked too.
Speaker:So we might need to do a part two, Tim, maybe a part two.
Speaker:So as far as why this topic is important, it's, it gets down
Speaker:to the basics of who we are.
Speaker:Why we're here, where are we going?
Speaker:And, and as you, I've read a little bit about you, you are a coach,
Speaker:you know, you coach, leaders, entrepreneurs, business people.
Speaker:And of course, anybody that's successful in business, you've
Speaker:got to know where you're going.
Speaker:you've got to have goals.
Speaker:You've got to have that big picture.
Speaker:And so for me, for my life, it's very important on a very practical level to
Speaker:know Who I am, why I'm here and how we got here because Lucifer rebelled originally
Speaker:in heaven, and he was kicked out and what those issues are are important.
Speaker:And then he came down to the earth.
Speaker:He tempted Eve at the tree and what the issues were that
Speaker:he brought up at the tree.
Speaker:And she believed the snake.
Speaker:She was duped.
Speaker:She yielded.
Speaker:She took the fruit, gave it to Adam, Adam ate, and that brought sin into humanity.
Speaker:And so now we're living in a world of sin.
Speaker:And that's what led to the gospel to, to Jesus coming down here,
Speaker:being born in Bethlehem, living a
Speaker:Holy life paying the price for us on the cross, dying,
Speaker:rising again, going to heaven.
Speaker:and he said, I'm going to come back again.
Speaker:I'm going to come again.
Speaker:And so we know that we're living in a sinful world behind us.
Speaker:There was a perfect Garden of Eden ahead of us is the new heaven and the new Earth.
Speaker:We're in the middle of a battle between good and evil.
Speaker:God and Satan, good angels and bad angels, and we're going to eventually
Speaker:get into the final scenes of the final conflict between good and evil.
Speaker:We need to know what those issues are.
Speaker:We need to stand for for Jesus and then we need to have hope that in spite of
Speaker:all the problems in this world, you know, whoever gets into the White House in
Speaker:November and whatever happens to America as far as the, you know, the moral issues,
Speaker:the disintegration of family values.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:We can see all these things all around us, and yet we don't need to be discouraged.
Speaker:By the darkness, because we know that God's control in control, and
Speaker:we know he's still on the throne.
Speaker:We know that at the end, Jesus is going to come.
Speaker:He said, I'm with you always, even to the end of the world, and then there'll
Speaker:be a new heaven and a new earth.
Speaker:bottom line is to have a comprehensive Understanding of the great controversy
Speaker:between Christ and Satan that we are in and how we got into this mess and
Speaker:how God's going to solve this problem.
Speaker:And that we do have hope that love will win.
Speaker:Good will win.
Speaker:Jesus will win.
Speaker:And there'll be the restitution of all things.
Speaker:as it says in Acts 3 verse 21, to me, all of this is very important
Speaker:for me to be able to live my life.
Speaker:Down here and to be able to talk to people who are struggling and who are hurting
Speaker:who may be depressed or potentially suicidal because they see no hope.
Speaker:Everything's dark.
Speaker:They don't see that God loves them.
Speaker:They has a plan for them that Jesus died for them.
Speaker:That love is going to win that.
Speaker:He has a future in store for them that there's a new heaven and a new earth.
Speaker:They have, like you said, I think something like an eternal perspective.
Speaker:You know, we need that eternal perspective, that eternal mindset.
Speaker:Is part of what you could, you know, the word, the technical term eschatology.
Speaker:But to me, I don't use that word a lot.
Speaker:It's just really where we are, what's coming and what's going to
Speaker:happen and how God's going to win.
Speaker:Yeah, kind of a follow up question to that, and it's going to relate to, I've
Speaker:got a lot of questions popping in my head.
Speaker:What is the most fundamental misunderstanding leads people astray?
Speaker:And let me hang that question out there, and I want to add
Speaker:a little bit of a layer to it.
Speaker:One of the things that bothers me a great deal, Steve, I don't like
Speaker:deception, but one of the things that bothers me with what I see on
Speaker:the horizon Is using fear, using,
Speaker:bad stuff's about to happen, things like that, that that's gotten to where
Speaker:that bothers me more than it used to.
Speaker:It's kind of one of the reasons maybe I started the deeper study that I did a year
Speaker:or so back was because I started seeing a lot of things kept popping up in the
Speaker:news and the media about a particular, the dispensational type, approach to this.
Speaker:so I say all that to come back to the question, what's the most fundamental
Speaker:misunderstanding you see that leads people astray related to this topic?
Speaker:There's a lot of misunderstandings.
Speaker:I think probably one of the most fundamental misunderstandings,
Speaker:which is really a simple Bible truth for Christians.
Speaker:We believe Jesus Came.
Speaker:He died on a cross.
Speaker:He was buried and he rose from the dead and he went to heaven.
Speaker:And when he went up in Acts chapter one, the Bible says that he was
Speaker:taken up and the cloud received him out of their sight and the disciples
Speaker:were there watching him go up.
Speaker:And then there were two angels standing by them in white clothes.
Speaker:This is Acts chapter one, and the angel said to the disciples, why
Speaker:are you gazing up into heaven?
Speaker:This same Jesus who?
Speaker:Ascended up that you saw him.
Speaker:He's going to come back again, just as you saw him go up into heaven.
Speaker:And so, to me, it's pretty simple.
Speaker:Jesus, the real Jesus died.
Speaker:He rose, he went up and he's coming back.
Speaker:Now, you would think that would be pretty basic, you know, pretty simple, but.
Speaker:There's a lot of misunderstanding about that.
Speaker:Some people think he's already come in.
Speaker:you know, he's already in the world now.
