Secrets Unsealed

Prophecy Made Simple

Stephen Bohr

1. How to Study the Bible

Father in heaven, we thank you so much for the privilege of being here tonight.

We're about to open your holy word, and we need the help of your Holy Spirit.

We realize, Lord, that the Holy Spirit gave the Bible, and only the Holy Spirit can come to explain it to us.

Give us open minds, give us tender hearts, and help us Lord to hear your voice.

We thank you for hearing our prayer, because we ask it in Jesus' name.

Okay, I'd like to invite you to turn to lesson number 1 and we're going to go through the process of how we're going to study these lessons.

And I'm going to take this microphone out of here because I feel like a lion in a cage.

Those of you who know me know that I have to move.

Okay, lesson number 1 is titled how to study Bible prophecy and basically I'm going to go through the sections of the lesson some of the texts I'm going to ask you to look up and help us read and some of the texts I'm just going to tell you what you need to put in the blank and then I hope that tomorrow at your leisure or tonight when you get home you'll check it out to make sure that the answer I provided you with is the correct answer.

1 of the reasons why we're doing it this way and giving you the lessons is because I do not want you to believe what I say, I want you to believe what you study for yourself.

There's no hidden agenda in this seminar.

We're not trying to convert you to anything.

All we're interested in is studying these prophecies so that we can better prepare for the coming of our Lord Jesus.

And so you know we want you to take these lessons home and prepare them, study them, and that way when you come to class you'll have a clearer picture of what you're going to be studying.

Okay the first section of our lesson deals with the person of prophecy.

Does somebody want to turn to John chapter 5 and verses 45 and 46 and read those verses for me?

And then somebody read Revelation chapter 1 and verse 1.

Please raise your hand if you're a good volunteer and you need to read with a strong voice like those 3 angels of Revelation 14.

Okay, Bible prophecy is not about voracious beasts, mysterious numbers, and cryptic symbols.

Prophecy is a revelation of Jesus Christ.

Now, Rosalina, would you please read John 5, verses 45 and 46.

Here Jesus is speaking these words to the Jewish leaders of his day.

Do not think that I shall accuse you to the Father, there is 1 who accuses you, Moses, in whom you trust.

For if you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me." About whom did Moses write?

Now wait a minute, Moses lived 1, 500 years before Christ was born.

So did Moses give a lot of prophecies about Jesus?

In fact Moses everything he wrote was about Jesus.

All his prophecies have to do with Jesus.

Now let me mention Luke chapter 24 just to give you a little bit of background.

It's interesting tomorrow is Resurrection Sunday isn't it?

And what I'm gonna mention to you now is happening on Resurrection Sunday, the day after Christ rested in the tomb.

There were 2 disciples that were walking to a little town near Jerusalem, the name of that town was Emmaus, and they were all dejected.

These were Jews, they studied the scriptures, they knew prophecy, they thought they knew prophecy.

And they were all dejected because they said to 1 another, you know, we thought this man was going to be the 1 who would redeem Israel, and now it's the third day since he was killed.

And as they were walking along, Jesus caught up to them and he started walking and talking with them.

And as Jesus talked to them, they discovered the reason why they had studied all of these prophecies and had not understood them.

I want you to notice Luke chapter 24 and verses 25 to 27.

Who would like to read Luke chapter 4 verses 25 to 27 and notice what Jesus says to these 2 disciples By the way, they were students of prophecy.

They were Jews They thought they knew when Messiah was going to come and what he was going to look like and what he was going to do But they were caught off guard.

Then he said to them, O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken.

Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into glory?

And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself." Okay?

Now, what did Jesus say to these individuals?

He called them foolish, because they did not believe what whom had written.

And from some of the prophets, oh thank you very much, you'll find that I'll say things wrongly once in a while because I want you to correct me.

And from all of the prophets he declared to them in all of the scriptures the things concerning himself.

Let me ask you, who is at the center of the writings of Moses?

