The Warning of the Last Days (No. 44)

It is necessary that God does not destroy a people unless they know what they are doing wrong. Therefore, it is necessary to warn those people of the danger that threatens them. God chooses to do this through His servants the prophets.

Amos 3:7 Surely the Lord GOD does nothing, without revealing his secret to his servants the prophets. (RSV)

Sometimes this warning is short as with the prophet Jonah, in that the warning was over three days and the period given to Nineveh to repent was forty days, and they did repent. The whole process of this prophecy and the significance of the Sign of Jonah is given in the paper The Sign of Jonah and The History of the Reconstruction of the Temple (No. 13). Sometimes the process was over a long period of time in patient long suffering, as related in Nehemiah 9:30.

Nehemiah 9:30 Many years thou didst bear with them, and didst warn them by thy Spirit through thy prophets; yet they would not give ear. (RSV)

God will not institute the process of the Last Days until He warns those nations involved. Sometimes this will be by bringing to the attention of those nations the meaning of prophecy given long ago and which has not been understood until the time.

The responsibility for the warning does not rest on God alone to appear in visions to His servants. It is for this reason that the elect were made stewards of the mysteries of God (1Cor. 4:1-2). He reveals the intent of the prophecies to them through the Holy Spirit, as we see above.

The process of warning was revealed to His servants through the passages in Ezekiel chapters 3 and 33. Ezekiel was sent to the House of Israel. He was in fact sent to the River Chebar or Khabour (Ezek. 3:15) which differs from the Chebar in 1:3 where he revealed the vision. He was sent to a tributary of the Euphrates some 45 miles from Babylon. From this text it might be assumed that he was sent to the House of Israel that was among the Babylonians at the time of the captivity. Such is the claim of modern Judaism. However, Ezekiel's mission was to the whole House of Israel and there is no doubt that the Book of Ezekiel has an end-time application to the House of Israel, which includes the elect of all nations but, more particularly, physical Israel. The responsibilities of the servants of God are to know the will of God, which is the Law, and the consequences that flow from the breach of that Law (see Ezek. 3:17-27).

Ezekiel 3:17-27 Son of man, I have made thee a watchman unto the house of Israel: therefore hear the word at my mouth, and give them warning from me. ¹⁸ When I say unto the wicked, Thou shalt surely die; and thou givest him not warning, nor speakest to warn the wicked from his wicked way, to save his life; the same wicked man shall die in his iniquity; but his blood will I require at thine hand. ¹⁹ Yet if thou warn the wicked, and he turn not from his wickedness, nor from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but thou hast delivered thy soul. ²⁰ Again, When a righteous man doth turn from his righteousness, and commit iniquity, and I lay a stumblingblock before him, he shall die: because thou hast not given him warning, he shall die in his sin, and his righteousness which he hath done shall not be remembered; but his blood will I require at thine hand. ²¹ Nevertheless if thou warn the righteous man, that the righteous sin not, and he doth not sin, he shall surely live, because he is warned; also thou hast delivered thy soul. ²² And the hand of the LORD was there upon me; and he said unto me, Arise, go forth into the plain, and I will there talk with thee. ²³Then I arose, and went forth into the plain: and, behold, the glory of the LORD stood there, as the glory which I saw by the river of Chebar: and I fell on my face. ²⁴Then the spirit entered into me, and set me upon my feet, and spake with me, and said unto me, Go, shut thyself within thine house. ²⁵ But thou, O son of man, behold, they shall put bands upon thee, and shall bind thee with them, and thou shalt not go out among them: ²⁶ And I will make thy tongue cleave to the roof of thy mouth, that thou shalt be dumb, and shalt not be to them a reprover: for they are a rebellious house. ²⁷ But when I speak with thee, I will open thy mouth, and thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; He that heareth, let him hear; and he that forbeareth, let him forbear: for they are a rebellious house. (KJV)

The process of the Book of Ezekiel is to develop from the responsibility of the days of the Babylonian system up until the destruction of the world system at the end of the period known as the Time of the Gentiles. This sequence develops to the time of the watchmen in Chapter 33. The period immediately before that is the period covered by the prophecies concerning the fall of Egypt. This period is the subject of the paper The Fall of Egypt (No. 36) The Prophecy of Pharaoh's Broken Arms.

Reference was made in this paper to the passage in Jeremiah 4:15ff. Jeremiah 4:15-16 contains a rather enigmatic statement.

