ARE YOU AMONG THE 7,000?

We know that all through the Bible, the number seven is associated with Yehovah’s eternal purpose.

Notice: Here is an example of the number 7:

1 Kings 19:1-18:

And Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and withal how he had slain all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger unto Elijah, saying, So let the gods do to me, and more also if I take not your life as the life of one of them by to morrow about this time. And when he understood that, he arose, and fled for his life, and came to Beersheba, which belongs] to Judah, and left his servant there. But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: and he requested for himself that he might die; and said, It is enough; now, O YEHOVAH, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers. And as he lay and slept under a juniper tree, behold, then AN ANGEL touched him and said unto him, Arise and eat. And he looked, and, behold, there was a cake baken on the coals, and a cruse of water at his head. And he did eat and drink and laid him down again. And the angel of YEHOVOAH came again the second time, and touched him, and said, Arise and eat; because the journey is too great for you.  And he arose, and did eat and drink, and went in the strength of that meat forty days and forty nights unto Horeb the mount of YEHOVAH. And he came to a cave, and lodged there; and, behold, the word of YEHOVAH came to him, and He said unto him, What are you doing here, Elijah? And he said, I have been very jealous for YEHOVAH ELOHIM - God of hosts: for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altar, and slain your prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away. And He said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before YEHOVAH. And, behold, YEHOVAH passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before YEHOVAH; but YEHOVAH was not in the wind: and after the wind, an earthquake; but YEHOVAH was not in the earthquake:  And after the earthquake, a fire; but YEHOVAH was not in the fire: and after the fire A STILL SMALL VOICE.  And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entering in of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said, What are you doing thou here, Elijah?  And he said, I have been very jealous for YEHOVAH ELOHIM -  God of hosts: because the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altar, and slain your prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away. And YEHOVAH said unto him, Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus: and when you comet, anoint Hazael to be king over Syria:  And Jehu the son of Nimshi shall you anoint to be king over Israel: and Elisha the son of Shaphat of Abelmeholah shalt you anoint to be a prophet in your place. And it shall come to pass, that him that escapes the sword of Hazael shall Jehu slay: and he that escapes from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay. Yet I have left SEVEN THOUSAND in Israel, all the knees who have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which has not kissed him.

Therefore, when YEHOVAH said to Elijah His prophet: “Yet I have reserved SEVEN THOUSAND in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him”, he was simply revealing everyone who made up His remnant. The people he sets aside for Himself could number 7, or 70, or 7 thousand, or 70 thousand. What matters is that they are wholly committed to walking in obedience to His will.

So, what are the characteristics of this remnant?

Here are three defining marks:

1. An unchangeable commitment to carry out the will of YEHOVAH. Every remnant believer will have made a single-minded choice to swim against the tide of evil. At some point, you have to make a commitment, declaring, “I don’t care what others say or do. I am YEHOVAH’s. I won’t give in to the wicked spirit of this age, enabled to do so by His Spirit.”

2. A willingness to identify with the poor. While society’s trend is to associate with the rich and successful, you align yourself with the suffering class. Scripture clearly states, “Whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:17-18)

3. A reliance on hope. The 7,000 mentioned in 1 Kings endured because of their hope in a coming day of deliverance. Likewise, the called-out assembly of God’s hope is for the soon-coming return of Jesus the Messiah. 

Do these three marks characterize you as a part of God’s holy remnant? If so, God boasts of you, “This one has given his heart to me. He is focused on me. He is wholly mine!”

We are to spread the word about God's soon-coming kingdom, evangelize, minister, and work while it is still day, for the darkness is fast approaching. We are to live in the hope that the lord Jesus God's anointed one is coming and that he will usher in a new world order, the kingdom of God. On that day he will sit upon the throne of David at Zion and rule as King of Kings and Lord of lords over all the nations that survive God's wrath. This was the great hope of the 7,000. True Deliverance!

What is the full meaning of being a New Creation in the Messiah Jesus?

What I am going to try to do is explain what being a New Creation in the Lord Messiah Jesus involves and how we can utilize our new position in the Messiah to grow in grace and understanding; that will enable us to walk worthy of our calling.

