January 25, 2011 ©Homer Kizer
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End Notes
Do You Presume on the Riches of His Kindness —
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Do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed. / He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, He will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek. For God shows no partiality. (Rom 2:4–11 emphasis added)
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1.
There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek—affliction and distress came upon Christian converts from Judaism in the 1st-Century. Those converts that remained in Jerusalem perished along with rebelling Jews when Roman legionnaires razed the city. But it is the affliction and distress of an even greater magnitude that will come upon Christian converts from the nations [Gentiles] in the 21st-Century that presently concerns me; for this latter period of tribulation will come upon Christians because they are self-seeking and do not obey the truth as evidenced outwardly by the day on which they seek to enter into God’s rest.
God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance—but what is repentance? What does it mean to “repent”? And from what does a saint “repent”? From what does a Christian who has embraced Christ Jesus as his or her personal savior repent, surely not from having embraced Christ as the Christian’s savior?
The Apostle Paul wrote, JÎ PD0FJÎ< J@Ø 2,@Ø,ÆH :,JV<@4V< F, –(,4— the kindness of the God to repentance you leads (Rom 2:4), with the Greek linguistic icon :,JV<@4" [metanoia] carrying the usual assignment of meaning of “to think differently” or “to reconsider” or “to reverse how one thinks.” Repentance is the reversal of how one usually thinks—
To reconsider how one thinks is what the person who was clearly of this world does when the person embraces Christ as his or her savior. This person thinks differently than he or she did before: there is an acquired difference in attitude, in behavior, in values, in most everything except for keeping the Sabbath commandment. Most “Christian” converts—nearly 100%--continue to transgress the Sabbath, conducting business on the Sabbath, doing their weekly shopping on the Sabbath, attending family gatherings, football games, weddings, whatever, on the Sabbath. Whereas the convert would not condone adultery in him or herself or in other Christians, the convert will continue to treat the Sabbath as another day of the week, the preparation day for Sunday when the convert attempts to enter into God’s rest.
The “Christian” who has grown to maturity in a Christian household, grown to maturity believing that he or she is under no obligation to keep the commandments — the Apostle John calls keeping-the-commandments the practice-of-righteousness (1 John 3:4–10) — will, despite what John writes, show no inclination to reverse how he or she thinks. Whereas the Christian convert has knowingly changed how he or she thinks, the generational Christian is usually satisfied to worship God in the manner of his or her parents, and though able to reconsider how he or she thinks, the generational Christian will not think differently than his or her parents. And this is especially true among family members of observant Jews or fundamentalist Muslims.
Temporarily leaving aside the observant Jew or the fundamentalist Muslim and their theological intransigence, it is the longtime “Christian” that stands as the foremost obstacle to the next generation of disciples believing God by reconsidering how they think; for if a “Christian” will not walk as Jesus walked, imitating Paul as he imitated Christ Jesus, then the “Christian” will never enter the kingdom of God.
The Apostle Paul expresses the concept that those who say they are of Christ ought to walk as Jesus walked when he says,
· “I urge you, then, be imitators of me” (1 Cor 4:16);
· “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (1 Cor 11:1);
· “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children” (Eph 5:1);
· “Brothers, join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us” (Phil 3:17);
· “And you became imitators of us and of the Lord” (1 Thess 1:6);
· “For you, brothers, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea” (1 Thess 2:14);
· “Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb 13:7–8);
· “‘Neither against the law of the Jews, nor against the temple, nor against Caesar have I [Paul] committed any offense’” (Acts 25:8).
No Christian can walk as Jesus walked or imitate Paul as he imitated Jesus and attempt to bodily enter into God’s presence on the day after the Sabbath [J± :4” Jä< F"$$VJT< — from John 20:1; Luke 24:1; Acts 20:7], and that is what Sabbath observance represents, bodily entering into God’s rest, with God’s rest being a euphemistic expression for God’s presence. Thus, the “Christian” who mingles the sacred [Christ] with the profane [the day of the invincible sun] does not walk as Jesus walked, but seeks darkness rather than light regardless of what this person believes about his or her relationship with Jesus.
The Christian convert who has accepted Jesus as his or her personal savior has mentally journeyed as far out of spiritual Babylon as the children of Israel had physically journeyed out from Egypt when on the plains of Moab, Moses in a second eternal covenant, an additional covenant, a covenant added to the covenant made at Horeb [Sinai] (Deut 29:1), set before the mixed circumcised and uncircumcised children of Israel—those present and those not then present (vv. 14–15)—life and good, death and evil, with life being to obey the commandments of the Lord by loving the Lord with heart and mind, walking in His ways, and keeping His commandments and statutes and rules found in the Book of Deuteronomy (Deut 30:10, 15–20). Yes, the Moab covenant, ratified by a song (see Deut chap 32), is a heavenly covenant as the second Sinai covenant (Ex chap 34), ratified by the glory that shone from Moses’ face, is a heavenly covenant … under the law, according to the writer of Hebrews, “without the shedding of blood there was no forgiveness of sins. Thus it was necessary for the copies of heavenly things to be purified with these rites [the shedding of blood], but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these” (Heb 9:22–23). And the song that Moses taught to the assembly of Israel there on the plains of Moab were not empty words but their very life (Deut 32:47), their sacrifice to the Lord, with repentance from dealing corruptly with the Lord (v. 5) being a major portion of their sacrifice that would be better than blood for it was to be ongoing, generation after generation (v. 46).
