The Future History of the Church

Stumbled across this over the past week, and thought I'd share it with you all. Every now and then, I read something that screams "Amen" on the inside of me, and I feel like I would have written it, if only I had the articulation of the author. Hell's Best Kept Secret by Ray Comfort, and Spirit of Truth by Art Katz, are two notable examples of this.Also it touches on a variety of issues that we have dealt with lately. It is pretty long, so I'll post in installments, as the Holy Spirit directs.Enjoy.*Edit* I must warn that this may mess with some heads a bit, but please bare with me, this is going somewhere beatuiful.:-)

The Future History of the Churchby James Jacob PraschEveryone wants to know the future. For this reason, people will go to fortune-tellers, the occult, and all kinds of other sources to try to discover it. Jesus, however, told us the future. Before I was a believer, I used to go to a witch who read my tarot cards; she was quite skilled at it, and one day she saw in the cards that I was going to become a follower of Jesus. When she saw it, she began saying "Don't come back and burn me when this happens; it's going to happen, but don't come back and burn me". She was quite accurate. The occult can often be very accurate in its predictions of the future. However, Deuteronomy 18 says that 'quite accurate' is not good enough; a true prophet must be exactly right every time. I see many people today who claim to be prophets and build prophetic ministries around themselves, yet they make outlandish predictions that fail to happen. When this occurs, people defend the false prophet by saying that he is 'usually right'. That may be so, but the witch in New Jersey who used to read my tarot cards was also usually right. Deuteronomy 18 is very clear: if you speak a word in the name of the Lord, it had better happen or you are a false prophet. This is dangerous; people are better off keeping these 'prophecies' in their mouths rather than speaking them when they're not of God. We should never suppress the Holy Spirit, but if a word is truly from the Holy Spirit it will surely happen. There was an occasion where I witnessed a true prophet: About 40 people were in a room in Mount Carmel, Israel, with this man who came from the Soviet Union (as it was called then). There were no diplomatic relations or direct air flights between Israel and the Soviet Union in those days; he had to fly via Europe. He flew into Tel Aviv, where someone picked him up at Ben Gurion Airport and brought him up to Galilee. He began speaking in English, making prophesies and predictions. When I heard what he was saying, I decided that either this man was a true prophet or not only was he a false prophet, but he was also out of his mind. This gentleman wrote a book, and in it he told of taking the Lord's Supper in Red Square. He said that the Lord told them to throw the communion cup into the Moscow River, after which they stood in Red Square and predicted that God would do to the Soviet Empire what He did to Egypt, because their government was persecuting the church and refusing to allow Jews to immigrate to Israel; they proclaimed "'Let My people go', and 'Let My Gospel be preached', or God will destroy your empire. We proclaim a curse on your land - God is going to curse your land." Immediately after that, Chernobyl happened, and they had the worst harvest of all the bad harvests they'd had. These Christians also said, "God is going to destroy the Soviet war machine"; right after that, the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan and the Warsaw Pact collapsed. Next these believers turned around to face the Tomb of Lenin, in which Lenin was kept permanently embalmed and on display, and they said "This is the spirit of death; God is going to destroy the spirit of Lenin-worship." There were about eleven factories in the Soviet Union that manufactured nothing but statues and busts of Lenin; every one of them closed, and on the evening news we saw all these busts and statues with their heads cut off. The believers then turned around to the Kremlin and said, "God is going to destroy your empire; the Soviet Union will collapse, and no one will be able to believe how fast God will judge it. 'Let My people go, and let My Gospel be preached'!" To say these things in 1984 or 1985 would have been unfathomable, totally unthinkable. You would either have to really be hearing from God or crazy. These were outrageous things to say, but they all happened. I have never met that brother since, and I never even read his book, but I know what he said and I saw it happen right in front of me. After that I came to Britain to go to Bible College, and I saw some people from Kansas City and California, calling themselves the Kansas City Prophets and the Vineyard. They came before tens of thousands of people and predicted a great revival and a great Latter-Day Rain was going to come to the United Kingdom in October of 1990. In the years since the 'great revival', more mosques have been built in England than churches. Deuteronomy 18 says that a false prophet is a neve sheqer; we don't stone them to death any more, but the sin is no less serious. Jeremiah 5 and 28 make it very clear what false prophets are, and Jesus said they would come during the Last Days. One of the biggest mistakes born-again Christians make is this: when we read the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24 and Luke 21, where Jesus repeats Himself four times regarding false teachers and false prophets in the Last Days, most of us automatically say, "That's the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Moonies, the Mormons, the Hare Krishnas, Christian Science, etc." While there is no doubt that these people are false prophets and false teachers, and also no doubt that the proliferation of these cults over the past 100 years is in itself a sign of the Last Days and certainly emblematic of the time we live in, if you read the context of Matthew 24, Luke 21, Acts 20, and Matthew 7, those were not the false prophets and false teachers that Jesus and the Apostles were warning about. The ones they warned about are the ones that deceive the elect. The unsaved are already deceived by the devil; he is out to deceive two kinds of people: the nation of Israel and the Bible-believing church. The nation of Israel is under a spiritual darkness. We see their signs in many places, including Jerusalem, Stamford Hill in London and Crown Heights in Brooklyn, saying "We want the Mashiach now!" Jesus gave a double prediction in John's Gospel that the Jews would believe another who came in His name, though they did not believe Him. This was fulfilled in the early church's time by Simon bar Kochba, but it is certainly also a symbol of the Antichrist, who will deceive the Jewish people into thinking that he is their Messiah. The Jews are being set up for this. So we see that the devil has the world deceived and the Jews deceived; who is he out to deceive now? You and me. Read Matthew 7, Acts 20, Matthew 24, and Luke 21. The false teachers and false prophets that we are warned about in these passages are the ones who get into the church to deceive the elect. I am very concerned about cults such as the Mormons and the Jehovah's Witnesses, because if born-again Christians were as zealous for the truth as the cults are for their lies, a lot more people would be getting saved rather than joining these cults. The fact that they are so zealous for a lie while the Bible-believing church sits around is in character with the church of Laodicea. It shows what has become of the church in the West. Nonetheless, very few Christians get sucked into the Mormons or Jehovah's Witnesses. If you see a Christian who does, he is either a brand-new believer whom they sheep-napped, or he is a very weak, awkward believer to begin with. Those are not the false prophets with whom we must be primarily concerned, though we are responsible to warn the unsaved about them. The ones we have to worry about are the ones coming into the church. Spiritual deception increases in the Last Days. (To be continued...)

There is a Biblical principle understood from a Jewish perspective called Qol veh Homer, which in English means 'light to heavy'. It is the first of the Migdoth of Rabbi Hillel, who was Rabbi Gamaliel's grandfather. Rabbi Gamaliel was tutor to the Apostle Paul when Paul became a rabbi. Rabbi Hillel had seven Migdoth, or principles, of interpreting Scripture. The New Testament uses these repeatedly. Ool veh Homer, or light to heavy, is again the first of these. One example of it is in Hebrews 10:25: ". . . not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching." Something that is true in a light situation becomes especially true in a heavy situation. In this passage we are dealing specifically with the subject of fellowship: fellowship is always important, but in the Last Days it becomes especially important. If we cannot stand together, we'll never be able to stand-alone when persecution comes. Another example of 'light to heavy' concerning the Last Days is false prophets and teachers. They've always been around - that's the 'light'; but in the Last Days, they multiply - that's the 'heavy'. Things that are always true become especially true in the Last Days, and things that are always dangerous to the church become even more so during the Last Days. Jewish people in the time of Jesus did not interpret Scripture the way we do. Jesus was a rabbi who taught the same way other rabbis did; He used Midrash. He also used something called the mashla and the nimshal format. The mashal is a description of something from everyday life, from nature, and the nimshal is the spiritual meaning in back of it. The book of Proverbs is called in Hebrew Mishla, the book of mashlas. For example, Proverbs 11:22: "As a ring of gold in a swine's snout," - that is the mashla - " so is a lovely woman who lacks discretion." - that is the nimshla. A parable is simply an elongated mashla. Our Western concepts of allegory and typology are basically Western repackaging. We need to understand the way Jews thought about the Bible, because in Daniel 12:9 it says this: "Seal these things up until the time of the end." When you see people who write books about Revelation and claim to have it all figured out, be careful. We're told directly in Daniel that these things are sealed. There is no new truth, and no new revelation; however, in the Last Days the Holy Spirit will give understanding to God's people regarding the deeper things of Scripture. We will have no new doctrine, no new truth, and no new revelation, but we will have a deeper and clearer understanding of what is already in Scripture. What liberals do is try to interpret the Bible out of its Sitz im leben, its cultural context. Evangelicals do the same thing, because we use Greek methods of hermeneutics and exegesis to try to understand a Jewish book. There is a lot more that could be said about this subject, but concerning the Last Days I'll simply give you the most important aspect: Western Protestant exegesis interprets prophecy in one of four different ways: Preterism, Historicism, Polemicism, or Futurism. Liberals love preterism; they say, "There is no God, and even if there was He wouldn't know the future, and even if He did He certainly wouldn't tell Isaiah." Therefore, in their minds when Isaiah predicts events concerning King Cyrus 200 years before their occurrence, it proves automatically - prima fasci - that Isaiah actually wrote it after the fact, or rather that the book of Isaiah was not written by Isaiah but by someone after the Captivity. Their basis for this is that Isaiah could not possibly have known about King Cyrus 200 years ahead of time. This is an ex-Vaticina interpolation, if you like theological terms. Liberals cannot believe in a supernatural knowledge of the future, so they embrace Preterism. The second, Historicism, is what Kingdom-Now people prefer. The Reformers were also greatly inclined toward this view. Historicism says, "The eschatological prophecies of the New Testament were completely fulfilled in the early church." The early church identified Rome with Babylon; when Peter closes his first epistle he says, "She who is in Babylon greets you." False religion begins in Babylon with Nimrod, finds its way through Asia Minor (particularly the city of Pergamum), and from there, into Greco-Roman civilization. From there it comes into things such as Roman Catholicism, Freemasonry, etc.; however, the root of it all is in Babylon: the false religious system of the world in confederation with the corrupt political system. The Babylonians destroyed the first Temple on Tisha ba'v, roughly the 9th of August on the Hebrew calendar. Under what were nearly identical military circumstances, Rome destroyed the second Temple on the same date, Tisha ba'v. Therefore the early Christians began identifying Rome with Babylon; it is the same false religion. The example I generally use to explain this is Scotland Yard. Scotland Yard is the name of an alleyway between two buildings running from Whitehall to Victoria Embankment in London; it was the original headquarters of the metropolitan police. Now, unlike in the days of Sherlock Holmes, the metropolitan police are located a half-mile away on Victoria St. However, their headquarters is still called Scotland Yard, although it is no longer located on that little street off of Whitehall. In other words, the name of the institution has taken the name of its original location. With Babylon it is the same idea. Therefore, in the book of Revelation, when the early church saw the woman on seven hills, representing the Capitolina, since the woman is a city, it would have been Rome to them. Therefore, when Rome burned under Nero, it fulfilled the prophecies of Isaiah and Jeremiah that predicted the fall of Babylon. This is the way the early Christians thought. When Mount Vesuvius exploded, volcanic ash accumulated in the ionosphere and the upper stratosphere, thus preventing solar and lunar radiation from giving their light over much of the Roman Empire. This actually does happen; I believe the last time it happened was in Iceland during the 1960's. Next, in roughly 70 AD, the Temple is destroyed and the Romans set up pagan images and worshiped them on the Temple Mount; the Christians of the day believed that was the Abomination of Desolations, ha shikutz ha meshomen. Thus these things have been fulfilled; that view is called Historicism. The Protestant Reformers loved Historicism, because they said that it was the Roman Empire, Imperial Rome, which stopped the medieval papacy from blossoming. After Constantine moved his capitol to Constantinople and the Visigoths moved in, then Rome blossomed. When Scripture says that 'He who restrains them will be taken out of the way', they interpreted that as Imperial Rome restraining Papal Rome and then being taken out of the way. This is why the Kingdom-Now proponents say that the 'Last Days' only refers to the events leading up to 70 AD, usually denying any future meaning to the book of Revelation and so on. The third way of interpreting prophecy is Polemicism. Polemicism says: "The book of Revelation is only given to encourage Christians during times of persecution. It reminds them of the glory to come and the judgment of their persecutors, and is thus designed to encourage them. This is a true point: Revelation opens by stating that there is a blessing on anyone who reads it, and apocalyptic literature will certainly always encourage a persecuted church. That is part of its purpose, but not in entirety. The fourth method of interpreting prophecy is Futurism, which states that these things are going to happen in the Last Days. To a Western Gentile mind, using Protestant hermeneutics which are Hellenistic in orientation for reasons I cannot go into here, one of these four methods is the true one. The question is concerning which one you support: are you a Preterist, a Historicist, a Polemicist, or a Futurist? A Jew in the first century, however, would have been all four simultaneously, as Jesus was Himself. In Matthew 24:15-33 Jesus says that when you see the Abomination of Desolations spoken of by the prophet Daniel, then you will know the End is near. The problem is that the Abomination of Desolations spoken of by Jesus in Matthew 24 and in Luke 21, the Olivet Discourse had already happened before He mentioned it. Jesus celebrated Hanukah in John 10, the Feast of Dedication. He knew all about Antiochus Epiphanes setting up the image in the Temple, the pigs being slaughtered in the Temple, and the Temple being reconsecrated by the Maccabees. The Abomination of Desolations prophesied by Daniel had already happened during the intertestamental period, but Jesus took that event and prophesied that it would happen again. Jesus used Preterism: He took a past event and spoke about it in the future tense. Then there is Historicism: Once again, look at the Abomination of Desolations as prophesied by Jesus in the Olivet Discourse. When you read Josephus and discover how the Romans destroyed the Temple and set up pagan ensigns on the Temple Mount and worshiped them, you see that it was an Abomination of Desolations. Then, in the second century, the Emperor Hadrian built a city called the Aerolinas Capitolina, putting a temple of Jupiter on the Temple Mount. Yet another Abomination of Desolations. Julian the Apostate, the nephew of Constantine who tried to re-paganize the Roman Empire, tried to rebuild the Temple, and all these mysterious fires broke out on the Temple Mount; another Abomination of Desolations. Today on the Temple Mount, we have the Mosque of Omar, the Dome of the Rock. On the outside of it, around its periphery, is inscribed a quotation from a surah in the Koran, which is translated: "God has no son". That is still another Abomination of Desolations. Yet there is still an Abomination of Desolations to come. All of these preceding ones typify the one that is coming. The point is this: Western ideas of prophecy involve prediction and fulfillment. The Hebrew idea of prophecy is a pattern that is recapitulated; multiple fulfillments with one ultimate fulfillment - that is how Jewish prophecy was understood. Each of the multiple fulfillments is a type of and teaches something about the ultimate one. (to be continued...)

Aaron, good night!Much to think on here, but goodness, first impressions...Every now and then, I read something that screams "Amen" on the inside of me,Amen and amen!I see many people today who claim to be prophets and build prophetic ministries around themselves, yet they make outlandish predictions that fail to happen. When this occurs, people defend the false prophet by saying that he is 'usually right'. That may be so, but the witch in New Jersey who used to read my tarot cards was also usually right. Deuteronomy 18 is very clear: if you speak a word in the name of the Lord, it had better happen or you are a false prophet. This is dangerous; people are better off keeping these 'prophecies' in their mouths rather than speaking them when they're not of God. We should never suppress the Holy Spirit, but if a word is truly from the Holy Spirit it will surely happen.Bullseye.There is no new truth, and no new revelation; however, in the Last Days the Holy Spirit will give understanding to God's people regarding the deeper things of Scripture. We will have no new doctrine, no new truth, and no new revelation, but we will have a deeper and clearer understanding of what is already in Scripture. What liberals do is try to interpret the Bible out of its Sitz im leben, its cultural context. Evangelicals do the same thing, because we use Greek methods of hermeneutics and exegesis to try to understand a Jewish book. There is a lot more that could be said about this subject, but concerning the Last Days I'll simply give you the most important aspect: Liberals love preterism; they say, "There is no God, and even if there was He wouldn't know the future, and even if He did He certainly wouldn't tell Isaiah." Have just written out a whole bit after reading Romans this morning, regarding "What an Honest Atheist Believes", bit unsure what to do with it, the last couple of days being almost a taste of being left alone to wander, not overtly or 'in sin' but recognizing that it is walking in the flesh, detached somewhat..."choose", to trust and wait or to depend on my 'own' worthless resources.Sorry for the digression here...The point is this: Western ideas of prophecy involve prediction and fulfillment. The Hebrew idea of prophecy is a pattern that is recapitulated; multiple fulfillments with one ultimate fulfillment - that is how Jewish prophecy was understood. Each of the multiple fulfillments is a type of and teaches something about the ultimate one. One of the biggest mistakes born-again Christians make is this: when we read the Olivet Discourse in Matthew 24 and Luke 21, where Jesus repeats Himself four times regarding false teachers and false prophets in the Last Days, most of us automatically say, "That's the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Moonies, the Mormons, the Hare Krishnas, Christian Science, etc." While there is no doubt that these people are false prophets and false teachers, and also no doubt that the proliferation of these cults over the past 100 years is in itself a sign of the Last Days and certainly emblematic of the time we live in, if you read the context of Matthew 24, Luke 21, Acts 20, and Matthew 7, those were not the false prophets and false teachers that Jesus and the Apostles were warning about. The ones they warned about are the ones that deceive the elect."within your own ranks" the seeming implication, the former being just to obvious.Also from 'light to heavy' and especially this:A Jew in the first century, however, would have been all four simultaneously, as Jesus was Himself. This is likely an expression of what I haven't been able to get my mind wrapped around all the way. This seriously confirms my truest suspicion....just to hear it...This is just phenomenal Aaron, easily could have ended up reprinting the whole thing in outtakes. Forgive my interruption, but going back to those same first thought's;Every now and then, I read something that screams "Amen" on the inside of mewow...