First and foremost we know that it is only in and through the son that we will receive eternal life! [John 5:11-12] It is by believing in the Messiah Jesus that we will not perish but have life in his name [John 3:15-16; 20:31] We who have been baptized and have received God’s Holy Spirit become at that time New Creations in the Messiah Jesus. We will at that time have been “born again” into an entirely new relationship with Yehovah and His uniquely begotten son Jesus His anointed one. We will now have Jesus the Messiah as the federal head of the New Humanity that we have become a part of; even as Adam was the federal head of all of his descendants that we are no longer a part of as New Creations in the Messiah we are in this world, but not of this world, as long as we remain in the Messiah.

As New Creations in the Messiah we have become members of a New Humanity that Yehovah has been creating since the time of Adam’s rebellion, formed from those who have proven in their lives to be totally committed to walking in faithful obedience before Him. As New Creations in the Messiah, members of the New Humanity, we are recognized as those who love Yehovah with all our heart, mind, being and strength, and who love our neighbors as ourselves, walking in the spirit according to the creed of the Messiah Jesus as we see in Mark 12:28-34.

The sciptures provide its own best commentary. The responsibility is on us to "correctly handle the word of truth [2 Timothy 2:15\, loking at everythingYehovah has reveled in the scriptures. Realizing that "all sctripute is God-breathed and usful for teaching rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so the seervbant of Godf may be thoroughly equipped for every good work" [2 Timothy 3:16-17]

Paul says that we are all the "limage and gloruy. of God - Yehovah" [1 Corinthians 11:7]. Peter says that we :participate in the nature of God" [2 Peter 1:4]. This shows us that as New Creations in the Messiah we are hodlike and becoming more so through the set apart work of God's Holy Spirit: "being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory" [2 Corinthians 3:18]. Notice Paul says that the Messiah is "godlike" - he is "of God" [1 Corinthians 3:23], he si "the image of God" [2 Corinthians 4:4], "the son of God" [2 Corinthians 1:19, and seated at the right hand of God, with all things subject to him [Ephesians 1:20-23]. With all of this he remains as a glorified man seated at the right hand of his God and Father Yehovah.

John 17:3: Now this is eternal life: that they know youi , the only true God, and Jesus the Messiah whom you have sent.

2 Peter 1:3-8: The secret things belong to Yehovah - the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to usand to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law. [Deuteronomy 29:29]. We are seeking to understand the "things revealed," which Yehovah has given to us for our understanding and obedience to reveal what He has given to us to those we reach out to as ambassadors of the Lord Messiah Jesusto proclaim the mystery of the Messiah [Colossians 4:3]

Jesus prays for his disciples:"Sanctiry - set apart them by the truth; your word in truthy" [John 17:17].

We have a grave responsibilty to live and declare the truth of God's word "in God's household, which is the called-out Assembly - Congregation of the libing God, the pillar and foundation of the truth" [1 Timothy 3:15]

Notice Paul exhorts Timothy [and all of us]: "Do your best to present yourself to God - Yehovah as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed and who correctyly handles the word of truth" [2 /timothy 2:15]

In the Gospels message the Messiah"s call is to follow him [Matthew 4:19; Mark 1:17; 2:4; Luke 9:59] in a costly obedience and sacrificial service: "Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny thfemselves - die to self and take up the cross daily and follow me [Luke 9:23]

To follow the Messiah Jesus is to become more like him, and fashion our lives on the examples he has set before us. It is vital that we have a clear understyanding of who his is and how how we can emulate him!

"We know that God- Yehovah alone is immortal and therefore unable to die [1 /timothy 6:16; //romans 1:23].

The main point of the Jewish law of Agency is expressed in the dictum, "a person's agent is regarded as ther person himself." Whatever the agent says or does is as if the person who went the agent was doing it. God - Yehovah was at work in and through Jesus. The Messiah was God's authorized representative - His agent, speaking and acting on his Father's behalf.  Peter expressed the Jewish law of agency in his sermon on the day of Penecost: "Jesus of Nazareth was a MAN accredited by Gpd - Yehovah to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God - Yehovah did among you through him... [Acts 2:22]. Jesus was constantly doing things on behelf of his God and Father Yehovah, by and through the Father's authority, as His agent.  An example of Jesus acting as the agent of Yehovah: "Whoever believes in me does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. the one who looks at me is seeing the one who sent mee... whatever I say is just what the Father has told me to say. ]John 12:44-45, 50] Also, "The words I say to you  I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father - Yehovah ling in me who is doing His worlk. [John 14:9-10] Notice: Acting as an agnet of Yehovah, Jesus shares in the authority and prerogatives of the Father - Yehovah; to judge the world at the end of the age [Matthew 25:31]; to give life [John 6:33] and resurrect those who beloing to him [John 6:44]; to be florified along with the Father [Luke 9:20.