Speaker:He's already ruling.
Speaker:He's already here.
Speaker:He doesn't need to come back again, literally come down.
Speaker:And then, the Jehovah's Witnesses, you know, they believe he's
Speaker:already come up in up in heaven.
Speaker:Some people think, well, he's, he's already here spiritually.
Speaker:and then there's others that believe that when he does come, nobody's gonna know it.
Speaker:He's gonna come down invisibly and snatch us up and take us to heaven.
Speaker:So there's all kinds of misunderstandings connected to a simple Bible truth that
Speaker:Jesus died, was buried, rose, went to heaven, and he is physically, literally,
Speaker:bodily, Going to come back down with all the angels and power and great glory
Speaker:every I will see him This is a very simple powerful biblical truth and yet a lot of
Speaker:misunderstandings about that simple truth
Speaker:And I think the thing that I've noticed, and I think I had this in my mindset,
Speaker:was this thought of being rescued.
Speaker:Or, heaven minded.
Speaker:Yeah, the end was Jesus is either kind of going to come down, take
Speaker:everybody and we're going to heaven, or, when I die, I'll go to heaven
Speaker:and there'll be an ending event.
Speaker:But as I read Revelation, it seems as if what's happening, there's
Speaker:a new creation that's occurring.
Speaker:Is it here on this earth?
Speaker:is it?
Speaker:In another realm, I think it's a combination of the two.
Speaker:That's my thoughts on it.
Speaker:and I do think that there is a process that'll be gone through
Speaker:that will get to that place.
Speaker:one of the things I've noticed, and I went to Bible school for a few years
Speaker:and I noticed a lot of people this way.
Speaker:really did think that their mindset was they're just punching their
Speaker:heaven ticket while they're here.
Speaker:And they were just going to heaven.
Speaker:That was their thing.
Speaker:And that to me seemed like it created quite a bit of confusion because it
Speaker:doesn't take that whole bigger story.
Speaker:And would you agree with that?
Speaker:Yeah, I do and before I read a text in second peter let me respond to the fear
Speaker:issue You know, you mentioned, yeah, and I've talked to different people
Speaker:about this, and my conviction is that people are afraid of what they don't
Speaker:understand, like a little child that's afraid of the dark, they're scared of
Speaker:the dark, they think there might be a boogeyman in the closet, because they,
Speaker:they're just not, they're not old enough, and they don't understand, there's no
Speaker:boogeyman in the closet, and it's, it's dark, because you just flick the switch,
Speaker:The light switch, it's electricity.
Speaker:and so, but as a child grows older, they, they lose their fear of the
Speaker:dark because they understand more.
Speaker:And it's the same way with Bible prophecy in the book of Revelation.
Speaker:People are afraid of what they don't understand.
Speaker:And the more we learn, the more we understand, the fear goes away and
Speaker:God doesn't want us to live in fear.
Speaker:I mean, Jesus, or what does it say, Paul, I think it's 2nd Timothy 1
Speaker:verse 7 says, God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power
Speaker:and of love and of a sound mind.
Speaker:So I think knowledge and understanding takes away fear.
Speaker:So now what was your, your second question?
Speaker:Did I, Did I miss something?
Speaker:Oh, yes.
Speaker:Yeah, you had a scripture there you were going
Speaker:Yeah, I did.
Speaker:So here, about the new heaven and the new earth, second Peter three
Speaker:verse nine says the Lord is not willing that any should perish, but
Speaker:that all should come to repentance.
Speaker:And that shows us God's heart.
Speaker:He wants to save everybody.
Speaker:He loves everybody.
Speaker:And then verse 10 says, But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the
Speaker:night, in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, the elements
Speaker:shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also, and the works that are therein
Speaker:shall be burned up, seeing then that all these things shall be returned.
Speaker:Dissolved.
Speaker:What manner of persons ought you to be in all holy conversation and godliness,
Speaker:looking for and hastening to the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens
Speaker:being on fire shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat.
Speaker:Nevertheless, we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new
Speaker:earth, wherein dwells righteousness.
Speaker:So to me, I take this at face value.
Speaker:just like in the days of Noah, there was a flood and the water came down.
Speaker:And the whole world was underwater.
Speaker:Sodom and Gomorrah, the fire came down and that was the end of those cities.
Speaker:these verses say that when the day of the Lord comes, he's going to come and the
Speaker:heavens and the earth are going to melt.
Speaker:They're all going to, you know, burn up.
Speaker:but we don't need to be worried about that because God's going to make
Speaker:a new heaven and a new earth and righteousness is going to live there.
Speaker:I believe this and I believe that just like there was a Garden of Eden, so
Speaker:there's going to be a new Eden, a new garden, a new heaven and a new earth.
Speaker:It's going to be real.
Speaker:we're going to see it happen and it's going to be an awesome day.
Speaker:I mean, absolutely awesome.
Speaker:Like when Moses came down from Mount Sinai, that whole mountain was shaking
Speaker:and in the days of Noah, the water came down and Noah and his family
Speaker:and the animals were in the ark.
Speaker:And when Jesus comes back again, nobody's going to miss it.
Speaker:It's not going to be a secret event.
Speaker:We're not going to wonder, where did all the Christians go?
Speaker:It's going to be a big day that the world's going to see.
Speaker:And those who are ready, are going to be with Jesus.
Speaker:And then when he makes the new heavens and the new earth,
Speaker:that's where we're going to live.
Speaker:I accept this at face value,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:So, and, but let's go back to that.
Speaker:How people live, where the fear comes from.
Speaker:I don't know why, just something popped in my mind and, you know, we're right
Speaker:around the, Halloween time of year.
