And in Conclusion… :: By Terry James

This commentary will be a bit personal, so I must warn that included is information I believe the Lord wants presented, but that the writing of it might be taken as self-attention-gathering allure. Please know that’s not what I intend.

While working in advertising many years ago, I served as creative director in a couple of ad agencies. We, of course, worked to put our clients’ businesses in the best possible light, and create allurements aimed at potential customers of our clients’ products and services through regional and national print and broadcast venues.

We constantly searched the recesses of our brains for the cleverest, yet on-the-mark lines of copy (word pictures) to attract customers for our clients and to demonstrate to our competitor ad agencies just how good we were at the business of advertising.

Annual awards were presented for such narcissistic endeavors. I loved the business of advertising, but, being younger than the agency heads, I never got caught up in the higher level of the business where the top guys would gather to accept the awards.

The one time I wish to relate here, in which the part I loved–the creative process—was involved, is captured in the title of this commentary. I’m sure the phrase has been used many times since that moment long ago. But it was the first time it was used, and we all sat around the ad agency’s creative environs wishing we could have thought of it.

It was emblazoned across a billboard. I can’t remember the ad agency that came up with it, or which funeral home it was created for, but it was, at the time, absolutely the perfect slogan for a funeral home: “And in conclusion….”

I guess that thoughts of funeral-type things are always close to the surface of our thinking, particularly the older we get.

My eighty-fourth birthday is the day after we post this article, and I’ve been listening to the funeral of Senator Lindsey Graham, who died considerably younger than I am at present, as I write it on Tuesday, July 28. So the slogan from long ago came to mind in a most poignant way.

Here I sit, thinking on, praying on, and writing about the biblical conclusion of things–Bible prophecy.

It comes to mind the many great friends that have gone to their heavenly rewards, some considerably younger than I am now. Like Dr. Dave Breese, truly one of my most beloved friends, who helped me get started with my first book—Storming Toward Armageddon.

Dave, one of the most eloquent and brilliant spokesmen for God’s Word, was just seventy-three when he was called into Heaven.

I think of my wonderful friend Dr. Tim LaHaye, who was sixteen years older than me. I remember this because the first time Tim and I met, he figured the age difference with a smile. Tim is certainly now enjoying the tremendous rewards of heavenly life–eternal life!

Then I think on the great preacher and teacher Dr. J. Vernon McGee, who inspired so many of us with his down-home but tremendously powerful teachings. He was…well…he was eighty-four when he passed into that heavenly dimension! Eighty-four!… Well…I’m now 84!

Time to think of what the slogan I remember so vividly from those many years ago really encompasses! “And in conclusion….”

This is not meant to be read like my own impending epitaph. I trust the Lord has me here yet for His own purposes. I won’t go into the widow-maker heart attack and heart stoppages way back on Good Friday, April 22, 2011, and the miraculous trip to Heaven and back three times. (Well, I guess I just did go into it again but just can’t help myself.) It’s a witness, and I will always interject it when opportunity permits.

And the witness–the main reason I believe I’m still topside of the soil, as I like to say—is to tell that God is warning the world that the end of this age (Age of Grace or Church Age) is about to come to an end. This means that the worst time in all of human history, as Jesus Himself stated (Matthew 24: 21), is about to come upon rebellious humankind.

The Tribulation will be the last seven years that will put an end to humankind’s rebellion against God. It will be Daniel’s seventieth week.

The telling of this terrible era of Heaven’s punishment against earth’s rebels, found mainly in the book of Revelation, detailing twenty-one judgments in a series of three specific acts of God’s wrath: seven scrolls, seven trumpets, and seven bowls, will be God saying, in effect, what that billboard advertisement presented all those years ago.

And in conclusion…

The Lord is indeed slow concerning His judgment. He is not willing for anyone to perish in their sin. He pleads for all to come to repentance. But His patience is not without limits, and it is obvious to any true student of Bible prophecy that this generation is bumping up against the very end of this age of God’s patience.

The Rapture of all believers, lifting them (harpazo) into the presence of Jesus Christ, who will receive (paralambano) them unto Himself where they will be with Him forever.