The convert to Christianity who accepts the Lord as his or her personal savior stands on the same theological promises as Moses mediated on the plains of Moab, for when the mediator of the second covenant goes from being Moses to being the glorified Christ Jesus, the promise of life goes from being long physical life to being life in the heavenly realm, and the promise of death goes from being physical death to being the second death in the lake of fire. The promises move up a level to pertain to the inner son of God, born of spirit and circumcised of heart after a journey of faith is undertaken that is equivalent in length to Abraham’s physical journey of faith from Ur of the Chaldeans [Babylon] to Haran [death of the old self] and on to Canaan [the Promised Land of heaven].
But the uncircumcised children of Israel were not circumcised on the plains of Moab—no circumcisions occurred under Moses—rather the children of Israel, following Joshua [Greek: [0F@Ø — Jesus, from Acts 7:45] into the Promised Land, were circumcised on the other side of the Jordan (Josh 5:2–7). Likewise, Christian converts who have chosen life through accepting Jesus as their personal savior must now follow Jesus into obedience to God, which is outwardly manifested in Sabbath observance, before their hearts are circumcised and they become a part of Israel, the nation now circumcised of heart (Rom 2:28–29; Col 2:11).
No Moabite will enter the kingdom of God, which means that the Christian convert who permanently camps on the plains of Moab, despite having chosen Jesus as his or her savior, will disappear into the flotsam of history and the lake of fire …
If the “Christian” who, as rebelling Israel in the wilderness of Paran did (Num chap 14), attempts to enter into God’s rest on the following day — again, the one [day after] the Sabbath (J± *¥ :4” Jä< F"$$VJT<) — does not reconsider how he or she worships God, this “Christian” will perish in the lake of fire regardless of the mighty works the person has done in the name of Jesus (see Matt 7:21–23 for an example text) … unfortunately, with an extremely small number of exceptions, this “Christian” will never repent, the reason why the two witnesses are garbed in mourning dress; for they know the fate of seemingly good, pious men and women who simply will not cease mingling the sacred with the profane in the ultimate expression of unbelief, that of judging God.
Whenever a Christian says openly aloud or silently in his or her mind, My God would never do that, the “Christian” has judged God, whose ways are not the ways of humankind or the ways of the present prince of this world.
Therefore, the “Christian” who should be first into the kingdom—for the spirit was not given to the nation of Israel that left Egypt or to the children of Israel in the wilderness but to the saints in earthly Jerusalem—will either perish in the lake of fire when judgments are revealed upon Jesus’ return if this Christian physically lives into the Affliction, the first 1260 days of the seven endtime years; or the “Christian” will appear before the Lord in the great White Throne Judgment when the Christian’s initial judgment is made, for in claiming to be a Christian, our “Christian” claims to see despite remaining spiritually blind. And because our “Christian” claims to see, his or her guilt remains (see John 9:41 for an example text).
2.
It is extremely important that Christians continue in repentance when they are filled-with and empowered by the divine breath of God [B<,Ø:" 2,@Ø]; for when the Torah is written on hearts and placed in minds (see Jer 31:33; Heb 8:10) — when the Son of Man is revealed and the garment of Christ is stripped away at the Second Passover liberation of Israel — the thinking of every Christian will be forcibly changed. Repentance will be imposed upon Christians. And if they do not return to their present way of worshiping God but continue, instead, in obedience as observant Christians they will enter the kingdom as part of the early harvest of God by simply enduring to the end.
But the vast majority of Christendom will repent of repentance and will return to their present ways and traditions: they will not continue in the repentance that was imposed upon them, and they will not because they sincerely believe they now correctly worship God … the practical question must be asked, why bother preaching repentance to the greater Christian Church in this era when the majority of the Church will rebel against God even after having their minds forcibly changed through being given the mind of Christ Jesus? What good will come from the expenditure of time and resources necessary to preach repentance to a blind and deaf and theologically hostile audience?
There are far more good reasons for not preaching repentance, for remaining silent, than for preaching repentance; so is the reason for preaching repentance today to greater Christendom the same as John the Baptist’s reason for preaching repentance? And John preached repentance because he was “born” to this task, this office of making straight the way to the Lord.
Have we—endtime observant Christians—been similarly born to the task of preaching repentance? Have I been born of spirit to the task of preaching repentance? And the answer to the latter question is, yes.
John the Baptist was, if a person will believe it, the Elijah who is to come (Matt 11:14), with Herod Antipas and Herodias being to John as King Ahab and Jezebel were to Elijah—
Christians with few exceptions lack understanding of Hasmonean and Herodian dynasties in the period between 165 BCE and Christ Jesus’ birth, or even of Pharisaical rebellion against the tyranny of Hasmonean kings and the politicized priesthood. There were good reasons for Pharisees and Sadducees to pray for a political leader that would lead Judeans to righteousness, peace, and independence. But the mingling of the sacred [worship of God] and the profane [the politics of this world] caused those Jews who sought righteousness to be spiritual bastards, about whom John the Baptist said,
But when he [John the Baptist] saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.” (Matt 3:7–10)
John preached repentance to Israel, but he did not necessarily preach repentance to the Pharisees and Sadducees who believed they already held the keys to the kingdom of God. In going into the wilderness to preach, John separated himself and separated the preaching of repentance from the politicized temple, where, because of the intransigency of Pharisees and Sadducees, such preaching would have fallen on deaf ears and unbelieving hearts.
It would be socially inappropriate and legally unwise today to enter a Catholic Church and there preach repentance to priests and parishioners. It would be equally unwise to preach repentance in a Mormon temple. Even though the “Christians” in any private gathering will necessarily be forced to reconsider how they worship the Father and the Son when the Second Passover occurs, such reconsideration is presently voluntary; is presently a journey of faith that the disciple must undertake as Abram followed his old man Terah out from Ur of the Chaldeans, then followed the Lord down into the land of Canaan.
