Bible Prophecies Fulfilled

BIBLE PROPHECIES FULFILLED.

I.—Past Events.

In Amos 3:7, we read these words: “Surely the Lord God will do nothing but he revealeth his secret to his servants the prophets.” How far can this statement be proved true?

(1) The Creation. In the book of Genesis we find an account of the creation of the world and the first man who dwelt upon it. From whence obtained we this knowledge? It was given to the Prophet Moses when he talked face to face with the Lord in the mountain, that all who would might know how this earth upon which we dwell came into existence.

(2) The Flood. In Genesis 7:8, we find an account of the flood which in the early ages of man’s existence destroyed both man and beast, leaving the earth desolate, with the exception of the eight people and the animals saved in the ark; but in chapter 6:3, we find that the people had received warning by the Prophet Noah one hundred and twenty years before the event took place, thus giving them the chance to repent and save themselves, if they had so desired.

(3) Rise of the Kingdom of Israel. This important event was revealed to Abraham, while he was yet childless, and he was promised that the land of Canaan should be given to him and to his seed for ever, and that in him all the nations of the earth should be blessed. This, of course, was fulfilled by his being the father of Isaac, who was the father of Jacob, who was the one of Isaac’s two sons chosen to be the father of the people of God, known as the Israelites, Jacob’s name being changed to Israel.

Abraham was told that his seed should be a stranger in a land that was not theirs, and should serve the stranger and be afflicted four hundred years (Genesis 15:13) and afterwards they should come forth with much substance. As you read the history of these children of Israel, you will find that four hundred and twenty years they sojourned in the land of Egypt, working until the day when Moses appeared as their deliverer.

Forty years after this period of bondage, the Israelites entered the land of their inheritance—the land promised to Abraham Palestine.

(4) The Captivity. In the midst of the sin and carelessness of the children of Israel came Jeremiah, and he prophesied that Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, would come against Jerusalem and lay the land waste, taking the people captive. To Babylon itself they should go, and there they should serve the king seventy years. When the seventy years had expired, they should return to their own land. They thought it but an idle tale, but just as it was foretold, so it came to pass.

(5) Rise and Fall of Four Great Empires. In Daniel 2:36-43, we read that four great empires should rise in the East. One by one they were to rise, one by one they were to fall. History records how the Babylonian kingdom, then in power, was con­quered by the Medes and Persians. The Persian kingdom fell to the Macedonians, the Macedonians being finally conquered by the Romans. Of the conquest of Persia by the Macedonians, Daniel speaks in his eleventh chapter, and shows how the Grecian king would become its master, and after his death his kingdom would be divided, but not to his posterity. According to Josephus, book II., chapter 8, Alexander the Great, the Grecian king, declared that when he was meditating the conquest of Persia, he had a dream. In this dream a priest clothed in the priestly garments of the Jewish temple stood before him and told him not to delay but to push right on, for he should conquer Persia. A little later he went to Jerusalem, and suddenly coming upon the high priest clothed in the garments of his office, to the surprise of all his courtiers and followers he did homage to him, as to some great king. When questioned as to why he, whom all men were honoring, should honor this priest, he told his dream, and said he was honoring not the man, but the God he served, for he firmly believed God would give him the victory over all his enemies. Accordingly, the priest took him into the temple where, under his direction, he offered sacrifice to God. The Book of Daniel was then brought to him and the passages therein referring to his conquest of the Persians pointed out to him. He conquered Persia, and after his death his kingdom was divided between his four generals, and finally conquered by the Romans.

(6) Birth and Death of Christ. All the Christian world is ac­quainted with the history of the birth and death of Jesus Christ. His followers accept Him as the Son of God. Josephus is thought to recognize Him as a great teacher, and to-day scoffers who refuse to accept His divinity, willingly accord to Him the palm, acknow­ledging Him the greatest Teacher the world has ever seen.

