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 jihad as a force utilized by God.
Weekly Readings
For the Sabbath of September 6, 2014
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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"Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber. But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens. The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers." This figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what He was saying to them. (John 10:1–6)
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In the metaphoric expression that has Israel being sheep and the true shepherd being Christ Jesus, with the gatekeeper being God the Father, an expression that Pharisees didn’t understand, Christ identified Pharisees as thieves and robbers, those who had entered the temple without being let in by the gatekeeper. This analogy was context specific, meaning that it pertained specifically to Pharisees and temple officials then present to hear Jesus’ words, but this analogy had within it <other sheep> not present at the time; therefore this analogy extended beyond its immediate setting … this analogy actually extends beyond its expansion that has greater Christendom being the other sheep, with Christ Jesus continuing as the good shepherd and God the Father continuing as the gatekeeper.
In Jesus telling the Jews, “‘And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd’” (John 10:16), Jesus laid the basis for the inclusion of all humanity as sheep found in many differing folds. Thus, in this one analogy is the theological undergirding of Jesus—not thieves and robbers; i.e., human ministers—gathering to God many flocks of sheep, with these other flocks being, today, neither Christians nor Jews, both of whom are Israel, spiritual [i.e., circumcised of heart] and/or physical [i.e., circumcised in the flesh only]. And to the consternation of greater Christendom, these other sheep include, following doubled day 1260 in the middle of the seven endtime years of tribulation, All who endure to the end (from Matt 24:13; 10:22), including today’s atheists, Buddhists, Hindis, and especially Muslims, the great nation promised to Abraham because Ishmael was his firstborn son though not the heir of the Promise.
Revelation becomes problematic when the ones receiving the revelation are so rooted in the past that change, repentance, is not really possible—
It is in the nature of the Promise made to Abraham where trouble resides: what is this Promise, and what does it include or exclude?
The Promise was made to Abram/Abraham before Abram had his belief of God counted to him as righteousness. But this Promise didn’t have fixed parameters even after Abram’s belief was counted to him as righteousness; for this Promise included Abram having his heir coming from his loins:
After these things the word of [YHWH] came to Abram in a vision: "Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great." But Abram said, "O Lord [YHWH], what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" And Abram said, "Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir." And behold, the word of [YHWH] came to him: "This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir." And He brought him outside and said, "Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them." Then He said to him, "So shall your offspring be." And he believed [YHWH], and he counted it to him as righteousness. (Gen 15:1–6 emphasis added)
Is there one star in the sky?
There is one main star, the sun that provides light to this world; that reflects off the moon to provide light in the darkness of night. But there are many—a vast multitude—of stars that fill the observable heaven at night. Abram would have seen many, many stars, too many to number. And so his offspring would be, according to the Genesis account received by the people of the book.
Christians do not tend to think of the sun as a star, the star that rules day, the light portion of a twenty-four hour day. However, to not consider the obviousness of the sun being a star introduces problems in the nature of the Promise that Abram’s seed would be as the stars of heaven.
Abram saw the Lord in vision when it was day. Darkness would come later, what Paul realized: “As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. And behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him” (Gen 15:12).
One sun, a star, but many suns too far away to cast much light in this world—has Paul correct when he wrote, “Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring [seed]. It does not say, ‘And to offsprings [seeds],’ referring to many, but referring to one, ‘And to your offspring,’ who is Christ” (Gal 3:16). … He was correct, but his argument doesn’t hold for Abram was promised that his seed would be as numerous as the stars of heaven; however, until darkness came, there was only one star in heaven, the sun.
What is a Christian to do when Scripture seems to disagree with “Scripture”? Does a Christian insist upon literal exactness, figurative correctness, infallibility? Or does the Christian gloss over the deficiencies, keeping the spirit of the text while ignoring apparent contradictions? Or does the Christian resolve differences by placing what has been disclosed in its context, which can certainly change as day become night which in turn gives way to day.
