Millions of copies of "the last(?)" book about young Harry Potter are being sold and read right now.  It's no longer a mystery that Harry survived and is now happily married;  reportedly, that's the end of his story.  But I have a hard time believing that we have heard the last about him!  Believe it or not, even this Ol' Geezer would like to hear more of his adventures in the super natural.  I've felt this way before. The first time I read the Acts of the Holy Spirit, which is Luke's sequel to his gospel account of the life of Jesus of Nazereth in the New Testament, I felt frustrated in the end!  The story told in the book of Acts ends with Jesus' friend, Paul of Tarsus, under house arrest in Rome.  But the story of the acts of the Holy Spirit of Jesus does not end there!  It has continued for nearly 2000 years and is still unfolding!  To this day I am discovering more and more of His exciting story!  And the most exciting part of my life is discovering what Jesus is doing TODAY, during my own lifetime! It seems to me that "the church"  -- by which I mean that whole mass of present-day religious stuff that calls itself "Christian" -- has made it difficult for truth seekers and believers alike to know the present-day Lord Jesus Christ.  The church has made an idol of the story of His 33 physical years on the earth 2000 years ago.  And I feel sorry for all the folks who focus only upon Christ as He was in the flesh and miss out knowing Him as He is now. The every moment Presence of the Most High God, aka God Almighty and the Lord Jesus Christ...  His Presence in my life is more-and-more actually becoming the biggest part of my life.  I am so very satisfied with this experience that I can't help myself trying to find new ways of sharing it with others.  But I have learned -- or at least, I am learning -- to share it ONLY with those others who are already experiencing the Lord calling them to Himself. Perhaps Harry Potter fiction is one of God's ways of attracting your interest in the very real, super natural gifts He still gives to us today!  Perhaps some of you Harry Potter fans are reading this blog because you have a yearning which God has given to you, a yearning to be a king and a lord, one set apart to become a maturing child of God, enjoying the love and favor of God, and spreading that to the rest of mankind.   These things are the present day reality for those of us who know the Never-ending Hero.  If you are interested, leave a comment or send me a message.

 In other words, what is Jerusalem Hill teaching about anticipating the return of Jesus Christ and the days of judgement for those who consider themselves Christians and also for the unbelieving “world?” 

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

Dispensationalism is a nineteenth-century evangelical, futurist, Biblical interpretation that foresees a series of "dispensations", or periods in history, in which God relates to human beings in different ways under different Biblical covenants.

The theology of dispensationalism consists of a distinctive eschatological "end times" perspective, as all dispensationalists hold to premillennialism and most hold to a pretribulation rapture. Dispensationalists believe that the nation of Israel (not necessarily the same as the state of Israel) is distinct from the Christian Church,...

Progressive revelation (Christianity)

One of the most important underlying theological concepts for dispensationalism is progressive revelation. While some non-dispensationalists start with progressive revelation in the New Testament and refer this revelation back into the Old Testament, dispensationalists begin with progressive revelation in the Old Testament and read forward in a historical sense. Therefore there is an emphasis on a gradually developed unity as seen in the entirety of Scripture. Biblical covenants are intricately tied to the dispensations. When these Biblical covenants are compared and contrasted, the result is a historical ordering of different dispensations.

Also with regard to the different Biblical covenant promises, dispensationalism places emphasis on to whom these promises were written, the original recipients. This has led to certain fundamental dispensational beliefs, such as a distinction between Israel and the Church.

With the rise of dispensationalism, some conservative Protestants came to interpret the Book of Revelation as predicting future events (futurism), rather than predicting events that have taken place throughout history (historicism)^[4][5][6] or predominantly associated to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70, a position known as Preterism. 

Note: I personally believe the Book of Revelation speaks to all three of these.  But futurism is the more significant to us living in 2012.  And I believe this is why the Spirit of God is directing me to teach on His Message From Heaven to the Universal Church, which includes a true church and the apostate "fallen away" church, alive and operating today, side by side as in Jesus’  parable of the Wheat and the Tares. Tares are toxic weeds which resemble wheat.

 ^{Matthew 13: 24} Another parable He put forth to them, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field; ²⁵ but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. ²⁶ But when the grain had sprouted and produced a crop, then the tares also appeared. ²⁷ So the servants of the owner came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’ ²⁸ He said to them, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The servants said to him, ‘Do you want us then to go and gather them up?’ ²⁹ But he said, ‘No, lest while you gather up the tares you also uproot the wheat with them. ³⁰ Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn.”’”…

 ³⁶ Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house. And His disciples came to Him, saying, “Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field.”

³⁷ He answered and said to them: “He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man. ³⁸ The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one. ³⁹ The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels. ⁴⁰ Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age. ⁴¹ The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, ⁴² and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. ⁴³ Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

…

Revelation 2 & 3.       Why Did Jesus Address His Message From Heaven to the Seven Churches?