James Prasch wrote:Yet there is still an Abomination of Desolations to come. All of these preceding ones typify the one that is coming. The point is this: Western ideas of prophecy involve prediction and fulfillment. The Hebrew idea of prophecy is a pattern that is recapitulated; multiple fulfillments with one ultimate fulfillment - that is how Jewish prophecy was understood. Each of the multiple fulfillments is a type of and teaches something about the ultimate one"The Hebrew idea of prophecy is a pattern that is recaptiulated; multiple fulfillments with one ultimate fulfillments-that is how Jewish prophecy was understood." I believe this to be a very accurate statement of the underlying precepts of Scripture. Thankyou Aaron for finding this article. I look forward and backward into reading the entire article as you post it. In ChristJeff

If anyone is wondering why I am posting this, and why in parts, and what has this got to do this Greg's intentions for this site, I thought I'd answer these questions.I'm incredibly humbled by people who somehow, intrinsically have a handle of God, that He protects them from deception (I'm married to one:-)), when people like me, need to be constantly vigilant in the pursuit of God, just to keep our heads above water. I came here around 14 monthes ago, totally dejected, and ready to give up on God. Like many, I downloaded some sermons, and read a few sermons, and then was stung by the urge to comment. I'd been a christian, who was saved right as the "(un)holy laughter" thing was in flight, and swallowed up every deceptive thing that came along, until some glaring fault appeared, which would make me question (like Paul Schell inviting the Serbian Orthodox Bishop to his conference, beacuse his line of apolostolic succession was from St. Thomas, who put his hand into the side of Christ, thereby midwifing the birth of the church).I put up with Rodney, Kenneth(s), Jesse, Rick, Ruckins, etc, etc, exusing their "minor problems" by explaining them away as being misunderstood, or mispronounced. I'd run to get words from "prophets" (even was a false prophet myself), but was becoming more and more disatisfied with all the unfullfilled "words", the inconsistant lifestyles, and the ignorance of "difficult" passages.Even my early days here began with my asking "What do you think about (insert dodgy preacher here)?", in order to run to there defence, by saying, "Oh, their not that bad, if you look at it like..." Now 14 months later, I've become the kind of guy who I would have avoided 14 monthes ago.What does this have to do with the above questions? Well essentially, I came here looking for revival, expecting stuff about prayer, fasting, repentance, and "hell-fire" preaching, but what I got was, church history, grace, and Israel. I came here looking for Ravenhill, Tzoer and Wilkerson, and ended up getting Orr, Katz, and Daniel. Yeah, there was alot of the former stuff as well, but the later stuff led me to a brokeness that made me pray, fast, repent, and preach uncompromisingly. But above all, it led to brokeness.What I offer you brethren (and sistren:-P) is my journey in one article. This journey is leading to my revival. Granted, I'm only yawning so far, but that is alot better than snoring. Why in parts? Because its LONG. In my experience, long articles tend to get overlooked for short ones, and even then, only the last couple of posts are read (or am I the only one who does that:oops:). It may take months to get the whole thing up, but I'd rather know that people get at least part of this, because it'll change the way you distinguish all the camps that we've divided ourselves into, and will help us to appreciate the fact that we're in the end times (without categorically defining the meaning of this).In Finney's day, revival was stopped over the prefered meathod of baptism. Finney's answer to this was to get the Prespytarians and the Baptists together, and give both meathods a fair hearing. I have know idea what he actually preached (there's a challenge for you RobertW;-)), but I personally believe that he emphasised the meaning over the meathod, the being the leaving of the old life behind (but being that he was Prespytarian, I could be wrong). We've had so much speculation about Roman Catholics, the Antichrist, the Rapture, Prophets and Prophecy lately and everyone has their opinions (myself included). What I offer, is a guy who's giving a map to figuring it all out as it's happening, as opposed to speculating what will happen. Rather that saying, this the right viewpoint, he's saying, "Their all right, but not all the time."Anyway, just thought I'd put in my 2 cents. Already had criticsm when I sent Part 1 (original comes in 2 parts) to my mailing list, so I know that this needs to be examined, and what better place than here.

Let me continue with another example: When Matthew writes his Nativity narrative he says of Jesus, "Out of Egypt I have called My Son," (Matt. 2:15) quoting from Hosea chapter 11:1. The problem with this is that when you read Hosea chapter 11, you find that Hosea was talking about the Exodus, when the children of Israel came out of Egypt under the leadership of Moses. Yet Matthew takes this, seemingly out of all context, and applies it to Jesus. However, the problem is not that Matthew took it out of context, but that the Western church has taken a Jewish book and constructed its own rules of context. Matthew thought midrashically; he thought of prophecy as pattern. Let me explain: It begins with Abraham. God judged Pharaoh, and Abraham came out of Egypt along with his descendants in Genesis; Abraham is the archetype, the father of all who believe. Then, in Exodus, God again judges Pharaoh - the wicked king gets judged - and once again Abraham's descendants come out of Egypt. Thus the pattern begins; what happened to Israel replayed what happened first to Abraham. Just as Abraham received money from Pharaoh, so the Israelites plundered the Egyptians in Exodus. Next, Jesus comes out of Egypt, after once again the wicked king - Herod this time - is judged. Midrashically, Israel alludes to Jesus. When you see things in Scripture such as "Israel My glory, Israel My first-born son", it is a midrashic allusion to the Messiah, as even the rabbis know. Therefore, Jesus, the embodiment of Israel, also comes out of Egypt. Just as the church is the Body of Christ, so is Israel in some sense. Then, in I Corinthians 10, we come out of Egypt ourselves! Egypt is a figure of this world; Pharaoh is a figure of the devil, who is the god of this world. And just as Moses goes onto the mountain and makes a covenant with blood on behalf of the people, so does Jesus. Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt, through the water, and into the Promised Land. Jesus leads us out of the world, through baptism, and into Heaven. One is a type of the other; we all have an Exodus experience. But the ultimate meaning is the resurrection and rapture of the church: the same judgments that take place in the book of Exodus are replayed in the book of Revelation. In the same way that Pharaoh's magicians were able to counterfeit the miracles of Moses and Aaron, the Antichrist and his False Prophet will be able to counterfeit the miracles of Jesus and His witnesses. Why is the song of Miriam ('I will sing unto the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously - the horse and the rider are thrown into the sea!") - sung in Revelation? The book of Exodus shows us that the destruction of Pharaoh was a typology of the destruction of the devil. Why did the Israelites bring Joseph's bones with them out of Egypt, at the front of the procession? As the scriptures tell us in I Thessalonians 4:16, 17, "the dead in Christ will rise first", and we will shall come out together. Once again, the Hebrew idea of prophecy is that of a pattern being recapitulated. It is not a prediction, but a pattern with an ultimate fulfillment. That is the Hebrew concept of eschatological prophecy. In order to really begin to understand what the Bible teaches about the Last Days, we have to stop thinking with a Western, Gentile, Hellenistic mind and begin thinking of the Scriptures in the way the early church did. Remember that in Revelation 2 and 3, the church of Ephesus had a lamp stand that the other churches did not have; 'Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path," Ps. 119:105. The virgins needed oil in their lamps in order to see in the night - we'll come back to that. In the Last Days, understanding and faithfulness become very important. Remember that the wise virgins of Matthew 25 had the oil in their lamps so that they could see in the night, representing the illumination of the Holy Spirit in our understanding of Scripture. Laodicea needed salve with which to anoint the people's eyes, so that they could see. Understanding of Scripture is going to be very closely associated to faithfulness in the Last Days. It says in Daniel that none of the wicked will understand. Now, it is very easy for God to take somebody who has a pure heart and an empty head, and give that person wisdom. However, it is much more difficult for Him to take somebody with a big head and a big intellect and give him a pure heart. Spirit and Truth; God wants us to have both. Simple people are much more likely to get saved than are sophisticated people; but after they do get saved, those simple people are not supposed to stay that way. (to be continued...)

Now, with these things in view, let us look at Matthew chapter 10, beginning in verse 1: "And when He had called His twelve disciples to Him, He gave them power over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease. Now the names of the twelve apostles are these: first, Simon who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James the son of Alphaeus, and Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus; Simon the Cananite, and Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed Him." Do you know what 'Judas Iscariot' really means? - Jude the Suburbanite. Continuing in verse 5: "These twelve Jesus sent out and commanded them, saying: 'Do not go into the way of the Gentiles, and do not enter a city of the Samaritans. But rather go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And as you go, preach, saying, 'The kingdom of heaven is at hand'. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons. Freely you have received, freely give. Provide neither gold nor silver nor copper in your money belts, nor bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor staffs; for a worker is worthy of his food. Now whatever city or town you enter, inquire who in it is worthy, and stay there till you go out. And when you go into a household, greet it. If the household is worthy, let your peace come upon it. But if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. And whoever will not receive you nor hear your words, when you depart from that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet. Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the Day of Judgment than for that city! "'Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves. But beware of men, for they will deliver you up to councils and scourge you in their synagogues. You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up, do not worry about how or what you should speak. For it will be given to you in that hour what you should speak; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you. Now brother will deliver up brother to death, and a father his child; and children will rise up against parents and cause them to be put to death. And you will be hated by all for My name's sake. But he who endures to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in this city, flee to another. For assuredly, I say to you, you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes. A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a servant above his master.'" When Jesus sent out the apostles in pairs, were they brought before governors and kings for His name's sake? No. Did the Holy Spirit give them utterance when they were on trial in Matthew 10? No. Did brother deliver up brother and parents deliver up their children? No. Were they hated by all nations for His name's sake when He sent them out in pairs? No. None of it happened. Jesus had been training them, and before that they had been trained by John the Baptist; now He sends them out for their first dry run, saying 'Here is what is going to happen', but none of it did. What happened is that in verse 16, Jesus totally changed time frames. We have today the Restorationists, who claim they are going to conquer the whole world for Jesus Christ and set up His kingdom before He comes back. They say these prophecies were fulfilled in the early church, that we are going to be the 'church Triumphant', etc. etc.; this is total rubbish. The Kingdom is now, but not yet. There are two terms: One is 'inaugural eschatology' and the other is 'over-realized eschatology'. Inaugural eschatology means that 'the Kingdom has broken in, Satan's powers are being thrown back, he can't possibly win, but the ultimate victory does not come until Christ returns'. Look at Daniel chapter 7:21: "I was watching; and the same horn was making war against the saints, and prevailing against them, until the Ancient of Days came, and a judgment was made in favor of the saints of the Most High, and the time came for the saints to possess the kingdom." That replays the story of the Maccabees, so the Restorationists would say that this was fulfilled with the Maccabees or with the early church, but that we are the !!!!!!!!!Kingdom Now. That is over-realized eschatology, and it is totally wrong. There will be a falling-away, there will be a persecution, and there will be an Antichrist. The church will be victorious, but that ultimate victory depends on the Return of Jesus. The other thing is that Matthew 10 says we will be brought before governors and kings, persecuted for the sake of the name of Jesus Christ, and that a servant is not above his master. I have a friend who was involved in Christian Science for 20 years before he was saved. E. W. Kenyon admitted that Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science, influenced him. The whole line of thinking begun by Kenyon - 'My body is lying to me', etc. - was begun by Christian Science, which also does not believe in the medical profession. The things you hear being taught by Kenneth Copeland and Kenneth Hagin were all learned from Kenyon, who admittedly got it from Christian Scientist doctrine. Every false cult and every distortion of the Gospel of Christ will deny the Cross of Jesus in some way, without exception. The Jehovah's Witnesses don't even like to call it a 'cross'; they call it a 'torture stick', and they say that salvation is obtained through their organization and each individual's commitment to it. It is the same with Roman Catholicism: Jesus said from the Cross, 'It is finished'. Roman Catholicism, however, says that the Mass is the same sacrifice as Calvary, that it happens over and over and over again. Roman Catholicism is a fundamental denial of the Cross of Jesus; it is a false religion. There may be true believers in it, but if they are true believers they need to come out of it. You cannot believe or participate in those doctrines and be in the will of God. Then you have the teaching of the faith-prosperity preachers that teach Jesus died spiritually. Kenneth Copeland, Kenneth Hagin, E.W. Kenyon, and all who follow them say that Jesus got the victory not on the Cross-, but by going to hell and becoming a satanic being of one nature with Satan. That is what they teach, and it is a fundamental denial of the Cross. So what happens as a result? "A servant is not above his master." Because the Cross of Jesus is made unimportant to His ministry, living the crucified life becomes unimportant for us also. Instead we are told, "God wants you rich, you'll never get sick, God wants you to have this and that and the other"- etc. The Cross becomes factored out of the equation. Again, every distortion of Christianity in the world will reject the Cross of Jesus in some way. Paul, conversely, says, "I glory in it (the Cross)". Like the old hymn says - "I will cling to the old rugged cross, and one day exchange it for a crown." We get the crown on that day, not this. Kingdom Now denies this and says we get the crown now. The Bible says the Kingdom is now but not yet; the proponents of Kingdom-Now say it is all now. Nonetheless, let us return to the basic problem: In Matthew 10 Jesus sends the apostles out, warns that these things will happen, but then they do not come to pass. Look at Matthew 24; Jesus begins by talking about the Temple in verses one through four. Jesus speaks about the prophecies of Daniel 9, that the Messiah would have to come and die before the second Temple was destroyed. However, He then speaks of events which happen in the lifetimes of some of the apostles, and the destruction of the Temple. Jesus does here once again what He did in Matthew 10 - He changes the time-frame in the middle of a conversation. Matthew 24 is the same way - He begins talking about 70 AD, but then He changes time-frame and talks about the end of the world. The same thing happens in Acts chapter 2, when the Holy Spirit is outpoured and Peter explains it. Peter quotes from Joel chapter 2, in Acts 2:15: "'For these are not drunk, as you suppose, since it is only the third hour of the day. But this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: 'And it shall come to pass in the last days, says God, that I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams. And on My menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days; and they shall prophesy.'" Were there any prophecies made on the day of Pentecost? - No. Verse 19: "I will show wonders in heaven above and signs in the earth beneath: blood and fire and vapor of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the coming of the great and awesome day of the Lord.'" Was there any great sign in heaven or on earth, any blood, fire, or vapor of smoke on the day of Pentecost? - no. Did the sun then turn to darkness or the moon to blood? - no. Remember that the sun is a type of Jesus, who is the Son. As it says in Isaiah, 'Arise and shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the risen Lord is brighter than the sun'. All four gospels tell us that the resurrection of Jesus happened at sunrise. The rising of the sun is a metaphor for the rising of the Son. The moon, on the other hand, has no light of its own; it only reflects the light of the sun, just as the church has no light of its own but reflects the light of Jesus. I am not denying that these astral phenomena will happen; I am simply saying that if and when they happen, they will simply be a reflection of something deeper. The light of Jesus will no longer be reflected by the church onto the earth, and the church will have blood on it - will be persecuted. I don't say that the literal astral events will not occur, only that we must understand the meaning of the metaphors. Verse 21: "'And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.'" This is called Peter's 'kerygma', and in Greek it literally states 'This is like that'. So in Matthew 10, Jesus sends the apostles out in pairs, telling them that some things will happen that don't happen to them. In Matthew 24, He tells the church about something that will happen, which does not happen to them fully, but only partially. Then, in Acts 2, Peter describes what is happening, but none of it actually happens. But let us take another look at Matthew 10: To whom do these things happen? Jesus sends out the apostles in pairs, telling them they will be brought before governors and kings, they will be persecuted, the Holy Spirit will give them utterance, and they will be betrayed by their families, but to persevere to the end and they will be saved. That didn't happen to the apostles in Matthew 10; but to whom did it happen? Every one of those things happened to Jesus. What happened to Him in His last days will happen also to the church in our last days. Betrayed, brought before governors and kings, people selling each other down the river and stabbing one another in the back, but the ones who persevere will be saved; it will happen to us as it happened to Him. But then there is something else: in the early chapters of Acts, these things do happen to the apostles. For example, let us look at Acts 4:18-23: "So they called them and commanded them not to speak at all nor teach in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered and said to them, 'Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God, you judge. For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard.' So when they had further threatened them, they let them go, finding no way of punishing them, because of the people, since they all glorified God for what had been done. For the man was over forty years old on whom this miracle of healing had been performed. And being let go, they went to their own companions and reported all that the chief priests and elders had said to them." So we see the apostles brought before governors and kings, scourged in the synagogue, given utterance by the Holy Spirit, which no one can refute. Then they go on to quote Psalm 2, in Acts 4:25,26: "'Why did the nations rage, and the people plot vain things? The kings of the earth took their stand, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against His Christ." The Bible frequently represents the tribulation of the church at the hands of the world in the End times by a raging sea. Psalm 2 happened to Jesus; the Gentiles took counsel against the Lord and against His anointed; now, in Acts, they begin doing it to the church also. Yet then the pattern increases: let's look at Acts 5:19-25: "But at night an angel of the Lord opened the prison doors and brought them out, and said, 'Go, stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this life.' And when they heard that, they entered the temple early in the morning and taught. But the high priest and those with him came and called the council together, with all the elders of the children of Israel, and sent to the prison to have them brought. But when the officers came and did not find them in the prison, they returned and reported, saying, 'Indeed we found the prison shut securely, and the guards standing outside before the doors; but when we opened them, we found no one inside!' now when the high priest, the captain of the temple, and the chief priests heard these things, they wondered what the outcome would be. So one came and told them, saying, 'Look, the men whom you put in prison are standing in the temple and teaching the people!'" It is fairly obvious what we have here. Let's look at Matthew 27:65: "Pilate said to them, 'You have a guard; go your way, make it as secure as you know how.' So they went and made the tomb secure, sealing the stone and setting the guard." Down to Matthew 28:11-14, after the resurrection of Jesus: "Now while they were going, behold, some of the guard came into the city and reported to the chief priests all the things that had happened. When they had assembled with the elders and consulted together, they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers, saying, 'Tell them, "His disciples came at night and stole Him away while we slept." And if this comes to the governor's ears, we will appease him and make you secure.'" So we see that just as an angel made the way for Jesus to come out of the tomb, so an angel also led the apostles out of prison. Next, the chief priests feared the people in Acts 5:26, just as it says in Luke 22:22. Once again, in Matthew 10 we see Jesus sending out the apostles in pairs and telling them what will happen; it doesn't happen to them at that time, but it does happen to Jesus, and then it begins to happen to the apostles and the early church. So we know that what happens to Jesus and what happens to the early church will be replayed again and will happen also to us. How do we know that? - Again, let's look at Matthew 10:17: "'But beware of men, for they will deliver you up to councils and scourge you in their synagogues. You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they deliver you up, do not worry about how or what you should speak. For it will be given to you in that hour what you should speak; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you. Now brother will deliver up brother to death, and a father his child; and children will rise up against their parents and cause them to be put to death. And you will be hated by all for My name's sake.'" This does not happen in Matthew 10, but let's look at Luke 21:12: "'But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons. You will be brought before kings and rulers for My name's sake." - Notice that He says 'before all these things'; the church will be persecuted before the End comes. Continuing in verse 13: "But it will turn out for you as an occasion for testimony. Therefore settle it in your hearts not to meditate beforehand on what you will answer; for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to contradict or resist. You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death. And you will be hated by all for My name's sake. But not a hair of your head shall be lost. By your patience possess your souls." The time-frame then changes again to 70 AD. What Matthew 10 predicts did not happen then; it did happen to Jesus and to the apostles and to the early church, and it is going to happen again to the church in the Last Days. He uses the same words, and I read it from Luke intentionally, to show that it is not only Matthew's attempt to construct that idea, but the Holy Spirit put the same thing in Luke. Then, however, it becomes very conspicuous. We must realize that when we read Acts we are not merely reading the history of the first-century church, but also the history of the last-century church. In John 9:4 & 6, the rabbis make false charges against Jesus to the Roman authorities. In John 19:4-6, however, Pontius Pilate wants no part in judging Jesus. This is the beginning. The ministry of Paul and his last days replayed what happened to Jesus in His last days. False charges were made by the rabbis against Paul to the Roman authorities, but the Roman governor wanted no part of judging Paul either, as we see in Acts 18:12-18. What happened to Jesus also happened to Paul. In Mark 14:12-15, prior to His arrest, Jesus met with His disciples at Passover in an upper room to break bread. In Acts 20:6-8, Paul met with his disciples in an upper room to break bread before he was arrested. In John 10:15 and in Mark 10:32-34, Jesus predicted His death to His followers, accepting it as God's will for His life. In Acts 20:24, 25, we see Paul doing the very same things. In John 18:11, Jesus' disciples attempted to convince Him to avoid this death, not to go to Judea in order to spare His life. In Acts 21:11-13, Paul's disciples also try to persuade him not to go to Jerusalem in order to save his neck. Matthew 7:15, 24:11, Mark 13:6, and Luke 21:8 contain warnings from Jesus about wolves that would come to devour the sheep once He left, and He did this at the end of His three-year relationship with them. Acts 20:29,30 shows Paul at the end of three years warning his disciples about false prophets who would come in among them. Mark 15:12-15, John 19:15, Luke 23:21, and Matt. 27:21-23 record that the multitudes cried out for the death of Jesus, having been incited by the rabbis. In Acts 21:36 and 22:22 we find the multitude demanding Paul's death after having been incited by the rabbis. Matthew 26:59-61 shows the rabbis trying to obtain false testimony against Jesus; He was falsely accused of teaching against the Torah and the Temple. Acts 21:28 records the same thing happening to Paul - the rabbis falsely accused him of teaching against the Torah and the Temple. In Luke 23:8 we see how Jesus aroused curiosity, then intrigue, with the civil Roman government; in Acts 22:30 we find that Paul, too, aroused curiosity and then intrigue with the civil Roman government. We will see this happening in the last days as well: governments will become infatuated with Christians, just as they were in the early church, wondering what makes us different. In John 19 and Matthew 27 the Roman government tried to release Jesus, but then turned the entire affair over to the rabbinic authorities once they were unable to free Him, knowing He was innocent. In Acts 22:30 and 18:15 it happened to Paul. Matthew 27:24 reveals that the Roman authorities were forced to re-intervene in the case of Jesus in order to prevent rioting; Acts 23:10, 21:34-36 records that the Roman government also had to intervene in Paul's case to prevent rioting. The Roman governor in Matthew 26:4 came from Caesarea to Jerusalem to judge Jesus when the rabbis formed their conspiracy to kill Him; the Roman proconsul came from Caesarea to Jerusalem to judge Paul under the same circumstances, in Acts 23:12, 21. Jesus was delivered by His Jewish brothers into the hands of Gentiles and the governor in fulfillment of a specific prophecy, as seen in Luke 23:1, Matthew 27:2, Luke 18:32. In Acts 10:18 Paul underwent the same ordeal, again in fulfillment of a specific prophecy. John 18:22 tells of Jesus being struck for the way He spoke to the high priest; Acts 23:2 tells of Paul also being struck for the same reason. In Matthew 23:27 Jesus called the religious hypocrites 'whitewashed tombs', alluding to the whitewashing of sepulchers for the Pesach. In Acts 23:3 Paul calls the priest a 'whitewashed wall'. Jesus used the Resurrection to counter-manipulate the Pharisees and Sadducees against each other when they had come together against Him, in Luke 20:26-40. In Acts 23:9, Paul uses the same strategy. (to be continued)

