Many of you Christians who find yourselves virgins now and wanting to marry eventually, some of you even soon, need to answer a question first. My prescription is you wait a few more years before marrying and having children. The forecast is very gloomy currently and I suggest that now is no time to be having children. You are better for now if you save your virginity and have no children going into the last days than to have children and go into the last days. My belief, which I derive from the abundance of signs being given us currently, is that those days are very close and so I do believe strongly that now would be a bad time for having children. I would recommend waiting at least 3-5 years before seriously considering marriage or children. Why do I say that? Because in 3-5 years, those of you who disagree with me now will change your minds.
Let's ask: Will things be better in a few years or will they be better? Will you have a better paying job in a few years or lesser paying, making more money or less money? Will you be promoted in a few years or will you be unemployed? Some of you may be concerned about savings. In a few years, will you have saved what you plan on saving or will you have saved less?
A question you might have been asked: "Would you like to have children some day?" I suggest we move beyond what we would like to do and ask ourselves if it is fair to be bringing children into a world in a climate of economic uncertainty, dismal job numbers, escalating debt, and imminent collapse and secondly, ask of God what He would like us to do, not what we would like.
What does the Bible say about the children in those days?
There are a couple things.
Matthew 24:19 And woe unto them that are with child, and to them who give suck in those days!
2 Kings 6:26-31 tells a story about threats to children during times of trouble.
The story tells how a woman asks a lady to kill her son and cook him this first day and then the next day the other woman will kill her son and cook him. This was during a time of incredible famine and the lady found that the offer was fair. She killed her son and they ate him. The next day, she returns to the lady who first offered the deal and asks her to present her son that they might cook and eat him. But this
woman changed her mind and put her son in hiding.
Do you want to face the very real possibility that if you have children in the near future, that you may have to fight off people who would like to eat your kids? There will be people in those days who will want to eat children, not theirs, but yours. There will be no buying or selling without the mark so their may be people who refuse the mark who still don't have a problem with eating children but there might also be people who do have the mark that because they are filled with such incredible evil they may like to eat children as a form of persecution against the Christians. There are things that society agrees are terrible and that no one should ever have to face. I think this is a fair candidate for that distinction. No one should have their children threatened by cannibals.
As terrible as it sounds, it is said that today in North Korea, there have been cases where parents ate their own children because of the terrible famine there. It has also been suggested that cannibalism may have even occurred during the Great Depression in America. Of course there was the Donner party and a soccer team that crashed in the Andes, Peru I believe, so when the Tribulation period does begin, this is not an unlikely scenario, or even a threat which should be taken lightly leading into those days.
Of course this is not the only fear. Starving children is another reality that some will have to address. For every additional child in the home, the responsibilities and trials of the parent/s will be that much more increased. The people who will be most successful in those days, I suspect, will be those who are responsible only for themselves who also have a large measure of mobility that families will not have. It
will be very necessary for many people to relocate over very long distances and this could be enormously difficult for people who have built themselves a life and are raising a family, for instance, in a home they have built. Moving a whole family under the circumstances that will be common in those days will be no easy task. Imagine taking your entire family, getting on a great ship with them taking no clothes, no belongings, no car, but only the money that you have to your name (in pre-mark times) and starting a completely "new life" in a country that you have never visited, know nothing about, do not speak the language, or know even one person there. Not easy with or without children but it would clearly be more difficult with a family than by yourself.
Some of these questions people in the near future will have to answer. Many from fear will choose to not do what is necessary to protect themselves because the sacrifice seems too great. They will take their chances in a place like my country where they will almost certainly die. Some will choose to stay because they do not see the danger that is coming.
Because of these several points, it is my suggestion that you become less concerned with the things of this world and pursuing them now and become more concerned with pursuing the things of God.
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Wait here at Jerusalem
I don't think these words actually appear anywhere in the Bible, but the disciples were told that Christ must go in order that the Comforter may come. So after Christ left, it was the disciples who were left to wait at Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit came down. It was on the Day of Pentecost that the Holy Spirit came down and the men and women began to speak with other tongues and many were saved.
What happened to me recently, a couple weeks ago today on Wednesday, I had been going through some serious troubles with my neighbors (not my next door neighbors particularly, but more the people in the larger neighborhood). Many of them are smokers but are cheap and useless no-good low-lifes and will not buy their own cigarettes. Either that, or they buy them and then they still ask you (more like harass you) for cigarettes, sometimes several times a day, because they want to smoke theirs AND they want to smoke YOURS too. My faith in humanity was being completely destroyed incrementally day by day and I was growing more nihilistic and misanthropic in hatred towards the degenerate human race. It all came to a head on Wednesday when I woke up with a weighty question on my mind: Should I quit smoking today?
I had the week before bought an electric cigarette so that I could legitimately tell these beggars that I did not have a cigarette and to avoid any more trouble. Smoking it for about a week went a long way towards reduction of my nicotine intake. I felt as if in some way I had already quit partially since I had not smoked a cigarette in so many days. But I felt deep within me, very much as if it were the voice of God, "Wait here at Jerusalem [for three days]". I put 'for three days' in brackets because it wasn't explicit but it was understood. The first part of the message I did not hear or sense in any way that I can explain, but it was just like some one passing you a small note on a sheet of paper. I knew that morning that I would go and buy one last pack of cigarettes that day and that I would be healed Friday.
