Posted in fordo, iran, kahlili, nuclear

Iran’s nuclear bomb program complete, says source

Posted on by elizabethprata

I’ve mentioned before that anonymous sources plus news media outlets that are not as solid as I’d like make for two strikes. The news below comes from World Net Daily and Reza Kahlili, who claims that Iran has finished making the Bomb.

Iran’s nuclear bomb program complete
“Iran successfully has built a nuclear bomb with the help of Russia and North Korea and has enough weapons-grade uranium and plutonium for more, according to a source in the Revolutionary Guards intelligence unit. The source, who has access to Iran’s nuclear program, said the Islamic regime is working out of seven nuclear sites, most unknown to the IAEA, and that its nuclear bomb program is complete.”

But that news above is supported by other news from 6 weeks ago in various news outlets that Iran was close to finishing a bomb. Here is one of those news articles:

From 6 weeks ago, the UK Daily Mail reported: Is Iran working on a nuclear bomb?
–Leaked graph shows computer testing for weapon three times as powerful as Hiroshima blast
–A leaked diagram suggests that Iranian scientists have run computer simulations for a weapon
–Meanwhile, satellite images from North Korea suggest that the nation could be about to test long range ballistic missiles
“Scientists in Iran could be producing a nuclear weapon three times as powerful as that which destroyed Hiroshima during the Second World War, according to a leaked diagram. The diagram, which suggests that experts have run computer simulations for the weapon, was released by an unnamed country which is opposed to Iran’s atomic programme and wishes to boost its view that it should be brought to a halt before a weapon can be produced.”

News of which is further buttressed by this from YNet in Israel from a few weeks earlier than that, in November:

Iran confirms completing centrifuges installation in Fordo
“Iran admitted to completing the installation of centrifuges in the underground Fordo nuclear site. Following a Wednesday cabinet meeting in Tehran, the Head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Agency Fereydoun Abbasi said the Iranians were perfecting their nuclear abilities as planned, Iranian media reported. Western diplomats reported last week that Tehran appears to have nearly finished installing centrifuges in Fordo, a move that brings the Islamic Republic closer to building a nuclear bomb, though according to reports, the new centrifuges have yet to be activated.”

Whether the centrifuges have been started or not is a matter of speculation. Confirmable reports from Iran are hard to get.

Iran is intent on getting the bomb. They are intent because they want to wipe Israel from the map. They want to wipe Israel because this will prove to the Final Imam that they are serious about fulfilling their religious duty to cause chaos and wipe out Islam’s enemies. This would be their gift to Imam and entice his return. They will not stop making the bomb and they will not hesitate to use it. They are unswervingly dedicated to this cause.

Some have suggested that Zechariah 14:12 illustrates what happens to the body when the person is standing at ground zero. The death toll described in the Ezekiel 38-39 war indicates weapons of mass destruction may be the cause of the huge numbers of dead, possibly nuclear weapons. The resulting burial and cleansing regime described in 39:14-17 also indicates what happens after nuclear wars.

We will see.

Posted in israel, palestinian, state of palestine

"State of Palestine"- Palestinians change their name

Posted on by elizabethprata

You might have heard the old adage, death by a thousand paper cuts.” It evokes the image of the fact that death can come not only by a dreadful stab with a large knife, but also by loss of blood over a thousand smaller cuts over time.

Wikipedia explains the origin of that phrase— Slow slicing (Lingchi), also translated as the slow process, the lingering death, or death by a thousand cuts was a form of torture and execution used in China from roughly AD 900 until its abolition in 1905. In this form of execution, the condemned person was killed by using a knife to methodically remove portions of the body over an extended period of time.” In business terms it means a failure that occurs as a result of many smaller problems.

Today I read in an AP report that the Palestinian Authority changed their name to “The State of Palestine“.

“RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — The Palestinian president has ordered his government to officially change the name of the Palestinian Authority to “State of Palestine.” The move follows the November decision by the United Nations to upgrade the Palestinians’ status to that of a “non-member observer state.” President Mahmoud Abbas said Sunday that all official Palestinian stamps, stationery and documents will now bear the new name. A statement from his office said the move was aimed at enhancing Palestinian “sovereignty on the ground” and was a step on the way to “real independence.” Israel still controls most of the West Bank. Israel objected to the Palestinian statehood bid at the U.N., calling it a unilateral step aimed at bypassing direct peace negotiations. Abbas denied that. Israel had no comment Sunday.”

In winning a culture war, a slow build is often the most effective tool. In looking at the homosexual agenda, at first they protested violently (1960s). But following the social protest strategies of the era, they turned social issues into political issues. That was a first step: take over the debate and steer it in a direction they choose. Next, although homosexual behavior is as old as history itself, there had not previously been a social identity based entirely on sexual behavior. Rather than it being just an issue, it became about a group of people. Once it was about a group of people, then that group could lobby for rights in the political arena, and represent themselves through the reflective lens of media and film. Then they began to rewrite history to show that ancient Greece had a gay culture…and once they had embedded themselves in history it lent credibility to their cause.

The relentless redefining of their issue into a beleaguered people group with lost rights and a solid history, and hammering that message through the media so it is implanted in our brain means that over time the paper cuts have bled us out. Gay rights had a big win in the last election politically and legislatively. Culturally, for the first time in history polling shows more than half the nation accepts gay marriage.

I said all that to show the strategy of how you win the culture war. Perhaps while you were reading it you were thinking of the success of the “Palestinians.” They took over and then controlled the debate, they named themselves as a people group agitating for their lost rights, they redefined the past to give themselves a history, and hammered us with images and entreaties through a compliant media. In the end political, legislative, cultural, and military advantage is gained.

Where once four decades ago the thought of an existing state of Palestine with a history and standing in the UN was unthinkable. Now it exists.

Death by a thousand paper cuts.

Fortunately the remedy is the Savior, who is also the Judge. Seeing history through HIS lens is truth and nothing but the truth. He is going to heal the cuts to His land and His people and He will pour lemon juice on the Palestinians. Obadiah, Ezekiel, Psalm 83, Zechariah, and Isaiah 17 and 19 show us that they can try to nuke Israel out of existence, and they can incrementally swipe at Israel with a thousand paper cuts, but in the end the most blood that will be shed are all those who come against the apple of His eye.

“For thus said the LORD of hosts, after his glory sent me to the nations who plundered you, for he who touches you touches the apple of his eye:” (Zechariah 2:8)

“I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12:3)

When that happens,

“Be silent, all flesh, before the Lord, for he has roused himself from his holy dwelling”. (Zechariah 2:13)

Posted in prosperity

Drillers herald new Israeli gas find

Posted on by elizabethprata

This is another, new, gas find. Israel has had around three or four gas and oil finds over these last four years!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Israeli and Norwegian energy companies said they encountered a significant amount of natural gas in an offshore Israeli field. Norwegian energy company AGR said it encountered “significant signs of natural gas” during drilling operations in the Aphrodite-2 exploration well in the offshore Ishai license block. The well encountered a gas layer of 49 feet, the Platts news service reports. Partner energy company Israel Opportunity said it would likely be late February before it can delineate the full extent of the find. The license area is said to contain about 3.7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, reports Platts.”

Source UPI Business

Posted in discernment, false, jesus, passion 2013

Part 3: Discerning a Gnostic conference called "Passion 2013," conclusion

Posted on by elizabethprata

I have been blogging a discernment series on what was taught at the Passion 2013 conference held in Atlanta this January. There was a star studded Christian lineup of speakers and singers at the conference. Unfortunately, that did not guarantee that the Word was handled correctly. Much was taught that was heretical. What was not overtly heretical was implicitly denigrating of preaching, the bible, and church as an organization. I had done an examination of the lead singer for Jesus Culture in part 1, and looked at what Louie Giglio said in part 2. Those links are below. All was balanced against what the bible says.

In this part I’ll present a bare bones synopsis of what Judah Smith said, and then conclude lower down.

Judah Smith talked with the kids at Passion 2013. It is all the rage these days to pooh-pooh doctrine. To mock religion. William Young did it in The Shack, writing,

–the dusty old King James Bible
–church attendance is “religious conditioning”
–“Images of family devotions from his childhood came spilling into his mind, not exactly good memories
–“God’s voice had been reduced to paper, and even that paper had to be moderated and deciphered by the proper authorities and intellect”

The cumulative effect of these subtle denigrations of what Jesus holds dear have an effect. In this piece, Smith is talking about Genesis 1, “Let us make man in our image.” He denigrated traditional Christianity, too. He said–

“For those of you who are not scholars, you are wondering who’s “Us” and who’s “Our”? God, I know this is awkward, but who are you talking to? I suppose you could create an alter-ego, but really, who are you talking to, God? … For those of you who are so scholarly and have been around church forever, you say, [he makes his voice a sing-song nasal so the mocking quality would become evident] “Clearly that is a a reference to the triune Godhead.” For the rest of us that watch NFL games and have a real life, it’s a bit [garbled].”

There are several messages here just in this short snippet, and none have anything to do with proper biblical understanding or preaching. Smith taught 60,000 kids that–

–If you’ve ‘been around church forever’ you’re not a respected elder. You’re outdated deadwood.
–Proper study is not to be desired or you risk being branded a “scholar”. In my day they were called disciples.
–Studying the bible and going to church means you don’t have a ‘real life’.
–It is cool to mock the brethren

He also said,

–Without community our world will not see God
–Trusting leadership is not easy (reminds me of the secular revolutionary mantra from hippie 1960s ‘don’t trust anyone over 30’)
–Going to a local place where people know you is not easy (he rarely says “church”)
–Jesus is building something. He is not just here just to individually save people.

Parents, is that what you want your child learning? That leaders are hard to trust and church isn’t real life? That is what these people are teaching. Before sending your child off to a conference that calls itself Christian, look into the people who are going to be filling your child’s mind. Those who claim Jesus may not be all that sterling of a role model as you would want.

