The Philadelphia Church

Israel in Prophecy

What Happens?

Part Ten

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There he [Elijah] came to a cave and lodged in it. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, and He said to him, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" He said, “I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away.” And He said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the Lord.” And behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire the sound of a low whisper [thin silence]. And when Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him and said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” (1 King 19:9-13 emphasis added)


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10.

The word of the Lord came to Elijah to ask Elijah what he was doing in his pity party, feeling that he alone of faithful Israel was left alive … in this passage, the word of the Lord is linguistically separate from the Lord who would speak to Elijah outside the cave, asking Elijah the same questions that the word of the Lord had asked Elijah:

And when Elijah heard it [the low whisper], he wrapped his face in his cloak and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. And behold, there came a voice to him and said, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" He said, "I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword, and I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life, to take it away." And the Lord said to him, "Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus. And when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael to be king over Syria. And Jehu the son of Nimshi you shall anoint to be king over Israel, and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abel-meholah you shall anoint to be prophet in your place. And the one who escapes from the sword of Hazael shall Jehu put to death, and the one who escapes from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha put to death. Yet I will leave seven thousand in Israel, all the knees that have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him." (1 Kings 19:13–18)

Once the spirit was given; once disciples are twice-born [born of water and of spirit]; once Paul introduces dual referents for the signifier <Israel>, disciples should not find using an earthly referent to speak of heavenly things difficult. But Paul didn’t get the concept of dual referents from having visited the third heaven (2 Cor 12:2), but rather, from having studied Scripture as a Pharisee. For in what Christians call the Old Testament, the concept is anticipated with the word of the Lord forming one referent that speaks to Elijah, and with the Lord forming a second referent that is in agreement with the first as if these two referents are one.

But stepping away from Elijah for a moment, it should be noted that there are inconsistencies between Old and New Testaments concerning the kingdom of this world that arise because of not-understood dual referents as seen in what the Lord told Elijah about anointing Hazael to be king over Syria and Jehu to be king over Israel. What the Lord told Elijah agrees with what the watcher told Nebuchadnezzar, saying that the “‘sentence is by the decree of the watchers, the decision by the word of the holy ones, to the end that the living may know that the Most High rules the kingdom of men and gives it to whom He will and sets over it the lowliest of men’” (Dan 4:17). In both passages, the Lord exercises dominion over the kingdoms of men.

But in John’s vision, “the seventh angel blew his trumpet, and there were loud voices in heaven, saying, ‘The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever’” (Rev 11:15 double emphasis added) … if the kingdom of men was already the kingdom of God when Nebuchadnezzar reigned, then what John hears when the seventh angel blew his trumpet makes no sense.

The kingdom of men is an earthly referent, the physical referent for the kingdom of this world/kosmos. The spiritual referent for this same identifying phrase will be taken from the Adversary by God, Father and Son, halfway through seven time years of tribulation.

What is being missed by Christians who believe that the United States of America, in particular, is a nation founded by God is the duality of angels declaring that the kingdom of this world has become the kingdom of “our” Lord and of His Christ … dominion over the kingdom of this world—one kingdom incorporating all living creatures—had previously belonged to the Adversary:

Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven. And the great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world—he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him. And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, "Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God. And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death. Therefore, rejoice, O heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to you, O earth and sea, for the devil has come down to you in great wrath, because he knows that his time is short!" (Rev 12:7–12 emphasis added)

John’s vision, the Book of Revelation, has specific chronological markers, with these markers placing the Kingdom (from Rev 1:9) between the 1260 days of the Affliction and the 1260 days of the Endurance in Jesus, meaning that the opening of the seventh seal occurs late on day 1260 of the Affliction, and the Adversary is cast from heaven by the beginning of day 1260 of the Endurance, with the Affliction and Endurance being enantiomorphs (non-symmetrical mirror images) but at differing planes.

The Adversary could have exercised no authority over Christ Jesus during Jesus’ earthly ministry if dominion over the single kingdom of this world didn’t then belong to him—and as it was, Jesus had to permit the Adversary to exercise authority as Jesus told Pilate:

Jesus answered [Pilate], "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world." (John 18:36 emphasis added)

Pilate said to him, "You will not speak to me? Do you not know that I have authority to release you and authority to crucify you?" Jesus answered him, "You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin." (John 19:10–11 emphasis added)

Even before Jesus was crucified, authority over the kingdom of men belonged to God even when He was not exercising this authority, but permitting the Adversary to exercise dominion over the signle kingdom of this world … Jesus told Pilate that His kingdom is not from this world, which will have the authority vector going from the “kosmos” to Rome to Pilate, with this authority vector passing through the Adversary before arriving at Rome.

The preceding is important; for the Adversary is not of this kosmos, but reigns inside this kosmos. He doesn’t reign outside the kosmos so he has no authority over angels who did not join him in rebellion against the Most High God. Therefore, the demonic king of Persia who withstood the angel delivering a word of knowledge to Daniel for twenty-one days (Dan chap 10) did so without authority to do so. And he would have withstood the angel coming to Daniel in the portion of heaven that poured through the rent in the fabric of heaven as water and blood poured from the body of Jesus when the Roman soldier pierced His side (John 19:34). In His flesh, Jesus during His earthly ministry represented the kingdom of heaven, with His skin serving as a type of the parameters of heaven. Thus, again in type, the Adversary’s rebellion “killed” heaven, doing heaven sufficient damage that heaven will be recreated, what’s seen in the coming of new heavens and new earth and New Jerusalem (Rev 21:1–2).

