Page 112 - Bible Doctrine Survey I - Student Textbook (3)

church will participate in the reign with Christ as His Bride but will not replace the nation of
Israel. The King will return to deliver Israel (Zechariah 14:1-3) and establish His kingdom (14:9).
The kingdom will be headquartered in Jerusalem, the very land promised to be the possession of
the nation of Israel. And Israel will be the central nation of this kingdom (Zechariah 8:22-23).

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Zechariah 14:1–3 (NIV84) A day of the Lord is coming when your plunder will be divided
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among you. I will gather all the nations to Jerusalem to fight against it; the city will be
captured, the houses ransacked, and the women raped. Half of the city will go into exile,
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but the rest of the people will not be taken from the city. Then the Lord will go out and
fight against those nations, as he fights in the day of battle.

Zechariah 14:9 (NIV84) The Lord will be king over the whole earth. On that day there will
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be one Lord, and his name the only name.

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Zechariah 8:22–23 (NIV84) And many peoples and powerful nations will come to
Jerusalem to seek the Lord Almighty and to entreat him.” This is what the Lord
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Almighty says: “In those days ten men from all languages and nations will take firm hold
of one Jew by the hem of his robe and say, ‘Let us go with you, because we have heard
that God is with you.’ ”

To properly interpret Scripture, therefore, there are some key principles for understanding Bible
prophecy:

1. Interpret prophecy in a normal, literal way. Unless it is obviously a passage that cannot be
understood in a literal normal way, let the passage mean what it says. One major error some Bible
interpreters make is call the Allegorical Method of Interpretation. This view holds that often the real
fulfillment of prophecy is not literal but rather some deeper “spiritual” meaning. For example, this view
would say that the Millennium (Revelation 20:2,4,6,7) is not a literal 1,000 year reign of Christ on earth
in the future but rather it is the “spiritual” rule of Christ on earth now. In contrast, the Literal Method
Says if God’s Word says something about the future, it will literally happen. There may be symbols in the
prophecy, but the symbols are predicting literal truth.

2 Understand some basic ground rules about symbols. Symbols represent a literal truth. For example,
God gave Daniel a symbolic vision of 4 beasts (a lion, a bear, a leopard, and a “dreadful” beast – Daniel
7). An angel told him they represented 4 kingdoms. It’s clear now they referred to the consecutive
kingdoms of Babylon, Persia, Greece and Rome.

3. Compare a prophecy with other prophecies – By comparing similar prophecies the meanings become
clearer. For example, by comparing Daniel 9:27; 2 Thessalonians 2:3,4and Matthew 24:15, we know that
the “Abomination of Desolation” is when the Anti-Christ will break a peace promise to the Jews in the
middle of the 7-year Tribulation and will demand to be worshipped. One passage alone doesn’t always
tell the whole story, but together, they clarify the truth.

4. Varied time element – Future events are not always in the future tense. For example, “Unto us a Son
is born, etc.” (Isaiah 9:6). Isaiah spoke in the present tense but we know it refers to the birth of Christ
which was then in the future. Another caution is that sometimes a prophecy may run together several
events without specifying that time gaps will divide them (see Isaiah 11:1-4 – Christ’s 1st and
2nd comings).

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