Edition 65. 19th December 2010
In this edition:
●The great restoration
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The great restoration:
Renovation, restoration and renewal is coming.
If you say you love our Lord, that's good. Here are some signs of someone who really does love our Lord: They will be holy and have a desire to be more holy. They will hate sin, evil and obstructions to God's work. They will see, love and partake in God's work. They will know Him and His word and keep His word. If they have been side tracked by the devil, they will want to put it right.
Acts 3:19-23 "Repent therefore and be converted that your sins may be blotted out and times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord and He may send Jesus Christ whom was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, that God has spoken by the mouth of His holy prophets since the world began."
Let's have a look at what this "restoration" is, when and how it is coming and what our response should be now.
Firstly the above verses assume that a restoration of all things is coming either at or just before the Second Coming. That's not too far from now.
The Bible also makes it clear that this restoration is going to be of "all things."
We can safely assume that at the Second Coming, the Millennium will be set up. This thousand year rule of Christ will most certainly be the complete "restoration of all things."
All the governments of the world will be destroyed, all evil will be gone. Satan will be bound, and perfect, radically changed environment will be here.
But there is another aspect to this restoration that we need to look at. Restoration of many things is in fact starting now. God is at work restoring a great many things now, just before the Second Coming. It's really exciting!
Restoration presumes that the subject of the restoration is broken.
Let's identify what has been broken and will be restored in our day:
●The church is broken. It is divided against itself. It is full of occult traditions. A new holiness in the church is desperately needed.
●The return of the Jews to their Messiah in repentance and a new holiness.
●Restoration of the whole land of Israel and all of Jerusalem to the Jews. Both houses of Israel and the lost tribes will be restored. This is beautifully portrayed in the prophecy of dry bones. (Ezekiel 36)
●Restoration of the temple on the temple mount.
●Restoration of revival, evangelism and the lost being saved. It's a logical presumption that when the church is in its restored and proper state that the power of God will be restored in a greater dimension to the church. The great end-time revival will occur in association with revival within the church
The great and terrible restoration:
It will be a terrible time in history just before the coming of Messiah for those not open to God's work.
Isaiah 13:6-11 "Wail for the day of the Lord is at hand. It will come as destruction from the almighty, therefore all hands will be limp, every man's heart will melt and they will be afraid, pangs and sorrows will take hold of them; they will be in pain as a woman in childbirth; they will be amazed one with another, their faces will be like flames. Behold the day of the Lord comes, cruel with both wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate and He will destroy it's sinners from it. I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity; I will halt the arrogance of the proud and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible."
Matthew 13:41-42 "The son of man will send forth His angles and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father."
Psalm 102: 8 "My enemies reproach me all day long and those who deride me swear an oath against me." verse13: "You will arise and have mercy on Zion for the time to favour her, yes the set time has come.
Psalm 102:16-18 "For (lit- when) the Lord shall build up Zion He shall appear in His glory...This will be written for a generation to come." (lit-the last)
Derek Prince commented on this Psalm above: "God is speaking here to the Gentile nations. He is saying "I'm planning to restore My Jewish people to the land that I gave them and to salvation. If you come against or hinder Me, I will treat you as My enemies."
Jeremiah 6:17-18 " I have set watchmen over you saying 'Listen to the sound of the trumpet !' But they said 'We will not listen.' Therefore hear you nations...I will bring calamity on this people."
The above verse is a tragedy. It shows that God has warned people time and again, but many will not listen.
Malachi 3:2 "But who can endure in the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He is like a refiners fire."
Zechariah 13:4 "I will bring the one third through the fire, which will refine them as silver is refined and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name and I will answer them. I will say this is My people; and each one will say, the Lord is my God."
God will restore the church:
The feasts of the Lord, the Sabbath, Passover and other Biblical convocations have been lost from the church and replaced with many Roman convocations and traditions, born in Babylon and Egypt. These were designed by Satan to change and "Romanise" the church to keep the Jews from the church. This then continues the times of the Gentiles, (Luke 21:24) which itself delays salvation going to the Jews. (Romans 11:26) This of course delays the Second Coming, simply because the coming of the Lord is in association with the salvation of the Jews.
