Servant of Messiah Ministries

Preaching the Gospel of the Kingdom of God.

Old Books – C.S. Lewis

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While we provide a wide variety of books by different authors does not mean we agree with every one of their teachings. We ask you to have a Berean mind and search your Scriptures, to verify what you read.(Acts 17 v 11). These books reflect a broad sampling of theologies and all books reflect denominational, historical and cultural biases.

Even though we do not agree with all the resources and eBooks we provide, we do offer them because Philippians 4:8 says

Finally, brethren,
whatsoever things are true,
whatsoever things are honest,
whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are pure,
whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

Some people have found them praiseworthy and useful…and if you do not …you can enjoy the fish and spit out the bones. We all need to discern truth and error and get beyond being bottle-fed milk. This is your opportunity to do that.

The lives presented in the biographies are just men, prone to error and sinners like the rest of us. Yet their lives do inspire us. Remember it is not their church, their great works, or their writings, that made them a “heroes of the faith,” but God made them so.

C.S. Lewis said it best when he encouraged us to read “old books”

There is a strange idea abroad that in every subject the ancient books should be read only by the professionals and that the amateur should content himself with the modern books. Thus I have found as a tutor in English Literature that if the average student wants to find out something about Platonism, the very last thing he thinks of doing is to take a translation of Plato off the library shelf and read the Symposium. He would rather read some dreary modern book ten times as long, all about “isms” and influences and only once in twelve pages telling him what Plato actually said. The error is rather an amiable one, for it springs from humility. The student is half afraid to meet one of the great philosophers face to face. He feels himself inadequate and thinks he will not understand him. But if he only knew, the great man, just because of his greatness, is much more intelligible than his modern commentator. The simplest student will be able to understand, if not all, yet a very great deal of what Plato said; but hardly anyone can understand some modern books on Platonism. It has always therefore been one of my main endeavors as a teacher to persuade the young that firsthand knowledge is not only more worth acquiring than secondhand knowledge, but is usually much easier and more delightful to acquire.

This mistaken preference for the modern books and this shyness of the old ones is nowhere more rampant than in theology. Wherever you find a little study circle of Christian laity you can be almost certain that they are studying not St. Luke or St. Paul or St. Augustine or Thomas Aquinas or Hooker or Butler, but Sproul, MacArthur, Keller, Piper, N.T. Wright etc.

Now, this seems to me topsy-turvy. Naturally, since I myself am a writer, I wish the ordinary reader to read no modern books. But if he must read only the new or only the old, I would advise him to read the old. And I would give him this advice precisely because he is an amateur and therefore much less protected than the expert against the dangers of an exclusive contemporary diet. A new book is still on its trial and the amateur is not in a position to judge it. It has to be tested against the great body of Christian thought down the ages, and all its hidden implications (often unsuspected by the author himself) have to be brought to light. Often it cannot be fully understood without the knowledge of a good many other modern books. If you join at eleven o’clock a conversation which began at eight you will often not see the real bearing of what is said. Remarks which seem to you very ordinary will produce laughter or irritation and you will not see why—the reason, of course, being that the earlier stages of the conversation have given them a special point. In the same way, sentences in a modern book which look quite ordinary may be directed at some other book; in this way, you may be led to accept what you would have indignantly rejected if you knew its real significance. The only safety is to have a standard of plain, central Christianity (“mere Christianity” as Baxter called it) which puts the controversies of the moment in their proper perspective. Such a standard can be acquired only from the old books.

It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones. Every age has its own outlook.

It is especially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books… 

Your Money and Prophecy…

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We wrote about cycles in the stock market and the 7-year corrections. It is time to revisit that.

We are a nation of consumers – obese locusts devouring the resources of the earth enabled only by record debt.  Debt levels have now reached their 2008 peaks…right before the Great Recession.

  • Total consumer debt reached a record $12.8 trillion. The prior peak was $12.7 trillion in 2008.
  • Since the financial crisis, auto loans and student loans have soared. Auto loans are now at $1.2 trillion, up 70% from the depths of the recession in 2010.
  • Student loans have reached an incredible $1.3 trillion.
  • Total credit card debt has reached $784 billion, the highest level since the fourth quarter of 2009.

Wall Street is the Temple of Capitalism, Finance is its religion,  and fear and greed are its sacraments. Fear and greed are not based on wisdom, logic or faith. The warning signs are being ignored in a greedy race for every new stock market high.

This is not meant to be a prediction of any kind.  I cannot even predict my own behaviour for the next 12 hours since phone calls and family needs arrange my day. These are warning signs that we are setting up for that cyclical correction of the type we had in 1973,1980, 1987, 2000, 2007.

Valuations are at levels only seen in 1929 and 1987.

The CAPE ratio (cyclically adjusted price-earnings ratio), a valuation measure applied to the S&P 500 devised by Yale economist Robert Shiller, is higher today than it was on Black Monday. In fact, it’s only been higher at two other moments in history: heading into the stock market crash of 1929 and the dot-com bubble of 2000. Today the Shiller CAPE, ratio, is above 30 when its average is 16.8

The trading 12-month GAAP price/earnings ratio was about 20 times earnings in 1987 compared with 23 times today.

