2nd Thessalonians 1:6-10

 ⁶For after all it is only right for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, ⁷ and to give relief to you who are afflicted, along with us, when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels ⁸ in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God, and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. ⁹ These people will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, ¹⁰ when He comes to be glorified among His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed—because our testimony to you was believed.

 

These are very sobering verses; verse seven reiterates the themes in the book of Revelation and Jesus' own testimony in the Gospels, that there will come a day when Christ comes a second time, and all those who did not believe in him and obey his teachings will gain retribution. 

 At this link at campusministryonline.com, the writer spells out the percentage of Biblical writings that contain prophecy: "6,641 verses, or 28.5%, of the Old Testament contain prophetic material, and,711 verses, or 21.5% of the New Testament contain prophetic material." When I came back to Christ after living a secular life for 30 years I remembered the Bible as being a series of stories; this was probably because I had absorbed so much of it as a young child in an evangelical denomination. 

As I began to read the Bible again it has been the prophecy, especially of the end times, that has jumped out at me. I never realized that most of the Bible points to an end times scenario and tells us, through parables and stories, how to live our lives in obedience to God so that we will be spared from eternal punishment and from the upheaval of the Great Tribulation.

If you want to accept Salvation from Christ here are some resources:

A Prayer for Salvation from Christ:

Lord Jesus, I confess my sins and ask for your forgiveness. Please come into my heart as my Lord and Savior. Take complete control of my life and help me to walk in Your footsteps daily by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thank you Lord for saving me and for answering my prayer.

A more detailed step by step process:

https://www.wikihow.com/Accept-Jesus-Into-Your-Life
 

Malachi 4:1-5

 

4 “For behold, the day is coming, burning like a furnace; and all the arrogant and every evildoer will be chaff; and the day that is coming will set them ablaze,” says the Lord of armies, “so that it will leave them neither root nor branches. ² But for you who fear My name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and frolic like calves from the stall. ³ And you will crush the wicked underfoot, for they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day that I am preparing,” says the Lord of armies.

⁴ “Remember the Law of Moses My servant, the statutes and ordinances which I commanded him in Horeb for all Israel.

⁵ “Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. ⁶ He will turn the hearts of the fathers back to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and strike the land with complete destruction.”

Matthew 22 1-14

 

 Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying, ² “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who held a wedding feast for his son. ³ And he sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come. ⁴ Again he sent other slaves, saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened cattle are all butchered and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast!”’ ⁵ But they paid no attention and went their separate ways, one to his own farm, another to his business, ⁶ and the rest seized his slaves and treated them abusively, and then killed them. ⁷ Now the king was angry, and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers and set their city on fire. ⁸ Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. ⁹ So go to the main roads, and invite whomever you find there to the wedding feast.’ ¹⁰ Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.

¹¹ “But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed in wedding clothes, ¹² and he *said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ And the man was speechless. ¹³ Then the king said to the servants, ‘Tie his hands and feet, and throw him into the outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth in that place.’ ¹⁴ For many are called, but few are chosen.”

Philippians 3:17-21

 

¹⁷ Brothers and sisters, join in following my example, and observe those who walk according to the pattern you have in us. ¹⁸ For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even as I weep, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ, ¹⁹ whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who have their minds on earthly things. ²⁰ For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; ²¹ who will transform the body of our lowly condition into conformity with His glorious body, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself.

 This is a beautiful set of verses that describes so accurately the difference that takes place in our priorities once we accept Salvation from Christ and begin to focus on living for Him instead of focusing on the world. When I read this, the words "whose god is their appetite" jumped out at me, as someone who has had a lifelong struggle with over-eating, or gluttony, due to severe trauma early on and growing up in a love devoid environment. I have never found much relief from this problem except through exercising it off; that got rid of the excess weight but didn't touch the compulsion itself. This has changed in the last few months when I started doing religious fasting. 

Jeremiah 31:33-34

 ³³ “For this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord: “I will put My law within them and write it on their heart; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. ³⁴ They will not teach again, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,” declares the Lord, “for I will forgive their wrongdoing, and their sin I will no longer remember.”

 These verses are a promise from God that a new day is coming in which God puts his law in the hearts of people to know the will of God instinctively. In the preceding verses we are told that there will be a separation between people who choose to sin and people who try to emulate God and follow his will. All of this points to a time when God will take possession of his whole church and plant righteousness in every heart.

Daniel 12:1-3

 "There will be a time of distress such as has not happened from the beginning of nations until then. But at that time your people—everyone whose name is found written in the book—will be delivered. ² Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting life, others to shame and everlasting contempt. Those who are wise will shine like the brightness of the heavens, and those who lead many to righteousness, like the stars for ever and ever."