Jeremiah 4:15-16 For a voice declares from Dan and proclaims evil from Mount E'phraim. ¹⁶ Warn the nations that he is coming; announce to Jerusalem, "Besiegers (watchers) come from a distant land; they shout against the cities of Judah. (RSV)

The footnote to the New Oxford Annotated Bible says of this and the subsequent passages:

13-18: Swiftly, like the eagle and the stormwind, the chariotry and cavalry of the enemy approach. Communiques trace this advance from Dan (8.16), through Mount Ephraim (central Palestine), Benjamin (6.1) into Judah's heartland.

19-22: Though the people are foolish and stupid (5.2-3), the prophet laments the sudden disaster which has destroyed his beloved land like the striking of a tent (10.19-21).

23-28: In a vision, the prophet sees the terrifying results of God's irrevocable judgement (7.16; 15.1-4). As if struck by a mighty nuclear bomb, the earth has been returned to its primeval state: waste and void (Gen 1.2).

29-31: Like a rejected prostitute (3.2-3), like a woman in the anguish of childbirth, like a victim helpless before her murderer, Jerusalem, the daughter of Zion, stretches out her hands in futile appeal and suffers her death throes- alone.

The references to nuclear weapons are not accidental slips of the pen.

The commentators know that Jerusalem was alone at this time because Israel had gone into captivity in 722 BCE. Dan and Ephraim were occupied by foreign vassal peoples who would not, and did not, support or warn Judah of anything. These people were enemies of Judah and remained enemies of Judah after the exile, during the Temple reconstruction mentioned in Ezra, Nehemiah, Haggai and Zechariah. This prophecy has a dual application.

The significance of Jeremiah is that it relates to the lead-up to the destruction of the Temple, which has its end-time application in the destruction of the Temple that is the elect. The elect cannot be destroyed as such, they are figuratively scattered, many being killed. This is the activity that Ezekiel takes up from Chapter 34 after the process of the watchmen in Chapter 33. The sequence should then be able to be seen from the end of the Time of the Gentiles, with the last fall of Egypt, to the concentration of Middle East powers we now see coming together as fundamentalist Islam. These are gathered for the release of the four great Angels at the Euphrates River (Rev. 9:15) for the Wars of the Last Days, so that they will kill a third of mankind. This process is explained in the papers The Fall of Egypt (No. 36) The Prophecy of Pharaoh's Broken Arms.

Modern secular scholarship attempts to reduce the power and scope of biblical prophecy by isolating the application of the references to fulfilment in the initial Babylonian invasions. The traditional argument is that the northern tribal area of Dan was first to be invaded and then Ephraim, and so on. The problem with this scenario is that when the prophecies were written, the northern tribes had already gone into captivity and were beyond the Araxes, having been taken there by the Assyrians. Shalmaneser (724-721 BCE) conquered the northern tribes in 722 BCE and relocated settlers from Cutha, Babylon, Hamath and other areas (e.g. Medes) (see Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Vol. 4, p. 191). Shalmaneser conquered Israel in 722 BCE.

But the major deportations occurred under Sargon II (McEvedy, The Century World History Factfinder, 1984, p. 20). Dan and Ephraim were gone by the time of the Babylonian invasion. Moreover, it is incorrect to say that the areas were reoccupied with Israelites in Dan and Ephraim -- they were not. The Samaritan view was that they were resettled in 722 BCE but they, as legitimate Israelites, were repatriated after 55 years, that is, in 667 BCE.

The Samaritans thus claimed to be descendants of the native Israelites mixed with the tribes put there as a deliberate process of political resettlement. The Samaritans claim to be the legitimate representatives, interpreting the texts of Deuteronomy 12:5 to make it appear as if God has chosen Mt. Gerizim, and altering Deuteronomy 27:4 with the curse from Mt. Ebal and the blessings from Mt. Gerizim. The Samaritan texts of the Ten Commandments enter a text, composed synthetically from Deuteronomy 27:2-8 and 11:30, to show that sacrifice is to occur on that mountain. Thus the Samaritan view has it that they had repatriated by 667 BCE and were in occupation of Israel at that time. The Jewish view is that they emphatically were not and that they are not Israelite. Judah cannot have it both ways. Israel was either not there and the prophecy relates to the Last Days or they were there and the Samaritans are Israelites with the true blessings.

