Night is Almost Gone

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Short Summary
The discourse explores the prophetic significance of Paul’s writings, particularly Romans 13:12, suggesting that Paul’s mention of the night ending and day approaching symbolically points to the end of the Gospel age and the nearness of Christ’s kingdom. It connects Paul’s three missionary journeys and the messages to the seven churches in Revelation to historical and prophetic church phases, emphasizing that current times align with the final period of distress before the establishment of God’s kingdom. The speaker also draws parallels with the experiences of Elijah, interpreting biblical timelines as indicative of ongoing prophetic fulfillment leading to the imminent coming of the kingdom.

Long Summary
Detailed Summary of the Discourse on Romans 13:12 and Related Prophetic Themes

Introduction and Key Text (Romans 13:12):
– The discourse begins with a focus on Romans 13:12: *“The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light.”*
– The speaker notes the intriguing nature of this verse, given that Paul wrote it early in the Gospel age, a time when “night” (symbolizing spiritual darkness or the end times) was not yet near from a historical perspective.
– Paul’s statement is interpreted relative to the spiritual maturity and experiences of the brethren he addressed, indicated by Romans 13:11: *“It is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.”*
– Paul wrote Romans approximately 20 years into his ministry, likely at the end of his third missionary journey in Corinth, which prophetically represents stages in the church’s history.

Understanding Key Scriptural Terms and Timing (1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, 2 Corinthians 4:4, Colossians 2:13):
– The resurrection and the catching up of the saints are discussed, emphasizing that the Greek word translated “with” (Greek: *sun*, meaning “together in the same experience”) does not imply simultaneous timing but a shared experience, sometimes separated by centuries.
– Jesus’s resurrection and the future resurrection of believers are linked in this concept of “with,” highlighting spiritual unity rather than chronological coincidence.

The Seven Churches of Revelation as a Prophetic Outline:
– The seven churches of Asia Minor (modern Turkey) presented in Revelation chapters 2 and 3 are geographically and prophetically sequential, representing progressive stages of the Gospel age.
– Each church’s message has application throughout the age but also corresponds to specific historical periods or spiritual conditions:
– Thyatira (4th church) — Associated with Jezebel and severe persecution under the Roman Catholic Church, where believers were urged to “hold fast until I come” (Revelation 2:24).
– Sardis (5th church) — Called to reform and repent or face judgment like a thief (Revelation 3:3).
– Philadelphia (6th church) — Christ’s coming is imminent (Revelation 3:11).
– Laodicea (7th church) — Christ is at the door, knocking (Revelation 3:20), indicating the nearness of the end of the age.

Paul’s Limited Knowledge of Revelation:
– Paul, though a gifted prophet, never had access to the Book of Revelation, which was revealed later.
– Daniel 12 indicates that certain prophecies would only be understood “in the time of the end,” with knowledge increasing then.

Overview of the Book of Revelation:
– Divided into three parts:
1. Gospel Age (Chapters 1-13)
2. Harvest or End of Gospel Age (up to Chapter 19)
3. Kingdom (Chapters 20-22)
– The “Sevens” (seven churches, seals, trumpets) cover much of the Gospel age and are unevenly detailed, with the first four Church periods described briefly, representing the era before the Reformation.
– The first four seals involve the four horses (white, red, black, pale green) symbolizing distinct phases of the church’s history.

Paul’s Three Missionary Tours as Prophetic Symbols:
– The Book of Acts records Paul’s three missionary journeys, which correspond prophetically to church history phases:
– First tour: Visited four places, symbolizing the first four church periods.
– Second tour: After the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15), represents the Reformation, as Paul revisited churches to explain new doctrine regarding Gentiles.
– Third tour: Confirming and strengthening churches, possibly representing the harvest period and the spread of faith into western lands (New World).

Early Christian Martyrs as Church History Symbols:
– Stephen: First Christian martyr, stoned by Jews, symbolizing the first phase of Jewish persecution.
– James: Executed by Herod, representing Roman persecution (second phase).
– Peter: Imprisoned but released, symbolizing a period when Christianity was more tolerated (third phase).