The single kingdom of this world/kosmos that will become the kingdom of the Father and His Christ when the seventh angel blows his trumpet incorporates two referents as the Tetragrammaton YHWH incorporates two referents, YaHdonWaiH, with <d~n> read as <another such>. The name <Israel> when given to Jacob incorporates two referents, the deceitful man who feared facing his brother, and the new man who had wrestled with the Lord and prevailed. In Paul’s tour-de-force allegory about Hagar (Gal 4:21–31), the name <Jerusalem> incorporates two referents, one earthly, one heavenly.

When humanity arrives in the moment when dominion over the kingdom of this world is taken from the Adversary and given to the Son of Man, the Adversary will no longer be in the portion of heaven that poured from the rent he caused by his rebellion. Rather, he will be cast into space-time and given the mind of man, with this mind of a man not permitting him to know how to escape the clutches of time.

When dominion over the single kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man, the dynamics that Jesus declared to Pilate (My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting) will have changed.

Once the single kingdom of this world is taken by God the Father and His Christ, the authority vector that originates with God the Father on the Throne of thrones will extend through Christ Jesus and through glorified sons of God that rule the day and through the loyal angelic kingdom before entering the portion of heaven that poured from the rent and continues to swell by seepage from the wound … it was in this portion of heaven where the Adversary and his angels resided when the Adversary reigned over the single kingdom of this world. And as the earth absorbed the blood and water that poured from the wound in Jesus’ side, the creation absorbs the weep from wounded heaven, the theological explanation for the rapidly increasing expansion of the creation.

The difference between the kingdom of this world as a signifier before the spirit was given and this signifier after the spirit is given is the added layer to <this world> that comes via the Adversary and his angels being expelled from the portion of “heaven” that is outside of heaven; by inclusion of the portion of heaven represented by the blood and water that poured from the wound in the side of crucified Jesus.

Once iniquity was found in an anointed cherub, the heavenly dance of oneness ended. The iniquity of the guardian cherub would have caused gridlock in heaven, No entity could move, unless this guardian cherub was cast from the moment in which he had received life—and casting this cherub from heaven caused or necessitated an opening in the fabric of heaven analogous to a wound in the flesh of a person, the spear wound in the body of Jesus … it was as if heaven were being bled to remove ideological poison. And what seems apparent is that from the spirit that poured forth from a rent in the fabric of heaven came the raw material [energy] for a big bang creation of matter, simultaneously making the creation both larger and smaller than it seems from inside it.

Before the spirit was given, single-breath-of-life humanity functioned as the shadow and copy of twice-born humanity … in order for single-breath humanity to still live when its reality, twice-born humanity, hasn’t received or loses its second breath of life [the spirit of God], single-breath humanity enters into enslavement or captivity, a point made in an earlier section.

When the children of Israel enter the Promised Land, crossing the Jordan on dry land, they are a free people, having had placed before them the choice of life or death. When the spirit was received by the first disciples (John 20:22), they had living inner selves for they believed the word of Jesus by having assembled together, and they then believed that the Father had raised Jesus from death (which they wouldn’t have done the day before), and they passed from death to life without coming under judgment by Jesus breathing His breath onto them, saying as He did, Receive spirit holy.

When the children of Israel assembled on the plains of Moab to hear the words of Moses, for the first time since Adam, death did not reign over all of humanity—

When Jesus breathed on ten of His disciples on the afternoon of the day of the Wave Sheaf Offering, for the first time a person whose father was the first Adam was given indwelling heavenly or eternal life. Death did not reign over these ten. They had passed from death to life without coming under judgment. And they formed the shadow and type of the endtime Elect, a people foreknown by the Father, predestined to be glorified while they live physically, called by Christ, justified by Christ, and glorified by the indwelling of the spirit of Christ in the spirit of man in each of them.

And while mainstream Christians in the Evangelical Church will claim that they have been born of spirit, they know not what they speak.

Does “death” reign over living creatures? Certainly. In this present world, death reigns over fleshly bodies. But death is not like Pilate or like President Obama; death is not a person even when personified. Death is the absence of life. Nevertheless, death is physically inescapable for as long as it continues to reign over living creatures.

But through Moses serving as the mediator of the Moab covenant [the book of Deuteronomy], the children of Israel were offered escape from death … if the children of Israel would have obeyed the commandments of the Lord, loving the Lord, walking in His ways, the children of Israel would have lived. Conversely, if the children of Israel turned away from the Lord as the earth turns away from the sun and enters into darkness; if the children of Israel worshiped other gods as they collectively did, Israel would perish. The land would expel Israel, sending Israel into captivity in far lands.

In the dynamics Moses presented to the children of Israel, the land functioned as a character, a woman as in Canticles … in the second half of the 20th-Century, numerous American writers living in western states began to unconsciously use the land and the landscape as characters in their writings. But these writers were anticipated by Moses and the prophets.

Is death, then, a personification of darkness coming from having turned away from God, or is physical death the shadow cast by the demonic king of the North, one of the four kings that sprout as horns from around the stump of the first horn of the spiritual King of Greece? Did Death reign as a king over all of humanity from Adam to Moses as Paul states (Rom 5:14), with the Lord in driving Adam and Eve from the Garden before they could eat of the Tree of Life, delivering man [adam] into the dominion of a demonic king that had no dominion in the Garden, a type of heavenly Eden, the garden of God on the holy mountain of God (Ezek 28:13–14)?