There is no evidence that the Samaritans inherited the blessings of Ephraim and Manasseh. Indeed, the actions of Christ speak volumes in that He did not regard them as Israelite. Moreover, the interpretation of the Dead Sea Scrolls shows that the Jewish Community at the time of Christ held Ephraim and Manasseh to be separate and powerful nations in the Last Days. The Samaritans emphatically are not. The lost ten tribes were taken north of the Araxes and there is no biblical evidence that they were present in the time of Jeremiah and the Babylonian exile. Indeed, Jeremiah says that they were not. He says that God would cast Judah out as all the offspring of Ephraim had been cast out (Jer. 7:15). Moreover, Jeremiah 4:23ff. deals specifically with the Last Days and the desolation of the Earth and its cities. This prophecy forms a pivotal base for the Seventh-Day Adventist view of the heavenly rapture and the desolate Earth theory of the thousand years. They are wrong, in that they ignore the comment in verse 27 that the Lord will not make a full end. There is no dispute however that Jeremiah 4 has an apocalyptic application. Jeremiah develops a framework and then shows its progressive application from the fall of Judah under the Babylonians to the re-establishment in the Last Days. The prophecies therefore relate to another time which we will extract from the prophecies of the Bible. The intent of the message of Jeremiah 4:15 is that God speaks through Ephraim and not Judah in the Last Days, thus removing the priesthood. It is a fact of life that Christ removed the priesthood and placed it with a nation showing the fruits.

Jeremiah goes on to look at the failure of Israel to heed the warnings of His servants. The end-time example of this process is the symbolism of the Laodicean Church, which does not listen and also is so arrogant and self-righteous that it is spewed out of God's mouth (Rev. 3:14-22). Note the comments to the Laodiceans. Christ stands at the door and knocks. The advent of the Messiah over the last four Churches is progressively more imminent. With the Laodicean he is at the door. However, all four are present at his return. He sends his servants to the Laodiceans and they do not listen. Not only does the leadership fail among the Laodiceans, but also the elect at every level fail to act in accordance with the responsibilities laid down in Ezekiel 3 and 33. They are in such respect of persons and so materialistic, that they simply do not understand their nakedness. Think of how the elect will be judged for their respect of persons over the last fifty years.

Jeremiah looks at the process of warning the congregation in a number of significant passages.

Jeremiah 7:25-28 Since the day that your fathers came forth out of the land of Egypt unto this day I have even sent unto you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them: ²⁶ Yet they hearkened not unto me, nor inclined their ear, but hardened their neck: they did worse than their fathers. ²⁷Therefore thou shalt speak all these words unto them; but they will not hearken to thee: thou shalt also call unto them; but they will not answer thee. ²⁸ But thou shalt say unto them, This is a nation that obeyeth not the voice of the LORD their God, nor receiveth correction: truth is perished, and is cut off from their mouth. (KJV)

Thus the final casualty of the arrogant disobedience of Israel was truth. This situation is present in the Last Days with the Laodicean Church. That Church is not convicted by truth, neither in its ministry nor generally among the brethren.

The message of Jeremiah is first to Jerusalem, to Judah and then to Israel generally. The message is again taken up in Jeremiah 25:4-6.

Jeremiah 25:4-6 And the LORD hath sent unto you all his servants the prophets, rising early and sending them; but ye have not hearkened, nor inclined your ear to hear. ⁵They said, Turn ye again now every one from his evil way, and from the evil of your doings, and dwell in the land that the LORD hath given unto you and to your fathers for ever and ever: ⁶ And go not after other gods to serve them, and to worship them, and provoke me not to anger with the works of your hands; and I will do you no hurt. (KJV)

This message is repeated in Jeremiah 35:15. But the difference there is that there is a small remnant, the Rechabites, who followed the commandments of their father and of God. These were rewarded. This concept is also repeated in the Sons of Zadok who approximate the loyal minority of the elect in the Last Days. This concept formed the basis of the Qumran community and the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The comment that the Lord has sent His prophets rising early does not mean that the Lord gets up early. It means that the Lord sends His servants with sufficient time to do the job and repent. But they did not listen then (Jer. 25:7ff.) and they will not listen now (Isa. 26:15-18).

The message is repeated in Jeremiah 26:3-6.

