The Dark Eagle

God speaks today. God the real Father of the real Lord Jesus Christ. What does God mean today by "Israel has sinned"? Why has the dark eagle circled overhead in ever watching surveillance since the late 1990s? Today we see what are called Neocons hawkishly influencing the world and inching towards WW3. What drives them? Is this the sin? They have close associates such as a certain granddaughter of Ukrainian Jews (Moldovan really) who fled to USA to escape pogroms. She seems to be driving the aggression in USA and UK and the EU against Russia as they all support Ukraine's Kiev regime. This has effectively brought the Collective West countries into a strongly supportive position in favour of persistence of the brutal repression of Russian ethnic people of the Donbass of Ukraine. God has already judged many believers for complicity in this support and in the murdering of these civilians of the Donbass which continues today as Russia seeks to stop it by trying to counter attack against the militia groups daily bombarding these civilians and as Russia tries to stop the militia dropping small maiming cluster bombs in reach of their children. God sees. God sees the atrocities, the suffering of innocents and sees hearts full of hatred behind the murderous killings and maiming of civilians. How long will this all be allowed to continue and how long will the NATO nations cast themselves as the good guys while they perpetuate this conflict by refusing peace talks and supplying weapons? The historical crimes of the Holocaust are surely being avenged but at the same time the rich nations are persisting one-sided anti-Russian hatred and crimes. God sends His eagle of war and we are all watched from above yet it will not keep circling, at some point it will swoop and we could be rapidly pulled into a full-scale world war which could even result in those awful mushroom clouds reminiscent of the four minute warnings of the Cold War, only there will not be four minutes.

The whole point of Christianity

“Worry about nothing but in everything make your requests known to God.” This defines God. The being who is so loving and powerful and wise and hears prayers as God such that we can stop worrying about any worry and instead turn that worry into a prayer to this One True God who really does answer prayer and is really the answer to our every worry. That is what it means that He is God, our God. Because of Jesus His Son we can have this true God as our God. No need for other gods. This one is so all sufficient that we can have Him as our One God. This is a very important truth indeed. Odd how theologians seem to miss it somewhat. It is the whole point of Christianity, or it should be. Jesus Christ is truly trustworthy to keep this Father God favourable towards us as adherents. Look how everything even in Nature is trusted to the authority of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. He has what it takes to be Great High Priest forever over this household of God’s adherents, supplicants. We can rest assured of this as we join this household in having the Father of Jesus, the God of Jesus as the One True God. Then God protects us, defends us, as we fear Him reverentially, fearing the One who if He were to destroy a life, could do it permanently forever, yet not living fearfully because His love for us, for you, for me, to some extent for every soul, is such that He sent His sinless one begotten Son to die for our sins, and raised this Jesus from the dead to be forever this Great High Priest, this Lord, this Deliverer. Yes God is fearsome in awe and holiness but Jesus mediates between us and God, taking direct access to God on our behalf and bringing teachings to us from God by the Holy Spirit given to us, and interceding for us before God in God’s immediate presence. Jesus is human so he can do this how we as humans need it done. We can rest assured of this. We can put away our weak defence systems and take refuge in the shadow of his wings. 

So great a name

 The Book of Enoch tells of the way the name of the Son of Man was incorporated into the oath by which Nature is kept in order, all natural processes functioning as God intended. Today we find the name of Jesus Christ the Lord is very much the power behind all Nature’s processes. This surely speaks to the purity of the life of Jesus and worthiness of the sacrifice he is as lamb of God such that all power is given to him now he is raised from the dead forever. It is beyond our ability to comprehend just how great Jesus is yet a human like us but sinless and perfected, the Son of Man.

The intimacy of a meal

 We sometimes need to learn from other cultures because a culture can lose sight of important things in life. The West is prone to lose sight of things and arrogantly think they see it all clearly and think that what they do mot see is not worth seeing. Ignore all that and learn from what the West does not see. Social intimacy such as eating together and the whole custom of breaking bread is lost from much of Western culture. Some countries still put great store on family meal times. There is a social phenomenon lost by many which is that eating with someone else or with a group can involve a fundamental human need to share feelings and share mind. Coffee houses used to be important in the West. Nowadays we do have coffee shops where people can meet and chat over coffee. Not quite what the coffee houses used to be. Insurance companies in the City of London started out of coffee houses where merchants could discuss trades and shipping knowledge and tips and use the knowledge eventually to develop insurance schemes and react to shipping events and accidents. Intimacy, though, we tend to confine to what happens between couples in private, yet intimacy in sharing coffee or tea and meals is very important for a balanced healthy life and a loss for those who live in solitude. Christ Jesus made much of mealtime intimacy between friends or in a household. It is still an important part of what he teaches and practices today. He famously announced in Revelation in a letter he dictated to a church after his resurrection, that he stands at the door and knocks and if anyone hears his voice and opens the door, he will come in and sup with that one, and that one sup with him. Intimacy. Nothing sexual like we see obsessively portrayed in our movies. This is pure human intimacy between friends or between master and servant. He the master invites the servant who is faithful in serving him to sit and be treated to a meal where Jesus himself serves. It is spiritual of course, not involving physical food, except in the communion Lord’s Supper of course. He reaches into the heart of the one he singles out for this and he knocks on that door of the heart and when the hearer hears and opens that door, he comes right in, right deep the innermost being where he the master of hearts aline can go, and he sets a table and shares a spiritual meal of the knowledge of himself at that purest, spiritual level, and that person finds Jesus to be human and alive in a body and everything the soul really needs, a mediator with God Himself. This food is eternal life. To those who believe and receive him. The bread of life and water of life. The fount of living water, from him whose blood bought atonement of our sins. 

Glimmers of God

 Answers to prayer. When we ask something and see it answered by God and we know it was God who answered it we are making history. God is manifesting Himself in the here and now of this material world. We rarely see the workings of God Himself, the Almighty Himself. God does so many things in this universe but mostly it is hidden from us and known only to His Holy Spirit, His Son and often His angels. Now and then there is an exception. Besides answers to prayer which we can be sure are the work of God Himself, we can sometimes be blessed with unexpected miraculous events in our lives where God defies the ordinary and does something we know must be Him at work. This is especially a blessing of those who believe the true gospel message of God, of the man Jesus Christ the Son of God who is mediator between God and man and died for our sins on the cross and was raised again by God to live as Lord and Christ forever. God blesses true believers in this message with direct actions which are truly miraculous and demonstrate in the here and now what God can do and how He works, and also with the blessing of the Holy Spirit manifest among us to bring from Jesus what God gives him and make it known to us. All these things are a window into heaven, a glimmer of the being we know as God, in events of the direct involvement of God Himself in this material universe before our eyes, They are history in the making and need to be remembered and cherished as facts even science cannot fathom because sciences are confined to the natural universe and ignorant of the divine. One day there will be no distinction between science and the divine, because it will all be fully known but for now the works of God are His testimony of light in a dark world. Know these things.

Jesus the man

 Jesus brings God’s truth to man and is himself a man, and intercedes with God directly so we can rest assured we need not endure unendurable direct contact with God, the holy fire of highest divinity, because Jesus himself has this direct contact on our behalf, like Moses but greater and eternal.

God’s truth is marching on

 Heaven has its regime, just as the world has its regimes. The God who spoke to me was clear that He, the Father, is the one God. This makes a break from Trinity dogma so powerfully enforced in Christendom since the fourth century. The power of the truth of God and testimony of God is greater than enforced dogma and God shows that He is the One who reigns by how His testimony can so powerfully override that of men, of theological philosophers past and present, with Almighty power, by how the teachings of scripture and of the Holy Spirit have backed up this testimony as I have taught it online and in churches. The precept has followed precept, little by little as I wrote and discussed and debated over the years since God spoke to me. Now I have understood how scriptures used by Trinitarians were originally supposed to be understood. The testimonies of Jesus Christ needed better understanding and Unitarians have helped greatly and the Holy Spirit has backed it up by giving me better and better understanding of the gospels and epistles. God reigns. God can overrule by His testimony. Jesus, God testifies, is His Son. Jesus testifies that God is His Father but God His Father is Himself alone the One True God. It is not about Trinity or sharing God divinity between three people, all one being, no. The Father is a distinct being otherwise He could not give a distinct testimony about Jesus His Son. Jesus brings God’s truth to man and is himself a man, and intercedes with God directly so we can rest assured we need not endure unendurable direct contact with God, the holy fire of highest divinity, because Jesus himself has this direct contact on our behalf, like Moses but greater and eternal. The real meanings of misinterpreted gospels such as John’s displace those misinterpretations as God gives grace to understand what is given by the Holy Spirit. God reigns. God’s testimony is greater than man’s. God’s truth is marching on. 