Abram received knowledge via a vision. Paul, however, does not in Galatians claim to have received revelation via a vision. In fact, when Paul speaks of a vision, he says specially, “I know that this man was caught up into paradise—whether in the body or out of the body I do not know, God knows—and he heard things that cannot be told, which man may not utter” (2 Cor 12:3–4). So whatever knowledge Paul received via a vision, he could not directly express or talk about: he could not repeat what he was told. However, whatever it was that he had seen and heard would have quietly manifested itself in his writings; for whatever he had heard would have changed him, would have affected him in a manner similar to how Daniel was affected.
Here is the end of the matter. As for me, Daniel, my thoughts greatly alarmed me, and my color changed, but I kept the matter in my heart." (Dan 7:28)
And I, Daniel, was overcome and lay sick for some days. Then I rose and went about the king's business, but I was appalled by the vision and did not understand it. (Dan 8:27)
Because Paul would not have ceased thinking about what he heard in his vision that he could not repeat, what he heard would have crept unawares into Paul’s epistles, with one of these things being Paul’s apparent error in saying <one seed, one offspring>, when Abram was promised that his offspring would be as numerous as stars in heaven.
Again, think about the Lord taking Abram outside during the day to look up at the heaven and telling Abram his offspring would be as stars, too many to number: Abram would have known how numerous stars were during the night, but he would have seen only one star, the sun, during the day. It was by the light of the sun that Abram tended his sheep, but it was by the light of distant stars that Abram defeated the four kings:
When Abram heard that his kinsman had been taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in his house, 318 of them, and went in pursuit as far as Dan. And he divided his forces against them by night, he and his servants, and defeated them and pursued them to Hobah, north of Damascus. (Gen 14:14–15 emphasis added)
Darkness wasn’t for tending sheep, but for wielding the sword … Abram would have known the stars that he could see at night but couldn’t see during the day. He had come from Egypt where dead pharaohs were believed to be stars, no longer ruling Egypt but still alive in distant regions to give light in the darkness. So regardless of whether Abram saw or didn’t see the many stars of the night sky when the Lord took him outside in vision, the point made was that from one offspring would come many, with the light cast by the one offspring serving all of humanity.
Northwest Coast Natives have Raven, a trickster figure, bringing to the people the sun: no person can perform a greater feat than bringing light to the people. Yet in the common telling of the story, after raven brings the sun, he is given a wife and a place in the village, but he won’t hunt to provide for his wife. He won’t go out every day to “work” to provide for his own; so before long, he is driven from the village. The motif of bringing the sun, of bringing light represents the greatest thing that can be done. No warrior, no hunter can do more. But the obligation remains to work daily despite the great deed[s] done in the past.
Abram’s vision occurred while he was wide awake, while he could sacrifice a heifer, a goat, a ram. But his vision continued after dark … the context changed from day to night, suggesting that the vision had both a spiritual [day] dimension as well as a physical [night] dimension. For the Promise has physical aspects—
· Now [YHWH] said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." (Gen 12:1–3)
· Then [YHWH] appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built there an altar to [YHWH], who had appeared to him. (Gen 12:7)
· On that day [YHWH] made a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites." (Gen 15:18–21)
· When Abram was ninety-nine years old [YHWH] appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless, that I may make my covenant between me and you, and may multiply you greatly." Then Abram fell on his face. And God said to him, "Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God." (Gen 17:1–8)
But Abram/Abraham did not receive the land between the Nile and the Euphrates so that he could pass it along to his heir[s]. He did not receive anything other than the addition of aspiration to his and Sarai’s name. The only inherence he could pass to his seed [offspring] was this change of name due to the addition of aspiration/breath beyond that received from his natural father Terah. The remainder of what was promised to him would go to his offspring at predetermined yet unknown times.
It isn’t Abram’s name that is today remembered in this world; it isn’t Abram’s name that is great. It is Abraham’s name that is great. It is Abram’s name with the addition of aspiration, <ah>, representing a second breath given to him by God Almighty that is remembered by virtually all the world.
Abram—not Abraham [same person, but one before receiving a second breath and the other after]—fathered Ishmael, who along with Abram was circumcised when aspiration was added to Abram’s name, this receipt of aspiration forming the basis for receiving the spirit of God through the indwelling of Christ Jesus. However, the Promise of added aspiration didn’t go to Ishmael or to the nation descended from Ishmael.