Moses fled from Egypt as a fugitive, a slave child reared as a free man who had when mature used his freedom to try and help his enslaved brothers and sisters. But he couldn’t help them without getting himself executed: his freedom could only be used to continue the enslaving of his brothers and sisters, not something Evangelical Christians consider when they go forth to preach dispensationalist theology to Catholic or Mormon Christians … if a Catholic or a Mormon Christian converted and became a Southern Baptist, the ex-Catholic or ex-Mormon would remain equally enslaved to disobedience, to lawlessness, to unrighteousness, to transgression of the Sabbath commandment. The convert is not more “free” to keep the commandments than before. The alleged personal relationship with Jesus that the Baptist convert claims to now have could as easily been had as a Catholic or as a Mormon; for it doesn’t take much of a relationship to spit in the face of Christ Jesus who died so that His disciples would be free to leave spiritual Babylon and journey by faith to the Jerusalem that is above, with the course of this journey marked by entering into God’s rest [figuratively crossing the Jordan] when the disciple begins to keep the Sabbath (see Heb 3:16–4:11; Ps 95:10–11; Num chap 14).
And as the Jordan, where John baptized, is a ways away from Jerusalem, Sabbath observance is still a ways away from where Paul laid the foundation for the spiritual house of God in heavenly Jerusalem.
John preached repentance as a warning to Israel to “flee” from the wrath to come; he preached repentance to save lives, knowing beforehand that the wildlife to be named by the last Adam (see Matt chap 23) would not change their stripes—
With very few exceptions, Christians believe they already hold the truth so they are not inclined to reverse how they think. Lawless Christians are more likely to try and convince observant Christians to repent of obedience to God rather than repent of their unrighteousness, or worse (because it is more difficult to see) of their mingling the sacred with the profane as in Sunday observance, or Christmas observance.
If an observant Christian were to understand Judean history, the observant Christian would never entertain contemplation of engaging in worldly politics, for freedom in this world comes only as Moses experienced freedom in Egypt; comes at the expense of separation from the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Freedom in this world—what America’s founding fathers and the Continental Army gave to the citizens of the United States of America—comes at the cost of separation from the Most High God and His Christ; for dominion over this world remains with the Adversary, and will continue with the Adversary until the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man (Dan 7:9–4; Rev 11:15–18) halfway through seven endtime years of tribulation.
Freedom carries a price tag … the price of liberation of the fleshly bodies of Christians has not yet been paid. Although Jesus at Calvary paid the price for liberation of the inner self from enslavement to sin and death—from disobedience and the unrighteousness of men—Jesus has not yet paid the price for liberation of fleshly bodies from indwelling sin and death, what the Apostle Paul did not realize until he found that he did in his flesh the very things that he hated in his mind (see Rom 7:7–25). Paul didn’t realize that there would be a second Passover-type liberation of Israel, the nation circumcised of heart, on the second Passover (the 15th day of Iyyar), with this Second Passover coming at the cost of the uncovered physical lives of biological and legal firstborns in heaven and on earth as the liberation of Israel from Pharaoh came at the cost of the firstborn of men and beasts in Egypt.
Throughout the nation’s history, Americans have been no more free to worship the God of Christ Jesus than Moses in Egypt was free to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; for to worship the God of Christ Jesus, the Christian must first be born of God as a son and separated from his Christian brethren as Moses was separated from his Hebrew brethren. Then, when mature in this separation, the Christian must identify with his Christian brethren as their liberator [what Sabbatarian Christians saw in the now-failed ministries of Ellen G. White, Andrew Dugger, and Herbert W. Armstrong], vainly attempt to intervene, then flee into the wilderness for a period represented by forty years before returning with the power of God to cause the present prince of this world to want observant Christians dead and removed from his wobbling, tottering, toppling kingdom.
The spiritual Moses that is to come will come in the form of the two witnesses that are the two olive trees and two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth (Rev 11:3–4). This spiritual Moses is not seen in this world until the Second Passover liberation of Israel, meaning that the Christian brethren of the two witnesses will not have collectively repented of their lawlessness prior to the Second Passover.
The Christian brethren of observant Christians use Scripture to support their disobedience to God, their lawlessness in a manner similar to how observant Christians use Scripture to support their obedience:
· Paul writes, @Ê B@40J"Â <`:@L *46"4T2ZF@<J"4— the doers of law will be justified (Rom 2:13);
· Elsewhere, Paul writes, 746"4T2X<J,H@Þ< ¦6B\DZ<0< — Having been justified therefore by faith/belief (Rom 5:1);
· And, *46"4T2X<J,H<Ø< ¦< Jè"ž:"J4 "ÛJ@Ø [Jesus] — having been justified now in the blood of Him (Rom 5:9);
· And, ¦> §D(T< <`:@L @Û*46"4T2ZF,J"4BF" FD> ¦<fB4@< "ÛJ@Ø [Jesus] — by works of law not will be justified all flesh before Him (Rom 3:20)
In the same treatise, Paul writes that the doers of the law will be justified, but by the works of the law no one will be justified; that disciples are justified by belief, but are justified by the blood [death] of Jesus—
Does belief/faith equate to the blood and death of Christ Jesus? And how does being a doer of the law differ from the works of the law?
Is a doer of the law the works that are done by the doer?