Now this is the way those of us who study and put forth God’s Word –particularly His prophetic Word—want ultimately for all who will heed Heaven’s call. This is the end of all things as God wants them to be because that end is really the Beginning.

Accept Christ and the redemption God offers through His Son’s death, burial, and resurrection. The words of that slogan I remember will then have a wonderful, not a fearful, meaning.

And in conclusion…

–Terry

Wtjames1@swbell.net

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Maintaining a Heavenly Focus

We live in the last moments before Jesus’ appearing. The Lord gave us a great many signs so we could recognize the season of His return for us, and this is it, no doubt about it. But is it possible to become overly preoccupied with what’s happening around us, the signs themselves?

As many of you know, Amir Tsarfati has stepped away from reporting the news each day. I very much miss his accurate perspective of the current war, but I increasingly understand his decision. In a recent post on Telegram, he said, “The world is captivated by what is happening. I am captivated by Who is coming.” I know from experience that it’s far too easy to also become captivated by the 24-hour news cycle and lose my focus on Jesus Himself.

I’m not suggesting that we bury our heads in the sand, but at the same time we must realize that not all Christian sources of end-time news are the same. Some don’t believe in a pre-Tribulation Rapture, and that significantly changes the way that they report current events. They lack the perspective of 2 Thessalonians 2:3-8, that of the Restrainer holding back the unveiling of antichrist and the rampant lawlessness he will bring with him after the Rapture.

As Amir so aptly stated, we must not become “captivated” by what we see, even though they are genuine signs of the last days. I might add that we must not allow others to needlessly alarm us when they report the dire news apart from the perspective of Jesus’ imminent appearing.

In Titus 2:13, Paul defined “our blessed hope” as “the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.” We see this same focus in Philippians 3:20-21:

“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.” (emphasis added)

I wrote the following in my book, The Triumph of the Redeemed:

The Greek word for “await” in verse 20 points to an “intense anticipation” or an “excited expectation” of a future event.[i]

Luke used the same Greek word for “await” in Acts 17:16 to describe Paul’s restless “waiting” in Athens for Silas and Timothy to rejoin him. After the apostle’s distressing experiences in Philippi, Thessalonica, and Berea, we know he intently watched and longed for a reunion with his fellow laborers. This is the same passionate yearning of the soul with which the apostle characterizes the waiting of the Philippians for the Lord’s appearing.

Paul used that same word, properly translated as “eagerly await,” in other texts referring to the Rapture (1 Corinthians 1:7; Romans 8:23-25). The apostle taught all his converts to look for the Lord’s appearing (1 Thessalonians 1:8-10). Jesus is our hope. Without this perspective, the alarming news of our day often generates fear rather than hopeful expectation.

One of my favorite Rapture passages is Colossians 3:1-4:

“If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”

Although the text doesn’t mention Jesus’ appearing until verse 4, it sums up our need for a heavenly focus on our Savior during these perilous times. He is our “life,” the reason we have hope as the storm clouds appear on the horizon. For me, these verses are the best remedy for feelings of fear or even anger brought about by reading about the widespread fraud, deceptiveness, and violence of our day.

Another reason for avoiding an undue reliance on the daily news cycle is its deceptiveness. It’s an extremely unreliable source for what might happen next. Solomon’s wise words in Proverbs 27:1 remind us of the uncertainty of thinking we know what lies ahead: “Do not boast about tomorrow, for you do not know what a day may bring.” Even when what we read is an accurate portrayal of what happened or what someone said, it often turns out to be a faulty indicator of what the next day will bring our way.

I pray Jesus comes very soon to take us to the place He’s preparing for us.

In the meantime, don’t let the daily hype of current events take your eyes off the source of our hope, Jesus. The Lord sovereignly controls all things, and at just the right time, He will take us out of here.

Maranatha!

-Jonathan

jonathanbrentner@yahoo.com

[i] Colin Brown, ed., Dictionary of New Testament Theology Vol. 2, (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1969) p. 244.

 

Malefaction and Malevolence Movement toward Millennium

“The evil men do live after them; the good is oft interred with their bones….”