Speaker:I remember growing up again, down in the Bible belt.
Speaker:And there was a church that had what they call tribulation trail
Speaker:as a, like a Halloween thing.
Speaker:And I remember our kids going and just being terrified.
Speaker:Having the heck scared out of them and all of that.
Speaker:But the subtitle to your book that I read in time delusions, there's a
Speaker:few things you bring up these are a few things that came up in question.
Speaker:So I'm going to mention these Steve, I know this is going to be hard, but
Speaker:I would love for us to just maybe say quickly, but I want to hit these sub
Speaker:items because you kind of in your subtitle gave a lot of the hot button items
Speaker:right?
Speaker:The rapture, the antichrist, Israel, and of course the end of the world.
Speaker:But those three are ones that are really, let's just go ahead.
Speaker:Whoever wrote the subtitle here, obviously you reached out and said,
Speaker:okay, this is what people, this is going to get people's attention.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:me just put those out.
Speaker:Cause I do have a couple of questions.
Speaker:I mean, someone asked about the rapture.
Speaker:someone mentioned about the antichrist or a antichrist, the antichrist spirit.
Speaker:There's Marcus Watson too.
Speaker:He's a pastor by the way, down in California.
Speaker:do you, what do you want to share about any of that?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And let me, let me just quickly, if you don't mind, I've got a
Speaker:number of my books here that we've been promoting on these podcasts.
Speaker:Approaching Armageddon is a simple book.
Speaker:I call it Prophecy 101.
Speaker:It doesn't deal with all that information.
Speaker:It just talks about how we can trust the Bible, the signs of the times
Speaker:Jesus is coming and, and good will win.
Speaker:So when we get into end time delusions, this one deals more
Speaker:with the different conflicting.
Speaker:Interpretations of prophecy right now.
Speaker:We have another little book called United States in Bible Prophecy that gives my
Speaker:understanding of the role of America.
Speaker:And by the way, we're offering these three books for free to your callers.
Speaker:People that are watching this, they want to call White Horse Media and
Speaker:say, can I have those books for free?
Speaker:The first 10 callers get the free books because we have a book fund.
Speaker:People have donated that and we want to give Give a lot of these away.
Speaker:So when it comes to end time delusions, that's the book that
Speaker:deals with the three lenses.
Speaker:and those three lenses are basically the Preterist view that says when you
Speaker:read the book of Revelation, almost all of that happened in the time of Nero.
Speaker:Way back in the time of the 1st century.
Speaker:It's all just a 1st century book.
Speaker:That's preterism.
Speaker:And then there's, that's one lens, another glass people, people wear
Speaker:these glasses, which is futurism.
Speaker:And futurism pretty much says that the majority of the book of Revelation is
Speaker:all, in the head of us after we're gone.
Speaker:That's futurism.
Speaker:And then there's historicism, which is the third set of glasses.
Speaker:People read the Bible through the historicist eyes, which says that
Speaker:prophecy has been fulfilled in the past.
Speaker:It's been going on down throughout history, and it's
Speaker:going to climax at the end.
Speaker:those are the glasses that I subscribed to.
Speaker:That was basically the Protestant view.
Speaker:So the futurist eschatology basically says We're all going to disappear
Speaker:and there's going to be seven years of tribulation during that time.
Speaker:The temple will be rebuilt.
Speaker:The antichrist will come.
Speaker:He'll be one charismatic man.
Speaker:He will eventually gather the nations against the Jews, which
Speaker:will be the battle of Armageddon.
Speaker:And then Jesus will come and conquer him and rule from Jerusalem for 1000 years.
Speaker:That's essentially.
Speaker:The futurist doctrine, which is also interwoven with dispensationalism.
Speaker:I don't believe that that's that sequence.
Speaker:I compare it to the rabbis having their sequence that the Messiah is
Speaker:going to come, conquer the Romans, sit on the throne, rule from Jerusalem.
Speaker:It's very, you know, their, their sequences has many
Speaker:parallels to the rabbi sequence.
Speaker:And so my book deals with, well, what does the Bible say about the rapture?
Speaker:What does it say about the tribulation?
Speaker:What does it say about the antichrist?
Speaker:What does it say about, about Israel?
Speaker:And it goes into all those details.
Speaker:And I don't know if, you know, how I can, do you want me to try to give you the,
Speaker:the three minute version of each, each topic, rapture, antichrist into the world?
Speaker:I think, let's do that because correct me if I'm wrong.
Speaker:Maybe it's my observation view.
Speaker:Seems to be extremely popular.
Speaker:Well, yeah.
Speaker:to have permeated.
Speaker:And I know the history of it back to the mid 1800s.
Speaker:If you want to say a word or two and,
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Lindsay's book and the left behind have just really put it into our culture.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:culture period.
Speaker:And so I think that's the one that.
Speaker:probably needs to have the most time spent because it's the
Speaker:one that bothers me the most.
Speaker:And so now having said that, correct me if I'm wrong or why, or is it as many
Speaker:people as I think, do we have any numbers
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:what do you
Speaker:Well, I don't know.
Speaker:We don't have numbers, but it's a lot.
Speaker:And in my book, I have a chapter called the path of the virus.
Speaker:And what it does, if you've read that it traces this sequence of rapture,
Speaker:seven years, future Antichrist.
Speaker:Rebuilt Temple, Armageddon Against the Jews, that sequence really gained
Speaker:steam in the early 1800s with, Edward Irving and then John Nelson Darby.