Jeremiah 26:3-6 If so be they will hearken, and turn every man from his evil way, that I may repent me of the evil, which I purpose to do unto them because of the evil of their doings. ⁴ And thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the LORD; If ye will not hearken to me, to walk in my law, which I have set before you, ⁵ To hearken to the words of my servants the prophets, whom I sent unto you, both rising up early, and sending them, but ye have not hearkened; ⁶ Then will I make this house like Shiloh, and will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth. (KJV)

Shiloh (or Seilun) was where the Lord set His name at first (see Deut. 12:5,11 etc.; cf. 1Sam. 4:4) and which the Lord destroyed because of its wickedness (Jer. 7:12). The message here is to the elect also in that if the Lord would not spare His house what is the end of the nation itself. Note also the concept of being spared by repentance from early warning. This emphasises the importance of timely work by God's servants.

Jeremiah 29:18-19 also notes the concept of warning the nation.

Jeremiah 29:18-19 And I will persecute them with the sword, with the famine, and with the pestilence, and will deliver them to be removed to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a curse, and an astonishment, and an hissing, and a reproach, among all the nations whither I have driven them: ¹⁹Because they have not hearkened to my words, saith the LORD, which I sent unto them by my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them; but ye would not hear, saith the LORD. (KJV)

Note the fact that the punishments here are the same as the second, third and fourth seals of Revelation 6. Thus the end-time duality of application is also evident.

The comments also appear in Jeremiah 44:4-5.

Jeremiah 44:4-5 Howbeit I sent unto you all my servants the prophets, rising early and sending them, saying, Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate. ⁵ But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear to turn from their wickedness, to burn no incense unto other gods. (KJV)

The Law is the binding statute that the Lord uses to deal with the elect as well as the nation. This theme is taken up also in Zechariah 1:4-6.

Zechariah 1:4-6 Be ye not as your fathers, unto whom the former prophets have cried, saying, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Turn ye now from your evil ways, and from your evil doings: but they did not hear, nor hearken unto me, saith the LORD. ⁵Your fathers, where are they? and the prophets, do they live for ever? ⁶ But my words and my statutes, which I commanded my servants the prophets, did they not take hold of your fathers? and they returned and said, Like as the LORD of hosts thought to do unto us, according to our ways, and according to our doings, so hath he dealt with us. (KJV)

The end result is that there is a general failure to repent. But the Lord will spare our people if we do the work diligently and they repent. Much of the onus is on us. The Lord must not lay this charge at our door.

And I looked and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold: therefore Mine own arm brought salvation unto Me; and My fury it upheld Me (Isa. 63:5).

The text from Isaiah 63:1-8 is plainly Messianic. This text refers to the salvation of Israel because they would not lie. The love for the truth will again be restored in them.

However, when the Messiah comes it will not be through the actions of the Church that the world is saved or even vaguely successful. They will preach the gospel of the Kingdom of God. Then the end will come. However, Isaiah 26:15-21 shows the actions of physical and spiritual Israel.

Isaiah 26:15-21 Thou hast increased the nation, O LORD, thou hast increased the nation: thou art glorified: thou hadst removed it far unto all the ends of the earth. ¹⁶ LORD, in trouble have they visited thee, they poured out a prayer when thy chastening was upon them. ¹⁷ Like as a woman with child, that draweth near the time of her delivery, is in pain, and crieth out in her pangs; so have we been in thy sight, O LORD. ¹⁸ We have been with child, we have been in pain, we have as it were brought forth wind; we have not wrought any deliverance in the earth; neither have the inhabitants of the world fallen. ¹⁹Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs, and the earth shall cast out the dead. ²⁰ Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast. ²¹For, behold, the LORD cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain. (KJV)

This text is examined in greater detail in the paper The Fall of Egypt (No. 36) The Prophecy of Pharaoh’s Broken Arms.

The matter of interest here is that the text is plainly Messianic and relates to the Last Days and the separation of the elect during the tribulation. This passage relates to the harming of the Earth after the servants of the Lord were sealed (Rev. 7:3).

Firstly the elect have to be brought out, called and developed in the Spirit. Then, after the persecution of the Last Days, they are set aside at the coming of Messiah so that the world might be brought to repentance.

The significance of the process is that we are expected to do all that we can yet it will still not bring the world to repentance. However, whether the nation is dealt with severely or whether one nation alone or Israel alone is brought to repentance and is spared is perhaps dependent upon what we do. It is not by the success of our activities that we are finally judged. It is by our spiritual state. There is, however, no doubt that we have a job to do, and a big one at that.

