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Wednesday, January 24, 2018

The day and hour revealed!

The Day and Hour Revealed!
By Richard P. Joseph
Picture borrowed from internet
There have been many doomsday preachers in my lifetime that have made
predictions of the end of the world and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down.  
Everytime there is a new world leader, blood moon, hurricane, earthquake or war
the “prophets” go into high gear.  However, all I really found was that it only
takes money, power and women to illicit a cult leader to start his bidding for
the end of the world.  So I thought maybe I will take a crack at it.   I actually
believe I have it nailed down to the exact day and hour!  Jesus gave us many
clues to watch for.  
One clue is Matthew 16:27-28
27 For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His
angels, and will then [a]repay every man according to his [b]deeds.
28 “Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who
will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.”
So to start with we can nail down the general time of within about 40 years from
when Jesus made that statement which was in about AD30.  That effectively
eliminates any event after about AD70.
Jesus then talks about wars and rumors of wars.  Much of this information was
conveyed by the historian Josephus who lived during those days.  He records
this upheaval in no uncertain terms when the zealots began raiding the
countryside of Judea in preparation for their upcoming war with Rome.  They
first engaged in a massive civil war in Jerusalem before engaging the main
Roman army.  Jesus’ wars were a reality within that 40 year period.  Nations
(all the city states in that area) were engulfed in this strife then the kingdom of
darkness was fighting the kingdom of light in the unseen realm.  The Jewish
leadership delivered the saints up to the Roman authorities for punishment and
abominable acts of bloodshed etc were performed in and around the temple.  All
of Jesus’ predictions of the end of the age were directed toward the unfaithful
city of Jerusalem so this also secured the time and location of this event as
before AD 70 and in Judea.  
Matthew 24:32 gives the disciples the signs to look for that would indicate that
the parousia (second coming) was about to begin.
32 “Now learn the parable from the fig tree: when its branch has already become
tender and puts forth its leaves, you know that summer is near;33 so, you too,
when you see all these things, [u]recognize that [v]He is near, right at the
[w]door. 34 Truly I say to you, this [x]generation will not pass away until all these
things take place. 35 Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass
away.
In other words, they might not know the exact day and hour but they would
know when it is very imminent.  What really occurred is spelled out in the
gospels but I will not go through all of that in this short article but if you go
through Matthew 24-25 you will see this pattern take place.  The epistles also
follow this pattern in real time.   First there was the Neronian persecution against
the church.  The Jews and the perverted Roman dictator began a vicious
persecution  of the Christians starting in 64 and ending in 66 AD.  Ed Stevens
labeled this period as the tribulation.  Then this slaughter was cut short by the
rapture.
Matthew 24:29-21 “But immediately after the tribulation of those days the sun will
be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will fall from
[r]the sky, and the powers of [s]the heavens will be shaken.30 And then the
sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and then all the tribes of the earth
will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky
with power and great glory. 31 And He will send forth His angels with a great
trumpet and they will gather together His [t]elect from the four winds, from one
end of the sky to the other.
Josephus tells us that a few days after Passover in the year 66, angelic armies
were seen in the sky over Jerusalem.  He gives the day and hour of this event.
Shortly thereafter,  the priests also heard what sounded like people leaving the
underworld (hades).
Josephus (A.D. 75) - Jewish Historian
"Besides these [signs], a few days after that feast, on the one- and-twentieth day of the
month Artemisius, [Jyar,] a certain prodigious and incredible phenomenon appeared; I
suppose the account of it would seem to be a fable, were it not related by those that saw it,
and were not the events that followed it of so considerable a nature as to deserve such
signals; for, before sun-setting, chariots and troops of soldiers in their armour were seen
running about among the clouds, and surrounding of cities. Moreover, at that feast which
we call Pentecost, as the priests were going by night into the inner [court of the] temple, as
their custom was, to perform their sacred ministrations, they said that, in the first place, they
felt a quaking, and heard a great noise, and after that they heard a sound as of a great
multitude, saying, "Let us remove hence" (Jewish Wars,VI-V-3).
So if we sequence this (as biblical historian Ed Stevens might do) it would look like this:
  1. Tribulation against the church.
  2. Visible sighting of angelic armies in sky.
  3. Hades being emptied of its contents and rapture event.
  4. Visitation (second coming) of Christ which lasted 3 ½ years which was the wrath against
    the unfaithful harlot (Jerusalem).
So my friends, the very day and hour has now been revealed as the 21st day of Artemisius
(a few days after passover) in the year AD 66 just before sunset.  Now you know and you
won’t have to fall for any more scams or faulty theology.  
When Jesus told his disciples that they would not know the exact day nor hour, he was
correct but fortunately we now know because it is a past event.  We no longer have to make
excuses why Jesus made mistakes because the fact is, he didn’t.  
Matthew 25:13 Be on the alert then, for you do not know the day nor the hour.

