prophetic gaps
Key 9: Prophetic Gaps
Knowing that the Church was a Mystery helps us to understand Old Testament prophecy. The prophets are often talking on a subject and suddenly jump over the Church Age. Sometimes when we look at two hills, one behind the other, we don’t see the valley in between, so they didn't know they were jumping across a gap of 2000 years from Christ’s First Coming (the Sufferings) to His Second Coming (His Glory). These GAPS wonderfully illustrate that the Church was a mystery hidden in God.
FIRST COMING......(MYSTERY GAP of 2000 years)......SECOND COMING.There is always a connecting idea that bridges the jump. (Sometimes because of the common theme there is a similar event on both sides of the GAP and the prophecy can be applied to both sides. When this happens italics are used in the following verses).
1. The classic example is Isaiah 61:1-3 (Messiah brings in the Jubilee):
“The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me, because the LORD has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the acceptable (Jubilee) year of the LORD”. (This was quoted by Jesus in Luke 4:17-20 as being fulfilled by Him right then; however He closed the Book and read no further because He would not fulfil the next part of the scripture for another 2000 years)...(GAP of 2000 years)...
“and the day of vengeance of our God (the Second Coming followed by the Millennium); to comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes,the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that He may be glorified. And they shall rebuild the old ruins, raise up the former desolations, and repair the ruined cities, the desolations of many generations....”
The spiritual blessings of v3-11 are a prophecy of the Millennium, but also apply to us in the New Covenant IN CHRIST (Galatians 3:26, Romans 11:17). Israel as a nation could have entered their Jubilee in AD 33 and seen the whole chapter fulfilled then, because Jesus declared it was Jubilee time (‘the acceptable year of the Lord’). But because they rejected it, the Kingdom was postponed and the Mystery Age inserted, which is why the prophecy jumps 2000 years. The Jubilee blessings are available in this Age for individual believers but are only fulfilled for national Israel in the Kingdom.
2. Isaiah 9:6-7: The King and His Kingdom. “For unto us a Child is born (His humanity), unto us a Son is given (His Deity); and the Government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counsellor, Mighty God, Father (Source) of Eternity, Prince of Peace.”....(2000 year GAP)....
“Of the increase of His Government and peace there will be no end, upon the throne of David and over His Kingdom, to order it and establish it with judgement and justice, from that time forward, even forever. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will perform this.”
3. Luke 1:31-33 The King and His Kingdom. “Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bring forth a Son, and shall call His name JESUS. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Highest”
.....(2000 year GAP).....
“and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David. And He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there will be no end.”
4. Isaiah 11:1-9 The King and Kingdom. “There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots. The Spirit of the LORD shall rest upon Him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the LORD. His delight is in the fear of the LORD” ....(2000 year GAP)....“and He shall not judge by the sight of His eyes, nor decide by the hearing of His ears; but with righteousness He shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; He shall strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, and with the breath of His lips He shall slay the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt of His loins, and faithfulness the belt of His waist.
The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young ones shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play by the cobra’s hole, and the weaned child shall put his hand in the viper’s den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all My holy mountain, for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.”
5. Isaiah 40:3-5. The Way Prepared for the King.
“The voice of one crying in the wilderness (John the Baptist): “Prepare the way of the LORD; make straight in the desert a highway for our God” .....(2000 year GAP)...... “Every valley shall be exalted and every mountain and hill brought low; the crooked places shall be made straight and the rough places smooth the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
6. Genesis 49:10. “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh (Messiah) comes” .... (2000 year GAP)....“and to Him shall be the obedience of the people.”
7. Micah 5:1-4 The Shepherd-King. “They will strike the Judge of Israel with a rod on the cheek. But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, though you are little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of you shall come forth to Me the One to be Ruler in Israel, whose goings forth are from of old, from ever-lasting. Therefore (because Messiah was rejected) He (God) shall give them (Israel) up (in judgement)” ...(2000 year GAP)... “until the time that she who is in labor has given birth; then the remnant of His brethren shall return to the children of Israel. And He (Messiah) shall stand and feed His flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the Name of the Lord His God; and they shall abide, for now He shall be great to the ends of the earth.”
8. Hosea 5:14-6:3. Israel’s sin and repentance.“ I (Christ) will be like a lion to Ephraim, like a young lion to the house of Judah. I, even I, will tear (cut them off) and go away (to Heaven); I will take them away (to the nations) and no one shall rescue. I will return again to My place” (the Ascension) ...(2000 year GAP).....“till they acknowledge their offence (of rejecting Him). Then they will seek My face; in their affliction (the Tribulation) they will earnestly seek Me (saying): “Come, and let us return to the LORD; for He has torn, but He will heal us; He has stricken, but He will bind us up. After 2 DAYS (2000 years) He will revive us; on the 3RD DAY He will raise us up, that we may live in His sight (Millennium). Let us know, let us pursue the knowledge of the LORD. His going forth (Second Coming) is established (it is as certain) as the morning (sunrise); He will come to us like the rain, like the latter and former rain to the earth (the outpoured Spirit in the Millennium)”