Seven is the number of dispensational fulness. It is the complete in that which is temporary—not the finally complete. It carries with it the idea of sacredness in that which relates to this world. It is the Trinity and the created in contact—the divine Three with the worldly four. Hence, it is always connected with whatever touches the covenant between man and God, worship, and the coming together of the Creator and the creature. Hence the sacred number. "The evidences of this reach back to the very beginning. We meet them first in the hallowing of the seventh day, in pledge and token of the covenant of God with man, as indeed in the binding up of seven in the very word Sabbath." The Bible is full of them. And the Apocalypse, which is the book of the consummation of all God's dispensational dealings with mankind, is, above all, a book of sevens. It consists of seven visions, with the sevenfold ascription of glory to God and to the Lamb, and discloses to us the seven Spirits of God, the seven candlesticks, the seven stars, seven lamps of fire, seven seals, seven horns and seven eyes of the Lamb, seven angels with seven trumpets, seven thunders, seven heads of the beast and seven crowns upon those heads, the seven plagues, seven vials, seven mountains, and seven regencies. And it is this book of sevens because it is the book of the fulness of everything of which it treats—the Trinity's consummation of all divine dispensations. It is therefore the number of dispensational fulness. And whatever bears this number, in the divine reckoning, is full, complete, with nothing left out, and nothing of its own kind to be added.

These Churches are seven. a key to the true significance of these Churches. It assigns to them the unmistakable character of completeness. As "the seven Spirits which are before the throne" are the one Holy Spirit, in all the fulness and completeness of His offices and powers in this dispensation, so "the seven Churches" are the one Holy Universal Church, in all the amplitude and completeness of its being and history, from the time of the vision to the end.

These seven Churches, in their names, in their graces, in their defects, in their relations to Christ, and in His promises and threatenings to them severally, comprehend everything found in the entire Church, as it then existed, or was to exist.  Seven is just the number to express a representative comprehensiveness which embraces the entire fulness of the Church of all time.

There are, however, other considerations to corroborate this view. One is found in the seven times repeated admonition: "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the Churches." And as I am bound to believe that Christ's words, so solemnly and significantly given, are entitled to all the fulness of meaning of which they are capable, I must conclude, from this sevenfold charge concerning these seven epistles, that these seven Churches of Asia, as here described, were meant to be paradigmatic of the whole Church, every Church, and every member of the Church, and Christ's judgment of them, then and thereafter, up to and inclusive of His final apportionment of rewards and punishments to each.

The same may be argued from the word mystery, as applied to these Churches and their angels. It intimates, from the start, that there is something more intended than is seen upon the surface; and what that something is, we find in the view I have given. And, indeed, the nature of the vision in which John received these epistles, assumes that not these seven Churches alone, but in them the entire Church, is to be contemplated.

These seven Churches, then, besides being literal historical Churches, stand for the entire Christian body, in all periods of its history. But how, or in what respects?

In the first place, the seven Churches represent seven phases or periods in the Church's history, stretching from the time of the apostles to the coming again of Christ, the characteristics of which are set forth partly in the names of these Churches, but more fully in the epistles addressed to them. There has been an Ephesian period—a period of warmth and love and labour for Christ, dating directly from the apostles, in which defection began by the gradual cooling of the love of some, the false professions of others, and the incoming of undue exaltations of the clergy and Church offices. Then came the Smyrna period—the era of martyrdom, and of the sweet savour unto God of faithfulness unto death, but marked with further developments of defection in the establishment of castes and orders, the licence of Judaizing propensities, and consequent departures from the true simplicities of the Gospel. Then followed the Pergamite period, in which true faith more and more disappeared from view, and clericalism gradually formed itself into a system, and the Church united with the world, and Babylon began to rear itself aloft. Then came the Thyatiran period—the age of purple and glory for the corrupt priesthood, and of darkness for the truth; the age of effeminacy and clerical domination, when the Church usurped the place of Christ, and the witnesses of Jesus were given to dungeons, stakes and inquisitions; the age of the enthronement of the false prophetess, reaching to the days of Luther and the Reformation. Then came the Sardian period—the age of separation and return to the rule of Christ; the age of comparative freedom from Balaam and his doctrines, from the Nicolaitans and their tenets, from Jezebel and her fornications; an age of many worthy names, but marked with deadness withal, and having much of which to repent; an age covering the spiritual lethargy of the Protestant centuries before the great evangelical movements of the last few hundred years, which brought us the Philadelphian era, marked by a closer adherence to the written word, and more fraternity among Christians, but now rapidly giving place to Laodicean lukewarmness, self-sufficiency, empty profession, and false peace, in which the day of judgment is to find the unthinking multitude who suppose they are Christians and are not.

The details in these outlines I leave till we come to the more direct exposition of the epistles themselves, but will yet observe, on this point, that everything which marks one of these periods pertains also, in a lower degree, to every period. It is simply the predominance, and greater or less vigour, of one element at one time, which distinguishes the seven eras from each other. The seven periods, in other words, coexist in every period, as well as in succession, only that in one period the one is predominant, and in another the other.

In the next place, the seven Churches represent seven varieties of Christians, both true and false. Every professor of Christianity is either an Ephesian in his religious qualities, a Smyrnaote, a Pergamite, a Thyatiran, a Sardian, a Philadelphian, or a Laodicean. It is of these seven sorts that the whole Church is made up, the several marks and characteristics of each of which will be brought out hereafter.

Nor are we to look for one sort in one period, or in one denomination, only. Every age, every denomination, and nearly every congregation, contains specimens of each. As all the elements of the ocean are to be found, in more or less distinctness, in every drop from the ocean, so every community of Christian professors has some of all the varied classes which make up Christendom at large. One may abound most in Ephesians, another in Smyrnaotes, another in Thyatirans, and others in other kinds; but we shall hardly be at a loss to find all in all. There are Protestant Papists, and Papistical Protestants; sectarian anti-sectarians, and partyists who are not schismatics; holy ones in the midst of abounding defection and apostasy, and unholy ones in the midst of the most earnest and active faith; light in dark places, and darkness in the midst of light.

