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 not engaging in commerce.
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Weekly Readings
For the Sabbath of November 20, 2010
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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In the second year of Darius the king, in the sixth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet to Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest: “Thus says the Lord of hosts: These people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the Lord.” Then the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai the prophet, “Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins? Now, therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. You have sown much, and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes. / Thus says the Lord of hosts: Consider your ways. Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the Lord. You looked for much, and behold, it came to little. And when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? declares the Lord of hosts. Because of my house that lies in ruins, while each of you busies himself with his own house. Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce. And I have called for a drought on the land and the hills, on the grain, the new wine, the oil, on what the ground brings forth, on man and beast, and on all their labors.” (Haggai 1:1–11 emphasis added)
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The temple that began as a building of hewn stone and timber—the second temple; the physical structure about which the Lord told those Israelites who had returned from Babylon to go up into the hills and log timber for its construction—became the Body of Christ when Jews asked by what sign did Jesus drive those selling livestock and changing money from the temple (John 2:18). Jesus said, “‘Destroy this temple [His earthly body], and in three days I will raise it up”’ (v. 19). The usual referent assigned to the phrase this temple is Herod’s temple, the wood and stone structure that was 46 years in the making as a replacement for the structure Zerubbabel, the governor of Judea, finally built. But in relating the account of Jesus initially driving merchants from the temple, John says, “But he [Jesus] was speaking about the temple of his body” (v. 21) … the referent for this temple was, according to John, Jesus’ earthly body that when destroyed [crucified] would be raised up in three days as His spiritual Body, with the glorified Jesus being the Head of this spiritual Body as the inner self of a person is the head of the outer self of that person, and [second analogy] as a man is the head of the woman [his wife]—two analogous relationships that are not identical but that together allow the endtime disciple to see with 3-D perspective the relationship between Christ and the Church both before the Second Passover liberation of Israel [when the Church is the Body of Christ] and after the Second Passover [when the Church is separated from Christ so that it can become His Bride].
After 49 years, on Yom Kipporim [six months and ten days into the first year of the next seven Sabbaths of years], a year of Jubilee shall be proclaimed (Lev 25:8–9 … the 50th year is the last half of the 49th year and the first half of the 1st year of the next cycle of seven Sabbath of years) and each Israelite shall return to his or her property. After seven times of setting every Israelite in bondage free, the temple itself would be set free; for the 46 years that Herod’s temple was in the making plus the three additional years of Jesus’ ministry are 49 years. Add to these 49 literal years a period representing the harvest of the earth, both the early barley harvest and the latter main crop wheat harvest—but a period when men would do no harvesting—and New Jerusalem, the temple grown into a city, shall come with the new heavens and new earth as the Bride of Christ (Rev 21:2, 9–10). But Yom Kipporim forms the Fall compression of the expanded Passover (i.e., from the 10th day of Aviv to the 22nd day), with the expanded Passover representing that harvest of firstfruits in their entirety as the Fall Festival season represents the great White Throne Judgment. Thus, in Jesus cleansing the temple on the particular year He initially cleansed it [spring of the Roman year 28 CE], Jesus set the stage for the liberation of the temple from death [lifelessness] and for returning the temple to Israel as part of Israel’s inheritance received from the Lord. Therefore, the second temple goes from being a lifeless structure of stone and wood that is analogous to the dead inner self of a son of disobedience to being, first, the physically living body of Christ Jesus when Jesus cleanses the temple (John 2:13–22) to being, second, the spiritually living Body of Christ when the glorified Jesus breathes on ten of His first disciples (John 20:22). As the first temple Solomon built was without indwelling life except on Yom Kipporim when the high priest entered the Holy of Holies, the second temple was without indwelling life until Christ Jesus cleansed it for the Ark of the Covenant wasn’t in the Holy of Holies of the second temple; the glory of the Lord left the first temple (Ezek chap 10) and didn’t return until after Jesus cleansed the temple in a manner analogous to how the executioners cleansed Jerusalem (Ezek chap 9).
The second temple was a house of commerce from its physical completion until it was cleansed; for without the Ark of the Covenant being in the Holy of Holies, the high priest was scamming Israel in an elevated extension of the money changers defrauding Israelites. The high priest was “selling” forgiveness of sin in a manner analogous to how the Roman Church sold indulgences throughout Europe’s Medieval period … when Seleucid troops installed a statue of Zeus in the temple’s Holy of Holies, these Syrian Greeks did not have to rearrange the furniture in the empty inner sanctuary.
