Apocalypse Now:

The Planet Ravaged by Disasters and Deception

 

For years, we have provided ample proof that the upheavals the world is experiencing these days are connected with the prophecies about the end of this age.  All the signs that Jesus Christ spoke about in connection with those prophecies have come to pass exactly as He said they would.

One such prophecy is found in the book of Revelation.  What is remarkable about this prophecy is that God relates it to human activity, more specifically to human sins.  Here it is in its context.  Bear in mind that Revelation prophecies are highly symbolic.  Even so, it is easy to relate it to our time, in particular verses 8 – 11.  (For detailed analysis of Revelation prophecies, see The Christian Heralds Nos 14 & 15).   

 

Rev 16:1  Then I heard a loud voice from the temple saying to the seven angels, "Go and pour out the bowls of the wrath of God on the earth."

Rev 16:2  So the first went and poured out his bowl upon the earth, and a foul and loathsome sore came upon the men who had the mark of the beast and those who worshiped his image.

Rev 16:3  Then the second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it became blood as of a dead man; and every living creature in the sea died.

Rev 16:4  Then the third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water, and they became blood.

Rev 16:5  And I heard the angel of the waters saying: "You are righteous, O Lord, The One who is and who was and who is to be, Because You have judged these things.

Rev 16:6  For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, And You have given them blood to drink. For it is their just due."

Rev 16:7  And I heard another from the altar saying, "Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are Your judgments."

Rev 16:8  Then the fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun, and power was given to him to scorch men with fire.

Rev 16:9  And men were scorched with great heat, and they blasphemed the name of God who has power over these plagues; and they did not repent and give Him glory.

Rev 16:10  Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues because of the pain.

Rev 16:11  They blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and did not repent of their deeds.

Rev 16:12  Then the sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up, so that the way of the kings from the east might be prepared.

Rev 16:13  And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet.

Rev 16:14  For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.

Rev 16:15  "Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame."

Rev 16:16  And they gathered them together to the place called in Hebrew, Armageddon.

Rev 16:17  Then the seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, "It is done!"

Rev 16:18  And there were noises and thunderings and lightnings; and there was a great earthquake, such a mighty and great earthquake as had not occurred since men were on the earth.

Rev 16:19  Now the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. And great Babylon was remembered before God, to give her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of His wrath.

Rev 16:20  Then every island fled away, and the mountains were not found.

Rev 16:21  And great hail from heaven fell upon men, each hailstone about the weight of a talent. Men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail, since that plague was exceedingly great.

 

Men were scorched with great heat, suffered pains and sores, yet what did they do?  They did not repent of their deeds but blasphemed God even more.  These things are already happening before our very eyes, however, because humans do not repent of their deeds, God is about to unleash His wrath upon this world with even more devastating plagues: islands will disappear, mountains will be flattened, and men will fall under great hail from heaven. 

Two decades ago, when we perceived that biblical prophecies were being ignored, we began publishing The Christian Herald in an attempt to bring knowledge of these prophecies to the attention of world leaders – religious and secular – and their people.  Yet instead of taking note of the danger that this world is blindly heading into, we encountered a never ending chain of problems and obstacles from the same people.  Even now, when it has become clear that humanity is on the edge of the precipice, religious leaders are still engaged in pathetic attempts to obscure and belittle our work.  Have a look at this.

  

 “Jury out on climate change?” ”THE drought this year has been particularly cruel in the country. Not simply because this is the seventh year and most farmers are broke, but because there were good early rains.  Hopes were high, but nothing followed.  The climate has changed, but Australia has long known terrible droughts.  I suspect it was not only distance that precluded a large population before European settlement, when only a few hundred thousand Aborigines had the skill to survive our harsh environment. But is human industrial activity making the weather worse?

Are we on the brink of a man-made catastrophe? Could we do anything to change global weather patterns, even in the unlikely eventuality that the Great Powers agreed and society could afford it?  These are big and different questions.

I am a believer in the Catholic understanding of faith and morals. I reserve my leaps of faith for religion: e.g.the Incarnation and Redemption. 

I am certainly sceptical about extravagant claims of impending man-made climatic catastrophes, because the evidence is insufficient.  Climate change has always occurred. Scientific debate is not decided by any changing consensus, even if it is endorsed by public opinion.  Science is a process of experimentation, debate and respect for all the evidence. Often it's dealing with uncertainties rather than certainties, so its forecasts and predictions can be spectacularly wrong.  In the 1970s, some scientists were predicting a new ice age because of global cooling. Today, other scientists are predicting an apocalypse because of global warming. It's no disrespect to science, or scientists, to take these latest claims with a grain of salt. 

Uncertainties on climate change abound. Temperatures in Greenland were higher in the 1940s than they are today, and the Kangerlussuaq glacier is growing in size, not shrinking.

 [Wrong! The glaciers in Greenland did not melt in the 1940’s at the speed they do now].

The journal American Scientist recently published a study on the melting glacier on Mt Kilimanjaro.
The study confirms that air temperature around the glacier continues to be below freezing, so it's not melting because of global warming.  Instead, the melt pattern of the glacier is consistent with the effect of direct radiant heat from the sun. Human activity can't be blamed for that.  The day before Al Gore and the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, England's High Court ruled that DVDs of Gore's documentary An Inconvenient Truth could not be shown in schools without teachers providing additional materials to correct nine "significant errors'' in the film.

Among them were claims that Pacific atolls were being evacuated because of rising sea levels, and that polar bears were drowning because they had to swim  as far as 100km to find ice. The court found there was "no evidence'' to support either claim.  [Wrong again! Some islands have shrunk in size,and many people have lost their homes. Tuvalu is one of them].

Some allege preachers raise their voices when they have a weak point. It has never worked for me, and it doesn't work in science or politics. (Cardinal Pell, The Sunday Telegraph, Oct 28, 2007).

 

This is none other than the head of the Catholic Church in Australia.  He reckons that human beings have had nothing to do with the current climate change.  More than that: he denies that there is even a global warming.  The current worldwide increase in tempereature, he says, is nothinmg more than a natural cycle the likes of which this world has experienced many times in its long history.  If Cardinal Pell had wanted to be properly informed and kept up to date with the latest scientific discoveries, he would have read none other than the very newspaper that publishes his concoctions.     

 

“Turning up the heat”  “LOS ANGELES: Climate models predicting the Earth's temperature could rise up to 5.6C by the end of the century may have underestimated the increase by as much as 2.3C.  Research at the University of California Berkeley suggested that, as carbon dioxide emissions heat the globe, hotter oceans and soils would release stored carbon dioxide, kicking up the thermostat.  "We've probably underestimated the problem," University of California Berkeley ecologist John Harte said yesterday.

Current models predict a doubling of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, which at current emissions rates should happen within the next 50 years. That would raise global temperatures between 1.5C and 4.5C.  The Berkeley lab predicted a doubling of carbon dioxide production would mean more of the gas would be released naturally, pushing the global thermostat up by between 1.6C and 6.2C.  By the end of the century, the rise could be as much as 7.8C.  "It's a vicious cycle where more warming causes more greenhouse gas emissions, and more greenhouse gas emissions cause more warming," biogeochemist Margaret Torn said.  "That could have serious consequences both for human populations and biodiversity."  Global temperatures fluctuate naturally with the intensity of sunlight hitting the Earth.

The scientists studied past warm periods in a 360,000-year climate record contained in Antarctic ice cores.

Using air bubbles trapped in the ice, they estimated past global temperatures using the ratios of oxygen isotopes and deuterium, which vary with the temperature.  They then checked the effect of hotter temperatures on the level of carbon dioxide and methane in the bubbles.  They found that, as temperatures rose, the production of two greenhouse gases increased more than would be expected from just the increased sunlight that initiated the warming.  "The extra greenhouse gas emissions that occurred would lead to a significant amount of extra warming in the future," Ms Torn said. (Betsy Mason, The Daily Telegraph, May 24, 2006).

 

Cardinal Pell preferred the opinion of a judge to that of scientists.  And to make sure his message is understood in the right places, he sunk his boot into what he called “allege preachers”.  What he does not know, or does not want to admit, is that virtually all of God’s prophets were “allege preachers” for their contemporaries, including Jesus Christ.  (See the article, “Why the prophets of God have never been welcomed by this world” elsewhere in this edition).    If it were not for these “alege preachers”, we would have no Bible today, and the world would not know where it stands in relation to its Creator. 

Let us now look more closely at the scientific evidence and see whether the jury is indeed still out on climate change. 

The same day Cardinal Pell published his article, Chanel Nine television network, presented two documentaries on global warming in its “60 Minutes” program.  One from the Greenland, and the other from California.  Here are parts of their transcripts.  First the one from Greenland.

 

 The Greenland’s dissapesring ice cap  “The Greenland’s ice cap is melting at an astonishing speed    even as we watch, it is changing.  Huge ice blocks are collapsing into the sea.  “The disappearing ice is a weather vein, proof that global warming is right here, right now.”   “In the past 30 years, temperatures have increased by 1.5 degrees, more than double the world average … High up into the mountain … a glacier has retreated in the last ten years by almost 100 metres.  You are really experiencing global warming. You see it happening …  “When you fly north and over Greenland’s vast ice cap, the downside of global warming becomes frighteningly clear.  Eighty per cent is still under ice.  If it were all to melt, sea  levels around the world would rise by a disastrous seven metres.  That thow is already under way, and glaciers here are retreating at a rate that is shocking glaciologists like Gene Katania.  “It has been increasing over the last 15 years or so. Every year we see more and more of it.”  

“Do you have any doubt that man has anything to do with this?”

“No!”

“Gene has been tracking the movement of the ice using satelite positioning.  The glacier in this area is the fastest in the world, moving 15 kilometres a year down fiord.”

“It definitely has been speeding up. We never thought that ice could move that fast …

“Disappearing icebergs, rising sea levels, unpredictable weather, this is the downside of a climate change, but for Greenlanders global warming gives them the best shot at a good life.”   

 

Now a transcript of the documentary from California.

 

California ablaze”.  Reporter: It’s a frighgtening warning for us.   Enough to make you wonder what we are in for this summer.  Let’s just hope it’s nothing like this, an absolute catastrophe.  A daily fire storm that’s raced through America’s west coast, forcing more than half a million people to evacuate their homes.  And the terrible thing is it’s all part of a global pattern: fires that get worse and worse every year, at least ten times bigger than we’ve ever seen before.  There is no doubt that we are living in the age of the mega fire.”

Tom Boatner, US Fire Chief: “The fire of this size and this intensity in this country would have been extremely rare 15, 20 years ago. They are common place these days.

Reporter:  “Ten years ago, a big fire was what?”

T.B.:  “Ten years ago, if you had a 100,000 acres fire you were talking of a huge fire. And if we had one or two a year that was probably normal. Now we are talking of 200,000 acres fires like it is just another day at the office. It’s been a huge change.”

Reporter:  “And the biggest fires are what now?”

T.B.: “We’ve had, I believe, two fires this summer that’ve been 500,000 acres, half a million acres.  And one of those was 600,000 acres . . . Seven of the ten bussiest fire seasons have been since 1999.”

Naration: “It was 20 years ago that fire fighters got their first glimpse of what was to come.  This is Yellow Stone 1998, when a third of the national park was burned.  Since then, fires have broken records in nine States.  Several mega fires like this one in Arizona have burned over half a million acres each.”

Reporter:  “Is it possible we get these mega fires and we just can’t fight them, because they are too large?”     

T.B.:  “Well, we’re …we’re there already.  We have had to fight fires this summer that we knew we can’t put them out with the resources that we have now. 

Naration:  “The fire season over the last 15 years has increased by 78 days due to the melting ice on top of mountains.  Global warming and climate change have increased temperatures in the west by one degree and that has increased the fire season.  With these super fires, some forests may never recover.  In 2006, the Feds spent 2 billion dollars on fire fighting, seven times more than just ten years ago.”

Reporter:  “You know, there are a lot of people who don’t believe in climate change.”

T.B.: “You won’t find them in America’s west, because we’ve had climate change beating us in the last ten or fefteen years.   We know what we are seeing and we are dealing with a period of climate change in terms of temperature, humidity and drought that’s different than anything people have seen in our life time.”  

 

So, is the jury still out on climate change?  Or is it a case that there is none as blind as he that will not see.  Far from the case of the jury being out on climate change, scientists are alarmed by the speed with which the globe is warming.

 

“2008 critical for shrinking ice cap” PARIS: The Arctic ice cap has shrunk by an area twice the size of France's land mass over the past two years, the Paris-based National Centre for Scientific Research said yesterday.  "The year 2008 promises to be a critical year on every level," said Jean-Claude Gascard, the body's research director and co-ordinator of the European scientific mission monitoring the effects of climate change across the Arctic.

Measurements in September last year show ice covering 4.13 million sq km, down from 5.3million sq km in 2005.

"Melting could result in the loss of another million in one (2008) summer," Mr Gascard said.

"Summer 2007 was marked by a major retreat in the ice cap, one we were not anticipating. The decline is also two or three times faster than (observed) beforehand."  International models used to predict retreating ice have some "catching-up" to do, he said.  Over the past 20 years, 40 per cent of the ice cap has melted, with the average thickness halved from three to 1.5 metres.   Year-round ice coverage has reduced, with summer melting also lasting longer, the centre reported.

The team highlighted the role of ocean currents, namely in the northern Pacific, behind the warming of waters.

Mr Gascard's research colleague, Gerard Ancellet, also spoke of recently-formed Arctic mist, pollution clouds that "trap" Earth's naturally emitted infrared rays, thereby raising temperatures.

In last year's summer, the Northwest Passage, historically an ice-jammed potential shortcut between Europe and Asia, was "fully navigable" for the first time since monitoring began in 1978, according to the European Space Agency. It lasted five weeks, according to Canada's environment ministry.”  (AFP/ The Australian,January 25, 2008).  

 

“Wild weather a taste of things to come“A MONSOON dropped 35 centimetres of rain in one day across many parts of South Asia this month. Germany had its wettest May on record, and April was the driest there in a century. Temperatures reached 45 degrees in Bulgaria last month and 32 degrees in Moscow in late May, shattering long-time records.  The year still has almost five months to go, but it has already experienced a range of weather extremes that the UN's World Meteorological Organisation says is well outside the historical norm and is a precursor to much greater weather variability as global warming transforms the planet.

The warming trend confirmed in February by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - based on the finding that 11 of the past 12 years had higher average ground temperatures than any others since formal temperature recording began - appears to have continued with a vengeance into 2007. The meteorological organisation reported that January and April were the warmest worldwide ever recorded.  "Climate change projections indicate it to be very likely that hot extremes, heatwaves and heavy precipitation events will continue to become more frequent," the organisation said.

The heavy rains in South Asia have resulted in more than 500 deaths and displaced 10 million people, while 13.5 million Chinese have been affected by floods, the report said. In England and Wales, the period from May to July was the wettest since record-keeping began in 1766, resulting in floods that killed nine and caused more than $US6billion ($7billion) in damage.  The World Meteorological Organisation, which is co-sponsoring a series of meetings and reports on global climate change, is putting together an early-warning system for climate extremes and establishing long-term monitoring systems, and plans to help countries most vulnerable to climate change.

"The average Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the second half of the 20th century were very likely the highest during any 50-year period in the last 500 years, and likely the highest in the past 1300 years," the report said.

Global warming is expected to result in more extreme weather because of changes in atmospheric wind patterns and the ability of warmer air to hold more moisture, said Martin Manning, the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's working group on the physical science of climate change. He said that one year of heavier than normal rains and warmer than usual temperatures said nothing definitive about climate change, but they were consistent with the panel's long-term predictions.  "What we have projected is an increase in extreme events as the global temperatures rise," Dr Manning said. "Floods, droughts and heatwaves are certainly consistent with that."

The World Meteorological Organisation reported the extreme weather occurred in many parts of the world. In May, a series of large waves (estimated at up to 3.6 metres) swamped almost 70 islands in 16 atolls in the Maldive Islands off south India, causing serious flooding and extensive damage. Halfway around the globe, Uruguay was hit during the same month by the worst flooding since 1959 - floods that affected more than 110,000 people and severely damaged crops and buildings. Two months later, an unusual winter brought high winds, blizzards and rare snowfall to parts of South America.  Meanwhile, two extreme heatwaves affected south-eastern Europe in June and July. Dozens of people died, and firefighters worked nonstop battling blazes that destroyed thousands of hectares. On July 23, temperatures hit the record 45 degrees in Bulgaria.  (Marc Kaufman, The Washington Post/SMH, August 9, 2007).

 

 

 “Antarctica shows need for action on climate change, Ban Ki-moon says”

“Ban Ki-moon, during his historic visit to Antarctica, the first by a United Nations Secretary-General, has said warming temperatures on the continent show the growing dangers of climate change and the need for action to address it.

“It is here where our work, together, comes into focus,” Mr. Ban said in a statement issued on Friday. “We see Antarctica's beauty – and the danger global warming represents, and the urgency that we do something about it.”

