Steps Of an Unknown Writer

THE APOCRYPHAL/DEUTEROCANONICAL BOOKS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT

NEW REVISED STANDARD VERSION

2 Esdras 2:33-41 Ezra on Mount Horeb (Mt. Horeb is in S.W. Saudi Arabia in ancient Midian, where Moses saw the Burning Bush and where Moses received the Ten Commandments…also known as Mt. Sinai)

I, Ezra, received a command from the Lord on Mount Horeb to go to Israel. When I came to them they rejected me and refused the Lord’s commandment. Therefore I say to you, O nations that hear and understand, “Wait for your shepherd;” he will give you everlasting rest, because he who will come at the end of the age is close at hand.

Be ready for the rewards of the kingdom, because perpetual light will shine on you forevermore. Flee from the shadow of this age, receive the joy of your glory; I publicly call on my savior as witness. Receive what the Lord has entrusted to you and be joyful, giving thanks to him who has called you to the celestial kingdom.

Rise, stand erect and see the number of those who have been sealed at the feast of the Lord. Those who have departed from the shadow of this age have received glorious garments from the Lord. Take again your full number, O Zion, and close the list of your people who are clothed in white, who have fulfilled the law of the Lord.

The number of your children, whom you desired, is now complete; implore the Lord’s authority that your people, who have been called from the beginning, may be made holy.

Amen.

2 Esdras 2:42-48 Ezra Sees the Son of God

I, Ezra, saw on Mount Zion a great multitude that I could not number, and they all were praising the Lord with songs. In their midst was a young man of great stature, taller than any of the others, and on the head of each of them he placed a crown, but he was more exalted than they. And I was held spellbound. Then I asked an angel, “Who are these, my lord?” He answered and said to me,”These are they who have put off mortal clothing and have put on the immortal, and have confessed the name of God. Now they are being crowned, and receive palms.”

Then I said to the angel, “Who is that young man who is placing crowns on them and putting palms in their hands?” He answered and said to me,”He is the Son of God, whom they confessed in the world.” So I began to praise those who had stood valiantly for the name of the Lord. Then the angel said to me, “Go, tell my people how great and how many are the wonders of the Lord God that you have seen.”

Jesus has a message for you to go, proclaim Him and be ready, for He is coming soon. The Lord Jesus Christ said in Revelation at the end of chapter 22, “Surely I am coming soon.” Amen.

John replied, “Come, Lord Jesus!”

The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all the saints. Amen.

Amidst COVID and racial divide comes this poem from David Fox in 1956…

God with humanity made one is seen in Christ, God’s only Son: in you, Lord Christ, the Son of Man, we see God’s reconciling plan.

To save a broken world you came, and from chaotic depths reclaim your whole creation; so we share your reconciling work and care.

In you all humankind can see the people God would have us be. In you we find how God forgives, through you, the Spirit in us lives.

Where race or creed or hate divide, the church, like God, must stand beside, with arms outstretched, to heal and bless the refugees of emptiness.

Then give us strength, great Lord of life, to work until all human strife is reconciled, and all shall praise your endless love, your glorious ways.

Amen.

Now it’s 2022 In the Year of Our Lord+, and so, so many people all over the world are hurting be it cancer, or Flu or COVID, brokenhearted or depressed. even addicted to something that takes over the body…and let us then turn to some voices of the past…

And so I wanted to offer in this great time of need,these healing prayer pomes from Common Praise on healing…HEALING.

From thee all skill and science flow, and pity, care, and love, all calm and courage, faith and hope: O pour them from above.

Impart them, Lord, to each and all, as each and all shall need, to rise, like incense, each to thee, in noble thought and deed.

Ans hasten, Lord, that perfect day when pain and death shall cease, and thy justruleshall fill the earth with health and light and peace.

Charles Kingsley 1819-1873

O CHRIST, the Healer, we have come to pray for health, to plead for friends. How can we fail to be restored, when reached by love that never ends?

From every ailment flesh endures our bodies clamor to be freed; yet in our hearts we would confess that wholeness is our deepest need.

