Guide to Tough Questions About the End Times

Blessings to Israel presents Discerning the Times, a program committed to encouraging you to view current events through the lens of the Bible. Now, in honor of the one and only true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, please join us for today's program.

I'm here alongside my co-host, Dr. Bruce Logan, who I will bring in shortly. But before I do, let me remind you, as I always do, that your eternal state is far more important than your current state. That means for those of us who have accepted Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, the best is yet to come, because we will spend an eternity in a perfect presence, a perfect kingdom in the presence of our almighty Lord.

But for those of you who have rejected him, you will spend eternity in the lake of fire separated from our almighty Lord. So I encourage you today, accept the gift of salvation that only comes by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. So once again, folks, I want to welcome you to the program. Now I'm going to pull in my co-host, Dr. Bruce Logan. Doc, always good to be with you. How are you doing today?

I'm doing great. And that's just a blessing to be on again. And I'm super excited about today's program because I'm a big fan of our guest today.

I've been following his work just for quite a long time now. And listen to him when I'm on the treadmill, when I'm driving him a car, and now to be able to speak with him live is just an honor. I can't wait to get into today's program.

Yeah. Amen to that. Amen to that.

Cause we have a very special guest that we are excited about and blessed to have today. I feel like I'm in the presence of royalty being in the presence of you, Dr. Logan and our guest who is Todd Hampson, a prolific author. That's not an exaggeration.

That is actually an understatement. He is a very prolific author. Todd Hampson is joining us today.

So want to bring him in. So Todd is great to have you. Thank you so much for joining us on the podcast. Oh, I'll tell you what, guys, it's an absolute honor to be here. And yeah, I got to go. I got to go get a pin and pop my head because it's all big and swollen from you guys giving me accolades. No, it's an honor to be here. I just, you know, it's an honor to serve with you guys and to reach people with this great message from scripture and to point them to the Lord through the compelling evidence of Bible prophecy. So thank you so much for having me on.

It's great to be here. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Yes. An honor to have you. So just a little bit about Todd for our audience. Todd, again, a prolific author. He is a speaker, illustrator, animation producer and the best selling author of the non-profits guide book series. He's also the co-host of the Prophecy Pros podcast alongside Jeff Kinley.

His award winning animation company, Timbuktoons, has produced content for many well-known ministry organizations, and he and his wife are the proud parents of three adult children. And they make their home in Georgia, the home of the Bulldogs. So Todd has a big smile on his face these years as the Georgia Bulldogs are cranking out all these championships in football.

So, so he's a happy man. But, but Todd, we have you just had to bring that up, right? I just had to do it. I had to rub it in the face of the Buckeyes on the last second field goal.

You just had to go there, but you won't hold it against him. No. All right. Well, we have Todd on to talk about the illustrated guide to tough questions about the end times. And definitely the three of us believe that we are living in the end times. We see things that are happening today. And what you have written, Todd, in the series alongside your co-host, your co-author and co-host of your podcast, Jeff Kinley, is something that's so vital because there are things happening today that have a lot of people scratching their heads. Even non-believers are seeking answers. And so you two have written this book again, the illustrated guide to tough questions about the end time. So very relevant, very vital to the times that we're living in. So to get us started, explain the format of the book and what inspired you and Jeff Kinley to produce it.

Yeah, that's a great question. It's basically we were through the podcast. We get a lot of Q&A, a lot of questions that come in, and a lot of the questions were similar or repeated. And it was a lot of people that had never studied Bible prophecy before were suddenly engaging with Scripture and hearing about Bible prophecy and trying to figure out what in the world is going on right now.

So in order to equip them and give them a really easy to use resource, we put this book together. And it's basically the top 100 questions that we get about the end times and it's categorized in 10 different categories. So, for example, there's 10 questions on the rapture. There's 10 questions about the signs of the times. There's 10 questions about the millennial kingdom and several other things. But it's all in chronological order. So they can literally read it cover to cover or they can just say, hey, I have questions about the rapture.

Let me dive into that chapter and they can bounce around or see if one of those questions kind of resonate. So it's really it's really designed as a resource or something. People can just read cover to cover to get a good grip, a good handle on Bible prophecy and eschatology. Yeah. And what I love about what you do, you and Jeff Kinley, is that you have it packed with charts and timelines. So, folks, it's not just the text, you know, just black and white text is very visual. And that's something that you guys just do a great job of.

