Testing time for the number 40

Places where the number 40 keeps appearing in the Bible

The number 40 keeps turning up in the Bible, 157 times to be exact.  Wherever you look, Old Testament or the New Testament it is there.  And it just so happens that it is quite significant in the end as well but it is not immediately apparent.  What is quite apparent though is what the number 40 has come to mean and signify.  Before I explain the meaning and how it comes up during the time of tribulation, let’s have a look at a few places where it pops up in the Bible:

1. It rained for 40 days and 40 nights when the earth experienced its first major rain event and flood during the days of Noah.  Noah and his family were tightly tucked away in the ark and the door had been shut.¹
2. Isaac and Esau were both forty years old when they married.²
3. Moses was 40 years old when killed an Egyptian trying to help his fellow Israelites.³
4. After another 40 years had passed when Moses was 80 years old, an angel appeared in a burning bush near Mt Sinai.⁴  Moses had exiled himself for 40 years in the backside of Midian where he met his wife, Zipporah.  It was his remaining 40 years that he led Israel to the doorstep of the Promised Land.
5. Moses was on Mount Sinai for 40 days and 40 nights without eating bread and drinking water while he wrote the 10 Commandments from God.⁵
6. The Israelites wandered in the desert for 40 years before God allowed them into the Promised Land.⁶
7. Moses sent 12 spies to explore the land before they had entered and they came back 40 days later.⁷
8. Forty stripes was the maximum number allowed for anyone to be punished.⁸
9. King Saul reigned over Israel for forty years⁹ as did David and Solomon.¹⁰
10.  Jesus fasted for 40 days and 40 nights.¹¹

What does the number 40 mean?

So what does the number 40 mean?  The number forty symbolizes a period of testing, trial, or probation and we can see that that is indeed the case when we examine each one of the trials in the above cases.  Interestingly though, many people have been in quarantine when diagnosed with possible Corona Virus so as to minimise infection to others.  But the actual word “quarantine” comes from the Italian word “quarantina” which literally means 40 days.  Quarantine was “a period, originally 40 days, of detention or isolation imposed upon ships, persons, animals, or plants on arrival at a port or place, when suspected of carrying some infectious or contagious disease.”¹²  Are we being prepared for the ultimate quarantine as we approach the final days?

So we can easily see that 40 has always been an important number associated with a test or trial that we might have to undergo. What test or trial have you had to undergo lately?  God has always been testing and stretching the faith of His children who believe in Him.  A faith not tested is a faith not trusted.  “A token faith will not survive suffering”.¹³  And plenty of suffering there will be in the last days.  And the consequence is that faith will be hard to find.  Jesus himself says of that last time when he returns, “However when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”¹⁴ Our faith as Christians will be sorely tested in the last period of this age — you had better start exercising it and strengthening your faith.

A period of testing for the woman of Revelation 12

For the woman (the redeemed–believing Israel and the wise virgins in the church) in the tribulation, there will be one last further major test as she escapes to the wilderness.  One doesn’t know how long it will take the woman to get to the safe place in southern Jordan but perhaps it could be a period of 40 days.  When the beast comes up out of the abyss at the 5th trumpet judgment at the exact halfway mark of the 7 years (i.e. 1260 days after) the two witnesses will be killed immediately and the Abomination of Desolation will be standing in the holy place.¹⁵  This is the sign that the believers who are in Jerusalem and Judea at the time and who are willing, should flee to the mountains across the Jordan Valley to the other side.  But the Bible is not specific how long that will take.  I believe that those who are wise virgins will escape and those who don’t are like the foolish virgins who have not prepared by having the proverbial oil in their lamps.  They will have to suffer their fate outside.  There are then three choices:  they either fall away and take the mark;  they become the ‘elect’ of Matt. 24:22,31 who have to endure to the end and become raptured at the end of 1290 days; or they become tribulation martyrs and are seen in heaven in white robes.¹⁶.

The dragon (devil) will in fact try to swallow up the escaping woman by spewing out water like a river to overtake the woman but the earth helps the woman by swallowing the river.¹⁷  The woman will be protected for 1290 days until the end when Christ returns.¹⁸  To see this more clearly you need to look at and examine my timeline here.  This time tells of a period of testing for God’s people who are willing to escape the pursuing dragon as they escape to the shelter of the Most High.¹⁹  Think that the woman is just Israel or maybe you are unsure of who the woman really is?  See my blog, “Who is the woman of Revelation 12?“

If you have any questions or comments please leave them below in the reply section.