Zealous for God

Thursday, February 17, 2011, 7:07 a.m. – When I woke this morning, this song was playing in my mind:

YOU RAISE ME UP / Brendan Graham / Rolf Lovland

You raise me up, so I can stand on mountains
You raise me up, to walk on stormy seas
I am strong, when I am on your shoulders
You raise me up to more than I can be.

Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. I read Romans 10:

Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. 2 For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. 3 Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. 4 Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes.

5 Moses describes in this way the righteousness that is by the law: “The man who does these things will live by them.” 6 But the righteousness that is by faith says: “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) 7 “or ‘Who will descend into the deep?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? “The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: 9 That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. 11 As the Scripture says, “Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” 12 For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, 13 for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

14 How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? 15 And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”

16 But not all the Israelites accepted the good news. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our message?” 17 Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ. 18 But I ask: Did they not hear? Of course they did:

“Their voice has gone out into all the earth,
their words to the ends of the world.”

19 Again I ask: Did Israel not understand? First, Moses says,

“I will make you envious by those who are not a nation;
I will make you angry by a nation that has no understanding.”

20 And Isaiah boldly says,

“I was found by those who did not seek me;
I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me.”

21 But concerning Israel he says,

“All day long I have held out my hands
to a disobedient and obstinate people.”

My Understanding: I read through this passage of scripture prayerfully before God, seeking his face for understanding of what he wanted to teach me from it today. As I read and as I looked at what this passage of scripture is talking about, I saw six main themes that I believe the Lord would have me to examine this morning.

Zealous for God without Knowledge

Paul, as Saul, had been zealous for God to the point to where he participated in and even led the charge in the persecution, imprisonment and killing of believers in Jesus Christ. He truly believed he was serving God by going against those whom he believed were traitors of the faith of his fathers. His zeal was thus misdirected and he persecuted in ignorance. So, Paul identified with his own people, because he had been where they are/were. Paul, as Saul, thus did what he did because he lacked knowledge and understanding of who Jesus truly was (and is). He was blinded by his ignorance long before Jesus blinded him literally on the road to Damascus where Saul intended to arrest and imprison the followers of Jesus.

The Israelites operated out of the same lack of knowledge of who God is as did Saul/Paul. Their misdirected and misguided zeal for God thus stood as a barrier between them and God to keep them from seeing the truth of who Jesus was and is, and from them believing in Jesus and receiving the truth of the gospel message into their hearts and lives. They operated on the basis of self-righteousness via human effort to gain God’s approval, but to no avail, for they failed to submit to God’s true righteousness that could only be found through genuine faith in Jesus Christ via his death for our sins and his resurrection in which he conquered death, hell, Satan and sin – the penalty of sin and the control and power that sin has over our individual lives on a daily basis. Their attempts to gain God’s approval through human effort only led to self-deception and pride.

The same can happen to us if we try to gain God’s approval through our own human efforts in doing what we feel is right. God is not looking for religious people who do religious activities for God. He doesn’t need our activities and/or our empty rituals. He is not pleased if we attend a church service or a prayer meeting or if we teach a Sunday school class or help in the nursery or whatever we do that we think we are doing for God to please him, if it is being done in the flesh and without regard for having clean hearts and purity of mind and obedient attitudes and actions toward following the Lord Jesus by taking up our crosses daily and following Him.

What God wants from us can be found in Romans 12:1-2, where he implores us, because of what Jesus did for us on the cross, to offer ourselves (our whole being) to God as living sacrifices (humble, submissive and obedient to God’s commands), holy (set apart from the world and set apart for God’s service), acceptable (according to God’s plan of salvation), for this is our reasonable service of worship (true worship is laying our lives on the altar). We are not to be conformed to the pattern of the world (what we see and hear on TV, in movies, in modern music, in teachings of man, and man’s philosophies for how to live life, etc.), but we are to be transformed (changed from one thing to something else entirely) by the renewing (restarting; renovating; and restoring) of our minds, and then, and then only can we prove by our lives what the will of God is, his good, pleasing and perfect will for our lives, which is found in the previous words in these verses.

Confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord”

The Lord brought this scripture to my mind from Matthew 10:32-33:

“Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.”

The KJV uses the word “confess” in place of “acknowledge,” but they mean the same thing. To acknowledge means to admit, recognize, concede and to own as individual and as personal to our lives that Jesus is Lord. Lord means owner, authority over, ruler, king, boss and master of our lives. So, this “confession” is not a mere audible acknowledgement, for it must be preceded by and followed by genuine faith in Jesus Christ. So, this means that we own the fact that Jesus is our Lord and that we confess it by all our words that come out of our mouths which come from what is within our hearts. So, if Jesus is Lord in our hearts, it will come out from our mouths, and that will be the true confession that leads to salvation.

Believe in your heart the resurrection of Jesus Christ

If we look at the word “believe” in the New Testament, we find that is often preceded or followed up by repentance and obedience. Jesus said, “The time has come, the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!” [Mark 1:15 NIV] It makes sense that repentance and obedience are part of believing, because to believe in something means to believe not only intellectually, but to put actions to our words. If I believe that Jesus died on the cross for my sins, that he rose again conquering my sin so that I could be free, not only from the penalty of sin but the control of sin over my life, then why would I continue living a sinful lifestyle? It would mean that I didn’t truly believe that Jesus died so that I could go free, for if I believed, why would I refuse this freedom? So, to believe means to act upon what Jesus did for me by turning from my sin and turning to God in obedience - in following him and his commands and to do whatever he requires of me. That is true faith.

Call on the Name of the Lord

A person’s name used to mean something. If I sign my name to something, I am putting my stamp of approval on what I signed, saying I agree to the terms written on that piece of paper, and hopefully I read it before I signed it so that I know what I agreed to. A person’s name on something thus means that person agrees to the terms of the contract. A name also used to say something about who the person is and their character, which goes along with the idea of a name meaning approving or agreeing with something, because if I sign my name to something, I am saying that who I am and my character gives approval and agreement to what I have signed. So, when we call on the name of the Lord, it is so much more than just saying his name or uttering a prayer of desperation in a moment of crisis.

To call on the name of someone is to make a request for that person to come, to communicate with you, to make a declaration of something, to decide something, to appeal to someone about something, etc. (ref: Encarta). To call on the name of Jesus thus is to make a request, to declare as true, to make a decision about, to appeal to him on the basis of, and to invite two-way communication with regard to his character, his righteousness, his justice, his mercy and grace, and his provision of salvation from sin. It is an acknowledgement and a confession and an agreement with the terms of the new covenant which God so graciously provided us through Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins so that we could go free. So, to call on his name means to request from him what he stands for, to declare it as truth, to agree with him in what he says about our sin and his righteousness, to make an appeal to his provision of salvation via his grace through our faith and to invite him into our lives in a two-way relationship that involves communication and fellowship on a daily basis.

How beautiful are the Feet…

Jesus told his disciples that when the Holy Spirit was to come upon them that they would be witnesses. He did not tell them that they should be witnesses, but that they would be. This is because when we are truly saved and we truly have the Holy Spirit within us working in and through us, the Holy Spirit of God will be revealed through our lives in our actions and in our words (all of them) and will be a witness either for or against the Lord depending upon how we conduct our lives and how we speak and what we say. Jesus also told his disciples, his followers, that after he left they were to go into all the world and make disciples of all nations. To make a disciple means we have to teach others how to follow Jesus Christ. We do this by our lives, because actions speak louder than words, but we also do this by the words we say, and through deliberate sharing of the gospel message and deliberately teaching followers of Jesus how to live for God, how to forsake the ways of this world and their sinful lifestyles, and how to walk in faith, submission and obedience to God.

Not all accepted the Good News

When we share the Good News with other people, not everyone is going to accept the message. And, we need to not let that discourage us. There are varied reasons people will reject Jesus or will reject what the Bible teaches concerning what it means to truly believe in Jesus, yet we must still give out the gospel message, because they can’t believe if they don’t hear, and they can’t hear unless we are sent by God. I believe all believers in Jesus have been sent by God to share the gospel, yet not all go in the Spirit, which is the true meaning of being sent. When we are truly sent by God, we acknowledge that we are operating under God’s direction and his authority over our lives and that our message does not originate with us but is given to us by the one who sent us, Jesus Christ. This is very critical that we understand this before we go out and share the gospel.