Time Periods and Chronology in Prophecy:
– Brother Frank Shalhou’s *Keys of Revelation* suggests the “space” given to Jezebel (Revelation 2:21) corresponds to a prophetic period of 360 years, linking to the Thyatira church period.
– Elijah’s experiences in 1 Kings 17–22 are linked prophetically to three periods:
1. Being fed by ravens at Cherith (Pergamos period).
2. Living with the widow at Zarephath for about a year (Thyatira period).
3. Reviving the widow’s son (Reformation period symbolizing the church’s revival).
– The drought in Elijah’s time (3.5 years) corresponds with Daniel’s and Revelation’s symbolic periods (1260 days/years), stretching from 539 to 1799.

Elijah’s Wilderness Experience and Later Church History:
– Jezebel orders Elijah’s death; he flees and is fed by an angel twice, representing two feedings or revivals of the church: the first in 1290 years and the second from 1874 onward.
– Elijah’s 40 days journey to Mount Horeb symbolizes 40 years ending in 1914, marking the start of world wars (winds), political upheaval (earthquake), and pending final trials (fire).
– The “still small voice” Elijah hears represents the future blessings of the Kingdom.

Prophetic Application to Today’s Time:
– Paul’s words in Romans 13:12 are seen as especially relevant now, indicating that the night (darkness of the Gospel age) is almost over and the day (Kingdom) is near.
– The speaker estimates the Kingdom to be between 13 to 23 years away from the time of speaking, emphasizing the nearness of Christ’s return and the end of this age.
– Current events and prophetic signs suggest the final period of distress (harvest) is unfolding, leading to the Kingdom’s establishment.

Summary of Key Bible Verses Referenced:
– Romans 13:12: *“The night is far spent, the day is at hand…”*
– Romans 13:11: *“It is high time to awake out of sleep…”*
– 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17: Resurrection and rapture described.
– 2 Corinthians 4:4: Raised *with* Christ in the same experience.
– Colossians 2:13: Quickened *together* with Christ.
– Revelation 2–3: Messages to the seven churches.
– Revelation 2:21: Jezebel’s space to repent.
– Revelation 3:3: Call to repentance at Sardis.
– Revelation 3:11: Christ’s coming at Philadelphia.
– Revelation 3:20: Christ at the door at Laodicea.
– 1 Kings 17–22: Elijah’s experiences.
– Luke 4:25 and James 5:17: Duration of Elijah’s drought (3.5 years).
– Daniel 12:4: Knowledge increased in the time of the end.

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Overall, the discourse presents a detailed prophetic understanding linking Paul’s writings, the Book of Revelation’s seven churches, Elijah’s experiences, and historical church periods. It emphasizes that the current generation lives at the prophetic “end of the night,” awaiting the imminent dawn of Christ’s Kingdom.

Transcript

A pleasure to be with you. Romans 13:12 is a very engaging text. The night is far spent, the day is at hand. Therefore, let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Now, it’s interesting to me that Paul would say this when he was so early in the Gospel age.

The night was not really near at hand from our perspective at that time. What does he mean and why did he say that? Perhaps he meant that relative to the time that the brethren he was writing to had been in the truth. In verse 11, he says, it’s high time to wake out of sleep, for now our salvation is nearer than when we believed. Well, of course, that’s the case.

Paul was about 20 years into his ministry by the time he wrote the Book of Romans. Now, I’ve looked on the Internet to find out where Paul wrote this, and I’ve looked at the end of my King James version of it, which gives a clue as well, and I believe it’s probably correct to say that he wrote Romans at the end of his third missionary tour when he was in Corinth. Now, those three missionary tours have some prophetic meaning for us. We’re going to look at that prophetic meaning as well today.

