Category: prophecy

Posted in a new creation in christ, end time, prophecy

The futility of New Year’s resolutions, the surety of Christ

Posted on by elizabethprata

I vacationed frequently at the beach in Venice, Florida. The Gulf coast is so peaceful the water so blue, I found it incredibly relaxing. One day, I watched a couple of kids make a huge sand castle. They spent most of the day on it. It was not architecturally sophisticated. They simply dragged up pail after pail of sand, made it about as tall as themselves, and spent a while looking for the perfect stones and shells to adorn it.  A stick on top and a scrap of seaweed made the flag. And what castle is complete without a moat? The kids wanted to be sure no enemy could raid their fortress, so they made three moats.

“Everyone who hears these words of Mine and does not act on them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand.” (Mt 7:26).

non-believers’ foundation is sand

Then the tide came in. Their day’s work was washed away. The kids tried unsuccessfully to restore, prop up, and protect their creation but it didn’t work. The inevitable happened. “…the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” (Mt 7:276).

Another place I used to vacation is Jasper Beach Maine. It is a wild beach in far eastern Maine, and one of only two beaches in the world to have stones for its base and not sand. The stones have been rounded by wave action and high tides rolling them around, and they make a nice clacking sound akin to pool balls when you walk over them. The beach is never eroded because the rocks seem so stable. But walking on them is hard, they roll, they move, and in the end, putting a chaise lounge atop them to lay on is almost impossible because the rocks move so much. Even that seemingly solid foundation crumbles in the end.

lukewarm believers’ foundation is on shifting stones

If you haven’t realized the allusions yet, it is to say that founding your life on anything other than the Gospel of Jesus Christ means you will topple. You may not topple until you die, or you may topple during the storms of your life, but you will topple. Apart from Him you can do nothing. (John 15:5).

believers’ foundation is the Rock, and He is the light!

“Therefore everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts on them, may be compared to a wise man who built his house on the rock. “And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and slammed against that house; and yet it did not fall, for it had been founded on the rock.” (Mt 7:24-25). Make 2011 the year you found your life upon the Rock! Be in His light! “While you have the Light, believe in the Light, so that you may become sons of Light.”(John 12:316a).

Many people take the New Year to make resolutions, that is, make self-improvement promises to one’s self. ‘I will lose weight,’ ‘I will stop smoking’, ‘I will spend more time with family’, ‘I will work harder…’ are typical promises. Research shows that most New Year’s resolutions fail in a week. Self-improvement is impossible without Jesus but “in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.” (2 Cor 5:17). Let HIM re-create you! You will not fail. You will “conform no longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” (Rom 12:2). He will “strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way.” (Isaiah 35:3). “Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Phil 1:6). Your resolution will not fail within a week if you allow Jesus to recreate you!

If you make ONE resolution this year, it is that you will follow Jesus as your Savior. Resolve to put aside the sinful man and allow Him to re-create you in His image. And yes, I am talking to people who think that are already followers as well as non-believers. Take stock, be sure of your salvation, resolve to allow Him to strengthen you. And your New Year will become a New Eternity.

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Posted in apollo, end time, genesis, prophecy

Apollo 11’s communion on the moon, and Madelyn Murray O’Hair

Posted on by elizabethprata

Apollo 8 (1968) was the first human spaceflight to leave Earth orbit; the first to be captured by and escape from the gravitational field of another celestial body; and the first crewed voyage to return to planet Earth from another celestial body—Earth’s Moon. The three-man American crew of mission Commander Frank Borman, Command Module Pilot James Lovell, and Lunar Module Pilot William Anders became the first humans to directly see the far side of the Moon, as well as the first humans to see planet Earth from beyond low Earth orbit. (Wikipedia). It must have made quite an impression on the three astronauts to see our globe hung in space as a tiny dot, and to ponder the mysteries of the heavens. On Christmas Eve, Frank Borman sent a message to the people on earth. Please take a moment to watch this moving, 2-minute clip:

A few years prior to the momentous and quite spiritual event taking place above the moon at earth-rise, Madelyn Murray O’Hair lodged a lawsuit at the Supreme Court in 1960 that was decided  in 1962. O’Hair was a well-known atheist, communist, free-thinker and sexual libertine. O’Hair’s suit contended that prayer must be removed from public schools. Actually, there were one or two suits being decided prior to O’Hair’s but her suit was in fact folded into a seminal judgment banning bible readings from public schools, closely on the heels of the ban on prayer in schools rendered a few months prior.  She took credit for the “victory”, anyway. So thanks to her, on June 25, 1962, “39 million students were forbidden to do what they and their predecessors had been doing since the founding of our nation – publicly calling upon the name of the Lord at the beginning of each school day.” When Borman read the passage from Genesis in 1968, O’Hair again lodged a lawsuit, this time against NASA. O’Hair wanted the courts to ban US astronauts, who were all Government employees, from public prayer in outer space.

A few months later, on July 20, 1969, Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon and he held a ceremony: the ceremony of communion. Please take a moment to watch the following 2-minute clip, from Tom Hanks’ Emmy award winning HBO series “From the Earth to the Moon” that accurately depicts the moment:

O’Hair’s Genesis-reading case was eventually rejected by the US Supreme Court for lack of jurisdiction. However, what comes to mind here was the tragedy of those few intervening months. Between the reading of Genesis on Christmas eve 1968 and 7 months later when Aldrin took communion on the moon, Christianity went from boldly declaring God as the Creator of all the Universe, to a timid and secretive religious homage to that same Creator, with an added lukewarm thank you to whomever. After he clicked off the radio, Aldrin read: “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15:5). How fitting! But how sad it was only heard by Armstrong and Aldrin. Aldrin’s choice of verse acknowledged the Creator of the planet upon which they were sitting as the One who is the Source of all endeavors. Yet O’Hair’s impact was such that this declaration of truth was muzzled and silenced.

O’Hair’s legacy was such that for a while she was called the most hated woman in America. Apparently, not only in America. She and her two children traveled via ship to Europe with the intention of defecting to the Soviet embassy in Paris and residing in the Soviet Union. The Soviets denied them entry. She founded American Atheists, promoted sexual liberation for children, and campaigned against God all her life. She even called her own son a “postnatal abortion.”

Sadly, she was abducted and killed, dismembered and her head chopped off. Her remains were not discovered for many years. Her son said that O’Hair was an evil person. “My mother was an evil person… Not for removing prayer from America’s schools… No, she was just evil. She stole huge amounts of money. She misused the trust of people. She cheated children out of their parents’ inheritance. She cheated on her taxes and even stole from her own organizations. She once printed up phony stock certificates on her own printing press to try to take over another atheist publishing company….Regardless of how evil and lawless my mother was she did not deserve to die in the manner she did.”

Her son is a Christian, baptised, and a Baptist preacher. I can’t imagine his pain, and his certain knowledge that his mother has much to answer for and will reside forever in torment in hell, apart from Jesus.

But if this one woman wreaked such havoc on America so as to remove prayer from before 40 million school children, from stopping the globe’s premier space agency from broadcasting one bible verse, and getting her message out on television, cable, and radio to millions over the course of decades, what can one Christian do? Much! If we each remain strong in faith, always acknowledging Him for all that we are and all that we accomplish as Borman and Aldrin did, then nothing is impossible. If such evil can accomplish so much, what can Good do? Pray and ask Him how you might be used today. And be ready for His answer!

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Posted in end time, moon, prophecy, signs in the sun, stars

Signs in the heavens: Saturn’s huge storm

Posted on by elizabethprata

If you got a telescope for Christmas, you are in luck. The two largest planets in our solar system are now putting on an exciting show for observers. Jupiter’s Equatorial Belt, which disappeared last year, is back. And Saturn is having a massive storm of its own, as the Cassini fly-by revealed. Veteran planet-watcher Thomas Dobbins notes the last time such a large storm appeared on Saturn was 1994.

