“Now, for years, I will admit, I did not know what to believe. And to be honest, I did not much care. But recent events have changed everything for me, Jonathan. It gives me no pleasure to say it, but I must tell you that I believe Ezekiel’s prophecy is coming true before our very eyes.”
Bennett wasn’t sure how to react.
Before him sat one of the most brilliant men he had ever met, a man who had predicted Iraq’s war with Iran eighteen months before it began, a man who had predicted Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990 when nearly every other Middle East analyst said Saddam was just “saber-rattling” and trying to drive up the price of oil.
Mordechai’s understanding of the Islamic world did seem eerily prophetic, and it had earned him the top spot in the world’s most effective intelligence agency. But how was Bennett supposed to process something like this?
Mordechai pointed to the old leather Bible still in Bennett’s lap. “Please open to Yechezchiel—Ezekiel — chapter 38,” he said softly.
Bennett quickly found the page and scanned the first two verses.
“Go ahead,” said Mordechai, “start reading in English.”
Bennett did.
He had no idea what he was reading, but he continued, curious to see where the old man was taking him.
Bennett stopped for a moment and looked up for guidance, but Mordechai simply motioned for him to go on, so he kept reading.
Mordechai poured Bennett another cup of piping hot, thick Turkish coffee. He handed one across the table.
Grateful, Bennett carefully took a sip and felt the caffeine surge through his system almost immediately.
Mordechai had warned that Ezekiel’s vision was cryptic — and it was that and more. But to his surprise, Bennett was beginning to catch glimpses of meaning in the murky passages. Evidently some king named Gog was going to attack a nation “whose inhabitants have been gathered from many nations to the mountains of Israel.” That was clear enough. The number of Jews who had returned to the nation of Israel since its rebirth in 1948 was in the millions. And the text further described these people as being “at rest” and living “securely.” Bennett himself had had a hand in establishing security in Israel in recent years. When before now could Israel be described as a nation at rest?
He had to admit that he found himself increasingly intrigued by the notion that an ancient prophecy was coming true in their lifetime. Was it?
The idea seemed ludicrous on its face. But even Bennett had to admit something bizarre was unfolding around them. He set down his coffee and continued reading.
“OK, Jonathan, you may stop there,” Mordechai said finally, then set down his own coffee and looked Bennett squarely in the eyes. “I know this may be hard to accept at first, but what you just read was not the scribblings of some ancient lunatic. It was an intercept from the mind of God.”
A chill suddenly ran down Bennett’s spine.
“Almost a third of all Scripture is prophecy,” Mordechai continued, his gaze still fixed on Bennett, “and half of all the prophecies in the Bible — some five hundred of them — have already been fulfilled. The rest deal with what the Hebrew prophets called the ‘last days’—the countdown to Messiah’s return, Messiah’s reign on earth, and God’s plan to destroy the heavens and the earth and to create them anew.
“Now, notice in verse 8 that Ezekiel refers to ‘the latter years.’ And in verse 16, he says this prophecy ‘will come about in the last days.’ Whenever the Hebrew prophets wrote about the last days, they were always referring to the last days before Messiah would come to set up His kingdom on earth, or what Revelation 20 teaches us will be the millennial, or thousand-year, reign of Christ. So we know that Ezekiel 38 is what’s called an End-Times prophecy. It refers to events that will occur before the return of Christ.