Speaker:And he and Darby put those ideas into the, which will actually Schofield put,
Speaker:put Darby's ideas into the Schofield reference Bible, which became one of
Speaker:the most popular footnoted Bibles in the early 1900s, which then in America,
Speaker:then worked its way into the seminaries, especially doubt the Dallas Theological
Speaker:Seminary, how Lindsay was a graduate of the Dallas Theological Seminary.
Speaker:He incorporated those ideas, put them into the late great planet earth.
Speaker:Which was a, nonfiction book.
Speaker:And then Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins teamed up and made it into
Speaker:a series of fictitious novels, which is the Left Behind series.
Speaker:And it has become the dominant view that most people believe in.
Speaker:They just think, you know, they accept it.
Speaker:They don't really look carefully at the texts of what the Bible actually says.
Speaker:But, you know, so that's the, that's the theory.
Speaker:as far as the rapture, you know, that's kind of like the Kingpin that gets the
Speaker:sequence started and people interpret second or first Thessalonians four
Speaker:where it says will be caught up and first Corinthians 15 where Paul says
Speaker:in the moment in the twinkling of an eye and Jesus says Matthew 24 he talks
Speaker:about two are in the field one's taken one's left and they interpret these
Speaker:verses to mean Disappearing Christians.
Speaker:We're all just going to vanish the rapture.
Speaker:We're going to be gone.
Speaker:The world's going to wake up and wonder where did they all go?
Speaker:And that'll be the beginning of the seven years.
Speaker:But when you look at those verses carefully, 1st Thessalonians 4, when
Speaker:we're caught up, it says Jesus is going to come down from heaven with a
Speaker:shout, with a voice, with a trumpet.
Speaker:there's a resurrection and we're caught up.
Speaker:It says nothing about disappearing Christians.
Speaker:This is the second coming of Christ.
Speaker:It's a very noisy, loud verse where Jesus comes back.
Speaker:Same with the first Corinthians 15, where Paul says, in a moment in the
Speaker:twinkling of an eye, when you keep reading, it says at the last trumpet
Speaker:for the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised, will be changed.
Speaker:This is a big day.
Speaker:It's not.
Speaker:It's not.
Speaker:It's not a blinking day where people just wonder where'd all the Christians go.
Speaker:That's not what the context is showing.
Speaker:And Matthew 24, when Jesus said, two are in the field, one's taken, one's left.
Speaker:You look at the whole context.
Speaker:He, Jesus just got done talking about Noah's day.
Speaker:He said, as it was in Noah's day, it's going to be the same.
Speaker:When I come, they were eating, drinking, marrying, giving and marriage
Speaker:until the day Noah entered the ark.
Speaker:And then the flood came and took them all away.
Speaker:And then he said, so shall the coming of the son of man be.
Speaker:then two are.
Speaker:in the field.
Speaker:One's taken, one's left.
Speaker:So when is then then is at the second coming, that's going to be just as
Speaker:big and catastrophic like it was in the days of Noah, which is what second
Speaker:Peter said when the day of the Lord comes, the heavens are going to pass
Speaker:away, the earth's going to all that.
Speaker:So my point is, when you really look carefully at the verses that
Speaker:are used to support the rapture theory, it just doesn't hold water.
Speaker:So,
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:no rapture, not in the Bible.
Speaker:no secret rapture or or or disappearing Christians rapture.
Speaker:We are going to be caught up.
Speaker:Paul says we shall be caught up and I certainly believe that we're going
Speaker:to be caught up just like Jesus was taken up, but he didn't disappear.
Speaker:He was taken up and we're going to be caught up.
Speaker:Caught up at the visible loud second coming of Christ.
Speaker:It's interesting that Billy Graham, one of the most respected
Speaker:Christians has ever lived.
Speaker:He wrote a book called answers to life's problems on page 309.
Speaker:I believe it is.
Speaker:He referred to 1st Thessalonians 4 and he said, this is the 2nd coming.
Speaker:This is the second coming of Christ.
Speaker:It's not a disappearing Christians seven years before the second coming.
Speaker:So this whole structure of beliefs is really just not biblical.
Speaker:And if I could just kind of shift quickly to the topic of the Antichrist.
Speaker:We have rapture, tribulation, Antichrist and Israel.
Speaker:Antichrist, and Israel.
Speaker:I want to make one comment about Rapture because this comes up often,
Speaker:and I don't even know if we need to comment, but if that secret Rapture
Speaker:doesn't exist, then the people that get in arguments over pre mid post,
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:a mute point too, right?
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:and then they'll still go back into the, well, are you a pre post middle?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:I'm
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:and my book brings all this out that the argument between pre trib, mid
Speaker:trib, post trib is all based on the assumption that there's a seven year trib.
Speaker:So, pre trib is beginning of the seven years do we go up, middle of the seven
Speaker:years do we go up, end of the seven years do we go up, when do we go up,
Speaker:but the whole thing is based on the assumption that there's a seven year
Speaker:tribulation at all described in the Bible.
Speaker:And the fact is, you can read from Genesis to Revelation,
Speaker:you can look in a concordance.
Speaker:I've got my concordance in the back of this bible.
Speaker:There is no seven year tribulation in the bible.
Speaker:Tribulation is there great tribulations there, but seven year tribulation
Speaker:It's gone and it's really based on a misinterpretation of daniel 9 27, which
Speaker:describes the seven year period and it says He will confirm the covenant
Speaker:with many for one week, which day for years, seven years, and then it says
Speaker:he will cause the sacrifice to cease.
Speaker:And so people interpret this to mean he's the antichrist.
Speaker:He's gonna make a covenant with the Jews.
Speaker:He's gonna stop the sacrifices of the rebuilt temple.
Speaker:That's the way they interpret it.
Speaker:But the text says nothing like that.
