~Introduction~
Back to 1The Bible’s Greatest Prophecies Unlocked!
There is gnawing concern on the minds of millions about the course of human events. As world trends and conditions grow worse, and ever more confusing and complex, uncertainty is increasing—and worry is deepening—about what lies ahead for all mankind.
Towering questions loom over every nation!
Everyone wants to know what the future holds. So many are confused, not knowing where to turn for answers to the great questions about the future!
Suppose you could know the direction and conclusion of world events—world history—in advance of the outcome. What if you could know the courses of nations before they happen? What if the future of great nations—indeed the greatest nations—could be known? Imagine knowing tomorrow’s biggest headlines before they come to pass, and how events will affect you, and every human being, personally
Approximately one-third of the Bible is prophecy—history written in advance. Over four-fifths of this future history is yet to be fulfilled. Tragically, most Bible readers are completely unaware of awesome, impending world events, soon to involve all nations. Vast sections of Scripture are hidden, and remain outside their understanding—completely lost to them. The result is that most simply have no idea what the future holds.
Many have opinions, but few recognize how to find the answers. Others think they already understand the prophecies of the Bible. The result? They remain ignorant of fascinating, incredible—vital!—knowledge, life-changing knowledge.
No book you have read, or ever will, on prophecy is like this one. Different from all others on the subject, it is destined to be read by vast numbers—and probably soon.
Ominous Signs Abound
Turmoil, fear and confusion now grip all nations of the world. Terrorism, economic upheaval and resultant widespread uncertainty are everywhere. Many sense that the differences between and within nations are intensifying and are threatening to spin out of control. New and different power blocs are forming, with traditional alliances wavering, waning or disappearing.
Ominous signs of grave difficulty in resolving humanity’s most fundamental problems abound. Many sense that the world is hurtling toward trouble, even possibly terrible calamity. Disease, famine and war sweep the planet as never before. New diseases are continually emerging and old ones are re-emerging worse than ever. Famine now decimates entire segments of local populations. Weapons of mass destruction, so incomprehensibly lethal and devastating that they boggle the mind, now threaten humanity—also as never before. Many nations are learning to live “on alert” to terrorist cells, which can strike anywhere without notice.
World conditions, events and trends speak daily in frightening terms about how things could quickly turn in the wrong direction. The future of nations, including the greatest nations, hangs in the balance. History shows that all the great civilizations eventually crashed, having become decadent, awash in material prosperity and greed—and educated in wrong knowledge. This can happen again!
Now think of poverty, illiteracy, disasters of every kind, violence, religious division and confusion, governments collapsing or under siege, increasing riots and protests, shortages of food and drinking water, shallow, pleasure-driven, immoral entertainment, breakdown of family values—and of virtually all other values held sacred for generations—that fill the headlines of newspapers and newscasts.
Then there are the stunning events and conditions throughout the financial world that are affecting every nation. One development after another—virtually all of them bad!—are impacting both Wall Street and Main Street. The effects are seen in tight credit, global stock markets, banks and other lending institutions, rising unemployment, rising inflation, rising fuel prices, declining retirement and pension funds, fallen home values, frozen business and home equity lines, corporate bankruptcies and bailouts—as well as the projected budget deficits of city, state and federal governments, in America and many other countries. These also have a rippling effect through all levels of politics in every democratic or Western nation. The entire global economy is being regularly revisited, reviewed and revised, with many acknowledging they simply do not know what to do next.
Where is it all going?
No Solutions
The question of what lies ahead for the whole world has become the very greatest question today. Millions are searching—wondering about the course of events. More and more world leaders are also expressing pessimism about the rise of troubles, evils, ills and woes also both within and between nations, including those that are the most powerful. So are educators, military planners, sociologists and scientists.
With all nations of Earth increasingly overwhelmed by a complicated and worsening array of difficulties confronting and challenging them, the greatest thinkers are being employed to find answers—solutions! The problem? There are no solutions to any of the world’s biggest problems anywhere on the horizon, but rather only new ideas that never seem to work!
Of course, many are unmoved—not concerned—about the tumultuous events surrounding them, trusting that things will work out in the end “because they always do.” Also believing things will eventually “turn out all right,” others close their eyes, choosing to pursue pleasure and the accumulation of material goods at an even more frantic pace. But for the short term, things will not turn out all right. World conditions are and will become far more serious than any imagine.
Almighty God will soon have to intervene and save humanity from itself. But before this occurs, world trouble will greatly increase—intensifying to staggering proportions. This will be followed by unexpected and cataclysmic events that will shake the whole world, affecting the life of every human being on Earth! Events are building to a final culmination—a tremendous climax! Nothing that has occurred over the past 6,000 years even remotely compares to what is yet to come upon this world! Civilization, as we know it, will change forever.
Countless Ideas—One Authority!
Knowing something is terribly wrong, many sense the world has reached what the Bible calls the “last days.” This has caused a mushrooming of interest in prophecy.
A growing percentage of thinking people are now asking whether the answers lie in the realm of biblical prophecy. We hear from them every day, and from all over the world. In effect, a market has developed for information. With opinions everywhere, books about prophecy now abound. Just count the number of volumes about this subject within the expanding “Christianity” sections of major bookstores. Again, there has been an explosion of books presenting popular scenarios, ideas, theories, suppositions and interpretations of “how it will all play out.”
