Gospel chapter 12 is a great chapter on the resurrection from the Old Testament.
It actually starts out at the beginning of the chapter referring to the resurrection
and then it ends up the chapter talking about the resurrection once again.
Look at verse number one, the Bible reads, "And at that time shall Michael stand up,
the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people, and there shall be a time of
trouble such as never was since there was a nation, even to that same time.
And at that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the
book.
And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting
life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.
And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, and they that turn many
to righteousness as the stars forever and ever."
And then also at the end of the chapter, it says in verse 12, "Blessed is he that waiteth
and cometh to the thousand, three hundred and five and thirty days.
But go thou thy way, speaking to Daniel, go thou thy way till the end be, for thou shalt
rest and stand in thy lot at the end of the days."
So right there it's pretty clear that Daniel's being told he's going to also sleep in the
dust of the earth, he's also going to die, but eventually he will rise again.
He will live again.
So the Bible is pretty clear, even in the Old Testament, that after we die that's not
the end and that there is going to be a resurrection some day and even beyond that the Bible makes
it crystal clear in the New Testament and so many verses that when a person dies they
go straight to heaven or they go straight to hell in regard to their soul.
But their body does rest in the earth, their body does sleep in the earth and one day that
body will rise again and Daniel is a great scripture on that.
Now I'm going to come back to verse one of chapter 12 but first I want to focus on these
great resurrection verses.
It says in verse number two, "Many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall
awake some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting contempt."
Let me start out by just defining for you what the word resurrection means.
The word resurrection means to rise again.
It does not necessarily mean to come back to life.
It just means to rise again.
Now in the case of the Lord Jesus Christ, He came back to life.
He rose again and He lives forever and He will never die.
He said, "I am He that was dead and behold, I'm alive forevermore, amen, and have the
keys of hell and of death."
But the reason I make that distinction is that many people will experience a resurrection
of damnation, the Bible calls it.
But those people will not live again.
Those people are dead.
In fact, in Revelation 20, when the dead, small and great, stand before God and when
death and hell deliver up the dead which are in them, the Bible says that John saw the
dead, small and great, stand before God and the books were opened and they were judged
by those things.
And even as they're standing there before that judgment, they're still called by God
the dead.
They're still dead.
And here notice there are two kinds of resurrection here.
There's the resurrection to everlasting life in verse 2, but then there's another resurrection
to shame and everlasting contempt.
That's the resurrection of damnation.
They're rising again, not to live forever, but rising again to experience eternal shame
and punishment.
The Bible said in Matthew 25, "These shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the
righteous into life eternal."
So notice, eternal life is on one side, eternal punishment is on the other side.
I've heard some people say, "Well, everybody's going to live forever in one place or another."
No, false, because burning in hell forever is not considered life, okay?
That's eternal death, eternal punishment, eternal destruction.
Now, yes, they're conscious, yes, there's an eternal conscious punishment, but that
is not eternal life.
People will try to twist that and it leads them into heresy when they mix up that fact,
that resurrection simply means to rise again.
Verse three says, "They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament,
and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever."
What does it mean to turn many to righteousness?
That means you find somebody who's unrighteous and you turn them to righteousness, right?
So this would be somebody who's preaching the word of God and influencing people to
be righteous.
It also says, "They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament."
Well, Proverbs 11.30 comes to mind, "The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and he
that winneth souls is wise."
You know, if you win a lot of people to Christ and you turn a lot of people to righteousness,
the Bible says that in the resurrection, you will shine as the brightness of the firmament.
And the Bible talks about how in the resurrection, there will be different levels of glory in
the resurrection when we are glorified with Christ, and that all of us will not have the
same glory.
You read 1 Corinthians 15 and elsewhere, that's taught, but it's based upon the works that
you do.
Salvation is based on faith.
Being in the resurrection of everlasting life is based on just believing on the Lord Jesus
Christ because whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have eternal life.
But when it comes to your level of reward or glory in the world to come, that is based
on your works.
Jesus said, "Behold, I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according
as his work shall be."
So works don't get us into heaven, works determine our status once we get there and they determine
our eternal reward once we get there.
So if we want to shine as the brightness of the firmament, we need to be wise and we need
to turn many unto righteousness according to Daniel chapter 12 verse 3, great verse.
Now flip over here to Matthew 16.
The resurrection is such an important doctrine, it's an Old Testament doctrine as we saw,
it's also a New Testament doctrine, but yet there are people who claim to believe the
Bible that don't believe in it.
Now even in Christ's day there were Jews who rejected the idea of the resurrection
and these Jews were known as the Sadducees.
And then later on in 1st Corinthians we read about people who are claiming to be Christians
who denied the doctrine of the resurrection.
And even today in 2018 there are so-called Christian groups that deny the resurrection
of Jesus Christ.
And by the way, the Jehovah's Witnesses are one of them.
Now they'll lie and say that they believe in it, but wait a minute, when you pin them
down on what the resurrection means, they do not believe in a bodily resurrection of
Jesus Christ.
Here's what they say the resurrection was.
Well, His spirit left His body.
That's called dying.
