Signposts of the Last Days: Coming Events Before the End

By Bill Goodwin

SIGNPOSTS of The Last Days is not an attempt to sensationalize predicted events from prophecy implying they will happen in a particular manner. Remember that when Jesus came the first time, all but two people were looking for a different kind of Messiah than the One they got. Instead you will find the Biblical basis for twelve predicted events of the Last Days.

This book is written to review some of the available passages concerning these events that will lead to the end of the Last Days and how they relate to each other. They are arranged in the order they are expected to happen. It also is designed to relate coming events to the past times in which God has presented Himself to the world using different people.

This is your opportunity to separate the modern day scenarios seemingly written for Hollywood from what we might realistically expect should we be alive to see it all unfold. Please read them all with the understanding that there may be fewer than two individuals who get close to the actual truth this time around.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Jun 7, 2012
• ISBN: 9781449750114

Bill Goodwin

Bill Goodwin was born in Conway, Arkansas in 1951, the middle child of seven. He surrendered to the ministry in 1976 and has pastored Baptist churches in Arkansas, Tennessee and Missouri. He and his wife, Deborah Hayes Goodwin, have three children by birth and have adopted three additional daughters. Bill has a knack for making the scriptures easily understood and applicable to real life. His sermon series on Bible characters have been especially well received by many who have heard them. He earned his BA from Liberty University and his Masters Degree in Speech Communication from Arkansas State University. Bill has enjoyed 47 years in the ministry and has been called by many, “A Teaching Preacher.”

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Contents

About the Author

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

For Further Study

I want to take this space to thank some individuals without whom I could never have attempted to write this book.

First I owe more than fifty years of gratitude to my wife, Penny, who has believed in me when I have not believed in myself. She also has been forced to sit through multiple times of hearing me present this material to the numerous groups of people I have led in studies of the prophets. During all of this time, she has done so without the slightest appearance of being bored or wishing she were somewhere else.

I also wish to thank my daughters, Katrina Nash and Kim Swanson, for putting up with all the times we had groups of people visit in our home to study the Scriptures together on this and other topics. It was very rewarding a few years ago when they talked their own class at the church into having me teach a brief study on last things.

I wish to also offer my thanks to Mrs. Sharon Trollinger, a faithful member of the Kingdom Seekers class for many years. She diligently created transcribed copies of recordings made when I taught prophecy so I could have a working overview of the material as it had been presented in past group meetings.

I definitely would be remiss if I did not thank the myriad groups of laypeople and ministerial staff members from the following churches where I have been allowed to lead studies of end-time events over the years, beginning in 1972.

• Central Baptist Church of Marshall, Texas

• Immanuel Baptist Church of El Paso, Texas

• Broadmoor Baptist Church of Jackson, Mississippi

• Spring Valley Baptist Church of Dallas, Texas

• Prestonwood Baptist Church of Dallas and Plano, Texas

• Numerous home interdenominational Bible studies in these same cities

Finally, and certainly most important, I wish to give glory to the Lord Jesus Christ as the author and finisher of our faith.

About the Author

I have been advised by editing personnel that before beginning the main subject of this book I should provide anyone who considers the possibility of reading it some information about myself. Since I am not a recognized theologian or known authority on biblical prophecy, you need to know why you will receive some benefit from your investment if you choose to devote time to reading it. Obviously, I am also not a celebrity, which seems to gain a certain automatic audience when someone with those credentials either makes a public appearance or produces an article, movie, or book on whatever subject they choose.

What I am going to share in the first pages is of a personal nature, so if you do not require knowledge of my background, I recommend that you skip to the first chapter now. I don’t feel that comfortable talking about myself, and you may not have any desire to know these things either. The purpose I have in writing the following information is simply to tell you that I consider myself to be called of God as a teacher of the Bible to those to whom He leads me.

The first thing I would like to point out is that the men Jesus chose to be His disciples were a common assortment of fishermen, tax collectors, and others considered by the religious leaders as below-average fellows. God has used people throughout history that most of the world thought of as unlearned. Except for possibly the apostle Paul and the physician known as Luke, none seemed to be very well equipped to write the books of the New Testament. God appears to make a habit of taking ordinary men with ordinary skills who will submit to Him and doing extraordinary things with their lives. Let’s just hope that I am ordinary enough for the task.

I am a father of two and grandfather of four who just celebrated fifty years of marriage to my college sweetheart. We met at Baylor University during our freshman year, began dating while sophomores, and were married in the middle of our junior year. At the time I was not even a Christian, which is something I will explain in the last chapter of the book. Despite that fact, I did study for the ministry for a brief time after we were married and was able to gain some educational habits that have helped me in the years since, particularly after I became a serious student of the Bible.

A few years after graduating and entering the field of business I became acquainted with a member of the Navigators. His method of looking at Scripture and the way in which he shared it with those of us he led in Bible studies affected how I have approached this responsibility over the years. You could tell he had an intimate relationship with the Christ of the Bible.

