Posts Tagged ‘Christian’

Seven Lesser Known Prophecies about Jesus’ Death

Posted: September 28, 2024 in Bible, Christ, Christian, GOD, Isaiah, religion, Satan, Sin
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I was thinking about prophecies of Jesus’ death and I wanted to choose a few that aren’t the better known ones and see where the Spirit leads.

  1. Deuteronomy 21:23 and Galatians 3:13 is the first prophecy we’ll look at. I probably wouldn’t have included this ruling about stoning someone who has committed a sin punishable by death and then hanging him on a tree that was handed down to the Jews as a prophecy of Christ’s death except for the fact that the Apostle Paul identified it for us as such in his letter to the Galatians where he said Christ became our curse that we could never be free of otherwise and wore it as His own, therefore taking and displaying our curse as His own before His Father. Deuteronomy 21:23 “his body shall not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that day, so that you do not defile the land which the LORD your God is giving you [as] an inheritance; for he who is hanged [is] accursed of God. (NKJV) Galatians 3:13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed [is] everyone who hangs on a tree”), (NKJV)
  2. Psalm 2:1 and 12 In my opinion, Psalm 2 is this cool, oddball prophecy about the Trinity discussing the folly of man. In verse one they are wondering why we as humans plot against God vainly, or plot without a hope of winning. The subsequent verses go on to talk about kings and rulers taking up arms against the rule of God in a prophecy of the near future, but verse one can be taken as a double entendre because the Jewish leadership, as the unwitting pawns of Satan, intended to quash and quieten this heretic called Jesus of Nazareth once and for all by having him put to death, but their plot was in vain, because they only were fulfilling prophecy that they should have seen was unfolding before their eyes, being the experts on the law that they professed to be. Instead of quieting Him they did the one thing that would carry His voice to the world. Verse twelve continues the pattern of the foolishness of humanity and it’s leaders for even thinking that they could defeat God, ending in a not so subtle warning to them to “shape up”. Psalm 2:1 Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?…12 Kiss the Son, lest he be angry, and you perish in the way, for his wrath is quickly kindled. Blessed are all who take refuge in him. (ESV)
  3. Psalm 16:10 and Psalm 49:15 are Psalms about achieving power over the grave, which Our Lord, Jesus Christ did (Psalm 16). By his death and resurrection, He created a pathway for our souls to achieve a similar power over the grave (Psalm 49) when we are snatched up to be with Our Lord. Psalm16:10 For You will not leave my soul in Sheol, Nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. Psalm 49:15 But God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave: for he shall receive me. Selah. (NKJV)
  4. Psalm 118:22-23 talks about the stone which the builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. These verses speak volumes about what is pleasing in the eyes of man usually isn’t what is pleasing in the eye of God. Even though Jesus was predicted and prophesied hundreds of year earlier to be our Messiah and to become the king of the Jews and the prophecies were specific to the very day that He would present Himself as the king in Jerusalem. The leadership was caught off guard and rejected Him. Even though we were told through prophecy that he wouldn’t be an eye catcher, people still look toward outward appearances for we are told in the book of I Samuel that was one of the qualities of Saul that attracted the Jews. This prophecy was quoted by Christ about Himself in Matthew 21:42 Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: ‘The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief cornerstone. This was the LORD’s doing, And it is marvelous in our eyes’?
    Psalm 118:22-23 The stone [which] the builders rejected Has become the chief cornerstone. This was the LORD’s doing; It [is] marvelous in our eyes. (NKJV)
  5. Isaiah 53:6 This verse in this very prophetic chapter in Isaiah wraps the whole purpose of Christ’s death into a very tidy, succinct bundle as to why He had to die for our iniquities and sins. Isaiah 53:6 All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. (NKJV)
  6. Matthew 26:2 is a prophecy of Christ, by Christ to His disciples in a straight forward matter-of-fact way as a wrap up on His lesson at the Mount of Olives that in a couple of days He is to be crucified. Matthew 26:2 “You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man will be delivered up to be crucified.” (NKJV)
  7. Luke 18:31-34 Here is another prophecy where Christ outlines the events that are about to take place that will culminate with His death and resurrection to fulfill one major portion of the plan of Our Lord that has been in place ever since sin was first introduced into the world back in Eden.
    Luke 18:31-33 Then He took the twelve aside and said to them, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished. “For He will be delivered to the Gentiles and will be mocked and insulted and spit upon. “They will scourge [Him] and kill Him. And the third day He will rise again.” (NKJV)