When they died in the Bible, they gave up the ghost.
Ghost means spirit.
And in the Bible, it says the body without the spirit is dead.
So their version of the resurrection is, "Oh, well, His spirit just left His body and His
body basically just dematerialized or disintegrated."
No, no, no.
That body that lay in the tomb did not see corruption.
And Jesus Christ walked out of the tomb in that very same body up from the grave He arose
and He showed His disciples the holes in His hands and the hole in His side just to prove
that it was Him.
And the Jehovah's false witnesses say that was a different body.
It just happened to have holes in the same places.
But there are other so-called Christian groups out there that deny the resurrection and to
deny the resurrection is to not believe the Bible.
It's that simple because this is clear in the Bible.
But preachers like Martin Luther King Jr. denied the resurrection.
He said, "Well, the resurrection is just that Christ lived on in their hearts.
He lived on in their memories."
That's what it means when it's said that he rose again, like he got popular again or something
in people's minds and hearts.
That's garbage.
But there are other super liberal groups out there, United Methodists and United Church
of Christ and these other types of groups that would claim to be a Bible-believing Christian
all while rejecting the idea of the resurrection, even rejecting the very afterlife itself,
heaven and hell.
But there's nothing new under the sun.
There was a group like this in the New Testament times that was a group of Jews who claimed
to believe the Bible, but yet they rejected the idea of the resurrection, and that group
is known as the Sadducees.
You remember this group from the Bible, the Sadducees?
Now Jesus warned about these people many times.
We don't really talk about them as much as we talk about the Pharisees.
We end up preaching against the Pharisees a lot more, but the Sadducees are mentioned
quite a bit in the New Testament.
In fact, if you study the book of Acts, the Sadducees were spearheading a lot of the persecution
of the early believers in the book of Acts.
But you're there in Matthew 16.
I'll read for you from Matthew chapter number, or no, never mind.
Let's just go to Matthew 16.
You're there in Matthew 16.
Look at verse number six.
The Bible reads, "Then Jesus said unto them, 'Take heed and beware of the leaven of the
Pharisees and of the Sadducees.'
And they perceived among themselves saying, 'It's because we've taken no bread.'
Which when Jesus perceived, he said unto them, 'O ye of little faith, why reason ye among
yourselves because ye have brought no bread?'"
Look at verse 11.
"How is it that ye did not understand that I spake it not to you concerning bread, that
ye should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees?
Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the leaven of bread, but of
the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees."
So he's warning them about the false doctrine, not just of the Pharisees, but also the false
doctrine of the Sadducees.
Now what was their big false doctrine?
Well flip over if you would to Matthew 22 verse 23.
Let's see what this big heresy of the Sadducees was.
And remember these are people who claim to believe the Bible.
They claim to believe the Old Testament scriptures.
This was a sect of the Jews and it says in Matthew 22 verse 23, the same day came to
him the Sadducees which say that there is no resurrection and asked him.
So the thing that the Bible points out as the big heresy about these people is they
don't believe in the resurrection.
You don't have to turn there but Mark 12 verse 18 says, "Then come unto him the Sadducees
which say there is no resurrection."
Luke 20 verse 27, "Then came to him certain of the Sadducees which deny that there is
any resurrection.
And they asked him."
Okay, flip over to 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
Not only that but in Acts 23 it says in verse 6, "But when Paul perceived that the one part
were Sadducees and the other Pharisees, he cried out in the council, 'Men and brethren,
I'm a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee, of the hope and resurrection of the dead I am
called in question.'
And when he had so said, there arose a dissension between the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and
the multitude was divided.
For the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, but listen to this, neither angel nor spirit,
but the Pharisees confess both.
Now think about how strange this is.
These are people who claim to follow the Bible, the Sadducees, and yet they say that not only
is there no resurrection, there's no such thing as an angel or a spirit.
Now how many times do we read in the Old Testament about angels, but they had ways that they
would explain away those passages just as false teachers will always explain things
away and try to negate them in the Bible.
Now who were the Sadducees?
Well the word Sadducee comes from the name of a guy in the Old Testament named Zadok.
And you have to understand that the Hebrew alphabet is only made up of consonants.
If you look at Psalm 119 in your Bible sometime, it lists off the 22 letters of the Hebrew
alphabet and they're all consonants, no vowels.
So a lot of words change shape from one form to another, but they keep the same consonants.
So the word sadducee, notice the consonants there, the S, the D, and the C, right?
Those are the same consonants that give us the sound of the name Zadok in the Old Testament.
So the Sadducees are like the sons of Zadok in their own mind.
Now who was Zadok?
Well, back in the Old Testament, King David had two chief priests, if you remember.
He had two different priests, and the reason why is because the priests were the sons of
Aaron.
And Aaron had four sons.
His four sons were Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, and Ithamar.
Well, Nadab and Abihu were killed by God when they offered strange fire before the Lord
in Leviticus chapter 10.
So that left two different sons of Aaron, Eleazar and Ithamar, and that's where the
priests came from.
They came from the house of Eleazar and the house of Ithamar.
Well, in David's day, when the kingdom of Israel was at its heyday, he actually had
two main priests.