It is absolutely unacceptable to attempt to write these prophecies off as not applying to the Last Days when they so plainly fit into patterns that lead up to the Millennium. The entire Bible can be written off as having happened centuries ago and as being irrelevant to the end times if the approach of applying secular commentaries is taken. The Bible interprets itself and there is a responsibility on us to be diligent stewards of the mysteries of God.

The gospel of the Kingdom of God is taught by example in daily living and by direct prophecy. They go hand in hand and cannot be separated in the execution of our duties. To attempt to do so is to attempt to avoid our duties in harsh situations. If we wish to preach smooth things now, when there is no threat or persecution, how will we stand when the Jordan is in flood? If we cannot contend with footmen, how can we run with horses in time of trial?

Jeremiah 12:5 "If you have raced with men on foot, and they have wearied you, how will you compete with horses? And if in a safe land you fall down, how will you do in the jungle of the Jordan? (RSV)

The elect are now in the safest time, relatively speaking, within the English-speaking world. Yet we do nothing and fail. We are discouraged by trifles in some instances and burden each other with weights we need not bear. The text in Jeremiah 12:6 goes on to say:

Jeremiah 12:6 For even your brothers and the house of your father, even they have dealt treacherously with you; they are in full cry after you; believe them not, though they speak fair words to you." (RSV)

Speaking smooth things is easy. Going to our brother is harder. Going to someone else's brother might get us killed. We must learn to run with horses when the Jordan is in flood.

The maxim of the soldier is, as you train so you fight. There is no difference between the rigours of the battle. Satan will fight with every weapon in his armoury. We have the Spirit of Truth and the word of God. We must now prepare to understand the mysteries of God as though our lives depend upon it. Ours might very well, and many of the people of our nation need to know the mysteries of God as they are brought to repentance.

The Servants of God

The texts in Isaiah at chapters 41 and 42 refer to the Servants of God that are the descendants of Jacob, God’s Servant and descendant of Abraham, God’s friend. Chapter 41 deals with the progeny of Jacob which is Israel as the servants of God and His prophets.

Isaiah 41:8 But thou Israel are my servant Jacob whom I have chosen the seed of Abraham my friend (cf. 2Chr. 20:7).

God established the Church through the nation of Israel and then established the prophets and the Messiah, and through the Messiah He established the church.

In Isaiah 42 the first three verses refer to the Messiah and are quoted in Matthew 12:17-21 and also refer to Isaiah 41:8. The text in Matthew 12:22ff then goes on to deal with the control and healing of the demons by the Messiah. The text from verse 31ff shows that the Holy Spirit is a result of the activities of the Messiah and that it is by blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and its misuse that judgment and condemnation occurs. For it is by Israel and the Messiah that salvation follows.

Isaiah 42:1-3 Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my Spirit upon him, he will bring forth justice to the nations.² He will not cry or lift up his voice, or make it heard in the street;³ a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will faithfully bring forth justice.

In verse 4ff. we see that it is through the Messiah that justice will be established and the coastlands wait for his law. Thus the law given to Moses by the Messiah as the Angel of the Presence is to be established forever by the Messiah. It is by the Lord God who is the creator of the heavens and the earth that the Messiah was sent to uphold the law and bring justice to the earth and give them breath and give the spirit to those that dwell in it. He sent Messiah as a covenant to the people, to be a light to the nations, to open the eyes of the blind and to set the prisoners free of those who sit in darkness.

⁴ He will not fail or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth; and the coastlands wait for his law. ⁵ Thus says God, the LORD, who created the heavens and stretched them out, who spread forth the earth and what comes from it, who gives breath to the people upon it and spirit to those who walk in it: ⁶ "I am the LORD, I have called you in righteousness, I have taken you by the hand and kept you; I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations, ⁷ to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness. ⁸I am the LORD, that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to graven images. ⁹ Behold, the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth I tell you of them."

It is from this text we know that God has declared the end from the beginning and before they spring forth He declares them. This He does through His servants the prophets.

The declarations commenced from the Assyrian systems under Sennacharib and from there through the Assyro-Babylonians as we saw in Chapters 10 and 37. The prophets commenced to deal from Assyria and then through the empires of the Babylonians and on to the Medes and Persians and the Greeks and the Romans, and then to Holy Roman Empire and the Empire of the Last Days as the Empire of the Ten Toes which is destroyed forever by the Messiah as foretold by Daniel chapter 2 and the subsequent chapters.

