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The Coming of Jesus: Coming on the clouds

...we're not Jewish with a better understanding of these prophecies. As a small note too, it's also these visions of Daniel that Revelation in the New Testament takes a lot of its imagery from and describes the same events – I will be touching on that more in the next part in this series. Often times, our thoughts on these phrases or this kind of prophetic language, is coloured by our upbringing or teaching from a church, or even by secular culture which has taken this imagery and "hollywoodized" it. You need only Google for "apocalypse" or "armageddon" to see this; and although it can be fun from a film watching perspective, it's not entirely helpful if we are...

The Coming of Jesus: Daniel's 70 Weeks

...t century Jewish historian, gives a nice little insight into this aspect of Jewish history (Antiquities 11:1,2) when he recounts that King Cyrus didn't realise this was written but when it was shown to him, he then had a desire to go about and fulfil it - despite being a Persian king who didn't even know nor worship the God of the Jews (Isa 45:5)! So when did the seventy week clock begin ticking, if not with Cyrus? There are four decrees by three kings to the Jews concerning the rebuilding of the temple and the city, over a period of time: Cyrus, Darius and Artaxerxes (twice, although there is some dispute over whether there was a second king with the same nam...

New Covenant Israel is no longer physical (nor literal)!

...ng of the Jewish people as a whole, but their culmination in being the lineage to which the Messiah would come! What about the nation of Israel? There are some internet memes which are still doing the rounds every so often, quoting Gen 12:3 ("I will bless those who bless [Israel], and the one who curses [Israel] I will curse") and by implication, putting guilt on anyone who dares say a bad word against the nation of Israel. Yes, all the families of the earth shall be blessed — but not by national Israel, but Jesus who IS the true Israel; the one in whom all the promises to the people of Israel are found complete (2 Cor 1:19-...

The Coming of Jesus: Our Future Hope - What Now?

...ng to the Jewish calendar – roughly another 224 or so years away, or at some indeterminate time, I don't know and I won't presume to predict so.   Urgency and imminence With that said, let's quickly look over all the places where these events were expected “soon” or were said to be “at hand”. Seeing it all as a list makes you realise just how often it was said in the New Testament and just how soon the early church really expected things to happen! I find it hard to believe that with all this urgency, the early Christians were actually speaking of a “soon-but-not-soon-really-we-mean-two-thousand-years-or-so” and expected nothing to come of it....

Melchizedek to Jesus: The Divine Thread of Bread and Wine

...This past Sunday at church, we were looking at Genesis 14 in the sermon. There’s a lot going on in this chapter with nine different kings all at war fighting one another, and Abram and Lot somehow mixed up in the middle of it (this is before Abram is renamed to Abraham). Sodom gets invaded, Lot gets taken captive (along with everyone else) and then Abram mounts a daring rescue with 318 of his men! It’s really quite action-packed for such a short chapter. I don’t know about you, but I always think of Abraham as this kindly old man, not some tribal warrior ready to go all “Taken” on his enemies (Gen 14:14–16). Abraham, probably It’s in the mids...

How Old Was Jesus When He Died? A Fresh Look At The Historical Clues

...nd 18 AD (Jewish Antiquities 18.2.2 and 18.4.3). Pontius Pilate ruled from AD 26 to 36, meaning Jesus had to be crucified within that decade. Caiaphas was deposed by Vitellius, the Roman governor of Syria, in 36 or 37 AD. If Jesus were born in 6 BC, he would have turned 30 in AD 24, and then he would have been about 39 years old at the time of his crucifixion in AD 33. But if he had died in AD 36, he could have been as old as 42. This makes the traditional age of Jesus being 33 at his death seem more like a minimum estimate than a confirmed fact, and at this point, it appears much less likely than the alternatives. The Death of Herod Most scholars con...