How strong, O Lord, are our desires, how weak our knowledge of ourselves! release in us those healing truths unconscious pride resists or shelves.

In conflicts that destroy our health we diagnose the world’s disease; our common life declares our ills: is there no cure, O Christ, for these?

Grant that we all, made one in faith, in your community may find the wholeness that, enriching us, shall reach the whole of humankind.

F. Pratt Green 1903-2000

We cannot measure how you heal or answer every suffer’s prayer, yet we believe your grace responds where faith and doubt unite to care.

The pain that will not go away, the guilt that clings from things long past, the fear of what the future holds are present as if meant to last.

But present too is love which tends to hurt we never hoped to find, the private agonies inside, the memory that haunt the mind.

Your hands, though bloodied on the cross, survive to hold and heal and warn, to carry all through death to life and cradle children yet unborn.

So some have come who need your help, and some have come to make amends: your hands which shaped and saved the world are present in the touch of friends.

Lord, let your Spirit meet us here to mend the body, mind and soul, to disentangle peace from pain and make your broken people whole.

John Bell 1949

Because Jesus loves us so much, He is not going to leave us here to face the terrible, terrible times that are going to come upon the whole-wide world!

No, for the ones who believe in Him and love Him, both the living and the dead, He is going to “some day” do something truly great by His mighty power. He is going to raise the dead from their graves, changing them into immortal, glorified bodies just like His. And at the very same time, He’s going to change or translate all the living believers into immortal, glorified bodies just like His. Then, in that same instant, we will all rise together….be lifted up…be caught up and fly to meet the Lord Jesus ‘in the air above the clouds, and from that point high above the earth, we shall all follow Him to Heaven to the Father. All this will happen so fast the Bible tells us, “in the twinkling of an eye.” That’s faster than you can blink!

For we shall see the Lord Jesus ‘face to face,’ as He is, and we shall be like Him on that day, that most precious day the Lord God has planned for all who truly love Him.

WOW! CRAZY! AWESOME! INSANE!

Yes, it’s true! Only by the love of God. Only by the mercy of God. Only by the grace of God. Only by the the power of God. And only by the Plan of God He had in His heart before the foundation of the world. And this is the beautiful future of the matter: one day known only to the Father we shall be like Him; we shall live with Him; we shall be with Him forever, for we are and always will be “sons and daughters of God.”

Knowing this, and believing, doesn’t this warm your heart? Doesn’t this bring on a loving smile and cause a new joy, a stirring in your heart and look up, expecting the Lord Jesus to call us to Him any day now?

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

I am humbled and honored for this opportunity to address you, my fellow monks at this, our gathering of the Brothers of the Beer and Bread Society, so ancient in our tradition. Since our last meeting three years ago, much has happened in society as a whole that I felt compelled to speak out! And so I will.

” Here I stand! God help me not to falter. I can do no more. Have my messages in the bottles in the sea reached many people? Probably not. But I believe someone, somewhere found the bottled words and they are the better for it. In each message, Christ was proclaimed. I don’t hide Christ! I am not ashamed to confess Christ anywhere, anytime! I am not ashamed to preach the Gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, for it is the message of salvation! And if any be offended, well, too bad! For it is God, the Holy Father who calls people everywhere and at all times to His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ to salvation unto eternal life, by the Holy Spirit. “What must I do to be saved?” you ask. “Just this: Who so ever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that all who believe in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.” “Do you believe? asked Jesus. “Yes, Lord, I believe, help me with my unbelief.”

Why does the church have to retreat in the midst of the lies of society ferociously attacking it? Why can it not hold its ground and proclaim to the world: this is who we are, this is what we believe. We confess our faith…we pray as we believe, and we believe as we pray. Our church is apostolic, fundamental or orthodox in that we are not ashamed in all services to say together The Lord’s Prayer, the Ten Commandments, the Apostles Creed, the Nicene Creed. And we celebrate each week and more the Holy Communion…”For as often as we eat of the bread and drink of the wine, we do show the Lord’s death till He come.” We take the Holy Bible literally; we our liturgical in make-up, singing the great hymns of church in past centuries, and showing forth our statement of faith: here is what we believe; here is who we are! Want to join us? Our doors and our arms are wide open to welcome you. BUT, Don’t come trying to change our church with your cultural agenda with the heretical social gospel, your kingdom now stuff, or the preterist errors, or replacement theology that tries to replace Israel with the Church! And all the other stuff of sexuality and race! We believe in marriage between a man and a woman…we do not hold to ordination of a homosexual.