I thus find the seven Churches in every Church, giving to these Epistles a directness of application to ourselves, and to professing Christians of every age, of the utmost solemnity and importance. They tell what Christ's judgment of each of us is, and what we each may expect in the great day of His coming. In every age, and in every congregation, Christ is walking among His Churches, with open, flaming eyes; and these epistles give us His opinion of what His all-revealing glance discovers. And as we would know where we stand, and what we may expect when this Apocalypse is fulfilled, let us carefully examine, and pray God to help us to the true understanding of, these special summaries of what the Spirit saith unto the Churches.

Excerpted from The Apocalypse: A Series of Special Lectures on the Revelation of Jesus Christ.

Lesson Plan for the Misfits Bible Fellowship Reposted from November 2007:

"I'm saved; so now what should I do?"  Learn to be Led by the Inward Witness of the Spirit of God

 

Romans 8: 14For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God....  ¹⁶The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.

Proverbs 20: 27    The spirit of a man is the lamp of the Lord,   Searching all the ^£inner depths of his heart.

 

Many times Christians try to receive guidance other than how the Bible says we are to receive. For example, nowhere in the Bible does it say that God guides us through our souls. People sometimes use the words “spirit” and “soul” interchangeably. But they are NOT interchangeable!

 

Hebrews 4: 12For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharperthan any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

1 Thessalonians 5: 23Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 24He who calls you is faithful, who also will do it.

 

Actually, the Bible teaches that you are a spirit, you have a soul, and you live in a body.

 

And, if you are born again, the Holy Spirit of God – the Helper sent as the better replacement for Jesus in the flesh! -- is living IN YOUR SPIRIT.

 

John 14:16... I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever—¹⁷the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you .

2 Corinthians 5:16Therefore, from now on, ... Even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him thus no longer.  ¹⁷... if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.

 

Believers have God's Promises that He will guide us directly!

 

Jeremiah 33: 3‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’

 

John 10: 1“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and arobber. ²But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. ³To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. ⁴And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice. ⁵Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.” ⁶Jesus used this illustration, but they did not understand the things which He spoke to them.

...14I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own. ¹⁵As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. ¹⁶And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.

 

John 16:13However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; ... and He will tell you things to come.

Usually God simply speaks the truth into our spirits; and we then “perceive” the truth as a known fact, seemingly from out of nowhere! And we ask ourselves, and finally make a decision: “This is God Himself speaking to me! I recognize His voice!”

 

Acts 16: 6Now when they had gone through Phrygia and the region of Galatia, they were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to preach the word in Asia.  7After they had come to Mysia, they tried to go into Bithynia, but the ^£Spirit did not permit them. 

 

Acts 27: 9Now when much time had been spent, and sailing was now dangerous because the Fast was already over, Paul advised them, ¹⁰saying, “Men, I perceive that this voyage will end with disaster and much loss,...

 

Notice Paul didn't say, “The Lord told me.” He didn't say the Spirit of God said anything to him. He just said, “I perceive.” Paul is talking about the real “I,” his inner man, the spirit man at the core of himself.

 

Paul didn't really perceive this truth mentally. He didn't perceive it physically with his senses. No. But in his spirit he had an inward witness that ”...this voyage will be with hurt and much damage...”

 

Have you ever had something on the inside of you tell you to do or not to do something? Something which may not have made sense to you at the time? Did you obey it, and then see why it had been told to you later? Sharing time!

Some Precautions To Observe:

 

We need to make sure we aren't trying to tell God HOW to lead us! Too many times when God is trying to lead believers through the inward witness, they don't take the time to listen for Him! Many times they are hoping He will lead them in a more spectacular way, such as through a vision, a dream, an audible voice, or an angelic visitation. These more spectacular kinds of guidance may occur or they may not. They happen as the Spirit wills. But God never promised us that we would be led spectacularly! He DID, however, promise to lead us by the inward witness, as we have seen. (Romans 8: 16)

 

Sometimes there's a price to pay in order to receive God's guidance for your life! Often it takes waiting before God in prayer and in the Word long enough to get all of your soul – your mind, will and emotions under control, because your soul is always trying to be in control, and it clamors for attention. And sometimes it just means waiting long enough to get your body quiet, because your body can be just as demanding as your soul. But once you get your soul and body quieted and under control, you can begin to understand what God is saying to you. You can understand what God is saying every time if you'll take the time to wait before Him. (Isaiah 40: 31)

 

It may take longer for some people than for others to get their flesh under subjection to their spirit so they can hear God, because they have allowed their flesh to dominate then for so long.

 

A Key Principle to following the inward witness is to diligently train and develop your spirit! But How?

 

1. Feed your spirit on God's written Word.

Matthew 4:4But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

 

2. Make sure you are walking in love regardless what others around you may do.

John 15: 9“As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love. ¹⁰If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love. 11“These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. ¹²This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.

Galatians 5:6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love.

3. Pray much in other tongues. (If you do not yet know how, I will teach you because it is scripturally correct and it works!)

 

1 Corinthians 14:14For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. 15What is the conclusion then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with the understanding.

