DEATH AND THE
PASSING OF CHRISTIANITY
CONT., page 6
HOPE DEFERRED
In Proverbs 13:12 we find the following illuminating passage:
Hope deferred makes the heart sick,
But desire fulfilled is a tree of life
For 2,000 years men have experienced the first part of this passage -
hope deferred. Starting with the first believers under the former rain
Pentecost, to the present, men have hoped for and often anticipated Yahshua’s
return, the setting up of His kingdom, and deliverance from sin and death.
But for 2,000 years He has delayed His coming, has left men under the curse
of sickness and death, and even allowed the defilement of His kingdom.
The deferring of this hope we have of deliverance from this curse and corruption,
causes men’s hearts to grow sick and weak. For 2,000 years men have
known the promise of His coming and man’s deliverance, only to experience
the day to day sorrows and pains and testings of a life far far far inferior
to that which is to come from above. For 2,000 years men have not had
the pure and perfect truth that is from above, but rather have received from
mere men teachings that are refined and processed through their own flesh,
as well as influenced by the lying deception of Satan.
History abounds with sincere and searching men who have fervently believed
that what they understood, practiced, and taught was the truth and leading
of God’s word; yet with time it was shown otherwise. Every generation
has held to their customized beliefs, confident that they are right, only
to be revealed in latter generations to have possessed error. Why should
this generation today be any different? As we read in the opening of
this writing, the sons of the Most High “do not know nor do they understand;
they walk about in darkness.” How great is their darkness? Dark
enough that they are not only in error; but equally destructive, they are
deceived so that what they believe to be true, is in fact the word of God
processed by the flesh under the influence of Satan. Once again we
make the unmitigated point - How can Christianity have the pure truth from
above, when they cannot agree among themselves? Every person, including
the one reading this, believes they know the truth, they have risen above
error, that others are wrong, when in fact they too do not understand Yahweh,
His ways, His works, His plans, and they walk about in darkness. The
result of this general state of error is that men’s hearts are sick.
This writer has a dog, a new dog at this time. The dog is one year
old and has never lived on a farm, where this writer lives. On a farm
are all kinds of items which lie around for dogs to eat, many items which
are in fact not good for the dog; nevertheless, they want to eat them.
On a farm there are various animals, other than a dog, and all of these animals
make their own deposits around the farm. When these animals first consume
the feed and grass offered on this farm, it is most palatable and profitable,
to all the farm animals, including the dog, if he so wished to partake of
it. But, once the farm animals process this feed and grass, the end
product they produce has been altered and no longer retains the profitableness
it originally possessed. Our new farm dog has not learned this yet;
so, on three occasions he has sought to ingest some of the farm droppings
- first from the goats, then even his own, and then from a horse. On
each occasion, our new farm dog has come into the house only to forthright
deposit onto our carpet the contents of his stomach, including the cause
for his newly acquired discomfort. He is slowly learning that previously
nutritious and palatable food that has passed through the processing of one
of God’s earthly creatures, is altered and laced with discomforting byproducts;
the consumption thereof leading to sickness. What, one might ask, does
this story have to do with our topic? A great deal, as we will see.
Though this may seem a bit untasteful, it is sorely relevant. Even
as our farm dog is learning that food processed by another of God’s creatures
is not profitable and even nauseous, so men in the kingdom of God learn likewise.
No, men are not eating literal dung; but they do eat that which in the beginning
was profitable, but once processed by the flesh becomes unprofitable.
Carnal men, men of this earth in carnal bodies, take the word of God, process
it according to their own understanding and experiences, add some of Satan’s
own deceptive ideas, and then feed that word to others. In truth, men
are thus eating dung - the processed and altered words of God. Once
again I ask - How can the decisively divergent and often conflicting teachings
of the church, with all of its 22,000 denominations, be presenting the unprocessed
and pure word of God? Oh yes, each one of them believe they have the
truth, even most confidently, passionately, and often piously believe they
have the truth; but they all cannot! And what is the source of their
differences? Digesting the word of God with the carnal flesh and feeding
the resulting dung to others. Thus comes to truth the scripture - “Hope
deferred makes the heart sick;” and as our farm dog learned, one of the causes
of that sickness is the diet of dung that carnal men are left to consume.
Please understand here, this is not an attempt to be unduly critical toward
the church; it is simply an honest look at the woeful and most impossible
and even highly deceptive limitations that exist for man in his earthly carnal
state, even carnal man that has come to gain the precious kingdom of God.
