To defeat the censors CMN has added "Push Notifications" - When a pop up window asks if you want this, say yes!

CMN ON BOARD LIVE STREAM AUDIO PLAYER

56K

32K

Click to listen live

2nd 32K

 

Christian Media

Communiqué

SEQUENCING SALVATION

Part III

 

 

 

 

 

The Sequencing Salvation series has dealt with the formation of Spiritual Israel, which is the body of Christ. At the same time, we have treated on how the two Spiritual entities of Death and Hell shifted their positions in response to the salvation in Christ which displaced them. Further, in seeking to affirm what the LORD has revealed concerning the Eternal Life which humankind receives when they turn to God through JESUS CHRIST, we invariably contradict the many false presumptions which exist in the fragmented church of our time.

One of the false traditions which is re-synchronized through a realization of the truth is found in the book of Revelation, in the passage where Christ opens a door into heaven, and invites people to come up to join Him in the kingdom of God:

 

"After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said, come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter" (Revelation 4:1).

 

The false doctrinal system of Dispensationalism, which teaches the LORD dispenses salvation during time periods they've dubbed "dispensations," claims this passage refers to the so called Rapture of the Church – an event that is supposedly followed by another Jewish "dispensation," in which the LORD finally keeps His promise to save Israel.

 

Riddled with inconsistencies, the Rapture Cult (which developed in 19^th Century England) borrowed the idea of the faithful being removed before a great conflagration from Egyptian Gnostic documents written before Jesus was born (see The Culting Of Christianity by James Lloyd). The deadliest error in the system amounts to a denial that Jesus is the Christ, as it indirectly negates the fact the fulfillment of the prophecies concerning the Saviour – including the redemption of Israel – were accomplished by the death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. The Apostle Paul explicitly stated that Jesus fulfilled His prophetic role – which included forgiving Israel of their sins if they turned to Christ – with His death and resurrection.

 

"The God of this people chose our fathers [and] raised unto them David to be their king…Of this man's seed that God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus…[and] they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets…have fulfilled them in condemning him. And though they found no cause of death in him, yet desired they Pilate that he should be slain. And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a sepulchre. But God raised him from the dead" (Acts 13:17, 22, 23, 27-30).

 

By claiming the fulfillment of Israel's promised salvation has yet to be fulfilled, millions have failed to recognize the Scriptures teach the Old Testament prophecies were given so people chosen by the Father would be able to recognize Him as the promised redeemer.

 

In this regard, Peter said "the more sure word of prophecy" is even more reliable than what the disciples actually saw occur:

 

"…..[we] were eyewitnesses of his majesty…when there came such a voice…And this voice which came from heaven we heard, when we were with him in the holy mount. We have also a more sure word of prophecy [from]…holy men of God [who] spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" (II Peter 1:16-19, 21).

 

All the Old Testament prophets indicated when Messiah arrives, He would save Israel from their sins. This belief extends into the New Testament as well. For example, when the crowd greeted Jesus entering Jerusalem, they shouted Hosanna (which means Save Now).

 

"And the multitudes that went before, and that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna to the Son of David: Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest" (Matthew 21:9).

 

Another example is found in the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, who had not yet realized that Christ was risen from the dead.

 

"...we trusted that it had been he which should have redeemed Israel" (Luke 24:21).

 

Any "believer" asserting that God has not saved Israel by translating His chosen into "a Spiritual house" (I Peter 2:5, Colossians 1:13) is, in actuality, denying that Jesus is the Christ. This is the type of "denial" that is meant by the following verse:

 

"Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son" (I John 2:22).

 

Through a deceitful doctrinal sleight of hand, many who profess Christ say that God will yet save Israel (after the fictional Rapture of the Church), when the Bible says this position actually denies the Father as well as the Son, who sent the prophets to testify of the Son, so Israel would know their salvation was at hand.  

 

"…this is the witness of God which he hath testified of his Son….he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son" (I John 5:9, 10).

 

That "record" says the following:

 

"He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities…and with his stripes we are healed" (Isaiah 53:5).

 

The Apostle Paul explains that redeemed Israel is now a Spiritual body, as opposed to the Flesh and Blood Israel which rejected Jesus.