When Satan and his angels are cast from heaven (Rev 12:7–10) and Satan comes appearing as a two-horned lamb, claiming to be the Messiah, but speaking like the old dragon that he is (Rev 13:11), the Adversary will require that his former serfs take onto themselves the mark of the beast, chi xi stigma, the tattoo of the cross before they can buy and sell. Yet, when Jesus cleansed the temple He drove out all of those who bought and sold, or who changed money. Therefore, in the temple of God—with the temple today composed of the inner selves of the saints—there will be no buying and selling, for these inner selves have nothing tangible to buy or sell.
During the Endurance, the last 1260 days before Christ Jesus returns as the King of kings and Lord of lords, the Adversary will enforce the ban on saints buying and selling in the temple: by requiring that the newly liberated third part of humankind (liberated from indwelling sin and death when the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man and the breath of God is poured out on all flesh) take upon themselves the mark of Death in order to buy and sell, the Adversary involuntarily does the will of God …
· For as long as livestock was bought and sold in the temple; for as long as money was exchanged in the temple, the temple was dead; i.e., without life.
· For as long as the outer selves of the saints buy and sell in this world, these outer selves [fleshly bodies] that constitute the temple of God are dead; i.e., subject to Death.
· For as long as disciples engage in commerce in this world, buying and selling and exchanging currencies, indwelling sin and death will continue to dwell in these tents of flesh, thereby causing the flesh to do the very things that the mind hates as was the case for the Apostle Paul (see Rom 7:15–25).
The fleshly body of the person remains subject to death and will die; for flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor 15:50). Hence, those disciples who will be saved and who have remained physically alive until Jesus returns will not engage in commerce once they have been liberated from indwelling sin and death: the third part of humankind (from Zech 13:9) will not have engaged in commerce throughout the Endurance but will have endured in faith to the end.
There is no commerce conducted in the living temple of God—
As a man in earthly Jerusalem, Jesus enforced this no-commerce clause. He, as the glorified High Priest of circumcised-of-heart Israel, has and will continue to enforce this no-commerce clause: for as long as the kingdom of this world is still ruled by the Adversary, Jesus will enforce the no-commerce clause through the inner self of the predestined person having no wealth in this world with which to conduct commerce. Jesus, Himself, paid the price for the saint’s sins in this world, and He is now covering the sins of the saint in the heavenly realm, with the price of these sins to be paid when judgments are revealed—paid by either the unbelieving saint by the sins being given back to the saint, or paid by the Adversary for the believing saint by the sins being given to the Adversary, the source of all unbelief.
But when the Adversary is cast from heaven and into time and to the earth, the Adversary will enforce the same no-commerce clause by requiring that all who buy and sell bear the mark of Death. Therefore, when the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man and humanity is no longer ruled by the Adversary but by Christ Jesus, the saints shall not buy and sell.
Does this mean that saints are not to engage in business today? No. The saints are not, today, the tents of flesh in which the inner self that has been raised from death by the Father (John 5:21) dwells. But this means that within the temple—among the saints that are the temple of God (1 Cor 3:16–17; 2 Cor 6:16)—no commerce is conducted.
A saint will not swindle another saint as has been done in the past if no commerce is conducted within the temple of God. In actuality, a saint will not sell to another saint, for the inner selves of outward Sabbatarian Christians are the spiritual equivalent to THE physical Levitical priesthood—and the tribe of Levi had no inheritance in this world. They owned no part of this world. They had no fields to sell [lease out] until the year of Jubilee. Their business was ministering to the Lord, not smithing or manufacturing pots and pans or raising pigeons to be sacrificed by visiting Israelites. And the inner selves of disciples, raised from death through receipt of a second breath of life, the breath of God [pneuma Theon], conduct no business in this world, nor have an inheritance in this world. By extension, following the Second Passover liberation of Israel through every Christian being filled-with and empowered by the breath of God, the outer selves of Christians will not engage in commerce—
Following the Second Passover liberation of Israel from indwelling sin and death, both the inner and outer self of a Christian will be the temple of God. The present war being fought within the Christian that Paul describes when his fleshly body did the very things he hated (again, Rom 7:7–25) will, at the Second Passover, move outside of the Christian and will be between the Christian and the world that is still ruled by the Adversary. For the Christian to then engage in commerce within the Christian community will cause the Christian to take death back inside him or herself.
