by Tim LaHaye
Another popular series by LaHaye and Jenkins is The Jesus Chronicles. This four-book novel series gives readers rich first-century experiences as John, Mark, Luke, and Matthew recount thrilling accounts of the life of Jesus. Dr. LaHaye is coauthor of another fiction series, Babylon Rising. Each of the four titles in this series have debuted in the top 10 on the New York Times Best Sellers List. These are suspense thrillers with thought-provoking messages.
TEST YOUR PROPHECY IQ
Who are the only two characters in the Bible named “the son of perdition”?
Who are the only two persons in the Bible whom Satan himself is thought to possess?
See answers at the end of this section.
THE TRUTH BEHIND THE FICTION
THE PROPHECY BEHIND THE SCENES
Between the Rapture in book 1 and the Glorious Appearing in book 12, most of the Left Behind series deals with the Tribulation. Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins believe the Bible teaches that this will be a period of seven years in the future, as they explain in chapter 12 of their nonfiction work Are We Living in the End Times?
The Tribulation
Jesus warned his disciples that in the last days just prior to his second coming, “there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be” (Matthew 24:21). Our Lord was referring to a brief—but extremely traumatic—prophetic event scheduled for the future of humanity.
A Thorn by Any Other Name
The disciples were familiar with this prophesied time of anguish. Jeremiah the prophet had called it “the time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jeremiah 30:7). It will certainly be far worse than the Spanish Inquisition or even the Holocaust of Adolf Hitler in the twentieth century. Other prophets called it “the day of His wrath” or “the day of Yahweh’s wrath,” and on one occasion, Isaiah referred to it as “the day of vengeance of our God” (Isaiah 61:2). Interestingly, when Jesus quoted from Isaiah 61, he stopped reading right before he came to this phrase, because the day of grace had come; the day of vengeance was yet future. (Read Luke’s account in Luke 4:16-20.)
The prophet Daniel specified a time frame for this “day of vengeance,” as did John in the book of Revelation. Daniel 9:24-27 says it will last a “seven.” In this context, years are the subject, which indicates the Tribulation will last seven years. Verse 27 tells us that the evil prince that shall come (Antichrist) will “make a covenant” with Israel to begin that seven-year period, then break it in the middle of the seven years by desecrating the rebuilt temple in Jerusalem. John divided those same seven years into two three-and-a-half-year periods, neatly paralleling the distinction our Lord made in the Olivet discourse between “tribulation” and “great tribulation” (Matthew 24:15-21).
No one wants to think of a future period—even a short one of seven years—that will be the greatest time of suffering and terror in all of human history. While that period may be short, the judgments will seem endless to those caught in them.
One Astonishing Event after Another
No other event in the Bible, except perhaps the Second Coming itself, is mentioned more frequently than the Tribulation. It is so important that even the twelve books of the Left Behind series could not cover it all. There is no end of astonishing events from this awful period. Consider the following that are clearly described in Scripture:
1. The four horsemen of the Apocalypse (including a world war that wipes out 25 percent of the world’s population)
2. The two witnesses who have the power to stop the rain and call down fire from heaven
3. The 144,000 servants of God who preach the gospel
4. A soul harvest which no one can number
5. Unprecedented martyrdom
6. Another world war that kills one-third of the world’s remaining population
7. Uncounted assassinations and murders
8. Supernatural activities beyond description
No wonder Jesus said the Tribulation was unique from anything that has ever happened or would happen again!
Judgment and Mercy
The Tribulation is a terrifying period of seven years in which God pours out his wrath on a rebellious and unbelieving mankind. It is also “the time of Jacob’s trouble,” in which the Lord will once again deal specifically with the nation of Israel, bringing the Jewish people to faith in Jesus Christ, the Messiah they rejected almost two thousand years ago.
Yet while this period is primarily a time of wrath and judgment, it also features a very strong note of mercy and grace—a note that too often gets overlooked.
The Tribulation judgments of God serve a dual purpose: to punish hardened sinners and to move others to repentance and faith. The Tribulation will be God’s ultimate illustration of the truth found in Romans 11:22: “Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God.”