Speaker:There's no Antichrist in Daniel 9, 27.
Speaker:There's no rebuilt temple in Daniel 9, 27.
Speaker:the context is it's the 70th week after the 69th week.
Speaker:And the previous two verses talk about the Messiah.
Speaker:It's all about the Messiah and the Messiah.
Speaker:He, the Messiah is the one.
Speaker:Who confirmed the covenant, the new covenant with his disciples.
Speaker:Jesus said, this is my blood of the new covenant shed for many for the forgiveness
Speaker:of sins, quoting Daniel 9 27 and after 3.
Speaker:5 years in the middle of the seven years, he caused the sacrifice to
Speaker:cease by his death on the cross.
Speaker:Matthew Henry is one of the most famous.
Speaker:Bible commentaries in Christian history.
Speaker:And if you go online, you can just open up and say, what did
Speaker:Matthew Henry say about Daniel 927?
Speaker:He didn't say it applied to the antichrist to rebuild temple or
Speaker:future seven years of tribulation.
Speaker:He said he is Jesus Christ and he caused the sacrifice to
Speaker:cease by his death on the cross.
Speaker:So people are picking up Daniel 927, applying it to seven years of tribulation,
Speaker:moving it down to the end of time.
Speaker:Believing in a rapture at the beginning of the seven years and the whole thing, you
Speaker:know It's just like you said when you're reading left behind you realized this is
Speaker:just a lot of fiction With a few bible verses in there and that's the same way
Speaker:futurism is it's a phony eschatology It's not based on scripture and that's what
Speaker:end time delusions really is all about is showing is proving that From the Bible.
Speaker:Yeah, you do a great job.
Speaker:I think if there's anyone that has recognized that they are steeped or
Speaker:they're full of, or whatever words they want to use, some of these words,
Speaker:you know, rapture and when are they going to rebuild that temple so that
Speaker:that's the clock starts and all this kind of stuff, you do a great job of
Speaker:giving history and picking those apart, which then I do want to, I do We had
Speaker:Antichrist, but we also have Israel.
Speaker:So I don't know if this is a good time to bring up Israel because
Speaker:we're in, in the news today
Speaker:I know
Speaker:and all my life, truthfully, Israel has been in the news.
Speaker:What we'll call the nation, not the nation of Israel biblical, but the nation of
Speaker:Israel, like the nation of, South Africa, the nation of whatever has been in the
Speaker:news since, as far as I can remember.
Speaker:And there is a thought by a lot of Christians that all the Jews and
Speaker:with your Jewish background, this is fascinating to have this conversation,
Speaker:that they all need to come back there so that a certain percentage of them
Speaker:be destroyed around the end of time.
Speaker:That's a little bit of my sarcasm coming out, but, Israel.
Speaker:What are we getting wrong about Israel in our current dispensationalism?
Speaker:a lot.
Speaker:We're getting a lot wrong and I definitely and I pray for the people in Lebanon.
Speaker:I pray for the people in Israel and the Gaza Strip.
Speaker:The whole thing is a mess.
Speaker:It's a terrible, terrible, terrible crisis and there's a lot of Bible verses about.
Speaker:war nation rising against nation that we can apply to what's happening over there.
Speaker:But when it comes to the topic of Israel in Bible prophecy, and just in
Speaker:a nutshell, and my book goes into a lot of this, Paul in the New Testament.
Speaker:Describe actually describes two Israels.
Speaker:Just like we have two eyes.
Speaker:We all have two eyes.
Speaker:We have two ears.
Speaker:Paul describes not just one Israel, two Israels in Romans nine six.
Speaker:He said they are not all Israel, which are of Israel.
Speaker:First Corinthians 10 18.
Speaker:He describes Israel after the flesh.
Speaker:And then in Galatians 6, 16, he describes the Israel of
Speaker:God that is centered in Jesus.
Speaker:And in a nutshell, as I mentioned, I was Jewish.
Speaker:And I consider myself now part of Israel back then, but I
Speaker:was Israel after the flesh.
Speaker:I was just the natural descendant of Abraham, but I had no real spiritual life.
Speaker:So when I got on my knees when I was 20 years old and accepted Jesus into my
Speaker:heart and the Holy Spirit came into my life, then I became, I was born again
Speaker:and I became part of the Israel of God.
Speaker:And Paul is very clear in Galatians chapter 3 and chapter 6 that the
Speaker:Israel of God is made up of Jewish people who believe in Jesus.
Speaker:non Jewish people who believe in Jesus.
Speaker:They're all part of the Israel of God.
Speaker:And when you read the book of Revelation, that is the Israel.
Speaker:That is the apocalyptic center of the storm.
Speaker:It's the people of God.
Speaker:They're also called the saints.
Speaker:They're the people that are following Jesus.
Speaker:They follow the lamb wherever he goes.
Speaker:And so.
Speaker:People, what people are doing is they're looking at Israel after the flesh.
Speaker:They're looking at the Jewish state and they're making the Jewish state
Speaker:the center of the, of the end times.
Speaker:And that's a mistake.
Speaker:It's not scriptural.
Speaker:It's not in the book of revelation.
Speaker:Now they're reading certain old Testament texts, which lead them in that direction.
Speaker:But they're not looking at all the New Testament verses
Speaker:in the Book of Revelation.
Speaker:And it's similar to what the rabbis did.
Speaker:The rabbis read the Old Testament text and they said the Messiah is going to
Speaker:conquer the Romans and exalt the Jews.
Speaker:And people are today developing a similar thinking, but they're not
Speaker:filtering everything through Christ.