Then, when we face resistance, as we will if we are truly sharing the truth of the gospel, then we don’t have to take it personally when people reject the message, because it is God they are rejecting, not us. Yet, even though God knows that people will reject the message, because they are rejecting Jesus Christ, still he commands us to go so that everyone will hear and will have the opportunity to believe, although he may often send us to a disobedient and obstinate people who refuse to believe. Our job is just to obey and go. It is God’s job to convict and to draw men to him; to Jesus Christ. So, let us go in the strength of the Lord and tell all men and women how they might, too, be saved.

Sources: You Raise Me Up - http://www.thestraitgate.org/music/you-raise-me-up-selah/
Romans 10 - http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans%2010&version=NIV1984

The Potato Salad was Overflowing

Wednesday, February 16, 2011, 6:39 a.m. – I woke this morning from a dream.

THE DREAM: I was working someplace where I had to try to keep containers (like cattle stalls) from overflowing after or while the particles that were being unloaded into the containers were being unloaded. In this case, potato salad was being dumped into these stalls from the north, and the potato salad flowed downhill toward the south. The stalls sat side-by-side west to east.

The potato salad was coming fast and furious into some of these stalls, so I had to work hard to try to keep the stalls from overflowing with the salad, but to no avail because the potato salad was coming at a very fast rate and I could not work fast enough to keep the stalls from overflowing. The potato salad began to overflow from several of these containers (stalls) – mainly from the one in the west first, and then flowing downstream toward the stalls in the east.

I know that I ended up to the east of the last stall trying to contain this overflow of potato salad. I had a cut on my leg. I was concerned about the potato salad getting into the cut and infecting my leg. A little later I looked at my leg again, and the wound was closed. END

Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. I read Romans 9:1-29:

God’s Sovereign Choice
1 I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it in the Holy Spirit— 2I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 3 For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, 4 the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. 5 Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.

6 It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” 8 In other words, it is not the natural children who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring. 9 For this was how the promise was stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.”

10 Not only that, but Rebekah’s children had one and the same father, our father Isaac. 11 Yet, before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad—in order that God’s purpose in election might stand: 12 not by works but by him who calls—she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” 13 Just as it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

14 What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Not at all! 15 For he says to Moses,

“I will have mercy on whom I have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”

16 It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” 18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.

19 One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?” 20 But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?

22 What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction? 23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory— 24 even us, whom he also called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles?

… 27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel:

“Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea,
only the remnant will be saved.
28 For the Lord will carry out
his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”

29 It is just as Isaiah said previously:

“Unless the Lord Almighty
had left us descendants,
we would have become like Sodom,
we would have been like Gomorrah.”

My Understanding: Potato salad mainly consists of cut up potatoes, mixed together with mayonnaise, though other ingredients might be added for flavoring. I wanted to understand the symbolism behind the reference to potato salad in this dream, so I looked up the meaning of potato, salad, and mayonnaise (the sauce that holds it together).

Potato - a rounded white tuber cooked in a variety of ways as a vegetable; a perennial plant that produces potatoes underground. Native to: South America. A tuber - a fleshy swollen part of a root such as a dahlia root or of an underground stem such as a potato that stores food over winter and produces new growth in spring; a small raised area or swelling on the body. White – “having the color of fresh snow or milk, as a result of the reflection of nearly all light from visible wavelengths; unmarked – not written on or printed on; pure – unblemished, especially in character” (Encarta). Salad – “a cold dish consisting mainly of a mixture of raw vegetables, whole, sliced, chopped, or in pieces, usually served with a dressing for flavor” (Encarta). Mayonnaise – “a rich creamy sauce or dressing made from egg yolks, vegetable oil, and flavorings” (Encarta).

What I saw from this is that this represents the underground church movement of believers in Jesus Christ who are committed to the spreading (swelling) of the true gospel message of salvation from sin through faith in Jesus Christ, and who are devoted to obedience to Jesus Christ and to living in purity before Almighty God. They are being represented as pieces of potatoes because potatoes are white inside and they are roots, symbolizing a root of righteousness and purity, because their faith is rooted in Jesus Christ, and also because Jesus is the root and we are the pieces (parts of His body).

The potato pieces (parts of the body of Christ) reflect the light of the gospel and Jesus Christ, who is the Light. They are unmarked by the world and the world’s system and they are pure of character because they have Jesus Christ living within them and working out through them. I believe specifically the Lord is pointing to Mexico – potatoes are native to South America - (news article referenced below) and also to the Middle East. Someone (represented by me in the dream – Obama/US Government/N.W.O.) is trying to contain them and to keep them from swelling and overflowing with the gospel message and infecting the open wound (perhaps sin) on my (USA) leg (part of an organization).

I also see that these pieces (parts of the body) are cut up – sliced into pieces through persecution or through death of the parts, and in this case this represents body parts being dumped underground into these cattle stalls (containers). The swelling of the body would thus be actual physical bloating of dead (cold as in cold salad) bodies, and that the containment here is either that physically the bodies (the dead) are outgrowing the containers and that there is danger of them being found or of spreading disease, or this is speaking more metaphorically of a containment of the news of the dead and the reality of why they are being killed from spreading, which fits possibly with the Mexico news article.

I see the mayonnaise as the cover story that holds this salad together and that keeps the truth contained. It is white, so it has an appearance of truth, purity and righteousness, yet it is just a smooth disguise for what our government and the N.W.O. are really doing world-wide in killing innocent civilians and innocent soldiers, too. The covering for the killings in Mexico is drugs (white), and the cover for the killings in the Middle East is protestors against pro-government demonstrators in multiple countries in the Middle East.

I read a news article (referenced below) presenting a case that states that Obama and the GOP are on opposing ends of a discussion over a proposed bill in Congress. The bill, supposedly, is for a new fighter jet engine and Obama supposedly is against it. The lawmakers must decide whether to vote for the engine or vote with Obama on immediate spending cuts. Apparently the GOP is for spending cuts to domestic programs, et al. and Obama is against these sharp cuts which he considers unwise cuts. What the Lord has shown me consistently is that there is no difference between Democrat and Republican; Liberal and Conservative, and that the real power behind our government is the New World Order and that the true governing body is the U.N. Security Council, not Congress.

I believe the Lord is showing me that the cuts that both Obama and Boehner support are these cuts of potato in the potato salad, i.e. chopping up the underground church, i.e. they are for attacking them and killing them in order to prevent the spread of the gospel and the increase of converts to Christianity (true saints of God). As well, the containment of the potato salad inside these cattle stalls was for the containment, I believe, of the news stories of the these people being killed, and the reason why they were killed, from spreading and for it infecting the open wound (cut) of a distinct part of an organization (U.S.).

In the Mexico article, I read that a U.S. Immigration agent was killed and another was wounded, supposedly as a result of drug wars in Mexico. Their vehicle was attacked by gunmen. It appeared, according to the article, as though the vehicle may have been stopped at a military checkpoint, which could also fit with these cattle stalls and the cut up pieces of potatoes into the “potato salad,” covered with mayonnaise (the disguise) to give it flavor (an appearance of something else) and to hold the story together. The closing of the American consulate in Ciudad Juarez was mentioned. In the dream, there was an open wound on my leg (a branch or unit of an organization), which would fit with American consulates or embassies in other nations, and at the end of the dream, the wound was closed.

This passage in Romans 9 is a very difficult passage to interpret, so I am going to just look at what I believe applies to this dream. Paul had unceasing anguish of heart for the sake of his brothers of his own race who had rejected Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. He wished he could be cut off from Christ if it meant their salvation. In a sense, I believe that is what is happening in these “cuts” of these potatoes in my dream, not that they are cut off from Christ, but their lives are being cut off because of their faith in Jesus Christ and due to their unceasing anguish of heart over their family (fellow countrymen) who don’t know Jesus Christ, which is evidenced by their strong commitment to spread the gospel message even knowing that they might be killed for their faith and for the sharing of the gospel.

Paul let his Jewish brothers know that just because they were born Jews and were descendants of Abraham that didn’t mean they were God’s children, because God’s children now are those who have put their faith and trust in God’s only Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. This applies to those who call themselves Christians, too. Just because their parents were Christians or they were brought up in the church, or even though they may have prayed a prayer to receive Jesus Christ as Savior does not mean they are truly Christians, i.e. saints of Almighty God. We cannot attain salvation through our physical heritage, by attending “church”, or by following a set of religious rules or even by going through a religious exercise called the sinner’s prayer, if the prayer is not followed by genuine faith, which is proved by repentance and obedience to Almighty God. Empty rituals do not bring about salvation. We are saved by grace, through faith, not of ourselves, it is a gift of God lest anyone should boast, yet faith that is genuine faith = repentance and obedience.