For the fleshly self, death is inescapable even if physical life were a millennium long. So, yes, it can be said that death reigns over humanity as a changed state of existence, with all of humankind not numbered among the firstfruits to appear before the Lord in the great White Throne Judgment. But there is the caveat: firstfruits, with two referents for the signifier.

Once a human person is truly born of spirit, the “person” ceases to be the fleshy body over which Pilate ruled; over which any other human person rules or ruled. The “person” becomes the resurrected living inner self that has passed from death to life without coming under judgment (John 5:24), and Death no longer reigns over this person.

To this person, it doesn’t matter if death is the personified absence of life, or a demonic king that joined the Adversary in his rebellion against God. Death is in this person’s past.

Likewise, when the twice-born person is filled with spirit at the Second Passover liberation of Israel, Sin will not any longer have ability to harm this person; so it doesn’t matter if Sin is the demonic king of the South or the personification of unbelief. What matters is whether the person truly born of spirit in this present era, will, post Second Passover, endure in belief of God to the end of the age, the Second Advent—and this person will because of the indwelling of the spirit of Christ in the person’s spirit although this person might well be martyred before Christ Jesus returns.

Again, once born of spirit, the person isn’t his or her fleshly body, but is the person’s living inner self. This person’s citizenship is no longer of this world, but of the kingdom of the heavens [plural], the kingdom over which the glorified Christ is, even now, king (because of timelessness).

The person who has already been born of spirit will be as salt sprinkled over the remainder of the firstfruits, all those who, when filled with spirit, do not take sin back inside themselves [the second referent for the signifier].

In the Affliction, only those who profess that Jesus is Lord—Christians—will be filled with spirit; however, once dominion over the single kingdom of this world is taken from the Adversary and given to the Son of Man, the spirit will be poured out on all flesh, and the third part of humanity [the little ones] will be filled with spirit as Christians were 1260 days earlier. And it is here where having dominion over the kingdom of this world matters.

When Christians (every person who professes that Jesus is Lord) are filled with spirit at the Second Passover liberation of this second nation of Israel, the Adversary remains the prince of this world. The Adversary continues to exercise dominion over living creatures—and even though filled with spirit, this second nation of Israel is not twice-born. Thus, this second Israel must live as fugitives, alienated from the cosmic powers that still reign over the mental topography of living creatures. This second Israel will be separated from the resources of this world. And life as mental fugitives will prove to be too difficult for most Christians. Most will rebel against God and return to the Adversary as chastened slaves of disobedience; most will commit unforgivable blasphemy against the spirit by taking unbelief of God back inside themselves. And this “most” will be as Cain was, physically alive by marked by God for the murder of his righteous brother Abel who briefly dwelt within the person when the Christian was filled with spirit.

That’s what’s missing: when, following the Second Passover, every Christian is filled with spirit, every Christian will be as righteous Abel was. The Lord will have given birth to a nation in a day (Isa 66:7–8), but this nation will be as the children of Israel were when Moses set before them life or death, telling them to choose life that they might live. These Christians will figuratively cross the Jordan [enter Sabbath observance] where they will be circumcised of heart. But as the children of Israel were commanded, concerning Jericho, not to leave anyone other than Rahab and those in her house alive, nor to take from the city any devoted thing, spirit-filled Christians will be instructed to believe God, thereby keeping the Commandments of the Lord.

But “the people of Israel broke faith in regard to the devoted things, for Achan the son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took some of the devoted things. And the anger of the Lord burned against the people of Israel” (Josh 7:1) … this was only the beginning of the children of Israel’s manifested unbelief, unbelief producing the idolatry that caused the Lord to deliver Israel into captivity, the house of Israel taken captive by Assyria, the house of Judah taken captive by Babylon.

Again, the children of Israel entering the Promised Land had set before them life or death, with instructions to choose life. Following the Second Passover liberation of a second Israel, greater Christendom will have set before each person a second life or the second death, with instructions to choose life and live forever.

But the majority of greater Christendom will break faith with the Lord, and this majority will rebel against God in the Apostasy of day 220 of the Affliction, a Sunday, with the “cause” of their rebellion being rejection of the Sabbath and a return to Sunday worship … after months of things not getting better for Christians despite them having turned to God and having kept the Commandments since the Second Passover; after months of things only continuing to get worse, the people choose for themselves new leaders that will return them to favor with the god of the world, that old serpent Satan the devil.

At the Second Passover liberation of Israel, there is no spiritual Cain: in the mirror image, the birth order is reversed, righteous Abel will be born before Cain is. And the glorified Christ, functioning as the last Eve, gives birth to righteousness, not to lawlessness; not to a murderer.

But as the first Eve gave birth to Cain, who when grown, had sin lurking at his door, ready to devour him, the last Eve in giving birth to a symbolic Abel also gives birth to a symbolic Cain by not having first taken dominion from the present prince of this world.

If in the spiritual, the single kingdom of this world is not yet the kingdom of the Most High God because the Adversary and his henchmen continue to lurk in that portion of heaven represented by the blood and water that flowed from Jesus’ side, then the Lord will “test” all Christians by filling them with spirit and thereby liberating them from indwelling sin and death while the Adversary remains the prince of this world. For as long as the Adversary continues to dwell in that portion of heaven that is outside of heaven, the Adversary retains his position as prince of this world.

In filling Christians with spirit, the Lord figuratively reaches underneath the Adversary to take whom He wants out from the Adversary’s control, the ransom price paid for those He wants being the lives of all uncovered (by the blood of Christ) firstborns. And in taking those He wants from the Adversary’s control, He gives control of the Christian to the Christian him or herself.