From Wired Science: “The storm has a huge central funnel and a long tail that sweeps around Saturn’s northern hemisphere for tens of thousands of miles. A shot in blue light (left) reveals the extent of the tail, but infrared light (right) shows detail of the storm’s amorphous core.” 

The storm is 12 times bigger than the east coast blizzard. It appears regularly, except when it doesn’t appear regularly, lol. “The Great White Spot is the lesser known, Saturnian equivalent of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot. It’s the name given to periodic storms that flare up about every 28.5 years, previously showing up in 1876, 1903, 1933, 1960, and 1990. As such, we shouldn’t be expecting another appearance until around 2018, although huge, Spot-like storms do occasionally show up at times that don’t fit the cycle, including 1994 and 2006.”

As for Jupiter, the brown stripe across its southern hemisphere that disappeared suddenly in May 2010 (“NASA: Big mystery- Jupiter loses its stripe“) just as mysteriously, has reappeared. “After fading out earlier this year, a large brown stripe on Jupiter is returning, according to astronomers. The stripe, known officially as the Southern Equatorial Belt had blended with the white clouds surrounding it. Now an amateur astronomer has said the belt is undergoing an outbreak and will soon return to its previous appearance. Experts say that the disappearance of the belt was the result of layers of clouds over Jupiter changing altitudes and that the brown strip had been covered up earlier in the year by the white-coloured ammonia clouds surrounding it. The brown stripe has occasionally vanished several times since it has been under observation, but scientists have yet to pinpoint exactly why it continues persist.”

In other recent science news, an extinct comet is coming back to life, the red in Jupiter’s Great Red Spot not what astronomers thought, scientists discovered they were wrong about neanderthals, the solar minimum lasted so long scientists had a hard time explaining, and oh yes, delaying sex makes for better relationships. Man – 0. God – ∞.

There were many other interesting science news articles this year that do illustrate man’s capabilities in finding, learning, and explaining the world and outer space. But there were just as many that illustrated that what man had previously thought was being shaken to its core, and that in reality, there is much to learn. Our body of knowledge, though increasing, is flawed. God is not. His Word is perfect and contains much knowledge for how to live, economics, science, matters of government, and inter-relationships. Jesus said that in advance of His coming, “There will be signs in the sun, moon and stars. On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea.” (Luke 21:25). He gives us our brains, and curiosity and the tools to discover Him in space, but when we lift up our brains and the tools above Him and worship them instead, He shows us just how infinite He is, and how in control.

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Posted in currency, end time, mark of the beast, prophecy, wireless transistors

Mark of the Beast rising: Currency to have wirelesss tracking transistors

Posted on by elizabethprata

“It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name.” (Rev 13:16-17). Those verses speak of the False Prophet. He institutes a system that tracks all people. It’s put on or in everyone’s hand or forehead. It is not necessarily currency itself, but it IS a mark of worship to and allegiance with the Antichrist. Its purpose is to identify those who worship the antichrist. The “benefit” to having the mark is that you will not be killed, and that you can participate in the global economy. Verse 18 is the famous 666 reference. Of course, anyone who takes the mark won’t be killed by the antichrist but their souls are forever damned and they will spend an eternity in hell. (Rev 14:9-10)

Ever since those scriptures were written man must have wondered about the mechanics of how one person could cause all the world’s population to have a mark on them. Can’t you just quietly refuse? Who would know? How are they going to track you down? Can’t you just go somewhere else? Until Social Security numbers came along the 1930s, anyone could simply change identities by moving and making up a new name.

Even more puzzling to previous generations, must have been concerning the technology. How would a mark on one’s hand allow the government to track all your purchases? How can it be? Our Sunday School teacher is 90 years old. When he was growing up, this county didn’t even have electricity until he was 21.