 

Jude:3Beloved, while I was very diligent to write to you concerning our common salvation, I found it necessary to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. 20But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, ²¹keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Behold, then, you who call yourself a Christian, your Lord and Judge, Jesus Christ: Revelation 1: 9 - 18

1. He is "in the midst of the seven candlesticks." When he left the world, he said to his disciples, "Lo! I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." And lest the promise should be mistaken as belonging to ministers alone, he gave the still further assurance, that where two or three are gathered together in his name, there he is, in the midst of them. The Lord is there. He is in his Churches, not only by his word, by his sacraments, by his ministers, by his authority, power and Spirit; but he is there himself, as the Son of man. He is present as Priest, as Lord, as Judge; and hence in his own proper person, as the Godman.

2. "Clothed with a garment reaching to the feet, and girt at the breasts with a girdle of gold." The high officer who drew the marks of distinction in Ezekiel's vision of the great slaughter was also similarly attired. One of those mighty personages with whom Daniel dealt in his heavenly visions was clad in this way. If, then, we are to take this attire of the Son of man as symbolical, as commentators generally have taken it, it must describe personal qualities, official dignity, and celestial majesty, at which we may well bow down in the deepest reverence.

3. And "his head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow." The Scriptures tell us, that "the hoary head is a crown of glory." The same appears in Daniel's vision of "The Ancient of Days, whose garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool." Many have taken these white hairs as symbolic of the Godhead of Christ. Pure, undistributed light certainly is the representative of Deity. Paul also says, "The head of Christ is God." White hairs connect with fatherhood, and patriarchal dignity; and "with the ancient is wisdom." But I take this peculiarity as I take the robe and the golden girdle. It belongs to the glory and beauty in which our Lord now appears, and will appear to his saints, when he shall call them to himself. It connects indeed with his eternal Deity, but also with his human majesty, and the sublime reverence that appertains to him as a man. He is the everlasting Father, as well as the Prince of Peace. He is the second Adam, with all the patriarchal honour and dignity which would by this time attach to the first, if he had never sinned.

4. "And his eyes were as a flame of fire." Here is intelligence; burning, all-penetrating intelligence. Here is power to read secrets, to bring hidden things to light, to warm and search all hearts at a single glance. And all this is expressed in the very aspect of our Lord. "His eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men." "Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do." The light of the human eye is from without, and shifts its focal point as the rays happen to fall on it; but the light in the eye of Christ is from the Divinity within, and streams forth with steady and all-penetrating sharpness, as well in the darkness as in the day, into the soul as well as upon the body. But his sharp look is one of inspiring warmth to the good, as well as of discomfiting and consuming terror to the hypocritical and the godless. Will you believe it, my friends, that this is the look which is upon you, and which is to try you in the great day! Well may we pray the prayer of David: "Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any evil way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting."

5. "And his feet [were] like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace." He once said, through Isaiah, "I will make the place of my feet glorious." But here we have the feet themselves, those feet with which he is to tread down the wicked; and the description corresponds with the rest of the picture. Christ is all-glorious, even to his feet. And it is upon these feet of dreadful holiness that our Lord walks among the Churches, and shall tread down all abominations, and crush Antichrist, and Satan, and all who unhappily set aside his authority and his claims. Beautiful are those feet to them that love him, but terrible and consuming to those who shall be trodden by them.

6. "And his voice as the sound of many waters." How could it be otherwise, considering how he is speaking and uttering himself throughout all his Churches, and all the world, from the beginning until now, and on to the day of his coming? Or, leaving this out of the question, how could it be otherwise, considering that the day is approaching when "all that are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of man, and they that hear shall live?" But this majesty and power of voice is elsewhere more especially referred to the dreadfulness of Christ toward his faithless servants and enemies. It is particularly characteristic of his rebukes. But whether for the overthrow of his enemies or the salvation of his people, "The voice of the Lord is powerful; the voice of the Lord is full of majesty." It scattereth the proud, and it giveth joy and confidence to the lowly.

7. "And he had in his right hand seven stars." "The seven stars are the angels (ministers) of the seven Churches," and, as such, they are distinct from the candlesticks. Christ walks among the candlesticks, but he holds these ministers in his right hand. The democratic idea of Church organization, which makes all power proceed from the members, and makes the ministerial position nothing more than what inheres in every Christian, is thus scattered to the winds. Ministers have relations to Christ and to the Church, which ordinary Church members have not. They partake directly of Christ's authority, and are responsible directly to him, and are upheld by his right hand, beyond the power of men or angels to displace them.

 

8. "And out of his mouth went a sharp, two-edged sword." The sword is the symbol of magistracy and judgment. But this is not a hand-sword, but a word-sword. Nevertheless, it accords exactly with what Christ has himself said. "He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day." Even now the word of Christ is all the while absolving, or binding under condemnation, every one to whom it is preached. A certain judicial process inheres in every faithful presentation of the Gospel. It is good news—glad tidings; but there is a sword in it; a sword of double edge; and that a sword of judgment. And all the solemn administrations of the last day are nothing more than the full revelation of this sword-power of Christ's word, cutting asunder the unfaithful servant, and carrying into effect what is now already spoken. The word of God is not an empty utterance. It is "quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow."