I bought that pack of cigarettes and I wanted to make it last about three days. It took me all day Wednesday and all day Thursday to smoke it. I desired to finish my last one some time Friday morning just before going to bed. I would go to bed a smoker and wake up the next day a non-smoker. And that is basically what happened. I smoked my last cigarette just before 2 am Friday morning. Went to bed some time later and
woke up Friday and I was healed.
I was on the phone with someone that Wednesday I think and I told him what my plan was. I said that God had been growing on me and teaching me that as a saved Christian I could no longer continue doing things my way but I must do things His way. He made a very skeptical comment against what I said, saying, "[If you're continuing to smoke], it sounds like you are trying to still do things your way."
This remark raises very serious doubts against this man. This is the sort of discouraging comment that could cause others in my position to abandon their plan and to continue smoking. The doubt it would inspire in that person could be doubt that they could fulfill their plan or lead to other doubts about that person's relationship with God. I consider it a harmful comment that I would say would be unwise to make. Neither is it lead by the Spirit of God. I'm not calling into question his sincerity but I am concerned that he may not be seeing the
forest for the trees in some areas.
To be specific, I told him that night that for a few days I was on my mountain. In the Bible, there were times when people needed time at the mountain in order to prepare themselves by training or education, for reconciliation, or to come closer to God before they could go about with their mission. Moses was an example of this. He was lead to Mount Sinai on occasion so that he could receive revelation from God
and instruction on leading the people, and to receive the law. But I think there is one story that is the best example of what I am talking
about.
Judges 11:30-40
Jephthah, a judge of Israel, was seeking to receive victory in battle from the Lord. He foolishly made a vow with his mouth that on the way back from the battle he received victory in, that whosoever should come first out of his house to greet him would be offered up as a burnt offering to the Lord. He was greatly disheartened when after arriving it was his daughter who came out of the house (What did you think was
going to happen?). When he saw this, he cried, "Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of them that trouble me: for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and I cannot go back."
"And she said unto her father, let this thing be done for me: let me alone two months, that I may go up and down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity, I and my fellows."
"And he said, Go, And he sent her away for two months: and she went with her companions, and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains."
vv-35-38
_____
I can make no suggestion here for anyone, but I do know what was true for me. It was revealed that I should wait at Jerusalem, or really, my own personal mountain, for a few days, until I was endued with the full power to be able to quit. I'm not saying if you are a heroin addict that it is okay if you are thinking about qutting to go shoot up for a few more days and then quit. I can't say that because it is understood that any one time you are shooting up might be your last time to shoot up. If God told you to, that would clearly be different but no man (unless he is a prophet moved by the Spirit to speak the will of God to you) can give you direction on that.
Peter, who spoke the first sermon at Pentecost, what if he was moving only by his own power and will and did not obediently wait for the Holy Spirit to arrive? If he had went about prior to that preaching then we can be certain he would have failed miserably and today he might not have been remembered as the hero we revere him as being. It was the perfect will of God that he wait, and the other disciples wait, at Jerusalem for a few days until He was ready to endue them with the power to begin fulfilling His plans for them. If you want to know why He didn't just do it then but wanted to wait instead, I cannot answer that AND I am skeptical of anyone who tries to answer it.
Finally, I want to run these ideas by you one more time. But first I will say, if God is giving you the power and the grace to deal with a problem you are intensely struggling with, to deny it then, you will go back to your addiction 7x over. If you have already cursed yourself by going back and have made it 7x worse by so doing, then it becomes 49x worse. If God gives you the commandment, He is behind you 100% and
will see you live to do it. But you can under no circumstances deny this power, or you will come very close to committing blasphemy, a full rejection of God.
You have a problem. God wants you to address it. He commands that you abstain or He may reveal a plan for your healing. He might have you go up on your mountain for a few days just to gather your thoughts, to remand yourself back unto God, and to gain peace with what must be done. And then He will finally call you back down from the mountain as He told Moses (Ex 32:7) and it is at Jerusalem where you will find your
healing. It is at the New Jerusalem where the tree of life will be planted which bears fruit for the healing of the nations (Rev 22:2). "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" (1 Cor 3:16). It is in the Jerusalem in your heart, this holy temple, where God will perform a work in you.
What happened to me recently, a couple weeks ago today on Wednesday, I had been going through some serious troubles with my neighbors (not my next door neighbors particularly, but more the people in the larger neighborhood). Many of them are smokers but are cheap and useless no-good low-lifes and will not buy their own cigarettes. Either that, or they buy them and then they still ask you (more like harass you) for cigarettes, sometimes several times a day, because they want to smoke theirs AND they want to smoke YOURS too. My faith in humanity was being completely destroyed incrementally day by day and I was growing more nihilistic and misanthropic in hatred towards the degenerate human race. It all came to a head on Wednesday when I woke up with a weighty question on my mind: Should I quit smoking today?