The doer of the law isn’t what he or she does (the works done by the doer) although that would be the contention of phenomenological existentialists who find it fashionable to reassert the importance of freedom and individualism in the worship of God. However, if the doer of the law were the works that the doer did, no person could be saved prior to when dominion is taken from the present prince of this world, for none are righteous … the Apostle John writes,
This is the message we have heard from Him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us. (1 John 1:5–10)
It is the inner self of a disciple that is set free when the disciple is born of God through receiving a second breath of life, the breath of God [B<,Ø:" 2,@Ø]. It will be the outer self that is set free when the disciple is baptized in the breath of God at the Second Passover liberation of Israel. Until then, observant Christians are to remain in heavenly Jerusalem and await being “‘clothed with power from on high’” (Luke 24:49). They are not to return to their Christian brethren who remain in spiritual Babylon, or even to their Sabbatarian brethren who either never reached Jerusalem [as in the case of Seventh Day Adventists who refuse to keep the high Sabbaths of God] or who reached Jerusalem but left to tend their fields in the distant hill country within Sabbath observance.
If a person keeps the law by faith (i.e., by his or her belief of God), then it isn’t the works of the law that justifies the person, but the person’s faith that caused the person to strive to keep the law. Likewise, if the person believes that Jesus is Lord and that the Father raised Jesus from death, then the person’s belief in the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ Jesus justifies the person. But this belief in the death and resurrection of Jesus doesn’t grant the person permission to ignore the commandments of God: belief of God in one area does not excuse unbelief in another area. Belief that Jesus is Lord coupled with unbelief manifested as deliberately not keeping the commandments is a mingling of the sacred [believing that Jesus is Lord] with the profane [lawlessness] — Christian belief that Jesus is Lord coupled to unbelief manifested as disobedience has the last Eve, the greater Christian Church, eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, with eating this mingled fruit condemning Christendom to the lake of fire.
But in Paul writing, ¦> §D(T< <`:@L @Û*46"4T2ZF,J"4BF" FD> ¦<fB4@< "ÛJ@Ø, Paul gave to lawless Christendom all of the scriptural support that the disobedient need to continue in their lawless ways. To argue that @ÊB@40J"Â <`:@L *46"4T2ZF@<J"4simply causes lawless Christians to say, You don’t understand Paul’s epistles. Well, I understand them, and I build on the foundation that Paul laid in heavenly Jerusalem, and I really don’t bother to preach repentance to those Christians who will never repent—I have learned from Moses. Intervention before it is time to intervene is of no value to lawless Christendom.
Even after the Second Passover liberation of Israel, older “Christians” within greater Christendom will not continue in repentance despite having their biological firstborns perish suddenly in a night. Because these “Christians” didn’t cover their houses with the blood of the Lamb of God taken on the dark portion of the 14th of Aviv, these “Christians” lost their firstborns, and the loss of their firstborn will push them to return to the faith of their fathers, faith manifested in mingling Scripture with unbelief and disobedience, and to cling to this faith more tightly than ever before. They will not cease mingling the sacred with the profane, but will eagerly celebrate Christmas 220 days after the Second Passover, with Christmas observance being as far as a Christian can get when in Christ from the resurrection. In order for a Christian to get farther from the resurrection than Christmas observance, the Christian must leave Christ and embrace the king of Babylon; only in this world can a Christian get farther from the resurrection than Christmas observance, the misplaced celebration of Jesus’ birth.
In Himself, and in His resurrection from death, Christ is the bridge that connects heaven and earth. His birth is one end of this bridge; His death is the other end. To focus on His birth is to remove focus from *46"4T2X<J,H<Ø< ¦< Jè"ž:"J4 "ÛJ@Ø [Jesus] — having been justified now in the blood of Him (Rom 5:9). Then to celebrate His birth on the birthday of the invincible sun (December 25th) is to not only have the wrong focus but to mingle Christ Jesus with paganism [Mithraism] in an unholy alliance that keeps disobedient Christians in spiritual Babylon.
John the Baptist preached repentance because he was called by God to do so—and that remains the only reason to preach repentance to the unrepentant. Because a chance must be given, a witness given, John did the job to which he was called before his conception …
Jesus was under no delusion about the men of Israel suddenly repenting and turning with whole hearts to God at His preaching. He knew only those disciples that the Father had given Him would remain with Him. Nevertheless, for the multitude who would come to God in the endtime harvest of firstfruits, He divested Himself of the equality with God that He had as the Logos [Ò8`(@H] (John 1:1), and He entered His creation (v. 3) as His only Son (John 3:16), the man Jesus the Nazarene, where He humbled Himself “by becoming obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross” (Phil 2:8). And if we as His disciples do not walk as He walked, we are not of Him (1 John 2:6), meaning as He was willing to die—to give up His life—for us, can we do less for our Christian brethren? No we cannot. Thus, I will preach repentance and continuing in repentance to my Christian brothers now and when clothed with power from on high. But until clothed in power from on high, I will remain in heavenly Jerusalem—not literally remain there, but mentally, spiritually remain there, delighting in the law of God in my inner being while seeing a different law waging war against obedience in my fleshly members, with the skirmishes fought over the past 39 years tending toward the total defeat and collapse of disobedience, a goal still not obtained but in sight on the near horizon.