We wrestle not with flesh and blood

 We could breathe better if Ukraine would deal with its far right issues like West Germany did after WW2. Personally, however, I believe invisible forces like an angelic power are at play. The existence of Ukraine’s unresolved far right issues are easily exploited by these forces to create trouble and inflict widespread judgement on Christians and Jews who forsake their God. These forces, I believe, as did many in my parents’ generation, were behind the Holocaust. Now the successor to that invisible power can use the unresolved issues to fan into flames a new Holocaust. This is, I tend to believe, what Putin and Putin’s Russia is having to fight against.

2023 and the Apocalypse

 Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, yes? First virus plagues. Now far right. Plus price caps. What next? Excess deaths. All Four Horsemen stuff. And nobody repents of murderous hatred and fixation on Big Pharma. Just like the good book says. 

God in fullness bodily

We humans cannot easily love what we cannot see or picture or know as a physical person. We need to either know a person by sight or by the description of those who know them by sight, touch, sound, by physical proximity. Someone never seen physically is hard to know and love. God is not easy to love from descriptions of direct contact because few have ever seen God physically and then never fully to describe Him fully. Full knowledge of God is really only something the Son has ever had from sufficient closeness to know God fully and be able to describe Him for us. We need to love God, as is our duty, but we need to know Him in the way we know other people who lead us and teach us. Jesus is so fully like God that effectively we get a true and full picture of what God would be like if physically seen in full when we learn what Jesus is like and what Jesus says and does and when we have closeness spiritually to Jesus. This is what we need in order to feel in our human way that we do indeed love God, loving with a clear conscience that we love what we actually truly know, not merely from some vision or dream but knowing God as we see Him more fully in Jesus His Son: Translated truly as a human being so we can love Him. Seeing God in Jesus we can rest assured with clear conscience that we love God for what God truly is with the same love we have for people we know from direct contact, This is part of what Jesus is as our human Mediator between us and God. We can love and believe in and hope in this God in truth with a clear conscience that it is in truth as we know and love and believe in and hope in Jesus Christ His Son. 

Covenantal or Professional?

In my work I have to adhere to what we all know as professionalism. Being professional is an unwritten standard of working behaviour. Like the English constitution, there is no documented standard definition of what this entails, as far as I am aware. We all get exhorted to be professional. We have a tacit understanding of what it probably means. Be mature. Don’t get too personal in working with colleagues. Be respectful. Work carefully according to knowledge of your profession. In some professions it is formalised by some recognised standard, such as the bar exams in Law and exams leading to ordination in Divinity. My profession is hardly a profession, software development. Nobody seems to define it with enforced discipline and standards. Yet we behave according to the unwritten expectations. In wider life including but not limited to working life I have to adhere to an even greater standard, one put in place by God and founded in the blood of His One Son Jesus Christ, the Lord. That is binding on me. My professionalism gives colleagues, employers and clients or customers assurance about how I am likely to behave in my work. Some might be even more assured to know the covenant to which I must adhere. If my colleagues use work procedures to sabotage my work or persecute me, I am under covenant to love them still and do to them what I would have them do to me, not to imitate what they themselves do to me. This might assure my manager if he knew that I am bound to this covenant. It is like the legal factors in operation when we walk down the street. If we wait at traffic lights (robots as some countries call them) we know that once the lights change we can, if the law so provides, walk out across the road assured the cars will not set off and hit us. We even risk our lives with such assurance. That is the power of traffic law. The covenant is greater if we live in the covenant of Christ. In our lives it should be powerful enough to ensure others can be safe with us, although living a life of love does not negate the possibility of God’s angel protecting our lives at the detriment of those who harm us or threaten to do so. The Lord’s angel encamps around us as we live in godly fear. But it should be recognisable in our lives that our covenantal adherence is at least as dependable as professionals’ professionalism can be. Now we might be outside this covenant with no awareness of duty to God. Even then there is a covenant. The covenant of ancient times covers concepts such as avoidance of violence, desisting from needless killing, even animals are punishable if they kill humans. Some, notably in Judaism, call it the Noahide law or Noahide covenant because of the belief that it was put in place by God after the Flood, applicable to all humans and even animals to some extent. The fullness of these covenants is largely unwritten, written on human psyche, perhaps animal psyche too (many predators are oddly reticent about attacking humans). We expect others to behave civilly towards us in life and work. God sets in place covenants which empower these assurances. Jesus Christ paid for such a covenant with his blood and is alive again from the dead to administer it and eventually judge us all.

Ministers of a new covenant

 We are ministers of a new covenant. The apostles could say this because Jesus has shed the blood of his own body as holiest of all sacrifices of perfection for our sins and we now live in times of hope for eternal life and the resurrection. This covenant is real and binding for those who believe. The commands and teachings of Jesus Christ the Lord are given and should be learned as part of this covenant which he has brought about. His love for God led him to obey even to the shedding of his blood on the cross, and God raised him from the dead. He now stands between us and God like a human shield for us to shield us from God’s wrath by his finished sacrifice and his ongoing intercessions and help. We need to know he is master of our innermost beings and all that we are and all that we have when we are in God’s family household  because of him. Only if we obey his teachings and receive cleansing from the Holy Spirit in his name can we be permanent members of his family, the family of Jesus and of God the Father. He is over all in all authority and even Nature itself operates under this authority of his name, so we can live by this authority of the Lord Jesus Christ in complete confidence that he has our back, so to speak. He shades us in his shade as Lord over all and the One Son of God. Until he returns. Then he will judge, not only us but all the world. Be ready. Return to his covenant. Return to his teachings. Return to his authority. Before it is too late. This lamb of God is the lion of Judah. Should he return to us as lion or as gentle lamb?

Opinion

 Opinion: If Britain takes its objective further in regards to Ukraine weapon supply, it will be morally guilty of perverting the course of justice by its obstruction of the Russian operations to stop the immoral killing of civilians in Donbas. The gracious benefits Britain has received to help through lockdowns, it seems to be taking as licence to engage in immoral opposition to these moral interventions by Russia in Donbas. This will all come back to haunt the UK later and future history will surely not speak kindly of Britain for doing this.

Tipping Point

 1995/1996 was surely a time of grave ethical failing so very costly to the whole world as it created conditions for nuclear war we are facing today.

Then between 1996 and 2000 there was a tipping point and Europe chose badly between a future without Christianity and a future with Christianity. The gravity worsened. 

The greatest command of God

 Love God. This command is given by Moses and then by Christ Jesus as the greatest command to keep. Love God then the commands of God will be yours to keep. God gives commands. If you love God you will keep these commands. Love towards God includes holding dear the commands of God such as love of your neighbour. Love towards God includes holding dear the commands of God and reminding yourself of them frequently and teaching them to your children and shouting them from your platform of choice, your voice to those around, near and far. Love God and you will love His Son Jesus Christ and this too means holding to Jesus’ teachings and teaching them to the next generation. It means loving people both of our own ethnicity and of other ethnicities, even those we are taught to despise. The Good Samaritan loved a victim of crime needing help even though this victim was of a race and ethnic culture which hated him. The Good Samaritan did not ignore the injuries but treated them simply and provided a safe place to recuperate using his own resources. This love overcomes extremist hatred. Overcoming is the goal of Jesus Christ’s commands. Love Jesus and God his Heavenly Father and obey their commands and they, Jesus and God, will visit you in your journey and make themselves known to you and become a part of your future acts of right living and lessons of right living forever. Resurrection is coming. Eternal life is in Jesus Christ who died for you and is resurrected by God and lives forever. 

Rest Assured

It is really about leaving in Christ’s hands representing us to God. This is his rest. We rest assured that Jesus Christ is flesh and bone as we are, has got our backs, and is there with God directly representing us and sharing what God gives him by the Holy Spirit bringing those things to us. Jesus has it covered. Put down your umbrella and let his cover us. We rest assured. He gives us tasks to build the temple. We do what God has prepared in advance for us to do. Yes, His hand is then in everything, 

My Lord and my God

 "My Lord and my God!" exclaimed Jesus' apostle, Thomas, on seeing the pierced hands of the risen Jesus Christ. How this fits into the doctrinal position of so many Christians who teach that Jesus is God together with the Father. Yet that is a wishful use of the verse, rather childish in its naivety. The fact is, in the Gospel of John where this exclamation of Thomas is recorded, just a bit earlier in that same passage, Jesus is recorded as having sent a message to his disciples via Mary to tell them that he is ascending to their God and his God, to their Father and his Father. Jesus had taught them throughout his ministry that God is both their God and his God, their Father and his Father. Thomas surely exclaimed his finally completed persuasion that this was indeed true and that now how could in all honesty and wholeheartedly call Jesus his Lord and God the Father his God. Now he could face life forever as a walk he could step by step live with a righteous aspect he could forever share with God his heavenly Father and with Jesus his heavenly Lord.