The Secretary-General, who has made climate change a priority issue and is working to galvanize support for an international conference to be held in Bali in December on global commitments to stop it, said he is personally determined to push forward.  He said the landscapes on Antarctica are “rare and wonderful” but also deeply disturbing as the ice continues melting at a fast pace.  “All this may be gone, and not in the distant future, unless we act, together, now,” he warned.

Antarctica is on the verge of a catastrophe – for the world.”

The Secretary-General offered stark figures to illustrate his point, noting that the glaciers on King George Island have shrunk by 10 per cent, while some in Admirality Bay have retreated by 25 kilometers. He also recalled how the 87-kilometer “Larsen B ice sheet” collapsed several years ago and disappeared within weeks and warned that the entire Western Antarctic Ice Shelf is at risk.  “It is all floating ice, one fifth of the entire continent. If it broke up, sea levels could rise by 6 meters or 18 feet,” he noted, pointing out that 138 tons of ice are now being lost every year.  Other “deeply worrying signs” he mentioned were the shrinking penguin population of Chabrier Rock, which has dipped by 57 per cent in the last 25 years.

“What will happen to the annual march of the penguins in the future? Will there even be one?”

At the same time, grass is growing for the first time ever on King George Island, where it rains rather than snows increasingly in the summer.  “These things should alarm us all. Antarctica is a natural lab that helps us understand what is happening to our world. We must save this precious earth, including all that is here. It is a natural wonder, but above all, it is our common home,” said Mr. Ban. (eGov Monitor, United Nations, Nov. 12, 2007).

 

Notice carefully: if only one fifth of the Antarctic continent were to melt, sea levels would rise by 6 metres.  Add to that seven metres if Greenland’s ice sheets melts, and you have a rise in the sea levels of 13 metres.  If that is not a catastrophe in the making, we would like to know what it is.  And this is happening right now.  The question is not whether sea levels are rising, but how they could be stopped from rising any further.   

Cardinal Pell said that the current phase in global warming is not caused by human activity but is a cycle like many others in the earth’s history caused by disturbances in the sun which have come and gone without much damage to the earth.  Well, perhaps the following story might change his mind.     

 

“Fewer trees, less rain: study uncovers deforestation equation”  “Australian scientist says they have found proof that cutting down forests reduces rainfall.  The finding, independent of previous anecdotal evidence and computer modelling, uses physics and chemistry to show how the climate changes when forests are lost.  Ann Henderson-Sellers, director of environment at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, at Lucas Heights, and Dr Kendal McGuffie, from the University of Technology, Sydney, made the discovery by analysing variations in the molecular structure of rain along the Amazon River.  Not all weather, Professor Henderson-Sellers said, was made from the recipe of two atoms of “common” hydrogen and one of “regular” oxygen.  About one in every 500 molecules had its second hydrogen atom replaced by a heavier version called deuterium.  And one in every 6500 molecules included a heavy version of the oxygen atom.  Knowing the ratio allowed scientists to trace the Amazon water as if flowed into the Atlantic, evaporated, blew back inland with the trade winds to fall again as rain, and finally returned to the river. 

“It’s as if the water was tagged,” she said.  While the heavier water molecules were slower to evaporate from rivers and groundwater, they were readily given off by the leaves of plants and trees, through transpiration.   “Transpiration pumps these heavy guys back into the atmosphere.”  But the study showed that since the 1970s the ratio of the heavy molecules found in rain over the Amazon and the Andes had declined significantly.  The only possible explanation was that they were no longer being returned to the atmosphere to fall again as rain because the vegetation was disappearing.  “With many trees now gone and the forest degraded, the moisture that reaches the Andes has clearly lost the heavy isotopes that used to be recycled so effectively,” Professor Henderson-Sellers said.  

Tom Lyons, professor of environmental sciences at Perth’s Murdoch University, said there was now “certainly very strong evidence that changes in surface conditions have an impact on the climate. In some parts of the world the impact is very marked”. The Amazon research “helps us understand the mechanism”.   Professor Henderson-Sellers said the average water molecule fell as rain and re-evaporated five times during its journey from the tropical Atlantic to the river’s starting point in the Andes mountains. Forests played a vital role in keeping the heavy molecules, and their far more common relatives, moving through the water cycle.  “People will tell you that when you remove the forests it rains less,” she said, adding, however, such anecdotal evidence, and even computer modelling, did not convince everyone.  “This is the first demonstration that deforestation has an observable impact on rainfall.”  (Sydney Morning Herald, March 4, 2005).                

 

And if this is not enough, there is a now a new “time bomb” for the earth resulting from human activity that is even more threatening than global warming. 

 

 

 

 

“Ocean Acidification – The BIG Global Warming Story”

 “This is a scary story.   For decades we’ve been acidifying our oceans and we haven’t been aware of it. We already know that warmer water is bleaching the coral of the Great Barrier Reef, but just recently it was discovered that there’s a new threat to the reef’s survival ... carbonic acid.  It’s only been in the science journals for the last few years but ocean acidification is a time bomb. It could not only destroy the Great Barrier Reef but it could wreak havoc on marine life around the world and, ultimately, affect land dwellers like ourselves.

Ocean acidification is destined to be one of the biggest issues humanity has ever faced”, says reef expert Dr. Charlie Veron.  Ocean acidification is a side-effect of putting too much carbon dioxide into the skies. This gas ultimately ends up dissolved in the oceans where it forms weak carbon acid.  With the focus of global warming largely trained upon increased levels of CO2 above sea level, Catalyst asks the question, what’s happening below the surface of the ocean?  Presenter/Reporter Dr. Graham Phillips meets scientists who, for the first time, have found evidence that acidification is affecting marine organisms in the Southern Ocean.  Will this change the delicate balance of ocean chemistry that we take largely for granted?  Transcript of the program. 

Narration: This is a scary story. For decades we’re been acidifying our oceans and we haven’t been even aware of it till recently. Acidification is a time bomb.
Dr Will Howard: This problem will continue to affect the oceans even if we stopped all carbon emissions now.
Dr Charlie Veron: It’s like having a party on a railway track. You know the train is coming. And it’s really frightening. It’s terrifying.
Dr Will Howard: We have put in train a process that will probably last for centuries.
Dr Charlie Veron: It is the most serious problem of climate change. It is the big one.
Narration: The acidification of the world’s oceans is a side-effect of putting too much carbon dioxide into the skies. You may not have heard of it – it’s only been in science journals for the last few years - and the consequences could be huge. . .  Acidification is caused by our carbon dioxide emissions not staying up in the atmosphere. They end up dissolved into the oceans, mixed in by the wind and waves to form carbonic acid.  To understand how this acid damages coral reefs you need to know how reefs form. They’re produced by vast colonies of little sea anemone like creatures – they’re the actual corals.
Dr Charlie Veron: You can see here some really big colonies. Hundreds of colonies there all together. And the actual coral itself. 
Every tiny little lip here is an individual coral. 
Dr Graham Phillips: So that’s a little animal. Each one of those is a little animal. . . It’s the little critters’ internal workings that are relevant here. They have a stomach to digest food and water that comes in from the mouth at the top. And here’s the key: the corals excrete limestone. A multitude of corals endlessly expelling this rocky material - for 100s and 1000s of years - builds up the vast skeleton scaffolding of a coral reef.  And that’s the problem with acidification. As you learn in chemistry class…acids and limestone don’t mix. 
Narration: Here’s a piece of dead coral skeleton. As you can see it’s hard – rock hard. But here’s the thing about limestone. Chemically it’s calcium carbonate and anything with carbonate in it can be dissolved by acid. Here’s a solution of weak hydrochloric acid and as you can see it bubbles instantly. Any sea creature that uses calcium carbonate to build its body will struggle as the oceans become more acidic. Now the oceans won’t become anywhere near as acidified as this and actually dissolve corals, rather slight ocean acidification will stop them growing. Check this out. 
Dr Graham Phillips: These are two relatively similar looking pieces of coral.
Dr Charlie Veron: Yeah they are, yeah they are. That one’s grown in a natural environment. You can try and crush it.
Dr Graham Phillips: Pretty hard.
Dr Charlie Veron: Don’t try too hard cause you’ll just cut your fingers.
Dr Graham Phillips: Yeah. 
Dr Charlie Veron: Yeah corals are tough. This guy has grown in an environment where there is artificial acidification such as would occur around the middle of this century. Now if I squeeze that.
Dr Graham Phillips: Oh yeah it’s just spongy.
Dr Charlie Veron: Yeah I can crush it. It all falls to pieces. 
Narration: While corals haven’t been affected yet, there are some important critters under even more immediate threat, according to new research out of Hobart.
Dr Graham Phillips: In this beaker of clear-looking water are 1000s of little creatures…plankton. They’re not as impressive as corals, of course, because you can’t see them, but they too build their bodies out of calcium carbonate.
Narration Could plankton have already been affected by acidification? That would be disturbing because they’re at the very base of the ocean’s food web. Plankton are eaten by krill, for instance, and krill by the larger animals. 
Dr Will Howard: This will have an ecological cascade effect right up to parts of the food web that are important to human beings, that is fish, shell fish for example a lot of the organisms that we depend on as food supply sources will directly or indirectly be effected by this process.
Narration: So a scientific expedition was mounted to the wild southern ocean to study the plankton. Down here is where the effects of ocean acidification would first appear.
Dr Will Howard: We see them first in the southern ocean because the southern ocean has absorbed a disproportionate amount of the anthropogenic carbon dioxide that has already entered the atmosphere because it’s a cold ocean and carbon dioxide is more soluble in colder water than in warmer water.
Narration: Plankton samples were collected…but how would the scientists know if the critters had been changed by acidification? The trick was to compare them with plankton fossils extracted from sea floor mud. When the debris was washed away the little white flecks become visible…plankton from long before the industrial age. When cleaned and dried, it’s under an optical microscope for a first peek. 
Andrew: What I’m looking at under here is, there are about 4 or 5 different planktonic foraminifera, which are calcite shells.
Narration: The foraminifera’s calcium carbonate shells are what interest the scientists. Could they be becoming thinner and more feeble with ocean acidification?  To find out, it’s to the more powerful scanning electron microscope.  And the answer is yes. This is the first evidence in the world that acidification is already changing organisms in the ocean.
Dr Graham Phillips: So can we see those changes here?
Dr Will Howard: Yes we can. What you see in this shell is much thicker crystals on the shell.

Dr Graham Phillips: So the crystals are here.
Narration: That shell belongs to the pre-industrial plankton. This shell is one of today’s. It’s visibly more feeble. 
Dr Will Howard: This shell is a thinner shell with a lot more porosity in it.
Narration: Side-by-side, the contrast is dramatic.
Dr Will Howard: These organisms have having to make thinner smaller shells than they would have in the pre-industrial ocean.
Narration: Now it’s too early to say what the flow on effects of more frail plankton species will be, but one concern for us land dwellers is that plankton currently take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. 
Dr Will Howard: All this extra carbon dioxide derived from fossil fuels will remain in the atmosphere that much longer because the ocean will become saturated.
Narration: What worries Charlie is, major ocean acidification has helped extinguish life before in Nature. These formations in north-western Australia are the remains of coral reefs. They suddenly died 360 million years ago.
Dr Charlie Veron: And we call those the great mass extinction events. Mass extinction. That means the extermination of a huge percentage of life on Earth. And coral reefs have taken at least four million years to recover. Now that’s quite well known, and been known for most of my life.
Dr Will Howard:There really is only one mitigation strategy and that is in this case to limit the extent and rate of carbon emissions into the atmosphere.
Dr Charlie Veron: It’s no use saying by 2030 that we’ll do this or we’ll do that, by 2030 it will all be too late. That is the problem. So we have to change. And humans are, I believe, very good at change.  But there’s not an ounce of hope in a world that wants to procrastinate and to say we can’t do this or that. We’re going to have to.  (Antarctic Climate & Ecosystems CRC, ABC – Catalyst,  Sept. 13, 2007).

 

Things are moving at break neck speed these days.  The planet is being denuded of is forests, glaciers are melting, and the oceans are being acidified.  Humanity is slowly waking up to the realization that this planet is no longer as accommodating as it used to be.  Climate change, global warming and ocean acidification have passed from the realm of news to that of well-established grim facts.  Yet, the Catholic Church would not even acknowledge that there is a crisis, let alone countenance the possibility that the life of this planet is in danger.  Why?  Because Rome is an “eternal city”, and as such it could never have an end.  You will never hear a Catholic priest talk about the end of this age, even though Bible prophecies about the end time correlate well with what is happening in the world at present. 

Not long ago, when a Catholic priest wrote a book about the mysteries of Revelation, he was promptly defrocked. 

Genesis and Revelation are two books that have come under severe attack by the Catholic Church.  Why? The first, because if Genesis is true evolution is wrong.  Since the Catholic Church has taken a firm position in favour of evolution, it follows that, according to them, the Bible must be wrong.  And the second, because Revelation speaks of “MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.”  The Catholic Church wants this to remain a mystery forever.  Only that there is a problem with that.  The Bible speaks of a time when the mystery of God will be finished. 

 

Rev 10:5  The angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land raised up his hand to heaven and swore by Him

Rev 10:6  who lives forever and ever, who created heaven and the things that are in it, the earth and the things that are in it, and the sea and the things that are in it, that there should be delay no longer, but in the days of the sounding of the seventh angel,

Rev 10:7  when he is about to sound, the mystery of God would be finished, as He declared to His servants the prophets.

 

Little does the Catholic Church know that this angel has already spoken.  If you want to know what he has revealed, read The Christian Heralds numbers 14 and 15. 

 

Post Scriptum:  Only hours, before we were to publish this edition, Cardinal Pell was at it again.  We had to cut out other articles in order to accommodate his latest diatribe on global warming.  This is what he said this time.

 

“Global warming is over” “Canada has experienced the coldest winter and the heaviest snowfalls since 1970-71, which was called a once-in-1000-years event. Another 18 cm of snow would set an all-time record.  A Kingston newspaper had a marvellous cartoon of a tough old Canadian, rugged up against the cold and hacking the ice off the windscreen of his car.  The caption read: Global warming my a***”!    In China, the Chinese New Year coincided with a fierce cold snap and snowstorms, which prevented many city workers returning to their village for the celebrations. Police had to deal with the ensuing riots.  London has just experienced snow at Easter. 

The world is much more bigger than both China and Canada combined, which might be the exceptions to the new rule of man-made global warming, but they are inconvenient facts for the climate-change bandwagon.  And it is an intolerant bandwagon with loud, exaggerated claims that the issue is settled and that an unchallenged consensus among scientists confirms the hypothesis of dangerous, humanly caused global warming. In fact the issue is far from settled.   Politicians sceptical of these claims would need unusual courage to resist the strong tides of public opinion.  However, the rest of us are not so constrained and we should consider all information.  Three points are of some significance.  Last December, more than 100 international scientists, some of them members of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, warned the UN that attempting to control climate was “ultimately futile”. So did 500 experts in Manhattan in March.  Fighting change was distracting governments from helping the most vulnerable citizens adapt to the threat of inevitable natural climate changes, whatever they might prove to be.  Futile attempts to prevent global climate change would be a tragic misallocation of resources, they claimed.  Secondly, none of the natural changes observed with glaciers, sea levels and species migration is outside the bounds of known variability, including the warming of 0.1C to 0.2C per decade, in the late 20th century. But the 1930s decade was warmer than the 1990s. Most importantly, the global temperature has not increased since 2001.  Global warming has ceased (New Statesman, 19/12/2007).  This finding invalidates the global-warming hypotheses because the amount of carbon dioxide continues to increase and the temperature should be increasing, too. It isn’t.  The last point is that today’s computers cannot predict climate over long periods, as there are too many unknowns and variables.  We should never forget that while computers are miracles of human ingenuity, they are also limited, cannot think for themselves and are totally obedient to their last human master.  More than this is needed to predict the future.” (The Sunday Telegraph, April 20, 2008).       

 

If this sounds like a desperate cry of one who clings on to straws in order to deny reality, is because it is.  As early as 2006, The Christian Herald No 15, pointed out that: 1. global warming is not equally spread all over the world, and 2. there are reliable scientific discoveries which show that global warming will, in most likelihood, be followed by an even greater evil – global dimming.  500 Manhattan “experts” who deny that there is a global warming problem, sounds a lot, but when you put that against the weight of the scientific world who believe that climate change has, if anything, been underestimated, you get a different perspective.  Cardinal Pell shows no suspicion that those “experts” come from the business capital of the most polluting nation on earth, which belches out gargantuan quantities of carbon dioxide into the air, the main culprit for global warming.  Reducing that to a “sustainable” level would be extremely costly, something that neither its political nor its business leaders are prepared to contemplate.  Cardinal Pell uses the example of Canada, which has experiencing the coldest winter since 1970-71, to “prove” that global warming is over, but conveniently ignores the fact that on the other side of the world, Australia experienced the hottest summer on record at the same time. 