Thus, William Shakespeare put the English words into the mouth of his fictionalized characterization of Mark Antony, as the Roman general and politician eulogized the assassinated emperor, Julius Caesar. Antony’s words were framed carefully to convince those who were in power and who had been complicit in one way or another in Caesar’s murder that he wasn’t praising the dead leader. At the same time, Antony was cleverly praising Caesar and appealing to the Roman citizens in attendance to understand that Caesar had ruled with the people’s best interest in mind at the center of all he did while their emperor.

Antony, speaking Latin translated into Shakespeare’s English words, in a way, unwittingly encapsulated humankind’s committing wickedness throughout the ages, while pointing out that all is ultimately leading to good things for Heaven’s citizens.

But it isn’t an earthly, sinful, fallen Caesar whose dead bones will bring forth the ultimate Good. It is the resurrected King of all Kings, the only Good that exists—who will one day bring about a Kingdom of perfection and goodness that will last forever.

We witness “the evil men do” daily through our newsfeeds. We’re especially given daily news cycles that report the usually terrible news of malefaction and malevolence—for example, the reports that thousands of young people are dying weekly in the war between Russia and Ukraine.

Down through the years of the twentieth century and so far into the twenty-first, evil leaders have caused the deaths of millions of the youth of enemies and of their own young men, and, like in the case of Mao and Stalin and many others, slaughtered millions of their own people to hold onto political power. If there was any “good…interred with their bones” of the likes of those tyrants or others such as Hitler, I certainly haven’t learned of it.

There seems no hope for humankind if one delves into the vaults of history. Malefaction and malevolence are so evil as to invoke within those who examine history a depression from which there can be no recovery.

The dark storm clouds continue to roll upon the immediate horizon, and much of the news I receive in daily alerts points to the prospect that soon the earth will again be embroiled within world war.

Even Christian writers who report on geopolitics, et cetera, dwell upon how we are stumbling into the Bible’s prophesied time of Tribulation. There is, they hold within their theological outlook—their view of eschatology (study of end things)—that there is no hope. They say we’ll all soon be in the middle of what Jesus said will be the worst time of all human history (Matthew 24: 21).

A couple of such fearful reports by a pre-Trib Rapture-denying Christian writer were posted in our Raptureready.com News on Monday July13, 2026:

• There Is Going to Be an All-Out Fight for Control of the Strait of Hormuz, and the Implications Are Staggering
  There will be no negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz, only fighting. The U.S. and Iran will now engage in all-out war for control of the Strait, and the consequences will be felt by everyone. Traffic through the Strait will be paralyzed for the foreseeable future, and there will be a severe worldwide energy supply crunch as a result.
• The Future Is Now: War, Famine, Pestilence and Natural Disasters Will Define the Months Ahead
  The war in the Middle East has escalated dramatically over the past week, the “Super El Niño” is causing crazy heatwaves and storms, the Ebola outbreak in Africa is out of control, and we’ve had some very large earthquakes in Venezuela and elsewhere. Global events have started to spiral out of control, and the chaos is not going to stop.

Indeed, malefaction and malevolence perpetrated by the evil leaders of history and of our moment on earth have seemingly engendered a course of murderous evil out of which humankind cannot escape. The very fact that America’s military is now engaged against a religiously fanatical regime determined to blow up the US and Israel by producing nuclear weaponry shows just how nearly hopeless things appear geopolitically. Most of the world’s news sources and most of the politicians and diplomats of the world are focused on how to achieve peace. They “cry peace, peace, when there is no peace.”

There seems no hope. But there should be no fear-induced bondage for the Christian who looks to the God of Heaven and to the King of all Kings, the Lord Jesus Christ, in consideration of the Heaven-promised future. The hourly news cycles announcing that the world will soon be aflame with war only means that the Christian is but an eye blink away from instantaneous transport into the clouds of Glory to be with the Lord of Lords forever.

The evil the world has endured since the Fall in the Garden of Eden will be dealt with during the seven years of Tribulation. With all believers of the Age of Grace (Church Age) in Heaven enjoying the marriage supper of the Lamb in the union with Christ, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, God will be at work on the earth. He will use twenty-one specific judgments—the scrolls, trumpets, and bowls—to prepare a remnant of Israel for receiving their returning Messiah at the end of Armageddon.

