Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure: Isaiah 46:9,10.
INTRODUCTION
Most Christians hearing the phrase “last days” assume it is referring to the last days of the world and think it is occurring presently, in our time. They would say the present generation of the 21st Century is living in the last days. There are many others who believe we are in the last days of planet earth because they see all the middle east turmoil, technological advancements, “new world order,” etc. They claim that these are fulfilments of biblical prophecy proving we are in the last days.
One American writer on the last days said:
“Don’t you see ‘the signs of the times?’ ‘Mark this,’ Paul wrote: ‘There will be terrible times in the last days’ (2 Timothy 3:1). And what do we see now? America at war. Shootings in our schools. Disasters in the weather. Is it all coming to a climax? Will World War III soon be upon us? We are living in the last days!”
By “last days” he meant the last days of the world, the “last days” of planet earth.
Let’s examine what the Bible said about the “last days” and see if we can understand its meaning and when they were to take place. First, I will examine how the phrase was originally used in the prophecies of Hebrew Scriptures. Next, I will look for their fulfilment or lack of fulfilment in the New Testament.
LAST DAYS IN THE OLD TESTAMENT
In Judaism the last days were also called the end time or time of the end. These phrases appear several times in the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) and in our English Bible was translated from achariyth hayamim; in the Textus Receptus, it is achariyth yome. The word achariyth is also translated as “end of” and “latter”. In the New Testament, the Greek is eschatais hemerais and was translated as “end times”, “last days” and “latter times”.
The phrase first appeared in Genesis with reference to the sons of Jacob, not the physical earth (world) but to the infant nation of Israel. Jacob was on his deathbed, and he called his twelve sons to his bedside. He prophesied to them what would happen to them in the last days. Jacob’s stated intention was “…I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days.” The entire chapter (49 of Genesis) described the fate of the Sons of Jacob or the Israelites in those last days. Note, it was not about the end of the world.
The prophecy of the last days concerned only the twelve sons of Jacob who later became collectively the nation of Israel. He told each of his twelve sons, beginning with the firstborn, Reuben, and ending with the last, Benjamin, “what shall befall you in the last days”:
And Jacob called unto his sons, and said, Gather yourselves together, that I may tell you that which shall befall you in the last days (achariyth hayamim). Gather yourselves together, and hear, ye sons of Jacob; and hearken unto Israel your father. Genesis 49:1, 2.
While prophesying about Judah, Jacob gave the time of the last days in the future. In verse 10, he said,
The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.
First, it indicated when Israel (Sons of Jacob) would be in its last days.
The Messiah would come to gather the people. The people were the nation of Israel not the whole world. This agrees with what Jesus at his first advent said:
But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Matthew 15:24.
Paul added:
Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision (Jews or sons of Jacob) for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: Romans 15:8.
By the circumcision he meant the Jews or the sons of Jacob who were the only nation given this ritual by God.
Second, Shiloh is another name for the Messiah.
Therefore, the last days were associated with the first coming of Christ. The King of Judah when Jesus the Messiah was born was Herod the Great an Idumean; the scepter had departed from Judah!
A scepter is an ornamental staff carried by ancient rulers as a symbol of sovereignty. So, Jacob said Judah will be the royal or ruling tribe of Israel “until Shiloh come.” He predicted the long line of the Kings of Judah from David until the Messiah Jesus (See the genealogy in Matt. 1:1-16).
Third, there would be a gathering of the people of Israel when Shiloh the Messiah came (first coming).
There can be no doubt this prophecy was fulfilled in the 1st Century when Jesus came to gather a remnant of the Jews who believed on Him, to himself:
These twelve Jesus sent forth, and commanded them, saying, go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Matthew 10:5-6.
In this Prophecy given by Jacob, to his sons, GOD was “Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:” (Isa.46:10).
Isaiah prophesied of the last days.
Again, the Prophecy concerns Judah and Jerusalem (Israel, not the whole world). Everywhere the phrase last days was used to refer to Israel not the whole physical world.
The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.
And it shall come to pass in the last days (achariyth hayamim), that the mountain of the LORD’S house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.
And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
This prophecy was a prediction of the New Covenant which was inaugurated in the last days by the Messiah Jesus. Therefore, the last days must coincide with the preaching of the gospel by the Apostles.
