Daniel was not only a prophet, but as the archetypical end-times saint, he was a preeminent student of God’s Word. It was through his study of the writings of Jeremiah that he realized the captivity of the Jews in Babylon would last exactly 70 years. Daniel asked God to what end this would be. Would Israel ever be saved? If so, when? What was His purpose in bringing about salvation by linking together what seemed to be such a dramatic and ironic array of events? And, how much tribulation and persecution would have to be endured by His loyal people during the long years of those chain of events?

Daniel has been shown the vicious nature of the Antichrist and his kingdom. Having knowledge of the coming blasphemies of Antichrist, Daniel is in need of reassurance and answers to the very alarming questions which are weighing heavily on his soul. So he did the only thing he could. He prayed. He looked to God privately with prayers, fasting and an honest heart. He registered the following plea with God.

“O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, hearken and do; defer not, for thine own sake, O my God: for thy city and thy people are called by thy name.” Dan 9:19

God immediately answered Daniel’s plea in dramatic fashion when the angel Gabriel “flew” to Daniel to deliver this comforting announcement. 

“At the beginning of thy supplications the commandment came forth, and I am come to show thee; for thou art greatly beloved: therefore understand the matter, and consider the vision.” Dan 9:23   

The entire bundle of prophetic promises would take place within a bundle of “70 weeks” of years, a week of years being seven years. 

“Seventy weeks are determined upon thy people and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.“ Dan. 9.24

Gabriel began his report telling Daniel not to fret over the outcome of the battle or over the salvation of Israel. Ultimately, six crucial matters concerning the salvation of mankind would be resolved for the faithful. The kingdom of God would win out. He tells him that a predetermined amount of time had been allotted by God upon Jerusalem and the Jews for their transgression against God to come to the full and finally be finished.

Sin would then be halted and a reconciliation for their iniquity would be paid, justice would be served and they would have peace with their God. Everlasting righteousness would then be established and the visions and prophecies that Daniel had been given would all come to pass just as God promised. The verse concludes by stating that the Most Holy, or the Messiah, would be anointed as their king.

These promises – sin and transgression ending, reconciliation with God and the establishment of everlasting righteousness – speak of the work of a Savior, one that had day scheduled on a cross on a hill called “The Skull” at the outskirts of the city of God, Jerusalem. The prophet Isaiah had been shown some two hundred years earlier what the prophecies of Daniel 9:24 were promising about the Messiah and his mission.

Isaiah 53
“For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a mot out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him.
   He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief and we hid as it were our faces from him: he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
   But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
   All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter; and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation?
   For he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand.
   He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors: and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for transgressors.” Isaiah 53

Verse 24 of Daniel is an all-encompassing expression of God’s Messianic promise to the Jews and in one line offers more than a glimpse into the details of Isaiah 53. It is the same promise given to Judah in Egypt by his dying father Jacob fifteen centuries before; “The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh (Jesus) come: and unto him shall the gathering of the people be.” This is the promise of salvation, the hope of righteousness being established once and for all among God’s people; culminating in the glorious coronation of “The Holy One” which is revealed as Jesus Christ the Righteous. The work done on Calvary by Jesus will accomplish all that God has promised to the nation of Israel. By His shed blood, death is defeated, sin and transgression forgiven. His mercy covers our unrighteousness which is paid for in full by His suffering and death. The power of His resurrection has opened the door to righteousness. The veil that separated man from God has been torn so that we now have the opportunity to stand before God to make known our petitions and receive His righteous and merciful judgment.

Through this prophecy, we come to know the day is coming when Jesus will return with ten thousands of His saints to take this world and rule it as our true Savior. He shall come with a sword in His mouth and a rod in His hand. For by His word alone the mountains and the cities shall topple by His rod of iron the world will submit to his justice and perfect integrity of government. 

“And I saw heaven opened and behold a white horse: and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war.
   His eyes were as a flame of fire and on his head were many crowns: and he had a name written, that no man knew, but he himself,
   And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.
   And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.
   And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God.
   And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.” Rev. 19:11-16

All of this is told or eluded to in the promises of verse 24, which introduce this great, great prophecy of the “70 weeks“.

