The real beginning

 How did the Messiah begin his ministry? With his crucifixion. "The beginning of the gospel about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God" wrote the gospel writer Mark. Yes Jesus did miracles and preached and led tens of thousands who his disciples were baptising. Yet this was a lead up to the real beginning. Because that crucifixion started everything. It set the conditions for disciples to be saved from their shortfall of standards in their lives and have peace with God in which they could truly follow Jesus without fear of death and dread of doom. The crucifixion of Jesus also paved the way for his resurrection. So Jesus, now clearly the Lord who reigns in the presence of God, this Jesus is a new being who leads us forward to becoming what he now is: the immortally resurrected human being of total spirit power who can reach out spiritually to anyone he chooses and enter their lives with the master key. This is just beginning! Praise God.

Failure to serve God wisely

 Not everyone on God's side is actually supportive of the Father and those He sends. You can be on someone's side but serve Him so foolishly and poorly that you do more to help the opposition. That is the case with the vast majority of servants of God today. They are like Nabal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabal who by being so foolish in failing to 'step up' for God's servant, king David, was almost treated as an enemy by David. In the end God gave a due comeuppance. When you step out in God's service you come across so many like this that it looks like the whole world serves Satan when in fact there are many of them who merely serve God with great foolishness and incompetence. This is why it is harder for the rich to enter the kingdom of God, because a lot is expected of them and it is easier to fall short in meeting those expectations. Wealth makes it harder to serve God and muddies the water of distinguishing who serves God and who serves Satan or Mammon.

Tattoos and 666

 All this new surge in tattooing. I thought I'd look online to see what tattoos are really about, thinking about whether this sudden boom in tattooing is going towards the notorious 666 foretold in Revelation. Very interesting what I start to find out looking superficially online. Tattoos were very much the rage in the Roman Empire before the rise of Christianity. The main use was to brand a gladiator or a slave. If gladiators were killed, their tattoos would help in dealing with the bodies. With slaves there were various words used in tattoos on their hands, such as a word to say the tax had been paid on them or a word to say they had escaped (no idea how you tattoo an escaped slave unless you capture them first of course). The words tattooed on escaped slaves, I suppose after they were captured again, were the first three letters of a word, such as FUG for the Latin for fugitive. A slave who stole or escaped (escaping is really stealing yourself from your owner) might get the letters FUR (for Latin fure, meaning thief). Moving to recent history, concentration camps used them to ensure bodies could be identified, even after burning. So maybe in warfare times, like today, tattoos on soldiers, like with gladiators in Roman times, would help count bodies on each side of the battle. A general or commander could have all their own troops tattooed so they can see how many of the bodies lost in a battle were their own soldiers, so they can do their counting and accounting. This seems to be the 666 tattoo purpose. Actually 666 is three letters, because Greek used in the writing of Revelation used letters for numbering. Now normally a tattoo in those times was the first part of a word, including a vowel. 666 is actually ChXS but there is one ancient copy of Revelation which instead has what looks like ChIS. So I did some digging to see what old European words perhaps used in Roman times started with Chis. The first one I came across rings true. Chislo or cislo means in slavic languages numdering, accounting, counting, calculating. This fits with Revelation saying "if anyone has a mind of wisdom let him calculate the number of the beast ... 666 (ChXS or ChIS) for it is (a) man's number". So maybe the tattoo of each person with something like ChIS will be for numbering dead bodies to identify which ones belong to the Beast empire system.

What is coming on the world?

