Are we near those times?

Run_to_da_hills

The news headline below could possibly cover two Biblical prophesies related to the end times.

"Infectious diseases are spreading faster than ever before, the World Health Organization annual report says. With about 2.1 billion airline passengers flying each year, there is a high risk of another major epidemic such as Aids, Sars or Ebola fever" The Scotsman Friday August 24th 2007.

Jesus said that an end-time sign would be pandemic disease epidemics: "pestilences...in diverse places..." (Matthew 24:7).

The Prophet Daniel was instructed that in the last days knowledge and travel would greatly increase: "Be thou, O Daniel, shut up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the end: many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased" (Daniel 12:4)

The Mad Hatter

You think 'many shall run to and fro' means travel will increase?

Stark

Daniel was clearly referring to school soccer matches.

Run_to_da_hills

The Mad Hatter wrote:

You think 'many shall run to and fro' means travel will increase?

I would hardly expect this passage it to be interpreted as mankind just moving swiftly on foot.

The Mad Hatter

Strikes me more as an image of panic. It seems a slightly silly way of saying that people would be travelling a lot.

Stark

People have been interpreting the signs as indicating the end of the world in their lifetime for centuries. The passages you refer to could easily refer to the Renaissance for example, where an increase in knowledge came in the wake of the Black Death and people sailed the globe looking for new trade routes to India. The Roman Empire was also famed for its great knowledge, the Romans travelled the globe conquering countries and the decline of the Roman Empire was preceded by waves of plagues including smallpox, which devastated its population.

It's most likely the end time passages in the Bible were written with the Roman empire in mind in order to give hope to the young Christian community.

Run_to_da_hills

Stark wrote:

People have been interpreting the signs as indicating the end of the world in their lifetime for centuries. The passages you refer to could easily refer to the Renaissance for example, where an increase in knowledge came in the wake of the Black Death and people sailed the globe looking for new trade routes to India. The Roman Empire was also famed for its great knowledge, the Romans travelled the globe conquering countries and the decline of the Roman Empire was preceded by waves of plagues including smallpox, which devastated its population.

They didnt have computers back then in the time of the renaissance and it would have taken years for these diseases to spread around!

Stark

I missed the part about computers. Could you cite the relevant Bible passage please? Also the part about the diseases actually spreading rapidly.

Galvasean

Run_to_da_hills wrote:

They didnt have computers back then in the time of the renaissance and it would have taken years for these diseases to spread around!

I don't see what the computers have to do with the end times. The diseases did spread very quickly. A year or two isn't very long in the grand scheme of things.

Run_to_da_hills

Galvasean wrote:

I don't see what the computers have to do with the end times. The diseases did spread very quickly. A year or two isn't very long in the grand scheme of things.

Daniel did say that "Knowledge" would also increase.

Galvasean

Run_to_da_hills wrote:

Daniel did say that "Knowledge" would also increase.

Yeah but knowledge doesn't mean computers. As Stark suggested it might have been the Renaissance or the Industrial Revolution. It could be a reference to one of many things.

Run_to_da_hills

Galvasean wrote:

Yeah but knowledge doesn't mean computers. As Stark suggested it might have been the Renaissance or the Industrial Revolution. It could be a reference to one of many things.

Like sending a men to the moon.

Fanny Cradock

There is little point in trying to second guess God's moves. As hase been stated, people throughout the ages have been thoroughly convinced that it was the end of days, only to be wrong. From the perspective of the 'non-believer', it can be damaging to faith if people state something as a fact ('the world will end in 3 weeks' type thing) that later turns out to be false. We have no special knowledge or fresh insight above some chap in the 1700's who felt for sure that the 'end was nigh'.

philologos

His time will come when we least expect it. It's said that he will come like the thief in the night.

Galvasean

So, if we constantly expect it can we avert the Apocalypse?

tritium

I expect it Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, but definitely not on a Sunday, 'cause thats a day of rest right....:)

The Mad Hatter

tritium wrote:

I expect it Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, but definitely not on a Sunday, 'cause thats a day of rest right....:)

I've got Sundays covered, just in case.

