Homer Kizer Ministries

August 20, 2010 ©Homer Kizer
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Commentary — From the Margins

In the Same Breath

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The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah a second time, while he was still shut up in the court of the guard: “Thus says the Lord who made the earth, the Lord who formed it to establish it—the Lord is his name: Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known. For thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the houses of this city and the houses of the kings of Judah that were torn down to make a defense against the siege mounds and against the sword: They are coming in to fight against the Chaldeans and to fill them with the dead bodies of men whom I shall strike down in my anger and my wrath, for I have hidden my face from this city because of all their evil. Behold, I will bring to it health and healing, and I will heal them and reveal to them abundance of prosperity and security. I will restore the fortunes of Judah and the fortunes of Israel, and rebuild them as they were at first. I will cleanse them from all the guilt of their sin against me, and I will forgive all the guilt of their sin and rebellion against me. And this city shall be to me a name of joy, a praise and a glory before all the nations of the earth who shall hear of all the good that I do for them. They shall fear and tremble because of all the good and all the prosperity I provide for it.” (Jer 33:1–9 emphasis added)

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In the same breath that the Lord pronounces the destruction of Jerusalem, the Lord promises health and healing: spiritually, death precedes life, with life coming out from death, not simply following death. Jesus said to let the dead bury the dead of themselves (Matt 8:22), and Jesus said to the Jews seeking to kill Him that the Israelite who hears His words and believes the One who sent Him (and whose words He speaks) does not come under judgment but passes from being of the dead to life (John 5:24); for the Father raises the dead (v. 21) who are to bury the dead of themselves, thereby giving life without judgment to those who hear and believe Jesus’ words, but life in a clay jar that can be broken. For in giving to human beings spiritual life without the person coming under judgment, the Father also gives the judgment of the person to the Son (v. 22) so that all may honor the Son as they honor the Father (v. 23). However the Son did not come to judge the world but to save it; thus, He left His word, His message, with His disciples, and it is this word that will judge the one who does not believe the writings of Moses and hear the words of Jesus (cf. John 12:47–48; 5:46–47). Two things, not one, with these two things forming one message as words themselves have both linguistic icons and linguistic objects.

To hear the words of Jesus requires that the person first believe the writings of Moses, who wrote of Jesus: the person who truly believes the writings of Moses will be a Sabbatarian Christian who keeps the Passover on the dark portion of the 14th of Abib, not on the following day[s] as rabbinical Judaism does.

Although rabbinical Judaism professes belief in God, Judaism doesn’t believe the writings of Moses; nor does rabbinical Judaism understand Moses and the covenants mediated by Moses: rabbinical Judaism adheres to the practices of 2nd-temple Pharisees, none of whom kept the law (John 7:19). But rabbinical Judaism is not alone when it comes to not believing the writings of Moses: no Christian neglecting the commandments can hear the words of Jesus for the saints are circumcised-of-heart Israelites who keep the commandments and their faith in Jesus (Rev 14:12). And this reality has far greater significance than initially perceived: no Muslim has a relationship with God for Allah (the Arabic equivalent to the Hebrew icon Eloah) who created all things, entered His creation as His only Son, the man Jesus of Nazareth, to reveal the Father to His disciples. It is the Father who is the Most High God, not the Son who is like the Father and who had His glory returned to Him when He was accepted as the reality of the Wave Sheaf Offering, the first handful of barley waved before Yah before the harvest of firstfruits could begin in ancient Israel.

Rabbinical Judaism as an ideology is not of God; nor is greater Christendom. The Adversary has been far more successful in perverting the words of the Lord than either Christians or Jews are willing to admit—and apparently because of how far Christians and Jews were from the Truth, the Lord planted an ideological cover crop that was, from its inception, intended to be plowed under to replenish the “soil” upon which the Word of God will be sown during the seven endtime years of tribulation.

Matthew records Jesus saying,

A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured them. Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil, but when the sun rose they were scorched. And since they had no root, they withered away. Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear. (13:3–9)

To His disciples, Jesus later explained the parable in metaphorical language that couldn’t then be understood by His disciples:

Hear then the parable of the sower: When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown along the path. As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away. As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful. As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty. (Matt 13:18–23)

If what the Apostle Paul writes about predestination is true—

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that He might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom He predestined He also called, and those whom He called He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified. (Rom 8:28–30)

—then what Jesus said when explaining the parable of the sower in figurative language (i.e., in using a metaphor to explain a metaphor) must necessarily agree with what Paul writes about predestination even though Jesus’ words would seem to contradict what Paul writes … if the call of God is broadcast as an ancient farmer handcast seed, with some seed landing on the roadway and some landing on the roadway’s gravel shoulders and some in the weedy ditches lining the roadway and some landing on the good soil of the field of humanity, then predestination as an ideology doesn’t work, one reason why Calvin’s understanding of predestination has been rejected by the greater Christian Church. But if the words of Jesus are lain over the historical narrative a different picture emerges, for there are four eras or stages in the harvest of firstfruits, with the first stage in the 1st-Century, the second stage beginning in the 16th-Century, the third stage ending in 1962, and the fourth stage beginning in 2002, when the visions of Daniel were finally unsealed. And in each of these stages there have been disciples predestined to be conformed to the image of the Son.

When worked for centuries, soil gets depleted; hence cover crops are grown and plowed under as green mature, with these cover crops returning vigor and vitality to the soil. If, now, the soil is all of humanity and the seed broadcast is an ideology [Christianity], then everything that grows from the field of humanity is ideologies, with tares [false wheat/false grain] being sown by the Adversary (see Matt 13:24–30; 36–43) as the ideology from which false Christianity has grown, beginning in the 1st-Century when the mystery of lawlessness was already at work while Paul lived (2 Thess 2:7). So tares [probably darnel, a ryegrass that looks like wheat in its early stages of growth—Roman law prohibited deliberately sowing darnel in wheat fields] that look like wheat when young, that looked like wheat in the 1st-Century before growing into the false Christianity that the world now assumes is true, were not and are now and cannot be the cover crop that the Lord plants/planted to renew the soil that is humanity. The Way, or the roadway that leads to God is not the good ground that brings forth a thirty or sixty or hundredfold return of the single seed that is the offspring of Abraham. Nor is that roadway’s graveled shoulder this good ground, with the gravel representing 16th-Century Sabbatarian Anabaptists who received the words of Jesus with great joy but who didn’t endure in the face of the persecution they experienced. Likewise, the third stage of Church growth (the last Elijah’s second attempt to resurrect the dead Body of Christ) ended in 1962, when it was choked by the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches; when Herbert W. Armstrong rejected revelation and chose instead to jet around the world as the ambassador of God, visiting minor heads of state to whom he spoke bland platitudes. Thus, it is in the fourth and final stage that seed is sown on good ground, with the soil enriched by plowing under all other ideologies, especially Islam, the specific cover crop sown by the Lord as a farmer plants alfalfa to fix nitrogen in the soil before being plowed under to invigorate a long depleted humanity … the cover crop isn’t planted to be harvested even though the cover crop was deliberately planted by the farmer, who sowed a particular crop to harvest another.

The conversion of Islam to Sabbatarian Christianity will produce the good ground for a hundredfold increase, but this conversion will be difficult and will require humanity undergoing a time like none before—will require all of humankind enduring seven endtime years of tribulation. In the same breath that the Lord pronounces the destruction of Jerusalem, the Lord proclaims healing and health and the return of prosperity to a world shaken to its core, literally.

What Islam and rabbinical Judaism and the greater Christian Church don’t theologically understand is that the Tetragrammaton YHWH represents the Father [WH] and His Helpmate [YH or Yah], two deities that functioned as one deity as Adam and Eve were two human beings that were one flesh (Gen 2:24) in the beginning. Adam and Eve did not become one flesh in the personhood of Cain, or of Abel, or of Seth, but through the narrative of cleaving to one another as husband and wife.

The Father and His Helpmate were one in unity in the beginning, with King David, a man after the Lord’s heart, disclosing in his latter psalms (by the structural positioning of Yah and YHWH) that he grasped that the Lord Israel knew was Spokesman-for or the natural face and voice of the conjoined Tetragrammaton YHWH. Likewise, John, the apostle that Jesus loved, knew that in the beginning, the Logos [Ò Logos] who was God [Theos] and who was with the God [ton Theon] (John 1:1) created all things that were made (v. 3). And what is seen in Scripture is that the person who understands the relationship between the Father and the Son before and after Calvary is loved by the Lord as a person after His own heart. To not understand this relationship spiritually hinders the person, and rejection of this relationship might well underlie all Christian rebellion against the Father and Son when the person is filled-with and empowered by the breath of God [pneuma Theon].

The Christian Church is one with Christ Jesus as Eve was one with Adam, from whom she came as a separate person to become his helpmate. The Church in the 1st-Century was the Body of Christ and hence was one with Christ as Eve was one with Adam, her head and lord, a cultural construct that has been lost in the Western world but one that though badly abused remains in Islam.

In the United States of America, political Progressives gave women the right to vote early in the 20th-Century, thereby recognizing in law that a wife was her own person and not the body or property of her husband. Fundamental Islamic law has not made this recognition of separateness; hence, women under Sharia or Sharia law are chattel, the property of the woman’s husband or father, a position that is contrary to basic human rights. But—and this is a giant caveat—basic human rights do not come from God but from the present prince of this world, a declarative statement that will be as hard for many to accept as Jesus telling His disciples that they must eat His flesh and drink His blood was for His disciples to accept (John 6:60–66).

·       Human rights as expressed by the United Nations are not of God, but are of the prince of this world, the present prince of the power of the air, the anointed cherub in whom iniquity was found.

·       God has reserved to Himself the first to open wombs—

·       If all firstborns belong to the Father, they are then the property of the Father—

·      As the property of the Father, the Father can do with these firstborns whatever He chooses without regard to the decrees or dictates of men or angels—

·       If the Father chooses (and He has so chosen), He can take the lives of these firstborns whenever He wants.

If the first to open wombs belongs to the Father, and if the Father can snuff out the life of these firstborn human beings whenever He desires, then what human right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness do these firstborns really have? What right to life does an unconsecrated firstborn American have? Is not this firstborn only alive because God hasn’t yet chosen to execute His claim to the firstborn’s life?

If God can take an unconsecrated firstborn’s life whenever He chooses without being faulted, then those human rights that were eloquently expressed in Thomas Jefferson’s writings are a fiction—

·       The Lord brought upon all flesh a Flood in the days of Noah and saved only the Eight—

·       No accusation can be brought against the Lord, for all of humankind had descended from Adam, the “firstborn” of Elohim [singular in usage; plural in construction].

If all of humankind has descended from Adam through Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and if Noah’s wife and the wives of Noah’s three sons were truly one with their husbands, baptism of the world into death in the Flood should have ended unrighteousness. But wives are separate individuals from their husbands as Rebekah was not of one mind with her husband Isaac, but encouraged and supported Jacob’s deception of his father (Gen chap 27) … when the Lord [YHWH] drove Adam and Eve out from the Garden of Eden, He [Yah] delivered Adam and Eve into the hand of the Adversary for the destruction of their flesh, what the Apostle Paul understood and used as the basis for commanding the saints at Corinth to deliver the man who was with his father’s wife to Satan (1 Cor 5:5). Unbelief is sin, and bondage to sin leads to death (Rom 6:16). Thus, before Adam and Eve ate the fruit of the Tree of Life they were driven from the Garden and delivered to the Adversary as sons of disobedience, condemned to die physically. They never received life from the Father, but remained spiritually lifeless. They were made from the basic elements of this earth; they were as spiritually lifeless as the mud from which the first man was taken. They were inwardly dead though they lived physically.

In a naked Eve being one with Adam, her “covering” [i.e., her clothing] was her head, her husband, and his “covering” was his obedience to the Lord; thus, sin did not enter the world when she ate forbidden fruit, but when her husband ate. They then “knew” they were naked, for they were no longer cloaked in obedience.

It was Adam’s responsibility to faithfully convey the words of the Lord to Eve, not to beat her with a cane because her ankle showed for both were then naked. But because Eve’s husband did not convey to her what the Lord said but apparently added to the Lord’s words [the Lord told Adam nothing about not touching the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil], the serpent was given an opening by which he could deceive the woman. Thus, Paul expressly prohibits a woman from teaching or from exercising authority over a man (1 Tim 2:12), a self-evident violation of her human rights.

A woman’s covering should be her husband’s or her father’s obedience to God, with the woman reflecting her husband’s obedience in her attire. There is, however, a problem in the preceding claim: a woman’s outward attire only represents her husband’s obedience in this world. Her inward attire that is partially manifested in her good works reflects her Husband’s righteousness, with her Husband-to-be being Christ Jesus, not her earthly husband. Therefore, a separation exists between the garments worn by the fleshly body of the woman and the garment of Christ’s righteousness [grace] worn by the inner son of God that temporarily dwells in the woman’s fleshly body. The two should not be confused; for these two have symbolic as well as real significance.

Where the dead inner self of a woman has not been raised to life through the woman receiving a second breath of life, a singleness exists that can be compared to a linguistic icon being the signifier read by auditors: the attire of the woman can be read as a signifier that discloses her husband’s obedience to God in this world. The meaning [signified] attached to the attire is not hard-linked to it, but merely connected by a historic trace that is as a streak of black sand on a beach.

Fundamentalist Islam has cloaked wives in fabric tents, with the berka serving as a signifier that reflects the authority the Muslim man imposes upon his wife and daughters, authority that has removed personhood and inserted in its place a collective salvation that is deceptive. However, the public nudity of Christian women [i.e., their lack of head coverings] that reflects their usurpation of authority over their husbands is even more damning—and the attire of Western women in general is visible symbolization that these societies are not of God, for these women through their attire disclose that they are not subject to husbands or fathers but claim the social power and authority that overt sexualization of their bodies affords them.

Women are not under a blanket of condemnation, but make visible through their attire an otherwise hidden relationship between ideological purity and God, a relationship that is also seen in Sabbath observance or lack there-of. Many women within rabbinical Judaism wear wigs as a “covering” that is not outwardly a covering as if they are embarrassed about their husbands being their worldly lords and masters. Christian women, with exceptions, dismiss the importance of head coverings as a visible sign of submission; for they do not believe that they have to submit to anyone other than Christ Jesus, to whom they also refuse to submit as disclosed by their relationships with their husbands—if a woman is not outwardly in subjection to her husband, she will not inwardly submit to Christ Jesus either. And the greater Christian Church as the last Eve (as Jesus is the last Adam — Rom 5:14; 1 Cor 15:45) is not in submission to her Husband, but lives as an adulterous wife, claiming Jesus’ name but shacked-up with the Adversary. It is, therefore, no wonder that Christian women have outwardly neglected head-coverings; for again, in the outward attire of the woman the man’s ideological relationship with God in this world is revealed as an example of the hidden things being made known to all men and angels.

The above should never be construed as advocacy of public nudity.

Judaism’s observance of the Sabbath is symbolically represented by Jewish women wearing wigs, again a covering that doesn’t appear as a covering, a legalized deception: Judaism’s Sabbath-observance is legalistic. In Judaism not kindling a fire on the Sabbath, Judaism legalistically reinforces its rebellion against God that culminated in the people commanding Aaron to make for them a gold calf (Ex chap 32), with the burden of not kindling a fire on the Sabbath being borne by the woman who must cook for her family before the Sabbath begins. The men of Judaism continue their disguised rebellion in their calendar, which, like a wig that looks to be the person’s hair but isn’t, seems to legally satisfy the commandments but doesn’t. For it isn’t a covering of cloth or of hair that truly matters to God: the only acceptable covering for men or women is obedience to God, with this obedience revealed by when the person takes the Passover sacraments that represent Jesus’ body and blood. This obedience or lack there-of will be seen by the attire of the Woman [the Church], with obedient women within the Woman being in submission to their husbands as represented by their head coverings … men do not have the right to “command” women to be “submissive,” but godly women will come and remain under the authority of their husbands when their husbands’ relationships with God are right.

In the same breath that the Lord pronounces the destruction of Jerusalem, now spiritual Jerusalem, the Lord promises health and healing; for the Son of Man will be revealed [disrobed] (Luke 17:30) and those things that have been hidden will be made visible through Christians being filled-with and empowered by the breath of God so that whatever is inside the Christian, he or she will do outwardly. If the Christian desires to keep the commandments, he or she will keep the commandments. If this Christian has rebellion hidden in his or her heart and mind, this Christian will rebel against God. If this Christian is a respecter of persons, this Christian will respect those who will be as the ten spies were and will ignore the two witnesses who will be as Joshua and Caleb were [see Num chaps 13–4]. But until the Second Passover liberation of Israel that is both a pronouncement of death and a promise of health and healing, the only reasonably certain means by which a collective [e.g., a theology, a denomination, a sect, a fellowship] reveals what is inside the collective’s hearts and minds is through the attire of the collective’s women, with meaning having to be attached to the attire that serves as linguistic signifiers.

Islam doesn’t trust God to do right by the ideology; thus, fundamentalist Sharia doesn’t trust women to do what is right, but requires—if head coverings are enough for Christians—the entire woman to be draped in fabric as Peter told the Lord, “‘Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head’” (John 13:9) … washing feet is a symbolic act as is wearing a head covering. The body that is modestly attired needs no further covering except as a spiritually symbolic statement of submission to its head, with the husband covered by obedience to Christ, his Head, and with the Christian wife covered by submission to Christ, her spiritual Head. A head covering is of this world and makes a statement about submission in this world.

If a wife doesn’t submit to her worldly head, how likely is she to submit to her spiritual Head?

The husband’s submission to Christ can be difficult to see if the husband keeps the Sabbath, but within his own family, if he is married to a like-minded believer, his submission will be seen through his wife’s attire; for she will be a reflection of what is within him. An observant Jew can hide within his heart deceit that even he doesn’t fully grasp, but that deceit will be reflected in a wig. An Anabaptist can hide his lawlessness from his Anabaptist neighbors, but not from Sabbatarians. However, his comprising with the commandments will be seen by the doily, or by the black bonnet his wife wears. A fundamentalist Muslim can hide the hate that is in his heart from his neighbors and brothers, but not from observant Jews or Sabbatarian Christians. However, that hate will be seen in the berka his wife wears; for his inner hatred is outwardly manifested toward his wife.

In America, when Mormon polygyny/polygamy was being debated in the late 19th-Century many Mormon wives spoke of a sisterhood within polygamist households … did such sisterhoods also exist within harems? Or did true sisterhoods really exist? And how did these sisterhoods differ from the comaradery that develops in prisoner-of-war camps; how do wives in a harem differ from soldiers in a stalag, other than the wives bear their husband children. And why were the men attending harems eunuchs? Did the husband not trust his wife/wives around other men—that distrust was justified in too many cases for that distrust was a reflection of Islam’s relationship with Allah, whom again, it distrusted. The person who is secure in his or her relationship with God doesn’t need to convert other men or women to the person’s belief. The person can put away his sword or her tract and trust God to call whom He will, for until the Second Passover liberation of Israel all who will be called are foreknown by the Father.

As an ideology, rabbinical Judaism is more secure in its relationship with the Lord than have been Christians and Muslims, both of whom have used the sword to “win” converts. But if security comes from hiding deceit in hearts, than security doesn’t spiritually profit the son of God.

The assumption that rabbinical Judaism shares with Islam and with greater Christianity and with a host of minor ideologies such as Scientology is that Adam did eat of the Tree of Life before he was expelled from the Garden of Eden; that human beings are born with immortal souls; that eternal life is not the free gift of God in Christ Jesus but is inherited from a man having his way with any woman … let it be known by all, no one inherits eternal life through fornication in the backseat of a Chevrolet. Eternal life only comes when the person receives a second breath of life, the breath of the Father [pneuma Theon].

The concept of raising the dead and giving life to the dead (John 5:21); the concept of raising the dead through the person hearing the words of Jesus and believing the One whose words Jesus spoke (v. 24); the concept of the dead receiving life without coming under judgment has not been well understood by Christendom for the author of Hebrews writes, “And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him” (9:27–28).

Since Jesus said, “‘If anyone hears my words and does not keep them, I do not judge him; for I did not come to judge the world but to save it’” (John 12:47), and since the writer of Hebrews says that Jesus will appear a second time, not to judge sinners but to save those who await His return, it has been assumed that those human beings who have died in Christ will pass from death to life without coming under judgment and will be with the Lord in heaven before the resurrection of the dead at His second coming. But that is not what Jesus said; for the Father does not raise the dead at the Second Advent. The Son does; the Son quickens/raises the dead upon His return. For the Son “‘can do nothing of His own accord, but only what He sees the Father doing. For whatever the Father does, that the Son does likewise’” (John 5:19). And the Son sees the Father raising the dead when the Father calls a person out from this world: the person, until given a second breath of life, is numbered among the dead about whom Jesus said to let the dead bury the dead of themselves.

Believing the above concept separates those who truly hear Jesus’ words from those who say they hear but do not; believing separates those who hear Jesus’ words from endtime Sadducees and Pharisees.

Moses wrote of Jesus—

The Sabbatarian who truly believes the writings of Moses will come to Christ Jesus as a disciple, but unless this Sabbatarian also actually hears the words of Jesus, this Sabbatarian will come with a physical understanding of Scripture. This Sabbatarian Christian will look for a physical temple to be rebuilt in earthly Jerusalem, and will look for an endtime physical king of the North [e.g., a united Europe lead by a pope] and for a physical king of the South [an Islamic alliance]. This Sabbatarian might place importance on how Jesus’ name is pronounced, or might place importance on when barley ripens in earthly Jerusalem. And this Sabbatarian represents the entirety of the splintered former Worldwide Church of God as well as the Church of God, 7th Day: everything that the Sabbatarian churches of God believe about prophecy comes from NOT hearing the voice of Jesus even though these Christians believe the writings of Moses. And the certain disclosure that these Sabbatarians believe Moses but either have not heard the words of Jesus or do not believe the voice of Jesus is their near-unanimous use of rabbinical Judaism’s calendar.

When would the Sabbatarian churches of God have heard Jesus’ words? Answer if you can. For words do not come with their meanings, but must have their meanings disclosed just as the prophets disclosed the linguistic icons to ancient Israel, a shadow and type [the left enantiomer] of the Christian Church.

·       Words are tripart: icon (signifier), and object (signified), and interpretant [the element of thirdness].

·       To hear the words of Jesus is to hear the icons and to hear the objects and to allow the Parakletos to connect icons and objects as the Father and the Son intend for them to be connected.

The icons are recorded in Scripture. They are as the living words that the Lord inscribed on the two tablets of stone Moses twice lugged down from Mount Sinai, but these words were not then inscribed on hearts and placed in minds as they will be following the Second Passover. Likewise, the words of the Lord that the prophets of old spoke were not inscribed on tablets of living flesh [i.e., the heart and mind of a disciple], but were written with ink made by men on parchment made from the tanned hides of sheep. These words were held in lifeless scrolls; for these words awaited the days when the Lord would make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not a covenant like the covenant He made with their fathers on the day when He took Israel by the hand to bring the nation out from Egypt (Jer 31:31–32; also Heb 8:8–9).

The linguistic icons that the prophets of old spoke, that Moses spoke, that Jesus spoke have been in plain sight for all men to see and read for millennia (in the case of Moses, for a time, times, and half a time, or three and a half millennia). But again, words are more than linguistic icons: they also have objects [their meanings], and there is an element of thirdness present that is represented in Scripture as the Parakletos, the spirit of truth.

The meanings or linguistic objects for the words that Jesus spoke were available to the first disciples because they were actually with Jesus, and they were known to Paul who was with the glorified Jesus, but after the Apostle John died, these meanings were not known or revealed to disciples [Christians], the hardpacked roadway where the evil one snatched away the Truth within a long generation. These linguistic objects died with John: they would not again be known until the end of the age when it became time to reread prophecy, this time with the meanings to the words of the prophecies supplied by Christ Jesus through the Parakletos. But to hear the meanings [linguistic objects] for the words of Jesus requires hearing and believing the one called as Paul was called in the 1st-Century through actually hearing the voice of Christ.

The men [and a few women] who preach Christ and Christ crucified in the Sabbatarian churches of God believe the writings of Moses, who again, wrote of Jesus; but these men—none of them—heard the words of Jesus prior to 2002, and the few who have since heard have rejected Jesus’ words. They are satisfied with Moses; they are truly as the Sadducees and Pharisees were in the 1st-Century. And if they are faithful in their handling of Moses, some will inherit eternal life. But none of them, unless they begin to hear Jesus’ words, will physically live into the Endurance, the last 1260 days of the seven endtime years of tribulation. They will not be allowed to contaminate the third part of humankind (from Zech 13:9) with their false understandings.

When the lawyer and the rich young ruler asked Jesus what they must do to inherit eternal life (Luke 10:25; 18:18), with each understanding that they did not have indwelling eternal life, they expressed a reality that has been hidden in plain sight: an Israelite’s day of salvation occurs when the Israelite [who believes the writings of Moses] hears the words of Jesus and either chooses to believe the one who sent Jesus, or rejects these words that, since 2002, have been made complete through having their meanings revealed as their icons were millennia ago.

The attire of Christian women has no meaning that is not attached to it by the one who “reads” the attire. To the Christian used to seeing women without head coverings, the absence of head coverings has no meaning. But if the Apostle Paul were jumped forward in time, he would be appalled by the absence of head covering on chaste women—and his horror would be dismissed as cultural difference. That is true: Paul lived in a different culture than do 21st-Century Christians, who call Sunday the Sabbath and eat pork on Easter. And Paul would not recognize the greater Christian Church as being of God, for the attire of Christian women as a collective can be read as Christendom’s open rebellion to God.

The hidden things that men have not known will be revealed to the prophets of the Lord. These things go beyond the destruction of a nation or of a polis; these things include what comes after the destruction of a people, with healing and restoration coming from forgiveness of sin and rebellion—

“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch to spring up for David, and he shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In those days Judah will be saved, and Jerusalem will dwell securely. And this is the name by which it will be called: ‘The Lord is our righteousness.’ / For thus says the Lord: David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel, and the Levitical priests shall never lack a man in my presence to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings, and to make sacrifices forever.”

The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: “Thus says the Lord: If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that day and night will not come at their appointed time, then also my covenant with David my servant may be broken, so that he shall not have a son to reign on his throne, and my covenant with the Levitical priests my ministers. As the host of heaven cannot be numbered and the sands of the sea cannot be measured, so I will multiply the offspring of David my servant, and the Levitical priests who minister to me.”

The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: “Have you not observed that these people are saying, ‘The Lord has rejected the two clans that he chose’? Thus they have despised my people so that they are no longer a nation in their sight. Thus says the Lord: If I have not established my covenant with day and night and the fixed order of heaven and earth, then I will reject the offspring of Jacob and David my servant and will not choose one of his offspring to rule over the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will restore their fortunes and will have mercy on them.” (Jer 33:14–26)

The Righteous Branch to spring up from David is Christ Jesus … does Christ today sit on the throne of the house of Israel? Do the Levitical priests lack a man in the Lord’s presence to make sacrifices? Or is the word of the Lord that Jeremiah recorded true? Has Jeremiah lied?