Karl,Please, may I suggets that you put aside you preconceived ideas, until finishing the article, and then judge the content based on you're understanding of scripture. You have presented one idea (remember, I've finished the article;-)), which consists of a "right" and a "wrong", that being "preterist" (although Prasch calls what you adhere to "historicism") and "non-pretist" (which Prasch refers to as "Futurism"). However, Prasch is saying (and I tend to agree) that there is another divide between, what I'll define as "lacking/adding" (these and similar idea's) and "raw" (that's encaptulates the entirity of God's Word). The two kinds of people that Prasch is refering to, is the "wild" and "cultivated" vines. There is no "Jews" and "christians" polarization, as much as God having seperated a race of people (the Jews), that are His matural vine, into which we Gentiles are grafted into. That's all.Anyway, enjoy.:-)

Healingwaters wrote:I will comply with your orders and read the entirety first...Thank you. And then we'll discuss the "enough said" :-P

Brother, he gives the sources. If not now, then later.Prash's website is www.moriel.org, if you have further questions.

If you've ever heard the joke that says if you have two Jews you have three opinions, that comes from something known as 'pilpul'. Pilpul is a manner of Rabbinic argumentation, which allows you to quote various rabbinic authorities who have commented on other rabbis in order to justify any opinion or condemn any position you choose. It is argument for the sake of argument, and Jesus would not engage in it. At the end of the Sermon on the Mount, when it says the people were amazed because Jesus taught as one with authority and not like the scribes or Pharisees, what it means is that He would not engage in pilpul; He simply said, "This is it", and would not get into all the theological haggling and nit-picking of the rabbis of His day or the liberals of today. There was one exception to this: Jesus used pilpul in order to get the Pharisees and Sadducees to fight with one another; Paul did likewise, refusing to engage in pilpul except with the aim of causing infighting among the Sadducees and Pharisees. Once again: Matthew 10 did not happen at the time Jesus spoke those words, but it did happen to Him, then to the apostles, and then to Paul, in very conspicuous detail - there is much more to it than I have listed here. Then, in Matthew 24 and Luke 21 we see that it is going to happen to us as well. What happened to Jesus happened to the early church, and both of those things together teach about what is going to happen to us. Jewish prophecy is a pattern recapitulated; multiple fulfillments, with each fulfillment teaching something about the ultimate fulfillment. If you want to know how we will end up, look at how Jesus ended up; if you want to know what will happen to the church in the last century, look at what happened to the church in the first century. Again, when you read the book of Acts, you are reading not only past history, but future history as well. The early church experienced a mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit, corresponding to the spring rains. The Hebrew term maim haim, or 'living water', is a term for the Holy Spirit. Outpourings of rain are representative of outpourings of the Holy Spirit; we deal with this in the typology of the Jewish calendar. There is a spring rain and a latter or autumn rain; there was a mighty outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the early church, and there will be again on the church of the last days. That is one of the reasons you see such an abundance of the gifts of the Spirit in the early church, and why they return during the Last Days; it has to do with the seasons of rain. This is also why you see Jewish people getting saved in large numbers again - the harvest. Jesus fulfilled the Spring Feasts of Israel during His first coming. He fulfilled Passover as the Passover lamb that was slain, He fulfilled Firstfruits as the firstfruit of the Resurrection, and He fulfilled Pentecost when He gave the Holy Spirit. Those are the spring holidays, when the spring rains come and prepare the harvest. The long, hot summer corresponds to the age of the Gentile church, but then Jesus fulfills the autumn holidays upon His return. The rainy season begins again in the autumn, and another harvest comes. Acts 2 quotes Joel 2, saying directly that what was seen in the early church will be replayed in the Last Days. This is one of the most powerful arguments against the error of Cessationism. The Cessationist error that the gifts of the Spirit ended with the apostles, never to be seen again, is just as false on one extreme as Charismania is on the other extreme. The truth is the via media. These things are seen in the early church, and then you have an outpouring on the church in the Last Days and these things are seen once again. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit was accompanied by signs and wonders. Acts 2:16-21 predicts that the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in the Last Days will also be accompanied by signs and wonders. Unfortunately, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the resulting signs and wonders was followed by false doctrine, experiential theology, carnality, and misuse of spiritual gifts - read I Corinthians. What happens today? The gifts of the Spirit are followed by experiential theology, carnality, immorality, people substituting the gifts for the Giver, crazy doctrines; the very same thing they had in the early church. The relevance of the law of Moses became a divisive issue among the early Jewish believers as seen in Acts 15 and Galatians 5. Once again, among Messianic Jews, this is happening. Tens of thousands of Jews have been saved during the past 15 years, and we now have the same kinds of issues that were around in the early church coming around to us again. The known world during the time of the early church was the Roman Empire, the Mediterranean Basin, and so on - not much beyond that. Yet we are told in Acts 17:6 that the gospel turned the world upside down in that time. Matthew 24:14 states that in the Last Days God will shake the earth one more time; the gospel will go to the ends of the earth, and in the Last Days God will shake the earth once more. We have seen whole Buddhist nations like Korea turn to Christ within one generation. In the largest Muslim nation on earth, Indonesia, two to three million Muslims give their lives to Christ every year, turning their backs on Mohammed. As the Gospel and Christianity decline in the Western world, they explode in the developing world. As the Gospel declines in Protestant countries, it explodes in the Roman Catholic nations. And as the Gentiles turn away from the truth and the grace given to them, the Jews are returning to it. In the early church, we see in Acts 1: 8, God used the Jews to bring the Gospel to the Gentiles. We see in Revelation 7 possibly, Romans 11 certainly - "what will their restoration be but life from the dead?" - that there can be no mistake about it; God is going to bless the church through the Jewish people. He is going to use Jewish people to evangelize Gentiles as well. Just as God used Jews to bring the Gospel to the Gentiles in the first century, so He is using Gentiles to bring the Gospel back to the Jews in the End. When that happens, God will use these Jewish believers to bless the church. Acts 19:33, 34 shows that in the time of the early church there was growing anti-Semitism. In the Last Days, we will again see growing anti-Semitism. The two kinds of people that the Bible calls God's chosen are Jews and born-again Christians; it all goes back to Genesis chapter 3, where God addresses the serpent to say that He will put enmity between it and the woman, between its seed and hers. Anti-Semitism and persecution of the church is like a coin, heads and tails: you can distinguish between them, but you cannot separate them. Who do Moslems hate the most? - Jews and born-again Christians. Under the Communists, behind the Iron Curtain, who was persecuted most? - Jews and born-again Christians. Who did the Roman Catholic Church persecute the most over the centuries with its Crusades and its Inquisitions and pogroms? - Jews and born-again Christians. Who did the Russian Orthodox Church persecute the most? - Jews and born-again Christians. It all goes back to the early church: after the Roman government turned against the church it went after the Jews. That's what happened in 70 AD and again in 120-132 AD with Bar-Kochba's rebellion, and that is exactly what is going to happen again in the Last Days with the Antichrist. He will come after us first, and then he'll go after the Jews. Anti-Semitism will increase, and through certain Restorationists, it is even coming into the church. Martin Luther, as an early example, was a man of God if there ever was one; but how he could end up the way he did is a shocking tragedy: he said that peasants should be stabbed in the back, that Jews should be herded into corrals and forced to confess Christ at the point of a knife, and that the German people were to blame for not murdering them to prove they were Christians. This is what is re-entering the church now. Corrupt political leaders who have tried to exterminate the Jews have always attempted to justify it theologically, by quoting people such as Chrysostum and Luther. Today we have the same situation; just read some of the books being published in our time, such as Whose Promised Land? or Blood Brother - very biased against Israel. People are trying to find Christian preachers who will justify their hatred of Israel and their denial of God's end-times purpose for the Jews, and they are succeeding. Yet God's plan for world redemption will ultimately depend on the redemption of Israel; His plan for the salvation of the world is prophetically bound up with His plan for Israel's salvation. Israel is God's timepiece. This does not mean that the Jews are higher, better, or anything else, but it is true nonetheless. (to be continued...)

Daniel 7:19,20, Revelation 17:9 - Rome ruled the world in the time of the early church. I have no doubt in my mind that the fourth beast of Daniel has to be some kind of a re-confederation of the Roman Empire; we have not heard the last of Rome. The council of Europe was founded by the Treaty of Rome. We must remember this: the emperor was head of the Pantheon of Rome; you could have any god you wanted, as long as you also bowed the knee to the Emperor of Rome. The Hebrew word for 'to worship' and 'to bow down' is the same word - hasta kovot. When you see Roman Catholics genuflecting before a statue of Mary, that is an act of idolatry. All gods came into the Pantheon which was headed by the Emperor, who allowed the people to worship any god they wanted as long as they acknowledged him as the spiritual guide of all religions and the political head. He was called Pontificus Maximus, the Pontiff. After Constantine removed his capitol to Constantinople, the Pope became the Pontiff. It amounted to the same thing - someone had a pagan god of gift-giving, so the Pontiff decided he would be called Saint Nicholas; someone else had a pagan god of love, and he was dubbed Saint Valentine. Artemis, Minerva, and all these other goddesses became Mary. Essentially, it remained the same false religion. This is what will happen again in the Last Days. The Romans had religio licita and religio illicita; a licensed religion was fine so long as it acknowledged the Pontiff as the guide. Unlicensed religions were those that refused to bow the knee to the emperor, and there was only one religion which ultimately fits into this category: ours. The Pontiff condemned it. Pope John Paul II has met with the Dalai Lama, a man worshiped as God by Tibetan Buddhists; he has met with Zoroastrian priests, witch doctors, Moslem imams, orthodox rabbis, and the Archbishop of Canterbury. He says that he respects all religions, and receives the Dalai Lama as a 'great spiritual leader' - a man worshiped as God! That is antichrist. He only asked that all these people acknowledge him as the Pontiff. However, there was one religion that the Pontiff, John Paul II, did not approve of. In Bolivia about six years ago and again in Santo Domingo less than one year ago, the Pope called born-again Christians 'rapacious wolves'. Religio licita and religio illicita; every religion is all right except ours. That is what the Pontiff did two thousand years ago, and that is what he still does today. Looking at the Greek word for Antichrist, we find that it does not simply mean 'against Christ', but 'in place of Christ'. The Pope's title is Vicarius Christus, the Vicar of Christ; translated into Greek, the Vicar of Christ is Antichrist. That is what was happening in the early church, and that is what is happening today. Pope John Paul II has said openly that he wants to see one Europe with one church. He knows very well that with a confederated Europe, they have only one thing in common: Roman Catholicism. The Church of England is dropping dead, going back under Rome. George Cary, Archbishop of Canterbury, wrote a book called The Meeting of Waters, urging the Anglican church to go back under the papacy. Across Europe, the only thing those people of different languages, different cultures, and different anthropological heritages have to unite them is Roman Catholicism, and the Pope knows that. He wants one Europe with one Church; in other words, to go back to what existed before the sixteenth century and the Reformation. The Pontiff came after the early Christians, and if the Pontiff gets his way - which he is - he will come after us again. Saved Catholics need to get out of Babylon. In the time of the early church, pagan Rome was the capitol of the world's false religious system. I have no doubt in my mind when I see interfaith meetings that Rome will in some way be representative of the center of the world's false religious system in confederation with its political system in the End. False religion persecuted believers; Acts 19:23-29shows an example of this, based on the worship of Artemis. Today we have the same thing throughout the world with Mary-worship. Though Mary herself proclaimed her need of a Savior, Roman Catholicism denies this and worships her.(To be continued...)