Likewise, Esau as Isaac’s firstborn did not inherit the Promise as added aspiration … this promise of a second breath descended by birth through Sarah (matrilineal descent) and by matrilineal choice by Rebekah in the physical type and shadow of all judgment having been given to Christ Jesus (John 5:22), the life-giving [Eve] spirit [pneuma] (1 Cor 15:45). Without the indwelling of Christ in the form of His spirit [pneuma Christou], the person is not of God (Rom 8:9). The person remains of this world as a son of disobedience (Rom 11:31; Eph 2:2–3).
But Jacob didn’t have aspiration added to his name; rather, Jacob had his name changed to <Israel> after wrestling with the Lord. The Promise skipped many generations, skipped all the way to Christ Jesus who, when raised from baptism, had received a second breath of life in the bodily form of the breath/spirit of God [pneuma Theou] descending upon Him and entering into Him (Mark 1:10). Aspiration was not simply added to Jesus’ name, but became a part of Him, thus giving life to His inner self.
Again, natural Israel did not receive the Promise of added aspiration—a second breath of life foreshadowed by aspiration being adding to both Abram’s and his wife Sari’s names, transforming Abram into Abraham and Sari into Sarah. This Promise of added aspiration is Abraham’s inheritance that descends from him; for Abraham claimed no earthly lands as his own although, again, a land inheritance was promised to his descendants:
On that day [YHWH] made a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites." (Gen 15:18–21)
That day was the day when Abram had his belief of the Lord counted to him as righteousness (Gen 15:6)—and the land described is the land representing life that lies between sin [Egypt] and death [Assyria] to the south and north, and bounded by trade, the realm of transactions as represented by Tyre to the west. To the east lay Babylon, whose king Nebuchadnezzar formed the earthly type and shadow of the Adversary, an unwilling servant of God used by the Lord to loot and raze the temple, only the temple the Adversary loots and razes is the Church of God, the Body of Christ (cf. 1 Cor 3:16–17; 12:27).
The Lord told Moses that Israel was His firstborn son (Ex 4:22), and natural Israel [the nation numbered in the census of the second year] and the children of Israel [the nation numbered in the census taken on the plains of Moab] rebelled against the Lord to form the shadow and type of Christians [circumcised-of-heart Israel] in the 1st-Century CE and Christians in the 21st-Century CE rebelling against the Most High God.
This week Phil Robertson, the patriarch of the Robertson clan on the A&E television reality show Duck Dynasty, when interviewed by Fox News’ Sean Hannity, said about ISIS jihadists, “Convert them or kill them” … is this not what these jihadists say to Christians, Convert or die, thereby having beheaded now hundreds of Iraqi Christians who refused to convert. Is this not what these jihadists dream of saying to Americans when their black flag flies over the White House? Where is the difference between Israel putting the city of Jericho to the sword, sparing no one, or Samuel in the name of the Lord commanding Saul to kill all who were of Amalek (1 Sam 15:1–3) from ISIS jihadists? In the physical—in which Phil Robertson remains as well as all of Judaism and Islam—the solution to idolatry was to sever heads (to kill the threat); for idolatry is of the mind. Idolatry is not a brain defect, but a fault lying within the mind of the person; so in the logic of the sword, the problem would cease to be by severing the head from the body when the real head of the idolater is the Adversary, not the idolater’s brain and cranium.
Phil Robertson understands that there is no Bible study he could conduct with a devout Muslim that would convince the Muslim to worship Robertson’s triune God. It might be that Robertson and a devout Muslim could agree that all men are to live under the rubric of peace, peaceful coexistence, not being covenant breakers but having manifested love for neighbor and brother, being people of the Book. Unfortunately, here a little, there a little, line upon line, precept upon precept exegesis of the Qur’an produces the same sort of errant readings of text as this form of biblical exegesis produces. And if the Bible is the divine word of God, how did a Second Sophist Greek novel [the book of Acts] get inside its covers? How did Luke’s Gospel get accepted as being divinely inspired? How did Matthew’s Gospel get accepted as factual? Why were the Pastoral Epistles accepted at all?