This Single Prophecy Spans One and a Half Thousand Years
God compresses this wide ranging prophecy of 1500 years by breaking it down into 70 units of “weeks” or groups of seventy years, within which there is a lengthy interregnum allowing for the ‘time for the gentiles’ and people outside of Israel and the Jews to brought into the heavenly kingdom of God. This formula and breakdown was also used in order to “hide” the time of Jesus’ first coming so that the wicked and perverse generation which were allowed by God to crucify Jesus would perform what was in their heart, i.e. to do away with God. As the Bible says, if they knew what they were doing they would not have crucified the Lord. God used the cryptic “weeks” as His yardstick of time for the same reason that Jesus taught in parables, so that hearing they might not hear and seeing they might not understand lest they comprehend and be converted without real repentance having taken place. Once again, it was an expression of the closing remark of the Book of Daniel, that in the end the wise will understand all these prophetic matters but the wicked shall not understand.  

The work of the Savior, forecast by the news delivered to Daniel via the heavenly messenger Gabriel, would take time, many judgments and events would have to unfold in the process. It would not happen right away, not in one generation’s time, or even, as it turned out, within a single millennium. At the end of Daniel’s writings, God tells him to seal up the book because it is for a time far off in the future. God’s plan would come to fruition only in the “fullness of time”.

God chose to tell the duration of the prophecy using the representative number 70. Broken down, 70 is 7 x 10. Seven is God’s number of perfect fullness (as in seven days to the week), and ten is His number of perfect order (as in ten digits to the decimal system), especially so in government systems. The two numbers combine to teach the end-times believer that this prophecy will be completed both in the fullness of time and in full and perfect order according to the way God has willed it. It is the expression of the promise spoken of by Paul in Ephesians 1:10, “That in the dispensation of the fullness of times He might gather together all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him.”

A “Week” as a Designation of Time is a Period of Seven Years.
Verse 25 says, “Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to 1.) restore and to build Jerusalem unto 2.) the Messiah the Prince shall be 3.) seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks (which = 62 weeks): 4.) the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.“

God begins verse 25 by advising Daniel that he should, “Know therefore and understand“. In other words, God is simply saying, I want you to realize and fully comprehend the rest of the implications of this prophecy. It is very important. Daniel is stopped from rushing to a conclusion about the time restraints on the many things in this long ranging, far reaching prophecy by ingenuously keeping the prophecies’ fulfillment open ended in terms of time.

This apparently short time span – one year and four months by our common reckoning of a year-weeks would not be enough time to have His entire plan of the age of Grace completed. Historians and scholars agree that a seven year span of time was not uncommon among the Jews to denote a period of time, akin to our use of decades, or centuries, or millennia. We must also remember that God’s purpose for the book of Daniel and the prophecy of the 70 weeks is meant primarily for end-times understanding. Since the end-times saint would have the advantage of history’s hindsight to see that a week obviously represents a period of seven years, it would give the end-times believer a clear and rock-solid understanding of the time schedule of the many prophecies. It also would make clear the distinction of the 70th, or final “week“, and how it is isolated from the other 69 weeks for a very necessary and significant reason. This is necessary for two reasons. The first being that it segregates the duration of the world-wide reign of the ultimate Antichrist as a seven year period, and second, it informs us that only during this particular period at the end will the earth be under the ultimate extensive dictatorship of Antichrist and his evil. Unlike the other 69 weeks and the interregnum periods when ‘would-be’ Antichrists would be unable to fulfill the full vision of Antichrist, at the end the ‘real’ Antichrist will have full totalitarian fascist rule over the globe. (1) 

Therefore, God is telling us through Daniel that one must follow the timing of the seventy weeks prophecy carefully if one is to understand the prophesied course of history, so as not to be enticed at any time by the antichrist conspiratorial spirit.

This means that at this time in history we may rightly regard that the first 69 weeks of the prophecy have already been fulfilled and the next events will be within the last ‘week’. We only wait for the start of the seventieth week to take place. Simple math is all that is required to see the outstanding fulfillments that came to pass exactly on time and in perfect order.

In years 69 weeks = 69 x 7 (7 years = one week), or 483 years. This increment of 69 weeks (483 years) is broken by the prophecy into two unequal parts of 7 weeks and 62 weeks. The two parts represent: first, the restoration of Jerusalem to the Jewish people and second, the advent of their long awaited Messiah. Verse 25 also discloses the exact time when they would occur.

The First Seven Weeks began with Rebuilding the Jewish Temple
The first thing; i.e. the rebuilding of Jerusalem, occurred in 445 B.C.E. when King Artaxerxes of Persia decreed that his Jewish cupbearer, Nehemiah, would be given unlimited and extensive authority to rebuild Jerusalem with Persian backing, money, and resources. It was accomplished exactly on the prophecy’s schedule when the city gates and the Temple were dedicated 7 ‘weeks’, or 49 years later. The prophecy about the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the Temple was accomplished perfectly. The detailed story of how this was accomplished, the rebuilding of the Temple, etc., even in “troublous times“, is recorded in the Biblical books of Nehemiah, Haggai and other prophets.