 

“Climate change ‘underestimated” “Climate-change experts have warned the rest of Australia to brace for record heatwaves similar to the one that has paralysed Adelaide for more than a week.  Adelaide yesterday sweltered for the ninth day in temperatures of more than 38C – a record for an Australian capital.  The city’s maximum daily temperature has not dipped below 35C since March 2, raising the risk of heatstroke among the young and elderly and causing a surge in power and water usage.  

The heat has spread to western NSW, with Broken Hill and Ivanhoe due to hit 40C yesterday.  Edwin Jackson, policy and research director at the Sydney based Climate Institute, said the heatwave was an indication predictions of climate change may have been conservative.  “Climate change is not just something our children are going to have to worry about; it’s something we are already seeing,” he said.  “Temperature and sea-level rises are at the top end of the range of the predictions . . . we might be significantly underestimating the extent of climate change.  ”Based on what we are seeing in the real world this is a much more serious problem than we would have considered a year ago.  It’s becoming hotter, drier and more extreme. We’re heading into dangerous uncharted territory.”   South Australian regional director Andrew Watson is confident the heatwave is influenced by climate change, showing global warming could be taking place quicker than forecast.  “If we had the same weather 20 years ago, we doubt temperatures would have been as high.  Because the greenhouse effect, the atmosphere can contain more heat than ever before,” he said.   (The Sunday Telegraph, March 16, 2008). 

 

This was published less than five weeks earlier in the same newspaper, which shows how much attention Cardinal Pell gives to the newspaper that pays for his articles.   As for the fact that “none of the natural changes observed with glaciers, sea levels and species migrations is outside the bounds of known variability”, we do not know where he is getting his facts from, but they are plainly wrong.  We have published enough on this topic to go into it again.  What we did instead, was to check out the New Statesman which he quoted as saying that “Global warming has ceased”.  Well, this is what title that publication carried: “Has global warming stopped?”  Notice the difference?  One is a statement of fact, the other a question.  When you put a question mark after a statement, it is not a fact, but a possibility.   The article does nothing but raises the possibility that, based on the data from the last few years, global warming may have stoped.  Since Cardinal Pell was so selective with his facts, here are some statements from the same article that show a lesser certainty on global warming.     

“The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 is statistically the same as 2006 as well as every year since 2001. Global warming has, temporarily or permanently, ceased. Temperatures across the world are not increasing as they should according to the fundamental theory behind global warming – the greenhouse effect. Something else is happening and it is vital that we find out what or else we may spend hundreds of billions of pounds needlessly. . .”   Certainly the working hypothesis of CO2 induced global warming is a good one that stands on good physical principles but let us not pretend our understanding extends too far or that the working hypothesis is a sufficient explanation for what is going on.”

 

Saying that “global warming has, temporarily or permanently, ceased”, and that we do not know all the facts about what is going on, is not the same as making a definite statement that “Global warming is over”. 

 

 

 

 

When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies,

         you know that its desolation is not near

 

There is a prophecy in the Bible that has been much misunderstood by biblical scholars, which says: “When you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near”.  We will prove to you that in our contemporary context if Jerusalem is surrounded by armies, it cannot be the end of it. First, here is that prophecy.   

 

Luk 21:1  And He looked up and saw the rich putting their gifts into the treasury,

Luk 21:2  and He saw also a certain poor widow putting in two mites.

Luk 21:3  So He said, "Truly I say to you that this poor widow has put in more than all;

Luk 21:4  for all these out of their abundance have put in offerings for God, but she out of her poverty put in all the livelihood that she had."

Luk 21:5  Then, as some spoke of the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and donations, He said,

Luk 21:6  "These things which you see—the days will come in which not one stone shall be left upon another that shall not be thrown down."

Luk 21:7  So they asked Him, saying, "Teacher, but when will these things be? And what sign will there be when these things are about to take place?"

Luk 21:8  And He said: "Take heed that you not be deceived. For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am He,' and, 'The time has drawn near.' Therefore do not go after them.

Luk 21:9  But when you hear of wars and commotions, do not be terrified; for these things must come to pass first, but the end will not come immediately."

Luk 21:10  Then He said to them, "Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.

Luk 21:11  And there will be great earthquakes in various places, and famines and pestilences; and there will be fearful sights and great signs from heaven.

Luk 21:12  But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons. You will be brought before kings and rulers for My name's sake.

Luk 21:13  But it will turn out for you as an occasion for testimony.

Luk 21:14  Therefore settle it in your hearts not to meditate beforehand on what you will answer;

Luk 21:15  for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to contradict or resist.

Luk 21:16  You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, relatives and friends; and they will put some of you to death.

Luk 21:17  And you will be hated by all for My name's sake.

Luk 21:18  But not a hair of your head shall be lost.

Luk 21:19  By your patience possess your souls.

Luk 21:20  "But when you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near.

Luk 21:21  Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her.

Luk 21:22  For these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled.

Luk 21:23  But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days! For there will be great distress in the land and wrath upon this people.

Luk 21:24  And they will fall by the edge of the sword, and be led away captive into all nations. And Jerusalem will be trampled by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

Luk 21:25  "And there will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring;

Luk 21:26  men's hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth, for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Luk 21:27  Then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory.

Luk 21:28  Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near."

Luk 21:29  Then He spoke to them a parable: "Look at the fig tree, and all the trees.

Luk 21:30  When they are already budding, you see and know for yourselves that summer is now near.

Luk 21:31  So you also, when you see these things happening, know that the kingdom of God is near.

Luk 21:32  Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all things take place.

Luk 21:33  Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.

Luk 21:34  "But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come on you unexpectedly.

Luk 21:35  For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth.

Luk 21:36  Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man."

Luk 21:37  And in the daytime He was teaching in the temple, but at night He went out and stayed on the mountain called Olivet.

Luk 21:38  Then early in the morning all the people came to Him in the temple to hear Him.

 

This prophecy parallels that of Mathew 24.  Mathew however, does not mention Jerusalem.  Being a relevant prophecy for our time, let us see what Mathew had to say, before we consider the implication of Luke’s reference to Jerusalem. 

 

Mat 24:1  Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple.

Mat 24:2  And Jesus said to them, "Do you not see all these things? Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

Mat 24:3  Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, "Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?"

Mat 24:4  And Jesus answered and said to them: "Take heed that no one deceives you.

Mat 24:5  For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will deceive many.

Mat 24:6  And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the

Mat 24:7  end is not yet.   For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.

Mat 24:8  All these are the beginning of sorrows.

Mat 24:9  "Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name's sake.

Mat 24:10  And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another.

Mat 24:11  Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.

Mat 24:12  And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.

Mat 24:13  But he who endures to the end shall be saved.

Mat 24:14  And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.

Mat 24:15  "Therefore when you see the 'ABOMINATION OF DESOLATION,' spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing in the holy place"  (whoever reads, let him understand),

Mat 24:16  "then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.

Mat 24:17  Let him who is on the housetop not go down to take anything out of his house.

Mat 24:18  And let him who is in the field not go back to get his clothes.

Mat 24:19  But woe to those who are pregnant and to those who are nursing babies in those days!

Mat 24:20  And pray that your flight may not be in winter or on the Sabbath.

Mat 24:21  For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been since the beginning of the world until this time, no, nor ever shall be.

Mat 24:22  And unless those days were shortened, no flesh would be saved; but for the elect's sake those days will be shortened.

Mat 24:23  "Then if anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There!' do not believe it.

Mat 24:24  For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect.

Mat 24:25  See, I have told you beforehand.

Mat 24:26  "Therefore if they say to you, 'Look, He is in the desert!' do not go out; or 'Look, He is in the inner rooms!' do not believe it.

Mat 24:27  For as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.

Mat 24:28  For wherever the carcass is, there the eagles will be gathered together.

Mat 24:29  "Immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Mat 24:30  Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

Mat 24:31  And He will send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other.

Mat 24:32  "Now learn this parable from the fig tree: When its branch has already become tender and puts forth leaves, you know that

Mat 24:33  summer is near.  So you also, when you see all these things, know that it is near—at the doors!

Mat 24:34  Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place.

Mat 24:35  Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will by no means pass away.

Mat 24:36  "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only.

Mat 24:37  But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.

Mat 24:38  For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark,

Mat 24:39  and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.

Mat 24:40  Then two men will be in the field: one will be taken and the other left.

Mat 24:41  Two women will be grinding at the mill: one will be taken and the other left.

Mat 24:42  Watch therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord is coming.

Mat 24:43  But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into.

Mat 24:44  Therefore you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.

Mat 24:45  "Who then is a faithful and wise servant, whom his master made ruler over his household, to give them food in due season?

Mat 24:46  Blessed is that servant whom his master, when he comes, will find so doing.

Mat 24:47  Assuredly, I say to you that he will make him ruler over all his goods.

Mat 24:48  But if that evil servant says in his heart, 'My master is delaying his coming,'

Mat 24:49  and begins to beat his fellow servants, and to eat and drink with the drunkards,

Mat 24:50  the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him and at an hour that he is not aware of,

Mat 24:51  and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

 

As you ca see there are some differences between the two Gospel accounts.   Matthew’s is much longer and more detailed.  Yet he does not mention Jerusalem, or of being brought before kings and rulers for a testimony for Jesus Christ. Matthew was a Jew, and Luke was a Gentile.  It appears that each wrote the Gospel from their own perspective.  This may explain why Luke makes no mention of the Sabbath.  What is important to realise though is that although there are some differences, they do not contradict, but merely compliment each other. 

Luke’s, which is the weakest Gospel of them all, is given credence in this case by a reference in the book of Revelation to a gathering of armies against the Lord in a place called Armageddon.  Biblical scholars have interpreted Armageddon to mean Megiddo, a valley not far from Jerusalem.  Let us look at that prophecy in its context too.    

 

Rev 16:10  Then the fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast, and his kingdom became full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues because of the pain.

Rev 16:11  They blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and did not repent of their deeds.

Rev 16:12  Then the sixth angel poured out his bowl on the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up, so that the way of the kings from the east might be prepared.

Rev 16:13  And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs coming out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet.

Rev 16:14  For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.

Rev 16:15  "Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame."

Rev 16:16  And they gathered them together to the place called in Hebrew, Armageddon. 

Rev 16:17  Then the seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, "It is done!"

 

The book of Revelation, like the rest of the New Testament, was recorded in the Greek language (or at lest it reached us in the Greek language).  Yet verse 16 is sending us to the Hebrew language, in other words, to the Jews.  Now, Jesus Christ knew that the time of this prophecy would be after the Jews were returned from their long Diaspora.  He also knew that this would be just prior to the Great Tribulation that would herald His return.  But the Great Tribulation is a time of worldwide nuclear conflagration.  This begs the question, what role would a place called “Armageddon” play in an age of ballistic missiles, if that is indeed located near Jerusalem, as so many people seem to think? 

There are at least two reasons why Armageddon could not be Megiddo.  1) It is tenuous to say the least to link the two words linguistically.  2) No hostile armies could possibly gather near Jerusalem, or anywhere else in the Jewish state, under the circumstances of a nuclear-armed Israel.  The Jews will not sit down and watch as another Holocaust is looming just next door to Jerusalem.  The point we want to make is that just because Revelation 16:16 says that the armies of nations are gathered in a place called Armageddon in Hebrew, is no guaranty that that place must necessarily be in Israel. 

It should not be forgotten that Revelation 16 is not about a war against the Jews but one against the Lord, against the return of Jesus Christ, and that is quite a difference.  To say that these armies are gathered against the Jews is to assume that they are friends of Jesus Christ.  I would not advise anyone to ask a Jew how much he loves Jesus Christ, for he may not like what he hears.  Yet, Luke’s Gospel, and other prophecies, make it clear that in the end time an attack on Jerusalem will indeed take place. The question is from where?   If Armageddon is not Megiddo, where could it be?  And why attack Jerusalem from Armageddon, if the armies are gathered against Jesus Christ?  For one reason:  He returns to Jerusalem, to stand in glory with His feet in the place in which they crucified Him; this time not to be seen by just a few of His loyal disciples, but by the entire world.

 

Mat 24:30  Then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in heaven, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.

 

 You can be sure of one thing: the Jews will fight against Jesus Christ as much, or more than, the rest of the world.   Remember what Revelation 16;14 said? “For they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.”  

The whole world, Jews included, are gathered to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. 

There are two other prophecies that we need to look at, if we are to understand the order in which those events will take place.   Here is the first one.   

   

Zec 14:1  Behold, the day of the LORD is coming, And your spoil will be divided in your midst.

Zec 14:2  For I will gather all the nations to battle against Jerusalem; The city shall be taken, The houses rifled, And the women ravished. Half of the city shall go into captivity, But the remnant of the people shall not be cut off from the city.

Zec 14:3  Then the LORD will go forth And fight against those nations, As He fights in the day of battle.

Zec 14:4  And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, Which faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, From east to west, Making a very large valley; Half of the mountain shall move toward the north And half of it toward the south.

Zec 14:5  Then you shall flee through My mountain valley, For the mountain valley shall reach to Azal. Yes, you shall flee As you fled from the earthquake In the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Thus the LORD my God will come, And all the saints with You.

Zec 14:6  It shall come to pass in that day That there will be no light; The lights will diminish.

Zec 14:7  It shall be one day Which is known to the LORD Neither day nor night. But at evening time it shall happen That it will be light.

Zec 14:8  And in that day it shall be— That living waters shall flow from Jerusalem, Half of them toward the eastern sea And half of them toward the western sea; In both summer and winter it shall occur.

Zec 14:9  And the LORD shall be King over all the earth. In that day it shall be "The LORD is one," And His name one.

Zec 14:10  All the land shall be turned into a plain from Geba to Rimmon south of Jerusalem. Jerusalem shall be raised up and inhabited in her place from Benjamin's Gate to the place of the First Gate and the Corner Gate, and from the Tower of Hananel to the king's winepresses.

Zec 14:11  The people shall dwell in it; And no longer shall there be utter destruction, But Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited.

Zec 14:12  And this shall be the plague with which the LORD will strike all the people who fought against Jerusalem: Their flesh shall dissolve while they stand on their feet, Their eyes shall dissolve in their sockets, And their tongues shall dissolve in their mouths.

Zec 14:13  It shall come to pass in that day That a great panic from the LORD will be among them. Everyone will seize the hand of his neighbor, And raise his hand against his neighbor's hand;

Zec 14:14  Judah also will fight at Jerusalem. And the wealth of all the surrounding nations Shall be gathered together: Gold, silver, and apparel in great abundance.

Zec 14:15  Such also shall be the plague On the horse and the mule, On the camel and the donkey, And on all the cattle that will be in those camps. So shall this plague be.

Zec 14:16  And it shall come to pass that everyone who is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles.

Zec 14:17  And it shall be that whichever of the families of the earth do not come up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, on them there will be no rain.

Zec 14:18  If the family of Egypt will not come up and enter in, they shall have no rain; they shall receive the plague with which the LORD strikes the nations who do not come up to keep the Feast of Tabernacles.

Zec 14:19  This shall be the punishment of Egypt and the punishment of all the nations that do not come up to keep the Feast of

Zec 14:20  Tabernacles.  In that day "HOLINESS TO THE LORD" shall be engraved on the bells of the horses. The pots in the LORD's house shall be like the bowls before the altar.

Zec 14:21  Yes, every pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be holiness to the LORD of hosts. Everyone who sacrifices shall come and take them and cook in them. In that day there shall no longer be a Canaanite in the house of the LORD of hosts

 

Their flesh shall dissolve while they stand on their feet, their eyes shall dissolve in their sockets, and their tongues shall dissolve in their mouths.  This could only happen in a nuclear war.  What is different about this prophecy is that, unlike others, it gives us a glimpse into what follows – a time of abundance, peace, and holiness.  It also tells us that all the nations that survive the great conflagration will come to Jerusalem from year to year to, ”worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to keep the Feast of Tabernacles”.  That would seem to imply that the devastation will be so great that only a tiny fraction of the world’s population will survive into the Millennium Kingdom, enough for them all to be accommodated at a Feast of Tabernacles in Jerusalem.  What is more likely to happen is that representatives of all nations will come to Jerusalem to bring their tithes and offerings on behalf of their people to the Feast of Tabernacles while the rest of them will keep that Fest wherever they are located on the face of the earth.  This is borne out by the fact that remnants of Gog and Magog will be scattered in the four corners of the earth in the aftermath of the Great Tribulation.

 

Rev 20:7  Now when the thousand years have expired, Satan will be released from his prison

Rev 20:8  and will go out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle, whose number is as the sand of the sea.

Rev 20:9  They went up on the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them.

Rev 20:10  The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.

 

It would be all but impossible to bring to Jerusalem all people from the four corners of the earth after the devastation of the Great Tribulation when the means of transport will be reduced to a trickle, if at all functional.  And of course, it would be impossible to accommodate them all in Jerusalem, even in booths of reefs and tree branches.   Even so, there is no dispute that few nations will survive this end time catastrophe. 

