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It Is Written

Sabbath School 2nd Quarter 2025: Allusions, Images, Symbols: How to Study Bible Prophecy

Shawn Boonstra

Eric Flickinger

01 Some Principles of Prophecy

♪ Welcome to Sabbath School brought to you by It Is Written.

We're glad you're joining us today for a brand new quarter, looking at 13 studies, 13 opportunities to delve into a very interesting subject.

This quarter, it is Illusions, Images, Symbols, How to Study Bible Prophecy.

We are going to take an incredible journey into the prophecies of the Bible, understanding and learning how we can delve more deeply into them, make sense of them, and what a difference they make in our lives today.

Father we thank you for drawing us together and giving us an opportunity to begin this journey through the study of prophecy.

We ask that you will bless us as we do so, and we thank you in Jesus' name, Amen.

Well, this week we have the author of this quarter's Sabbath School lesson.

He is author, speaker, evangelist, pastor, former Speaker Director of this ministry, It Is Written, and the current Speaker Director of The Voice of Prophecy, Pastor Shawn Boonstra.

Obviously, they ran out of good authors at the Sabbath School Department, And so they called on me.

And it's something that we truly do need to understand.

Because there are so many different and varied interpretations of prophecy out there.

And some of it, it's almost like you lick your finger and stick it up in the wind and see which way it's blowing.

In fact, maybe it should be troubling, but there are some guidelines, some principles that we can follow that will head us in the right direction.

And that's what we're gonna be looking at this quarter.

They got down to the bottom of the barrel.

We've run out of good authors, and so, Sean, we got nobody else.

How long ago did this kind of begin to percolate?

Well, this has been percolating for 32 years.

The stuff that I put in there, for better or for worse, comes out of the brain of Boonstra, right?

But I'm a believer today because of prophecy.

And I know some people are shy, like we shouldn't study prophecy.

And it's like, well, it was the opposite for me.

Once somebody cracked a Bible with me and showed me like the book of Daniel, I suddenly ran out of excuses.

It's like, oh, there is something out there.

It was the first time I'd seen tangible evidence.

There's no actual hardcore proof of God's existence, but There's a ton of evidence, and there's no way for me to get through Daniel 2 and Daniel 7 and Daniel 8 and 9 and 11 and not say, okay, there's no human way to explain this.

The God I was taught about as a child is clearly real.

And I grew up in a home that read the Bible every night after dinner.

You know, as a teenager I ran a little wild.

But it was actually an Adventist evangelist sat down and showed me some of this stuff, and I realized, I got cold chills.

And I've had those cold chills now for 32, 33 years.

It's like, I can't get to the bottom of this.

If it's consistent, it holds up, and it's been holding up for 32 years.

So this is not just interesting information that we're going to be covering.

Oh yeah, I'm a recovering heathen, is the way I describe myself, because of this information.

And it's still to this day, I mean, I don't love getting up front and preaching I don't love making TV and radio shows because I'm basically a really shy introverted kind of guy but I'm watching that the stuff I'm watching people go through what I went through and that's satisfying.

This can't be explained any other way than there is a God.

We prefer to be more closed in rather than wide open.

But this that we're looking at here, the fact that we can believe the Bible, that there is truth that exists and that it really impacts eternity for people, we can't very well effectively keep that to ourselves.

And so I think God has a sense of humor and he says, I'm going to take some introverts and extrovert them in such a way that they just can't hold back and share this hope and this good news with many other people.

And so for 13 episodes here, 13 weeks, we're going to be doing exactly that.

I will be sitting in this chair for an entire 13 weeks.

It's gonna be a long time with Sean Boonstra here.

We are really glad that you are here, Sean.

Week number 1 is some principles of prophecy.

As we're delving into this, as we're getting into it, we want to make sure that we understand some of these principles that undergird everything that we are going to be looking at.

In Sunday's lesson, you talk about Jeremiah chapter 9.

This is clearly a passage that is important to you, is meaningful to you.

I just so happen to have my Bible open to that very text as if I knew this was coming.

Thus says the Lord, let not the wise man boast in his wisdom.

Now, that always took me back a little bit because I was 1 of those political science, political philosophy, philosophy majors, you know, would you like fries with it degree is what that is, is like you're qualified for nothing but to read books.

But let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, there's the entire Greek system of thought.

Let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, " verse 24, but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me.

Here's an infinite God, the mind behind the entire universe, inviting me to know and understand, not just know Him, understand Him, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth, for in these things I delight, declares the Lord.

Who He is, His personality, His character.

That doesn't mean that I'm going to unlock all the secrets of the universe.

