Episode 77: Letting the Bible Speak for Itself

Bible Prophecy Under the Microscope-Episode 77

Gary analyzes a clip from a teacher on Facebook claiming that Gog and Magog from Ezekiel 38-39 will soon be upon us.

A more recent interpretation holds that Ezekiel’s Gog and Magog battle is fulfilled in the details of Revelation 20:7–10 when Rome and its international armies attacked Israel and destroyed the temple in A.D. 70. This approach is difficult to comprehend since the 1000 years of Revelation 20:4 would have to be contracted into a 40-year period between A.D. 30 and 70. Then there’s the interpretive problem that Israel’s rescue is in focus and not her judgment. The destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 was a judgment and not a rescue.

Still others teach that Ezekiel’s prophecy takes place near the end of the 1000-year period mentioned in Revelation 20:7–10 and applies it to the church and the forces of evil, instead of a physical battle. It’s more likely that John’s use of the Gog and Magog imagery is symbolic, similar to the way Babylon (Rev. 14:8; 16:19; 17:5; 18:2, 10, 21), Egypt (11:8), Sodom (11:8), and Jezebel (2:20), are used in Revelation.

Most interpreters have tried to find the fulfillment in events of their day using current events as the interpretive grid. For example, in the fourth and fifth centuries, Gog was thought to refer to the Goths and Moors. In the seventh century, it was the Huns. By the eighth century, the Islamic empire was making a name for itself, so it was the logical candidate for fulfillment. By the tenth century, the Hungarians briefly replaced Islam as a Gog candidate. But by the sixteenth century, the Turks and Saracens seemed to fit the Gog and Magog profile with the Papacy thrown in for added prophetic juice. In the seventeenth century, Spain and Rome were the end-time bad guys. In the nineteenth century, Napoleon was Gog leading the forces of Magog-France. For most of the twentieth century, Communist Russia had been the logical pick because of its military power, its atheistic worldview, and its designation of being “far north” of Israel.

History shows that when the headlines reflect a change in the political climate, many of the interpretations of the prophetic parts of the Bible change with them. The repeated failure of the interpretive history of Ezekiel 38 and 39 over the centuries is prime evidence that modern-day prophecy writers are not “profiling the future through the lens of Scripture” but through the ever-changing headlines of today’s news. This is why revised prophecy books continue to be published.

The Gog and Magog End-Time Alliance

Jet planes… missiles… and atomic weapons. You will search in vain in Ezekiel 38 and 39, and you will not find them. You will, however, find horses, bows and arrows, shields, clubs, and chariots. If the Gog and Magog prophecy was written for a time more than 2500 years in the future from Ezekiel’s day, why didn’t God describe the battle in terms that we could relate to and understand? Why confuse Ezekiel’s first readers and us?

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Gary analyzes a clip from a teacher on Facebook claiming that Gog and Magog from Ezekiel 38-39 will soon be upon us. Pointing out first that the chronology of what this person is saying is all wrong, Gary continues to show how the Bible teaches that Gog and Magog is not a future event at all, but was fulfilled long ago.

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American Vision’s mission is to Restore America to its Biblical Foundation—from Genesis to Revelation. American Vision (AV) has been at the heart of worldview study since 1978, providing resources to exhort Christian families and individuals to live by a Biblically based worldview. Visit www.AmericanVision.org for more information, content and resources