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THE BIBLICAL LAST DAYS

Let’s return to the Bible to define the “last days” or “end times.”

There are 18 primary texts about the last days, end times (or end of the age) in the New Testament. Taken together, it is clear that the writers of the New Testament saw themselves as living in the last days. Contrary to popular opinion, the setting and fulfillment of the last days can only be placed within the first century! Here are five passages, which can ignore or try to explain away, but you cannot ignore them and deal honestly with the text:

• “Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, ON WHOM THE END OF THE AGES HAS COME.” (Apostle Paul, 1 Corinthians 10:11)

• “Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in THESE LAST DAYS He has spoken to us by his Son. . . .” (Writer of Hebrews, Hebrews 1:1-2)

• “He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but WAS MADE MANIFEST IN THE LAST TIMES for your sake.” (Apostle Peter, 1 Peter 1:20)

• “The END OF ALL THINGS is AT HAND.” (Apostle Peter, 1 Peter 4:7)

• “Children, IT IS THE LAST HOUR.” (Apostle John, 1 John 2:18)

Here are the other thirteen: Matthew 13:38-42; 24:2-3; 13-16 (ref. v. 34); Acts 2:14-20; 1 Corinthians 1:8; 7:29-31; 15:24; 1 Timothy 4:1; 2 Timothy 3:1-5; Hebrews 9:26; James 5:1-6; 1 Peter 1:5-7; Jude 17-23. It is clear. You cannot push the last days beyond the generation of men who were writing the New Testament without doing violence to the text.

The last days/end times did not just begin in the first century―and continue until now. That would make the end time longer than the period to which it was an end. That is, we have been in the New Covenant era for 2,000 years, which is longer than the Old Covenant era which was 1500 years, beginning with Moses and lasted till the first century. “At hand” and “It is the last hour” cannot be 2,000 years later. The biblical last days were the END OF SOMETHING NOT THE BEGINNING OF SOMETHING.

There is only one logical conclusion. The last days are not about the end of the world. In fact, the Bible never speaks about the end of the physical universe, and indeed teaches that the earth abides forever in some sense (Psalm 78:69; 104:5; 148:3-6; Ecclesiastes 1:4; Ephesians 3:21). They are not about a supposed end of the Christian age. They are not about a future millennium. Rather, they marked the last days of the OLD COVENANT AGE, which came to a violent end in AD 70 at the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple.

This is when God judged Israel for her sins, her refusal to accept Jesus as Messiah, and for her participation with the Roman authorities in Jesus’ conviction and crucifixion. This was the end of biblical Judaism.

Where do you suppose that these writers of the New Testament got such an idea? Well, from our Lord himself, of course, in such passages at Matthew 21-24. In these and many other passages, Jesus placed the “end” at the time of the destruction of the temple, during his own generation. For more detail on all the end-times passages, see my two-part series here:

http://faithfacts.org/world-religions-and-theology/the-biblical-last-days