Mary was the greatest woman who ever lived. The angel Gabriel, whose name means 'mighty man of God' in Hebrew, told her "Blessed are you among women" (Luke 1:28). What did the greatest woman who ever lived say about herself? "My soul magnifies the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my Savior"(Luke 1:46, 47); she said, "I need a Savior." Rome, however, denies this, saying that she was conceived without sin. This is very typical behavior that we will see frequently. What happened during the Reformation was relatively mild in comparison to the tremendous revival taking place now in Roman Catholic countries, specifically in South America: In Santiago, Chile, 20,000 people leave the Roman Catholic church every week to become Pentecostals. In Guatemala, 10% of the population left the Roman Catholic church within ten years' time and became Pentecostals. In the Philippines it is the same; in the United States, the number of converted Roman Catholics is incredible. In Ireland, more Roman Catholics are now getting saved than Protestants. In Italy there are over 1000 Assemblies of God churches, none of them small and practically all of them new. While the Assemblies of God denomination is failing in countries that had the Reformation, it is prospering in Catholic countries. We will observe that the Mary issue will be incendiary; "Great is Diana of Ephesus" - see Acts 19:23-34. The Roman emperors were worshiped, and God's people were killed for refusing to participate in it. II Thessalonians 2 and Revelation 13 speak of the same thing. The emperor worship of Rome prefigures worship of the Antichrist. The kissing of the Pope's ring and other similar practices are derived from emperor worship. Once again, in the Last Days the Antichrist - the emperor - will demand to be worshiped in some way. Those who will not do so will be persecuted for their refusal. Scripture notes in Acts 5:37, the nativity narratives, etc., that the Roman emperors took a census. When you really understand the way census was used in the Bible, you will understand why David's taking the census in Israel was even worse than his sin of adultery with Bathsheba. The Roman emperors used census to number people's heads and thus gain financial control of the world; this is what the Antichrist will also do. It happened in the time of the early church, and it will happen again in the end. The worst emperors slaughtered the church, and then turned against the Jews. It began with Nero in 62 AD, and in 68-70 AD the tide turned against the Jews. In the second century emperors such as Diocletian, Marcus Aurelius, and Septimus Severitus were against the church, but then with Hadrian they went against the Jews from 120-132 AD. The early believers had an imminent eschatology; they believed that Jesus was coming back during their lifetime. We, too, will begin to see that happening. The general tide of world events politically at that time fulfilled specific eschatological prophecies. The events surrounding the destruction of the Temple, the burning of Rome, etc. - those things fulfilled prophecy. But once again, Jewish prophecy is pattern, and those same prophecies will again be fulfilled in the future. What I am basically saying is this: When you read the book of Acts, you're not only reading the history of the early church, you're also reading the history of the latter church. What happens to Jesus happens to the Apostles, happens to Paul, and happens to the early Christians; all of these things together teach what will happen to us. What happens to Jesus in His last days happens again to His Body in the Last Days. What happened in the early church will happen in the latter church. The Book of Acts happens again. Forty-eight percent of the Gospel of John deals with the last week of Jesus' life; the Passion narrative. All four gospels devote at least one third of their time to what happened in the last days of Jesus' earthly life. If it is read the right way, the New Testament does the same with us, speaking a great deal about what will happen in the Last Days. Jesus was betrayed, crucified, and raised victorious. We, too, will be betrayed, crucified, and raised victorious. It is important to realize that the kinds of deceptions perpetrated by Satan against the early church are the kinds of deceptions he will use against the church in the Last Days. The same heresies, false doctrines, and deceptions that the devil introduced into Christianity in its early centuries make a comeback in the Last Days. In the early church people with a low Christology - people who did not believe that Jesus was God - were called Arians. Today we call them Jehovah's Witnesses; the two are essentially the same. In the early church they called the Sabbatarian and dietary legalists and Nomianists Judaizers (see Galatians). Today we call them Seventh-Day Adventists. In the early church, people who were hyper-Dispensationalist - who took Dispensationalism to a bizarre extreme and made a radical, tremendous separation between the Testaments - were called Marcionites. Today they are the Exclusive or Closed Brethren. In the early church, the people who said that the Father was Jesus, the Son was Jesus, and the Spirit was Jesus were called Sabaleans, or Patripassionists. Today we call them Jesus-Only Pentecostals, or United Pentecostals. There is nothing new under the sun. Undoubtedly, however, of all these lies and the many others, the two most damaging were the Montanists and the Gnostics, who were related to each other. The Montenists had over-realized eschatology; they believed that the kingdom was now. They made many crazy predictions and prophecies that revival was coming to their capital or that Jesus was coming there Himself in Phrygia, or modern-day Turkey. They had all manner of wild predictions, but the way they sucked people into it was by putting a heavy emphasis on signs and wonders. 'The Apostles had these things, the Bible teaches them, so we should have them', was their philosophy. Irenaeus, the pre-Nicaean church father, wrote against these people while yet defending what was right about them. He did say that signs and wonders and the gifts of the Spirit are Biblical; but this particular group was using them to get people to believe other bizarre things. The same is true today. In the early church, people like Tertullian, the church father - people you would never have expected to get caught up in crazy errors - did. Today, too, I find people I never would have expected being caught up in the same kinds of Kingdom-Now ideas of Triumphalism, Restorationism, and Dominionism. It works the same way, with the emphasis laid on signs and wonders, etc. These people in the early church made insane predictions that didn't happen and led to total anarchy. At any turning point in church history, this same Kingdom-Now theology has surfaced. The Montenists began to surface when the Roman Empire went into decline. During the Renaissance, which was a very important turning point in the history of Europe, believers in Montanist doctrines were called the followers of Joacham of Fiore. This man, leader of Kingdom-Now theology at that time, has such a similar philosophy to that of the Vineyard movement today that he could have written for their magazine. We see in them the same ideas, for example: there are supposedly three ages, the Age of the Father, the Age of the Son, and the Age of the Spirit; the Age of the Father being Old-Testament Israel, the Age of the Son being the church age, and the Age of the Spirit being the latter-day rain, identified with their own movement. They believed they belonged to a new religious order that was going to take over all other religious orders. This is the same belief found today in John Wimber's Vineyard Movement. (to be continued...)

During the Reformation, there were the Prophets of Zwickau. Now, if you're Brethren, Pentecostal, or Baptist, don't ever consider yourself a Protestant. If you had been around during the Reformation, the Protestants would have called you an Anabaptist and they would have killed you as fast as the Catholics would. Zwingli said, "So you want to be baptized again?" and cut a hole in the ice in Zurich, in which they drowned the believers there who believed in believers' baptism. The followers of Luther, Calvin and Zwingli killed Anabaptists. If you're Anglican, Lutheran, Presbyterian, or Reformed, then you're a Protestant; but anything non-conformist is not Protestant. The Anabaptists were in most ways much closer to the Scripture than the Reformers were. The Protestants ran around pretending they had rediscovered the Gospel, when in fact there were people who had never lost it. Long before Luther, Calvin, or Zwingli, there were people on the Continent such as John S. Huss and the Bohemian Brethren, or in England the followers of John Wycliffe, or the Waldensians who were around for centuries - all of whom were Bible-believing Christians. There were always people who understood the basic truth and knew the church at large had gotten away from it. However, in the time of the Reformation something happened. Feudalism ended, and capitalism began. The decline of the Holy Roman Empire - which was neither holy nor Roman - was occurring, and that Empire was being replaced with the nation-state; people began saying 'I am English', 'I am German', 'I am Scottish', etc. Therefore, the Pope no longer had the political leverage to exterminate Christians and suppress the preaching of the Gospel in the way that he had throughout the Dark Ages. Additionally, Gutenberg invented the printing press. You no longer had the Vulgate, which was the Latin edition of the Bible that monks copied; instead you had people like Luther putting the Bible into German and Tyndale into English and so on, and Bibles could be mass-produced because of Gutenberg's invention. So the Bible went out, literacy increased, and the Pope lost his ability to stop the spread of the Gospel politically. That is why the Reformation happened. The only thing people like Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli did was get away with something that other people before them had always said, only the political and social circumstances were not ripe for them to live to tell about it. The idea that the Reformers rediscovered the Gospel is a perversion of history. There were some Anabaptists whose capital was Muenster in Germany, near Holland. They followed these 'prophets' called the Prophets of Zwickau, who made a lot of crazy predictions, prophecies, and practices, with excessive abuses of the gifts of the Spirit etc., which led to total anarchy. Today we have the same thing, only instead of the Prophets of Zwickau we have the Kansas City Prophets. After Paul Cain publicly made false predictions with John Wimber in England, the same people who witnessed these false prophecies will get on buses again to go hear a repeat performance by this man, who prophesied falsely in the name of the Lord. The Anglican bishop David Pitchers wrote a book called Some Said it Thundered, telling all Evangelical Anglicans to follow this guy. They did, and Paul Cain has since that time gone to Saddam Hussein, a man who has murdered God only knows how many tens of thousands of his own people, and apologized, repenting on behalf of the born-again Christians in the United States and Great Britain for 'what we did to him'. Kingdom-Now theology has always surfaced at pivotal points in history - there is nothing new under the sun. Related to it is something really crazy: Gnosticism. Alexandria was where the Judeo-Christian world met the Orient. It was where Zoroastrian priests, Jewish rabbis, Buddhist monks, and Christians converged, with the exchange of ideas. At the onset of the Christian era, the Hellenistic ideas of someone named Philo had already begun to come into Judaism. This was picked up by some of the people in Alexandria who were Christians, especially Origen - possibly Clement of Alexandria, but certainly Origen. Let me explain. Midrashically, in the Jewish way of handling Scripture, you use symbolism, typology, and allegory to illustrate and illuminate doctrine, without ever basing doctrine on it. Take the Passover as an example, with the symbolism of the Last Supper. When you understand the Jewish Passover and the Last Supper as a Passover, the symbolism of the Jewish ritual in the Passover seder will help you understand the Lord's Supper on a much deeper level than you otherwise could. The purpose of allegory, typology and symbolism is to illuminate doctrine on a deeper level, never to be the basis of doctrine in itself. Very briefly: A Jewish Christian reading John's Gospel in the first century would have read John 1, 2, and 3, and he would have said that it was, of course, a midrash on Genesis 1, 2, and 3. He would have said that John 1, 2, and 3 narrated the New Creation, while Genesis narrated the Creation; therefore Genesis 1, 2, and 3 and John 1, 2, and 3 are a midrashic parallel. God walks the Creation in Genesis, and God walks on the earth in the New Creation in John. The Spirit moves on the water and brings forth the Creation in Genesis, and the Spirit moves on the water and brings forth the New Creation in John. God comes to separate the light from the darkness in the Creation in Genesis, and He does so again in the New Creation in John. In the Creation in Genesis you have the small light and the great light; in the New Creation you have Jochanan ha Mat Biel (sp?), John the Baptist (the small light), and Yeshua ha Mashiach, Jesus the Messiah (the great light). Midrashically, the fig tree is a metaphor for the Tree of Life that is in the Garden of Eden. The Tree of Life is in the garden, and the fig tree is in John. So midrashically, when Jesus sees Nathaniel 'under the fig tree', in Jewish metaphor Jesus was not merely saying to Nathaniel, "I saw you under a literal fig tree", although he did. He was saying midrashically, "I saw you from the creation; from the foundation of the world I foreknew you." That illustrates the truth; the Bible directly states elsewhere that there are 'those whom He foreknew from the creation of the world'. I am not a Calvinist, but there is a truth in it. The midrash illustrates that truth, but it is not the basis of it. In the same way, "This is the cup of the new covenant in My blood", as Jesus said at the Last Supper, shows that the Passover meal illustrates the doctrine of atonement, while not being the basis for it. That is the way in which Jewish hermeneutics uses allegory. It's totally wrong to reject allegory in the way the Reformers did, because the deeper things of the Scriptures will never be understood if we do that. On the other hand, however, it is just as wrong and even dangerous to base doctrine on it. What the Gnostics did was this: They claimed a subjective mystical insight into the types and allegories in Scripture, then reinterpreted the plain meaning of the Bible in light of this gnosis, which is the Greek word for spiritual revelation. They claimed to have special knowledge, and if you didn't see it, they would say you were under spiritual deception or in rebellion. Roman Catholicism is based on Gnosticism. The Pope erroneously claims to be the successor of Peter; to have your hermeneutics right, you must first have your ecclesiology right. In other words, only the Pope, the Magisterium of the Church, can interpret the Bible. Therefore, although the plain meaning of Luke 1:47 is that Mary says she needs a Savior, Catholicism replies 'yes, but you don't have the gnosis; the Pope has it because he's the heir of Peter, and he says that Mary does not need a Savior because she was conceived without sin.' Hasidic Judaism is the same way. Their rabbis are called rebbes, and they're the descendants of someone called Bal Shem Tov, the Besch in Judaism, a Jewish Gnostic who was into things like astral projection. The Hasidic Jews contend with each other about whose rebbe is the real descendant of Besch; who really has the spirit of the Besch. It's a form of reincarnation that comes from Hinduism. Therefore, for Hasidic Jews there are two ways to God: The Torah and the rebbe, the righteous one. The rebbe goes to God through Torah; you go to God through the rebbe. What the Torah says is not important; what the rebbe says about it is important. Similarly, with Catholicism it is not what the New Testament says that is important, but rather what the Pope says about it that matters. With Sufi Moslems, it's the suf; with Shi'a Moslems, it's the imam, and what the imam says about the Koran. With Zoroastrians, it's their priesthood. With Hindus, it's the Brahman priests, the highest order of the caste system, or the guru. He goes to Vishnu and Krishna, you go through him. With Shamanism it's the shaman. To Tibetan Buddhists the essential figure is the Dalai Lama. All of these groups follow Gnosticism. The essential issue in these forms of Gnosticism therefore becomes, 'who is your guru, who is your pope, who is your imam, who is your rebbe, who is your suf, who is your lama or your priest or your shaman?' In Restorationism, the corresponding question is, 'who is your apostle, who is your prophet?' Joel chapter 2 is the basis for the Manchild/ Manifest Sons of God doctrines of Restorationism. Let's take a look at John Wimber's exposition of Joel chapter 2: Remember that Jewish prophecy is pattern, and therefore somehow this passage is about the Last Days. However, in its historical context it is speaking of Nebuchadnezzar's invasion. Joel 2 says this: "Blow the trumpet in Zion, sound an alarm. There is a great and mighty people - there has never been anything like it, nor will there ever be again to the years of many generations - a fire consumes before them, and a flame after them. The land is like the Garden of Eden before them, and desolate wilderness after them. Nothing escapes them." That is what John Wimber, Paul Cain, David Pitchers, Gerald Coates, and the people in the house churches who follow them have said that the church triumphant is going to be. But let's look more closely: "Their appearance is like the appearance of horses; like warhorses they run. They rush on the city, they run on the walls." It goes on from there to describe this army as locusts; the Restorationists say that the church triumphant will be this army of devouring locusts, that they will conquer all. But now let's look at verse 20: "I will remove the northern army far from you, and will drive it into a parched and desolate land, its vanguard in the Eastern Sea and its rearguard into the Western Sea. And its stench will arise, and its foul smell will come up, for it has done great things." God is going to destroy and judge this army because it is evil, the way He judged and destroyed Nebuchadnezzar's army. That is the context exegetically, grammatically, historically, or any other way you would like to look at it. But John Wimber came along claiming a gnosis, saying 'No, that's not what it means - it's the church triumphant'; if you don't see this, he will simply say that you are under spiritual deception. If you disagree, you'll be accused of having the spirit of Antichrist. Another man who is guilty of this kind of thing is Andrew Shearman, though he is more eisegetical than actually Gnostic. He will take a text which says that the Gospel is preached until John, but then with the Kingdom, men enter it violently; he will twist that text. What 'violently' means here in its original Greek context is 'pressed into'. It can be compared to this hypothetical situation: If you were taking a boat across the Irish Sea, from Hollyhead in Wales to Dublin, and you put on a life jacket and got into a lifeboat, the other passengers would think you were crazy. On these ferryboats there are pubs, discotheques, casinos, etc. The people are thereby amusing themselves, while you sit in the lifeboat with your life jacket on, trying to encourage people to put on life jackets and join you because it will add to the comfort and pleasure of their trip. They would say you were nuts; but as soon as the warning whistle goes off, and these people know the boat is sinking and they're doomed, they'll be pressing into the lifeboats and trying to get life jackets on in order to save their necks. (to be continued...)