Acing in accord with the Jewish law of agency Jesus commissioned 72 of his disciples and sent them out as his agents, representing him: "Whoever listens to you listens to me; but whoever rejects me rejects Him who sent me" [Luke 10:16]. The commission and agency that comes from Yehovah to Jesus also works through him to his disciples [Matthew 28:18-20] We have also been commission to speak forth tghe Kingdom of God to the world and do so as the agents of His son Jesus the Messiah.

Scripture teaches us that Yehovah promised us eternal life "before the foundation of the ages" [Titus 1:2]. We were chosen in the Messiah "before the creation of the ages [Ephesians 1:4], and that Yehovah's plan for our glorifiction was "before the ages began" [1 Corinthians 2:7]. Our God Yehovah knows the end from the beginning. Paul says we already "have a building from God" - out resurrection body "in heaven" that we have not yet received [2 Corinthians 5:1].

Isaiah speaking by prophetic word talks about Jesus when he writes: "Surely he took up ouir paoin and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punishedby Yehovah, sticken by Him and afflicted. hbut he was peirced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed." [Isaiah 53:4-5].

The creed of Jesus the Messiah: Mark 12:28:32:

It wsa prophesied of the Messiah that he would be a descendant of David a MAN or "son of man" [Psalm 80:17] who would come as Yehovah's cnosen and anointed one to establish Yehovah's kingdom on on the earth. The basis for the messainic title "son of Yehovah" comes from Psalm 2:7, where Yehovah says "Yoiu are my son; today I ahve become your Father." His "anointed" [verse 2] and "King" [verse 6] refer to the future Messiah, whom Yehovah installs and establishes on Zion, His "holy mountain" from where the Messiah will reighn, not only over Israel but all the nations that survive God wrath; to the "ends of the earth" [verse 8].  As Yehovah's anointed one, he wouild be an Israelite like Moses, a human descendant of David who woiuld come in Yehovah's name, authorized as His representative, to fulfill Yehovah's saving and redeeming purpose for the world and usher in the Kingdom of God on earth, over which he would reign.

"The son is the rediance of God's glory and the exact representation of His being" [Hebrews 1:3].

Jesus is the one "who loves us and has freed us from sin by his blood, and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his god - Yehovah and his Father" [?1:5-6]

Chapter 6 of Jeff Deubles book. con't..

 

What does it mean to lean on ouir own understanding?

First let us understand that our own understanding comes from a heart that is deceitful above all things, blind to its own faults, etc.

Jeremiah 17:9: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"

Proverbs 14:12, Proverbs 16:25: "There is a way which seems right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death".

As a result of being in the flesh, the natural man acts accordingly.

For a regenerate man the following it true:

Proverbs 16:9: "A man’s heart devises his way: but Yehovah directs his steps".

Job 32:8: "But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding".

We need to look outside of self to our God and Father Yehovah, and not lean on our own faulty understanding of things, for Yehovah knows the end of a matter from the beginning. 

Job 12:13: "With Him is wisdom and strength, He has counsel and understanding".

How do we begin to get right understanding?

Proverbs 9:10: "The fear of Yehovah is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding".

Psalm 111:10: "The fear [reverential awe and respect] of Yehovah is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endures for ever".

Psalm 119:130: "The entrance of your words gives light; it gives understanding unto the simple".

Proverbs 2:6: "For Yehovah gives wisdom: out of His mouth comes knowledge and understanding".

Jesus didn't do anything without the guidance and direction of his God and his Father Yehovah whose Spirit was in him without measure.

John 5:19: "Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father do: for what things soever he does, these also does the Son likewise".

John 5:30: "I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which has sent me".

Jesus did nothing without being in subjection to his Father's will. He carried out to perfection the commission he had been given and when he had done all he cried out "It is finished". What an example for all of us who are in Him!

John 6:63: "It is the spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life".

In the flesh and on our own we can not have the right understanding on how to proceed according to the will of our God and our Father Yehovah. Only as we maintain close communication with Him in prayer, seeking to have more of the direction of His holy spirit and submitting to the spirit guidance, can we achieve real and true understanding in order to  conduct our lives according to His will. May our God and our Father Yehovah give all of us more of His spirit to carry out all He has called us to do!