The Following 62 Week Period Ends with Messiah Entering Jerusalem
This brings us to the year 397 B.C.E. and the start of the second prophecy of 62 ‘weeks’ duration. This part is not as easily chronicled because of the confusion of calendars and dates between the Roman, Jewish, Greek and Babylonian systems. But if we go according to the Babylonian calendar (the “host” nation of Daniel’s prophecy), which used 360 days as its annual count, and break down the (62 weeks x 7) into its corresponding number of 434 years, and take it further down to its number of corresponding days we get an even more exact number (176,240) with which to work. Starting from the decree of Artaxerxes on April 14, 445 B.C. and counting down to the 176,240th day, we come just six days short of the day for which we can best guess was the day Rome and Pontius Pilate crucified Jesus and we know it was on the Passover and when the Passover was celebrated in 32 C.E.. Five days short of the Passover in that year is what Christians declare as Palm Sunday. This is the day the prophecy declared would be the coming of Messiah the Prince, therefore it is the exact day upon which Jesus triumphantly entered Jerusalem cheered on by throngs of enthusiastic worshipers hailing Him as the Messiah on that first “Palm Sunday”. Christ, the King was hailed as the Messiah, and six days later was “cut off’, “but not for himself’, just as the prophecy had said would happen.

 “After threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.” Dan. 9.26

The first part of verse 26 tells of Jesus (Messiah)  “being cut off” which points to His death on the cross and that He would be severed from Israel for a time. It further implies – by saying “but not for Himself” – that this rejection would be connected with a mission of unselfishness, which we know was a mission to save not only the Jews, but the Gentiles out of every nation and peoples as well.

We further deduce that the last part of vs. 26 of the prophecy refers not only to the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple which was fulfilled in 70 AD. by the Roman Emperor Titus, but that the phrase “unto the end of the war desolations are determined” also refers to the overall spiritual war that has effectually made Israel and the nation of the Jews desolate throughout the Age of Grace, or otherwise the period in God’s plan of the ages also known as the ‘Time of the Gentiles’. So the second phase of 62 weeks has already been accomplished.

Only The Last Week Remains to be Fulfilled
There is still one week left, dangling alone in prophecy, unattended to by the Jewish nation and the sufferings of the Messiah. Most notably it is a ‘separation of times’ a wide gulf in spirit, between the 69th and 70th “weeks“, for the 70th and final week addresses not the Christ, but the Antichrist and his time; The 70th Week.
It is verse 27. 

“And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week [the 70th Week]: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease. And for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.” Vs 27

The 70th Week is a separate entity, but the time between the 69th and 70th weeks is opened ended without any prophetic designation of amount of days or times in between them. It is an interregnum without specific duration given to us by God. It is a time designated by God the Father for the salvation of the lost sheep of the Gentiles. It is a time of which Jesus tells us is only known by the Father himself, not even the angels or Himself know how long it will last or when it will end. They only know as we know by way of prophecy that it will end at some designated time purely within the Father’s Will alone – but we know it will end with the second advent of His Son.

Daniel and the Book of Revelation, as well as the other prophets and things in the Gospels and Epistles tell us what and how the 70th Week shall come to pass and how it shall be concluded, but unlike the things in the 69 weeks in which we are told specific time frames, we do not know when the 70th week shall begin. We only know the sign that will begin it, and that from there on out, seven years will provide us with the fulfillment of all its prophecies and then the end will come right on schedule.

Waiting with Suspense
We are existing in a kind of state of suspended animation, a time of separation of times, generally accepted by teachers of prophecy as a “suspension” of time set aside for the full and complete salvation of any of the Gentiles who would turn to Jesus and accept His salvation. The event which triggers the start of the last week is the covenant that the Antichrist makes between Israel and many nations. It is the last seven years, the final ‘week’ of the great prophecy of Daniel 924-27, the showdown and judgment of man and his government with Christ and his people.

At this moment we wait. We are rapidly approaching its conclusion. Peter spoke of it as a period of undetermined length, a time of grace and salvation and God’s extended mercies on the rebellious souls of Man.

“But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up.” 2 Peter 3

The Final Week is Glorious
The general conception among teachers of prophecy in Evangelical circles is that the Tribulation either begins with the Rapture of the faithful believers or the initiation of a false peace by the Antichrist with Israel. While both of these may end up being true because their timing might coincide with the actual start of the Tribulation, neither of them mark the beginning of the seven year period we commonly call the Tribulation.