The question we must ask now is what do we make of the first two verses of  Zechariah’s prophecy, which say that Jerusalem will be taken, the women ravished, and half the people taken into captivity and half left into the city?

If you have a New King James Version of the Bible, the most accurate that we know of, you will notice that verse 3 is a boldfaced numeral.  This is what the translators say on page XI about that fact: “A boldfaced verse numeral in the text indicates a paragraph break.”  In this case, a paragraph break means a break in prophecy – a time lapse of almost two millennia.  What this means is that the first two verses were fulfilled when the Roman legions, which could rightly be said to have been armies of the nations, destroyed Jerusalem and sent the Jews into their long Diaspora.  The prophecy then takes us forward to the time following the return of the Jews to their ancestral land, and the return of Jesus Christ. 

It is clear then that the attack on Jerusalem in the end time will no longer result in half the city being taken into captivity, and half left, for as we said earlier, in the context of a nuclear-armed Israel any attempt to do such a thing would be suicidal.  Moreover, the Lord says that He will fight against the nations that came up against Jerusalem: “Then the LORD will go forth And fight against those nations, As He fights in the day of battle” (Verse 3).  Now why would He fight against the nations that come against Jerusalem, if the Jews continue to refuse to repent of the horrible sin they had committed against Jesus Christ?  Because they do not mean to merely conquer the Jews, they want to obliterate them and Jerusalem form the face of the earth, the city the Lord had chosen as the Capital of His Kingdom, so that He would have no place to return to.  That is how the nations of this world are preparing to fight against the Lord.  The Jews unwittingly bear the brunt of that fight.

 

Zec 14:4  And in that day His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, Which faces Jerusalem on the east. And the Mount of Olives shall be split in two, From east to west, Making a very large valley; Half of the mountain shall move toward the north And half of it toward

Zec 14:5  the south.  Then you shall flee through My mountain valley, For the mountain valley shall reach to Azal. Yes, you shall flee As you fled from the earthquake In the days of Uzziah king of Judah. Thus the LORD my God will come, And all the saints with You.

 

The Jews shall flee when they see the glorious Christ standing on the Mount of Olives.  That they will suffer severe devastation during the Great Tribulation, like all nations of the earth, there is no doubt, for we know that all life would perish if God Almighty does not intervene to cut those days short, but they will not be obliterated from the face of the earth.

 

Jer 46:27  "But do not fear, O My servant Jacob, And do not be dismayed, O Israel! For behold, I will save you from afar, And your offspring from the land of their captivity; Jacob shall return, have rest and be at ease; No one shall make him afraid.

Jer 46:28  Do not fear, O Jacob My servant," says the LORD, "For I am with you; For I will make a complete end of all the nations To which I have driven you, But I will not make a complete end of you. I will rightly correct you, For I will not leave you wholly unpunished."

 

Where then is Armageddon in this context?  Clearly, Megiddo could not be that place, for it would be suicidal for any army to even breach the border of Israel let alone advance to the proximity of Jerusalem. 

The nation that has been raving for some time now of wiping Israel off the map is Iran.  Now let us assume that Iranian armies reach as far as the Megiddo.  Since the Bible tells us that this will be a nuclear conflict, a massive attack on Jerusalem will affect people living dozens of kilometres from that city, including Megiddo.  Of course, if the Iranians, or anyone else, will mount such an attack, they would not target just Jerusalem, but several other cities plus military targets.  Given the size of Israel, that would mean nothing less than wiping off the map the entire nation.  That, however, would also mean that the aggressor, or aggressors, would be wiping off the map their own armies. 

If Israeli leaders wanted an assurance against a nuclear attack on their nation, they could do no better than to have a few Iranian divisions posted in various places in the country. Mind you, given the value the Islamists are putting on the life of their own people these days that may not be much of an assurance.

Can you see now why we say that if you see Jerusalem surrounded by armies it cannot be the end of it? 

The truth is that in an age of nuclear missile technology, you do not look for infantry divisions in Megiddo, in readiness to attack Jerusalem.  You look to where the real danger comes from, and that is hundreds and thousands of kilometres away.

In that context, Jerusalem is already being surrounded by deadly enemies.  Have a look at this prophecy.  

 

Eze 38:1  Now the word of the LORD came to me, saying,

Eze 38:2  "Son of man, set your face against Gog, of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal, and prophesy

Eze 38:3  against him, and say, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "Behold, I am against you, O Gog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech, and Tubal.

Eze 38:4  I will turn you around, put hooks into your jaws, and lead you out, with all your army, horses, and horsemen, all splendidly clothed, a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords.

Eze 38:5  Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya are with them, all of them with shield and helmet;

Eze 38:6  Gomer and all its troops; the house of Togarmah from the far north and all its troops—many people are with you.

Eze 38:7  "Prepare yourself and be ready, you and all your companies that are gathered about you; and be a guard for them.

Eze 38:8  After many days you will be visited. In the latter years you will come into the land of those brought back from the sword and gathered from many people on the mountains of Israel, which had long been desolate; they were brought out of the nations, and now all of them dwell safely.

Eze 38:9  You will ascend, coming like a storm, covering the land like a cloud, you and all your troops and many peoples with you."

Eze 38:10  'Thus says the Lord GOD: "On that day it shall come to pass that thoughts will arise in your mind, and you will make an evil

Eze 38:11  plan:  You will say, 'I will go up against a land of unwalled villages; I will go to a peaceful people, who dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates'—

Eze 38:12  to take plunder and to take booty, to stretch out your hand against the waste places that are again inhabited, and against a people gathered from the nations, who have acquired livestock and goods, who dwell in the midst of the land.

Eze 38:13  Sheba, Dedan, the merchants of Tarshish, and all their young lions will say to you, 'Have you come to take plunder? Have you gathered your army to take booty, to carry away silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods, to take great plunder?' " '

Eze 38:14  "Therefore, son of man, prophesy and say to Gog, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "On that day when My people Israel dwell

Eze 38:15  safely, will you not know it?  Then you will come from your place out of the far north, you and many peoples with you, all of them riding on horses, a great company and a mighty army.

Eze 38:16  You will come up against My people Israel like a cloud, to cover the land. It will be in the latter days that I will bring you against My land, so that the nations may know Me, when I am hallowed in you, O Gog, before their eyes."

Eze 38:17  Thus says the Lord GOD: "Are you he of whom I have spoken in former days by My servants the prophets of Israel, who prophesied for years in those days that I would bring you against them?

Eze 38:18  "And it will come to pass at the same time, when Gog comes against the land of Israel," says the Lord GOD, "that My fury

Eze 38:19  will show in My face.  For in My jealousy and in the fire of My wrath I have spoken: 'Surely in that day there shall be a great

Eze 38:20  earthquake in the land of Israel, so that the fish of the sea, the birds of the heavens, the beasts of the field, all creeping things that creep on the earth, and all men who are on the face of the earth shall shake at My presence. The mountains shall be thrown down, the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground.'

Eze 38:21  I will call for a sword against Gog throughout all My mountains," says the Lord GOD. "Every man's sword will be against his

Eze 38:22  brother.  And I will bring him to judgment with pestilence and bloodshed; I will rain down on him, on his troops, and on the many peoples who are with him, flooding rain, great hailstones, fire, and brimstone.  Thus I will magnify Myself

Eze 38:23  and sanctify Myself, and I will be known in the eyes of many nations. Then they shall know that I am the LORD." '

 

Those armies from the north, from the furthest parts of the earth, that come like a cloud in the latter years against those brought back from the sword, have gained their greatness because of a misguided Hebrew atheistic philosophy, called communism.  God is about to unleash those armies upon their own heads.  That is what Armageddon means in Hebrew – a massive army the likes of which this world has never seen, coming against Israel not on land but by air like a cloud.  An attack  against which Israel will have no defence and no remedy, except a divine intervention.  However, God will not intervene to save them until they atone for their sin, their deicide, and turn to the only Power that can save them in heartfelt repentance.  The longer they wait, the more of them will perish, in a doomsday scenario that is now in the making before our very eyes.   

 

“Russia Sends Warships to Mediterranean”  “In response to the US turnaround on Iran, Russian President Vladimir Putin decided to send six Russian warships, led by the Admiral Kuznetsov aircraft carrier and the Moskva guided missile cruiser, the Russian Navy's Black Sea flagship, to the Mediterranean.  As the the first prolonged stay of a Russian carrier in the eastern Mediterranean vicinity of Israel's shores and waters patrolled by the US Sixth Fleet, the move is more than significant. The Admiral Kuznetsov carries on its decks 47 warplanes and 10 helicopters.  The Admiral Kuznetsov is a Class CV carrier, built in 1991. It is 999 ft. in length, displaces 67,500 tons and has a top speed of 30 knots.  It accommodates a crew of 1,700.  Sources in Moscow say that the Kremlin acted quickly to make its presence known after the NIE report was released.  The Russian fleet, which has already set out for its new mission from the North and Black Seas, will reportedly have the use of naval facilities at Syria's Tartous port. Its presence for several months will be a complication for the Israel navy's operations opposite the Lebanese and Syrian coasts, especially if the Russians are joined at Tartous by Iranian submarines or warships. Russia also sent ships to the northeastern Atlantic.” (The Lekarev Report, Dec. 6, 2007).

 

“Russian Ships in Syrian Ports”  “For the first time since the fall of the Iron Curtain, Russian ships will again operate the Tartus and Latakia ports in Syria as permanent bases for the Russian Navy in the Mediterranean.

During a recent visit to the Russian Navy base in the Sevastopol port in Ukraine, Russian Navy commander, Admiral Vladimir Masorin said, "Being present in the Mediterranean is very important for our Navy in the Black Sea." Western media picked up on this statement, as did Arabic stations like Al-Jazeera.

According to reports, Syria plans to let the Russian use its ports as part of the large arms deal signed between the two countries a few months ago. Syria had been deeply indebted to Russia to the tune of $11 billion but recently, Russia 'forgave' some 70% of the debt and made an 'arrangement' with Syria by which some of the remaining 30% will be paid in cash and the rest will be 'paid' through permanent services rendered to the Russian Navy in the two Mediterranean ports.

The Russian Navy is known to massively operate spy ships. Israeli officials believe that a renewed base in Syria will help the Russians carry out spy missions against Israel, particularly electronic spying aimed at observing new weapon systems and the flow of information in channels used by the army and the defense establishment. (The Lekarev Report, June 8, 2007). 

 

“Iran Gets Anti-Aircraft Missile System from Russia”  “Iran's Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar announced on Iranian TV Wednesday that Russia will provide Iran with the sophisticated and powerful S-300 anti-aircraft missile defense system, vastly improving the Islamic Republic's ability to protect its nuclear development facilities.  The missiles can intercept targets at an altitude of up to 27 kilometers (90,000 feet) and at ranges of up to 150 kilometers (95 miles) from the launch point. They are effective against cruise missiles and ballistic warheads as well, and are equivalent to the PAC-3 Patriot missiles which Israel is considering purchasing.

Russian military officials contend that the S-300 is of a higher operational standard than the U.S.-built Patriot missiles currently used by Israel. The S-300 systems are also a major improvement over the 29 Tor-M1 air defense missile systems delivered to Iran from Russia earlier this year. The $700 million contract for that purchase was signed in December 2005. Former Israel Air Force Commander Eitan Ben-Eliyahu told Channel 10 TV that the missiles will make it significantly harder for Israel to attack Iran from the air, if it chooses to do so.  Even aircraft that do not directly participate in the attack will be endangered by the missiles, he said, adding that AWACS planes, standby rescue planes and other planes with protective missions could be targeted by such long range missiles.  Najjar did not specify how many S-300 systems would be shipped to Iran, nor did he say when this would happen. An unidentified Russian source confirmed that dozens of S-300 batteries would be transferred to Iran and that the contract had already been signed several years ago.”  (The Lekarev Report, Dec. 27, 2007).

 

“Russia Sending Nuclear Fuel to Iran”  “In a dramatic turnaround, Russian president Vladimir Putin indicated Friday that Moscow would send uranium to Iran's atomic reactor in Bushehr. International Atomic Energy inspectors were invited to the Novosibirsk Plant on Nov. 26 to verify and seal the fuel before shipment. On that day, too, the US-promoted Middle East conference is provisionally set to open in Annapolis, Maryland. The Quartet of which Russia is a member will not be there.  This decision means that Moscow has backed away from the commitments Putin gave President Bush and Israeli prime minister Olmert, after his mid-October talks with Iranian leaders in Tehran broke down in discord. He then promised to withhold the fuel from the Bushehr reactor and in fact, pulled all the Russian staff out before they had completed work on the project's final stages.  Olmert received Putin's commitment to withhold the uranium fuel from Iran when they met in the Kremlin on Oct. 18 and passed it on to President Bush and later to French president Nicolas Sarkozy and British premier Gordon Brown in special trips he made to Paris and London. The Israeli prime minister announced then that Israel had a true friend in the Russian leader. Olmert is deeply embarrassed by Putin's about-face, putting it mildly. It also bodes ill for the third round of sanctions, for which the Bush administration is pushing at the UN Security Council, where Russian holds a veto, now that the nuclear watchdog confirmed in its latest report Nov. 15 that Iran had not given up uranium enrichment.  DEBKAfile's Moscow sources report that the Russian president has reverted to his previous tactic of broadcasting to Muslim nations a message that Moscow has its own agenda and is willing, unlike Washington, to help them develop their nuclear programs.  The question mark hanging over UN sanctions also affects the decision on military action against Iran's suspect military nuclear facilities, which President Bush had put on a back burner under the influence of Putin's breach with Tehran. There was a brief thaw in the tense relations between Washington and Moscow and signs of a new willingness for compromise on both sides on such matters as the US plan to deploy anti-missile systems in East Europe.  The month-long détente was abruptly curtailed Friday, Nov. 16, with Moscow's decision to let Iran have the uranium to fuel its Bushehr reactor six months before its scheduled start-up. The step was gladly welcomed in Tehran - of course!” (The Lekarev Report, Nov. 18, 2007).

 

“Putin Rejects Tough Stand on Iran”  “At the Russian-EU summit in Portugal Friday, Oct. 26, Russian president Vladimir Putin compared the US proposal to build a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe to the Cuban missile crisis of the 1960s. "Such a threat is being set up on our borders," he said, but then admitted that tension was much lower now than then and that the US was listening to Moscow's concerns.  On arrival in Portugal, Putin compared the supporters of tough policies against Iran to "mad people wielding razor blades." On Kosovo's future, he questioned the wisdom of "encouraging separatism in Europe."  Earlier, US defense secretary Robert Gates said the US has done as much as it can "to appease Russia" on its missile plans. "We've leaned about as far forward as we can." This week, the defense secretary offered to open the proposed sites in Poland and the Czech Republic to Russian observers and delay switching on the interceptors until the Washington and Moscow agreed on proof of a threat from Iran.  "We are not satisfied with any of their proposals," Russian defense minister Anatoly Serdyukov commented Thursday.  Regarding his future, Putin said he would not assume presidential powers if he became prime minister after finishing his term in the spring. "There will be no infringement on the powers of the president of the Russian Federation, at least while it depends on me," he declared. (Lekarev Report, Oct. 28, 2007).

 

“Iranian Opposition: Nuclear Race Continues” “An Iranian opposition group in exile acknowledged that Teheran halted its nuclear weapons development program in 2003, but vehemently insisted that the bomb-making program resumed the following year and said that the NIE Report published last week was therefore misleading in ignoring the evidence of the resumption of the program.  "We announce vehemently that the clerical regime is currently continuing its drive to obtain nuclear weapons," said Mohammad Mohaddessin, a spokesman for the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran, or NCRI. 

Speaking at a news conference, Mohaddessin said that Iran appeared to have duped US intelligence. "The clerical regime leaks false information and intelligence to Western intelligence services, through double agents," he said.  Mohaddessin acknowledged that Iran shut down the Lavizan-Shian weapons center in Teheran sometime in 2003 under international pressure. However, he claimed that the Iranian authorities merely shifted their weapons development efforts to other sites around the country, and that work had resumed by 2004. Israeli officials, citing their own sources, have confirmed this scenario.  The NCRI is described as the political wing of the People's Mujahedeen of Iran, an opposition group advocating the overthrow of the government in Teheran. The Mujahedeen are considered a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union as well as Iran. There was no independent verification of the NCRI claims, which Mohaddessin attributed to sources within Iran, including staff at covert nuclear plants. He said the group had checked with its sources in the past week and discovered that the centers were still working. (The Lekarev Report,  Dec 13. 2007).

 

Iranian Submarines Can Hit Tel Aviv “The Iranian Navy is presently deploying two submarine fleets - mini-subs in Persian Gulf waters for attacks on US shipping and Gulf oil facilities, and the long-range Kilo class sub of Russian, Chinese and Iranian manufacture, for long-range targets in the Mediterranean, such as the US Sixth Fleet and Israel coastal towns, primarily Tel Aviv.