Since PE valuations of broad indexes ignore stocks losing money adding them takes the PE of the Russell from 26 to a more realistic P/E of 78.(combined market cap /all component companies trailing earnings)

Since its 2009 lows, the S&P 500 SPX,  is up more than 250%, the second-longest bull market ever, which should put you on guard.

Trading Behavior is a warning

The small-cap stocks and broader indexes are flat and have turned down to below their 200-day averages.

Dow Transports –  A traditional leading indicator has broken down and since they move the goods and products they should participate in the boom?

NYSE exchange – more stocks are making 52-week lows than are making 52-week highs triggering the Hindenburg Omen. Five such signals recently are only tied with 2007 and 2000 leading up to both corrections.

Political and other considerations

The Federal Reserve is now unloading the $4.5  trillion-dollar portfolio of mortgages it bought which has propped up Real Estate prices. Selling 4.5 trillion dollars of mortgages will reprice all fixed income securities. Never fight the Fed is a ‘truism” in trading circles.

The “business leader” president has shut down his Business Councils amid massive defections and so far his agenda is a mystery.

Korea and Iran remain nuclear thorns in our side while civil unrest and racial tensions fill the news. This President is likely to abandon the nuclear deal with Iran.

We have not paid back the trillion-dollar bailout passed by Congress in 2007  for all those “shovel-ready projects’  and we are certainly not prepared for another correction so soon.

“Make American Great Again’  is not a new idea.  The American foreign policy of Isolationism in the 20’s and 30’s  was a diplomatic and economic doctrine that aimed at self-advancement to make the United States economically self-reliant.  The policy of Isolationism in the 20’s and 30’s attempted to isolate the United States from the diplomatic affairs of other countries and limiting foreign competition by imposing high import tariffs (Taxes).

Tearing up N.A.F.T.A.  and recent trade skirmishes with England and Canada over jets…are but the beginning.

My conclusions are that a cyclically inevitable correction and a bear market must follow.

This selfie generation is best described here:  2 Timothy 3 v2 – For people will love only themselves and their money. They will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God, disobedient to their parents, and ungrateful. They will consider nothing sacred.

We need this Global Correction for two reasons: 

  1. A loving God must take away our idols to save us….and tear down what separates us from Him.
  2. On a larger scale –  the crash of 1929 set the stage for the Messiah’s of the 1930’s. That decade gave us the leaders that promised their nations a solution to the economic meltdown of 1929.  Stalin, Franco, Tojo, Tito, Mussolini, Hitler. They also brought us a World War.

There are new Messiah’s waiting to capitalize on the coming economic meltdown.  My bible says 10 in fact ….and so we watch events unfold..…

Reformation and Jubilees?

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Blow the Shofar in Zion, and sound an alarm on My Holy Mountain!  Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, For the day of the LORD, is coming; Surely it is near… (Joel 2:1)

The Feast of Trumpets falls on Sept 21, 2017, and Yom Kippur is 10 days later….

The U.N. declared International Day of Peace “just happens” to be September 21, 2017. The Theme this year “just happens” to be peace and safety.

It is 70 years from 1947 which was the rebirth of Israel. – On 29 November 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted the Plan as Resolution 181

It is the 50th anniversary or year of Jubilee for Jerusalem. It was liberated in 1967 when Jerusalem was recaptured by Israel from the Jordanians. Fifty years earlier Jerusalem was liberated by Allenby in 1917 and 400 years earlier in the Turks conquered Jerusalem in 1517.

It is the 70th anniversary of the Dead Sea Scrolls – early 1947

It is the 100th anniversary of the Balfour declaration – On November 2, 1917, Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour writes a letter expressing the British government’s support for a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

It is the 120th anniversary of the First Zionist Congress – “In Basel, I founded the Jewish state,” Zionist visionary Theodor Herzl said in 1897 of the First Zionist Congress.

It is the 500th anniversary of the Reformation – Catholics and Lutherans will celebrate Reformation Day Oct 31st, 2017 in Jerusalem. They will begin to set aside differences that started with Luther actions on Oct 31, 1517, in Wittenberg Germany.

 

It is 120 Jubilees from Adam.

It is 40 Jubilees since Christ’s death.

It is 70 Jubilees since Exodus (1483 B.C).

It marks year 5777 on the Jewish calendar.

So we pay attention and we note the time….for God moves in time and with design and order.

No – I make no attempt to interpret the mind of God and His inscrutable plans. I do know that ‘coincidence” is not a Kosher word….We only pray to be part of whatever He plans to do among His people and we prepare spiritually.

Christian Merchants of Death

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Defense stocks rallied after Pres. Trump signed a $350 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia which was the “biggest single arms deal” in US’ history.

The State Department’s Human Rights Report  made no secret of Saudi Arabia’s numerous human rights abuses, saying, “The most important human rights problems reported included citizens’ lack of the ability and legal means to choose their government; restrictions on universal rights, such as freedom of expression, including on the internet, and the freedoms of assembly, association, movement, and religion; and pervasive gender discrimination and lack of equal rights that affected most aspects of women’s lives.”

The State Department report also mentioned the Saudi-led coalition to defeat the Houthi rebels in Yemen, whose airstrikes have “resulted in civilian casualties and damage to infrastructure on multiple occasions.”

