Quote
‘scholar’: “Have you not heard of the Gentile Times? Such a doctrine
underscores 1914CE” unquote
Right!
The whole
607 date issue has but one purpose, namely to prove that the ‘Gentile Times’
utterance of Jesus (Luke 21:24) has reference to 1914.
But would
God make eternal salvation contingent on the average Joe having to pick the
right history scholar, in order to properly understand Jesus’ words?
If we
read the accounts in Mat 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21, it becomes easy to see that
the passage of Luke 21:20-24 corresponds to, and explains, Mat 24:15-21.
Please
stop and just read those two passages side by side.
Now, the
WT teaches that the “standing” of the “disgusting thing in a (a, Gr. Generic,
not specific) holy place,” in order to “cause its desolation,” is yet future, and
Luke 21:20 informs us that Jerusalem” is that “holy place."
Further,
the “disgusting thing” is identified as the “gentiles” in Luke 21:24, and the
desolation of “Jerusalem” is accomplished by means of “trampling.”
And since
this desolating trampling kicks of the “great tribulation,” it follows that the
“appointed times of the gentiles (nations)” – the “appointed times” of the
“disgusting thing” to START trampling on “Jerusalem,” i.e. Christianity – is yet
in the near future.
Hence,
the “appointed times of the nations” (gentile Times) starts with the NWO
trampling of Christianity at the beginning of the great tribulation and ends
about 3.5 years later when Jesus ‘comes on the clouds of Heaven in power and
glory’ – this is the contextual framework in which the “Gentile Times” were
placed by Jesus as a comparison of Mat 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21 clearly show.
Now this
raises the issue of the “Parousia” and its WT interpretation.
Parousia does NOT mean ‘presence followed by coming’ (on the clouds of Heaven,
in this case), but ‘coming (or arrival) followed by personal, bodily presence
with,’ as can be seen by Paul’s usage of the concept, where he was ‘invisibly
present’ in mind and spirit with the brothers at a distant location, not using
the term parousia, precisely because he was exactly the opposite of present.
Since
presence is the opposite of absence, and parousia means the ‘coming and consequent
bodily presence with,’ so that one being present cannot said to be coming again
unless FIRST leaving and becoming absent again, it follows that if Jesus became
present in 1914, and is still to come in the future, He has first to become
absent again in order to then come on the clouds of Heaven – when exactly did
Jesus become absent again in preparation for His future coming at Armageddon?
Hence,
Jesus becomes present AFTER His ‘coming on the clouds of Heaven’ at the end of
the great tribulation and the start of Armageddon.