I think there are some lines in this world where God says, that's not for you.

And we struggle with that as human beings.

If we're the wise man boasting in his wisdom, that's not good enough.

God says, no, but you are invited to know me.

You can't reason your way into a knowledge of God.

02 The Genesis Foundation

We are glad that you are joining us again this week as we continue our journey through a fascinating subject, how to study Bible prophecy.

We're going to continue this week In lesson number 2, looking at the Genesis foundation, how can we better understand the prophecies of the Bible later in the story by going back to the book of Genesis?

Father, we thank you for giving us an opportunity once again to learn more about you through our study of your word and specifically the prophecies in your word.

We ask that you would help us to gain a clear understanding of you and your plan for all of our lives through the book of Genesis today.

We're happy to have back with us once again this week, the author of this quarter's Sabbath school lesson, Pastor Sean Boonstra.

He is the Speaker Director of the Voice of Prophecy Ministry.

I'm surprised I got a return invitation for a second week.

Let's see if you get a third week invitation.

Let's see what I can do today to get myself disinvited.

But knowing what this quarter's lesson is about and this week especially, I think you'd better make some room in your schedule for episode number 3.

The Genesis Foundation, you refer to the book of Genesis as kind of a survey course in Sunday's lesson, kind of a Bible prophecy 101, or understanding the Bible 101.

What's the significance of the book of Genesis as we are trying to understand Bible prophecy?

Yeah, I'm completely enraptured with, even when I was a brand new believer or even pre-believer, the first 11 chapters of Genesis in particular always held my attention.

Now we've given these first 5 books, the Torah, we've given the Pentateuch Latin names, Genesis, Exodus.

The Hebrews didn't do that, they just lifted a phrase out of the first verse, in the beginning, Bereshit, in the beginning, and it's the beginning of everything.

I'm convinced that especially us Seventh-day Adventist Christians in particular, everything we teach and believe can be found in the first 11 chapters of Genesis.

It's an embryonic form, and you have to do a little bit of homework, but it is all there.

There's a lot of first mentions, and I'm a big fan of the, the rule is too, law, people say the law of first mention, that's too strict.

It's not a law, it's not a rule, it's a general principle or pattern.

The first time something shows up in the Bible, pay very careful attention because God's laying the foundation for how you should understand that concept throughout the rest of the Bible.

So, think about what's in the first 11 chapters of Genesis.

Creation, obviously, the big 1 right there.

The origin of sin and suffering, it's there.

And that's a big, big question, even for secular minds.

Why do they have to be suffering in this world?

You know, the seed of the woman shows up in Genesis chapter 3.

If you eat from that tree, you will surely die.

It's weird how God doesn't say float away to exist in the Elysium fields, but the state of the dead, health message is there.

We see God's original plan for humanity, every herb of the field.

So we know the best, the health messages there, the gift of prophecy is on display.

God communicating directly with Noah, for example.

I mean, everything, Everything that's important to believe shows up in those opening chapters of the book of Genesis, absolutely everything.

So if you can master those first 11 chapters, you're well on your way to understanding the rest of scripture and prophecy in particular.

And that's very important for us to understand today and to make sense of the many and varied interpretations that are out there to sift through them and find what's accurate, what's right.

1 thing that's very important for us to understand is God's love.

And in Mundy's lesson, you talk about God's love and how God's love is different from what maybe we understand love to be.

We've put our own somewhat twisted spin, maybe I'm speaking over myself, but a twisted spin on what love is, but God gives us a clear picture in the Bible.

What is, how do we understand the love of God?

God's character is defined by John as love, right?

God is love, that's the biggest part of who he is.

Understanding what that love is, that's a little more complicated.

What I find fascinating, it's such a big part of who God is, but it doesn't show up for 22 chapters.

The concept of love doesn't show up until we get to the story of Abraham and Isaac in Genesis chapter 22.

I think it's Genesis 22 and verse 2, is the first actual mention of love in the Old Testament.

Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love.

And when you start to dig into this story, you start to understand what God understands by love.

This has been done to death in almost every Bible study you've ever gone to.

There's actually 4, I think, but we've got eros, erotic love.

Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love.

And agape, we still sometimes, some churches will refer to the communion service as an agape feast.

And what do we find when love first shows up in Genesis?

Here's your son that you love, I'm asking you to put him on an altar.

And what I find fascinating about this is that they go to the mountains of Moriah for this.

You'll notice Isaac carries the wood for his own sacrifice.

And mountains of Moriah, that's where Golgotha, that's where Calvary is.

Thousands of years in advance, they're going to the very spot where God would put His Son on the altar.

