A Puzzle Comes Together

Thomas Jefferson

"A  studious persual of the sacred volume will make better citizens, better fathers, and better husbands"

When I was young I used to love putting together puzzles.  I admit I wasn’t that good but I did enjoy the challenge.  I would start with piecing together the border then begin working towards the middle.  I found that there are key pieces and when you find them and put them together the puzzle becomes much easier.

I use this same technique in understanding the Scriptures. When it comes to understanding Bible prophecy it is even more important to seek out the key pieces.  Those pieces will come together but it takes plenty of patience and longsuffering.

I started studying Biblical prophecy during my teen years.  Most of what I understood was from what I would hear other preachers expound on the subject.Over the last 10 to 20  years I have started to begin studying Biblical prophecy with a clean slate.  I decided to clean my mind of all previous teachings and then try to go down paths as they presented themselves.

When I was in active ministry I was totally unmoveable.  I had everything in place when it came to doctrine.  I felt I had all of the right answers.  No matter what I heard or read I judged those things through my train of thought.  Everything came through a filtered lens of understanding.

There is nothing like spending hours going over the scripture.  Learning how to really intrepet scripture with scripture.  Most of the time when my understanding was challenged it felt like someone punced in my abdomen.  This would then compell me to study more on the subject.  Also, developing a more mature discernment. The Apostle Paul wrote, ‘when I was a child I thought like a child’.  As you begin to study the scriptures without the filter of bias you begin to mature in your understanding. This happens when you allow yourself to be challenged in your beliefs.

1Co 13:11 KJV When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.

Popular New TestamentCommentary  1 Corinthians 13:11

When I was a child, I spake as a child—prattling; I felt as a child, I thought (or ‘reasoned’) as a child. My thoughts were all a child’s thoughts, my notions of persons and things were childish, and my way of connecting things—as causes and effects, premises and conclusions—was ludicrous.

now that I am become a man, I have put away childish things—wondering ever so spake, felt, and thought.

There was something about prophecy that drew me in.  It was like a great mystery story.  To most it still is a mystery, one that to them was too difficult.  It is a subject that many that stand in the pulpit that is not taught.  So, those sitting in the pews have very little understanding.  Mention the Book of Revelation and many will tell you that they don’t understand what they believe is symbolism.  Then there is a lot of debate of the time line of when events will take place.

When it comes to terms like ‘rapture’, ‘tribulation’, ‘mark of the beast’ and many more.  Depending on who is teaching each one tries to make the other one like they are in error.

During the last couple of months I have been able to put another piece to the puzzle of end-time prophecy. That piece is called Babylon.  When I began to see this puzzle piece in a different perspective other pieces also fell into place.

I now believe we have already entered the period which John the revelator called ‘Tribulation’.  John tells us that this period of time is seven years.  These seven years are divided into two parts.  The tribulation, and the great tribulation.  I will go deeper into this in the next several blog posts.  I will show you this period of time is found in both The Old Testament and The New Testament.

There will be a one world religion, one world government led by one man, and then also a false prophet.  These three are a false trinity.

Through these three they create a one world economy.  The anti-christ(false prophet) will make a decree that everyone receive his’ mark.  The 666.  Without it you will not be able to buy or sell. If you take this mark, we are told in the Book of Revelation that those who receive this mark are lost forever.

The anti-christ will come saying he has all the answers and for the first three and half years there is peace.  This man will make a peace treaty with Israel only to break the agreement near the end of the first three and half years.

The anti-christ will not come from North America, but from a revived Babylon. Some believe that he will come from what we call the European Union, but that is not so. (to be continued)

Babylon Revived

Babylon, The Revived Empire of Revelation

Scripture used is from the Message Bible Translation:

Rev 13:1 MSG  And the Dragon stood on the shore of the sea. I saw a Beast rising from the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads—on each horn a crown, and each head inscribed with a blasphemous name.

Rev 13:2 MSG  The Beast I saw looked like a leopard with bear paws and a lion's mouth. The Dragon turned over its power to it, its throne and great authority.

Rev 13:3 MSG  One of the Beast's heads looked as if it had been struck a deathblow, and then healed. The whole earth was agog, gaping at the Beast.

I truly believe that the revived empire spoken here is Babylon. Scholars have taught for years that it will be the Roman Empire.

In Daniel the beast that the king saw and Daniel was given interpretation was of the empires that would arise and then be thrown down.

The head on that image was the current empire of Babylon. Babylon would be overthrown by the Medes.

So the head did receive a fatal blow but it will be healed.

I know many use figuratively when trying to give meaning to many things in the Bible.

I believe that many things are literal. Therefore, Babylon was a literal place believed to be in what we now call Iraq. It was surrounded by seven mountains or hills. It is also believed that the king of Babylon created one of the wonders of the world which is the floating Gardens. He built them for his queen.

There are still prophecies that have not yet been fulfilled concerning Babylon and I feel these are the ones found in the Book of Revelation written by the Apostle John while imprisoned on the isle of Patmos.

Historical Babylon was the trade hub of the known world. All routes went through Babylon. It was like our modern day stock markets.

It was able to be this hub because of being on a shipping routes also.

Jer 50:9 MSG  Do you see what I'm doing? I'm rallying a host of nations against Babylon. They'll come out of the north, attack and take her. Oh, they know how to fight, these armies. They never come home empty-handed.