Thank you. Yeah, it is. It's a full color book and it's we come up with and it's not real complex charts. We spend a lot of time. I spend a lot of time in all my books trying to make the charts simple and easy to understand with references so people can see kind of how we got there. And what I'm finding is most people are visual learners to at least to one extent or the other. And they like that added component of having some kind of informational infographics, looking artwork and stuff in there. So that really helps. That really goes a long way to helping people understand the topics in each section. Yeah, absolutely. All right, Doc, I think you have a question about the millennium.

Yeah. First of all, I just want to respond to what you just said in describing your book in regards to your charts. And one of the things I just want to maybe mention that really stands out to me is the fact that I really, really appreciate how this material is written. It's written in such a way that if you're a new Christian just really being introduced to this topic for the very first time, I mean, you could learn so much. But even if someone like myself or Brian or somebody even more astute that's really into the topic, they can also garner quite a bit from the way this material is presented. And I'm so thankful for that. It's just really incredible, this writing style.

I just love it. And these visuals, as you say, some people are visual learners. And I've always said that when you can achieve or receive information through the eye gate and the ear gate at the same time, I mean, it enhances the learning process to no end. Because basically in the Bible, that's what Jesus used oftentimes when he gave the parables. He related something that they could visualize and to make a spiritual point.

And it was just an awesome tool of learning that I really appreciate. But the question that I have is that I was looking here and it was interesting, you mentioned the charts and graphs. And I was noticing here on page 34 that you talked about three views of the millennium. Could you speak to that just for a moment for our audience?

Yeah, absolutely. We present our view in the book and it's kind of our view in terms of the timing of the rapture and the nature of the millennial kingdom. And a lot of believers have never even heard of that before. They don't even know there's a millennial kingdom. They may hear people talk about the kingdom of God and just think it's generally speaking about the church age or God saving people and his kingdom growing. And there is that overarching aspect of God's kingdom, but many people don't realize there's actually three different views about this thing called the millennial kingdom. We call it the millennial kingdom, meaning it's a thousand year kingdom. And we learn about that at the end of the book of Revelation where John says six times that it's a thousand years is the duration. But there's a difference of opinion or a difference of interpretation by smart people who disagree about the nature of that kingdom.

And so those three views are the first one is the premill view or the premillennial view. And what that means is that Jesus is going to return pre or before this future kingdom age. The Old Testament talks at length in the prophets and in the Psalms and a few other places about this future kingdom age when a descendant of David is going to be ruling from Jerusalem. So we believe that's a literal future kingdom. And again, the timeframe for that's not given in the Old Testament, but it is in the New Testament.

So I'm premill and you guys are premill. We believe that the rapture, that the return of Christ, that Jesus is going to come return to earth before this future kingdom age. And we get there by using a literal hermeneutic or literal interpretation method, meaning just like all the Old Testament prophecies were fulfilled literally, we believe all the yet future prophecies will be fulfilled literally.

So there's no reason to switch gears or change lanes, you know. But another view is, and this view is not that popular anymore, but it's the postmillennial view, meaning that Christianity is going to so grow and take over the world that it's going to usher into the kingdom. Or we're going to get so many people saved that it's going to be good enough for Jesus to come back. Right. I've heard that a lot.

I used to hear that all the time. Yeah. And that view was the prominent view or one of the most prominent views until World War I and World War II when they realized, yeah, things ain't going so well anymore, you know. Right. Right.

Right. But the biggest view, and in my opinion, it's an incorrect view, the biggest view in terms of the most Christians around the world that hold this view is what we call amillennialism, meaning, and that means no millennium. That means it's just symbolic of the church age, that everywhere in the Old Testament where it talks about this kingdom and everywhere in the New Testament where it talks about the kingdom, it's just talking about the church age when Christ rules through believers. But there's all sorts of problems with that, the biggest being they have to completely reinterpret the Old Testament and ignore large chunks of the Old Testament to get there. So while that's the most popular view, I think it's the one with the most problems.

I think the most clear view is premill that Jesus is literally coming back and there's literally going to be a kingdom age before the eternal state. Yeah. Amen. Amen. Yeah, I agree with you.