Exiting Babylon is moral and not ethnic

 Babylon today is the historical and spiritual city of Rome which spreads immorality and misery worldwide by its luxury and opulent industries and influences. So coming out from it is not an ethnic matter but a moral one. When we come out of the system surrounding Rome, we do so by disconnecting from it but also from keeping its influences of immorality at arms length. This is not an ethnic issue. The fighting today in Ukraine and Donbass illustrates how it can be dire to make independence a matter of ethnic purging. It is not ethnic. There is no need for ideological nationalism on those lines. As the UK stays out of the EU, it is the moral excesses of the EU and its immoral system that we both keep away from and put away from ourselves. This is not to be taken to a direction of nationalism and fascism. 'Therefore, “Come out from them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.”' So the scripture says, but the unclean thing to avoid is the immoral industry we see with fashion and luxury cars and fine food and wine that entices our young people toward compromising their morality for the sake of the money to buy these luxuries and the selling of their souls that can result from this. That is what Babylon means in the book of Revelation as is seen in the city it metaphorically really meant to pinpoint which was Rome and its environs and its systems and gangs.

Amazing

Amazing that God has a human firstborn Son, conceived by God by the Holy Spirit overshadowing virgin Mary. The Son, Jesus Christ, is a human being like us but raised from the dead to be Lord forever, master of our soul, the One with firsthand knowledge of God the Father, to whom we can ask “Hide me” and he says “Let me shelter you”. Amazing that the Holy Spirit breathes into the churches and all believers mysterious inspiring truth from Jesus who receives it from the Father, and this Spirit can guide us along righteous paths. This way leads us to a step by step walk with God and with His Son. Because God sent Jesus to be born that gloriously divine day in Bethlehem.

The True Jesus born a true human being

Know the true Jesus Christ, born a normal baby, Son of God but fully human, sinless but tempted, as human as we are, conception by the Holy Spirit and firstborn of God, yet born like any human and living like us, indistinguishable from us and truly like us. To have eternal life we must ‘eat’, feed on, the flesh of the Son of Man. We must take nourishing inspiration and encouragement in the human being who Jesus, the Son of Man, is. Missing this humanity is missing the eternal life nourishment of spirit that we need. (Some philosophy clouds the issue, muddies the water, obscures this truth with apparent denial that Jesus is truly flesh and blood.) Jesus has come this way so we do not have to directly interface with God. Confusing people by telling them Jesus is God makes people think he isn’t a human fully like us, which hides from them the real nature of human Jesus, alive from the dead, human forever, that people need to feed on in their lives.He died for us. He died for you. Christ died for you. Now you can know, if God gives you grace to know it, that Jesus is alive from the dead and human like us, the Son of Man, and he has direct access to God on our behalf. He has no sin, nothing to keep him from peace with God forever and ever. The One we all need. The One like Moses. Lamb of God and the good shepherd of the sheep. Walking on water but just in the way he says we too can do with faith, persuasion without doubt. Looking unto him. Lord over us all and master of all the righteous things God wants us to do, with a walk step by step with Himself and His Son, forever, even raised from the dead by Jesus if we die before his return.

Step by step with God and His Son forever

Each day we face a possible next step in that part of our lives concerning righteousness. God wants to be forever with us in that step, both He and His Son. His Son (Jesus Christ) suffered death by crucifixion as a sacrificial lamb of God to atone with God for our sins, because the failure to meet God's standards needed this sacrifice. God raised him from the dead and he together with God will walk with those who believe in each step of righteousness throughout life and forever. This is what God wants for us and has given Jesus Christ in provision for our sins to enable it if we believe in Jesus God's One Son, first of many sons, who is in direct touch with God for us, and if we hold to Jesus' teachings.

2023

 2023: while Ukraine starts to abolish its own Orthodox Church because of links of this church to the Russian Orthodox Church (Jesus Christ is not divided, and he who destroys God’s temple, God will destroy), there are so many churches in the West claiming to support Ukraine. Israel has sinned, God says. Mushroom clouds could result. The watchful eagle is overhead, that is the sign.

The splendid Book of Enoch

 The Book of Enoch: The Lord, Jesus Christ, taught the merits of knowing this book along with other scriptures, as a means to avoid being in error and with the need to know the power of God along with it. As with any scripture, it is best to have the same faith as those who were first led by Jesus Christ, in order to maximise the benefits of knowing these scriptures. What persuasions did these early believers, especially the early apostles, have? The Book of Enoch captures this faith, this persuasion, very well; so well that many over the years have assumed it was written  by either these early believers or by groups such as Essenes who were, it was thought, close in their beliefs to the first followers of John the Baptist and Jesus Christ. This was especially the view of those who translated it into English from the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and Ethiopian Beta Jews who preserved it in their sacred Ge'ez language. Only when the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered did it become apparent that it was older than Christianity and probably older than the Essene communities. The first believers such as Jude and other earliest church leaders clearly had persuasion that it was an authentic record of the true prophetic words of an ancient prophet from before the time of the Flood and Noah, the prophet and leader of civilisation named Enoch. Jesus told his hearers in particular the Sadducees that it was scripture. He said many things which borrowed the words of the Book of Enoch, clearly showing how highly he regarded it and how he held to its contents. I believe that as Christians started to hear words uttered under the powerful influence of the Holy Spirit they were persuaded that the Book of Enoch was a work of this same Holy Spirit. I believe this too. So we can learn much from the Book of Enoch if we hold to it in this way and believe God is behind it. Then we find its passages about the Son of Man (the middle section of the book) are assuring that Jesus is this one known spiritually by Enoch thousands of years before Jesus came. The book shows that there is a man from heaven who is greater than even the prophet Moses. Moses knew God as-it-were face to face from meetings with direct contact with God. This Son of Man knew God from meetings even with God in the throne room of God in Heaven, and God, in Enoch chapter 105, calls this elect one His own Son. So we can know that if the Son of Man is given to us as leader, we have the benefits of his direct access to God Himself. Moses foretold the coming of this one with such immediate access to God, and the apostle Peter proclaimed that this one is Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, after Jesus had been crucified and rose again. The Book of Enoch passages about the Son of Man are plainly to me one of the very best scriptural descriptions of Jesus Christ and who and what he is.

Jesus Christ is not merely a prophet but is unique

 One argument against Christianity is that Jesus Christ is merely a prophet like the many prophets past, present and future who bring messages from God. Well the testimony of the first leaders of the first disciples of Jesus Christ is that Jesus Christ is a far greater than normal prophet along the lines of what was previously only seen with Moses, over a thousand years earlier, in that Moses regularly went into a tent and there met God as if face to face. Jesus attributed this to the special intimacy Jesus alone had with God, as God’s Son. Moses had been promised by God that in the future God would send one like Moses, to whom the people of God must listen. Apostle of Jesus, Peter, proclaimed that Jesus is this special prophet like Moses, foretold by Moses. So for this kind of man, the One who could have such special access to God, being Son of God, to die for each of us, you, me, everyone, as Jesus Christ did when crucified, thus providing a sacrifice for sins, this is of immense effect and procured great benefit from God to our benefit if we believe, such that it provides benefits which lead believers to eternal life. Then the raising from the dead of Jesus Christ by God brings the prospect of believers having a Moses-like leader who can represent us to God and fully represent God to us. The giving by God of the Holy Spirit since Jesus returned to God, to His right hand, means the benefits of Jesus’ incomparable endless access to God can be distributed spiritually to reach every believer in every century, until Jesus himself returns. This all makes eternal life within the reach of every believer. It is a matter of us continuing to be persuaded of these things and being united by this with Jesus Christ and keeping in unity and fellowship with him by holding fast to his teachings, living by them as God gives us understanding of these teachings. The sacrifice of Jesus continues to provide God’s favour and forgiveness and makes us clean in God’s eyes as we hold to these teachings with this persuasion and confess to each other that we sin, that we fall morally, ethically short of God’s ethical standards. We have the prayer Jesus taught. In this we learn to forgive others before God in our prayers regularly so that God will in turn forgive us too. So prospects are on a new level for us with God, which we can call a spiritual rebirth for us. We have prospects of God being the creator, through His Son Jesus Christ, of our ongoing righteous living and inner peace and persuasion and ongoing renewal of life spiritually, despite our physical mortality. When Jesus returns, he promised, he will raise such believing disciples of his teachings from the dead and for those still alive, give a state of immortality. This all brings glory to God. 