Earth will begin a complete transformation to pristine condition—like it was before the Fall in Eden—when Jesus’ foot touches down on the exact spot where He ascended into Heaven.

He will proceed into the city of Jerusalem through a great valley created when His foot touched the Mount of Olives. His Temple will sit atop of greatly lifted up Mount Zion, where He will reign and rule over the earth for a thousand years. This will be the millennial Kingdom, which only believers will populate, and they will prosper in every way possible under the first perfect government that has ever operated upon Earth.

Satan and his unholy minions will be confined in the bottomless pit for that thousand-year era (Revelation 20:1-2), so there will be no temptation to any inhabitant of Earth, except from the sin nature within each mortal person inhabiting the millennial Kingdom. Christ will rule with an iron scepter, which means with an all-seeing, all-knowing perspective. Sin, when it rarely surfaces to disrupt life, will be instantly dealt with by the King of all Kings.

Christians who went to be with Jesus in the Rapture will serve King Jesus upon Earth in their supernatural, immortal status. They will no doubt oversee the mortal believers who go into the millennial Kingdom following the Tribulation and their offspring who will be born during that era.

My great friend Daymond Duck offers the following about that tremendous time of the millennial reign of Christ:

Below are seven things that the saved [those who were raptured, now in their supernatural bodies] will do:

1) Worship (Revelation 4:9-10)

2) Keep the Feast of Tabernacles (Zechariah 14:16-19)

3) Visit Jerusalem to learn (Isaiah 2:2-3; 1 Corinthians 13:11-12)

4) Fellowship (Revelation 19:9)

5) Serve Jesus (Psalm 72:11; Revelation 22:3)

6) Judge fallen angels (1 Corinthians 6:3)

7) Reign on the earth (Luke 19:11-27; Revelation 5:10; 2 Timothy 2:12

These things will be more than enough to keep us busy.

Amen! And this Kingdom could be as near as seven years away, with the Rapture at any moment! Even so, come, Lord Jesus!

—Terry

Wtjames1@swbell.net

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11 Compelling Signs of the Last Days

I recently came across an article I wrote about two and a half years ago highlighting eleven signs of the last days. At the time, I anticipated that the Lord would’ve already come for us long before July 2026.

The fact that we still wait for His appearing despite the increasing relevance of all the signs I wrote about back then demonstrates God’s patience as well as His restraining hand in holding back the calamities that loom over the world at this moment. And the clouds grow darker by the moment.

My purpose in reviewing these signs in what follows is to encourage those who may have grown weary or even disheartened as they wait for the Lord’s appearing. Please know that what we see is all the more reason to be hopeful the Rapture will happen soon.

The first sign is that of Israel’s miraculous rebirth as a nation. It’s the continuing basis of our assurance that we live in the last days.

The Bible long ago predicted that Israel would again exist as a nation. The miraculous reappearance of the Jewish state in 1948 fulfilled Bible prophecy and testifies to the relevance of the myriad of other signs that continue to converge in our day with increasing intensity.

Second, the growing fever within Israel for the rebuilding of the temple also heralds the nearness of Jesus’ appearing. The Bible says that Israel will have a temple by the midpoint of the Tribulation. The ongoing preparations for the third temple are significant; don’t let anyone tell you they are not.

During the past couple of years, the Temple Institute has begun training a great many Levites for service in the future temple. The Israeli government is planning infrastructure in preparation for the construction of the third temple. The evidence continues to mount; there will be a third temple.

Third, the approaching hoofbeats of the riders of the Apocalypse (Revelation 6:1-8) are louder than ever. During a radio interview a few years ago, the interviewer asked me if I thought we were already living in the time of these seal judgments. I’m not sure he agreed with my explanation that the Rapture must happen first; he seemed to think God’s wrath had already arrived upon the earth.

Fourth, although it has faded from the headlines in recent years, the ongoing push toward a worldwide digital currency displays the world’s preparations for fulfillment of Revelation 13:16-18. Since 2024, data centers have become front and center as the world races toward generating the computing power and databases necessary for the mark of the beast.

The antichrist needs just such a system in place by the midpoint of the Tribulation in order to control the buying and selling throughout the world. And we are already so close to this becoming a reality.