Iran's defense minister Mostafa Najiar announced today, Nov. 27, that a new Iranian-built submarine would be delivered to the navy Wednesday. He offered no details of the new item. However, two days earlier, Iran's navy chief. Adm. Habibollah Sayyari disclosed that the new submarine would operate in Persian Gulf waters in the Strait of Hormuz area. He also declared that Tehran has no intention of blocking the Strait in a flare-up with the US military.

DEBKAfile's military sources note that Iran's strategic thinking has undergone a change. Up til now, the rulers of Tehran viewed the blockage of the narrow waterway to shipping that carries one-third of the world's oil needs, as its most effective reprisal for a military attack. They have revised their thinking for two reasons: First, Iran has made great strides in expanding its influence in Gulf oil states and an assault on their sole source of revenue would win more enemies than friends.

Second, Tehran has developed a new capability to deploy in the Mediterranean Kilo class submarines armed with the Russian-made "Sizzler" Klub-S (3M54) missile. This missile can be shot from underwater at a range of 300 kilometers and has a powerful 450-kilogram warhead.  This possibility was outlined by an authoritative Iranian security figure, the spokesman-cum-commentator at Iran's defense ministry, Gen. Reza Naghdi, on Nov. 12. He said that if Iran were attacked, its navy - and its submarine fleet in particular - could come close enough to "reach an Israeli coastal target" from the sea.

If conditions are 'right', a strategic decision could be taken in Tehran to send a sub or two to the Mediterranean to hit American or Israeli naval shipping or the Israeli coast. The Revolutionary Guards Corps is known to have built a large fleet of mini-subs and special marine units equipped with fast boats for deployment in the Persian Gulf.

Don't forget that Iran's first intervention in the Israel-Hizbullah war in South Lebanon last year was by sea. On July 14, 2006, Iranian naval officers helped Hizballah shoot a shore-to-ship C-802 missile from a Lebanese army base, crippling the Israeli Hanit missile ship. The incident is still considered the most damaging suffered by Israel in that war. A month later, Iran began experimenting with firing the Sizzler missiles from its Kilo-class submarines.  The Kilo class submarine is 74 meters long, has a maximum speed of up to 30 knots surfaced, diving depth of 300 meters and range of more than 12,100 km. The Kilo carries a crew of 52 sailors and, depending on the type, is armed with six to eight 533 mm torpedo tubes, 24 mines and air defense missiles. The Kilo submarines' quiet engines enable them to appear and disappear like wraiths, winning them the name of "Black Hole" from the US Navy.” (The Lekarev Report , Nov 28, 2007).

 

“Ahmadinejad: End of Israel is Imminent”  Speaking in the southwestern town of Bushehr near the site of Iran's planned first nuclear power plant, being built with Russian help, Iranian President Ahmadinejad said today that "Israel's days are numbered."  He declared, "It is time to end the puppet theatre of the fake regime," referring to the Jewish state. He insisted that Iran will not yield to western pressure and that it is reaching the "peak" of its nuclear program.  "If you (Western powers) imagine that the Iranian nation will back down, you are making a mistake," he said in the televised speech.  "On the nuclear path we are moving towards the peak."

Regarding Israel, Ahmadinejad said, "The religious Palestinian people will bring down the last screen with its powerful hand on the Zionists' puppet theater. It's time to end the puppet theater of this fake regime."

Turning to the Western powers supporting Israel, he said, "Those who remain silent in light of this regime's crimes and support it should know that they are taking part in the bloodshed of the Palestinian people and will be tried in the future.  Defying international pressure, Iran has been working on producing its own nuclear fuel, technology the West fears will be used to make atomic bombs. Tehran says its work is peaceful and has refused to stop.  Ahmadinejad delivered this speech two days after taking delivery of the Iran the eighth and final consignment of nuclear fuel from Russia for the Bushehr plant. (LR, Feb, 1, 2008).

 

“UNBELIEVABLE!”  “In his most provocative anti-US speech to date, Iran's president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad brazenly questioned whether al Qaeda's Sept. 11, 2001 attack on New York actually took place in an address marking Iran's Nuclear Technology day, April 8.  He went on to ask why the US had never released the names of the thousands of dead in the Trade Center attacks and how the most advanced security, intelligence and tracking devices in the world had failed to detect the hijackers' planes before they struck the two New York towers.  [Apparently Ahmadinejad didn't read the papers on that memorable day when the names of all the victims were printed and beamed around the world.]  Ahmadinejad is famous also for denying the Nazi Holocaust.

Announcing earlier that Iran had begun installing 6,000 new advanced (P2) centrifuges for uranium enrichment at Natanz, the Iranian president claimed his country's nuclear program had passed the point of no-return technologically and politically.  According to Ahmadinejad, America is disintegrating politically, militarily and economincally and therefore, Iran's nuclear achievement will change the international order of power that has been in place since World War II. By going full steam ahead with uranium enrichment, Iran is flouting three UN Security Council resolutions and standing fast against threats, sanctions and incentives offered by the West to halt a process capable of producing nuclear weapons. Instead, Tehran is installing a new generation of advanced P2 centrifuges to replace the older P-1 machines and accelerate enrichment. He claims they are five times cheaper than the commercial machines.” (The Lekarev Report, April 10, 2008)

 

 “Iran's New Missile” “According to Israeli News Channel 10, Iran tested a new missile during the Annapolis summit. 

The Ashoura missile has a range of 2,000 kilometers and is capable of reaching Israel, US Army bases in the Middle East and eastern European cities.  According to the report, the new missile is an improvement on the existing Shihab-3 missile. The Ashoura uses solid fuel instead of the Shihab's liquid fuel, giving it a significantly faster launch sequence which is harder to detect.  Iranian Defense Minister Gen. Mostafa Muhammad-Najjar had announced the development of the new missile on the day of the summit, but had not specified whether it had actually been tested.  He also called it one of "Iran's greatest achievements." (The Lekarev Report, Dec. 13, 2007)

 

“The NIE and the 12th Imam (the Islamic 'Messianic' figure)”  “On August 8, 2006 Professor Bernard Lewis, the doyen of Islam studies in the West, wrote in the Wall Street Journal: "There is a radical difference between the Islamic Republic of Iran and other governments with nuclear weapons. This difference is expressed in what can only be described as the apocalyptic worldview of Iran's present rulers." And "In this context, mutual assured destruction, the deterrent that worked so well during the Cold War, would have no meaning. At the end of time, there will be general destruction anyway. What will matter will be the final destination of the dead -- hell for the infidels, and heaven for the believers. For people with this mindset, MAD is not a constraint; it is an inducement." I did a quick search of the National Intelligence Estimate document "Iran: Nuclear Intentions and Capabilities" for the words "imam" or "12th" or "Mehdi". No hits. So I can judge with "high confidence" that NIE conclusions have not much to do with WHY Iran wants to do what it wants to do. As long as that has not changed, nothing has changed.  In other words, it is irrelevant whether this is disinformation by Iran or not. The consequences of making a mistake in estimating the threat from Iran are so high, that the worst case scenario estimates should be the ones on which decisions should be made. The mistakes done in Iraq where Saddam's WMD were moved to Syria, apparently by the Russians, and the whole affair hushed up by both Democrats and Republicans since the truth would have embarrassed them both, must not be repeated. There is no room for petty partisan politics if the result is a nuclear war. (Mladen Andrijasevic, www.israelinsider.com).

“Egypt to Sign Nuclear Pact with Russia” “Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak heads for Russia today where he is expected to get assurances of Russian assistance to build a nuclear facility. A bilateral nuclear power deal      was outlined last week and is expected to be signed during the visit.  Egypt's Foreign Minister Ahmad Abu Al-Gheit said the pact would enable Egypt to tap into Russia's extensive experience in the field of nuclear energy.  The deal could allow Russia to participate in a tender to build nuclear reactors in Egypt.  The pact coincides with international efforts to pressure Iran into abandoning its nuclear program. Iran insists its program is for civilian purposes of manufacturing energy, but Western countries are concerned Teheran is covertly making an atomic bomb.  The technologies for creating nuclear energy and nuclear bombs are similar and involve many dual-usage elements and substances.  Egypt is one of several Middle Eastern countries seeking a nuclear program. Cairo wants to revive its atomic energy program, which was aborted in the wake of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, when the dangers of such a program became apparent.” (The Lekarev Report, March 25, 2008).

 

“Hizbollah Preparing for Upcoming War” “Naim Kassem, Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah's deputy, described a training exercise the group conducted at the beginning of this week as preparation for the next war with Israel.

In an interview with the Arab-Israeli paper Sawt el-Balad published Thursday, Kassem said that the Shiite organization's weapons arsenal can hit all parts of Israel. He described the maneuvers as "enormous and important and they were carried out as part of our deployment so that we won't be caught by surprise.  "Our exercise was unrestricted and was meant to cover all of the territory of the Israeli entity and not simply to strengthen our companies," he stated.  Kassem added that UNIFIL forces detected the increased Hizbullah activity but, since no militants were carrying weapons, he claimed they were acting in accordance with UN Security Resolution 1701.

The drill was part of our obligation to make our presence and readiness known and (to show) that we act how we deem necessary," Hizbullah's number two said. (Lekarev Report, Nov. 11,2007).

 

“Syria Arming Itself 'Furiously'”  Jordan and Israeli security officials speaking to Aaron Klein, Jerusalem Bureau Chief for World Net Daily, have said that Syria, aided by Russia and Iran, in recent months has been furiously acquiring rockets and missiles, including projectiles capable of hitting the entire state of Israel. A Jordanian security official said one of the main reasons Damascus did not retaliate after Israel carried out its Sept. 6 airstrike inside Syria allegedly targeting a nascent nuclear facility was because Syria's rocket infrastructure was not yet complete. Syria picked up the pace of acquiring rockets and missiles, largely from Russia with Iranian backing, with the goal of completing its missile and rocket arsenal by the end of the year, after the Israeli attack. The Jordanian official said Syria is aiming to possess enough projectiles to fire over 100 rockets into Israel per hour for a sustained period of time.

According to Israeli and Jordanian officials, Syria recently quietly struck a deal with Russia that allows Moscow to station submarines and warboats off Syrian ports. In exchange, Russia is supplying Syria with weaponry at lower costs, with some of the missiles and rockets being financed by Iran.  "The Iranians opened an extended credit line with Russia for Syria with the purpose of arming Syria," said one Jordanian security official.  "Russia's involvement and strategic positioning is almost like a return to its Cold War stance," the official said.

Both the Israeli and Jordanian officials told WND large quantities of Syrian rockets and missiles are being stockpiled at Latakia, Syria's main port on the Mediterranean Sea, as well as at Syria's Tartus port, another major port area south of Latakia and north of Damascus.

Syria's new acquisitions include Russia's S-300 surface-to-air missile defense shield, which is similar to the U.S.-funded, Israeli engineered Arrow antimissile system currently deployed in Israel. The S-300 system is being run not by Syria but by Russian naval technicians who work from Syria's ports, security officials said.  New ballistic missiles and rockets include Alexander rockets and a massive quantity of various Scud surface-to-surface missiles, including Scud B and D Scud missiles.

The Wise Man Sees

In Proverbs 22:3 we read, "The wise man sees evil coming and prepares, while the naive goes on and is punished." My friends, the mass of evidence growing daily that the enemies of Israel are seriously and systematically preparing for war against the state of Israel - a war they openly call the war to destroy the Jewish state - cannot be ignored.  As we are exhorted by the verse quoted above, the wise see evil coming and prepare. Those who proverbially hide their heads in the sand will suffer.  Top security and defense officials are saying this is not a question of "IF" but "WHEN".  So when the rockets begin falling (G-d forbid) in other parts of Israel like they have been falling on Sderot and the Negev, it will be too late to prepare.  It will be too late then to get bottled water, non-perishable food and other necessities for survival.  It will be too late then to get help to IDF soldiers on the frontline, like we did during the Second Lebanon war, thanks to your generous assistance.  Last night, we had a call from the Sergeant Major of the IDF unit for whom you bought shoes in August 2006.  His concern was evident in the phone call; there are preparations that must be made now.  We cannot wait. (The Lekarev Report, February 7,2008).

 

 “Israel Will Defend Its Own” “As the UN Security Council debated a resolution to condemn Israel (again!!) for the situation in Gaza, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni declared forcefully in her speech to the Herzliya Conference that Israel will defend its own, regardless of UN condemnations or resolutions.  "I believe that Israel should not have to apologize for its existence and it will continue to defend the lives of its citizens, even at the price of condemnation," she said, adding that "it is inconceivable for Palestinians to fire rockets on Israel and then ask for our help."  Livni dedicated an extensive part of her speech to the negotiation process and the divisive core issues: "I am not here to peddle dreams nor am I here to strengthen the hands of those who have given up. . .   "Even if the Palestinians fail to implement it, this document will be of worth if in it there are Israeli interests set in writing and ratified by the international community. There will be no further claims beyond this document and it will offer a lasting solution to the conflict, one which will take the place of United Nations resolutions and proposals like the Arab Initiative," the foreign minister added. (The Lekarev Report, Jan. 23, 2008).

 

 “UN Fails to Condemn Jerusalem Massacre”  “The United States accused Libya on Thursday of preventing the Security Council from condemning as a "terrorist attack" the deadly massacre at the Mercaz Ha Rav Yeshiva. The United States had drafted a statement that was discussed at an emergency UN Security Council session called to debate an attack by a Palestinian gunman who killed at least eight people and wounded at least 10 more at an Israeli religious school.   "The members of the Security Council condemn in the strongest terms the terrorist attack that took place in Jerusalem March 6, 2008 which resulted in the death and injury of dozens of Israeli civilians," said the draft statement.  The US delegation hoped the 15 member council would unanimously support the condemnation but Libya, along with several other council members, voted it down. (The Lekarev Report,  March 7, 2008).

 

 

“Can Israel Rely on America?”

 “Thanks to Naomi Ragen for forwarding this article by Gerald M. Steinberg (Institute for Contemporary Affairs/Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs).  The December "surprise" resulting from the publication of the U.S. National Intelligence Estimate disrupted fifteen years of Israeli policy based on working with the international coalition to pressure Iran to drop its nuclear weapons program through sanctions and the threat of military action, and has reminded Israelis of the limits of American security guarantees and strategic cooperation.
*    Within two weeks following publication of the NIE report [that Iran is no longer pursuing nuclear weapons. Ed], China signed a major contract on energy development and supply with Iran, and Russia quickly dispatched two shipments of nuclear fuel for the Bushehr nuclear reactor. Egypt moved to improve relations with Iran, and Saudi Arabia welcomed Iranian President Ahmadinejad to Mecca for the Haj.
*    Prime Minister Olmert had explained the logic of the "Annapolis process" in terms of the coalition to stop Iran, but two weeks after Annapolis, with the release of the NIE report this rationale has lost much of its relevance. 
*    Another source of stress comes from differences over renewed U.S. efforts to forge a quick agreement with the Palestinian Authority at a time of continued terrorism, the violent conflict between Fatah and Hamas, the failure to develop functioning Palestinian institutions, and the PA's ongoing incitement and rejection of the legitimacy of a Jewish state.
*    In addition, the overall decline of U.S. influence, as reflected in Iraq, the return of Russia as a world power, the chaos in Pakistan, and other developments, has highlighted the limits of Israeli reliance on American assistance, and the need for Israel to maintain an independent capability to act when necessary.” (The Lekarev Report, Jan. 8, 2008).

 

The media and political commentators all over the world have been saying that it is not a matter of if, but of when, Israel, or America, or both, will attack Iran.  However, a widespread devastation of Iran by those nations is not in biblical prophecy.  Instead, as we saw, the Bible says the opposite, that it is Iran, in an alliance with Russia and a host of other countries that will attack Israel.   God will magnify Himself before the world by destroying such a mighty coalition that is led by the bastion of atheism.  The good news is that immediately afterwards Jesus Christ will return to set up the Millennium Kingdom – a new world order of true peace, holiness and prosperity, in which wicked people will have no place.

 

 

 

 

    Where God Was During the Holocaust

 

The Jews never tyre asking the questions: Where was God during the Holocaust? Why did He not intervene to prevent it or put an end to it after it became obvious what was going on? 

The answer is rather clear and straightforward.  God was on His throne; He did not prevent it or stop it sooner was because He prophesied it, He foresaw it, and He implemented it.  Simple as that, and proven by the Scriptures, yet they would never accept it, always claiming innocence and victim hood. 

 

Amo 3:6  If a trumpet is blown in a city, will not the people be afraid? If there is calamity in a city, will not the LORD have done it?

Psa 135:6  Whatever the LORD pleases He does, In heaven and in earth, In the seas and in all deep places.

 

Why then do the Jews keep on asking those questions, and never finding the answer to them?  Because their spiritual leaders are as self-centred and ignorant of the Scriptures now, as they were at the time of Jesus Christ.  And as dangerous for Israel as they were then.  They led the nation to catastrophe then, and are about to do it again.  Not because they are not making peace with their intractable duplicitous enemies, for as sixty years of history have proven, that is an impossible task, but because they continue to refuse to bend their knees before the Almighty, and acknowledge their sins and wrongdoings, and the evil they have inflicted upon the world with their anti-God, anti-life, atheistic philosophy of communism. 