The Gospel Truth

 Moses came down from the mountain of God and of the law, with his face shining, having met with God so directly. Jesus appeared on a mountain with his face and whole body shining like lightning and Moses spiritually appeared beside him, as did Elijah. After the crucifixion then resurrection of Jesus he appeared from the sky to Paul and the light of Jesus' glory burned Paul's eyes so they became blind. Jesus is a greater one like Moses for us all. He is like Moses, seeing God in communications so direct that they would kill any of the rest of us. Jesus is even greater because he is there beside God in direct communication forever, never to die, never to fade in his glory. It is all for us. It brings us all close to God by letting us receive what God says through this ministry of Jesus and through the Holy Spirit brining it to us, forever. He intercedes with God too because he, Jesus Christ, is human like we are and has been a mortal human, weak as we are. He is given to us as master shepherd. He even raises from the dead those he saves by their discipleship. We can trust God wholeheartedly and sincerely because God has provided His Son to minister for us in this way. The crucifixion of Jesus was the perfect lamb atonement sacrifice to turn aside God's wrath, taking the heat, so-to-speak. Believe in him and believe in God who sent him, because of him. Hold to his holy, blessed, life-giving teachings. They are the words of eternal life. Let the miracles God does as a result of this message assure you of the truth of who Jesus is and be the second testimony we need as assurance beside the testimony of Jesus about himself. God, the Father, is distinct and can provide the second testimony and does so with the miracles that accompany this true gospel message.

God with us

 Having hope of God being with us? Can it be? The only way to walk in the light of God is to ever have His light at hand by His will that we have it. Who does God want to have His light forever at hand? Well God sent the Son those two thousand years ago. In the previous age He had sent prophets after first sending one greater than other prophets, one who spoke with God and heard from the mouth of God more directly than other prophets, the great leader Moses, resulting in the great law being given to the ancient Israelites. Moses was in the world several decades ministering this light. Then Moses was taken away and the light was sustained with occasional prophets for the next thousand years. These prophets after Moses did not interact with God as directly as Moses had done. They had dream visions and waking visions by which God spoke to them and they could respond to God and pass on or write down what God gave them. This is still happening today. Yet God had promised through Moses (see Deuteronomy 5, Exodus 20) to eventually send another who interacted with Him as closely as Moses. And so came Jesus Christ. Now the hope of having God’s light and leadership immediately at hand revived. Yet although this was first to Israelites as with Moses, mere months later the non-Israelites were given this light too, when the Holy Spirit was given to religious non-Israelites as they believed the message about Jesus Christ. Now this continues today. The light of Jesus is distributed far and wide by the Holy Spirit leading believers. This Holy Spirit speaks to many, spreading beyond the reach Jesus Christ had two thousand years ago, unbounded and not limited by distance and social constraints, nor limited to Jews. Believing that Jesus Christ died for you, and yes he did on that cross on which they crucified him and he became a sacrificed lamb of God sacrificed for your sins and mine, you too should hold to this message in persuasion that God is with us because of Jesus Christ, and you too will receive the Holy Spirit to lead you in the light and fellowship of Almighty God: Until Jesus Christ comes to reign, and eventually gives the kingdom over to the Father, so God is with us forever and we are given eternal life by Jesus His Son. Hold to these things and be set free from sin for which Jesus died, Jesus who God raised from the dead and is now alive forever, returning soon to raise his disciples from the dead: Those who believe Jesus is, today as thousands of years ago, and who believe Jesus is this One Son of God who is forever in direct communication with God, the Christ, our Lord, and those who believing, trust in God who sent him, and hold fast to his teachings. We belong to him as his body, united with him, no longer lying to each other or hatefully angry with each other, but telling each other the truth and lovingly forgiving each other, keeping out of immorality and adultery and living honourable lives as befits those so united with Jesus Christ, having God with us forever. 

Repurcussions

 Unknown things happen in this world which if we knew them we would scream to God from our deepest soul and He would hear and stop them. But we must have faith and a sincere heart lest we be complicit. In the meantime we are better not knowing. But we must be ready for the truth. We must have a sincere faith and a clear conscience and be like young people and meek sheep. Those who do know might do things we find strange who still do not know. Thank God He sent us a shepherd to lead those who love Him, the Lamb of God, His Son Jesus Christ, born a human who knows God as his Father and meets with God face to face so we do not have to get so close to the consuming fire. Let Jesus reveal things to us as he prepares us for the truth. God requires cooperation from us who believe: Co-operation in the grown-up work of justice among believers. When the truth comes out and we are sure of the facts, we must deal with those who share in the atrocities, no matter how high or low they are. We must hand over the murderers to the father of murderers, in the power of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, not taking it on ourselves to do evil, but letting it be settled in the spirit in the power of heaven through the ways God has ordained for believers, by the spiritual handing over to the power of darkness outside the camp, not welcoming them and thus not being complicit in their work. Ugly things happen but when it involves believers the other believers must act. A grave message but grave things are afoot and this world is on the brink of their repercussions.

To survive

If we want to belong to God, with Jesus Christ as our shepherd, we cannot allow murder to be acceptable among us, nor can we be complicit in it. We must love those who God loves, if we want to rest in the protection of God’s love. Then we can rest assured that we have a mediator with God, since Jesus Christ hears God like a man communes with his friend, face-to-face, and brings God’s things to those who have received the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ is the human mediator we need to survive the holy fire of God Himself. 

The mysterious authority of the name

 It is a challenge to write about such a spiritual thing, and I am probably not spiritual enough to do it justice, but there are various things revealed from Jesus and in the very ancient past, then down the ages by the mysterious Holy Spirit, which speak of such things. In the Book of Enoch, a most mysterious scripture of all scriptures, it tells how the name of the Son of Man was incorporated by arch angels into the Oath, by which all Nature is governed. So Jesus name was part of how Nature was governed even many centuries before he was manifested. So trees put out buds and leaves and planet orbit stars by the authority of Jesus’ name. Now risen from the dead the reigns are in his hands to pull the reigns of Nature as he wills and according to God his Father’s will. The very word of God which is manifested in Jesus is in charge of Nature and created it too. I ponder these things often but they are always steeped in holy mystery. Thank God the Holy Spirit makes them known to true believers. We see the manifestation of this in the churches, where there are baptisms and services in the name of Jesus today. A mystery unfolding day after day. The same mystery as is there every day in all of Nature. The authority of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

Lord forever

 When God raised Jesus from the dead, He was making Jesus supreme Lord. Now Jesus is next to God, immediately in contact with God, like Moses who met God face to face, but Moses only lived a century or so, while Jesus lives forever in the power of God. Moses has had worldwide laws all based on the laws God gave him for three thousand years and if he were alive, present and available today the nations would have to honour him for his immediacy with God and his influence over all governments and international law for two thousand years. Now Jesus Christ actually is alive and has far more claim to such honour and is divine source for all wisdom and government that comes from the mouth of God at whose right hand he sits. The Holy Spirit spreads this counsel worldwide forever, which comes from God but almost always comes through Jesus His Son. It is now Jesus the Son of God, sent as only begotten Son by God, who has most immediate, direct access to God, to his Father, and is permanent intermediary with humans who follow God through him. He is never to die again and so this mediation is permanent and eternal.

The Son of Man - more insights

 More insight into the Book of Enoch passages about the ‘Son of Man’: The Hebrew scriptures which followed on from the original prophecies of Enoch include the accounts about Moses and the ancient Israelites and here can be found the explanation of what is meant by what Enoch called the Son of Man. Moses was one of few, perhaps one or two, people in history who God spoke to and conversed with face to face. The directness of this communication with the Most High God is unsurpassed in history, except for one person, the Son of Man. Moses was a kind of Son of Man figure himself. This is because the greatest directness of human communion with the Almighty is beyond most humans. When Israelites started to get close to this kind of immediacy with God they panicked. They realised just how terrible in shock and awe this communication could be when it started to mean face-to-face encounters with the fiery supernatural being that God is and the kinds of responsibilities this would put on them all. They had to kill animals which approached the mountain to which God was physically descending. The mountain itself became fiery like a volcano, not from any lava burst but from the supernatural fire coming upon it by God’s physical descent on its heights. Moses actually went up to God and as he returned his whole face was visibly glowing. He became too terrible to gaze at. Then came the greatest physical phenomenon of all, one of the greatest in human history, as God physically wrote commands on stone pieces which Moses took down to these people, and they realised they were in a predicament. If Moses kept up these round trips to the physical presence of God it could go further still and the writing of God on stone tablets might lead to actual immediate encounters between this topmost God and the ordinary Israelites, men, women, children. They could not see how they could possibly survive such contact, so they pleaded with Moses to not let God contact them immediately but for Moses to always act as intermediary with God. So was started the concept of human mediator with God. Moses could do it. Others could not. Moses would not always be around though. God promised the Israelites, throughout history until today, to never have to deal directly with God but eventually that God would provide a new Moses-like go-between who could meet with God face-to-face, even beyond normal prophetic encounters (usually in dreams and visions), and pass on to Israelites the word of God. This is surely what ‘Son of Man’ entails, a human mediator, messenger from God, like Moses but eternal, never to leave the people without mediation with God. In Acts in the New Testament it is recorded that Apostle Peter told the Israelites two thousand years ago that Jesus is this One. Jesus’ own proclamations of this are recorded in John’s gospel in detail and the other gospels in summary. The Epistle to the Hebrews reiterates it. The human follower of God could normally not cope with direct contact with God, being told commands by God face-to-face. Someone who can do this is needed, but someone truly human with whom people can converse easily and without fear of harm. This is surely where a Son of Man meets the need, and for this we see Jesus as this One, when God gives us faith to believe. Holding to Jesus’ teachings with this faith makes us his disciples and he gives eternal life to those who are freed from their sins this way. The Way, the Truth, the Life. The Word of God made flesh. 