PREPARING FOR THE END OF THIS AGE

Brothers and sisters, we are living in the end times. The end of this age is drawing near, very near. Are we preparing ourselves mentally, physically, and spiritually for what lies ahead?

Are we striving with all our being to love our God and Father Yehovah with all the enabling power of the loving spirit He has given us to do with? Do we as enabled by the Spirit of Yehovah, love our neighbors, who reflect His image, more than ourselves? Do we love our neighbors, as the Lord Jesus loved us when he willing became a sin-offering sacrifice to reconcile us to his God and his Father Yehovah? Jesus gave his all for us, are we giving our all to him? Are we fruit-bearing branches attached to the vine, the Lord Jesus [John 15:1,4-5].

These questions are critical, for how we answer them individually will let us know where we stand in these last days.

Observe the attitude that Noah had before Yehovah caused a flood to destroy all human beings who were living depraved and violent lives.

Genesis 6:9: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

Notice what Jude wrote just a short time after the resurrection of the Lord Jesus:

“Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints. For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our Master and Lord, Jesus the Messiah” (Jude 1:3-4, ESV emphasis added).

Notice what Peter wrote probably around the same time Jude wrote his letter:

1 Peter 2:1-22: …. false prophets also arose among the people [of Israel], just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies [the doctrine of the Trinity, etc.], even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them, the way of truth will be blasphemed [as is happening today]. And in their greed, they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle [today], and their destruction is not asleep.

For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into the pit and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment; if He did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness [which we should be], with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes He condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly [in these end times]; and if He rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked (for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard) [as we do today]; then the Lord [Yehovah] knows how to rescue the godly from trials, and to keep unrighteous ones under punishment until the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority.

Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones, whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord [Yehovah]. But these, like irrational animals, creatures of instinct, born to be caught and destroyed, blaspheming about matters of which they are ignorant, will also be destroyed in their destruction, suffering death as the wage for their wrongdoing. They count it a pleasure to revel in the daytime.

They are blots and blemishes, reveling in their deceptions, while they feast with you. They have eyes full of adultery, insatiable for sin. They entice unsteady souls. They have hearts trained in greed. Accursed children! Forsaking the right way, they have gone astray. They have followed the way of Balaam, the son of Beor, who loved gain from wrongdoing, but was rebuked for his own transgression; a speechless donkey spoke with a human voice and restrained the prophet’s madness.

These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. For them, the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. For, speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error. They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that, he is enslaved.

For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus the Messiah, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. What the true proverb says has happened to them: "The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire."

What Peter has written applies to the sinful attitudes of people that surround us every day. The influences of this world can cause us to stumble and sin, but if we repent we can move on strengthened by the enabling power of the indwelling Spirit of Yehovah and of His son Jesus! We are living in a time, as it was in the days of Noah before the flood and as it was before fire and brimstone fell on Sodom and Gomorrah.

We have been warned about what will take place before the end of this age [Matthew 24] and we need to be prepared spiritually to stand fast, hold fast to the end.

Notice the words of encouragement our God and Father Yehovah gives to those who are His.

Isaiah 2:2: And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of Yehovah’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it.

Micah 4:1: But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain of the house of Yehovah shall be established in the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow to it.

Acts 2:17: And it shall come to pass in the last days, said God [Yehovah], I will pour out of My Spirit on all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams:

These words give us every reason to hold fast to all our loving God and Father Yehovah has given us to hold on to and to go forth giving our testimony to all with the hope that those who hear will turn their lives around to believe and trust in Yehovah and in His son Jesus and accept their rulership in their lives! We can live victoriously enabled by the Spirit of our God and Father Yehovah! May we as His children hold on to His hand as He leads us into HIs coming Kingdom.

JOHN AND JESUS - ANTICIPATION OF THE ADVENT

The morning star, shining in the midst of the glow of dawn, is the fittest emblem that nature can act as a herald that proclaims the rising of the Sun of Righteousness; answering the prophet Malachi across the gulf of three hundred years who had foretold that Sunrise, and the healing in his wings.

Every sign attests to the unique and singular glory of John the Baptist. Not that his service was observed as a blaze of prodigy and wonder, like the miraculous multiplication of the widow's meal or the descent of fire of heaven to consume the altar and the wood; for it is expressly said that "John did no miracle." Nor did he owe anything to the circumstances of wealth and position; for he was not a position-loving courtier, "clothed in fancy clothing or found in kings' courts." Nor was he a master of the eloquence possessed by Isaiah or Ezekiel.

He was sent only "to cry out"; a short, thrilling, piercing message through the darkness, ringing over the desert plains to all of Judea. His Master said of him that "among them that are born of women there has not risen a greater than John the Baptist".

In a brief six months of witnessing about the coming one and the coming Kingdom of God, this young prophet in the wilderness became the center of attention which all the land went forth to see and hear and for many to be baptized. We observe from the scriptures Pharisees and Sadducees, soldiers and publicans, enthralled by the power of his ministry; the Sanhedrim forced to investigate his claims. He caused the rulers of Palestine to tremble on their thrones. As a result of his service, John the Baptist has left a name and an influence that will never cease from this age and the one to come.

But there is another feature that draws our attention to the life and ministry of the John the Baptist. He was ordained to be "the go-between" of two covenants. In him, Judaism reached its highest embodiment, and the Old Testament found its noblest exponent.

It is significant, therefore, that through his lips the law and the prophets should announce their transitional purpose, and that he who brought forth the torch of Hebrew prophecy with a grasp and spirit unrivaled by any before him, should have it in his power and in his heart to say: "The object of all prophecy, the purpose of the Mosaic law, the end of all sacrifices, the desire of all nations, is at hand." And forthwith turning direction to the true Shepherd, who stood at the door waiting to be admitted, to him the porter opened, bowing low as He passed, and saying: "This is He of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write, Jesus of Nazareth, who was for to come."

Few studies can bring out a clearer demonstration of the superlative glory of the Messiah than a thoughtful consideration of the story of his forerunner. They were born around the same time; were surrounded from their birth by similar circumstances; drank in from their earliest days the same stream of sacred traditions, with the same glowing hopes. But that parallel soon stops. John the Baptist was certainly a grand embodiment of the noblest characteristics of the Jewish people. We see in him a conspicuous example of what should have developed out of eight hundred years of Yehovah’s revelation and discipline. But John the Baptist points to the Lord Jesus the Son of man about whom there is a width, a breadth, and universality about him which cannot be accounted for above what John the Baptist declared: "He who comes from above is above all."

The history of both men’s service was in the case of John the Baptist was about six months and in Jesus' case about three and a half years. 

In each case, at first, there was abounding enthusiasm, bursting forth around them as they announced the coming of the Kingship/Kingdom of God, but as time passed they were to meet the wrath of the rulers of Israel and the unconcealed hatred of the religious world of their time. In each case, the brief sunny hours of service were soon succeeded by the rolling up of thunder clouds, and these were the murderous tempest of deadly hatred, even unto death. In each case, there were a small group of disciples, who bitterly mourned their master's death. Both men were buried after having died.

But there the parallel ends. The life purpose of John the Baptist culminated in his untimely death; but with the Lord Jesus, it only was just the beginning. In the case of John, his death was a martyrdom, which shone brilliantly in the midst of the murky darkness of his time. However; in the case of Jesus' death as a sin-offering sacrifice there was a reconciliation of humanity to Yehovah. For John, there was no immediate resurrection, but his Master saw no corruption; it was not possible for him to be held by death, and in his resurrection, he took his place next to the throne of his God and Father Yehovah.

When the ax of Herod's executioner had done its deadly work in the dungeons of Machaerus, the bond which knit the disciples of John was severed and most became followers of the Lord Messiah Jesus. When; the Roman soldiers thought their work was done, and the cry "It is finished!" escaped the parched lips of the dying Lord Jesus, and after his death and resurrection three days and three nights later, he appeared to his disciples and continued with them for forty days revealing to them the depth of God word about the Kingdom, and then he was taken up before their eyes into the clouds with the angels telling them “as you have seen him to into the clouds so he will return again”. Then on the day of Pentecost, the Lord Messiah Jesus sent down the Holy Spirit which formed them into a strong united called-out Assembly that this world has ever known, which is not the case in Christendom today.

John's influence on the world has diminished, but Jesus is Lord and King of the ages. He will be with those who are his to the end of this age and the ages to come. We do not have to go back through the centuries to find him in the cradle or in Mary's arms, in the fishing boat or on the mountain, on the cross or in the grave; he is here with us, indwelling in us by his Spirit. So we see that John, was "a burning and shining torch," lifted for a moment aloft in the murky air; but Jesus was a shining light to all of Israel.

