The Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry will present its annual Look Up virtual Bible prophecy conference this weekend—Friday and Saturday, March 10 and 11.

The theme this year is “Unraveling the Mysteries of the Bible,” and it deals with a number of questions related to eschatology.

The conference is free for all to participate and will remain available to re-watch until March 24. Registration is required at lookupfoi.org.

This online event is especially significant for me because it is the first time I have been involved in Look Up—or in any speaking opportunity of this magnitude.

I was amazed and humbled at the invitation to present the concluding message, in a series of six, on the subject, “Why Must There Be a Millennial Kingdom?”

The other speakers and their subjects are as follows:

Dr. Jim Showers – “Why Is Prophecy Important for Today?”

Dan Price – “What Are the Signs of Christ’s Coming?”

Chris Katulka – “Why Must Things Get Worse Before They Get Better?”

Steve Herzig – “Where is the United States in the End-times?”

Dr. Mike Stallard – “When Will the Kingdom Begin?”

I was given complete latitude to develop my presentation, so I expanded upon five reasons why I believe that there must be a 1,000-year kingdom of Christ on this Earth—as our Lord rules the world from Jerusalem.

A big part of the joy of being involved in this project for me was traveling to our headquarters in Westville, N.J., to spend time with my colleagues there—preparing for and then recording these conference sessions.

My message not only comes last in the series, but it was the final one to be recorded. This worked to my advantage, as I was able to sit and watch all the other recordings first, allowing me to get acclimated to the environment. I will have to say that this was really the first time I have been on the set of any video production of this scope.

Another thing that helped me is that I did not specifically have to preach just to the cameras. All FOI staff were invited to come and listen to the sessions as they were able. There was a good representation of the faithful still there for me as I did the final recording, and that made it much easier for me, as I was able to talk directly to an audience.

All of this was a great learning experience for me, and I hope that it will provide a wonderful learning opportunity for the thousands of people who will view this material in the days, weeks, months, and years to come.

Jesus exhorted His disciples in Luke 21:28:

“Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near.”

May God enable this Look Up conference to provide significant Biblical insight into the issues of this time, which so many people all around us are seeking to understand. May it calm those with “hearts failing them from fear” (Lk. 21:26)—instilling peace from the One who is returning to overturn the curse of sin.
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Paul J. Scharf (M.A., M.Div., Faith Baptist Theological Seminary) is a church ministries representative for The Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry, based in Columbus, WI, and serving in the Midwest. For more information on his ministry, visit sermonaudio.com/pscharf or foi.org/scharf, or email pscharf@foi.org.

 

Scripture taken from the New King James Version.

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One day you are young and attractive and full of energy, and the next day, you are putting your will and testament in order and writing your memoirs.

The earth spins at a rate of one thousand miles per hour and orbits the sun at a thousand miles per minute clip. Time really does fly.

Time seems to go by so slowly when we are young. Then before you know it, youth has become an ever more distant memory, fleeting away in the rear-view mirror of our long and yet short journey along the road of life.

Depending on our frame of mind, time can seem to be rapidly speeding by or dragging on painfully slow. In reality, time simply marches on in perfect cadence and is measured by the night and day, seasons and years, decades, centuries and millenniums, until the last second before God decides it is time for returning to a state of timelessness.

There was a timeless time right before it was time for time. At that instant, right before it was time for time, there was no time at all.

In the beginning (Genesis 1:1), God created the heavens and the earth. He created the day to be separate from the night (Genesis 1:5), and time as we know it began. When God decides it is time to create new heavens and a new earth (Revelation 21:1) (Isaiah 65:17), time as we know it will merge into eternity, and timelessness will be quite normal.

If a person is unsaved and yet is alive in time as we know it, there is still time to accept the free gift of salvation paid for in full by the blood of God’s only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, on that cross at Calvary.

The state of being referred to as the “now” or the “present” is, in reality, the spontaneous and instantaneous phenomena of the “future” constantly and unceasingly swallowing up the “now” and rendering it into the past.

Past, present, and future all merge together into one continual time flow. As we march forward into the future, the present is instantaneously gobbled up by the pac-man of history.

With man, prophecy is impossible. With God, prophecy is not only possible; it is completely natural.

Almighty God is not bound by time, and yet He can discern the end from the beginning (Isaiah 46:10) in regard to time. The spirit of prophecy that God gave to His chosen prophets is able to operate inside and outside of time simultaneously.

In the Bible, God referred to Himself as “I Am That I Am” and also as “the Alpha and the Omega.” He is both timeless and eternal, as well as the designer of the beginning and ending of time (Exodus 3:14 and Revelation 22:13).

Only someone who is timeless and eternal could possibly be in a position to invent and manifest a thing such as time.

As Eternal God, He saw time from beginning to end and everything in between before He even set time in motion. To Eternal God, to whom timelessness is normal, time is a relatively short and temporary part of His creation.

Time did not start when someone invented the first calendar or the first clock. It began when God separated the first day from the first night, and that is a fact regardless of whether we believe it happened six thousand years ago or billions of years ago.

To Eternal God, thousands of years or billions of years are both short periods of time.

According to scripture, seven thousand years is as one week to Eternal God. And a thousand years is as a day (2 Peter 3:8 and Psalm 90:4).

It is impossible to imagine just how old God is or how big He is. Even a box the size of the universe could not contain more than a tiny fraction of a microscopic particle of His entire being.

Humans can only think in relative terms of measurement. In reality, there is no way to measure God’s entire being or His age because there are no boundaries at all to Him in time or space.

In modern secular culture, astrologers, clairvoyants, and psychics are admired for making one correct prediction out of a hundred. Yet God, who is one hundred percent accurate in His ability to predict the future, is mostly ignored.

It is an upside-down world where false prophets are adored and true prophets are ignored. And yet, the true prophets predicted that this would happen.

Prophets, even Jesus, received no honor (Luke 4:24) in their own hometowns. People would say, isn’t that just so and so who is nothing more than such and such, and who does he think he is?

People that love sin more than they love God do not want to hear about the future consequences of their sin from the mouth of a true prophet of God. They prefer having their ears tickled by the warm and fuzzy words of a false prophet (2 Timothy 4:3).

Human Beings, through the prompting of Satan, have turned the world into a very dangerous place. Through the prophets and especially through Jesus, God has revealed the only possible hope of survival.

John 3:16 is the gospel (Good News) in a nutshell. “For God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son so that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” John 3:17 continues to say, “For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.”

Bible Prophecy peers through the long tunnel of time and reveals a great and awesome light at the end of the tunnel.

Unbelievers that close their eyes to Bible Prophecy have no idea what part of the tunnel they are in. They see nothing but darkness in either direction.

Jesus is the Light of this World. All Bible Prophecy leads directly to Him because Jesus is that light at the end of the tunnel.

In the footsteps of the master, we walk with hearts so fond, awaiting the note of a trumpet that will sound from the great beyond. From far beyond the madness and yet as near as the heart, in the blink of an eye, we will be with Him, never more to part. Oh, but what a pity for all that reject His grace, eternity without Him, what a terrible thing to face. Pray for the unbelievers while there is time yet to change their fate; yes, pray for their eyes to open, for soon it could be too late.

Any precious soul who has read these words and still has not given your life to Jesus, please do so today. You will be so glad you did. He longs to save you, forgive you, wash away your sin, give you the gift of eternal life, and be your best friend right now and for all eternity.

Your friend in Him,

Rick Segoine

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All are welcome to visit ricksegoine.net, where free downloads of my book “From God to Eternity” are available, as well as downloads of original gospel songs and story songs also at no cost.