In order to be forgiven, all sins must be atoned for, and the Jews have a lot of atoning to do. Only then can they be at peace with God, and especially with His Son, whom they have so ingloriously crucified, and benefit once again of God’s protection and blessings.  Ezekiel makes the following statement in one of his prophecies:

 

Eze 38:8  After many days you will be visited. In the latter years you will come into the land of those brought back from the sword and gathered from many people on the mountains of Israel, which had long been desolate; they were brought out of the nations, and now all of them dwell safely.

 

There can be no doubt that this verse, in particular the expression, “brought back from the sword”, refers to the Holocaust.  No other comparable catastrophe can fall upon the Jews “in the latter years”, other than the Great Tribulation which will fall upon the whole world.  This means that this event was prophesied and implemented under the eyes of God.  Such being the case, how is it that the Jews keep asking the question of where was God in the days of the Holocaust and why He did not intervene to prevent it or cut it short?  Even Pope John Paul II asked these questions when he visited Auschwitz. 

The role of spiritual leaders is to inform people of the will of God, of His laws, statutes and judgments, of His prophecies and warnings, in order to keep them on the straight and narrow path.  As Jesus Christ said: 

 

Mat 7:13  "Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it.

Mat 7:14  Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.

 

Now notice carefully what Jesus Christ said in the very next breath.

 

Mat 7:15  "Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves.

Mat 7:16  You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?

Mat 7:17  Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.

Mat 7:18  A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit.

Mat 7:19  Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

Mat 7:20  Therefore by their fruits you will know them.

Mat 7:21  "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.

Mat 7:22  Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?'

Mat 7:23  And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'

 

False prophets, ravenous wolves, thornbushes, thistles – strong words and extraordinary comparisons for those who would be spiritual leaders.  Since Jesus Christ knew that His religion will be universal, these words apply to the spiritual leaders of Judaism, of Christianity, and of the whole world.  Any wonder that the world is in such a mess, and on the brink of a universal catastrophe.    

The question therefore that should be asked is not where God was in those days, or why He did not intervene to stop it, but why He implemented such a grievous prophecy to the full.  The answer, like the prophecy itself, is in the Bible.    

 

2Ch 33:1  Manasseh was twelve years old when he became king, and he reigned fifty-five years in Jerusalem.

2Ch 33:2  But he did evil in the sight of the LORD, according to the abominations of the nations whom the LORD had cast out before

2Ch 33:3  the children of Israel.  For he rebuilt the high places which Hezekiah his father had broken down; he raised up altars for the Baals, and made wooden images; and he worshiped all the host of heaven and served them.

2Ch 33:4  He also built altars in the house of the LORD, of which the LORD had said, "In Jerusalem shall My name be forever."

2Ch 33:5  And he built altars for all the host of heaven in the two courts of the house of the LORD.

2Ch 33:6  Also he caused his sons to pass through the fire in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom; he practiced soothsaying, used witchcraft and sorcery, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did much evil in the sight of the LORD, to provoke Him to anger.

2Ch 33:7  He even set a carved image, the idol which he had made, in the house of God, of which God had said to David and to Solomon his son, "In this house and in Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, I will put My name forever;

2Ch 33:8  and I will not again remove the foot of Israel from the land which I have appointed for your fathers—only if they are careful to do all that I have commanded them, according to the whole law and the statutes and the ordinances by the hand of Moses."

2Ch 33:9  So Manasseh seduced Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to do more evil than the nations whom the LORD had destroyed before the children of Israel.

2Ch 33:10  And the LORD spoke to Manasseh and his people, but they would not listen.

2Ch 33:11  Therefore the LORD brought upon them the captains of the army of the king of Assyria, who took Manasseh with hooks, bound him with bronze fetters, and carried him off to Babylon.

 

Jer 7:17  Do you not see what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

Jer 7:18  The children gather wood, the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead dough, to make cakes for the queen of heaven; and they pour out drink offerings to other gods, that they may provoke Me to anger.

Jer 7:19  Do they provoke Me to anger?" says the LORD. "Do they not provoke themselves, to the shame of their own faces?"

Jer 7:20  Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: "Behold, My anger and My fury will be poured out on this place—on man and on beast, on the trees of the field and on the fruit of the ground. And it will burn and not be quenched."

Jer 7:21  Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices and eat meat.

Jer 7:22  For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt

Jer 7:23  offerings or sacrifices.  But this is what I commanded them, saying, 'Obey My voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be My people. And walk in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well with you.'

Jer 7:24  Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but followed the counsels and the dictates of their evil hearts, and went backward

Jer 7:25  and not forward.   Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have even sent to you all My servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them.

Jer 7:26  Yet they did not obey Me or incline their ear, but stiffened their neck. They did worse than their fathers.

Jer 7:27  "Therefore you shall speak all these words to them, but they will not obey you. You shall also call to them, but they will not

Jer 7:28  answer you.   "So you shall say to them, 'This is a nation that does not obey the voice of the LORD their God nor receive correction. Truth has perished and has been cut off from their mouth.

Jer 7:29  Cut off your hair and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on the desolate heights; for the LORD has rejected and forsaken

Jer 7:30  the generation of His wrath.'   For the children of Judah have done evil in My sight," says the LORD. "They have set their abominations in the house which is called by My name, to pollute it.

Jer 7:31  And they have built the high places of Tophet, which is in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, which I did not command, nor did it come into My heart.

Jer 7:32  "Therefore behold, the days are coming," says the LORD, "when it will no more be called Tophet, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter; for they will bury in Tophet until there is no room.

Jer 7:33  The corpses of this people will be food for the birds of the heaven and for the beasts of the earth. And no one will frighten

Jer 7:34  them away.  Then I will cause to cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride. For the land shall be desolate.

 

Jer 16:1  The word of the LORD also came to me, saying,

Jer 16:2  "You shall not take a wife, nor shall you have sons or daughters in this place."

Jer 16:3  For thus says the LORD concerning the sons and daughters who are born in this place, and concerning their mothers who bore them and their fathers who begot them in this land:

Jer 16:4  "They shall die gruesome deaths; they shall not be lamented nor shall they be buried, but they shall be like refuse on the face of the earth. They shall be consumed by the sword and by famine, and their corpses shall be meat for the birds of heaven and for

Jer 16:5  the beasts of the earth."  For thus says the LORD: "Do not enter the house of mourning, nor go to lament or bemoan them; for I have taken away My peace from this people," says the LORD, "lovingkindness and mercies.

Jer 16:6  Both the great and the small shall die in this land. They shall not be buried; neither shall men lament for them, cut themselves,

Jer 16:7  nor make themselves bald for them.  Nor shall men break bread in mourning for them, to comfort them for the dead; nor shall men give them the cup of consolation to drink for their father or their mother.

Jer 16:8  Also you shall not go into the house of feasting to sit with them, to eat and drink."

Jer 16:9  For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: "Behold, I will cause to cease from this place, before your eyes and in your days, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride.

Jer 16:10  "And it shall be, when you show this people all these words, and they say to you, 'Why has the LORD pronounced all this great disaster against us? Or what is our iniquity? Or what is our sin that we have committed against the LORD our God?'

Jer 16:11  then you shall say to them, 'Because your fathers have forsaken Me,' says the LORD; 'they have walked after other gods and have served them and worshiped them, and have forsaken Me and not kept My law.

Jer 16:12  And you have done worse than your fathers, for behold, each one follows the dictates of his own evil heart, so that no one listens to Me.

Jer 16:13  Therefore I will cast you out of this land into a land that you do not know, neither you nor your fathers; and there you shall

Jer 16:14  serve other gods day and night, where I will not show you favor.'  "Therefore behold, the days are coming," says the LORD, "that it shall no more be said, 'The LORD lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt,'

Jer 16:15  but, 'The LORD lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north and from all the lands where He had driven them.' For I will bring them back into their land which I gave to their fathers.

 

Eze 5:5  "Thus says the Lord GOD: 'This is Jerusalem; I have set her in the midst of the nations and the countries all around her.

Eze 5:6  She has rebelled against My judgments by doing wickedness more than the nations, and against My statutes more than the countries that are all around her; for they have refused My judgments, and they have not walked in My statutes.'

Eze 5:7  Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: 'Because you have multiplied disobedience more than the nations that are all around you, have not walked in My statutes nor kept My judgments, nor even done according to the judgments of the nations that are all

Eze 5:8  around you'—therefore thus says the Lord GOD: 'Indeed I, even I, am against you and will execute judgments in your midst in

Eze 5:9  the sight of the nations.   And I will do among you what I have never done, and the like of which I will never do again, because of all your abominations.

Eze 5:10  Therefore fathers shall eat their sons in your midst, and sons shall eat their fathers; and I will execute judgments among you, and all of you who remain I will scatter to all the winds.

Eze 5:11  'Therefore, as I live,' says the Lord GOD, 'surely, because you have defiled My sanctuary with all your detestable things and with all your abominations, therefore I will also diminish you; My eye will not spare, nor will I have any pity.

Eze 5:12  One-third of you shall die of the pestilence, and be consumed with famine in your midst; and one-third shall fall by the sword all around you; and I will scatter another third to all the winds, and I will draw out a sword after them.

Eze 5:13  'Thus shall My anger be spent, and I will cause My fury to rest upon them, and I will be avenged; and they shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken it in My zeal, when I have spent My fury upon them.

Eze 5:14  Moreover I will make you a waste and a reproach among the nations that are all around you, in the sight of all who pass by.

Eze 5:15  'So it shall be a reproach, a taunt, a lesson, and an astonishment to the nations that are all around you, when I execute judgments among you in anger and in fury and in furious rebukes. I, the LORD, have spoken.

Eze 5:16  When I send against them the terrible arrows of famine which shall be for destruction, which I will send to destroy you, I will

Eze 5:17  increase the famine upon you and cut off your supply of bread.  So I will send against you famine and wild beasts, and they will bereave you. Pestilence and blood shall pass through you, and I will bring the sword against you. I, the LORD, have spoken.' "

 

Does anyone still wonder where God was, or why He did not intervene to stop the Holocaust?  The answer is clear for all to see: they did not obey God, they did worse than their fathers, and even worse than the nations that God removed to make room for them.  Yet even after the Holocaust, still they would not obey God, repent and acknowledge their sins. They are in mortal danger again, for without repentance, God does not hear their prayers, and they cannot be saved, for this time truly it is no longer a question of survival, but one of salvation.  

Those who think that they have reasons to hate the Jews, or that they are any better, should beware of the fact that after they are refined through the fire, the Jews will be leading the world back to God in the very near future.       

 

Isa 48:10  Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.  For My own sake,

Isa 48:11  for My own sake, I will do it; For how should My name be profaned? And I will not give My glory to another.

 

Isa 48:17  Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer, The Holy One of Israel: "I am the LORD your God, Who teaches you to profit, Who

Isa 48:18  leads you by the way you should go.  Oh, that you had heeded My commandments! Then your peace would have been like a

Isa 48:19  river, And your righteousness like the waves of the sea.   Your descendants also would have been like the sand, And the offspring of your body like the grains of sand; His name would not have been cut off Nor destroyed from before Me."

 

Eze 36:16  Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying:

Eze 36:17  "Son of man, when the house of Israel dwelt in their own land, they defiled it by their own ways and deeds; to Me their way was like the uncleanness of a woman in her customary impurity.

Eze 36:18  Therefore I poured out My fury on them for the blood they had shed on the land, and for their idols with which they had

Eze 36:19  defiled it.   So I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed throughout the countries; I judged them

Eze 36:20  according to their ways and their deeds.  When they came to the nations, wherever they went, they profaned My holy name—when they said of them, 'These are the people of the LORD, and yet they have gone out of His land.'

Eze 36:21  But I had concern for My holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations wherever they went.

Eze 36:22  "Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'Thus says the Lord GOD: "I do not do this for your sake, O house of Israel, but for My holy name's sake, which you have profaned among the nations wherever you went.

Eze 36:23  And I will sanctify My great name, which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst; and the nations shall know that I am the LORD," says the Lord GOD, "when I am hallowed in you before their eyes.

Eze 36:24  For I will take you from among the nations, gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land.

Eze 36:25  Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your

Eze 36:26  idols.  I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

Eze 36:27  I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them.

Eze 36:28  Then you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; you shall be My people, and I will be your God.

Eze 36:29  I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. I will call for the grain and multiply it, and bring no famine upon you.

Eze 36:30  And I will multiply the fruit of your trees and the increase of your fields, so that you need never again bear the reproach of famine among the nations. Then you will remember your evil ways and your deeds that were not good;

Eze 36:31  and you will loathe yourselves in your own sight, for your iniquities and your abominations.  Not for your sake do I do this,"

Eze 36:32  says the Lord GOD, "let it be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel!"

Eze 36:33  'Thus says the Lord GOD: "On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities, I will also enable you to dwell in the cities,

Eze 36:34  and the ruins shall be rebuilt.  The desolate land shall be tilled instead of lying desolate in the sight of all who pass by.

Eze 36:35  So they will say, 'This land that was desolate has become like the garden of Eden; and the wasted, desolate, and ruined

Eze 36:36  cities are now fortified and inhabited.'  Then the nations which are left all around you shall know that I, the LORD, have rebuilt the ruined places and planted what was desolate. I, the LORD, have spoken it, and I will do it."

 

Mic 4:1  Now it shall come to pass in the latter days That the mountain of the LORD's house Shall be established on the top of the mountains, And shall be exalted above the hills; And peoples shall flow to it.

Mic 4:2  Many nations shall come and say, "Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, And we shall walk in His paths." For out of Zion the law shall go forth, And the word of the LORD from

Mic 4:3  Jerusalem.  He shall judge between many peoples, And rebuke strong nations afar off; They shall beat their swords into plowshares, And their spears into pruning hooks; Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, Neither shall they learn war

Mic 4:4  anymore.  But everyone shall sit under his vine and under his fig tree, And no one shall make them afraid; For the mouth of the LORD of hosts has spoken.

Mic 4:5  For all people walk each in the name of his god, But we will walk in the name of the LORD our God Forever and ever. "In that

Mic 4:6  day," says the LORD, "I will assemble the lame, I will gather the outcast And those whom I have afflicted; I will make the lame

Mic 4:7  a remnant, And the outcast a strong nation; So the LORD will reign over them in Mount Zion From now on, even forever.

 

Mic 4:11  Now also many nations have gathered against you, Who say, "Let her be defiled, And let our eye look upon Zion."

Mic 4:12  But they do not know the thoughts of the LORD, Nor do they understand His counsel; For He will gather them like sheaves to the threshing floor.

Mic 4:13  "Arise and thresh, O daughter of Zion; For I will make your horn iron, And I will make your hooves bronze; You shall beat in pieces many peoples; I will consecrate their gain to the LORD, And their substance to the Lord of the whole earth."

 

Zec 8:13  And it shall come to pass That just as you were a curse among the nations, O house of Judah and house of Israel, So I will save you, and you shall be a blessing. Do not fear, Let your hands be strong.'

Zec 8:14  "For thus says the LORD of hosts: 'Just as I determined to punish you When your fathers provoked Me to wrath,' Says the

Zec 8:15  LORD of hosts, 'And I would not relent, So again in these days I am determined to do good To Jerusalem and to the house of

Zec 8:16  Judah. Do not fear.  These are the things you shall do: Speak each man the truth to his neighbor; Give judgment in your

Zec 8:17  gates for truth, justice, and peace; Let none of you think evil in your heart against your neighbor; And do not love a false oath.

Zec 8:18  For all these are things that I hate,' Says the LORD."   Then the word of the LORD of hosts came to me, saying,

Zec 8:19  "Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'The fast of the fourth month, The fast of the fifth, The fast of the seventh, And the fast of the tenth, Shall be joy and gladness and cheerful feasts For the house of Judah. Therefore love truth and peace.'

Zec 8:20  "Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'Peoples shall yet come, Inhabitants of many cities;

Zec 8:21  The inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, "Let us continue to go and pray before the LORD, And seek the LORD of hosts. I myself will go also."

Zec 8:22  Yes, many peoples and strong nations Shall come to seek the LORD of hosts in Jerusalem, And to pray before the LORD.'

Zec 8:23  "Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'In those days ten men from every language of the nations shall grasp the sleeve of a Jewish man, saying, "Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you." ' "

 

Rom 11:1  I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not! For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

Rom 11:2  God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel, saying,

Rom 11:3  "LORD, THEY HAVE KILLED YOUR PROPHETS AND TORN DOWN YOUR ALTARS, AND I ALONE AM LEFT, AND THEY SEEK MY LIFE"?

Rom 11:4  But what does the divine response say to him? "I HAVE RESERVED FOR MYSELF SEVEN THOUSAND MEN WHO HAVE NOT BOWED THE KNEE TO BAAL."