We are pro-life: human life begins at conception! We are made in the very image and likeness and form of God. Unless compelling reasons, abortion is murder! It is the taking of an innocent, precious baby boy or girl at the early stages of their tiny, tiny growth and development into a human being. They are conceived with an immortal soul from God. Ancient pagans sacrificed their babies to demon gods in a burning fire by the hundreds and hundreds; people today abort by the millions and millions! Society says it’s the law…a woman must have the right to choose. It’s business as usual! They will find cleaver language to make it seem right and normal! And if one marches in protest of the ugly, demented thing, why the proponents go into a frenzied attack mode of any group protesting against it!!

We stand for Israel and the Jewish people; we will speak out against any form of antisemitism, period! We celebrate all races of humanity because each has a story to tell, each has its special heritage that seek to learn about and celebrate the history, the culture, the richness of its people in celebration in the body of Christ. If one group or race is celebrated, all should equally be celebrated!

But so called Christians who seek to tear down the Holy Bible, who liberalize everything, who through deception have an underlining agenda that prompted gender confusion and play on the emotions of the racism card. I denounce evolution which is anti-creation, anti-God; I also denounce the ‘higher criticism/ that has wrecked much of the church!

We teach and believe the whole Bible written by God through men as His holy word, from the very beginning of Creation in Genesis, to the end and last book, the Revelation of Jesus Christ. It is inspired by God; there are no errors. It is the sacred treasure of all truth, all life, all light! We believe and teach the soon to come Rapture of the believing church where the dead and living in Christ Jesus will be caught up and gathered in the clouds, to meet Him in the air above the clouds and follow Him to Heaven to the Father. We believe in and teach that a seven year Great Tribulation will follow the Rapture of the Church, and at the end of this period, the Messiah, Jesus Christ will return to earth at His second coming and destroy the enemies of God and the Antichrist and the False Prophet, and shall cast them all into the Lake of Fire forever! At this tome Satan will be bound and cast into the Abyss for a thousand years! Then Christ will set up His kingdom on earth at Jerusalem and shall sit on the throne of David and shall reign for a thousand years. You see, we believe and teach and proclaim Christ too in Daniel, Matthew, and the Revelation. But we don’t stop there! We believe and teach that after Christ has reigned on earth for a thousand years, Satan will be released and will gather an immense army of unbelievers against God and Christ and seek to try and destroy the people of God! You see, Satan never, ever gives up! But God will destroy the army of Satan with fire from Heaven! And Satan will be cast into the Lake of Fire for all eternity!

Then shall come the judgment and final destiny of all the masses of unbelievers of human history. Christ shall resurrect each one and they shall face Him and be judged for their wickedness and cast alive into the Lake of Fire for all eternity This is the second death!

When this is finished, God will create a new Heaven and a new earth. And we shall live with God, the Father, and the on, and the Holy Spirit in the New Jerusalem which comes down from Heaven. And so shall we ever be with the Lord.

Here I stand. Here is my confession. Here is what I believe. Here is what I stand for as I have been able to state; Blessed be the Lord God Almighty. Blessed be the Holy Trinity. Blessed be the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, fowveer and ever and ever…

Amen

OK…Let’s put some things together from Scripture and see how it speaks to us today in the 21st Century.

First of all, God still speaks to us through His holy written word in His Holy Bible. There is no other book like it in all the world! Never was never will be, period! But have you heard from God today? God will bless you when you read your holy Bible.