 When the early indications are there that dark clouds are coming and a storm of oppression is brewing, and we have all seen it happening in history and far away but reason told us it might come near, then we can only find refuge in the healthy fear of God, not the snaring fear of mere men, and the truth is that "the angel of the Lord surrounds those who fear Him, to protect them in times of trouble". "A thousand will fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. You will only stand and see what happens to the wicked." "So do not fear the arrow that flies at day or the terror that stalks at night" but let your trust be in God as you fear Him. This is better for your heart than letting it dwell only on what is coming on the world. Can your heart stand what is coming? It is helped if you learn to rightly fear God, the judge of all the earth. "Fear Him ye saints and you will then have nothing else to fear." Delight in the love of God we see He had and has still now for His Son, Jesus Christ, because this love will be for you too if you trust in Him and take Christ's flag of his name and teachings to wrap around you before God. God will adopt you as His child and you will need no fear of the troubles to come.

Naughties from the forties

 All those naughties from the forties never prosecuted or returning after prison sentences, where did they all go? It is documented that many were kept on in police forces in Eastern Europe and many went to South American countries and many found their way into the USA. At some point they might have returned to roost in their old haunts. I bet the CIA took a lot of them on then dropped them as hot potatoes, but once a CIA ... Probably some found their way to power. They are surely behind the things we see today and the threat these things pose to us all. The things they taught their children and followers before they died. These are dark times. It reminds me of Revelation "they had over them the angel of the bottomless pit". The angels presiding over the persecutions of God's people all end their tenures waiting to be thrown into the bottomless lake of fire. The present incumbent must be no exception. We will soon find out why.

Salvation Baptism

 Jesus gives us a salvation baptism. With it, we wrap his flag around us before God. Then God adopts us as His own.

Big Witchcraft

 If there was real witchcraft today it would be industrialised by the West and taught in universities throughout the world. There would be something called Big Witchcraft and governments would pass laws mandating its products led by a global body. But God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ would still condemn it to the lake of fire.

The devil has gone down to you

 "Therefore rejoice, you heavens and you who dwell in them! But woe to the earth and the sea, because the devil has gone down to you! He is filled with fury, because he knows that his time is short.” 

-- Revelation 12:12

I remember years ago a dream of Satan flying across the sky and descending like a meteor - landing with destruction in Russia. Now I look at what is happening and the effects of Satan are hatred and lies. Satan is rising in the earth having crash landed in fury, "as his time is short". The flare up in anti-Russian hatred and phobia and the lies thrown at it from all directions only assure me that this prophetic dream was true and the devil has directed his wrath at Russia in a very big way. Woe to the earth. Woe to the sea. The sea is boiling to the point of worldwide war. Out of the war will emerge empires which will be deeply regrettable and apocalyptic. Beasts. Do not give way to the devil. Do not give his hatred a foothold. Do  not learn the language of lies, the devil's native tongue. Fill your words with truthfulness. Do not fall morally short because of your anger. See how we are brothers in truth and love if we learn the ways of Christ and make this our guide. Set aside immorality and unlearn the ways of Satan, the deeds of darkness. Reject lying tongues and hateful speech. Else we will all be destroyed by each other and the devil will be rubbing his hands in glee.

When we look back on 2022

When we look back on 2022

This will have been the year when hatred reared it's ugly head in the West and true colours were shown which perhaps had been hidden for a long time. That is not all bad. It is an indicator that people and politicians with a veneer of religion or morality did not really hold to teachings of love and good faith, truthfulness and honesty. It is good that we know our leaders. It helps people to face up to their inner nature when they have openly acknowledged angry hatred and bitter envy and lies. In the Gospel of John, chapter eight tells us how Jesus took the opportunity of the manifesting of people's hatred towards him to point out the true origin of their behaviour as Satanic. This opened the way to contrast this with the behaviour towards which he aimed to lead them if they followed him, towards the love for God and for himself that would indicate that they have been transformed by holding to his teachings, having believed in him. This too should be our goal. To be marked as children of Satan is miserable but it is necessary to face up to it and so be spurred on towards adherence to Jesus having believed in him. This is our real hope as humans, especially now that God the Father has raised this Jesus Christ, His son, from the dead after evil humans crucified him. Let us hold to love, not hate. Even if they want to kill us for it. This is the way of God. Love for God and love for those who follow God and believe in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. 