In this pre Second Passover era, the inner selves of predestined Christians have no inheritance in this world: they are technically unable to engage in commerce due to their lack of material possession, for they are not easily able to sell their only possession, the tent of flesh in which they dwell — and selling the tent of flesh is prostitution. And a disciple can begin to grasp why so much is made of prostitution in Scripture; e.g., Amos telling Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, that Amaziah’s wife [analogous to the inner self’s fleshly body] will be a prostitute in the city (Amos 7:17) is the physical equivalent to Philadelphia telling born-of-God Christians that by engaging in business transactions with other sons of God in the Affliction, these Christians shall die in the lake of fire, the spiritual equivalent to Amos telling Amaziah that he “‘shall die in an unclean land’” (also 7:17).
In dropping a dimension and using physically circumcised Israelites as the shadow and type of circumcised-of-heart Israelites, physical slavery of the outer self represents the dead inner self of the Israelite who will be born of spirit; thus, outwardly circumcised Israel in Egypt forms the left hand enantiomer of greater Christendom in this present pre Second Passover era. By the same analogy, Israel going into captivity (national slavery) following centuries of lawlessness forms the shadow and copy of greater Christendom’s rebellion against God on day 220 of the Affliction. But in dropping a dimension a man’s wife represents in ancient Israel what the fleshly body of a son of God in this endtime era represents. Thus, a faithless wife in ancient Israel forms the left hand enantiomer of the fleshly body of a son of God doing those things that the inner self hates, as Paul expressed his inability to do what is right (Rom 7:18). The ancient Israelite whose wife was a prostitute forms the shadow and copy of the son of God who is unable to rule over his flesh. Now moving from the individual to the collective, in dropping a dimension the physically lifeless temple of God forms the shadow and copy of the Christian Church, and conducting commerce in the earthly temple forms the left hand enantiomer of faith, or better, lack of faith by the assembly of saints that is the endtime Church.
A situation not now readily apparent is that the man of perdition will encourage Christians to engage in commerce with other Christians following the Second Passover, specifically encouraging Christians to join with him in Christmas observance, buying and selling handmade items to be given as presents in the spirit of an earlier era. And the glorified Jesus will have to again cleanse the temple by driving from it those Christians who would sell to their brothers and fellow saints—and this becomes important because during the Affliction, the outer court of the temple is given over to Gentiles who will buy and sell in the holy city of the Jerusalem that is above. … Christians will condemn themselves to the lake of fire.
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Extending the words of Jesus back to the days of Haggai and forward to the end of the age, the temple that wasn’t getting built in the days of Haggai is, therefore, the same temple that is still under restoration two and a half millennia later in a manner analogous to how a son of disobedience, following the prince of the power of the air (Eph 2:2), is drawn from this world by the Father (John 6:44) and given a second breath of life, with the old inner self of the son of disobedience crucified with Christ and buried in baptism then resurrected in newness of life to live as a spiritual Judean, a son of God in this world [i.e., in a tent of flesh] but not of this world for the second breath of life, the breath that came from heaven to give life to the inner self, was never of this world or of the physical creation.
The above is a mouthful: saints are individually and collectively the Body of Christ (1 Cor 12:27). The razing of the temple in this world is analogous to the old self of a saint being crucified with Christ, and is also analogous to the collective Body of Christ [the Church] losing the spirit of God [pneuma Theon] and therefore dying as an assembly as a crucified man dies individually—
After Jesus cleansed the temple a third time, how long did it take Pharisees to return the temple to being a house of commerce? Less than a day? Certainly. So the question is, why did the Lord wait so long before bringing Roman soldiers against the temple in a manner analogous to how Roman soldiers were employed to crucify Jesus?
The transformation of a person—a natural born son of disobedience—from death to life as a son of God is analogous to the transformation of the temple from being a lifeless stone and timber structure to being the Body of Christ, with the cleansing of the temple at the beginning of Jesus’ earthly ministry then again at the end of His earthly ministry being analogous to the journey of faith disciples must make to cleanse their hearts so that they can be circumcised by the soft breath of God. Therefore, endtime disciples can look to Haggai’s words and take them forward as textual shadows of what has been occurring to endtime Israelites circumcised of heart.
