Bible Believers' Newsletter #111
"We focus on the PRESENT Truth -- what Jesus is doing NOW . . ." ISSN 1442-8660
We greet you in the wonderful Name of our Lord Jesus Christ and appreciate your fellowship.
"All we like sheep have gone astray". But God made a contract with Adam's race so He laid upon Jesus the iniquity of all. "He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquity; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him and with His stripes we were healed." That was God's contract to the Church, His elect.
When He killed the Lamb at Calvary and tore Him apart, He took the body part into glory and set It on the right-hand of the Majesty but He sent the Holy Spirit part back to the people to reproduce the Body in a many-membered form.
The Holy Spirit that fell on the day of Pentecost is gathering a people whose lives will dovetail into that same Body seated at the right hand of the Father. When the Seventh Trump sounds the end of the Gentile dispensation, and the latter rain strikes the earth, Body and Spirit will prove their union by preeminence under the Head in the manifestation of the Sons of God.
When God sees both halves of the contract dovetail, He will glorify the Body and take it Home to be with the Head. So when you pray, ask God to meet your needs. He is pleased to do these things. If only we can believe, He is a present help in time of every need. As the Scripture says, "Love begets love", and God is love, so if He is in our hearts, we will manifest a true spirit of love to all.
We don't love the evil spirits that dominate a man. but we love his soul that Jesus died for on Calvary. That was His love for all of Adam's race (which includes you and me). His desire was that none should be lost, but that all would come to repentance.
"God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and has committed unto us the Word of reconciliation". Once you understand the Message for THIS hour, pass it on (Revelation 10:8-11).
This newsletter serves those of like precious faith and whosoever will receive the Truth is welcome to feed their soul from the waters of the River of Life. Everything presented should be confirmed personally in your own Bible. . . . Anthony
Echelon
A report to the European Parliament's Committee for Justice and Home Affairs compiled by independent Scottish investigative journalist Duncan Campbell, includes allegations that sensitive commercial information gathered through Echelon meant the French company Thomson lost a radar contract in Brazil, and the European Airbus consortium lost out to the US's Boeing in competition for a $6bn aircraft contract.
German Christian Democratic Euro-MP Christian von Boetticher told reporters he estimated the economic cost of the spying to European business to be 20 billion euros ($20bn).
Mr Campbell alleged that national security agencies were using several major US corporations to aid their interception of data capabilities. He named Microsoft, IBM and a certain "large American microchip maker" . . .
Echelon's existence was only recently confirmed by the US Government . . . Most of installations are in the US and UK, but the report also states that Canada, Australia and New Zealand are partners in the operation.
Is this why Uncle Sam tried so hard to outlaw encryption?
Full Story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/newsid_654000/654394.stm
Prayer
Last week we spoke about prayer, and the way our Savior taught us how to pray.
God is more interested in our holiness than our comfort. He more greatly delights in the integrity and purity of His Church, than its material well-being. He more readily shows Himself to men and women who enjoy and obey Him, than to folk whose horizons revolve around good jobs, nice houses, and health. He's building a temple in which His Spirit dwells, not preserving our reputations.
God's more disposed to display His grace, than to flatter our intelligence. To stretch our faith, than to extend our popularity. He wants us to pursue daily death, not self-fulfillment. For the latter leads to death, while the former leads to life.
These essential values of the Gospel must condition our praying, as they shaped Paul's. Indeed, they become the ground for our praying. And a wonderful comfort, a marvellous boost to faith, to know that we're praying in line with the declared will of Almighty God.
Many ask: "Why not leave other faiths alone? Don't all worship the same God in different ways?"
No! Christianity is the only faith. All others are false trails, which don't lead to God. Jesus said, "I am the way to God, the only sacrifice. No one comes to the Father except through the Me" (John 14:6).
Peter said "Salvation is found in no one else" (Acts 4:12).
Jesus commanded His disciples "to go into all the world and preach the Gospel", Mark 16:15. However the end-time evangelism is not to those who know they're heathens, but to heathens who think they're Christians. The call in this day is, "Come out of Babylon, and be filled with the Spirit" (Revelation 18:4).