The Law and the Prophets are taught until John; in Galatians the Law is called our teacher, because it teaches us that we are condemned and in need of salvation. This is what the text means, but Mr. Shearman says, "No, this is the church triumphant. We're the mighty men who are going to do the conquering." This is nonsensical, and doesn't come close to what the text means. There is no way anyone can read that text in its original context and come up with such a stupid conclusion, yet this is what the man teaches, and if you don't see it you're 'under spiritual deception'. Again, it's not what the Bible says that's important, but rather what the person with the gnosis claims. This is what the Gnostics do today, and it is exactly what they did in the early church as well. In the time of the early church, there were two forms of Gnosticism: the totally pagan form and the form that got into the church under the leadership of people such as Basiili and Valentinus. The same applies today; there are two forms of Gnosticism. The utterly pagan form is the New Age movement; Gnosticism is really what the New Age movement is. It may have occult packaging and so on, but the core of it is Gnostic. The kind of Gnosticism getting into the church today is Restorationism. All of the visualization techniques among many other popular things Restorationists embrace - such as Joyce Hugeet's books - are New-Age ideas, totally alien to the Bible. Using breathing exercises for prayer, as she describes, comes from yoga. She states also that the exercises of Ignatius Loyola should be used as a model for Christian prayer. Ignatius Loyola was the founder of the Jesuits, a religious order designed to stop the spread of the Gospel in the counter-Reformation. He was a man whose order is responsible for the death, torture, and murder of probably a half-million Christians. Yet his shamanistic exercises are being upheld in today's church as a model for Christian prayer! These are New-Age ideas creeping into the church. These were also the kinds of deception faced by the early church; the same ones have come back. It doesn't matter whether you call it Aryanism or Jehovah's Witnesses; it is the same thing. Charles Taze Russell and Judge Rutherford, the founders of the Jehovah's Witness movement, claimed a gnosis. If you don't agree with them, you're under deception. Roman Catholicism = Gnosticism. Shia Islam = Gnosticism. Sufi Islam = Gnosticism. Zoroastrianism = Gnosticism. Hinduism = Gnosticism. Shamanism = Gnosticism. The house churches = Gnosticism. Just look at the damage that heavy shepherding and similar practices have caused people. This Restorationism is a natural bedfellow for all kinds of other errors, one of which is heavy shepherding. We deal with this more in depth in a separate teaching; I am simply saying here that it was a deception in the early church, and it is again becoming a deception now. A person who claims the gnosis naturally going to become a heavy shepherd; what else could he be? Jesus, however, said that One is your Teacher, Who is in heaven (Matt. 23:8-10). God will do a new thing. If a couple has four children and they decide to have a fifth (God help them), God will do a new thing, but they will get the fifth child in the same way in which they got the first four. When God does a new thing, it will always be in character with the way He has always done things. What Gnostics will say is that everything can be abrogated because God is going to do a new thing in the Last Days; that is true, but it will never be out of character with the way He has always done things. There is a lot wrong with abortion, but one of the things that bothers me most is the waiting list of couples who are trying to adopt a baby. This list is three miles long, while other people are killing children. There is no such thing as an unwanted baby. People will adopt handicapped children or just about any child if they want one badly enough; yet other people are killing them. If a couple really loves each other, and they want to share their love with a baby, the mother never says, "I just can't face labor. I can't face morning sickness or contractions; therefore I am not going to have the baby. It's too miserable." The only thing she's thinking of is pushing the baby in a pram, taking him to the park on the swings, and going to the zoo to show him the zebras and the monkeys. Morning sickness and labor are not what occupy her mind; that's just what has to be gone through in order to get the child. I'm glad I am not a female. I watched one of my children being born, and kept my eye on the monitor that measures the intensity and frequency of contractions. Every time the thing started moving I told my wife, "This is the last one, this is it! I wouldn't lie to you, baby," but I was lying. Forget those rugby players at Wiggin; women are the strongest creatures in the world! If one of those rugby players had a baby he'd be out for the season. Birth pangs and earth tremors - but particularly birth pangs - are the most common things Scripture uses to describe what is going to happen to the church before Jesus comes. Think of the nature of birth pangs: Contractions become more frequent and more severe, while letting up for a while in between. They are at their worst right before the baby is born. The same applies to the Last Days; the pressure grows worse and worse, and though it might let up for a while, it returns and continues in that pattern until the birth occurs. That's what Revelation is about; certainly that's what Jeremiah talks about. Jeremiah refers frequently to birth pangs; he is a prophet who prophesied for his own time, for the first coming of Jesus, and for the Last Days, sometimes almost in the same breath. Whenever you see something in Scripture about birth pangs, the Holy Spirit is trying to reveal something about what will happen to the church in the Last Days. I Thessalonians 5 is another example. "When they are saying 'peace and safety', then destruction will come upon them like birth pangs upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape." Read Jeremiah; whenever you see the idea of birth pangs, it is eschatologically significant. In addition, whatever you have in the science of obstetrics has its parallel in the science of seismology. Earth tremors behave in much the same way as birth pangs; before there is a major shift of plates causing a big earthquake, a number of smaller tremors precede it. They tend to become more frequent and more intense before the final quake actually occurs. In America and Japan they spend astronomical sums of money trying to discern patterns in tremors in order to predict earthquakes. But they do know that tremors operate under much the same principle as birth pangs. Tremors, too, teach something about what will happen in the Last Days. The tremors increase, the birth pangs increase, and then the baby comes. Once the baby arrives, and the obstetrician or midwife hands the baby to the mother, all the pain, misery, and mess of labor and delivery is quickly forgotten. The only important thing is the baby, who is well worth it. A woman could be in labor for four weeks, but as soon as she has her baby it's all forgotten. It will be the same way when Jesus comes; as soon as He appears, all pain and misery is forgotten. We should think about Jesus coming; we don't have to consider the tribulation that goes before it, just as a mother anticipates her child's birth rather than dreading labor pains. Yet we must realize that tribulation is going to happen in the Last Days; just as a mother realizes there is no getting around the birth process. What happened with the Maccabees and Antiochus Epiphanes happens again to Israel and the church in the Last Days in some way. The book of Daniel also happens again. What happened in the days of the Maccabees was this: a lot of Jews compromised with the Seleucids, allowing Hellenism and Avodat Zara, in Hebrew, or foreign worship, to begin taking place in the city of God and ultimately in the house of God. Things wouldn't have gotten that far if so many Jews hadn't been willing to compromise. The way the Maccabees stood up against it and others began joining them teaches something about what is going to happen when the Antichrist manifests. Antiochus Epiphanes did not simply come one day, slaughter a pig in the Temple, and set up an image of Zeus and of himself to be worshiped. Nor is that the way the future abomination of desolations will come. Things build up toward that point; the Jews compromised and compromised, until one day things had gone so far they could no longer put a stop to it. The same thing is happening now. The Church of England is a church where someone who will not agree to sprinkle babies for infant baptism cannot be ordained a minister, but someone who is prepared to deny the Resurrection of Jesus Christ can be consecrated a bishop, with two-thirds of the other bishops defending him - including Evangelicals. Canterbury Cathedral is a site of interfaith worship. Greek word demonoi, Hebrew word shiddim; other gods are demons, as Scripture directly states in Deuteronomy and in I Corinthians. Hindu worship takes place in Canterbury Cathedral; 2000 Anglican bishops signed a petition to stop it, but the Evangelical Archbishop stated that he 'respects all religions'. That is an abomination of desolations in the house of God. People give up and give up and give up, continuing to compromise until it is too late. In the same way, don't expect to see the Antichrist being worshiped in the church overnight. It doesn't happen that way, it happens the way it did in the time of the Maccabees, with God's people compromising repeatedly until things have gone too far to be stopped. Daniel 11:33-35 says this: "Those who have understanding among the people will rise up and give understanding to the many. But they will be persecuted . . ." etc. We discuss this on the Christmas/ Hanukah tape; what happened with the Maccabees happens again in the Last Days. The book of Daniel is replayed; Jesus said directly that when we see the abomination of desolations being set up, we could know that our redemption draws near. What happened with the Maccabees as Daniel predicted it has to happen again; Jesus said so directly. When you read Daniel, read Maccabees in the Apocrypha, and see what happens. When you do, you will be reading about one of the main things that is going to happen to the church again. There will be an abomination of desolations. There are different words in Greek for 'church' or 'temple': oikos, naos, hieron; in Hebrew it's ha hekal, beth mishkatn , beth migdash. In no less than seven places, the New Testament says that the church is the temple. When Jesus died, and the Temple veil was torn from the ceiling to the ground, a physically visible event did happen in the Temple. However, what was important was not that the Temple veil was torn; what mattered was what it meant: that sinful man was no longer separated from holy God because Jesus paid the price for our sins. We deal with this on the Typology of the Temple tape. The old-time Brethren emphasized the typology of the Temple, and in many fundamental respects, because of their emphasis on typology, the old-time Brethren were probably closer than the Gentile church has ever been to beginning to interpret the Bible as a Jewish book the way the early church did. Maybe they didn't go far enough; maybe a lot of things, but they were closer than the Gentile church otherwise ever got to reading this Jewish book as a Jewish book. Nonetheless, when Jesus died and the Temple veil was torn, the physical event reflected a deeper spiritual one. If the Temple is rebuilt - and I don't say it won't be; there are many supposedly secret excavations going on in Jerusalem that everybody knows about - and if this image is set up in it, it will only be a reflection of a deeper spiritual reality. Make no mistake: the Antichrist will be worshiped in the so-called church, and it will happen in the same way it happened with the Maccabees. Repeated compromise on the part of God's people until it's too late; look at the Church of England today as a modern example. They deal with this issue of women priests, yet the New Testament is clear that every Christian is a priest. If you are not a priest, you are not a Christian. The issue is not even Biblical, yet over the ordination of female priests people are standing up to walk out. Did you see anyone stand up to walk out when a bishop denied the Resurrection and Virgin Birth of Jesus, or when homosexuality was approved? Did you see anybody stand up to walk out over demons being worshiped in Canterbury Cathedral? No. People will only walk out over something not Scriptural. And where do they walk out to? Rome. That's almost like someone going to Brighton for a holiday and saying, "This place is a dump; I'm going to Blackpool". Look at 2 Thessalonians 2: "We request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, that you may not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed by a spirit, a message, or a letter as it were from us, to the effect that the Day of the Lord has come. Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasia, the falling-away, comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the Temple of God, displaying himself as God." On the Antichrist tapes we deal with this. We see in Isaiah and Ezekiel that Satan wants to be worshiped as God like the king of Babylon, etc. "Do you not remember, when I was with you I was telling you these things? And you do not know what restrains him now, so that in his time he may be revealed; for the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only He who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way." (to be continued...)

There are three things that restrain evil: One is human government, which God ordains for that purpose. The New Testament tells Christians to pray for the authorities. The early Christians even prayed for the emperors, because they knew that if the emperor was not being influenced by God's Spirit, he would be influenced by another spirit. I don't like politicians much, but I certainly pray for them, because I know that if I am not praying for them, they will come under other influences and will make it bad for us. When the Antichrist comes, human government will be given into his hand. To understand how this happened in the early church, we must look at emperors such as Caligula, who persecuted the church. Another example is the medieval papacy, when the government was given into its hands. What makes the Great Tribulation unique is this: God is the God of history. But somehow, Scripture says that the Antichrist will seek to change the times. For a brief period of three and a half years, equating the ministry of Jesus, the lordship of history will be given into the hands of Satan, within certain parameters. Christians often make the mistake of saying that the last seven years of history will be the Great Tribulation. The Bible calls it the seventieth week of Daniel and ha Tekufot ha Tsurot Yacov, the time of Jacob's Trouble. Only the second half of that time can be proven to be the Great Tribulation. There will be tribulation before it, but the second half is much worse. If you want to say that the church will not go through the Great Tribulation, that's one thing; but that's not to say the church won't enter the last seven years. Neither is it to say that they won't be taken out sometime after the beginning of those seven years. If you or I should die, God forbid, on the road tonight, Jesus came for us. We should always live our lives as if He could come for us at any moment, because He can. Whether He returns tonight or a million years from now has no effect on our walk with Him, because in any case He can come for us at any moment. But the resurrection and the Rapture cannot happen until the identity of the Antichrist is revealed to the faithful: "Until the man of lawlessness is revealed". So the first thing that restrains evil, human government is given into Antichrist's hands. The second thing that restrains evil is the church preaching the Gospel. Understand about the metaphor of the night: Jesus said, "Work while you have the light, for night will come when no man can work." He's coming 'like a thief in the night'; is He coming 'in the second watch of the night, or the third'? 'Watchman, watchman, how far is the night?' The ten virgins needed oil in their lamps in order to see in the night; the Apostles were arrested at night, and so was Jesus. That means something. In the Song of Solomon, the bridegroom comes for the bride during the night. The parable of the wise and foolish virgins, in Matthew 25, was told at Passover, at the same time the Song of Solomon was being read in the synagogues. In the Song of Solomon, it is evident by the gender of the Hebrew text whether it is the bride, the bridegroom, or the hosts of heaven singing the choruses. The story hinges on the two dreams of the bride, in chapters three and five. In chapter three, she is ready for the bridegroom to come; in chapter five, she is not. When Jesus returns, it is either the church's best dream, or it's her worst nightmare. In Judaism, Nisan, the month of Passover, is the month of redemption. This is when the Song of Solomon is read in the synagogue, and that is what Jesus was preaching from at Passover in Matthew 25. The parable of the wise and foolish virgins replays what was being read in the synagogues that very week. The night is the most frequent Biblical metaphor for the Great Tribulation. When Jesus was betrayed, it was night. Remember: His last days are like our last days. This night is coming. The Holy Spirit, we are told in John 14, convicts the world concerning sin. Somehow, He restrains evil and He unites the church and empowers us to preach the Gospel. God's Spirit 'will not forever strive with man'. Jesus said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." (Hebrews 13:5) God's Spirit will never leave the hearts of His people. He will not be taken from us, but He will be taken from the world. In the book of Revelation (without being a Dispensationalist), God goes back to behaving the way He did in the Old Testament. Grace, as it were, comes to an end. There is a difference between the Spirit indwelling and the Spirit outpoured. The Spirit indwelt the disciples in John 20:22; Jesus breathed on them - pneuma in Greek - and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit". The Holy Spirit then indwelt them, but He was not outpoured on the church until the Day of Pentecost, thus empowering them to preach the Gospel. He also brought conviction on the world, as John 14 said He would. That will end. In other words, God's Spirit will be the reserve of His people. God will never take His Spirit from us, but His Spirit will no longer convict the world and will no longer empower the church to minister the Truth to the world in the way He does now. Grace comes to an end, and His mercy is reserved for those who are His, though He does turn His redemptive attention towards Israel and the Jews at this period through the Great Tribulation. However, that is not to say that the church will be removed at the beginning of it. Too many people equate the taking of the Church in the Rapture with the taking of the Holy Spirit; that is not true - the Spirit indwells and the Spirit is outpoured. There is a gap. Between the Ascension and the Day of Pentecost, there was a gap. The Spirit indwelt God's people during that time, but He was not yet poured out and was not convicting the world. The converse happens in the Last Days. Jesus ascended into heaven and sent the Holy Spirit to be outpoured; in the time of the end, the Holy Spirit leaves, is no longer outpoured, and sends Jesus. God does not take His Spirit from us, but He is taken from the world. This period is the Great Tribulation; Satan is no longer restrained, and the church is rescued out of it - we do not go through the worst part of it. It says in Job, "In six tribulations He will keep us, in seven He will deliver us". I am quite convinced that the removal of the church takes place between the sixth and seventh seals in the book of Revelation. There are a number of things in the Bible that teach about this period of time. The first is the period of time between Jesus breathing on the Apostles and the Day of Pentecost. Christ had risen, the victory was won, and His Spirit indwelt His people. But the church was not yet empowered to deal with the world, nor was the Holy Spirit restraining the world's evil or bringing conviction on the world. That happens again in the end. His Spirit will be only with us. We have to understand the Church of Smyrna, as seen in Revelation 2. 'Smyrna' comes from the Greek word 'myrrh', which was used in anointing bodies for burial. The way the Roman government acted in declaring every religion legal - religio licita - except ours will happen again in the end. The government in league with the Antichrist will declare every other religion religio licita, but come against us. The church of Smyrna is another thing that teaches about the experiences of the Last Days church. (to be continued...)

The third thing is more complicated. We must understand Elijah; whether this means a man or something else in this context is an issue I cannot deal with now - we have a separate teaching on it. But it says in James that Elijah stopped the rain for three and a half years. That rain represents the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, when it stops during the second half of the three and a half years. 1,260 days by the Jewish lunar calendar; two times, time and a half time. Elijah fed the Gentile woman during that period. Now, look at what happens in the story as told in I Kings: Jezebel. On the Antichrist tapes we develop this at length: there are good girls, and there are bad girls. Whenever you see a 'good girl' in the Bible, it teaches us something about God's woman, Israel or the church, in some way. Shulamite in the Song of Solomon, Eve, Rachel, Rebekah, Sarah, Mary, Deborah, Jael, Esther - the good women in the Bible all teach something about the Bride of Christ in some aspect. The bad women in the Bible, on the other hand, teach something about the spirit of false religion, the bride of Satan. She is personified by Jezebel in Revelation. Certainly Queen Athaliah in the book of Kings is another example; her behavior is very much like that of Nero's mother. The way that Nero's mother influenced him negatively, becoming part of the cause of his turning against the church, is the same way in which Queen Athaliah influenced her son in the book of Kings. All of the wicked women in the Bible teach something about that ultimate one; the spirit of false religion.Let's look at Proverbs, please, and we'll read it midrashically: Now, I don't suggest that the teaching of Proverbs is not about a literal prostitute; it is. But in Midrash you have a difference between peshat and pesher. Peshat is the literal whoredom and idolatry and spiritual seduction is the pesher. This is, of course, about literal prostitution, adultery and immorality. But the character of this woman, or these women, describes the spirit of false religion. Very briefly, let's look at Proverbs 31. In verses 10-31 we find a description of Solomon's ideal woman. She goes to a field, like a mission field (v. 16). She gives food to her household, she considers a field and buys it, and she's a delight to her husband. In v. 18, she senses that her gain is good and her lamp does not go out at night. Is that familiar? That is the good girl. Now let's look at some of the bad girls. Who said bad girls are more fun? They're not more fun, they're deadly. Let's look at Proverbs 5: "My son, give attention to my wisdom" - remember, people without God's wisdom are going to be deceived by false religions - "that you may observe discretion, and your lips may reserve knowledge. For the lips of an adulteress drip honey, and smoother than oil is her speech" - oil is what you use to anoint people with. The devil is very good at counterfeiting anointing; how does he do it? With smoothness and suavity. The hype artists from America are smooth talkers. They're substituting anointing with hype, and people don't know the difference. "But in the end, she is bitter as wormwood." Take as an example a poor drunken sailor on payday. On his way back from the pub after last call, he sees a prostitute and goes with her, only to find out two weeks later he has contracted AIDS. That's the kind of metaphor the Scripture is using here. "In the end, she is as bitter as wormwood, sharp as a two-edged sword" - look at that! The devil can counterfeit God's truth. Remember, in the Old Testament the devil is called 'Star of the Morning'. Jesus is called the 'Bright and Morning Star'; we go into this on the Antichrist tapes. "Her feet go down to death, her steps lay hold of Sheol; she does not ponder the path of life, her ways are unstable. Now then, my son, listen to me: do not depart from the word of my mouth. Keep your way far from her; don't go near the door of her house, lest you give your vigor to others and your years to the cruel one, lest strangers be filled with your strength and your hard-earned goods go to the house of an alien." Who gave his strength to a wicked woman? Samson. Delilah is a type of the wicked woman; she seduces God's man into giving up his strength. The way that she brought Samson to destruction, but God revived him in victory, teaches something about the end. Sometimes you'll have a guy who really loves Jesus, who is sincere in his faith and his walk with God, but he's a sucker for some nasty woman. That can happen to people; however, it can also happen to the church: spiritual seduction. We have to understand the relationship between idolatry and adultery. Israel's husband was to be Yahweh; the Hebrew word for 'husband' is baal, the same word as 'master'. The abomination of desolations is called shikutz ha eshomen in Aramaic. Shikutz comes from the Hebrew word shihetz, meaning 'slimy reptile', or 'detestable thing'. Satan has two modes of attack in Revelation: the serpent and the dragon. The dragon is the persecutor, the serpent the seducer. The way that the serpent beguiled Eve in the Garden of Eden is the same way in which Satan tries to deceive the church. Women are generally much more vulnerable to spiritual seduction than men are, because they are more sensitive and God can speak to them more easily than He can to men, and anything that God intends for good Satan will twist and use for evil. God instructed that women have their heads covered; not literally covered, but because Eve was vulnerable to spiritual seduction, a woman needs to be under male headship in a protective sense. In that culture it meant wearing a headscarf, but the principle is true in every culture. I know a woman who always wears a head covering yet has the biggest mouth I've ever heard. If her husband dares open his mouth, he gets a smack. That woman's head is not covered. The word shikutz occurs many times in the Bible; unfortunately we usually translate it 'your detestable things': "O daughter of Zion, you have played the harlot. You have profaned My sanctuary with your detestable things." That word is shekitzim; it has to do with Satan as a deceiver, but is almost always applied to Baal-worship. Baal, again, is the Hebrew word for 'husband'. The abomination of desolations will express Satan's desire to be God, as we see with the king of Babylon in the Old Testament. He will attempt to take God's woman through spiritual seduction. That's what the abomination of desolations means: Satan using spiritual deception to try to take God's woman. Adultery and idolatry go together. Idolatry equals spiritual adultery. That is why, when Israel goes into the sin of idolatry God says, "O daughter of Zion, you've played the harlot, you've gone after other lovers, etc." The language of marital infidelity is used to describe idolatry. Proverbs 7: "My son, keep my words and treasure my commandments within you. Keep my commandments and live, and my teaching as the apple of your eye. Bind them on your fingers, write them on the tablets of your heart, say to Wisdom, 'You are my sister', and call understanding your intimate friend'" - Remember, in the Last Days, understanding and faithfulness become closely associated. Why? Because those who don't have it will be vulnerable to deception. "That they may keep you from an adulteress, from the foreigner who flatters with her words. For at the window of my house, I looked through my lattice and saw among the naïve, and discerned among the youths, a young man lacking sense passing through the streets near her corner. And he takes the way to her house in the twilight." When? In the twilight, the evening. Remember, qol veh homer. Things that are always true become especially true in the Last Days. Spiritual seduction has always been around, but it intensifies before Jesus comes. "And behold, a woman comes to meet him, dressed as a harlot and cunning of heart. She is boisterous and rebellious; her feet do not remain at home. She is now in the streets, now on the squares, and lurks by every corner. She seizes him and kisses him, and with a brazen face she says to him, 'I was due to offer peace offerings today that I have paid my vows. Therefore I have come out to meet you, to seek your presence earnestly, and I have found you. I have spread my couch with coverings, with colored linens of Egypt'" - what is Egypt a figure of? The world. - "'I have sprinkled my bed with myrrh'" - it's a deathbed, though it smells nice. A corpse can be made to look pretty good, but it is no less dead with cosmetics - "'Come, let us drink our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with caresses.'" Now let's read verses 19 and 20: "'For the man is not at home; he has gone on a long journey, he has taken a bag of money with him and at full moon he will come.'" And she goes on to deceive the guy. You see, she knows that the man is not at home; she knows that Jesus has gone on a long journey, and that at 'full moon' He will come. What, again, is full moon? The time at which the moon is reflecting the maximum amount of light from the sun. The Bible will have to be understood at some point, that despite the darkness there will be a ray of sun. But for those who do not have oil in their lamps, it will then be too late to go out and buy it. We must get the oil now. (to be continued...)