Today, the Christian Church lies in ruin, and there is a spiritual drought so that the land [mental topography] of Judea is not bringing forth grain—the early barley harvest and the latter wheat harvest—or new wine, or oil, or the fruit of the spirit. Rather, what passes as Christianity is Hellenistic paganism, a mysteries religion that has come forward in time almost unchanged since the 5th-Century BCE, with the evidence for the claim buried in the many words of Martin Luther’s three works (An Appeal to the Christian Nobility of the German Nation; Concerning the Babylonish Captivity of the Church; and On the Liberty of a Christian Man) that sparked England’s King Henry VIII’s Assertio, and Sir Thomas More’s Responsio ad Lutherum and A Dialogue Concerning Heresies, with these defenses of Catholicism being followed in 1531 CE by Master William Tyndale’s An Answer unto Sir Thomas More’s Dialogue and then by More’s 500,000 word long Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer … in More’s Confutation, a platonic dialogue with Tyndale, More effectively shows that the Roman Church predates Christ Jesus. More then uses this predating of Christ to make the claim that the Roman Church has authority over Scripture and by extension over Jesus Himself, an argument that 16th-Century Anabaptists sidestepped by eliminating the hierarchal organizational structure of the Roman Church. For in all of the mysteries religions, a temple and a priesthood are required, with initiates into the mysteries being guaranteed salvation while all others are doomed to destruction, and with the priesthood holding the knowledge needed by the initiates for salvation.
The mysteries religions acquired that “mysteries” identification because with all of them there was no general salvation offered to humanity. The keys that unlocked salvation were closely held and guarded by priests and priestesses. These keys were then purchased by initiates into the faith; thus, salvation was bought and sold as if it were a commodity listed on the Chicago Board Options Exchange. This has traditionally been the case for both Catholic and Protestant denominations as well as for the Sabbatarian churches of God that began through refuting the 19th-Century visions of Ellen G. White, with these Sabbatarian churches of God coming of age in the now-splintered 20th-Century work of Herbert W. Armstrong.
The organizational structure of The Philadelphia Church [or non-organizational structure] holds that no human person should stand between a disciple and Christ Jesus; that there are no initiates into a mystery, but that by employing typological exegesis every disciple can read Scripture for him or herself and take intended meaning from the narrative. In actual practice, most Philadelphians lag somewhat behind the work being done by a few in developing fresh understanding of Scripture, for the analogy holds: the word of the Lord came by the hand of Haggai, with this word being about construction of the second temple. The prophet spoke to Zerubbabel and to Joshua, not to all of the remnant of Israel that had returned to Judea from Babylon even though all of Israel was affected by Zerubbabel’s inactivity. Likewise, the restoration of the spiritual portion of this second temple is committed to a spiritual Zerubbabel [Christ Jesus] and His high priest Joshua, who isn’t Christ Jesus but a man born of God—and all of Christendom is affected by the spiritual drought that has slowed growth of the temple.
Do Christians sow much and harvest little? Does Sabbatarian Christendom sow much and harvest even less than they have sown. Do Sabbatarians feast on spiritual knowledge but go away hungry? Drink spiritual drink, but thirst for more? Do Sabbatarians clothe themselves in obedience, but then spiritually shiver as if the righteous garments with which they clothed themselves were doilies that concealed nothing but left disciples naked before God? Do Sabbatarians earn wages that they put into various ministries that produce nothing but can be likened to pockets with holes in them? Where do Sabbatarians invest tithes and offerings of the increase God gives them? Has there been no increase? Or is the steadfast refusal of Sabbatarian Christendom to build the temple, to cease building for themselves paneled houses [or million dollar mansions] the reason why there is so little recruitment into Sabbatarian Christendom today; for the temple of God is not constructed on the foundation Ellen G. White laid, or on the foundation Andrew Dugger laid, or on the foundation Herbert W, Armstrong laid. The temple is constructed on the foundation the Apostle Paul laid in the 1st-Century. And this foundation is of heavenly Jerusalem, the future Bride of Christ.
It is foolishness to believe that a Sabbatarian Christian can construct the house of God on a sand foundation, what here a little, there a little biblical exegesis is. Won’t happen. The little here and little there shifts meaning whenever a fresh wind of doctrine riles the waters of discontent.
Every Sabbatarian who sows into a ministry based upon taking meaning from Scripture through a here-a-little, there-a-little reading of the narrative throws his seed away as a man does who pulls away from the woman early. No lasting fruit will be borne. All that results is a mess that will have to be cleaned up by those coming behind the Sabbatarian.
But in a mysteries religion such as the Sacred Names Heresy, salvation isn’t available to everyone, but only to those “in the know” about how to correctly pronounce Jesus’ name … perhaps some Sabbatarian enslaved by bastardized Hebraic pronunciations will read More’s Confutation and realize just how alike he or she is to an initiate into the ancient mysteries religions of the Near East. Then, perhaps, the Sabbatarian will see the C-clamp hanging on the tree beside the bear trap into which he or she has stepped; perhaps the Sabbatarian will quit struggling to pronounce Hebrew characters, the sound for which he or she cannot orally replicate; perhaps the Sabbatarian will abandon the foundation upon which he or she has been building and journey to the Jerusalem that is above and build on the foundation that Paul laid, this foundation being Christ Jesus.
