Immortality or Resurrection, William West [best romance books of all time txt] 📗

AND COMING ON THE CLOUDS OF HEAVEN" [Mark 14:62]. The high priest did not literally see Jesus in Heaven, but he and all Israel did see the coming of Jesus in judgment on Israel.
"The signs in the heavens, the darkening sun and falling stars, refer to the falling of Jewish dignitaries, casting down of authorities and powers, long established, and signified the darkness that settled upon the Jewish state, the sun of the Hebrew temple was darkened, the moon of the Jewish commonwealth was as blood, the stars of Sanhendrin fell from their high seats of authority...The sign of the Son of man in the heaven was a signal, the evidence of divine visitation and intervention in the downfall of the Jewish authorities and in all the transpiring events. The mourning of all the tribes of the earth refers to the lamentation of the Jewish families all over the world because of the destruction of their city and their temple and their state. The coming of the Son of man in the clouds of heaven is not a reference to the second coming of Christ but to the coming foretold by Jesus to Caiaphas in Matthew 26:64: 'Hereafter shall you see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of Heaven.' Jesus told Caiaphas that he would see it, he would be living witness to these event" Foy E. Wallace Jr., "The Book of Revelation" Page 354.
"And then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn." When their country was destroyed, the Jews that were in other parts of the earth would mourn. The word translated "earth" is "gee" and in the King James Version is translated "land" forty-one times, "ground" eighteen times and "country" two times. "Gee" is translated land in Matthew 2:6; 2:20; 2:21; 4:15; 9:26; 11:24; 14:34; 27:45; Mark 4:1; 6:47; 6:53; 15:33; Luke 4:25; 5:3; 5:11; 5:24; 8:27; 14:35; 21:23; John 3:22; 6:21; 21:8; 21:9; 21:11; Acts 7:3; 7:4; 7:4; 7:6; 7:11; 7:29; 7:33; 7:36; 7:4013:17; 13:19; 13:19; Hebrews 8:9; 11:9; Jude 5. "Gee" is translated "ground" in Matthew 9:29; 13:8; 13:23; 15:35; Mark 4:8; 4:20; 4:26; 8:6; 9:20; 24:35; Luke 8:8; 8:15; 22:44; John 8:6; 8:8; 12:24; Acts 7:33. "Gee" is translated "country" in Matthew 9:31 and Acts 7:3. Had it been translated "land" in Matthew 24:30, "And then shall all the tribes of the land [gee] mourn" most of the confusion would not have existed. See Zechariah 12:11-12.
"And he will send forth His angels with a great trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other" [Matthew 24:31]. Still speaking in figurative language Jesus is saying He will send His messengers into all the world with His Gospel and gather them to Him in His kingdom, the church. Just as there was not literally a "great trumpet" that was heard in Egypt and Assyria [Isaiah 27:13], there was not literally a "great trumpet" after the fall of Jerusalem. "And they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other," is figurative language meaning from all over the earth, just as is "from east and west, and from north and south" [Luke 13:29 also see Matthew 24:14]. All the saved "His elect" are now gathered together in His kingdom, the church.
Those in the first century would understand "blood, fire, vapor and smoke" to be used as it was in the Old Testament [Acts 2:19; Joel 2:28-32], but would never have understood it to be referring to a nuclear war as many Millennialists apply it. Christ used the symbolic language of the Old Testament as it was used in the Old Testament, as those hearing Him would have understood, not something in today's newspapers. Literally, that day was an ordinary day; the moon was not literally turned into blood, but spiritually it was an earth shaking day. Even the Millennialists who say all scripture must be interpreted literally do not believe the moon will ever literally be turned to blood.
THE SON OF MAN SEEN COMING IN HIS KINGDOM "Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who shall not taste death until they SEE THE SON OF MAN COMING in His kingdom" [Matthew 16:28]. The parallel passage in Mark says, "Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who shall not taste death until they see the kingdom of God after it has come with power" [Mark 9:1]. His kingdom came in Acts 2; therefore, Christ was seen coming in His kingdom in power and glory in A. D. 30. Christ came both in the coming of His kingdom and in judgment on Israel, but neither one was a visible coming as the second coming that will be seen by all, both all the living and all the dead will see Him. The problem many have when they read Matthew 24 is that they see only His second coming and therefore must interpret much of Matthew 24 to be speaking of the end of time. Neither His coming in His kingdom in A. D. 30, nor His coming in judgment on Israel in A. D. 70 was the second coming when the saved will put on immortality and forever be with Him.
COMING OF CHRIST BEFORE HIS DISCIPLES HAD GONE THROUGH THE CITIES OF ISRAEL. Matthew 10:16-23 "Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be you therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves. But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to councils, and in theirs synagogues they will scourge you; and before governors and kings shall you be brought for my sake, for a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up, be not anxious how or what you shall speak: for it shall be given you in that hour what you shall speak. For it is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaks in you. And brother shall deliver up brother to death, and the father his child: and children shall rise up against parents, and cause them to be put to death. And you shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endures to the end, the same shall be saved. But when they persecute you in this city, flee into the next: for verily I say unto you, You shall not have gone through the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come."