Millions of people now routinely discuss terms such as “Antichrist,” “Great Tribulation,” “Millennium,” “Armageddon,” “Beast,” “Mark of the Beast,” “666,” “False Prophet,” “God’s Wrath,” “Abomination of Desolation,” “Babylon the Great” and others, without proper context, meaning or comprehension. Again, they simply do not know where or how to look within God’s Word to get correct understanding of what these and other terms mean, and how they will play out, sequentially, within God’s Master Plan for the end of the age. Like a kind of “Rubik’s Cube,” the many critical elements of prophecy never line up—never come together—for millions wanting to know. This is because, instead of examining for themselves the hundreds of clear scriptures on these and other aspects of prophecy—for proof—many seem content to trust in “experts.”
These supposed experts have set themselves up as authorities on Bible prophecy. There are fiction writers, history-based writers, technical commentators, “mathematicians” and “code experts,” as well as a nearly endless stream of outright false prophets, phony prognosticators, crystal ball gazers and self-proclaimed seers and psychics spewing little more than ignorant confusion on unwitting, but willing, listeners and readers.
When understood, all popular human interpretations of Bible prophecy are ridiculous—a complete jumble of ideas where a little truth is mixed with much error. They are almost painful to read—yet large numbers now subscribe to dangerous, counterfeit scenarios. Those sincerely interested in learning the truth remain tangled in a Gordian knot of disjointed, confusing, competing—and plain wrong!—popular ideas and opinions.
This is because none knows how to understand—either how to use, or even that there are, keys to unlocking climactic Bible prophecies.
But who is an authority? Who really knows?—who really understands what the future holds as outlined in the Bible? While religion should hold the answers, it has not even figured out most of the questions—and, when understood, is seen to be the biggest part of the problem. However sincere at least some preachers and religionists may be, all of their publications merely add to the confusion offered to those desperately seeking answers in all the wrong places.
What is the truth about prophecy? What does the Bible really say about events preceding Christ’s Return? Sobering world conditions make this question larger than ever.
The Keys to Understanding
Most who write about the Bible do not realize that this Book interprets itself, that if a symbol is mentioned within a prophecy—any prophecy!—and virtually every prophecy involves symbols—the Author of this greatest of books would not leave the most crucial questions, those involving all humanity, subject to human interpretation. He would provide clues—necessary vital keys!—to understanding the large portions of His Word devoted to future events. He would also make known that He is the Author of the Bible. And He would make absolutely clear that the Bible is a book backed by His authority—that it is His divinely revealed instruction book—and that this need not merely be “accepted on faith.”
God would provide proof of all the things He says!
The Bible commands its readers: “Prove all things; hold fast that which is good” (I Thes. 5:21). This certainly applies to prophecy. You will find that what the chapters ahead explain can be proven—that it is not just opinion from one more ill-informed, self-appointed “expert.”
Tragically, most who read the Bible remain in near total ignorance of its meaning, including being completely unable to recognize the speed, sequence and seriousness—and the awesome magnitude!—of certain onrushing prophecies. And again this is on top of not truly comprehending what any of them actually means!
So many just cannot untangle the maze of what happens when, as well as where and to whom—and why.
The Questions
In pursuit of the truth, some people never seem able to correctly identify the questions that must be answered to get to it. They cannot create a road map to their destination. They stumble around “ever learning” but “never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (II Tim. 3:7) of a matter. If we are to answer the great questions about Bible prophecy, we must first correctly identify them—carefully spell them out. Then we must understand why they are important, and be unwilling to accept any but proven facts, whether from God’s Word or history.
All that is written in the coming chapters is the truth about the greatest prophecies of the Bible. This book presents numerous facts, much evidence and real proof in answering the many questions that one might have—that one should have.
Realize that every explanation of a biblical teaching has a reasonable and natural limit, or it could almost go on without end. This is true of prophecy. But this subject also cannot be short-changed. Its explanation must be conclusive. Therefore, this book has been written in thorough fashion. The reader will be left with inescapable conclusions—answers!—to all the crucial questions regarding Bible prophecy.
Many Bible Prophecies
Here are but a few examples of questions (a great many others appear as the book develops): Many wonder if the world has entered what is called the “end time.” How can you know if this time has come, and if it has, what does this mean?—for you and the rest of the world?
Then there is the Middle East, the region prophesied thousands of years ago to lie at the centre of the very biggest—the most planet-rattling—and shattering!—events ever to occur on Earth! While some Bible students seem to sense at least this much, they do not know in any detail what these events are, or why they will come. Others seem to know the Middle East should be avoided at some point, but assume the rest of the world will be largely “okay.”
Of course, the book of Revelation evokes an endless stream of questions about its meaning and purpose. The last book of the Bible stands shrouded in mystery to almost all who read it. Seen as filled with terms—metaphors, symbols and descriptive language—that seem impossible to decipher, many lose hope that they will ever understand even its most basic messages.
Within Revelation is the often talked about, but almost universally misunderstood, mysterious “beast.” Who or what is this multi-headed, strange and fierce-looking beast?—and who (or what) is the “woman” that rides it? Then, what is the dreaded “mark of the beast”? The Beast of Revelation is the topic of countless speculative books promoting popular theories—but they are all terribly, even disastrously, wrong!
What about the meaning and timing of the infamous battle of Armageddon—and the lead-up of events surrounding it—as well as the abomination of desolation, the four horsemen, the seven seals, the antichrist, the great tribulation, the day of the Lord, the 144,000 and the great multitude...and so many other topics mentioned either in Revelation or by various prophets of the Old Testament?
These are just some of the greatest questions.