If the Lord can take whomever He wants away from the Adversary, He can also elevate whomever He wants within the Adversary’s kingdom without paying a ransom price; for He removes no one from the Adversary’s kingdom in elevating one person and permitting another to die. Thus, without modifying the pattern established, the Lord can place over the kingdom of men whomever He wants by selection based on the worst that is in the son of disobedience.

To get the qualities of the Adversary in a human person, the Lord had to harden the heart of Pharaoh so that Pharaoh at the time of the first Passover could serve as the shadow and type of the Adversary at the time of the Second Passover. So the Lord’s elevation of one servant of the Adversary to a higher or lower position within the Adversary’s hierarchy as He sees fit will be done to produce shadows of spiritual entities and spiritual events inside of that portion of heaven that is outside of heaven.

The phrase <heaven outside of heaven> should seem like nonsense, but in a dual referent schema, there has to be two referents for the signifier <heaven> just as there is for <Adam> or <Israel>. And what seems apparent is that the human body is configured as heaven is, with the non-physical inner self of a human person representing the holy mountain of God in heaven. Therefore the location of the wound on the side of Jesus, a wound analogous to the wound in Adam’s side from which a rib and fresh were taken for the creation of Eve, would be where the rent in the fabric of heaven occurred, from which spirit poured as water and blood poured from Jesus’ earthly body.

Endtime disciples find that at the beginning of Daniel chapter eleven, the angel who brought the word of knowledge to Daniel telling him, “And as for me, in the first year of Darius the Mede, I stood up to confirm and strengthen him” (Dan 11:1).

If a chief angel stood up to confirm and strengthen the human person, Darius the Mede–most likely the general Gubaru, for no “Darius the Mede” is historically known during the reign of Cyrus—then the Lord had intervened in the Medo-Persian conquest of Babylon, thereby assuring that the earthly shadow of heavenly events would “seal” Daniel’s visions that are not apocalyptic as most scholars today believe but prophetic, pertaining not to earthly kingdoms but pertaining to war in heaven between demonic kings.

If a chief angel had to stand up to confirm and strengthen a human person so that this person could serve as a shadow and type of a demonic king in a manner similar to how the Lord had to harden Pharaoh’s heart so that he would not let Israel leave Egypt, then the Lord’s intervention in affairs of the kingdom of men will be to guarantee that heavenly events cast faithful shadows in this world—and when using single-breath-of-life humanity to form the shadow of demonic entities, the post-Flood shortness of human life serves as a symbol for how quickly the war in heaven begins and ends. This war is not a long war even though extensive damage is done to the fabric of heaven, again damage that calls for a recreation of heaven, not a repair job.

The kingdom of men either was ruled by the Most High when Nebuchadnezzar reigned over Babylon, or something else is in play that has the words Elijah heard, that Nebuchadnezzar heard, meaning something other than what they would seem to mean. And again, this something other is a second referent for <heaven>, a referent that has “heaven” outside of “heaven.”

Christians have been quick to believe that the Lord presently rules over humanity, meaning that the Lord is responsible for Hitler’s murder of six million Jews and a greater number of Slavs and other peoples he deemed genetically inferior to a German master race. Christians would have the Lord responsible for Pol Pot’s killing fields; would have the Lord responsible for Lenin’s and Stalin’s Gulag; would have the Lord responsible for human slavery, for ISIS beheading “Christians,” for ISIS burning alive the Jordanian pilot … the atrocities one human has committed against another human all become the responsibility of the Lord if He truly reigns over the kingdom of men. Either that or the Lord is too impudent to prevent man from killing over men—and this is not the case. Therefore, the single kingdom of this world isn’t yet the kingdom of God, Father and Son, meaning that an element is missing from the narratives that endtime Christians received from Imperial Hebrew scribes, the element found in the difference between the word of the Lord speaking to Elijah, and the Lord speaking to Elijah, with both asking the same question, but not responding in the same way to Elijah’s identical answer.

Narratives can have interior and exterior narrators, but they can also have both an interior and an exterior logic that need not be explained to auditors: if the word of the Lord were the Lord [if they were the same entity], why ask the same question of Elijah? Why go through a charade of disguises as a strong wind, an earthquake, a fire—any of which could have been the manifestation of the God of Abraham? Why a low whisper, a weak exhalation of breath, a thin silence, nothing more than a breath?

Again, the exterior structure of the passage has the word of the Lord differing in some way from the Lord; for the word of the Lord tells Elijah to go out and stand on the mount of the Lord, presumably where Moses spoke face to face with the Lord. And once outside the cave, with his face covered by his mantle or cloak—his mantle taking on the glory of the Lord [power from God] as Moses’ face took on the glory of the Lord—the Lord asked Elijah the same question as the word of the Lord had asked. Elijah answered in the same way … did the Lord expect Elijah to answer differently? No, He didn’t. What changed is the narrative distance between Elijah and the word [one narrative distance] and Elijah and the Lord [a differing narrative distance]. For outside the cave, Elijah spoke to the Lord face to covered face, again with Elijah’s mantle or cloak taking upon itself the glory that Moses’ face acquired when Moses saw the backside of the Lord in His glory.

