God's covenant with Israel and the Jews is eternal, and cannot be broken, and God is not going to leave them in their fallen condition. The time of Jacob's trouble is going to be the means by which He restores His chosen people back to a right relationship to Himself.
There is a time coming where God will execute judgment over the whole world, and it will be a literal, physical and visible display of His power on a world that has rejected Him. It is discussed in great and graphic detail in both the Old and New Testaments, and there is more prophecy related to this time period than any other in the whole of the Bible.
It is the time of Jacob's trouble.
"Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of it." Jeremiah 30:7 (KJV)
There is so much information on this subject that putting it into a single article like this is a daunting task. No matter what I write, I will be leaving out so many other details. But the Lord has put on my heart in my personal Bible study over the last few weeks to talk about this, so I have every confidence that the Holy Spirit will say what needs to be said on this topic.
First of all, the time of Jacob's trouble is the exact same event Jesus mentions in Matthew 24 where He prophesies about the coming time of great tribulation that will target the entire world in general, and the Jews in particular.
"But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day: For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be." Matthew 24:20,21 (KJV)
The entire chapter of Matthew 24 shows how the Jews and Israel are the main focus of this judgment, but it will affect the entire world. The angel Gabriel in the book of Daniel, in talking about this time period, tells us very clearly what people and what place are the main subjects.
"Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression..." Daniel 9:24 (KJV)
Who were Daniel's people? His fellow Jews, of course. What was the holy city? Only one city the Bible ever says was the holy city, and that is Jerusalem. What is the purpose of the time of Jacob's trouble? It will be the time when God will reclaim and restore His Bride, the Jewish people.
Israel was destroyed in 70 AD, and the Jews were scattered according to prophecy. In 1948, they were miraculously regathered in exactly the same place from which they were dispersed. But their regathering was a physical one, not a spiritual one. Israel in 2018 is no closer to God than any other nation on the face of the earth, and in some respects, is much farther away.
Tel Aviv is the gay capital of the world, surpassing even than that of ultra-Liberal San Francisco. Hospitals in Israel perform lots of abortions and even many Third Trimester abortions. Yes, they like to reference their connection to the scriptures, it certainly boosts tourism, but modern-day Israel bears no resemblance to the Israel of the Old Testament where the Spirit of God dwelt in the Temple.
God's covenant with Israel and the Jews is eternal, and cannot be broken, and God is not going to leave them in their fallen condition. The time of Jacob's trouble is going to be the means by which He restores His chosen people back to a right relationship to Himself. But it is going to come at a horrific cost that rightly cannot be properly imagined, no matter how much you study it in the scriptures.
Here are a few easy-to-digest bullet points on how that restoration will happen:
- GOD WILL USE SATAN AS HIS ROD OF JUDGMENT: "O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, and the staff in their hand is mine indignation. I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets." Isaiah 10:5,6 (KJV). When God decided to test Job, and thoroughly purge him of his self-righteousness, He used a very unlikely means by which to accomplish it. God sent Satan to put Job through a fiery trial that brought him certainly to the end of himself, and nearly to the end of his life. In the time of Jacob's trouble, God will again send Satan against His chosen people the Jews, and in that time obedience to God will absolutely come at the cost of your own life. When Jesus opens the First Seal in Revelation 6, Antichrist is released, and the Jews will follow him as thinking that he is their promised Messiah.
- THIS JUDGMENT COMES BECAUSE OF ISRAEL'S DISOBEDIENCE: "Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Judah, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they have despised the law of the LORD, and have not kept his commandments, and their lies caused them to err, after the which their fathers have walked: But I will send a fire upon Judah, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem. Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Israel, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they sold the righteous for silver, and the poor for a pair of shoes;" Amos 2:4-6 (KJV). The Jews have forgotten that they are God's chosen people, and the time of Jacob's trouble is their wake-up call to return to Him. Even in most Jewish synagogues today, there is no real mention of the Law of the Lord, there is no relationship between the Jews and God. Yes, the call themselves the 'people of the Book', but that's mostly lip service. The Jews are still serving other gods, and the actual God who swore a covenant with Abraham, will not all that to stand. He would be neither a good or righteous God if He did.
- ONLY A REMNANT OF THE JEWS WILL SURVIVE: "And it shall come to pass in that day, that the remnant of Israel, and such as are escaped of the house of Jacob, shall no more again stay upon him that smote them; but shall stay upon the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. The remnant shall return, even the remnant of Jacob, unto the mighty God. For though thy people Israel be as the sand of the sea, yet a remnant of them shall return: the consumption decreed shall overflow with righteousness. For the Lord GOD of hosts shall make a consumption, even determined, in the midst of all the land." Isaiah 10:20-23 (KJV). Matthew 24 amplifies the prophecies of Isaiah, and show us that the Jews will flee to the red rock city of Selah Petra. That will be the only safe hiding place throughout the entire time of Jacob's trouble. Everyone else has one of two choices they can make. Either take the Mark of the Beast and live through the tribulation but be damned to Hell, as seen here - "And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name."Revelation 14:9-11 (KJV). Or you can become a tribulation saint and get your head cut off. "And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled." Revelation 6:11 (KJV).
So where will the Church be when all this is taking place? The Bible clearly shows us that the Church is removed from the earth just before the start of the time of Jacob's trouble. We call this event the Pretribulation Rapture, and it is the next event on the timetable to take place. The Church, made up of born again Jews and Gentiles, is not removed for any other reason than we simply don't belong there.
When we got saved, we were judged, found guilty, and redeemed by the precious Blood of the Lamb slain at Calvary. We have already been reclaimed, and no further action is needed. We will have the Judgement Seat of Christ in Heaven, yes, but that is a judgement on works and has nothing to do with salvation. The time of Jacob's trouble will deal with the salvation of God's people.
In closing, allow me to address one more point that seems to confuse a lot of inexperienced students of scripture. The false teaching that the Church will be taken out halfway or three-fourths of the way through the time of Jacob's trouble, the so-called
Pre-wrath Rapture heresy, came about by wrongly dividing verses like these:
"Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time." Revelation 12:12 (KJV)
People have read verses like that, and wrongly made a division between the time of Jacob's trouble, the wrath of the Devil and the wrath of the Lamb. All of it, the entire 7 year period, is the wrath of God, and as previously noted, God uses Satan as His 'rod of judgment'. The Prewrath Rapture people say that the Church will be here for the first 3.5 years, then taken out when the Antichrist forces people to take the Mark of the Beast. The Bible teaches no such thing. Antichrist is sent out over the world as the very first event of the time of Jacob's trouble, and who sends him out? Jesus does! Antichrist is the 'strong delusion' that comes upon people after the Rapture of the Church takes place.
"And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie:" 2 Thessalonians 2:11 (KJV)
The pre-wrath rapture was conceived in the 1970’s by a man named Robert Van Kampen, who died in 1999. This view was then picked up and endorsed by Marvin Rosenthal who wrote his book ‘
The Pre-Wrath Rapture Of The Church‘. The “Pre-Wrath” view of the Rapture argues that the first three-fourths of the Tribulation is the wrath of Man and the wrath of Satan, and not the wrath of God. Therefore, the proponents of this view argue that the Church will suffer through the first three-quarters of the Tribulation since the Church is promised protection only from the wrath of God.
I hope this has shed a little more light on the massive subject of the coming time of Jacob's trouble, who this time period is for, and the reason why God has determined it to be so. If you have any questions, please comment below and I will be my best to answer them.
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