The following Scripture passages are offered to aid beginning fellowships. The readings and commentary for this week are more in line with what has become usual; for the following will most likely be familiar observations. The concept behind this Sabbath’s selection is the United States of America is not a Christian nation.
Weekly Readings
For the Sabbath of March 23, 2013
The person conducting the Sabbath service should open services with two or three hymns, or psalms, followed by an opening prayer acknowledging that two or three (or more) are gathered together in Christ Jesus’ name, and inviting the Lord to be with them.
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The hand of [YHWH] was upon me, and he brought me out in the spirit of [YHWH] and set me down in the middle of the valley; it was full of bones. And he led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry. And he said to me, "Son of man, can these bones live?" And I answered, "O Lord [YHWH], you know." Then he said to me, "Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of [YHWH]. Thus says the Lord [YHWH] to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. And I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am [YHWH]." So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. And I looked, and behold, there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them. But there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, "Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, Thus says the Lord [YHWH]: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live." So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army. Then he said to me, "Son of man [adam], these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say, 'Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are indeed cut off.' Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord [YHWH]: Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will bring you into the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am [YHWH], when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am [YHWH]; I have spoken, and I will do it, declares [YHWH]." (Ezek 37:1–14 emphasis added)
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The bones in the Valley of Dry Bones are identified within the Prophet Ezekiel’s vision: these bones represent the whole house of Israel, not the bones of corpses. And this is an essential distinction; for if the bones seen in Ezekiel’s vision function as metaphors for returning life to the nation of Israel and not as “real” bones of Israelites who will be returned to life, then it is the procedure not resurrection of Israel itself that has importance:
Behold, I [the Lord] will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will bring you into the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. (Ezek 37:12–14)
The converse of what’s declared is that Israel will not know the Lord [YHWH] until the graves of Israel are opened and the breath of the Lord is placed within the resurrected nation of Israel; thus, Israel does not today know the Lord, with Israel not being the nation circumcised in the flesh but circumcised of heart. Simply put, Pharisees in the 1st-Century and rabbinical Judaism today do not know the Lord; nor do Christians within the greater Christian Church know the Lord. They cannot know the Lord until they come under the New Covenant:
Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. (Jer 31:31–34)
Note, the New Covenant will replace the covenant made “on the day” when the Lord took the fathers of Israel by the hand to lead this nation of Israel out from Egypt … what covenant was made on the day when the fathers of Israel left Israel?
The time that the people of Israel lived in Egypt was 430 years. At the end of 430 years, on that very day, all the hosts of [YHWH] went out from the land of Egypt. It was a night of watching by [YHWH], to bring them out of the land of Egypt; so this same night is a night of watching kept to [YHWH] by all the people of Israel throughout their generations. And [YHWH] said to Moses and Aaron, "This is the statute of the Passover: no foreigner shall eat of it, but every slave that is bought for money may eat of it after you have circumcised him. No foreigner or hired servant may eat of it. It shall be eaten in one house; you shall not take any of the flesh outside the house, and you shall not break any of its bones. All the congregation of Israel shall keep it. If a stranger shall sojourn with you and would keep the Passover to [YHWH], let all his males be circumcised. Then he may come near and keep it; he shall be as a native of the land. But no uncircumcised person shall eat of it. There shall be one law for the native and for the stranger who sojourns among you." All the people of Israel did just as [YHWH] commanded Moses and Aaron. And on that very day [YHWH] brought the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt by their hosts. (Ex 12:40–51)
The covenant made on the day when the Lord took the fathers of Israel by the hand to lead Israel out from Egypt is the Passover covenant, not either the first or second Sinai covenant or the Moab covenant. The New Covenant is a second Passover covenant that will no longer require the shedding of blood, neither that of paschal lambs or the Lamb of God … the New Covenant is made with Israel, the nation to be circumcised of heart, on the day of the Second Passover, when the Lord again gives the lives of men in exchange for the lives of Israel (Isa 43:3–4).
There is injustice in this world, but there is no injustice with the Lord: every biological or legal firstborn not covered by the blood of the Lamb of God will suddenly perish at the midnight hour of one long theological night that began at Calvary. These firstborns will perish because they all belong to God as the firstborn of Israel belongs to the Lord (Ex 12:2), and in being removed at the beginning of the seven endtime years of tribulation, they are sealed in death so that they cannot openly rebel against God when the Apostasy (2 Thess 2:3) occurs 220 days into the Affliction. They will be when called forth in the great White Throne Judgment as they were on the day when they suddenly perished.
Israel in Egypt, on the dark portion of the 14th day of Aviv beginning at dusk, killed the selected and penned Passover lamb, then each family roasted this lamb whole (that is, without disemboweling) which would have taken hours, suggesting that the lamb would not have been ready to eat until about the midnight hour when the death angel passed over all the land of Egypt, slaying the firstborn in every house whose lentil and doorposts had not been smeared with the blood of the slain Passover lamb.