He had one from the house of Eleazar and one from the house of Ithamar, okay?
And these two high priests were known as Abimelech and Zadok, okay?
Those kind of represented those two streams.
Well, if you remember, earlier on in the book of 1 Samuel, there was a guy named Eli, and
Eli was a high priest who was found to be wicked before the Lord, and here's what was
wicked about him, was that he let his kids just do whatever they wanted.
So he was a bad parent.
I don't think that he himself in his personal life was a horrible guy.
The Bible doesn't indicate that he was a terrible person, but he was a lazy parent, and so he
allowed his sons to grow up undisciplined, and his sons were these horrible fornicators
and thieves and people who did all kinds of awful things.
So God ended up killing his two sons, and not only that, but he swore that the house
of Eli would just be cut off from the priesthood, that nobody from that family was going to
be a part of the priesthood anymore.
This was not fulfilled until many, many decades later, though, because of the fact that later
on after David's reign, when he had the dual priesthood, when King Solomon took over, a
bimalak and a biothar, that side of things got wiped out and they got fired from being
priests and Zadok became the only priest.
So when Solomon came along and when the temple was built and the temple was being inaugurated
and everything like that, it was just Zadok at that point that was the high priest of
Israel.
And from then going forward, it was the sons of Zadok who would be the priests in the temple.
And we'll see that all throughout the Old Testament.
And in fact, all the way in Ezekiel 48, very far into the biblical history of the Old
Testament, it says in Ezekiel 48, 11, when he's talking about a new temple and who's
gonna do what, it says that it shall be for the priests that are sanctified of the sons
of Zadok which have kept my charge which went not astray when the children of Israel went
astray as the Levites went astray.
So even in the days of Ezekiel, which is several hundred years before Christ, the sons of Zadok
were still faithful in the days of Ezekiel.
When the rest of the Levites were going astray, the sons of Zadok remained faithful.
So because of these scriptures praising Zadok as being the great high priest, the legitimate
son of Aaron, he wasn't part of that Eli family and all their wickedness.
And even when the rest of the Levites went bad, Zadok stayed true to the word of God.
You know, obviously that's why the Sadducees want to associate themselves with this guy
and say, "Hey, we're the sons of Zadok, okay?"
Now that makes sense because the Bible tells in Acts 5 verse 17, "Then the high priest
rose up," this is the high priest in the days of the apostles, "Then the high priest rose
up and all they that were with him, which is the sect of the Sadducees," and they were
filled with indignation against the apostles.
So the Bible tells us that the sect of the Sadducees was the high priest and his family
and everybody who kind of was associated with the high priest.
Those were the Sadducees, which makes sense that they're the sons of Zadok, okay?
But being a physical son of Zadok does not make you a spiritual son of Zadok.
How many times do we see in the Bible great men of God having descendants who are as wicked
as the devil?
And this is why we have to be careful of anything that is hereditary, because of the fact that
the sons are not always going to be like the father.
And over the course of 100 and 200 and 300 and 400 and 500 years, these lineages deteriorate.
And that's why the Jews in the New Testament said, "Well, Abraham's our father."
And he said, "Well, if Abraham were your father, you'd do the works of Abraham."
I know that you'd be Abraham's seed, but he's telling them, "You don't live like Abraham.
You don't believe like Abraham.
You don't do like Abraham."
Well, that's the condition of the Sadducees here.
They claim to be the sons of Zadok, but they've become so apostate by the time we get to
the New Testament, they don't believe in the resurrection, they don't believe in angels,
they don't believe in spirits.
It's like they don't believe in anything supernatural hardly.
They want to just take away maybe the miracles of the Bible, and there are groups out there
today that are like that as well.
They lack faith to believe in the miracles of the Bible.
So notice the great council of the Jews that's judging the apostles, the Sanhedrin of the
children of Israel, that group is made up of Pharisees and Sadducees.
I mean, Paul looks at it and he sees, "Okay, part of this is Pharisee and part of this
is Sadducees."
And then he does a divide and conquer saying, "Well, I'm a Pharisee."
And then he gets the Pharisees on his side, and then the Sadducees are on the other side.
And then if you remember, they grab him and they're going to rip him in half, you know,
the Sadducees are pulling on Paul one way and the Pharisees are pulling on him the
other way, and they almost tore him apart.
Now one of the big lessons we can learn from that is that the devil often provides us with
two alternatives that are both wrong.
Now we know the Pharisees were wrong.
Jesus is constantly ripping into the Pharisees.
Now what was wrong with the Pharisees?
The Pharisees were adding to scripture.
They added their own traditions and teachings that were not in the Bible.
They had the oral Torah or the oral traditions, the traditions of the elders, the stuff that
would later be known as the Talmud, and they were adding that stuff to the Word of God.
And Jesus constantly rebuked it, and he called them hypocrites and vipers and all kinds of
names.
But then the Sadducees on the other hand, they did not add to the Word of God.
They didn't have all those extra traditions that the Pharisees had.
But they had another problem where they're just denying scripture and denying the resurrection
and denying angels and denying spirits.