Since the Acts of the Apostles, which describes the foundation of the church, Christianity has continued to spread throughout the earth. In the first century it spread through the Mediterranean world, (including England, parts of North Africa and India). The false church organised at the First Nicea Council, and became the official religion of the pagan Roman Empire in the fourth century. In the eighth and ninth centuries, it spread to northern Europe at the point of a sword, killing any and all who refused to submit.
By the 15th-16th centuries, the Light of the Reformation, began to shine through the darkness of the false church, and spread from Europe to America, which was settled in part by godly people seeking to escape the religious oppression of England and Europe.
The modern missionary movement began about 200 years ago, with William Carey. Since then a quarter of a million missionaries have gone to almost every country on earth. Yet today, only 30% of the world's population is nominally Christian, up from 20% in 1900. If Bible types are any guide, and Jesus applied them to our day, less than one in a million nominally Christians are born-again and therefore, genuine Christians who'll be in the first Resurrection, the Wedding Supper and the Millennium.
In the days of Noah, one man was translated from a whole world of people. Enoch was a type of the end-time Bride, he was translated without death. Noah and his family represent the "saved", without the Holy Spirit, who stand before the saints at the White Throne Judgment. Of those carried over in the Ark, five were saved: three were lost. Ham, sin, was still in there, showing that after the Millennium, there must be a resurrection and judgment.
In the days of Lot, Abraham and Sarah typed the end-time Bride. We receive new bodies, before we meet our Promised Son, just as they were renewed in the atoms, before Isaac came. Like Noah's family, Lot and his family represent the saved, going through tribulation. Mrs. Lot was ultimately lost along with every soul in that gentile civilization. And when God burns this Gentile civilization at the end of Daniel's Seventieth Week, all life on earth will perish and earth will be renewed for the Millennium
Few will be translated at the end of the Gentile dispensation. And very few will be "saved". God ends both the Gentiles and the Jews in UNBELIEF.
Secular Humanism is now the fastest growing religion. It might be described as "designer religion" because one makes up the rules to suit oneself. Of the rest, 20% is Muslim, the fastest growing older religion in the world, having almost doubled this century; 13.5% is Hindu, and 11.5% Buddhist. Of the remaining 25%, 0.025% are Jewish, over 90% of whom are Ashkenazim and not related to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob by blood -- or by faith. The remainder are animist, spiritist or other minor religions and sects, plus 18.5%, or one billion people, who have no religion or are atheist. These would include many Secular Humanists.
Of the 30% NOMINAL Christians, half are Roman Catholic, one third Protestant and a sixth evangelical. Evangelicals are growing twice as quickly as other nominal Christians. I wonder what percentage of these nominal Christians are in fact Secular Humanist?
These statistics were contained in a publication of the "Church Missionary Society". It adds, that there are 6,500 language groups in the world, yet portions of the Bible are available in only 2,000 of these. And it's later than we think. We're living in the end of the last generation, just before the close of the Gentile dispensation, the end of God's grace.
Jesus stated emphatically, "that the generation that saw Israel restored to the Promised Land, is the last generation, before the destruction of all life on earth". This generation is no more than atomic fodder.
Its time to get real, and stop wearing God on our shirt sleeves. If we want a safe place ourselves and our loved ones, the only way we'll find it is to "get into Christ" -- then you'll partake of the glorious Millennium reign. That's where the kingdom's restored to Israel.
Until the Millennium, wars are determined (Daniel 9:26-27; Matthew 24:8). This world is headed for Armageddon and the nuclear annihilation of all life on earth. Jesus was quite certain that the generation that saw Israel restored to the Promised Land would not pass away through old age before this takes place. And the true Church will be translated seven years beforehand, for in those last seven years God deals with 144,000 true Israelites, in Israel, pours out His wrath in the plagues, and looses the nations for the Battle of Armageddon. Just look how Australia and the once Christian world, is preparing the way of the kings of the East as Jesus prophesied.
We have no time to waste. God's grace turns to judgment after the end of the Gentile dispensation. Even the 144,000 elect Israelites will be martyred. And anyone who imagines himself to be an Israelite, claiming the Covenant of Moses, yet living outside the Promised Land, is outside that Covenant.