But meanwhile, if you look in first Thessalonians 4, 16, that’s a scripture that you probably just remember. That’s when he’s talking about the resurrection of the saints. At the end of the age, the Lord shall descend from heaven with a shout and the voice of an archangel, and the dead in Christ will rise first afterward, and by the way, that’s a good word to remember in the King James. It says then, but it doesn’t mean at that time, it’s afterward.

We who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them. Okay, that’s always been confusing to me, but that’s the end of the age. Are we caught up together with them if we’re caught up afterward? Well, that word with is in the Greek word soon, and it doesn’t mean with at the same time. This is a vital point to recognize.

It means in the same experience, not at the same time. Now, as a matter of fact, there are other places where this is found where it’s very evident we’re not going to read these Scriptures in depth because of time. But 2 Corinthians 4, 4, he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise us up also, not by him, King James, but with him. That is, as Jesus was raised. We’re going to be raised in the same experience.

Not at the same time. There’s 2000 years between them, of course, and again in Colossians 2:13, you Hath he quickened together with him. Well, now, when Paul is writing that people that were quickened couldn’t have been quickened before Pentecost, Jesus was raised 40, 50 days before that. So that word with again soon means the same experience, but not at the same time.

So the point here is that Paul was speaking to the brethren at that time, that they had lived quite a while and had a lot of experiences, and therefore they were closer. But I do wonder spiritually, metaphorically, prophetically, if the fact that he wrote this at the end of his third missionary tour might be prophetically symbolic of the end of the age in which we’re living today.

Now, there’s a picture of the seven churches that you see on the screen, and you see that the seven churches are from Asia Minor. We wouldn’t call it that today. We would call it Turkey, but it’s Asia Minor, and if you look at the names of those seven churches, you’ll see that they are geographically in sequence, and they are in the sequence as you would go if you were traveling from one to the other when they’re listed in Revelation, chapter 2, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, and all the way to Laodicea.

So those seven churches, of course, are progressive through the Gospel age. Now, not everyone would hold that point of view. Perhaps, I think all the brethren do. But when you look at other message to the seven churches, there’s messages and information that are applicable to every person through the age. So each message has benefit and value to even us at the end of the age.

However, nevertheless, there is a progression of events prophetically in these seven churches. For example, it says in Thyatira, which is a fourth church, I’m going to put none other burden upon you but what you have already, hold fast until I come. Now, Thyatira is where you’re going to find the name Jezebel, and we’re going to come across her name a little bit later in our study, and this was the deepest part of the Gospel age church, when the most people lost their lives for their faith, and the most people were put down and persecuted for their faith by the Roman Catholic Church, and so Jesus says, I won’t put any other burden on you but what you’ve got.

Hold fast till I come. Then to Sardis in chapter three, verse three, he says, now you I expect more. You’ve got to reform, you’ve got to repent. Or else I’m coming like a thief. Philadelphia, Revelation 3, verse 11.

Behold, I’m coming quickly. We’re now at the six days of the Church, when the presence of Christ is approaching, and finally, in Laodicea, chapter two, verse 20. I’m not coming. I’m at the door and I’m knocking.

And if you compare that to Luke 12, 36 and 37, that means the end of the age, he is no longer on the way. He’s knocking at the door, and if we hear that knock of prophecy and we open to him, he’s going to feed us a supper of truth, such as the Church for seven periods of the Gospel age has never had before, and that’s why we have the divine plan so well. Now, Paul wrote these verses, of course, in Romans, but even Paul, as sharp as he was, and prophetically gifted as he was, and he was, we learn things just by reading him.

He never even one time read the book of Revelation. Why not? Well, you know the answer. It wasn’t there. So there are things that are known to us that even Paul didn’t have the privilege of understanding.

And of course, you remember Daniel in the 12th chapter, says the angel, said Daniel, you won’t understand these. Put them aside until the time of the end, because then knowledge of these things will be increased.

Okay, now this is an outline of Revelation. Be meaningful to our prophetic context. Here you’ll see that Revelation has three. This is jumping on me, on the computer. Is that all right?

Just the way it is. Okay. I don’t know if it’s up there or not. Okay, good, good. It’s not jumping on you.