 

9. "And his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength." The Churches are lamps; the ministers are stars; but Christ is the sun. He is to the moral world what the sun is to the natural. But let us not consider the description exhausted by its spiritual significations. Christ has a literal face; and that face must have a form and expression. He is not a fiction, but a reality—not a spirit, but a man, with all the features of a man, though it be in a glorified condition. He has a countenance, and that countenance is "as the sun shineth in his strength." Something of this was seen in the mount of transfiguration, when "his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light." Something of the same was manifest when he appeared to Saul of Tarsus in "a light above the brightness of the sun." And so glorious and pervading is this light which issues from his face, that in the New Jerusalem there will be neither sun, nor moon, nor lamp, nor any other light, and yet rendered so luminous by his presence, that even the nations on the earth walk in the light of it. And so the lightning brilliancy, which is to flash from one end of heaven to the other at the time of his coming, and the glory which is then to invest him and the whole firmament, is simply the uncovering or revelation of that blessed light which streams from his sublime person.

Such, then, is the full-drawn picture of our glorious Lord, as he walks among his Churches, and proceeds to pass his solemn judgment upon them.  Here I see him lifted up to the right hand of power, and clothed with all majesty, that creation's knees might bow at his feet, and creation's tongues confess his greatness and proclaim his praise. Here I see Godhead in manhood, unhumbled and unalloyed by the union; and humanity transformed and exalted to the sphere of the worshipful and Divine; and all, to give greatness to the lowly, and strength to the feeble, and honour to the despised; and to bring the lofty neck to obedience, tear away the masks of falsehood, and enforce the rule of heaven on the earth. I do not wonder at the effect the vision produced upon the exiled apostle as it burst upon him in his lonely solitude: "And when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead."

And if John was so overwhelmed with this vision of the Saviour, on whose bosom he leaned, and with whose power he was so familiar, how will it be with those who know him not, how will it be with us, when the startling trump of God shall make these heavens ring with the tidings of that great Saviour's presence, and these eyes of ours shall meet his eyes, and see him in his glory? Will there be no fainting, falling, swooning, then? Will there be no sinking in the souls of men, no drying up, as it were, of the very fountains of life at the stupendous Apocalypse? But a single utterance made it all right with John; and with that, if you be indeed a Christian, I would have you comfort yourself in view of that awful moment. Jesus said, "Fear not."

The true Christian is forever safe. If you be in the Spirit, and the Spirit be in you, the life that would otherwise fail you will not fail; the fear that would otherwise overwhelm you shall not overwhelm you. In your weakness, Christ will give you strength. In your terror, Christ will be your consolation. In your wild wonderment, his hand will touch, and his gracious words assure you. Only see to it that you are on right terms with him—that you are one of his true people—that you are a brother of John, and a copartner in the kingdom, and in patient waiting, in Christ Jesus. Having this, you have secured your armour against all the terrors of the Apocalypse.

Excerpted from The Apocalypse: A Series of Special Lectures on the Revelation of Jesus Christ.

When I can't find the answers I need, I pray in the Spirit to receive them directly from God!

The Apostle Paul wrote about this in 1^st Corinthians 14. 13-15.   “…let him who speaks in a tongue pray that he may interpret. ¹⁴For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful. ¹⁵What is the conclusion then? I will pray with the spirit, and (then) I will also pray with the understanding.”

The one must follow the other.

The gifts of unknown tongues and interpretations are ours to be used. When I pray in spiritual language -- mere ecstatic utterances which are meaningless to the mind -- my carnal mind is blocked from trying to figure things out mentally, BUT my spirit is opened to receive understanding from His Spirit.  Then when I open my mouth and begin to pray in my own, known language of English, the words which flow out of my mouth inform my own mind of the understanding which the Holy Spirit has just shared with my spirit.

I learned this late in my life and have used it often since. 

Re-posted from a year ago for my California Girl.

The Lord Jesus Christ sent a message to the church from heaven.   It is found in the book called The Revelation of Jesus Christ, or The Apocalypse, the last book in the New Testament of The Holy Bible.  The word apocalypse literally means the unveiling, the removal of the veil.  The Apocalypse is made up of several distinct scenes, visions or acts. The first gives us the Apocalypse of Christ in his relation to his Churches on earth, and his judgment of them. The second gives us the Apocalypse of Christ in his relation to the Church in heaven, or his glorified Church, and the scenes into which the saints are introduced after they are caught up from the earth. The third gives us the Apocalypse of Christ in his relation to the unbelieving world, and his administrations of retribution to the nations. And so on, till we see everything settled in the excellencies of the new heavens and the new earth. We have to do now only with the first of the scenes (or visions) recorded by the Apostle John, and particularly the first three chapters which contain Christ’s message to the church.

The instant John turned to "see the voice that spake with" him, he "saw seven golden candlesticks (or lampstands), and in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like to the Son of man."  The Son of Man is a name Jesus Christ called Himself.  And these "seven candlesticks are seven Churches." In all languages, truth and knowledge are likened to light. The Psalmist speaks of God's word as a lamp to his feet and a light unto his path. And so the Churches are the lampstands, or lightbearers. They have no light in themselves, but they hold forth and diffuse the light which they have from the oil of grace and the fire of the Spirit. Each Christian is a lighted candle. And all God's children are described as "lights in the world, holding forth the word of life." It is therefore a most significant image by which the communities of saints are here set forth. They are as so many lampstands of God's light and truth in a world of darkness; and as such Christ deals with them.

These lampstands are gold—composed of the costliest, the most precious, the most glorious, the royal, the sacred metal.  From Jesus’ point of view, a saint is an excellent, a glorious, a royal, in some sense a sacred being; and a congregation of Christians is altogether the most precious thing on earth. It is the pure gold of the world.  Seven is the number of completeness. It here designates the whole Christian body, of all times and all places.