We have seven years less than many think. Last week we read how China is preparing for eventual war with the US. In the new Cold War, Australia is being invited to take sides against China. Richard Armitage, adviser to US Presidential candidate Bush said, "It we were taking casualties . . . we would not want our allies to stand by. The US would expect Australia to contribute to the dirty, hard and dangerous work." (This might explain the constant recruitment ads on TV and talk about creating an American style coastguard for rapid deployment).
Linked to this, Japan changed its constitution last September so its defence forces may take an offensive role. According to these guidelines, the US will take over all Japanese military bases, commercial airports, roads and hospitals in case of an emergency. This is a contingency for large-scale war.
Russia and her satellites are arming at the expense of US taxpayers. And the Islamic nations are being continually provoked. All of this activity is orchestrated by the City of London as part of an age-old plan to bring about a one world Luciferian government.
"What must I do to get into Christ"?
There is only ONE way: recognize YOUR day and ITS Message. Search the Scriptures to learn what God said He'd do NOW, in THIS day. When you see THAT part of the Word manifesting through your life, you know you're born-again. A written epistle. Christ in you, willing and doing His Own good pleasure.
God is known by simplicity and a revelation of Jesus Christ in the most illiterate person. Not by theology but a revelation of Jesus Christ. "Upon this rock, (of Spiritual revelation) I'll build My Church" -- no other rocks are accepted; no other Roman rock; no other Protestant rock; no other school; nothing but the revelation of Jesus Christ in a new birth. He's born in there and injects His Own Life: your life is gone and the Life of Christ is projecting Itself through you because you're under preeminence. And people see the very life, and works and signs and wonders He once did, only now He's doing those things through you. Outside of that, the rest of them are not even called to at all.
Lack of this revelation is the reason we have so many divisions among us, and so much impersonation. The divisions are because people lack this understanding. The teachers, their ministers must first be partakers of the faith God is unfolding for THIS day before they can feed their flock. Without a clear revelation of the PRESENT Truth, all they can do is repeat a history of what Jesus did in the past.
Setting the Stage for the Dark Ages
You'll remember when we reviewed the first or Ephesian Church Age, we encountered the DEEDS of the Nicolaitanes, which established a hierarchy within the clergy, between God and man. In the third or Pergamean Age these "DEEDS" were entrenched into law, by the false vine church. In the revelation, Jesus no longer calls them the DEEDS, but the DOCTRINE of the Nicolaitanes.
The third Age revealed by the Spirit of prophecy that the worldly church would adopt Nicolaitanism as a DOCTRINE. The separation of the clergy from the laity grew from the Biblical truth of the ELDERS -- (shepherds of local flocks) ruling the flock by the Word, to the "DEEDS of Nicolaitanes" wherein the clergy set themselves in ranks, one over the other; and this unscriptural formula then evolved into a priesthood that placed the clergy between man and God, giving the clergy certain rights, all the while denying the laity their God-given rights. This was usurpation. In the Pergamos Age it became a DOCTRINE. It was established in the church as the assured Word of God, which indeed it was not. But the clergy called it the Word of God, and therefore the doctrine was antichrist.
Because human government is politics, pure and simple, the church became involved in politics. This involvement was welcomed by a dictator-emperor, who joined church politics with state politics, and by force established the false church (Satan's false religion) as the true religion. And through several edicts by various emperors, we find the false church, with state power, destroying the true vine even more avidly.
Sad to say, the true vine was not exactly immune to this doctrine. By that, I don't mean to say that the true vine ever did establish Nicolaitane ideas as a doctrine. Far from it. but that little worm of death kept sucking at the true vine, hoping that it might fall. Even within the true church, men whom God had called as overseers, were holding that title to mean a little more than just a local responsibility. It was not the clear understanding of Paul, that existed in the church at this time. For Paul had said, "And they glorified GOD in me." No matter what authority Paul had, he kept the people looking to God, from Whom is ALL authority. But the clergy were always looking to Divine Leadership plus human, and thus, in giving honor where honor was not due, we find the True church was spotted with Humanism. With Nicolaitanism established. apostolic succession, placed ministers, pastors voted in, etc., it was only one step for the false church to proceed to "Balaamism".