But Daniel 12:4’s prophecy “But as for you, Daniel, conceal these words and seal up the book until the end of time; many will go back and forth, and knowledge will increase” comes in to play here. This generation has seen such an explosion of knowledge and technology it staggers the mind. Within one lifetime, an elderly gentleman can recall the day they strung electricity on wires in front of his house, remember men walking on the moon, communicate with grandchildren on the other side of the world in an instant to…the following:

New Scientist magazine has an article from a few days ago describing a new technology: “Banknotes go electric to outwit counterfeiters“
“Modern banknotes contain up to 50 anti-counterfeiting features, but adding electronic circuits programmed to confirm the note’s authenticity is perhaps the ultimate deterrent, and would also help to simplify banknote tracking. …A team of German and Japanese researchers created arrays of thin-film transistors (TFTs) by carefully depositing gold, aluminium oxide and organic molecules directly onto the notes through a patterned mask, building up the TFTs layer by layer. All this is done “without aggressive chemicals or high temperatures, both of which might have damaged the surface of the banknotes”, says team member Ute Zschieschang from the Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research in Stuttgart, Germany. The result is an undamaged banknote containing around 100 organic TFTs, each of which is less than 250 nanometres thick and can be operated with voltages of just 3V. Such small voltages could be transmitted wirelessly by an external reader, such as the kind that communicates with the RFID tags found on many products.. The team’s technique has been tested on US dollars, Swiss francs, Japanese yen and Euro notes. Although the researchers have yet to work out how the organic electronics could be harnessed as an anti-counterfeit measure, the circuits are able to perform simple computing operations.”

RFID is radio frequency identification. So currency will soon have micro-layers of tiny circuits that can track. I do not know what the mark of the beast will be like, whether it will be a tracking device or whether it will be the currency itself. But the technology for advances in currency development combining with tracking are here. Not in the future. HERE. Just in case you are not spooked to your prophetic core yet, here is another article today:

Ceiling lights in Minn. send coded Internet data
“Flickering ceiling lights are usually a nuisance, but in city offices in St. Cloud, they will actually be a pathway to the Internet. The lights will transmit data to specially equipped computers on desks below by flickering faster than the eye can see. Ultimately, the technique could ease wireless congestion by opening up new expressways for short-range communications.”

Inside one generation we went from porcelain covered insulators,

to this:

There is no doubt that we are the generation spoken of in Daniel in which people go to and fro and knowledge has increased. There is no doubt that the scaffolding is being erected that will allow the infrastructure of the building of the one world economy. If we see scaffolding being erected, then the rapture must be even closer.

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Posted in end time, florida, ocna mures romania, prophecy

Sinkhole in FL opens to 100 feet wide within minutes

Posted on by elizabethprata

From Highland Today, Interim Emergency Operations Management Director said ‘this was the biggest one he’d seen’. I’ve written about the phenomenon of sinkholes several times before. Here is an essay from Nov. of this year with scriptures plus some context reporting on additional sinkholes titled “Experts worried about increase in sinkholes“. In that piece, it was reported that ‘Citizens Property Insurance Corp., the state’s second largest multi-peril home insurer, told a state Senate committee during a hearing on the sinkhole issue that the number of claims being made to the company has more than doubled since 2005.” Premiums are up 30%. Last June I wrote an essay called “Is the Earth Cracking Up?” which explains further my thinking on the biblical implications of sinkholes’ increasing appearance. By the way, another sinkhole opened in Ocna Mures Romania on December 23, where the town is in a state of emergency.  Below is a story excerpt with photos from this latest sinkhole in Florida:

“About 3:30 p.m. Thursday, Luis Hernandez felt the soil trembling beneath his feet. “He had to run that way,” said his wife, Orpha, pointing to the east behind their three-bedroom mobile home. He heard air coming up, “Whooo, whooo, whooo,” Orpha approximated the noise, as if underground air was rushing to the surface. Luis knows because he looked at the clock on his phone – in just five minutes, a 100-foot wide sinkhole opened in the sand, gulping pots with palm trees and ligustrum hedges and catley guava. By Friday, they’d rescued all the nursery plants from the one-acre plot, moving them to the adjoining nine acres. But the hole had swelled 20 feet wider, and at 4 p.m. Friday, the circular mouth was an estimated 140 feet across. “This morning, there was just a little water in it,” she said. But by late afternoon, water was three feet deep and rising in the center of the hole.”