So through His new song and declarations His praise is declared from the ends of the earth. The seas will roar and the desert and its cities will lift up their voices and give praise to the Lord and shout from the tops of the mountains. It is in these lands that God will bring the covenant to fruition and the demons will seek to frustrate it.

¹⁰Sing to the LORD a new song, his praise from the end of the earth! Let the sea roar and all that fills it, the coastlands and their inhabitants. ¹¹ Let the desert and its cities lift up their voice, the villages that Kedar inhabits; let the inhabitants of Sela [the rock] sing for joy, let them shout from the top of the mountains. ¹² Let them give glory to the LORD, and declare his praise in the coastlands.

It is the sons of Kedar that are the sons of Ishmael and the Bedouin or Arab tribes as they now stand and also the sons of Esau as they now exist. These lands extend from the River of Egypt to the mountain of the Kurds and the Arabian Peninsular. It is in these end days that He stirs His fury and sends the Messiah to subjugate the nations. By the destruction of the Middle East God will educate these blind guides and destroy their lands to bring them into captivity. Their symbol of the crescent moon of the goddess Easter or Ishtar or Ashtoreth will be destroyed. So also their false calendar will be brought into line with the true Calendar as it should have been (see the Hebrew and Islamic Calendar Reconciled (No. 053)).

¹³ The LORD goes forth like a mighty man, like a man of war he stirs up his fury; he cries out, he shouts aloud, he shows himself mighty against his foes. ¹⁴ For a long time I have held my peace, I have kept still and restrained myself; now I will cry out like a woman in travail, I will gasp and pant.¹⁵ I will lay waste mountains and hills, and dry up all their herbage; I will turn the rivers into islands, and dry up the pools.

The long time that the Lord has held His peace and restrained Himself was over the forty jubilees in the wilderness and now it has come to an end. God will lead the blind in the way that they know not and will guide them and turn their darkness into light and their rough places into level ground. The salvation of the nations will be undertaken by Messiah as God has directed and He will not forsake them.

¹⁶ And I will lead the blind in a way that they know not, in paths that they have not known I will guide them. I will turn the darkness before them into light, the rough places into level ground. These are the things I will do, and I will not forsake them.

The false worshippers will be forced to turn back and they shall be utterly put to shame, as will the false worshippers who trust in graven images and false images of a pseudo Messiah on a sun cross with long hair and a forked or trimmed beard. So also those with idols of saints and the virgin mother goddess, who pray to the false gods. This text is directed specifically at the Israel of God who has allowed its religious system to be corrupted with these idols and false systems and Babylonian sun cults. Its people claim God but rob Him ceaselessly by withholding tithes. His name is on their lips and their hearts are far from Him and it is they that lie and preach the love of Messiah and do nothing of what he says. They are fakes and liars and thieves as we are told by God through the prophet Malachi. The test of the return to God is to tithe, for if you do not tithe you rob God and are a fake (Mal. 3:1-5; 6-15).

Who are these liars and thieves in the Israel of God?

· They are those who worship on the days of the Sun and disregard the Sabbath, New Moons and Feasts of God as laid down by the Bible.

· They are those who keep the false Calendars of the Jews and the Hillel system with its Babylonian intercalations.

· They are those who claim God but do not keep the Calendar of God (No. 156).

· They are those who disobey God and keep the festivals of the sun cults as Christmas and Easter instead of the Feasts of God and disobey Jeremiah 10:1-9.

· They are those who follow priests in black cassocks as they did the Khemarim of the Sun cults.

· They are those who rob God in his three offerings a year at the feasts and in the tithes who espouse the Love of God but are disloyal to both the Church and the laws of God.

· They are those who fail to identify the true Church of God and persecute the brethren who try to obey God.

· They are those who purport to serve God and shout from the rooftops but are disloyal to the Church of God as identified by the Law and the Testimony.

The problem is identified by Isaiah chapter 42:17-22.

¹⁷ They shall be turned back and utterly put to shame, who trust in graven images, who say to molten images, "You are our gods." ¹⁸ Hear, you deaf; and look, you blind, that you may see! ¹⁹ Who is blind but my servant, or deaf as my messenger whom I send? Who is blind as my dedicated one, or blind as the servant of the LORD? ²⁰ He sees many things, but does not observe them; his ears are open, but he does not hear. ²¹ The LORD was pleased, for his righteousness' sake, to magnify his law and make it glorious. ²² But this is a people robbed and plundered, they are all of them trapped in holes and hidden in prisons; they have become a prey with none to rescue, a spoil with none to say, "Restore!"