There is much more that I could say about this, but let me put it to you this way: we must understand Elijah. King Ahab covets the vineyard - the Antichrist enters the beautiful land in Nahum - but he can't get the vineyard too easily. So Queen Jezebel tries to get possession of the vineyard for him. This brings her into conflict with Eliahu ha Nevi, Elijah the Prophet. In the last days, the Antichrist wants the vineyard and goes to the false religious system to get it. This somehow results in a conflict with Elijah. Elijah, Elisha, Samuel, and John the Baptist are all connected. Midrashically, there are ways to connect things that the church doesn't think of because they're reading a Jewish book with a Greek mindset. Whenever you see things happening in the same geographical location in the Bible, there is a midrashic connection between those events. Where does the ministry of John the Baptist take place? On the plain of Jericho. This is the same location in which the ministry of Elijah ends and the ministry of Elisha begins. Samuel was the last of the judges, but the first of the prophets. John the Baptist was the last figure of the Old Testament, but the first figure of the New Testament; when the Apostles looked for someone to replace Judas, they didn't search out someone who was with Jesus from the beginning, but rather someone who was with them from John's ministry. John was the pivotal figure; he was transitional. The New Testament era begins with John, not with Jesus. John the Baptist and Samuel have similar circumstances surrounding their births. Wherever you see people born under similar supernatural circumstances, there is a midrashic connection. Elijah, Elisha, and John had the same spirit. So the wicked woman turns the king against Elijah; the same happens with Herodias and King Herod: the wicked woman turns the king against John the Baptist. It is a pattern; the same things happen again and again. What happened in both these cases is somehow what happens when Elijah comes again in the end. There is a lot more that could be said about this, but it is very complicated. Let's look at the book of Amos, chapter 8 verse 11: "'Days are coming', declares the Lord, 'when I will send a famine on the land. Not a famine for bread or a thirst for water, but rather a famine for the hearing of the Word of God.'" Remember that the physical reflects the spiritual: when the Temple veil was torn, the physical event reflected a spiritual one. Jesus said there would be famines in the Last Days, but the physical famines are only reflections of a spiritual one. There had been no prophet in Israel for over 400 years when John the Baptist came in the spirit of Elijah to feed God's people during the famine, preparing for the Messiah to come. There is going to be a famine in the end; but somehow, God's people in the spirit of Elijah are going to be fed and prepared for the Messiah to come. The way Elijah stopped the rain is the same way that the Holy Spirit will be absent from the world when the outpouring stops. Yet Elijah fed the Gentile woman supernaturally; she is a type of the church, as are many Gentile women in the Bible, such as the Queen of Sheba. Remember that Jesus said the Queen of Sheba came to hear the wisdom of Solomon. God's people are fed during the famine. On the Jewish calendar you have outpourings of rain and harvests. A Jew reading Revelation 10 and 11 would have called it a midrash on Joshua. You've got the same numerical pattern in both: in Revelation, the seven seals, with the seventh seal having seven trumpets, a numerical subset. Those trumpets correspond to the Feast of Trumpets, which corresponds with the last Trumpet and the trumpet blown on Yom Kippur - all of these things fit together, though I cannot go into it now. Anyway, you have seven with the seventh having a subset of seven. Then there is silence in heaven for half an hour. For me that may be the most confusing verse in the Bible, how can a human measurement of time be applied to eternity? I don't understand that verse. Next, there come these two witnesses who are spoken of in Zechariah. The last Trumpet is blown, and the text says "This kingdom has become the kingdom of our God and of His Messiah." Now, let's look at what happened at the capture of Jericho. They marched around the city seven times, once a day for seven days, but on the seventh day they had to march around it seven times. There you have the same numerical pattern present in Revelation. The two spies in Joshua were sent to Jericho to rescue the Gentile woman, Rahab, before the judgment came. They prefigure the ministry of the two witnesses in Revelation. Revelation midrashically replays the text of Joshua, though you won't find that in any commentary that I know of, because people with Greek minds wrote them all. Moses fed the children of Israel to prepare them for the Exodus from Egypt. Joseph fed the whole world during the famine, but Moses fed all Israel to prepare them to leave Egypt. This, again, is a type of the Resurrection/ Rapture. There was darkness on the first Passover, and only the Jews had lights on in their houses in order to eat the Passover. When Jesus faced His last days, He fed His disciples and prepared them for what was coming. In Acts 20, before Paul leaves for his last days, he goes to an upper room, breaks bread, and feeds the disciples. It says in Acts 20 that there were many lamps in the room; the eye is the lamp of the body. If the eye is sound, as Scripture says, the body will also be sound. In Zephaniah chapter 1, there is an allusion to the Jewish Passover Bedichat Chametz, during which each person's house is searched by its inhabitants for leaven. Here in Zephaniah it says, "I will search Jerusalem with many lamps, purging leaven". Leaven is a figure of sin in the Bible (see I Cor. 5). Jews had to get all leaven out of the house before they could eat the Passover, just as we are supposed to get rid of the leaven in our lives before we come to the Lord's Table. Once again, the old-time Brethren have a much more Jewish understanding of the Lord's Supper than other Christians do. "I will search Jerusalem with lamps," (Zeph. 1:12). There will be a purging of the leaven from Zion through right teaching in the Last Days before Jesus comes. "The eye is the lamp of the body," (Matt. 6:22). Think of the armor in Ephesians 6, quoted from Isaiah. It says in Nahum and in Isaiah 52, "How lovely on the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news". Ephesians 6 admonishes us to "Put on the shoes of the preparation of the Gospel of peace". The church is a Body; its feet are its evangelists. But the eye is the lamp of the body; this refers to teachers, who see and give the light. Somehow, the ministry of Elijah is going to put the oil into the lamps of the teachers in the Last Days. Jesus fed the Apostles, who then took the bread when He fed the 5,000, and fed the people in groups of 50. 50 is the number of the Holy Spirit, of Pentecost. Elijah, through Obadiah, also fed the sons of the prophets in groups of 50. The food comes from one source, but then is broken down and given to several groups. I don't fully understand this, but that is the pattern, and somehow it will happen like that. Elijah is going to feed the other teachers in the Last Days - whoever Elijah is, or however you understand it. Whether 'Elijah' is a man, a movement, two people, or something else is something I won't go into. I will only teach something once I have understood it definitively, and the Holy Spirit hasn't shown me fully what this means or how it works. James says, "Let few of you be teachers"; God will hold me more accountable than He will those of you who are not teachers. Therefore I will not teach anything doctrinally until I am sure that God has shown it to me. The Maccabees, in Daniel 11, are similar to Elijah in this way: "Those who have understanding among the people will give insight to the many." In Proverbs we saw that the wicked woman had truth that was like a two-edged sword, and she was smoother than oil. This is the nature of seduction. If people lack God's wisdom, they're going to be vulnerable; since we have something that is sharper than a two-edged sword, so will they. We will have the oil of anointing, and they will have something even smoother. Not better, but it will be a counterfeit. With diamonds, if you don't have a professional eye, you cannot tell a counterfeit from a genuine stone. Some false diamonds, made of polished glass and worthless, can look so real that only a jeweler can tell it is false. There are some false diamonds that are such good reproductions that even the experts have a hard time spotting them initially, and have to do all kinds of cauterization tests. In the same way, if Christians today are sucked in by things that are obviously erroneous - if they are fooled by a guy like Rick Godwin, who claims that Matthew 24 is not about the Last Days - what will they do when convincing lies confront them? If you can't stand on the dry land, how will you persevere in the thicket of the Jordan? Again, if people are fooled by name-it-and-claim-it nonsense, what will they do when the real deception comes? There will be a schism within the church in the Last Days, with a number of things that will divide it. One factor will be the churches that compromise and the ones that do not. Another thing dividing the church will be the role and calling of God upon Israel. A third thing will be the authority of Scripture and the way in which it is interpreted. Those are three of the issues that are going to divide; there may well be others. What happens with Elijah teaches about this tribulation. (to be continued...)

Just want to thankyou for your work in the Lord. I look forward to your continuing work on this thread.God BlessJeff

Another indicator is where Scripture says that in the Last Days it will be "as it was in the days of Noah" (Matt. 24:37). In Peter's epistle, he describes the problem of Noah from one angle: Noah, a preacher of righteousness, was warning people who would not listen until it was too late. That is the message of Noah for unsaved people. As it says in 2 Peter 3:9,10: "The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some count slowness, but is longsuffering toward us, wanting none to perish but that all should reach repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat; both the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up." I don't know what you make out of it, but before Mr. Einstein and Mr. Oppenheimer, nobody knew about sub-atomic particles in the sense of an atom gaining explosive energy when it is divided. Long before sub-atomic physics or particle physics, long before anyone thought of splitting an atom, a fisherman from Galilee not only said it was possible to split an atom, but that it is possible to get enough explosive energy to destroy the whole world that way. That is exactly what that passage is saying in Greek. So again, Peter is giving a warning about the days of Noah for the unsaved. They didn't listen to Noah until it was too late, and unsaved people won't listen to us until it's too late either. Boats are types of the church. Noah's Ark, even in its dimensions, means something. Nonetheless, that is for the unsaved. They won't listen, because they'll be occupied with their sin and immorality, and only a remnant is preserved. However, Jesus warns about the days of Noah in Matthew 24 from another aspect: vv 37-39 "'But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the Ark, and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.'" Eating and drinking, marrying and being given in marriage! The unsaved have to be warned about immorality; Christians must be warned about being caught up in temporal things. There's nothing wrong with eating and drinking, or with marrying and being given in marriage. However, the danger in these things to Christians in the Last Days is that they will become the primary focus of the Christian's life, and believers will be absorbed in them. It is vital to remember this: The things that are for here are not the things that we are here for. There is nothing inherently wrong with getting married or going to a restaurant, but when those things become the focus of a person's life, that person has a problem: he or she will not be ready for Jesus to come back. Not only that - there is also the danger of ministry becoming an idol, people building their own empires instead of the kingdom of God. 'Let him who is in the field' - the mission field - 'not go back for his cloak'. 'I will make you fishers of men', Jesus said. Think about that; they fished all night and caught nothing until Jesus told them where to cast their nets. Fishing is a type of evangelism, and that is the way it happens. When Jesus directed their fishing, they had to call people in another boat to come and help them. When He directs our evangelism, the same miracle occurs. When revival breaks out in one church, it spreads to another. When Peter is fishing in John chapter 21, and the call goes up that the Lord is waiting, he does something very peculiar. Normally, if you want to go swimming, you pull your shirt off and dive in the water; but Peter puts his on, because his shirt is a type of the garments of salvation in Isaiah and Revelation. He dives off the boat as soon as it is said, "It is the Lord", in John 21:7. At this time, Peter was fishing; in figure, he was engaged in his ministry. But as soon as Jesus came, he forgot the ministry because Jesus came first. There is a real danger that in the Last Days even the ministry can be an idol. Jesus must always come first; I wish more Christians thought about that. I need to think about it a lot myself. Consider American basketball: there are African-Americans who play basketball almost like they're superhuman - it's unbelievable how good they are. It doesn't matter to them if there are two hours on the clock left to play the game or only 30 seconds. They play with such energy, vigor, and concentration that even though there are only ten seconds left in the game, they know that can make a difference and as far as they're concerned, there might as well be an hour left in the game. Yet as soon as the final buzzer goes off, that's it; it's over. That is how we should be: totally intent on what we're doing. It doesn't matter if there are three days left until Jesus comes or 300 years, we should be playing the game in the same way, with the same concentration, vigor, and intensity. But as soon as that buzzer goes off, that's it. We're done. It's always ten minutes to midnight. In John's epistle he says it is the last hour; the idea in Greek is that time freezes. Israel is God's timepiece for the nations. Why did the early Christians say it was the Last Days? Let me explain: One day, Harold was watching rugby on television, and Susan said, "When do you want your dinner?" It was then ten minutes to six, so he said, "I want my dinner in ten minutes, when the rugby game is over; the game ends at six o'clock. So Susan puts his dinner in the microwave, pushes the buttons. All of a sudden, at ten till six, there's an injury on the rugby field, and they stop the clock. The medics come out and say they can't move the guy without a doctor. The doctor comes out and says they need an ambulance because they have to move him a certain way. They can't do anything about it, the rest of the game is delayed. But how many minutes are left in the game? Ten. Ten minutes ago there were ten minutes left in the game, but the game time hasn't advanced from that point. There are always ten minutes left in the game, but at any time the clock can be started again, once the injured man is removed. This time is the time of the Gentiles; it is Israel that is God's timepiece. Nebuchadnezzar represents many things in the Bible; he is a very interesting and complex figure in Scripture. The seven churches of Revelation were seven churches that literally existed in Asia Minor in the first century; they're also seven types of churches that can exist generally, especially in the Last Days before Revelation 4. But I am convinced that they also correspond to four overlapping periods of church history. The Greek names of those churches also mean something: 'Ephesus' is 'not lasting', 'Smyrna' is 'myrrh', 'Pergamum' is 'divorced', 'Thyatira' is 'continuing sacrifice', and so on. We have a series of tapes dealing with this in depth. Nonetheless, those seven periods occur before we go on to Revelation 4 and the main part of the vision. Nebuchadnezzar is cut down, and an iron collar is put around him. It says that for seven periods that iron collar is kept on him to prevent him from blossoming, but at the end of those seven periods, the collar is removed and he blossoms again. It's the same idea. The age of the church occurs, to the best of my understanding, between the 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel. Somehow the age of the Gentiles comes to a close, as it says in Luke 21:24 and Romans 11, and then the clock is started again. There are always ten minutes left in the game; time is frozen. (to be continued...)

