Question: [In] the September 2002 Berean Call...you had to add to the Word of God...to make your ...

Question: With regard to the item on page 3 of the September 2002 Berean Call...you had to add to the Word of God...to make your point. To Daniel:9:27And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one 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.
See All... you added the words, “breaking the covenant,” and this concept is in no way found in the original text....To Daniel  8:25 you added the words “at the Second Coming,” in order to make this appear to be a prophecy concerning a future Antichrist. Here again, there is nothing in the text about the Second Coming of Christ...you had to add to the Word of God to try to make it appear plausible.

Answer: Your claim that I added to God’s Word is most serious. I would never do so. The words you say I added are in brack­ets [ ], which you surely know indicates a commentary that is not part of the quota­tion. Comments, interpretations, and observa­tions re Scripture are a normal part of teaching—not additions to God’s Word.

You say Christ confirmed a covenant with Israel for Daniel’s 70th week. What covenant? In the midst of the week He “caused the sacrifice and oblation to cease”? When did that happen? “He” in Daniel:9:27And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one 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.
See All... can only refer to the nearest previous person, “the prince that shall come” after Messiah is cut off (v. 26), whose people would “destroy the city and the sanctuary”—a prophecy of the Roman destruction of A.D. 70.  Titus could not have been the “prince that shall come” because he made no such covenant. This must refer to Antichrist. It certainly was not fulfilled by Christ during His earthly ministry. At least that is reasonable, thus I am not reading into this passage something that isn’t there.

Logically “the sacrifice and the oblation” could not be “caused to cease” had they not been resumed upon the rebuilding of the temple by the imposition (the meaning of the Hebrew) of the covenant for the 70th week. None of this has hap­pened, and certainly not during Christ’s earthly ministry. I am not “adding to the Word of God” in coming to this conclusion, but it follows as a reasonable commentary upon these scriptures.

My insertion of “at the Second Coming” was in brackets, not the way you quote me in your letter.  When did “Antiochus Epiphanes in the second century B.C.,” as you claim, “stand up against the Prince of princes [i.e., Christ]” and was “broken without hand”(Dn 8:25)? It didn’t happen. Disagree with me, if you wish, but once again I did not add to God’s Word when I simply indicated that this must be Antichrist destroyed by Christ at the Second Coming. “Without hand” is surely a reference to the “stone...cut out without hands” which destroys the image and becomes the mountain that fills the whole earth and is the kingdom established by Christ (2:34-45) at His Second Coming.  It certainly hasn’t happened yet and can only be future.