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Hide Thyself for a Moment

  • | Chris McCann
  • Audio: Length: 49:03 Size: 8.4 MB
  • A continuation of the previous study relating to Proverbs 27:12 and the prudent or wise man as compared to a fool.

I was thinking that I would just talk a little bit more once again about Proverbs 27.  I am not really going to look at Proverbs 27:12 again, but I will kind of use it like a springboard to go from there to other places.  In Proverbs 27:12, it says: 

A prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth himself; but the simple pass on, and are punished. 

A prudent man is a wise man. 

There is a verse in Proverbs 14:8 that links the two.  It says: 

The wisdom of the prudent is to understand his way: but the folly of fools is deceit. 

So wisdom has to do with understanding. 

God repeatedly identifies the time that we are in with either those who are wise or those who are foolish.  We are familiar with Daniel 12:10, where it says: 

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. 

It is all a matter of understanding.  Some understand; some do not understand.  The wise understand; the wicked do not understand.  It is really is as simple as this. 

So God says in Proverbs 27:12:

A prudent man foreseeth the evil… 

What He has in mind here is the day of judgment, which God calls “the evil day” in several places, and a wise man sees this.  The word “foresee” is really the word “see.”  He sees the day of judgment, which is what we are doing now.  We see. 

We can actually get a calendar and circle the date.  Nine months is not that far.  They already have calendars coming out for the upcoming school year that go from September 2010 to June 2011, which is only one month longer than the actual time that we have left in this world for salvation. 

Someone sent me a calendar where it had the rest of 2010 and into 2011.  It was printed up to May 21, 201l; but then he had it printed up with five more months of time all in red going up to October 21, 2011; then the calendar ended on that date.  This is actually a pretty good idea because it is letting people know. 

For the coming New Year, we give gifts.  Try to think of a calendar related to this that you can give to others.  You just might get a response back, “This calendar is not full.  Where is the rest of the year?”  This would perhaps give you a little opportunity to share that there will be no rest of the year.  They may even ask, “Why are these days in red?”  Then you can tell them that this is the five months of judgment that God has planned and that on the last day of this five months, on the 153rd day, He intends to destroy the world by fire. 

We can see this so clearly only because God has opened our eyes.  This is the only reason.  We would not know otherwise.  No one would know anything about this if it were not God opening up our eyes.  Christ is in complete control of this. 

Remember what He says in Luke 24 after talking with some of the disciples on the road to Emmaus and then entering into the place where some of the other disciples were.  Jesus says in Luke 24:44-45: 

And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me. Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures, 

We cannot understand the Bible apart from Christ opening our understanding.  This is why Jesus did so many miracles dealing with blind people.  He healed many who were blind and He gave them sight.  He opened their eyes, literally and physically. 

We understand this.  They could not see anything prior to this, but then He opened their eyes and they could see.  They could see clearly, except in one case.  If you remember, there was one blind man whom Jesus healed who, afterwards, opened his eyes and saw for the first time; however, he saw things a little hazily.  He said that he saw “men as trees, walking.”  Christ took him out of the city where He touched him again and opened his eyes; then he could see clearly. 

Of course, we now know what this was all about.  God had a plan to “set his hand again the second time to recover the remnant of his people.”  The first time, during the church age, during the period where He was gathering the firstfruits, men had their eyes open but only partly.  This is like what we read in 1 Corinthians 13, “We see through a glass, darkly.”  How much do you see through a glass darkly?  Well, you can make some things out, but you cannot really see very clearly. 

Let us go to this verse so that we can read the comment that God makes after saying this.  In 1 Corinthians 13:12, it says: 

For now [the church age] we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face [or mouth to mouth]: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. 

There has been only partial knowledge and, therefore, only partial prophesying of this knowledge.  “We prophesy in part” because it was not complete.  It was not full. 

Then it says, “But then,” yet this is not speaking of Heaven.  When we are sitting in Heaven in the very presence of God forever, yes, then we will be face-to-face, truly, but this is not what was in view here.  It says “then” because the Apostle Paul was speaking from the vantage point of the first century A.D. and looking all of the way into the future to the time of the end where we find ourselves; “but then,” we will be face-to-face.  God reserves the language of “face-to-face” to indicate that this is when He makes things plain and very clear. 

This was the problem with the blind man when Jesus stretched forth His hand a second time.  He had to do it a second time.  Did Christ ever do this a second time with any other blind man?  Did He really even need to touch him at all?  No.  He is God.  He is Jesus.  He could speak and He could give someone sight across town, if He so desired.  He did not even have to be in someone’s presence.  He healed people long distance on occasion, did He not? 