Who is at the center of the writings of all the prophets?

Who is at the center of the book of Psalms Jesus notice verse 44 and 45 who would like to read verses 44 and 45 yes please real loud then he said to them these are the words which I spoke to you while I was still with you that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and the prophets and the Psalms concerning me." Did you catch that?

All the things that were written in Moses and in the prophets and where else?

So who is at the center of the book of Psalms?

In fact we're going to find in this seminar that there's not 1 single story, not 1 single page of the Old Testament that is not a prophecy about Jesus.

The center is not some battle in the Middle East.

The center is not the oil of the Middle East.

The center has nothing to do with any of these side issues.

The center and core of Bible prophecy is Jesus.

Now the third question in this section, Revelation 1 verse 1, we find that the book of Revelation is the revelation of whom?

See revelation isn't about seals and beasts and mysterious numbers and horns and heads and all of these things the center of revelation is whom Jesus because it is a revelation of Jesus Christ so in this seminar we must find Jesus in all of His glory in the prophecies and that's what we're going to do.

Let's go to the second section of our lesson, the reasons for prophecy.

And obviously we're not going to be able to read all of these verses but I'm going to basically tell you what the verses say and you can fill in the blanks.

John 14 verse 29 Jesus told the disciples that he would tell them beforehand what was going to happen so that when it happened they might what?

So what is 1 of the purposes of prophecy?

1 of the purposes is that when the prophecy is fulfilled people will what?

People will believe that it was a prophecy from God.

That's 1 of the reasons we're going to study the prophecies here.

It's because we want to see how prophecy has been fulfilled.

And you'll say, wow, look at God said these things to his prophets hundreds and thousands of years ago and look it's happened exactly the way God said so the purpose of prophecy 1 of the purposes is so that when things occur we might believe 2nd Peter 119 the second verse in this section prophecy was given so that the morning star might arise in our hearts.

You want to write down this verse it's not in your lesson write it down Revelation 22 verse 16 Jesus says that he is the bright and morning star so if prophecy has the purpose of the morning star arising in our hearts it must mean that the purpose of prophecy is for Jesus to be where for Jesus to shine in our hearts in the beautiful so that Jesus will shine in our hearts.

Romans 15 verse 4 tells us that prophecy was given so that we might have hope.

In fact, do you know what the second coming is called in Titus chapter 2 and verse 13 it's called the blessed hope and by the way biblical hope is not wishful thinking like saying is Jesus coming soon well I hope so that's not biblical hope Biblical hope means that it's firmly rooted in what God says.

Titus 2 verse 13 yes okay you're welcome okay so when we study prophecy what do we get?

In our hearts And when the prophecy is fulfilled we what?

But the primary purpose folks for Bible prophecy is in John 5 39 where Jesus says you search the scriptures he's telling the Jewish leaders you search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life and they are they which testify of me What is the main purpose for studying Bible prophecy?

2. Earth’s Invisible War

Father in heaven, we thank you for bringing us together once again to study your holy word.

We realize that without the help of your Holy Spirit, we could never understand your word and we would reach wrong conclusions.

Therefore, we ask that you will come and be with us through the influence and power of your Holy Spirit.

Help us to understand this very important lesson, Earth's Invisible War.

We thank you, Lord, for the privilege of prayer and thank you for hearing us because we ask it In the precious name of Jesus, our Savior.

Okay, did you fill out your lesson for today?

Raise your hand if you did the lesson for today.

Let me underline that it's really important that you answer the lesson before you come to class.

Because it's impossible for us in class to read all of the verses in the lesson.

We would be here 2 hours if we covered every little detail of the lesson.

And so it's of critical importance that you study the lesson before you come.

Now I realize that this is going to take a big investment of time.

It's going to take you probably an hour and a half, 2 hours to do the lesson.

If you really study the notes and you really look at the context of the verses.

And you're also making an investment of time coming here to the seminar, an hour and a half or an hour and 45 minutes each night by the time you come and by the time you return home.