Fifth, another sign of the last days is sadly the rapid rise of antisemitism that’s reached epidemic proportions in many places around the world. The Lord said there would be an abnormal obsession with Jerusalem, hatred for Israel and its people, and a desire to divide the promised land in the last days (Zechariah 8:13, 12:1-3; Joel 3:1-3). And this is exactly what we see today as the anti-Zion fervor grows stronger every day, even among some who profess to be Christians.

Sixth, the world’s fascination with UFOs and aliens has grown considerably in the past couple of years. In recent months, the scoffers of our faith believe that the evidence of extraterrestrial life will undermine our beliefs. Will this be the deception that the world will accept as the reason for our sudden disappearance? It’s entirely possible, if not probable.

During the past couple of years, belief in the existence of UFOs has grown immensely.

Seventh, back in 2024, I wrote about the UN’s 2023 seven-year commitment to implement all of its 17 Strategic Development Goals (SDGs) of Agenda 2030. At the time, I wondered if globalists believed they were falling behind on their agenda. I also believed it was significant that they were talking about a “seven-year plan.”

I’m convinced that the plans of the elite will remain somewhat frustrated until after the Rapture. They will continue to make some progress, but our disappearance along with the “sudden destruction” that will mark the start of the Day of the Lord will be the crises they need in order to achieve global dominance.

Eighth, the scoffing that I noted a couple of years ago has expanded beyond that of mocking the Rapture to that of our Premillennial belief in Jesus’ thousand-year reign in Zion. The apostle’s warning in 2 Peter 3:3-4 aptly describes the day in which we live as its prophetic words come to life all around us:

“. . . knowing this first of all, that scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing, following their own sinful desires. They will say, ‘Where is the promise of his coming? For ever since the fathers fell asleep, all things are continuing as they were from the beginning of creation.’”

The ninth sign is the epidemic of deception. The use of artificial intelligence (AI) to deceive people has grown exponentially in the past two years. My recent experience with its capabilities to portray a false reality went beyond anything I could’ve imagined just a few weeks ago.

After the disciples asked Jesus about the signs of the end of the age and of His coming, the first words He spoke were these, “Take heed that no man deceive you” (Matthew 24:4). I can’t imagine how this sign will get any worse during the Tribulation, but the Bible says it will (Matthew 24:24). The tools that the antichrist will need to deceive the masses are available; how close must we be to our departure?

Tenth, since 2001, Earth’s magnetic north pole has been moving. A May 2020 article on the Forbes Magazine website discussed how this shift has speeded up in recent years, but did not discuss the dire consequences should the north and south poles swap places.[i] What does this have to do with Bible prophecy?

It’s because what many scientists, mostly unbelievers, tell us will happen during a pole shift is remarkably similar to what Isaiah says will happen in the Day of the Lord (24:19-20) and also closely resembles John’s description of the sixth seal in Revelation 6:12-17.

Eleventh, another sign that continues to capture our attention as students of Bible prophecy is the building of underground bunkers by the ultra-rich. Back in 2024, social media was abuzz with reports of Mark Zuckerberg, billionaire founder of Facebook, building a massive underground shelter in Hawaii at a cost of about one hundred million dollars. Today we read reports of many other wealthy people constructing elaborate underground places of refuge packed with storable food and resources for a long duration.

This fulfills the prophecy of Isaiah 2:17-19, which John also alludes to in Revelation 6:15-17.

Will I be updating these signs two years from now? I hope that will not be necessary because we will already be with the Lord.

Jesus is coming for us very soon; I very much hope this is the year we meet Him in the air. Regardless of whether or not that happens, I will continue to live with the sense of imminence that I wrote about last week. It not only keeps me hopeful, but it also keeps me reasonably sane as I follow current events.

-Jonathan

jonathanbrentner@yahoo.com

[i] Eric Mack, Earth’s Magnetic North Pole Is Shifting Dramatically From A Powerful Tug Of War, May 7, 2020, at https://www.forbes.com/sites/ericmack/2020/05/07/earths-magnetic-north-pole-is-shifting-dramatically-from-a-powerful-tug-of-war/?sh=1934c391ffe1