We read of a centurion who sent someone to Jesus to ask that his servant be healed.  When Jesus was going, the centurion sent others to Him to tell Him, “Lord, trouble not thyself… but say in a word, and my servant shall be healed…for I also am a man set under authority, having under me soldiers, and I say unto one, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh.”  Christ healed him and then said, “I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel,” and this man’s servant was healed long distance.  This is how God has done all healing since He left this world.  It is all long-distance healing now because He is in Heaven and man is upon earth. 

So Christ is demonstrating to us, “I know that you would love to run up to Me personally.  You would really be very diligent about this, and you certainly would be very careful about this as you came to Me and pleaded with Me desperately for your desire that maybe your son or your daughter be healed or become saved, and yet you can do this same thing right now.  You can do this exact same thing as when I was there in person.  You can come running to Me.  I do hear you just as well as when I was on earth.”  There is no necessity that Christ has to be physically present.  He can do it from a distance, from a throne that He sits upon, from “the throne of grace.” 

So He did not even need to touch the man or to take him out of the city.  This account is found in Mark 8:22-25 where we read: 

And he cometh to Bethsaida; and they bring a blind man unto him, and besought him to touch him. And he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the town… 

Apparently, He did not heal him first and then lead him out.  He led him out of the town first.  It continues: 

…and when he had spit on his eyes, and put his hands upon him, he asked him if he saw ought. And he looked up, and said, I see men as trees, walking. After that he put his hands again upon his eyes, and made him look up: and he was restored, and saw every man clearly. 

This has to do with today when God is saving “the remnant of his people.”  He is saving a great multitude.  He has opened up the Scriptures and He is causing His people to see His communication, His Word, very clearly and very accurately. 

So Proverbs 27:12 says: 

A prudent man foreseeth the evil [or the wise man sees Judgment Day], and hideth himself… 

He “hideth himself.”  I cannot get over how God connects this regarding hiding.  If we look at Zephaniah 2:1-3, it says: 

Gather yourselves together, yea, gather together, O nation not desired; Before the decree bring forth, before the day pass as the chaff, before the fierce anger of JEHOVAH come upon you, before the day of JEHOVAH’S anger come upon you. Seek ye JEHOVAH, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgment; seek righteousness, seek meekness: it may be ye shall be hid in the day of JEHOVAH’S anger. 

So it is a possibility; it may be.  There is a good possibility, because God is saving more today than He ever has in the history of the world.  God is saving, “Do come to Me and seek Me, because you could possibly be hid.”  If you are hid, then you are safe; you are safe.  The “day of evil” is coming and a wise man—a prudent man—hides himself before it gets here.  

Of course, this almost implies that we are doing something in order to hide ourself, but this is not possible.  We cannot bring salvation to ourself.  We cannot hide ourselves through anything that we do, through any merit of our own, through any work of any kind; but we can go to God, as it said in Zephaniah, and we can beseech Him that we might be hid, that it might be God’s good pleasure to hide us. 

Remember what He says in Isaiah 26:19: 

Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. 

When does the earth “cast out the dead”?  The dead are cast out on the day of resurrection, on Judgment Day, which we know is May 21st

So this is the context of what God is about to say next in verse 20, Isaiah 26:20: 

Come, my people… 

He is not speaking to everyone, only “my people.”  Whom did Jesus come into the world to save?  He came into the world to save His people, “for he shall save his people from their sins,” according to Matthew 1:21. 

It says in Psalm 110, “Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power.”  “Thy people” are God’s people, His elect, those who were predestinated from the foundation of the world, and only God’s people, even though the call goes out to all, to all who will hear. 

God sends forth His Word and says, “Seek Me; come to Me; beseech Me for mercy,” and so on.  Yet no one can come of their own.  No can seek after God according to God’s definition of truly seeking Him, which is “with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.”  No one can do this, and so He says, “There is none that seeketh after God.” 

This is a fact; this is a truth; but He goes beyond this and He begins to draw certain ones whom He has chosen.  Why did He choose this one or that one?  Why did He choose Jacob and pass by Esau?  It was only because “of his good pleasure.”  There was nothing in Jacob that would have caused God to prefer him over his brother. 