And here Jesus Christ reveals Himself as much more than a Priest. We here have to do with the Lord and Judge of the Churches. As Judge of the world, more is to be revealed later; but here He appears as Judge of the Churches. He is a Priest invested with royal prerogatives, and come forth to pronounce judgment upon the candlesticks which he attends. This vision and the letters within it are for the entire Church from the days of the Apostle John on to the resurrection, grasped in a single view; so it is Christ's whole relation to that Church, with special reference to his judgment of it.  And that is my point for today.  If anyone would desire to know if Christ regards him or her as His at His coming and worthy to escape the horrors of His judgements, this is the passage of scripture to study and understand!
 

After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven. And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me, saying, “Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this.”  Revelation 4: 1

These words begin a new vision, which constitutes the second grand section of the Revelation of Jesus Christ.  It relates not to things on earth, but to things in heaven, and to things subsequent to the period covered by the letters to the seven Churches. As the first vision embraces the entire earthly career of the Church on earth, from its organization under the apostles to the second coming of Christ, this gives us the state of things intervening between the removal or rapture of the saints, and the letting forth of judgment upon apostate Christendom. In other words, it is the Revelation of Christ in relation to those believers wholeheartedly His at His coming, His elect in heaven, after they have been "taken"—"caught up"—miraculously removed from the world to the pavilion cloud,—and previous to the going forth of His visitations upon those who may think themselves Christians, but not "accounted worthy to escape all these things," and "left" to face the tribulation.

Who, then, are they; they who are Ready For Rapture? And what are their characteristics? Nowhere in the Scriptures may we find a more direct and satisfactory answer to these inquiries, than is furnished us in the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2 & 3.  Christ himself here looks down with flaming eyes upon His people, and with a certainty infallible points His finger to those whom He acknowledges, and for whom His everlasting rewards are in reserve. The merest glance is all that we can now attempt; but even that will be enough to reveal, in vivid outline, who and what are the saints, and the partakers in the honors of transforming grace.

First of all, they are Ephesians—people of warm and kindled hearts, glowing with the impulses of ardent love and zeal toward Christ.  Love to Jesus is the root of all true Christianity. It is the perfection of faith, and it is the fulfilling of the law. Let a man be alive in love to God, and make it his joy to give his whole heart to Jesus, and his title is clear, and his acceptance sure.

And as the fruit of their affection, Christ's true people are further characterized by unswerving and uncompromising devotion to their profession. They have taken Christ for their Lord, and they will know no obedience but obedience to Him. For Him they labor, for Him they endure, and His they count themselves to be, to the full extent of all they have and are. Pledged to stand out unshaken against whatsoever is wrong, they will have no communion with evil ones, and will not fellowship with such as say they are apostles and are not, and hate and loathe the deeds of tyranny which would tread down any in whom God's image is, and are not afraid to speak their condemnation of wrongdoers, whatever may be their pretensions or their place. There is a tendency, in these days, to account that the purest Christianity which has the largest "charity," as it is called, and toleration for everybody and everything, and which disdains social differences for opinion's sake, or separations and controversies on account of the faith. But that is not the sort of Christianity which our Lord and Judge commends in these Epistles. Those whom He here approves as His true people, are such as cannot bear those who are evil, such as test men's claims to apostolicity, and expose their falsities, and hate the deeds of the Nicolaitanes, and stand to the truth as they have received it from the Lord, earnestly contending for the faith.

Another characteristic is, that they are poor, and reproached, and tried, and often persecuted unto death. Smyrnaotes, to a greater or less extent, are all the true saints of God. It seems to be one of the unvarying laws of this dispensation, that the absence of censure from heaven conducts through affliction on earth. The richest and most independent man, if he be a true Christian, is quite convinced that he is one of the very poorest and most helpless of God's creatures. He is poor in spirit, and his earthly possessions are no riches to him. And if any would live godly in Christ Jesus, it is useless to think of exemption from trials, reproaches and persecutions. People may serve the devil all their lives; and if they only manage to do it decently, not a word from the world shall ever be said against them, and not a frown need they fear. But let them start in earnest, honest Christianity, and they are snubbed, and sneered at, and put out of the synagogue, and made to hear of it and feel it at many points. Pious people, somehow, have ever been afflicted people. It seems to be God's plan to make his children ill at ease in this world, that they may the more earnestly long for that which is to come. The mass of them have been martyrs, living martyr lives, if not dying martyr deaths. The holiest men are always suffering men. There is no saintship which is exempt from trial, sorrow, and this world's frowns. Nor may any one be a Christian of the purer and better sort, with whom the world is satisfied, on whom earthly fortune ever smiles, and of whom no spiteful ill is ever said. Woe unto you, when all speak well of you, is the word of Christ himself.

But along with this, we find another feature. Afflicted, poor and persecuted, God's true people cheerfully bear whatever He appoints, and keep Christ's word of patient endurance. The saints of Ephesus did bear for the Savior's name, and fainted not. Those of Smyrna were faithful to the last, as illustrated in the case of Polycarp, who preferred burning to a compromise of his faith, and found place for songs and thanksgivings amid the flames that consumed him. Those of Pergamos held fast Christ's name, and did not deny the faith of Him, and stood out in glad adherence to the truth, under the very sword of the executioner. Those of Thyatira and Philadelphia are specially commended for their endurance in the midst of falsity and suffering, and held fast in joyous prospect of the speedy coming of their Divine Deliverer. And so it is ever the character of God's saints to choose rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than all the treasures in Egypt.