Overall, I took away that what was taught to the young adults at Passion 2013 was that visions are normal and to be expected. If you’re not having visions and hearing God’s voice speaking to you personally, something is wrong with you. Topically addressing the scripture in a skeleton context while filling the rest of the time with personal anecdotes and description of ecstatic experience is a sermon. What we experience in ecstatic mode is to be preferred to diligent study of the word. In other words, the bible is OK, but visions are better. The world’s social ills can be fixed with zeal and money. Plus, fixing the world’s social ills with zeal and money should be the purpose of my life. A real faith includes volume, excitement, drama, and surfing from one high encounter with God to the next.

You might remember I talked about the time when David Platt’s book Radical came out. Christians all over the place got on the bandwagon and decided that their plain-jane faith was unremarkable and they needed an adrenaline shot of daring and a radical change to prove to God that they’re really a Christian who means it. Let’s contrast the fancy lights and high volume indoctrinaton of charismatic faith preached at Passion 2013 with this-

An Unremarkable Faith
By Tommy Clayton, Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Meet Larry, a thirty-six year old Science teacher. Larry married Cathy 12 years ago. They love each other and enjoy raising their two sons. Larry’s life wouldn’t hold out much interest to the average citizen. His Facebook account doesn’t draw many friends and nobody ever leaves a comment on his blog. In fact, most people would summarize Larry’s life with one word—boring. But not Larry. Teaching osmosis to junior high students, playing Uno with his kids, and working in the yard with Cathy is paradise to him. But the real love of his life is Jesus. Larry’s a Christian. He’s been walking with the Lord for more than 20 years.

Larry’s Christian friends all employ the same word to describe their companion—faithful. He’s faithful to his local church where he’s been teaching Sunday School for nearly a decade. He’s never ignored a legitimate financial need within the body of Christ. He gives sacrificially, but secretly. Larry devotes himself to his wife and family, lovingly shepherding them through every season of life with the Scriptures. He’s faithful to his job and fellow colleagues. He’s managed to share Christ with nearly every junior-high teacher at Oakwood Academy. And although they mock Larry behind his back, all the teachers respect him. It won’t shock you to know Larry pays his taxes and never misses an opportunity to serve his community. Larry’s life commends the gospel. He’s faithful, but he’s unremarkable. Or, is he?

If you’re bored with Larry’s Christianity, it’s probably because you’ve been influenced by a very different idea of the Christian life. Larry’s not radical, or wild at heart—not in the sense of taking careless risks, jeopardizing the stability of his family, or pursuing a life of adventure. You could say Larry is quite content with his station in life, a station given him by God. He aspires to live a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. Sound familiar?

There’s a stubborn and influential voice within evangelicalism that seems to despise simple yet unremarkable faithfulness. Pastor Tom Lyon acknowledges that when he writes, “The value of a humble and unassuming life seems to have been eclipsed by this upwardly mobile ‘dare to be a Daniel’ brand of Christianity which elevates ambition above maturity and has seated the stable but unremarkable believer in coach class. Something is wrong here.”[1]

Lyon went on to describe what he called the unremarkable Christian: “His aspirations, his thirst for notoriety, his estimate of greatness have all been changed. His horizon has come closer to home. He finds in the Bible no call to be outstanding. He is not without ambition, but his dreams have nothing to do with rising above his fellows. Unless pressed, he prefers anonymity to attention. He is steady. Steadied by grace. And one of the most amazing things about grace is how it works this even disposition.”

That’s not an endorsement for ministerial mediocrity or a call to settle for small, lifeless pursuits. On the contrary, it’s is a plea for excellence—but excellence according to Scripture. A humble, Spirit-filled pursuit of greatness should characterize every Christian’s efforts in ministry, but remember that greatness in God’s kingdom is unappealing to the world, unremarkable. How does the world view your life? John MacArthur writes:

“Christians are to be known for their quiet demeanor, not for making disturbances. Unbelievers should see us as quiet, loyal, diligent, virtuous people…To promote a tranquil and quiet life, believers must pursue godliness and dignity…Godliness can refer to a proper attitude; dignity to proper behavior. Thus believers are to be marked by a commitment to morality; holy motives must result in holy behavior. Both contribute to the tranquility and quietness of our lives.”[2]

Here’s a thought to ponder as you go your way. Had you befriended Larry, how might you react to his faithful, yet unremarkable life? Would you advise him to venture out further, take a radical risk for the kingdom and leave behind the quiet, mundane confinements of his Norman Rockwell life? Or would you commend Larry for how he’s living, giving God glory for such a faithful yet unremarkable Christian? Remember, the handful of so-called radical, risk-taking Christians stand on the backs of men like Larry. They are only able to take their risks because the Larry’s of this world won’t, and Larry wouldn’t have it any other way.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Who wants a boring faith like that when you can have a vision and tell it to adoring crowds and dance in the footlights? Who wants to study the word, attend church, and serve when you can stamp out sex trafficking in your lifetime or reach an entire generation to bring fame to Jesus? Which brand of Christianity do you want your child to embrace? The vision casting kundalini-dancing, tromping the world kind of faith that eschews doctrine as dry and church as old hat? Or the faithful, dignified, pure, quiet kind of faith that Jesus brought us- and died for?

Don’t hesitate in your answer, because just as the debt clock swings inexorably upward every second, so does  the count of another youth lost to satan. Every second that goes by where that good kind of faith is not taught- or corrected- is a second where the tentacles of hyper-Charismatic ecstasy and cultural ambition will remain in your child like a poison. And just like the kids in secular world were taught in 1960- don’t trust anyone over 30, the Christian youth of today are being taught, don’t trust any pastor over 30. These youth of today will be the pastors of tomorrow. Uncorrected, this trend will doom our faith to a dwindled few, unless we pray battle prayer, and contend for these kids, bringing them back to a knowledge of what TRUE passion for Christ really is.

““““““““““
Part 1: Jesus Culture and Kim Walker-Smith
Part 2: Louie Giglio

Posted in discernment, false, glittering generality, louie giglio, passion 2013

Part 2: Discerning a Gnostic conference called "Passion 2013," Louie Giglio

Posted on by elizabethprata

Louie Giglio is a 54 year old pastor of Pastor of Passion City Church in the Atlanta area which he founded in 2008. Prior to that Giglio was a pastor at Andy Stanley’s North Point Church for 13 years, itself an emergent-leaning church with a mystical bent. He is Speaker/Founder of the Passion Movement. The Passion Movement is most publicly seen in the large conferences held at the first of each year and is so named after the year. Passion 2013 just concluded this week in Atlanta, Georgia. The Atlanta paper reported that 60,000 youths attended.

Mr Giglio’s main ministry began in and continues to be aimed at Christian youth- especially college aged students through young adult.

More than 170,000 people from more than 130 countries watched part of the Passion 2013 conference online. His “Laminin” sermon has attracted over 3 million views on Youtube. If you would like another take on the Giglio laminin sermon, I point you to the essay Laminin and the Cross at the science-oriented website Answers in Genesis, where we are specifically cautioned against looking for signs in the world OR in science via Mr Giglio’s laminin doctrine.

This blogger had this to say about the Inadequacies of Evidentialism (i.e. ‘Laminin proof’):

And though I would imagine his ministry has been a blessing to many folks over the years, he is one of those type of speakers who will sensationalize Christian “evidences,” like the laminin molecule, in order to make God appear to be really cool and neat-o. But this misappropriation of Christian evidence has some hidden dangers that will undo your credibility as a messenger for God.

First, it capitulates to the culture, particularly the teen culture who already think being a Christian is “squaresville.” Though there is good intentions with the attempt to show that believing in Jesus doesn’t make a person an “L7,” what happens when smug and surly Devon goes home after one of these Giglio conferences where he opines on the shape of the laminin molecule, does an internet search only to discover that Giglio exaggerated his proof? All that shows is Christians can lie.

Secondly, the illustration merely trivializes the Gospel. Honestly, does the laminin molecule have to look like a cross in order for God to be a perfect creator? How does a cross shaped molecule help God out exactly? How does it make God more real? Isn’t the fact that there is a complex, self-replicating molecule to begin with proof enough for God’s hand in all of life?

I agree.

So the statistics show us that Pastor Giglio is popular and has influence. The facts show that his most famous sermon is a bit off-center and exaggerated, with a wrong emphasis. With such numbers it behooves us to take a look at what he is preaching to these multitudes of youth, many of whom reside in my own state of Georgia.

The Passion 2013 website says “At the heart of it all, Passion exists to see a generation stake their lives on what matters most. For us, that’s the fame of the One who rescues and restores, and the privilege we have to fully leverage our lives by amplifying His name in everything we do.”

This is something I have read frequently that Giglio and the people associated with Giglio say. It is that what they do is for the fame of Jesus. On the surface it looks like bringing fame to Jesus is a good thing. But words matter. I say again, words matter. Jesus doesn’t need fame. He had fame. (Luke 4:14). Fame is fleeting and fame is fickle. We do not need to bring Him fame.What we bring Jesus is glory.

Puritan Thomas Watson wrote in his sermon, “Man’s Chief End is to Glorify God“,

The glorifying of God, 1 Pet. 4:11. “That God in all things may be glorified.” The glory of God is a silver thread which must run through all our actions. l Cor. 10:31. “Whether therefore ye eat or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.” Everything works to some end in things natural and artificial; now, man being a rational creature, must propose some end to himself, and that should be, that he may lift up God in the world. He had better lose his life than the end of his living. The great truth asserted is that the end of every man’s living should be to glorify God. Glorifying God has respect to all the persons in the Trinity; it respects God the Father who gave us life; God the Son, who lost his life for us; and God the Holy Ghost, who produces a new life in us; we must bring glory to the whole Trinity.

Jesus does not need us to bring Him fame.