I think that many times in families, the one whom God seems to be drawing is normally not the one who is the nicest or the kindest or the best.  It is often someone like the prodigal, a low-life.  It is the low-life many times in the family and not the one who continued doing things mom and dad’s way and was upright.  It is the one who wasted his substance with riotous living, and yet God in His own good pleasure says, “You are one of Mine” and He begins the drawing process to Himself; but then there can also be someone else in the family who is more like the elder son. 

Let us go to Luke 15:29-30 where the elder son is speaking to his father.  We read: 

And he answering said to his father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends: But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf. 

He always apparently did many things that his father wanted him to do.  He did not run off anywhere.  He was a very steady man and a very moral man, and yet God takes advantage of this situation to stress that he is not righteous enough though.  This man in his own righteousness could never be right in God’s sight through any faithfulness of his own, through anything of his own.  No man is justified by his own works, “by the works of the law.”  We are justified “by the faith of Christ.” 

The big failure of many people who are moral, many people who are in the churches and who live a basically upright life in many different ways, is that they do not understand that it is not what one does.  It is not one’s keeping of the Law, because we cannot keep it perfectly.  If anyone is trying to make it based on their own righteousness, then the moment that they sin, God says that their righteousness is worthless. 

This is why He says of the believer in Isaiah 64, “all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.”  They cannot cover us, and so we are told, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness.”  Seek His righteousness.  This is the covering that we need, not what we do or how we have kept the Law and obeyed God. 

This was the elder brother’s mistake.  He was going to his father and saying, “Look father at what I have done!”  This is a complete misunderstanding of God’s salvation plan; therefore, the fatted calf was not slain for him, which is a representation of Christ.  It was slain for the prodigal, the miserable son who did everything wrong.  He did everything wrong as much as anybody could do wrong.  He lived a life of riotous living.  He ate, drank, and was merry as he had his parties on Friday and Saturday nights. 

He did it all, and yet it was God’s plan, God’s “good pleasure,” to draw this one because “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners,” as He said, “for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”  The righteous do not realize that they need Him, but they really need Him just as much as those who are unrighteous, those who are obviously doing sinful things. 

Returning back to Isaiah 26, we read in Isaiah 26:20-21: 

Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself…

Here it is again, “hide thyself”: 

…as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast. For, behold, JEHOVAH cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain. 

The earth will not be hiding the dead anymore because God is going to bring them up and lay them on the face of the earth.  All of the injustices, all of the wrongs, all of the blood, “from the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias,” are now being called as God is avenging their blood on this “day of vengeance,” Judgment Day, and there will be no place to hide in all of the world.  They will not be able to hide under the ground because God will just have brought them all up.  They will not be able to hide in the depths of the sea because God says that He is also there.  They will not be able to hide anywhere. 

If you remember what we read in Revelation 6, it is pointing to this same day.  It says in Revelation 6:14-17: 

And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand? 

They have a desperate cry to be hidden, “Hide me!  Hide me safely!  Put me somewhere, O Lord,” and there is only one safe place.  There is only one place to hide and this is in Heaven.  This is what Isaiah 26 is pointing to when God tells His people, “Come into the chambers,” which is really into the marriage bed because He is the Bridegroom and He is calling up His Bride, and then He says to “shut thy doors about thee.”  Shut the door. 

Where have we heard this before?  We have heard this in relation to May 21st, 2011.  This is the day that the door shuts.  Right?  But this is in relation to a singular door, and I just read “shut thy doors.”  Well, there is one door.  There is only one way into Heaven, but there is a doorway in America and there is a doorway in China and there is a doorway in Africa and there is a doorway in Asia, etc.  God has many portals, many entrance points, but all of those funnels go finally through the one door who is Christ Himself, through the One who said, “I am the door” and  that “No man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” 

There is no other way.  You cannot climb up like a thief.  If you try, you are not going to get in.  You are not going to make it into Heaven.  There is only one door and God intends to shut this door on May 21 st, 2011. 

Then what follows?  What follows will be five months.  There will be five months of torment according to Revelation 9.  There were five months of the waters prevailing according to Genesis 7.  The five months of the waters prevailing took place after what event?  It says in Genesis 7:11: 

In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. 

Then we read in Genesis 7:16-20: 

And they that went in, went in male and female of all flesh, as God had commanded him: and JEHOVAH shut him in. And the flood was forty days upon the earth; and the waters increased, and bare up the ark, and it was lift up above the earth. And the waters prevailed, and were increased greatly upon the earth; and the ark went upon the face of the waters. And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills, that were under the whole heaven, were covered. Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered. 