Here's where it all gets a little weird, but for any out their who have understanding about Aryan White Supremacy, would follow some of the conotations attached to these theories.Therefore, it is always the Last Days. So concerning the days of Noah, we have to warn the unsaved about their immorality, but we must also warn ourselves about becoming attached to this life. When you want to understand the days of Noah, you must go back and read the story of Noah. When I was a young Christian, I was a hippie who got saved out of the drug culture. We used to witness eight hours a day sometimes, because we thought Jesus was coming next week, so what did anything else matter? I met so many people who said their beliefs were based on gods on other planets, UFOs and such. When Jimmy Carter became President of the United States, he declassified something called 'The Blue Report' that was put together by the American Air Force, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the Central Intelligence Agency. It was not all declassified, but Carter declassified a major portion of it. They found no evidence from exobiology for extraterrestrial life, but they had innumerable cases of people using parapsychology to conjure up extraterrestrial phenomena; there were even cultists who could make these things appear. Similar studies were done in Great Britain. Reading the Blue Report can be quite frightening. There is no scientific basis for belief in extraterrestrials, but a firmly recorded basis in the occult. Uri Geller, the Israeli spoon-bender, said that there were people on other planets trying to persuade him to be the Messiah. The Nephilim, the fallen ones, are strange characters in Genesis. It would appear that they survived the Flood; whether the Nephilim who were in the land of Canaan when the Jews came to it are a different Nephilim from the ones who were spoken of before the flood is an issue over which theologians are divided; no one is really certain. Some say they are the same ones, some say they're different. If they are the same, it would mean they had survived the deluge somehow. Nonetheless, these things are 'the fallen ones', and we're told in Scripture that they copulated with human women. Now, most of the popular 'deliverance ministry' going around today is a lot of Ghostbusters-type nonsense with no Scriptural basis; I would seriously question whether most of these people could handle real demon possession if it ever faced them - it's no joke. But I once cast a demon out of a black necromancer who was having sexual relations with demons. There was a witch in England on television in America, who gave her testimony when she got saved and told of having intercourse with a devil; people witnessed this. This kind of activity was around in the days of Noah, and it will be around again in the Last Days. Somehow, demonoids - they were virtual monsters - will exist on the earth again, as they did in Noah's day. We will see an increase in occult activity, but particularly in this kind of high Satanism; even to the point of people having relations with demons. It already goes on, but it's going to increase. Man is utterly fallen. I studied science in university, and I have no problem with science. However, it remains that man is fallen. So while I have no problem with science, I know what happens when you put science into the hands of fallen man. It is easy to visualize the kinds of atrocities that can be accomplished with biogenetic engineering; people can eventually take DNA, clone it, and re-create Josef Stalin or a whole race of Josef Stalins. There are things happening right now in genetics that when I studied biology in university would have seemed like science fiction; they no longer are. I have no doubt - I am not teaching this doctrinally, this is my own opinion - that the world is being set up for a huge spiritual seduction in which UFOs and extraterrestrials along with other things of this type will play a role. It can be seen in David Bowie's albums and in Stephen Spielberg's movies, for example. The Bible talks about 'the fallen ones'; the ones who fell from heaven, the Nephilim. The cosmos needs to be cleansed. I am quite convinced that extraterrestrial phenomena will be a large part of the spiritual seduction that is on its way. I am also quite afraid of the developments in biogenetic engineering - not the developments themselves, but seeing that kind of technology in the hands of fallen man. When combined with the occult, which scientology and other of these types of groups are already doing, the ramifications are terrible. Somehow, there was a physical manifestation of demons in the days of Noah; that will recur in some way in the Last Days, before the Return of Jesus. I won't speculate on it further, but I do see the way things are heading. This is the kind of world that we have to prepare our children to live in; think about that and then tell me you don't believe in Christian school! Smyrna, the days of Elijah, and the days of Noah all teach about the Tribulation in some way, as does the sin of Sodom. Under the leadership of Simeon, who was a cousin of Jesus who replaced the Apostle James when James was martyred, the believers left Jerusalem for a place called Pella; not Petra, Pella. The believers thought that the Rapture of the church would happen in 70 AD. When the Romans were through and they were rescued - Josephus wrote about this - they thought Jesus was coming then. This is a major type of the Rapture; it teaches what will happen at the end. This idea of being surrounded, God's people being rescued, and destruction coming is quite significant. That's what happened at the fall of Samaria in 720, what happened in the fall of Jerusalem, and what happened when Jerusalem fell again on the same day in 70 AD under the Romans. The idea is that God's people will be rescued, and judgment will follow. Somehow the two angels who rescued Lot's family correspond with the two spies sent into Jericho to rescue Rahab and the two witnesses in Revelation; they all teach the same idea in some way. Lot's daughters thought the destruction of Sodom was the end of the world; the way his wife turned around and faced Sodom is like what Jesus warned about - don't turn back when the flight comes. Don't hold onto this world. Lot represents a weak believer, and Abraham, who was interceding for Lot, represents Jesus. Salt preserves; once the salt stops preserving and the light stops being light, God will only intervene for those who are truly His, and judgment falls. In the Last Days, even the true believers have a lot of problems. Lot is a good example, for in many respects he was a weak believer. Up to a point, he was comfortable living in such an evil place. Isaiah 28 is one of the most important chapters of the Old Testament in teaching about the Last Days. It talks about the message at the end, and says that it is 'sheer terror to understand what it means'. When the deep meaning of Scripture is revealed, there is going to be 'sheer terror'. When Habakkuk saw the future, what he saw was so frightening that he asked God to change it; God told him no. Something really terrible is going to happen, but God will intervene for those who are truly his. Remember Lot's sons-in-law: when they were being warned, they failed to take Lot seriously. They were therefore not rescued. He leaves, his daughters leave, and his wife leaves. His wife was being rescued, but she looked back. Jesus is coming for fervent believers - for those who want Him to come, who are not holding onto this world. Those are the ones who will once again be rescued from Sodom. A baby is the ultimate emblem of God's love; even unsaved people can see that. If a couple has their firstborn, and - God forbid - that baby is in bad health, facing death, the baby's parents would willingly give their own lives if it meant that baby could live. God created that kind of love in order to teach how much He loves us. Jesus gave His life so that we could live. The baby might drive his parents nuts - may be colicky and all the rest of it - but still the parents would say, 'this is my baby and I would die for him'. God creates that love to teach us how He loves us. The point at which Israel went too far was when they sacrificed their babies to demons, to Moloch and other gods. In modern society, if you were to take all of the clinical reasons for abortion and put them together - such as ectopic pregnancy, vaginal cancer, radio-induced mutinogenesis of the fetus - they would account for a miniscule percentage of the abortions performed in any Western country. Most abortions are performed for non-therapeutic reasons; in other words, for social and economic considerations. Jesus called this 'Mammon-worship'. Make no mistake about it: non-therapeutic abortion is theologically and spiritually related to demon-worship. God judged Israel for it, and God is going to judge the United States and Great Britain for it. When someone takes these ultimate emblems of God's love and sacrifices them to demons, that's where God draws the line. We'll return to this in a moment. The sins of Sodom are similar. You must understand the theology of human sexuality: the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is head of the church, Scripture says. Sex in a Christian marriage is a reflection of Jesus going inside of His bride and causing her to be fruitful. This does not mean that sexual love in marriage is not erotic or pleasurable - what it does mean is that it is holy. God comes together in an act of creative love in Genesis, and brings forth the Creation. The plural God comes together - the Hebrew word is echad, oneness, and makes the creation. He created us in His likeness; so when male and female procreate in His love, we replay the Creation. He is creative, so He makes us pro-creative since we're made in His image. Human sex as God intended it has a deep spiritual significance, going back to the relationship between the Godhead as well as Christ's relationship with His church. A clear mark of Satan's is that he will always try to be the opposite of God. In God's design for sexual relations, it is giving and receiving pleasure, and it is heterosexual. The two biggest forms of sexual perversion in the world today are undoubtedly homosexuality and sadomasochism. Both of those things bear the clear signature of Satan, because of the principle of opposites. Instead of being heterosexual, sex is twisted to become homosexual. Instead of being the giving and receiving of pleasure, sex becomes the giving and receiving of pain. I am not saying it's wrong for married couples to enjoy aggressive sex; I am speaking of perversions. The pop singer Madonna was interviewed once in Time or Newsweek Magazine; I read it. She put out a video about sex, and much of it was sadomasochistic. They asked her about this, why she found it sexually appealing, and her response was that she likes being humiliated and punished by a strict male authority figure because of her Roman Catholic upbringing. She has a point, in a way, if you know Roman Catholicism. Roman Catholicism puts guilt on people through its denial of the Cross. The Cross is what takes away our guilt, so because of their removal of the Cross with their doctrine of the Mass, Roman Catholics have a deep guilt problem. Oftentimes after a Roman Catholic gets saved, you'll see that it takes them a long while to grow out of this guilt complex. There is in our society a blossoming of both homosexuality and sadomasochism. Recently in London, a lesbian headmistress in a school refused to let the children go on a class trip to see Romeo and Juliet because it was 'blatantly heterosexual'. This describes the last days of Sodom; it also describes the last days of England and America. Judgment begins in the house of God, and that includes 'Christian' countries. Take, for example, what is happening in Hollywood/ Malibu, with the rise in earthquakes, forest fires, and landslides. God judged Israel for these things, and He is also going to judge the Western nations for them also. We have much more than Israel did, and are therefore even more guilty than they were. (to be continued...)

Finally, the Bible says, 'Fallen is Babylon'. Scripture takes this theme from Jeremiah and Isaiah and uses it in Revelation, along with the theme of Daniel about the Temple being destroyed - see Matthew 24. Jeremiah, Daniel, and Isaiah were the prophets leading up to the Babylonian captivity. What happened in Israel during that time - leading up to and during the captivity - is a type of what happens at the end of the world. That is why Revelation and Matthew 24 take those themes and recycle them for the Last Days, for both Israel and the church in different ways. Let's look at Jeremiah 5:30, 31: "An astonishing and horrible thing has been committed in the land: The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own power; and My people love to have it so. But what will you do in the end?" The prophets prophesy falsely, the leaders lead on their own authority, and God's people love it. A modern example would be the fact that after John Wimber and Paul Cain made false predictions in the name of the Lord, the same people get on the same buses to go and see them again. Jeremiah was warning of God's judgment coming against their nation. Look at verse 27 in chapter 5: "Therefore they have become great and grown rich." They thought, like Laodicea, that because they were materially well off, they were blessed by God and had His favor, and didn't want to recognize that judgment was right around the corner. This is the Laodicean church. Jeremiah was telling the truth - 'God's judgment is coming and we have to repent'. They were saying, 'No, no, no, we're rich and God wants us rich'. He was warning of judgment, they were denying it. We have the same thing today with the faith-prosperity preachers and the Restorationists. "The prophets prophesy falsely, and My people love it so." Notice that it doesn't say they are not His people. Look at Jeremiah 28: Hananiah makes wild predictions that fail to happen, just like the Kansas City false prophets. In verse 15 it says this: "Then Jeremiah the prophet said to the prophet Hananiah" - it doesn't say he is not a prophet - "'Hear now, Hananiah, the Lord has not sent you, but you make this people trust in a lie. Therefore, thus says the Lord: "Behold, I will cast you from the face of the earth. This year you shall die, because you have taught rebellion against the Lord."'" You have made God's people trust in a lie, Mr. Wimber. You have made God's people trust in a lie, Bob Jones. You've made God's people trust in a lie, Paul Cain. They did it; it's a fact - you can see the videos and read the books, and you'll see that they did the same thing. That is what happened then, that is what Jesus said will happen before He comes, and it is exactly what is going on now. These people are Gnostic and ecumenical: 'it's OK to be a Roman Catholic and pray to the dead; God calls it an abomination, but that's all right.' What happened leading up to and during the Babylonian captivity is a major type of what happens to the church in the Last Days. The same is true of Sodom and Gomorrah and the period of Elijah's life dealing with Ahab and Jezebel, the age of the church of Smyrna, the days of Noah, and the last days of Israel and Samaria. Again, it was the sacrifice of babies to demons that caused God's judgment to fall before the Babylonian captivity, and I have no doubt that non-therapeutic abortion is going to be the impetus of God's judgment on the West. Similarly, when Israel's society was falling to bits just before the Babylonian captivity and the hallmarks of God's impending judgment were all over, people were running around saying 'We're rich, God wants us rich, we're triumphant, we're the King's kids, you're a false prophet, Jeremiah'. It is the same today. The hallmarks of God's coming judgment are all over the place and the society is falling to bits. Yet we have people running around claiming that God wants us rich and we're the King's kids, the church Triumphant, etc. Again, this is what Jesus warned about repeatedly in Matthew 24 - false prophets deceiving the church. Rick Joyner wrote a book called The Harvest, which actually predicted a blossoming of communism that would take over the entire developing world, part of the United States, and various other major areas of the West. The exact opposite, however, has happened. Yet people will follow this man and others like him as true prophets. "The prophets prophesy falsely and My people love it". Whenever you read the history of Kings and Chronicles, Jeremiah and Isaiah - the events leading up to the captivity - it teaches about the end. Remember Proverbs 5:10: "Lest aliens be filled with your wealth, and your labors go to the house of a foreigner;" King Hezekiah showed his treasure to the king of Babylon (2 Kings 20:12-18). There will be a blossoming of Babylon, the false religious system, in the Last Days. They will want the treasures of the house of the Lord. When you find Evangelicals who are ecumenical - people like John Wimber and George Cary - they are showing our treasures to the king of Babylon, and the king of Babylon will plunder those treasures. What happened before the Babylonian captivity and what caused it to happen - the sacrifice of babies, the show of our treasures to the king of Babylon, the following of false prophets instead of listening to true ones, thinking that God wants us rich and because we are rich we've got it made - these are the same things that preceded it. All of this Gnosticism and other errors are based in eliticism, or simply put, spiritual pride. Be very careful about this. I got a letter a while back from Roger Foster, who did not like the fact that I challenged him on his annihilationism. He claims there is no eternal hell, so I showed him that the Greek word used in regards to hell for 'forever and ever' is the same term used to describe God's glory, the high priesthood of Jesus, and our salvation. Hence, if the torment of hell is not truly eternal, then neither is God's glory, Jesus' high priesthood, or our salvation. As soon as you begin telling unsaved people that if they don't repent and come to Jesus when they die they'll cease to exist, they will say 'So what? That's what we believe anyway'. Unfortunately, that is the theology in back of the March for Jesus. That is what Graham Kendrick and Roger Foster believe; people don't realize this. I like the idea of Christians standing together proclaiming Jesus and preaching the Gospel, but in Dominion theology, proclamation into the heavenlies replaces evangelism. Graham Kendrick is a very talented musician and hymn writer; probably the best since Charles Wesley, many people would say. However, all of his songs contain these Dominionist ideas - "We proclaim, we announce, we are triumphant" etc. The problem is this: When you deal with Gnosticism, its adherents will always use the same terms we use, but they will mean different things by them. Let me explain: A Roman Catholic theologian and a Protestant one will have an ecumenical dialogue at a theological forum. The Protestant will say, "We're saved by grace", and the Jesuit will agree, "Yes, we're saved by grace". Well, it seems they both agree and the Reformation was a mistake. However, the Hebrew word for 'grace' is hesed; it is God's mercy in the covenant. The Greek word is charism, meaning 'gift'. The English word is 'undeserved favor' from the Latin grazia. So when we speak of 'grace', these are the things we think of. To a Roman Catholic, however, grace is an ethereal substance earned by the sacraments administered by a priest. Therefore they can both agree 'we're saved by grace', but they mean two totally different things by the term 'grace'. When you witness to someone in the New Age movement, you may tell them, "I saw the light." You're thinking of the true Light that came into the world according to John 1. They will respond by saying, "I also saw the light"; only they mean an 'illumination of cosmic consciousness'. You can both say that you saw the light when you give your respective testimonies, but you have two different definitions of 'light'. Similarly, when Restorationists use terms like 'victory', 'kingdom', 'triumph', 'dominion', 'proclamation', they mean different things by those terms than you do. They use Biblical terms in unbiblical ways, just as a Roman Catholic or a New Ager will. Indeed, Roman Catholicism, Restorationism, and Gnosticism all come from the same place: Alexandria. They all have roots in that theology. Now, we need to talk about the idea of the Temple. Jesus begins talking of the end of the world in Matthew 24 by discussing the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD. Jesus said, "Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up" (John 2:19). He was herein talking about His body. Man is made in God's image and likeness; we are like a temple. In Corinthians, Paul says "Know ye not that ye are temples of the Spirit?" The Temple was like a box within a box within a box: the Outer Courts, the Holy Place, and the kodesh kodeshim (sp?), the sanctum sanctorum, the Holy of Holies. The Outer Court corresponds to our physical bodies. The Holy Place represents our mind, emotions and intellect; our souls. Paul says to keep this holy. The Holy of Holies corresponds to where God's Spirit dwells within us. This is one way to understand and eliminate a lot of the confusion surrounding demons being cast out of Christians. Yes, even Christians may come under demonic influence and be oppressed, or even invaded in their bodies or possibly their souls. But when you say 'possessed' by a demon, you are talking about a demon entering the innermost man, where in a Christian God's Spirit dwells. That cannot happen. A Christian who is following Jesus cannot be demon-possessed. The Greek word, ek ballo is a very strong word meaning 'cast out'; we get our word 'ballistic' from it. This term is never used in connection with a Christian anywhere in the Bible. Jesus spoke of His body as a temple. Remember: what happened to Jesus in His last days happened to the early church and to the Apostles in their last days. Those things together teach us about what happens to the church in its Last Days. Again, in John 2:19 Jesus said, "Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up." The physical temple was an emblem of His body. In Hebrew we call Hosea, Sohea; that 'sh' sound indicates a link with Jesus, because of the structure of Hebrew. The Hebrew language is based on roots; when you have the same root in two different words, those two words are usually connected in some theological manner with each other. In Midrash, words with the same root, or shoresh, usually have an established Midrashic connection in their interpretation. That 'sh' root in Hosea means 'salvation'. Jesus' name is Yeshua; Isaiah's name is Ishiahu; Joshua's name is Yehoshua. Wherever you have that 'sh' sound it has meaning pertaining to salvation, and all of those figures with an 'sh' sound teach about Jesus in some way. Look at Hosea 6:2: "After two days He will revive us; on the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His sight." So we see it: what happens to Jesus happens also to us. In seven places, the New Testament refers to the church as the 'temple' or the 'tabernacle'. The Holy Spirit is like the cement that holds the bricks together. Take a look at I Peter 2:5: "You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood"; we are the stones of the temple. The church is the holy house, the Temple, and we are the stones that comprise it. The Hebrew word for 'fellowship' is heet ha brut. Peter's epistle was written to Jews and his ministry was mainly to Jews, as we're told in Galatians. He writes therefore from a very Jewish perspective, and the Jewish view of 'fellowship' was heet ha brut, meaning 'bricks cemented together'. It is one thing to come to church, but quite another to come to fellowship. Anyone may come into the building, but being a brick in the wall is something entirely different. If there is a brick missing from our wall, there is something wrong with the building; if a Christian is not cemented into it, there is something wrong with the church. He or she must get cemented in. We are the stones. (to be continued...)