Absolutely, Todd. Another area that I want to ask you about, I think a lot of people get sort of tripped up and confused when talking about last day's events. And one of the things that causes me to almost pull out the little bit of hair that I have is I hear people talk about the end of the world, is the end of the world about to happen, and that when that happens, according to them, you know, everything just blows up or ceases to exist.

I don't know. Different people have different variations, but speak about the order of events when we're talking about where we are today and wherever you want to start. I mean, if you want to go back to the cross at Christ, but just bring us up to the order of events and how things are going to actually transpire as we go into what's going to be eternity.

Sure. Yeah, that's a great question and a common one. And to be real, there's no single verse in Scripture that clearly in one passage lays out in chronological order all the order of events. So what that causes some people to do is say, well, then how are we supposed to know? Well, certain things in Scripture are easy to understand. You know, John 3 16, a four year old child couldn't understand salvation based on that. But when it comes to the deeper things of God, it's not just Bible reading, it's Bible study. So by nature, you have to study it to work it out.

But it's not random and it's not forced. When you talk about the order of end time events, there are key reasons we believe this. And I'll just go over kind of the end time events and then kind of talk about how we get there in terms of the big brush strokes. Right now, we're in what's called the church age that began with that Pentecost when the Holy Spirit came.

Of course, before that, you know, Christ did his work on the cross. So the beginning of the church age was Pentecost and the church age will end with the rapture of the church, with the bride of Christ being taken out of here. And then after that, we believe there's necessarily a small, at least a small gap period. Some people say it's days, some people say it's weeks or months or some even think it might be years.

I tend to think it's going to be fairly brief. But there's a gap period and then the start of the tribulation period, which commences with the confirming of a covenant between the Antichrist and Israel and many other nations. Then the tribulation period is a seven year period, and we'll talk about why that is here in a little bit. Then at the end of that seven years, Christ returns to the earth with the church who's been in heaven with him to set up a future thousand year millennial kingdom. At the end of that kingdom is what we call the great white throne judgment at the unbeliever's judgment when they're raised from the dead to basically face judgment for their works.

They're not covered by God's grace because they rejected Christ, so they have to answer for their works. And then they're cast into the lake of fire. And then the Bible says God recreates a new heavens and a new earth where righteousness dwells. And it's kind of like the Garden of Eden again, where heaven and earth are back together.

And that's the eternal state where God dwells with his people in perfect harmony for all eternity. So, yeah, you can't say the end of the world is upon us because there's a whole bunch of stuff that necessarily has to happen before that. And scripture informs us about all those things, which would be insane for us to believe if it were not for the fact that God has a 100 percent track record of his prophecies coming true.

So he he gives us this built in proof of authenticity based on past prophecy to let us know we can take him at his word and we can trust him for future prophecy. Yeah. Amen.

Amen. And one of the reasons why I say it sometimes makes me almost pull my hair out is because, Todd, you and I have had conversations in the past, private conversations with ministry. And we talk about the millennial kingdom, which will be here on the earth, as you said. And so that means we have at least a minimum of a thousand years of ministry still left because there are going to be people in that during that time that will be born and they are going to need to make a decision about Jesus Christ. And so when you look at that, along with the tribulation, so we say really a thousand and seven years minimum. So, yes, that that whole thing about the world coming to an end, a lot of people just really don't understand that. And to our audience, we're going to share with you at the end of the program how you can get a copy of this book where they cover all these topics that we are discussing.

So I do encourage you to go out and get it. So, Doc, what do you have up next? Amen. Well, I noticed that oftentimes, you know, when the topic comes up, there's a lot of confusion about the difference between the rapture of the church versus the second coming. A lot of people tend to conflate the two as one and the same. But what would you describe as the difference between the rapture of the church versus the second coming of Christ?

Yeah, that's another great question and another common one that people have. And there are different views on that, which we could save maybe for we could do a whole episode on that. But we believe that the rapture and the return are two part both part of the Lord's return, but they're two separate events. And actually, it's similar to the first coming. You know, when you read the scriptures, you come in, say, Luke two, for example, you see that Simeon and Anna are awaiting the Messiah.