To continue, Mr Giglio has gone the way of people who teach, preach and expect to hear divine audible voices directly telling them what to do specifically and in individual circumstances. And not that they can expect this voice just once, but often. At last year’s Passion 2012 conference, Mr Giglio said, “How many of you heard the voice of God speak specifically, clearly, directly, and personally, to you? Can you just put a hand up? I’d like you to share it. Can you put a hand up for a minute?” … “God spoke to me.” Don’t let the voice of the darkness, tell you that you are not worth that God would not speak to you. Don’t let him tell you, you don’t matter. God spoke to you.”

He teaches youth that it is normative to hear God, and worse, the flip side of his teaching is that if you do NOT hear God, there is something wrong with you. Apparently Mr Giglio has full confidence in his ability to detect the Voice. At a conference in GA in March 2012, Mr Giglio was interviewed by his friend Andy Stanley. Mr Giglio said, “The upside to planting a church at 50 years old – You care less about what other people think. You have more confidence in your ability to hear from Jesus.”

The ability to hear His voice- through the scripture and no other place- comes from the Holy Spirit. Not ourselves.

That was a short overview. Now to the Passion 2013 conference.

I was struck by the catch-phrases Mr Giglio used throughout his session one teaching. He kept saying God is “the God who does of immeasurably more” and that phrase was a main tenet of the talk. I hesitate to say it was a sermon.

By definition if you have more of something you have to already have had a quantity to measure against. That’s how you know you got more. But Mr Giglio never defined what he meant by this term. He didn’t define it from scripture or use it in context . (It was from Ephesians 3:20). It was not concrete, it was nebulous. More than what? If I don’t get more, am I doing it wrong?

What you find when you listen to scripture twisters, is that they unhitch a verse, or worse, a partial verse, from its context. They then use these well known phrases in their talks so they can sound godly but deny its power. It is a technique that politicians and propagandists use and it is called the tactic of the Glittering Generality.

“Glittering generalities are emotionally appealing words so closely associated with highly-valued concepts and beliefs that they carry conviction without supporting information or reason. Such highly-valued concepts attract general approval and acclaim. Their appeal is to emotions such as love of country and home, and desire for peace, freedom, glory, and honor. They ask for approval without examination of the reason. They are typically used by politicians and propagandists. … A glittering generality has two qualities- it is vague and it has positive connotations. … [they] are terms with which people all over the world have powerful associations, and they may have trouble disagreeing with them. However, these words are highly abstract and ambiguous, and meaningful differences exist regarding what they actually mean or should mean in the real world.”

George Orwell described such words at length in his essay “Politics and the English Language.” He said these words and phrases, “are strictly meaningless, in the sense that they not only do not point to any discoverable object”. When used by a preacher unhitching the meaning of the scripture from context, it also unhitches it from pointing to the discoverable object, in this case, Jesus. Orwell continued, ” Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different.”

When politicians use glittering generalities they do so to appeal to the widest audience possible without causing an offense to as few people as possible. Emergent/Mystical preachers do the same, and in his session one talk, Mr Giglio and his immeasurably more not only was a hit, the phrase is taking on a life of its own on Twitter.

The key is that without precisely dividing the word as preachers are supposed to do, which would include a specific application of the meaning of this phrase from Ephesians in context, we now have thousands of kids running all around believing God will do immeasurably more in their lives, each having a different definition about what that is. Some might believe is it more finances. Others, more health. Others, to stamp out a social ill, still others may hope to receive immeasurably more visions. Politicians and propagandists have made use of the glittering generality for years but now it seems, they must make room for the Southern preacher. I literally lost count of how many times Giglio said it.

In the same session, Mr Giglio discussed his ministry and the impetus for it. It is that millions of young adults “don’t have a clue as to why they’re on this planet.” Again as with any Gnostic doctrine, the emphasis is always shifted away from Jesus toward the human. I would be happier if he had said he had a burden for young people because “they don’t know Jesus”. But in emphasizing their purposelessness in preparing to solve their problem as to why they are on this planet, scriptures can be done away with in the movement toward works. And make no mistake, works is the mantra of the Passion conferences.

The focus this year as last year is to eradicate the sex trade in the world. The focus these youths had been set toward was not to correctly proclaim the Jesus of the bible but to solve a cultural ill. Three million dollars was called for and the day after the conference closed, over three million dollars was gotten.

Of all the world’s ills, child abuse and the sex trade, especially in children, make me fall down in horror. No one more than me would love to eradicate it. I am not saying that trying to do good is bad.

But the reason Christians are on the earth is to proclaim Jesus. Jesus could have eradicated poverty. He could have stopped slavery. He didn’t He said “the poor will always be among us.” (Matthew 26:11). And apparently Mr Giglio had not read Revelation 18:13, where in the future a healthy slave trade is part of the going economy of the world and is taken down by Jesus Himself. We are not here to solve the world’s problems.

The slavery is a symptom. The root cause is our sin. Do they not believe that when the Restrainer is taken out of the way, and sin is allowed to burst through in all its evil, that when the wars of the Tribulation occur, that the parties will be adhering to the Geneva convention? No, every person on the losing side of every war in the Tribulation will become a slave.

The goal today is to preach Christ crucified so that millions can be saved before the judgment comes.

Continuing, in his talk, Mr Giglio did say that he had directly heard from Jesus and that he had received “confirmation” that the conference was to be about solely the person of Jesus Christ, and that he and his wife “wanted to inspire a generation to cash in little dreams and to make the focus of their life’s goal to make Jesus known in their generation.”

First, any get-together of Christians should solely be about the person of Jesus Christ. One does not need direct revelation from Jesus to tell a person that. I included Mr Giglio’s age up above for a reason. If this was a new preacher or a young preacher perhaps these statements could be forgiven as youthful immaturity. But Mr Giglio is 54 years of age and finished bible college 25 years ago. He should already know that the purpose of conferences is to put Jesus at the center. And as for making Jesus known to a generation…that is in the bible too. All he needs to do is cite the verse. (Mark 16:15). But instead Mr Giglio went on for 20 minutes about his personal vision where he got this information. So it ends up being about Giglio, not Jesus- exactly the opposite of what he said he wanted it to be about.

He had said way back at the beginning to open to Ezekiel 37, but there was a long intervening period of time when he talked about himself. When he did preach the valley of dry bones, he allegorized it, as many emergent/Gnostic preachers do. He talked a lot about our “foolishness” and did not use the word sin. (OK, once.) Beth Moore does that when she preaches our ‘pits’. Joel Osteen fails completely to make mention that we sin, only infrequently alluding to our “mistakes.” See? Words matter. We have three of the nation’s most popular preachers choosing not to use the hard word ‘sin’. So you see the trajectory.

Substituting the doctrinal words for less loaded ones is a common tactic. Making fuzzy the hard words is a favored tactic because the person wants to please and not divide. It is a way to make hard doctrines sound ticklish to itching ears. (2 Timothy 4:3). Below, Giglio is softening the doctrines and making mush out of the rightly divided word. Giglio continued in his talk–

“Many of us came to the door in captivity. We got to the dome but we came in captivity, we didn’t come free and clear. Something has a grip on us. When you trace that back there could be events and circumstances, for sure, but at the end of the day it is because of our foolishness that we forget what God is. And that’s what his people did. They were dragged of into captivity into foreign lands. God intervened. He sent a voice.”

That makes no sense. Then Giglio read from Ezekiel 36:24-27.

“I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules…”

But he stopped short of where God said they shall live in His land. God was speaking of a definite time and place and a promise given to the Israelites. Not the Gentiles. If we are to see the promises given to the Gentiles we turn to the New Testament and it is better preached from there. Many preachers these days allegorize and spiritualize the events in the Old Testament and make incorrect application to the church of today. The verse ends with this, which shows it is not for us but for the Jews–

“You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. And I will deliver you from all your uncleannesses. And I will summon the grain and make it abundant and lay no famine upon you. I will make the fruit of the tree and the increase of the field abundant, that you may never again suffer the disgrace of famine among the nations. 31Then you will remember your evil ways, and your deeds that were not good, and you will loathe yourselves for your iniquities and your abominations. It is not for your sake that I will act, declares the Lord God; let that be known to you. Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel.”

Far be it for a Emergent/Gnostic preacher to say that we are evil and that God is ashamed of us. When was the last time you heard any preacher of stature preach that?

He resumed his talk by saying, “That’s what God does. When God sends a voice, that voice announces that God wants to come, and when God wants to come, God wants to breathe, and when God breathes, He breathes on hard-hearted people, on stone-hearted people, and He takes out of us the hardness and he puts into us beating living life. And that’s the Gospel.”

That is not the Gospel. Anyone there who heard that would not understand one thing about what Giglio said, because it wasn’t scripture. THIS is the Gospel–

“Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” (1 Corinthians 15:1-4).

The Gospel according to Giglio is that ‘I was foolish so God breathed on me’.

Other perplexing phrases from the opening session at Passion 2013 by Louie Giglio:

–Jesus rocks into the moment and the disciples are all in a wad.
–God was breathing into the vision
–That verse was birthed in us
–It all has to do with the voice. I heard a voice intervening into foolishness.
–Worship is when we give God His breath back

None of that makes any sense. God is not the author of confusion. (1 Corinthians 14:33). If the word is being handled rightly, it will always make sense.

In his final prayer, Giglio prayed:

–Do you think your dreams can live? (It is not about my dreams, it is about God’s will)
–God believes in you (remember the Gnostic shifts the emphasis from the work of the Shepherd to the worth of the sheep)
–Can your memories be restored? (what does that have to do with anything?)
–Lord, come and speak (Giglio teaches that audible hearing of God’s voice is the norm. It isn’t)

Other concerning items from Mr Giglio of late outside this year’s Passion 2013 are that last year he invited John Piper and Beth Moore to perform and lead the audience at Passion 2012 in the pagan/Mystical practice Lectio Divina. Lectio Divina is a clear attack on the sufficiency of scripture. It is a pagan Roman Catholic practice and is to be avoided. Church Leaders blog covers this concerning event well, and at the end asks some excellent questions to Mr Giglio.

