• "The Rapture" - A future event in which Jesus will "snatch up" all Christians (living and dead) in the twinkling of an eye to meet Him in the clouds (He will not return all the way down to the earth at the Rapture). All dead Christians will be physically resurrected at that time, and then they and all living Christians will be transformed from mortality to immortality. We will then be taken up into heaven where we will be judged according to our deeds (as we will see later).
• "The Second Coming" - A future event in which Jesus will physically return to the earth. All of the raptured Christians will return to the earth with Jesus.
• "The Antichrist" - A future ruler who will be controlled by the devil and who will exalt himself as God. He will carry out the worst persecution that the world has ever seen.
• "The Tribulation" - A future seven-year period during which God will pour out His wrath on the earth. The Tribulation will begin when Israel signs a treaty with the Antichrist (not when the pre-trib Rapture happens), and it will end at the Second Coming. Some people believe that the Rapture will happen before the Tribulation begins (the "pre-trib" view), some people believe that the Rapture will happen during the Tribulation (the "mid-trib," "pre-wrath," "mid-wrath," etc., views), and some people believe that the Rapture will happen after the Tribulation ends (the "post-trib" view). In this series of articles we will see why many people believe that the weight of Scriptural evidence supports the pre-trib view of the Rapture.
• "The Great Tribulation" - The final three and a half years (1,260 days) of the seven-year Tribulation.
• "The Millennium" - Christ's future thousand-year reign of righteousness, peace, and prosperity on the earth after the Second Coming.
• "The Church" - Everyone who receives salvation through faith in Jesus Christ from the day of Pentecost until the Rapture is a member of the Church. The Church is called the "body" of Christ and also the "bride" of Christ. The Church has not "replaced" Israel, the Church is not the "new" Israel, the Church is not the "true" Israel, the Church is not the "spiritual" Israel, the Church is not "the Israel of God," and Gentile Christians are not "spiritual Jews." If you believe that the Church has "replaced" Israel in God's program, or if you are not sure, then I would highly recommend that you prayerfully read my article called Are Gentile Christians All "Spiritual Jews"? before you continue with this study of end-times prophecy. The reason why I say this is because if we have an inaccurate view concerning Israel and the Church then we will also form inaccurate views concerning end-times prophecy. Israel and the Church are two separate and distinct entities, and God has separate programs for them (as we'll see in this article).

Leviticus 25:1: "The LORD said to Moses on Mount Sinai,"
Leviticus 25:2: ""Speak to the Israelites and say to them: 'When you enter the land I am going to give you, the land itself must observe a sabbath to the LORD."
Leviticus 25:3: "For six years sow your fields, and for six years prune your vineyards and gather their crops."
Leviticus 25:4: "But in the seventh year the land is to have a sabbath of rest, a sabbath to the LORD. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards."
Leviticus 25:5: "Do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land is to have a year of rest."
Leviticus 25:6: "Whatever the land yields during the sabbath year will be food for you--for yourself, your manservant and maidservant, and the hired worker and temporary resident who live among you,"
Leviticus 25:7: "as well as for your livestock and the wild animals in your land. Whatever the land produces may be eaten."
Leviticus 25:8: "Count off seven sabbaths of years--seven times seven years--so that the seven sabbaths of years amount to a period of forty-nine years."

Daniel 9:24: ""Seventy 'sevens' are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy."
Daniel 9:25: ""Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven 'sevens,' and sixty-two 'sevens.' It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble."
Daniel 9:26: "After the sixty-two 'sevens,' the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed."
Daniel 9:27: "He will confirm a covenant with many for one 'seven.' In the middle of the 'seven' he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him.""