The ministry of Elisha has always been theologically interesting for Elisha does/did twice what Elijah did, the reality of which suggests a fictional listing of feats. But again, it isn’t the phenomena described by or within a narrative that is important, but the narrative itself; for in chirality, the left hand enantiomer of a right hand non-physical heavenly enantiomer shouldn’t be a physical phenomenon, but the emphemeral “telling” about the phenomenon—

Heaven is unchanging even though activity happens in heaven, the activity “erasing” what had gone on before for there is no “before”; there is only the present. Therefore, “what was” cannot exist. Only “what is” exists. And there can be no “what will be” even though what is can change by what doesn’t disrupt what is … movement in heaven comes as a dance of oneness during which there is simultaneous and harmonious movement. It is for this reason that when iniquity was found in an anointed cherub, this cherub had to be cast away. And apparently a rent opened in the fabric of heaven that caused enough damage there has to be a recreation of heaven.

Again, what was in heaven cannot exist, and the Adversary as an anointed guardian cherub is central to what was; therefore, the Adversary can no longer exist, what’s seen in Ezekiel’s chiral declaration concerning the king or prince of Tyre versus the chief commander or king of Tyre. These chiral images need to be seen; so first, the left hand declaration [the declaration that pertains to the physical]:

The word of the Lord came to me: "Son of man, say to the prince of Tyre, Thus says the Lord GOD: "Because your heart is proud, and you have said, 'I am a god, I sit in the seat of the gods, in the heart of the seas,' yet you are but a man, and no god, though you make your heart like the heart of a god—you are indeed wiser than Daniel; no secret is hidden from you; by your wisdom and your understanding you have made wealth for yourself, and have gathered gold and silver into your treasuries; by your great wisdom in your trade you have increased your wealth, and your heart has become proud in your wealth—therefore thus says the Lord GOD: Because you make your heart like the heart of a god, therefore, behold, I will bring foreigners upon you, the most ruthless of the nations; and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom and defile your splendor. They shall thrust you down into the pit, and you shall die the death of the slain in the heart of the seas. Will you still say, 'I am a god,' in the presence of those who kill you, though you are but a man, and no god, in the hands of those who slay you? You shall die the death of the uncircumcised by the hand of foreigners; for I have spoken … ." (Ezek 28:1–10)

This prophecy about the prince/king of Tyre [the Rock] wasn’t fulfilled by Nebuchadnezzar; nor was it fulfilled by Alexander who did overwhelm the fortress on the Rock, killing many but with many also escaping by sea to Carthage. So in the category of fulfilled or unfulfilled prophecies, this prophecy seems to be about Melqart, the god created in a religious revolution under the reigns of Abibaal and Hiram, the god that assumed primacy over the divine couple of Phoenicians, Baal and Astarte (also known as El and Asherah). Melqart took power away from priests of the tradtional pantheon. And worship of Melqart effectively ceased with Alexander being rebuffed when he sought to offer a sacrifice in the Temple of Melqart, a sacrilegious act: Alexander became angry and sent ambassadors demanding the surrender of the city … the ambassadors were murdered and their bodies thrown over the city walls. Alexander lay siege to Tyre from November 333 to August 332 BCE.

Melqart was a tutelary god [god of the city] and often titled, Lord of Tyre. Allegedly, the royal family of Tyre was descended from Melqart, the Tyrian Herakles. Therefore, the prophecy about the prince/king of Tyre lines up better with being a prophecy about Melqart, not about a human prince or king.

This prophecy against the prince of Tyre, the Rock, will now form the left hand enantiomer of the prophecy against the king of Tyre [the right hand enantiomer], who was an anointed guardian cherub in Eden, the garden of God on the holy mountain of God … that who was no god forms the mirror image of an anointed cherub who is/was also no god, with the former perishing by the hands of Alexander and the latter perishing by the breath of the Most High God … again, the word <Tyre> means “Rock”; so without forcing meaning onto the text, the King of the Rock who declares himself God can be read as a Christian in the temple that is the Body of Christ:

Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the [Apostasy] 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, proclaiming himself to be God. (2 Thess 2:1–4)

Hence, the prophecy against the prince [king] of Tyre can also form the left hand enantiomer of Paul’s right hand declaration against the lawless one [the man of perdition] who, within the temple of God, declares himself God, but will be destroyed by the breath [pneuma] of Christ Jesus. This lawless one will be an Arian Christian possessed by the Adversary on day 220 of the Affliction. He will be destroyed by men who can kill him when dominion over the single kingdom of this world is taken from the Adversary and given to the Son of Man.

The chirality of the Affliction in which the lawless one [the man of perdition] declares himself God, and of the Endurance in which the Adversary, given the mind of a man, declares himself the returned Messiah is reflected by the chirality of the ruler of “the Rock” saying he is a god and the chief commander [king] of “the Rock” declaring himself to be the Rock.

Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me: "Son of man, raise a lamentation over the king [chief commander] of Tyre, and say to him, Thus says the Lord GOD: "You were the signet of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were in Eden, the garden of God; every precious stone was your covering, sardius, topaz, and diamond, beryl, onyx, and jasper, sapphire, emerald, and carbuncle; and crafted in gold were your settings and your engravings. On the day that you were created they were prepared. You were an anointed guardian cherub. I placed you; you were on the holy mountain of God; in the midst of the stones of fire you walked. You were blameless in your ways from the day you were created, till unrighteousness was found in you. In the abundance of your trade you were filled with violence in your midst, and you sinned; so I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, and I destroyed you, O guardian cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire. Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor. I cast you to the ground; I exposed you before kings, to feast their eyes on you. By the multitude of your iniquities, in the unrighteousness of your trade you profaned your sanctuaries; so I brought fire out from your midst; it consumed you, and I turned you to ashes on the earth in the sight of all who saw you. All who know you among the peoples are appalled at you; you have come to a dreadful end and shall be no more forever." (Ezek 28:11–19)

The relationship between the king/prince of Tyre who is in type Melqart, the creation of men that can be killed by other men, and who is in reality the endtime man of perdition, a Christian possessed by the Adversary, and the Chief Commander/King of Tyre who is [was] an anointed cherub that has fire coming from his belly to utterly consume him mirrors the relationship between the man of perdition in the Affliction and the Antichrist in the Endurance, with both coming to their end by the will of the Lord. Therefore, what Paul declared to the Thessalonians in his second epistle to them is anticipated by the prophet Ezekiel, with this anticipation serving as a type of Paul’s declaration.

The chirality of “what is” will have the ruler of the Rock [Tyre] declaring himself God or a god, whereas the Chief Commander of the Rock [Tyre] was on the holy mountain of God as a guardian cherub when iniquity is found in him … if the left hand or earthly enantiomer of the spiritual “what is” hasn’t yet happened inside the creation but awaits the liberation of Israel at the Second Passover, then this left hand enantiomer isn’t a future physical event, but an ephemeral narrative given permanency through inscription as prophecy (as Ezekiel’s prophecy). So the phenomenon that hasn’t yet happened—this phenomenon being the Christian who, as the man of perdition, declares himself God when possessed by the Adversary—isn’t really important, even when he makes his declaration. What’s important is that the narrative is believed to be true, with this narrative tested as spirits are tested.

Right now, Sabbatarian Christians tend to believe that what Paul wrote about the Apostasy happened between the end of the 1st-Century and the Council of Nicea in the 4th-Century. Therefore, these Sabbatarians can only employ their carnal wit in their expectation that Christ will soon return. They reject additional revelation … a narrative from antiquity should be rejected if the narrative doesn’t prove to be prophetic in the Lord’s Day, either the dark portion [beginning with Jesus’ earthly ministry] or the light portion [beginning with the kingdom being given to the Son of Man]. And about this Paul wrote to the holy ones at Corinth (this citation also appearing in the 9th part of this series):

I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play." We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did and were destroyed by serpents, nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. (1 Cor 10:1–12 emphasis added)

The Exodus narrative—the story of Moses, the plagues, the Passover as the tenth plague, the liberation of Israel, the escape of Israel from Egypt, the rebellion of Israel in the wilderness, the replacement man for man of Israel by the children of Israel—is prophetic, with greater Christendom presently living in the spiritual reality of the portion of the Exodus narrative between when Passover lambs were sacrificed and when the death angel passed over the houses of Egypt, slaying all uncovered firstborns.

In the physical and in a sentence fragment, the six hour period when Israel with loins girded, scandals on, staffs in hand, roasted with fire their Passover lambs fully represents the reality of greater Christendom roasting Christ Jesus, the Lamb of God, with their fiery sins for nearly two millennia. As Christendom’s High Priest, Christ Jesus takes upon Himself the sins of Christians, these sins figuratively roasting Him with fire.

Returning to Elijah’s thin silence … who recorded the Elijah narrative? Elijah was alone. He did as told, then disappeared, caught up to heaven in a fiery chariot. So did he write down what happened on the mount of the Lord before he crossed the Jordan with Elisha beside him, thereby in analogy leaving the Promised Land? Did he tell Elisha what he was told by the word of the Lord and by the Lord, which doesn’t seem to be the case although the doubling by Elisha of what Elijah did suggests a linkage that has Elijah being analogous to the word of the Lord and Elisha being analogous to the Lord in a manner typified by Jesus telling His disciples, “‘Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father’” (John 14:12).

If the glorified Jesus is the last Elijah—and He is—then His disciples will also do the works He did and greater works as Elisha did greater works than Elijah. Hence, the Elisha narrative would, at this time, seem prophetic, not in what the narrative says about Elisha [floating an axe head is physical and remains in the physical realm] but in how the narrative relates Elisha to Elijah forming the left hand enantiomer of how endtime disciples will relate to Christ Jesus … the greater work that endtime disciples already do can be seen in the delivery of this explication around the world moments after it is posted on-line, with this explication then remaining available to be read at anytime virtually anywhere for as long as the open door of the Internet remains “open.”

The prophet Jeremiah recorded the words of the Lord:

Therefore, behold, the days are coming … when it shall no longer be said, “As the Lord lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt,” but “As the Lord lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the north country and out of all the countries where He had driven them.” For I will bring them back to their own land that I gave to their fathers. Behold, I am sending for many fishers … and they shall catch them. And afterward I will send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill, and out of the clefts of the rocks. For my eyes are on all their ways. They are not hidden from me, nor is their iniquity concealed from my eyes. But first I will doubly repay their iniquity and their sin, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations. (Jer 16:14–18)

A hunter must intercept his or her prey, with both the hunter and the prey passing through the same location at the same time. And so it is with a fisherman holding a set, or a radio broadcast or a television broadcast. But a trapper sets a snare then moves on, leaving the snare to “hunt” in the trapper’s absence—and this is how the Internet, originally created to preserve knowledge in case of nuclear war, works in that “knowledge” on the Net is available even after the one who puts this knowledge onto the Net moves on to figuratively weed his garden. The knowledge remains in place to either feed or to ensnare the person surfing by, with porn hustlers using the Net to trap many and with ISIS using the Net as a recruitment tool, but with Christ also using the Net to deliver His word to the persons whom the Father has delivered to Him. And the Adversary, when released after the Thousand Years, will use today’s social media, abundance of food, and democratic dispersal of knowledge as “proof” that human life under his administration of the single kingdom of this world was “better” than life in the Millennium under Christ Jesus. Unfortunately, the Adversary will neglect to mention the wars fought, the human suffering, the inequality of life that existed when he was the prince of the power of the air. All of these things would be known if the Internet were permitted to again exist. This paragraph would be known if after the Thousand Years the Net was again permitted to exist. But once the “door” that is the Net closes, it will never again open.