Mr Giglio has been aligning more with Prosperity Gospel preacher Joel Osteen, preaching at Lakewood in May 2012.

In closing, I have a warning and an encouragement. The warning is that any pastor can drift. Any Christian can drift. As any car driver, boat owner, pilot, or farmer knows, one moment of inattention can cause you to get off course. Unless that course is corrected, you wind up over time far from your intended destination. Christian life is a series of immediate course corrections. We do this by repenting, praying, and constantly reading the bible. Attend a local church so that you can be accountable and so you can hear the word of God rightly preached.

But if that course correction is allowed to fester, like a disease, it grows in you. The disease makes the person sicker and sicker. In Christian life, one unconfessed sin, one time we adhered to a false doctrine, can cause others to immediately come in. Satan wants to capture you into a snare, and false teaching is the way to do it. If Mr Giglio began well, he is not finishing well. He is drifting.

Undiscerning Christians tend to take take snapshots and stop there. If they find that their one time investigative results into a particular preacher or teacher was doctrinally sound, they take a mental snapshot and stay with that assessment forever. But the Christian should be armed with a sounding line. That is the line which sailors of old threw out constantly to see how deep the bottom was. When the depth got too shallow, they sounded the alarm and changed direction. Without throwing out the sounding line, they would run aground and maybe sink. But constant vigilance allowed them to always know how deep they were in it, and whether they were navigating safe waters.

Christians need to be like that. If they ever only threw out the line once they would not have an up-to-date data on how deep or shallow the waters were of someone’s preaching. Mr Giglio needs to take the measure of the shallow waters he is navigating. He needs to get back deeply into the word. The encouraging thing is that he, and any person who follows teachings of his or like his, will be forgiven if they repent. Jesus told the church at Pergamum who were holding to a false teaching to repent (Revelation 2:15-16.) To the church at Thyatyra Jesus told them He gave much time to repent of their false prophesying. (Revelation 2:21). To the church at Ephesus who forsook their first love, He called out to them to repent. (Revelation 2:5). That is how Good Jesus is. But with each church in need of repentance there also came a warning of judgment if they failed to set aside their undoctrinal ways. That is how holy Jesus is.

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Part 1: Jesus Culture and Kim Walker-Smith
Part 3: Conclusion

 

Posted in discernment, false, gnostic, heresy, jesus culture, kim walker smith, passion 2013

Part 1- Discerning a Gnostic conference called "Passion 2013," Jesus Culture and Kim Walker-Smith

Posted on by elizabethprata

A major ‘Christian’ conference at the Georgia Dome was just concluded this week. It was called Passion 2013 and 60,000 youths attended.

Joining founder and leader Louie Giglio at the conference were the band Jesus Culture, Judah Smith, Chris Tomlin, Lecrae, Francis Chan, John Piper and Beth Moore, plus several other speakers and singers.

As with any large “movement”, or sellout venue that says it features Jesus as its centerpiece, we wish to rejoice. Our hearts want revival. We want to see many come to know Jesus to the salvation of their souls. We love to praise Him in large numbers. But being a discerning Berean, I know that the bible says that the end time will be rife with false movements, false Jesuses being proclaimed and that they will not endure sound doctrine and will heap up teachers to themselves who tell them what they want to hear. So where does Passion 2013 stand in terms of doctrinal purity, safe  absorption of its proclamations and general joy in corporate praise?

Sorely lacking.

The alert-meter is off the charts on this one and I am sad to say that from the many hours I’ve invested in listening to what came out of it I have more tears than applause. I will write a series of blog entries addressing some of the major speakers and singers doctrines. I do this so that we can be warned and so that we can begin a rescue operation toward those whom we know who attended or who are influenced by these people. I do this because I love the Jesus of the bible as He has revealed Himself- not as the one experienced by others in visions and signs. I do this because I love my brothers and sisters and do not want to see them stumble over this obstruction satan has put in their way.

Which Jesus was preached at Passion 2013? Let’s find out by looking at what its participants said at the conference and prior in other venues. So who are these people? Let’s begin by looking at a band called “Jesus Culture”

Source Do Not Be Surprised via Twitter/Giglio

In my first essay reacting to what was taught at Passion 2013, I want to take a look at Jesus Culture’s lead singer, Kim Walker-Smith. After that in subsequent entries I’ll look at Louie Giglio and Judah Smith before concluding.

Kim Walker-Smith [Notice her hyphenated name, and read Genesis 2:24] is a part of the Jesus Culture Band. She is part of a home church called Bethel Church in Redding CA. Smith is a worship leader and/or a “worship pastor” at that same church, which teaches heresies. On her church page she is listed as as “a passionate worship leader with an anointing to bring an entire generation into an encounter with God.” I’m impressed. The Apostles didn’t even have such an anointing.

At a conference called ‘Awakening 2011’ Smith shared with the audience a vision she said she had. It was an experience of cuddling with Jesus, and God was nearby too. She said her vision buoyed her and she lives off it, explaining, “I live off of the encounter … until the next one.” Yet the bible says “It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” (Matthew 4:4). This means we don’t live just in the flesh and for the flesh (having adrenaline rushed encounters) but we live by His word.

The problem that comes from living from encounter to encounter is three-fold: first, we live by His word as the bible commands, not by experiences. Second, human nature requires ever bigger rushes. The last one has to be topped. It is the Law of Diminishing returns for an adrenaline junkie. Adrenaline junkies seek encounters or experiences in which a high is produced by epinephrine released by the adrenal gland. It produces a fight-or-flight response (one which Ms Smith admits she felt during each of the encounters she described). The problem is that each ‘high’ has to be succeeded by one with more oomph in order to achieve the same effect. It seems like it would be an upward spiral but it is really a downward one. Third, what happens when the encounters stop? They do and they will. After each high, there is a low. What will sustain her faith then? If you live by the word, it will never pass away. (Matthew 24:35).

Here is a bit of what Mrs Smith said regarding her encounter with Jesus and God:

“This is not a normal thing for me, to have these encounters.” But then later she said “I live off of the encounter … until the next one.” We know from the bible that several righteous men encountered Jesus as He is glorified, but they are few. Few. Isaiah, Ezekiel, Paul, and John were lifted up and saw Him in heaven. Of those four, three were allowed to relate a small bit of what they saw and Paul was commanded not to speak of it at all. Peter saw a transfigured Christ on earth, Paul encountered Jesus on the road to Damascus and Moses encountered God atop Mt Sinai.

In comparing her experience with the ones above from the bible, the two experiences are dramatically different. I’ll summarize what Mrs Walker-Smith has said in her video testimony. Then we will compare her experience to those who experienced God from the bible’s record:

In her vision, she said she saw Jesus and God behind Him. God beckoned for her to come closer. When she did, two questions popped into her mind that she wanted to ask Jesus. One was “How much do you love me, and the other was “What were you thinking when you created me?”

In answering her question as to how much Jesus loved her, Smith said he started stretching out his arms, and it looked like Stretch Armstrong, the superhero cartoon character “whose arms and legs could stretch out like spaghetti noodles. And He’s laughing hysterically.”

A person entering the presence of God and Jesus would become immediately insensate & insensible. But Mrs Smith remained conscious enough in her own flesh to ask Jesus to ‘tell me about me.’ Then she likens him to a cartoon character, and says he laughed hysterically. Hysterical laughter is out-of-control laughter, and Jesus is never out of control.

The bible tells us that if you were one of the FEW men to have seen heaven while still alive that what you see is unlawful to express. (2 Corinthians 12:4). But if directed to tell, the visionary must use many symbols and metaphors to try and get the point across because the scene is so incomprehensible. The writer uses exalted metaphors to convey the inexpressible beauty and holiness of the scene. The writers did not use everyday toys and cartoon characters to convey the scene, in no way is that appropriate. The metaphors themselves that John or Ezekiel used for example were ‘hair white like wool, eyes like a flame, feet like bronze’, (Revelation 1) ‘a brightness all around Him…like a bow in the sky.’ (Ezekiel 1:27-28).

After Daniel’s visions of the Ancient of Days, he became “distressed, alarmed and dismayed.” (Daniel 7:15). That sounds bad enough, but the Hebrew says the word alarmed means active suffering and piercing grief. (Strong’s). Yet in Mrs Smith’s visions she giggled like a schoolgirl and cuddled in Jesus’ arms while God roamed around nearby.

Mrs Smith said that she had wanted to ask Jesus two questions but in that first vision had only asked one. She continued in her sharing of her now second vision in which the unasked question was answered: “What were you thinking when you made me”. She said that a few months later she was watching the sun come up early in the morning. “I like to watch the sun come up, which is a miracle in itself … because I am not a morning person.” Oh wait, I thought she was going to praise the creator.

“Again, I felt the presence of the Lord, and I felt like He wanted me to ask that question. Jesus is like, ‘Please, please ask me that question.’ And again he said, ‘Please, please ask me that question.”

The scene she describes here is of a begging Jesus. It continues:

Smith said she’s now standing with Jesus. In front of her is God the father. Jesus’s got a table, and He reaches into His body and clutches his heart and rips a chunk off His heart and throws it on the table… he fashions her out of a clay or play-dough like substance, puts her into a ballerina music box where she begins dancing, and then Jesus begins shouting “who hooooo” while running around with his arms up, continually going around, “woo hoo!” in circles, running around a bunch of times. Smith said he looked like a jack in the box.

“Then I’m in the palm of the Father’s hand…and I see His heart and the outline of his heart and the outline is the chunk he ripped out and he slides me into His heart like a puzzle piece and it’s a perfect fit. Smith said Jesus told her, “I made you because you make me happy.”