The work I was called to do in rereading prophecy will cause me to preach repentance to lawless Christians as a witness to them, and as a witness against them before the Second Passover liberation of Israel occurs. Even though I know that with few exceptions all of today’s “Christians” will rebel against God and will be condemned to the lake of fire, a sad but very real reality — as I consider “Christians” I know personally, ones with whom I have discussed Scripture, and as I consider the Anabaptists with whom I do business and who I see in stores and on roadways, and as I remember Russian Orthodox Old Believers with whom I worked on Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula, I know for certain that within greater Christendom are pious, sincere Christians whose desire is to do those things that are pleasing to God; I also know with equal certainty that most of them will never cease mingling the sacred with the profane, that even when they are filled-with and empowered by the spirit of God they will continue in their traditions, clinging even tighter to them, thereby making it impossible for them to ever truly repent and reconsider how they and their ancestors have worshipped God — as I consider Christians I know personally, I understand why I will preach repentance to them, knowing beforehand that regardless of the words I speak or write, nothing will come of them. Why? Because of cognitive dissonance. The sincere Christians I know have invested so much of their lives in a certain way of life that for them to admit everything they have done for decades has not been true worship of God is beyond them, even after the unbelievably traumatic event of a third of humankind perishing in a day.
But the children of pious Christians—teenagers and young adults who have not invested decades of their lives in the traditions of their ancestors—are able to reconsider how they worship God; so for them, reconsideration of how they have previously worshiped God is truly possible, especially when the Torah is written on their hearts and placed in their minds. It is for them, the children, that repentance is today preached as a witness that will speak to them from both sides of the Second Passover.
The turning of “‘the disobedient to the wisdom of the just’” about which the angel Gabriel speaks (Luke 1:17) will not be the turning of the hearts of the elderly to Christ Jesus, but the turning of the hearts of the children to God.
Compare what the prophet Malachi writes with what the angel Gabriel says:
Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And he will turn the hearts of fathers to their children and the hearts of children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction. (Mal 4:5–6 emphasis added)
Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great before the Lord. And he must not drink wine or strong drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb. And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God, and he will go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready for the Lord a people prepared. (Luke 1:13–17 emphasis added)
Now consider what Jesus said about John, His cousin:
What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind? What then did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing? Behold, those who wear soft clothing are in kings' houses. What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written,
“Behold, I send my messenger before your face,
who will prepare your way before you.”
Truly, I say to you, among those born of women there has arisen no one greater than John the Baptist. Yet the one who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven has suffered violence, and the violent take it by force. For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John, and if you are willing to accept it, he is Elijah who is to come. He who has ears to hear, let him hear. (Matt 11:7–15 emphasis added)
In moving from physical to spiritual as in Hebraic thought-couplets, the first presentation is physical/natural/of this world. Thus, the last Elijah will turn the hearts of fathers to their children, with the spiritual application of this physical reality being that the last Elijah will turn the Father’s heart to His children, born-of-spirit sons of God, through disciples being cleansed [justified] by the blood of Christ Jesus. It is for this reason that Jesus said,
And as they were coming down the mountain, Jesus commanded them [Peter, James, and John] “Tell no one the vision, until the Son of Man is raised from the dead.” And the disciples asked him, “Then why do the scribes say that first Elijah must come?” He answered, “Elijah does come, and he will restore all things. But I tell you that Elijah has already come, and they did not recognize him, but did to him whatever they pleased. So also the Son of Man will certainly suffer at their hands.” Then the disciples understood that he was speaking to them of John the Baptist. (Matt 17:9–13 emphasis added)
John the Baptist did not restore all things; so the Elijah — the name “Elijah” can be translated as God is Yah, or God-God — that had already come was one in the form of John & Jesus, first cousins that functioned as one entity as Moses and Aaron were brothers that functioned as one entity, and as the two witnesses will be brothers that function as one entity.
Elijah and Elisha functioned as one entity, with the second doing twice what the first did … the ramification of Elisha’s ministry being a continuation of Elijah’s ministry is usually overlooked—
There [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. 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?” 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 19:9–18 emphasis added)
There is an element in Elijah lodging in the cave that is usually unappreciated: if Elijah heard the Word of the Lord, and answered the Word of the Lord by saying that he had been very jealous for the Lord (1 Kings 19:10), what is the point of going outside the cave and standing on the mount? For Elijah to leave the cave and enter into the presence of the Lord becomes a foreshadowing of Elijah crossing dimensions, leaving this earth and appearing directly before the throne of the Ancient of Days, which isn’t physically possible and can only be represented in metaphor.
Elijah in the cave in hearing the Word of the Lord and in answering the Word of the Lord functions as Elijah in this world, or as John the Baptist functioned. However, when Elijah hears the sound of thin silence, he covers his face and ventures to the mouth of the cave where he is asked the same question as he was asked by the Word of the Lord, making what happened inside the cave a type and copy of what happened at the mouth of the cave when his face was covered by his cloak … it is Elijah’s cloak that separates him from the glory of the Lord, and it is Elijah’s cloak that absorbs this glory.
At the mouth of the cave, Elijah answers the Lord as he had answered the Word of the Lord … the Lord did not need to hear Elijah’s answer a second time to know what Elijah said, and Elijah did not need to repeat himself to justify his presence in the cave where the angel of the Lord had sent him: “And the angel of the Lord came again a second time and touched him and said, ‘Arise and eat, for the journey is too great for you.’ And he arose and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb, the mount of God” (1 Kings 19:7–8).
Elijah was where the angel of the Lord sent him, so asking Elijah why he was there was needless except for its metaphorical meaning: Elijah was where he was supposed to be after fearing for his life … if Elijah had stood up to Jezebel, of whom Herodias [Herod Antipas’s wife] was a type, Elijah would have been killed even though Elijah had just slain the 450 prophets of Baal. Elijah escaped the fate of John the Baptist by running for his life: “Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had killed all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, ‘So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.’ Then he was afraid, and he arose and ran for his life and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there” (1 Kings 19:1–3).
