The World Tomorrow

The US in Prophecy (Part 2)

by Herbert W Armstrong

(PLAY FROM START)

Well greetings friends. This is Herbert W. Armstrong with the Good News of the World Tomorrow. And, yes, there is good news ahead. But today’s news once again is not good. I’ve been telling you that top scientists say that we have come to the time when all human life can be destroyed. No human life would be left on the face of this earth. My friends you’re facing that kind of a world - why don’t we wake up!

Now I was reading to you in one of the prophecies because you can know what’s going to happen. One third of your Bible is devoted to prophecy and about 90% of that to the present and the immediate future during the next twenty or twenty five years; and you can know. Oh I know the prophecies have been closed and sealed until now. As one of the prophets was inspired to write - the prophet Daniel - that the words were closed and sealed till the time of the end. Daniel couldn’t understand what he wrote; he merely wrote it down. It was inspired by the Almighty God. But now my friends we have come to the time of the end. God’s time has come to lift back the curtain on the mysteries of God that have been concealed until now. And now we can know.

Now the keys are available that open up these prophecies, that unlock the doors of prophecy that have kept them closed and sealed until now. This one-third of your Bible that is so neglected, that part of the Bible that is scarcely ever read - that part of the Bible that explains today’s news, and shows you what is the real significance behind today’s world news. The news commentators, the news analysts on radio, on television, or the columnists, or the editorial writers - they cannot understand today’s news. You can’t understand the news unless you know two things that they don’t know. First, the purpose being worked out here below, and secondly, what is definitely foretold in biblical prophecy of what is to happen in working out that purpose.

Now you can know the major events of the world and the turn of events as they’re going to take place from here. I was reading now as we’re going through Jeremiah, specific prophecy now, and in the thirtieth chapter I was reading I believe in the preceeding program, God had said of our people, that "I will save you from afar...[and so on. Then] Fear not, O Jacob my servant... nor be dismayed, O Israel" (Jeremiah 30:10): and you might say America or the United States and so on.

He said that we are to be saved and that everything is going to come out alright. But also, He had said that "I will not leave you [altogether] unpunished." (Jeremiah 30:11)

> He had also said that. And He said that our sins were greatly increased and that’s why these things are coming on us. Now this prophecy, foretelling a time of captivity, of invasion, actually of our nation unless we’ll turn to God and do those things that will prevent it and we’ve been going into that. Now He said that those things are coming on us - but when? This is not talking about something that happened way back there 600 years before Christ. Look at the very last words of this chapter. In the 24th verse, the very last words, "In the latter days you shall consider it" (Jeremiah 30:24). We’re in those latter days now at the time of the end. We’ve come to the time when this is to be considered, when this is to be fulfilled, when this prophecy is going to take place.

Different Bible Translations (Play from 03:56)

Now let’s go on into the thirty-first chapter – the thirty-first chapter of Jeremiah. I am going to read a few of these verses now from the Moffatt translation because the first two or three verses here are not too plain in the Authorized or the King James translation. The meaning of English words has changed.

We had some people here, I think some visitors from the state of Kansas. I was showing them around over the college and so I took them back in our stack room of our library and where under glass, under heavy glass and lock and key, we have some very valuable ancient Bibles. Bibles published way back and printed long before the Authorized or the King James translation was ever made. And I was showing them way back in some of those ancient Bibles - in fact one of them – the very first book ever printed or the first translation made in the English language. Well they could scarcely read it. They said "Well now what kind of a language is that?" I said "Well that’s English. That’s the English as they spoke it way back there in the 1500’s." Way back there in the 14 and 1500’s - the 16th century. That’s when this was translated. They said, "We could scarcely understand that today." That’s true!

And you see they had to get a new translation when they came up to the 17th century in the year of 1611. They had to have a new translation that people could understand because some of that old English, the way that our Anglo-Saxons, the way that they had spoken it – one or two hundred years before that, the language was changing and people couldn’t understand it. And so in the reign of King James they made another translation. Now when that translation came out, oh I want to tell you the critics threw up their hands, they were horrified and anyone was worse than an infidel if he would ever use that new Bible. Why everybody protested against that new Bible. Nobody wanted anything to do with it but of course they couldn’t understand these old translations, they were getting too old by now. And so finally you know, the whole world accepted the King James translation. And now it’s gotten old and now that language is old and you don’t always understand it.