What is not realized by humankind today is that with liberation from indwelling Sin and Death through being filled with the spirit of God, the person who physically lives into the beginning of the Millennium will, barring accidents, live throughout the Thousand Years and will in his or her memory carry knowledge of this present age, and will not forget the suffering of humanity under the Adversary’s administration of this world. … The Internet is only needed to carry knowledge today because of the shortness of human life, with every person physically dying before all that can be known is learned or realized.

Jesus told His disciples that He would ask the Father to send them the Parakletos, the spirit of truth, with <truth> in Greek being the negation of being concealed. Thus, the Parakletos is the spirit that reveals what has been hidden from Israel, from humanity. And this Parakletos permits the Father to “communicate” with firstborn sons via the groaning of a spirit within the son of God.

In the physical, there is no groaning of the spirit within a person. And we are back to Elijah’s thin silence: in the physical, the Lord communicated with His people primarily via visions …

Under the oaks of Mamre, the patriarch Abraham spoke with the Lord. Jacob wrestled with the Lord. Moses spoke with the Lord before seeing the glory of the Lord by entering into His presence. And what seems to be the case, Elijah spoke with the Lord after the word of the Lord apparently came to him in a vision.

The difference between the word of the Lord and the Lord is the difference between the Lord communicating with Israel via visions and God communicating with His sons via the Parakletos, with the thin silence Elijah heard typifying the groaning of the spirit.

 In the physical, everything is outside the person, from circumcision to the Law, from physical long life to visions. But in the movement from physical to spiritual, circumcision goes from being of the flesh to being of the heart, a euphemistic expression for the person’s inner self. The Law moves from being written on two tablets of stone to being written on hearts and placed in minds. Long physical life moves to being indwelling heavenly [eternal] life, and visions move to being interactive groaning of the spirit.

In chirality, the silent groaning of the spirit that the Elect experience forms the right enantiomer of the thin silence Elijah heard that caused him to leave the cave and face the Lord. Thus, in this passage where Elijah is told that his ministry is over, that Elisha shall replace him as the Lord’s warrior prophet, the thin silence that Elijah hears corresponds to the groaning of the spirit in the Elect.

Again, when Elijah wrapped his mantle around his face and left the cave, he entered into the presence of the Lord in a manner similar to how Moses had entered into the presence of the Lord, both having fasted for forty days (cf. 1 Kings 19:8; Ex 34:28). The cave and Elijah’s mantle served him as the cleft in the rock and the hand of the Lord served Moses, Elijah’s mantle being analogous to the hand of the Lord. And Elijah’s mantle acquired power:

Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. And Elijah said to Elisha, "Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel." But Elisha said, "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." So they went down to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, "Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?" And he said, "Yes, I know it; keep quiet." Elijah said to him, "Elisha, please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho." But he said, "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." So they came to Jericho. The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha and said to him, "Do you know that today the Lord will take away your master from over you?" And he answered, "Yes, I know it; keep quiet." Then Elijah said to him, "Please stay here, for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan." But he said, "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you." So the two of them went on. Fifty men of the sons of the prophets also went and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his cloak and rolled it up and struck the water, and the water was parted to the one side and to the other, till the two of them could go over on dry ground. When they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, "Ask what I shall do for you, before I am taken from you." And Elisha said, "Please let there be a double portion of your spirit on me." And he said, "You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it shall be so for you, but if you do not see me, it shall not be so." And as they still went on and talked, behold, chariots of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it and he cried, "My father, my father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!" And he saw him no more. Then he took hold of his own clothes and tore them in two pieces. And he took up the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. Then he took the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and struck the water, saying, "Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah?" And when he had struck the water, the water was parted to the one side and to the other, and Elisha went over. (2 Kings 2:1–14 emphasis added)

The miracle that occurred when the children of Israel entered the Promised Land—the parting of the Jordan as the Sea of Reeds was parted when Israel left Egypt—twice occurred when the Jordan parted for Elijah, then parted for Elisha. But instead of the Ark of the Covenant being the signifier that caused the Jordan to part, the mantle of Elijah was the signifier.

But there is more to the story of the parting of the Jordan by the signifying mantle of Elijah: Elijah and Elisha crossed the Jordan, the eastern boundary of the Promised Land, and the boundary representing entering into Sabbath observance (cf. Heb 3:16–4:11; Ps 95:10–11; Num chap 14), and left the Promised Land, with Elijah not returning but being caught up in chariots of fire. Elisha, outside of the Promised Land when he sees Elijah depart from him, returns to the Promised Land, striking the Jordan with Elijah’s mantle and entering dry shod into the Promised Land.