The return of our Lord sees the defeat of Satan and his world. Obviously Satan wants to prolong his time. When the times of the Gentiles are completed salvation comes to the Jews en-mass. So, if Satan can keep the Jews from salvation he is also preventing the Second Coming and prolonging his own time as god of the world.
Can you see why a church restored to the truth is so important?
Ephesians 5:27 "He might present to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish."
2 Corinthians 11:2 "For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy, for I have betrothed you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ."
2 Corinthians 6:17 "Come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord, do not touch what is unclean, and I will receive you."
The heart of modern Christianity is rooted in the Council of Nicea in 325 AD. All Jews were banned from Nicea. This was where a new Roman flavoured church was born. The early church was born in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Nicea banned the baptism of the Spirit and birthed an idolatrous church.
There are two women contrasted in the Revelation. The one is a beautiful woman in pure white, representing saved Israel. The other is a whore in scarlet riding a beast, filled with idolatry, representing the Catholic church and much of the modern church. Interestingly, the whore removed the feasts and changed the Sabbath, replacing them with idolatry and the woman in white does no such thing.
God will restore the church to the way it was before Nicea.
God will restore Israel to Himself:
Jeremiah 50:6 "My people have been lost sheep. Their shepherds have led them astray"
Jeremiah 31:10 "Here the word of the Lord O nations (Gentile) and declare it in the Isles afar off and say, 'He who scattered Israel will gather him and keep him as a shepherd does his flock."
Hosea 14:4-8 "I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely, for my anger has turned away from him. I will be like the dew to Israel. He will grow like the lily and lengthen his roots like Lebanon. His branches shall spread. His beauty shall be like the olive tree...Ephraim shall say, what have we to do with idols anymore?"
Jeremiah 31:21 "Set up signposts, make landmarks; set your heart towards the highway, the way in which you went, turn back O virgin of Israel, turn back to these your cities."
Jeremiah 50:4-5 "In those days, the children of Israel shall come; with continual weeping they will come and seek the Lord their God. They shall ask the way to Zion saying 'Come let us join ourselves to the Lord in a perpetual covenant that will not be forgotten."
Jeremiah15:19-21 "If you return, then I will bring you back; You shall stand before Me if you take out the precious from the vile, you shall be as My mouth. Let them return to you, but you must not return to them and I will make you to this people a fortified bronze wall and they will fight against you but will not prevail...I will deliver you from the hand of the wicked."
Jeremiah 31:28 "It shall come to pass that as I have watched over them (Israel) to pluck up to break down to throw down to destroy and to afflict, so I will watch over them to build and to plant says the Lord...Behold the days are coming says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah."
A new Temple will be built on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem very soon. For those interested in this great subject see www.templeinstitute.org
Here are some of the new Temple implements that have recently been made and are now waiting and ready for the coming Temple (below)
Isaiah 2:2-3 "It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on top of the mountain and shall be exalted above the hills and all nations shall flow to it. Many shall come and say, let us go up to the house of the God of Jacob..."
Interestingly when David liberated Jerusalem, it took one generation for the building of Solomon's Temple. Jerusalem was restored to Jewish control in 1967. It could be very soon until Temple construction. (See edition 5 for more)
The new church:
Here is a big shock for many. God is leaving you behind! Yes He is. He is moving forward with a truly wonderful new work.
Restoration must be to God's pattern and plan. His plan is to create one new glorious church that is not divided. It will be in unity, with those not in agreement left out. It will have all of the pagan, occult influences removed. It will be a church that is welcoming to the Jew and Hebraic in character. It will be just like the early church was before the advent of Constantine and the Catholics.
Jeremiah 6:16 "Stand in the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths where the good way is and walk in it; then you will find rest for your souls."
The real Messianic movement consists of Jews and Gentiles. This is the Abrahamic expression of faith.
The true Messianic believer is trans-covenant, having both the old and new in operation. In the early church, Gentiles were never required to convert to Judaism. But they were Sabbath, Passover and feast observers. The Catholic church re-constructed the church led by Satan, to keep it separate from the Jews and to keep them out of the church. For many years the Jews and those who remained faithful to the pure doctrine of the early church were seen as "enemies of the empire".