A few days ago, I wrote about the Therapeutic Gospel. I noted how the Gnostic changes the emphasis of the Gospel from the work of Jesus to our own worth. I’d said:

The Therapeutic Gospel does something else that’s devastating. It leads us to believe that it is our worth that motivates God’s action to save us. The thinking is, Jesus came to save us because we are so valuable to God. … A good example comes from comparing two parables.
Pastor Wax compares the subtle shift in a counterfeit Gospel from being Christ-centered to man-centered, by comparing the parable of the sheep as they are presented in Luke and in the false Gospel of Thomas. Here is the Gospel of Luke:

“What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. (Luke 15:4-7)

The other is from the non-canonical, false Gospel of Thomas.

“Jesus said, “The kingdom is like a shepherd who had a hundred sheep. One of them, the largest, went astray. He left the ninety-nine sheep and looked for that one until he found it. When he had gone to such trouble, he said to the sheep, ‘I care for you more than the ninety-nine.'” (FALSE, NON-CANONICAL “Gospel of Thomas”)

What has happened here, said Pr. Wax, is that in the counterfeit Gnostic gospel the point of the parable in the counterfeit is about the worth of the sheep, instead of the work of the Shepherd.

Jesus did not create us because it made Him happy. He made humans so as to bring HIM glory. (Romans 11:36). Do you see the exact Gnostic emphasis that is present in the Gnostic Gospel of Thomas is also in Smith’s vision? It was the worth of Kim Walker-Smith that caused Jesus to make her? And in so doing brought Jesus a measure of happiness he had not had before?

This is not possible. It does not line up with the scriptures and if it does not line up with scripture, it is false.

In looking at the biblical record of people who were lifted to heaven or saw Jesus glorified, we compare their reactions with Kim Walker-Smith’s. For example, Isaiah-

Isaiah said, “And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5)

“Such was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. And when I saw it, I fell on my face, and I heard the voice of one speaking.” (Ezekiel 1:28b)

“When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.” (Revelation 1:17). The Greek word “dead” in that verse means literally ‘one that has breathed his last, lifeless‘.

The point is, when men encounter the Christ in all His glory, you become insensate with fear and dumb in the face of His holiness. Even the ones who encountered Him in human form prior to His appearing (Hagar, Jacob, for ex.) were relieved they did not drop down dead. After Hagar’s encounter with Him, she asked (in the Hebrew), “Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?” Of Jacob, it is written, “So Jacob called the place Peniel, saying, “It is because I saw God face to face, and yet my life was spared.” (Genesis 32:30)

Just seeing His light, never mind His glorified holy body, caused Paul to fall straight to the ground (Acts 9:3). In Exodus 34:30 the people saw the shining visage of Moses of the glory of God reflected on his face and they were so afraid that Moses had to put a veil over it. The bible consistently records that the first and only reaction of these people who had direct and indirect encounters with God were that they were: a. terrified and b. struck dumb as if dead. So what are we to think of Mrs Smith’s encounter where she cuddled, talked about herself and learned that Jesus wasn’t happy before He made her?

It varies completely from all biblical records of anyone who directly or indirectly encountered the holiness of God. Therefore is it only logical to conclude that her visions are false.

We have become so inured to the notion of sin and by contrast His holiness, that we accept a ridiculous story such as Mrs Smith’s as inspiring or uplifting.

The problem with destructive heresies are that many are brought secretly. 2 Peter 2:1 says

“But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction.”

Mrs Smith isn’t saying outright that “I deny the Master.” That is not how false teachers work. Don’t expect the most subtle creature in the garden to cause his minions to outright deny the Master. How she does it is that in her vision description, she is denying the Master by telling us that we can expect encounters like these and that we live off them. She is denying the Master because He is the Word, not the experience– but she exalts the experience and not the Word. The word confirms the word, (2 Timothy 3:16) the experience does not confirm the word. (2 Peter 1:19). If in that verse Peter wouldn’t even use his experience to confirm a truth nor would Paul (2 Corinthians 12:6) then what are we to say of Mrs Smith? Everything she does and says implicitly and explicitly denies the sufficiency of Scripture- and that denies the Master.

Additionally, the heresies she holds in her heart are secret because of 2 Timothy 3:5. Outwardly the Jesus Culture songs appear to have a form of godliness via their lyrics, but they deny God’s power by being sung from a heart that does not rest on the knowledge of this same Jesus we know through His word. If you hadn’t googled about her and watched this testimony of her vision, you would think that the song I linked to above, “Where you go I’ll go” was good. Its outward form of godliness seems OK but inwardly there is a ravenous wolf waiting to spring. That wolf is the exaltation of personal experience as a validation of the word to the exclusion of the word itself by the person who wrote it and sings it. The filter of flesh that the song comes from has been polluted with leaven.

Jesus said, “But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ (Matthew 15:18)

In 2011 John MacArthur preached about the Modern Blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. He was not referring specifically to Smith and Jesus Culture, and their songs but was in general preaching against the incorrect attribution of things of satan to the Spirit. There are too many false visions and signs plaguing the church today.

MacArthur said

“…and mostly this comes in the professing church from Pentecostals and Charismatics who feel they have free license to abuse the Holy Spirit and even blaspheme His holy name. And they do it constantly. How do they do it? By attributing to the Holy Spirit words that He didn’t say, deeds that He didn’t do, and experiences that He didn’t produce, attributing to the Holy Spirit that which is not the work of the Holy Spirit. Endless human experiences, emotional experiences, bizarre experiences and demonic experiences are said to come from the Holy Spirit…visions, revelations, voices from heaven, messages from the Spirit through transcendental means, dreams, speaking in tongues, prophecies, out of body experiences, trips to heaven, anointings, miracles. All false, all lies, all deceptions attributed falsely to the Holy Spirit.”

“Satan is alive and well and the work of Satan is being attributed to the Holy Spirit, that is a serious blasphemy just as attributing to Satan the work of the Holy Spirit is a serious blasphemy.”

The tongue corrupts the whole person.

“The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.” (James 3:6)

Like any invasive species, the invasion is first undetectable (secretly brought in). For example, zebra mussels. The invasive species may attach to a large container ship which appears mighty and powerful but undetected the mussel colony grows and eventually the prop and the rudder will be frozen in a mass of mussels as solid as cement.

Before you know it, your pipe or prop is clogged and the water will not flow. If the living water does not flow, the machine or the organism it’s attached to dies.

Paul used the metaphor of gangrene, and Jesus used the example of leaven spoiling the whole loaf and the tares choking out the wheat. In all cases, the invading organism chokes off the life supply of the home organism and the home organism dies.

Are you getting my theme? Untreated false leaven brings death.

That is what accepting a song does that’s written from a heart that obviously does not understand who Jesus is. It may seem innocuous to the church body but it is in actuality brought by an invading organism bent on your destruction. It is not just a song like a tare is not just a tare.

The heartbreak is that people like the folks in Jesus Culture are probably not cackling vultures twirling their mustaches like Snidely Whiplash in back rooms and applauding their satanic success. They may not even know they are bringing destructive heresies. They are like the container ship that under its waterline had some zebra mussels clinging to it, unbenownst to them. “Human beings who pro­mote paganism, the occult, and various other ungodly and immoral movements and programs are but the dupes of Satan and his demons. They are trapped by their sins and weaknesses into unwittingly helping to fulfill his schemes.” (source)

But if they go too far down this path, extricating them will be a hard go. They will be trapped. Here is what you need to do, as do I:

“Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.” (Galatians 6:1-3)

On a personal note, I found this entire exercise difficult. I watched hours of the conference at Passion, read reactions to it and  listened to interviews. It is hard to see so many of our children being drawn away. It physically hurts. My laptop is covered in tears. I take no glee in bringing this message out. All those youths and youth pastors and speakers and bands need rescuing. They need to be rescued, cared for back in the doctrinally sanitary hospital of their home church, but the sanitation of each home church is increasingly compromised these days. I fear for those kids and I mourn the blasphemies done to the Spirit when calling the devil’s work His work.

I look at the photo above of the 60,000 in attendance and I faint at the knowledge at how insidiously satan has infiltrated poisonous leaven into our churches via the youth. Each youth and youth pastor and person attending carries back to their home church (if they have one) a tiny zebra mussel nestled in their bilge, waiting to multiply and then choke the flow of water through the veins of the church.

I plan a few more blog entries reacting to the Passion 2013 conference. One will focus on Louie Giglio. Another on Judah Smith and also be a summary conclusion. Pray that eyes will be opened to the heresies and blasphemies being done to our precious Jesus and in the name of the Holy Spirit. Jesus is more powerful than satan and His Holy Spirit destroys strongholds! Pray, people!

“For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ, being ready to punish every disobedience, when your obedience is complete.” (2 Corinthians 10:3-6)

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Part 2: Discerning a Gnostic conference called “Passion 2013,” Louie Giglio 
Part 3: Conclusion

Posted in drought, israel, mississippi, syria, weather

News: Israel falling off media’s radar, woman dies mysteriously in flight, Damascus shredded, Miss. river low

Posted on by elizabethprata

Here is a news roundup for you of news I thought was interesting. I look at the trends of news articles and the language within news articles to spot patterns. In the past five years, more often than not, the media presents news articles with headlines that offer information about a record-breaking something. Lately records are constantly being broken: the deepest debt, the most tornadoes, the highest number of flu cases. And yet these records are broken again the next year and again the next month, spiraling ever higher. In my estimation, this has been especially true of weather events.

First, a refresher on the Tribulation and the rapture. Remember, the scriptures tell us implicitly and explicitly that the rapture of the born-again believers will occur prior to the unfolding of the events prophesied to occur in the 7-year Tribulation (AKA Time of Jacob’s Trouble). Daniel 9:24 tells us the reasons for the Tribulation.