Phil Robertson appeared on Sean Hannity’s show to promote his recently released book. But it wasn’t his book that attracted the most interest: it was his dog-eared Bible, evidence that he has carried the Bible with him wherever he went, which is what he told Hannity. But his dog-eared Bible was not evidence that he understood its contents despite his renewal in the faith that apparently transformed his lifestyle from what typified the 1960s—sex, drugs, and roll & roll—to a solid family man sporting evangelical values.
Robertson was the starting quarterback at Louisiana Tech, ahead of NFL Hall of Famer Terry Bradshaw, but for Robertson, hunting eventually won out over football. He earned a Master’s Degree in Education and taught for a few years before becoming a commercial fisherman and then going on to build a better duck call.
A person cannot play high school or college football and keep the Sabbath; a person cannot play football and walk in this world as Jesus walked. And when he was playing football, Robertson wasn’t trying to walk as Jesus walked.
What Robertson doesn’t understand is that no person can come to Christ Jesus unless the Father draws the person from this world, and the glorified Jesus calls the person after the model seen in the drawing and calling of the initial disciples, who came to know[revelation via realization] that Jesus was “‘the Holy One of God’” (John 6:69), knowledge that came to them from the Father (Matt 16:17) …
How can coming to know a matter be revelation? It is not revelation to realize that the sun is the star that can be seen during the day; so where does divine revelation start and stop?
Consider again Phil Robertson’s observation concerning ISIS jihadists: “Convert them or kill them.” It is their intention to convert you—along with the remainder of the world—or kill you. What are your options? Talk nice to them while they kill you? Reason with them while they kill you? Submit to God and trust that He will protect you, even if that protection is in the grave for you are not your physical body? Or Robertson’s option, engage them in a gunfight, with the Lord picking the winner?
As an educated person in both the hard knocks of life as well as in classrooms, what Robertson understands is that if the American way of life is to continue, if Christianity in its bastardized evangelical form is to survive, American Christians will be called upon to take up arms and slay jihadists until one or the other perishes. But the technology America has used and uses today to its military advantage is expensive—and America is broke, spending what it doesn’t have and cannot borrow, digitizing debt, buying its own debt by creating even more debt, thereby threatening the fiscal stability of all currencies.
But Phil Robertson doesn’t need an angel to tell him that jihadists are coming to America unless they are stopped where they are. No, he doesn’t need additional revelation. He realizes the reality of what President Obama, educated in Marxist economics and street politics, apparently does not: a human person will fight and die for an ideology apart from that ideology’s economic benefit to the person. Marxist economics, despite the plausibility of its arguments, cannot account for why the Crusades occurred, or for why Phil Robertson chose hunting over an NFL contract.
Why does any Christian make the choices he or she does? If for economic gain, the Christian has made no choice, but remains consigned to disobedience as a son of disobedience.
No Christian needs biblical prophecies to understand that Islamic jihadists pose a genuine danger to them. Similarly, no Christian needs privileged knowledge to take the Passover on the night Jesus was betrayed, the dark portion of the 14th day of the first month, this month beginning with the first sighted new moon crescent following the spring equinox—this knowledge coming from simply reading that well-worn Bible Robertson carries; yet very few Christians take the Passover sacraments of unleavened bread and wine, representing the broken body and blood of Christ Jesus, on the night Jesus was betrayed. Many Christians neglect the Passover all together, while many more take the sacraments of bread and wine daily, weekly, quarterly, or annually (on a date other than the 14th day of the first month), according to human wisdom and understanding. However, a Christian needs spiritual understanding to know in advance that there will be a Second Passover liberation of Israel and then a repeated slaying of a third part of humanity for the liberation of a Second Israel at the beginning of the endtime years of tribulation.
Yes, on a second Passover day coming in the near future, the Second Passover liberation of Israel—liberation from indwelling sin and death—will occur. Then approximately 1260 days later will come the liberation of remaining humanity, this third part forming a second Israel, sheep not now shepherded by the glorified Christ.
On the Second Passover, all uncovered [by the blood of Christ] firstborns will be slain as the ransom price for the liberation of greater Christendom from sin and death. Then three and a half years later, a random third part of remaining humanity will be slain by God at the liberation of a Second Israel, baptized not in water but in spirit, with the gift this Second Israel presents in the temple being their physical lives; being in how they live their lives or die in obedience to God.
The preceding is revelation, the uncovering of what has been concealed, but revelation coming via realization.