After becoming a Christian I was asked while a member of the First Baptist Church of Longview, Texas, to teach a Bible class for a group of eighth-grade boys. I was able to intellectually prepare the lessons for weekly delivery but considered myself a miserable failure in communicating any truth to these young men. Remembering some teachers who had taught me while in college and how well they were able to get even complex ideas across to my hungry mind, I decided I was not cut out to be a Bible teacher.

My company transferred me from Longview to nearby Marshall in east Texas, and we joined a new church there called Central Baptist Church. Shortly after our relocation was complete, our new church and eight other local churches consisting of Baptists, Presbyterians, and Methodists sponsored what was called a Lay Renewal Weekend. I must admit that their method of advertisement for the event made me quite uncomfortable for some reason. A billboard in black and white with what appeared to be an inkblot representation of the face of Jesus had the words Where Will You Be and the dates of the meeting followed by a question mark.

Things became more perplexing when I returned from work one day and my wife enthusiastically announced that we would be providing temporary housing for one of the couples coming as volunteers for the weekend in question. As a relatively new Christian who felt like a loser in trying to share the Scripture with a group of great kids, I was not ready to be real close to people making the commitment they had. It especially unnerved me the first day of the event when my wife brought the couple to our small home and a lady named Sandy loudly proclaimed, with her arm raised and index finger pointed skyward, Praise the Lord! Here we are in Texas.

Bill and Sandy Baskin were from Greenville, South Carolina, and held nothing back in their love for our Lord or for the Goodwin family. As a result, I was quickly attracted by the genuineness of their faith and readily volunteered to take them to every meeting requiring their attendance, which means I was also exposed to the hundreds of other lay volunteers in the group.

This became the most important thing for both my wife and me, as we were exposed to a large group of Christians from various denominations demonstrating a much more vital relationship with Christ than we had known. It was during this weekend that I heard for the first time the fact expressed in the Bible that the Holy Spirit is available to each believer for a daily walk. It was a message not just from preachers but also delivered by people who had the same everyday cares I experienced trying to earn a living and raise a family. I told my wife while watching volunteers who spent their own money and gave of their time to come share with us that I felt as if we were actually living in the times of the New Testament church.

Since that weekend and because of intense investigation of the Scripture to see what was happening within me, I came to realize I had received the gift of the Holy Spirit when I became a believer a few years before. The reason things were now different for us was that we had learned how to yield to the control of the Holy Spirit in our Christian walk. This affected our lives with each other and our children. It also gave us a great hunger for the Bible and the opportunity to serve Jesus in any way He would lead us. In fact, the Bible itself became more than just an ancient book; it was now a living object of which I couldn’t get enough.

Some of my friends who went through this same period of time left their jobs and returned to school, becoming ministers and full-time servants of the Lord. I felt in the back of mind that this might be our future too, but Christ never seemed to lead us away from the business career in which we were involved. Every time my company moved us, the first thing we did in our new hometown was to find a Bible-believing church to join. In each situation, God allowed me to become the teacher of a class within a very short time after we got there. One particular location in Jackson, Mississippi, actually had the class members and the church asking me to teach a class on the second Sunday we visited, even before we had actually joined the church. This is not an attempt to prove my qualifications but is an example of how God prepares the way for anyone who will submit to His leading.

Because of this change in my life that began to take shape in 1971, I became involved with intense personal Bible study using available commentaries and various translations of the Bible. I also came to rely on the teachings of highly respected experts in the Bible and on the research methods I learned while a ministerial student at Baylor. However, I am convinced that the greatest influence on my growth as both a Bible student and a teacher of biblical things came from this newfound dependence on the Holy Spirit in my life that I gained in Marshall.

To give you a small glimpse of how God convinced me that I was being gifted to teach His Word, I want to share one brief experience that occurred when I was asked to be the teacher of an adult Bible class after my failed experience with the unfortunate boys in Longview.

With that personal embarrassment firmly in mind I was very reluctant to even consider a second request by church leadership to teach married adults. But I decided to let God lead me in the decision now that I had understood the influence of the Holy Spirit in my life that was available to me. One thing I had already heard during the Lay Renewal of Marshall is that it was not a good idea to test God with the Gideon fleece approach, because it was intended for a special purpose in the life of this Old Testament saint.

For those not familiar with this story from the Bible, there was a Jewish judge in the Old Testament named Gideon. I will assume most readers are familiar with the story of Joshua and the battle of Jericho where the walls fell to the ground as the result of a miraculous intervention by God on behalf of the children of Israel. This had happened just after the Jews entered the Promised Land after their exodus from Egypt.

Gideon was a ruler of the new nation some years after they had been able to take control of the land but during a time when peoples from nations that did not believe in God still lived there. One of these nations was Midian, and the children of Israel had not yet driven them out. Because God had promised them all of this land as their own, He directed them to drive the Midianites from the land. Those who question this type of action from God need to realize that God knew people who did not worship Him would be a negative influence on those whom He had called to be His people. An angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon in a vision and related God’s Word to him.