Oh, it is. Okay. Okay. Maybe I’m doing something. Be careful.

So we have three parts to the book of Revelation, we have the Gospel age. In the first 13 chapters, we have the harvest or ending of the Gospel age, and that takes you through the 19th chapter. Now, I’m only giving the introductory chapter to each one of these, so that’s chapter 19, and then we have the kingdom, chapters 20 through 22.

Now, whenever I start in Revelation to a new crowd of people, I always start with this because it’s a nice, pleasant overview. But you see the one we have in red number two in the Gospel age, those are the sevens. Now, that almost takes half of the entire book of Revelation. So you can’t divide it into 12 parts and say these are equal spaced parts. So the sevens are through the gospel agent, it takes up half of the book.

And of course, the harvest is really the same as Period seven of the Church in that respect. It even takes more. But you see, at the bottom, we have the seals. Oh, excuse me. Those sevens that we have in point number two are actually the seven churches, the seven seals and the seven trumpets.

Now, those seven seals start with four horses. Now, you know what those horses are. There was a white horse and there was a red horse. There was a black horse and there was a pale green horse, and after that, you have no more horses.

You go on to something else. My point here is very simple, that the first four parts of the Gospel age are unique and distinct and different. Now, our opinion is that those four take you through the Gospel age up until the Reformation. The Reformation takes you in the next two periods of the Church, and finally, at the end, you get into the harvest.

Now, you look at the seals and you’ll find that the first expression about the seals takes two verses for the white, the red, the black, and the pale green horse, and after that. Now I’m not touching the thing. So this is happening without my attention. I don’t know why.

Okay, so after that, 27 verses take you through seals, 5, 6, and then 7. Now you go on to the Trumpets of Revelation, and you find that the first verse takes you through the first trumpet, and the next three trumpets take two verses apiece, and after that you have 51 verses for the remaining. So my point here is very simple, that the first four periods of the Church are unique and they’re briefly expressed, but. But they have reference to one period of time, and that is before the Reformation.

Now, when Paul was taking his tour of his three missionary tours. If you look at the Book of Acts that describes these three missionary tours, the Book of Acts itself seems to talk about things that were literally true, but also prophetically meaningful. Now, you know that the first Christian martyr ever was Stephen, and he was stoned because that’s what the Jews do to you when they. The Jewish people. That was the traditional way of execution by stoning.

Now, Paul was involved there. He was with it. Paul even says that he was agreeable to it. He never threw a stone, though. But Paul was there.

But it was done by the Jewish opposition, and I think that that means that Stephen represents the first oppression of Christians. That was in the first phase of the Church, primarily by Jews, and then James was the next person sacrificed for his faith, and that came from Herod, and it came with the sword, and it came with the Roman power.

And in the second phase of the Church, the Roman Empire, pagan Roman Empire was the biggest persecutor of the Church. Now, in Revelation 2:10, it even says this great tribulation for 10 days, and if you look on the Internet, it’ll even talk about the great tribulation and the great persecution of the church from 303 to 313. So I think that second person, James does represent the second phase of the Church, and then finally Peter himself was taken prisoner, ready to be killed.

But he was let loose. Just as in the third period of the church pergamos things, Christianity was more accepted and they were let loose. So I think that when you go from there forward, you have after the first 12 chapters, all of the experiences of Paul and you have three missionary tours. On his first missionary tour, he visited four places. Those four places, I believe, represent the first four phases of the church.

The second missionary tour came after Acts 15, Acts 15. Paul had a council at Jerusalem to determine what to do with the Gentiles in the church, and they came to a conclusive agreement. Paul went then to all the churches he had went to earlier and, and he explained the thinking of the, of this gathering. Well, my suggestion is prophetically that would represent the Reformation.