Rom 11:5  Even so then, at this present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

Rom 11:6  And if by grace, then it is no longer of works; otherwise grace is no longer grace. But if it is of works, it is no longer grace; otherwise work is no longer work.

Rom 11:7  What then? Israel has not obtained what it seeks; but the elect have obtained it, and the rest were blinded.

Rom 11:8  Just as it is written: "GOD HAS GIVEN THEM A SPIRIT OF STUPOR, EYES THAT THEY SHOULD NOT SEE AND EARS THAT THEY SHOULD NOT HEAR, TO THIS VERY DAY."

Rom 11:9  And David says: "LET THEIR TABLE BECOME A SNARE AND A TRAP, A STUMBLING BLOCK AND A RECOMPENSE TO THEM.

Rom 11:10  LET THEIR EYES BE DARKENED, SO THAT THEY DO NOT SEE, AND BOW DOWN THEIR BACK ALWAYS."

Rom 11:11  I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles.

Rom 11:12  Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness!

Rom 11:13  For I speak to you Gentiles; inasmuch as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry,

Rom 11:14  if by any means I may provoke to jealousy those who are my flesh and save some of them.

Rom 11:15  For if their being cast away is the reconciling of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?

Rom 11:16  For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches.

Rom 11:17  And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive tree,

Rom 11:18  do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.

Rom 11:19  You will say then, "Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in."

Rom 11:20  Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear.

Rom 11:21  For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either.

Rom 11:22  Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off.

Rom 11:23  And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.

Rom 11:24  For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?

Rom 11:25  For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.

Rom 11:26  And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: "THE DELIVERER WILL COME OUT OF ZION, AND HE WILL TURN AWAY UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB;

Rom 11:27  FOR THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS."

Rom 11:28  Concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers.

Rom 11:29  For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.

Rom 11:30  For as you were once disobedient to God, yet have now obtained mercy through their disobedience,

Rom 11:31  even so these also have now been disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also may obtain mercy.

Rom 11:32  For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all.

Rom 11:33  Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!

Rom 11:34  "FOR WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD? OR WHO HAS BECOME HIS COUNSELOR?"

Rom 11:35  "OR WHO HAS FIRST GIVEN TO HIM AND IT SHALL BE REPAID TO HIM?"

Rom 11:36  For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.

 

Amen, indeed!

 

 

 

Why the prophets of God have never

been welcomed by this world

 

In the beginning of the nation of Israel, God spoke to His people through anointed priests.  They had the priviledge of communicating with God whenever they went into the Temple’s Holy of Holies adorned with the Urim and the Thummim – a special breastplate that contained twelve precious stones inscribed with the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. 

 

Exo 28:29  "So Aaron shall bear the names of the sons of Israel on the breastplate of judgment over his heart, when he goes into the holy place, as a memorial before the LORD continually.

Exo 28:30  And you shall put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim, and they shall be over Aaron's heart when he goes in before the LORD. So Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel over his heart before the LORD continually.

 

Num 27:18  And the LORD said to Moses: "Take Joshua the son of Nun with you, a man in whom is the Spirit, and lay your hand on him;

Num 27:19  set him before Eleazar the priest and before all the congregation, and inaugurate him in their sight.

Num 27:20  And you shall give some of your authority to him, that all the congregation of the children of Israel may be obedient.

Num 27:21  He shall stand before Eleazar the priest, who shall inquire before the LORD for him by the judgment of the Urim. At his word they shall go out, and at his word they shall come in, he and all the children of Israel with him—all the congregation."

Num 27:22  So Moses did as the LORD commanded him. He took Joshua and set him before Eleazar the priest and before all the

Num 27:23  congregation.  And he laid his hands on him and inaugurated him, just as the LORD commanded by the hand of Moses.

 

In the course of time, however, the priests failed to perform their duties before God, forcing Him to choose a new set of servants, called prophets, to convey His messages to the people.  Not surprisingly, the priests did not take kindly to the new arrangement.  They have been hostile towards the prophets throughout the history of Israel, a hostility that continues to this day in both Judaism and Christendom.  Take a careful look at the following passages from the book of Nehemiah, and see the disastrous consequences this hostility has had on the prophets and on the nation of Israel.    

 

Neh 9:13  "You came down also on Mount Sinai, And spoke with them from heaven, And gave them just ordinances and true laws, Good statutes and commandments.

 

Neh 9:26  "Nevertheless they were disobedient And rebelled against You, Cast Your law behind their backs And killed Your prophets, who testified against them To turn them to Yourself; And they worked great provocations.

Neh 9:27  Therefore You delivered them into the hand of their enemies, Who oppressed them; And in the time of their trouble, When they cried to You, You heard from heaven; And according to Your abundant mercies You gave them deliverers who saved them

Neh 9:28  From the hand of their enemies.  "But after they had rest, They again did evil before You. Therefore You left them in the hand of their enemies, So that they had dominion over them; Yet when they returned and cried out to You, You heard from heaven; And many times You delivered them according to Your mercies,

Neh 9:29  And testified against them, That You might bring them back to Your law. Yet they acted proudly, And did not heed Your commandments, But sinned against Your judgments, 'Which if a man does, he shall live by them.' And they shrugged their shoulders, Stiffened their necks, And would not hear.

Neh 9:30  Yet for many years You had patience with them, And testified against them by Your Spirit in Your prophets. Yet they would not listen; Therefore You gave them into the hand of the peoples of the lands. Nevertheless

Neh 9:31  in Your great mercy You did not utterly consume them nor forsake them; For You are God, gracious and merciful.

 

Neh 9:34  Neither our kings nor our princes, Our priests nor our fathers, Have kept Your law, Nor heeded Your commandments and Your testimonies, With which You testified against them.

Neh 9:35  For they have not served You in their kingdom, Or in the many good things that You gave them, Or in the large and rich land which You set before them; Nor did they turn from their wicked works.   "Here we are,

Neh 9:36  servants today! And the land that You gave to our fathers, To eat its fruit and its bounty, Here we are, servants in it!

 

Over and over again, God kept forgiving His backsliding “chosen people”, until there was no further remedy, and He gave them over into the hands of their enemies.  Did you notice the main reason for this disastrous outcome? Let us assemble the emphasised words together. 

 

 “Neither our kings nor our princes, Our priests nor our fathers, Have kept Your law, Nor heeded Your commandments and Your testimonies, With which You testified against them.  Yet for many years You had patience with them, And testified against them by Your Spirit in Your prophets, That You might bring them back to Your law.  Yet they would not listen, [but they] Cast Your law behind their backs And killed Your prophets.”

 

In the early days of Israel, the priests, being custodians of God’s laws, also served as judges of the people.  However, when they ignored the law and became self-indulgent and perverters of justice, the people, instead of calling an assembly of the elders and praying to God for guidance and more righteous holy priests, demanded instead a king in order to be like their surrounding pagan neighbours.

Now notice what God told them when they made that request.

 

1Sa 8:1  Now it came to pass when Samuel was old that he made his sons judges over Israel.

1Sa 8:2  The name of his firstborn was Joel, and the name of his second, Abijah; they were judges in Beersheba.

1Sa 8:3  But his sons did not walk in his ways; they turned aside after dishonest gain, took bribes, and perverted justice.

1Sa 8:4  Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him,

1Sa 8:5  "Look, you are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations."

1Sa 8:6  But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, "Give us a king to judge us." So Samuel prayed to the LORD.

1Sa 8:7  And the LORD said to Samuel, "Heed the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected Me, that I should not reign over them.

1Sa 8:8  According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt, even to this day—with which they have forsaken Me and served other gods—so they are doing to you also.

1Sa 8:9  Now therefore, heed their voice. However, you shall solemnly forewarn them, and show them the behavior of the king who will

1Sa 8:10  reign over them."  So Samuel told all the words of the LORD to the people who asked him for a king.

1Sa 8:11  And he said, "This will be the behavior of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them for his own chariots and to be his horsemen, and some will run before his chariots.

1Sa 8:12  He will appoint captains over his thousands and captains over his fifties, will set some to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and some to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots.

1Sa 8:13  He will take your daughters to be perfumers, cooks, and bakers.

1Sa 8:14  And he will take the best of your fields, your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants.

1Sa 8:15  He will take a tenth of your grain and your vintage, and give it to his officers and servants.

1Sa 8:16  And he will take your male servants, your female servants, your finest young men, and your donkeys,

1Sa 8:17  and put them to his work.  He will take a tenth of your sheep. And you will be his servants.  And you will cry out in that day

1Sa 8:18  because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves, and the LORD will not hear you in that day."

1Sa 8:19  Nevertheless the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel; and they said, "No, but we will have a king over us,

1Sa 8:20  that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles."  

1Sa 8:21  And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he repeated them in the hearing of the LORD. So the LORD said

1Sa 8:22  to Samuel, "Heed their voice, and make them a king." And Samuel said to the men of Israel, "Every man go to his city."

 

The king would take their sons and daughters and make them his servants. He would also take the best of their fields, plus ten percent of their produce every year.  Now is that what has transpired since that time?  

Tell me a country where people pay only ten percent tax, and I will tell you a hapy people.  I will migrate to that country in no time at all.  Rather, what we have in the world is a ruinous regime of taxation that far exceeds that amount.  Worst of all appear to be the countries in which the priests and ministers of religion hold sway over the people, for they demand tithes and offerings on top of the taxes people have to give to their governments. Religious leaders forget that ten per cent plus Holy Day offerings were to be the whole tax people paid to the governing authorities.  Except for the Levites, who had a full time job serving in the Temple in Jerusalem, other religious leaders were to supplement people’s offerings by working with their own hands, as was the case with the Apostles of Jesus Christ. 

After the appointment of kings over Israel, the priests did their best to obscure the messages of the prophets and create a wedge between them and the king.  Here is one such example. 

 

Amo 7:10  Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, "Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel. The land is not able to bear all his words.

Amo 7:11  For thus Amos has said: 'Jeroboam shall die by the sword, And Israel shall surely be led away captive From their own land.'

Amo 7:12  Then Amaziah said to Amos: "Go, you seer! Flee to the land of Judah. There eat bread, And there prophesy.

Amo 7:13  But never again prophesy at Bethel, For it is the king's sanctuary, And it is the royal residence."

Amo 7:14  Then Amos answered, and said to Amaziah: "I was no prophet, Nor was I a son of a prophet, But I was a sheep breeder and a tender of sycamore fruit.

Amo 7:15  Then the LORD took me as I followed the flock, and the LORD said to me, 'Go, prophesy to My people Israel.'  Therefore,

Amo 7:16  hear the word of the LORD: You say, 'Do not prophesy against Israel, And do not spout against the house of Isaac.'

Amo 7:17  "Therefore thus says the LORD: 'Your wife shall be a harlot in the city; Your sons and daughters shall fall by the sword; Your land shall be divided by survey line; You shall die in a defiled land; And Israel shall surely be led away captive from his own land.'

 

While there are some examples of prophets who arose from the priestly line, on the whole the prophets were drawn from simple people who had no expectation of exalted positions.  In fact, becoming a prophet of God not only did not confer one any special priviledges with the leaders and the people, but was a sure way of landing him into many personal and family problems. An interesting example is that of David, who was a prophet before he became a king.  Had he failed to overcome his trials and difficulties during his testing period and spiritual growth, we would not have the Psalms – some of the most wonderful writings ever put on paper.  

When he began to write his prayers and songs of praise to God, he could hardly have imagined that he was writing for posterity.  In the course of time however, he became aware that something wonderful was happening in his life and in the life of the world.  He understood that he was an instrument in the hands of a higher power.

 

Psa 8:3  When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, The moon and the stars, which You have ordained,

Psa 8:4 What is man that You are mindful of him, And the son of man that You visit him?

Psa 8:5  For You have made him a little lower than the angels, And You have crowned him with glory and honor. . .

 

Although anointed King over Israel, David endured some of the most horrific trials that could befall a human being.  Was he aware that he was a forerunner for Someone who would endure even more horrendous trials and become the Saviour of the world?  Many of the Psalms are about Jesus Christ, who acknowledged David as His forerunner. 

 

Mat 22:41  While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them,

Mat 22:42  saying, "What do you think about the Christ? Whose Son is He?" They said to Him, "The Son of David."

Mat 22:43  He said to them, "How then does David in the Spirit call Him 'LORD,' saying:

Mat 22:44  'THE LORD SAID TO MY LORD, "SIT AT MY RIGHT HAND, TILL I MAKE YOUR ENEMIES YOUR FOOTSTOOL" '?

Mat 22:45  If David then calls Him 'LORD,' how is He his Son?"

Mat 22:46  And no one was able to answer Him a word, nor from that day on did anyone dare question Him anymore.

 

It is general knowledge that Jesus Christ came into the world in order to make the Holy Spirit available to all human beings.     

 

Joh 14:15  "If you love Me, keep My commandments.

Joh 14:16  And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—

Joh 14:17  the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He

Joh 14:18  dwells with you and will be in you.  I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you.

 

Joh 16:7  Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you.

 

The prerequisite for salvation is receiving the Holy Spirit, and the prerequisite for receiving the Holy Spirit is keeping the Commandments of God. Salvation means eternal life, and eternal life means knowing the true God and loving Him with all of one’s heart, soul, mind and strength.   

 

Joh 17:1  Jesus spoke these words, lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said: "Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You,

Joh 17:2  as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him.

Joh 17:3  And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.

 

Mar 12:28  Then one of the scribes came, and having heard them reasoning together, perceiving that He had answered them well, asked Him, "Which is the first commandment of all?"

Mar 12:29  Jesus answered him, "The first of all the commandments is: 'HEAR, O ISRAEL, THE LORD OUR GOD, THE LORD IS ONE. 

Mar 12:30  AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.' This is the first commandment.  And the second, like it, is this:

Mar 12:31  'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these."

Mar 12:32  So the scribe said to Him, "Well said, Teacher. You have spoken the truth, for there is one God, and there is no other but He.

Mar 12:33  And to love Him with all the heart, with all the understanding, with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love one's neighbor as oneself, is more than all the whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."

Mar 12:34  Now when Jesus saw that he answered wisely, He said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." But after that no one dared question Him.

 

In order to make the Holy Spirit available to all, Jesus Christ had to die and rise again, then create a New Covenant. 

 

Heb 9:1  Then indeed, even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and the earthly sanctuary.

Heb 9:2  For a tabernacle was prepared: the first part, in which was the lampstand, the table, and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary;

Heb 9:3  and behind the second veil, the part of the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of All,

Heb 9:4  which had the golden censer and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant;

Heb 9:5  and above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail.

Heb 9:6  Now when these things had been thus prepared, the priests always went into the first part of the tabernacle, performing the services.

Heb 9:7  But into the second part the high priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people's sins committed in ignorance;

Heb 9:8  the Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the Holiest of All was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was still standing.

Heb 9:9  It was symbolic for the present time in which both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make him who performed the service perfect in regard to the conscience—

Heb 9:10  concerned only with foods and drinks, various washings, and fleshly ordinances imposed until the time of reformation.

Heb 9:11  But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation.

Heb 9:12  Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.

Heb 9:13  For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh,

Heb 9:14  how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

Heb 9:15  And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

Heb 9:16  For where there is a testament, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.

Heb 9:17  For a testament is in force after men are dead, since it has no power at all while the testator lives.

Heb 9:18  Therefore not even the first covenant was dedicated without blood.

Heb 9:19  For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water, scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people,

Heb 9:20  saying, "THIS IS THE BLOOD OF THE COVENANT WHICH GOD HAS COMMANDED YOU."

Heb 9:21  Then likewise he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry.

Heb 9:22  And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission.

Heb 9:23  Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

Heb 9:24  For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;

Heb 9:25  not that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood of another—

Heb 9:26  He then would have had to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now, once at the end of the ages, He has appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.

Heb 9:27  And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment,

Heb 9:28  so Christ was offered once to bear the sins of many. To those who eagerly wait for Him He will appear a second time, apart from sin, for salvation.

 

What is not so well known is that the Holy Spirit was available to select individuals since the beginning of time, such as the prophets who wrote the Old Testament.  Indeed, the term “Holy Spirit” was used for the first time by King David. 

 

Psa 51:9  Hide Your face from my sins, And blot out all my iniquities.

Psa 51:10  Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Psa 51:11  Do not cast me away from Your presence, And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.

Psa 51:12  Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me by Your generous Spirit.

Psa 51:13  Then I will teach transgressors Your ways, And sinners shall be converted to You.

Psa 51:14  Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, The God of my salvation, And my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness.

 

It is interesting to note that David wrote this prayer and Psalm in connection with two grievous sins: adultery and murder.  Adultery with Bathsheba and murder of her husband in order to cover his adultery.  Some people may wonder how God could forgive such grievous sins.  The remedy, of course, is repentance.  What is repentance? Macquarie dictionary: 1. compunction or contrition for wrongdoing or sin.   2. regret for any past action.  What is even more interesting is that David’s sin occurred after God said that he was a man after His own heart (1 Sam. 13:14), a fact acknowledged in the New Testament too. 