So these two denominations of Pharisee and Sadducee are both wrong.
They're both very wrong and they're both so wrong that they're actually damned.
It's not like they're just a little off.
I mean when John the Baptist, it says in Matthew 3, 7, saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees
come to his baptism, he said unto them, "O generation of vipers, who with warned you
to flee from the wrath to come."
So he calls the Sadducees vipers and he calls the Pharisees vipers.
They're both snakes.
They're both devils.
They're both wicked.
So don't get caught up in this thing of these two false alternatives that are both wrong.
It's sort of like this.
You know, the Catholic and the Protestant, there's wrong and there's more wrong.
You know, which one are you, Calvinist or Arminian?
They're both garbage.
Which one are you going to drink, Coke or Pepsi?
It's both sodium benzoate filled high fructose corn syrup, caramel color, artificial flavor
junk.
It's just this false left right paradigm where you've got to be for Trump or you've got to
be for Hillary.
Right?
And if you're not for one, you're for the other.
Oh, you know, you're preaching against the Sadducees, you must be a Pharisee.
Oh, you're with the Pharisees, yeah, you know, no, I'm neither.
And Christ came along and rebuked both.
They were both wicked.
He preached against both.
Now go to 1 Corinthians chapter 15 where I had you turn.
It says in 1 Corinthians 15-12, "Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how
say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?"
I mean, Paul is just saying how can you believe that?
It's ridiculous.
But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen.
And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain and your faith is also vain.
So some of the Pharisees and Sadducees had brought in some of their false doctrine into
the early church.
They infiltrated the church with their false doctrines.
And he's rebuking this junk about there being no resurrection.
He's saying, "Look, if there's no resurrection, our preaching is vain and your faith is vain.
Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God because we've testified of God that he raised
up Christ, whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not.
For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised.
And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain.
You are yet in your sins.
Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.
Now that's the same language that we saw back in Daniel 12 about people sleeping in the
dust of the earth.
He said, "Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished.
If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.
But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the firstfruits of them that's left."
Look, if there's no resurrection, we're of all men most miserable, he's saying.
If in this life only we have hope in Christ, but thanks be to God Christ is risen from
the dead.
And not only is Jesus Christ risen from the dead, he has become the firstfruits of them
that's left.
Meaning that just as God raised up the Lord, it says, he also will raise up us by his own
power.
Just as Christ is risen, we shall also rise one day.
And then go back to Daniel chapter 12, while you're turning there, I'll read you another
great Old Testament scripture that the Sadducees should have been reading, that the Sadducees
rejected.
But in Job chapter 19 verse 25 it says, "For I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he
shall stand at the latter day upon the earth."
Now who is Job's Redeemer?
Well, the Redeemer of anybody is Jesus Christ.
And he said, "I know my Redeemer liveth," and not only that, he said, "that he shall
stand at the latter day upon the earth."
So you know, Christ is going to stand on this earth, "And though after my skin worms destroy
this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes
shall behold, and not another, though my reigns be consumed within me."
Now Jesus Christ, when he died on the cross, was buried, and for three days his flesh saw
no corruption, and three days later he rose again from the dead.
Now Job, when he died, his flesh did see corruption.
The Bible says David's flesh saw corruption.
Job was eaten of worms, not to be graphic, but that's how bodies decompose.
There are other organisms that help out with the decomposition, and so Job's body was eaten
of worms, and he said, "After my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I
see God."
Now what's he saying there?
If his body is being completely eaten of worms down to the bone, how's he going to see God
in his flesh, unless he's getting a new body?
And that new body is not just some spiritual body that has no flesh, it's a spiritual
body that has flesh and bone.
Just as when Jesus rose from the dead, he said, "I'm not a spirit," because he said,
"A spirit hath not flesh and bone as you see me to have."
So the resurrection of Christ was a flesh and bone resurrected body right there, and
that's the same way it is for us.
He will rise again one day, our bodies even, and we will have flesh and bone on that body.
Job will rise again, and we will see Job in the flesh.
He will be a flesh and bone human being.
So that's a pretty powerful scripture in Job 19.
We can go to other scriptures, but I'm just showing you how the Sadducees just didn't
believe the Word of God.
And just like there are people today who refuse to believe the Word of God, even though it's
crystal clear.
Go back to Daniel chapter 12, Daniel chapter number 12, let's go through this whole chapter
quickly here.
Daniel chapter 12, Bible reads in verse number one, "And at that time shall Michael stand
up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people.
And there shall be a time of trouble such as never was, since there was a nation even
to that same time.
And at that time thy people shall be delivered, everyone that shall be found written in the
book."
Now this is a super interesting verse because it ties in with End Times events very clearly
because it talks about the time of trouble such as never was, since there was a nation.
Well in the New Testament this is known as a time of tribulation such as was not, since
there was a nation.
Now again, notice the connection between the word trouble, what are the consonants, t-r-b-l,
and tribulation, what are the consonants, t-r-b-l, these words are related.
Tribulations is a variation on the word trouble.
So the time of trouble is the time of tribulation.