Jer 51:1 MSG  There's more. GOD says more: "Watch this: I'm whipping up A death-dealing hurricane against Babylon—'Hurricane Persia'— against all who live in that perverse land.

Jer 51:2 MSG  I'm sending a cleanup crew into Babylon. They'll clean the place out from top to bottom. When they get through there'll be nothing left of her worth taking or talking about. They won't miss a thing. A total and final Doomsday!

Jer 51:3 MSG  Fighters will fight with everything they've got. It's no holds barred. They will spare nothing and no one. It's final and wholesale destruction—the end!

Jer 51:4 MSG  Babylon littered with the wounded, streets piled with corpses.

Jer 51:5 MSG  It turns out that Israel and Judah are not widowed after all. As their God, GOD-of-the-Angel-Armies, I am still alive and well, committed to them even though They filled their land with sin against Israel's most Holy God.

Jer 51:6 MSG  "Get out of Babylon as fast as you can. Run for your lives! Save your necks! Don't linger and lose your lives to my vengeance on her as I pay her back for her sins.

Jer 51:7 MSG  Babylon was a fancy gold chalice held in my hand, Filled with the wine of my anger to make the whole world drunk. The nations drank the wine and they've all gone crazy.

The verses just mentioned describe exactly the same as the Apostle John wrote in the Book of Revelation.

The countries that come down from the north is now Syria. A warning is given for the people of Babylon to flee the city as fast as they can. After the attack Babylon is totally destroyed forever. It will never again be inhabited by man again.

It is from the Revived Babylonian Empire that arises a false religion, false government, and a man who is called by John, an anti-christ.

The historical Babylon was the place that the first false religion came from. The government of Babylon became great and the King became proud. Pride so took over his’ being that he order a statue to be made of his’ likeness and made a decree that everyone will bow down to it.

The revived Babylon will be the same as the one mentioned in the Book of Daniel and Jeremiah, etc.,

The false government will give power to the anti-christ to go and conquer all lands. He will speak to mankind that he will bring peace to the world so that all the world will worship and bow down to him.

The false government will also bring into being a new form of financing. The anti-christ will make a decree that everyone must take a mark of the beast. Without it no one will be able to buy or sell.

All these things will not be just a certain region but rather it will be globally.

The anti-christ will cause all other governments and their leaders to cease existence.

With this one can see that this is the reason why countries like The United States of America and other countries are not mentioned in the Bible.

Global trade once again will flow through the Revived Babylonian Empire.

Man may try to circumvent God’s plan but will fail in their efforts.

So, no matter how a politician can declare a nationalism message and want the country to be an isolationist it will only come to naught as God continues to execute His’ plan.

An Open Rebuke to Evangelical Leaders

Scratching my head, frustrated, and righteous anger.  These are some terms to describe how I am feeling about evangelicals in the United States election 2016.

These are very serious times, times which we have never seen before.  These are matters of which cannot be taken lightly. 

This election  of 2016 must be met with a grave consideration of our thought.  It is not a matter of being loyal to a political party, but a matter of  which way does the citizens of the United States want to go.  Pick the wrong way and it could lead down a road of no return.

I would not be writing this if I was still in active ministry. If I were still standing behind a pulpit the only advice I would give to the parishoners is this, get out and vote, and vote your conscience.

There are two evangelical leaders that I have heard some things with my own ears that disturbs me deeply.  They are Jerry Falwell Jr and Jim Bakker.  I am not a follower of either.  I will admit though my mother did travel to Charlotte, NC to vacation at Bakker’s Heritage USA. She went several times over a period of years and I never travelled there with her.

Concering Jerry Falwell Jr the concern I have is that he would shake Donald Trump’s hand and give him the invitation to speak to his campus students.  The other concern is this, he proposed that every student should carry a gun while on campus. A university that declares is a christian university.  Somehow the terms christian university and guns just do not connect no matter how you parse it.

My concern with Jim Bakker is this, he is proposing that if the Democratic nominee is elected that a ministry like his is in danger and would be pushed off the air.  I disagree, Jim Bakker.  Aligning yourself with Donald Trump, a man who is willing to ban one who culture allowed in the United States.  Donald Trump is the nominee that would actually go and begin stripping the rights of freedom of speech.  He is already barring certain press media from his rallies.

Both are aligning themselves with a person who is openly a racist and a bigot.  Those are just two of his flawed character.  Donald Trump and evangelicals do not mix, like oil and water do not mix.

History teaches us through the scriptures and other sources that every time God’s people have aligned themselves with a earthly government they end up in trouble.  They have been taken captive, treated like second rate citizens.  I deeply feel that this things may be the results of the evangelicals aligning themselves with a Donald Trump administration.

I don’t understand the reasoning why evangelicals in North America are seeking protection from an earthly government, when really the only protection they need is from the God that they profess to believe in and trust in.

I believe when evangelicals put their trust in man instead of God it ties God’s hands putting a hinderance in God’s ability to sustain them.

This post has been very difficult for me to write.  I thought and prayed for several days before sitting down to write it.  When I write any post I truly give much meditation and time in searching for the words and the thoughts that I want to convey.

So, I strongly implore the reader of this post to take it to heart and seek God’s wisdom about how you will vote in November 2016.  I would also stress to take to heart what is being expounded from the pulpit of the congregation you worship with.

These truy are the last days.

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