There will be some who contend that more is being read into this story [eisegesis] than should be—the entire Elisha narrative should be read as symbolism—but when Christ Jesus is the last Elijah, His disciples function in relationship to Him as Elisha functioned in relationship to Elijah, with Jesus’ disciples using power received from Jesus to even forgive or withhold forgiveness of sin (John 20:23), thereby permitting or denying entrance into the Promised Land that is a type of both the Millennium and of heaven.

Again, the naming phrase, the word of the Lord, linguistically differs from the naming phrase, the Lord, with the first phrase apparently referring to the Lord speaking to Elijah via a vision that would be analogous to the Lord speaking to Moses from the cloud. The second phrase will have the Lord speaking directly to Elijah, and not speaking via a vision.

Disciples who are today of Philadelphia hear the Lord and respond, thereby doing the work of Christ Jesus, the spiritual Elijah who turns hearts around.

Elijah in the stone cave atop the mountain of God is analogous to a born-from-above son of God in a body of flesh. Moving from physical to spiritual, what was stone and by human perception not-living becomes flesh and spiritually still not-living for flesh and blood will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. The law of God inscribed on two stone tablets were housed, when God gave rest to Israel during Solomon’s reign, in a stone temple. But the Moab covenant when mediated by Christ Jesus will have the law of God inscribed on two tablets of flesh (the hearts and minds of disciples — Heb 8:10 & Jer 31:33) and housed in a temple of flesh (1 Cor 3:16-17). Again, a physically circumcised Israelite in a house in Egypt or in Babylon is analogous to (or the shadow of) a spiritually circumcised disciple living in a fleshly body that is not living as a Judean, an important juxtaposition.

A physically circumcised Israelite living in a stone house in Judea forms the shadow of a spiritually circumcised disciple who outwardly keeps the laws of God, including clean and unclean foods as well as the Sabbaths of God.

Under the new covenant, the commandments of God move from governing what the hand does to what the heart does. Disciples are no longer under an external law written on stone tablets and housed in a stone temple, for the commandments are now written within their flesh. And the essence of Christianity is that a disciple is not the flesh, but a new creation within the mind and the heart of a previously spiritually lifeless human being. This new creation is not of this world, but is housed in a tabernacle of this world to grow and mature and to overcome the prince of this world. And if this new creation is overcome by the prince of this world as were a third of the angels, then this new creation will never leave this world but will be cast into the lake of fire when his judgment is revealed.

Again, a physically circumcised Israelite living in a house in Babylon, where God sent the nation because of its lawlessness, forms the shadow of a spiritually circumcised Israelite (a Christian with a circumcised heart and mind [naphesh] through being born of Spirit) living as a righteous Gentile. A few Israelites in Babylon served God faithfully, but most bowed down to the gold image the king of Babylon made. Likewise, a few spiritual Israelites have served God faithfully in spiritual Babylon, but most have bowed down and worshiped the spiritual king of Babylon (Isa 14:4-21) that is Satan disguised as an angel of light (2 Cor 11:14). Most find “justification” for going along with, and getting along with the world and the prince of this world.

When it came time to rebuild the temple of God, the construction wasn’t undertaken in Babylon, but at Jerusalem—and the rebuilt spiritual temple of God is constructed in the Jerusalem above, which, theologically, lies Beyond the River from Babylon. Crossing that River places the disciple in spiritual Judea, where the disciple will live as a spiritual Judean, doing those things that separate an already circumcised Israelite from neighboring nations.

The glorified Jesus restores all things, and turns the hearts of the children of God to their Father and His Father. He must restore all things; for the Church, the spiritual reality foreshadowed by circumcised Israel, no longer walks in the ways of God, but rather, profanes His Sabbaths while teaching sons of God to be lawless. Thus, with regret it must be said that God isn’t in Evangelical television just as He wasn’t in the strong wind that tore the mountain apart and broke rocks to pieces. It would seem that He ought to have been there; it would seem that much power must be of God. But it takes no faith to believe what the eyes see. It takes faith to hear God in thin silence. It took faith for Elijah to hear the Lord in thin silence, and then to cover his face so as not to perish.

Christ Jesus is the acceptable covering for disciples who hear the voice of the Lord and respond as Elijah responded. And those disciples who are of Philadelphia respond when they keep and teach Jesus’ words of endurance, these words being the good news that all who endure to the end shall be saved. Those who endure to the end (the third part of humanity) will be saved for they will be born of spirit when the spirit is poured out upon all flesh (Joel 2:28).

Then, for reason of pedagogical redundancy, let it again be said that with the pouring out of the Holy Spirit when the kingdom of this world becomes the kingdom of the Most High and of His Christ halfway through the seven endtime years of tribulation, the third part of humanity (from Zech 13:9) will become the spiritually third-born son of the last Eve: Seth. In effect, this third part of humanity will be like the uncircumcised children born in the wilderness to the nation that left Egypt.

Because of the nation of Israel’s unbelief, the nation that left Egypt never entered God’s rest, except for Joshua and Caleb (and Moses atop the Mount Sinai). Because of the unbelief of the greater Church today—unbelief that will manifest itself in the Affliction—most of greater Christendom will not enter God’s rest. Rather, this “most of Christendom” will, as Cain did, murder their righteous brother; murder their righteous self by returning to lawlessness.

However, after Cain kills Abel in a form of self-murder—after Christians commit spiritual suicide by taking sin back inside themselves, thereby committing unforgivable blasphemy against the spirit—Cain is marked and righteous Abel is dead and a third son is born to Eve, the third part of humanity that will be saved by enduring to the end.

This is enough for a section. The remainder of the thought will appear in Section 11.

(to be continued)


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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."