This period represents not just the showdown with the antichrist spirit but is the culmination of ‘God’s plan of salvation and the Messianic promise to the Jewish nation. It has been referred to by many prophets through the ages and in various ways by Jesus, Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Paul, John, Peter and the book of Revelation as well as dozens of other books of the Bible. But of all the places in which it is mentioned, Daniel verse 9:27 is the one place that definitely declares what constitutes the start of the Tribulation and how long it will last. Daniel’s vision of the 70th week is the first scripture to reveal that the Tribulation has a predetermined duration of seven years. It also declares that this seven year period will begin when the prince (Antichrist) confirms the covenant with many for one “week“. In this one verse the Lord strikes at the very heart of the Antichrist and shows us not only how he will be known but also what his mission actually is.

What is meant by “the covenant” which this “vile person” (as he is called in chapter 11) confirms with many for seven years? It seems only reasonable that it must be used in the context of the Jewish covenant of the Old Testament. Any other idea of confirming the covenant is stretching credibility. To the Jew this covenant comprises the land and promises made to the fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the covenant of the law which was given to Moses on Mt. Sinai.

Chapter 11 of Daniel refers to this covenant he made as “the holy covenant“. Dan. 11:28 This covenant must have something to do with Mosaic religion and probably something to do with the rebuilding of the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. Some sort of deal will likely be struck between hostile Arabs and Muslims that will give them a trade off for a settlement in the Palestinian problem and give the Jews their Temple, probably on the Temple Mount.

We know that the Jewish Temple must be rebuilt because much of the Antichrist’s religious activity that is of paramount importance for his ruling the world takes place and is centered around activities in the Jewish Temple. There is no other meaning that can be attached to the word ‘covenant’ which triggers the 70th Week than God’s religious sacred covenant with Israel. The point is that the Antichrist will be known beyond any shadow of doubt by his helping to reestablish Jewish religion and putting the Arab problem seemingly at rest. The Tribulation will begin that day when the agreement is inked, when this man “confirms the covenant with many“. This is the very moment of the beginning of the Tribulation, not the Rapture, not false peace, not the forming of the ten nations or the inauguration of a president over a European confederation, not tumults and wars, or pestilence – these are signs of the end, yes – (though any or all of these could happen simultaneously to the start of the Tribulation), it is the deal that is connected somehow to the “holy” covenant. We watch for this, though we watch for Christ’s appearing first and foremost. But who knows we may not have yet been Raptured before the start of the 70th Week. Only time shall tell.

The reason this point is important is that it also reveals much about the mission and spirit of the Antichrist and the subtleties of his religious deceptions. “To confirm the covenant” means he will be a religious man. He will be a champion of Jewish religion. He will sponsor the reestablishment of Jewish law and he will ordain the re-institution of sacrifice in a rebuilt and renewed temple. The confirmation of the covenant of God’s people may even take place with the dedication and ribbon cutting ceremonies of the new Temple, or it may be at the ceremony of ground breaking for the Temple.

The Tribulation is inexorably connected to the setting up of the temple and the reestablishment of Mosaic Law. Consider, “and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and oblation to cease“. For this to happen, the sacrifices and oblations of the law must be renewed. The Antichrist will be the one behind their establishment. The sacrifices and offerings for Israel will be reinstituted largely due to his efforts and influence. It will look good and godly. He will look and fit perfectly the part of a modern day David to the Jews. He will be comfortable in the temple, sure and mighty in war, clever in diplomacy, and apparently have the anointing of God resting on his charismatic and yet humble head. The reason the Antichrist must establish the temple and reinstate the law and sacrifices is because his mission is to set himself up as God, “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; Who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God. ” That’s what Paul warned in his letter to the church of Thessalonica.

To do this the Antichrist must be in Jerusalem, sitting upon God’s own throne. This is the act that is so abominable that it makes everything desolate. Christians speak of the time when the Holy Ghost will be driven out of the earth and no longer convict men of sin. This is the moment in the midst of the week (Tribulation) by which things become desolate, because of this incredible blasphemy of making himself God. This is the same abomination of desolation that Jesus spoke of and urged that everyone should run for the hills when they hear it has happened. The 70th week is coming upon us, but God wants the end-times saint to know that the Rapture is also coming and, as He promised to the faithful believers in Philadelphia, we can be kept from this terrible hour if will we heed His warnings and walk according to His ways.

This is why it is appropriate to cry out – Come Soon, Lord Jesus – Come Soon!