Speaker:Jesus is very clear that, in John chapter 8, John the Baptist is clear
Speaker:in Matthew chapter 3, John the Baptist told a whole group of Jewish leaders.
Speaker:He said, don't think you can say to yourself, we have Abraham as our
Speaker:father, because God can raise up.
Speaker:Children to Abraham from these stones.
Speaker:And he said, the axis laid to the root of the tree.
Speaker:And if the tree does not bear fruit, it's cut down and thrown into fire.
Speaker:there's no new Testament support for the idea that just because a
Speaker:person is a physical Jew or the state of Israel, or the Jewish state
Speaker:that that they have a claim to, to God's protection in the end times.
Speaker:People are misreading this.
Speaker:The book of Revelation says nothing about earthly Jerusalem.
Speaker:It's all the heavenly Jerusalem.
Speaker:Every single reference to Jerusalem in the book of Revelation.
Speaker:John says, I saw the new Jerusalem coming down from heaven like a
Speaker:bride adorned for her husband.
Speaker:And That's our hope.
Speaker:So bottom line is, Gentiles and Jews who believe in Jesus
Speaker:become part of the Israel of God.
Speaker:They're the ones that are going to be under assault by
Speaker:the devil in the final days.
Speaker:And if we, trust the Lord and he's with us and we believe in him, we follow his word.
Speaker:Our home is the new Jerusalem and the earthly Jerusalem has no role in
Speaker:the book of revelation, not one text.
Speaker:It's just like seven years of tribulation, not one text disappearing Christians,
Speaker:not one text, the Jewish state in the book of revelation, not one text.
Speaker:it's a mammoth, system.
Speaker:of illusion and delusion.
Speaker:Yeah, and and so I Just to kind of say this for someone listening
Speaker:in there's no reason a Christian to start to keep running around
Speaker:looking for the red heifer They're
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:for the temple and all that just stop it.
Speaker:All right, so we've hit two out of the big three
Speaker:Yeah, we got to get the other one.
Speaker:This next one, Antichrist, the Antichrist, Antichrist spirit.
Speaker:let's go ahead and bust that one up a little bit.
Speaker:The Antichrist, Steve, what do you want to say about that?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well, the word Antichrist is used five times in the New Testament.
Speaker:First and second John refers to, the spirit of Antichrist or John
Speaker:said there are many Antichrists.
Speaker:he said they went out from us, 1st John 2, 18 and 19, showing that these many
Speaker:Antichrists were coming out of the church.
Speaker:but then John said, but they are not of us.
Speaker:They came out from us, but they're not of us.
Speaker:So there's no support in 1st and 2nd John for one man.
Speaker:being the Antichrist.
Speaker:Now, the prophecies of Daniel Revelation do talk about a little
Speaker:horn that would rise out of the fourth beast, which was the Roman Empire.
Speaker:It does talk about, the man of sin Paul described in second Thessalonians
Speaker:two coming from the falling away.
Speaker:It describes this beast in Revelation 13.
Speaker:It describes the harlot woman riding upon a seven headed beast in Revelation 17.
Speaker:So there's all these symbolisms of something that is Antichrist.
Speaker:During the time of the 1500s, when Martin Luther first started reading a Bible,
Speaker:got a hold of a Bible, first book off the printing press was a Bible, and he began
Speaker:to read the Bible and look at the church, look at the Bible, looked at the church,
Speaker:he realized that the church that he was part of was not following scripture,
Speaker:and he tried to reform the church.
Speaker:And he started spreading the knowledge of scripture and then the church, the
Speaker:head, the leadership in Rome said, if you don't turn away from your crazy ideas,
Speaker:we're going to burn you at the stake.
Speaker:And Luther said, we'll see about that.
Speaker:And so that resulted in the protestant reformation.
Speaker:And there's a famous saying that in the time of the Reformation, the
Speaker:Protestants discovered Jesus Christ and they discovered Antichrist.
Speaker:And it's no secret that if you go back 400 years and go back to Luther, the Lutheran
Speaker:Church, Wesley, the Methodist Church, Calvin, the Presbyterian Church, Spurgeon,
Speaker:the great Baptist pastor in London, it's no secret that they all understood Jesus.
Speaker:The Antichrist of Prophecy to be the Roman Catholic Church system
Speaker:centered in the false authority of the Pope, but that now that doesn't
Speaker:mean that all Catholics are evil
Speaker:But it does mean that there's a system that is pinpointed in
Speaker:prophecy as being Antichrist.
Speaker:And then what happened was the Catholic Church.
Speaker:Countered that with the counter reformation and they commissioned the
Speaker:Jesuit to create different ideas the preterist idea It all happened in the
Speaker:past Nero was the Antichrist in that view and then the futurist idea is that
Speaker:the Antichrist is coming way in the future and then Darby and Schofield They,
Speaker:you know, adapted this idea and made it ultimately, and then you get to how
Speaker:Lindsay left behind that the Antichrist is one man who shows up after we're gone.
Speaker:But that is not Protestant theology.
Speaker:It's not the original Baptist teaching or the Lutherans or the Methodist.
Speaker:They believe that the Antichrist was a system centered in a man.
Speaker:That was leading people away from Jesus Christ and the gospel and
Speaker:grace sola scriptura, only the Bible, only grace, only faith.
Speaker:That was the Protestant, motto and their cry, their battle cry.
Speaker:So all this history is in end time delusions, as you know.
Speaker:And so to me, it's a battle between antichrist
Speaker:Very similar to, and you do a good job of saying this, we're saying anything
Speaker:against, we'll call it the Jewish people, and we're also not saying
Speaker:anything against Catholics in general.
Speaker:It's the leadership.
Speaker:It's the papal Rome.
