Revelation 11:1 ¶ And there was
given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure
the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein. 2 But the court which is without the temple
leave out, and measure it not; for it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy
city shall they tread under foot forty and two months.
There is a literal temple here, as
the Gentiles will tread its outer court for 3 and a ½ years, which is the time
of the Great Tribulation as it was the time of the great drought of Elijah’s
time, as that number of months is the number of chapters in the book of Job, a
book about God’s person suffering. John is writing, according to scholars, at
least two or more decades after the temple of Christ’s time, the second temple,
was destroyed.
Ezekiel writes about a third
temple as his description does not seem to fit either Solomon’s temple,
destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, or Herod’s version, destroyed by the Romans in
AD70, decades prior to this writing. There was a group of devout Jews who called
themselves the Temple Mount Faithful, whose website was
templemountfaithful.org. They wanted to set the cornerstone to rebuild the
temple. When their leaders die there will be others, you can rest assured. So,
it is not an unknown impulse in modern Judaism to rebuild the temple.
The temple is being measured
except for Solomon’s Porch, the outermost court, which is the only place that
Gentiles, even Roman citizens in Herod’s day, were allowed to come providing
their behavior was good. It is mentioned in John 10:23; Acts 3:11; 5:12. Notice
that the worshippers in the temple are also being measured. Jerusalem, along
with the outer court, are tread upon for this period of time.
Luke 21:24 And they shall fall
by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive into all nations: and
Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the
Gentiles be fulfilled.
Daniel 12:7 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 sware by him that liveth for 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.
In Daniel there are interesting
additional times mentioned of 1290 days and 1335 days and 2300 days which are
thought by some to be a reference to years. In fact, the founder of the
Millerites who eventually became the Seventh Day Adventists used these as years
to get to an end times date in the 1840’s.[1]
These days as years have also been used
to add up to 1776, as the founding of America, to justify making the United
States to be the stone that was cut without hands that became a great mountain
and covered the whole earth in Daniel 2:35, 45.[2]
There is a great danger in trying to set the exact date as the calendars don’t
match up, having changed since then, and prophecy is twisted to fit the agenda
of the speaker on it so often. Remember what Jesus said to His disciples;
Acts 1:6 ¶ When they therefore
were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time
restore again the kingdom to Israel? 7
And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the
seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.
To gleefully say, “Aha! Then,
since God didn’t say day or hour I can know that!” is the beginning
of a journey down a long and confusing road as many preachers did when they
announced that it would all happen in the year 2000.
Here, Paul mentions this time.
Romans 11:25 For I would not,
brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in
your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the
fulness of the Gentiles be come in.
[1]
Ruth Alden Doan, The Miller Heresy,
Millennialism, and American Culture (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University
Press, 1987), 33
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