And then taking that Reformation information to all of the churches that had previously been established in that second missionary tour, Paul then got to the west coast and he couldn’t go any farther. There was water there and an angel appeared to him in prayer, in, in dream rather, and said, paul, come across the waters and serve us, and that’s where Paul went westward and the truth of Christianity was brought into the western lands. Well, just a suggestion, that’s the sixth period of the church, we would suggest, and that’s where the ministry went across the Pacific into the New World.

And really that’s where the harvest movement would start at in the New World. Subsequently, on his third missionary tour, Paul went again to all of the various churches with confirmation, and I think that that’s a picture of the Reformation. Therefore, when Paul is saying In Romans, the 13th chapter, the night is far spent in the days at hand, a suggestion that perhaps what Paul is meaning, he doesn’t mean it prophetically, but God arranged it prophetically, is that we are now at the end of the Gospel age when things prophetically are ready to change. Now here’s a period, a listing of all of the seven churches you see in the middle in the list of the periods of the church.

In the third column in red we have 360. Now we’re going to get to that point a little bit later. But I would just say this. If you read the book by Brother Frank Shalhou. That’s the keys of revelation.

On page 53, he suggests that the message to the church number four Thyatira, in which he says, in Revelation 2:21, I gave her Jezebel space to repent of her fornication, and she repented. Not that that word space, Chronos, can refer to a prophetic time of 360 years. I think that’s correct, and that’s why we have 360 for that period of time, and I mention that here because we’re going to see that again when we go a little further into the period of Elijah.

Now, in Elijah and Elijah’s experiences, you have a network of experiences that take us from the Dark Ages forward to the end of the age where we are today, where indeed the night is long spent and the day is at hand. Now, in First Kings, chapter 17 through chapter 22, that’s where you find a lengthy account of the experiences of Elijah, and in this verse, Elijah, the Tishbite of the inhabitants of Gilead said to Ahab, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word. Now, we don’t know how long a period that drought was by reading the narrative of First Kings 17 all the way through 22, it’s never told us. However, you will find two scriptures there in Red Luke 4.

25 and James 5:17, where we do have that period expressly marked three years and six months, and prophetically, we link that up to the prophecies in Daniel and five times in Revelation, and it’s a period of 12, 60 years that. Well, we’ll get to that in a moment. But that period of drought turns out to be divided into three periods of time. Now, we’ve been studying First Kings recently in our local Ecclesia, and there are things about it that I didn’t know until recently.

But there are three periods of time in Elijah’s experiences. First Kings 17. One is where this whole account starts, but it says that he was in an area called Tishbe, and that’s on the east side of the River Jordan. He was there for a time, and that’s where he needed the raven to give him food and drink. Used water from the brook Kidron, but the.

From the brook Cherith. Excuse me. But the raven brought him bread and meat, and that raven probably represents that through the unclean nature of the Catholic Church, there was still spiritual nourishment available in some direction. So that’s before things got really bad, and then the brook, Cherith dried up and he had to go to Zarephath.

And at Zarephath, that’s where a widow took in into control. He wasn’t in Israel, he was in Zidon, where this widow was, and then they were there for about the space of a year. Now, I’d like to read this scripture from First Kings 17, and this is verse 15. This is something I hadn’t realized until recently.

She went and did according to the sayings of Elijah, and she and he and her house did eat many days. But if you look in the margin, it says or a full year. Now, I looked and did a lot of research on that, and it turns out that word in the Hebrew is used for a full year various times in the Old Testament. So I never realized that he was with that widow in the second step of their arrangement for one year. Would that connect with Revelation 2 that we read earlier, that I gave her space?

That is one prophetic Chronos or time? I think probably so, and that’s why we think that perhaps that fourth period of the church is 360. That means the experiences of Elijah encompass at least three periods of the church, because he was at Cherith being fed by the ravens for what I would say is the pergamos period of the church. He was then with this widow for one year, which I would call the thyatira period of the church.

And then after that, finally there came a time when something crucial came up that he had to deal with. Let’s look at that in First Kings 17, verse number. Well, the narrative is about verses 18 down through the end of the chapter. Our time is brief, so we’re not going to read it. We’ll just explain what happened.