Searching through the Old Testament you will find that every prophet there referred in some way to this great life. Some spoke of His birth, some of His life, some of the manner of His death, so that from the Old Testament alone, without the aid of the New, we might gather the facts which now are history. If you will read carefully Isaiah 7:14; Micah 5:2; Hosea 11:1; Zech. 9:9; 11:12; Psalm 22:18; 69:21; together with the whole of Isaiah's 53rd chapter, you will have a pretty clear idea in your minds of the life of Christ.

(7) Siege of Jerusalem. In A.D. 70, occurred the siege and fall of Jerusalem, when the holy temple was levelled to the ground and the city destroyed, since which date the Jews have been a scattered people. Did this take place without the warning cry that had been sounded before every other great calamity took place, or did the voice of the prophet of the living God sound the warning? Turn to Deut. 28, and read there what the Prophet Moses had to say. Had he been an eye-witness to the awful hap­penings of the year 70 A.D., he could not more graphically have described the horrors of that fearful time when, in accordance with his prophecy, mothers ate their own children.

(8) The Apostasy. When Christ was upon earth He founded a Church and left it in the hands of a presidency—Peter. James and John. It was not fully organized until after His death, but He left with them the authority necessary to carry on the work He had begun. Again and again in His preaching He warned them of the apostasy that should take place, and Paul in his writings constantly affirmed that the Church should not always stand. Writing to the Thessalonians, he declared that Christ should not come to earth again till after there had been a falling away, i.e., after the apostasy.

No one looking on conditions in the world to-day can doubt that this apostasy has taken place, and we are right now where Amos foresaw we should be, when he said, “Behold the days come,” saith the Lord God, “that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the word of the Lord.”

II.—Present Events.

(1) Lack of Spirituality. Amos (8:11-12) foresaw’ the time when the people of the world would be hungering and thirsting for a knowledge of the truth, and would seek it here and seek it there and find it not.

No man or woman who has hungered and thirsted for the truth, who has visited this Church in the hope of appeasing that hunger can doubt for one moment the fulfilment of this prophecy in these latter days. Word of man there is in plenty, but word of God, thundered forth in power and might, “Thus saith the Lord,” there is not, except in the place where the world will not acknowledge its presence.

(2) Coming forth of the Book of Mormon. David, in his 85th Psalm, verse 11, declared, “Troth shall spring out of the earth and righteousness shall look down from heaven.” Ezekiel (37:16-19) tells how the stick of Ephraim (Book of Mormon) shall be joined with the stick of Judah (Bible) in the last days, and shall both be of equal value to those who will receive them.

Isaiah (29) tells us that in the days that are to come, there shall come forth out of the ground the words of a people now low in the dust, and the words shall be familiar to those who will receive them. They shall be given to one to read who will say he is unlearned and cannot read them.

(3) Coming of the Angel. In Revelations 14:6. we read, “And I saw another angel fly in the midst of heaven having the everlasting gospel to preach unto them that dwell on the earth.”

That angel, foreseen by John, was the angel Moroni, who came to fulfil the above prophecy and give to this generation the writings spoken of by Ezekiel mentioned above.

In 1823 Joseph Smith, the “Mormon” prophet, was visited by this angel and told of some plates hidden in the Hill Cumorah, in the state of New York, and four years later he was permitted to take the plates and translate them. The result is the Book of Mormon.

(4) Establishment of God's Kingdom. After showing the rise and fall of the four great eastern kingdoms and the subsequent dividing of the land amongst numerous kings, Daniel (2:44) declares: “And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.”

On April 6th, 1830, the “Mormon” Church was established by Joseph Smith, and the kingdom of God set up, for the “Mormon” Church is the kingdom of God established in the latter days in ac­cordance with Daniel's prophecy.

(5) Signs of Christ's Second Coming. One of the predictions of Christ was that many false prophets should arise and deceive many, and because iniquity should abound many should wax cold.

Paul, writing to Timothy (II., 4:3-4), declared: “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”

In chapter 3, he says: “This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemous, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce­breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof. * * * Ever learning and never able to come to a knowledge of the truth.”

