SUMMARY

THE SUMMARY

 

Some authors close their books with a last chapter called a "summary", or perhaps "epilogue", or just "last words". As I understand it, the meaning of all of these words is more or less the same thing. They are trying to sum up the intended content of their book in one brief chapter. I have recently been spending some time in the book of Revelation, and consider it to be God's summary of His book, the Holy Bible. I often refer to the Bible as the "Manufacturer's Manual", and compare it to the manual that always comes in the dash of a new car. This manual gives you all the information you need to operate this car properly, in order to obtain "optimum performance" from it throughout the life of the vehicle. I see Revelation as God's attempt to sum up the entire content of His book in one chapter. In (Rev 1:3) from the NLT we read "God blesses the one who reads the words of this prophecy to the church, and He blesses all who listens to the message and obeys what it says, for the time is near". My question is why do we not do that? The reasons are varied I'm sure, because many false prophecies and strange doctrines have been birthed from its pages, by people with a natural mind. And Paul has a word for these people in (1 Cor 2:14). But we shouldn't allow the actions of a few so-called prophets, or people with weird interpretations of parts of Revelation, to keep us from taking advantage of the truth it contains.

 

Revelation is not a book like Acts, which can be read in a chronological fashion, because Acts is like a history book, but Revelation is a series of prophecies or visions given by Jesus to His servant John.

(Rev 1:1-2) These visions often overlap, and are sometimes like different views of the same event. Therefore the chapters do not follow each other in the normal way! This is critical to know, and requires careful study of other scriptures pertaining to the same topic being discussed, and discernment from the Holy Spirit when reading this book. There is such a thing as the gift of the Holy Spirit referred to in (1 Cor 12:10) as the gift of "discerning of spirits". I understand this to be the supernatural power to discern what spirit is behind any type of utterance. Apparently there can be three sources, 1/ The Holy Spirit, 2/ The human spirit of the person involved, or 3/ A demonic spirit from Satan's kingdom. So this gift operating in our churches today could well be the most important of all the spiritual gifts mentioned. Jesus warned us that there would be many false prophets in the last days! (Matt 24:4,5,11,24)

Sincerely submitted.

Dave Jamer

FORGIVENESS

FORGIVENESS

 

The Word of God has a lot to say about the act of forgiveness, but there are certain "myths" that have been circulated throughout the church about forgiveness that are not true! I would like to mention a few that come to mind, and comment briefly on them. The first one that is often heard is "Just forgive and forget!", but this is impossible for us to do in the natural. Yes we can forgive the other person who offended us, but to forget about the damage it did to our relationship is a completely different matter. God forgets, or actually chooses to not remember, our sins once they are confessed, but we humans cannot do that. Our memory bank is such that once that offence has been registered in our brain it is there to stay. To forgive requires an act of our will, but the damage has been done to our emotions and recorded in our memory bank. So although we may forgive with our mind, and be very sincere about it, the damage caused to our emotions is not healed, and we may never be able to trust that other person again to have a close trusting relationship.

 

Another thing I consider to be a "myth", is believing that you cannot forgive the guilty party unless, and until they confess their wrong actions, and ask you for forgiveness. Lots of times they are not even aware that their words or actions have offended you. So you could wait for a very long time, and continue to be offended. The important thing to remember is that you are the one who is suffering, so forgiveness will end this. Someone has said that forgiveness is simply "letting go" of the offense, and beaming out forgiveness in the spirit toward the party involved. They are certainly not suffering, if they are not even aware of the incident, but the act of forgiveness will release you from the pain. After all forgiving actually is the act of canceling out the offense, or writing " paid in full" over the record we have been holding! After all, this is what our loving God does with the record of our sins against Him! (Col 2:13-15)

 

In order to accomplish this however, we must first forgive everyone for every sin ever committed against us. (Matt 6:14-15). Then in (Matt 18:21-35) Jesus tells a very important story of the man who owed his master an enormous debt, but his master showed him mercy and forgave the entire debt! Then this man had a friend who owed him a very small debt, and refused to forgive him for it. This man was turned over to the "torturers", or Satan's demons, for not showing mercy to his friend! This is a warning to all of us!!

Sincerely submitted.

Dave Jamer

MESSIAH'S COMINGS

MESSIAH'S COMINGS

 

One of our favorite scriptures that tell of the promised Messiah is (Is 9:6), which we know was fulfilled when Jesus was born to the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem some 2000 years ago. When it reads "A child is born to us", this refers to His humanity, or His position as the only perfect man who became the second, or last Adam, (1Cor 15:45). However "A Son is given to us", refers to His "Divinity"! Not only was Jesus the perfect man, but He was also the "God Man" (John 1:14), and Paul declared in (Col 2:9) "For in Christ lives all the fullness of God in a human body." NLT. Because of this fact, we know that Jesus is the only person who can "reverse the curse" brought on creation by the disobedience of the first Adam. He is also the only person who is found worthy to open the seals of the scroll in (Rev 5:5).