God Bless, Jim

Empty space and galaxy near and far, or how long did it take for our universe to form?

Posted: September 26, 2024 in Christian
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Is space empty? When I went to school many decades ago we were taught that for the most part, space was empty. However in the last few decades the concept of the universe being full of dark matter has been bandied about. Why? There is simply too much stuff going on, energy-wise, in our universe for the viewable and/or measurable amount of matter to have enough mass to be the cause of it all, mathematics and physics have shown.

In fact when they crunch the numbers, it seems they are missing a little matter…more than a little? OK, they are missing some matter…no…even more? Actually, calculations determine they are missing almost 90% of the matter of the universe and they can’t find it, it seems…it apparently is hiding somewhere, so they came up with the tag of ‘dark matter’. One popular example of this concept is something called ‘zero point energy‘ and the consternation the discrepancies in the math cause scientist has been labeled the cosmological constant problem.

We learned all about thermodynamics in school (whether we actually realize it or not). Thermodynamics is the concept that matter gives off heat to the background creating energy in exchange. If there is no potential difference in temperature between an object and the background, there is no heat transference in the form of energy and no work can be performed…in other words, all work results in heat being dissipated, or given off to the surrounding, or background.

The ambient temperature of space is very, very cold while matter that resides within the universe has different levels of heat that they give off to the ’empty’ space background. That cold background temperature is called ‘absolute zero’, somewhere around -460of. That is as measurably cold as you can get…you can’t get any colder. When matter gives off all its heat and it gets as cold as the background, that is called heat death. At this point science tells us that there is no exchange of energy…matter is as dead as it can get…everything we know stops…everything ceases being. Kind of sad to think about, isn’t it?

However, that isn’t the end to the story…remember the dark matter, as they call it? Science has found out that even when the background of space is at absolute zero, there is an unexplainable massive amount of energy stored within that ’empty space’. Science can’t explain where it comes from or even what it is, but they have realized that this zero point energy is a constant source of energy at the sub-atomic level that keeps the electron in their orbits. It appears that this energy somehow keeps replenishing it’s self from outside the universe1. Is it some creepy mojo happening…or does it simply means that the Creator is still at work? I’ll take the latter explanation.

If it weren’t for the zero-point energy replenishment, we or nothing else would be here, for there would be no energy to keep the electrons spinning in their orbits around the nucleus and the atomic structure of life would destroy itself. Empty space?…I don’t think so. It certainly seems to me someone is still holding it all together. Let us look and see if we can get any insights from the scriptures…Colossians 1:16-17 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. (NKJV)

The current theories on the beginning of the universe named “The Big Bang” by the scientific religionists speculate that matter sprang into existence and grew and developed over a few billion years, with matter morphing in to stars and galaxies that grew from infancy to maturity.

