We are NOT Living in “the Last Days”
If you listen to religious radio and TV broadcasts or purchase religious publications, then you no doubt frequently hear or read that “we are living in the last days”. It is popular among some groups to preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. According to their interpretation, these are the “end times”, and we need to be looking for things like the Antichrist and the Mark of the Beast.
The result of this kind of Bible interpretation is that it must continually change to keep pace with current events. We can go back in history and find that people thought various popes were the Antichrist or Russia’s Peter the Great or France’s Napoleon or Italy’s Mussolini or Germany’s Hitler or anyone who ever tried to reunite Europe and create another Roman Empire.
In more recent years, you may have heard any number of modern political figures named as possible Antichrists. Religious book markets are flooded every few years with new waves of books about Armageddon and the Middle East, especially as of late with the War between Israel and Hamas.
The Bible says a great deal about the last days. In the Book of Genesis, when Jacob was on his death bed, he gathered his twelve sons together and told them what would happen to them in the last days. Genesis 49:1 & Genesis 49:33
The expression “the last days” in the Old Testament and in the New Testament of the Bible always refers to the end of the Jewish Age. The Scripture clearly defines “the last days” as AD 30 – AD 70 in the first century.
When Peter preached to the crowds on the Day of Pentecost, he quoted a prophecy from Joel 2:28-32.
Peter was identifying the sound of a rushing mighty wind and the tongues of fire that sat upon each one of them and the speaking in other tongues as the outpouring of the Spirit of God as the prophet Joel had prophesied. Acts 2:16-17
Peter believed that he was living in “the last days”. It is important for us to know not only what Peter said, but also what his audience understood.
He was directing his words to people whose minds had been prepared a certain way by many years of hearing the words of their prophets read in the synagogues.
To the Jews of that time, “the last days” meant the days when Messiah would come. They had heard the words of the prophet Isaiah saying “In the last days, the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established”. Isaiah 2:2 Isaiah often used the expression “in that day” to signify the Messiah who was to come. Isaiah 11:10, 12:1,4, 7:14, 9:6-7
The Jews were very familiar with these Scriptures. They had no sense of “the last days” encompassing thousands of years. They expected everything to be fulfilled when Messiah came. They did NOT expect the earth to be destroyed. They knew that the earth abideth forever. Ecclesiastes 1:4
The writer of the Book of Hebrews also believed that “the last days” had already arrived. Hebrews 1:1-2
Paul warned Timothy about the problems he would face in his ministry with those who would “fall away from the faith” in the latter times. 1 Timothy 4:1
Paul warned Timothy of the difficult times that he would face. 2 Timothy 3:1 Why would Paul warn Timothy about something that was not going to happen for another 2,000 years and counting?
Paul warned Timothy because these were things that he would soon be confronted with in his ministry. James also understood that he and his readers were already living in “the last days”.
James warned the rich about the folly of their materialism in “the last days”. James 5:3
Peter said it was to be expected that “in the last days” mockers would make fun of the message of Christ’s coming. 2 Peter 3:3
All of the Apostles had taught the coming of the Christ with such immanency that even the short period between AD 30 to AD 70 seemed like too long of a delay in His Return. This is why they mocked.
What would they have thought about a 2,000-year delay?
The specific “last days” of the prophets were the days of Messiah’s coming to establish His Everlasting Kingdom.
The Apostle John noted, not only were they in “the last days” but also that they were in the last time. 1 John 2:18
Think carefully about what John wrote. Put aside everything you have thought in the past about the 70’s, the 80’s, the 90’s up to today being “the last days”.
Are these periods of time the same “last days” of which Peter spoke?
Are there other “last days”?
John said that many antichrists were among them already back in the first century. 1 John 2:18 John said that the “last time” was then. Can the “last time” be in our future?
John believed that he was living in the final hour of “the last days”.
Obviously, he and his readers were not in “the last days” of human history nor were they in the final hour of Earth’s existence. “The last days” that the Bible speaks about over and over again must be something entirely different than what we hear in our mainstream religious media today.
The Jewish prophecies about “the last days” referred to the culmination of the Old Covenant period. In AD 70 of the first century, the Old Covenant and the relationship God had with the Nation of Israel ended after 1,500 years. A new Everlasting Eternal Covenant began with the establishment of the Spiritual Kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Conclusion
We are NOT living in “the last days”. The Bible never speaks of an “end of time”. Instead, the Bible tells us that the Earth abides forever. Ecclesiastes 1:4 & Ephesians 3:21
There was a “time of the end” spoken by the Prophet Daniel. This was the “time of the end” of the Old Covenant. Daniel 12:9
The only end that the Bible speaks about is the end of the Old Covenant age which ended in the year AD 70 of the first century. Today, we are NOT living in “the last days!”