The human Lord

 When God raised Lord Jesus from the dead, He provided forever a human who could know all that God chooses to reveal to us, and the commands with which God His Father wishes to command us, without faltering, and pass it all on to us, just like Moses did to the Israelites thousands of years ago. We can relate to Jesus, a human like us, yet risen from the dead, even though we would find it impossible to directly relate to God Almighty, the holy and terrible burning fiery spirit. When we believe this, we can feed on it, draw strength and comfort from it, drawing on the wondrous truth of the humanity of Lord Jesus Christ, feeding on the truth that he has flesh like us, though alive forever from the dead. We can feed on the things the Holy Spirit passes on to us from Jesus, things passed on to us in Jesus’ name. This is the beginning of eternal life. Jesus is the beginning of this eternal life and the end of it forever: the same Jesus who came two thousand years ago, same today as then, and same forever.

Do not be misled

 God did not come in the flesh. That would not help us. The Son of God came who can hear God and not die. We would hear God giving commands and our consciences and human frailty and fear would kill us. Jesus can hear his Father and not perish and then he passes on to us what he hears and the Holy Spirit makes it known to many all at once. This is how we need to hear God. This is how Jesus helps us. This Jesus who died for our sins is what we need now that he lives forever and is right there beside the Father to receive things from the Father and through the Holy Spirit make them known to us, when we believe in him and hold fast to his teachings: Jesus, the word of God who became flesh and dwelt among humans and died and lives forever. He gives eternal life and will raise from the dead those who believe in him and hold to his teachings. He has the Father as a witness by the miracles God does in the lives of those who believe these things. This makes two witnesses, because two witnesses are necessary for what is important to believe. This means the Father and the Son are not one being. Do not be misled by those who say the Father and the Son are one being. The Father and the Son are united in spirit and purpose but are distinct people. The Father provides a second testimony as required by the Law of Moses. This means he is distinct from Jesus, although at one with Jesus and lives in Jesus, as Jesus is at one with Him and lives in Him. Be sure you believe these things as the first apostles of Jesus Christ believed them. This makes the teachings a true blessing and joy. This is the way to eternal life.

Living happily with the Truth

If God came in the flesh 2000 years ago, and preached, almost everyone nearby would have died. They would have heard the Almighty like Moses did and they would not have been able to receive it in a worthy manner. Who but the rarest, like Moses, could hear God directly and not falter and die? Fortunately it is not God Himself who came. It is the One, the very Son of God, who could hear God and live, then in the flesh the Son could speak to ordinary people without them dying as a result. In this sense Jesus is like Moses. He could hear God without dying, then speak to his followers without killing them. The people around Jesus could live happily side-by-side with him and not die for it. Even if they could not believe he was the Son of God Almighty they did not die by proximity to him. Yet he can us what God Himself says. He can explain it. Now he has died for all on the cross, a sacrifice for our purification from sins, and having risen to live forever and gone to the right hand of God, the Holy Spirit has come into our world and brings to teachings of Jesus to many of us all at once, spreading out to the followers of Jesus wherever they are, comforting , leading, guiding, teaching. If we believe these things, let us hold to these teachings and the eternal life from God through His Son will be given us.

Truth that leads to Eternal Life

 There are two major errors in how people think about Jesus Christ in Christianity. Firstly there are those who think he is God the Almighty. This contradicts the truth that humans cannot have direct contact with God Almighty without almost inevitably dying in the process. Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5 tell us this. So the people, the Israelites, asked God to only speak to them via Moses and God promised to send a future prophet to always do this like Moses had done, and Peter, apostle of Jesus, told the Israelites of his time that Jesus is this very one promised by God. Secondly there are those who think Jesus and God are so much united that they are one being. This contradicts the teaching of Jesus that God testified concerning him as a separate, distinct testimony constituting the Law of Moses requirement that there be two who testify. He said the miracles were a separate distinct testimony about him from God the Father. This would not be true if Jesus were one being with God the Father. Of course other erroneous thinking about Jesus exists too, especially the denial that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. God testifies concerning Jesus that Jesus is His Son and Jesus says the same. The prophesies and especially the testimony of John the Baptist and that of the apostles, John brother of James in particular, these testify that Jesus is the Christ, as did Peter by revelation from the Father. I too can testify to these things by what I have witnessed in my past, holy memories I hold dear. Jesus is not God but is the Son of God. The Father, God sent many servants down the centuries and eventually sent His One Son, Jesus. In turn, Jesus brought into sonship many sons for God and many of these he sent. Following Jesus leads to his raising these followers eventually from the dead on the last day. Following Jesus means believing the truth of who he is, the beliefs of the apostles, and holding to his teachings. It leads to eternal life from God. 

Not God but Son of God

 Jesus is Son of God. He is not God Himself. But which scripture verses tell us this conclusively, when we understand them rightly? Moses was able to speak to the ancient Israelites without killing them. Yet they were unable to hear God speak to them in person because they would die that way. They knew it. God acknowledged it. In Deuteronomy 5, Moses records how he had a discussion with the Israelites about this matter

“When you heard the voice out of the darkness, while the mountain was ablaze with fire, all the leaders of your tribes and your elders came to me. And you said, “The Lord our God has shown us his glory and his majesty, and we have heard his voice from the fire. Today we have seen that a person can live even if God speaks with them. But now, why should we die? This great fire will consume us, and we will die if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any longer. For what mortal has ever heard the voice of the living God speaking out of fire, as we have, and survived? 27Go near and listen to all that the Lord our God says. Then tell us whatever the Lord our God tells you. We will listen and obey.”.”

In Exodus 20 Moses records the same matter after the Ten Commandments were given 

 “When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.””

So God made a promise, that He would make a necessarily more harmless way to speak to them forever through a prophet like Moses, not directly. This way the death they dreaded by direct interaction with God Himself would not happen. In Deuteronomy 18:5 Moses recorded telling  the Israelites this “The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your fellow Israelites. You must listen to him.“ In the time after Jesus came the apostle Peter preached to the Israelites how Jesus is the fulfilment of this promise. Acts 3 “Now, fellow Israelites, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did your leaders. But this is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, saying that his Messiah would suffer. Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus. Heaven must receive him until the time comes for God to restore everything, as he promised long ago through his holy prophets. For Moses said, ‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your own people; you must listen to everything he tells you. Anyone who does not listen to him will be completely cut off from their people.’ “ So Jesus, if he were Almighty God Himself would have meant death to the Israelites because immediate contact with God would have killed them, but rather Jesus is like Moses, a prophet, and those who were there at his time in his company could rest assured they could heed his words without dying as a result. They could live right with him among them, living safely all through his childhood and young adult days until his ministry among them and even eat and drink and have fun in his company. Now he intercedes with God for them and for those of us who believe, his having died for our sins to be our saviour and risen from the dead he is our Lord, the master of God’s house. 

Red Lines

 We all need to establish our red lines. Like perimeter defences, when these lines are triggered we know it is time to do things a little more drastic than we would normally countenance. What matters most to you? What are the most obvious red lines to set? What must be defended most? We need simple but effective courses of action that kick in once these red lines are triggered. Perhaps voting differently. Perhaps changing job. Perhaps praying a different kind of prayer. Perhaps seeking out old friends, friends you haven't wanted to bother till you really needed to. Perhaps warning those concerned that maybe they should back off. Diplomats call these 'red lines'. It has a good ring of wisdom. Like Solomon drawing a line in the sand and waring his agitator not to cross it, lest there be consequences. Above all else, guard your heart, said Solomon, for it is the wellspring of life. Have some red lines and a rough idea of what will happen when they are crossed.