What did it mean at the Transfiguration of Christ in Luke 9:28-31? Why, it was a preview of His glorification at His resurrection…a glimpse of the glory we too will have one day at the resurrection when the Rapture of the believing church takes place someday soon. And who were the two men who appeared with Jesus in glory? Moses and Elijah. Why? Well, Elijah never died but was taken uo to Heaven in a whirlwind, raptured. He represents the living believers who will not die but be translated to glory at the Rapture. and Moses, I believe, represents those who have died in Christ and are resurrected from the grave at the Rapture.

At the Transfiguration, a cloud covers them and a voice is heard from the cloud, the voice of God, the Heavenly Father, who said in Luke 9:35, “This is My beloved Son: hear Him.” Then and even now, who is listening? Who hears Jesus? Who follows Him? Who believes?

And when He came down from the mountain and a crowd waited to see Him, and there was the father who asked Jesus to cast out a demon in his son which the other disciples could not, He said to them all:

“O faithless and perverse generation.” (Luke 9:41) Has much changed from that time until now? Look around and see what’s going on in the world, even in out own country and our churches and Christendom. Really?

In Luke 11:28, Jesus said: “Yea, rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it.”

In Revelation 1:3, John wrote: “Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand.” The Church Age is moving on having completed 20 centuries since the church was founded in Jerusalem on Pentecost in the year of our Lord, 33 AD. I believe we are living in the end stages of this age, and the Rapture of the Church isn’t far off! There will be no signs in order for the Rapture to happen: it is IMMINENT! As Christians we expect it to happen at any time now, and we are commanded by Christ to watch, and wait, and occupy and to love His appearing, to be steadfastly looking up into the clouds because on that day, that awesomely wonderful day in Christ’s love we are going to meet Him “in the air, above the clouds” and follow Him to Heaven.

Jesus said: “This is an evil generation: they seek a sign; and there shall be no sign be given it…” Many believe they must see a sign, a wonder, a miracle in order that they might believe.

We walk a hard road as Christ’s own, right? But when shall we be recompensed? In Luke 14:14, Jesus said: “For thou shall be recompensed at the resurrection of the just, Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the Kingdom of God.”

God deals in timelines. He planned the ages of time which began at the six days of Creation. The first seven days constituted the first week. And that was over six thousand years ago. He made the earth at just then right distance to revolve all around the sun to complete one full year. He made the first man and the first woman and seven ages, seven time-periods mankind would go through after the Fall, where God would test them to see if they could fully obey, and they couldn’t, or wouldn’t…and didn’t. And isn’t that the same story that has plagued human beings since then? And in the moving of time ever forward, century after century, millennium after millennium to now our time in the nearing end of the sixth age or dispensation, God brought all to fruition of the age, that particular century and place with the word, “And it came to pass.”

With the miraculous birth of Yeshua-Jesus the Messiah, God used the words, “In the fullness of time.” That exact time was completed to the full after four centuries of man’s total failure and destruction on his own. He needed a savior-someone who could save him from his sins and give him life eternal after death…and, the other big thing no one ever hardly mentions, “to save us from the Wrath of God that is to come upon the whole world!” But that’s for a not to distant time-period known as “The Day of the Lord, ” or “The Tribulation.”

Yet the one I shall address, what this time-period in God’s Plan of the Ages did…it brought mankind a Redeemer, a Savior, when God Himself became flesh-became a man and dwelt among us. This God-Man, fully God and fully man was and is Yeshua-Jesus of Nazareth, the Messiah, the Christ.

Now, let us look at some miraculous, awe inspiring things about how and when all this came about.

We have to go back in history to the Babylonian captivity of the Jewish people and the prophet Daniel (605-538/37 B.C.) who received the prophecy of the seventy weeks as it related to the Jewish people being with their Messiah in his Kingdom.

In the first year of the reign of the Meno-Persian king Darius in 538/37 B.C., Daniel understood that the seventy-year captivity as written by Jeremiah was coming to completion. Daniel misunderstood about Israel returning to their land and the kingdom would be set-up. However, God sent his messenger angel, Gabriel to give Daniel understanding of the prophetic message of the seventy weeks which would assure him that God would fulfill His covenant promises to the nation…but not the time Daniel thought.