 

We also know from many scriptures like (Acts 1:11), that this same Jesus that the disciples saw taken up to heaven in the clouds, will come back to earth again, just as they had seen Him go. This disproves the theory of some "secret rapture" that has been made popular by certain books and videos. Jesus will certainly come back to our planet at the time appointed by His Father, to receive a bride who has made herself ready. (Matt 24:36). His appearance will put an end to the period of tribulation by Satan's Antichrist. (Matt 24:21-22). In other words when Jesus says this time will "be shortened for the sake of God's chosen ones" NLT, He doesn't mean the 7 year period mentioned by Daniel, but only the period of the persecution by the Antichrist in the last half or 3½ year portion of this time. This will be the time of the "Rapture" that some people expect could happen at any moment, and remove the church and escape the period of tribulation. But a careful examination of all the scriptures pertaining to His return will disprove this theory. It is a very interesting fact that both the Jews and the Muslims are waiting for a coming "Messiah". When this person shows up, who the Bible identifies as the "man of lawlessness" in (2 Thess 2:1-4), other wise know as the Antichrist, these people will be deceived and welcome him as their anticipated Messiah.

 

So in summary, yes Jesus Christ the Son of God who came the first time as a humble babe in the manger in Bethlehem, and died on the cross on Mount Calvary, will come again in the clouds of glory to establish His actual Kingdom on planet earth! One Messiah—Two Comings!!

Sincerely submitted.

DaveJamer

THE ADVENT SEASON

THE ADVENT SEASON

For many centuries church tradition has set aside the four weeks leading up to Christmas Day as the "Advent Season". A time to prepare for the second coming of Christ, by dwelling on the events that surrounded His first coming. According to scripture, God is continually coming to His people, to refresh them by His presence. As part of his second recorded sermon, Peter exhorts the people "Now repent of your sins and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped away. Then times of refreshment will come from the presence of the Lord, and He will again send you Jesus, your appointed Messiah. For He must remain in heaven until the time for the final restoration of all things, as God promised long ago through His holy prophets." (Acts 3:19-21) Because of the teaching in church circles about an "any moment" return of Jesus, to rapture the church to heaven before the "great tribulation", that's the first thing they think of when God manifests His presence. According to Peter, His presence is meant to refresh us, for what is to come in the days ahead of us. Jesus must remain in heaven "until" the "restoration of all things" that the Lord promised through the prophets. Only the Father knows when the church has cleansed itself from "everything that can defile our body and spirit" (2 Cor 7:1). Jesus is coming back to earth for a bride who has made herself ready for her groom, Jesus Christ! The church is portrayed as the "new Jerusalem" in the book of Revelation (Rev 21:2, 9-10), which is the way God sees His redeemed people!

So this time of Advent every year, is a time for us to "cleanse" ourselves of anything that could defile us, and cause a separation between us and our Savior. As we wait upon God, He will show us what things we need to repent of, and ask forgiveness for. This is what will bring the presence of God to our lives, and the time of refreshment that Peter spoke about! Once we get beyond the idea of an any moment rapture, and realize what God is up to, our lives will never be the same. Everyone who has studied church history will realize the church has never been ready to be raptured. Actually the church today has been so influenced by the world system, that it's difficult to tell the difference between church members and the people of the world, in their behavior and life style! What will it take to bring the church to the place of sanctification, and holiness before God? Perhaps only a time of intense persecution will do the job. Many parts of the world are already going through this type of persecution, and history proves that the church grows in number, and in quality, in these times! We in North America, know very little about real persecution, except what we read about he church in other lands. Let's use this Advent Season to prepare ourselves for the future!

Sincerely submitted.

Dave Jamer

WHICH WAY WILL YOU CHOOSE

WHICH WAY WILL YOU CHOOSE ?

 

This is the title to a song I recently heard by Randy Travis, which is taken from the book of Revelation. He describes a future event when we who are still living on planet earth will have to make this important choice! The choice is clearly explained in chapter 13, which describes two beasts who will appear at the start of the last half of the 7 year period spoken of by Daniel, and know as "Daniel's seventieth week". Most Bible scholars agree that this 7 year period describes the last 7 years on earth as we have known it, that Jesus spoke of in (Matt 24:3-36), sometimes referred to as the time of "great tribulation". Many people believe that a Pre-tribulation Rapture will remove the church before this Antichrist (first beast mentioned) appears on the scene. But even a casual reading of (2 Thess 2:1-4) will disprove that theory, and clearly show us that the church will still be here at that time.

 

So the all important choice at that time will be, will we choose to receive the mark of Antichrist, and be able to buy and sell, or will we choose to be true to Jesus and refuse to worship the "man of lawlessness". It would seem that once he shows his true colors at the mid point of this 7 year period, and demands the world to worship him as god; that is the beginning of the real time of tribulation. His wrath will be extended toward the church and the Jewish Nation, until the time of persecution is "cut short" by the return of Jesus in the clouds of glory. (Matt 24:21-22). At this time the rapture of the true church, that has made herself ready, (2 Cor 7:1) will take place, and immediately the bowls of the Wrath of God will start to be poured out on the remaining ungodly crowd whose names were not recorded in the Lamb's Book of Life. (Rev 16). This will include all those who have taken the mark of the beast (Rev 13:5-10)!

 

So you can see how important the proper choice will be at this critical time. A choice to refuse the mark, and be able to buy and sell as usual, will result in being persecuted by the Antichrist forces, and possibly dying as a martyr. On the other hand to take the mark may buy you a bit of freedom from the wrath of the Antichrist for a brief time, but will result in spending eternity in hell with Satan and his kingdom of darkness! I trust you will search the scriptures, like the believers of Berea did and see if these things are so!

(Acts 17:11) This will probably be the most important decision of your life!

Sincerely submitted.

Dave Jamer