The truth which is strange to many

 Jesus, despite what many Christians believe, is just the Son of God, sent by God: He is NOT Almighty God Himself. Now this is clearly what Jesus and his own disciples and apostles believed when Jesus was in charge of what was being taught. Once it all got into Roman and Greek hands there started some twisting and misrepresenting. Now we have many thinking Jesus is in some way a replacement for God who is proclaimed in the Old Testament, a new Almighty God. Well that is a misunderstanding based probably on the confusion people get from thinking Jesus is God Himself, because if you look at the Bible you find that anyone who even touched the mountain on which God descended to give the law to Moses had to be put to death. The box the law was kept in had to be carried on poles to prevent it being touched by anyone and once when a man touched it to steady it in transit he immediately dropped dead. So touching anything that closely physically linked to God or most sacred things of God was so deadly that people needed strict warnings about it; deadly, grave warnings. Now Jesus came in the flesh and grew up with kids his age and had parents and siblings and went to lessons and did household chores. Animals touched him. Maybe a few dogs even tried biting him. Perhaps donkeys kicked him a few times. If Jesus was Almighty God they would either be condemned to death or would have died instantly for getting so close so as to touch him, shout at him, annoy him, even bite or kick him if they were animals and pets. He would have had to warn friends he was close to as a child not to get near him, certainly not to touch him, not to shout at him or insult him with banter and his parents could never have rebuked him to his face. He would have had a trail of dead bodies everywhere he went. So today people try to reconcile their fearful insistence he must be God Almighty with the scriptures of the Old Testament by assuming God has somehow changed and is not scary any more. No God never changes. Dualism and Manichaeism might say there are two kinds of Almighty God, but this is not the teaching of scripture and not the teaching of Jesus. God is the same. Jesus just is not this Almighty God, shocking as that might sound to some. God sent many servants before He sent Jesus Christ His One Son. Then Jesus brought many into becoming sons for God and sent many of these. This is what we find in scripture and what Jesus taught and what we must believe to be saved from dying in our sins. God is still God and Jesus is the Son of God. If we believe these things we should become disciples of Jesus himself by holding to his teachings. Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. For disciples there is this promise: eternal life from Jesus and resurrection on the last day. Thanks be to the One True God who is the Father to Jesus and to all who believe. 

The biblical name of Israel

 Prophecy of God: "Israel has sinned" How are we to understand prophetically the name 'Israel' today? We daily seem to hear news of the risk of escalation of world conflict. We see the eagle overhead. Where is this sin that causes this risk and ongoing crisis? The name given originally to biblical Patriarch Jacob after he wrestled with a physical manifestation of God, 'Israel' has two parts: 'Isra' similar to 'Sarah' or 'Sarai', and ;'El' which of course means God. The first part Isra has a fairly clear meaning of a prince or great person or master, someone who overcomes others and rises to greatness among peers. Combined with 'El' we see the way Jacob received this name, this epithet or title or badge of honour from God, like a great medal of honour, to say that he had overcome all peers around him and gained the respect even of God because his success in contending with peers had even given him some success in wrestling with God.  So to say 'Israel' it means we are recognising that the bearers of this title, this name, are so successful in rising in power that they have even come up against God Himself and achieved some success. This seems to me to be targeted at the victors after WW2 who mastered the Axis powers and eventually helped to create a State of Israel and became principle powers in the world, the whole world, even to rising in power to attempt to contend with God, and have gained respect from God in this regard. But the sins of such people cannot be disregarded by God. They are on God's radar. They are in God's plain sight. The results could be hugely catastrophic.

Heavenly assurance

 “Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God.”

— Revelation

“The angel of the LORD encompasses those who fear Him.”

— Psalms

“ And Elisha prayed, “Open his eyes, Lord, so that he may see.” Then the Lord opened the servant’s eyes, and he looked and saw the hills full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha.”

— 2 Kings

When God encompasses the servants who fear Him and they have a very dangerous bodyguard detail from Heaven itself, the other godfearers who are with them do not need to be caught in the cross fire because they can share the protection if they call on God in prayer.

The One

God sent many servants. Then He sent One Son. Then His Son sent many sons. If you believe it, hold to Jesus’ teachings, being fully persuaded that Jesus is this One Son.

Gospel for Today

 Jesus Christ came, a baby born to be the One sent by the Father. The testimony of Apostle John was that this Jesus is the Lord he saw alive from the dead after seeing Jesus certainly die on the cross. Some of us know John’s gospel testimony is true because promises of Jesus recorded by John are fulfilled for us as we take the words of Jesus to our hearts to obey them when we can. So we know Jesus died on the cross for us. We see what Jesus does today and from it we know it is true that this Lord we see today is the same Jesus who John wrote about thousands of years ago. Jesus is the same now as he was back then. When the season is a gospel season and even when it isn’t, know for sure that some us know it is all true. This is how the Father is at work in us as He worked in Jesus and as Jesus works in us. Jesus and the Father work in harmony and we see the Father there in this Jesus alive today. Believe and hold fast to Jesus’ teachings and to our testimony so that you too will know this same Jesus and testify of him to others. The promise he brings is a truly great promise of eternal life. The Father wills this eternal life for all who follow His Son, holding to his teachings and believing in him. Then we all receive the Holy Spirit and the miracles of God in Lord Jesus Christ’s name, the name by which all Nature does the will of God its creator, except the fallen human race, who need to be turned back to God from sin, and receive His forgiveness and right way of living.

EU attempting to cap the price of oil

 EU attempting to cap the price of oil.

"When He broke the third seal, I heard the third living creature saying, “Come.” I looked, and behold, a black horse; and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard something like a voice in the centre of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not damage the oil and the wine.” Revelation 6

What truth did Jesus bring into the world?

 What truth did Jesus bring into the world?  Jesus speaks truth even today and what he says reinforces what he meant by "the truth" when he spoke to Pontius Pilate at his trial, saying he had come into the world to testify to the truth. "What is truth?" asked Pilate. Jesus has some truth revealed to him by the Father (such as we see in the book of Revelation) and some is what he knows is true of all that was written as scripture known to himself and others at the time (Bible including Apocrypha and some other books of scripture we have discovered in recent times preserved among Dead Sea Scrolls and by groups such as Ethiopian Beta Israel and Ethiopic Orthodox Church, such as the Book of Enoch), plus the testimony of the miracles God gave him to do and the teachings God gave him to teach and together with teachings he has given him by God since his ascension which the Holy Spirit sometimes reveals to us. In addition, he and the Holy Spirit convert people inwardly so we speak truthfully of what we know and see and we testify of these things truthfully to each other.

Appointed and sent

 Jesus appoints judges just as God appoints judges, and they are humans who use their discretion. God loves to give freedom of decision and freedom to use human understanding. He gives this to Jesus and Jesus in turn gives it to those he appoints and sends.

Jesus and the Temple of God

 A Temple is what gives a god a name. The name of the god is tied up with the glory of their temple or temples. If the temple falls, the name of the god is affected because it looks to all around like that god was not able to uphold their name by saving their temple from destruction. The building of a temple affects the impression all who see it have of the glory of the name and reputation of the god to whom the temple is built. With the Jerusalem temple, this is so too. The temple was only built once God had given peace to Jerusalem and then the peace of Jerusalem would affect the permanence of that temple. Now Jesus pointed out really that all this is true of himself too, since God's name would be tied up with Jesus' life and wellbeing and when Jesus died it would look to all around as if God had failed and yet Jesus rising from the dead would demonstrate that God is glorious and able to withstand such a temporary setback and come through and shine. It showed that God is eternal and cannot fail in the long-term. This is the glory the nations would see of the God who raised Jesus from the dead. Jesus is tied inexorably with the glory of his Father who sent him and sends him and works with him forever. Jesus too has a great name, greatest under God, which even underpins Nature.

The eagle is overhead still

 That eagle is still over the house. Israel has sinned, says God. Back in the mid 1990s in the UK, this was the sign God gave me. The following days, months, years saw its fulfilment as first US spy planes on the news, then police helicopter services, locally called Operation Vulture in my area, then a build up towards cameras in the streets, monitoring of communications and internet use (beware lest they see your browser history), and mass surveillance spreading internationally. The vision of the eagle overhead, black with a white eye, when God’s spirit overwhelmed me one Sunday morning, it eventually showed me generals anxiously discussing war, and trouble on the ground below the eagle, until it culminated in mushroom clouds and bombers and I had to stop the vision. What sin could cause all this? I believed it was lack of love and devotion towards God and wilful turning away from His teachings and embracing of immorality instead. I urged God to let me preach love for God and the words came to me to shout it from the mountain top. “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength … and suddenly the spirit added AND VOICE! We need to use our voice to love our God. We should use our voice to lovingly teach His teachings to our neighbours and children and shout it all on social media and wherever we have a voice, whatever voice we have. Let us try to turn this tide of sin, before we see mushroom clouds for real. The eagle is overhead still.

Product withdrawal

 Humans are a creation. Science would never tell you so. Oddly, because Science has no way of knowing whether human beings were ever created by another intelligence, except if one day scientists succeeded in it, yet even then they would probably deny it could ever have happened in the distant past. But if scientists ever created a human and it proved to be dysfunctional they might think of a product withdrawal or recall and scrap the dysfunctional version on a mass scale. Well Bible accounts tell us this is going to happen with the humans God has made. Not all are write-offs. Left unchanged we would be but some can be converted and not need withdrawal, recall and scrapping. Jesus does the fix. He can lead us to conversion and lead us back to our Creator for the necessary fix. Even an upgrade like Jesus had by his own resurrection. God is good. But we are bad and we have to accept the fix.