*diary: Monday, work; Tuesday, work; Wednesday, work; Thursday, work; Friday, work; Saturday, work; Sunday, panic*

humanji

Jakkass wrote:

His time will come when we least expect it. It's said that he will come like the thief in the night.

Well lets hope his first stop isn't Padraig Nally's house...

PDN

tritium wrote:

but definitely not on a Sunday, 'cause thats a day of rest right....:)

Sunday a day of rest? Where do you get that from?

BrianCalgary

I do think that as our society throws God out of our lives, God leaves us to our own devices.

Part of that is the Earth starts to run down as God takes that step away. The end can come at any time.

The question has to be: Are you ready for it when it comes?

Whose side are you going to be on when the final battle happens?

Sapien

BrianCalgary wrote:

Whose side are you going to be on when the final battle happens?

That's a little B-movie melodramatic, surely? You believe there will be humans fighting alongside the Forces of Darkness in the Battle of Armageddon? I presumed one would either be saved, damned, or cowering out of sight somwhere.

Run_to_da_hills

Sapien wrote:

That's a little B-movie melodramatic, surely? You believe there will be humans fighting alongside the Forces of Darkness in the Battle of Armageddon? I presumed one would either be saved, damned, or cowering out of sight somwhere.

I would put Sarah’s dream from Terminator 2 as the most realistic movie effect of an Armageddon senario. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OInkKYOV0o

The Prophet Zachariah reveals the effects of Nuclear war when he wrote: "And this shall be the plague wherewith the LORD will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet, and their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth." (Zachariah 14:12).

Jesus predicted a world in which, before His return, man's accumulated weaponry would be enough to annihilate all life on the planet. He said: "For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be. And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved, but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened" (Matthew 24:21-22).

The Mad Hatter

BrianCalgary wrote:

I do think that as our society throws God out of our lives, God leaves us to our own devices.

Part of that is the Earth starts to run down as God takes that step away. The end can come at any time.

The question has to be: Are you ready for it when it comes?

Whose side are you going to be on when the final battle happens?

*shrugs* I'm a pacifist.

Smellyirishman

BrianCalgary wrote:

Whose side are you going to be on when the final battle happens?

While I have chuckled through the rest of the thread, this statement intrigues me. Can you be a little more elaborate please? Do you foresee a war waged between two forces, men, woman and children being called to arms or some sort of instant judgment, people sectioned into their various sections, hell, limbo, heaven etc...? Why do you believe this will happen? Or were you just being a little dramatic?

Fanny Cradock

Smellyirishman wrote:

While I have chuckled through the rest of the thread

Well, we are here to amuse

Good man!

BrianCalgary

Smellyirishman wrote:

While I have chuckled through the rest of the thread, this statement intrigues me. Can you be a little more elaborate please? Do you foresee a war waged between two forces, men, woman and children being called to arms or some sort of instant judgment, people sectioned into their various sections, hell, limbo, heaven etc...? Why do you believe this will happen? Or were you just being a little dramatic?

Sure. Revelation 20
7When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison 8and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth—Gog and Magog—to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. 9They marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God's people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. 10And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

So no melodrama, just prophecy.

Smellyirishman

Thanks.

JimiTime

OP. While it is a facinating subject, (for me anyway), the answer is we don't know. Certainly I can see the world heading towards the prophetic times, and the fact that the earth is starting its 'pangs of distress'. However, to say its around the corner etc, serves no purpose IMO, other than being and interesting discussion.

The Mad Hatter

BrianCalgary wrote:

Sure. Revelation 20
7When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison 8and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth—Gog and Magog—to gather them for battle. In number they are like the sand on the seashore. 9They marched across the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of God's people, the city he loves. But fire came down from heaven and devoured them. 10And the devil, who deceived them, was thrown into the lake of burning sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet had been thrown. They will be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

So no melodrama, just prophecy.

Prophecies have to be melodramatic. Otherwise people will just ignore them.

Why the change of tense half way through?

Tim Robbins

BrianCalgary wrote:

Sure. Revelation 20
7When the thousand years are over, Satan will be released from his prison 8and will go out to deceive the nations in the four corners of the earth—

Is the four corners the reference the reason why some people used to believe the world was flat?

hallelujah

Stark wrote:

Daniel was clearly referring to school soccer matches.