So Gabriel told Daniel that God would bring Israel back into their land and set up the Messianic kingdom in God’s plan and time. His timeline. And this countdown of years from start to finish would involve specific people and places and events and time. For this all to happen as decreed by God, seventy sevens of weeks would have to pass, or 490 years until Messiah Jesus returns to reign on earth and Israel-the Jewish people are permanently back in their land.

In this prophecy, Jesus Messiah would come on the scene almost 500 years after a decree was given to the Jewish people to rebuild the Temple and the walls and moat and plaza, four decrees were issued by three Persian kings. Therefore, one must determine which decree started the count-down that fits when Jesus was crucified.

The first decree was issued by Cyrus to rebuild the temple around 539 B.C.

The next decree was by Darius to restore the temple in Jerusalem about 519/18 B.C.

The third decree was by Artaxerxes to Ezra in 457 B.C. for the return of more exiles and further enhance the temple and worship.

The final and fourth decree was also by Artaxerxes to Nehemiah in 444 B.C. to rebuild the city of Jerusalem.

The prophecy by Gabriel also said that sixty-nine weeks would expire when the Messiah would be “cut-off,” meaning a violent death or crucifixion! This happened in the year 33 A.D. in Jerusalem in Judea to Jesus of Nazareth! That means that 483 years had to be completed to this horrific event! And the only decree that matches this is the fourth one, the one issued by Artaxerxes in 444 B.C.

So the death of Yeshua (and His burial, resurrection and ascension) stopped the countdown to when Messiah will reign on earth and the Jewish people will once more truly be God’s people and be in their land in His kingdom.

There is a “gap” of time that has existed since the Messiah was “cut-off” and the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost in 33 A.D. that started the “Church Age” whereby God is calling-drawing people all over the world and every nation to His Son Yeshua. This operation has been going on now for over twenty centuries or the past 2,000 years! This will continue until God calls His church-the believing church home by His Son at the Rapture.

Once this has happened (perhaps soon?) then the last seven years of Daniel’s Seventy Seven of Weeks will commence upon the whole wide unbelieving people of earth! This future time period of seven years will start when the “Antichrist” signs a seven year covenant with Israel! And then, and only then God will pour out His almighty wrath upon the unbelieving world.

Then at the very end of the Tribulation period, the last seven years of human history, Yeshua Jesus, the Messiah the Christ will return from Heaven with His armies of angels and saints as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and set up His kingdom on earth and He shall reign for a thousand years.

Thus the 490 years as decreed by God and told to Daniel by the angel Gabriel for all these things to be completed will be fulfilled.

For this is God’s marvelous “Timeline” in His awesome Plan of the Ages and the fulfillment of all scripture in His Holy written word-the Holy Bible.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,

Amen

THE ARMY OF GOD

Father Monk: “Brother Monk, I noticed you stayed a little longer after Holy Communion. And you’re sweating! Are you ill?”

Brother Monk: “No, I’m fine, Father. I just had such a powerful sense come over me as a real dream I could see and feel! I couldn’t move…I was transfixed, and I am sure it was the Lord showing me something…then, now and future.”

Father Monk: “When?”

Brother Monk: “Right after you blessed the bread and the wine as the Body and Blood of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Then you said:

“Who, in the multitude of they saints, has compassed us about with so great a cloud of witnesses so that we, rejoicing in their fellowship, may run with patience the race that is set before us, and together with them, may receive the crown of glory that fades not away.”

“Therefore with Angels and Archangels, and with all the company of Heaven, we laud and magnify Thy glorious name, evermore praising Thee, and saying,

HOLY, HOLY, HOLY, Lord God of hosts, Heaven and earth are full of Thy glory: Glory be to Thee, O Lord Most High.”

Father, it is the uncountable, forever the Army of the Lord our God, and He has given me a glimpse of that vast, vast army as the grains of sand at the seashore. And it is magnificent to behold, and we are all going to be there, as we are now in the glorious mighty Army of God.

Many greats of the centuries have eluded to this army of saints, for example, just before Willian the Conqueror and his army set sail for England in 1066, he and his chief captains prayed in his church in Normandy that God would grant them victory.