  • While 119 countries have banned the sale and use of cluster bombs, the US (the largest merchant of death on the planet) continues its sale to Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia and Iran are fighting a proxy war in Yemen and US cluster bombs are being used on their civilians.
  • Saudi Arabia is in the top five major human rights violators worldwide including the indiscriminate use of the death penalty. Saudi Arabia executed over 157 last year including 47 in one day of which 72% were for non-violent crimes, in violation of  International Human Rights Law.
  • Atheism is a considered a terrorist offense. There are over 60 synagogues in Iran, that “axis of evil state”. There are no synagogues in Saudi Arabia. There are no churches either. Non-Muslim public worship of any kind is forbidden by law.
  • People who are known to be Jewish or to have visited Israel (i.e. with Israeli stamps in their passport) are only allowed into Saudi Arabia if they have a pressing and documented political or financial reason to be there.
  • Women cannot drive – cannot leave the home without a male guardian known as a Mayram. They are refused access to swimming pools and most workplaces have separate entrances for them. A Saudi woman was even flogged for checking her husband’s phone without his permission. The testimony of one man is equal to that of two women in court. Of 137 countries they ranked the 127th as most sexist.
  • Saudi Arabia blocked the UN from inquiring about their war crimes. Amnesty argued the US, and the UK should stop selling arms to Saudi Arabia because they are funding war crimes.
  • The Saudi-led coalition has imposed a blockade on Yemen since they began their military campaign two years ago – at times rerouting ships on their way to Yemen’s main port. They have impeded, delayed and restricted the entry and movement of humanitarian aid. Yemen imports 90% of its food. Large parts of Yemen are on the brink of famine, and 21 million people need food assistance while 2.2 million people have had to abandon their homes.

Even though the USA is only 5% of the world’s population we sell 50% of the world’s arms. We cannot fix our roads. The water in Flint is undrinkable. Our airports are 30 years old. Yet 55% of all our federal discretionary spending is for our military – better weapons and improved killing.

Is it no wonder that we need to keep selling death to keep our military-industrial complex busy? Saudi defense spending already is the world’s third highest after the U.S. and China. Their foreign exchange reserves have fallen 30% in 3 years and their budget deficits are 13% of GDP since oil is 90% of their only evaporating income.

They mortgaged their future paying for weapons that they do not need. The young uneducated unemployed Saudis – with no jobs in a country with no industry will become frustrated, restless, and attentive to the very extremism that Trump has just admonished them to shun.  Remember, 15 of the 19 attackers that flew planes into the World Trade Centre on Sept 11 were Saudi citizens, they were not Iranians or Iraqis or Afghani’s?  They are expecting President Trump to repeal the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, which has led more than 800 families to file suit in New York against Saudi Arabia.

So what are we as Christians to do?

It does not matter if you are Republican, Liberal or Democrat. This system is not changing. I urge you to look at your King who stood before two Roman governors and said  John 18v36  Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world.  If it were, my servants would fight and campaign and vote and all the rest … But now my kingdom is from another place.”

  • Democracy is Satan’s method of inviting you to share in his running this country. He is the god of this world and the governments in power rule under his sway. 2 Cor 4:4 Satan, who is the god of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don’t believe.
  • Why would you have any part in arming the enemies of Israel – and those sworn to annihilate the children of Abraham?
  • The Bible is very clear. You have to pay taxes, that belongs to Ceasar. You are not required to cast your vote for a Ceasar who has blood on his/her hands….. Revelation 18:4 And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that are not partakers/complicit in her sins, and that you do not receive her plagues.
  • What will you say to your King when He asks you to account for what was done in your name? If you voted – you are an accomplice in this wickedness…

 

Israel becomes a spoil

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Israel is embarking on its largest-ever infrastructure project with the development of the huge Leviathan offshore gas field in the Mediterranean. The development of Leviathan, which is scheduled to take about three years, constitutes both the largest energy project and financial investment in Israel in the country’s history.

Developers of Israel’s Leviathan natural gas field committed last month (Feb 2017) to a $3.75 billion investment to develop the oil and gas reserves. Leviathan was first discovered in 2010 some 100 miles west of Haifa. Located in the eastern Mediterranean Sea area off the coast of Israel, the Leviathan field is estimated to contain 22 trillion cubic feet of gross recoverable natural gas resources.

Phase one – The first phase involves an initial investment of $4 billion to produce 12 billion cu meters of gas annually for domestic customers as well as, initially, Jordanian, Palestinian and Egyptian markets.

The first phase of Leviathan’s development includes the drilling of eight production wells, which are to be linked to an offshore production-and-treatment platform and, from there, by undersea pipeline to two entry points along Israel’s central coast.  Subsequently, the processed gas will be transferred to Israel Natural Gas Lines’ onshore transportation grid for export.

Phase two – A second phase to expand production to 21 billion cu m per year at a cost of $2.5 billion export to Turkey, Egypt, and southern European countries. “A pipeline to Turkey could be operational by the time commercial production begins,” predicted Yuval Steinitz, Israel’s energy, and water minister.  Talks are already underway with Turkey following the thaw in relations between the two countries after a six-year freeze. The Israeli energy minister last month met in Istanbul with his Turkish counterpart, Berat Albaryrak, to discuss future gas shipments to Turkey and possibly to Europe using existing networks.