The Old Testament prophet Joel clearly saw these two aspects of God’s nature working side by side in the Tribulation. (See Joel 2:28-32.)
These verses teach that there will be a great “soul harvest” during the Tribulation. Uncounted millions of men and women and girls and boys will recognize that, although they missed the Rapture and thus will have to endure the terrors of the Tribulation, yet God is still calling them, wooing them to his side. That is why the apostle John could write:
After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands.
Revelation 7:9
These Tribulation saints could well number into the billions. And do not forget: Every one of these new believers will have been left behind after the Rapture precisely because he or she had (to that point) rejected God’s offer of salvation. Yet even then, the Lord will not give up on them!
Yes, the Tribulation is a time of fury and wrath and terrifying judgments, but it is also a time of long-suffering grace and mercy. Only God could hold both extremes in perfect balance.
And in the Tribulation, he does exactly that.
IN THE MEANTIME . . . since the Left Behind series was first published.
The four horsemen of the apocalypse refer to the first four of the seven Seal Judgments in Revelation 6. We saw the introduction of the first in Left Behind—the white horse, which represents the Antichrist, who appears as a peacemaker, depicted in the series by the character Nicolae Carpathia. In Tribulation Force we have seen the next two of the four horsemen: the red horse, representing war and bloodshed; and the black horse, representing famine and disease.
The Coming Food Crisis
In an article for the April 30, 2008, issue of the Left Behind Prophecy Newsletter (2003–2009), prophecy expert Mark Hitchcock wrote about the black horse.
In the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, Umberto Boccioni’s “The City Rises” portrays the four horsemen of the Apocalypse in a modern, urban setting. The oil painting occupies a massive six-foot-six-inch by nine-foot-ten-inch canvas. It singles out the horror of the third horse and its rider. Boccioni depicts the black horse as a tornado, spinning wildly above the other horsemen.
The rider on the black horse holds a pair of scales in his hand. This activity reveals that food is in short supply. Consuming food in carefully weighed out portions is a sign of famine (Ezekiel 4:16-17).
For the first time in my lifetime, the world is experiencing a serious global food shortage and skyrocketing food prices. The growing food crisis is front page news. Rice has hit an all-time high. Wheat prices have risen 130% just in the past year. It’s estimated that food prices will rise 50% by the end of the year. The main reasons for this crisis are the use of massive supplies of corn for biofuel and the escalating demand for food in China and India. While the U.S. appears to be immune from this crisis for now, some are predicting “perfect storm” for food shortages in many places. Could this be a faint foreshadow of what’s coming in the end times?
<
br /> According to Revelation 6:5-6, during the famine of the Tribulation period, it will take a denarius to buy a measure of wheat or three measures of barley. A denarius in the first century was a silver coin equal to the average day’s wages for a working man. . . . Food prices will be so high that it will take everything a person can earn just to buy enough food for one meal for an average person.
Wheat was the main food of the ancient world. Barley was a lesser quality grain with less nutritional value, often used to feed animals. During the future famine of the end times, people will quit buying the normal foods they have been used to and will turn to cheaper foods. By eating food of grossly inferior quality, a family of three could eat three meals a day of barley, whereas they could only eat one meal of wheat.
Someday, the world will be consumed by the rider on the black horse. The earth will writhe in the clutches of stabbing hunger. What we see today could be a foreboding sign that’s he’s getting ready to mount up.
While Mark Hitchcock suggested in this 2008 article that the U.S. “appears to be immune from this crisis for now,” and solutions could be found to prevent a global crisis, the reality is that even in the best of times famine will impact parts of the world—and provide a foretaste of the black horse.
TEST YOUR PROPEHCY IQ—ANSWERS
Judas Iscariot and the Antichrist were each called “the son of perdition” and were the only two persons in the Bible whom Satan himself is thought to possess.1 In the Left Behind series, Nicolae will not be fully possessed by Satan until the midpoint of the tribulation (The Indwelling), but that he is the Antichrist is already clear. More on the nature of Antichrist in the next book, Nicolae.
1. Are We Living in the End Times? p 272