I read an article recently that mentioned the Hubble telescope, and it got me thinking about this. There are a few deep space telescopes that can look at very distant objects in our universe, including thousands upon thousands of galaxies of all different sorts. If you look at mature spiral galaxies you notice that despite how far away they are, the arms seem to be extended about the same because of the gravitational and centrifugal effects. What is intriguing about that is because of the limitation of the speed of light, the ones we see far away are snapshots of the galaxy long ago in the past, where the ones relatively close are glimpses of only a few years past. In other words, the light we see from a galaxy far, far away left the galaxy millions of years ago, meaning what we are seeing is a millions of year old snapshot of that particular galaxy. While the photo of the Andromeda galaxy is only a few years old. When you compare the photos of the near and the far galaxies you notice that the spiral arms are extended about the same regardless of distance away from us which means that they also demonstrate about the same amount of maturity as the near galaxies. This intrigues me because using the current theory of the age of the universe according to modern science’s theories, that should not be so…the far distant ones are pictures of spiral galaxies taken eons ago and the arms should be less well developed that the closer ones. In fact there should be many, many examples of infant galaxies and galaxies in various stages of maturity in these photos from the long range telescopes, but there aren’t…so…what does it mean?

What it means to me, is that every single one of the uncountable galaxies all appeared at the same time…It means that they were all created at the same time and the photographic evidence is before us.

God Bless

Jim

1 Quantum Physics experiments by Bohr and others show that we exist in what is referred to as ‘local reality’ and that below a certain ‘smallness’ (time, size, etc) things, as we perceive them, no longer exists. (There have been experiments at the subatomic level that appear to prove this where protons seem to ‘sense’ what is happening to other proton, regardless of location on the earth).

 

One of Satan’s Successful Campaign

Posted: February 19, 2020 in Christian
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Throughout the history of the human race, we can find multitudes of ways that Satan has tried to thwart the plan of God. There are the obvious and overt ways that we know in the bible, but what immediately came to mind when I thought about this subject was one way that Satan has tried to thwart the plan of God that is still continuing to this day. The way I am referring to is to sow derision, doubt and conflict within the Body of Christ.

All the different groups or denominations within Christianity, for the most part, are philosophically separated by seemingly insignificant differences. We find these differences begin to crop up in the first few years of The Way(1), as the group of people that followed the teachings of Christ were called in the book of Acts. Even in the very infancy of the Church, Satan was able to successfully insert false prophets and start to sow doubt and deception within the Christian movement. Small, subtle changes here and there, a doubt about the real meaning behind this passage or that passage and Satan’s ability to convince scholars and teachers that taking passages out of context is OK all resulted in the beginnings of the division of the Body of Christ. The letters to the Thessalonians and the Corinthians churches were penned by Paul partially to calm them and answer their nervous questions and doubts that were being whispered in their ears by false prophets and those intent in creating discord within their local congregations. Satan was also very successful in his campaign to deceive the early church fathers into questioning the meaning of the scriptures, which allowed them to start creating their own interpretations of the Word, which resulted in a more palatable form of religion for the leaders of Holy Roman Empire. The disgust with the end product of the religious/political superpower that these continued interpretations morphed into resulted in the protestant reformation movement in the sixteenth century.(2) Part of the problem that the reformation movement left us with is many of the reformed protestant religious entities that were formed didn’t take the reformation far enough, which has resulted in many of our ‘siblings’ in the Body of Christ still firmly believing in the long time Catholic view of allegorizing the scripture, just as they did in fourth century Constantinople to make the watered-down lessons and commandments of the Word of Our Lord easier for the masses to digest and accept, making them little less rigid, and a lot less ‘black and white’. Therefore many of our brethren teach traditional interpretation instead of what the scripture really says. To do this effectively, they have to do several things. One of the first things that needs to be done is to ignore the fact that the scriptures from Genesis to Revelation is a single, cohesive message system with a single stranded woven web of meaning and purpose about God, his people and his Son. Once this is accomplished, the rest is easy. From that point on, it becomes simple to take and chop the word of Our Lord up into individual sections that don’t relate to each other significantly or not at all to be able to build the traditions and religious philosophy the the church has replaced Israel as God’s chosen people referred to as replacement theology(3) that many of our brethren teach weekly from their pulpits as gospel.