The gas would be transported via a 500-kilometer-long undersea pipeline from the Leviathan field to Turkey’s southern Mediterranean coast.   An initial cost estimate of the pipeline is $2 billion. Israeli energy sources said the state-owned Eilat to Ashkelon Pipeline Co. is set to complete in March a technical planning and economic analysis of the proposed pipeline.

In addition to sales to the Egyptian domestic market, discussions have resumed on possible gas shipments from both the Leviathan and the neighboring Tamar fields to two largely idle LNG plants on Egypt’s Mediterranean coast.  This plan would entail construction of a 450-km-long pipeline.

Phase three – An even more ambitious plan proposes building a 1,300-km pipeline that would transport gas from the Leviathan field and a nearby, newly discovered field off the coast of Cyprus to Cyprus itself and Greece. Then, it would link up with existing transmission lines to Italy.

A feasibility study conducted by IGI-Poseidon for the European Commission estimated the cost at $5.7 billion, but the report found that total would be substantially less than an offshore LNG plant. “Israel views gas exports to Europe as important from a strategic point of view,” said Chen Herzog, an economist.  But Herzog added that the pipeline to Greece likely would depend on the discovery of more gas at sites off the coast of Israel.

There are dangers ahead….

While Energy Minister Steinitz celebrated the decision, pointing out that the natural gas field will boost Israel’s economy, provide cleaner air, and give the country a measure of energy security in the near term. “If we continue on a responsible and steadfast path, we will also succeed in discovering more gas fields, positioning Israel as an important player in the energy market alongside our neighbors in the Middle East and Europe.”

Could it be not all players want to share?  Russia is the largest provider of natural gas to Europe. A pipeline from Israel to Greece/ Italy breaks the leverage Russia always had over a freezing Europe.

In 2007, Russia provided 38.7% of the European Union’s natural gas total imports and 24.3% of consumed natural gas. That has grown to over 40% now. As of 2009, Russian natural gas was delivered to Europe through 12 pipelines. The largest importers of Russian gas in the European Union are Germany and Italy, accounting together for almost half of the EU gas imports from Russia

Ezekiel 38 and 39 tell of a time in the near future when a consortium of Muslim Nations (including Turkey and Russia) will invade Israel….The identity of those nations includeTurkey, the Southern Russian Muslim States, Iraq, Libya, Ethiopia, Somalia,  Iran and Syria and others.

(Ezek. 38:10-13)  This is what the Sovereign LORD says: On that day thoughts will come into your mind and you will devise an evil scheme.  You will say, “I will invade a land of unwalled villages; I will attack a peaceful and unsuspecting people all of them living without walls and without gates and bars. I will plunder and loot and turn my hand against the resettled ruins and the people gathered from the nations, rich in livestock and goods, living at the center of the land.”

Sheba and Dedan and the merchants of Tarshish and all her villages will say to you, “Have you come to plunder? Have you gathered your hordes to loot, to carry off silver and gold, to take away livestock and goods and to seize much plunder?” ‘ (Ezek. 38:10-13)

Ezekiel 38 v 11 And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates, v 12 To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places that are now inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.

  • The target is the people of Israel, only once they are resettled in the land –  Post-1948
  • The motivation will be v 12 – to take a spoil and plunder dressed up perhaps as the “liberation of the Palestinians?”

That never made sense until now – and Israel never had any natural wealth like oil that would make her a target until now.

This oil and gas project competes directly with Russia and Turkey’s energy ambitions.  Completed pipelines to Turkey and Europe to carry 22 Trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas fields are a huge spoil.  A stranglehold on Europe’s Energy supply ….is a Russian bonus. It is a motivation for Russia and Turkey to join the final Muslim attempt to destroy Israel.

We do not prophecy future events since we cannot even predict the next 8 hours of our day. It never goes as planned.  We do however watch world events….and see how Gods infallible word could possibly come to pass in our time.

 

Troop ship or Cruise ship

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There is war upon us…Satan has canceled all leave and is running a 24/7 operation. He knows his time is short….but we are still utilizing our time and resources as if we are at peace…

The Queen Mary, lying in the harbor at Long Beach, California is a fascinating museum of the past. It was used both as a luxury liner in peacetime and a troop transport during the Second World War. Now she is a museum showing the contrast between the lifestyles appropriate in peace and war.

On one side of a partition, you see the dining room reconstructed to depict the peacetime table setting that was appropriate to the wealthy patrons with fine china and an array of knives and forks for each course of the meal. On the other side of the partition, the evidence of wartime austerities are a sharp contrast. One metal tray with indentations replaces fifteen plates and saucers. Bunks eight tiers high explain how the peacetime capacity of 3000 passengers gave way to 15,000 troops on board in wartime.Two men shared each bunk (sleeping in shifts) on the Queen Mary as it steamed across the Atlantic in World War II.

This transformation took a national emergency. The survival of a nation depended upon it. The essence of the Great Commission today is that the survival of many millions of people depends on its fulfillment.  She was set apart for a wartime purpose…

So we are set apart …consecrated…“setting apart of things for a holy use.” Are we set apart for wartime troopship conditions or are we still trying to be a cruise ship

Ours is a save-yourself society if there ever was one. Underdeveloped societies suffer from one set of diseases: tuberculosis, malnutrition, pneumonia, parasites, typhoid, cholera, and so on. Affluent North America has virtually invented a whole new set of diseases: obesity, heart disease, strokes, lung cancer, venereal diseases, cirrhosis of the liver, etc.

And we’re more than ever plagued with the social diseases of drug addiction, alcoholism, divorce, abused children, suicide, murder. Our divorce courts, prisons, psychiatric offices and mental institutions are flooded. In saving ourselves, we have nearly lost ourselves.

The decks and staterooms and dining facilities of the Queen Mary spoke of luxury and comfort and ease. Travelers could relax and be served anything their heart desired, at any time of night and day.

The coming of war changed all that as she was pressed into a wartime role…..Luxury Liner became troopship. Staterooms that slept 2 now slept 8. Dining facilities that fed 3000 now fed 15,000. It was not pretty or comfortable ….but the survival of Britain and Europe depended on it.

On August 30, 1939, the Queen Mary departed on her last peacetime voyage. The following day the Nazis invaded Poland and for safety reasons, the Queen Mary was ordered to run a zigzag course under blackout conditions.

She was called “The Grey Ghost” and she transported 765,429 troops during the war. Adolph Hitler offered $250,000 and the Iron Cross to any U-boat Captain that could sink the Queen Mary. She resumed peacetime cruises on July 31, 1947. Winston Churchill traveled on the Queen Mary three times during WWII and considered it his headquarters at sea. In fact, he even signed the D-Day Declaration onboard.

The church is a cruise ship of leisure and luxury when we were commissioned to be a life raft and a troopship …Like the bounty put on the Queen Mary – the apostle,  Paul was known in Hell.  Acts 19 v 15 the evil spirit answered, “Jesus I know, and Paul I know, but who are you?”

We remain anonymous in hell and ineffective…

It is a time we ripped out the comfort and the leisure and gird ourselves for war… If the church is going to finish the great commission it is not going to be as a cruise ship….it may be as a troop ship.

J.B.Phillips, who gave us the Phillips New Testament, said of the first chapters of Acts:

  • “This is the church of Jesus Christ before it became fat and out of breath by prosperity.
  • This is the church of Jesus Christ before it became muscle-bound by over organization.
  • This is the church of Jesus Christ where they didn’t gather together a group of intellectuals to study phycho-sematic medicine, they just healed the sick.

Leonard Ravenhill said…

  • The church used to be a lightning bolt, now it’s a cruise ship.
  • We are not marching to Zion – we are sailing there with ease.
  • In the apostolic church it says they were all amazed – In our churches, everybody wants to be amused.
  • The church began in the upper room with a bunch of men agonizing, and it’s ending in the supper room with a bunch of people organizing.
  • We mistake rattle for revival, and commotion for creation, and action for unction.

I think this is a critical hour in history, the most critical hour in history; the prestige of this nation we love has gone down, and we face insurmountable problems. As someone said, “We live in a theater of the absurd.”

We have complete Bibles and stunning technological devices but we are dying as we try and save ourselves. If we transformed ourselves by giving up a lifestyle of comfort for a lifestyle of service, we will save others and so save ourselves...Luke 9 v 24 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it.

 

Foot Washing or Hand Washing

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We live in a democracy and many Christians are pleased that we elected Donald Trump. He pledged to make us “Great”.  The danger of democracy is, that we all share the blame and the consequences of our Governments rule in our name.  Literally ‘democracy’ comes from the Greek ‘demokratia,’ and may be translated as the rule of the common people (‘demos’ means ‘common people’ and ‘Kratos’ means rule or strength).

As the richest and most powerful nation on the planet, we have a responsibility to mankind. This United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all….is on track to collide with the values and the concerns of the Creator of all men.

In ancient Jewish literature, there are many references to Sodom. The phrase “middat Sdom” was used. It may be translated as “the way the people of Sodom thought”. It meant a lack of charity and hospitality towards others; ignoring the needs of the poor, etc. In the Middle East, a person’s survival could depend upon the charity of strangers. To help strangers was a solemn religious duty of paramount importance.

Isaiah 1; The entire first chapter is an utter condemnation of Judah. They are repeatedly compared with Sodom and Gomorrah in their evildoing and depravity. Throughout the chapter, the Prophet lists many sins of the people: … being unjust and oppressive to others, being insensitive to the needs of widows and orphans, committing murder, accepting bribes, etc.

Ezekiel 16:49-50:”Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.” God states clearly that he destroyed Sodom’s sins because of their pride, their excess of food while the poor and needy suffered; sexual activity is not even mentioned.

Our new budget calls for a 10% increase in defense spending ($54 Billion) at the expense of UN food aid. The largest humanitarian crisis since World War 2 is looming in Africa. The lack of humanitarian access in Somalia and conflict in Sudan, South Sudan, and Eritrea has resulted in an influx of refugees into Ethiopia. The refugee camp at Dadaab, located close to the Kenyan border with Somalia, was originally designed in the early 1990s to accommodate 90,000 people but the UN estimates over 4 times as many reside there. The ongoing civil war in Somalia and the worst drought to affect the Horn of Africa in six decades has resulted in an estimated 12 million people whose lives are threatened. The total number of refugees and asylum seekers has made Ethiopia the largest refugee-hosting country in Africa…and they can barely feed themselves. The millions that face starvation is larger than the Ukrainian famine, the Cambodian famine, and the Irish famine combined.

This punitive gutting of food aid makes up only a microscopic part of the US budget. It costs less than a new jet – and only buys sacks of corn meal….the kind that obese and intoxicated Americans feed their animals and would never stoop to eat.

In 2011  40% of the U.S. corn crop was diverted to make fuel for cars. Ethanol uses 4.9 billion bushels of corn in the U.S. That was enough grain to feed 350 million people. Seems biofuel and ethanol paid more as Govt incentives redirected corn/wheat into ethanol production. So we filled the tanks of our cars with subsidized ethanol at the expense of the very hungry poor.

American farmers cashed their checks and Egyptians, Libyans, Algerians, and Mexicans rioted over the price of their bread/tacos/tortillas. Raising their basic food prices along with our efforts to destabilize the Middle East was our “gift” with political motives. The Arab Spring was the chance for the “rule of the common people”  and left six countries in ruin and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and the Islamic State of Libya in charge…before chaos. Food is a weapon more powerful than oil.

It is Passover next week and another crowd once chanted “Crucify Him”  His blood be on us and our children. They understood the responsibility of democracy.

This Passover we will gather for our Seders and our Easter festivities…collectively having sentenced millions of people to death. They are black and brown and we will never get close enough to smell that smell or hear the rasp of a starving baby.

  • We too will ask for a bowl and a towel.  
  • It won’t be to wash their feet…..
  • It will be our hands we wash as we proclaim ourselves innocent of their blood.

 

First Fruits and Nisan 17th

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There is a strange connection between New Beginnings and First Fruits and Nisan 17th. Yeshua was resurrected 3 days after his death on Nisan 14th on Nisan 17th on the 8th day. First Fruits and Resurrection Sunday was the greatest of all New Beginnings...

Let us consider the other New Beginnings
• Nisan 17, Noah’s Ark safely rested on Mt. Ararat (Gen 8:4) Note that the seventh month was later designated as the first month at the time of the Exodus (Ex. 12:2).
• Nisan 17, Hebrews entered Egypt (Exo 12:40-41) 430 years before deliverance. ...even the self-same day it came to pass...
• Nisan 17, Moses led the Israelites through the Parting of the Red Sea (Exo 3:18, 5:3)
• Nisan 17, Israel entered and ate the first fruit of the Promised Land (Joshua 5:10-12)
• Nisan 17, The cleansing of the Temple by Hezekiah (eight hundred years after entering the promised land. (2 Chronicles 29:1-28)
• Nisan 17, Queen Esther saved the Jews from Elimination (Esther 3:12, 5:1)
• Nisan 17, The Resurrection of Messiah

The odds of just two of these events both happening accidentally on the same day of the Hebrew year (360 days) are one in 129,000. The odds of these events all happening coincidentally on the same day of the Hebrew year are one in 783 quadrillions, 864 trillion, 876 Billion, 960 Million (783,864,876,960,000,000).

1. Noah’s Ark
Genesis 8:4 dates in a Hebrew Word Study: The Hebrew New Year begins in the month of Nisan (April of the contemporary calendar). However, there is another calendar that may have been used to account for the days of the Flood. This account is documented in an ancient Jewish commentary on the Genesis passage.
According to this ancient calendar, the ark rested on the mountain on precisely the same day that Jesus was resurrected from the tomb. Yes, that’s right. Thousands and thousands of years before the resurrection, God engineered history to point toward the pinnacle event of salvation. Just as the ancient judgment ended on the day the ark touched the ground, so the judgment of the restored world ended on the same day of the year when the tomb could not hold Him.

2. Entered Egypt
The Hebrews entered Egypt 430 years to the day they excited Egypt.

3. Crossing the Red Sea
Moses recorded the fact that Israel crossed the Red Sea and physically left the land of Egypt on the 17th of Nisan in Numbers 33:1-8: These are the journeys of the children of Israel, which went forth out of the land of Egypt with their armies under the hand of Moses and Aaron.2 And Moses wrote their goings out according to their journeys by the commandment of the LORD: and these are their journeys according to their goings out. 3 And they departed from Rameses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month; (Nisan) on the morrow after the Passover (still the 15th) the children of Israel went out with an high hand in the sight of all the Egyptians. (Remember, Israel’s days start at sunset) 4 For the Egyptians buried all their firstborn, which the LORD had smitten among them: upon their gods also the LORD executed judgments.5 And the children of Israel removed from Rameses, and pitched in Succoth. (Evening of the 15th) 6 And they departed from Succoth, and pitched in Etham, which is in the edge of the wilderness. (Evening of 16th) 7 And they removed from Etham, and turned again unto Pi-hahiroth, which is before Baal-zephon: and they pitched before Migdol. (Evening of the 17th) 8 And they departed (morning of the 17th) from before Pi-hahiroth, and passed through the midst of the sea into the wilderness, and went three days’ journey in the wilderness of Etham, and pitched in Marah.”