The doorposts and lentil represented the way into the house in which the Israelite dwelt, with the Passover lamb being roasted into the house and with the Israelite not to leave his house until dawn (Ex 12:22) … the mouth represents the way into the fleshly house of a human person, the house in which a born-of-spirit Israelite dwells, with this born-of-spirit Israelite being a firstborn son of God as Israel in Egypt was the firstborn son of the God of Abraham (Ex 4:22). Add to this that Christ Jesus was the selected Lamb of God, slain when Pharisees believed they should kill the Passover for Israel, not when Moses in Egypt commanded the people to sacrifice the Passover, that when the people of Israel in Egypt would have been eating their Passover lambs Jesus gave to His disciples symbols representing His body and His blood so that they could commemorate the Passover year-by-year, eating His flesh in the form of the blessed bread as the reality of the Passover lamb Israel sacrificed in Egypt, with drinking from the blessed cup being analogous to the smearing of the blood of the Passover lamb sacrificed in Egypt on the doorposts and lentil of every house in which an Israelite dwelt.
Under the New Covenant, there will be no sacrifice of a Passover lamb as a sin offering for Israel; for there will be no remembrance of sin. With the Law written on hearts and placed within every Israelite, there will be no sin without there also being open rebellion against God as in the Apostasy of day 220 in the Affliction, the first 1260 days of the seven endtime years.
The reason Christians today on Passover (the night that Jesus was betrayed) take the sacraments of broken, unleavened bread and drink from the cup is that on this one night a year—and on no other night—bread and wine represent the body and life of Christ Jesus, the Lamb of God. On every other night of the year, bread and wine is Cain’s offering. Thus, the person who solemnly takes a cracker on the day after the Sabbath, week after week, and believes that he or she eats the Lord’s sacrifice is deceived, and deceives him or herself. … Under the changed symbolism of the first Passover Covenant, the wine in the blessed cup represents the blood of Christ Jesus that is poured out for the forgiveness of sins (Matt 26:28), meaning that remembrance of these sins are retained until they are covered by the blood of Christ represented by the blessed cup. The very act of taking the Passover sacraments of bread and wine assures Christians that they are not under the New Covenant, but remain under the first Passover covenant, now made with the living inner self of the person and not with the outer self.
What changed with Christ’s death at Calvary wasn’t the ending of the first Passover covenant, but the possibility for resurrection of the inner self through the person receiving a second breath of life, the breath of God [pneuma Theou] in the breath of Christ [pneuma Christou]. What changed was “Israel,” now the nation circumcised of heart rather than in the flesh. And with the change of Israel from being a physical people to being a nation composed of living inner selves [souls], the symbols representing the Passover sacrifice also had to change.
But when Paul wrote to the saints at Corinth, it was evident that these holy ones did not well understand the above:
But in the following instructions I do not commend you, because when you come together it is not for the better but for the worse. For, in the first place, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you. And I believe it in part, for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized. When you come together, it is not the Lord's supper that you eat. For in eating, each one goes ahead with his own meal. One goes hungry, another gets drunk. What! Do you not have houses to eat and drink in? Or do you despise the church of God and humiliate those who have nothing? What shall I say to you? Shall I commend you in this? No, I will not. For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, "This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me." In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me." For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on himself. That is why many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. But if we judged ourselves truly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged by the Lord, we are disciplined so that we may not be condemned along with the world. So then, my brothers, when you come together to eat, wait for one another—if anyone is hungry, let him eat at home—so that when you come together it will not be for judgment. About the other things I will give directions when I come. (1 Cor 11:17–34 emphasis added)
A person—any person—who takes the Passover sacrifices in an unworthy manner takes judgment upon him or herself. And taking the Passover sacraments of bread and wine in an unworthy manner includes not having examined oneself, but also includes taking the sacraments because the person is physically hungry or taking the sacraments when division among disciples exists, and especially includes taking the sacraments on a day other than the Passover.