This watered-down version of the gospel may pass inspection at the microscopic or planar level, but if you were to get high above it and inspect it from a distance, I believe you would see a nasty conglomeration of square pegs sticking out of round holes and non-matching puzzle pieces, hammered and taped together to form a Picasso style picture instead of a smooth flowing message system that easily fits and continues from end to end, the way the Holy Spirit wrote it and the way the Creator of All Things intended. This form of religious interpretation opens itself up to attack from Satan who can squeeze in between the gaps and cracks and, in my opinion, I’m afraid that is what happened to the early Church when it started using this formula in the fourth century to please the masses.

We as the Body of Christ are much like extremely dysfunctional siblings that are constantly fighting and squabbling over minor issues and irrelevant things to the point that most of our energies are absorbed in this in-fighting instead of taking the Word to the lost of the world. This has to be one of Satan’s more successful campaigns in his plan to thwart the plan of Our Lord.

Jim
02-19-20

1 Acts 9:2 and Acts 19:9, 23

2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protestant_Reformation

3 http://www.gotquestions.org/replacement-theology.html

Patterns That Are and Patterns That Aren’t in the Bible

Posted: February 18, 2020 in Christian, My view of the world
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I have a non-traditional view of the scripture (to put it kindly, according to some) and in my mind’s eye, I see God discussing with the others in the Trinity over steaming cups of nectar, his script for our universe before zapping us into existence. We all know what happened…Satan immediately threw a wrench into the works and by appearances this caused the Lord to rewrite the script of the complicated sim game that is our existence and reality1, so to speak, with that in mind, I want to discuss patterns I see.

I look for patterns everywhere, and the bible is no exception as I see them peeking  out at us from the scriptures as I peruse the pages of this awesome book. On my journey through the testaments, I find many patterns from the beginning of the scriptures, to the end. For instance, one pattern that I see is that after the Jews turned chicken and refused to invade Canaan the first time, The Lord sent them wandering for thirty eight years around the Median wilderness before they were allowed to occupy the land. Fast-forward several hundred years and we have the Jewish nation reject God again by rejecting His Son. Thirty eight years after the rejection and crucifixion (see the pattern?), in 70AD, the Roman siege began, causing the destruction of the temple and the horrendous massacre of over a million Jews during this lengthy siege and subsequent occupation of Jerusalem. In my minds eye, I can’t help but wonder if this was simply a modified script from the original one, the original script possibly being one where the Jews accepted him as the Messiah as Jesus rode triumphantly into Jerusalem and thirty eight years later, the chosen people, with Christ as their King, started the rule of the earth from Zion instead of watching it being destroyed, just as they had captured and occupied the promised land so many centuries before.

I also see potential patterns that would have been fulfilled, if they hadn’t been broken. An example of this was Moses and the water from the rock during the wilderness wanderings. If you recall, the Lord asked Moses in Exodus 17 to strike the rock and after he did so, a great volume of water came gushing out to give sustenance to the people and their animals in the Median desert. If you carefully read the second account in Numbers 20, the second time Moses was asked to provide water from the rock the Lord asked him to speak to the rock, but because of the grumbling of the people, Moses became annoyed and frustrated with this ungrateful horde and struck the rock again out of anger at the people. Water did spew forth from the rock, but this wanton act by Moses landed him in the penalty box and prevented him from entering into the Land of Canaan. If  Moses had spoken to the rock, it would have established a pattern relating to the plan of salvation where the first time the Jews struck Christ (as Moses struck the rock the first time as requested). The second time if Moses had spoken to the rock, it would have related to the passage in Hosea 5:15 relating to the second coming where we read of the Children of Israel asking Christ to save them when they acknowledge their offense and Christ returns to rule from Zion as we read in Hosea 5:15…think of who is referred to as the Rock throughout the scriptures…Christ is called the rock. See the potential pattern that never was?