In that verse angel Gabriel lists for Daniel the 6 reasons God will enact the 7-year Tribulation. It is to bring wrath to the ungodly world, yes, but it is mainly for “your people and your holy city.” God will be dealing with His people the Jews. Therefore we look to Israel to see what is happening so we can keep informed of the main prophecy marker. In his sermon, “The Day of the Lord, part 1” John MacArthur wrote, “Once the signs that precede the day of the Lord start to happen, a wise and informed person could know that it was coming soon but not know the day or the hour.”

“Coming soon” was the mantra of Apostle Paul and it is our mantra today. Irrespective of the intervening years and centuries, the imminence of the second coming of Jesus Christ has always been present in the hearts of diligent and discerning Christians. Yet how much closer is His arrival today than yesterday? How much sooner will He arrive tomorrow than two thousand years ago? We look at the season, pray for His return, and continue going about our Father’s business until the trumpet calls us home. So here is the news:

ISRAEL

Israel is definitely one of the major end times signs. When it was re-formed into a nation, it was a cultural miracle and historically unprecedented. The story of how the Hebrew language was revived after two thousand years of dormancy is equally amazing. The fact that aliyah (immigration back to Israel by Jews) is steadily on the rise is also a continual fulfillment of prophecy. (Zechariah 12 and Ezekiel 11:17).

Israel falling off the media’s radar
“Major media outlets’ reviews of 2012 and predictions for big news stories in 2013 indicate that Israel finally may have to spend less time defending itself as the Palestinian Authority’s demands become old hat and pale in the shadows of events in Syria and Iran. The Council of Foreign Relations, considered to be the most influential American think tank, predicted that the Middle East is a major issue for the Obama administration but not because of PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.”

Israel is having an election on January 22, 2013. It will be a Parliamentary election. They are not electing a President. However, after the election, the government of Netanyahu will have to forge a unity government with those who win, based on a complicated routine of percentage of seats won etc. This past tenure of the Netanyahu government was relatively stable and was able to overcome various political and national security related crises with no real threat from the opposition. His popularity has waxed and waned over these last years but has overall remained fairly high.

Source

Then came the Tal Law controversy- in which a challenge was made to the excusing of Haredi men from active military service. The Haredi are the ultra-orthodox Jews. The Law was enacted in 2002 and must be renewed every five years. 2012 was a renewal year. The High Court struck down the law based on its opinion that it was unconstitutional. Netanyahu is for allowing the Haredi men to serve, saying it would make military service in Israel more equitable and fair.

Photo: An IDF soldier guarding Haredi men near the grave of Eliezer Ben Aharon, in the northern West Bank.

Israel’s elections- the Dividing Line
“ISRAEL’S elections, which are now two-and-a-half weeks away, are pitting hawks against doves in stark confrontation, despite the original determination of the two camps’ leaders to blur their differences. The question now is whether this unintended deepening of the political divide will extend from the election campaign to the coalition-making process that inevitably follows. Will Binyamin Netanyahu be able to woo a moderate party into his new government? Or will he have to make do with the rightist and religious groups which he calls the ‘natural allies’ of his party, Likud?”

3,000 conscription notices go out to ultra-orthodox
“Roughly 3,000 ultra-Orthodox Israeli youths have been issued draft notices, and are set to be inducted into the Israeli Defense Forces in August 2013, according to the director of the IDF Personnel Directorate, Maj. Gen. Orna Barbivai, who spoke to Israel Radio on Thursday.  The 3,000 youths had previously been exempt from performing military service under the Tal Law, which granted exemptions to ultra-Orthodox men for religious reasons.”

Ultimately, the government is in God’s hands. He sets up rulers and He takes them down. It’s always interesting for us who are watching what God does in government to see what happens when the power balance comes under an opportunity for a change. The next few weeks will be such a time for Israel.

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MIDDLE EAST

Syria—

Have you ever seen an American flag that has been on a post too long, and the ends of it are tattered and shredded, and the rest faded and thin? That’s Syria. The two-year long civil war has shredded the nation and made it so tattered it is almost unrecognizable. It’s hard to see how Dictator President Assad will hang on through 2013. I believe it has been God’s decision and power holding him in place this last year. Photo, a bombed out gas station in Damascus.

We look at Syria, of course, because of the unfulfilled prophecy in Isaiah 17 that Damascus and environs will be completely destroyed.

Syria is now so tattered, they cannot be counted on to aid Iran in any foray against Israel. Ultimately, we know from the Ezekiel 38-39 prophecy that the alliance that surprise-attacks Israel in the last days does not include Syria as a participant. Perhaps this current shredding of the nation of Syria is part of God’s goal to neutralize that nation, upon which so many dire prophecies are piled.

Damascus countdown: 60,000+ slaughtered in Syria…key Syrian general defects….what does the future hold?
“Tragically, the implosion of Syria continues unabated. The death toll continues to mount. The cruel Assad regime is slaughtering people without hesitation. The world is doing letting to help, but what would be the best way to help? Radical jihadists make up a significant portion of the rebel force fighting the Assad regime. Putting them in power could prove more dangerous to Israel, and to the region. …  Bible prophecy indicates that God will bring judgment on Damascus for the evil its leaders have done.”

Even Syria death toll of 60,000 unlikely to revolutionize world leaders into action
“Lacking international consensus on outside military intervention, and since opposition forces, political and military, also oppose foreign intervention, a resolution in Syria depends on the rebels’ ability to seize key locations.” [note, this article read its entirety requires a subscription]

Is the End Near in Damascus?

Modern Damascus, with the
Omayyad mosque illuminated in the centre

“Over the past several months, Bashar al-Assad’s military position has become increasingly precarious. The regime’s defensive capabilities have waned — it has difficulty holding even the most advantageous positions, and all efforts to roll back opposition forces (using field artillery, airpower, and, most recently, Scud missiles) have failed. YouTube videos show regime forces looking and acting like a defeated army.”

“Several trends have contributed to this deterioration. First, the rebels have significantly improved their combat capabilities since last winter, allowing them to reduce the regime’s presence throughout the country and capture checkpoints, barriers, and police stations. In doing so, they have acquired more arms, ammunition, and combat experience while eroding Assad’s ability to control the population. Currently, rebel forces control lines of communication in Idlib, Aleppo, and Raqqa and frequently isolate and harass regime airfields. They have defeated several regime units, contributing to their growing psychological dominance.”

“Most significant, the rebels are now self-sustaining: they regularly seize antitank weapons, shoulder-fired missiles, rocket-propelled grenades, and other weapons from regime forces, and they appear to replace lost personnel with relative ease. They do not need much if any outside armament; the U.S. debate about whether to send them weapons seems to have been overtaken by events.”

“Whatever the case, the regime appears to have only a few weeks left before it collapses….”

It seems so. But then again, God is in control.

Iran—

ISFAHAN

Isfahan is an Iranian city in which a large experimental nuclear plant exists. In November 2012, the Jerusalem Post reported a large explosion rocked the Isfahan plant and the nearby area. The explosion was heard throughout the city. The cause remained unknown. Or, unreported.

A week later, rumors surfaced that the plant at Isfahan was leaking radiation. The Iranian News agency, FARS, vehemently denied and dismissed all such rumors.

Then a few weeks after that, the BBC reported that the Iranian government gave n edict to evacuate Isfahan. This would mean 1.5 million people would have to leave. The government said that it was due to excessive air pollution, the BBC reported. Washington Free Beacon picked up on the story:

Iran to Citizens: Flee Isfahan
Iranian officials tell citizens to vacate city located near nuke site
“Iranian officials have instructed residents of Isfahan to leave the city, renewing concerns that a nearby nuclear site could be leaking radioactive material.  An edict issued Wednesday by Iranian authorities orders Isfahan’s one-and-a-half million people to leave the city “because pollution has now reached emergency levels,” the BBC reported.  However, outside observers suspect that the evacuation order may corroborate previous reports indicating that a uranium enrichment facility near Isfahan had been leaking radioactive material. Tehran went to great lengths in December to deny these reports, telling state-run media outlets that “the rumors about leaking and contamination at Isfahan’s [Uranium Conversion Facility] are not true at all.”

Iran Unveils Copycat Arsenal
“Iran’s newest gunship helicopter, unveiled Wednesday, might look awfully familiar to aviation historians. And it’s not unique in that regard. Almost all of Iran’s “new” weaponry — including jet fighters, ‘copters, warships, tanks, missiles and other equipment — is a copy of a much older American, British, Russian, Chinese or North Korean design. But that doesn’t mean all of Tehran’s weapons suck. Far from it. While some of the sillier Iranian gear is obviously meant mostly for fleeting propaganda purposes, the main hardware is grounded in experience and hardship. Driven by desperation and shaped by the isolation that comes with widening external sanctions, Tehran’s copycat arsenal could contain a few nasty surprises for the U.S. and its allies in the unlikely event that tensions over Iran’s nuclear program come to blows.”

I want to unearth and bring to light something that many Americans hide in their heart. We have had been on top for so long we tend to dismiss the military capabilities of others, particularly those in the Middle East. Though many of those nations are poor, despite not having the advantage of more numerous armies or higher technology, they have a long history of cunning battle strategy. Just look to the bible for that. And 9/11. In addition, as the author of the article above says, “low-tech weapons force the users to fight creatively.” The Americans in 1776 did that when strategically using guerrilla warfare against the more numerous and technologically advanced British army.

The alliance that Ezekiel 38 describes includes Turkey, Russia, Iran, Libya, Sudan, and Ethiopia (among a few others less clearly pinpointed). Turkey has the second largest army in NATO (after the US). Russia has long been a superpower with staying power. Even when seemingly defeated in the 1990s, she simply licked her wounds and bided her time. Russia is patient, like a hibernating bear, and also like a bear, she is fast and cunning.

Iran’s elite are single-mindedly dedicated to Allah and wants to bring the final Imam back. This can only be accomplished by fomenting chaos and attacking her enemies as proof to a waiting deity that Iran means it. To that end, Iran has been pushing covertly and overtly for the weaponry and materiel she needs to accomplish this. A group in power allied with satan to defeat God’s people is a powerful entity indeed.