And one of the ancient prayers he prayed was the Te Deum Laudamus:

We praise thee, O God; we acknowledge thee to be the Lord. All the earth doth worship thee, the Father everlasting. To thee Angels cry aloud; the Heavens, and all the Powers therein; To thee Cherubim and Seraphim continually do cry, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of Sabbath; Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty of thy glory.

And here is the Army of God:

The glorious company of the Apostles praise thee.

The goodly fellowship of the Prophets praise thee.

The noble army of Martyrs praise thee.

The holy Church throughout all the world doth acknowledge thee;

The Father, of an infinite Majesty; Thine adorable, true, and only Son; Also the Holy Ghost, the Comforter.

We are the Army of God; invincible. unshakable, steadfast and holding the line; able to do all things in Christ who strengthens us; in Christ Jesus, our Commander in Chief, we have the Victory.

For twenty centuries now Jesus has been building His Army against the forces of evil, Satan and his demonic host.

And one day in the future not far from now, at the end of the Great Tribulation, Jesus Christ will come back to earth on a white horse, in power and glory, follower by His armies of saints and angels on white horses. He will crush His enemies and set up His Kingdom, the Kingdom of God, and reign on earth as the KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS for a thousand years.

Onward Christian soldiers marching with the banner of Christ…onward…onward.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit,

Amen.

I love you Lord, the Almighty GOD, creator of Heaven and Earth and all things and everything! I love you Lord that you first loved me. I love you Lord that You gave to us Your only begotten Son, Yeshua-Jesus the Messiah the Christ who died for my sins, for our sins and the sins of the whole world! I cannot fathom it all Lord but You have shown me and continue to show me by the Holy Spirit ‘the things that were, the things that are, and the things to come.’ I love Your Holy written Word, the indestructible, living, Holy Bible, the Word of God in which there is no other way for forgiveness and salvation unto eternal life with You forever and ever!

I Love you Lord with all my heart, and with all my soul, and with all my mind, and with all my strength….help me to love You more and more each and every day of my life on earth that You have given me. I love all you created and that it all works perfectly just as you created them ‘In the beginning.’ I love the seasons of the year, the seven day week You created and started time. I love that You created everything….all things that we can see and all things we cannot see…that You did all this in six regular 24 hour days, and that You stopped creating because everything was finished, so You rested on the 7th day. I love how You said it best when You wrote in Genesis, chapter two, verses one through four:

“Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.

And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had made; and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made.

And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it He had rested from all His work which God created and made.

These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens.”

I love this Lord, and I love that I can tell other about your amazing, eternal love, Your wonderful works and acts throughout history, and all the miracles You perform each and every day, even Your healing hand. I am witness to Your circle of healing, step by step by step…I love the circle of birth, and I pray for the souls of those conceived and never born.

I love that at this very moment You are calling to You today Jews and Gentiles ‘by grace through faith.’

I love that I can talk to You Lord, and You listen to my prayers; prayers of blessings, and thanksgiving, and intercession for others, and even asking for things that You might give to me to the glory of Your holy name, Lord.

I love how you rescued me from drowning, and brought me through all my set-backs, my mistakes, persecutions, my addiction, my surgeries, my procedures, my therapies, my recovery, my walking again, my coach and cheerleader, and love who You gave so much to me. I love how You give me the insights, the understand to study and know and teach your Holy Word.

I love my family and friends and the now life we have together and the future life we believers will be part of according to Your promises, according to the plans You made for us before You created anything, in eternity past.

I love You Lord that in You Lord, the blessed and holy Trinity, the Triune GOD, that You are Three Persons in One, and One in Three; that You Lord, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit have always loved me, and I love You with a love that comes from You and that is sheared and that grows stronger and stronger day by day by day.

I love that You are calling to Your Son people all over the world to salvation by the Baptism of the Holy Spirit into one church, the body of Christ of Jews and Gentiles together, one. I love how You make all this work…and I love that one day, Lord, when you have called the last person to Your Son, that then Your Son will come back to earth, way above the clouds, and by His command He will gather up unto Himself His church, the living and dead in Christ, and by His mighty power, in an instant will snatch us up and take us home to Heaven. How I love that we who believe in all these things promised, are waiting, and watching and making ready with a great joy in our hearts not even able to describe! And how I love that You have promised a crown in Heaven for all of us who love Your appearing!