 

Act 13:21  And afterward they asked for a king; so God gave them Saul the son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, for forty years.

Act 13:22  And when He had removed him, He raised up for them David as king, to whom also He gave testimony and said, 'I HAVE FOUND DAVID THE SON OF JESSE, A MAN AFTER MY OWN HEART, WHO WILL DO ALL MY WILL.'

Act 13:23  From this man's seed, according to the promise, God raised up for Israel a Savior—Jesus—

Act 13:24  after John had first preached, before His coming, the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel.

 

David’s forgiveness is an important lesson for those who think that their sins are so heinous that God cannot forgive.  Repentance, a broken heart, and a contrite spirit are what God loves in human beings. 

 

Psa 34:18  The LORD is near to those who have a broken heart, And saves such as have a contrite spirit.

Psa 34:19  Many are the afflictions of the righteous, But the LORD delivers him out of them all.

 

When people repent of their sins, their past life does not matter anymore.  They become new creations in God. 

 

2Co 5:14  For the love of Christ compels us, because we judge thus: that if One died for all, then all died;

2Co 5:15  and He died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for Him who died for them and rose again.

2Co 5:16  Therefore, from now on, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him thus no longer.

2Co 5:17  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.

2Co 5:18  Now all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ, and has given us the ministry of

2Co 5:19  reconciliation, that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, and has

2Co 5:20  committed to us the word of reconciliation.  Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ's behalf, be reconciled to God.

2Co 5:21  For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

 

Human beings are constantly under the influence of their carnal nature, and prone to fall, but as long as they repent and come before God with a broken heart and contrite spirit, they are forgiven and given the chance of reconciliation. David’s example clearly shows that even people who have the Holy Spirit can be overtaken by sin. God used him, one of the greatest personalities of the Bible, to pass on this important message to us.  Willing, persistent sins, however, are a different matter.

 

Heb 10:26  For if we sin wilfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,

Heb 10:27  but a certain fearful expectation of judgment, and fiery indignation which will devour the adversaries.

Heb 10:28  Anyone who has rejected Moses' law dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses.

Heb 10:29  Of how much worse punishment, do you suppose, will he be thought worthy who has trampled the Son of God underfoot, counted the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified a common thing, and insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him

Heb 10:30  who said, "VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY," says the Lord. And again, "THE LORD WILL JUDGE HIS PEOPLE."

Heb 10:31  It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

 

Now although David was the first to speak of the Holy Spirit, he was not the first to have the Holy Spirit.  Since the beginning of the world, the Holy Spirit was available to select individuals; people who were set apart for important transcendental roles: Abel, Noah, Job, Abraham, the Patriarchs, Moses, are but a few such examples. 

You may have noticed references to the Spirit in some of our earlier references.  Here they are again.  

 

Num 27:18 And the LORD said to Moses: "Take Joshua the son of Nun with you, a man in whom is the Spirit, . . .”

Neh 9:30  Yet for many years You had patience with them, And testified against them by Your Spirit in Your prophets.

 

All people who had the Holy Spirit in Old Testament times became role models for us. 

 

Jas 5:10  My brethren, take the prophets, who spoke in the name of the Lord, as an example of suffering and patience.

Jas 5:11  Indeed we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord—that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.

 

Jesus Christ connected the sufferings of the prophets that came before Him, with those who would come after Him. 

 

Mat 23:34  Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city,

Mat 23:35  that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.

Mat 23:36  Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

 

The question is, do these words apply only to the Pharisees of old, as modern day preachers would have it, or are they valid for all times? If they applied only to the Pharisees of old, Christians would have had an easy time after the Jews were dispersed by the Romans among other nations.  The truth is painfully different.  For more than a millennium true Christians, and others of different opinions and beliefs, were persecuted, imprisoned and even burned at stake, by none other than people who thought that they do God a service.  But then what did Jesus Christ tell His disciples?

 

Joh 16:2  They will put you out of the synagogues; yes, the time is coming that whoever kills you will think that he offers God service.

 

The Devil has always had servants ready and willing to do his work in the world. During Middle Ages, it was Catholic Church’s Inquisition; nowadays, fundamentalist Islamists have replaced them.     

Those who murdered the elect of God in the past are about to do it again to His last two prophets.  You are going to see it with your own eyes, in real life or on the television screens.  More than that: you will see a miracle the likes of which the world has not seen since the time of Jesus Christ.  Here is the story of God’s last two witnesses. 

 

Rev 11:3  And I will give power to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy one thousand two hundred and sixty days, clothed in

Rev 11:4  sackcloth."  These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands standing before the God of the earth.

Rev 11:5  And if anyone wants to harm them, fire proceeds from their mouth and devours their enemies. And if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this manner.

Rev 11:6  These have power to shut heaven, so that no rain falls in the days of their prophecy; and they have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to strike the earth with all plagues, as often as they desire.

Rev 11:7  When they finish their testimony, the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit will make war against them, overcome

Rev 11:8  them, and kill them.  And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.

Rev 11:9  Then those from the peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations will see their dead bodies three-and-a-half days, and not allow their

Rev 11:10  dead bodies to be put into graves.  And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them, make merry, and send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth.

Rev 11:11  Now after the three-and-a-half days the breath of life from God entered them, and they stood on their feet, and great fear fell

Rev 11:12  on those who saw them.  And they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, "Come up here." And they ascended to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies saw them.

 

Things however are not going to be as simple as that.  For just as it happened in the past, Satan will turn things up side down once again, presenting his servants as ministers of righteousness, and the prophets of God as anti-Christs, or “allege preachers”. 

 

2Co 11:13  For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ.

2Co 11:14  And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light.  Therefore it is no great thing

2Co 11:15  if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works.

 

As Jesus Christ would have said: whoever reads let him understand! 

 

 

 

             What Exactly Is A “Real Church”?

 

In July 2007, Pope Benedict made a statement that stunned the Christian world.  He told them that only the Catholic and Orthodox are “real” Churches, and that all the others are mere “ecclesial communities”.

 

 “You are not real churches, Pope says to Protestants”  “Pope Benedict … backing traditional practices” 

PROTESTANT churches have reacted with dismay to a new declaration approved by the Pope insisting they were mere "ecclesial communities" and their ministers in effect phonies with no right to give communion.  Coming just days after the reinstatement of the Latin Mass, Tuesday's document left no doubt about the Pope's eagerness to back traditional Catholic practices and attitudes, even at the expense of causing offence.  The view that Protestants cannot have churches was first set out by Pope Benedict seven years ago when, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he headed the Vatican ministry for doctrine. A commentary attached to the latest text acknowledged that his 2000 document, Dominus Iesus, had caused "no little distress".  But it added: "It is nevertheless difficult to see how the title of 'Church' could possibly be attributed to [Protestant communities], given that they do not accept the theological notion of the Church in the Catholic sense and that they lack elements considered essential to the Catholic Church."  The Pope's old department, which issued the document, said its aim was to correct "erroneous or ambiguous" interpretations of the Second Vatican Council, which ended in 1965. Quoting a text approved by the council, it said Protestant churches, "because of the absence of the sacramental priesthood", had not "preserved the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic Mystery".  However, other Christians saw the latest document as another retreat from the spirit of openness generated by the council, which laid the basis for talks on Christian unity. Bishop Wolfgang Huber, head of the Protestant umbrella group Evangelical Church in Germany, said: "The hope for a change in the ecumenical situation has been pushed further away by the document published today."  He said the new pronouncement repeated "offensive statements" in the 2000 document and was a "missed opportunity" to improve relations with Protestants. The president of the Federation of Evangelical Churches in Italy, Pastor Domenico Maselli, called it a "huge step backwards in relations between the Roman Catholic church and other Christian communities".

The Church of England reacted cautiously. A spokesman for the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, said: "This is a serious document, teaching on important ecclesiological matters and of significance to the churches' commitment to the full, visible unity to the one church of Jesus Christ."   The Vatican's statement had fewer misgivings about the Orthodox Church, which had "true sacraments" and a genuine priesthood. But its failure to acknowledge the Pope's authority meant it suffered from a "defectus", politely translated from Latin as "a wound".  Last Saturday the Pope freed Catholics to ask for Masses to be celebrated according to the Latin rite abolished by the Second Vatican Council. This meant the reinstatement of a Good Friday prayer describing Jews as blind to the Christian truth.  (John Hooper in Rome and Stephen Bates in London, Sydney Morning Herald, July 12, 2007).

 

Now although we are not enamoured with the papacy, we agree that this time the Pope did the right thing in raising the question of what a “real” church is and what is not.  The first thing we wanted to know is what he understood by the term "ecclesial communities" which he applied to Protestant congregations which he says are not real churhces.  In four decades of rather intensive Bible and religious studies, we have never come across that kind of distinction between “church” and “ecclesial communities”.  So we looked in an English Dictionary.  This is what Macquarie says:

 

Ecclesia = /uh'kleezeeuh/ noun, plural ecclesiae /uh'kleezeeee/.     1.  an assembly, especially the popular assembly of ancient Athens.  2. a congregation; a church.  [L: assembly of the people, LL church, from Greek ekklesía]

 

“Ecclesia” means “church” according to this dictionary.  But that cannot be; the Pope is a wise man, and if he says that “ecclesial” does not mean church, it could not mean church.  The problem must lay with Macquarie Dictionary.  This is an Australian Dictionary, and what would the colonials know.  So we looked into Webster’s “school and office” Dictionary, one of the most popular these days.  This is what that one says.  

 

Ecclesia = a church, a religious assembly.   

  

Short and to the point, but basically the same thing.  Could it be that an Aussie had surreptitiously found his way into Webster’s editorial team and sneacked in that term?  We decided to look into an old English Dictionary, Funk & Wagnalls.  

 

Ecclesia = 1.  The popular or legislative assembly in Athens and other ancient Greek states in wich every free citizen could vote.  2. A body of Christians organised for worship and religiouys work; a church; congregation.

 

Wherever we looked, ecclesia meant, among other things, church or religious congregation.  There was only one other thing for us to do – look into the Bible and see what Jesus Christ and His apostles meant  by the trem “church”. 

This term appears for the first time in the New Testament.  Remarkably, it was used by Jesus Christ in relation to Apostle Peter, whom He designated as head of His congregation of followers. 

 

     Mat 16:18  And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

      

That explains why the Popes think that only their followers form a “real” church, for they claim to be the inheritors of Peter’s mantle and “Vicar’s of Christ on Earth”.  Well, we had much to say on that; those interested should read “Why Apostle Peter Could Never Have Been the First Pope Of Rome” in TCH 16, and the article on the same topic in this edition.

Now, even if the Popes are wrong in believing that they are Vicars of Christ on earth by virtue of Peter’s mantle, it is still possible that the Catholic is a real Church.  We have examples in the Bible in which the apostles of Jesus Christ were excluded form the very churches that they themselves set up.  This is what Apostle John said in  his first epistle:

 

3Jn 1:9  I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to have the preeminence among them, does not receive us.

3Jn 1:10  Therefore, if I come, I will call to mind his deeds which he does, prating against us with malicious words. And not content with that, he himself does not receive the brethren, and forbids those who wish to, putting them out of the church.

 

Extraordinary, isn’t it?  The Apostle, whom Jesus loved the most, was excluded from a Church of God by one who loved to have preeminnce among the members.  And why would he want to do that?  The Bible tells us why. 

 

Rom 16:16  Greet one another with a holy kiss. The churches of Christ greet you.  Now I urge you,

Rom 16:17  brethren, note those who cause divisions and offenses, contrary to the doctrine which you learned, and avoid them.

Rom 16:18  For those who are such do not serve our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly, and by smooth words and flattering speech deceive the hearts of the simple.

 

Php 3:17  Brethren, join in following my example, and note those who so walk, as you have us for a pattern.   For many walk,

Php 3:18  of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:

Php 3:19  whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame—who set their mind on earthly things.

Php 3:20  For our citizenship is in heaven, from which we also eagerly wait for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,

Php 3:21  who will transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body, according to the working by which He is able even to subdue all things to Himself.

 

Those, whose god is their own belly, who set their minds on eartly things, would do anything to clamour up to the leadership of churches, because that guarantees them a full belly for life. 

Now consider the implications of these statements.  Apostle John, could have turnend around and put the onus on  Diotrepes and his followers to prove that they are a “real” church.  He could simply have said that since only the apostles and the true disciples of Jesus Christ had the authority to baptise and pass on the Holy Spirit, any other congregation would not be a real Church of God.  He could have empowered Gaius, to whom he wrote that epsitle, to take out the genuine believers and form a rival but true Church of God.  The fact that he did not do that, is quite extraordinary and speaks volumes. 

Instead, Apostle John let that wretched Diotrepes remain leader, at least until he arrived, at which time he would “call to mind his deeds which he does”.  He did not even imply that he would put him out of the church, just to give him a good verbal chastening.  Now what does that tell you?  Undoubtedly, Apostle John had the ear of Jesus Christ, for he received the book of Revelation in direct communication with the glorified Christ in heaven.  Therefore, the glorified Christ approved of impostors leading His Churches.  Unless one believes and understands this fact, he cannot understand the mysteries of the book of Revelation, which says so much about today’s churches, including the Catholic Church (See TCH Nos 14 & 15).      

Now far be it for us to suggest that the Pope is an impostor of the like of Diotrepes.  Even if he were, if he is leading a “real” Church of God, no one could complain against him, for he would be approved by Jesus Christ.  What is at stake here, is not the authority, or otherwise, of the Pope, but the definition of a “real” church.  For that we have no other choice but to go to the New Testament and see what the apostles understood by this term, and especially what Jesus Christ called, and expected, of a Church of God.  This may surprise some people, but this is what Jesus Christ said is a Church of God. 

 

Mat 18:19  "Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father

Mat 18:20  in heaven.  For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them."

  

Two or three people gathered in the name of Jesus Christ form a church.  And not just any curch, but a “real” Church of God.  By this definition, the question is, are Protestant congregations “real” churches, or are they not?  First of all, let us define the term, “Protestant”.   Catholic and Orthodox Churches define as “Protestant” any church that does not belong to their camp.  That is not correct.  This is what Macquarie Dictionary says about Protestantism. 

 

Reformation = the religious movement in the 16th century which had for its object the reform of the Roman Catholic Church, and which led to the establishment of the Protestant Churches.

 

There are many churches in the world these days that did not originate in the Protestant Reformation.  They used to be defined by the term, “fundamentalist”, meaning they sought to go back to the fundamentals of the Bible.  They pointed out that although the Protestants had revolted against the excesses of the Popes, and separated from them, they retained almost all of the Catholic doctrines such as going to heaven or to hell after death, Catholic Holy Days, sainthood after death, etc.   

Lately, since the term “fundamentalist” has been identified more and more with Islamic extremists, fundamentalist churches have adopted the term, “evangelical”.  Did the Pope have in mind evangelical churches also when he told the Protestants that their congregations are not “real” churches?  Most likely, yes.  That is just as well, because on a close analysis, there are enough deviations from the standards of the early Churches of God among evangelicals, to make them hardly any better than the Protestant churches.  

This brings us back to the definition of a Church of God according to Jesus Christ and His apostles.  As we saw, Jesus Christ is in the midst of two or three people that are gathered in His name.  You cannot have a clearer definition of what makes a Church of God than that.  Apostle Paul said that Christians are only those who have the Spirit of Christ.      

 

Rom 8:8  So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.   But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit,

Rom 8:9  if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.

Rom 8:10  And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

Rom 8:11  But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

 

The Spirit of Christ is none other than the Holy Spirit.  And how does one get the Holy Spirit? 

 

Act 2:38  Then Peter said to them, "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

 

This creates a real problem.  Apostle Peter was speaking to adult people here.  In asking them to repent, he was telling them to make a turn around in their life, to change from a life of sin and dissipation, to one of holiness and righteousness. 

The problem comes from the fact that neither the Catholic, nor the Orthodox Churches, which the Pope anointed as the only “real” churches, preach and practice adult baptism.  Which means that even if they are ”real” churches according to the Pope’s definition, they do not have the Holy Spirit. And if they do not have the Holy Spirit, they are not Christ’s. And if they are not Christ’s, they go neither to heaven nor to hell, but to everlasting perdition.  The Bible simply does not preach judgment after death, but judgment after resurrection at the last day. 

 

Joh 11:23  Jesus said to her, "Your brother will rise again."

Joh 11:24  Martha said to Him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day."

Joh 11:25  Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live.

Joh 11:26  And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?"

Joh 11:27  She said to Him, "Yes, Lord, I believe that You are the Christ, the Son of God, who is to come into the world."

 

People who have the Holy Spirit, who believe and die “in Christ”, go neither to heaven nor to hell when they die, but are “asleep” in their graves until the resurrection of the last day.  This is true as much of the New, as of the Old Testament.

 

Dan 12:8  Although I heard, I did not understand. Then I said, "My lord, what shall be the end of these things?"