I had the week before bought an electric cigarette so that I could legitimately tell these beggars that I did not have a cigarette and to avoid any more trouble. Smoking it for about a week went a long way towards reduction of my nicotine intake. I felt as if in some way I had already quit partially since I had not smoked a cigarette in so many days. But I felt deep within me, very much as if it were the voice of God, "Wait here at Jerusalem [for three days]". I put 'for three days' in brackets because it wasn't explicit but it was understood. The first part of the message I did not hear or sense in any way that I can explain, but it was just like some one passing you a small note on a sheet of paper. I knew that morning that I would go and buy one last pack of cigarettes that day and that I would be healed Friday.
I bought that pack of cigarettes and I wanted to make it last about three days. It took me all day Wednesday and all day Thursday to smoke it. I desired to finish my last one some time Friday morning just before going to bed. I would go to bed a smoker and wake up the next day a non-smoker. And that is basically what happened. I smoked my last cigarette just before 2 am Friday morning. Went to bed some time later and
woke up Friday and I was healed.
I was on the phone with someone that Wednesday I think and I told him what my plan was. I said that God had been growing on me and teaching me that as a saved Christian I could no longer continue doing things my way but I must do things His way. He made a very skeptical comment against what I said, saying, "[If you're continuing to smoke], it sounds like you are trying to still do things your way."
This remark raises very serious doubts against this man. This is the sort of discouraging comment that could cause others in my position to abandon their plan and to continue smoking. The doubt it would inspire in that person could be doubt that they could fulfill their plan or lead to other doubts about that person's relationship with God. I consider it a harmful comment that I would say would be unwise to make. Neither is it lead by the Spirit of God. I'm not calling into question his sincerity but I am concerned that he may not be seeing the
forest for the trees in some areas.
To be specific, I told him that night that for a few days I was on my mountain. In the Bible, there were times when people needed time at the mountain in order to prepare themselves by training or education, for reconciliation, or to come closer to God before they could go about with their mission. Moses was an example of this. He was lead to Mount Sinai on occasion so that he could receive revelation from God
and instruction on leading the people, and to receive the law. But I think there is one story that is the best example of what I am talking
about.
Judges 11:30-40
Jephthah, a judge of Israel, was seeking to receive victory in battle from the Lord. He foolishly made a vow with his mouth that on the way back from the battle he received victory in, that whosoever should come first out of his house to greet him would be offered up as a burnt offering to the Lord. He was greatly disheartened when after arriving it was his daughter who came out of the house (What did you think was
going to happen?). When he saw this, he cried, "Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low, and thou art one of them that trouble me: for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and I cannot go back."
"And she said unto her father, let this thing be done for me: let me alone two months, that I may go up and down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity, I and my fellows."
"And he said, Go, And he sent her away for two months: and she went with her companions, and bewailed her virginity upon the mountains."
vv-35-38
_____
I can make no suggestion here for anyone, but I do know what was true for me. It was revealed that I should wait at Jerusalem, or really, my own personal mountain, for a few days, until I was endued with the full power to be able to quit. I'm not saying if you are a heroin addict that it is okay if you are thinking about qutting to go shoot up for a few more days and then quit. I can't say that because it is understood that any one time you are shooting up might be your last time to shoot up. If God told you to, that would clearly be different but no man (unless he is a prophet moved by the Spirit to speak the will of God to you) can give you direction on that.
Peter, who spoke the first sermon at Pentecost, what if he was moving only by his own power and will and did not obediently wait for the Holy Spirit to arrive? If he had went about prior to that preaching then we can be certain he would have failed miserably and today he might not have been remembered as the hero we revere him as being. It was the perfect will of God that he wait, and the other disciples wait, at Jerusalem for a few days until He was ready to endue them with the power to begin fulfilling His plans for them. If you want to know why He didn't just do it then but wanted to wait instead, I cannot answer that AND I am skeptical of anyone who tries to answer it.
Finally, I want to run these ideas by you one more time. But first I will say, if God is giving you the power and the grace to deal with a problem you are intensely struggling with, to deny it then, you will go back to your addiction 7x over. If you have already cursed yourself by going back and have made it 7x worse by so doing, then it becomes 49x worse. If God gives you the commandment, He is behind you 100% and
will see you live to do it. But you can under no circumstances deny this power, or you will come very close to committing blasphemy, a full rejection of God.
You have a problem. God wants you to address it. He commands that you abstain or He may reveal a plan for your healing. He might have you go up on your mountain for a few days just to gather your thoughts, to remand yourself back unto God, and to gain peace with what must be done. And then He will finally call you back down from the mountain as He told Moses (Ex 32:7) and it is at Jerusalem where you will find your
healing. It is at the New Jerusalem where the tree of life will be planted which bears fruit for the healing of the nations (Rev 22:2). "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?" (1 Cor 3:16). It is in the Jerusalem in your heart, this holy temple, where God will perform a work in you.
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