Had Paul lived in these latter days, could he better have described prevailing conditions? Are not men lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God? Are not children disobedient to their parents? Are we not where Isaiah foresaw we would be when he declared, “Children shall be your oppressors and women shall rule over you?”

As to the accusation of truce-breaking, is it not true? Of what avail was the Hague convention of 1890?

Again, look at some of the ministers of to-day, who spend three or four years in college before they are allowed to preach the gos­pel. Are they not “ever learning”? And yet, with it all, they never come to “a knowledge of the truth.”

Here then we find predictions faithfully being fulfilled in these our days.

Again, Christ said, "This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations, and then shall the end come.”

(6) Coming of the “Mormon" Elders. In fulfilment of the prophecy just quoted, the “Mormon" elders have gone forth to the nations of the world proclaiming the gospel of truth, the gospel of the kingdom, but—the people have turned their ears from the truth and are turned unto fables; the result of which is the olive branch of peace which the elders held out to them has been rejected and instead of that “universal brotherhood” and that “universal peace” which the gospel alone can bring, we have uni­versal hatred and universal war.

(7) Gathering to Zion. Jeremiah (3:14, 15). declares. "And I will take you, one of a city and two of a family, and will bring you to Zion, and 1 will give you pastors according to mine own heart."

We find this prophecy fulfilled this day when, obedient to the call of the "Mormon” elders, the saints gather to Zion (in America). One by one they are gathered in where they, indeed, find pastors after their own hearts. And wherefore should they gather? Even that they may work for their dead in the temples of the Lord, built for that purpose.

(8) Women to Help in the Lord's Work. In Joel 2:28, 29, we read. “And it shall come to pass, afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams and your young men shall see visions; and also upon the servants and upon the hand­maids in those days will I pour out my spirit."

The fulfilment of this prophecy is seen in the "daughters of Zion being called on missions, set aside as teachers, speakers, workers, etc., in the Church.”

(9) Coming of Elijah. In Malachi 4:5, 6, we read: “Behold, I send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord; and he shall turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.”

This prophecy was fulfilled when Elijah, the great former-day prophet, appeared to Joseph Smith in the Kirtland temple and revealed to him that the way in which the hearts of the children should be turned to their fathers, etc., was by baptism for the dead; hence the “Mormons” build their temples, that in them those who have died without hearing the gospel may be baptized for by their relatives, that all may be saved if they will, and progress through all the ages of eternity.

(10) Signs to Follow Believers. In days of old in the Church of Christ many mighty miracles were performed. Hear the words of Christ: “And these signs shall follow them that believe: In my name shall they cast out devils, they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover" (Mark 16:17, 18).

These words of Christ still hold good in His Church to-day, and many an honest soul rises and testifies that by the laying on of the hands of the “Mormon” elder they have been enabled to rise healed from a bed of sickness. In the temple of the Lord in Salt Lake City many miraculous cores are recorded, proving beyond doubt that the “Mormon” Church is Christ’s Church.

(11) Sojourn in the Wilderness. In Ezekiel 20:33-38, we find this:

“As I live, saith the Lord God, surely with a mighty hand, and with a streched out arm, and with fury poured out, will I rule over you, and I will bring you out from the people, and will gather you out of the countries wherein ye are scattered * * * And I will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and there will I plead with you face to face. Like as I pleaded with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so will I plead with yon * * * And I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the land of the covenant: and I will purge out from among you the rebels, and them that transgress against me * * * and they shall not enter into the land of Israel.”

The “land of Israel” here mentioned is Missouri, the centre stake of Zion. The Lord has brought His people—the “Mormons”—into the wilderness in the valleys of the mountains. They have reclaimed it and made it fruitful and a pleasant place to dwell in. But here the Lord is trying them, not with poverty and wander­ings as in days of old, but with rest and plenty, but He is, never­theless. proving them, as He did in days of old. Soon will sound the call to re-gather to Missouri, and, as in days of old, those found worthy will be chosen to enter the promised land.

(To be continued.)