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About Jesus Steve Sweetman Chapter 47 and 48 lPrevious Section - Chapters 44, 45, 46 In chapter 47, verses 1 to 12 we see a stream of
water trickling out from under the temple.
The stream of water flows to the east.
The farther the stream goes, the deeper it becomes.
In fact it becomes a river that flows into the sea.
The sea mentioned in verse 8 is the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea is dead
because it is full of salt, but this river brings life to the Zechariah 14:4 and 8 has something to say about this
event. Verse 4 states that
the Messiah will come and stand on the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem. This will cause a great
earthquake that will split the mountain into two parts.
Part will move to the north and part to the south, causing a
valley in between the two parts. Verse
8 of Zechariah 14 states that "living water will flow from Jerusalem". It also states that
this water will flow to the east as it says here in Ezekiel.
The Zechariah text also states that the water will not only flow
to the east but to the west, right to the "western sea", which
is the The water in the river that flows from the temple is
called "living water" in Zechariah 14:8.
It is probably called living water because it will bring much
life to central The same river of water is spoken about in Joel 3:18
where we see it is a literal river.
It will indeed bring much needed water to the land
of Israel.
The first few verses in chapter 45 speak to the issue
of dividing the land
of A reading of the above passages will show that
Israel
will be divided into 13 strips of land, running west to east.
The will be one strip of land for each of the twelve tribes of Israel
and one strip for the prince, who I spoke about earlier.
The strip of land for the prince is centralized, with seven
strips to the north and five strips to the south.
In the middle of the strip of land that is for the prince is a
square. In the middle of the
bottom part of the square is the city, and north of the square is the
temple we saw earlier. It appears to me that the river I spoke of earlier
that comes from the temple and flows to the east and the west cuts this
strip in half. We need to note that this city is not the New
Jerusalem spoken of in the Book of Revelation because it is much
smaller. This is the
Millennial city of Jerusalem. As the tabernacle of Moses was a small replica of Solomon's temple, so
this city is a small replica of the New Jerusalem.
The very last verse of the book of Ezekiel tells us the new name for the old city of Jerusalem. In English, it is called "The Lord Is There". As stated earlier, this new city is slightly north of present day Jerusalem, and may actually include part of the present city. So here we have a bit of a glimpse into the
Millennial rule of Christ. We
will now look into a few other Scriptures that will give us a few more
glimpses into what those thousand years will look like. To start, I turn our attention to Revelation 20 where
we actually see that there is indeed a thousand year period where Christ
will rule. This is the only
place in the Bible where we actually see the time duration of this age.
The first thing we learn about in this thousand years is that the
devil will be locked away during this time and will not be able to
deceive the nations of the world any longer.
At the end of this thousand years, he will be loosed for a short
period of time before he is actually thrown into the In verses 4 through 6 of Revelation we see those who
were killed during the great tribulation for their association with
Jesus. They were brought
back to life and will be scattered across the world and rule with Jesus
for this thousand years. These saints will be national leaders during this period of time. We also learn that the rest of the dead will not be
brought back to life at this time. They
will be brought back to life at the end of the thousand years.
Note in Revelation 20:9 that Joel 3:17-21 gives us a picture of
Israel
during these thousand years. This
passage pictures Israelis being agriculturally prosperous, mainly due to the river that flows
from beneath the temple
of Zechariah 14:8 to 21 paints a bit more of a picture
of these thousand years. As
stated above, there will be a river flowing from under the temple that
will flow west to the Mediterranean Sea and east to the Dead Sea. The landscape of Zechariah 14:16 tells us that there will be survivors
from all nations after the last great battle.
These Gentile survivors will come to In the Old Testament, the Feast of Tabernacles took
place on Tishri 15, five days after the Day of Atonement.
Tishri was the seventh month for Israel. It would correspond to our
September. The feast lasted
seven days and was to be a time of celebrating the harvest.
If this feast is celebrated in the thousand year rule of Christ
as it was in the Old Testament, then you might call this an old fashion
Evangelical camp-meeting. Zechariah 14:17 to 19 tells us that if any nation,
and Egypt is centered out as being one of these nations, does not come
up to celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles, then that nation will receive
no rain as punishment. This
tells us something about the Millennium.
It tells us that there is still the possibility of disobedience
on behalf of people and the nations. We need to remember, that this
thousand years is not the new earth as seen in the last
two chapters of Revelation. This
period is history as we've know it now.
The big difference is that Jesus will be the supreme leader.