Within five minutes, the hole was 100 feet wide, said Hernandez. The owners had to run to escape:

By Friday afternoon, several feet of water had accumulated in the bottom of the sinkhole. The couple owns Florahome Nursery, and they had plants on the area of the property when it caved in:

A wall of sand and soil shows the division of one of several tiers of ground where a sinkhole opened up, which had increased to 140 feet wide by Friday afternoon:

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Posted in atheists, end time, prophecy

Apollo 8 Christmas Eve message to the world

Posted on by elizabethprata

1968: The crew of Apollo 8 delivers a live, televised Christmas Eve broadcast after becoming the first humans to orbit another space body.

http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1

That is so beautiful!

Forty years later:

source

Lord, come soon! He is so worthy, the undivided Trinity remains forever, may His name be exalted.
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Posted in earthquakes in diverse places, end time, prophecy

Guy Arkansas residents sick of three-month quake swarm

Posted on by elizabethprata

On October 15, 2010 I posted a story about an incredible earthquake swarm in Arkansas that had begun in late September. It was a 4.0 quake that caused the story to become of national interest. One news excerpt I posted reported: “Faulkner County residents had a shaky start to their Monday morning as a 4.0-magnitude earthquake rattled throughout the county. The quake, which occurred at 8:33 a.m. and was centered two miles southeast of Guy, was just one of 48 earthquakes reported since Wednesday afternoon. According to Shelia Maxwell with the Faulkner County Office of Emergency Management, the U.S. Geological Survey is looking into the recent earthquake activity in the area. “We’re having them (earthquakes) in places we’ve never had them before,” Maxwell said. “The USGS is looking into why we’re having them and why there have been so many.”

Jesus said that there would be earthquakes in diverse places. To me that means places that do not usually experience earthquakes will have them, and at not only the surface location but the depth. Deep-focus quakes are quakes aren’t supposed to happen, but they do, occurring in the very deepest parts of the earth. Last July, a series of quakes occurred in the Philippines which were 400+ feet deep that scientifically were not supposed to be able to occur. Deep-focus quakes are rare, just as rare as ongoing quake swarms in Arkansas. At one point during the Arkansas swarm, Oklahoma radio jockeys even joked that though they had experienced one strong quake (for them) at a 4.8 magnitude on the Richter scale, they felt left out because neighboring Arkansas was getting all the attention. So, earthquakes in diverse places.

Since last September, the Arkansas tremors have never stopped. The earthquakes have continually shaken, and shaken, and shaken the ground and have never ceased rattling nerves for a second. CNN reports today, “Central Arkansas growing weary of relentless tremors.”

“More than 500 measurable earthquakes have been reported in central Arkansas since September 20, ranging in magnitude from a barely noticeable 1.8 to a very noticeable 4.0 (recorded on October 11), according to the U.S. Geological Survey.Geologists can’t say whether they’ll stop anytime soon. … Meanwhile, Sam Higdon, the mayor of Guy, says the quakes’ novelty is worn out. “I think everyone just kind of figures maybe it’ll just go away,” he said. “And that’s what we’re all hoping.”

The New Madrid Seismic Zone is in the northeast corner of Arkansas and was home to one of the most devastating earthquakes to occur in the continental US, back in 1811-12. Faulkner County’s town of Guy Arkansas is 200 miles away from the New Madrid seismic zone, though the area is historically seismically active in a minimal way. In reviewing the Arkansas Geological Survey spreadsheet on Arkansas seismicity for 2009, Arkansas statewide had 39 measurable earthquakes last year. Eight were in Faulkner county. This year, over 500 occurred in central Arkansas alone.