The unfortunate and detrimental state of kingdom-occupying man is that he
is woefully plagued with the deception and limits of this earthly flesh and
Satan. It is an impossible situation, really. The only true hope
of man is to get out of this flesh and receive a body that is not of this
earth, one which, in contrast, is born from above, immortal, and imperishable.
Only then is man fully qualified and equipped to offer the true unaltered
words of God to other men, void of their own self processed dung.
While bringing up this subject of food and the process of digestion, we find
another creature of God whose means of digestion did in fact please Him.
This is of course the cow or the goat or the sheep that chewed the cud.
These animals that do so were called “clean.” Do you know what chewing
the cud is? For an animal to chew the cud means that it has the ability
to regularly and systematically bring its food up from its stomach, chew
it, then swallow it again, all for its own good. Our farm dog lacks
that ability; and when it brings up the contents from its stomach, it does
so because there is something wrong. Our dog, according to the laws
of God, would thus be considered “unclean.”
There of course was a second requirement that determined the cleanness of
an animal; that being whether it also split the hoof. As we pointed
out earlier in this writing, it is the absence of the requirement of chewing
the cud that disqualifies the swine from being clean. Yes, the swine
is clean on the one count of splitting the hoof; but, it lacks the second
necessary quality of chewing the cud. What can Yahweh be saying to
us in these unclean swine, especially when we find that the 2,000 swine represent
the 2,000 year period of the kingdom of God when its inhabitants all go the
sea of death? One can be certain that Yahweh is speaking more to us
here than merely providing an account of one of Yahshua’s miracles.
This miracle is as much a living prophecy as were many, if not most, of the
accounts in the Old Testament; it speaks a message as hidden and as real
as any one of the many parables of Yahshua. What is He telling us?
First, as we have noted before, a focal issue in this account concerning
the swine is this matter of death - all of the 2,000 swine went into the
sea of death. But this matter of death, we find, arises in another
highly enlightening and attesting way. What, one would ask, is the
significance of these two requirements for cleanness? Surely, and most
certainly, Yahweh established this Law of cleanness concerning the swine
with prophetic intentions (as are all the Laws and ceremonies). So
what is the prophetic message that Yahweh has in this Law?
We will not deal here in this writing with the prophetic significance of
splitting the hoof, for which the swine qualified for cleanness. Instead,
we will limit our examination to this matter of chewing the cud.
Even as we saw with the cleansing of the healed leper, cleansing or being
clean is a picture of acceptableness to Yahweh, allowing for men to be taken
up to Him on the “mountain,” or heaven, where He dwells. This quality
of chewing the cud is one of those vital issues to Yahweh which causes a
man to be clean before Him - ushering him into heaven to receive his immortal
imperishable body that is born from above. What is it Yahweh is telling
us in this requirement of chewing the cud, the ability which the church has
failed to possess, making it an unclean mix? The answer to this is
seen in the mere process involved in this physical practice.
What, we ask again, is chewing the cud? It is the ability of an animal
to take in food, to bring that food up again, and return it with positive
and beneficial purposes. The clean animal has the power to take in
its food, and the power to resurrect it for positive purposes. This,
we see here in picture form, is the power of resurrection - the power of
descending and ascending!
The church has not of yet had this power. In its first 2,000 years,
every man in the kingdom of God has gone to the grave, has descended, and
has been held there by death. They have lacked the power of resurrection,
the power to ascend out of the grave, the power of an indestructible life,
and are thus qualified as unclean. Yahshua had that power. He
had the power to lay his life down, and the power to take it up again (John
10:18). Yahshua had the power of rumination. And He has been
the only man to possess that power; He alone is the only man to be clean.
No man in the church has had that power of an indestructible life; therefore,
Yahweh has viewed the church as unclean. In fact, furthermore the Law
considers men as unclean who even touched the dead (Leviticus 21:11, Numbers
6:6, 9:6). The continuation of death in the kingdom for 2,000 years
is an unclean act, qualifying or characterizing the possessors of the kingdom
to be swine - having split the hoof, yet lacking the power of resurrection.
This unique power of an indestructible life that Yahshua possessed and man
lacks, is testified to at His crucifixion. In John 19:31-34 we read
that because the day of His crucifixion was the day of the preparation of
the Passover, the Jews had the legs of those being crucified broken so that
they would go ahead and die. When the soldiers arrived, they found
that Yahshua was already dead, so they did not break His legs; this, as recorded,
was so that the Scriptures might be fulfilled - “Not a bone of Him shall
be broken.” But this act was more than the fulfillment of prophecy;
for in it we see the power inherent with Yahshua - the power to lay His life
down, and the power to take it up again.