And so now we have new modern translations in the language that we speak today and the modern English language. If we’re going to translate it, you might as well translate it into our language and not into some languages half way between what we speak in some foreign language as English used to be. Oh yes I know they’ve made some glaring mistakes – that’s true. And I’ve explained before the one that is most condemned is where they translated the Old Testament passage, a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son. And they translated it a young woman shall conceive and so on. Well, technically that’s exactly the way it was in the Hebrew. The only difference being this to a Hebrew in that day a young woman meant a virtuous young woman, and if she was not virtuous she would not have been called a young woman. She would have been called a harlot. And it didn’t say harlot, it said a young woman and so actually it should have been a virgin because in today’s language that’s the way we speak and sometimes even a harlot might be called a young woman today where that was not true in the time of the original inspiration in the Hebrew language and so I think that’s an error certainly but it’s technically correct.

Oh I know you hear a lot of things about the men that translated that translation. Well they were among the world’s best, greatest, Hebrew and Greek scholars, regardless of their personal belief, and if you know what I know my friends, and you’re going to put your trust in a man and how good he is when he does his translating, you know you’re not going to trust anybody anyhow. It’s a matter of scholarship. Now on the other hand while there are some of these glaring mistakes, some of us know a lot better - that isn’t going to influence me. I wouldn’t recommend that translation. If you want to know what Bible I recommend and you’re going to buy a Bible and you’re only going to have one – alright I’ll recommend the old Authorized Version, sure I never recommend anything else. But I do recommend that if you really want to understand since there are literally hundreds of errors and mistakes in translation in this Old King James translation, I do recommend that you also look at some of the other translations once in a while along with it.

Now I use the Authorized or the King James translation more than any other. But to come out with prejudice like so many people do today my friends, let’s put that away. It’s alright to look at any of them and we should have minds that can understand and comprehend and by comparing them all diligently - and you have 24 hours a day of time - it’s the most important thing in your life. Don’t say "I haven’t time, I can’t bother with it." Maybe you haven’t time to bother with the kind of a life that will make you happy! Maybe you haven’t time for the kind of eternal salvation that’s going to give you eternal life. Well if you’re so busy, go ahead and enjoy what you’ve got, because you aren’t going to last long anyhow in that case. But we all have the time if we only realize it, and we could compare all of these things, and I do know this - that in spite of some of those errors – now I know where they are and what they are. They don’t mislead me, and they don’t need to you if you also are a student and if you use the other translations. Nevertheless there are some two or three hundred errors in the King James translation that have been corrected in the so- called new Bible that people hate so.

God's Promises to Israel (Play from 10:01)

Now then, I am going to use the Moffatt translation here a little bit, and I don’t think that it’s the most accurate translation at all but it is in very plain English. Now I’ve checked with the Authorized, I’ve checked with other translations to see if it’s accurate, and then if it is, I like to use it because it’s in language that you can understand. This is your language. Alright.

"Then the Eternal promises..." Now that’s 'at the consummation' of the age you shall consider it, as Moffatt renders the verse I just read to you - the last verse of the 30th chapter of Jeremiah. Now the 31st chapter of Jeremiah, "Then the Eternal promises I will be [a] God to all the families of Israel". (Jeremiah 31:1 - Moffatt)

Now notice, God says, "I’ll be a God to all the families of Israel." That’s not only the Jewish people. It includes them, but my friends that is including America. That’s including the Canadians, the British, the Australians, the South Africans; that’s including the Dutch and the Danes and the Swedes and the Norwegians.

God says; "I’ll be a God to all of the families of Israel and they shall be my people. For this is the Eternal’s promise: Those who survive the sword shall find grace in the dungeon." (Jeremiah 31:1-2 Moffat)

Now I’ve been reading to you my friends how this sword is coming, but we’re going to be delivered out of it. I have read to you in other broadcasts from other prophecies. For instance the fifth chapter, is it not, of Ezekiel or is it the sixth? The fifth - it is. In Ezekiel, there is a prophecy of how famine is to come and what is going to happen as a result and one-third of the population are to die of the famine and the disease epidemic that will follow it. Then on the heels of that will come an invasion of war.

"And the third part [of thee] shall fall by the sword round about thee; [says God] and I will scatter the third [that’s the only third that remains] into all the winds and I will draw a sword out after them." (Ezekiel 5:12)

Just as both Israel and Judah went into captivity and were taken as slaves out of their country and taken to the land of their conquerors to be their slaves, so that’s going to happen to us. This says - and the word of God says - that if we don’t straighten up and we don’t return to our God in time, which would prevent it, then our whole nation - the third of us that will remain alive - are going to be taken to the land of our conquerors and made slaves. That’s in your Bible believe it or not! Why don’t you hear anyone proclaiming these things? Why is it that everybody is afraid? They think it's too shocking or something. It’s in your Bible my friends and I tell you it’s about time we begin to get it!

