It is a striking geological fact that the greatest "fault," or break in the earth's surface, is found in Palestine, running north and south from Antioch on the Orontes down even into Africa. But this earthquake will affect very wide areas, including the city of Babylon, which will be shaken to utter destruction. That earthquake will make radical changes in the formation of the earth's surface in Palestine.
At the same time there will be an equally terrific shake-up in the heavenly bodies, the sun, moon, and stars. The effect of both these upon the vast panic-stricken multitudes will be most pitiable. They will call upon the upheaved rocks to hide them from the wrath of God.
These are the four events occurring at this time. They are grouped together. It seems impossible to say first this, then that. They are grouped. The great essential thing standing out is that our Lord Jesus' coming will be at a terrible climax of evil. There will be partial judgment visited on the earth. The system of evil will be wholly overthrown. The Jews will be converted as a nation by the Holy Spirit. The Church will be caught away out of the distress, and will have part with our Lord Jesus in His coming.
It should again be noticed that in all this there are no time notes, except as to the length of this tribulation time. The persecution of the Jew and desecration of Jerusalem, the time of the two witnesses, and the sway of the Antichrist, each runs through three and a half years. There are no time notes whatever for the present waiting-time. And though the length of the tribulation itself is stated, yet it should be noted that the exact time of the Lord Jesus' actual return still remains quite undetermined.
In Daniel's prophecy there are four events spoken of as occurring at this time, and each is measured from the time when the sacrifices are stopped and the chief desecrating act in the temple begins. The tribulation runs for three and a half years. Thirty days later comes some glad event not specified further. Seventy-five days later there comes another glad event, and two years ten months and twenty days later the complete cleansing of the temple. Each of these portions of time is measured from the same starting point. This would suggest a period of readjustment after the Antichrist is slain, running through almost three years. All these time notes are of a year of three hundred and sixty days, not our common calendar year of three hundred and sixty-five and a fraction days.
There comes the period called the kingdom. Its capital is Jerusalem. The regenerated nation of Israel becomes the first nation of the earth, with all other nations tributary. Israel's leadership is a blessed one in its spiritual influence over all others. The Jews are a missionary nation, whose one passion is to make the knowledge of God known throughout the earth.
The redeemed ones of all the earth through all times will reign over the earth in fellowship with the King, the Lord Jesus. In their resurrection bodies, with all present bodily restrictions and limitations gone, they will have a blessed share in the new earth ministry.
The purpose of the kingdom is world-wide evangelization, but with all the conditions radically changed. Satan, with all evil spirits, is removed from the scene of action. The nation of Jews, baptized by the Holy Spirit, is the missionary force, under the direction and help of the Church. The Holy Spirit will have been poured out upon all flesh, making all peculiarly open to the truth.
What a wonderful time of continual revival it will be! But that much abused word "revival" will have its sweet, original meaning restored. It will mean a re-living, a new life of the Spirit coming, that will naturally include the body, too.