Mountain and hills refer to places of worship. At the time of Jesus and the last days the mountain and hills were the Jerusalem temple and synagogues. The mountain of the LORD’s house refers to the Temple in Jerusalem. Verse 3 is a reference to the Gospel of Jesus Christ “going forth” from Jerusalem and all the nations (tribes of Israel) receiving it. All these things were to take place during the last days.
Ezekiel’s placement of the last days.
The prophet Ezekiel, writing during the Babylonian Captivity, placed the Roman invasion and destruction of Jerusalem of 70AD as occurring in the last days:
And thou shalt come up against my people of Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days (achariyth hayamim), and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes. Ezekiel 38:16.
Some think Gog here refers to Russia and the invasion as taking place sometime in our distant future. However, this is an error. The Russians are not the only descendants of Gog. The Romans (Italians) were also descended from Gog. This prophecy is of the Roman destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in AD70 which ended the last days.
The angel Gabriel foretold the last days to Daniel.
Now I am come to make thee understand what shall befall thy people (Israel) in the latter days (achariyth hayamim): for yet the vision is for many days. Daniel 10:14.
And I heard, but I understood not: then said I, O my Lord, what shall be the end (achariyth) of these things? And he said, Go thy way, Daniel: for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the end. Many shall be purified, and made white, and tried; but the wicked shall do wickedly: and none of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand. Daniel 12:8-10.
Again, the prophecy has reference to “thy people”, Daniel’s people (Israel). It was approximately 538 BC when the Jewish exile to Babylon came to an end.
LAST DAYS IN THE NEW TESTAMENT.
Most Christians would agree that the last days began around the time of Christ as we saw prophesied by various prophets of the Old Testament. The debate is whether those days have continued until now and whose last days they were. Hopefully, our study of the New Testament will help us answer these questions
Acts 2:16-20/Joel 2:28-32
This sermon by Peter placed the fulfilment of the prophecy of Joel as occurring in the last days. The pouring out of the Holy Spirit upon all flesh on the day of Pentecost indicated that the last days were already upon them. However, the great and notable Day of the Lord was still some 40 years in the future:
But this is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel;
And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams: And on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit; and they shall prophesy: and I will shew wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath; blood, and fire, and vapour of smoke: the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come:
There is nothing in this passage linking its “last days” to present time.
Hebrews 1:1,2
The writer of Hebrews said, they (first century Christians) lived in the last days but does not identify those days with the present time (2024).
God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; Hebrews 1:1-2.
The writer contrasts “in time past” when God spoke “unto the fathers” with “these last days”, indicating he was writing during the last days, the time of the Son and His Apostles. The use of the pronoun “us” as well as the demonstrative pronoun “these” strengthens this argument. These last days must be those in which the writer lived. For in those days Christ appeared and spoke to the Jews, according to the prediction of Jacob, Moses, and Daniel.
2Peter 3:1-4
This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance: that ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour:
Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
Peter was not giving a new prophecy which would come to pass in the 21st Century. But he was calling upon the disciples to remember a prophecy which was spoken before by the holy prophets, “that there shall come in the last days scoffers…”. He also reminded them that the scoffers were there present in the first century for they were saying “since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.” Because there were scoffers at the time Peter was writing, he knew that the prophecy was fulfilled in his lifetime.
On examination of the relevant Scriptures, I believe the last days, prophesied of in the Old Testament, is the same last days that came to pass in the New Testament. Furthermore, the prophecies established a chronology or timeline of the last days which has no link to the present.
First, the last days began with the arrival of the Messiah Jesus to minister to and gather the Jews; then, during the last days the coming of the Holy Spirit with signs and wonders; and afterwards, the great and notable day of the LORD (judgement of Judah and Jerusalem in AD 70).
There is no biblical evidence which suggested that the last days are being fulfilled in our time or will be fulfilled anytime in the future. In the Old Testament, the phrase “last days” was used only in reference to the nation of Israel. There is no instant of it being used in reference to the Gentile nations or the physical world around us. In the New Testament, the same phrase was used in the fulfilment of the Old Testament prophecies to which they referred.