Now that is the time of Jacob’s trouble. That is the time of the GREAT trouble of America that is coming! It’s the greatest time of trouble that is ever happened to any nation. Jesus Christ foretold that time of trouble when He said it was the greatest time of national and of worldwide trouble that had ever come since there was a nation on the face of the earth, or ever will. The prophet Daniel spoke of it in the same language virtually. He said at that time, "many that sleep in the dust of the ground shall awake, some to everlasting life..." (Daniel 12:2).

That is just before the second coming of Christ. It is the time known as spoken of in the prophecy of Jesus recorded in Matthew 24 as the Great Tribulation. God Almighty is going to intervene and cut short those days, but the days are going to happen. He’s going to deliver us out of this trouble, but we’re going to get into it. And we’re going to be into it until Christ comes to shorten those days.

Now the third of our people remaining are going to be in dungeons. They are going to be slaves, but those who survive the sword of that captivity shall find grace in the dungeon. Now that’s the time this is talking about in Jeremiah 31. There you are - I want you to get that.

Now, let’s go on with the Authorized Version.

"The [Eternal] hath appeared... [verse 3, Jeremiah 31]. The [Eternal] hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee. Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built, O virgin of Israel [And]: thou shalt again be adorned with thy tabrets, and shalt go forth in the dances of them that make merry." (Jeremiah 31:3-4)

That’s where we’re finally going to wind up, but we’ve got some very serious lessons to learn in the meantime!

Now my friends listen, if you as an individual will heed even though the nation will not, and even though the nation must be punished because God is love and I was telling you in the preceding program why God is going to send this punishment. Because we are doing the things that ultimately will annihilate ourselves. And out of His great love for us, God is going to punish us. He’s going to bring us to our senses, but, oh my friends I hope you can understand it! Even though the nation gets into this thing, you as a private individual can be spared if you will turn to God and seek His protection.

If you will pray unceasingly and if you will study these prophecies to know what’s going to happen and watch the world news as it takes place day by day and understand. God is going to take you, He will take you to a place of safety and protect you; and then when the plagues of the Day of the Lord come when God sends them - which is to follow, later - no plague will come nigh your dwelling. You will be protected. You can have absolute protection! You need not fear one particle of this IF you will turn to God. IF the nation will turn to God, none of this will happen.

But if we don’t, I’m telling you on the authority of Jesus Christ and of the Word of God that it’s going to happen, and it’s going to come to you. And I say you’d better be frightened and you had better be scared enough that you will turn to God and escape this thing so that it will not happen. Now if you turn, it won’t happen to you. Your neighbor turns, it won’t happen to him. If all of us turn to God and turn away from all our evil ways, it won’t happen because, this is all coming as He says in chapter 30 and verse 14 "...because thy sins were increased." (Jeremiah 30:14)

God will not punish the innocent. It’s only the guilty. But I want to tell you my friends; our nation is GUILTY and stands GUILTY before God. The handwriting is on the wall of America now! Our United States of America is being weighed in the balances by God Almighty and found wanting. It’s time for us to wake up.

Christ's Second Coming to Rescue (Play from 17:15)

Now let’s go on with this. After this is happened, Christ will come at His second coming to rescue us and to save us out of it. And He says, "Again I will build thee and thou shalt by built, O virgin of Israel" (Jeremiah 31:4).

You need our booklet, ‘The United States in Prophecy’ to know where we’re mentioned in prophecy and to realize that this is talking of America. Let’s read it that way again, ..."thou shalt be built, I will build thee, O virgin of America." You can read it that way and read it accurately because it’s in symbolic language so that no one would understand it until now, and if you have this key, write in for this great key that will unlock prophecy.

We have come to the time of the end. God’s time has come to lift back the curtain on the mysteries of God that have been concealed until now. And now we can know that whole third of your Bible that has been so misunderstood and so neglected. Write in for that booklet, ‘The United States in Prophecy’ if you don’t have it, and then apply it as you read the Bible and you’ll understand the prophecies as you never did before.

"Thou shalt yet plant vines upon the mountains of Samaria... [and that my friends is the land of the ancient kingdom of Israel - not the Jews - but the Israelites, the kingdom of Israel, the House of Israel and the northern part of Palestine up north of Jerusalem and of Judah]… and [you] shall eat them as common things. For there shall be a day, that the watchmen upon mount Ephraim shall cry, Arise, and let us go up to Zion unto the [Eternal] our God. [now Zion in some ways sometimes means Jerusalem, but it means the Church - it's spiritual Jerusalem so to speak. And to come to Christ and to His ways]. For thus says the [Eternal]; sing with gladness for Jacob and shout among the CHIEF OF THE NATIONS..." (Jeremiah 31:5-7)

Now this is a warning. This is a message to go to the chief of the nations - Israel. The Jews are not the chief of the nations today my friends. They haven’t even been a nation until very recently. They’ve been scattered in all nations. Now they've got a little nation, they call it Israel. Actually it should be called Judah and not Israel. It just shows you how blind and how confused we are today.