"This is what the LORD says: "When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile."" (Jeremiah 29:10-14)

"Then the land will enjoy its sabbath years all the time that it lies desolate and you are in the country of your enemies; then the land will rest and enjoy its sabbaths. All the time that it lies desolate, the land will have the rest it did not have during the sabbaths you lived in it." (Leviticus 26:34-35)

"He brought up against them the king of the Babylonians, who killed their young men with the sword in the sanctuary, and spared neither young man nor young woman, old man or aged. God handed all of them over to Nebuchadnezzar. He carried to Babylon all the articles from the temple of God, both large and small, and the treasures of the Lord's temple and the treasures of the king and his officials. They set fire to God's temple and broke down the wall of Jerusalem; they burned all the palaces and destroyed everything of value there. He carried into exile to Babylon the remnant, who escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and his sons until the kingdom of Persia came to power. The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, until the seventy years were completed in fulfillment of the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah." (2 Chronicles 36:17-21)

"In the first year of Darius son of Xerxes (a Mede by descent), who was made ruler over the Babylonian kingdom--in the first year of his reign, I, Daniel, understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the LORD given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last seventy years. So I turned to the Lord God and pleaded with him in prayer and petition, in fasting, and in sackcloth and ashes." (Daniel 9:1-3)

Daniel 9:20: "While I was speaking and praying, confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel and making my request to the LORD my God for his holy hill--"
Daniel 9:21: "while I was still in prayer, Gabriel, the man I had seen in the earlier vision, came to me in swift flight about the time of the evening sacrifice."
Daniel 9:22: "He instructed me and said to me, "Daniel, I have now come to give you insight and understanding."
Daniel 9:23: "As soon as you began to pray, an answer was given, which I have come to tell you, for you are highly esteemed. Therefore, consider the message and understand the vision:"
Daniel 9:24: ""Seventy 'sevens' are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy."
Daniel 9:25: ""Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven 'sevens,' and sixty-two 'sevens.' It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble."
Daniel 9:26: "After the sixty-two 'sevens,' the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed."
Daniel 9:27: "He will confirm a covenant with many for one 'seven.' In the middle of the 'seven' he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him.""

• Daniel 9:24: "Seventy 'sevens' are decreed for your people and your holy city to finish transgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the most holy."
  
  This verse says that God had decreed a period of "70 sevens" (490 years) concerning Daniel's people (the Jews) and the holy city (Jerusalem). The purpose of these 70 "sevens" or 70 "weeks" was to finish transgression, put an end to sin, atone for wickedness, bring in everlasting righteousness, seal up vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most holy (Daniel 9:24, above). This indicates that when the 70 "weeks" (490 years) are completed, then the sins of Israel will finally and for all time be put to an end, and everlasting righteousness will be brought in. Notice that this 70 Weeks prophecy is specifically dealing with Israel's disobedience to God, and it specifically relates to Jerusalem and the Jews.
• Daniel 9:25: "Know and understand this: From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Anointed One, the ruler, comes, there will be seven 'sevens,' and sixty-two 'sevens.' It will be rebuilt with streets and a trench, but in times of trouble."
  
  This tells us that the 70 "weeks" will begin when a decree is issued to restore and rebuild Jerusalem. According to The Bible Knowledge Commentary (Walvoord and Zuck, Dallas Theological Seminary, p.1362), there were four decrees issued in the Old Testament in reference to the Jews. The first of these decrees was issued by Cyrus in 538 B.C., and it is recorded in 2 Chronicles 36:23 and Ezra 1:2. However, that decree was only for rebuilding the temple, not for restoring and rebuilding the city of Jerusalem. Darius I also decreed a rebuilding of the temple in 520 B.C., but this was simply a confirmation of Cyrus' decree (see Ezra 6:6-13). The third decree was issued by Artaxerxes Longimanus in 458 B.C. (see Ezra 7:11-26), but it related specifically to finances for animal sacrifices at the temple. None of these decrees said anything about rebuilding the actual city of Jerusalem, which is what the angel Gabriel had prophesied. The decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem (in Daniel's prophecy) was issued by Artaxerxes Longimanus in 445 (or 444) B.C. (see Nehemiah 2:1-8).
  