I love how after the Rapture of the church, we will come back with You, Lord Jesus and that You will set up Your kingdom of God on earth and that You shall reign for a thousand years, and that we, “the army of the church saints in Christ Jesus’ shall be with You when You return ater the horrible, terrible “tribulation’ of seven years such as has never been before or ever will be after!

All this, and more, so much more the things I love about You Lord that You have done, that You are doing, and that You will do in the future that not even hundreds of notebook binders could begin what, if I could write, could hardly contain my feeble words to express my love for You Lord, Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit

I love that You have set eternity in our hearts!

I love You Lord.

In the name of the Father, and the Sin, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, now and forever,

Amen.

I wonder how many Christians missed today, a most holy and significant day, a day of hope and gladness, and joy, even a day of great expectation…looking up, watching, because this is the day of the celebration of the Feast of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ, when, 40 days after His resurrection Jesus ascended to Heaven to be with His Father. Today, May 13th, 2021-not just any year, but “In the Year of Our Lord,” 2021…almost 2,000 years ago (1,988 years to be closer if we use the date of 33 A.D.).

Jesus had resurrected from the dead on the third day to a new, glorified, eternal body, and after seeing His disciples in Jerusalem, He told them to meet Him up in Galilee as soon as possible. Probably a month or so before He was to ascend to Heaven, they journeyed from Galilee to the Mount of Olives near Jerusalem.

In Acts, Chapter 1 we follow the story of when they arrived on the Mount of Olives, the same place where He had been betrayed and arrested, He told them to stay in Jerusalem and wait for the coming of the Holy Spirit, “not many days from now.” And while they were still together His disciples asked Him if He was going to restore the kingdom to Israel at this time?

Jesus answered: “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father has put in His own power.”

“But,” he said, “you shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and you shall be witnesses unto Me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”

For now, Jesus would save the timing of His kingdom on earth to His beloved disciple, John, who would write the Revelation some 62 years later as a prisoner on the island of Patmos. And perhaps they were thinking back to what Jesus said at the Last Supper in the Upper Room, that He was going to prepare a place for them and would one day come back for them…that where He is there they would also be. But Jesus would leave that explanation to Paul and the teaching of the Rapture of the Church.

And now the time of Jesus being on earth was up!

“And when He had spoken these things, while they watched, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight.”

“And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel.”

“Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.”

And that’s why we celebrate this most awesome day! Because Jesus ascended into Heaven, we too one day shall all ascend into Heaven when Jesus comes back and calls us to Himself, in the air, above the clouds…all, all who have believed on the Lord Jesus as their Savior.

The Holy Bible tells us there have been six men who were taken up to Heaven, raptured: Enoch, Elijah, Ezekiel, Jesus, Paul and John. Enoch, Elijah and Jesus stayed; Ezekiel, Paul and John returned Two wrote about their experience; one did not.

The next ascension will not be individual, but a large, uncountable group will be gathered to Jesus in the air, above the clouds at the command of His voice and the sound of the trumpet…the dead in Christ shall rise first, then we who are alive and remain shall be changed…and together we shall rise up to meet Jesus and follow Him home to the Father.

I believe this will be the 7th ascension, the completion of the Church Age, when the body of Christ will be reunited with Him forever.

Therefore, let us celebrate this special day in honor and in remembrance in the eternal hope and all He promised for all those who love Him. Blessed be the name of our Lord Jesus forever and ever.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen ..

The Holy Bible tells us that, In the beginning, before time, GOD created the heaven and the earth, and all things, seen and unseen, in just six. regular 24 hour days! He made everything by His spoken Word! GOD, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, One God, created all things in a sequential, chronological order, just as He has showed us this principle in the Holy Bible. For example, first HE created Heaven, His home and all the angels; next, HE created the Earth, and all things on the earth and in the seas; then HE created the Sun, then the Moon, then the stars-the universe! On the sixth day, GOD created-made man and women, male and female and placed them in the paradise on earth, the Garden of Eden. Everything was perfect until…

Until sin entered the world when the wicked one, the serpent, Satan himself deceived Adam and Eve and they disobeyed GOD! And God pronounced the very first judgment upon Saten and Adam and Eve without any of His wrathful warning of thunder and lightning!