But anyway; "Sing with gladness, [let’s say] for [America], and shout among the chief of the nations...[The United States and the British - we today are the chief of the nations. Israel is the chief of the nations at this time and the latter days when we are to consider this prophecy]...publish ye… and say, O [Eternal] save thy people, the remnant of Israel." (Jeremiah 31:7)

'Remnant' is the last generation and we’re in that generation now. In other words, the 20th century generation of America and Britain. And this is an appeal to warn the people, to cry out to God to save our nation from this destruction that’s coming. Now we don’t even need to get into it. Christ says He’s going to save us out of it because we will finally learn the lesson if we’ve got to learn it the hard way.

"Behold [says Christ here], I will bring them from the north country, and gather them from the coast of the earth, and with them the blind and the lame, [and] the woman with child and her that travaileth with child together: a great company shall return thither. They shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I lead them [that’s not the way the Jews under the Zionist movement have gone back to Palestine. But this is the way they will come and the way we will go too when the time comes]: I will cause them to walk by the rivers of waters in a straight way, wherein they shall not stumble [that rivers of water is a spiritual – the Holy Spirit of God that fulfills the law of God, the love of God in our hearts that will fulfill the law of God]: for I am a father to Israel [let’s read it, I am a father to the United States and the British], and Ephraim is my first born. Hear the word of the [Eternal] O ye nations, declare it in the isles afar off [Ephraim is Britain]…in the isles afar off and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock."(Jeremiah 31:8-10)

Did you ever read in Ezekiel 34 and in other places where the Eternal says that He’s coming again in person to this earth to feed His own flock and to deliver them out of the hand of the false preachers and the false ministers that have deceived them? "For the [Eternal] hath redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand that was stronger than he." (Jeremiah 31:11).

We think we’re the strongest nation on earth. My friends, in less than twenty years, we’re going to find there’ll be a stronger power than we on this earth. It hasn’t happened yet. You’re living in terrifying times and you probably don’t realize it. You’re just so interested in this apparent time of peace, and you like to get it out of your mind. It’s a time when we can have mechanical and material luxuries and gadgets and things, and we’re so interested in those things. We’re so self-centered into our own selves and other people, and the things that our hands can make; in human interests and television, in the new kind of movies that are coming out, in everything to amuse and entertain ourselves. We don’t realize how empty our lives are either.

"Hear the word of the [Eternal] all ye nations, declare it in the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel [which means here America and Britain], will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock [that scattering is yet to happen a second time]. For the [Eternal] hath redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand that was stronger than he. Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together to the goodness of the [Eternal] [that’s after we’ve learned our lessons], for wheat, and for wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow anymore at all. Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance [or the young women], both young men and old together: for I will turn their mourning [which is coming on our people – I’m warning you my friends. I, says God, finally when we’ve learned our lesson, will turn their mourning…] into joy, and will comfort them, and make them rejoice from their sorrow. And I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people shall be satisfied with their goodness, saith the [Eternal]." (Jeremiah 31:10-14)

Good News Coming (Play from 24:10)

So my friends, there is the good news that is coming on beyond today’s terrible bad news. Now, notice here in the next few verses.

"Thus saith the Eternal; A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rachel [who was really the mother of our people now], weeping for her children refused to be comforted for her children because they were not [or as not]. Thus says the [Eternal], Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thy eyes from tears: for thy work shall be rewarded, says the [Eternal]; and they shall come again..." [where from?]. (Jeremiah 31:15-16)

When our people, when Israel goes back my friends to Palestine - the land God gave our forefathers - where are we coming from? Every place where it designates where we’re coming from will tell you the same thing in your Bible. "THEY SHALL COME FROM THE LAND OF THE ENEMY." NOT from our own land in North America but from the land of the enemy where they’re going to be scattered. This is in too many places in your Bible my friends for you to misunderstand. If you only open your ears and open your minds to the truth of God. It’s going to be a great exodus - so great, they won’t even remember the Exodus from Egypt under Moses. But this coming great exodus under Christ out of Babylon will be not from the United States and Britain, but from the land of our enemies.

"And there is hope in thine end, saith the [Eternal] that thy children shall come again to their own border. I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus. Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yolk: turn thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art the [Eternal] my God." (Jeremiah 31:17-18)

That’s what we’ll finally say. Oh my time is up. I’m going to have to break off there. Now we’re coming into this new covenant too in this chapter a little later. Some mighty interesting things coming tomorrow.