Lastly, I am no theologian so I am not going to go into great detail to explain this passage, plus I am not God nor do I pretend to completely understand all that he is or does, but yet I love Him with all my heart, and I trust him even when I don’t understand. He is God and he doesn’t have to answer to me for the things that he does. I do know that elsewhere in scripture it says that he is slow to anger and abounding in love and compassion and that he is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance. I know he is all knowing, all powerful and he is present everywhere. And, I know that he is just. Because he loves us and because he wants us to obey him, and because he is God and he is righteous and he is just, he must judge us. And, I believe that he is judging the world right now and that those objects of his wrath are coming against his children with great fury, as Revelation prophesied would happen in the last days (See Rev. 12-13). Yet, a remnant of his objects of mercy will be saved through judgment, I believe, and they are being attacked right now.

So, what should our response be to all of this? We need to make sure of our salvation. We need to be certain we are not relying upon our parents, our race, our family, our church background, our religious rituals, possibly an empty prayer, etc. to secure our salvation. We must come to Jesus Christ humbly, turning from our sin completely and turning the exact opposition direction in full submission and surrender to God and to obedience to his commands. Then, when what is going on in the rest of the world reaches us and we are being affected, we will not die in our sin, but we will die as part of that remnant who is being saved and who will one day be with our Lord Jesus Christ forever in glory. Amen!

Sources: F-35 engine battle breaks out on GOP spending bill - http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_CONGRESS_SPENDING?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-02-16-07-11-05
Gunmen kill US agent, wound another, in Mexico - http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LT_MEXICO_ICE_AGENTS_SHOT?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2011-02-16-06-31-01
Bible Gateway - http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans%209&version=NIV1984

About Midnight

Tuesday, February 15, 2011, 12:07 a.m. – I woke up from a sound sleep about midnight with the song “Abide with Me” going through my mind. I tried to fall back asleep, but my body was having one of those rare hot flash moments where I could not get comfortable, so I got out of bed to hear from the Lord. I prayed, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening,” and then I read Romans 8:18-39:

Future Glory
18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. 19 The creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed. 20 For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? 25 But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God’s will.

More Than Conquerors
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

31 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

My Understanding: In summarizing the first seventeen verses of Romans 8, for the purpose of context, it must be understood that verses 18-39 are thus applied to those who:

• are in Christ Jesus
• the law of the Spirit of life set us free from the law of sin and death
• do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit
• are not controlled by the sinful nature but by the Spirit
• (whose) body is dead because of sin, yet whose spirit is alive because of righteousness
• by the Spirit put to death the misdeeds of the body
• led by the Spirit of God
• are not slaves to fear

The Midnight Hour is often a phrase used to depict the time when Jesus will return for his bride, but also it is a time when he will judge and will separate those who are ready to meet him from those who are not ready (See Matthew 25, The Parable of the Ten Virgins).

“At midnight the cry rang out: ‘Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!’”

Half of the virgins were ready with their oil lamps full, but the other half were not ready when the bridegroom returned. The virgins who were ready for his return went with him to the wedding banquet and then the door was shut. Those who were not ready came to the door and asked to be let inside, but the Lord told them that he never knew them. Obviously, they were under the impression that God did know them, but he did not.

“Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour.”

I believe the Lord is giving me a picture here that it is “about midnight,” so we need to wake up from our deep slumber, and we need to have our oil lamps full and ready to meet our bridegroom so that we can go with him to the wedding banquet when he returns. And, this second half of Romans 8 speaks much of this subject of Jesus’ return and what it will be like until he does come back for his bride.

For one thing, while we are still on this earth and in these fleshly bodies, we will face suffering of many kinds – physical pain and ailments; heartache; sorrow; friends and loved ones who will fail us and/or who will reject and/or mistreat us; dampening of or injury to our spirits (emotions); life’s changes (my hot flash symbolizing those changes in the seasons of life); decay; wickedness prevailing; temptation from the enemy of our souls; clouds of life that bring with them gloom and despair; death; pains of childbirth; our weaknesses (physically and emotionally); false accusations against us; trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger or sword; and being considered as sheep to be slaughtered, i.e. facing the reality of possibly being martyred for our faith in Jesus Christ.

Yet, in all of this, we are to consider that our present sufferings, when weighed on balance scales, are light in value or importance compared to what we will yet experience in eternity with God in heaven when we will be liberated from these earthly bodies and we will no longer experience this kind of suffering, as mentioned above. In other words, we can endure these sufferings in this life by the grace of God as we look forward with great expectation to the return of our Lord and the completion of our salvation. The Bible says about Jesus, “… who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame.” Jesus was able to endure all that he suffered because he was looking forward to the joy of our salvation that he was providing for us on the cross via him taking upon himself all our sins, thus crucifying them along with him and then burying them in the grave, then rising again, conquering death, hell, Satan and sin, so that we could go free. In a sense, when we suffer in these earthly bodies, they are for the purpose of helping us to die to our sins, to humble us, and to draw us closer to God in full assurance of faith, so that we can look forward with joy.

This time just prior to the Lord’s return is often referred to in scripture as a time of birth pains, which is symbolic of a time of great suffering and pain, yet with the anticipation of the joy of the birth of a child. The scriptures use it metaphorically to describe what must take place while we are still in these earthly bodies as we look forward - like sitting on the edges of our seats - with great expectation to our Lord’s return when our salvation will be complete. We, in this passage of scripture, are described as those who have the “firstfruits of the Spirit.” For those of us who never lived on a farm or who did not grow up in Old Testament times, this might be a difficult concept. The “firstfruits” were the first elements of grain and fruit to be reaped in the harvest, which the Israelites were commanded to give to the Lord as an offering. This was for the purpose of acknowledging that the harvest was a provision of God but it was also to solidify that the Israelites understood that the harvest belonged to God. In a spiritual sense, with regard to the firstfruits of the Spirit within us, this is speaking of us having begun our relationship with Jesus Christ but is also showing awareness that this is only the beginning and there is so much more to come.

So many people think of salvation as a onetime experience where one prays a prayer of salvation, he or she is saved, then one day, when he or she dies, he or she gets to go to heaven. I heard a sermon on this once where the pastor described this kind of theology as a save ‘em and shoot ‘em mentality, i.e. if that is all there is to salvation while we are still on this earth, then why not get people saved, shoot them and send them to heaven. No, there is so much, much more, which is why the term “firstfruits of the Spirit” is used to indicate that this is just the beginning, but there is more fruit to come and the harvest will not be complete until Jesus returns. The Bible refers to salvation in three ways: 1) We are saved, 2) We are being saved, and 3) We will be saved. Salvation is a process, not a onetime experience, and included in that process is suffering, but also much, much joy!

Once we have the “firstfruits of the Spirit” within us, the rest of the harvest can begin to come in to our lives through our daily walks of fellowship and obedience to our Lord. We don’t have to do this on our own, and we certainly cannot do this in the weakness of our own flesh. So, it is comforting for us to know that the Spirit helps us in our weakness. He even helps us when we don’t know what to pray for or how to pray specifically for someone or something in any given situation. There have been many times when I have just asked the Holy Spirit to intercede for me in prayer, because I didn’t know what to say, but he does. It is so nice to know, that even if no one else is praying for us, the Spirit of God is! Amen! And, he does this in accordance with God’s will, not our human wills and desires.

In all the things we go through in this life, though, for those of us who are in Christ Jesus, who love Jesus - as is evidenced by our obedience and repentance - we can have this hope that God will work out all the situations of our lives for our good, i.e. for what is best for us to help us to mature and to become more and more like Jesus. Part of our suffering in this life involves having people against us, yet we can have hope even in the greatest of suffering in knowing that the Spirit of God is always interceding for us, that nothing can separate us - those who love God - from his love, and that in all these things we can be conquerors through him (Father, Son & Holy Spirit) who loved (and loves) us. The key to this kind of promise is that we first of all have the Spirit of God within us through faith in Jesus Christ, that we love God (shown by our repentance and obedience), that we are not walking according to the sinful nature any longer, satisfying its cravings and desires, but that we are walking according to the Spirit of God and the teachings of scripture, spending time at Jesus’ feet each day, listening and then obeying, and that we are being led by the Spirit of God and are choosing to walk in obedience to God’s commands. This is how we have our lamps full with oil so that when Jesus returns, we are ready to meet him.