The second step to the "depth of Satan" was now in full progress.
This second step was the doctrine of Balaam, (described in Revelation 2:14), who taught Balak to stumble the children of Israel by a "united meeting". There the guests would do two more things contrary to the Word of God. You'll recall that Balak needed help to keep his kingdom. He called on the most dominant spiritual figure of his day, Balaam. Balaam gave the advice that trapped and destroyed Israel. It was first of all, to suggest that they all get together and "talk things over, and eat together" and get things ironed out. After all, understanding each other goes a long way. Once you accomplish that, you can go from there. The next step would be worshiping together, and of course, a little pressure from the host, usually makes the guests go a lot further than they intended.
Now that didn't only happen back there to God's church of the Old Testament, it happened to the church of the New Testament, for there was an emperor, who, like Balak, needed help to secure his kingdom. Constantine invited the nominal Christian, First Church of Rome, to help get the Christians behind him, as they were a very large body.
The outcome was the Nicene Council of 325. There, the Christians, both true and nominal, came together at the invitation of Constantine. The true Christians had no business even going up to the meeting. In spite of all Constantine could do to unite them all, the real believers knew that they were out of place and left ... before the Council sat.
To those who remained, Constantine gave of the state's treasury, along with political and physical force. The people were introduced to idol worship and spiritism, for statues with the names of saints were placed in the buildings, and the people were taught to commune with the dead, or pray to saints which is nothing more nor less than spiritism. For the food that man truly needs, even the Word of God, they were given creeds, and dogmas and rituals, which were also enforced by the state; and above all, they were given three gods with the triple compound name of the One true God, and water baptism in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ gave way to the pagan baptism of three TITLES.
The real believers ought not to have gone there. They had already lost much truth, and now they, too, would lose the understanding or faith of godhead, and forfeit names for Titles in water baptism.
Now watch this doctrine of Balaam most carefully. Notice above all, that its the deliberate manoeuvre of a corrupt clergy to bind the people to them, by leading them deliberately into unbelief, or sin. The Nicolaitane doctrine was the corruption of the clergy, as they sought political power amongst themselves, while Balaamism is the subjection of the people to their system of creed and worship, in order to hold them.
Now watch this carefully. What was it that bound the people to the nominal church, and thereby destroyed them? It was creeds and dogmas formed into church tenets. It was the DOCTRINE of the Roman Catholic Church. They were not given the true Food, the Word. They were given the food that came from idol worship, Babylonian paganism, wrapped up in Christian terminology.
That very same spirit and doctrine is right amongst all Protestants and it's called denomination. Nicolaitanism is organization, humanising the leadership of the church, and thereby deposing the Spirit. Balaamism is denominationalism which takes the church manual instead of the Bible. And right to this hour, many of God's people are caught in the snare of denominationalism, and God is crying to them, "Come OUT of her, My people, that you be not partakers of her sins, and that you receive not her plagues." You see, they are ignorant. But if the rapture should take place at this moment, ignorance would be no court of appeal from the judgment of God, for being in the wrong ranks.
For the clergy to organize themselves, with one rank over another, until they're finally headed up by a president, is a manifestation of the antichrist spirit, regardless of how wonderful and necessary it may seem. It's nothing but human reasoning taking the place of faith in the Word. And any person in the organised denominations, is right in the midst of an antichrist system. Now let me say this, and make it very plain. I am not against the PEOPLE. I'm against the SYSTEM.
With a state and church union, the stage had been set for the DARK Ages. And indeed for almost 1000 years, the church went into the depth of blackness, knowing the depths of Satan.
When a religious people embrace both Nicolaitanism and Balaamism, and have the political, financial and physical power to back it up, there's only one direction they can go. That direction is right into the Jezebel doctrine. But that would take us into the THYATIRA Age, and we'll leave that historical review for another day. radio023.html
For Further Information Contact:
Bible Believers' Church
Currabubula, NSW 2342, Australia
e-mail: ags@biblebelievers.org.au
URL: http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/