I used to believe that Elijah made a mistake in running from Jezebel, that he had a failing of courage after the traumatic day of slaying 450 prophets of Baal, but I have since come to understand that Elijah realized that the power he had and that he employed to slay the prophets of Baal had left him, that if he didn’t run for his life he would lose his life. Yes, there is a biological explanation for why Elijah ran, an explanation that modern psychology can use to explain what spiritually seems initially unexplainable. But the reality of the situation is in the Word of the Lord asking Elijah the same question that the Lord asks Elijah, What are you doing here? It is Elijah’s answer that seems reasonable that is not complete—
To be the shadow and copy of John the Baptist who was beheaded at the bequest of Herodias through her daughter, and to be the shadow and copy of the two witnesses who will be slain by Apollyon, king of the Abyss, Elijah needed to stay and be killed by Jezebel. But the last Elijah isn’t John the Baptist, but the glorified Christ Jesus who appears before the Father to say that He has been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts. Thus, in the narrative of Elijah fleeing from the face of Jezebel and going where the angel of the Lord sends him, going forty days and forty nights on the strength of the food received from the angel of the Lord, the first Elijah morphs into the shadow and copy of the last Elijah, the Son of Man.
As Moses twice fasted forty days and forty nights, Elijah twice answers the Lord … as Elijah fasts forty days and forty nights, the two witnesses will—because they are two—twice answer the call of the Lord in one answer, doing those things that were foreshadowed by Elisha, who continued the ministry of Elijah by doing twice the works of Elijah.
Humanity holds it is self-evident that two are not one, but with God, two are one.
In the transfiguration, Jesus’ face suddenly shone like the sun, and His clothes became white as light (Matt 17:2). Peter, James, and John then seemed to see Moses and Elijah talking to Jesus (v. 3) … how were they to know Moses and Elijah? They could not have met either. There was no iconography depicting Moses and Elijah. So for Peter to identify the three as Jesus, Moses, and Elijah (v. 4) required that the identification of Moses and Elijah be supernaturally given to the disciples. But in type, Moses and Elijah represent Christ Jesus, who was the only Son of the Logos [Ò 8`(@H], with the Logos being Yah, the visible half of the Tetragrammaton YHWH.
The Tetragrammaton YHWH represents one deity that is two in number as Adam and Eve are one flesh that is two in number. The Church as the Body of Christ and Christ Jesus, its Head, together, represents one OD4FJ@H that is two in number, the inner self and the outer self of the Son of Man. There is one inner self, but many members of the outer self. … Aaron was to Moses as Yah was to the Most High God, but Moses was to Yah what Aaron was to Moses, which now has the hierarchy of heaven and earth being like stud-linked chain, with each link being of two parts.
Elijah didn’t make a mistake in running for his life for his work was not then complete when he killed the 450 prophets of Baal: there remained considerable killing that had to be completed, with Hazael whom Elijah would anoint as king of Syria and with Jehu whom Elijah would anoint to be king of Israel and with Elisha whom Elijah would anoint to be prophet in his place to put to death, killing by sword all but seven thousand in Israel, the seven thousand who had never bowed to Baal.
Elijah anoints Elisha for the expressed purpose of killing idolaters—
In doing so, Elijah as the shadow and type of the last Elijah passes his ministry and his authority to Elisha for the purpose of purging evil from Israel through the continued killing of the prophets of Baal and of all who had become cozy with Baal. Elijah doesn’t anoint Elisha for the healing of the sick or to reveal prophecies or to bring peace to Israel. Rather, Elisha is called to root out the last vestiges of idolatry, slaying the idolaters that escape from foreign and domestic kings.
The two witnesses continue John the Baptist’s ministry as Elisha continued Elijah’s ministry … John the Baptist did not kill with a sword, but with words in his preaching of repentance. The two witnesses will not kill with swords, but through the doubled preaching of repentance, or better, through the preaching of doubled repentance (i.e., repentance pertaining to the inner self and repentance pertaining to the outer self). John the Baptist and the two witnesses, together, do one work, the purging of idolatry from within Israel, with the work John did in the 1st-Century being doubled in the 21st-Century.
3.
As the Roman perfunctory Herod the Tetrarch [Herod Antipas] reluctantly killed John the Baptist, the Roman governor Pilate would reluctantly condemned Jesus the Nazarene to death. As the Jewish princess Herodias of the Herodian dynasty—the daughter of Aristobulus IV and Bernice, and granddaughter of the Hasmonean princess Mariamne I—demanded John the Baptist’s head on a platter, the people of Jerusalem demanded the death of Jesus. And there is a metaphorical relationship between Ahab/Jezebel and Herod Antipas/Herodias and Pilate/the people of Jerusalem and the Adversary/the man of perdition.
As Ahab and Jezebel were one flesh through marriage, and as Herod Antipas and Herodias were one flesh through marriage, and as Pilate the Roman representative and the people of Jerusalem were one political entity through political marriage, the Adversary as the spiritual king of Babylon and the human man of perdition are one “person” through demonic possession in a manner analogous to how Christ Jesus as Head of the Church is represented by the husband to his wife in marriage. Thus, until the Son of Man is revealed (Luke 17:30) through the disrobing of the Church—through the stripping away of grace once Christians are filled-with and empowered by the spirit of God—the man of perdition cannot be revealed. Once the Second Passover occurs, the Body of Christ will be separated from its Head through the Son of Man being unclothed, with Christ being the garment every baptized disciple has put on (see Gal 3:27). Only through rebellion against Christ can demonic possession occur once a Christian is filled with spirit. Therefore, the human man of perdition—an Arian Christian filled with spirit—will rebel against God through mingling the sacred with the profane in Christmas observance 220 days after the Second Passover; the human man of perdition will not give up Christmas and his Christmas sweater, but will rebel against God and will, when he rebels, be possessed by the Adversary, the little horn of Daniel chapters seven and eight.
When possessed, the man of perdition in the Affliction will form the shadow and type [the left hand enantiomer] of the true Antichrist in the Endurance, with the true Antichrist being the Adversary cast from heaven and given the mind of a man.
The man of perdition will be a mingling of miry clay and metal, a mingling of the sacred [a Christian man born of God and filled with spirit] with the profane [Satan the devil] …
Rebellion against God is insidious. It doesn’t occur as an appearance of evil; for Satan himself appears as an angel of light (2 Cor 11:14), appears sacred, but buried inside this appearance of sacredness is a heart that judges God in a mingling of sacred and profane.
Evil is simple unbelief, nothing more. Hence, evil can be concealed until this unbelief is revealed in an unguarded moment, an emotional moment, an emotional event that touches the heart of the person who outwardly appears righteous, with Christmas observance being this event for Christians who will rebel against God when the lawless one is revealed (2 Thess 2:3). The emotions attached to a simple sweater will overwhelm the outward appearance of righteousness that comes from the Torah being written on the heart and placed in the mind of the human man of perdition. For the kernel of unbelief that has been kept alive by having on hand a year’s worth of foodstuffs when the Second Passover occurs will put forth a root, burst its pit, and sprout as a fully mature tree before even this human man of perdition realizes what has happened to him: his rebellion against God will then become complete when he accepts his suspicions that the angel inside him is Christ Jesus when that angel is the Adversary. When he invites that angel within him to speak for him, his fate will be forever sealed—as will be the fates of those Christians who follow him into rebellion against God. And this human man of perdition will seem believable for with good conscience, he will declare himself God, believing that because he can call fire down from heaven and can do other miraculous deeds, he can only be the returned Christ when he is in reality a pitiful human being possessed by Satan.
And in a 1260 day long duel, the four demonic kings and the half-size little horn will engage the two witnesses as the 450 prophets of Baal engaged Elijah, with the outcome being the fall of spiritual Babylon and the resurrected-from-death two witnesses disappearing into the wilderness of heaven where they will be to either side of the Lamb of God, who has been with them all along.
Moses and Aaron in the wilderness of Sin/Zin are a shadow and type of the two witnesses in the Affliction as the two witnesses are a shadow and type of the Lamb of God and the Remnant in the Endurance.
4.
There has been a political question asked, can man rule himself, with the answer to this question found in the human administration over the Promised Land since the children of Israel followed Joshua into God’s rest (from Ps 95:10–11) … much of this history is recorded in Scripture, but the text is mostly silent about the two centuries immediately preceding Calvary—
The Herodian Dynasty was, itself, a mingling of the sacred and the profane.
Two decades after Judas the Maccabee defeated the armies of the Seleucid emperor Antiochus Epiphanes IV, in 165 BCE, his brother Simon Maccabaeus established the Hasmonean dynasty (ca 140 BCE to 37 BCE). And this Hasmonean dynasty under John Hyrcanus (134–104 BCE), conquered Edom, which Romans called Idumea, and forced the Edomites—Nabateans and a mixed peoples that had entered the region after the natural descendants of Esau had emigrated southward and westward, disappearing from history in ships sailing from Carthage—to convert to Judaism in an unnatural integration that in type functions to incorporate the nations [Gentiles] into the natural firstborn son of promise born to Isaac. (In rabbinical writings, Romans are called Edomites.)
In the days of Alexander Jannaeus, king of Judea from 103 BCE to 76 BCE and son of John Hyrcanus—and under the name King Yannai, the wicked king who fought against the Pharisees and brought 800 Judean rebels to Jerusalem where he crucified them after having the throats of the rebels’ wives and children cut before their eyes while he lunched with his concubines—the Hasmonean kingdom expanded: Jannaeus led a Judean mercenary army to victories from Gaza to the Golan Heights, adding to Judea Western Samaria, the Galilee, and Northern Transjordan, and securing for Judea control of the Mediterranean outlet for Nabatean trade routes to Rome and Damascus, thereby sparking a war with the Nabatean king Obodas I, and a civil war at home. And amid the internal and external warring, one of Edomites forcibly converted to Judaism, Antipas, was appointed governor of Edom. Control of Edom had returned to an Edomite who was now “a Jew.”
Antipas’ son Antipater became the founder of the Herodian Dynasty.
In 47 BCE, Julius Caesar appointed Antipater as procurator of Judea, and Antipater appointed his sons Phasael and Herod to respectively be the governors of Jerusalem and Galilee. Although Antipater was assassinated in 43 BCE, his sons continued to hold power and were elevated to the rank of Tetrarch by Mark Anthony in 41 BCE.
Warring in the region continued: the Hasmoneans allied themselves with the Parthians who invaded Rome’s eastern provinces and expelled the Herodians from Judea. In 40 BCE, Parthia made the Hasmonean Antigonus king of Judea … Herod the Great, the son of Antipater and Cypros, a Nabatean princess, managed to escape to Rome where he was elected King of the Jews by the Roman Senate. And supported by Roman legions, Herod regained control of Judea in 37 BCE: he ruled for 34 years, or until 4 BCE when he died. His kingdom was divided among his three sons, with Herod Archelaus [son of Herod and Malthace the Samaritan] receiving Judea, Edom, and Samaria, which Herod Archelaus ruled until 6 CE when he was banished to Gaul.