And if there is yet another mark of saintship singled out in these Epistles, it is the profound regard which true believers have for the recompense of the reward at the coming and revelation of Jesus Christ. There is a Paradise of God on which their hopes are set. There is a crown of life at which they aim. There is a heavenly sustenance and gem of celestial privilege and honor, and a scepter of holy dominion, and an inheritance of the morning star, and an acknowledgment before God and angels, and an enrollment among principalities in the eternal empire, and a session with Jesus on His everlasting throne, on which their hearts are set. They believe that these things exist, and that they are meant for them, and that it is the merciful will of God that they should have them; and they wait for them, looking not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. Seeing that Christ has given these promises, they embrace them, and confess that they are strangers and pilgrims on the earth, "looking for that blessed hope, the glorious appearing of God our Savior."

What, then, is to become of these people? Many of them have fallen asleep; and daily one and another of them, in every age, has been consigned to the tomb. Scattered over all the world their wasting ashes lie, whilst the places that once knew them know them no more. But these Epistles take very little account of death. The most that they say of it is that Christ has passed through it and revived, and that He has the keys of both it and Hades. Since then, it is hardly any more accounted death. The addresses to the Churches are given as if those same Churches were to continue through all the ages, and to meet the scenes of the great consummation just as they were living at the time. Hence, the resurrection also is but inferentially embraced. It is, indeed, presupposed in all the seven promises; but the short hiatus in the lives of individual saints is treated as hardly worth being embraced among the greater things of this vision. The return of Jesus and His Apocalypse to His Church is the master theme; and the preparation for that, and the rewards then to come to the saints, absorbs everything. And when Christ comes, it will be the same with those faithful ones of His that sleep, as with those who may be still alive and waiting for Him. There will be no advantage to the one class above the other as respects what is to follow. When the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and the trump of God, first of all, the saints that sleep in Him shall rise. This is plainly taught us in the apostolic messages. And when they have been thus recalled, whatever is further said is the same with regard to them as to those living saints who shall not have died at all.

One very striking statement concerning them, is that they are to be kept out of the hour of temptation—out of that season of trial which is then to come upon the whole world, to try those who dwell upon the earth instead of cherishing a heavenly citizenship. (See chap. 3:10.) How this deliverance is to be wrought, St. Paul explains. The saints, both living and resurrected, are to be miraculously snatched away from earth to heaven, suddenly, and in the twinkling of an eye. His own unmistakable words are: "Then we who are living, who remain, shall be caught up together with them (the resurrected ones) in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air." (1 Thess. 4:17.) The Savior himself has also given assurances to the same effect, where He says: "I tell you, in that night there shall be two in one bed: the one shall be taken; and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding together: the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two shall be in the field: the one shall be taken, and the other left. And they answered and said unto him, Where [or Whither], Lord? And he said unto them, Wheresoever the Body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together." (Luke 17:34-37.) And to this same marvelous occurrence, which Paul speaks of as one of the great mysteries (1 Cor. 15:51), do the words at the head of this discourse refer. "I saw," says John, "and behold, a door set open in the heaven, and the former voice which I heard as of a trumpet, speaking with me, saying, Come up hither."

That door opened in heaven is the door of the ascension of the saints. That trumpet voice is the same which Paul describes as recalling the sleepers in Jesus, and to which the Savior refers as the signal by which His elect are gathered from the four winds, but which we have no reason to suppose shall be heard or understood except by those whom it is meant to summon to the skies. And that "Come up hither" is for every one in John's estate, even the gracious and mighty word of the returning Lord himself, by virtue of which they that wait for Him shall renew their strength, and mount up with wings as eagles. (Isa. 40:31.) And thus, as the Psalmist sung, the Lord will hide them in the secret place of His presence from the vexation of man, and screen them in a tabernacle from the contradiction of tongues. (Ps. 31:19, 20.)

Such, then, is the termination of the earthly career of God's elect, for which the saints of every age have waited, longed and prayed.

And such is the next great scene which may now be any day expected. I know of nothing in the prophecies of God, unless it should be the mere deepening of the signs that have already appeared, which yet remains to be fulfilled before this sudden summons from the skies: "Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were a little moment, until the indignation be overpast; for, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity." (Isa. 26:20, 21.) Any one of these days or nights, and certainly before many more years have passed, all this shall be accomplished. Some of these days or nights,—while men are busy with the common pursuits and cares of life, and everything is rolling on in its accustomed course,—unheralded, unbelieved, and unknown to the gay world, here one, and there another, shall secretly disappear, "caught up" like Enoch, who "was not found because God had translated him." Invisibly, noiselessly, miraculously, they shall vanish from the company and fellowship of those about them, and ascend to their returning Lord. Strange announcements shall be in the morning papers of missing ones. Strange accounts shall be whispered around in the circles of business and society. And for the first time will apostate Christendom, and the slow in heart to believe all that the prophets have written, have the truth brought home, that no such half-Christianity as theirs is sufficient to put men among the favorites of the Lord.