Shortly after being initially drafted into the Body of Christ in 1972, a young woman I had known in high school eight years earlier came by the house to “witness” to me. She might have recognized the name on the rural mailbox if she saw the box before turning in my half-mile long lane. Most likely she hadn’t for she seemed genuinely surprised when I came to the door … she had an older woman with her, and with their Bibles under their arms and Watchtower tracts in hand, they wanted to know something (I don’t remember their introductory pitch). Because I knew the young woman (she had kicked me in the shins when I had tricked her into grabbing hold of a dead frog, a story I reference in the essay “Frogness”), I invited them in, and for several hours we discussed Scripture, a practice I have continued although usually on the front porch; for inevitably, these witnesses for a God-they-do-not-know will, at some point, slam their Bibles shut and say some version of, I’m supposed to be preaching to you and not you to me, actual words said by another witness.

The point on which our discussion of Scripture ended was whether David “‘shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel, and the Levitical priests shall never lack a man in my [the Lord’s] presence to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings, and to make sacrifices forever.’” My position then was that since the “‘covenant with day and night and the fixed order of heaven and earth’” was still in effect, David had a human heir sitting on his throne which necessitates the existence of a worldly throne that was the continuation of ancient Israel’s throne-line … that was, in 1972, the teaching of the most visible sect of the Sabbatarian churches of God, the sect being the Worldwide Church of God.

What I didn’t then understand was that when disciples individually and collectively are the temple of God, the inner self of these disciples serve in the temple as the Levitical priesthood served in the earthly temple: what was physical moves inward to become spiritual, with the outer person (the tent of flesh) reflecting what the inner person does and what this inner person believes.

No Christian neglecting the Sabbaths of God believes the writings of Moses, and as of 1972, no Christian had heard the words of Jesus since John died at the end of the 1st-Century. That is absolutely true! The prerequisite for hearing the words of Jesus is believing the writings of Moses, and again, no person neglecting Sabbath observance truly believes Moses; therefore, throughout the centuries between John’s death and the beginning of the third attempt by the last Elijah to breath life into the Body of Christ [the fourth stage, or the good ground on which seed is sown], there has been an ideological drought. The words of Jesus have not been heard: they could not be heard although the icons could be read, for both the icons and their linguistic objects must be revealed, and the object [signifieds] were not revealed until the visions of Daniel were unsealed.

For 1900 years—between John’s death (ca 100-102 CE) and January 2002 CE—no Christian heard the words of Jesus despite millions having read the icons for the words Jesus spoke.

Certainly there are/were plenty of Christians who believe/believed they know/knew the words of Jesus, with most of these Christians living today or yesterday in open rebellion to God … false ministries can last for centuries, but a work that is of God will not last when that work rejects revelation and rebels against Christ Jesus. Rather, the particular work will be ruthlessly destroyed as Jerusalem was razed—and such was the fate of the Worldwide Church of God, which in 1962, rejected revelation.

Again, the question that must be asked is when did Christians of any sect or denomination hear the words of Jesus prior to when the visions of Daniel were unsealed? Did Peter know any of what was revealed to John in his vision? No, he did not; hence, Peter misreads what occurs on that day of Pentecost following Calvary.

A Christian can misread the attire of Christian women: Paul writes, “For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man. That is why a wife ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels” (1 Cor 11:8–10). Will angels also misread the symbol of authority present or absent from the head of Christian wives?

The linguistic icons for Jesus’ words have been misread for centuries; nevertheless, those saints who were foreknown and predestined will be in the harvest of firstfruits for they believed what was logically impossible for them to accept; i.e., from death comes life.

It is the inner self that passes from death to life without coming under judgment, for the inner self judges itself by whether it believes the words of Jesus. Right now, the track record for disciples who have historically believed Moses isn’t good: most have refused to hear and believe, opting instead to continue in their understanding of Moses. Sobeit. The dead can continue to bury the dead of themselves. We shall not awaken them prior to the Second Passover, when the Father Himself shall do the awakening through slaying all uncovered [by the blood of Christ] firstborns.

Islam is not the enemy, but the theological cover crop growing on the fields of humanity as a farmer grows alfalfa to enrich the soil before the farmer plows it under to plant the desired crop: circumcised-of-heart Israelites. It isn’t alfalfa that will be gathered to God, but barley and wheat that will be thrashed, winnowed, and ground into fine flour during the seven endtime years of tribulation.

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"Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved."