THE TRUE SIGN (part 3)

This will be the last of this series in which we have proposed that Jesus was the "Sign" mentioned in several different scriptures, that speak about His coming to planet earth. As we know from scripture, He came, died on the cross to pay the price for the sins of mankind, was buried, and rose again on the third day. All this was to fulfill various prophetic scriptures that had been given through OT prophets. Before He returned to heaven, Jesus gave His followers various instructions, as recorded in chapters 14-17 in the Gospel of John. Part of these instructions pertained to the sending of the Holy Spirit to take His place on earth when He returned to heaven. Also He told them to expect His return to earth at some future time, known only by the Father. Until that time He said He would build the Church which would serve as His Body on earth, while He, the Head of the Church, would remain in heaven. This process has been going on now for some 2000 years, and this Body includes people from every tribe and nation.

There has been much speculation regarding the timing of the Lord's return to earth, and just how it will happen. Many theories have been put forth as to when and how, but the fact is that only our heavenly Father knows. We do know He is coming back, and He encourages us to stay alert and be ready for His return. When you study church history, you find that He has come at various times to the Church with a definite move of the Spirit. These times of refreshing could last for several weeks, months, or years, and sometimes affected several countries. The end results varied depending on how serious people were in their response. Nearly every move of God spawned some weird fanatical doctrines, that discouraged many believers from accepting the real truths that God was wanting to restore to the Church. This of course was always the work of Satan, who hates God and tries to prevent His children from benefiting from these moves. The closer we get to the actual return of Christ, the more of these moves of God we can expect, because God wants to prepare His Body for this great event. We need to be aware of deception of the enemy, as Jesus warned us in (Matt 24:4, 5, 11), and test every so-called word of prophecy to be sure it is genuine (1 Thess 5:16-22). Remember what Paul warned us of in (2 Cor 11:12-15), and be on the alert! The Holy Spirit has been given to us as believers in Jesus for this very reason, so we need to be filled with the Spirit, (Eph 5:18-21)!!

Sincerely submitted.

Gramp

THE TRUE SIGN (part 2)

In part 1 we pointed out that Jesus was referred to in several scriptures as the "Sign", and we said a sign is meant to direct us toward some destination. We suggested that what Jesus was meant to direct us toward could be the "True Church", that He said He would build, (Matt 16:18). This Church is referred to as different things in scripture, including the "Body of Christ", which is the present visible representation of Jesus Christ on earth. He is presently in heaven, and will remain there until the Father gives Him permission to come to earth again to receive the Church as His "Bride". This Bride will become His "Wife", or ministry partner, to reign with Him throughout eternity! (Rev 21:9). This would seem to be the ultimate plan of Father God, to obtain a perfect eternal partner for His Son!

This great mystery of the True Church was kept a secret by God, until it was revealed to the apostle Paul. He explains this mystery in (Eph 3:1-7), and (Col 1:24-27), which is that God intended to include Gentiles as well as Jews in this Church, which is the Bride for His Son Jesus Christ! As we know, the Jewish Nation was established by God through Abraham to be a pattern nation on the earth. He gave them distinct laws through His servant Moses, to direct them into a lifestyle that would reflect His Holiness. He made a covenant with them which they promised to live up to, however they failed to keep these laws, and followed the sinful practices of their neighboring nations. This failure to keep God's laws resulted in their being defeated by their enemies,and brought under bondage to various nations from time to time. They were under the control of Rome at the time Jesus came to earth to ransom humanity from the hand of the enemy. They knew about the promise of a coming "Messiah", but expected he would be a conquering king like David. When Jesus came as a humble babe in a manger in Bethlehem, not many people accepted Him for who He really was. Through the Gospel writers, and the various letters in our Bible record, we can get the overall plan that God had in mind to redeem mankind from their sinful condition resulting from the disobedience of Adam. (Rom 5:12). This plan culminated in the death of Jesus on the cross, and His resurrection three days later. Then followed a period of 50 days, during which He appeared to many people, and promised to send "The Gift" of the Father to them (Luke 24:49) if they waited prayerfully in Jerusalem. (Acts chapter 1 and 2) give us the details of the beginning of the Church, which is the Body of Christ. We believe this to be the fulfillment of the Sign as mentioned above.

Sincerely submitted

Gramp

THE TRUE SIGN (part 1)

Recently while researching the topic of signs and wonders I came across some interesting scriptures that led me to realize that Jesus is really "The True Sign"! In (Isa 7:14) we read the prophecy of a virgin conceiving a child as a sign from God, then in (Matt 1:18-23) this was confirmed to both Mary and Joseph that Jesus was the promised son to be born of the virgin Mary. Then in (Luke 1:26-35) this sign of the virgin birth is again confirmed to Mary. And in (Luke 2:12) Jesus is described as a sign to the shepherds, and in verse 34 He is again referred to as a sign by Simeon. Now a sign is not a fulfillment in itself, but merely points forward to something or someone. For example a road sign points to a certain destination, and usually gives the distance to be covered before the destination can be reached. Now if Jesus is the true "Sign", and I believe scripture states that He is, then what is the fulfillment of that sign? Is it His return to planet earth as is promised in (Acts 1:9-11), or something different? I believe that the fulfillment of the Sign represented by Jesus, could be His Body that is in the process of being formed on planet earth right now. He is the head of this body, and is presently located in heaven at the side of His Father, from where He has been building this body now for some 2000 years. In his letter to the church in Ephesus, Paul speaks much about this body in (Eph 2:19-22, and 4:11-16), as well as other places.

This Body of Christ is the "True Church", composed of people who have been born again by the Spirit of God, and not the nominal denominational variety that carries the name church! At various times in the past God has come to His Church in special ways in a revival or restoration movement. He apparently wants to draw His people closer together, in order to have fellowship with them, and reveal some new truth to them. This could be called a coming "to" His Church for refreshing, teaching, or edification, but because of a teaching that is common in the churches that Jesus is coming at any moment "for" His Church, they miss the real purpose of his coming. He has always desired to have a family of redeemed humans dwelling on planet earth that He could commune with, from the time of Adam and Eve in the garden. However Satan, who is the avowed enemy of God, has done all he can do to prevent this true Church from being formed, and functioning as God planned. I believe this accounts for the many difficulties the Church has experienced since its beginning.

Sincerely submitted.

Gramp

JUSTICE OR JUDGEMENT

The scriptures speak about both of these things many times, and we should come to a real understanding of each of these words. Both of these words express part of the very essence, or character of God. He is certainly just in all His ways, and because of this He will have to judge evil! We often hear people speak of the coming judgement of God as a very fearful event, when He pours out His wrath on the ungodly after the rapture of the Church. It will indeed be a fearful event for those who have not made the choice to receive Jesus as their own personal Savior, but not for those of us who have made this choice!

God declares over and over in His Word that He is a just and righteous judge, because He is perfect, and knows all things. Therefore His judgements are always based on perfect justice. As we look around the world today we see very little justice! God is often blamed for this injustice because people say if He is really all powerful, then He could prevent these incidents that are unjust. The real problem is that when He created this earth and put Adam in charge of it, and He didn't take back this authority from Adam even when he chose to disobey God's command and follow Satan's suggestions through his wife Eve. Then when at the appointed time Jesus came to earth to be the Savior of fallen mankind, He destroyed Satan's power and gave back the authority to rule the planet earth to His followers, the Church. So the injustice we see in the world is not God's fault, it is the fault of the Church who has not assumed their rightful place of authority, but have given it to the world system which is under the control of Satan!

We will only see a proper system of righteous justice when Jesus returns to set up the visible Kingdom of God on planet earth. This will definitely happen at a time appointed by Father God, as promised in His Word. In the meantime He has given us His Word to direct us in the way of righteousness, and how we should live our lives to please Him. Recently I heard a brother sharing in a message that he was not looking for coming "judgement", but for "justice" on the earth. This clicked with my spirit, because both things are going to come to earth at the same time when Jesus returns! If you study the scriptures that mention "The Day of The Lord" you will clearly see that it is a day of blessing for the righteous, but a day of terror and extreme destructive judgement for the unrighteous! Take your Bible and check it out for yourself! (Acts 17:11).

Sincerely submitted

Gramp

RECIPE FOR FACING A NEW YEAR

1/ Don't hang out with the "wicked"----(Ps 1:1), Remember we were all in that crowd before we were saved (Eph 2:1-10). Remember we have been redeemed for a purpose! (Phil 1:27, 2:14-15)

2/ Forget the past ---(Phil 3:12-15), Press on to reach perfection! (not sinless perfection, but Christian perfection), or maturity! And verse 16 reads "But we must hold on to the progress that we have already made".