Then look at verse 24, Genesis 7:24: 

And the waters prevailed upon the earth an hundred and fifty days. 

“An hundred and fifty days” is five months.  For five months, the waters prevailed, the waters prevailed, the waters prevailed, because the water represents the Word of God, the Gospel.  It was the water that lifted up the ark. 

Peter says that they were “saved by water.”  How can water save anyone?  Water that is the Word of God, the Gospel, saves.  They were saved by water.  The waters prevailed.  The Word of God lifted up His people in the ark and the Word of God will lift up His people on May 21, the day that the door shuts, which is the 17th day of the 2nd month in the Hebrew calendar.  It will lift up all of God’s people in a rapturous and joyful way into Heaven where they may hide themselves for five months.  They can hide there, “Come My people.  Enter into the chamber.  Enter into the joy of the Lord.  Come and rest.” 

Actually, there will not be much rest going on because Revelation 7 pictures this very thing when the great multitude comes out of great tribulation and they just suddenly show up in Heaven.  It is a great multitude and the question is asked, “Whence came they?”  The answer is, “These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.” 

They came out of great tribulation.  When does the Great Tribulation end?  It ends after an exact 23-year period, from May 21, 1988 to May 21, 2011.  On that very day, the 8400th day, the Great Tribulation concludes and it is the day that the door is shut.  When the door is shut, then everyone is safely in Christ.  God raptures His people and they go into Heaven to hide themselves.  How long do they hide?  They hide for five months. 

Look at Luke 1.  For me, this is perhaps one of the most amazing things that confirms that God is the Author of the Bible.  Only God could have written this.  Only He could have developed all of these things so that there was the end of the church age at a very specific date, the 2300 evening/mornings begin and conclude at a very specific date that ties in with His calendar and His feast days, and then the full 23 years concludes on a very specific date that has nothing to do with anything else but happens to be the very day that is the 17th day of the 2nd month of the Biblical calendar, which is the equivalent date when God shut the door on Noah and the ark and which, 7,000 years later, falls on this day, May 21, 2011. 

But there was a gap of five months that, at first, people did not know what to do with.  Then it was seen that May 21 to October 21 is a five-month period and that the Bible happens to speak about five months very directly in three places.  In Revelation 9, it speaks of five months of torment or intense sorrow across the face of the earth.  In Genesis 7, it speaks of the waters prevailing for 150 days, which is five months of Noah’s calendar.  Then, finally, we find a reference to five months in the Gospel of Luke dealing with Elisabeth and her pregnancy. 

This does not make any sense.  This just does not make any sense the way that God writes the Bible.  We see perfectly how the five months fit in with the verse in Genesis.  We see perfectly how it fits in with Revelation 9 [note: speaker made incorrect reference to Genesis 9], but what does Elisabeth, an old barren woman, have to do with this five-month period that is coming at the end of the world? 

It says in Luke 1:23: 

And it came to pass, that, as soon as the days of his ministration were accomplished, he departed to his own house. 

This is Zacharias, Elisabeth’s husband.  Do you know what the names of Zacharias and Elisabeth mean?  Zacharias is from the Hebrew and it means “JAH has remembered.”  Elisabeth is also from the Hebrew and it means “God of the oath.” 

They are a perfect couple, are they not?  Elisabeth, “God of the oath”; Zacharias “JAH has remembered” or “The Lord has remembered his oath.”  He has remembered His Word, His promises, and so it is very fitting that they would be the parents of John the Baptist who would speak forth and declare the coming of the Lord.  God remembered His oath about sending the Messiah and Jesus entering into the human race; and so their names fit very well. 

But these names also fit very well in the completion of all things, because God has given an oath.  He has given an oath that His people will experience eternal life, that He will create a new heaven and a new earth, that He will remove all effects of sin, that He will take the curse and utterly destroy it.  When He destroys this creation, He will destroy all of the rebels who rebelled against Him. 

Actually, when we read the Bible, we have to recognize that everything in the Bible is rushing towards the grand conclusion of all things.  The whole purpose of the Bible is not so people can use it to find out how to live a moral life, even though it can be used in this way, but God’s purpose is to save a people for Himself.  This job is not complete until He saves them entirely, completely, not just in soul.  Salvation is of body and soul.  Perfection comes when we receive this new resurrected body. 

This is why it says in Hebrews 11:39-40, towards the end of this great chapter of faith: 

And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect. 

