occasions). The other passages in the Acts where tithemi is translated `to put', refer to `prison' (Acts 4:3; 5:18,25;

12:4). Other translations in the Acts are `to make'; `to conceive'; `to purpose'; `to give' as counsel. In the epistles it

is rendered in addition to these, by such words as `to set'; `to commit'; `to appoint' and `to ordain'. The idea of

authority is evident in every reference. The phrase `in His own authority' can be interpreted in the light of the same

Greek words found in Acts 5:4 `was it not in thine own power?' or as Moffatt freely renders it `and even after the

sale, was the money not yours to do as you pleased about it?' Not only has the Father complete jurisdiction over

`times and seasons' but the specific `day and hour' when the Son of Man shall come is not even known by

`the angels' although they may `desire to look into these things'. In Mark 13:32 we have a fuller and more

comprehensive statement :

`But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the

Even after the resurrection, the Son is represented as seated at the right hand on high `henceforth expecting', so

completely have times, seasons, days and hours been reserved to the authority of the Father. In the face of such

statements, all attempts to calculate, forecast or otherwise anticipate `the day and the hour' are alike foredoomed to

failure and contrary to Scripture. The reader may very well repudiate the attempts that have been made to arrive at

the date of the Second Coming by `Pyramid Inches', he may, moreover, have acquaintance with such an abortive

attempt as that of Dimbleby, who by the Zodiacal Circle, the Eclipse Cycle, and the Solar Cycle, `proved' that the

Times of the Gentiles ended in 18981/4 and that the Millennium started in 19281/4, a colossal set of calculations

which only stand today as the monument to his misdirected energies.

Another basis for calculation, and one that claims the attention of the believer in the Bible as the book wherein is

unveiled the purpose of the ages, is that which sees both in the opening chapters of Genesis, and in subsequent types

and shadows, the warrant to believe that the present age will last 6000 years. There is in this view much to be

commended, the danger lies in yielding to the temptation by the use of analogy to forecast dates. We have one such

attempt open before us, as we write. In this computation, the days that are to come will be as it was in the days of

Noah, when the Son of Man is revealed (Luke 17:26-30) and these days are dated A.D. 1938-77, the interpretation

of the `revealing' of the Son of Man is given as that Christ is revealing Himself to His people for 40 years before the

fall of Mystic Babylon in A.D. 1978. `With the Munich crisis in 1938' says the writer, `we entered upon the last

forty years of the Time of the End (Dan. 12:9)'.

When we examine the chronology of this writer, we discover that he dates the going forth of the commandment

the Companion Bible dates the going forth of the commandment from the 20th year of Artaxerxes (see Neh. 2:1).

The date of Artaxerxes is given in the Companion Bible as 454 B.C., and the date of Darius is given by the writer

whose work we are examining as 483 B.C., a discrepancy of 29 years, fully accounted for in Scripture, as the 483

years reach to the `cutting off' of the Messiah, whereas the calculations before us make the 483 years end at the birth

of the Messiah. He then adds another 30 years to the commencement of the Lord's ministry, and so arrives at his

conclusion that the age will end at the 6000th year from Adam in A.D. 1977. It certainly would have been awkward

*

to have made the 6000 years end 30 years earlier, namely in 1947, for that would have written Ichabod across the

whole attempt.

We write with no unsympathetic spirit of this patient endeavour to piece together the pattern of the ages, but

taking our stand with the Scriptures already quoted, can only feel sorry that another abortive attempt should be made

by a confessed child of God. The recognition that the day and the hour of the Lord's return is hidden with intention

by the Lord, by no means forbids an intelligent reading both of the Scriptures and of the signs of the times. These

are as clearly indicated in Matthew 24:32,33,38 and 39, as the attempt to compute the date is forbidden in Matthew

24:36. In our next article we will examine these `signs of the times' more carefully.

*

See 1 Samuel 4:21.