The disciples asked Jesus when He will come back. “And Jesus answered and said to them, “See to it that no one misleads you. “For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will mislead many. “You will be hearing of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not frightened, for those things must take place, but that is not yet the end. “For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and in various places there will be famines and earthquakes. But all these things are merely the beginning of birth pangs.” (Mt 24:4-8) “But when these things begin to take place, straighten up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (Luke 21:28).

The Arkansas ongoing quake swarm is another warning to the lost and dying world that He is about to return, in wrath and judgment. But for the believers who are saved and eternal, we know that His sooner arrival for us in the air is even closer. No one needs to perish, all can come to the glory of God even though we fall short. How? By recognizing our sins, that we do sin and each and every sin is an affront to God and creates an incredible rift between us humans and Him Who made us to have a relationship with. Is it a coincidence that just at the time Jesus said there would be famine and wars and earthquakes and signs from heaven that we are experiencing more famine and wars and earthquakes and signs from heaven than ever before? That we are experiencing things that science has no clue as to explain? That the world is in perplexity with no rational explanation yet there are historical events and statistical anomalies occurring all over the place? Daily?

Well, it is not a coincidence. One cannot separate our behavior and our rebellion from God’s promises of warning, then judgment. It is happening: the warnings are continuing this long because of His mercy and His love for us, that none should perish. But eventually many will perish because they refused to heed the signs. Don’t let that be you. Ask Him to forgive your sins and accept that He is your Sovereign King whose glory is immeasurable and who is worthy to be served. His grace abounds and I pray that you will see His light and become one of His lights in the world … before it is too late.
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Posted in end time, high priest, melchizedek, prophecy

Jesus as High Priest

Posted on by elizabethprata

There are many aspects to the Lord’s personality, aspects we have been given through His grace to explore for all eternity. We will never learn all there is to learn about Him, because He is infinite, but the glory will be in the journey, drawing ever closer to Him.

The Christmas season rightly focuses attention to Him as savior, the babe born of a virgin and who lived a sinless life, died as the sacrifice to satisfy God’s Holy righteousness and fulfill the sin-debt that must be paid. We usually focus on Him as Savior, friend, father, and occasionally as judge. But there is another aspect to Him that I would like to explore today: Priest.

David refers to the coming Messiah as a priest on the order of Melchizedek. “The LORD has sworn and will not change His mind. You are a priest forever According to the order of Melchizedek.” (Psalm 110:4)

Caption: (Cf. Gen 14:18-20). Here the mysterious figure of Melchizedek (Cf. Heb 7:3), depicted as prophet, priest and king, goes out to meet Abraham after his return from the latter’s defeat of his enemies and offers a sacrifice of bread and wine on his behalf. Melchizedek prefigures the person of Christ who, similarly shrouded in mystery, enjoys the three-fold status of priest, prophet and king and will also offer a similar sacrifice of bread and wine become his Body and Blood for us all.” Source

Who was Melchizedek and why is his Order considered higher than Aaron’s, the first High Priest of the Levites? We read of Melchizedek when he meets with Abraham in Genesis. He is an actual King and an actual Priest, living and walking on the earth in Abraham’s day.

“And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High. He blessed him and said, “Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth; And blessed be God Most High Who has delivered your enemies into your hand.” He gave him a tenth of all.” (Gen 14:18-20). 

The city of Salem was later known as Jerusalem.

In Hebrews 7:3 we read again of Melchizedek, and notice that there is an omission. Usually, especially in the Old Testament, people are introduced to the reader by their genealogy. “So-and-so who was the son of so-and-so and father of…” But it is specifically noted that Melchizedek has no genealogy, so we wonder how anyone who claims Melchizedek is actually Shem, for example, and some Talmudic scholars do, learned of Melchizedek’s lineage. No one knows his geneology, as is stated in the Hebrews verse below.

In any case, the personage of Melchizedek is certainly righteous. Anyway, the story of the meeting with Abraham is repeated in Hebrews, and introduced this way:

‘Melchizedek’s Priesthood Like Christ’s‘
“For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham as he was returning from the slaughter of the kings and blessed him, to whom also Abraham apportioned a tenth part of all the spoils, was first of all, by the translation of his name, king of righteousness, and then also king of Salem, which is king of peace. Without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like the Son of God, he remains a priest perpetually.” (Heb 7:1-3).