Speaker:right.
Speaker:I think the thing, I have said this often here.
Speaker:We, our current culture, we're a product of that Greco Roman system that
Speaker:system is playing into a lot of what's rising up that, that we're seeing here.
Speaker:I believe that.
Speaker:We're, I'm watching our time here and we are really pressed.
Speaker:you've studied Revelation quite a bit, and I've recently gone through
Speaker:a study of Revelation in a way that I never had up to that point.
Speaker:What do people need to know about that book, especially
Speaker:people that have avoided it?
Speaker:while you're thinking about that, let me add, there's something else that
Speaker:came in from Marcus that asked the question, again, this guy, he's a pastor
Speaker:too, went to Fuller Seminary down in California, a fellow podcaster also, it
Speaker:might be a good conversation for you.
Speaker:Marcus wanted to know, why do you think John wrote Revelation?
Speaker:when there's a lot of things that revolve around the date of the writing of some of
Speaker:the New Testament, especially as it starts going into that AD 70 type scenario.
Speaker:So maybe those two things, if you could hit those quickly and then talk about
Speaker:do we need to know about Revelation?
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:You
Speaker:We got to have a part too, Tim.
Speaker:So yeah, John wrote the book of 70 AD was when Jerusalem was destroyed.
Speaker:John, according to the most accurate and majority of historical understandings,
Speaker:wrote the book around 96 AD he wrote the book because he had a vision on
Speaker:the Island of Patmos and Revelation chapter one, where Jesus came to him
Speaker:in all of his glory and said, I want you to write down what I'm telling you.
Speaker:So that's why he wrote the book.
Speaker:There's many things in the book of Revelation that we need to understand.
Speaker:Number one, Jesus is the Lord.
Speaker:He's the, he's our great high priest in heaven.
Speaker:He's coming back again.
Speaker:He's going to win in the battle between good and evil.
Speaker:And he wants us to be, to overcome by the blood of the lamb and by the word
Speaker:of our testimony, Revelation 12, 11, he wants us to hold on and, and trust him.
Speaker:And no matter what happens, he's going to bring us through.
Speaker:So all those things are in Revelation.
Speaker:I'd like to just kind of plant a seed, maybe.
Speaker:You know, what you said, what should we know about Revelation?
Speaker:And there's so many other things, but Revelation 13 verse 11 says, I saw
Speaker:another beast coming up out of the earth.
Speaker:He had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon.
Speaker:I've written a whole book on this called the United States in Bible prophecy.
Speaker:This book will give away for free to your, At least the first 10 callers
Speaker:and maybe more who call our office.
Speaker:But I build the case in this book that this verse, a beast, according
Speaker:to Daniel, seven is a nation, just like Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome.
Speaker:This beast comes up out of the earth, which applies to a.
Speaker:sparsely populated area in contrast with the sea, which represents lots
Speaker:of people where Babylon, Persia and Greece came up, comes up out of
Speaker:the earth down near the end times.
Speaker:He has 2 horns, indicating a separation of power.
Speaker:These horns have no crowns, which, like the 1st beast in chapter 13
Speaker:has crowns on his horns, indicating this beast is not ruled by.
Speaker:Kingly power.
Speaker:And then it's two horns like a lamb.
Speaker:It has Christian characteristics.
Speaker:And Jesus also said, give to Caesar what is Caesar's gift to God.
Speaker:What is God's separating the things of government from religion, that
Speaker:government is not to force people to become a certain religion.
Speaker:And then it says, and he spoke as a dragon and I build my case.
Speaker:And I did this at the Pentagon.
Speaker:I was invited to speak at the Pentagon in 2007, one of the most exciting experiences
Speaker:of my life, and I gave a Bible study with PowerPoint slides to a group of people.
Speaker:And I built my case that the only nation on earth that fits this prophecy
Speaker:is the United States of America.
Speaker:And that America is in a transition stage from the lamb to the dragon.
Speaker:And eventually.
Speaker:America is going to speak like a dragon, but the lamb is going to win because
Speaker:he's king of kings and lord of lords, and we're all in a battle between the dragon
Speaker:and the lamb between satan and Jesus.
Speaker:I believe it's very important as we're getting close to the elections that
Speaker:America has a place in Bible prophecy.
Speaker:We are a mighty nation that still has religious freedom.
Speaker:That has Christian principles, but these principles are going to break
Speaker:down and eventually, America is going to speak like a dragon, but Jesus is
Speaker:going to come and conquer the dragon and deliver those who follow the lamb.
Speaker:So I think that's important for us to know.
Speaker:Yeah, that is interesting.
Speaker:I've actually got to get that book because I'm still having trouble making that.
Speaker:I'm having trouble seeing that as America, but.
Speaker:I will study that.
Speaker:So I appreciate you bringing that up.
Speaker:And love that you've been able to discuss this in some powerful circles.
Speaker:So big question.
Speaker:I do want to ask what.
Speaker:Does the average Christian that's listened in with something we've hit
Speaker:pretty quickly, what do they need to do?
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So let's just say the United States is in revelation and we know we've
Speaker:heard about, you know, the rapture Antichrist Israel and how we've
Speaker:got some delusions about that.
Speaker:they need to read your book because you do a great job of really picking that apart
Speaker:even more, but what do they need to do?
Speaker:Well, yeah, we all need to humble ourselves.
Speaker:We need to confess the sins that we're aware of to Jesus, our pride,
Speaker:whatever else we're dealing with.
Speaker:and lay those sins on Christ, who died on the cross for every sin that we've
Speaker:ever committed, who loves us no matter what, who died and rose from the dead,
Speaker:who went to heaven and who's coming back.
Speaker:And so we need to give our lives to Jesus, confess our sins, recommit
Speaker:to following the Bible, every word that comes from the mouth of God
Speaker:and to being his true followers.
Speaker:In these final days that stand up for him and don't buckle in the midst
Speaker:of all the pressures of the world that are pulling us away from Jesus.
Speaker:So that's really the bottom line and try to put aside preconceived
Speaker:opinions and study the Bible.
Speaker:I do believe that my books are valuable to help people study the Bible.
Speaker:White Horse Media has a lot of fantastic resources, but our goal
Speaker:is not to give people our own ideas.
Speaker:Our goal is to direct people to the word of God.
Speaker:So they study the word of God.
Speaker:You know, Jesus said, those who hear my words and do them are like a wise
Speaker:man who built his house on the rock.
Speaker:And when the rain comes, the storms hit and the floods, Blow that house will
Speaker:stand because it's on the rock and those who hear my words, but don't do them
Speaker:They're like a foolish man who builds his house on the sand And when the rain
Speaker:comes down the storm hits the floods beat against that house It's going to
Speaker:fall because it's on the sand and so bottom line What we need to do is we
Speaker:need to build on jesus and the rock and be prepared to stand no matter what
Speaker:Great, great finish.
Speaker:and that helps us avoid what the word delusions here.
Speaker:I love
Speaker:Yes
Speaker:delusions there.
Speaker:And I will say that there, there's great information in this book specifically
Speaker:because that's the one I read.
Speaker:That caused me to want to do additional study.
Speaker:And I think there's value in that.
Speaker:Steve, two quick questions as we wrap up here, cause I'm watching our time.
Speaker:You mentioned that you've got some resources that people can get.
Speaker:So now if you can maybe tell people exactly where to go to find you, to
Speaker:get your information, your books, we'll include it in the links to
Speaker:people that are watching the video.
Speaker:They'll be able to see it, but people listening on the audio, they may
Speaker:need the information to be, audible.
Speaker:So, where can people find you and get your information?
Speaker:Yeah, white horse media.
Speaker:That's what the name of our ministry.
Speaker:We pick the name because Jesus is coming in Revelation 19.
Speaker:It's described on a white horse.
Speaker:So we're the white horse people.
Speaker:And Jesus is the rider on the horse.
Speaker:He's the center of everything we do.
Speaker:So white horse media dot com is our main website.
Speaker:We have a YouTube channel, just go to YouTube and type in white horse media.
Speaker:You'll find a lot.
Speaker:And we have a whole new video series coming out called America and the dragon
Speaker:that goes right through revelation 1311.
Speaker:and we have these books that we're offering first 10 callers for free and
Speaker:maybe 11 or 12, you know, we have a fund people have donated some money for this.
Speaker:So we have a little book, American prophecy, United States and prophecy and
Speaker:time delusions and approaching Armageddon.
Speaker:These are great resources.
Speaker:We also have a Bible school.
Speaker:Whitehorsemediabibleschool.
Speaker:com.
Speaker:It's a free online Bible school.
Speaker:So we're on a lot of places.
Speaker:People can find us.
Speaker:They can call.
Speaker:We have a toll free number, 878 Bible, 878 Bible.
Speaker:Very good.
Speaker:We'll make sure we include that, and I appreciate you making
Speaker:those resources available.
Speaker:I know that you said this End Time Delusions is not necessarily the 101.
Speaker:I actually think it's written, though, still in a language that anybody
Speaker:gather because of the history and some of the things you give there.
Speaker:So, uh, you know, it wasn't like a deep scholarly paper, I guess, is one of the
Speaker:Good.
Speaker:I'm glad you feel that way.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:Yeah, I think approaching Armageddon is Prophecy 101.
Speaker:Maybe End Time Delusions is maybe Prophecy 5.
Speaker:0.
Speaker:I have some other books, which are Prophecy 10.
Speaker:0.
Speaker:You know, they're more involved, but we start where people are
Speaker:at and we lead them along.
Speaker:But I try to write in a simple way that anybody can understand.
Speaker:yeah, we just, we just need to get people stop to stop chasing after the
Speaker:red heifers is what we really need to do.
Speaker:So anyway, hey, Steve, we are seek go create those three words.
Speaker:to allow you to choose one of those over the other two seek
Speaker:go create that's our title.
Speaker:So which word?
Speaker:Don't overthink it.
Speaker:Which word do you choose and why?
Speaker:Yeah, create, Psalm 5110, you probably know this, David said,
Speaker:create in me a clean heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me.
Speaker:So I like that verse.
Speaker:I like all of them.
Speaker:I like seek and you will find.
Speaker:I like go into all the world and preach the gospel.
Speaker:But if I picked one right now, it would be create in me a clean heart.
Speaker:Excellent.
Speaker:Thank you for doing that.
Speaker:Steve, I appreciate you taking the time to be here.
Speaker:and pressing people to think more about it, cut through some of
Speaker:the delusions and illusions and the deception that's out there.
Speaker:get to a place where they've got some resources they could study.
Speaker:But really, I love what you said to study it themselves,
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:and, and study it out.
Speaker:So I appreciate that.
Speaker:I just want to honor you for doing that.
Speaker:Thank you for being a guest.
Speaker:Thank you for this conversation.
Speaker:Could have talked for another hour or so or longer, but, I think
Speaker:we've gotten people thinking, and maybe we'll look at a, a part two.
Speaker:At some point we're, we're seek, go create here.
Speaker:We've got new episodes every Monday.
Speaker:On YouTube and all the podcast platforms until next time, continue
Speaker:being all that you were created to be.