And Jesus is introduced in the Bible, this is my beloved Son in whom I'm well pleased.

God loves His Son because He was willing to suspend everything.

God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.

What's really fascinating, you know, first mention is going to come up in this quarterly.

This is also the first mention of a lamb anywhere in the Bible.

Father, here's the wood for the fire, where is the lamb?

God provides the ram caught in the thicket.

First time lamb shows up in John's gospel is John the Baptist answering Isaac's question.

Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

This is a picture of God's self-sacrificing love, not willing to spare himself if it means saving you.

And as you mentioned, that lamb is right there.

03 Images from Marriage

♪♪ Welcome to Sabbath School brought to you by It Is Written.

And we are going to continue our study of how to study Bible prophecy.

How can we make sense of Bible prophecy in an authentic, a genuine and accurate way.

In this week, lesson number 3, we're looking at images from marriage.

What role do the images from marriage play in us rightly understanding the prophecies of the Bible?

Father, thank you for bringing us together again, and we ask that you will bless us once again, as you have in the past, with a deeper understanding of your word and your character as we study through the pages of scripture.

We thank you for hearing and answering our prayer today in Jesus' name, amen.

We're grateful once again to have with us the author of this quarter's Sabbath School lesson, Pastor Shawn Boonstra.

And throughout the Bible, you see these images of marriage, and we want to see how they can help us better understand the prophecies of the Bible.

So the metaphor of marriage in Bible prophecy, we look at marriage today, and it's not what God originally intended for it to be.

1 might use the word degraded from the original intent.

Yeah, I think that what's going on with marriage is by design.

I'm not going to pretend that life was easier in the 50s and people didn't have messed up marriages in the 30s, 40s, and 50s.

As a pastor, I've heard too many stories to believe that.

However, there does seem to be a consistent deterioration, and that should concern us because it's 1 of the biggest object lessons God has to help us understand his relationship to us.

And the very consummation of history is a marriage.

It's the new Jerusalem coming down from heaven as a bride.

And if we get removed from the experience of marriage as God designed, we're gonna have a hard time wrapping our minds around what God's intent is for us in the long haul or even in the short haul.

You know, last week we were talking about Genesis as the foundation of all things.

Marriage shows up for the first time there.

It's also anchored in Daniel and Ezekiel and Jeremiah, but Genesis is a big 1.

And there are 2 gifts that come out of Eden too.

That's been under attack in the Western world for a long time.

Even Christians are saying, Fourth Commandment, I'm good with 9, I don't know about that fourth 1.

And they actually call it a curse and a burden and an obligation.

And I'm convinced in that case, you just don't understand what it is.

It's like, I'm not trying to earn anything on the Sabbath.

I'm not trying to earn my salvation, get brownie points with God.

I stopped doing, and I'm just God's child that day.

Male and female, He created them in His image.

There is more in that sentence in Scripture than we could possibly unpack in today's show.

But I think that fallen angels have gone after marriage very deliberately because it's going to obscure the nature of our relationship with God.

Every bit as much as obscuring the Sabbath takes something away from our understanding.

So we've distorted this institution of marriage in the 21st century.

You've touched on some of the challenges that we face.

How else does that manifest itself in our misunderstanding of God and who he is and his desire for our lives.

We've already touched on the idea that marriage is in trouble.

The good news is that divorce rates in America are actually dropping.

At least that looks like good news until you realize not as many people are getting married.

And so the marriage rate is down, so naturally the divorce rate is down.

Marriage has gotten to the point where a lot of young men in particular, as I hear from them, don't see the point.

And I think what happens there, we know statistically, for example, and listen carefully, if you're in this boat, I do want you to hear me.

I just want to point out that God actually has something a little bit better.

People who live together first have a higher divorce rate than people who don't.

People who do it God's way and can find intimacy into the bonds of that permanent relationship And permanent is the operative word here.

In marriage, there's a seal, it's finished.

When Gina and I got married, we said, no matter what comes, look, life is hard.

It doesn't matter what comes, divorce never ends up on the table.

It doesn't matter if that day, and Jeanne and I fight.

If you're a young couple and you think that your marriage is in trouble because you argue with your spouse, welcome to the club.

I've been arguing with my spouse for 30 years.

But here you learn how 2 different personalities can live with each other and honor the other above self.

When God makes a covenant, he doesn't change his mind.

I will send my son, He will give his life for the world.

Write these words for they are true and faithful, God says in Revelation 21.

When you shack up first, you leave the back door open.

I can always leave if this doesn't play out.

You'll never learn what God is like if the back door is hanging open.

And everything seems to be stacked against marriages.