And I want to tell you that I really appreciate you making that investment.

And as we go along, you're gonna see more and more that it's a blessing to make this investment in time.

The more you study the lessons, the more you're going to get out of them.

Now, 1 thing which I failed to mention last night, which I want to mention now, and that is that the first few lessons, you might not understand every little detail of what we're studying.

Some things might kind of be a blur, but I assure you that if you stick with it, you continue studying the lessons, you continue coming, suddenly things are going to get clearer and clearer.

Until finally, by the time we get to the end of the seminar, your knowledge of Bible prophecy will have increased drastically.

And so be patient, just because you didn't understand a certain concept or a series of concepts, don't give up.

Keep on coming, keep on studying the lessons, and as the lessons go along, they will clarify the previous lessons that you've already studied.

So just hang in there, study hard, and you know, it's kind of like chemistry and physics those are difficult subjects I never liked those subjects but in the first few classes were misery but as I went along you know it became clearer and clearer and easier to understand.

Now let me just review very briefly what we studied last night.

Who is the very center of Bible prophecy?

Does somebody want to raise their hand and give me 1 reason for Bible prophecy?

To get closer to Jesus so that the day star rises in our hearts.

So when it comes to pass we might believe.

Oh, apocalyptic prophecy, that's a big word.

But basically it means the great prophecies of Daniel and Revelation.

And you remember what we studied about those 2 kinds of prophecy, right?

1 has already, the classical prophecy has already been fulfilled, it's fulfilled in the future on a larger scale.

Apocalyptic prophecy was not fulfilled in the past, it begins to fulfill in the past and it continuously fulfills until it culminates at the setting up of Christ's kingdom.

Then we talked about praying for understanding, this is very important isn't it?

Because no prophecy is of any private interpretation.

The Holy Spirit gave the Bible and therefore we must ask for the Holy Spirit's help in order to understand the Bible, especially the prophecies.

Then we notice that we should use the historical approach.

When do the prophecies, the great apocalyptic prophecies begin to fulfill?

And they continuously fulfill point after point, step after step, culminating in the second coming of Christ.

In other words, they are like a chain of links all together, 1 right after another, that culminate at the second coming of Christ.

And 1 prophecy that I did not mention last night is, for example, Matthew 24.

If you study Matthew 24, you'll notice that it begins with the destruction of Jerusalem.

Jesus speaks about the destruction of Jerusalem.

But when you get to the end of the prophecy of Matthew 24, it speaks about Jesus coming in the clouds of heaven.

And so Matthew 24 begins in the days when disciples lived and it ends with the setting up of Christ's everlasting kingdom.

Now, we also notice that you need to learn to decipher symbols.

Where do we find the marginal references?

Marginal, well the word margin means the edges.

So the marginal references are the references that are at the edge of the page or in the center of the page.

But I found some of them in my Bible, not these quite seen things.

And so just because a reference is in the margin of the Bible doesn't mean that it necessarily has a connection with the text that you're studying.

Generally they are connected with the text that you're studying.

Once in a while they'll slip up, but not very often.

Now we notice that prophecy deals with symbols, right?

3. The Prophecy of the Fallen Star

Father in heaven, we thank you so much for the blessings that we've received from you this day.

We thank you for the privilege of knowing you.

We ask Lord that as we study your holy word tonight that you will send your Holy Spirit to be present in our midst.

We ask that you will open our minds so that we might have understanding, that you will open our hearts so that we might be willing to receive that which you have for us.

We thank you Lord for answering our prayer.

Because we come before your throne in the precious name of Jesus our Lord and Savior.

Okay, lesson number 3, the prophecy of the fallen star.

We're just going to basically go through the lesson.

I'll be making a few remarks as we go along.

I'll be adding a few details which are not in the lesson.

In lesson number 2, we studied about how sin began on earth.

We saw that a mysterious serpent enticed Eve to disobey God.