Why weren’t Yahshua’s bones broken, other than for the fulfillment of the
Scriptures? We can answer this by noting the significance of bones.
What is the purpose of bones? Like government, they support our structure.
But also, and most essentially, they are the source of the blood that flows
in our veins. And what is the meaning of blood in the Scriptures?
In Leviticus 17:11 we read - “For the life of the flesh is in the blood.”
The bones represent the power or source of life. Thus, since Yahshua
had the power of an indestructible life, it was paramount that His bones
were not broken, providing testimony to the resurrection power which He alone
possesses. Yahshua defeated death, the grave could not hold Him, and He ascended
to the Father - His “bones” were unbroken.
But there were two others who hung there with Him, who in pattern, we find,
were like unto Moses and Elijah. Both of these men hanging to the right
and to the left of Yahshua died; but in a fashion lesser than that testified
on the mount of transfiguration, we still see a similarly characterized distinction
between these two men. The former man did not understand the import
of the moment; but the latter with greater understanding cried out, “Jesus,
remember me when You come into Your kingdom!” Yahshua responded to
that man - “Truly I say to you today, you shall be with Me in Paradise” (Luke
23:43). Though the legs of both of these men were broken, testifying
that they neither had the power of an indestructible life, the power to lay
their lives down and to pick them up again, the power of rumination, the
promise was still given to the latter Elijah type witness - “Truly I say
to you today, you shall be with me in paradise.”
This power of an indestructible life, this power of rumination, has not resided
with the church for its 2,000 year tenure; thus, this period of the church
has been characterized by Yahweh as being unclean like swine - possessing
a quality of cleanness on one point, but still failing to possess the power
over death. The grave still holds every Christian; though being the
sons of God, nevertheless they all die; and none have had the power to ruminate
or resurrect back to life. This is the great weakness of Christianity
- it cannot defeat the enemy death!
Though being gods, as the Scriptures proclaim, they nevertheless lack the
power of an indestructible life which the Son of God possessed. Thus,
they go to the grave and remain there. What must take place is that
the latter witness, who has the promise of being with Him in paradise, must
appear; not as a solitary man, but, like the coming Elijah, as a host who
are called out under the power of the latter outpouring of the Holy Spirit,
the latter rain. It is this witness host who, like the one hanging
there with Yahshua, in and of themselves are like every other person in the
church - their legs are broken and they too would go to death. But
possessing the promise of the Elijah, they in their day - “today” - will
instead be with Him in paradise. This is the work of the second Remnant.
Yes, for 2,000 years man has experienced the agonies as well as the blindness
of hope deferred, with the result of a sick and often pained heart.
And most surely, that which is needed and expectantly due is the tree of
life, the second work in the kingdom of God that will deliver man from the
curse of death and the bondage and great limitations of these earthly bodies.
The tree of life work is the work of Yahweh that finally comes following
the long period of the good and evil work of the kingdom of God in which
man’s hope has for 2,000 years been painfully deferred. While one could
certainly recount many good and greatly received experiences that have come
from serving Yahweh, consider the agonies of the deferment of this blessed
hope of deliverance from the pains of this earth. The agonies of death,
the slow or even unexpected separation from loved ones; the tragedies of
divorce or disputes and conflicts; the pain and drain of sickness, both in
one’s own cursed flesh, but often even more painful when in the body of one
we love; the hurt of disappointments that come to us from relationships with
others; the gnawing pains of hunger and war, of hatred and insult; the sorrows
of sin that stalk us like a relentless beast, seeking to spring upon us at
the most unsuspecting or weakest moment, waiting, waiting in darkness, ever
stalking; the sorrows of passion that lead us astray, causing us to stumble
and become lame; the pain of watching loved ones grow old, their loss of
faculties, of sanity, of physical strength, of mental prowess, wasting away
until there is only the frail shell of what used to be a strong and accomplishing
individual. Yes, hope deferred makes the heart sick; and men have experienced
this sickness for 2,000 years in the kingdom of God.
Still we wait; we wait for desire fulfilled, the tree of life. When
the tree of life comes, there will be no more sorrows; all tears will be
wiped away. The pains of death will cease. Sickness will no longer
reside in our bodies. Confusion, wars, hatred, conflict will pass as
the Prince of Peace reigns upon this earth. Yes, the fulfillment of
the tree of life is most needed; and it will be fulfilled in the second Remnant
who, under the latter rain, will be the Elijah, and as promised will restore
all things, providing for mankind the restored garden of God. This
tree of life will be the hope-filled beginning of the transformation of all
mankind, Yahweh’s creation, when “desire fulfilled” will longingly and finally
come to man.
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