An Alphabetical Analysis
Volume 8 - Prophetic Truth - Page 173 of 304
INDEX
in heaven the foreknown day, when He shall ascend the throne so long denied
Him.  Why was it essential that the number twelve should be completed upon
the defection of Judas?  The answer is, that if Israel had repented as they
were called upon to do, there must have been twelve apostles ready to sit
upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.  It would have been
useless to have argued, that inasmuch as God foreknew that Israel would not
repent that He could disregard the fact that there were only eleven apostles
just before the day of Pentecost.
In the ordinary way, a man is himself, whether other folk are willing
to accept him or not -- but John the Baptist was no ordinary man, and so the
Saviour said, 'If ye are willing to receive (it, or him), this is Elijah, the
one about to come'; but the people were not thus willing, and instead of
'receiving' they rejected the gospel of the kingdom.  In the same way we can
say, if Israel had repented, then Rome would have been the last Gentile
kingdom on the earth, Antichrist would have arisen, the Beast would have
received Satanic power, the whole of Joel 2:28 -31 would have been fulfilled
instead of only the prelude at Pentecost, the day of the Lord as depicted in
the Revelation would have run straight on without a break, the Second Coming
of Christ would have taken place, and the times of restitution of all things
would have come in.
Instead, a gap of about nineteen hundred years intervenes between Joel
2:28,29 and verses 30 and 31; in the same way a gap intervenes in prophetic
details which corresponds with the discontinuance of the hope of Israel at
Acts 28, until prophetic times are renewed at the time of the end.  Up to
Acts 28, Rome was still the world power in direct succession from
Nebuchadnezzar, it was to Caesar that Paul was sent for trial and under
Caesar he finally paid the extreme penalty for his faithfulness.  A few years
after Acts 28, Jerusalem and the temple were destroyed and Israel became Lo -
ammi, 'not my people', their house left desolate, and their hope suspended.
Upon the defection of Israel in the land, the kingdom of the heavens had
assumed its 'mystery' form (Matt. 13); upon the defection of Israel at Rome,
the long suffering of God which had waited for another thirty -five years,
came to an end, 'the Mystery' of the present dispensation came in, the
mystery of Israel's blindness also ensued, and Gentile dominion, while still
functioning, is covered by a cloud, and mystery intervenes, for the
dispensation of the Mystery has no place in it for Gentile powers.
We know from secular history that from the battle of Actium, 31 b.c.,
to the Saracen conquest, a.d. 636, Rome trod down Jerusalem for a period of
666 years -- no accidental number.  The Mahometan power continued this
affliction right up to our own times, when Jerusalem was delivered from its
oppression in November 1917.  Since then Israel has been accepted once again
as a nation by the nations though not yet by their God, and the image of
Daniel 2 is emerging from the mist, the iron legs now being seen as feet in
the Middle East, which will be eventually intermingled with clay.  It is this
final aspect of Gentile dominion with which we are chiefly concerned, and
which is shaping before our very eyes.
In Daniel 7, the first year of the last king of Babylon, Daniel had a
vision of the time of the end.  As a consequence of the stirring of the four
winds upon the great sea, four beasts were seen to emerge, they 'came up from
the sea' (Dan. 7:2,3).  'The great sea' is a title given in the Old Testament
to the Mediterranean Sea (Num. 34:6,7; Josh. 1:4); it is sometimes called
'the uttermost sea' (Deut. 11:24).  In the interpretation of this vision,
these four beasts are said to arise out of the earth.  So the geographical