9. Zechariah 9:9,10. The Presentation of the King.
“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your King is coming to you; He is just and having salvation, lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey”....(2000 year GAP)...“I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the horse from Jerusalem; the battle bow shall be cut off. He shall speak peace to the nations; His dominion shall be from sea to sea, from the River to the ends of the earth”
10. Zechariah 13:7. The Sheep (Israel) scattered, because they rejected the Good Shepherd. “Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, against the Man who is My Companion,” says the LORD of hosts. “Strike the Shepherd, and the sheep (Israel) will be scattered (Matthew 26:31) ....(2000 year GAP).... then I will turn My hand against the little ones and it shall come to pass in all the land,” says the LORD, “that two-thirds in it shall be cut off and die, but one-third shall be left in it: I will bring the one-third through the fire, refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘This is My people’; and each will say, ‘The LORD is my God.’”
11. Malachi 3:1,2 “Behold, I send My messenger (John), and he will prepare the way before Me. And the Lord, whom you seek, will suddenly come to His Temple, even the Messenger of the (New) Covenant, in whom you delight. Behold, He is coming” says the LORD of hosts” ....(2000 year GAP).... “But who can endure the day of His Coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He is like a refiner’s fire and like launderer’s soap. He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver; He will purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer to the LORD an offering in righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasant to the LORD, as in the days of old, as in former years.”
12. Revelation 12:1-6 The Rapture of the Man-child. “Now a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman (Israel) clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a garland of 12 stars. Then being with child (Messiah), she cried out in labour and in pain to give birth. And another sign appeared in heaven: behold, a great, fiery red dragon (satan) having 7 heads and 10 horns, and 7 diadems on his heads. His tail drew a third of the stars of heaven (angels) and threw them to the earth.
And the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to give birth, to devour her Child (Jesus) as soon as it was born (the massacre of the innocents at Bethlehem). She bore a male Child who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron, and her Child was caught up to God and His throne” .... (2000 year GAP)....“Then the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, that they should feed her there 1260 days” (this happens in the Tribulation). The link here is the catching up of Christ to the Throne. First the Head (Christ) in AD 33, then the Body (the Church in Christ) 2000 years later Then comes the events of the Tribulation. So when Christ and the Church are removed from the earth, the devil centres all his attack on Israel to destroy her.
13. Daniel 9:25-27. Jerusalem and the Temple. “From the going forth of the command to restore and build Jerusalem (458 BC) until Messiah the Prince, there shall be 7 Weeks (49 years) and 62 Weeks (434 years); the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in the narrow time (the 49 years). After the 62 weeks (sometime after 483 years) Messiah shall be cut off, but not for Himself; and the people of the prince who is to come (the Romans) shall destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end of it shall be with a flood, and until the end of the war desolations are determined” (fulfilled in AD 67-73). .... (2000 year GAP)..... “Then he (the Roman prince to come) shall confirm a covenant with the majority for one Week (the 7 year Tribulation) but in the middle of the Week, he shall bring an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the Temple he will set up an Abomination that causes desolation (desecrating the Temple by setting up his own image to be worshipped), even until the consummation determined, is poured out on the desolator” (Jesus destroys antichrist at His Return). The connecting link is the Roman Empire for they destroyed Jerusalem in the first century and are called ‘the people of the prince who is to come.’ Thus after the 2000 years we see the Prince of a Revived Rome making a covenant with Israel that starts the final 7-year Tribulation.14. Daniel 11:35-36 The Antichrist. v21-35 has been fulfilled in Antiochus the Great - a type of Antichrist 175-163 BC. Then the prophecy jumps to the antichrist himself ..... (2000 year GAP)... “then the king (antichrist) shall do according to his own will: he shall exalt and magnify himself above every god, shall speak blasphemies against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the wrath has been accomplished; for what has been determined shall be done” (Daniel 11:36- 12:1 give events in the future Tribulation).
15. Daniel 7:23-27. The Roman Empire which dominated Israel will be revived in the end-times. “The 4th beast shall be a 4th kingdom on earth (Rome), which shall be different from all other kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, trample it and break it in pieces ....(2000 year GAP)....The ten horns are ten kings who shall arise from this kingdom (the Revived Rome). And another (the antichrist) shall rise after them; he shall be different from the first ones, and shall subdue three kings. He shall speak pompous words against the Most High, shall persecute the saints of the Most High, and shall intend to change times and law. Then the saints shall be given into his hand for a Time, Times and half a Time (the Great Tribulation). But the court (in Heaven) shall be seated, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and destroy it forever. Then the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdoms under the whole heaven shall be given to the people, the saints of the Most High. His Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey Him (God’s Kingdom established).”
16. Daniel 2:32-35.
“This image’s head was of fine gold, its chest and arms of silver, its belly and thighs of bronze, its legs of iron (Rome) ....(2000 year GAP)... its feet partly of iron and partly of clay (Revived Rome). You watched while a stone was cut out without hands, which struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces. Then the iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold were crushed together, and became like chaff from the summer threshing floors; the wind carried them away so that no trace of them was found. The stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.”17. Isaiah 49:1-13. Jesus speaks towards the end of His ministry concerning God’s salvation going also to the Gentiles: “Listen, O coast lands, to Me, and take heed, you peoples from afar!