There is big difference between legalistically keeping days and traditions and observing or honouring the days, feasts and convocations of the Lord. We don't come under a legalistic spirit, but we do what our Lord commands.
The true Messianic believer is God's new work. Members are Jews, Gentiles, ex-Muslims, Arabs, Zulus and everything in between. There is no single leader, organisation or central body. Some have tried to take control of it, but all have failed. The Holy Spirit Himself is building and leading this wonderful new expression of faith. Our source of unity is the Bible itself.
The Messianic movement is closely involved with the largest revival of Jews since the days of the early church. Never before have so many Jews come to know their Messiah and it's early days! Many Jews are finding that Yeshua / Jesus is not a Gentile false prophet.
When the Jews find out that Yeshua / Jesus never destroyed the Torah, but fulfilled it and kept all the feasts, Passover and the Sabbath and when they find out He was born on Sukkot and not on the Babylonian birthday of the sun, and when they find out that He was crucified on Passover...then they see with new eyes.
Many Jews will spit before walking into a church. Few will. They feel warmly welcome in Messianic fellowships.
The church is now being restored in preparation for the coming of Messiah, where He will enter Jerusalem through the Golden Gate and set up His rule and reign in the new rebuilt Temple.
The Catholic church had no authority to change the Sabbath and Passover to Easter (which is the name of a Babylonian sex-goddess) They had no authority to introduce Christ Mass and no authority to declare babies saved at infant baptism.
If your church leaves out a whole lot of Bible truth it is doing you a huge injustice. If it adds to it's gospel things not in the Bible or things commanded against in the Bible it is doing you an even greater injustice.
Revelation 22:18 "For I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his part from the Book of Life, from the holy city and from the things written in this book.
Deuteronomy 4:2 "You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take away anything from it, that you may keep the commands of the Lord your God which I commanded you."
Today there is a great multitude of believers who are not happy in their traditional churches. Many don't know why. They just feel as though there is something missing. They are quite right. (By the way it's not just the traditional churches either!) The pastors and teachers are not preaching from the Bhagavad Gita. They use the Bible. But it's what is not being preached that's the problem.
Things commanded by our Lord have been ignored and things commanded against are observed.
The Messianic movement is far from perfect, but it rejects everything the Bible condemns and affirms what the Bible affirms. You can see this clearly by the fact that it is hated by those bound in tradition. The Messianic movement is like returning to your first love!
Isaiah 66:17 "Those who sanctify themselves and purify themselves shall go to the gardens."
Summary:
God is going to restore all things to the way they should be. What wonderful words those are. In the process God is going to destroy all things that offend and are wrong. It's going to happen in fullness.
The big question is; if it's going to happen , why wait, when there is so much that can be done now?
Well, you can wait if you like, but you will be delaying the inevitable! That's not very clever.
Some of course, won't change. They are bound in traditionalism. They are in God's way and will get run over.
Daniel 11:35 "Some of those of understanding shall fall, to refine them, and to make them white, until the time of the end; for it is still for the appointed time."
Daniel 12:10 "Many shall be purified, made white and refined, but the wicked shall do wickedly and none of the wicked shall understand, but the wise will understand."
Heaven or hell:
Dear old lady, you look as though life has given you a hard time. When you die it could get a lot harder, or it could be the greatest relief you could ever imagine! There's a new life waiting for you. God has an amazing plan for you even though your life is almost over. What a tragedy it would be if you miss that plan and it's glorious consequenses.
Hi Mam. Guess what? Your kingdom is about to be taken over. Yes it is and you will no longer be queen. Yeshua/Jesus is going to destroy your kingdom and take over complete ruler ship. He won't be ruling from Buckingham Palace either. Are you ready to receive Him at His coming? You may be queen, but you still need to get saved. If not you may find that your eternal abode is with Adolf, Mussolini, Napoleon and others. Wouldn't that be a turn of events!
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Here is a beautiful painting by Rembrandt of Jeremiah the weeping prophet.
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Kind regards and many blessings...Shalom and grow in grace!
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