God’s promise is that all of His people will be “made perfect.”  For God’s own purposes, yes, there is a handful who already have new resurrected bodies; but, in general, all of God’s people will be perfected at one time.  On the day of the resurrection, the day of the rapture, everyone will receive the completion of this salvation and then they will go into Heaven.  This is what the Bible keeps leading towards.  All of history is leading towards this.  There is no other purpose.  There is no other plan for earth.  It is not so that we can build here and develop things here, but it is so that God can finish His salvation plan and finish His overall plan for this world.  This is exactly what He is going to do. 

Getting back to Luke 1:24, we read: 

And after those days his wife Elisabeth conceived, and hid herself five months… 

Is this a coincidence?  Is it a coincidence that God says in Isaiah 26:20:

Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself… 

Then in the next verse, in Isaiah 26:21, He speaks about the ground opening up: 

…the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain. 

Is it a coincidence that God tells us to hide ourselves in Him before the Great Day of the Lord comes?  Is it a coincidence that Proverbs 27:12 says: 

A prudent man foreseeth the evil [Judgment Day], and hideth himself; but the simple pass on, and are punished. 

Judgment Day is punishment for sin.  The simple are all of those who are not saved.  They do not have eyes to see.  They are not wise, and so they cannot hide themselves.  They are the ones whom we read about in Revelation 6 who respond after they can see with their physical eyes, “Hide us…for the great day of his wrath is come.” 

So there are only three references, clear and direct references, to the five months.  This one refers to an old woman, Elisabeth, who is hiding herself for five months.  What is she saying for five months?  We read in Luke 1:25: 

Thus hath the Lord dealt with me in the days wherein he looked on me, to take away my reproach among men. 

The child of God is reproached for the Gospel’s sake.  Are we not?  We are very lowly esteemed.  The world is not going to congratulate anyone who is out there warning them night and day.  The world is not going to come to you and say, “Hurray for you.  You have gone on so many tract trips and have really shown an extreme diligence in demonstrating great love for us in warning us!” 

Is anyone going to tell any child of God this?  No.  What do we find instead?  We find disdain.  They do not like this and they do not want it.  They do not want to see us standing on street corners.  They do not want to hear these things, for the most part.  They have no appreciation for this, which is fine. 

God told us exactly how this would be and this is fine.  We do not need applause.  We do not need anyone in the world to give us a cheer.  We have the Lord.  We know that there is going to shortly be an everlasting rest and tremendous blessings for all of His people who have been working so hard to get this message out; but still, the believer does bear reproach now at this time. 

When will the reproach be removed?  Let us go back to Isaiah again.  In Isaiah 25, which is the previous chapter, it says in Isaiah 25:7-8: 

And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death in victory; and the Lord JEHOVAH will wipe away tears from off all faces; and the rebuke [reproach] of his people… 

This word is also translated as “reproach.”  It continues 

…and the [reproach] of his people shall he take away from off all the earth: for JEHOVAH hath spoken it. 

The word reproach is used here in relationship to other barren women in the Old Testament, so we know that it, therefore, is an equivalent word to the New Testament word where Elisabeth, who was a barren woman, had her reproach removed. 

Keep in mind, that Elisabeth is saying this for five months.  This is how it reads.  She is not saying it once.  She is not saying it twice.  Luke 1:24 reads: 

…Elisabeth conceived, and hid herself five months, saying

It reads that she is saying for five months, “My reproach is removed.”  This is because she is representative of the believers who trusted in God’s oath, who trusted in His Word, who believed His promises. 

It really does all come down to whether or not we trust the Bible.  Do we really believe the Bible?  Do we have faith, which only God can give, in His Word the Bible, whether or not we are going to understand these things? 

So Here in Isaiah 25, it speaks of death being swallowed up in victory.  This, obviously, is the resurrection of God’s people.  It is at this point that the reproach of His people is taken away. 

Luke 1:24 reads: 

…Elisabeth…hid herself… 

Elisabeth hid herself.  Do you get this?  Elisabeth hid herself. 

We read in Proverbs 27:12 again: 

A prudent man foreseeth the evil [Judgment Day], and hideth himself… 

Elisabeth hid herself for five months, saying, “My reproach is removed.”  This is the reproach that God says is removed when death is swallowed up in victory.  This is the reproach that He says He will take away from off His people on all of the earth at one time. 

I just keep coming back to this and thinking about it because this is just an amazing thing to me.  I keep wanting to share this with others so that they can see it and understand it and be amazed and wonder at the Bible, wonder at the Word of God, wonder at how God has arranged these things so perfectly and so completely that, along with May 21 being the 17th day of the 2nd month, it is an infallible proof.  This is absolute evidence that He is going to do this. 

This leaves us with little time, from now to then.  We have these remaining days, just this time.  May God give all of us wisdom and may He gives us eyes to see so that we can use this time in a way that is glorifying to Him. 

We do know also that what God says about His people at this time is that they are going to work.  They are going to work.  They are going to take the task that God has assigned them, as “many are called, but few are chosen.”  The “few” are the elect.  We are living at “the time of harvest” and “the labourers are few.”  The laborers are God’s elect people and they are going to go forth in whatever way possible. 

Is it not something that God has made it possible for an individual to sit at home on their computer and yet be able to go to many places in the world where other people are that he could never physically go to?  Of course, there is radio and all of the other electronic media that is also going out.  The earth is “full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.”  All are going to hear and all of God’s elect will believe and be drawn to Himself. 

There are just a couple more verses to look at, which explain why God is telling us these things.  The reason is that He is a Jealous God who will not share His glory with another. 

We read in Isaiah 42:8-9: 

I am JEHOVAH: that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images. Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them. 

This is because He will not share His glory with graven images. 

We read also in Isaiah 48:3-5: 

I have declared the former things from the beginning; and they went forth out of my mouth, and I showed them; I did them suddenly, and they came to pass. Because I knew that thou art obstinate, and thy neck is an iron sinew, and thy brow brass; I have even from the beginning declared it to thee; before it came to pass I showed it thee: lest thou shouldest say, Mine idol hath done them, and my graven image, and my molten image, hath commanded them. 

In other words, “I am going to tell you so that you will know that when this happens it is not your idol that is doing this.  I am going to tell you men of the world and you evolutionists and you atheists—you who think that you need no God—I am going to tell you this so that when this day comes and you see these things come to pass, do not think that this was due to an asteroid or because of some man-made calamity.  This is from the hand of the God that you deny.  I am also going to tell you idol worshippers—you who still bow down to statues, whether of stone or of wood, decked with gold and silver—when this comes to pass, do not think that these things were because of your god.  Your god has no eyes, no ears, and no life and you have to carry him about.  Be sure to know that I am telling you in advance so that you will know that these things were done by the God of the Bible, the only God, the only true God.  And I am also going to tell you church members, I am going to tell you and your idols and your false gods and false teachings and doctrines, when this day comes, as it surely will on May 21st in 2011, do not think that this is to establish some kind of thousand-year reign of Christ.  Do not think that this has anything to do with pre-mill, post-mill, or a-mill or any other erroneous teaching.  You will know that this is from the God of the Bible, that this is from My Word, and I am telling you in advance because I will not share any glory—none—with idols.”  God will not do this. 

Isaiah 41:21-24 says: 

Produce your cause, saith JEHOVAH; bring forth your strong reasons, saith the King of Jacob. Let them bring them forth, and show us what shall happen: let them show the former things, what they be, that we may consider them, and know the latter end of them; or declare us things for to come. Show the things that are to come hereafter, that we may know that ye are gods: yea, do good, or do evil, that we may be dismayed, and behold it together. Behold, ye are of nothing, and your work of nought: an abomination is he that chooseth you. 

So God is laying this out.  “Go ahead; tell me what is coming in the future.  Tell me mankind, what is coming?  I will tell you what is coming, because I am God.” 

When people are saying that Christ does not know, they are basically declaring that God does not know something because Jesus is God.  “Even the Son does not know,” they say.  They are basically saying that the Son is like an idol and that He knows nothing.  An idol does not know a thing.  An idol does not know the day or the hour. 

God says, no.  They are making a big mistake if they are trying to compare God to an idol.  If their understanding of God—the God of Heaven and earth, the God who spoke and brought this creation into being—is the same as an idol, then God is saying that He will tell them exactly what is going to happen. 

This is what He has done and this is “for the glory of His majesty,” as He says in three places in Isaiah 2 where He is speaking of the Day of the Lord.  For example, He says in Isaiah 2:18-21: 

And the idols he shall utterly abolish. And they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of JEHOVAH, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. In that day a man shall cast his idols of silver, and his idols of gold, which they made each one for himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats; To go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for fear of JEHOVAH, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. 

This is speaking of “the glory of his majesty.”  The waters prevail and He is glorified for five months. 

Let us stop here.