 

Philippians 2:9-11

 ⁹ For this reason also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, ¹⁰ so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, ¹¹ and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

 

 At this link, three quarters of the way down the page, Keith Giles writes that this verse in Greek uses a verb that should be translated a bit differently; he says that the translation should read that 'every knee will gladly bow' to Christ, as the full translation of the verb meaning is shortened. I have just started learning Greek myself, so I can't offer an opinion but it seems wonderful to think that everyone might see the glory of Christ on his return will bow down and worship him, and accept his offer of Salvation. 

First Corinthians 15:22-24

 "For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ. Then comes the end, when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power."

 

These verses touch on a repeating theme in the Bible. At Christ's second coming he collects all the members of his church, and delivers them to God. Not only does he do this though; it's demonstrated repeatedly in the book of Revelation that God wants absolute destruction of the 'ruler of this world', satan himself, and all his demons. Revelation gives a play by play of the order of this destruction, driving home over and over how much of an abomination it is to God how humans value wealth, status comfort, and human esteem over loving and caring for our fellow humans.

1 Thessalonians 4:16-4:17

¹⁶ For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:

¹⁷ Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

 

 These verses tell us that if we believe that Christ came to earth and was crucified and rose again as a testimony to the power of God and of Salvation, and we are willing to come to Christ and repent of our sins and ask him to save us from sin and guide us along the path of emulating him and following his commands, we will be saved.  Then at the end of the age, at the appointed time of the last trumpet, Christ will return to earth and collect his followers, people who have accepted Salvation from him, and his followers will spend eternity in heaven with him and God and the angels.

 

If you want to accept Salvation from Christ here are some resources:

A Prayer for Salvation from Christ:

Lord Jesus, I confess my sins and ask for your forgiveness. Please come into my heart as my Lord and Savior. Take complete control of my life and help me to walk in Your footsteps daily by the power of the Holy Spirit. Thank you Lord for saving me and for answering my prayer. 

A more detailed step by step process:

https://www.wikihow.com/Accept-Jesus-Into-Your-Life

 

Matthew 24:21

 

 "For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be."

 

Jesus gives this response after answering a question from his disciples about signs that the end of the world or end of the age is about to come. He tells them in Matthew 24 that there will be wars and rumors of wars, that they will be handed over and beaten in the synagogues. He talks of false prophets and other deceivers that will arise, and how the love of most of humanity will grow cold and their hearts will harden. He says that the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of Heaven will be preached to the whole world, and then the end will come.

John 14:3

 John 14:3

And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.

This verse is a very simple foreshadowing of what is to come. Jesus has just washed his disciples' feet in the prior chapter and told them about how he is to be betrayed. Peter is very upset and tells Jesus that he will lay his life down for him, and Jesus tells Peter that, on the contrary, before the rooster crows in the morning he will have denied him three times.

Mark 13:32

 32 “But about that day or hour no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

 

Here Jesus is telling us that even he does not know when the exact time of the end will happen; he makes it clear that only God the Father knows when these things will transpire. 

Over the centuries many, many people have predicted certain days and times for the Rapture or the beginning of the Great Tribulation or other events to happen, using plain scripture or even using things like astrology to try to pinpoint these events to an exact time-frame.

2nd Peter 3:10

 ¹⁰ But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, in which the heavens will pass away with a roar and the elements will be destroyed with intense heat, and the earth and its works will be discovered. (NASB)

¹⁰ But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed. (NRSV)

 

¹⁰ But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. (KJV)

I used three different translations for this verse because I wanted to understand the meaning of the last phrase better; however, all three show some variation in meaning. The NASB is supposed to be the best literal translation of the Bible and the NRSV is supposed to be the superior reference for 'thought for thought' translation; since they both differed I looked at the KJV and it too differs from the others. I eventually realized it was impossible to come to a conclusion about the last word so here's the Greek and it kind of shows why translators interpret it differently: link

Matthew 24:31

 Matthew 24:31  

And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

 

After doing a blog on the chapter of Revelation (link to my blog), I decided to go looking for other instances of eschatology in the Bible.

What does the Bible say about the End Times outside of Revelation?

 Having recently completed a blog on the last chapter of the Bible, Revelation, I decided to look into what other books of the Bible have to say about the End Times, and to broach some of the topics that different denominations and belief systems interpret and forecast differently. Wikipedia has a good summary of the many different topics and interpretations on Christian eschatology: link

 

If you want to accept Salvation from Christ here are some resources:

the Sinner's prayer for Salvation from Christ:

https://www.crosswalk.com/faith/prayer/the-sinners-prayer-4-examples.html  


more detailed step by step process:

https://www.wikihow.com/Accept-Jesus-Into-Your-Life