A warning for all, whatever our religion or lack of religion

 I remember my days listening to long sermons in church and always worrying how to tell people around me about the risks of the hereafter that be impressed on me in church and in my religious reading. My earliest religious memory is of hearing that Jesus taught about when we die we could go to a place of suffering or to a place of comfort, depending on our fortunes or misfortunes in this life and what we did or didn't do to help the unfortunate. This gave me a deep trust in Jesus that he more than anyone told the truth according to what people need for not just this life but the next and the judgement day after that and eternity. Now looking back it strikes me that Jesus did see my concern for what to tell others and God heard my prayers about it. The answer in the teachings of Jesus recorded in scriptures tells how the warnings are all there in scriptures, but Jesus knows that most today are oblivious to the fact that there are scriptures he had in mind that people today do not even know exist, even if they are raised religiously and have had religions, sects or denominations instructing them. There is the Holy Spirit who today imparts what Jesus knows and makes it known to believers. By this spirit I came to know that there is a genuine book of scripture little known outside African Ethiopic churches and Beta Israel groups: It is the Book of Enoch. Without knowledge of this book, I'll try putting this carefully (many would argue with it), it is not well-known what really awaits us after death. We should all take warning from the Book of Enoch, no matter our religious leanings and traditions. We all have to face the same choices in this life and results in the hereafter when it comes to looking our for others and avoiding violent ways, while understanding whether we are fortunate in only this life with misfortune stored up for the next.

Something New

 The cross ended and perfected a life of true obedience but the Father started something new, which had been from the beginning, the resurrected spirit. Our Lord Jesus Christ.

Ditch them

 The wisdom of Jesus Christ: "Leave them; they are blind guides. If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.” 

Leaders today are leading us into a pit. Ditch them. Leave them. Pray.

God is light

 Children of Satan want the narrative twisted in Satan's favour but when the narrative is established in truth, God is glorified. God is light.

Trouble looming

 The troubles arising again in Kosovo take me back to the word I received in the nineties just before the NATO countries UK and US invaded Yugoslavia, fighting Serbs and creating Kosovo and other Balkan breakaways. Israel has sinned, says God. And the eagle overhead with the white eye is the sign of this word. Albanians were being driven out by Serbs and NATO’s USA and UK suspected it might be genocide and intervened. UN decided it was a driving out but not a genocide but the intervention continued despite protests from Serbs and Russia. God allows hawkish surveillance to continue because sins are committed by those God regards as covenanted to Himself. It is a sign of this covenant but also a sign of the covenant being neglected by those covenanted to God. God has believers in many countries, not only State of Israel, USA and UK, but many in Serbia and Russia too. The West should remember this. Love is commanded between all people of this covenant as part of this covenant Christ brought about by his body and blood. Love one another as Christ loved us. Love God who sent Christ for us and raised him from the dead. In all our communications and words, love God and love ome another. When the eagle is overhead, war looms and even nuclear war. 

Realisation

 Realisation is tremendously important in spiritual life, as Jesus often taught. We realise things personally. No committee of church leaders, no council, can realise something. We realise each one individually as we progress through life and progress in discipleship with Jesus. Jesus tells how his crucifixion would lead to realisation that he is the Messiah, the Son of Man sent in the flesh from heaven. The centurion at the foot of the cross realised this. "Surely this was the Son of God" is the gist of what he said (translation disputed). We can individually reach a point when we realise two things: firstly that Jesus is this premier person sent by God and is the very Son of God, acknowledged fully as such by the Father when raised from the dead; and secondly that the Father and Jesus are utterly united in all they do. These are the goal realisations of the gospel of John: "That you may believe that Jesus is the Christ and that, believing, you may have life in his name". The crucifixion lifting up Jesus like the snake on the pole lifted up by Moses, is mysteriously the crucial thing to bring about this realisation.