Again, there is no salvation to be found in any other house, in any other name, in any other message but that of Christ Jesus.
What the seven endtime years of tribulation are about is open salvation—salvation that comes from the spirit of God being poured out on all flesh (Joel 2:28) when the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man. Then, when the spirit is poured out on all flesh, every person alive will have been baptized [immersed or submerged] in the breath of God. Then, when the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man, all who endure to the end shall be saved. No longer will sin and death have dominion over any person; no longer will any person die from internal causes. Unless the person takes sin [unbelief] back inside the person, the person will physically live until the person’s judgment is revealed—
· For the person who takes judgment upon him or herself through being baptized and who endures to the end will be glorified when the Son marries His Bride;
· The person who does not take judgment upon him or herself but who endures to the end will live physically into the Millennium, the thousand year long reign of the Son of Man, and barring accidental death will live for the full thousand years, or until the great White Throne Judgment.
The message Jesus left with His disciples—the good news [gospel] that must be proclaimed to the world as a witness to all nations before the end comes (Matt 24:14)—is that all who endure to the end shall be saved (Matt 10:22; 24:13). There will be no initiates into a concealed mystery; for as Seth was accepted by the Lord without the sacrifice of either a lamb or the fruit of the earth, the third part of humankind that will be born filled with spirit when the Adversary is cast to earth will be accepted by God by simply enduring to the end.
The Lord asked Cain, “‘If you do well, will you not be accepted?”’ (Gen 4:7) … sin was lurking at Cain’s door, its desire being for Cain, but Cain could not rule over it. Likewise, when the spirit of God is poured out on all flesh halfway through the seven endtime years of tribulation, the Adversary posing as the Messiah will be lurking at the door of the third part of humankind, all of whom will have to overcome the Adversary by doing nothing more than enduring to the end without taking upon themselves the mark of the beast, the tattoo of the cross, the mark of Death, the fourth horseman and fourth king. Thus, enduring to the end will mean enduring without buying and selling, but enduring in belief that God will supply the needs of those who are His—and all who do not take the mark of death upon themselves will be and will remain His.
The spiritual Cain rebels against God by returning to sin after Christians are filled-with and empowered by the breath of God so that there is no indwelling sin in their fleshly members—and this spiritual Cain will kill [or try to kill] his righteous brother, disciples who do not return to sin when liberated from it. This spiritual Cain will be successful in killing all but a remnant of his righteous brother; hence, the breath of God will be poured out on all flesh, thereby giving birth to a spiritual Seth as a replacement for righteous Abel, those disciples slain by their brother Cain, fellow Christians who have returned to lawlessness.
This endtime good news that Jesus left with His disciples isn’t like the gospel proclaimed by Christian mysteries sects and denominations. It isn’t anything like the Evangelical concept of a bodily rapture of initiates into heaven where they will escape the ravages of the Tribulation. It isn’t anything like Seventh Day Adventist dogma of initiates spending the Millennium in heaven with Christ Jesus before returning to the earth. It isn’t anything like Armstrong’s dogma of initiates being spirited away to a place of physical safety and final training. It isn’t like any gospel Christian disciples have taken to the world—
The place of final training isn’t a geographical location, but a slot in time [or better, space-time] during which disciples do not buy and sell; do not conduct commerce—and this slot in time is the seven endtime years that incorporates the Affliction and the Endurance. The training is about developing a functioning society that doesn’t rely upon commerce.
Since Jesus answered His disciples’ question about what would be the sign of His return and of the end of the age, the good news that all who endure to the end shall be saved has not been proclaimed as a witness to all peoples that the single kingdom of this world will be given to the Son of Man—and that is what this good news is all about; for once the kingdom is given to the Son of Man, even though Christ Jesus will not return for another 1260 days, all of humankind will become sons of God, either unbelieving sons as a third of the angels were and as Israel in the wilderness of Paran was, or believing sons as Jesus was and as James, John, Peter, and Paul were.
But the good news that all who endure to the end shall be saved has been proclaimed to the world as a witness to all peoples for nearly a decade. Just how loudly this proclamation has to be made is up to the Father and the Son. And without conducting greater commerce, the message will not be proclaimed more loudly than it presently is—until the sudden and seemingly unexplainable death of uncovered firstborns at the Second Passover liberation of Israel. Then the world will clamor to hear what the world previously ignored … perhaps that is how it has to be: a small, quiet voice, easy to ignore, even easier to dismiss as not being of God.
The restoration of the temple, however, is continuing day by day.
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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."