It is reasonable to assume that Phil Robertson doesn’t take the Passover on the 14th day of the first month … there is nothing stopping him from doing so other than his own reading of Scripture. God could say to Robertson, Convert or die! But if God did, what would be the odds of Robertson converting, beginning to truly walk in this world as Jesus walked? He wouldn’t—unless God drew him from this world and delivered him to Christ Jesus. He couldn’t convert unless God draws him from this world. And even then, he would find it difficult to unlearn forty years’ worth of evangelical doctrine.
What if, following the Second Passover liberation of Israel, Robertson doesn’t convert; doesn’t leave behind his present understanding of Scripture; doesn’t cease attempting to enter into God’s rest on the day after the Sabbath, thus trying to take the kingdom by force? What can be said about Robertson and salvation, considering that prior to the Second Passover liberation of Israel it is not reasonable to expect Robertson to mend his ways and begin keeping the Commandments by faith?
Robertson is young enough that is it certainly possible for him to live to the Second Passover liberation of Israel: he is the fifth of seven children, so he is not a biological firstborn. Therefore, even if he is not covered by the blood of Christ Jesus by taking the Passover sacrament prior to the Second Passover liberation of Israel, he will live into the Affliction, the first 1260 days of the seven endtime years. This means that he, as a Christian, will be suddenly filled with the spirit of God … he presently believes he is a born of spirit Christian, but he will find that when truly filled with spirit, his outer self [the fleshly person] will be subject to the thoughts of his mind and desires of his heart on which will be written the Law of God. He will know the Lord in a way he couldn’t previously imagine. Yet, if he follows the majority of greater Christendom, he will rebel against God 220 days into the Affliction by taking sin back inside himself through, say, continuing to ignore the Sabbath. And by taking sin back inside himself, he will commit blasphemy against the spirit.
Perhaps he won’t return to sin, to unbelief of God. Perhaps he will, via revelation through realization, decide to obey the feeling of his gut and begin living as a Judean, keeping the Commandments while displaying outward love for neighbor and brother, thereby completing his first journey of faith by returning to the promised land of obedience by faith, obedience that leads to righteousness, obedience that comes from hearing the voice of Jesus and believing the one who sent Him into this world (this would be analogous to Abram being told to leave Egypt and returning to Canaan, where he had briefly paused on his way south from Haran).
If Robertson were to begin living as a Judean—and all of Philadelphia should pray that he and all other Christians do for with the liberation of greater Christendom the way to Christ will finally be open to all who profess that they are Christians—he will make a powerful witness for Christ Jesus, and he will most likely be martyred.
Every Christian has to make two journeys of faith, one into the Promised Land [represented by obedience by faith] and a second one within this Promised Land that tests the faith of the Christian.
When Robertson was in his 20s and his marriage was in trouble, he pledged to himself that he would figuratively fly right, and by faith he undertook a journey into but through the Promised Land, not stopping for long enough to really read his Bible, but continuing on into figurative Egypt where unbelief didn’t seem to be sin. He has prospered as Abram prospered in Egypt:
When Abram entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful. And when the princes of Pharaoh saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh. And the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house. And for her sake he [Pharaoh] dealt well with Abram; and he had sheep, oxen, male donkeys, male servants, female servants, female donkeys, and camels. (Gen 12:14–16 emphasis added)
The spiritual king of Tyre has dwelt well with Robertson, who said of his youth that they lived in the 1950s but lived like they were in the 1850s. The spiritual king of Tyre has, though his realm of transactions, given to Robertson financial stability, but if this new wealth were taken away, I suspect that Robertson would still survive while others around him would have tough going.
Now returning to revelation: Robertson doesn’t need to understand biblical prophecies to realize that ISIS jihadists pose a real danger to all Christians. He doesn’t need biblical prophecies to know that Israel is the only nation in the region that has Western values. He doesn’t need Marxist professors to explain global economics to him to understand that a person devoted to God/Allah needs nothing but that devotion to wage war against unbelievers. So from the wisdom of having lived through the 60s, 70s, and 80s, when America went from believing in itself to questioning and doubting itself then back to believing in itself, Robertson knows from observation what most Christian pundits claim biblical prophecies say, thereby making these prophecies mere confirmation of what Robertson already knows, and not any revealing of what has been concealed.