Jim

02-18-20

1 I personally think we are some sort of giant SIM game where our reality is all smoke and mirrors and the real reality is what we refer to as the ‘spirit world’. The apostle Paul supports that view, by the way in Ephesians 6:12

Christ and the Daughters of Zelophehad

Posted: February 15, 2020 in Christian
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I am fairly certain everyone that has done more than a cursory reading of the bible knows that there are prophecies all through this holy tome. Some events and prophecies in the bible are straight forward and generally self-explanatory…then there are some events or prophecies or things mentioned in the scriptures that appear to have no purpose and are seemingly insignificant in their importance except for historical reference or record-keeping. However, I personally believe everything mentioned in the scriptures is put in there by the Holy Spirit for a purpose, and Peter confirmed that in his second letter…2 Peter 1:20-21: knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.(NKJV). I am going to highlight two apparently separate events that occurred centuries apart and demonstrate how one utterly innocuous request and the subsequent ruling, coupled with another almost completely unknown and insignificant event, helped set the stage for the coming Messiah.

The first event we read of has a strange request by five daughters of a cursed Israelite named Zelophehad wandering in the Median wilderness. This odd request is a passage that is easy to pass over without a second glance, but upon Subsequently, we find that the ruling by Moses accepting their request to allow them to inherit their father’s land, opens the door to another almost totally insignificant event that allowed a loop-hole around a curse by God upon King Jehoiachin that has caused some commentators to want to pull their hair out because of the apparent implications of this curse on the royal line of David in regards to the coming Messiah.

The daughters of Zelophehad and Jehoiachin’s curse

I imagine that the events of Zelophehad’s appeal to Moses and Jehoiachin’s curse by the Lord are just a couple of the thousands of strands of prophecy that is woven throughout the bible to form proof of the power and the majesty and of the unmistakable and irrefutable fact the The Lord is the only true God and the Creator of all things.

How do these seemingly unrelated events that happened many centuries apart relate?

Let’s begin with a summary of the wilderness wanderings. At the end of about two weeks travel from the Red Sea, the Israelites were camped in the Median wilderness at the border of Canaan. The Lord had Moses send twelve spies to sneak in to inspect and report on the land. Most of us know that only two of the twelve spies came back without fear of the inhabitants and demonstrated their trust in our Lord by giving a good report and suggested they attack immediately while the other ten spies spread fear and indecision with scary stories of the giant inhabitants of Canaan. We know the rest of the story about how the people swiftly ignored all the miraculous stuff the Lord had just demonstrated a few weeks back and started murmuring against Moses. This, coupled with the evil influence by Korah that roused up the people against God’s plan of invasion, caused the Lord to curse the adults of the congregation, resulting in a relatively short trek through this wilderness to suddenly turn into a 38 year wandering with the intention of making sure all the grumbling adults would die, save for Joshua and Caleb (the two faithful spies). At the end of the thirty eight year wilderness wandering, only the these two adults, as well as the those that were children almost four decades earlier were allowed to enter Canaan, according to the record in Numbers chapter 14. However, if we go back to the early portion of the wanderings, we read in Numbers 26 about an obscure man by the name of  Zelophehad, of the tribe of Manasseh, that had five daughters. Other than the fact he was part of the cursed adult congregation that died many years before they were to win the land of Canaan for the Lord and enter into it to claim it as their own, why would the scriptures highlight this seemingly innocuous man?

To begin with, according to God’s decree in Numbers 26, only each one of the male members (for the census only counted the males of each tribe) of the different tribes of Israel could inherit land but their daughters could not inherit according to the law. Therefore, the daughters of Zelophehad found themselves in a bad situation; their father has five daughters and no son, therefore their family name would pass without inheritance or land grant and die with him. They decided to petition Moses to appeal the law so his namesake would continue within the tribe and his heirs could claim their tribal inheritance. Moses took it to The Lord and The Lord told Moses to grant the tribal exception (Numbers 27: 1-8). Years later, after the Israelites conquered Canaan and the tribes were set to divide the land, the daughters of Zelophehad went before Joshua and reminded him of the exception granted by The Lord through Moses and they received their inheritance which stated as long as they marry within the their tribe, their husband would be adopted into their family as a legal son, and their tribal line and inheritance would be preserved (Joshua 17:3). This seemingly insignificant event however, will have major ramifications several hundreds of years in the future as it helps to fulfill a very significant prophecy first mentioned in Genesis 3: 15 And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, And you shall bruise His heel.”(NKJV).