The son of this widow died, and he had to go and revive the son. Now, if you look in the message to the third period, fifth period of the church, in Revelation 3, verse 1, it says, I know that you, I know thy works, that thou hast a name, that thou livest and art dead, and in the Reformation, the church sprung back to life again, and I believe Elijah’s healing of this young boy probably represents that Reformation movement to spring the church back to life. Therefore, this is the third period of the church in the Elijah experience.

Okay, got to go on quicker here.

So there’s the 1260 days, 1260 years that the famine and the dearth took place prophetically from 539 to 1799, and those are the three periods of time when he was in Cherith, then he was in Zarephath, and then when he revived the child and then waited for the overthrow of the priest of baal. Now, those are the three prophetic periods of time that Daniel talks about that extends this 1260 years to 1799 and then to 1829, 1290, and then 1335 take you to 1874. So in those three periods of time, you actually have those mentioned also in First Kings. In First Kings, the 18th chapter, things are going well.

And then in the 19th chapter, Jezebel hears about the experiences of Elijah, and she’s not going to say, bring him to me and let’s talk. She says, go out and kill him and be done with him. So Elijah flees into the wilderness. He’s there, tired, desperate, lonely, and an angel wakes him out of his sleep and feeds him.

I think that’s the 12, 90 years where the first feeding of the church and then he falls asleep again. The angel wakes him up a second time and feeds him a second time. I think that’s the second feeding of the church in 1874 forward. Then it says he goes in the strength of that for 40 days. 40 days, 40 years, that would be to 1914.

And finally Elijah comes to Mount Horeb and he sees the wind, the earthquake and the fire. Now we’ve gone 40 days from 1874 to 1914. The winds in the Old Testament generally refer prophetically to. To the winds of war. When Daniel saw four world empires, he saw the winds blowing upon the sea.

There were great troubles that caused the empires of the world to rise. So I think this is World War I and World War II, and then there’s a great earthquake. I think that earthquake is the dissolution of the old governments of Europe that had risen during the kingly powers. After the two world wars.

Then all of these various empires began to dissolve, and you have independence in many countries around the world. I have a whole list of them. We don’t have time to read them, so we’ll go to the next part, and that is the fire.

And the fire, I think, is something still pending. The last distresses of this harvest. Now I see Sister Carmela Luke with us today. It’s wonderful to have her, and that reminds me of her husband, of course, Brother Rayluke.

And years ago, probably 30 years ago, he gave a talk on Acts, the 27th chapter, talking about the last experiences of trouble of this age. It was 14 days of storm. We have suggested on occasion, it’s been a few years since we’ve talked about it, that that might be 14 years of final distress. We’ll see. We don’t know for sure.

That’s very interpretive. But we’re coming up to that last phase of experience, and then finally, Elijah hears a still, small voice which will be the blessings of life in the kingdom. So the point of all this is that when Paul wrote this in Romans 13:12, the night is far spent and the day is at hand, that really applies to us in a very unique way, more than it would apply to any other brethren during the Gospel age, because we are really at the final conclusive period of distress and difficulty that are going to lead us to the promised kingdom. So our time is short, but we have some years to go.

Now, I gave a talk in the LA class maybe two years ago. Everybody knows I have an opinion about the kingdom. I didn’t mention it. I don’t like to push and insist, but I did mention this. I said, I’m not aware of any brethren that think the kingdom is less than 15 years away.

And I’m not aware of any brethren that think the kingdom is more than 25 years away. Now, I said that publicly so they could all correct me afterwards and let me know. Now, that was two years ago. So I guess I could Change those to 13 and 23. But the point is, everybody knows the kingdom is coming soon.

Now, when I hear brethren talk about the events that are going to unfold or that are unfolding preparatory to the kingdom, everybody thinks, yes, it’s getting close. We’re going to talk tomorrow about. About things that are happening today. So we are, as Paul said, late into the night and waiting for the breaking of the day, and that will be a beautiful time when it comes.

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