He talks about Michael standing up, the great prince which standeth for the children of
thy people and he says at the end of the verse there that thy people shall be delivered,
everyone that shall be found written in the book.
Now who's the thy people there?
Now a lot of people will say oh well the thy people, that's got to just be all the Jews,
you know God's people, Daniel's people, thy people, you know that's just the Jews so they'll
try to actually take unbelieving Israel and try to call them Daniel's people or God's
people or the chosen people or something like that.
But the Bible is pretty clear here when it says everyone that shall be found written
in the book.
So any so-called Jew whose name is not found written in the book of life, that person is
not one of God's people, they're not the chosen people.
So the Bible tells us that the ones who will be delivered, in other words for delivered
is saved, the ones who will be delivered are those who are written in the book.
Now this is pretty similar to what we see in Joel chapter two.
You don't have to turn there, but in Joel chapter two it says, "The sun shall be turned
into darkness and the moon into blood before the great and notable day of the Lord come."
And it says, "It shall come to pass that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall
be delivered.
For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance as the Lord hath said and in the
remnant whom the Lord shall call."
So the Bible talks about in Joel how it was going to be a great and terrible day of the
Lord where the sun and moon are darkened and it shall come to pass that whosoever shall
call upon the name of the Lord shall be delivered or shall be saved.
That's the same thing that we see here in Daniel chapter 12.
In Daniel chapter 12 when the great time of trouble comes, when the great time of tribulation
comes, the Bible says that those who have called upon the name of the Lord will be saved
or will be delivered.
In Daniel 12 it says those whose names are written in the book, the book of life, will
be saved or will be delivered.
What's that referring to?
This is referring to what we know as the rapture because the Bible refers to the fact
that except the days of the tribulation should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved.
But for the elect's sake, those days shall be shortened.
So in the midst of great tribulation upon God's people, the days will be shortened.
They will be cut short because Jesus Christ will come in the clouds and those who are
saved, those who have believed on Christ will be literally saved in the sense that they'll
be pulled out of here before God's wrath is poured out and before the Antichrist has a
chance to wipe them all out.
They'll be delivered from that.
They will be brought out of this world and of course that's clear in 1st Thessalonians
chapter number 4 and Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 are other places where we could
clearly read about that.
So the Bible gives us some information here about the end times that there's going to
be a time of trouble.
During that time of trouble, Michael the archangel as we know him, Michael the great prince
which standeth for the children of thy people, he'll stand up and the Bible says there'll
be a time of great tribulation and then those who are saved will be delivered out of it,
will be rescued out of it.
And then it says many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, just referring
to the resurrection in general, some to everlasting life and some to shame and everlasting intent.
And it makes perfect sense to roll right into that subject because of the fact that at the
time of the rapture when Christ comes in the clouds and those who are saved are delivered
out of that trouble and that tribulation, the Bible says what?
The dead in Christ shall rise first.
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, wherefore comfort one
another with these words.
So the Bible is clear that the resurrection of the dead and the salvation of those who
are alive and remain being pulled out of the tribulation, those things both happen at the
same time.
They both happen on the same day.
So let's keep reading.
He says, "They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament and they that
turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever."
Verse four, "But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words and seal the book even to the time
of the end.
Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased."
Now what does that mean?
Many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased.
Well, most people have interpreted this as referring to the end times and that during
that time many shall run to and fro and knowledge shall increase is referring to the amazing
technology of the end times and I tend to agree with this interpretation that this is
referring to the fact that transportation will be such where you can just go to and
fro on the earth.
I mean, you can hop on a plane and you're on the other side of the world in less than
a day.
I mean, that's pretty amazing.
When you think about the fact that in Bible days it would take them weeks or months or
years to travel long distances.
But even just to get to the new world they'd have to get on a ship and spend months and
months and that was only a few hundred years ago.
But then now we just hop on a plane and it's so easy and they said knowledge shall increase.
Well think about the internet, how there's just so much knowledge, so much information,
just all the data and everything's just been mapped and logged and cataloged and it's all
just at our fingertips.
You can just pull out a smartphone and just have access to virtually any information in
the world.
It's bizarre.
And we're not even to the end yet.
What's going to be the next thing after the internet that we haven't even thought of?
So I think that that's probably what that's referring to when he says that at the time
of the end, many will run to and fro and knowledge shall be increased.
Verse five, "Then I, Daniel, looked and behold there stood other two, the one on this side
of the bank of the river and the other on that side of the bank of the river.
And one said to the man clothed in linen, which was upon the waters of the river, 'How
long shall it be to the end of these wonders?'
And I heard the man clothed in linen, which was upon the waters of the river, when he
held up his right hand and his left hand unto heaven, and swear by him that liveth for ever
and ever, that it shall be for a time, times, and an half.
And when he shall have accomplished to scatter the power of the holy people, all these things
shall be finished."
Now what's this three and a half year time frame or time, times, and half a time?
It's the time frame that we've talked about over and over again.
And this has to do with the fact that in the end times there's a seven year period where
the events of the tribulation and God pouring out his wrath take place.
And this period is cut in half by the abomination of desolation that happens right in the middle.