And there's a whole you know, obviously we celebrate Christmas at the whole big thing about the birth of Christ. And then then when you read it kind of fast forwards to the ministry and the work of Christ on the cross. So even the first coming had to two parts to his first coming, so to speak. And the second coming is similar. The rapture of the church is when we're taken to be with Christ, we're taken to be with him in the air.

And it says so we will ever be with the Lord. But then you read at the end of the Book of Revelation that we return with Christ with our wedding garments on. So there's there's some things that have transpired in heaven while the tribulation period is going on in earth. So we you the three of us hold to the pre the pre view, pre-mill view and the pre-millennial view of the rapture that the rapture happens prior to the tribulation. I'm sorry, the pre-trib view, the pre-trib view. The rapture happens prior to the tribulation.

There's also a mid-trib and a post-trib. But Scripture is abundantly clear. And I think we'll get into this as we talk that pre-trib, I think, has the most strength and is very clear in Scripture.

It's not even a question about it, in my opinion. But so so the rapture is the resurrection. We go to be with Christ and then the return of Christ, we return with him. And the purpose of his returning is to kill his enemies, so to speak, judge judge the nations and then set up the millennial kingdom. So like you said, Brian, part of our preparation now, many people don't realize this, but we're preparing for our work in the millennial kingdom. So, you know, that's exciting. All the things that God has put into our heart and all the things we've worked for in his name, he's going to use it here.

But he's also going to use it for a thousand years in the future. So that's exciting, exciting, exciting reason for us to work hard and look forward to our future. Yeah. Yeah. And that's super exciting.

It is. And that's great perspective, Todd, because one of the things I hear from people in ministry sometimes who are discouraged and they say, well, things haven't gone the way that I hope that it would. And I'm kind of disappointed. And it looks like everything is coming to an end. But I say, no, we're just getting started. Because as you said, we have we have that 1000 years in the millennial kingdom to to share Jesus Christ with with those people during that time. So.

So, yeah, that's that's great perspective. So as you said, we believe that the rapture of the church takes place before the tribulation. So that's the next thing that we're waiting for to happen.

They didn't can happen at any moment. And then the seven year tribulation transpires. You cover in the book the judgments of the tribulation. Why do you think it is important for believers to know about the judgments if we're not going to be here anyway?

I think several reasons. Well, for one thing, it's God's eternal word. So he wants God wants us to know the future. He wants us to know what's going to happen.

So if for nothing else, so we can avoid that. Those who trust Christ now can avoid all of that. But there will be this this large explosion of believers early in the tribulation period.

It's going to be important for them to know what's going on there as well. But we see through these these twenty one judgments. There's there's seven seal judgments, seven trumpets and seven bowl judgments. And then a whole bunch of stuff that happens in the middle of the tribulation period. But all of those things, even in this is what I love about God. Even in the midst of his judgment, there's part of the purpose is to extend his grace, because you see over and over again through those judgments that people are given the opportunity to respond to God all the way up until the midpoint when they accept the mark of the beast.

At that point, they're no longer redeemable. They've chosen sides. They've aligned with Satan, you know, basically, you know, pick their sides. But up until that point, God's mercy is shown. There's even a gospel angel that says in Revelation that flies around the entire world and the Greek there is like he's zipping like lightning to every tribe, every nation, every tongue, every person to make sure that everyone hears the gospel before final judgment falls. So and another reason I think it's really important for us to know as believers is because we can discern the times. We can see the tribulation era casting its shadow on us, so to speak.

We can see conditions developing that line up with some of those judgments. And also it's just it displays God's sovereignty. God is holy. God is just. He is full of mercy, full of love. But the other side of that, he also with his justice is judgment. He has to judge evil. You know, if we were to let the Hitler's of the world get a pass, there would be no there would be no you know, God wouldn't be seen as righteous or just.

There has to be some kind of justice when all is said and done. Yeah. And I love that term. You said casting its shadows already. We see so much in the tribulation. And and again to our audience, we're scratching the surface.

So we encourage you to go get the book and to dive deep into this. But when we look at things happening today, the WHO talking about all of these things coming into this whole global way of ruling and when you hear things about the digital currency and I could go on and on and on. But those things are letting us know that we're on the verge. We don't make predictions. But but as you said, those shadows are being cast already. We see it already beginning to unfold. For sure. Well, I'm I'm just enjoying this conversation to the nth degree because every one of these topics can be an episode in and of itself.