Herod Antipas, another son of Herod and Malthace and the half-brother of Herod Philip I, ruled the Galilee and Perea, the eastern bank of the River Jordan and the traditional land of the tribes of Gad, Reuben, and the half tribe of Manasseh. Hence, because John baptized in the Jordan, he would have been in the jurisdiction of Herod Antipas who was eventually exiled to Spain by Caligula in 39 CE.
Agrippa I was the grandson of Herod, and the “friend” of Caligula who appointed him ruler of the territory formerly ruled by Herod Philip and Herod Antipas. In 41 CE, Claudius gave to him the portions of Judea that had been governed by Herod Archelaus, thereby in his person, Agrippa reestablished his grandfather’s kingdom.
Complicated enough? When the relationships are unraveled, the Herodian Dynasty is murderous enough and incestuous enough to appall most anyone. But what is of importance is the mingling of Judaism and the mixed peoples that were identified as Nabateans.
If Pharisees were vipers (Matt chap 23), then what were the Hasmonean and Herodian dynasties? Vipers don’t usually eat their own young.
The freedom that Judas the Maccabee [the Hammer] won for Israel was soon squandered in political intrigues and marriages, but the kings of Israel were never free to truly worship God … they were never more free than Moses in Egypt, as the adopted son of Pharaoh, was free to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Moses in Egypt remains the standard by which freedom in this world is judged, and Moses was not free to openly worship the God of Abraham. Likewise, the political freedom won by America’s founding fathers granted to Americans the freedom to worship God however they choose as long that worship was limited to thoughts; for civil authorities have the legal authority to restrict a person’s outward worship to those things that reinforce the public good. It is this reinforcing of public good that caused polygamy to be banned and prohibited the introduction of animal sacrifices (either directly or indirectly as in bull fighting where the matador as the culturally forgotten representation of Mithra slays the bull). It is for the good of the public that Sunday blue laws came into existence, with these blue laws indirectly inhibiting Sabbath worship, subjugating obedience to God to the goodwill of neighbors.
For Israel, liberation from Greek rule introduced servitude to Roman rule through Edomite kings, to Parthian rule through a Hasmonean king, and a return to Roman rule through an Edomite king. The promised freedom was never “free” nor “freedom,” but was continued servitude to disobedience and unbelief.
The American and French revolutions in the Age of Enlightenment that promised freedom were neither “free” nor lived up to their promises, but left American Christians with blood on their hands and black powder smoke in their nostrils and left Frenchmen ruled by a self-appointed emperor. Thus, the question of whether men can rule themselves was answered in the negative: only by being active agents of the prince of this world can men and women support the illusion that in freedom they can rule over themselves. For the truth of the matter is no political entity in this present world is more free than Moses was while he lived as a son in the household of Pharaoh, and Moses was not free to openly worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob until he fled as a fugitive into the land of Midian. By extension, no person politically involved in the governance of this world is free to worship the God of Abraham. And what will be seen is that the two witnesses actively work to collapse the governments of this world throughout their ministry, and work in a manner analogous to Elijah slaying the 450 prophets of Baal.
The two witnesses will be hated by all peoples for cause; for calling into existence droughts and famines and plagues of every kind will not endear the two witnesses to the peoples of this world, but will hasten the fall of Babylon, the single kingdom of this world that is presently ruled by the Adversary.
If American Christians truly believe they are free to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, then let them keep the Sabbath and enter into God’s rest when the promise of entering stands—and what American Christians will find is that they are mentally and spiritually prevented from keeping the Sabbath by their prevailing belief paradigms, thereby disclosing how limited their freedom is. With few exceptions, American Christians remain the serfs of the Adversary, plowing the metal typography of disobedience to God, planting their seed in the soil of disobedience, and reaping the harvest of disobedience.
Any mingling of the sacred [e.g., a holy one] with the profane [the present prince of this world] will defile that which is sacred, and will cause what is sacred to be spewed from the mouth of Christ Jesus. The two witnesses will understand this, and through their preaching of repentance, they will slay those Christians who attempt to keep Babylon upright after Christ Jesus delivers a below-the-belt blow to Babylon through the death of uncovered firstborns on earth and in the Abyss. For the two witnesses will not preach repentance in mere words, but in famines and plagues that actually slay rebelling Christians. And in Elijah’s cloak that Elisha used to part the waters of the Jordan, lay the power embedded in Moses’ staff, power the two witnesses will have in their words.
Preaching repentance is easy when only “good” comes from Israel repenting of its lawlessness, but preaching repentance becomes more difficult when that preaching means slaying idolaters, many of whom are personally known and known to want to serve God even though they are unwilling to do so when the opportunity is given them … every Christian today has the opportunity to enter into God’s rest this coming Sabbath, but most will not do so. They simply refuse to believe the Father and His Christ as they stand on the banks of a figurative River Jordan and skip stones across its waters, stones that the last Elijah will fashion into Arabic-speaking sons of God in the Endurance, when all flesh will have been baptized in the divine breath of God.
The Edomites that John Hyrcanus compelled to convert to Judaism serve as a type of the third part of humankind that the Father will compel to convert to observant Christendom, with a type of Herod Antipas and Herodias reappearing at the end of the Millennium when Satan is loosed for a short while to deceive those who are far from Jerusalem.
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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."
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