Abide With Me / Henry F. Lyte / William H. Monk

Abide with me; fast falls the eventide;
The darkness deepens; Lord with me abide.
When other helpers fail and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, O abide with me.

Swift to its close ebbs out life’s little day;
Earth’s joys grow dim; its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see;
O Thou who changest not, abide with me.

I need Thy presence every passing hour.
What but Thy grace can foil the tempter’s power?
Who, like Thyself, my guide and stay can be?
Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.

I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless;
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness.
Where is death’s sting? Where, grave, thy victory?
I triumph still, if Thou abide with me.

Hold Thou Thy cross before my closing eyes;
Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies.
Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee;
In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.

Geronimo

Monday, February 14, 2011, 3:56 p.m. – The Lord gave me a vision.

THE VISION: I saw soldiers in camouflage with square backpacks on their backs being loaded on to a bus. The soldiers began to step on to the bus one at a time, and then they began to be pushed and shoved and trampled over and then I saw hundreds and maybe thousands of soldiers in blue and grey being dumped by the load full into what appeared to be the baggage compartment underneath the bus’ passenger compartment above.

Then, I saw a group of soldiers standing around in a circle with their arms and hands extended toward one another and with their hands one on top of the other in an “all for one and one for all” posture. Then, I saw soldiers who appeared to be praying, and then I saw these soldiers being shot execution style in the back of their heads.

Following this I heard “Geronimo” and then saw an explosion and bloody body parts flying everywhere. This was breaking my heart – all of it – as I felt the Lord was showing me what is going on in other nations in the world, yet with our own US soldiers, too. The dream ended with a pick ax being swung into what appeared to be cement. END

Geronimo - (Military) US a shout given by paratroopers as they jump into battle. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Geronimo

Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. I read Romans 7:

An Illustration From Marriage
1 Do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to men who know the law—that the law has authority over a man only as long as he lives? 2 For example, by law a married woman is bound to her husband as long as he is alive, but if her husband dies, she is released from the law of marriage. 3 So then, if she marries another man while her husband is still alive, she is called an adulteress. But if her husband dies, she is released from that law and is not an adulteress, even though she marries another man.

4 So, my brothers, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God. 5 For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death. 6 But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code.

Struggling With Sin
7 What shall we say, then? Is the law sin? Certainly not! Indeed I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, “Do not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead. 9 Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. 10 I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death. 11 For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death. 12 So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good.

13 Did that which is good, then, become death to me? By no means! But in order that sin might be recognized as sin, it produced death in me through what was good, so that through the commandment sin might become utterly sinful.

14 We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. 15 I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16 And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. 17 As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. 18 I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. 19 For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

21 So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. 22 For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.

My Understanding: As I considered the reality of all of this the Lord was showing me in this vision, it overwhelmed me. All I could think about is how I was sitting in the comforts of a modest home in the USA, by USA standards, with warm blankets for when I was cold, central heating, plenty of food, clothing, a roof over my head, etc., while men and women throughout the world were being killed by the thousands and perhaps the hundreds of thousands. I saw the thousands of soldiers being dumped into this baggage compartment underneath this bus as some wearing blue and some wearing gray uniforms. This was a reference, I learned, to the two sides of the war in America, which we call the Civil War, but which was really a revolutionary war prompted by the government in order to protect the union of the states so that none could secede from the union. A similar war is going on now worldwide, but both the blues and the grays are being dumped. And, the union is a global one, i.e. we call it the New World Order.

I read the news, which was mainly about the unrest in the Middle East, but affects some refugees from Africa, as well, who are apparently trapped inside Egypt. Countries in the Middle East being impacted by this civil unrest and demonstrations are Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, Yemen, Jordan, Bahrain, etc. The news stories paint the situations in these countries as a cry of the people for democracy and for reform in their governments, and yet the Lord has been revealing to me, his servant, that these demonstrations are staged and/or are instigated by the New World Order in order to take down these governments of these nations and to make them part of the union of the global order of nations, by force if they must, and through many deaths, if necessary, in order to accomplish the goals of the New World Order in conquering the world so that there can be truly a one world rule.

I believe the Lord has been showing me that the Obama administration and at least some members of Congress, as well, are party to this takeover worldwide, and that they are willing to make the necessary sacrifices of human life in order to gain control of the governments and nations of the world and to bring them under a global order. So, Obama’s true goal in being our president, I believe the Lord has shown me, is to facilitate the rising of this global order of rule, and to help facilitate the suppression and even the deaths of believers in Jesus Christ or anyone who stands in the way of this rule of order coming to fruition. These are some of the difficult decisions and sacrifices that must be made in his term of office as president of the USA in order that the Global Order (the union) will be preserved, much like Lincoln’s mission was the preservation of the union even at the cost of thousands of human lives, both blue and gray.

I saw the soldiers in this circle in my vision with the “all for one and one for all” stance and position as this global order that brings all nations together into one, and all religions together into one religion, and that punishes those who believe that Jesus Christ is the only Messiah and the only way to God the Father. I believe the Lord has been showing me for some time that our NATO soldiers (international) are killing their own who take a strong belief in Jesus Christ as the only way, truth and life and who are not willing to compromise their faith in order to be more tolerant and unified in religion with the New World Order of government. The news from the Middle East mentions thousands and tens of thousands of people supposedly involved in these protests who are being attacked by law enforcement officials via various weapons of choice. So, I believe these thousands represent the thousands of blues and grays that were being dumped underneath this bus in my vision.

There is a sense in the news that the new order at large is largely a military order not unlike that of Hitler’s regime with his SS and his Gestapo, which I see as like the Sanhedrin of the Bible or a ruling council that decides who dies and who gets to live. And, it appears, from what I believe the Lord has been showing me, that Christians (true believers in Jesus) are being targeted for extinction or for reprogramming, and one day soon it will come to America, too. We will not be spared this injustice for long.

So, this is a wakeup call, I believe, from God to get our lives right with the Lord while we still have today. For those of us who claim Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, we need to understand that when we received Jesus as Lord of our lives that we died to that old law of sin and death so that we might belong to Jesus and so that we can bear fruit for God. Jesus came to set us free, but not free to continue in our sin. He set us free so that we would no longer be bound by or be controlled by sin so that we could serve him in the new way of the Spirit. Paul explains in this passage of scripture that in our sinful human and fleshly natures we cannot do what pleases God because we will continually end up doing what we don’t want to do or what we know we should not do. The only way we can live lives pleasing to God and free from the bondage to and the control of sin over our lives is through the inner working of the power of the Holy Spirit within us, which Paul explains in chapter 8:5-10:

“Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires… Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.

“You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.”

So, we need to make sure that we are not living according to the sinful nature, but that we are living in accordance with the Spirit of God so that we have our minds set on what the Spirit desires. Time is short. Please pray through what I have shared here, and please inquire of the Lord as to what is really going on in our country and these other countries in the world so that we are not deceived and we are not led into the devil’s trap to do his will.

What Enslaves Us?

Monday, February 14, 2011, 8:05 a.m. – When I got up this morning, and I sat down to have my quiet time with the Lord, he placed this song in my mind:

Search me, O God / James E. Orr 1936

Search me, O God, and know my heart today,
Try me, O Savior, know my thoughts, I pray;
See if there be some wicked way in me;
Cleanse me from every sin, and set me free.

I praise Thee, Lord, for cleansing me from sin;
Fulfill Thy word and make me pure within;
Fill me with fire, where once I burned with shame;
Grant my desire to magnify Thy name.

Lord, take my life, and make it wholly Thine;
Fill my poor heart with Thy great love divine;
Take all my will, my passion, self and pride;
I now surrender, Lord, in me abide.

O Holy Ghost, revival comes from Thee;
Send a revival, start the work in me;
Thy Word declares Thou wilt supply our need;
For blessings now, O Lord, I humbly plead.

“Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. Rebuke, correct, encourage and train me in righteousness for your name’s sake. In Jesus’ name I pray these things, amen.” I read Romans 6:1-14 for my quiet time with the Lord today:

Dead to Sin, Alive in Christ
1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

5 If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.

8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.

11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. 14 For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace…

My Understanding: I believe the Lord would have me use the stanzas to this song as a kind of outline to provide for me four basic areas addressed in this passage of scripture, and then to discuss the practical application of each one to our (me, too) lives today.

Soul Searching – The premise of this song is based off of Psalm 139:23-24:

Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting.