Wednesday, January 17, 2018

The Last Days

The Last Days
By Richard P. Joseph


We are often bombarded by end times prophecy experts that we are in the
“Last Days”.  I have been hearing this my entire life.  So I thought I would
attempt to nail down exactly when the “Last Days” really are.  As I am able to
figure out, we have two choices to choose from; the scripture or the modern
prophecy experts.  I have also figured out that these two are indeed mutually
exclusive as either one is correct and the other wrong or they are both wrong
but they cannot both be correct.
All modern prophecy experts that hold to a future last days event have created
this scenario by using modern thought patterns only.   Since there is no such
evidence in scripture that indicates a protracted wait period before the final
days, this leaves only one method of creating a future event and that is by
invention only.  I therefore will not waste any time trying to figure it out since
there isn’t anything in scripture that supports that view.  There, that was easy.  
Now let’s see what scripture says about the last days.
Let us start with the day of pentecost in the year AD 30. Most of us are familiar
with the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles in the upper room.
They then took to the streets and were prophesying in various languages.  
Then Peter stood up and declared;
16 but this is what was spoken of through the prophet Joel:
17 ‘And it shall be in the last days,’ God says,...
If Peter declared that Joel’s prophecy was fulfilled in AD 30, how is
it fulfilled 2000 plus years later?  Now how about what Paul has to
say about it in Hebrews;
God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in
many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to
us in His Son,...
Paul is assigning the last days as the time he was then living in.  
Again, if Paul was living in the last days, what are we living in?
If that is not enough, what about what John wrote in Revelation;
1 The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show to
His bond-servants, the things which must soon take place; and He
sent and [a]communicated it by His angel to His bond-servant John,
2 who testified to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus
Christ, even to all that he saw. 3 Blessed is he who reads and those
who hear the words of the prophecy, and [b]heed the things which
are written in it; for the time is near.
If the message of the apocalypse was to take place “soon” and
“near” then when is that to us today?
In fact if John was addressing his letter to the seven churches of
Asia minor, and those churches disappeared after AD 70, then why
didn’t he address the letter to the churches in America or elsewhere?  
My real goal in these short articles is to prompt people to think
about what they are following and believing.  We were once all in
that same position of believing everything that the pastor says.  So,
the next time your pastor says to check out his teachings against
scripture, take him up on it.  Make an appointment and ask him
the questions I listed above to start with.  If he makes up a story
about a double meaning of scripture, ask him to show it to you in
scripture.  After he can’t do that, and he can’t, then present to him
the simple answer that it is and that is that the second coming was
an event that was to take place in the first century and against the
unfaithful harlot, Jerusalem.  It is all in the scripture and hard to
miss.  You won’t even have to make anything up because it all
makes sense.

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Religion

Religion
By Richard P. Joseph
This is a test; can you identify the item above that does not belong with the rest
of the images?