With the passing of over 1600 years of human beings populating the earth with millions and millions of people, the fallen ‘sons of God,’ evil, wicked angels came down to earth and mated with women. Their offspring was the hideous, giant, half angel, half human beings, called the ‘nephilim,’ or the ‘fallen ones.’ These creatures were so violent and blood thirsty and wicked and immoral that total evil reigned all over the earth!

In fact, “the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence.” “For all the people on earth had corrupted their ways.” Genesis 6:11-12

Something had to be done! For “the LORD saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.” Genesis 6:5

God’s very own creation was hurting Him…”The LORD was grieved that He had made man on the earth, and His heart was filled with pain.” Genesis 6:6

So God would bring upon the whole earth a flood that would be higher than the mountain tops, and destroy every living thing upon the face of the earth!

But GOD had only the righteous Noah and his sons build an enormous Ark into which would survive his family, eight souls and all the animals and birds and such that were brought on the Ark by GOD. All would survive and repopulate the earth. It would be a new beginning for mankind.

And in the 1650 plus years since Creation, the turbulent flood waters churned up everything that was under the water!

And there appeared for the very first time great black clouds of water; and there was, I believe, the first thunder and lightning of God’s judgment wrath! How could it be. otherwise, for the Holy Bible tells us in Genesis 7:11-12, “In the six hundredth year of Noah’;s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month-on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.”

The years went by and a great number of people from the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham and Japheth camped at the foothills of the mountains of Ararat. Not long after, these huge tribes journeyed south by the Tigris and Euphtates rivers to the land of Shinar. But rather than obey the command of GOD to repopulate the whole earth, they stayed there and began to build the Tower of Babel and the surrounding city-Babylon! So came down to have a lookout what was going on and saw that man was worshipping the creature rather than the Creator! So GOD struck them with confusion in that they were not able to understand each other; therefore, they began to separate and go to other places all over the world as GOD intended!

There may have been thunder and lightning before His judgment, I don’t know, but I do know HE was very angry!

Fast forward a thousand years or so to the time of Moses…there at the real Mt. Sinai, in what was then Midian, the home of Jethro, his father-in-law, the home where Moses lived after his escape from Egypt, where he married and had a son…this is the place in what is today north west Saudi Arabia, the place where God will take all of Israel after the miraculous crossing through the Red Sea from the Sinai Peninsula, to the mountain where Moses saw God in the burning bush, Mt. Sinai!

On a certain day appointed by God, the people were to follow Moses to the foot of the mountain to meet God. “On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, and a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast.” Exodus 19:16

“And God spoke all these words:” And thus He gave them The Ten Commandments and the rest of the Law.

“When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear (unlike today?). Exodus 20:18

Was this not a warning to Israel not to worship demons? Or go astray from His commandments? First the warning of thunder and lightning, a glimpse of God’s Almighty power! Then , in God’s exact time, his wrath of judgment! You know the rest of the story.

By the fourth millennium from Creation, we come to the time of the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. The year is 33 A.D. in Jerusalem of Judea. Although there was no thunder or lightning, darkness cover the land and there was an earth quake when Jesus died.

Finally, when the apostle John is taken up to heaven to the throne of God, the Holy Bible tells us in the book of Revelation, chapter 4, verse 5: “From the throne came flashes of lightning, rumblings and peals of thunder.”

The wrath of God is being readied to pour out upon an unbelieving, wicked earth during the future time to come, when the believing Church will have been Raptured up to Heaven by Jesus Himself, and the judgment of the seven year [eriod known as the Tribulation will start when Jesus opens the first seal.

So could it be that when God sends his thunder and lightning during a storm that He is giving us all a warning to wake up and repent and turn to Him?