Gideon, who was not a military man, was identified by the angel as a mighty warrior and told that God was with him in this task. In the words of the angel, the success of Gideon did not depend on him but upon God, who would take responsibility of the work to be done. Gideon basically said okay and began to gather an army. One characteristic Gideon and I share, particularly in regard to the call to teach, is that we both had weak faith. Throughout most of this experience Gideon was discouraged and unsure of success. I can imagine that he probably laughed when the angel called him a mighty warrior.

In this condition he asked the angel to provide a sign from God that would prove he could do what God was asking. The angel provided him a sign to confirm the calling of God and then disappeared from his sight. In the book of Judges we are told that shortly after this sign the Spirit of the Lord came upon Gideon and he became an instrument to accomplish the purpose of God.

Even with all of this taking place, Gideon was wanting to make sure God would be with him if he followed His call to drive out the Midianites. At nightfall, he placed a piece of wool on a smooth floor that was not covered by a roof. He asked God to make only the wool wet with dew the next morning. God met his request, and the next morning the wool was wet and the ground was dry.

Gideon still was not sure for some reason, so he asked God for another sign. He placed the piece of wool out again and asked God to keep it dry while the ground became wet with dew overnight. When the morning came, God had done exactly as Gideon had requested. Gideon learned by this experience to depend on God to make him a leader from this point forward.

Fortunately, in my own case, I did not have to ask God to perform two signs, because one was enough for me. A form of putting forth a fleece I had heard required you to close your eyes and allow the Bible to fall to an open page in one hand. With the other hand you would place your index finger at a location and see if God would give you a message. I know this sounds strange and it is the only time I ever tried anything like it, but I was feeling desperate.

I began by asking God to do whatever He wanted with me but said that I felt I needed confirmation that if I were to teach these married adults, He would be in the teaching and it would come from Him and for Him. Even though He did not need me to tell Him what I was doing, I explained the process of closing my eyes, letting the Bible fall open, and placing my finger on it. Even thinking about it today makes me feel somewhat embarrassed, but I have come to realize that God is not going to ridicule you when you are honest and open with Him.

I proceeded to close my eyes while holding my Bible in front of me with my left hand supporting it in a position that would allow it to freely fall open when I relaxed the pressure of my grip on its sides. With one last brief sentence of prayer, I let go in order for God to show me His way. As I felt the book open, I took the index finger of my right hand and moved it downward until I could feel the pages of my Bible under it. For a second, I was afraid to open my eyes, mainly because I was worried someone might have walked into the room where I was sitting and was watching me. To my relief, I noticed as I opened my eyes was that I was alone in the room. And then, I looked down.

The first thing I saw was that the book the Bible had fallen open to was Job. I think everyone who knows anything about the Bible is aware of the terrible trials this man experienced as recorded on these pages. I certainly did, and I must be truthful in telling you I was prepared for some bad news. I need to point out again that the reason I was doing this was to get some word from God indicating to me whether I should teach and how to do so if He really was leading me into this calling. It was my belief that God did not need someone teaching others if they were not going to allow themselves to be led by His Spirit. I was not encouraged when Job ended up being the book to which I had been led.

As my eyes focused on the particular verse where my finger was touching the page, I was totally surprised at the words written there. These words are found in Job 27:11 ESV, as follows: I will teach you concerning the hand of God; what is with the Almighty I will not conceal.

I will be the first to admit that the verse as part of the context of the book may not be talking about someone becoming a teacher or following some call from God for the rest of his life. In fact, the way I understand it today is that God was counseling Job, who had questions about why all the bad things had been happening to him and his family. I believe God informs him that Job and anyone else needs to be willing to go to the Lord with all of life’s questions. Those who study the Bible will recognize that Jesus is referred to most of the time as Rabbi, which can be translated teacher.

What I saw personally was a promise from God that as long as I trusted Him in my teaching opportunities, He would teach me what to say and things hidden to my mind before would start to become clear. I can truthfully say since that day in 1972, He has kept this promise in ways continually amazing to me. Although I spend much time preparing to teach each lesson, more often than not I am surprised at how my teaching has reached some people at the exact time of a need in their life. As a friend of mine frequently says, It’s a God thing.

With this confidence gained in knowing I could depend on the Holy Spirit and not myself while trying to teach the Word of God to married adults, it has been my privilege to do so now for over forty years. There have been very little lapses in time when I have not been teaching. God has given me a hunger and has increased that desire to a compulsion today so that I would feel totally unnatural if I were not doing so.

It is important to me that I make this clear to anyone reading. Please do not consider what I have said as seeking to set myself apart from others who teach. I am only trying to communicate to you my skills do not include any ability to teach, since I definitely do not possess it in a natural sense. To put it more bluntly, any school system in America would immediately trash my application to teach with them despite the tremendous shortage of teachers.