The North African nations mentioned in the prophecy have long been allied with evil, and have served as a training place, practice place and conduit for money and materiel for their larger brothers. Don’t look at these nations as they are today but rather their history as powerful allies of satan and covering huge geographic areas. As a matter of fact, Ham’s son Cush settled in the area of today’s Sudan, where the Blue and the White Nile meet. (Genesis 10). And the western boundary of Eden may have included parts of present day North Sudan, though this cannot be stated with any certainty whatsoever. (Genesis 2:10-14). I think it is evident that these lands have long been in God’s heart. They have certainly been long in history, since the extreme beginning. His plans for them are coming to pass and will come to pass.

Ultimately we don’t need a history lesson to confirm God’s word. What Ezekiel reported will happen, will happen. But in this short essay I wanted you to see a bit of how and to remind us to look at the sweep and scope of Middle Eastern history from the perspective of the beginning rather than only through the lens of now.

“A sword will come upon Egypt, and anguish will be in Ethiopia; when the slain fall in Egypt, they take away her wealth, And her foundations are torn down. Ethiopia, Put, Lud, all Arabia, Libya and the people of the land that is in league will fall with them by the sword.” (Ezekiel 30: 4-5).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

WEATHER

Weather.com reported last July on what, in their estimation, made 2012 so weird in terms of weather phenomenon to date. Since then we had Superstorm Sandy and a rare Christmas outbreak of tornadoes in the south, plus much more in other nations, but suffice to say, the weather is not getting curiouser and curiouser, but weirder and weirder.

This is because God controls the weather. The bible is not silent on the origin of weather phenomena. He either directly causes (Proverbs 30:4) or indirectly allows (via satan, as in Job 1:9-12, 19 or in general as from the Fall) to produce events which serve His plan.

The bible says that as we progress closer to the time of the end, the events taking place on earth will be as birth pangs, which increase as the event draws nigh. The pangs are more painful, too. We saw that this year in all kinds of secular spheres, but never more evident than in the area of weather.

A Wild 2012, So Far
“Tornadoes, heat, cold, wildfires, snowstorms, drought, flooding. These are phenomena you see in any year. What’s made 2012 so strange? Two words: “timing” and “location”. We’ve seen events occur much earlier in season than what’s considered average. We’ve also seen weather events in locations you wouldn’t expect. Finally, we’ve seen persistent “high-amplitude” weather patterns crank out impressive precipitation totals (rain and snow) and prolonged heat or cold.”

Weather.com goes on to list as of last July the weirdest things that happened:

Most Destructive Wildfire in Colorado History
Alaska Snow Buries Towns
Strange Start to Hurricane Season
Florida’s Exceptional Drought Erased in One Month
Exceptionally Long Late June/Early July Heat Wave
Europe Snow Buries Homes
March Warmer Than April
Daily Lows Setting New Record Highs
Mammoth Hail…in Hawaii

Weather.com followed up their midyear report with a year-end report, called Unforgettable: Reliving the Unusual 2012 weather

Strongest Hurricanes in an Unusual Places
Lack of Tornadoes After Mid-April-
see graph below for 2012 tornado activity

The Weather Channel

Erik Klemetti’s volcano roundup can be found here in his essay announcing the 2012 Pliny Volcano of the Year award. Ecuador’s Tungurahua had a mention, with Klemetti writing,

“Tungurahua had an especially active year, with some large explosive events that sent pyroclastic flows down the slopes of the volcano and ash across the region. The activity prompted repeated calls for evacuations around the volcano and significant damage to the crops that grow on the slopes of the Ecuadoran volcano.”

He continued, “Guatemala’s Fuego had one of its most active years in decades, with multiple large eruptions” along with Tongariro in New Zealand coming to life for the first time since 1896. But it was Tolbachik in Russia that won the informal volcano activity award this year. Tolbachik hadn’t erupted in over 36 years, but one day simply did, erupting with a “fissure eruption that coalesced into singular vents with long — and I mean long — a’a lava flows.”

January snow cover
“With 67 percent of the contiguous U.S. covered by snow, the first day of 2013 marked the widest coverage of snow the U.S. has seen on Jan. 1 in the past ten years.”

Barge traffic stalls along drought-parched Mississippi River
“The boats had to stop while crews dredged downstream in a desperate attempt to keep the shipping channel open as the river approaches historically low levels. … “looking out the wheelhouse windows in disbelief at sandbars and stone dikes that are usually deep underwater. “I’ve never seen it this low myself,” said Cox, who’s worked on Mississippi River towboats for nearly 14 years. “It’s a lot more stressful right now.” The drought that devastated crops throughout the Midwest over the summer has made the mighty Mississippi dangerously narrow and shallow, threatening to choke off a vital transportation artery that carries billions of dollars’ worth of raw materials and commodities through the heart of the country.”

From December 3, 2012:
Historic Low Mississippi River Levels Could Impact American Consumers
“The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is bracing for what could be a historic low levels of water along the Mississippi River that likely would halt barge traffic in the heart of the storied river. Such a sudden stop would directly impact the American consumer. “The Mississippi River is the lifeblood of the Gulf and Midwest, so a shutdown of traffic on the river — whether at the mouth, the middle, or the headwaters — is a great concern,” noted Rep. Jeff Landry, R-La., whose district sits in the lower portion of the river. “If we shut down the river to commerce, we will see higher prices in basic commodities such as food and electricity and fewer jobs for hard-working mariners.” About $7 billion in commodities such as corn, grain, coal and petroleum are set to flow along the river in the months of December and January…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

PESTILENCE

Of course, disease has always been with us. By itself, its existence is not an indicator of end time symptoms. However, we read in Revelation 6:8 that death will be loosed upon the world in the Tribulation, and one of the ways people will die is by “famine and plague.” Those two go together in ways that Americans have largely escaped direct experience with, but that indeed are interrelated in ways that most of the rest of the world well knows. In a post called “Looking at the coming famine“, I noted the biological process of starvation. Starvation begins with scarcity, and the effects on the body begin within one day. But because most people who aren’t in a starvation pattern eat and/or drink within a reasonable time frame after the last meal, the effects of starvation that have already begun in the body are counteracted.

But famine begins with scarcity, and famine and plague go together. A body undergoing the dramatic effects of starvation cannot stave off disease. Remember, starvation really begins in the body within 24 hours of the last meal. When Mississippi barges cannot bring the food, it is a problem for the supply chain. Grocery stores typically carry only a three-day supply. In most cases of short-term disruption, stores in America get around that in other ways, or the items in short supply are forgone and consumers simply wait it out as an inconvenience rather than a life-threatening event. But just think if a long-term supply disruption occurs…which could happen easily via worse weather than described above, or an electromagnetic pulse, or a New Madrid quake destroying large swathes of highway or changed river courses. In those cases, food simply will not be able to be delivered for a long time. Hospital shelves would not be replenished with drugs, and disease breaks out.

If you’re skeptical, just picture Superstorm Sandy. It wreaked havoc on a third of the nation, closed major cities, and stopped regular life for a week or more. Most people were prepared, and either stocked up or got out. But what if an event were to happen for which we had no preparation? Food ran out even for the people who had stocked up, there was no water (sanitation problems arise from lack of cleanliness and expiring food), the trash wasn’t picked up…and boy did the rats come. I am not telling you this to scare you, but to tell you. Read Revelation 6:8 again.

Pakistan: Record child measles deaths in 2012 
Pakistan suffered record child measles deaths, jumping from 64 in 2011 to 306 in 2012.

Maine’s whooping cough cases triple; worst in 50 years
“Reported cases of whooping cough in Maine more than tripled this year, in line with a national trend that resulted in the worst year of pertussis infection in the United States in more than 50 years.  Maine’s increase from 202 cases in 2011 to 701 cases so far this year [as of December 20, 2012]”

Woman, 25, Dies On Texas-Bound Flight From Brazil
“An American Airlines flight from Brazil to Dallas was diverted to Houston on Wednesday after a 25-year-old passenger became ill and died aboard the aircraft, police said.”

Well. Does that remind me of Charles Campion trying to outrun Captain Trips, or what? Autopsy results on the woman are still pending as of a moment ago.

Of this next article, I’m not a huge fan of WND, and the article’s source is anonymous, after all (two strikes) but credible knowledge of North Korea and Syria’s chemical and biological warfare strategies and capabilities are a fact. And the bible says that disease kills a fourth of mankind. So, biological warfare unleashed is a distinct probability. So I post the article and ask you to use your judgment in accepting all its premises.

8 deadly agents ‘to bring U.S. to its knees’
“Iranian scientists, working under orders from the radicals running the Islamic regime, have genetically altered microbial agents in a nightmarish scheme to bring the West to its knees. According to a source in the Revolutionary Guards intelligence unit with knowledge of Iran’s microbial research and development, the scientists, with Russian and North Korean help, currently possess eight extremely dangerous microbial agents that, if unleashed, could kill millions of people.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

CONCLUSION

God is the author of all prophecy.

“Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the LORD? and there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Savior; there is none beside me.” (Isaiah 45:21)

I was listening to a sermon by Dr. John MacArthur from 1985. That is 28 years ago. The title was “The Sufficiency of Scripture.” He had briefly deviated from his usual approach of preaching on a verse of the bible in his verse by verse, chapter by chapter exposition to address a topic. He saw some devilish tings creeping into the church and into global Christianity that he felt burdened to make a lecture against. It was a sermon of contending for the faith.

In his talk, MacArthur said he believed that the influence of purpose driven thought, Mystical practices, and entertainment-driven sermons only beginning to encroach then were a devastatingly subtle attack on the word and will ultimately drive Christianity to a weakened and pagan position because all of that is an attack on the sufficiency of the Word of God.