 

"For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is…circumcision [the mark of being one of God's chosen people], which is outward in the flesh: but he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit" (Romans 2:28, 29).

 

As we have repeatedly shown, "believers" caught in the Rapture Cult – especially those who reject the truth when they are exposed to it -- manifest the fact they are deceived by their tactics, which include deception. The Bible shows the use of deceit is intrinsic to the entity known as the False Prophet, seen in Revelation.

 

"And [that Spirit] deceiveth them that dwell on the earth" (Revelation 13:14).

 

Those who consider themselves to be in the faith, but refuse to hear the Spirit of the LORD, demonstrate their double-minded nature when they assert they love Jesus – who is the truth – even as they reject the truth when they hear it. Such individuals look like a lamb (representing a believer), but they speak as dragons.

 

"And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon" (Revelation 13:11)

 

The previous installments of Sequencing Salvation detailed how the Spirit imaged as the False Prophet is the Spirit of Hell – commonly seen in association with the Antichrist Spirit, which is associated with Death. The Scriptures widely utilize such prophetic metaphor, and "Hell" – the Spirit of the False Prophet – is the gateway to "Death," even as that wicked spirit "causes" those who dwell on the earth to follow the first beast, or Death.

 

"And [he] causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast…" (Revelation 13:12).

 

Our last installment showed how the Spirit of Hell, residing in the Jewish priesthood, sought to invoke Death, which was nested in the Gentile Roman leader, Pontius Pilate. However, after the cross of Christ, the born again part of humanity were indwelled by the Life inherent in Spiritual Israel, even as the roles of Death and Hell were inverted.

The characteristics of deception, which evidence the Spirit of Hell within, are now found in the Christian Church, and the Death once found in the Old Covenant era physical Gentiles, now resides in flesh and blood Israel, as well as the nations who are apart from Christ. The transition wherein the Spirit of Death in the Gentiles (and the Spirit of Hell in the Jews) is reversed, begins to be seen just after the Gentiles are brought into the body of Spiritual Israel.

 

As we follow the sequence, in Acts chapter 9 we learn the Apostle Paul incurred the ire of the Gentiles in presenting the Gospel, and they sought to kill him.

 

"And [Paul] spake boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and disputed against the Grecians: but they went about to slay him" (Acts 9:29).

 

In the next chapter, the Holy Spirit is bestowed on the Gentiles in the presence of the Apostle Peter, and immediately after that, a deceitful opposition to the calling of the Gentiles emerges among those of Jewish descent in the church.

 

"And when Peter was come up to Jerusalem, they that were of the circumcision contended with him" (Acts 11:2).

 

As the LORD began to draw many Gentiles into the body of Spiritual Israel, we see another evidence of the transition in Herod, the king of the Jews. The reader will recall that in part two of Sequencing Salvation, we showed how Herod was identified with the Spirit of Hell as he turned JESUS over to the Gentile Pontius Pilate, representing the Spirit of Death. Obviously Jesus Christ, inhabited by the Life of God, opposes Death and Hell in the triune architecture of the Spirit.

 

The symbiotic relationship between Death (in Pilate and the Romans) and Hell (in Herod and the Jews) was accentuated, as Christ's path towards His crucifixion and resurrection was then well underway.

 

"And the same day Pilate [Death] and Herod [Hell] were made friends together: for before they were at enmity between themselves" (Luke 23:12).

 

However, after Christ was resurrected, and the Gentiles were added to the body of Christ in Spiritual Israel, we see the half Jewish Herod is the one who manifests Death, as he moves against the Life residing in the Christians.

 

"Now about that time Herod the king stretched forth his hands to vex certain of the church. And he killed James the brother of John with the sword" (Acts 12:1, 2).

 

We previously noted how Herod, then representing Hell and Torment in his mistreatment of JESUS in Luke 23:11, cooperated with Pilate as the Gentile governor who executed Jesus. As the Life in Spiritual Israel continued to grow, the convergence of the Spirit of Death and Hell occurred again, and the role reversal continued to progress. After Herod killed James, we see he was encouraged because his actions caused the Jewish priests, who previously hated him, to respond by drawing closer to him.

 

"And because he saw it pleased the Jews, he proceeded to take Peter also" (Acts 12:3).

 

 [To Be Continued]

 

-- James Lloyd

_______________________________________