Truly a man

 Jesus: truly a man. The most special man in all of history, so much so that his name and spirit transcends history, but a man. Now if you think of a god as a non-human entity then Jesus is not that. If you think of a god as someone mighty who can judge the rest of us, then he is that, set aside by God for this and sent into the world for it. Special because this is the one man who is to God the only begotten Son of God. Now among many brothers, but to God this is His one and only son, and we can be sons through him. 

What a guy

 What a guy Jesus is. What a guy. Master. Mediator. Friend and Lord. But amenable and humble to treat us like he treated Zacchaeus, despite what Zacchaeus was. And he's got such rich wealth of teachings to give us. Still today, all in line with what he said back then and more besides which the Holy Spirit brings in his name. What a Son, this One Son God has. Making us sons. United with us so we can sin no more like we used to sin.

Biblical implications of One God

 What are the implications for understanding the Bible of the Unitarian-like view that God is just one person, not a Trinity?

It leaves it more open as to the reason and implications of the plurality of Elohim. Probably God is regarded in a context of His council with sons of God as we see in Job 1. Then that is assumed through scripture.

"Let us make man in our image". God is not a man. God is one, not a plural. So despite rabbinical teachings, this probably means man is made like the sons of God and God - the nature shared by God and the sons of God. Like the angels, in other words, and with qualities the angels share with God Himself. Intellect and speed of thought. Tendency to reason and work out what is to be done, as well as listening for commands to obey. Not like brute beasts.

Abraham would have known the one Jesus called the Father, in particular as the one God. He believed that only this one God, the Almighty, is above all responsible for creation. He met this one God. He heard the voice of this one God and received promises from Him in visions over a period of many decades. If he met others who some would say include the Son of God before the incarnation, he understood that there is just one who is the Almighty God, not all three he met at Mamre. By 'Almighty' his understanding would have been of one God who is stronger than all the others (the Semitic word for Almighty is similar to the word for the mightiest creature, a shedu, a lama or lamassu, like a huge winged lion, like a very powerful angel more powerful than a sphynx, hence 'Al Shaddai'). He would have contrasted this God known personally to him, as much more powerful than any of the gods worshipped around him, king over them all, superior in wisdom and power and love, and ultimately responsible for all creation, even creation that happens through other gods or angels, being highest over all these angels, these gods.

Visions seen by many through the scriptures of the one they called God, even sometimes pagans such as Abimelech and Balaam, but also many Israelites, where they saw someone called God, this would have been the Father. God Himself was seen in visions. And sometimes very, very rarely this same God was seen physically, such as by many Israelites of the Exodus.

True prophets, although not usually directly communicating with God Himself, were always indirectly at least, sometime on rare occasions directly. communicated with by the Father, often as a result of the Father Himself personally speaking something, other times by the Holy Spirit communicating to them the thoughts of God.

Christ is seen when there is truth

Truth. Christ is seen when there is truth. 

The killings of civilians who help an enemy army. We see this in Ukraine when Russian troops are forced out of an area and Ukraine soldiers move in. The civilians who helped the Russians often wear the armbands worn by the soldiers. You see in videos how these civilians are killed and their bodies are found in the streets. It all takes me back to the childhood years when I used to read the Bible my parents bought me and I read how King Saul, first king of Israel, was hunting down David who he saw as a rival because God had anointed David to one day be king and David had great popularity after miraculous military success (we all know about David and Goliath, even today, three thousand years later). David entered a town and received help there from civilians including the local priest. When David left and King Saul entered the town, chasing after David, Saul killed all the town's people including the priest because of their help for David. Then a thousand years later, Christ Jesus lived life knowing he had descended from this same David, the David who became Israel's greatest king. Christ knew this same hatred David had suffered would be levelled at Christ. The friends who helped Christ would be in danger of being killed. Christ knew this was his heritage and this would be his badge of honour, that he is descendant of David, yet the Lord of David. When Ukraine events are truthfully reported, then the picture of Christ too becomes clear. 

Truth reveals Christ. Christ reveals truth.

Daniel 3

 That fiery furnace in Daniel 3. The height of the neo-Babylonian Empire and three Hebrews in exile were being punished for refusing to bow to a statue of the King of kings, Nebuchadnezzar. Wow, did he the king get a fright. It wasn't the three men who were thrown into a fiery furnace who suffered but the guards who threw them in who died. Reminds me of sanctions. The three men were in that furnace. In ancient Hebrew lore, probably true. (Jasher and Midrash) Abraham their patriarch ancestor had been treated the same way by the first old Babylon emperor Nimrod and survived. This was a thing. God protecting in fire was a thing for which God was known. God Himself revealed His imperviousness to fire when He spoke to Moses from a burning bush because the presence of God kept the bush from being consumed by the fire, so it seemed. How this should encourage us too. Fear of God is key to survival in the direst situation. The three men in Babylon feared God more they feared the Emperor King and more than they feared fire and death. They would rather, they explained to the king, have suffered death than sin against their God and they knew God could save them but did not know that He WOULD save them, yet they would not sin against Him by bowing to a statue of the king. In this case God did save them. An angel from God, some say the spirit of Jesus Son of God before Jesus became flesh, whatever it was, God provided it, and it surrounded them with protection against such raging fire that the fire had killed the men who threw them in there. The angel of God, the LORD, surrounded these men who feared their God, and Nebuchadnezzar wrote a decree about it found there in Daniel 3, that said no other god had ever saved like this God who saved those who feared and worshipped this God. This angel sent by God had even been seen by the king there amidst the men in that furnace, and by guards guarding it. We today can have that same angel surrounding us if we fear this true God, this One True God. The Holy Spirit sent in Jesus Christ's name by this One True God the Father who sent Jesus tells us this. The Psalm says it clearly too: The angel of the LORD surrounds those who fear Him.

Liberalisation

 God says in our times "Israel has sinned" but this Israel is not meaning the country we call the State of Israel but rather the people everywhere who are covenanted to God, especially those who are brought to God through Jesus Christ. I was awakened to this sinful state of those covenanted to God and alerted to it in the mid and late 1990s. It was a time when churches were starting to be influenced by liberal church thinkers, authors and leaders who politicised the gospel and downplayed traditional doctrines. Many started to leave these liberal churches and yet the liberalisation continued and we started to see the introduction of the neo-liberal concepts such as gay marriage and ordination of openly gay clergy. The Bible was being reinterpreted along the lines of the previous century when people were claiming that scientific analysis could be applied to scriptures to 'discover' things previous church generations would have regarded as heresy, such as a notion that the scriptures were heavily edited to combine various strands which never originally said what these combined texts ended up saying and are passed down to us today. Now we see countries in Christendom such as Russia starting to reject this excessive departure from tradition and a turning back to traditions such as those concerning the family and leadership. What went wrong? It is good to use our intellect to examine what we are taught and 'kick the tyres' so-to-speak. Yes, Jesus taught his followers to know all the scriptures available in those times, not just the five books of Moses upheld by the Sadducees. Yet there is a limit. The morals we hold dear are a compass and a guide in our search for truth, not a hindrance to be set aside. The second Psalm tells of the folly of the nations saying "Let us throw off their shackles" when talking about the faithful of God. The sin has now been done and cannot be undone and we might be heading to a third world war over it. But if we start to hold to teachings given by God and teach these to our children we might just escape the worst of it.

Propaganda and staying sane

 How do we stay sane in a world of vicious propaganda which might kill us or make us do deranged things? A serious problem. Jesus Christ had visions of our plight even in biblical gospel times and his main mission given by God was to help us stay sane and not be deceived by all this propaganda and lies, which he ultimately attributed to the devil. His solution is valid today and effective today: to hold to the words of life and truth and spirit which he taught. Now the Holy Spirit in believers continues this ministry, bringing teachings from Jesus today. Believe in Jesus and keep his words in the back of your mind to counter the lies and brainwashing hate-filled propaganda. Keep his teachings until you can understand them well enough to let them guide your actions in obedience. God be with you as you do so. If we all do this we are truly brothers in him. 

A losing battle

 November 4th 2022. UK seems to be getting a warning now from Russia which some are interpreting to mean the UK is getting closer to being actually at war with Russia. The warning seems to be pointing out the UK's evident role in provocations. Of course only an unprovoked attack triggers the NATO article allowing NATO countries to be called in to help. UK must be foolishly thinking USA is in it with us. The UK must think it will win and get a return on the huge investment it would entail to engage a superpower in actual war (or effectively war). Maybe it is eyeing the natural resources in Ukraine and even maybe those in Russia thinking it could get a share. Oh dear. oh dear. Thinking this is politicians blindly leading the blind: Then I remember the biblical passages about how evil spirits led kings into fighting wars these kings would only lose - as punishment from God. They might seem to be mad, our leaders, but the reality is that it is not just the mind that gets unhealthy but our spirit can get cranky too and we can be given badness at a spirit level as punishment by God, and this bad spirited state of unhealthiness can indeed lead leaders into losing battles. Oh dear, oh dear. It could be worse than madness and inner blindness. 

