I've read Colson's comments on the matter. He considers the sanctity of life along with religious freedom (two of the core tenants of the Declaration) to be vital (not required, though) for the proclamation of the gospel. Something I wholly agree with.

Not really as those wouldn't constitute "the promised messiah".

I'm not saying that truth and study of Scripture are not important, I'm merely pointing out that Christ never required a fully fleshed out doctrine before coming to him. Just trust and faithfulness in his claims to be the savior we need.

Exactly, that's what I was trying to get at with my previous comment. We don't need to wait around wringing our hands wondering when God's timing is when we've been given the tools and authority to make our own decisions.

How can we take this verse and extrapolate it out to become a normative of "God's timing" for us when Jesus was clearly talking about his crucifixion here and not arbitrary events?

NO WHERE are we told to "wait and pray earnestly for some specific thing God wants us to do" before we do it. Rather, we are constantly commanded to pray, study, seek wisdom and counselors, and THEN act in righteousness TRUSTING God along the way.

This whole "God's timing" mess really just overburdens believers with unnecessary anxiety about somehow missing "God's timing" or looking for some "specific, individual, personal plan God has for our lives" which raises two important questions. If there is such a plan, why is God hiding it from us and if there is a plan, why worry about studying or making wise decisions?

Ultimately I believe this whole "God's timing" mess is really just an excuse for us to be even more narcissistic in our faith (i.e. it's all about us) rather than understand that while god DOES have plans and his plans DO include us, our free actions were pre-calculated into them and that God is FAR more concerned with our obedience to Him than he is with our worrying about things He never laid on our shoulders.