4. Ate Fruit in Promised Land
Nisan 17 in 1445 BC (BR). On this same day, Israel makes the first camp at Succoth beginning the Exodus and their first day out of Egypt on the evening of Friday Nisan 17 as stated in Exodus 12:37-39. On this same date, 40 years later, Joshua would meet “the Commander of the army of the Lord” which begins Day 1 of the 7 day Battle of Jericho according to Joshua 5:13-6:5.
On Nisan 16 last day God rained Manna. On Nisan 17 Israel ate the first fruits of the promised land.

5. Hezekiah
Immediately upon becoming king, Hezekiah commenced a great religious reform. In eight days they had re-opened the great Temple of Solomon and cleansed it of defilement (2 Chronicles 29:1-17). The cleansing of the temple was not completed until the sixteenth day of the first month (Nisan)

6. Queen Esther
Haman had convinced the king to sign a decree to destroy the Hebrews (Esther 3:1-12). The decree went out on the 13th Nisan (Esther 3:12). Esther then proclaimed a three-day fast (Esther 4:16) for the 14th, 15th and 16th. On the 3rd day (5:1) Esther approached the king saying to herself ‘If I perish, I perish!’ (an attitude of death or resurrection… it’s in God’s hands!) On the 17th Nisan, the tables were turned on the enemy Haman and instead of the Jews being destroyed, his own life was taken!

7.Yeshua the Messiah
With the death of Jesus, all looked lost to His disciples and followers. Their Messiah was dead! The one they had placed all their hope in was gone and two of them headed out of town to Emmaus. The disciples, being Jewish, knew that God had told Moses that the first Sunday following the Sabbath after Passover would be the feast of Firstfruits. (See Lev 23:9-14). It was on this day that they were to offer to God the first-fruits of the harvest. And yet, even the disciples didn’t see that God was starting a new ‘first fruits’ on this day, the 17th Nisan. A ‘first fruits’ of those that would be raised from the dead!

Luke 23:1-8 “On the first day of the week (17th of Nisan), very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright, the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’” Then they remembered his words.”

1 Cor 15:20-23 But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ, all will be made alive. But each in his own turn: Christ, the firstfruits; then, when he comes, those who belong to him.

Like the defeat of the Egyptians and the death of Haman on this same day previously, this Sunday morning on Nisan 17th saw the resurrection of Jesus and the defeat of Satan!

Death had been turned into the life and defeat into victory!  Like the two travelers on the road to Emmaus on that fateful Feast of First Fruits, could the opening of the scriptures cause our "hearts to burn." Could this day not be an annual New Beginning for each of us?

American Drunken Delusions

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Since I was not born in America I was afforded the benefit of a British schooling in Africa. Our history lessons included European history and the rise and fall of great empires. Now living and working as a citizen of the United States, we talk about OLD houses that are only 50 years old. In Britain, the city of Bath was established in the 1st Century by the Romans, in Europe an old house is 700 years old, and in Jerusalem, they date back to the Crusades…. 700 years before America was even settled.

The great business leaders that made America great are Astor, Rockefeller, DuPont, J.P. Morgan with roots that are less than 200 years old. In 1308 some 700 years ago, the Frescobaldi’s were wool traders and bankers and they financed King Edwards wars both in Wales and in France. The family, which also built Florence’s first bridge Santa Trinita also became one of the main composers of keyboard music during the late Renaissance and early Baroque periods.

The Bank of Italy compared the tax records of Florentine taxpayers of 1427 to track the mobility of social economic status across the centuries. All that long before Columbus ever sailed.

We look with pride on Harvard (1693) and Yale (1701) and Princeton (1747) Ivy League schools that trace their roots back to the first Great Awakening that swept the East Coast. The word university comes from the Latin: Universitas – which was coined at the foundation of the University of Bologna in Italy in 1088. In 1158, the Emperor Frederick Barber also settled the rules, rights, and privileges of universities. Back then Italy was part of the Holy Roman Empire. The University of Oxford in the Kingdom of England was founded between 1096 and 1167, but it was not until 1254 that Pope Innocent the fourth granted Oxford University, a charter by papal bull. I guess our schools missed some 700 years of early education.

Our largest Protestant denomination is the Baptists with a long history extending all the way back to 1845 and the Southern Baptist Convention. The Catholic Church held sway over all of Europe and crowned its Kings and its Emperors a thousand years before….The old line confessions of the Reformation that are the roots of Lutheran and the Westminster confession are 200 years older than America. The 500 year anniversary of the Reformation is this October 2017 and the Catholics and the Lutherans and the Anglicans are planning a wonderful reunion as the mother church embraces her errant daughters.

So what is my point?
We are the illegitimate offspring of no lineage that stumbled onto a continent and found the winning lottery ticket. In the last 80 years, we became the most ignorant, most obese, entitled people squandering the world’s resources at an unprecedented rate.

We are thrilled and hypnotized with our latest technological gizmo. Like most lottery winners, we have bought depreciating cars and lead the world in drug addiction, divorce, illegitimate births, abortion, porn production and consumption, depression, and the highest number of incarcerated citizens on the planet.

We have remained too drunk to realize we can’t read or write, have no sense of history, and our biggest political concern is who is allowed in which bathroom.

Like most lottery winners we have racked up the world’s largest national debt and bankrupted ourselves with pouring trillions of dollars in failed “Nouveau riche” (French: ‘new rich’) schemes to export our democracy.

Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar already recognized Afghanistan would not be changed. If our schools included history we would have recognized neither Greece, Rome, Genghis Kahn, the British nor the Russians ever defeated and subdued Afghanistan. She has been called the graveyard of empires…but we won the lottery…..so our money can change what 1000 years could not?

Europe is not ignorant of her history and her monuments and her old buildings are reminders of her ancient roots. Nationalism is awakening all over Europe and the E.U. is done. Europe is beginning to realize that the United States (which has no history and no character) is only about consumerism and self-protection. Like most “friends” on a drunken bar hopping spree, they tend to leave when the U.S.A. can no longer pick up the tab for the next round of cool-aid……

There is a new world order coming, and the United States is no longer the center of the world. Like a cherry tree in the coming hurricane, she will be blown over by the wind of History. America will be replaced by a tree planted in Europe long ago, with deep roots, reaching all the way back to Rome, Greece, and Babylon.

God also has a view of history and it also stretches back to 2000BC when He called a man out of Mesopotamia, the cradle of civilization. Babylon, that area between the Tigris and the Euphrates River in modern-day Iraq.

God has also appointed a King to return and take up His throne. Those two world orders, who both trace their roots back to Babylon, (the cradle of civilization) will clash at the center of the world. Jerusalem.

The people of God need a worldview and a global perspective to look beyond bathroom politics, immigration, and taxation. There are bigger matters at hand according to the God who writes history.

The end time powers will once again be prophets and kings. Our happy feel good “scampering before the Lord” in playful worship in church, is not going to sustain us in the time ahead. As the people of God, we need to sober up, put down our small screen device, and realize there is a war coming.

A Nation Prays

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Born and raised in South Africa compels me to follow the events there. Mandela and Bishop Tutu led the way with a Truth and Reconciliation Commission that avoided a race war and defused years of hate.

However, Crime and Vigilantism now rule the street, while corruption and partisan infighting paralyze the government and the economy struggles as South African debt just got downgraded to junk. Xenophobia and tribal hatred have brought violence to the many undocumented workers due to double-digit unemployment.

As a minority in a land, there is a realization amongst Christians that God is the only one that can change the moral and socio-political climate of that country.

Popular South African farmer/evangelist and subject of the book and film, “Faith Like Potatoes”, Angus Buchan called for a nation-wide prayer meeting called, “It’s Time” scheduled for Saturday, April 22, 2017. (Side Note …I really enjoyed the movie Faith like Potatoes…and could fully relate to Angus pre-conversion attitudes and flaws.)

Buchan said, “We are tired of people taking the law into their own hands. We are going to call upon the Lord to bring justice, peace and hope to our beloved South Africa. The day of prayer is intended for all South Africans of all genders, races, and denominations who are concerned about the malice, hatred, violence, murder, and corruption in the country,” said Buchan. He says ‘If My people who are called by My name’—that is you and I, so I want to ask you to pray for us.”

Two thousand hectares of land were already been prepared for the influx of people. Tractors had cut grass on 450 hectares of land to prepare 2 000 bales for people to sit on, although people were asked to bring their own chairs. At one stage a group of farmers donated 800 liters of diesel for the 20 tractors used to cut the grass.

Farmers in the area also allowed thousands to camp free of charge on their land and traffic was snarled for 25 miles (40 km) around the event for hours.
• One group took several days to cycle there from Cape Town.
• Others are going on motorbikes, cars, and buses.
• Some walked and the rich and the famous filled the local airports with their planes and helicopters.
This resonated with all denominations ….even those that do not agree with Angus Buchan’s old school Pentecostal theology. Churches set aside differences for a day to act in unison facing a common crisis opening their buildings for prayer meetings that day.

The prayer time was duplicated in hundreds of town and suburbs around the nation. No television broadcasts were allowed, but Christians around the country followed the event from the social media posts of their friends.

Police estimate that 700,000 braved the heat and the traffic to drive through the night to attend to pray. Over 1.7 responded online with pledges of prayer meetings around the world from Thailand to Canada, from Britain to Australia among the Expats of South Africa.

The meeting started 2 hours late due to the traffic and then Angus addressed the crowd. We all want to see our nations healed, restored, revived – yet in order for this to happen, God’s people first have to rise up and take their place. Angus Buchan focused on two key scriptures that will work in any situation, whether personal, family or national.
James 5:16 – “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”
2 Chronicles 7:14 – ” If My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from Heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
After his short message, Buchan allowed people to pray on their own.
• The crowds prayed—some in whispers, and others loudly.
• Some were on their knees and others held their hands in the air as they cried to their God.

This reminds of the open air preaching of Whitefield and Wesley – when shiny tracks of on the faces of the coal miners betrayed their tears. Why is it we only turn to God in times of trouble? I know that is usually what it takes to get serious about prayer.
• Would that God could bring this to the American Church. She has been blessed by God with the resources and the people to touch the world.
• While the moral and spiritual decline in the USA has taken decades and so far it has not affected the safety of the church ….so the frog has not jumped out of the pot.
• South Africa has been baptized in radical political and economic change in one generation. It affects their safety and their family daily. They have a reason to pray. May God have mercy on us and open our eyes to our need.