Some Principles of Prophecy

                                  Lesson 1  Some Principles of Prophecy

       (Jeremiah 9, Matthew 13, Daniel 12, Revelation 22)

Copr. 2025, Bruce N. Cameron, J.D.  Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Suggested answers are found within parentheses. If you normally receive this lesson by e-mail, but it is lost one week, you can find it by clicking on this link: http://www.GoBible.org. Pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit as you study.

Introduction: We begin a new series of studies on prophecy. What are your views on Bible prophecy? Do you think you understand them, while many others do not? Do you think it is a waste of time to study them? The best argument for studying Bible prophecy is the second chapter of Daniel. In that chapter Daniel interprets a dream of King Nebuchadnezzar which lays out the entire course of history on planet earth! While our history is not yet complete, the first 2,000 years following the dream were correctly predicted! The best argument for being skeptical, or at least cautious about Bible prophecy, is that most of our current study is on the Second Coming of Jesus. The Bible scholars got Jesus’ first coming wrong, so why should we think we can get His Second Coming right?  Whatever your current views on Bible prophecy, come with me as we explore this topic!

1.    Understanding God

1. 1.    Read Jeremiah 9:23. What does God say that we should not boast about? (Our intelligence, our strength, or our money.)

1. 2.    Read Jeremiah 9:24. What should we boast about? (That we know God.)

1. 1. 1.    What do you think it means to “know God?” That we are friends? Or, that we understand that God delights in love, justice, and righteousness? (Because God states details about His character, it seems that He means both.)

1. 3.    Read Isaiah 55:6-9. What kind of problems do we have in seeking and understanding God? (His thinking is not in our league.  He is much smarter than we are.)

1. 1. 1.    Then why does God call on us to seek to understand Him?

1. 4.    Read Matthew 13:10-11. How do you understand Jesus’ answer to the reason why He speaks to the people in parables? (Jesus wants some to understand and others not to understand.)

1. 1. 1.    Why would Jesus want anyone to misunderstand? (Read Matthew 13:14-15. Jesus is not cheering on a failure to understand. Rather He is saying that some people do not want to understand.)

1. 5.    Read Matthew 13:12-13. Is Jesus saying that some people are not too smart, hard of hearing, or have poor eyesight? If that is true, then it surely is not their fault that they do not understand, right? (Wrong. Jesus says that the ability to understand what He is teaching turns on the attitude of the listeners. If they study to learn, then they will be given greater understanding. But if you don’t care about understanding, then you will lose even the little understanding that you have.)

1. 6.    Read Acts 1:6-9. What do you say about the question asked by the disciples just as Jesus was about to return to heaven? (If I were Jesus I would have started yelling at them! After all the time they spent with Him, they still did not understand that He was not going to overthrow the Romans and restore Israel as master over their Roman oppressors.)

1. 1. 1.    How good were the disciples at understanding the future? (This suggests that they were terrible. They refused to let go of the common prophetic belief of the Jews that the Messiah would set up a secular kingdom.)

1. 1. 1. 1.    I know many people who are very sure that they understand the prophecies about last-day events. The disciples spent more than three years listening to Jesus. If that does not make a person cautious about arrogance in understanding prophecy, what does that tell you about that person? (They are foolish.)

1. 7.    What do you think is the key to understanding prophecy? (Matthew 13:12 suggests that we be serious about it. To work diligently at understanding. At the same time God is God and we are not. We must understand our limitations.)

2.   Shut Up or Open Up?

1. 1.    Read Daniel 12:1-3. What is being discussed here? (The Second Coming of Jesus.)

1. 2.    Read Daniel 12:4. What do you think it means to “shut up the words and seal the book?” (Read Isaiah 29:11. This means that the book should not be understood until some future time.)

1. 3.    Read Daniel 12:8-9. Did Daniel understand? (No. He wanted to understand, but was told the words were “shut up and sealed until the end of time.”)

1. 1. 1.    When we read that “the book” is to be sealed, is it the entire book of Daniel? (Read Daniel 2:44-45. The “book” cannot refer to the entire book of Daniel because Nebuchadnezzar’s important dream prophecy is explicitly “known,” and the interpretation is “sure.”)

1. 4.    Re-read Daniel 12:1. Is the “time of trouble” the part of the book that is sealed and shut up? (I don’t know. What is clear is that the entire book of Daniel was not sealed.)

1. 5.    Re-read Daniel 12:3. Who is this describing? (Just before the statement about sealing, we read this statement about the “stars” who convert others. Some type of knowledge of God is increasing.)

1. 6.    Read Matthew 24:15-16. Who is speaking? (Jesus.)

1. 1. 1.    Who is Jesus quoting? (He is attributing this to Daniel. I suggest Daniel 9:27.)

1. 1. 2.    What does this tell us about the entire book of Daniel being sealed? (Jesus said that His listeners should be looking at the Daniel prophecies to survive the Roman destruction of the Jewish second temple!)

1. 7.    One commentator pointed to the prophetic work of William Miller, who predicted the world would end in 1843-44, as an example of the time of unsealing when “knowledge shall increase” (see Daniel 12:4).  What do you think? Is an obviously incorrect understanding of prophecy (because the Second Coming did not occur in 1843-44) an example of the book being sealed or unsealed? 

1. 1. 1.    With uncertainty about what part of Daniel will be unsealed when, how should we view those who claim to be correct about end-time prophecies? (If history were not enough (that God’s people misunderstood Jesus’ first coming), this text about sealing gives additional warning against being arrogant regarding Bible prophecy.)

1. 8.    Read Revelation 22:10-11. What did the angel tell John about sealing the prophecies of Revelation? (He was told not to seal them. They should be understood now.)

1. 1. 1.    Why is Revelation unsealed and Daniel sealed? (John writes that the “time is near.”)

1. 1. 1. 1.    Does that mean that Daniel should be understood after the time of writing Revelation?

1. 1. 1. 2.    Daniel and Revelation cover the same topics to some degree. How can one be sealed and the other unsealed?

1. 1.    I recently listened to a lecture on the phrase “the time is near” and similar statements made in the New Testament. From a human point of view the time of the Second Coming is at least two thousand years later.  The lecturer argued that “near” did not refer to chronology (counting time), but rather referred to being unexpected. His argument was based on a culturally informed translation of the original language. He sounded convincing, and I know too little to evaluate his understanding of the original language. But that understanding accords what has happened since. If you do not expect Jesus to come now, and He does, the time is near.

3.      Our Role in Opening Up

1. 1.    Read 2 Peter 1:19-20. If we should avoid arrogance about prophecy, what is required of us? (We should pay attention!  We should study the prophecies to understand them and to determine what is unsealed.)

1. 1. 1.    What is our beginning point as students of prophecy? (It is like we have a lamp in a dark place.)

1. 1. 1. 1.    How effective is that in seeing the entire picture? (Not very. But it is a beginning.)

1. 1. 2.    What does our lamp become? (The dawn of morning.)

1. 1. 1. 1.    What does this suggest about our increased knowledge? (Our knowledge rapidly increases!)

1. 2.    Look again at 2 Peter 1:20. In studying prophecy, what direction does this give? (The Bible prophecy is inspired by God. We need to keep a clear line of distinction between what the Bible says and what a person interpreting the Bible has to say.)

1. 3.    Read 2 Peter 1:21. How confident can we be in Bible prophecy? (It comes from God. We can be very confident. Interpretation of prophecy is another thing. We need to have the Holy Spirit inspire the interpreter.)

1. 4.    Friend, we need to be serious students of the prophecies that God has given to us. Will you join in this journey to better understand Bible prophecies?

4.   Next week: The Genesis Foundation.