3/ Accentuate the positive-----(Phil 4:8-9), Eliminate the negative! (3:18-19)

Don't mess with Mr in between! (Phil 2:12-15)---(the words of an old song)!

4/ Be content with what you have----(Phil 4:11-13), (1 Tim 6:6-10), It seems that contentment often has to do with our desire for riches, or material possessions.

Why not give these simple steps a try this year and see what happens.

Sincerely submitted.

Gramp

THE FALL FROM THE WALL

You all know the story of Humpty Dumpty and his fall from the wall, and all the kings men couldn't put him back together again. I recently read an article, in which the author likened the situation in the church structures of today to this children's story. Present day church structure is not the same as Jesus had in mind when He made the statement "I will build my church" (Matt 16:18). When we read the book of Acts, the church we see developing in Jerusalem after the day of Pentecost was more like what He had in mind, I'm sure! Here we see a church that was based on "relationships" between people who were being saved and added to the church (Acts 2:42-47). They met for teaching and fellowship in homes, and in public places for larger gatherings.

Unfortunately this all changed after Emperor Constantine merged the church together with the Roman Empire in 317AD and we see the beginning of the first State Church, which over the years developed into various denominations. A brief study of early church history will reveal how the church became like Humpty Dumpty on the wall, with each group thinking they had the right doctrines, and therefore all others were wrong in what they believed. Jesus never came to start a "Religion", but that is what church became, and most people consider Christianity to be one with the other major religions of the world. Actually it would be more accurate to say Jesus came to destroy religion! The main religion of the day was Judaism, and the Pharisees were one of the leading denominations which were always at odds with the teaching of Jesus. And these religious people were the only ones that He criticized for their hard hearted religious practices (Matt 23:1-36) gives a graphic description of what Jesus thought of religion, and I have no reason to think He has changed His opinion of such religious practices!

In our present 21st century we are beginning to see some major changes to religious structures that could easily be compared to Humpty Dumpty on the wall. I believe as this system falls, it will be impossible to put it back together again like it was, and what will take it's place will be a completely different structure that will be more like the church we see functioning in the Book of Acts. It seems that the newly formed "house church networks" that are springing up all over the world, could take the place of old line denominational structures with their expensive to maintain buildings, and their elaborate system of "top down" management patterned after the world system! Let us be praying for proper discernment for believers during this transition period!

Sincerely submitted.

Gramp

THE INCARNATION

At this time of year when we celebrate the coming to earth of Jesus Christ, in a time we call “Christmas”, our minds are drawn to the miracle of what we call “the incarnation”. In the writings of the apostle Paul, we find several passages that pertain to this event. (Phil 2:5-11) is one of my favorite scriptures pertaining to the first coming of Jesus to our planet, and (Gal 4:4-7) is another. But first we should look at (Luke 1:26-38), where we read of the coming to Mary of the Archangel Gabriel, with the news that she had been favored by God for the task of being the human instrument through whom the Savior of the world would take on human form!

Most of us learn quite early in life how the human reproduction system works. It requires a female to produce an egg at a certain point in her monthly cycle, which must then be fertilized by a male at the right time in order to achieve conception. In Mary’s case, at the correct time in her monthly cycle, she was “overshadowed” by the Holy Spirit, and the child conceived in her womb was truly the Son of God. This was one of the greatest miracles of all time!

The way Paul described this miracle event in (Phil 2:5-11) is "awesome!" The first part of the chapter describes how we should relate to other members in the body of Christ by putting others ahead of ourselves. He uses Jesus as our example of humility. Let me quote verses 5-7 from the Amp version “Let this same attitude and purpose and [humble] mind be in you which was in Christ Jesus—let Him be your example in humility—who although being essentially one with God and in the form of God [possessing the fullness of the attributes which make God God], did not think this equality with God was a thing to be eagerly grasped or retained; but stripped Himself [of all privileges and rightful dignity] so as to assume the guise of a servant (slave), in that He became like men and was born a human being.”

That is what Christmas is all about!! Is it any wonder that the world system and other world religions, do not want us to celebrate Christmas as the birthday of the Savior Jesus Christ? They do not believe in Jesus, and don’t want to be reminded of His coming in the “fullness of time”, born of a virgin, so that He could fulfill all the scriptures from the Old Testament prophets, who told about His supernatural birth. Let’s do all we can do to keep this true message of Christ in Christmas this year, and every year until He comes again for His second appearance!!

Sincerely submitted.

Gramp