The Bible's Prophecy
How can this be? How can the desperate condition of modern mankind, the world-wide nature of its problems, and the need for an upright Leader equipped with life and power, have been foreseen in the writings of the Bible so long ago, when these things are not found in any other writing of any age and any nation or civilization? There is only one answer: somebody must have known long ago what conditions and needs would arise. But clearly no men could have known, for if they had, it would have appeared in their writings. But if it was God who knew, and if the Bible really is His Word for mankind, then all is explained.

The conclusion from this is that we ought to treat the Bible seriously. For if it has proved so right in what it has said about events centuries before they happened, is it not highly likely to be right in its prophecies of events that have not yet come to pass? Common sense would suggest that we should note carefully what more it has to say about the future of the earth and mankind.

The Early Believers
There can be no doubt at all that the early believers in Christ -- the apostles and those who believed in their preaching -- expected that Jesus would personally return to the earth to carry out God's purpose with the nations. The New Testament has many passages which clearly express this idea. For instance, Jesus himself, after describing the conditions of distress, fear and perplexity which would come upon the inhabited earth, immediately adds this:

"Then shall they see the Son of man coming in a cloud with power and great glory" (Luke 21:27).

The "Son of man" is a title Jesus frequently gave to himself. Notice that his coming to the world in distress is not to be so quiet that it will not be noticed; it will be spectacular, in "power and great glory". Further, as the disciples stand on the Mount of Olives watching Jesus ascend to heaven, this is the message they receive:

"This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven" (Acts 1:11).

There is no escaping the literal character of this declaration. It is the same Jesus as they had got to know again after his resurrection. His coming again would be in the same way as his departing. As he literally and personally went, so he will come. Hence their preaching and writings in the New Testament clearly express this expectation. We have looked at one passage already in Acts chapter 17, where Paul declares that Christ will be the appointed ruler of the nations. The Epistles of the New Testament frequently allude to the return of Christ to the earth. The two Epistles of Paul to the Thessalonians contain such an allusion in every single chapter. Here is the first of them:

Paul rejoices with the believers in Thessalonica, that they had "turned unto God from idols, to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom (God) raised from the dead, even Jesus, who delivers us from the wrath to come" (1 Thess. 1:9-10).

The Apostle Peter, addressing the inhabitants of Jerusalem shortly after Jesus ascended to heaven, had this to say to them:

"Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; and he shall send Jesus Christ . . . whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, whereof God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began" (Acts 3:19-21).

This is a tremendous declaration of what God intends to do in the earth. Let us look carefully at what Peter says. Leaving for the moment the question of repentance and the forgiveness of sins, which deserves separate treatment, notice Peter's insistence that there is hope for the future: "times of refreshing . . . times of restitution (restoration, R.V.) of all things" are to come. But where from? "From the presence of the Lord", says Peter-in other words, not from the resources of mankind, but from God. And how will these "refreshing times" come? "He (God) shall send Jesus Christ", who incidentally had only a little while before ascended to heaven. But he is not to stay there for ever. "The heaven" receives him only until the times of restoration of all things". The general message is clear. The new age of "refreshing" and "restoration" for the earth will come about by God sending His Son back again when the right moment in His purpose has come. The personal return of Jesus thus became a vital point in the preaching of his apostles, as the writings of the New Testament clearly demonstrate.

The Value of the Prophecies
But Peter has added one more important piece of information. These "times of the restoration of all things" had already been revealed: God had "spoken (of them) by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began." What is Peter referring to? There can be no doubt about the answer. "The prophets" were the chosen men through whom God spoke to His people in Old Testament times. Their writings existed in Peter's day; the same ones exist in ours in the books of the Old Testament. In them, says Peter, you will find what God has already revealed. So when we turn to Old Testament prophecy for information about what God intends to do in the earth, and among the nations, we are not wasting our time-so says Peter.

So what do the prophecies say? That is expressed in many fascinating details, but the general message is this: human history is, despite appearances to the contrary, under the control of God. He has given to mankind the power to dominate the earth -- but not for ever. Mankind will become corrupted and so demonstrate that they can neither govern themselves nor save the world from destruction. The time will come when God will intervene in human affairs, and by His own power will set up His own government of the world, to establish right and peace among men, upon the basis of honor to His Name.

The simplest and yet most comprehensive example of this is to be found in the second chapter of the prophecy of Daniel. The king of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar, sees in a vision a great human image made up of different metals: head of gold, breast and arms of silver, etc. He then sees a "great stone" fall upon the feet of the image, grind all its components to powder, and then itself fill the whole earth. The prophet Daniel explains what it means. The great image represents the kingdoms of men: Nebuchadnezzar is told that the head of gold represents his Babylonian empire; that the remaining parts of the image denote the empires which were to follow his; and it is not difficult to perceive a prophecy of the rise-and fall-of the empires of Persia, Greece and Rome. In the "last" stage of development, the feet of the image are a mixture of iron and clay. They represent a weak stage when the nations would "not cleave together", a remarkable prophecy of the divided state of the nations of Europe ever since the overthrow of Roman power in the 5th century A.D.

But the stone smites the image in its feet -- its divided state -- and destroys it; and the empires of men are over-thrown and replaced by the stone which becomes "a great mountain and fills the whole earth" (v.35). Daniel then gives the meaning of this last development:

"In the days of those kings (that is, the divided kingdoms) shall the God of heaven setup a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed . . . it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever" (v.44).