The Psalmist had just finished describing how God knows everything about us. There is nowhere we can go to hide from God, for wherever we go, God is there, and he sees everything we do, he hears everything we say, he knows every thought we think even before the words come on our tongues. There is nothing hidden from God. Then, the Psalmist goes on to describe how God is the one who knits us together in the wombs of our mothers and how he has a plan and a divine purpose for each and every one of our lives. So, God is the only one who truly knows our hearts, our minds, our thoughts, our desires, etc. He knows us better than we know ourselves, because our hearts can be deceitful and we can fool ourselves into believing things about ourselves that are not true. So, that is why we must ask God regularly to search our hearts to see if there is any offensive or wicked way within us that he needs his cleansing power and his renewal in our lives.

This passage of scripture begins with three basic questions that are soul searching questions: 1) Should we go on sinning that God’s grace may increase? 2) No! How can we live in it any longer? And 3) Don’t we know that when we were baptized into Christ Jesus we were baptized into his death? These are good thought-provoking and soul searching questions to regularly ask ourselves. Are we continuing in sin because we feel as though God’s grace will just keep coming? So many believers in Jesus Christ take sin lightly because they feel that they are covered by God’s grace. May that never be that we should take such a casual view of sin just because we have such a gracious and loving God who is slow to anger and abounding in love and compassion. Should we take advantage of this grace? How can we continue in sin after God did all he did to see that we could go free? Don’t we understand that faith in Jesus Christ means dying to sin and to our old lives?

Purifying Process - When we receive Jesus as Lord and Savior of our lives, it means being baptized into his death, i.e. having our old sin nature crucified on the cross, having it buried in the grave where it remains, then having been raised with Christ to a new life, not a “cleaned-up” version of our old lives. It means turning from our old lives of sin and walking in faith and obedience to Jesus Christ, taking up our cross daily, having our all on the altar, and being fully surrendered and committed to Jesus Christ. It means coming before the Lord daily and asking him to search our hearts so that we know what wicked ways exist in our lives so that we can confess, repent and be renewed in the Spirit. Then, when the old is gone, the Holy Spirit of God can fill us to overflowing with his presence, his power, his love, his passion and his desires for our lives so that our lives and the words we speak are like a torch on fire for the Lord that shines brightly for him for his purposes and for his glory.

This passage of scripture compares the life of sin to a life of slavery, and the life of freedom in Christ as also a life of slavery. One life is a life of slavery (bondservant) to sin in which sin reigns (rules; has dominion; controls; influences strongly; dominates; governs; and has power) in our mortal bodies so that we obey its evil desires, offering our bodies to sin as instruments of wickedness. The other life is a life of slavery to righteousness in which we offer ourselves to Almighty God to serve him as instruments of righteousness (being blameless before God) and where sin is no longer our master because we are under grace. So many people use God’s grace as an excuse to remain enslaved to sin, and this should never be. This makes a mockery of what Jesus did for us in dying for our sins so that we could go free. Instead, we need to be living sacrifices to God, holy and pleasing to him.

Sacrificial Life – The song writer asks the Lord to take his life and to make it wholly God’s. This means that no part of our lives are our own to do with as we choose while reserving a section of our lives for God and for God’s service. We cannot and should not compartmentalize our lives into the secular and the sacred, but rather our lives should be sacred - fully committed to, fully owned by, and fully obedient to our Lord Jesus Christ, without reservation, holding nothing back for ourselves. The song writer continued by asking the Lord to remove from him all his selfish will, his self-centered passions and desires and his pride, and to replace them with God’s love and his fire and passion for doing what God requires of us to do and what he purposed for our lives even before we were thought of by our parents. We are to consider our old lives dead and buried never to rise again and we are to consider ourselves now alive in Christ Jesus, fully surrendered to him and to his will for our lives. Instead of planning out our days and doing what we want, we should inquire of the Lord as to what he would have us to do, and then we should obey him.

Reviving the Heart – To “revive” means to come back (from the dead) to life. This is speaking of someone who was alive, but has died, and now must be brought back to life. So, this is not speaking of those outside of Christ Jesus who have never come to life in Christ, but rather this is referring to those who once were alive in Christ, but their commitments to obey their Lord in all things, their hearts’ desires to serve the Lord, their determinations to consider themselves dead to sin but alive to God slowly but surely ebbed away through disobedience and through neglect until they became non-existent or simmering on low heat on a burner with the flame barely lit and visible for others to see. So, they must be brought back to life; they must be revived. And, this happens through repetitive pressure applied to the heart, and the breath of life being blown into their bodies by force in order to get them to breathe and for their hearts to beat once more. And, that is what it often takes to get those who have once been alive in Christ but have allowed their passion for the Lord to die a slow, painful death, to come back to life.

The writer of the song asked the Lord to begin this work of revival in his own life. I pray that with him daily for my life that God will search my heart and that he will point out to me any areas of my life, unknown to me, where I am not walking in obedience to him and where I am allowing sin to reign (rule) in my body so that I obey its evil desires. I ask this so that I may repent and so that I may continue to walk in faith and obedience and to be an instrument of his righteousness in the lives of others for his glory, honor and praise.

Vv. 15-23 (not quoted here) say that when we offer ourselves to sin that we are offering ourselves as slaves to obey its lusts and desires and so we become slaves to the one we obey – whether we are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness. Then, the passage says this: “When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness.” This is profound! We can’t be slaves to both sin and righteousness, as they are counterproductive. We must choose one or the other to be our master. If we are still being led and controlled by sin, then we are free from the control of righteousness. They cannot and should not co-exist. Yet, so many try to blend the two together as though they are compatible, but the one will always contradict the other. So, we must choose to be free from the control of sin so that we can be slaves to righteousness.

Against All Hope

Saturday, February 12, 2011, 8:13 p.m. – I was sitting here at my computer in the stillness of the evening reading all my messages from people. Then, the Lord brought this song into my mind, and I began singing it back to him in prayer:

More Love To Thee, O Christ / Prentiss / Doane

More love to Thee, O Christ, more love to Thee!
Hear Thou the prayer I make on bended knee.
This is my earnest plea: More love, O Christ, to Thee;
More love to Thee, more love to Thee!

Once earthly joy I craved, sought peace and rest;
Now Thee alone I seek, give what is best.
This all my prayer shall be: More love, O Christ to Thee;
More love to Thee, more love to Thee!

Let sorrow do its work, send grief and pain;
Sweet are Thy messengers, sweet their refrain,
When they can sing with me: More love, O Christ, to Thee;
More love to Thee, more love to Thee!

Then shall my latest breath whisper Thy praise;
This be the parting cry my heart shall raise;
This still its prayer shall be: More love, O Christ to Thee;
More love to Thee, more love to Thee!

Speak, Lord, your words to my heart for your servant is listening. In Jesus’ name I pray, amen. I read Romans 4:18-25:

Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” 19 Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. 20 Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, 21 being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. 22 This is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” 23 The words “it was credited to him” were written not for him alone, 24 but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. 25 He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.

My Understanding: When Abraham (then he was called Abram) was 75 years old, God called him to leave his country and his people and to go to the land that God would show him. Then, God promised to make him into a great nation and that he would bless him and would make his name great. So, Abraham did what God told him to do. A little while later, the LORD God visited Abraham again and he told him to lift up his eyes from where he was standing and to look in every direction. Then God told him that all the land that he saw, God was going to give it to him and to his offspring (Abraham was childless then). God said he would make Abraham’s offspring like the “dust of the earth,” referring to the number of descendants that Abraham would have. He then told him to walk the length and the breadth of the land that God was giving to him and to his offspring. Abraham then obeyed God.

Sometime later, God visited Abraham in a vision. At this time, God told Abraham that he was going to have a son coming from his own body who would be his heir, i.e. he told him this because Abraham thought that his servant would be his heir since he was childless. Then, God told Abraham to look at the stars in the heavens and to count them, if he could, because his offspring would be as countless as the stars. This is where the scripture says that “Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness” (Gen. 15:6).

About ten years passed between the time God first visited Abraham and told him that he was going to make him into a great nation. During that time, God promised him the land, he promised him offspring as countless as the dust of the earth and the stars in the heavens, and he told him specifically that he would have a son that would come from his own flesh. In those ten years, Abraham and Sarah had no children. So, one day, Sarah approached Abraham and offered her maidservant to Abraham to be his wife and to bear him children. Abraham agreed, Hagar became his wife and bore him a son, Ishmael.