The second somewhat related event I want to bring to mind is the curse of Jehoiachin (also called Jeconiah and Coniah) by the Lord. Jehoiachin seemed to follow the footsteps of a string of evil kings of Judah, as listed in II Kings chapters 22, 23 & 24 (most of the research I did referred to this king as Jehoiachin, but in this particular translation of the passage below, the Lord uses the name of Coniah). The Lord had all he could take of these evildoers and pronounced a curse on Jehoiachin and his descendants in Jeremiah 22: 24-30 “As I live,” says the LORD, “though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, were the signet on My right hand, yet I would pluck you off; “and I will give you into the hand of those who seek your life, and into the hand of those whose face you fear—the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and the hand of the Chaldeans. “So I will cast you out, and your mother who bore you, into another country where you were not born; and there you shall die. “But to the land to which they desire to return, there they shall not return. “Is this man Coniah a despised, broken idol— A vessel in which is no pleasure? Why are they cast out, he and his descendants, And cast into a land which they do not know? O earth, earth, earth, Hear the word of the LORD! Thus says the LORD: ‘Write this man down as childless, A man who shall not prosper in his days; For none of his descendants shall prosper, Sitting on the throne of David, And ruling anymore in Judah.”(NKJV). This in itself is bad enough, but when you consider the implications of the Lord’s Covenant with David that the Throne of David would be established forever as was written in II Samuel 7:16 “And your house and your kingdom shall be established forever before you. Your throne shall be established forever”. (NKJV), it seems to throw a wrench into the works of the Davidic prophecy. While researching this article, I found several discussions pointing to the curse of Jehoiachin as proof the Jesus couldn’t be the Messiah because of the curse, for after the Babylonian captivity, no descendant of David sat upon a Throne of Israel. I also saw many sites with discussions trying to prove that the curse was later lifted and all was forgiven. All of these discussions and all of these websites totally miss the point of the virgin birth that was prophesied in Genesis 3 and the ancestry of Mary (even though it says Joseph)1 laid out in Luke 3 beginning in verse 23.

What ties these two otherwise unrelated events together is the lineage of Mary provided by the Holy Spirit in the Gospel of Matthew and in the Gospel of Luke. Luke 3:23 states: And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was [the son] of Heli,(KJV). Matthew’s account of the lineage of Jesus say this in chapter 1:16: And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ. (KJV). Matthew covers the descendants through the legal line, (Joseph’s father Jacob) even though that line was cursed by God after Jehoiachin that no direct descendant would sit upon the Throne, Luke covers the descendancy through the untarnished, royal line from the Messiah’s mother, (Joseph’s adopted father through his marriage to Mary, Heli) back through David, which means God’s promise to David is secure through his mother’s ancestry and legal through his earthly father’s line.

This all sets the stage for the prophecy of Christ to rule on David’s Throne in the end-times. Something I have read all my life and never understood were the direct, simple statements that began and ended Christ’s earthly existence. Matthew 2:1-2 says: Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem (I have an interesting theory about these magi, Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.(KJV) While Matthew 27:37 states: And set up over his head his accusation written, THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS.(KJV). I have read these verses all my life and never understood the simple plain logic that Jesus has yet to fulfill this destiny…to Rule as KING OF THE JEWS.

God Bless…

Jim Bussell

02-15-20

1 Mary’s father was Heli, but for the most part, Jewish ancestries only lists male descendants. Joseph was the adopted son of Heli according to Jewish law established with the agreement with the daughters of Zelophehad.

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