So you have three and a half years, then you have the abomination of desolation, and then
you have three and a half more years.
Well Christ coming in the clouds and the resurrection of the dead and the rapture and so forth,
that all happens shortly after that midpoint.
Not right at the midpoint, but shortly after that midpoint is when that takes place.
And so it makes sense that when he just talked about the fact that the people will be delivered
and people are going to be resurrected and so forth, and then the next question out of
his mouth is, how long shall it be to the end of these wonders, that he gives them a
number three and a half years, time, times, and half a time.
Now it's not exactly three and a half years, but it's approximately three and a half years.
See, whenever the Bible uses numbers, we have to realize they're often approximate.
And when he wants to get more specific, he'll use a more specific unit of measurement.
So for example, when he really wants to get specific in the end times, he'll use the number
1,260 days.
Now 1,260 days is three and a half years, but it's a little more precise.
Just like another time he says 1,290 days, that's also about three and a half years,
but it's more precise than that.
It's around that.
Also it'll say 42 months.
Often in the Bible, numbers are rounded off, like when it says that David reigned for seven
years over here and 33 and a half years over here, so it's a total of 40 years.
So he just kind of rounds things off in that sense to the nearest year.
Obviously it's not exact.
So that's what we see here.
And then it says in verse 8, "And I heard, but I understood not.
Then said I, 'O my Lord, what shall be the end of these things?'
And he said, 'Go thy way, Daniel, for the words are closed up and sealed till the time
of the end.
Many shall be purified and made white and tried, but the wicked shall do wickedly and
none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand.'"
Now the Bible is saying here many will be purified and made white.
That has to do with being saved, being purified of our sins, being saved and being made white
because we've been washed in the blood of the Lamb.
We've been saved by believing on Jesus Christ.
So the Bible says a lot of people are going to be purified, a lot of people are going
to be made white and then it says a lot of people are going to be tried.
So the people who get saved and who live as saved Christians in the end times, they're
going to go through trials, they're going to go through troubles, tribulations, they're
going to be tried.
But on the other hand he says the wicked shall do wickedly.
So many are going to be purified and made white and tried.
That's the Christian life in a nutshell.
You get purified and made white and then you get tried and then you go through trials,
you go through tribulations.
That's life.
But the wicked shall do wickedly.
And then he says none of the wicked shall understand.
But the wise shall understand.
Now here's the thing.
He doesn't say that every saved person is going to understand.
See saved people have the ability to understand the Bible, but they don't necessarily understand
it.
Why?
Because if you haven't studied, you're not going to understand it.
If you haven't prayed and studied and read your Bible like you should, you're not going
to understand.
Now the Bible says that none of the wicked shall understand.
Some of the saved will understand.
Not all of the saved.
So he says none of the wicked will understand, but when it comes to the saved, he says the
wise among the saved will understand.
Those who are wise will understand.
Now why will none of the wicked understand?
Because the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.
Their foolishness unto him, neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned.
The Bible is very clear that unsaved people cannot understand the Bible.
It goes over their head.
Now when you're saved, you have the Holy Ghost inside you and you have the ability to understand
the Bible.
It doesn't mean you're going to understand everything in the Bible without any reading
or study.
You have to read and study and work at it and then you have the ability to understand
what the Bible teaches.
Then after he makes this statement about the wise will understand, none of the wicked will
understand, then he goes into a very deep teaching.
So it makes sense that he talks about, "Hey, wicked people, they're not going to understand
this," and only some of the wise are going to, or I mean even, and only some of the saved
are going to understand it, those who are wise.
He says, "From the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away and the abomination that
make a desolate set up, there shall be 1,290 days."
So what's he saying here?
He's saying after the abomination of desolation, there's 1,290 more days.
Now that makes perfect sense if we're dealing with a seven year period and in the middle
of it is the abomination of desolation.
That would make sense because 1,290 days is the three and a half years that we're looking
for.
Right?
Makes perfect sense.
So from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away and the abomination that
make desolation set up, there should be 1,290 days because when we study Revelation it's
clear that the first half of Daniel's 70th week is 1,260 days long and the second half
is 1,290 days long and the reason why is that the Bible deals in 30 day months and that
there are 42 months in the first half and 43 months in the second half and the reason
for that is that 42 months of 30 days each it falls a little bit short of 3 1/2 solar
years because a solar year is 365 days right?