As moonlight fails to illumine a page of your book or the dial of your watch, it is to the sunlight, as a servant is to a sovereign, or as a streamlet is to the ocean; such was John compared with him whose shoe-latchet he felt unworthy to stoop down and unloose. Greatest of men born of women he was; "sent from God": but the one who came after him who bore the witness of his God in his origin and mission, behind whom the gates of the past closed, as when a king has passed through, and on whose belt hangs the key of the narrow gate that gives entrance to the coming age of the Kingdom of God.

To read the calm idyllic pages of the Gospels, apart from some knowledge of contemporary history, is to miss one of their deepest lessons; that such holiness and beneficence were set in the midst of a most tumultuous and perilous age. Those times were by no means favorable to the cultivation of the deepest spiritual life. The flock of God had long left the green pastures and still waters of outward peace, and were passing through the valley of death, every step of the path being infested by the enemy of their peace, their unbelief. The wolf, indeed, was coming. The national life was already being rent by these throes of agony which envision the passing away for a time of the nation of Israel that reached its climax in the Fall of Jerusalem in 70 A.D, and completely in 134 A.D, as the result of the rebellion against Rome by a false Messiah.

Herod was on the throne; crafty, cruel, sensual, imperious, and magnificent. The gorgeous Temple which bore his name was the scene of priestly service and sacramental rites. The great national feasts of the Passover, the Feast of Tabernacles, and of the Feast of Weeks, Pentecost, were celebrated with solemn pomp and attracted vast crowds from all over the world. In every part of the land, synagogues were maintained with punctilious care, and crowds of scribes were perpetually engaged in a microscopic study of the law, and in the instruction of the people. In revenue, popular attention, and apparent devoutness, that period was not excelled in the days of Solomon or Hezekiah. But beneath this decorous surface the rankest, foulest, most desperate corruption thrived.

To John the Baptist's parents in the hill-country of Judea, and to Mary and Joseph at Nazareth, must have come tidings of the murder of Aristobulus, of the cruel death of Herod's wife Mariamne and her sons, and of the aged Hyrcanus. They must have groaned beneath the grinding oppression by which Herod extorted from the poorer classes the immense revenues which he squandered on his palaces and fortresses and on the creation of new cities. That he was introducing everywhere Gentile customs and games; that he had dared to place the Roman eagle on the main entrance of the Temple; that he had pillaged David's tomb; that he had set aside the great council of their nation, and blinded the saintly Jochanan.

We observe from the scriptures that the religious leaders, like Caiaphas and Annas, were quite willing to wink at the crimes of the secular power, so long as their prestige and wealth were secure; that the national independence for which Judas and his brothers had striven, during the Maccabean wars, was fast being laid at the feet of Rome, which was only too willing to take advantage of the chaos which followed immediately upon Herod's hideous death; such tidings must have come, in successive shocks of anguish, to those true hearts who were waiting for the redemption of Israel, with all the more eagerness as it seemed so long delayed, so urgently needed. Still, they made their yearly journeys to Jerusalem, and participated in the great convocations, which, in outward splendors, eclipsed memories of the past; but they realized that the glory had departed and that the mere husk of externalism could not long resist the incoming tides of militarism, of the love of display, and the corrupting taint of the worst aspects of Roman civilization. When the feasts were over, these pious hearts turned back to their homes among the hills, tearing themselves from the last glimpse of the beautiful city, with the cry, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem!"

Are not these events in history a forerunner of what is taking place today?

The darkest hour proceeds that day, and it was just at this point that Old Testament predictions must have been so eagerly scanned by those that watched and waited. That the Messiah was nigh, they could not doubt. The term of years foretold by Daniel had nearly expired. The scepter had departed from Judah and the lawgiver from between his feet. Even the Gentile world was penetrated with the expectation of a King, in their ancient writings, hermits in their secret cells, Magi studying the dazzling glories of the eastern heavens, had come to the conclusion that he was at hand who would bring about the Golden Age.

And so those loyal and loving man and women that often spoke together, while their God Yehovah hearkened to and heard what they said, must have felt that as the advent of the coming one, the Messiah, whom they sought was about to come, that of his messenger must be nearer still. They listened for every voice. They scanned the expression on every face. "Behold, he shall come," rang in their hearts like a peal of silver bells. At any moment might a voice be heard crying, "Cast up, cast up the highway; gather out the stones; lift up an ensign for the peoples. Say yes to the daughter of Zion, Behold your salvation comes." Those anticipations were realized in the birth of John the Baptist and came to pass with the birth of the Messiah Jesus.