In the lesson tonight we're going to see how sin began in heaven and how it will come to an end on earth.

Interesting, it entered heaven but it will come to an end on earth.

Now you'll notice the next note is very important.

The Bible makes it very clear that angels existed before God created this world.

Did you read that text in Job 38 verses 5-7?

When God created this world, what did the stars do?

We know stars don't sing, but stars represent angels.

And so when God created this world, the angels sang.

This means that the angels pre-existed the creation of planet earth.

Now as our lesson says, the leader of these angels was called Lucifer, the son of the morning.

And tonight we're going to study about this magnificent angel.

Let's talk first of all about the origin of this being, Lucifer.

And by the way, before we talk about his origin, I need to tell you something about Ezekiel 28 where a lot of verses are taken from for the lesson tonight.

I don't know whether you noticed the tenses of the verb of the verbs of this chapter.

Maybe you weren't paying attention to that little detail, but it's very important.

Even the destruction of Lucifer in Ezekiel 28, 18 and 19 is presented by the prophet Ezekiel as past.

It simply means that Ezekiel is being carried forward to the very end of this world.

In actual fact, he's being carried all the way forward to the time after the thousand years of Revelation 20.

And Ezekiel is describing from that perspective the history of Lucifer.

That's the reason why the verbs are in past.

Obviously, some of the things that are mentioned in Ezekiel 28 are not past.

Like for example where it says that he'll cease existing and it'll be reduced to ashes.

That hasn't happened but it's presented as a past fact because Ezekiel is being transported way to the future, probably in vision, and he's transported to the time after the thousand years when the New Jerusalem descends from heaven and this being, this magnificent being is finally destroyed.

And Ezekiel 28 is describing his history from that perspective.

Now with that in mind, let's notice the origin of this being.

Did you notice this twice in Ezekiel chapter 28 he's a created being which means that he had a beginning is Lucifer everlasting is Lucifer eternal is Satan eternal no he had a beginning Must that mean that he also can have an end then?

Yes, because he's not eternal like God, he's created.

Now question number 2 under the first section.

I don't know whether you read, did you notice that in this question?

It says For all things were created by him, that is by Jesus, both things that are in heaven and things that are on earth, whether they be principalities and powers, All was created by him and for him.

So we are going to find in this story that it is a case of the creature rising against his creator.

He lived in heaven originally when he was created.

Now let's talk a little bit about his identity, who he was.

He was created at some point in eternity past by Jesus.

But we need to know a little bit more about him, who he was.

He had a brilliant intellect according to scripture.

But not only did he have a brilliant intellect, Question number 2 says that he was bright and what?

He's not as he's depicted in many caricatures, you know, this being that has a tail and horns and a pitchfork in his hand, roasting sinners on the fires of hell.

That's not the picture that the Bible gives of this being.

The Bible says that he was bright and beautiful and full of wisdom.

Number 3, he was covered with precious what?

Now I don't know whether you thought about this but if you look at the list of precious stones, they are the same precious stones that form the foundations of the New Jerusalem.

And of course we found in our lesson that he lived in the New Jerusalem.

See, the reason why I make these a little bit difficult is because I want you to think.

4. The Good News of Bible Prophecy

Now, let's get right into our lesson study this evening.

It is actually foundational for many of the lessons that we're going to be studying in the future.

So it is of critical importance that we understand the lesson tonight.

And you'll see why it is so important for us to understand this lesson.

Now let's just begin at the top and work through the lesson.

It's a little bit shorter at least that's 3 pages tonight that doesn't mean that the time we're going to spend together is shorter, but the lesson is shorter.

1 year after Daniel arrived in Babylon with his 3 friends, King Nebuchadnezzar had a dream.

The story of this dream is found in Daniel chapter 2.

Let's study this chapter together and incidentally something that's not in the lesson is the fact that the date for this chapter is 604 BC.

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Prophecy Made Simple

1. How to Study the Bible

Transcript

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