12 30 day months is only 360 days so if you have 360 day years in the Bible because the
Bible is consistent the Bible always has 30 day months, 12 months in a year, 5 months
is 150 days I mean the Bible is consistent with that well if you only have 360 day years
and we know that the sun takes 365 days to do its thing how are you going to make up
for that 5 day discrepancy you say oh what's 5 days no big deal well it becomes a big deal
pretty fast because you start you know having Easter and it's snowing outside right because
the fact that your calendar is going to get all off so the way that they would fix that
because they're basically 5 days off every year is that every 6 years they have to add
an extra month because 6 times 5 is 30 right so every 6 years they add an extra month well
if the end times is over a period of 7 years you're going to have to have what an extra
month thrown in to balance that thing out and make it 7 actual years so that's what
we see in the bible is that the second half is 1290 days for that reason but verse 12
is the thing that people don't understand most people understand verse 11 I've never
met anybody who studied bible prophecy who didn't understand verse 11 I mean everybody
agrees on verse 11 but the bible says in verse 12 blesses he that waiteth and cometh to the
thousand three hundred and five and thirty days but go thou thy way till the end be
for thou shalt rest and stand in thy lot at the end of the days now this is where people
get confused and the reason why they're confused is because they start counting the thousand
three hundred and five and thirty days at the abomination of desolation they assume
that since the twelve hundred and ninety days starts at the abomination of desolation that
the thirteen thirty five starts in the same place and I can see why they would think that
I mean I can see how that would make sense that okay we'll start in the same place but
here's the proof that that's false okay the proof is that if there were to be twelve
hundred and ninety days after the abomination of desolation and then's the end you know
where Christ sets up his millennium and all things are fulfilled and all that well then
what's this thirteen thirty five that would bring you like partially into the millennium
like forty five days into the millennium and the problem with that is that there's no
scripture anywhere in the whole bible that talks about anything happening forty five
days into the millennium so you'd just be having this one verse throw in this number
at you that doesn't jive with anything else and if you have something in the bible that
doesn't jive with anything else you're probably misunderstanding it number one but number
Number two, if we actually look at the context of the passage, he tells us what the 1335
days is about.
Because he says, "Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the thousand three hundred five
and thirty days."
That shows that that time is something that you're waiting for, okay?
It's something that we're waiting for.
Now if we study the word wait in the New Testament, you know what it says we're waiting for over
and over again?
It says we're waiting for the redemption of our body.
Waiting for the redemption of our body.
It says that we're waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Bible says to wait for his son from heaven whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus which
delivered us from the wrath to come.
So over and over again in the Bible it talks about waiting for Christ's coming, waiting
for the second coming, and waiting for the resurrection.
Waiting for the redemption of our body.
Waiting for that day.
So that makes sense, especially in light of the next verse.
Look at verse 13, "But go thou thy way till the end be, for thou shalt rest, Daniel,
and stand in thy lot at the end of the days."
Now people will often misquote this as, "You'll stand in your lot at the end of days."
That doesn't say at the end of days, because they'll say, "Well end of days," that just
means end times.
No, no, no, it says the end of the days.
Now the reason that's significant is when you use the definite article the, you're referring
to something specific.
You know, it's the difference between saying house and the house, I'm referring to something
specific.
Well the Bible here is saying, "Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh unto the thousand
three hundred and five and thirty days," and he says, "You Daniel will stand in your lot
at the end of the days."
Which days?
The thousand, three hundred, five and thirty days.
So what is it that we're told that we're waiting for in the New Testament over and over again?
The redemption of our body, our resurrection, the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in the
clouds.
So what's Daniel waiting for here?
Basically, until He stands in His lot.
When is Daniel going to rise again?
Daniel's going to rise again at the end of the days.
Why?
Because Daniel's going to rise again when all the other believers are going to rise
again, which is when?
At the end of the 1,305 and 30 days.
So therefore, the 1,005 and 30 days is pointing to when Christ comes in the clouds and the
resurrection happens and when Daniel and everybody else is resurrected.
Now, when people hear me preach this, which I'm just preaching clearly what the scripture
is saying.
They'll say, "Oh, you're date setting the rapture."
Really?
What date did I set?
And people often accused me, because of preaching this in Daniel chapter 12, of date setting
the rapture or setting a date for the coming of Christ.
Well, it's funny, they can never tell you what that date was that I ever set, because
I've never set a date and I never will.
Because we don't know when exactly the tribulation starts.
The tribulation is not happening now, and we don't know when it's going to start.
So if we don't know when it's going to start, we don't know the day of the rapture, we're
not setting a date.
Now, people say, "Well, but once it starts you'll know."
Well, you know, eventually when we see him coming in the clouds we'll know, and afterward
we're going to know too.
But here's the thing, I don't even think we're necessarily going to know even when
we're in the tribulation, because how do you know necessarily exactly what date the tribulation
technically started?
Because the tribulation starts with a battle in heaven, where Michael and his archangels
are fighting against the dragon.
We're not necessarily going to see that.
And Daniel's 70th week starts with the Antichrist confirming the covenant with many for one
week.
Well, that could take place behind closed doors somewhere.
We're not necessarily going to know exactly when to start the clock counting, so I don't
think that we're ever going to know the exact date until we see the abomination of desolation.
And once we see the abomination of desolation, it's going to be so close at that point, of
course we look up because our redemption is drawing nigh at that point.
So this is not a date setting, but it's 1,305 and 30 days.
Now, let me just point out one more thing before I close here about this because this
is important.
When we find something in the Bible that is unique or different than what we see elsewhere
or what we've heard, we should always look for other evidence to confirm what we believe.
It's kind of like I mentioned a moment ago, 45 days into the millennium, some significant
event happening, well, there's just no evidence of that anywhere in the Bible.
So let's ask ourselves now, is there any evidence of anything happening 1,335 days into Daniel's
70th week or 1,335 days into the tribulation?