  Therefore, the starting date for the 70 "weeks" is accepted by many scholars as being 445 (or 444) B.C., when the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem was issued in fulfillment of Daniel 9:25 (above). The angel Gabriel had said that from the issuing of this decree until the Anointed One comes (i.e. the Messiah - see Luke 4:18, Acts 4:27, 10:38), there will be 7 "weeks" plus 62 "weeks" (483 years). If we start with 445 (or 444) B.C. and we add 483 years, taking into account the Jewish lunar calendar (as we saw in Part One), this brings us right up to the Triumphal Entry where Jesus officially entered Jerusalem as the Messiah, riding on a donkey. For a detailed description of the math involved, see The Bible Knowledge Commentary (Walvoord and Zuck, p.1363), or The Footsteps of the Messiah (Dr. Arnold Fruchtenbaum, p.131), or Major Bible Prophecies (John Walvoord, chapter 16), or other books on Bible prophecy.
  
  When Jesus entered Jerusalem riding on a donkey, Bible scholars refer to this as "the Triumphal Entry" because Jesus was officially presenting Himself to Israel as the Messiah by fulfilling a prophecy of the Messiah in Zechariah 9:9:

  "The next day the great crowd that had come for the Feast heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, "Hosanna!" "Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!" "Blessed is the King of Israel!" Jesus found a young donkey and sat upon it, as it is written, "Do not be afraid, O Daughter of Zion; see, your king is coming, seated on a donkey's colt." [Zechariah 9:9]. At first his disciples did not understand all this. Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize that these things had been written about him and that they had done these things to him." (John 12:12-16)

  These actions by the Jews and these shouts of greeting had been prophesied concerning the long-awaited Messiah (see for example Zechariah 9:9 and Psalm 118:22-27), which tells us that the crowd was greeting Jesus as the Messiah. So at the end of the 69th "week," Jesus was officially entering Jerusalem as "the Anointed One," right on schedule (in the Greek, the word "Christ" means "Anointed," according to Strong's Greek Dictionary). The angel Gabriel's prophecy to Daniel was literally and accurately fulfilled at that moment, and the 69 "weeks" of Daniel 9:25 (above) had come to an end. This means that there was one more "week" (7 more years) left to go until Israel's sins would be completely removed for all time.
• Daniel 9:26: "After the sixty-two 'sevens,' the Anointed One will be cut off and will have nothing. The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. The end will come like a flood: War will continue until the end, and desolations have been decreed."
  
  In this verse, Gabriel said that the Anointed One will be "cut off" after the 69th "week." The Hebrew word for "cut off" is sometimes used to describe violent deaths (see for example Genesis 9:11, 1 Samuel 17:51, Obadiah 1:9, and Nahum 3:15), and in fact Jesus was crucified just a few days after He presented Himself to Israel as the Messiah (see chapters 11 through 15 of Mark's Gospel). This is further evidence that the 69th "week" ended at the Triumphal Entry.
  
  Gabriel also said in Daniel 9:26 (above) that "The people of the ruler who will come will destroy the city and the sanctuary." This indicates that a future ruler will come (referring to the Antichrist, as we saw in Part One), and it tells us that the city of Jerusalem and the Jewish temple will be destroyed by "the people" from whom the future Antichrist will come. In 70 A.D., the Romans attacked the city of Jerusalem (see the Historical Highlights at Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs ) and destroyed the Jewish temple, which literally and accurately fulfilled the angel Gabriel's prophecy in Daniel 9:26 (above).
• Daniel 9:27: "He will confirm a covenant with many for one 'seven.' In the middle of the 'seven' he will put an end to sacrifice and offering. And on a wing of the temple he will set up an abomination that causes desolation, until the end that is decreed is poured out on him."
  
  This verse says, "he will confirm a covenant with many," and people sometimes assume that the "he" is Jesus, and that the "covenant" is the New Covenant. However, there are some problems with that view. For one thing, Daniel 9:27 (above) says that this will be a seven-year covenant, yet the New Covenant in Jesus' blood was not limited to seven years. Another problem is that Daniel 9:27 (above) says that "he" will set up "an abomination that causes desolation" in the Jewish temple (desecrating the temple) until the end that is decreed is poured out on him. This cannot be describing Jesus. A further problem with that view is that the word "he" in Daniel 9:27 (above) is referring back to a person who has previously been identified, and the most recent person to be identified is "the ruler who will come" (Daniel 9:26, above). Notice that this "ruler" is described in another one of Daniel's prophecies which also mentions that "abomination":