The vast majority of Christians today are deceived; however, Christians are no more deceived today than were Israelites in the days of Jeremiah:
Therefore thus says [YHWH] of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will set my face against you for harm, to cut off all Judah. I will take the remnant of Judah who have set their faces to come to the land of Egypt to live, and they shall all be consumed. In the land of Egypt they shall fall; by the sword and by famine they shall be consumed. From the least to the greatest, they shall die by the sword and by famine, and they shall become an oath, a horror, a curse, and a taunt. I will punish those who dwell in the land of Egypt, as I have punished Jerusalem, with the sword, with famine, and with pestilence, so that none of the remnant of Judah who have come to live in the land of Egypt shall escape or survive or return to the land of Judah, to which they desire to return to dwell there. For they shall not return, except some fugitives." Then all the men who knew that their wives had made offerings to other gods, and all the women who stood by, a great assembly, all the people who lived in Pathros in the land of Egypt, answered Jeremiah: "As for the word that you have spoken to us in the name of [YHWH], we will not listen to you. But we will do everything that we have vowed, make offerings to the queen of heaven and pour out drink offerings to her, as we did, both we and our fathers, our kings and our officials, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. For then we had plenty of food, and prospered, and saw no disaster. But since we left off making offerings to the queen of heaven and pouring out drink offerings to her, we have lacked everything and have been consumed by the sword and by famine." And the women said, "When we made offerings to the queen of heaven and poured out drink offerings to her, was it without our husbands' approval that we made cakes for her bearing her image and poured out drink offerings to her?" Then Jeremiah said to all the people, men and women, all the people who had given him this answer: "As for the offerings that you offered in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, you and your fathers, your kings and your officials, and the people of the land, did not [YHWH] remember them? Did it not come into his mind? [YHWH] could no longer bear your evil deeds and the abominations that you committed. Therefore your land has become a desolation and a waste and a curse, without inhabitant, as it is this day. It is because you made offerings and because you sinned against [YHWH] and did not obey the voice of [YHWH] or walk in his law and in his statutes and in his testimonies that this disaster has happened to you, as at this day." Jeremiah said to all the people and all the women, "Hear the word of [YHWH], all you of Judah who are in the land of Egypt. Thus says [YHWH] of hosts, the God of Israel: You and your wives have declared with your mouths, and have fulfilled it with your hands, saying, 'We will surely perform our vows that we have made, to make offerings to the queen of heaven and to pour out drink offerings to her.' Then confirm your vows and perform your vows! Therefore hear the word of the LORD, all you of Judah who dwell in the land of Egypt: Behold, I have sworn by my great name, says [YHWH], that my name shall no more be invoked by the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt, saying, 'As the Lord [YHWH] lives.' Behold, I am watching over them for disaster and not for good. All the men of Judah who are in the land of Egypt shall be consumed by the sword and by famine, until there is an end of them. And those who escape the sword shall return from the land of Egypt to the land of Judah, few in number; and all the remnant of Judah, who came to the land of Egypt to live, shall know whose word will stand, mine or theirs. This shall be the sign to you, declares [YHWH], that I will punish you in this place, in order that you may know that my words will surely stand against you for harm: Thus says [YHWH], Behold, I will give Pharaoh Hophra king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies and into the hand of those who seek his life, as I gave Zedekiah king of Judah into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who was his enemy and sought his life." (Jer 44:11–30 emphasis added)
Hot cross buns are the modern successors to ancient cakes bearing the image of the queen of heaven … for Christians, observance of Easter is open rebellion against the Father and Son, rebellion comparable to Judah’s rebellion against the Lord, with Zedekiah’s rebellion against the king of Babylon (2 Kings 24:20) being the figurative straw that caused the Lord to cast Jerusalem and the house of Judah from His presence.
Remember what the people who temporarily escaped from Nebuchadnezzar by going to Egypt (the geographical land representing sin) said when “Christians” following the Second Passover liberation of Israel want to return to the Christianity of their past, of their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents. You will hear nearly identical words, with Christmas and Easter being the holidays that these Christians refuse to give up; for America was a great nation when America as a nation kept Christmas. There was no want, no disaster. Everything was well in America, Canada, Sweden when the entirety of the nation observed Christmas. So what argument will you have against neighbors who insist upon everyone celebrating Christmas once the seven endtime years of tribulation are upon the world? They will have history on their side. You will have Jeremiah—and that will not be enough for you to prevail, which is why the two witnesses will be compelled to shut skies and strike the earth with plagues.
When the Second Passover liberation of Israel occurs through all self-identified Christians being filled-with and empowered by the spirit of God, this filling with spirit occurring after all uncovered firstborns, legal and biological, die suddenly because they refuse to take the Passover sacraments on the night Jesus was betrayed, implementation of the New Covenant will have also occurred. When the Second Passover occurs, the New Covenant will be implemented; for the New Covenant is the vehicle that will harvest the firstfruits of God, with most of greater Christianity rebelling against God and becoming open enemies of God that will have to be destroyed in the lake of fire upon Christ Jesus’ return as the Messiah.
According to Scripture, the fate of rebelling Israelites is not positive: those individuals who know the will of God but who steadfast refuse to do those things that are pleasing to God will be punished by God through other men as the House of Israel was taken captive by Assyria and the House of Judah was taken captive by Nebuchadnezzar and the Chaldeans; therefore Christians in the Western world can expect to be punished by God bringing unbelievers against them, and this might already be happening … how can a “Christian” nation support gay marriage or abortions on demand? No Christian nation can—and America’s President Obama assured the world that the United States of America was not a Christian nation, a reality he has set about confirming day-by-day.
This subject will be continued into next week’s Sabbath reading.
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The person conducting the Sabbath service should close services with two hymns, or psalms, followed by a prayer asking God’s dismissal.
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"Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved."