Homer Kizer Ministries

December 24, 2009 ©Homer Kizer
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1.

The United States’ Senate is presently voting on its health care reform bill, which for the first time in the nation’s history will impose a tax on a non-activity (a fine for not purchasing health insurance). Noses have been counted; votes have been bought. The bill will pass, for we have to do something, or so goes the mantra that has infected many. And the stench created in crafting the vote for this bill makes plain to everyone what is wrong with democracy and representational democracies.

Otto von Bismarck, 19^th-Century German Chancellor and statesman, said that laws were like sausages, it is better not to see them being made … in this Obama era of government transparency, the American public now sees its laws being made: two-thousand page bills are voted on without being read. The concerns of specific legislators are assuaged through payouts. The opposition party is excluded from the deal-making that openly goes on behind closed doors (the televised image of the closed door was broadcast worldwide). And the Democrat majority, executing another of Bismarck’s admonishments—A government must not waiver once it has chosen its course: it must not look to the left or right but go forward—bulls ahead, taking America over a fiscal precipice from which there will be no recovery.

Allegedly, British politician and future Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli said of Bismarck, after meeting him, “Be careful of that man—he means what he says,” which is an indictment of politicians in general for the implication is that it’s a rare politician and a dangerous politician that tells the truth.

If democracies are supposed to reflect the will of the people, the usual truism about democracies, why not rule via public opinion polls? Why not establish a government akin to an indexed mutual fund? As goes public opinion, so goes the government—why go to the expense of holding elections and paying representatives that never cease their fund-raising for future elections. A mutual fund that reflects the DOW average doesn’t require much maintenance; a government linked to opinion polling would not require politicians to prostitute themselves and would not run up debt faster than the present Administration is doing. Of course, democracy would then be undisguised mob rule, which is, unfortunately, the essence of every democracy which merely reflects the competence, integrity, and morality of the populace at the time.

Yes, democratically elected leaders reflect or make visible the concealed mental landscape of the people, or the will of the people … the will of the people—what is the will of the people—must be respected in a representational democracy, but what if the public doesn’t know what’s best for it, as Democratic politicians now suggest. Weren’t they sent to Congress to do what they think best for their constituents? Is this not the difference between a representational democracy (what the United States is) and a pure democracy as ancient Athens was? Is this not the reason for selling a legislator’s vote on critical issues; for getting the legislator’s state exempted from paying a required mandate to include the working poor in the state’s Medicaid program?

Bismarck was a royalist, but when a royal (Kaiser Wilhelm II) came to power who wanted to fiddle in the Balkans, Bismarck opposed the monarch for he knew what would eventually happen: World War I.

For two centuries (16^th and 17^th), the French population increase did not outstrip French resources even though the population was overtaxed and the central government poorly administered, but in the 18^th-Century France’s population increased by 20% as France faced the financial hardship of paying for the Hundred Years War while losing its North American colonies; so when the ill-prepared Louis XVI came to the throne in the Age of Enlightenment, the monarch was out of touch with the people and had lost the confidence of the people—and lost his head because of his ineptitude as democracy ran amuck in the streets of Paris. Meanwhile, late 18^th-Century England was ruled by insanity.

A monarchy or a constitutional monarchy has the same inherent problem as a democracy: its governance is only as beneficial to the people as the monarch is competent and moral, whereas the governance of the people by the people mirrors the integrity and morality of the people. Although the monarch can temporarily impose his or her will upon a people, ultimately the monarchy must represent the best interests of the people in his or her own person as is the case with the highest elected official in a constitutional monarchy or in a representational democracy. The cruelty of an overbearing monarch is mirrored by the corruption of a single-party democracy as was long seen in Mexico or for the past year seen in the overreaching Democratic majority in the United States. And when the morals of the nation are represented by a semen-stained blue dress or by a thinly disguised transformative agenda, the people will get the governance they deserve; i.e., for which they voted. They will do to themselves what they despised in a monarch.

Whereas in a monarchy, the character of one person determines the fate of the people, in democracies the character of the people is reflected in one person; i.e., in whomever has been elected to the highest office in the land. Thus, the integrity and morality of America, for good or for bad, is reflected in the personhood of Barrack Hussein Obama, a product of the radical revolutionaries of the 1960s. And it is as if Maximilien Robespierre and the Committee of Public Safety have been resurrected in the form of President Obama and his Democratic congressional majority as a reign of fiscal terror is ushered forth by the national teleprompter, the voice of the nation … too harsh of a condemnation? No, from the ruins of the French Revolution and France’s initial democratic experiment emerged Napoleon Bonaparte, who plunged Western Europe into war, and from the American Revolution and the United States’ democratic experiment, largely deemed successful because of the initial integrity and morality of the British Colonists, will emerge a leader like Napoleon. This leader will be the man of perdition, who, despite alarmists’ concerns, will not be President Obama, and this lawless man of perdition will wage worldwide war in the name of Christ as this latter day saint postures as a man of God, but he will not be a man of God that Judaism, the Church of God, or Trinitarian Christendom recognizes. He will, however, after some initial difficulties be accepted by Islam as the man for whom the people have waited.

(The man of perdition, a human being possessed by the Adversary, will not be an uncovered natural firstborn, such as President Obama; he will not be a person who outwardly appears morally or ideologically corrupt. Rather, he will, most likely, be a second born son [not necessarily a second son], and he will, most likely, be a person reared in the western portion of the United States. He will be a charismatic individual who argues for traditional American values and who is a convert to Arian Christendom; he will be as publicly visible prior to the second Passover as the two witnesses are invisible—and his personal history will have odd parallels to that of the two witnesses.)

Strict constitutionalists are appalled by most every piece of legislation being passed by the sitting American Congress and signed into law by a political radical who vowed to bring foundational change to the United States. A debt burden is being placed on further generations that cannot be paid: the interest on this debt load will require taxes to be increased even beyond the burdens placed on European wage earners. What the now-unavoidable tax increases will do is force a black market (an underground economy) to develop in America that becomes the mother of all black markets. And the fundamental problem with underground economies is the crime inherent with them; for participation in such economies takes the participant outside of the law. Once outside of the law, the person loses the protection that the law affords.

The Apostle Paul wrote, “For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified” (Rom 2:12–3). And the preceding words of Paul are not badly translated, nor do they contradict what Paul wrote to the Galatians: “For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.’ Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for ‘The righteous shall live by faith.’ But the law is not of faith, rather ‘The one who does them shall live by them’” (3:10–12).

The above passage from Paul’s epistle to the Galatians is regularly used to justify Christian lawlessness, but Paul began his epistle to the Galatians as an Aristotelian argument—because Paul did not have the authority to command these saints to do anything—intended to convince those who had begun to circumcise the flesh to cease mutilating themselves. Paul, however, realized that reason alone would not be enough to counter the perverse arguments made from Scripture by the Circumcision Faction so he began to figuratively throw everything in the kitchen sink, then the sink itself at these erring saints. Thus, what endtime English-speaking disciples have is a double translation of Deuteronomy 27:26 and of Leviticus 18:5; for Paul was working from the Septuagint, not from a synagogue scroll. If then the endtime disciple looks at the passage Paul cites from Deuteronomy, the disciple will see the introduction to the passage:

Now Moses and the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying, “Keep the whole commandment that I command you today. And on the day you cross over the Jordan to the land that the Lord your God is giving you, you shall set up large stones and plaster them with plaster. And you shall write on them all the words of this law, when you cross over to enter the land that the Lord your God is giving you, a land flowing with milk and honey, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you. (27:1–3)

Then Moses and the Levitical priests said to all Israel, “Keep silence and hear, O Israel: this day you have become the people of the Lord your God. You shall therefore obey the voice of the Lord your God, keeping his commandments and his statutes, which I command you today.” / That day Moses charged the people, saying, “When you have crossed over the Jordan, these shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people: Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, and Benjamin. And these shall stand on Mount Ebal for the curse: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali. And the Levites shall declare to all the men of Israel in a loud voice:

“‘Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the Lord, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret.’ And all the people shall answer and say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who dishonors his father or his mother.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor's landmark.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who misleads a blind man on the road.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who lies with his father's wife, because he has uncovered his father's nakedness.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who lies with any kind of animal.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who lies with his sister, whether the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who lies with his mother-in-law.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who strikes down his neighbor in secret.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’

“‘Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’ (27:11–26)

“And if you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today, the Lord your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the Lord your God.” (28:1–2)

So the first requirement for understanding what Paul wrote is realizing that Paul misapplies a Scripture citation … did Paul do so unintentionally or intentionally? It doesn’t matter. As a Hebrew Greek, Paul loved equivocation. Romans hated equivocation [using the same word but shifting meanings for the word in the argument]. And the American rejection of equivocation comes from the philosophical Utilitarian dynamic that holds a person should say what the person means and mean what the person says, which is why President Clinton was vilified for saying what he did about the meaning of “is.”

The context for Paul’s citation about everyone being cursed who doesn’t abide by all things written in the Book of Deuteronomy [that is the context for Moses’ words] physically pertained to the children of Israel who would become the people of God only on this day (not forty years earlier), or better, would become the people of God when the children of Israel followed Joshua (i.e., Jesus — cf. Acts 7:45 and 4:10 in Greek) into God’s rest.

Paul gets ahead of himself in what he writes to the Galatians: he reaches backwards to grasp a passage that physically pertained to the children of Israel under Joshua after they crossed the Jordan and spiritually pertains to those human beings who physically live into the Millennium when they will be under the reality of the Moab covenant (see Deut chaps 29–32). Just as Peter misapplies Joel 2:28–32 on that day of Pentecost following Calvary, not realizing that he was living through the shadow or type of what would occur during the last seven years of tribulation, Paul misapplies Deuteronomy 27:26 for the same reason: Paul doesn’t understand that what he sees occurring with saints throughout Galatia foreshadows (or is the shadow and copy of) what will happen to endtime saints that physically seek righteousness, such as those trapped in the sacred Names heresy. Thus, what Paul writes to the Galatians is not wrong; what he writes is simply delivered early to Christians that have returned to outward circumcision or to bastardized Hebrew pronunciations of the Father’s and the Son’s names.

In Paul’s backward reach, Paul brings attention to Moses’ words in the plains of Moab. Cursed be anyone who makes a metal idol (Deut 27:15) equates to what the Lord told Moses in the second Sinai covenant: “‘You shall not make for yourself any gods of cast metal’” (Ex 34:17). Cursed be anyone who dishonors father or mother (Deut 27:16) equates with the Decalogue’s commandment to honor father and mother (Deut 5:16; Ex 20:12)—is there any Christian who sincerely believes that he or she will not be cursed if the Christian doesn’t honor father or mother? Is it ever all right for a Christian to dishonor father or mother? Were not saints in Galatia obligated to honor father and mother? Is Paul giving Galatians permission to dishonor father or mother: is that what Paul intended when he wrote about doing all things written in Deuteronomy? No, of course not. So what about, Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor’s landmark? Did Paul give Galatians permission to defraud one another? Or did Paul intend that what he wrote to the saints at Corinth about judging and marking the brother who swindles his brother (see 1 Cor 5:9–13) pertain to the saints of Galatia?

A canary in a cage is not free to fly wherever it wills, but the cage that inhibits the bird’s freedom also protects the canary from the cat that feigns sleep on the back of the couch … the law functions as a cage: if a person keeps the law, the person shall live and not be devoured, whereas anarchy is the “natural” child of lawlessness.

The issue that plagued the 1^st-Century Christian Church was whether the convert had to become a physical Israelite before the person could be born of God—and because spiritual birth was not well understood by the first disciples, the issue of physical circumcision was never fully resolved even after the Jerusalem conference. Paul understood that circumcision of hearts cleansed by faith was what made a person a Christian, but he didn’t realize that Jesus would not return within his lifetime [see 1 Thess 4:15–17] and that the spiritual Body of Christ had to die as the physical body died before being resurrected after the third day. Therefore, some of what Paul writes pertains specifically to when Jesus will return or to the time of the end, not to the intervening centuries when the Body of Christ is dead and buried in a garden tomb.

The lawlessness of this era’s Christian Church will give rise to theological anarchy that will translate into political anarchy following the Second Passover, when all natural firstborns not covered by the blood of Christ will die suddenly. If the Second Passover occurs in a near year, using 2011 as an example year, both the President and Vice-President of the United States will perish. Next in line of secession is the Speaker of the House and the nation will not be ruled by the present Speaker. Anarchy will occur. And the 220 days following the Second Passover will be a period of terror like that which gave France Napoleon or Russia the Soviet Union or Germany Hitler. A strong hand will be needed to check the lawlessness of the mother of all black markets … the legacy of the former Soviet Union’s underground economy is a Russian mafia as or more ruthless than its Sicilian predecessor. The Mexican drug wars are an ongoing part of the economy that developed from America’s illegal drug culture—the gang violence that has spread across the nation is the “natural” result of a dynamic underground economy. And the violence that has manifested itself within the United States is nothing compared to what will be seen as Congress adds to the burdens it places on Americans, making it advantageous for small businesses to pay employees cash in brown paper bags while its employees draw welfare or unemployment checks. Or if the Federal Government goes to a cashless society as it has threatened in discussions about taxing the present underground economy, an alternative currency will arise: perhaps Americans will use Canadian Loons to buy and sell within the nation as English Colonists used Spanish Doubloons rather than Pounds and Shillings.

During the worst of the anti-Federal government sentiment that gripped Alaska in the 1970s—when a Democratic Administration used the D-2 clause in the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) of 1971 to lock up much of the state—a hamburger joint with locations in Kenai and Soldotna actually paid its employees cash in brown paper bags, with the amount the employee owed in withholding and FICA written neatly on the bag.

A people will not be taxed into oblivion, and given the amount of spending the sitting Congress has already approved, truly confiscatory tax increases are inescapable … it has been said that Prohibition turned the United States into a nation of cheaters; so into what will servicing the nation’s present debt turn its citizenry if the Second Passover doesn’t occur in a year such as 2011, which would have the Rebellion of day 220 occurring on or about Christmas day of that year, the opening of the sixth seal (Rev 6:12–17) occurring on December 21, 2012, and have Satan and his angels cast to earth Halloween 2014?

The Second Passover’s sudden breaking of elected officials represents the sudden breaking of America’s present mindset, a mental landscape that uses sex to sell hamburgers and bath soap; a landscape that objectifies women yet celebrates Dionysian fluidity, giving to the dark abyss power over the Apollonian sky god unknowingly worshiped by most Christians, giving to female sexuality those things that have traditionally been reserved to males, giving to the Church apparent authority over its Husband. Once the Second Passover occurs, today’s bacchanalian revelry will cease: sex will suddenly seem unimportant. The only thing that will matter is getting right with God. And from a worldwide murmuring will come renewed elevation of the family, traditional values, and the Christendom of ancestors.

Unfortunately, the return to the Christendom of ancestors will be rebellion against God, who will not be worship by baptizing pagan holidays and calling them “Christian” celebrations.

 

2.

Social compassion is a double-edged sword, for there is an obligation to be my brother’s keeper, an expression that U.S. President Obama utters without meaning: his brother lives in poverty in a hut in Kenya while he lives in the White House. The inverse of the question Cain asked—“‘Am I my brother’s keeper’” (Gen 4:9)—implies an obligation to provide for the welfare of one’s brother. This obligation was, when Cain was Adam’s only surviving son, purely individual, but as society has grown so has the obligation; for the necessity to insure the welfare of brother and neighbor is both societal and individual … when the lawyer sought to test Jesus and asked what he must do to inherit eternal life, Jesus asked the lawyer how he read the law. The lawyer answered correctly, saying that a person is to love God with heart and mind, and love neighbor as self. Jesus then told the lawyer to do what he just said and he would live (Luke 10:28); he would be saved by applying those things that the law commands. But the lawyer responded with the question, “‘And who is my neighbor’” (v. 29), the scribes’ version of who is my brother.

If President Obama’s half-brother is not a brother for whom he is his keeper—the President makes no discernable effort to provide for his half brother, and his apologist [Press Secretary] has explained why he doesn’t—then who is the President’s brother? And how is President Obama not like the lawyer who sought to test Jesus, other than President Obama makes no serious attempt to keep the law.

After Jesus told of the man going from Jerusalem to Jericho who was robbed and left for dead, and of the priest and of the Levite who passed him by, then of the Samaritan who had compassion on the man, Jesus asked the lawyer, “‘Which of these three … proved to be a neighbor to the man’” (Luke 10:36). The lawyer, trapped by Jesus, answered, “‘The one who showed him mercy’” (v. 37).

A person’s neighbor or brother is the one to whom the person shows mercy. In His Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, “‘Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy’” (Matt 5:7), and Paul wrote, “For just as you [Gentiles] were at one time disobedient to God but now have received mercy because of their [Israel’s] disobedience, so they too have now been disobedient in order that by the mercy shown to you they also may now receive mercy. For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all” (Rom 11:30–32 emphasis added).

If a person wants mercy from the Father, the person will show mercy to neighbor and brother; the person will have compassion on neighbor and brother, for the person will receive mercy in the measure with which the person shows mercy. The person will do for a stranger what the Samaritan did for the man going from Jerusalem to Jericho, a journey away from the temple of God.

Human beings are naturally born as sons of disobedience (Eph 2:2–7), consigned to disobedience because of the trespass of the first Adam. They are the bondservants of the Adversary. They are not free to obey God; they are not free to keep the law; they must transgress it. Even the most pious of human beings is a sinner, a slave of the Adversary, and in need of God to extend the person mercy—and through the indwelling of Christ Jesus, God extends to those human beings who will be His firstborn sons mercy by giving to the person or persons a second breath of life, a “life” over which sin has no dominion (Rom 6:14), a “life” free to keep the commandments, but a “life” dwelling within a tent of flesh that (until the Second Passover) remains consigned to sin and death.

The war Paul fought—the war Paul, by his own admission, didn’t understand—between doing what his mind knew was right and doing those things in the flesh that his mind knew were wrong (see Rom 7:15–25) is the war every Christian must fight and fight to win between now and the Second Passover when the flesh of Israel will be liberated from indwelling sin and death as ancient Israel was liberated from physical bondage to Pharaoh. Once liberated by being filled with spirit (or empowered by the spirit of God), the war will move outside of the Christian, who then can do what the mind wills. The flesh will still be mortal, but without indwelling sin and death, the flesh will not “naturally” die. Martyrdom will return big-time, especially after the Rebellion of day 220 occurs: the core of this Rebellion is whether Christians will believe God or believe the Adversary and his ministers, and the issue that sparks this Rebellion is Christmas observance.

To believe God, the Christian must hear the words of God. To hear the words of God, the Christian must hear the words of Jesus, who only spoke the words of the Father during His ministry. To hear the words of Jesus, the Christian must hear the voice of Jesus. To hear the voice of Jesus, the Christian must believe the writings of Moses (John 5:46–47). And to believe the writings of Moses, the Christian must read Scripture for him or herself.

Paul explicates the above scenario:

For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” [Paul’s citation is from Joel 2:32, which is time dated to the Tribulation, not earlier]

How then will they [Israel] call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ. (Rom 10:12–17)

Again, Paul misapplies a Scripture, the same passage that Peter misapplied on that day of Pentecost—1^st-Century disciples sincerely believed that the time of the end was upon them, that the spirit of God had been poured out on all flesh, but they neglected an important aspect of the prophet Joel’s words: quoting the Lord, Joel records, “‘And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes’” (2:30–31). These signs and wonders did not occur on that day of Pentecost when the first disciples were baptized in spirit and fire as the visible shadow of disciples being invisibly baptized in spirit at the beginning of the seven endtime years and of the third part of humankind being baptized in spirit when Satan is cast from heaven and the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man.

Just as Paul did not understand the war that was occurring between the law of God in his mind and the law of sin and death that remained dwelling in his flesh, Paul did not understand that his ministry was the shadow and type of an endtime ministry during the Tribulation. Thus, the passages he cites that he believes pertain to the situation at hand but are actually time dated by their content to the Tribulation are not used errantly, only prematurely. However, the Adversary and his ministers have placed great emphasis on these passages and used them to kill the Body at the end of the 1^st-Century, then used them to keep the Body sealed in death until Christ Jesus restores life to the Body at the Second Passover.

Both Peter and Paul believed that the visible baptism of the first disciples in spirit and fire on that day of Pentecost represented the fulfillment of Joel’s prophecies; yet Joel, in speaking of when the spirit would be poured out on all flesh, records the Lord saying,

For behold, in those days and at that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. And I will enter into judgment with them there, on behalf of my people and my heritage Israel, because they have scattered them among the nations and have divided up my land, and have cast lots for my people, and have traded a boy for a prostitute, and have sold a girl for wine and have drunk it. (3:1–3 emphasis added)

The time reference is to when the world will be baptized in spirit (Joel 2:28–32); for that is when the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem will be restored. They will not be restored prior to the stated heavenly signs. Thus, without the heavenly signs occurring, Joel’s prophecy remains to be fulfilled in the future, with John’s vision telling endtime disciples when that fulfillment will be.

The importance of endtime disciples understanding prophecy cannot be overstated; for the Remnant that will be to the third part of humankind in the Endurance as the two witnesses are to Israel during the Tribulation keep the commandments and have the testimony of Jesus, which is the spirit of prophecy (cf. Rev 12:17; 19:10). This Remnant in the Endurance will have the same use of the spirit as the two witnesses have in the Tribulation.

Genuine disciples who do not have the spirit of prophecy (i.e., who do not understand prophecy) will die physically during the Tribulation: all disciples who believe God and who will not be put to [spiritual] shame keep the commandments, with Sabbath observance outwardly marking who believes God and who doesn’t. With the exception of the 144,000 who are natural Israelites—who are Observant Jews, regardless of tribal ancestry—that come to Christ after the sixth seal is opened (i.e., after day 580, and probably after day 940), and with the exception of the Remnant (Sabbatarian Christians who have the spirit of prophecy), all genuine disciples will die physically in the first 1260 days of the seven endtime years of tribulation. There will be no other exceptions but for the 144,000 and the Remnant; for God will not have Sabbatarian disciples teaching the third part of humankind the mishmash of heresies, false understandings of prophecies, and half-truths that presently exists within Sabbatarian Christendom. For the sake of those who will be His people (Zech 13:9), He will use the Adversary to clear away the theological underbrush that presently prevents Sabbatarian Christians from understanding prophecy. If this means those disciples who profess to believe Him but hold skewed understandings of prophecy have to give their lives for their belief, then they will be in the resurrection of firstfruits though they won’t physically live to see Christ return: they will be sealed in death and resurrected in glory, thereby missing years of living through tribulation.

The first disciples had reason to believe that Jesus would return within their lifetimes, but the visions of Daniel were still sealed and secret, and the Book of Revelation (John’s vision) was not yet given … the first disciples are sealed in death and await in sleep those endtime disciples who will be martyred as they were. These first disciples did not understand prophecy—it was not for them to understand, for what would they have done if they realized the same fate had to happen to the spiritual Body of Christ as happened to His earthly body? Would they have been as willing to die in faith if they knew that Christ would not return for two millennia? That the fullness of time would see three and a half millennia transpire between the first Passover and the Second Passover.

It's easy to believe what Peter said about the prophecy of Joel being fulfilled on that day of Pentecost, or what Paul wrote about everyone who calls on the name of the Lord being saved: the words are right there in Scripture. It is more difficult to believe that the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem were restored in the 1^st-Century, for they were not! Even the physical ministry of Christ Jesus and the giving of the spirit of God to men did not restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem, which scripturally becomes a nation circumcised of heart and the temple of God built from living stones.

The fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem were not even restored in 1948, with the formation of the modern State of Israel, which remains a microscopic nation in unceasing turmoil with its Arab neighbors … Arab and non-Arab Muslim nations have needed Israel as a whipping boy so that tyrannical leaders could retain control of impoverished populaces. They have needed the parable of the Good Samaritan reenacted over and over again, with the modern State of Israel being represented by the priest and the Levite. They have used the words of Jesus against Israel, not realizing that in recognizing Jesus as a prophet they condemn themselves before God. They have no covering for their lawlessness for despite acknowledging Jesus as a prophet, they reject His divinity, thereby making the Second Passover a wakeup call for Islam, a call that will see the vast majority of Muslims becoming Arian Christians as they sally forth as an army of latter day saints bent upon “correcting” the errant ways of Trinitarian Christendom.

The first disciples could only see darkly what is plainly visible at the end of the age; therefore, their misapplication of prophetic passages is understandable, for they lived their faith as shadows and copies of endtime disciples. With the exception of the Apostle John and probably Paul late in his ministry, the first disciples were not self-aware texts that understood their actions were forming the shadows of the acts and deeds of endtime disciples as the history of ancient Israel in this world forms the shadow and copy of the history of the Christian Church in the heavenly realm (i.e., the portion of the heavenly realm that is in the Abyss).

The reality of disciples in this present era is that only a few understand they are self-aware texts, their lives being epistles in the heavenly Book of Life (see 2 Cor 3:2–3) but epistles that visibly reflect those things that will happen to saints during the seven endtime years of tribulation. In other words, genuine disciples in the Tribulation and the third part of humankind in the Endurance can see themselves in the lives of Sabbatarian disciples in this present era … using one heresy as an example, those disciples trapped in the falsity of the Sacred Names movement place spiritual importance on the physical utterance of the name of God (Father and Son). They deny Christ Jesus, who in turn denies them before the Father. They have been pruned away, cut from the Vine that is Christ (John 15:2), and they cannot be restored to life. But in their placing importance on physical utterance, they form the now-lifeless shadow and type of disciples in the Tribulation who place importance on the manifestation of signs and miracles, thereby setting themselves up to be deceived by demons who will seem to do miracles that are of God as Pharaoh’s magicians cast down their staffs and their staffs became serpents (Ex 7:10–12). Remember, Jesus said, “‘For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand’” (Matt 24:24–25).

For endtime saints who realize (who are self-aware texts) that those things they do today reflect those things that will be done by believing disciples in the Tribulation and/or Endurance, life is exciting, even when impoverished and in want of those things that this world offers.

As the Sacred Names Heresy has decimated many struggling Sabbatarian fellowships in this present era, the signs and wonders—the miracles that seem to be of God—of the false christs and false prophets in the Tribulation and Endurance will decimate struggling Sabbath-keepers … let it here be said with no equivocation, the disciple who looks for miracles in the Tribulation will be deceived by the Adversary and his ministers, for the disciple seeking miracles looks amiss. The Adversary and his ministers will use miracles that seem to be of God to “lure” believing disciples into taking sin within themselves when they have no covering for sin but their obedience. Those disciples who bite the Adversary’s bait were forewarned by Christ Jesus not to do so, but Jesus’ warning was not heeded because they, themselves, determined beforehand what would happen in the Tribulation when they were still without knowledge.

 

3.

When governments use progressive tax structures to take from the wealthy and give to the poor in a real life application of Robin Hood ideology, the government negates individual responsibility to be one’s brother’s keeper, for the government does not leave the wage earner with the resources to do more than barely care for him or herself. Thus, the government begins to subsidize the poor—

An often ignored political truism is that governments get more of whatever they choose to subsidize. If a government wants more home ownership, the government will subsidize home ownership through tax credits, thereby making it more advantageous to purchase a home than to rent. If a government wants more married households, the government will subsidize marriage through tax credits that penalize single wage earners and reward married wage earners. If a government ends its subsidy of marriage then the number of married households decline while the number of households headed by a single person rises.

When the U.S. government sought to help farmers through farm subsidies because of depressed prices caused by overproduction, more of the subsidized crops were harvested to the virtual exclusion of non-subsidized crops being grown. But when crop subsidies were diminished and the Federal government sought to help impoverished individuals through direct food subsidies (not through the continued distribution of commodity foods), farm prices rose as did the number of Food Stamp recipients: by subsidizing an individual’s purchase of foodstuffs, the number of individuals receiving this subsidy rose above anticipated projections. The same applies to Medicaid and Medicare.

Through the middle of the 20^th-Century, in an effort to show societal compassion state and Federal governments subsidized teen pregnancies and out-of-wedlock pregnancies, producing more of both and beginning a trend that now has single mothers accounting for an unreasonably high percentage of live births … if the government wants more unemployment, the government will subsidize unemployment by extending to the unemployed benefits that are great enough the unemployed can remain unemployed. Likewise, if the government wants more impoverished individuals, the government will extend to the impoverished benefits great enough that these individuals can survive while remaining impoverished, and without the means to legally escape being impoverished.

But the question that must be addressed is, doesn’t human compassion for the unemployed or for the impoverished individual require that the government, organized for the good of society, extend a helping hand to the less fortunate within the nation? This is the heart of the argument made for every social program, is it not?

Not only was Bismarck responsible for the unification of Germany, he was largely responsible for beginning Germany’s social welfare state. About age thirty, Bismarck became a Pietist Lutheran—he was a royalist so he wasn’t a Christian Democrat, but he understood that workers had legitimate fears about what would happen to them if they were injured, became sick, lost their job, or became too old to work. In an effort to nip socialism in the bud, Bismarck, using the term practical Christianity or Staatssozialismus, proposed basic legislation that afforded workers health insurance, for which they had to pay, workman’s compensation insurance, unemployment insurance, and a retirement pension when workers reached age 70. The cost of these social programs was borne jointly but unequally by employers and workers. They were truly 19^th-Century Germany’s manifestation of Christianity’s claim to be its brother’s keeper.

Practical Christianity is neither biblical nor unbiblical. The Bible is, upon first glance, silent about how Christians are to participate in civil governance—actually, it is not silent at all: Christians are to be subject to, but are not to participate in civil governments, all of which derive their immediate powers to govern from the prince of this world.

God has consigned all of humankind to disobedience so that He could have mercy upon all (Rom 11:32). All of humankind is naturally born as sons of disobedience (Eph 2:2–3); naturally born as the willing or unwilling servants of the Adversary. All are bondservants or slaves of the Adversary. All are enslaved to indwelling sin and death. All have or will die, said with the exception of those individuals who bodily live into the Endurance and who are then changed upon Christ’s Jesus return as the Messiah. None are naturally born as sons of God. No human nation is naturally the people of God, and this includes the modern State of Israel as well as the United States of America.

Much is made by Christian fundamentalists of the U.S. Constitution. It is said to be a divinely inspired document when nothing could be much farther from true. It is a magnificent document, establishing the best humanly inspired form of governance yet devised. But it is a document based upon one of the Adversary’s imitations of Christianity, and it is based upon the Adversary’s philosophical rejection of God as sovereign. Yes, the Constitution pays homage to God, but its separation of powers is a rejection of God; for it is the Adversary’s position that Korah stated in the wilderness when he said to Moses and Aaron, “‘You have gone too far! For all in the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them. Why then do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of the Lord?’” (Num 16:3) … why indeed—did not the Lord say to Moses, “‘You shall speak to him [Aaron] and put the words in his mouth, and I will be with your mouth and with his mouth and will teach you both what to do. He shall speak for you to the people, and he shall be your mouth, and you shall be as God to him’” (Ex 4:15–16 emphasis added).

If Moses was to be God to Aaron (the “as” has been added), then Moses was to be God to Israel as well as to Aaron; Moses was to visibly stand before Israel as the glorified Jesus will invisibly stand before Christendom in the Tribulation. Thus, Moses was to be God to Korah and his followers; therefore, rebellion against Moses was rebellion against God. And Korah’s rebellion against God formed/forms the visible shadow and type of the Adversary’s rebellion against God in the heavenly realm, and of Christendom’s rebellion against God in this world.

Is there a more pure expression of the underlying principle of democracy than what Korah told Moses? All men are equal before God; all of Israel is holy. No person, regardless of who the person is, is more equal than another person. This is, is it not, the essence of the Constitution? And the man of perdition will hold the U.S. Constitution as sacrosanct, a document truly inspired by God.

The Christianity of the cross is not the Christianity of Christ Jesus, who delivered an anti-family message to Israel, a message that could not be effectively taken to Hellenistic Greeks. Jesus did not bring a message of peace to this world. He defined who the peacemakers shall be, but Jesus said,

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person's enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross [stake, as in being staked or tethered to this world] and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. (Matt 10:34–39)

The man of perdition will advocate for the family being the cornerstone of society, for personal responsibility, for private (versus public) acts of charity—all admirable values that the majority of Christendom can support. But for genuine disciples of Christ Jesus, family is not the cornerstone of society; Christ Jesus is. Personal responsibility is important, but is also a negation of grace. For the Father and the Son will liberate Christians, all Christians, from indwelling sin and death at the Second Passover regardless of the sinfulness of the Christian who has been covered by grace. The Christian who has been too weak to openly keep the commandments will no longer be weak, but will be empowered by being filled with spirit.

The Sabbatarian Churches of God have long “hated” their fellow Christians for the lawlessness of the visible Church; Sabbatarians have condemned 8^th-day Christians to the lake of fire when judgment has not been on the majority of the visible Church, and when the requirement for salvation of those who have been born of God is doing what the person knew/knows is right. The 8^th-day Christian—the son of God who worships on Sunday—has been under grace if the Christian did not know to keep the Sabbath, a real possibility although a possibility that every Sabbatarian finds difficult to believe. It is the hypocrite who knows the law and knows to do what the law requires that is condemned, the reason Jesus said,

Not everyone who says to me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?” And then will I declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.” (Matt 7:21–23)

It is the Christian who teaches other Christians to transgress the commandments that is utterly condemned before God; this Christian is a worker of iniquity, knowing what the law requires but denying that the law pertains to Christians in general or to the person in particular. And this is the Christianity that governments have subsidized within their jurisdictions through either exempting the Church or churches from taxes or by giving to the Church special rights of ownership. This is the Christianity that the United States has seen grow large from being subsidized by state and Federal laws: separation of Church and State should have the Federal government making no law pertaining to the free exercise of religion, which would include well-intended laws to exempt churches from property taxes, or to exempt those employed in ministry from Social Security taxation. By exempting church-owned properties from local taxation, the State subsidizes the acquisition of these properties, thereby promoting greater and greater acquisition of real property which by the grandeur of the properties encourages giving additional time and monies to these Christian ministries, which feeds a voracious cycle of fundraising that knows no end.

Stopping the endless fundraising, the eloquent and the brazen requests for monies broadcast 24/7 on satellite television, would begin with taxing church properties at the same rate as other business properties are taxed, for churches are service businesses devoted to burying the dead … the man of perdition will argue that the power to tax churches is the power to restrict religious assembly, a position that assumes religious equality, that all of the congregation of Israel is holy and has the right to come before the Lord, that all who are holy are of the priesthood (Num 16:10), that the temple of God is a real property structure as Solomon’s temple was a structure built of wood and stone.

Which disciple, each individually and collectively composing the Body of Christ, cannot assemble before God wherever the disciple is on the Sabbath? Jesus said, “‘Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them’” (Matt 18:19–20).

If Jesus will be wherever two or three of His disciples are gathered in His name, how large of a building is needed for Christian assembly? One large enough for two or three to gather in Jesus’ name—is a property tax exemption needed for such a building? No exemption is needed. So if an assembly is large enough that a bigger meeting hall is needed then the assembly is also large enough to pay taxes on the bigger meeting hall. Otherwise, the assembly can return to being many assemblies of two or three meeting in homes.

The man of perdition will be an advocate for the right-to-life cause … if life begins at conception, or even eleven hours later when excess chromosomes are expelled, then all willful abortion is murder. No other position can be held by a Christian. But willful transgression of the Sabbath condemns the Christian born of God to the second death, as does willful lying, coveting, lusting after someone other than the person’s spouse. So is aborting a child by a non-believer a more heinous transgression of the law than a Believer putting up a Christmas tree? The man of perdition will hold that there is no comparison between the two deeds—and really there isn’t, for the woman who consents to murdering her child will be forever a murderer in this world, where Jesus’ death at Calvary paid the penalty for every transgression of the law, whereas the Christian who rebels against God through keeping the traditions and holidays of this world will not even ask for forgiveness for his or her idolatry but will blaspheme God when condemned to the lake of fire.

The present thoughts of human beings and the ways of this world are those of the Adversary; they are not of God. And the man of perdition will be an advocate for those things that make this present world limp along as a lame beggar, blind and deaf to the ways of God.

In an unfettered democracy, every person represents him or herself. No person is more important than another person. There is no Moses, no Joshua, no Jesus. There is true equality, and there is also anarchy, social chaos, and continual war, the state of the world throughout the 1260 days of the Tribulation and the 1260 days of the Endurance.

Bismarck’s pietism manifested itself in Bismarck advocating that the State assume some responsibility for the social welfare of its citizens—

Pietism originated with Phillipp Jakob Spener (dob 1635 in Alsace), and was a distinct movement within the German churches, both Protestant and Anabaptist. It combined Lutheranism with the Reformed movement, especially Puritanism, by placing emphasis on the individual’s responsibility to live a pure life. It influenced John Wesley and his Methodist movement as well as Alexander Mack and his Brethren movement; it indirectly led to the second wave of Sabbatarian churches. But calling a person a pietist was to use a pejorative intended to belittle the person who sought to live righteously.

Spener proposed that the Christian should earnestly and thoroughly study the Bible in private meetings, that the Christian priesthood was universal (the laity should share in the governance of the Church), that the Christian should practice what the Christian preached, that a sympathetic attitude be adopted toward unbelievers and dissenters, that theological training in universities be overhauled, that a different style of preaching be used, a style that built up the inner man … Spener’s proposed reforms (except for theological training in universities) manifested themselves in the 18^th-Century German Seventh Day Baptist Church, which gave rise to the Seventh Day Adventists and Church of God Seventh Day in the 19^th Century, and the Radio Church of God in the 20^th-Century, and now The Philadelphia Church (not to be confused with Gerald Flurry’s Philadelphia Church of God, an Oklahoma based cult that idolizes Herbert W. Armstrong) in the 21^st-Century.

To receive accreditation and the financial perks associated with being accredited, universities have become purely secular institutions, with the Latter Day Saints’ Brigham Young University perhaps being the best example of a university that has partially resisted being ideologically overwhelmed by Marxism or theological humanism. Although the theology of Latter Day Saints is arguably “Christian,” the theology has more in common with Islam than with what the man Jesus of Nazareth taught as recorded in the gospels and what Peter, John, James, and Paul taught in their epistles … the 1^st-Century Church was a recognized (by Sadducees and Pharisees) sect of Judaism, the sect called the Nazarenes, and the 21^st-Century Christian Church when liberated from indwelling sin and death at the Second Passover will also be a recognizable sect of Judaism. Until then, the vast majority of Christians are as Eve was when she believed the serpent’s lie that she would not surely die:

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. / He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Gen 3:1–5)

Eve would not die if she merely touched the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge: the serpent recognized the addition to the Lord’s words, for the Lord told Adam nothing about not touching the tree (see Gen 2:16–17). Apparently Adam had added to what the Lord told him when placing him in the Garden of God; apparently Adam did not trust Eve to touch but not taste. And the serpent used this addition to defeat Eve’s faith.

Apparently the early Church did not trust converts to believe the writings of Moses (the prerequisite to hearing the voice of Jesus — John 5:46–47) without converting to Judaism; so the mid and late 1^st-Century Church added much to what Jesus and His first disciples taught, with these additions scabbed onto both the left and the right hand side of the Way that leads to life. And as the serpent, more subtle than any other beast, used Adam’s addition to what the Lord told him about not eating from the Tree of Knowledge to deceive Eve … Can you visualize the scene: the serpent tells Eve that she would not die, that eating the forbidden fruit would open her eyes and make her like God, a good thing. Eve then “accidentally” brushes her hand against the tree. She doesn’t die, and she begins to doubt what Adam told her. She picks a piece of fruit, and still she doesn’t die (she probably doesn’t understand the concept of what death is). And she begins reasoning with herself: if eating will make her like God, and since the fruit is good for food and pleasing to look at, why not eat, for she now doesn’t believe anything Adam told her. She eats, and she doesn’t die. Adam, who is beside her all the time, sees her eat and not die. But Adam doesn’t realize that he and his obedience are Eve’s covering for unbelief; that because Eve came from him and the two are one flesh, as long as he doesn’t eat her transgression is “covered” by his belief/faith. After all, he was responsible for telling Eve what God said. If he got the message wrong, intentionally or unintentionally, the fault is his; the transgression is his fault. Yet when Adam sees Eve eat but not die, he doubts what the Lord told him; he ceases to believe God. So he eats and immediately he and she realize that they are naked; they marked themselves for death. They no longer have their unbelief covered by obedience.

The last Adam, Christ Jesus, has His faith tested and His righteousness accepted by God before the last Eve [the Christian Church] is created; therefore, the last Eve’s disobedience has been covered by Christ’s righteousness. But when the late 1^st-Century Church chose to present itself to sin—to lawlessness—as sin’s willing bondservant, these Christians made themselves slaves to “sin, which leads to death” (Rom 6:16). They removed themselves from being under grace, the garment of Christ righteousness, at a time when sin had no dominion over them; they simply chose not to believe the writings of Moses, especially after Rome’s sacking of Jerusalem in 70 CE. And when they chose not to believe the writings of Moses, they ceased being able to hear the voice of Jesus and believing the One who sent Him into this world (cf. John 5:46–47; 24). They lost possession of the breath of God by the Father simply not drawing any more saints from this world, and the ones truly born of spirit being martyred. Although Christianity as a religion continued to grow, the Body of Christ was visibly dead as Jesus’ physical body was visibly dead while it hung on the cross from about 3:00 pm until Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus took it down almost three hours later. The Christian Church would remain visible in this world but dead until it was buried by Emperor Constantine at the Council of Nicea (ca 325 CE). After the Council at Nicea, Christianity was “Christian” in name only; it was and it remains barely disguised Greek paganism.

As the serpent used Adam’s addition to what the Lord told him about not eating from the Tree of Knowledge to deceive Eve that old serpent Satan the devil used what 1^st-Century converts added to the words of Jesus and to what the first disciples taught to separate the Church from the mantle of grace; i.e., the garment of Christ Jesus’ righteousness that covered the early Church as first Adam’s obedience covered Eve. And as the Lord drove Adam and Eve from the Garden of God, the Lord took the spirit of God away from the 1^st-Century Church so that the spiritual Body of Christ died as the physical body of Christ had died on the cross at Calvary. With the death of the Apostle John at the end of the 1^st-Century (ca 100–102 CE), the Body of Christ was dead; the Church was spiritually lifeless. All of the following activity that occured was like that of a chicken running around with its head cut off; was like that of the Worldwide Church of God from January 1962 to the present day … in the history of Andreas Fischer’s disciples following his death in 1540, a person sees in type what happened to the portion of the early Church that veered to the right hand side of the Way; and in the history of Herbert W. Armstrong’s disciples following his death in 1986, a person sees in type what happened to the majority portion of the early Church that veered left of the Way.

As the first Elijah lay over the son of the widow of Zarephath three times before life was restored to the child, whom rabbinical Judaism contends was the prophet Jonah, the last Elijah (the glorified Jesus) will lay over the Christian Church three times before the Church again “breathes” on its own through being empowered by or filled with the spirit of God. When the first Elijah delivered the living child to the widow of Zarephath, the woman said to Elijah, “‘Now I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is truth’” (1 Kings 17:24 emphasis added). And when the Second Passover liberation of Israel occurs—when the Church again breathes on its own through every Christian being filled with spirit—then the Church will know who speaks for the Lord and in whose mouth is truth; for many, many false prophets have come in the name of Christ bringing with them damnable heresies that prevent infant sons of God from growing in grace and knowledge (growing in grace is not growing in forgiveness which cannot be done, but growing in the spiritual equivalent to physical growth in physical size).

It is aptly appropriate that the Senate passed its version of Health Care insurance reform on Christmas Eve—

As a Hebrew Greek, Paul loved shifting meanings for words, using the same linguistic icon to represent successive linguistic objects as I just did in the above sentence, where “Eve” doesn’t represent the first woman or the Christian Church but the evening before Christmas Day. Western culture, Roman in practice but Greek in ideology, doesn’t appreciate the use of many linguistic objects for a single linguistic icon. Western culture wants to read Paul’s words with one meaning, not with meaning dependent upon context, a slippery slope that prevents Scripture from being the infallible word of God, being instead merely the inspired word of God, the “text” which requires believing the writings of Moses and hearing the voice of Jesus before the intended meaning can be taken from it. This means that by diligent study of ancient languages and historical contexts—the fodder of universities—a person cannot comprehend the things of God, but can only read in an insignificant way their surfaces.

When Spener urged that universities overhaul their theological training programs, he could see the problems imbedded in the system, but he didn’t realize that by pious actions and force of will, no one can become a Christian in this present era unless the Father first draws the person from this world. Until all who call themselves Christians are liberated from indwelling sin and death at the Second Passover, disciples are individually called by the Father and the Son—and the Father isn’t drawing many from this world. He is only drawing those needed to fulfill all things.

The man of perdition, before he is revealed, will vigorously oppose the runaway spending of the sitting Congress. He will be an advocate for small government and fiscal responsibility, good things in this world. He will be someone with whom every Sabbatarian Christian can identify, the means by which he would deceive the Elect if it were possible. And it actually is possible for this individual to deceive most Sabbath-keepers, who sincerely believe that the Federal government is their adversary—and because the Federal government rules over human beings under authority given to the Adversary, its relationship with Sabbath-keepers is adversarial as it snipes at disciples living on the fringes of Sabbatarian Christendom.

Bismarck proposed meaningful social legislation as a hedge against Socialism just as the (still future) man of perdition now proposes an originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution and return to the philosophy of America’s founding fathers as the means to quarantine the plague of socialism … Practical Christianity, however, merely opened the door to socialism in the modern German state.

When President Obama truthfully states that the United States is not a Christian nation, Christians take great offense. But should they? As they anxiously watched the midnight workings of the Senate, with the dealings—the political prostitution—occurring behind closed doors in this era of declared openness, these Christians begin to gnash teeth as they eagerly await mid-term elections so they can throw the scallywags out of office. But why are they surprised by what is happening: they are only seeing the inherent flaw imbedded within all democracies; for once the poor (which will always be in every nation) discover they can, through their vote, seize the wealth of the “more fortunate,” the poor use their vote as a club to bludgeon those they envy, and included among the poor are the youth of the nation who have not yet acquired jobs or even vocational skills.

The inherent flaw imbedded within every democracy is that the vote of the impoverished individual will negate the vote of the industrious individual; thus, when the number of impoverished individuals—the reason for being impoverished is not important—exceeds the number of industrious individuals, power within the democracy shifts from producers to consumers. As long as these consumers retain the dream of achieving quantifiable success, the dynamics of the shift in power are not readily observable. However, when the dream (the American Dream) is lost, the impoverished consumer seeks to protect him or herself through auctioning off the person’s vote, expecting in payment lifetime support.

In the early decades of the 20^th-Century, the parable of the democracy of goods (Roland Marchand’s term) squelched political dissent by promising the middle class that it could have the same products that the wealthy purchased and used. The poor aspired to join the middle class so that the poor could also have the things of the wealthy; for financial investments or money in a bank does not outwardly show as prosperity. It is what money purchases that shows as prosperity. The wealthy individual who makes few purchases appears outwardly as middle-class or as one of the poor. The individual’s wealth is concealed from public view. Hence, many of the nouveau riche (e.g., professional athletes or movie stars) purchase flashy goods without making investments that would allow them to purchase in the future; for the immediate display of goods is what marks the person as successful.

Before class envy can be exploited by politicians, the dream empowering the democracy of goods must be extinguished: impoverished individuals must be made to feel “entitled” to the things the wealthy use and display, and must be made to believe that those things have been unfairly obtained by the industrious.

Because of how successful the parable of the democracy of goods was in the first half of the 20^th-Century, it has taken a Great Depression and fifty years of social engineering to transform the wealthiest nation the world has ever known into the greatest debtor nation the world has every known, with this transformation fueled by compassion for the poor—and because of the compassion that turned this nation fiscally upside-down, Americans might eventually receive healthcare by committee in what might well be the next to last nail driven into the coffin of the United States.

The last nail will be cap-and-trade, a carbon tax that doesn’t subsidize carbon usage but penalizes industrial activity, thereby writing into law statutes that return the United States to being an agricultural-based economy. In a century, the United States will go from being a nation of mostly subsistence farmers to being a nation of mostly corporate farmers, meaning that the surplus population warehoused in the cities of the nation will face a very bleak future; they are industrially and agriculturally expendable. They are only politically important, and then only important to sitting Democrats in Congress and in the White House; thus, they will be of little or no value to the nation after the Second Passover. They will have no worth to the man of perdition when he is revealed. Hence, they will be quickly sacrificed in a purge of ridding the world of all things that destroy free will, personal responsibility, and free enterprise. After all, how will they survive when they are treated as a plague spawned in the vials of socialism?

Does not love for brother and neighbor mandate that individuals in inner city ghettos receive the same opportunity to repent and begin to believe God as the corn farmer in Iowa or the logger in Oregon or the orchardist in New York? Are they not of more value as human beings than their worth as reliable voters for whomever bears the Democrat brand?

In subsidizing home ownership, the Federal Government consciously or unconsciously sought to stabilize the nation’s workforce, for home ownership prevents the person from relocating to a different geographical region as jobs move from one area to another. High mortgage payments consume wealth rather than produce it; thus home ownership has become an impoverishing ploy used nationally to stabilize voting patterns … but isn’t part of the American dream to own one’s home?

Home ownership by the nation’s poor has been used by Democratic politicians to bankrupt not just the second and third generation of home owners but the nation itself. It is not possible for a wage earner to pay off a thirty or forty year mortgage on a home located in a region with a shrinking industrial base: increasing property taxes and decreasing employment opportunities will eventually produce a financial breakdown in both individuals and the nation.

Because the urban poor have been cultivated for their vote as if they were a named variety of rapeseed, bearing an exceedingly fruitful harvest in 2008, the urban poor have doomed themselves to neglect in the Tribulation. They voted for politicians who promised them “life” in an economic desert, and they will reap famine on a scale they cannot now imagine; for they have to see the affluence of those who live outside the law disappear, and they have to see themselves abandoned by the politicians and political system they supported. They have to see democracy fail. They have to see the deal they made with the devil blow up as if it were a soggy firecracker.

Unlike the urban poor, the rural poor in America though angry at lying politicians respect the Constitution enough they are not going to violently rebel when times get very difficult for them. They will, instead, turn to God for help … it was the support of the rural poor that allowed the Confederacy to field an army that almost dissolved the union a century and a half ago, and it will be their support of the Constitution—they respect the rule of law enough that they will even bear confiscatory taxation reaching down to their rung of the economic ladder—that the man of perdition needs as he rallies support for the founding principles of the United States. The rural poor are the best citizens the nation has, but they will be among the first to rebel against God when the man of perdition is revealed. At some point, they will choke on the political lies being fed them, and they will have had enough as they return to the Christianity of their forefathers. However, it will be their assumption that God inspired the founding of this nation that leads to their spiritual undoing.

It is popular to say that that the man of perdition will be a charismatic Jew who switches religions, with the most commonly advocated switch being to Islam. It is equally popular to say that the two witnesses will be Jews now in earthly Jerusalem. But popular theological positions are never of God. They are always of the Adversary.

Jesus said,

If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. But all these things they will do to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. (John 15:18–21 emphasis added)

The world doesn’t hate its own; it listens to its own; it puts its “experts” on The History Channel to explicate biblical prophecies and the Book of Revelation; it doesn’t listen to the people of God; it’s not interested in hearing what God reveals through His servants. Christians would today persecute Jesus just as temple officials persecuted Him two millennia ago. Nothing much has changed.

What theological academia doesn’t grasp is that Christians are prophetic Israel, and they lack spiritual life just as Sadducees and Pharisees did in the 1^st-Century. Whereas popular prophecy pundits look for the man of perdition to be a natural Jew who has converted to another faith, in reality the man of perdition will be a Catholic Christian (a Trinitarian) who has converted to Arianism (Unitarianism) in perhaps its most popular modern form. It will take a while for the man of perdition to sincerely believe that the angel inside him is Christ Jesus—the man of perdition does not know today that he will do those things that are prophesied about him. He is not yet a self-aware text, which is why he will remain unnamed even though his identity is known. He can though he won’t repent of those thoughts that will develop into his revealing on or about Christmas of the year of the Second Passover.

A disciple has to question what book prophecy pundits are reading that has them expecting a physical temple to be constructed in earthly Jerusalem before Christ Jesus returns … in his anticipatory style, Paul tells disciples that they are the temple of God; in the Tribulation and Endurance, they are the restored temple built on the foundation that Paul laid. And when glorified at Jesus’ return, they will be New Jerusalem; hence, when disciples are born of spirit they are Jerusalem, with those disciples who wash out being the refuse of the city that is burned in the Valley of Hinnom (gehenna).

For those disciples who have been truly born of spirit, understanding biblical prophecy is not difficult … the difficult part is accepting that what the disciple believes is actually true when the vast majority of Christendom preaches and teaches a different gospel and different prophetic understandings. The disciple must, by faith, believe what Christ Jesus says. And if this were really easy, then faith would not be a thing pleasing to God.

Americans are going to get forced upon them healthcare by committee if the citizens of the nation do not rally behind strict constitutionalists, with the future man of perdition being among the leaders attempting to prevent the bankrupting of the nation. Again, this individual is as visible today as the two witnesses are invisible, and that is as it should be until the Second Passover liberation of Israel. Then the two witnesses will go head to head with the man of perdition and the false prophet, the first horseman of the Apocalypse.

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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."

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