  "His armed forces will rise up to desecrate the temple fortress and will abolish the daily sacrifice. Then they will set up the abomination that causes desolation. With flattery he will corrupt those who have violated the covenant, but the people who know their God will firmly resist him. . . . The king will do as he pleases. He will exalt and magnify himself above every god and will say unheard-of things against the God of gods. He will be successful until the time of wrath is completed, for what has been determined must take place. He will show no regard for the gods of his fathers or for the one desired by women, nor will he regard any god, but will exalt himself above them all." (Daniel 11:31-37)

  This passage tells us that the "abomination" (possibly an image or an idol of "the ruler who will come" as a god) will be placed in the Jewish temple by a "ruler" or a "king" who is able to "do as he pleases" during "the time of wrath," and who will "exalt and magnify himself above every god." As we saw in Part One, the name which we often use for this future ruler is "the Antichrist."
  
  So Daniel 9:27 (above) indicates that the Antichrist will make a "covenant" (what we might call a peace treaty) with some people for seven years, and then immediately the angel Gabriel made a point of telling us that in the middle of that treaty period the Antichrist will desecrate the Jewish temple. This implies that the treaty is with Israel, and that the Antichrist will break the treaty after three and a half years. We saw that the angel Gabriel had indicated that the entire 70 Weeks prophecy was specifically for the nation of Israel (Daniel 9:24, above), which is further evidence that it is Israel who will enter into a seven-year treaty with the Antichrist.

Matthew 24:14: "And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come."
Matthew 24:15: ""So when you see standing in the holy place 'the abomination that causes desolation,' spoken of through the prophet Daniel--let the reader understand--"
Matthew 24:16: "then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains." . . .
Matthew 24:21: "For then there will be great distress, unequaled from the beginning of the world until now--and never to be equaled again."
Matthew 24:22: "If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened." . . .
Matthew 24:26: ""So if anyone tells you, 'There he is, out in the desert,' do not go out; or, 'Here he is, in the inner rooms,' do not believe it."
Matthew 24:27: "For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man." . . .
Matthew 24:30: ""At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory."

"For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders." (Isaiah 9:6)

"Rejoice greatly, O Daughter of Zion! Shout, Daughter of Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and having salvation, gentle and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will take away the chariots from Ephraim and the war-horses from Jerusalem, and the battle bow will be broken. He will proclaim peace to the nations. His rule will extend from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth." (Zechariah 9:9-10)

1. The 70 "weeks" for Israel began in 445 (or 444) B.C.
2. 483 years later, the 69th "week" ended at the Triumphal Entry, and the 70 Weeks program for Israel was put on hold (because there is a gap of time between the 69th and 70th "weeks").
3. A few days after the Triumphal Entry, Jesus was crucified at Passover time (John 19:14).
4. Pentecost (literally, "50th" in the Greek) is always 50 days from the day after the Passover lamb is slaughtered (Leviticus 23:5-16).
5. The Church was created on the day of Pentecost (as we saw in Part One), which was 50 days after the cross (because Pentecost is always 50 days after Passover, and Jesus was crucified at Passover).
6. Approximately 2,000 years later, the Church is still active on the earth, and the 70 Weeks program for Israel is still on hold (because the 70th "week" is still in the future).

• As we have seen, the 70 Weeks program was specifically for the nation of Israel, to put an end to their sins. It never involved anyone else.
• For the entire time that the 70 Weeks program was active, God deliberately kept the Church off of the earth.
• God has been dealing with Israel in different ways throughout history. For example, He is currently regathering Jews back to the nation of Israel, which was re-established in 1948. Also, Jews who receive salvation through faith in Jesus before the Rapture are automatically members of the Church, along with saved Gentiles. So God is working out His plans for the Jews in various ways, but His 70 Weeks program for Israel was put on hold at the time of the Triumphal Entry. When this specific program for Israel was put on hold, almost immediately (in less than two months) God began the "Church" program.