So God asks the questions as to who among His people will listen and see and hear and save Jacob from the destruction that God has dealt to His people.

²³ Who among you will give ear to this, will attend and listen for the time to come? ²⁴Who gave up Jacob to the spoiler, and Israel to the robbers? Was it not the LORD, against whom we have sinned, in whose ways they would not walk, and whose law they would not obey? ²⁵ So he poured upon him the heat of his anger and the might of battle; it set him on fire round about, but he did not understand; it burned him, but he did not take it to heart.

So God puts His people to the sword so that they might be saved.

He sent to them His servants the prophets and the Church of God that is true and the final voice of the Last Days to warn of the coming of the Messiah and to save His people from their own arrogance and hypocrisy.

We are warned of this event through the prophet Jeremiah and we will listen or be destroyed.

Remember we are to return to the Lord and the sign of that return is by the identification of the true Church of God and the keeping of the Passover with that church and the payment of the tithes and offerings to that Church in the service of God for the warning of the last days.

We return to God and the nations will bless themselves in Him.

Warning for the End Times

The return to God is based firstly on the removal of abominations from among the people and the warning is to Israel firstly and then to Judah. It is by the circumcision of the hearts that Israel is saved and the nations are blessed in the God of Israel. Israel is warned first and then Judah is occupied by God’s Witnesses and then the Messiah. It is first to Israel and then to Judah from Jerusalem that the sequence is proclaimed.

Jeremiah 4:1-31 "If you return, O Israel, says the LORD, to me you should return. If you remove your abominations from my presence, and do not waver, ² and if you swear, `As the LORD lives,' in truth, in justice, and in uprightness, then nations shall bless themselves in him, and in him shall they glory." ³ For thus says the LORD to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem: "Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns. ⁴ Circumcise yourselves to the LORD, remove the foreskin of your hearts, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; lest my wrath go forth like fire, and burn with none to quench it, because of the evil of your doings."

The proclamation is of evil and great destruction that comes from the North. It is the prophecies of Revelation when the angels are released from the pit that were kept at Euphrates so that a third of the world shall be destroyed in the wars of the Fifth and Sixth trumpets. So also must Judah be purged of its Kabbalistic Mysticism as Israel is purged of its Babylonian Mysteries and sun cults. All must be cleaned and purged with hyssop. Then they are prepared for the wars of the end.

⁵ Declare in Judah, and proclaim in Jerusalem, and say, "Blow the trumpet through the land; cry aloud and say, `Assemble, and let us go into the fortified cities!' ⁶ Raise a standard toward Zion, flee for safety, stay not, for I bring evil from the north, and great destruction.⁷ A lion has gone up from his thicket, a destroyer of nations has set out; he has gone forth from his place to make your land a waste; your cities will be ruins without inhabitant. ⁸For this gird you with sackcloth, lament and wail; for the fierce anger of the LORD has not turned back from us." ⁹"In that day, says the LORD, courage shall fail both king and princes; the priests shall be appalled and the prophets astounded."

It is in those days that the princes, priests and prophets will be astonished because they had no understanding of just how far they had fallen into the Sun cults and the Babylonian Mysteries. Their priests and rabbis have to be purged and cleansed of their idolatry and falsehood.

The coming of the wars of the end are prophesied firstly by the voice of Dan/Ephraim that warns of the coming of the Messiah and the Wars of the End that besiege the cities of Judah. So the smooth words spoken by the prophets are lies and Israel and Judah are deceived.

¹⁰ Then I said, "Ah, Lord GOD, surely thou hast utterly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, `It shall be well with you'; whereas the sword has reached their very life."

The judgment of God is sent upon them and ruin is upon them. Modern warfare is inflicted upon them.

¹¹ At that time it will be said to this people and to Jerusalem, "A hot wind from the bare heights in the desert toward the daughter of my people, not to winnow or cleanse, ¹² a wind too full for this comes for me. Now it is I who speak in judgment upon them." ¹³ Behold, he comes up like clouds, his chariots like the whirlwind; his horses are swifter than eagles -- woe to us, for we are ruined!