“Let’s talk religion and politics”.  Usually when you hear that, people cringe but
don’t worry, you are safe here.  There is a serious problem with most people in
that they do not understand the difference between religion and Christianity.  In
fact, most (and I mean most) people lump Christianity and religion together as
if somehow Christianity is a religion.  We often hear politicians and educators
talking about the great religions of the world.  In highschool textbooks there is
usually a section on “religions of the world”.  The book will give a description of
each religion as if they are somehow items that one can choose from like a
tasty dessert.    I had a friend who came up to me and told me how well her
kid’s textbook did when it provided a healthy section on Christianity.  I had to
inform her that it is all in the master plan of indoctrinating our children into
believing that Christianity is just another man made religion that is equal to all
other religions.  This is a serious and dangerous hoax that most people have
followed right over the cliff.
Pretty much all public schools have banned the expression of religion in
schools; so they say.  The truth is, is that they only banned Christianity, not
religion.  The irony of that is that Christianity isn’t even a religion.  Schools and
liberals in general are committed to the ultimate destruction of Christianity, not
religion, and they definitely know the difference.  Unfortunately most pew
warmers have no clue of the difference.  In reality, if a school or institution bans
religion, it has nothing to do with Christianity but try telling them that.  So what
is the difference anyhow?
Simply said, religion is mans attempt to explain or seek out the spiritual
dimension of their culture or society.  All cultures have religious beliefs and all of
them are wrong.  Man does not have the capacity or the knowledge to seek out
the true creator of the universe.  This is one reason that the second
commandment warns the people to not make for themselves any graven
images of things above or below.  God knew that they had 100% chance of
getting it wrong.  The only way us humans can experience the true God is if he
himself presents his glory to us, not us looking for him.  In the beginning, God
presented himself to his creation, namely Adam and Eve, and they enjoyed a
profound communication with God until the day that they broke God’s trust in
them.  At that point God would only be experienced through his prophets until
the Messiah once again restored communications between God and man
through the Holy Spirit.  In old Testament times God made his presence known
in the Holy of Holies in the temple.  Once Jesus appeared he made many
statements about there being a time when the Temple would be dismantled and
men would then worship God in spirit and in truth.  That time occurred in AD 70.
 This is the time of the parousia (second coming of Christ).  Once this occured
we see that God would once again dwell with men, not in a temple.


Revelation 21:2-4
2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven
from God, made ready as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I
heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, “Behold, the tabernacle
of God is among men, and He will [a]dwell among them, and they
shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them[b], 4 and
He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer
be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or
pain; the first things have passed away.”


God does not dwell in buildings, or in religions, or in the communion host; he
dwells with those that were called out of the darkness of the world system and
into his marvelous light.  That is the true church.  So when an institution tells you
that they have banned religion, you can stand tall and confident and worship
Jesus Christ right in front of them because Christianity is not a religion and is
therefore not banned.  Christianity is really only true history.  It is the story of
how God created the heavens and the earth and sent his son to set us free
from captivity.  There is no myth or man made beliefs associated with it.  It is
just the plain truth!  The church is really those that understand and embrace
this.  Even Nero knew that.  When Nero wanted to destroy Christianity, he did
not attack a religion or a church building; he attacked “people”.  Christians are
“free agents” of the most high God.   The church is not defined by man made
inventions.  If someone wants to destroy the church then they must destroy all
Christians.  Perhaps that is why the homosexual activists are focusing on
individuals such as wedding cake bakers etc.  They are now targeting the core
of the church.  Nero understood it, the homosexuals understand it, but the pew
warmers have no clue.  The pastors have no clue.  The people in general have
no clue.  That is why I write.
As you can guess, it would really take an entire book to do this subject justice
but my goal is to bring these issues up in short articles so that people would at
least get a glimpse of some of the social issues that are never brought up in
our politically correct churches.  I do not wait to take orders from an
organization, I take orders directly from God.  Jesus is my shepherd and I shall
not want.  My hope is that my readers will understand that Christianity is not a
religion and therefore governments cannot take it from you.  Stand tall and
proclaim the everlasting gospel of Jesus Christ because there is no law against
it no matter how hard they try.

Jesus Christ has no competition, there is no one that compares to him.  He is
not in the same boat as anyone.  He is Holy which means he is separate from
all others.  He is not the founder of a great religion, he is God almighty.