Third Quarter 2003 Adult Sabbath School Lessons:
"Sanctuary Themes"

Insights to Lesson 13
Jesus and Our Future
Sept. 20-26, 2003

(Produced by the Editorial Board of the 1888 Message Study Committee)

The serious question is posed in our Quarterly: Why did Paul say that his lifetime 2000 years ago was “these last days”? Also, “now once in the end of the world”? Why did Peter say his day was “these last times”? (Hebrews 1:2; 9:26; 1 Peter 1:20). Did Christ lead His disciples then to believe He was coming back within their lifetime?

This is important. If the time of the apostles 2000 years ago was the “last days,” how can we say our time today is “these last days”? Could it take another 2000 years before Christ comes back? A fairly recent Review article quoted many of our youth in our colleges and universities saying they had no idea when Christ will return. The Quarterly rather leaves the question in limbo; at least there’s not much to help us. Is there any truth in the 1888 message of Christ’s righteousness that can help us get our bearings in this important question?

The 1888 message that “the Lord in His great mercy sent” is in total harmony with the prophetic time scale that established confidence in the rise and progress of the Seventh-day Adventist Church:

1. Paul specifically taught his people that Christ was NOT returning in their lifetime, even though some in Thessalonica had picked up that idea. He wrote his Second Letter to disabuse their minds: “Now, brethren, concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, we ask you not to be soon shaken in mind or troubled, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as if from us, as though the day of the Lord [NU-Text] had come [or “is at hand,” KJV]. Let no one deceive you by any means, for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God” (2:1-4).

2. The demonstrative pronouns “THAT day,” “THE falling away,” “THE man of sin,” indicate he is referring to specific truths he taught them when he was with them. “Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things?” (vs. 5). Where else could he have gotten it all except the book of Daniel? “Paul . . . pointed his brethren into the then far-distant future …” (The Great Controversy, p. 356).

3. Jesus had specifically begged His disciples to read Daniel (Matt. 24:15). Paul would obviously do so. After the resurrection, the disciples saw the prophecy of the “seventy weeks” (490 years) fulfilled, as Jesus explained it to the two disciples on their way to Emmaus; and of course during the time He was with them until His ascension. Paul could see that the “seventy weeks” were “cut off” from the 2300 “days.” He knew that the “seventy weeks” had to be prophetic time in order to come to the time of the Jews’ final rejection of the apostles (Acts 7:59, 60). He knew the Jews had passed their day of probation as a nation. He could easily have at least a rudimentary idea that time must yet elapse for Daniel’s “little horn,” the rise of the papacy, and the persecution of 1260 years. This is evident in what he wrote to the Thessalonians.

4. In Hebrews, Paul said that his lifetime was not the “now” time to speak of the ministry in the Most Holy Apartment (9:5). He knew they were living in the First Apartment ministry.

5. The time prophecies of Daniel and Revelation figure in this problem. Genuine Christians, truly converted, began studying these prophecies in the late 1700s and early 1800s. They saw the prophetic time-line that Ellen White described as “the chain of events that have made us a people what we are today.” She said, “Historical events showing the direct fulfillment of prophecy were set before the people, and the prophecy was seen to be a figurative delineation of events leading down to the close of this earth’s history. The scenes connected with the working of the man of sin are the last features plainly revealed in this earth’s history. … [God’s] students of prophecy [were] led by genuine, living experience, advancing point by point, tested, proved, and tried, until the truth to them was a reality. … [We must not] make an application of the Word that will undermine the foundation and remove the pillars of the faith that has made Seventh-day Adventists what they are today” (Selected Messages, book 2, pp. 101-103; 1896).

6. When the above was written, the 1888 message was “present truth.” At the same time, she made reference to it as follows: “A new life is coming from heaven and taking possession of all God’s people … the present message which is already lightening the earth with its glory” (ibid., p. 114; 1896).

7. When Ellen White urged the General Conference brethren and the church at large to accept the message of Jones and Waggoner, she offered no criticism of the main features of our prophetic message. Their message as the initial “showers from heaven of the latter rain” and “the beginning” of Revelation 18, complemented our prophetic message, and would have completed the gospel commission in that generation.

So, what about “these last days” and “these last times” of Paul and Peter? The Old Testament was at its end and the New Testament was beginning. Simple.

Today the 1888 message pinpoints our place on God’s prophetic time-line. We are way behind God’s schedule. Heaven knows it’s time for repentance.

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