This thousand years will look more like this present age than the
age of the new heaven and new earth. Zechariah 14:20 and 21 confirms the presence of the temple
in Jerusalem. Concerning Jesus being the supreme ruler, we all know
Isaiah 9:6 where the prophet speaks of a child being born and a son
given. It also says that the
government will be upon His shoulders.
All conservative Bible teachers say this person is Jesus.
The question is, "when will He rule" as stated here in
Isaiah? Verse 8 says the He,
meaning Jesus, will rule from David's throne.
Where was David's throne? It
was in Jerusalem. There hasn't been a throne
in You might remember in Luke 1:32 that the angel told
Mary that her baby son would some day sit on the throne of David.
We need to understand that his throne is not the throne on which
Jesus presently sits in heaven. That
throne has never been called the throne of David.
The throne of David is an earthly throne in Jerusalem. Some people feel that Isaiah 65:20 speaks of the
Millennial rule of Jesus. It
says that if a man dies at the age of 100 he dies as a young man. This
suggests that some people will still die in these thousand years. There
is a difficulty with this verse.
Verse 17 speaks of the new heaven and the new earth so you might
wonder where verse 20 fits in. People
don't die in the age of the new heaven and new earth.
The only age left for verse 20 is the Millennium.
Note also that in this passage we see the possibility
of people sinning. We see
this in Zechariah 14:17 as well. Verse 25 speaks of the wolf and the lamb living and
eating together. Again, we
have a similar problem as we did in verse 20.
Is this the new earth or is this the Millennium?
Isaiah 11:6 to 9 says the same with but with one addition.
This passage speaks of children playing along side cobras.
As Romans 8:19 and 20 tells us, all creation can't wait until
this day comes. There will
be peace among the animals of the earth. Some people feel that Isaiah 35:1 and 2 also speaks
of the Millennium. It
states, as we've seen in other passages, the Psalm 2 concerns the end of this present age.
It gives a hint of the Millennium when it speaks of
'"anointed one", who is Jesus, as ruling with a "iron
scepter". It also
speaks of Jesus inheriting the nations of the earth and decreeing His
law to them. Jesus will rule
at this time, but, as Zechariah 14:17 states, nations will have a
measure of free will. If a
nation chooses not to go to Joel 3:18 is one of a few passages where we see a
fountain blowing out of the house of the Lord.
Other passages state this fountain is a stream that actually
flows from beneath the temple. It
flows into the newly created valley because of the earthquake caused by
Jesus standing on the Isaiah 9:11 states that Jesus will rule on David's
throne. This is a literal
throne and it is in Jerusalem.
In Isaiah 30:26 we note that the sun will shine seven
times brighter than normal, while the moon will shine as bright as the
sun. All of Isaiah 11 speaks of the thousand year rule of
Christ. As we've seen
elsewhere, we see animals at peace with one another, along with children
being at peace with the animals, and that includes snakes.
Beyond that, we see the seven fold Spirit of God upon Jesus for
the purpose of ruling righteously. Jesus
will take care of the poor. He
will rule, and all of his rulings and decisions will be based on justice
and His standards of righteousness.
Note Isaiah 11:11.
The text specifically states that Jesus will return to and for I will end here.
There are a number of Old Testament
passages that give us some clues to what the thousand year rule
of Christ will be like. These
are just a few. Thus ends the book of Ezekiel, written about 2600
years ago, but extremely relevant for today.
Summery to Ezekiel 40 Through 48 In this most controversial section of the Bible,
there is an extremely detailed blueprint of a temple.
The basic question is, "should this temple being taken
symbolically or literally"? I
take it as literal since the blueprint is so specific, especially in its
dimensions, that I don't know any other way to take it.
The next question to ask is, "if this is a
literal temple, then what temple is it"?
It can't be the tabernacle of Moses, or, the temple
of This presents a problem because along with this
temple is Old Testament style worship which includes the killing of
animals for sacrifice. Why
would this be since the cross of Christ was to have done away with these
sacrifices? The only
answer I have to this is two fold. One answer is that these sacrifices don't take away
sin, but they are like Christian communion that reminds us of the cross
of Christ. If you note
during these chapters that in this thousand year rule of Christ, Jesus
seems to remind There is one called the "prince" in this
section of Scripture. He
can't be Jesus for a number of reasons that I've mentioned.
He appears to be the highest level of human leader for Israel, right under Jesus Himself. This is just one of a number of Biblical passages
that gives us a brief look into the thousand years that Jesus is on
earth ruling as king. The
thousand years will end. Satan
will be let free for a while before he is thrown into the |