Melchizedek is referred to again in Hebrews 5:6-10; Hebrews 6:20; Hebrews 7:1-21: “Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek”; and Hebrews 8:1. From his initial introduction at the meeting with Abraham it was another thousand years until David mentioned him and another thousand again until the writer of Hebrews mentioned him, and then Melchizedek disappears from the biblical record. But the notion of Jesus as Priest does not.

High Priests of the Temple died and their office was given to the son. But Jesus is perpetual and His office of High Priest will never die. High Priests in the temple managed the sacrifices, which were daily. Thousands upon thousands of lambs and other animals were killed, blood ran by the buckets all day every day, but Jesus is the once for all sacrifice. He IS our High Priest, forever.

“Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession;” (Hebrews 3:1-3)

So what does a High Priest do? They were compassionate about sins, being human themselves. They participated in the sacrificial system, managing others’ sacrifices. Yet being human, they also had to sacrifice on behalf of their own sins. They represented humans before God.

In Revelation 1:6 we read that we are made to be Kings and Priests. “and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father–to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.” 

Again, in Rev. 5:9b-10 we read that

“Worthy are You to take the book and to break its seals; for You were slain, and purchased for God with Your blood men from every tribe and tongue and people and nation. “You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth.”

Peter reveals that we as believers are part of a royal priesthood:

“you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. … But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” (1 Pet 2:5,9).

Matthew Henry writes:

“All true believers are a holy priesthood; sacred to God, serviceable to others, endowed with heavenly gifts and graces. But the most spiritual sacrifices of the best in prayer and praise are not acceptable, except through Jesus Christ. Christ is the chief Corner-stone, that unites the whole number of believers into one everlasting temple, and bears the weight of the whole fabric. Elected, or chosen, for a foundation that is everlasting.”

What Grace! What Mercy! He as the Chief Cornerstone as High Priest, elects His priests and unites us in a priesthood to serve Him! We are called privileged and we are. Our duties today and forever are to offer up spiritual sacrifices to Him the Most High. Is this a good gift in your eyes? Better than an X-box or a bike or a diamond bracelet? It is a tremendous gift to be called to a royal priesthood serving the High Priest in heaven. It is a high calling. Are you living a holy life worthy of Him and making spiritual sacrifices so His name is magnified? I am rejoicing! I am singing His praises!

As you ponder the mysteries of His very Being this Christmas season, ponder Him as high Priest representing us before God. What a blessed Gift to be able to serve for Him and with him!

Posted in end time, prophecy

Government sanctioned homosexuality and staggering storms on the west coast. Coincidence? I think not.

Posted on by elizabethprata

Does anyone notice an interesting juxtaposition with Drudge’s latest front page?

When individuals or nations succumb to sin, particularly homosexuality, God warns, then judges. He always has and He always will. We are the formerly blessed nation of America whose light was set up on the hill. As Massachusetts Governor John Winthrop wrote in 1630 aboard the ship Arbella, “For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw His present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world. … But if our hearts shall turn away, so that we will not obey, but shall be seduced, and worship other Gods, our pleasure and profits, and serve them; it is propounded unto us this day, we shall surely perish out of the good land whither we pass over this vast sea to possess it.”

The light upon a hill was a reference to Matthew 5:14-16; “You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hid… Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”

Does it glorify God to formalize and legitimize government-sanctioned homosexuality? No. And so we see just above the photo a series of headlines where unusual rains and staggering storms have arrived in California. And unseen in the photo but contained under it was another headline, “Freak diversion of jet stream paralyzing globe with freezing conditions…” These are not coincidences. They are not. The photo may be worth a thousand words, but the Word of God is the real treasure.

“For this reason we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away from it. For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just penalty; how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard, God also testifying with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.” (Hebrews 2:1-4) Take heed!

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