And they're really good. Brian said we're just literally just scratching the surface and I'm so grateful. But another question that I have is that I remember when I first, you know, except the Christ started going to church and I I went to a church that had a lot of young people, but it had a lot of older members and they used to give off the idea that heaven was going to be just like some eternal or some kind of eternal. Church service, like we're going to be like, oh, boy, we're out of eternity. We're just going to be having church.

And but, you know, as I began to study, I began to see that that wasn't quite lining up. And so what would you say with life is going to be like? I mean, you could speak to either or because we can speak about because you write it in your book quite a bit about information about what life is going to be back in what life is going to be like, rather, in the millennium. And also in the eternal state after the conclusion of the thousand years. So either one of those, what would life be like either in the millennium or in our when we get to the eternal state?

Yeah, sure thing. I'll hit a little bit on both. That's OK. And I've heard the same thing that that people assume heaven is going to be any perpetual church service or we're going to be fat babies with harps sitting on clouds for eternity. Both of those sound a little bit more like hell than heaven to be honest with you.

So I think, you know, God created us to be where we're created in his image. We obviously love adventure and surprises and and working. You know, one thing that's going to be that is going to be in heaven is work, but it's not going to be work with toil like we have now. Think about the thing you love to do the most.

Maybe it's fishing, maybe it's writing or playing an instrument, whatever it is that you can make a living at. God's going to have things like that for us when we work for him. It's going to be just complete enjoyment. So to answer the question directly, right now, heaven is a bit of an intermediate state. So if a believer dies right now, they go in their spirit to be immediately with the Lord and they're with him and they're they're they're loving it.

Everything's great. But even they're awaiting the rapture because that's also the resurrection. So at the rapture, we get what's what the Bible calls our glorified spiritual bodies or glorified heavenly bodies. So in other words, our current bodies couldn't even handle what we're going to experience in heaven. We would we would explode on impact, you know, but but God's going to give us bodies that can see the sights of heaven, see colors we've never seen. You know, smells smells we've never smelled that are beautiful and all this kind of stuff. He's going to prepare us for life in heaven.

Then this is kind of weird. I tell people it's kind of like Chronicles of Narnia where we return with Christ. We no longer have a sin nature. We'll be in our heavenly bodies. But those the Jewish remnant and anybody else that survived the tribulation period will enter the millennial kingdom in their natural bodies. And like you said, Brian, that's what we'll be witnessing to them will be telling their descendants who are born after them. Hey, you know, this is what the Savior did.

This is what you need to do to accept them. But we're going to be with them in their natural bodies. Then at the end of the millennial kingdom, when God creates the new heavens and the new earth, it says a new Jerusalem comes down out of heaven. Now, I believe that's probably our living spaces now where Jesus said, I go to prepare a place for you.

If they're in my father's house, there are many living spaces. If it were not so, I would have told you that kind of thing. I believe that's in the in the new Jerusalem now that comes down out of heaven. And it says once again, God will dwell with mankind, that he will be the light.

The sun will no longer be needed. If anybody wants to do a really cool exercise, read Genesis one, one and two and Revelation twenty one and twenty two, you'll see that God completely restores things to his original order in an even better form. It's amazing. So and also, I know I'm rambling a little bit, but John, when he's describing heaven, he says it was like this.

It was like that. The things that God showed him what heaven is going to be like, he couldn't even put into words. It's amazing to me that the tribulation period is from chapter six to nineteen.

The millennial kingdom is only one chapter and then heaven only has two chapters. So there's a lot of mystery there. There's a lot we don't know.

But I think we'll be exploring the universe. I think God has God is a loving heavenly father. Every loving heavenly father loves to surprise his kids with gifts that are bigger and better than they could even imagine. So I think that's what we're going to experience is just a an eternity of being surprised by God, learning more and more about his holiness.

And we we can't even imagine it's like trying to explain to an aunt how to build a 747. We can't even imagine what heaven is going to be like because we don't have that glorified spiritual body yet. But when we do, we'll we'll see it for all it's worth. And I can't wait. Yeah.