"After the destruction of Jerusalem seventeen hundred Jews who surrendered at Macherus were slain, and of fugitives not less than three thousand in the woods of Jardes. Titus having marched his army to Caesarea, he (Titus) there, with great splendor, celebrated the birthday of his brother Domitian; and according to the barbarous manner of those times, punished many Jews in honor of it. The number who was burnt, and who fell by fighting with wild beasts, and in mutual combats, exceeded two thousand five hundred." G. Holford, The Destruction of Jerusalem.
Adam Clarke lists some that were killed at other places. "The inhabitants of Caesarea, above 20,000. At Scythopolis, above 13,000. At Ascalon, 2,500. At Ptolemais, 2,000. At Alexandria, 50,000. At Joppa, when taken by Cestius Gallus, 8,400. In a mountain called Asamon, near Sepporis, above 2,000. At Damascus, 10,000. In a battle with the Romans at Ascalon, 10,000. In an ambuscade near the same place, 8,000. At Japha, 15,000. Of the Samaritans, on Mount Gerizim, 11,600. At Jotapa, 40,000. At Joppa, when taken by Vespasian, 4,200. At Tarichea, 6,500. And after the city was taken, 1,200. At Gamala, 4,000, besides 5,000 who threw themselves down a precipice. Of those who fled with John, of Gischala, 6,000. Of the Gadarenes, 15,000 slain, besides countless multitudes drowned. In the village of Idumea, above 10,000 slain. At Gerasa, 1,000. At Machaerus, 1,700. In the wood of Jardes, 3,000. In the castle of Masada, 960. In Cyrene, by Catullus the governor, 3,000. Besides these, many of every age, sex, and condition, were slain in the war, who are not reckoned; but, of those who are reckoned, the number amounts to upwards of 1,357,660, which would have appeared incredible, if their own historian had not so particularly enumerated them." Clarke's Commentary on Matthew. The unknown number that was destroyed throughout the country by pestilence, famine, earthquakes and robbers throughout the reign both before the destruction of Jerusalem, during the destruction, and the years after it must be added to this. Also, Adam Clarke says most of those taken captive "above seventeen years old were distributed through the Roman provinces, to be destroyed in their theaters by the sword, and by the wild beasts."
AFTER TITUS CAME ADRIAN
All of Israel was destroyed.
"'In the reign of Adrian,' say Bishop Newton, 'nine hundred and eighty-five of their best towns were sacked and demolished, five hundred and eighty thousand men fell by the sword, in battle, besides, an infinite multitude who perished by, famine, and sickness, and fire; so that Judea was depopulated, and an almost incredible number of every age and of each sex, were sold like horses and dispersed over the face of the earth' - (Newton, vol. I, Page xviii.) The war which gave rise to these calamities happened about forty-four years after the destruction of Jerusalem" G. Holford, The Destruction of Jerusalem.
"Therefore, behold, the days come, says Jehovah, that it shall no more be called Topheth, not the Valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of slaughter: for they shall bury in Topheth, till there be no place to bury. And the dead bodies of this people shall be food for the birds of the heavens, and for the beasts of the earth; and none shall frighten them away. THEN WILL I CAUSE TO CEASE FROM THE CITIES OF JUDAH, AND FROM THE STREETS OF JERUSALEM, THE VOICE OF MIRTH AND THE VOICE OF GLADNESS, THE VOICE OF THE BRIDEGROOM AND THE VOICE OF THE BRIDE; FOR THE LAND SHALL BECOME A WASTE" [Jeremiah 7:32-34].
John Calvin, "For within fifty years the city was destroyed and the temple ruined, THE WHOLE COUNTRY WAS REDUCED TO A HIDEOUS DESERT." "Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelist, Matthew, Mark, and Luke." All Israel, the whole nation, not just the temple was totally destroyed, "reduced to a hideous desert."
David Chilton, "'Let Him be Crucified! Let Him be Crucified! His blood be on us, and on our children!' the apostates had cried forty years earlier (Matthew 27:22-25); and when it was all over, more than a million Jews had been killed in the siege of Jerusalem; close to a million more were sold into slavery throughout the empire, and whole of Judea lay smoldering in ruins, virtually depopulate." "The Great Tribulation" 1987, Dominion Press.
Josephus says, "The countryside, like the city, was a pitiful sight, for where once there had been a multitude of trees and parks, there was now an utter wilderness stripped bare of timber; and no stranger who has seen the old Judea and the glorious suburbs of her capital, and now beheld utter desolation, could refrain from tears or suppress a groan at so terrible a change. the war had blotted out every trace of beauty, and no one who had known it in the past and came upon it suddenly would have recognized the place, for though he was already there, he would still have been