Blind UK

 The UK blindly follows blind leaders in various walks of life. These leaders have personality issues which compel them to get the minutiae 'right' in a way that hardly matters while they make huge mistakes that can even cost people their lives. The people like to have leaders who are like themselves and largely the people are similarly dysfunctional so these leaders are a comfort to their egos and they just keep on following them. Others in turn follow these people, others such as their clients, their children, people in their care, and  they all go off towards the nearest cliff, oblivious to their folly and predicament. Such is what I notice about the UK which matches the teachings and warnings of that great teacher Jesus Christ. He taught that the desk workers and administrative function people, in his time they were called scribes and Sadducees, were what he called hypocrites who strained out the gnat but swallowed the camel and were blind guides so people should leave them, not follow them. This seems to be the problem today with a nation that is made largely of desk job workers guiding, managing, advising everyone else, so all together walk into a ditch, oblivious to what is actually up ahead as they do what seems 'right' to them without actually looking where it leads. The outcome is going to end badly for the UK and for the blind countries taking the lead from the UK and the West in general.

Communion

 Communion is a sacred rite in Christian denominations but is quite varied in how it is practiced. The first time I took communion in a Catholic Church I had just professed to a street evangelist in the church my need to receive afresh the message of Christ having been crucified for me. He had been preaching it in the shopping centre and I went with him into this nearby church building which was Catholic. We went to the front row and there he prayed for me, out loud, and then asked me to pray aloud. The gospel message had sunk in so much that it was as if I had never heard it before, even though I had been in a church all my life and had been a leader in Christian circles. I knew my biggest sin had been a compulsion to lie and give a better that true impression of myself. Now as I prayed aloud, there was a power in my voice I never knew before or since, but as soon as I started to revert to my lying, self-exalting way of speaking in the prayer, the power went away. When I prayed humbly and honestly it came back. This went on a few minutes maybe. I think the voice I had when filled with the heavenly power must have resounded in the church and people nearby were having a service. The evangelist took me to join the service just in time for communion. Now it was like taking my first communion even though I had been baptised and taken communion many times before. This was new, a new me. The lying habit was getting broken. I had a resolve to please heaven’s power by keeping the fellowship of the power by only telling the truth. I was given both bread and wine. This is a bit unusual for some. Sometimes both bread and wine is protected in its sanctity by only being offered in exceptional circumstances in some Catholic churches under some bishops. I did not know this till recently. My profession that moment earlier meant that this was an exceptional circumstance anyway as I was under special holy influence and had not sinned wilfully against it so I was free to receive both bread and wine, both body and blood of Christ. It is clear to me now as I learn about Catholic communion. In Eastern Orthodox and in Protestant churches the bread and wine are usually given. That is what I had been used to. It is all a depiction of the crucifixion of Lord Jesus Christ. The power in my inner being which affected my voice and taught me honest speech was in response to my open acceptance of a simple message from heaven “Christ died for you” and my hope in response to it of cleansing from my sins. The power continued a day or so longer and kept teaching me until my lying habit was broken. It gradually faded over coming days but my habit changed by then to one of persistence in speaking truthfully. Heaven has a language of truth. Lies, said Jesus, are the language of the devil. The message of the cross brings power to switch language and learn to speak only truth despite having been compelled to lie previously. Such is God’s power. Power is in the gospel message Christ died for you. He did. It is hope for you, if you simply receive it. The Communion depicts this sacrificial death for sins, shedding body and blood in Christ’s crucifixion. Heaven has come to us. God has supplied a mediator, who is a lamb sacrificed to take away the sins of the world, yours and mine. Let us keep the feast in holiness. 

The lost tribes of Israel

The Lost tribes of Israel: Around 745 BC Tiglath-Pileser III came to the throne of the Assyrian Empire. His predecessors had not made great attempts to expand the empire but Tiglath-Pileser III was different. Conquests marked his reign. For a hundred years the Assyrian empire had been growing, but had been held back, around 850 BC, by an alliance of nations which had created a combined army to repulse the Assyrians. There was at this time a kingdom of northern tribes of the Israelite people, under a king named Ahab. For the coming century from 850 to 750 BC this kingdom, called the Kingdom of Israel, was prosperous but was swinging like a pendulum between the biblical God and a Canaanite god they called Ba'al. Ahab had a sequence of short-reigned successors during this time. In biblical terms this was a time of prophecies of warnings against the unfaithfulness of these northern tribes towards their founding God who had led them out of Egypt. Assyria had been gaining strength as an empire, since the 850 BC alliance against Assyria had failed to completely stop it. Tiglath-Pileser III had enough power to overthrow the Kingdom of Israel, which he did around 740 BC. This was a time heralded in many prophecies, and the Book of Enoch records a prophecy from more than two thousand years earlier, which told how there would be angels put in power over these Israelites, (the Israelites are called the sheep in the prophecy), as shepherds, who would punish the unfaithfulness by allowing a sequence of conquests and oppressions lasting over what appears to mean 2800 years or 70 successive angelic shepherd terms of office (apparently 40 years long, considering the other prophesied events). The tribes of the north, in the Kingdom of Israel, were conquered by the Assyrians and the tribes were dispersed deliberately through the Assyrian empire which later spanned most of the Middle East. Some of these people remained in the countryside but those from the conquered cities were taken away and never returned in their lifetimes. Their descendants merged with other peoples, although some groups might have survived as intact groups of Israelites (for example some think that the Bene Israel people long established in India might be such a group, many of whom have who have now moved away from India and settled mainly in Israel, plus some in the UK and some in Canada). The judgment from the 2800 years of shepherd rule from heaven is nearing completion. We seem to be in the last term of the seventy terms of office, with what might be the last angel in charge out of the seventy. The last twelve such angels, the Book of Enoch foretold, will permit so many excess deaths during their terms that these excess deaths will outnumber any of the previous terms. The last few centuries have seen many persecutions and genocides but this next few decades will be no exception. Then the time will be over. The Lord will return in wrath and will judge the sheep and destroy those who are still spiritually blind. The blindness, the prophecy tells us, is due to their original historical forsaking of the temple, back in the ninth and tenth centuries BC, and the lack of faithfulness to God since that time. A champion will have arisen before the Lord returns, who though opposed by the oppressing nations, will stand firm and be helped by the returning Lord from heaven. In the last times of the oppression before the Lord returns, the prophecy says that what the prophecy calls the eagle will instruct the oppressing people. The prophecy designated these oppressive nations as predators and as birds of prey. None of the predators and birds of prey will defeat the champion, called the 'billy goat' in the prophecy. A sword, it foretells, will be given to the 'billy goat'. Then the Lord will come. In Early Church teachings such as the Revelation and the Epistle of Barnabas, this marks the beginning of a seventh millennium of civilised human history when the Christ will rule, like a sabbath millennium. So it seems the merging of the prophecies all points to this millennium starting at Christ's return and that it would be 2800 years after the time of punishment began with the Assyrian conquests around 740 BC, so this means around 2055 to 2065 as a rough estimate. No precise time can be given, as Christ Jesus himself taught: nobody, not even the Son, nor the angels of heaven, knows the exact time, only God the Father.

The real secret of life

 What is the real secret of life? It is understanding with truly practical understanding that Jesus Christ who came two thousand years ago is trustworthy and his teachings are a guiding light, especially in a life of practical obedience to the light those teachings give. Gain this understanding and everything else will start to fall into place and true power will follow. Nothing in this world can overcome that power. Jesus is Master and the Father is Highest God. They give power no worldly force can overcome and wisdom to accompany it. Love, a sound mind and power.

What is at hand

 There is something which comes into our lives from time to time and has been going on like this for the past two thousand years. People need to respect it because it has our life and death in its reach. The fables around Christmas reflect it. Be good, say the fables to children, because Santa is coming. Well the message is correct though the context is contrived. Repent because the kingdom of God is at hand. Indeed. We have it at the door from time to time when the hidden saints who shine like cities built on hilltops are close to us and are under orders from God to oversee our actions and judge us for misdeeds. We are not like the pagans before the birth of Christ, or even the |Jews before he came. They could hide in anonymity or go unpunished if they had the necessary resources and connections. Now there is no hiding. The Holy Spirit is sent out to believers and witnesses to the world about all misdeeds. We cannot afford to be drug-pushers, prostitutes, thieves, liars, murderers, idolaters, vile, immorally disposed, adulterers, or the like without the possibility the kingdom of God will reach us with divine vengeance and justice. It catches up to us, if not in this life then in the next. But ideally we need to be on the inside with this kingdom. That is a most precious place to be, worth losing everything to gain it. The only door to it is through Jesus Christ's teachings and presence and intercessions to the Father. Mediating between believers and the Father, he brings people to God who believe.