Therein is the problem inherent to greater Christendom: if biblical prophecies as understood by Christians merely confirm what the Christian already knows, no revelation has occurred. The Christian knows no more than the Christian knew before. If however, the biblical prophecy is “unsealed” so that the Christian must reread the prophecy, then genuine revelation occurs and the prophecy is of value to the Christian. If Phil Robertson were to discover that within the pages of his well-worn Bible was concealed the Second Passover liberation of Israel at which a third part of humankind will be suddenly slain because this third part are all uncovered firstborns, would Robertson accept this revelation, or would he reject it until it happens …
How will ISIS jihadists respond when all firstborns among them are suddenly slain on a particular day? Muhammad wrote nothing about the Second Passover liberation of Israel. Muhammad didn’t warn them that the Second Passover was on the horizon, soon to occur.
How would a Christian go about converting an Islamic jihadist to Christianity after the Second Passover liberation of Israel?
The Christian taken by surprise by the Second Passover will convert no one; for this Christian and others like him or her couldn’t warn the world of what was soon to occur. Yet those who have faithfully proclaimed the Second Passover, disclosed to Philadelphia through revelation by realization at Passover 2003, will not be taken by surprise, nor found not covered by the blood of Christ.
It appears that after greater Christendom rebelled against God late in the 1st-Century, God sent a strong delusion over greater Christendom so that those who didn’t love the truth would perish in their unbelief … for a century, the lives of Christians who would not worship on the day after the Sabbath but instead, insisted upon worshipping on the Sabbath haven’t been severely threatened; yet the number of Christians worshiping on the Sabbath seems to be on the decline in the 21st-Century.
For Iraqi Christians—Sunday keepers all—ISIS jihadists function as Nebuchadnezzar functioned in the 6th and 7th Centuries BCE, when the Lord brought Nebuchadnezzar (Jer 25:8–11) and his armies against Jerusalem and the House of Judah because of the idolatry of Manasseh:
Moreover, Josiah put away the mediums and the necromancers and the household gods and the idols and all the abominations that were seen in the land of Judah and in Jerusalem, that he might establish the words of the law that were written in the book that Hilkiah the priest found in the house of [YHWH]. Before him there was no king like him, who turned to [YHWH] with all his heart and with all his soul and with all his might, according to all the Law of Moses, nor did any like him arise after him. Still [YHWH] did not turn from the burning of His great wrath, by which His anger was kindled against Judah, because of all the provocations with which Manasseh had provoked Him. (2 Kings 23:24–26)
The question now is, would the Lord bring Islamic jihadists against American Christians because of the lawlessness and arrogance of these Christians, ones such as Phil Robertson? Certainly the Lord’s M.O. between Moses and Christ Jesus was to bring the enemies of Israel against the nation when this nation strayed from the Lord. But with the giving of the spirit, what was physical became spiritual. Thus, instead of bringing an alien nation against the people of Israel, the Lord will bring an alien ideology against endtime Israel, the nation to be circumcised of heart.
What would constitute an alien ideology? Humanism? Yes, certainly. Islam? Possibly. Buddhism? My eldest daughter abandoned Christ for Buddha. Worship of Gaia, the personification of the earth? Definitely, with global climate change being a major tenet of this ideology. There are others, many others, but the preceding are enough to establish the point.
It is in Islam where interest today resides; for those who worship Gaia will make electricity more expensive, and will have adult Americans drive vehicles the size of a child’s peddle car, but they decapitate wallets, not living persons.
Would God send an ideology such as Islam against idolatrous Christians for the purpose of bringing Christians to repentance as the Deportation to Babylon brought the House of Judah into repentance? Yes, He would.
Just as God would bring humanism, which leads to public acceptance of homoeroticism, pornography, sodomy, and orgasmic sexual intercourse, against errant Christianity, God would bring Islam against the endtime physical and spiritual descendants of Isaac in a battle of half-brothers. He would do so because He intends to keep the inheritance centered in the descendants of Abraham.
The element of brother and half-brothers, brother and half-sister, has not been well explored by greater Christendom …
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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."