He was right. Of course everything he said and warned about 28 years ago is happening now. He sounds rather like a prophet, doesn’t he? However it is the WORD that is prophetic, not the man. It’s prophetic in the sense that the entire word of God was given to us in the bible from a place that is outside of time. From a place that is infinite. From a place where what will happen has already happened and is still happening. The entire word of God is always prophetic. In its most general sense, it is foretelling from the beginning all that we need to know throughout all the ages and is applicable to every man who ever lived.

An illuminated bible shown to visitors
to one of the ancient cave churches near Lalibela, Ethiopia.
The script is probably Ge’ez, the old Semitic language still
used by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Source

What MacArthur preached against and foresaw coming of and warned about seemed prophetic because everything God says is always applicable to us in every season. It is a more sure word! (2 Peter 1:19). The very fact of his sermon advocating the sufficiency of scripture through the lens of almost three decades of having correctly foreseen intervening satanic influences into the church is a very validation of just how sure the word is! You can never go wrong with a close walk with Jesus Christ, because He is the light, and His word shall light your way.

photo credit: Eileen Delhi via photopin cc

Posted in precious, street of gold

Gold is not so precious

Posted on by elizabethprata

The bible discusses gold and treasure quite often. God is a precious metal to us here on earth. It has been since the beginning and it still is today. Subsequently, men become foolish for gold (and other treasure) and store it up. There are lots of warnings about why not to store it up. For example,

“Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days.” (James 5:3).

Also, gold and other treasure are destroyed by moths and rust. (Matthew 6:19). It can get stolen. (Matthew 6:20).

1 Peter 1:7 says that gold is destroyed. 1 Peter 1:18 said that gold is perishable. Lamentations 4:1 says that gold tarnishes. Matthew 23:17 says that the temple is infinitely more valuable than the gold in the temple. “You blind fools! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that has made the gold sacred?”

Gold is called a precious metal, but is it really precious? Most couples have a gold wedding band. Women have gold necklaces or earrings. Men have gold tie clips or cufflinks. A gold watch can be bought for $110. There is gold in every computer’s circuit board. Some people use gold for teeth! Does that sound precious to you?

We think of gold as a precious metal but here on earth it’s not really. In the heavenly eternal state, it’s really not precious.

Typically we think of the gold street as something of beauty that the Lord has adorned His holy city for His bride. (Revelation 21:2). And that is true. But here is an opposite thought just to ponder:

Something that is precious is rare. It is even unique. Faith in Jesus is really the only precious thing there is. (1 Peter 1:7). There is only ONE Jesus! Now, that’s precious! The New Jerusalem even has no temple because God and Jesus is the temple (Rev 21:22).

As Pastor Jordan Hall said, “The traditional thought on these streets of gold (Revelation 21:21b) is that God is demonstrating the worth of Heaven. Could it be instead that God is demonstrating the worthlessness of gold?”

With such a precious treasure before our eyes, what is gold, then? In heaven, it is a common material that we will tread upon with our feet. Did God place the gold underfoot for all eternity to continually remind us of how we were warned not to set our eyes upon what we previously thought of as precious?

In heaven’s economy, gold seems to be the same as asphalt is to us today. Today on earth would we strew around in our home all our gold necklaces and earrings and platters and rings and walk on them? No. But we will in heaven. For the believers who believe by faith, it is an eternally wonderful trade, a faith in Him who is more precious than gold.

Posted in iran, isfahan, nuclear

Has there been a nuclear accident at Iran’s Isfahan nuclear site?

Posted on by elizabethprata

The BBC and Washington Beacon report tonight that 1.5 million Iranians have been told to evacuate an area near Isfahan via a government-issued edict. The Beacon reports

“Iranian officials have instructed residents of Isfahan to leave the city, renewing concerns that a nearby nuclear site could be leaking radioactive material. An edict issued Wednesday by Iranian authorities orders Isfahan’s one-and-a-half million people to leave the city “because pollution has now reached emergency levels,” the BBC reported. However, outside observers suspect that the evacuation order may corroborate previous reports indicating that a uranium enrichment facility near Isfahan had been leaking radioactive material. Tehran went to great lengths in December to deny these reports, telling state-run media outlets that “the rumors about leaking and contamination at Isfahan’s [Uranium Conversion Facility] are not true at all.”

… “Mass evacuations suggest a far more serious problem,” [Michael Rubin, a former Pentagon adviser on Iran and Iraq] Rubin explained. “There are two possibilities here: There is a radiation leak and the regime is lying or there is really bad pollution and no one believes the regime’s explanations.”

Please stay tuned to developments in the Middle East. I’ll update if/when conformed items become available.

Posted in back to basics, blood

Back to Basics: What is "The Lamb"?

Posted on by elizabethprata
Hindrick S

During this Christmas season just past, we often hear of ‘The Lamb’. Most Christians know what that means, no matter if you’re a babe in the faith or mature in the faith. However, the practice of study (in my opinion) means constantly asking questions. I ask myself, ‘what does this mean?’ ‘How can I go deeper?’ ‘What does the Greek say?’ ‘Why is this reference here, at this moment in the narrative, and not earlier in the chapter or later?’ Isn’t this the fifth time this particular reference has been made…so why is that?’ What did the Lord want us to know here?’

Never assume you know the full answer, because we don’t. Never assume we can’t learn more, because God is infinite. He always has things to teach us. So what is “The Lamb”? For many of us in this industrialized world, we may never see a lamb or a grown sheep. We are not agricultural and the metaphors that were immediately understood by the agrarian society in which Jesus preached are lost to us today in terms of daily experience. So we study it.

We are introduced to Jesus as the Lamb when John the Baptist saw Him arrive at the banks of the Jordan. This moment was the one God intended for Jesus to be baptized and begin His earthly ministry as the God-Man.

John the Baptist saw Jesus and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).

EssJayNZ

Going back in time now, God had told the Israelites that they must sacrifice a year-old lamb twice a day. (Numbers 28:3-4). This act was to shed the blood of a young, perfect animal so that the person’s sins would be atoned for. It goes without explanation that we understand every person on earth is born with a sin nature, and is an enemy of the Lord, at war with Him, and in need of reconciliation. Without atonement, we cannot commune with God.

The sacrifice of the lambs were a temporary covering of those sins that must be repented of and atoned for. A person’s sins are so deep and so tall that a blood covering from one lamb one time certainly would not fulfill the debt to the Lord that the sin’s existence created. People wrongly think, “I lied once, but that’s over and I haven’t lied since, so my sin is gone.” The lie is an offense against God, and that offense remains forever reverberating in the strings of the Milky Way, as a clang against His holy being in the harmonious temple, and as a blight in His sight for all His days. It stays. This stain can never be removed. A sin doesn’t vanish into thin air. You may have forgotten it, but God has not.

Therefore, any sin has an eternal existence and so would need an eternal sacrifice to atone for it. So God set it up that the Law would be delivered at Mt. Sinai, and He ordained that the blood from twice-daily slaughtered lambs would be the covering. Though God made known the Law to the Israelites, the blood covering had been ordained since Genesis 4:4 when Abel brought the first fatlings of his flock as a sacrifice to the LORD.

What about lambs, and sheep in general? What are they like?

Ferran Jorda

Well, when shepherds brought their flocks together to the troughs to drink, the sheep all mixed and mingled. How would the shepherds ever get them sorted out?! Sheep are not branded like cows are. It’s easy- the shepherd calls them. Sheep know the voice of the one who cares for them, and they follow him without making a mistake.

When Jesus said “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me” (John 10:27) his hearers knew exactly what He was talking about. And the lambs followed the mother sheep, who followed the shepherd.

Sheep are not fighters. They may struggle for a moment when caught for shearing, but when they sense they are held firmly in the grip of the shepherd, they give up entirely and become docile.

“He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth.” (Isaiah 53:7; Mark 15:5).

This is true of sheep and lambs even if they are headed to the slaughter and not just for shearing.

Sheep are flocking animals and have a natural tendency to follow a dominant one to greener pastures.

“The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.” (John 10:3)

Chris Gin

“I will tend them in a good pasture, and the mountain heights of Israel will be their grazing land. There they will lie down in good grazing land, and there they will feed in a rich pasture on the mountains of Israel.” (Ezekiel 34:14)

Lambs are prey animals (grown sheep are too). Wolves stalk them. Lions do too. Jesus was surrounded by wolves many times:

“And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff.” (Luke 4:29).

Jesus sent the disciples, saying “Go your way; behold, I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves.” (Luke 10:3).

These disciple lambs were innocent, vulnerable, put amidst the cruel schemes of malicious men, just as Jesus was. Some indeed were slaughtered. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs is thick.

Jesus was the prototype for that innocent, gentle obedience that He told us to employ now, as His flock.

His death on the cross was as a silent lamb to the heinous slaughter. But His blood is eternal. His perfect life and His holy blood was the fulfillment of the payment to God for the wrath He held against sin and sinners.

Source

Lambs are gentle, vulnerable-looking innocent, and obedient. Make no mistake, the babe grew up. As far as unbelievers go, the lamb was slain. The one who is coming the second time is not the Lamb but is the Holy Righteous One, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, full of wrath and meting it out in perfect precision unto every sinner on the earth.

Yet, for the believer, the Lamb is still the Lamb. It is one aspect of His work on earth that will never be diminished or forgotten. (Revelation 5:13)

The Lamb is in heaven, with God:

“And between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders I saw a Lamb standing, as though it had been slain” (Revelation 5:6a)

The Lamb opens the scroll containing the seals. Lo, He judges:

“Now I watched when the Lamb opened one of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures say with a voice like thunder, “Come!”” (Revelation 6:1)

And the Lamb becomes the Shepherd!

“For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.” (Revelation 7:17)

Jesus was and is and is to come. He is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.

photo credit: Hindrik S via photopin cc
photo credit: EssjayNZ via photopin cc
photo credit: Ferran. via photopin cc
photo credit: Chris Gin via photopin cc