How to understand Bible prophecy (and other scriptures)

The basic idea for understanding when you read Bible prophecy is about the same way as when you read other scripture or non-fsction: read it in a”straighttforward” sense, meaning take it for what it says. The word “literal” get some people confused, because when they start in on the Bible they like to get confused to avoid the plain meaning. One good example is the word “day” in the Genesis creation account. They avoid the obvious literal meaning of the word as is obviously implied by context by pointing to other places to excuse themselves from actually believing the 6-day Creatiot

Difficulty is usually disspitated by getting understanding from the context. In the King James Bible especially, context often even makes the definition of a word clear. The closer it is in the text, the more relevant it is. Then there is the broader context. Scriptures in the book of James for example that to some appear to support salvation by works, rather support salvation by faith as seen from the context in the surrounding verses, and from the general context of the entire New Testament.

So it’s the literal meaning if it makes sense, or go by immediate context, then nearby context, then more distant” context, then excerpts from other places in the scripture that relate by meaning. Exemples of this last are the verses in Daniel 9, and Matthew 24, and in the epistles and in Revelation that line up with a ‘holy covenant’ of seven years, the latter half of which is the Tribulation period of three and a half years.