Is there any evidence of something happening at that point?
And the answer is, yes, I can show you three things right now that symbolically point to
that exact date, and it's pretty interesting when you think about it.
First of all, and I'm just going to explain this very quickly and very simply for sake
of time, and I've done whole sermons on this if you want to go deeper on this subject.
I did a sermon called The Timing of the Rapture where I went into this very deeply, but let
me just point out that if we have a seven-year period known as Daniel's 70th week and we
look at how far 1,335 days takes you into that period, it takes you 53% of the way into
that period, just to make it a simple way of understanding it.
Well if you look at the Hebrew calendar year, there's an event that happens at that exact
point in the year, 53% into the year known as the trumpet of the Jubilee where liberty
is proclaimed throughout all the land.
Well the Bible calls the rapture the glorious liberty of the children of God and we obviously
know that the rapture, a trumpet is going to sound.
So that's a perfect parallel at that exact point in the year where that trumpet is sounded.
And not only that, at the exact midpoint of the Hebrew year is a blowing of trumpets,
plural, which symbolizes danger, that's the abomination of desolation.
So there's a parallel right there with the Hebrew calendar.
Another parallel is that King Jehoiakim was in captivity for 70 years.
When was he raised up out of captivity?
When was he pulled up out of the dungeon and lifted up, the Bible says.
He was lifted up in the 37th year of his captivity.
And 37 years into a 70 year captivity is 53% of the way into that captivity.
So basically the exact point in the Hebrew year where the trumpet of Jubilee is blown,
that's the equivalent of 1335 days into the tribulation.
When Jehoiakim was lifted up in the 37th year of a 70 year captivity, that's 53% of the
way into that captivity.
And then also when Jesus Christ walks on the water at the Sea of Galilee and the disciples
are on a ship crossing a seven mile body of water and Jesus Christ meets them at the ship
and he gets into the ship and calms the storm and the Bible says that when he gets on the
ship and the storm is calm, they're immediately warped to the other side.
So they're on a seven mile journey and they get to a certain point and Christ gets on
the ship and all of a sudden they're just at the other side, they're just at the destination.
The trip is what?
Cut short.
The trip is shortened.
The exact point where that happened is that exact same point.
It fits perfectly with being 53% of the way across that lake.
Okay, so I don't think that's a coincidence that you can line all this stuff up with the
1335 days and the Hebrew calendar and Jehoiakim being raised up out of captivity and the
crossing of the Sea of Galilee and it all fits like a glove.
So that helps you confirm that you're interpreting the verse correctly.
Whereas this other interpretation where the 1335 days starts at the abomination, well
that just has no support in any other scripture that I've ever seen anybody be able to produce.
So all that you say, this is way too deep for a Sunday morning, well you know what?
We need to read our Bibles and study to show ourselves approved and go deep because there
are a lot of people here this morning who enjoy the sermon because of the fact that
they know what I'm talking about, because they've read the Bible.
They know who Zadok is.
They know who Jehoiakim is.
They know about these great stories.
They know about the Hebrew calendar because they've been reading and studying their Bibles.
But out of all the important things that the Bible teaches us and all the important doctrines
and all the teachings both simple and difficult that we find in the Bible, the most important
teaching is the doctrine of the resurrection.
And the reason that I preach about this this morning is because it's Easter Sunday.
And I do believe in celebrating Easter.
The word Easter is not a pagan word.
It's actually found in the Bible in Acts chapter 12 verse 4.
And the thing that we celebrate on Easter Sunday is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
And without the resurrection of Christ, we're doomed.
The Bible tells us without the resurrection of Christ, we are yet in our sins.
And so thanks be to God that Jesus Christ not only died and was buried, but that up
from the grave he arose.
And here we are in the year of our Lord, 2018, still celebrating the resurrection of the
Lord Jesus Christ because it's the very basis of our salvation.
And so when we go out and preach the gospel, what are we preaching?
The death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.
And what is it that a person has to believe in order to be saved?
The Bible says that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus and shall believe
in thine heart that God has raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
It means that every Sadducee went straight to hell, you know, and every so-called Christian
group out there today that denies the bodily resurrection of Christ is on their way to
hell today.
We need to get them the gospel.
We need to get them the truth.
You say, why does that have to be bodily?
Because it's the death, burial, and resurrection.
You don't bury a spirit, you bury a body.
It's the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ that saves us.
And when we go out soul winning and preaching the gospel, we need to emphasize that most
important cornerstone of our faith, the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
And today, let's think about that and ponder that and meditate on that, not just have an
Easter egg hunt and eat ham and potatoes and corn, although that sounds pretty good
right now.
Let's focus on Christ and His resurrection and inspire us in that word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord.
Thank you for this chapter, Daniel chapter 12, Lord, that tells us that there is a resurrection,
Lord, unto everlasting life.
And we know that you have raised up Jesus Christ as the firstfruits of that resurrection
and that we are going to be phase two of that resurrection.
We thank you so much, Lord, for the promise of your coming.
Help us to wait patiently for your coming and for the resurrection and changing of our
own bodies.
And in Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.