Brethren and friends, these are neither dreams nor fables. They are realities, set forth in the infallible truth of God, and as literally true as anything else in the inspired Word. Value the prize of our high calling in Christ Jesus, and take this holy book as an unfailing guide, be not faithless, but believing. And if you feel yourself unready for such events, do not think of setting them aside by scoffs and sneers. If they are in the purpose of God, as He so plainly says they are, and as I conscientiously believe they are, your unbelief cannot alter them. Better bestir yourself to be prepared, with your loins girded and your lamp trimmed and burning. There is chance for you yet to be among these favored ones whom God has engaged thus to keep out of the judgment plagues and sorrows; but that this opportunity shall remain to you for another year, or month, or week, or day, or hour, no living man or angel of heaven is authorized to promise. 

Excerpted From The Apocalypse: A Series of Special Lectures on the Revelation of Jesus Christ, by Joseph Augustus Seiss.

 

 

I became aware of theories about aliens visiting earth and affecting the history of humankind when I was a teenager in the 1960's and first read Chariots of the Gods.  (For those who want to know more about these, I suggest this link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_astronauts .)  My awareness of these was only heightened over my years as a Bible scholar and student of religions and philosophies.  And I just want to declare to all, this heightened awareness of the possibilities of alien visitation and activity has only enhanced my understanding of scripture and my personal friendship with the Spirit of Truth, My Lord Jesus Christ! 

Primary among these enhancements is my absolute faith in God the Creator of all things.  Genesis opens with "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth."  The Hebrew word translated created in English versions of this verse literally means made from nothing.  God spoke and the creation began its existence.  A subsequent Hebrew word in Genesis is also translated created, but it literally means rearranged or re fabricated. In other words, I believe that IF ancient aliens visited our planet and affected our history, those aliens were created beings, either angels or some other race of creature, subject to God the Creator even as we all are.  Jesus said: "God is Spirit and seeks worshipers in spirit and in truth."  He was speaking of God the Creator of all things, including all creatures.

Another of these enhancements is my personal relationship with Jesus Christ, God Incarnate.  It is clear to me Jesus of Nazareth was a unique human being, fathered by the very Spirit of God the Creator, qualified as "the Lamb of God which takes away the sin of the world," "the Way and the Truth and the Life," and My Redeemer, Lord, King, Savior!  It is clear to me that when I received the gift of faith and believed in Jesus as Messiah, I became a new creation, born from above, spiritually one in Spirit with God the Creator, in Christ.  I received eternal life and entered the Kingdom of Heaven, God's Presence Forever!  And it is clear to me the Spirit of God is in me and upon me, enabling me to love as Jesus loves, to put to death my lower, earthly self and to speak with God's authority to the spiritual rebels all around me.  Here on planet earth I am being perfected -- rearranged or re fabricated -- in God's own image, created according to God's originally-stated intention for man.

What are your beliefs concerning ancient aliens?  Do you see Jesus as "not of this world?"

...

I started a series about Who Is Ready for the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.  But the Lord has put my writing further on that on hold for awhile.

So instead I shall tell a short story how I came to be so passionate about that subject:

I was in Germany in 1990 when Jesus confronted me with the fact my salvation was incomplete.  I had accepted the truth that the Son of God had redeemed me by His substitutionary death on a cross.  But I'd missed the part about Him making it possible that I may become a child of God myself here and now by yielding all of my earthly life to Him.  I was for all practical purposes a god unto myself in those days, doing whatever seemed right to me at the time.  I was, then a "carnal" Christian with little understanding of being "Spirit led" in all things.  Suffice it to say He got my attention and let me know He intended I should be His servant from that day forward.  And I began to seek a Bible college education.

In Christianity Today I found an advertisement from the Moody Bible College offering correspondence courses.  And one of them was a 2 unit class offered for about $180 I think, which I could afford to write a check for then and there, entitled Biblical Eschatology.  I ordered the correspondence course despite the fact I barely understood what the word Eschatology means.  And before long I received in the mail not just one but three textbooks which would guide my study into what the Bible has to say about "the end times."

Before very long I had discovered that there are more than a few differing interpretations of what the Bible says about "the end times."  But after an exhaustive time of studying and contemplating and praying for divine guidance, I found that I understood what God was saying.  And I also found that very few living souls, including my fellow Christians, even cared much less knew what God was saying about "the end times."

Today, twenty some years and much Bible college study later, the Lord is reminding me of those facts and stirring me to preach and teach what He has said about "the end times."  The end of "church" history is near.  Many of us alive today will experience it.  And just a few weeks after the Wednesday Night Bible Class I participate in had already ineffectively skimmed through the prophecies which are known as the Epistles to the Seven Churches, found in Revelation 2 & 3, the Lord led me to find an excellent book on that subject.  And I am now studying it, and wondering again what God is up to in me.

The man who wrote the text I'm reading died in 1904; so his exposition on The Revelation of Jesus Christ is not new.  The man knew then when he wrote his book (which was actually a series of lectures) what I now know; and that is Jesus Christ is returning to earth soon to commence the long delayed judgement of mankind; and that judgement begins with us, the visible church of Jesus Christ.  How soon?  Only God knows.  But it is imminent, the next prophesied move of God on the earth.   And those of us humans who are not ready to meet Him in the air during the initial resurrection/ translation of the saints will regret it, and this is a gross understatement!  I'm passionate about this because, like my Lord Jesus, I would that everyone would be saved to eternal life in Christ and from the wrath and judgement which is coming.

 ...