It will be anything but boring. That's for sure. Yeah, man. I mean, I just just listening to you talk, it makes me think about what I heard your your co-authors state once. He said, if that doesn't get you fired up, then your wood is too wet. That's right.

That's good. I mean, it's just thinking about the awesomeness and the greatness and a couple of things, too. I was reminded of as you were talking, my grandmother, who passed away a couple of years ago at 98 years old, godly woman, love the Lord. And she would talk about heaven. And she used to tell me of how she had a friend of hers who used to say, well, when I get to heaven, I'm just going to eat honey and float on the cloud and drink milk.

That's all she's going to do. And my grandmother used to say, what kind of what kind of an existence is that? And and I said, yeah, grandma, that's that's not the way it's going to be. And also, when you talked about having having jobs, you know, I remember I was speaking to a friend of mine and when I asked him one day, I said, well, he's a believer as well. And I said, what do you think your job is going to be in the Lord's kingdom in heaven?

And he said, what you mean? You mean you're going to have to work? And I said, well, we will have jobs, but it's not as work as we see it today. And it's hard labor, like you said, something that you enjoy. And I know myself, I love doing yard work.

I love going out and mowing my grass and then just standing back and looking at it. And I tell people, I said, I'm going to have a I think my zero turn lawnmower that I have now is great. Whatever Jesus is going to have for me, the end is going to blow that away. I don't know.

It might be a more made out of pure gold. I don't know what it's going to be like, but it's going to be something great, though. So. All right. We're going to wrap up here.

But just one other thing I want to touch on or a couple of other things. So in going forward in the eternal state. So basically, as you talk about the New Jerusalem coming down and God himself, God the father is going to come down as God, the son Jesus Christ will have already been on the earth for a thousand years. So really, heaven and earth will become as one and we will go into the eternal state. So so that's the way you see it as well. Yes, sir.

Yeah. What about for the unbeliever? Where will they spend eternity? Sadly, yeah, they'll be in the lake of fire. The Old Testament talks about Sheol or hell, which is a place of suffering. And then that there comes a point in Revelation where it says hell itself was thrown into the lake of fire. So it's one way I heard it described is it's almost like Alcatraz, where there's a prison in the middle of this big body of water. It's inescapable. They're there forever. It's not a good place to be.

So it'll be the same thing. Hell itself will be in the lake of fire. It is a place of punishment.

I've heard a lot of people cite, I think with C.S. Lewis, that if there's one doctrine I could get rid of, it's the doctrine of hell because we don't want people to go there. We don't like to talk about it, but it's necessary. And God has done everything possible to keep people from going there. It wasn't even created for people originally.

The Bible says it was created for Satan and his demons. But when people align with them and reject God, they wind up in the same place. So it's a sad state of affairs, but it's one or the other and we're eternal. So we need to choose now where we're going to go, where our eternal destiny is going to be.

And he's done everything to get us to heaven. Exactly. Exactly.

Yeah. Folks, heed the words. If you're out there and if you've not received Christ, we have an eternal eternity that is awaiting us.

It's either going to be in the presence of the Lord in his kingdom or in the lake of fire. So that's why I always encourage come to Jesus Christ at the beginning of our programs. So we're going to wrap it up. I think, Doc, you have one last question for Todd before we close things out for today. Yeah, first of all, I just want to say, when you were just talking about things in our eternal state and then when our glorified body that God, you know, we're going to surprise us with things, you know, in the universe.

And I'll just start getting goosebumps when you say that, because it just so happens that I'm like a big fan of like the Hubble telescope and this new James Webb telescope, like watching the images that come back. And I think about that all the time. I'm wondering if God is going to allow us in our eternal state, you know, to like get on the Starship Enterprise and just like warp around the galaxy and see some of these marbles up close. And I think about that all the time.

But that's not something that you can normally would teach in a class or maybe you would, but it'd be beyond what some people would really be able to comprehend. It's called that sanctified speculation. It lines up with the physical scripture, but it makes a lot of sense. It makes so much sense.

Absolutely. And if this fallen universe is that beautiful, can you imagine what the new created heavens and earth is going to look like? I don't think our human mind can even comprehend it. But real quick, I did have one final question, and it pertains to our current events that surrounded us, that we're inundated by on a daily basis. What are some of the current world events which you say are the most significant signs that could be pointing to the fact that we could be nearing the rapture of the church? Because we hear the term living in the last days. I've heard that for the past 40 years since I've been saved. But what would be some of the things that you would say that would indicate that this literally could be more than just the same, that we literally could be living in the last days?