The LORD has called Me from the womb; from the matrix of My mother He has made mention of My name. He has made My mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of His hand He has hidden Me, and made Me a polished shaft; in His quiver He has hidden Me. And He said to me, ‘You are My servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified.’ Then I (Jesus) said, ‘I have laboured in vain,I have spent my strength for nothing and in vain (because it seems Israel was rejecting Him and the Kingdom is not going to be established), yet surely my just reward is with the LORD, and my work with my God.’
And now the LORD says, Who formed Me from the womb to be His Servant, to bring Jacob back to Him, so that Israel is gathered to Him (for I shall be glorious in the eyes of the LORD, and My God shall be My strength) (His first mission was to Israel). Indeed He says, ‘It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved ones of Israel;I will also give You as a Light to the Gentiles, that You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth’ (God reveals an extension of His mission, that through Israel’s rejection salvation will go to the Gentiles).
Thus says the LORD, the Redeemer of Israel, their Holy One, to Him whom man despises, to Him whom the nation (Israel) abhors, to the Servant of rulers: “(Gentile) Kings shall see and arise, princes also shall worship, because of the LORD who is faithful, the Holy One of Israel; and He has chosen You.” Thus says the LORD: “In an acceptable time I have heard you, and in the day of salvation I have helped you” (quoted in 2 Corinthians 6:2 - this is the Jubilee message now preached to the Gentiles) ...(2000 year GAP)... The KINGDOM: “I will preserve You and give you as a covenant to the people, to restore the earth, to cause them to inherit the desolate heritages; that You may say to the prisoners ‘Go forth,’ to those who are in darkness, ‘Show yourselves.’They shall feed along the roads, and their pastures shall be on all desolate heights. They shall neither hunger nor thirst, neither heat nor sun shall strike them; for He who has mercy on them will lead them, even by the springs of water He will guide them. I will make each of My mountains a road, and My highways shall be elevated. Surely these shall come from afar; Look! Those from the north and west, and these from the land of Sinim.” Sing O heavens! Be joyful O earth! and break out in singing, O mountains! For the LORD has comforted His people, mercy on His afflicted.”17. Isaiah 28;16: “Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: “Behold, I lay in Zion (1) a STONE for a Foundation, a tried STONE (the Messiah in His First Coming who would be tried and tested, and through his death and resurrection would lay the foundation for our salvation and for His Kingdom, see Zech 3:9) ..(2000 years)..(2) a precious Cornerstone (really the Cap or Pinnacle STONE) (a sure foundation; whoever believes (in the Foundation Stone) will not act hastily (will not be in fear).”
The One who became the Foundation Stone in His 1st Coming, will also be manifested as the Capstone (the supreme ruling Stone) in His 2nd Coming. He is both: “(1) a STONE of Stumbling, and (2) a ROCK of Falling” (Isaiah 8:14,15; also Romans 9:33,10:11). “(1) The Stone the builders rejected (1st Coming) has (2) become the Chief (Head or Pinnacle) Stone (to be fully manifested at His Second Coming)” (Psa118:22, Mark 12:10, Acts 4:11).Christ is both the firsowest (laying the foundation through His sufferings) and the highest (in His glory, exalted, enthroned over all, the Chief Stone). As far as the Church is concerned He is already the Chief (Head) Stone as well as the Foundation Stone (Eph 2:20). As far as Israel and the Kingdom is concerned He is yet to be put into place as the Capstone at His Return.t (foundation) stone and the last (the chief, head or pinnacle Stone). He is both the l
The New Testament Commentary on these verses agrees with this 2-fold fulfilment:1Peter 2:4-8: “Come to Him as to a living Stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious.... Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture (Isa 28:16), “Behold, I lay in Zion (1) a Stone, (2) a Chief (Cap) Stone, elect, precious, and he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.” Therefore, to you who believe He is precious; but to those who are disobedient, “(1) The (Foundation) Stone that the builders rejected (2) has become the Chief Stone (Capstone)” and “(1) A Stone that makes them stumble and (2) a Rock of offense (a Rock that makes them fall).” They stumble, being disobedient to the word.”
(1) Christ, as the First (Foundation) Stone has already come down (1st Coming), but unbelievers who come across Him but continue to walk in their own ways (rather than standing on Him) stumble over Him and fall. (2) Christ, the Chief Stone, will also come down from above (His 2nd Coming) and fall upon His enemies and crush them in judgement (Daniel 2:34,35,44,45) Christ presented these 2 contrasting images of the same Stone in Matt 21;42,44 (Lk 20:17,18): “Have you never read in the Scriptures: (1) The stone which the builders rejected has (2) become the Chief (Cap)Stone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes? And (1) whoever falls (stumbles) on this Stone will be broken to pieces; but (2) on whoever it falls, it will grind (crush) him to powder.” (See Zechariah 4:7-9 for a type of these 2 Stones)