God warns them through his last prophets to repent and cleanse themselves from wickedness that they may be saved. The final voice is from Joseph in the combined tribes of Dan/Ephraim that is the Joseph of Revelation chapter 7. This voice is the warning of the final Church of God of the Philadelphians in the Last Days (see the paper The Pillars of Philadelphia (No. 283)).

¹⁴ O Jerusalem, wash your heart from wickedness, that you may be saved. How long shall your evil thoughts lodge within you? ¹⁵ For a voice declares from Dan and proclaims evil from Mount Ephraim. ¹⁶ Warn the nations that he is coming; announce to Jerusalem, "Besiegers come from a distant land; they shout against the cities of Judah.

Note the voice of prophecy warns the nations that he is coming. The “He” here is the Messiah. The nations are the entire nations of the earth. In that time the watchers or besiegers come from a distant land and they shout against the cities of Judah. The term watchers is not the same word as the word used for the heavenly host. This action occurs at the return of the Messiah and heralds the battles of Armageddon (see the papers War of Hamon-Gog (No. 294) and also Advent of the Messiah Part I (No. 210A) and Part II (No. 210B)).

¹⁷ Like keepers of a field are they against her round about, because she has rebelled against me, says the LORD. ¹⁸Your ways and your doings have brought this upon you. This is your doom, and it is bitter; it has reached your very heart." ¹⁹ My anguish, my anguish! I writhe in pain! Oh, the walls of my heart! My heart is beating wildly; I cannot keep silent; for I hear the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. ²⁰ Disaster follows hard on disaster, the whole land is laid waste. Suddenly my tents are destroyed, my curtains in a moment. ²¹ How long must I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet? ²² "For my people are foolish, they know me not; they are stupid children, they have no understanding. They are skilled in doing evil, but how to do good they know not."

This text shows just how false and misguided the people of Israel are in their religious understanding and the worst is at Jerusalem with these people who say they are Jews but are not and who lie. They have no understanding and have corrupted the Calendar of Judaism through their traditions and postponements and they have corrupted the Churches of God with this abomination of Hillel and their priests and rabbis will die because of it. By the coming of the Messiah there will not be one rabbi or priest left alive that is keeping Hillel and the postponements and traditions.

War will ensue and will continue on to utter devastation so that the earth will again become tohu and bohu and the heavens have no light. This was as we saw in Joel.

It was this text that forced the false prophetess Ellen G White to declare the desolate earth theory and the heavenly investigative judgment and to declare Satan being confined to a desolate earth which is utter heresy. See the papers The Millennium and the Rapture (No. 095); The Pre-Advent Judgment (No. 176) and False Prophecy (No. 269). It is the text that says I looked and there was no man that appears to have thrown those who wished to see what they wanted to be so. It also says that all the birds of the air had fled. The fruitful land was a desert and all the cities were laid in ruins before the fierce anger of the Lord.

However the Lord made a declaration in verse 27 which makes it all clear that the Lord will not make a full end. The people will be among the rocks and not in the cities and at this time the Babylonian whore will be entirely destroyed.

²³ I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void; and to the heavens, and they had no light. ²⁴ I looked on the mountains, and lo, they were quaking, and all the hills moved to and fro. ²⁵ I looked, and lo, there was no man, and all the birds of the air had fled. ²⁶ I looked, and lo, the fruitful land was a desert, and all its cities were laid in ruins before the LORD, before his fierce anger. ²⁷ For thus says the LORD, "The whole land shall be a desolation; yet I will not make a full end. ²⁸For this the earth shall mourn, and the heavens above be black; for I have spoken, I have purposed; I have not relented nor will I turn back." ²⁹At the noise of horseman and archer every city takes to flight; they enter thickets; they climb among rocks; all the cities are forsaken, and no man dwells in them. ³⁰And you, O desolate one, what do you mean that you dress in scarlet, that you deck yourself with ornaments of gold, that you enlarge your eyes with paint? In vain you beautify yourself. Your lovers despise you; they seek your life. ³¹ For I heard a cry as of a woman in travail anguish as of one bringing forth her first child, the cry of the daughter of Zion gasping for breath, stretching out her hands, "Woe is me! I am fainting before murderers."

It is at this time that the daughter of Zion shall give birth and the Millennial system will come into operation. The murderers of Israel are not just the killers of men but of women and the women who abort their young and those who sell bodies for spare parts and they will be judged and put to the sword along with their false priests.

Christian Churches of God

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