Midrashically, on Palm Sunday what happens? In Luke 19:37-40, we find this: Jesus comes onto the Temple Mount while the people are singing the Hillel Rabbah from Psalm 118 - "Hosanna to the Son of David". The Pharisees freak out, telling them to be quiet; but Jesus says, "If these remain silent, the stones will cry out", indicating the Herodian stones of the Temple. In other words, "If the Jews don't proclaim Me, the Christians will." The Pharisees and Jewish leaders believed themselves to be special because they were descended from Abraham. But they go out to hear Yochanan ha mat bil, John the Baptist, in the wilderness, and he tells them, "God could raise up Abraham's children out of the stones" (Luke 3:8). Somehow what happened to Jesus' body was replayed in the destruction of the Temple in 70 AD. Acts 15 shows the Tabernacle being restored as the church, quoting from Amos. That will also happen to us. The temple will be destroyed again, but then raised up in glory. The early church had been meeting in Solomon's Portico, right outside the Temple. At the same time God was making ready to destroy the old Temple, He was building a new one right next to it. When the new Temple was ready, the old one was destroyed. The same is true with us; God is building a new temple, a new tabernacle. The old Temple in Jerusalem was demolished, and the abomination of desolations was set up with the entrance of imperial Rome in 70 AD, symbolizing political dominion over the house of God. Be careful of Erastianism, or state churches. The concept is totally dangerous. When Jesus said, "Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and render to God the things that are God's", he was addressing three issues: The first issue was that even in Old Testament Judaism there was to be a kind of separation of 'church and state'. The kings had to be descended from David, while the high priests had to be descended from Aaron. That became convoluted during the reign of John Hurricanus, during the period of the Hasmoneans, which followed the time of the Maccabees. In context, Jesus was addressing this. The second issue was the distinction between the two covenants. As it says in Jeremiah 31, the new covenant would not be like the old one. "I will cut a new covenant with the house of Judah and with the house of Israel; it shall not be like the covenant I made with their fathers." They had a state church: people in Jeremiah's day thought they were rightly related to God because they were part of the national covenant. Jeremiah came and said, "The new covenant won't be like that; God will write His law on your heart. It will be based on individual response." John the Baptist expressed the same thing. Jesus came and got rid of the state-church relationship; the Temple is destroyed. Then Paul wrote in Romans 2, 'That's it; it's over. There is a new covenant that is not like the old one.' But the very thing that Jeremiah predicts Jesus would get rid of, the thing John the Baptist predicts He'll get rid of, the thing that Jesus dies to get rid of, and Paul confirms that Jesus did get rid of it, gets put back in place by Constantine Then the Reformers, instead of going back to the Bible, came and also put it back in place. Instead of a Catholic state church, there was now a Protestant state church. In order to really reform the church and bring it back to the Bible, the first thing that had to be done was to destroy the unscriptural marriage between church and state. The second thing was to be rid of Augustine's false doctrine of the 'visible and invisible church', which claims that the church is made up of the unsaved as well as the saved. They failed to get rid of these things, and so in essence put back the old covenant. Remember, before Satan paganized the church he Judaized it. Roman Catholicism and Protestantism are both Judaizations. They both put back Erastianism, a state religion, and they both persecuted believers who would not go along with it for centuries. The Antichrist will ultimately marry church and state in that way; that is the third thing Jesus warns against. Having a state religion is totally unbiblical. In fact, when you understand the real eschatology implicit in it, it is abhorrent. England has had homosexual kings such as King James, and now has a New-Age king coming to the throne, all of whom have taken the title that belongs rightfully only to Christ - 'head of the church'. When you read Acts, you're not only reading past history, but future history also. When you read Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Kings, about the Babylonian captivity and what led up to it, that too is future as well as past history. The same goes for Daniel and the story of the Maccabees that he predicted, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the days of Noah. God 'declares the end from the beginning', it says in Isaiah. Now for the ultimate picture: Again, this is typology; I am not basing doctrine on it, I am using it to illustrate the truth. In Mark chapters 4 and 6, we read of boats being storm-tossed; this is a type of the church in tribulation. The earth has to do with Israel, the sea with the nations - "Why are the nations in an uproar" etc. However, the ultimate boat is in Acts 27, with Paul being like the good and faithful servant in Matthew 24:45, who will give the proper food at the proper time, just as Joseph fed the whole world and Moses fed the children of Israel in preparation for the exodus. Follow the typology: Acts 27:1 - "When it was decided that we should sail to Italy, they delivered Paul and some other prisoners to one named Julius, a centurion of the Augustan Regiment." Remember, Paul had to stand before Caesar; the Caesars are types of the Antichrist. Verses 2, 3: "So, entering a ship of Adramyttium, we put to sea, meaning to sail along the coasts of Asia. Aristarchus, a Macedonian of Thessalonica, was with us. And the next day we landed at Sidon. And Julius treated Paul kindly and gave him liberty to go to his friends and receive care." As it says in Daniel, they will receive a 'little help', if you can understand the connection. Verse 4: "When we had put to sea from there, we sailed under the shelter of Cyprus, because the winds were contrary." The word for 'wind' in Greek is pneuma, or in Hebrew ruach; these are the same words for 'spirit'. There are positive winds and negative winds, but the worst wind is the wind of the northeast. When a northeastern wind is blowing off the Mediterranean, it goes through the Carmel mountain chain in Galilee and comes down onto the Sea of Galilee, causing tumultuous waves. The ravines of the Carmel mountains cause a piston effect, which in turn creates these waves on the Sea of Galilee. This is the same wind that Paul's ship meets up with here. If you look at the Jewish calendar, which is agricultural, you will see on it the rainy seasons and which ways the wind blows. There are contrary and positive winds, just as throughout history there are predominant spiritual forces. In the very end, however, the spiritual forces become tremendously contrary. Let's continue in verse 5: "And when we had sailed over the sea which is off Cilicia and Pamphylia, we came to Myra, a city of Lycia. There the centurion found an Alexandrian ship sailing to Italy, and he put us on board. When we had sailed slowly many days, and arrived with difficulty off Cnidus, the wind not permitting us to proceed, we sailed under the shelter of Crete off Salmone. Passing it with difficulty, we came to a place called Fair Havens, near the city of Lasea. Now when much time had been spent, and sailing was now dangerous because the Fast was already over, Paul advised them, saying, "Men, I perceive that this voyage will end with disaster and much loss, not only of the cargo and ship, but also our lives." Nevertheless, the centurion was more persuaded by the helmsman and the owner of the ship than by the things spoken by Paul. And because the harbor was not suitable to winter in, the majority advised to set sail from there also, if by any means they could reach Phoenix, a harbor of Crete opening toward the southwest and northwest, and winter there. When the south wind blew softly, supposing that they had obtained their desire, putting out to sea, they sailed close by Crete." Paul knew that they were headed for trouble; he warned them how to avoid it, but the majority didn't want to listen to the guy who really knew what was going on. Then, when the wind changed and things seemed to be getting better, they reacted with an attitude of "See, I told you he was a jerk". Restorationists said when the Iron Curtain came down, "See, we told you Hal Lindsay was a jerk, and the Russians aren't going to invade Israel." Yet anti-Semitism in Russia has done nothing but increase since that time, and there are four Moslem countries that are part of the former Soviet Empire, at least one of which has nuclear weapons capabilities and a growing fundamentalist Islam. This is the same idea: 'when men say "Peace and safety", then the end will come'. Bush spoke of a 'New World Order'. A few weeks later, he and Mr. Major were rushing thousands and tens of thousands of troops to the Gulf in what was probably the biggest war since the Second World War. Next they decided that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the New World Order and must be gotten rid of; but he is still down there. Then there was Yugoslavia, and then the Middle East. There will be no lasting peace anywhere in the world, particularly not in that area of the world, until the Son of David, the Prince of Peace, is recognized by Jew and Arab. There is a false peace in the Middle East; I don't know if it's the false peace predicted by Zechariah, but if not, it is certainly a prelude to it. Things seem to get better; but remember, this is like birth pangs. The pain seems to let up for a while, but then the uterine contractions begin all over again, worse than the last time. (to be continued...)

Let's look at what happens next in Acts 27:14: "But not long after, a tempestuous head wind arose, called Euroclydon. So when the ship was caught, and could not head into the wind, we let her drive." The church finds itself unable to control its direction and its destiny. "And running under the shelter of an island called Clauda, we secured the skiff with difficulty. When they had taken it on board, they used cables to undergird the ship; and fearing lest they should run aground on the Syrtis Sands, they struck sail and so were driven." They give up trying to control its direction, only remaining concerned with keeping it afloat. "And because we were exceedingly tempest-tossed, the next day they lightened the ship." The early Christians had to get rid of this world's goods. In the Last Days, if we aren't careful, the things we own will wind up owning us. The attitude we need is that everything we have belongs to Jesus; if I have a lot of money, in actuality I'm flat broke, because it doesn't belong to me. I am only a steward of what belongs to Jesus. On the other hand, if I have nothing and am unemployed for four years, I am actually rich because I'm a co-heir with Christ. Any other attitude is unbiblical and unhealthy, and will lead to trouble for us. They begin to jettison the cargo to save the ship. I know a place in Brazil where the Christians are very poor; the people sold their houses and cars in order to build a church. Would Christians in the West be willing to jettison their cargo like that and divest themselves of this world's goods in order to save their church? Not many. Let's look further, beginning in v. 19: "On the third day we threw the ship's tackle overboard with our own hands. Now when neither sun nor stars appeared for many days, and no small tempest beat on us, all hope that we would be saved was finally given up." The sun and stars were not giving their light. Jesus told Abraham that his descendants would be like the stars of heaven. When the stars don't give their light - when Abraham's descendants hide their light - the glory of Jesus is obscured. Isaiah 13:10, 11: "For the stars of heaven and their constellations will not give their light; the sun will be darkened in its going forth, and the moon will not cause its light to shine. I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; I will halt the arrogance of the proud, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible." This is what happens in Acts 27. The ship gets storm-tossed; the people who know what's going on are ignored by the majority that rules, and that doesn't want to know the truth. If you'd like to know what will happen to the Charismatic movement, look at Isaiah 24:7, 8: "The new wine fails, the vine languishes, all the merry-hearted sigh. The mirth of the tambourine ceases, the noise of the jubilant ends, the joy of the harp ceases." That is how the Charismatic movement ends. There is a place for joy and a place for worship, as long as it is based on the truths of God's Word. Once you begin basing your doctrine on experience, standing on something other than the Bible, you have nothing left to rejoice about. There is only your own destruction to look forward to. However, Jesus wants to preserve us. Let's continue with verse 21 in Acts 27: "But after long abstinence from food, then Paul stood in the midst of them and said, 'Men, you should have listened to me, and not have sailed from Crete and incurred this disaster and loss.'" Most of the things that are going to happen to the church could, in theory, be avoided if people had the wisdom to listen to the teachers who are telling the truth, and to follow the pastors who are leading their flocks in the way of Scripture instead of following those who are tickling their ears. We see today many big Restorationists and the prosperity preachers in the United States with their big churches: do you know why their churches are big? Not because people are getting saved - those are not the churches where people get saved. People are getting saved at traditional Pentecostal churches such as David Wilkerson's and Nicky Cruz's. The reason the Restorationists and prosperity preachers have big churches is because they suck people out of other churches who want to have their ears tickled with prosperity preaching and Kingdom-Now theology. Most of the destruction and judgment coming on the church could theoretically be avoided if people were willing to obey the Word of God and heed its warnings. Verse 22: "And now I urge you to take heart, for there will be no loss of life among you, but only of the ship. For there stood before me this night an angel of the God to whom I belong and whom I serve, saying 'Do not be afraid, Paul; you must be brought before Caesar; and indeed God has granted you all those who sail with you.'" I am convinced that not only will we see an increase in demonic activity before Jesus comes, but also an increase in angelic activity. Verse 25: "Therefore take heart, men, for I believe God that it will be just as it was told me." Notice Paul's confidence and his countenance. You can always tell the difference between hype and anointing if the Holy Spirit has tuned your ears. Verse 26: "'However, we must run aground on a certain island.' Now, when the fourteenth night had come, as we were driven up and down in the Adriatic Sea, about midnight the sailors sensed that they were drawing near some land. And they took soundings and found it to be twenty fathoms; and when they had gone a little farther, they took soundings again and found it to be fifteen fathoms. Then, fearing lest we should run aground on the rocks, they dropped four anchors from the stern, and prayed for day to come." The number fourteen is interesting. Jewish genealogies considered fourteen to be an important number; double seven. They would resculpture the pedigree tables, only naming those ancestors who were of theological importance to the argument they were trying to make. For instance, in the genealogy of Jesus, they sculptured in fourteens and only named those ancestors who were of theological importance to the theological argument that Matthew was trying to make about Jesus being the Messiah. Fourteen has something to do with being halfway to the next event. Again, a good example is in Matthew 1:17: "So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations, from David until the captivity in Babylon are fourteen generations, and from the captivity in Babylon until the Christ are fourteen generations." This is an example of the way the number fourteen is used frequently in Scripture. There is more to this subject of Biblical numerics than we have time for, and a lot more than I personally have time to study. Nonetheless, let's continue. Verse 30 of Acts 27: "And as the sailors were seeking to escape from the ship, when they had let down the skiff into the sea, under pretense of putting out anchors from the prow," Many will fall away in the Last Days; let's look at backsliders. In Jude's epistle he describes backsliders inside the church. There are as many backsliders in the church as there are outside it. Proverbs says that the backslider of heart shall be filled with his own ways. Backsliders often scheme when they try to leave. They stop coming to church, to fellowship, to prayer meeting, etc. on one pretense after another; they begin manipulating and scheming. What they're really trying to do is get away from the ship, because they have gotten away from the ship's Owner. Verse 31: "Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, 'Unless these men stay in the ship, you cannot be saved.'" Remember, fellowship is always important. Like I Peter, the epistle to the Hebrews is a very Jewish book, which draws on the Jewish concept of fellowship. "Forsake not the assembling one with another, especially as you see the Day approaching" (Hebrews 10:25). If too many bricks are removed from strategic places, the roof of the building will fall in. Christians are going to have to stand together, or they will never be able to stand-alone. Let me qualify that: There is a unity of the Spirit and there is a unity of man. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth; you cannot build a unity of the Holy Spirit on a lie. The ecumenical and interfaith movements are trying to do this, to build unity on a lie. True unity of the Spirit, however, can only be built on the truth. Ecumenism builds unity on a deception, they do have 'unity of the spirit', and the question is, which spirit? Much of what people are calling the 'unity of the Holy Spirit' is really a man-made unity that compromises the truth of God's Word for the sake of organizational politics. Acts 27:32: "Then the soldiers cut away the ropes of the skiff and let it fall off. And as day was about to dawn, Paul implored them all to take food, saying, 'Today is the fourteenth day you have waited and continued without food, and eaten nothing.'" For three and a half years, Elijah fed the Gentile woman. Now Paul comes in the way Moses, Joseph, Elijah, and John the Baptist came - like the good and faithful servant - to feed God's people during this time of darkness and famine. In the End, it will be the same; the good and faithful servant will feed God's people. Verse 33: "'Therefore I urge you to take nourishment, for this is for your survival, since not a hair will fall from the head of any of you." You really have to be some man of God to stand up when things are like this, when everyone thinks they're finished, and have His power and anointing to tell people, "You're not finished; Jesus loves us and He's going to get us out of this." When persecution comes, the first ones to betray each other and fall away will be the ones described in Jude's epistle. When hard times come, the prosperity preachers and those who follow them will be the first to lose their faith. They have not been prepared to live a crucified life, one of hardship, so when hardship comes, they won't be able to handle it. Verse 35: "And when he had said these things, he took bread and gave thanks to God in the presence of them all; and when he had broken it he began to eat. Then they were all encouraged, and also took food themselves. And in all we were two hundred and seventy-six persons on the ship. So when they had eaten enough, they lightened the ship and threw out the wheat into the sea." 'Cast much bread upon the water, and you will reap in a due season.' Somehow, the Gospel of the Kingdom will be preached during the Tribulation to the raging sea. The Gospel of the Kingdom is different from the Gospel in some ways; it is still the same Gospel, still good news, but it is different in character. The Gospel of the Kingdom is like Matthew's Gospel: Jesus talked about hell three times as much as He did about heaven in Matthew. John the Baptist also preached this Gospel of the Kingdom, the warning that God is going to pour out His judgment. They feed themselves here in Acts 27, and then they cast the rest of the bread on the water. Verse 39: "When it was day, they did not recognize the land; but they observed a bay with a beach, onto which they planned to run the ship if possible. And they let go the anchors and left them in the sea, meanwhile loosing the rudder ropes; and they hoisted the mainsail to the wind and made for shore. But striking a place where two seas met, they ran the ship aground; and the prow stuck fast and remained immovable, but the stern was being broken up by the violence of the waves. And the soldiers' plan was to kill the prisoners, lest any of them should swim away and escape. But the centurion, wanting to save Paul, kept them from their purpose, and commanded that those who could swim should jump overboard first and get to land, and the rest, some on boards and some on parts of the ship. And so it was that they all escaped safely to land." So the ship is destroyed, but the people in it are not. We should learn from this that if we cannot stand together, we couldn't stand-alone when the time comes. Acts 28:1: "Now when they had escaped, they then found out that the island was called Malta. And the natives showed us unusual kindness; for they kindled a fire and made us all welcome, because of the rain that was falling and because of the cold. But when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks and laid them on the fire, a viper came out because of the heat, and fastened on his hand. So when the natives saw the creature hanging from his hand, they said to one another, 'No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he has escaped the sea, yet justice does not allow to live.' But he shook off the creature into the fire and suffered no harm." In Revelation, it says that they took that old serpent who was the devil and cast him into the fire. This represents the judgment of Satan. Jewish midrash reads the Bible differently than the church at large, because the church at large has made the mistake that Paul warned them not to make in Romans 11, forgetting the root. We don't see the root because it is underground; however, if it were not there, the tree wouldn't be either. If the root were dead, so would the tree be. God is going to bless the church through the Jews in the Last Days. We will see that as more Jews begin coming to faith in Jesus, God will begin pointing the church back to its roots and teaching it how to interpret the Bible correctly. A little light will take you a long way, but when things get very dark you need a strong light. These things are sealed up until the time of the End; one of the things that indicates that we are in the Last Days is that the Holy Spirit has begun to unseal them. The ship is destroyed, but those on it are saved; the stones are thrown down, but resurrected. Satan will be judged. That is what will happen. Eventually, the people on the ship in Acts 27 realized that Paul was telling the truth all along, though the majority had refused to listen to him. They found out the hard way that he was right. The people of Sodom scorned the words of Lot and the two angels, but they found out the hard way that they were right. Those in Noah's day thought Noah was crazy, but they too found out when it was too late that he was right. In Daniel 11 we read that those who have understanding among the people will give insight to the many. If it were up to me, I would never teach the Bible. I would rather do nothing but evangelism - I want to see people saved, and I would give this up in a minute to pursue that. The only reason I do teach is that enough people have told me that this is what God wants me to do, and I believe they are right. If God wants me to feed His people in preparation for the Last Days, then that is what I'll do. There are wise and foolish virgins, the foolish ones do not have oil in their lamps, and when they realize the wise virgins were right, they try to get it then. However, as we see in Matthew 25, they go to buy it and it is too late. When the night comes, you need to have the oil in your lamp already. What I want is to see that all of you have oil in your lamps, because you're going to need it. I want to see that all of you have grain stored up in your storehouses, because you'll need it. Yet at this time, when we should be storing up grain and buying oil for our lamps, when we should be facing the facts for what they are and prophecy is being fulfilled under our noses, we have the same thing they had in Noah's day, Jeremiah's day, Sodom's and Jerusalem's last days. What happened then is going to happen now; in fact, is already happening now. A division is coming to the Body of Christ, and there will be at least three issues that cause it: Once again, those who will compromise and those who will not. A lot of evangelicals are compromising: Baptists, Pentecostals, and Charismatics among them - division is already coming. Secondly, Israel and its role in prophecy. Division in the church over this issue is coming and in fact is already here. Thirdly, division will come over the authority of the Word of God and the way in which it must be interpreted. This is what is happening now. Make no mistake about it - Jesus is coming. The time to get the grain and to purchase the oil is now. If you do, you will be a wise virgin. If not, you will be a foolish one. Jesus wants you to have it now; He is here, and He is offering it to you. Please take it.THE END