Another thirteen years passed after Ishmael was born to Abraham and Hagar. Abraham was now 99 years old. The LORD appeared to Abraham again and said, “I am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers” (Gen. 17:1-2). God then gave instructions to Abraham concerning his covenant with Abraham and his descendants, the sign of which was to be circumcision. And then God spoke to Abraham about Sarah: “I will bless her and will surely give you a son by her. I will bless her so that she will be the mother of nations; kings of peoples will come from her… Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac” (Gen. 17:16, 19).

So, Abraham, at the age of 100, and Sarah, at the age of 90, gave birth to their son, Isaac. Isaac had a son named Jacob, who was later named Israel, and through him came what we know to be the nation of Israel, then Jesus Christ, and then spiritual Israel - the true church, the Body of Christ - his new covenant people. So, spiritual Israel, i.e. true believers in Jesus Christ, is now God’s chosen and kingdom people and the only ones to inherit the promise of eternal life in heaven with God.

That history should help us to better understand the passage in Romans 4 concerning how Abraham, against all hope, believed God, and so became the father of many nations, including Gentile nations. This passage says that Abraham 1) did not weaken in his faith, even though he and his wife, Sarah, were past childbearing age; 2) he did not waver through unbelief concerning the promises of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God; and 3) he was fully persuaded that God had the power to do what he had promised. And, this is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.”

Ok, this is an interesting statement about a man who, ten years after God promised him a son from his own body, took his wife’s advice and took Hagar as his wife and had a son with her. The scriptures also record that Abraham, when told another thirteen years later that Sarah was to have a son, laughed to himself and asked if a man a hundred years old and a woman ninety years old could have a son. I have heard many sermons on this story of Abraham over the years that depicted that Abraham took matters into his own hands because he didn’t trust God enough, but that is contrary to this passage in Romans.

As I look at this historic picture of Abraham and compare it with Romans 4, I believe there is another way of looking at Abraham’s story. God promised Abraham the first time that he was going to be the father of many nations, then he told him that he would have offspring as countless as the dust of the earth and the stars in the sky, then he told him that the offspring would come from his own body and would not be a servant in his house, but at that point, the scriptures do not record that God told him that Sarah was to be the mother. So, it is reasonable to assume that Abraham acted in full faith and belief in God’s promise of an heir coming from his own body when he took Hagar to be his wife and she bore him a son. God didn’t tell Abraham until 13 years later that Sarah was to have the son.

The other thing of note is that, when Abraham learned that Sarah, at the age of ninety, and he, at the age of one hundred, were to give birth to a son, the scriptures said he laughed to himself and asked the question concerning them giving birth at such old ages. So, it does not appear he was questioning God but rather that he was perhaps just humored at the idea of them giving birth at such an old age. Even when he asked God if Ishmael could not be the heir, I don’t believe he was questioning God even then. I see it more that he was just being practical and/or was just trying to understand why Ishmael was not to be the heir.

The Bible Knowledge Commentary says it this way: “Hearing this, Abraham laughed because it seemed incredible that a barren 90-year-old woman could give birth to a son. Abraham had assumed that his descendants would come through Ishmael.”

This makes sense, in light of what Romans 4 says about Abraham. What this says to me is that, even though Abraham was a man of faith, he believed in God’s promises, he heard God’s voice clearly, he obeyed God fully, his faith did not weaken and he did not waver in unbelief, and he was fully persuaded that God had the power to do what he had promised, still Abraham was a human being and he saw “a poor reflection as in a mirror” and he “knew in part,” especially since God revealed his promise to Abraham one step at a time (See: I Co. 13:12). So, each step of the way, Abraham stepped out in faith on what he had heard God say and what he understood of God’s promises, even though his understanding was not yet complete and would not be until he saw God face to face in heaven.

So, I am encouraged by the life of Abraham, not only that he never wavered (vacillated; faltered; or was indecisive) in unbelief, that his faith never weakened, even in the face of impossible odds against him, that he was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, and that he was fully persuaded that God had the power to do what he had promised, but I am encouraged that he did not do this with absolute perfection and that he didn’t have perfect understanding, and that he, as well, saw only in part as we do, and he had to trust God even when he didn’t know the next step or even when he thought he understood what God meant but found out that isn’t the way God planned to do it.

His life, though, does teach us that we shouldn’t get ahead of God or make assumptions about how God is going to do something when we don’t have all the information needed to make a wise decision. We need to inquire of the Lord each and every step of the way to make sure, as much as is possible, that we are hearing God correctly and that we are obeying him to the best of our understanding. Yet even there, we must recognize that “we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us” (2 Co. 4:7). God did not choose us because of our own human perfection. He chose us because of his great love for us, even while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.

What God is looking for are those who are willing to obey Him in all things, and who will obey him even when it doesn’t make sense by natural human thinking and reasoning. He is looking for those who will step out in faith, even when we can’t see what the next step is. He chose humans to be his instruments, not because of our greatness, but because he could then show that the power comes from Him and not from us, for his power and strength are perfected in our weakness. That is why Abraham was fully persuaded that GOD had the power to do what he promised, because he realized that what God had promised him could only be done by the power of Almighty God. And, then it was God who got the glory.

In the song, More Love to Thee, O Christ, the poet expressed that she had once craved earthly joy, but now she sought God alone. She humbled herself before God on bended knee and she submitted to him and to his will for her life. She recognized that following the Lord would mean that sorrow, grief, and pain would be used of God in her life to do its work in her heart in melting and molding her into a vessel that God could use for his purposes and for his glory. The prayer and the plea of her heart was to love her Lord Jesus more and more, and the way she proved her love to him was first of all to forsake the cravings of her sinful nature and then to give Jesus Christ her life on the altar, fully surrendered and submitted to his will for her life, even submitting to pain. Her goal was that, even in her death, that the parting cry her heart would raise, and the prayer of her heart would still be, “More love, O Christ to Thee.” I echo the words of this song back in prayer to my Lord.

Abraham was a man who loved God, too. He believed God for what God told him that he was going to do, and he followed the Lord in faith and obedience as the proof of his love and his commitment in faith to the LORD, even against all hope. His love was proved by his actions – by his unwavering faith in God’s promises and in God’s power to do what he had promised. And, because of that kind of faith, God credited righteousness to him. This is the same kind of faith that God requires of those who believe in Jesus Christ – the kind the poet wrote about in the words to this song, and the kind that Abraham had. Both of them loved God and both of them desired to serve the Lord until death. And, their love and their commitment to the Lord was proved by what they did in obedience to their Lord. So, when we say that we love Jesus, and when we claim him as our Savior and our Lord, then our declared love and devotion to Him must be proved by our repentance and our obedience.

The Raging of Nations

Thursday, June 18, 2009, 4:19 a.m. – I woke to this song:

I Will Rise / Chris Tomlin

There's a peace I've come to know
Though my heart and flesh may fail
There's an anchor for my soul
I can say "It is well"

There's a day that's drawing near
When this darkness breaks to light
And the shadows disappear
And my faith shall be my eyes

Jesus has overcome
And the grave is overwhelmed
The victory is won
He is risen from the dead

And I will rise when He calls my name
No more sorrow, no more pain
I will rise on eagles' wings
Before my God fall on my knees
And rise
I will rise

And I hear the voice of many angels sing,
"Worthy is the Lamb"
And I hear the cry of every longing heart,
"Worthy is the Lamb"

I also woke from A DREAM: There was an older (unmarried) couple who decided to get married and then they split up – think it was out of fear that they split. So, we were trying to get them back together.

We were at a swimming place (like an oversized swimming pool) and had been out in the sun for a while. I looked over my shoulder at my back and saw that my back was sunburned. I, evidently, did not (or failed to) put on sunscreen. At the right of the pool was this woman. South of the pool on a peninsula that went part way into the pool was me. The other people came from the northwest and southwest of the pool.

I started to go back into the water. I saw that other people were getting or had gotten into the water and some had gotten quite far in when I began to slowly step into the water. I was standing at the edge of the water on some stairs or on a gradual declining slope that would take me into the water one step at a time. Just then we were informed that it wasn’t time to get into the water, so we had to wait. We were premature in trying to get back into the pool before it was time.

Then, the woman who had separated from her fiancé said that she was ready to go, so we went with her to meet her fiancé in hopes we could get them back together. We were then at a restaurant, I believe. The woman had a purse with some medicine in it, including some vitamins. She asked me for her vitamin, so I got it for her. There was something here about combining her things with other stuff related to this relationship with her fiancé, in preparation for their being reunited. It looked like newspaper that I added to her newspaper. I think I added something to her purse, too.