That's a great question. And one, I'll give you a few conditions that I see. First, there's a legit fulfilled prophecy, and that's Israel becoming a nation again. Every Old Testament prophet except for Jonah prophesied that Israel would become a nation again in the last days. So Israel as a nation again, and there's so many other things related to how it came back into being that also fulfilled prophecy.

So that's the super sign. Then, aside from that, I think we have several things that are conditions, like we talked about earlier, where we see the conditions of the tribulation era casting a shadow before itself. So these aren't necessarily signs, but they're trends and forming conditions that we can watch. And one, you guys have mentioned, globalism. The fact that we're pushing for a global government and it's out in the open, that's compelling. The technology that's going to be needed for the mark of the beast at the midpoint of the tribulation.

All the pieces are here. It's just not all together under one global government or being controlled by one man yet. But literally all the technology for that to take place is in existence today.

I find that very, very compelling. From AI to blockchain technology to digital currency to you name it, all of that is pointing towards the future mark of the beast. And to me, a biggie is just all the geopolitical alignments.

And again, like you said, each of these statements could be a show on its own. But the Ezekiel 38 war that has Iran, Russia and Turkey heading up a coalition of nations that's going to come against Israel in the last days, that's forming before our eyes. Like literally just like scripture said it would. And also how the whole world is coming against Israel and there's a rise of anti-Semitism. The United Nations just recently passed a thing saying that every year they would celebrate a day in the United Nations that says the founding of Israel is a mistake and it's a bad thing. So you just can't make this stuff up because the Bible says in the last days all nations will come against Israel.

So that and so many other things, the weakening of America aligns up with in terms of geopolitical alignments. So there's so many things literally you can't keep up anymore. And all this sounds strange and maybe complex to people who haven't studied it before.

But when you do study the specific prophecies of the Bible, it's like putting on infrared goggles where you can see what's happening in the world is lining up with the Bible more and more every day. Amen. Amen. Wow. Man, that's so good. Yeah. I wish we could go on for hours and hours. This is such good stuff. Oh my goodness.

This could go on for this could go on all night. I mean, I would love it. Well, and to our listening audience, you know, there are a lot of you that if I were to make a guess, I would guess that you're probably at a church that does not talk about these type of things. I do encourage you to, to address it with your pastor.

And if the pastor is not willing himself to do it, encourage him to bring in someone like Todd Todd and Jeff Kenley with the prophecy pros, they go speaking all over the country. And, and if you're unable to bring them in to speak at the very least, pick up their books, listen to the podcast. So Todd, to close us out, share with the audience how they can follow your podcast and get a copy of this book and all the others that you authored in the, in the series. You bet.

Thank you so much. Yeah. If they just go to Todd Hampson.com, that's H a M P S O N.com. There'll be links to all of that, including links to the podcast links to all the books and that kind of thing.

So that's probably the simplest, easy way. Just go to Todd Hampson.com. All right. All right. Well, Todd, you have been a great personal friend for a number of years and the work that you're doing for the Lord's kingdom. I'm just in awe in the way God is using you.

You're doing such great things. So you've been a blessing to, to my life as a personal friend and with ministry. So I praise God for you and thank you so much for coming on. And we'll, we'll be looking to speak with you again in the very near future.

You got it. And, and, and likewise, it's an honor being y'all's friends and, and co-ministering together and just pointing people to, to God's word and to salvation found only in Christ. I thank you guys so much for your ministry. Amen. Thank you. Thank you.

Yes. All right. Well, that's going to wrap it for this week. Doc, looking forward to being back again with you next week as always. And to our listening audience, please come back and join us as we continue to discern the times by viewing life through the lens of the Bible. Until then, remember to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Bless God's great nation of Israel. And to the only wise God, be glory through Jesus Christ forever.

Amen. Thank you for tuning into Discerning the Times. Please come back and join us next week as we continue to encourage you to view current events through the lens of the Bible. Until next time, remember to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Bless God's great nation of Israel and seek first the kingdom of God. Discerning the Times is presented by Blessings to Israel.