I got the impression that the woman was blind. She got up to go somewhere and she counted all her steps and turns so that when she returned she could find her way back to her seat or to the table. Also, she didn’t see what I did with her purse and/or with the newspaper.

We had visited previously Providence church. This church had a drawer in their church nursery under the crib, I believe, and the drawer was filled with money. People could take whatever they needed, but there was a sense that there were strings attached. In other words, it wasn’t the “free” money that they thought it was.

Anyway, this woman became aware of this “free money” and so she thought she would use some of it for her wedding, but I cautioned her about it. I did say there were good things about the people of that church, but there was also a sense that they would hold it against someone, particularly an outsider, if one took some of the “free money” but did not pay it back. END

Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening. I read Isaiah 17 and 18:

An oracle concerning Damascus:
"See, Damascus will no longer be a city
but will become a heap of ruins.
2 The cities of Aroer will be deserted
and left to flocks, which will lie down,
with no one to make them afraid.
3 The fortified city will disappear from Ephraim,
and royal power from Damascus;
the remnant of Aram will be
like the glory of the Israelites,"
declares the LORD Almighty.
4 "In that day the glory of Jacob will fade;
the fat of his body will waste away.

5 It will be as when a reaper gathers the standing grain
and harvests the grain with his arm—
as when a man gleans heads of grain
in the Valley of Rephaim.
6 Yet some gleanings will remain,
as when an olive tree is beaten,
leaving two or three olives on the topmost branches,
four or five on the fruitful boughs,"
declares the LORD, the God of Israel.
7 In that day men will look to their Maker
and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel.
8 They will not look to the altars,
the work of their hands,
and they will have no regard for the Asherah poles
and the incense altars their fingers have made.

9 In that day their strong cities, which they left because of the Israelites, will be like places abandoned to thickets and undergrowth. And all will be desolation.
10 You have forgotten God your Savior;
you have not remembered the Rock, your fortress.
Therefore, though you set out the finest plants
and plant imported vines,
11 though on the day you set them out, you make them grow,
and on the morning when you plant them, you bring them to bud,
yet the harvest will be as nothing
in the day of disease and incurable pain.

12 Oh, the raging of many nations—
they rage like the raging sea!
Oh, the uproar of the peoples—
they roar like the roaring of great waters!
13 Although the peoples roar like the roar of surging waters,
when he rebukes them they flee far away,
driven before the wind like chaff on the hills,
like tumbleweed before a gale.
14 In the evening, sudden terror!
Before the morning, they are gone!
This is the portion of those who loot us,
the lot of those who plunder us.

Isaiah 18: A Prophecy Against Cush
1 Woe to the land of whirring wings
along the rivers of Cush, 2 which sends envoys by sea
in papyrus boats over the water.
Go, swift messengers,
to a people tall and smooth-skinned,
to a people feared far and wide,
an aggressive nation of strange speech,
whose land is divided by rivers.
3 All you people of the world,
you who live on the earth,
when a banner is raised on the mountains,
you will see it,
and when a trumpet sounds,
you will hear it.

4 This is what the LORD says to me:
"I will remain quiet and will look on from my dwelling place,
like shimmering heat in the sunshine,
like a cloud of dew in the heat of harvest."
5 For, before the harvest, when the blossom is gone
and the flower becomes a ripening grape,
he will cut off the shoots with pruning knives,
and cut down and take away the spreading branches.
6 They will all be left to the mountain birds of prey
and to the wild animals;
the birds will feed on them all summer,
the wild animals all winter.
7 At that time gifts will be brought to the LORD Almighty
from a people tall and smooth-skinned,
from a people feared far and wide,
an aggressive nation of strange speech,
whose land is divided by rivers—
the gifts will be brought to Mount Zion, the place of the Name of the LORD Almighty.

My Understanding: As I was praying for understanding of this dream in relation to these passages of scripture, all of a sudden the Lord brought to mind the picture of this pool in the dream – the shape of it, where I was standing, where the woman was located, and where the other people were coming from. I had the feeling that the woman was Israel, so I looked at my globe and it looked like where I was standing was in Libya, so I Googled news on Libya, and the first article was written from Cairo. A light bulb turned on inside my head. I had remembered reading that Barack Obama had recently given a speech in Cairo, so I looked at Cairo on the map on Google maps and then I saw that the peninsula that I was standing on at the pool of water was Cairo, Egypt, based upon the location of Israel on the map, and the pool was the Mediterranean Sea. Also Cush, in chapter 18, was located in Egypt.

President Obama’s Cairo Speech Transcript http://joeduck.com/2009/06/04/president-obamas-cairo-speech-transcript/

The purpose of the president’s trip to Cairo was to “seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world…” He stated, “Islam is part of America,” and “I believe that America holds within her the truth that regardless of race, religion, or station in life, all of us share common aspirations… to love our families, our communities, and our God. These are the things we share.”

A little further into his speech, he referenced the events of 9/11 and stated something to the effect that fear and anger led us “to act contrary to our traditions and our ideals.” The implication was that this fear caused us to stereotype all Muslims and that is what separated us, but now we were going to work at getting back together. He did state that our enemy is the extremists and that there is a partnering; a coalition of 46 countries to come against these religious extremists.

Then, he went on to the subject of Israel. He acknowledged Israel’s history and the oppression they have faced and their right to exist as an independent nation. But, then he went on to tell how the Palestinians have been without a home for over 60 years (a reference, I believe, to when Israel became a nation in 1948). He stated that America would not turn our backs on the “legitimate Palestinian aspiration” for a state of their own. He stated that the two groups have been in a “stalemate” for decades. And, he said that if we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be “blind to the truth.” The only solution is a two-state one.

He went on to state this about Israel: “Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel’s right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine’s. The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.”

He continued: “Too many tears have been shed. Too much blood has been shed. All of us have a responsibility to work for the day when the mothers of Israelis and Palestinians can see their children grow up without fear; when the Holy Land of the three great faiths is the place of peace that God intended it to be; when Jerusalem is a secure and lasting home for Jews and Christians and Muslims, and a place for all of the children of Abraham to mingle peacefully together as in the story of Isra — (applause) — as in the story of Isra, when Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed, peace be upon them, joined in prayer.”

Continuing on with his speech he stated: “Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance…” “This tolerance is essential for religion to thrive.” “In fact, faith should bring us together. And that’s why we’re forging service projects in America to bring together Christians, Muslims, and Jews. That’s why we welcome efforts like Saudi Arabian King Abdullah’s interfaith dialogue and Turkey’s leadership in the Alliance of Civilizations. Around the world, we can turn dialogue into interfaith service, so bridges between peoples lead to action — whether it is combating malaria in Africa, or providing relief after a natural disaster.”

Towards the end of his speech, he made these statements: “I know there are many — Muslim and non-Muslim — who question whether we can forge this new beginning. Some are eager to stoke the flames of division, and to stand in the way of progress. Some suggest that it isn’t worth the effort — that we are fated to disagree, and civilizations are doomed to clash. Many more are simply skeptical that real change can occur. There’s so much fear, so much mistrust that has built up over the years. But if we choose to be bound by the past, we will never move forward. And I want to particularly say this to young people of every faith, in every country — you, more than anyone, have the ability to reimagine the world, to remake this world. All of us share this world for but a brief moment in time. The question is whether we spend that time focused on what pushes us apart, or whether we commit ourselves to an effort — a sustained effort — to find common ground, to focus on the future we seek for our children, and to respect the dignity of all human beings.

“It’s easier to start wars than to end them. It’s easier to blame others than to look inward. It’s easier to see what is different about someone than to find the things we share. But we should choose the right path, not just the easy path. There’s one rule that lies at the heart of every religion — that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. (Applause.) This truth transcends nations and peoples — a belief that isn’t new; that isn’t black or white or brown; that isn’t Christian or Muslim or Jew. It’s a belief that pulsed in the cradle of civilization, and that still beats in the hearts of billions around the world. It’s a faith in other people, and it’s what brought me here today.

“We have the power to make the world we seek, but only if we have the courage to make a new beginning, keeping in mind what has been written.

“The Holy Koran tells us: “O mankind! We have created you male and a female; and we have made you into nations and tribes so that you may know one another.”

“The Talmud tells us: “The whole of the Torah is for the purpose of promoting peace.”

The Holy Bible tells us: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” (Applause.)

“The people of the world can live together in peace. We know that is God’s vision. Now that must be our work here on Earth…”

Relationship to Dream and Scripture

Ok, so how does this relate to Isaiah 17-18 and to this dream? I believe the dream was about this speech. And, I am representing the USA who is being represented here by Barack Obama.

As I read this speech and then compared it to the dream and to the scriptures, the Lord gave me this understanding: The couple that had split and that “we” were trying to get back together is Islam and Zionism, i.e. Islam in combination with Judaism and Christianity and/or the Palestinians and Israel in a two-state solution side-by-side, and/or Muslim nations and America. And, the “we” is America, represented by our president, Barack Obama.

The pool represents the nations like the many waters represented many peoples in Revelation and like what is spoken of here in 17:12-14. The pool or the many nations are nations that are rising up against God and against God’s people. I believe this is this “new beginning” that President Obama is talking about, which involves a new world order and a new world religion, which brings all religions under one god and that punishes those who are narrow-minded and who do not tolerate all faiths.

Do you see where this is going? Soon Christians and Jews alike will be persecuted for their faith because they believe in the One true God. We will be tagged as “intolerant.” We will be classified among the “religious extremists” who think their faith is the only one. Barack Obama claims to be a Christian, but everything in this speech shows that he is truly not one, because to be a believer in Jesus Christ is to believe that Jesus is the Only Way to Heaven and to the One and Only True God the Father.

Getting into the water, I believe, symbolizes this joining of these nations together in a coalition that will form this one world order and one world religion. Yet, the Lord is saying that the timing is not right just yet for this, so he is going to rebuke the nations, including the U.S.A. From that judgment on the nations will come revival, I believe (see vv. 17:7-8). The reason for the judgment on the nations is that they have forgotten God, their Savior. They have not remembered the Rock, their fortress – Jesus is our Savior and our Rock and our Fortress and our mighty deliver!

The sunburn on my back (on the back of America) represents this judgment that is coming upon us like judgments in our past (9/11). Perhaps it is hot because it will take place in the summer and perhaps it is hot because the judgment will come in the form of fire. Even though I looked over my shoulder to see this sunburn, I proceeded into the water anyway. I believe this is ignoring the past and the many messages of impending judgment and going ahead with our plans anyway.

The looting spoken of in v. 14 of chp 17, I believe, is a reference to both taking away our freedom to believe in Jesus Christ as the Only Way, and it is also a reference to our taking away Israel’s land from them. And, God will judge us for that.

I had the impression in the dream that the woman was blind. Obama stated that if we see this Israeli-Palestinian conflict from only one side, then we are blind to the truth. Obama appears to be pulling the wool over Israel’s eyes.

Lastly, we had visited Providence Church. I believe this means the providence of God, that the crib is symbolic of Jesus and spiritual birth and that the money is the free gift of salvation. Obama, in promoting this “all for one” view of religion is thus downplaying the true meaning of what it means to be a Christian. God help us!

Additional thoughts

I wanted to do a few more comparisons between this dream and Obama’s speech that I feel are significant. As I said before, this “pool” of water symbolizes this “raging of nations” who are coming against God and against God’s people. The United States is represented here in the dream by me (an American) and in real life by Barack Obama. I believe that the Lord used me in this dream so that I would understand that this includes the whole of the American people. When Obama steps into that pool of nations, we, as a nation step into that pool.

In his speech, Obama looked over his shoulder – he looked back in time - to see the sunburn on his back (history), i.e. he referenced the events of 9/11, which I believe was a judgment of God on America in order to cleanse us, but we would not be cleansed. Obama stated that if we “choose to be bound by the past, we will never move forward.” So, in the dream when he looked over his shoulder and saw the sunburn on his back, this was signifying seeing the judgments of God on our nation in the past yet disregarding them and deciding that even though he was sunburned, he was going to move forward anyway. So, he began to gradually step into this pool in which many other nations were already deep into the water already.

But, then we were rebuked and told the timing was not right and that we could not go into the water yet, i.e. it is not time for this one world order yet. In vv. 12-14 where it talks about this “raging of many nations,” it also states that these many nations will face the Lord’s rebuke and that when they do, they will flee, just like we did in the dream. This is a judgment of God coming against the U.S.A. and perhaps against all of these nations who are turning their backs on Almighty God. And, I believe revival (vv7-8 of chp 17) will be a result of this judgment and that many people will turn back to God.

Ok, then we followed the woman to a restaurant where we were trying to get her to get back with the person she was supposed to “marry.” This is a picture of the Obama administration trying to convince Israel to give up some of their land to the Palestinians, only Obama used fairly strong language in stating that further developments (Jewish) must cease.

Again, I got the impression in the dream that the woman (Israel) was blind. Obama stated that if we see the Israeli-Palestinian conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth, so in essence, he is saying that those Israelis who are not willing to give up their land are blind to some truth, not sure whose truth, but it is not the truth of Almighty God.

Ok, in the dream we had previously visited “Providence” church where all this money was in a drawer (like a safe deposit box) under a crib in the nursery. I believe this is speaking of our salvation that Jesus provided for us as a free gift to all who would receive Jesus as his or her Lord and Savior. Another word for “providence” is “fate” or “destiny.” It is the providence of God that draws each and every person to the Savior, Jesus Christ. We can not come to Jesus unless the Father draws us.

Obama, completely ignoring the teachings of the Bible, went on to talk about the Holy Land being of Islam, Christianity and Judaism – the “three great faiths.” And, he stated that this was how God intended it to be, all of us living in harmony with one another. The one and only true God does not want the religion of Islam coexisting alongside of Judaism and Christianity. God Almighty has called out a people unto himself and all through Biblical history he has taught us not to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers. He does not want this blending of religions. We don’t all serve the same God, as Obama would seem to indicate.

Then, Obama was blasphemous when he quoted from the story of “Isra,” the Islamic Jesus, saying that Moses, Jesus and Mohammed joined together in prayer. And, he calls himself a believer in Jesus Christ; a Christian. Any true Christian knows that Mohammed is a false prophet and that Islam is a false religion and that God’s people are not to intermarry; to be unequally yoked together with people of different religions. Biblical history teaches us that over and over again, and we saw the judgments of God over and over again when God’s people joined with false religions and began to worship their gods.

But, Obama wants “tolerance,” not just being kind and respectful of other people who think or who believe differently from us, but he takes tolerance to the degree to where we are to be accepting of all faiths as though we are all working together towards the same ultimate end and that we all worship the same God. Obama kept talking about “interfaith” dialogue. This is this one world religion – this ecumenical movement in America that has the modern church working side-by-side with the US government in promoting harmony among religions. On the religious side of this, Rick Warren is the leader, I believe.

Ok, still on the idea of the “providence” of God, Obama stated that “some are eager to stoke the flames of division, and to stand in the way of progress. Some suggest that it isn’t worth the effort – that we are fated to disagree, and…” Here, Obama is discounting the providence of Almighty God. Those who believe in the One true God and who believe in the promises and inheritance that is ours (the drawer of money under the crib in the church nursery that is free) in Christ Jesus, our Lord – he is making us out to be bigots and narrow-minded and those who would fan the flames of division because we believe in only one God and one faith.

So, in the dream I, meaning Obama and America, i.e. we, as a nation, are moving toward this ecumenical faith to where we are becoming tolerant of all faiths to where we no longer take a stand for Jesus Christ and for the gospel of Jesus Christ. So, as America, and as Obama, I am discouraging belief in the Messiah, Jesus Christ and the inheritance he has promised not only to true believers in Jesus Christ but to his people, the Jews, who will return to him as a nation (a remnant will return). That, in essence, is what Obama is doing in his speech. How could anyone possibly believe this man is a follower of Christ? Obama is trying to discourage people from believing in the One true God and from believing in the inheritance that has been promised to us as a people of God. He wants us to forsake our belief in Jesus as the only way and he wants us to embrace this “all for one and one for all” ecumenical movement.

He wants us to “reimagine” and to “remake” this world. He wants to lead us into a one world order and to a one world religion. And, he is trying to say that this is Almighty God’s vision. It is NOT! Don’t be led astray. It is time to take a stand for Jesus Christ like no other time in the history of the world. We are about to enter this time of the rule and reign of Satan on the earth and the mark of the beast. So, stand firm in your faith!

Notice how the mark of the beast is either on the hand or the forehead. Our forehead symbolizes our thoughts and our hands represent our deeds. To take a mark is much more than just a physical mark – it is the evidence of the influence or involvement of somebody or something, i.e. “he left his mark…” (Encarta). If our thoughts and our actions are being influenced by Satan instead of by God, then we bear that mark of Satan on our lives. Don’t let Satan rule your life! Give your life to Jesus today!!