A Remnant of Christians?????

If you are a student of Scripture you should be familiar with the profesied 'remnant of Jews' which will be saved at the 2nd coming of Jesus Christ, at which point the Jews will believe that He was the Messiah. That's another study, (ref. Zephaniah 2:9, Zechariah 14:2, etc.).

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary (MHCC tab in e-Sword if you have downloaded it). E-sword's Commentary download page: http://www.e-sword.net/commentaries.html.

"Rom 9:25-29 -

The rejecting of the Jews, and the taking in the Gentiles, were foretold in the Old Testament. It tends very much to the clearing of a truth, to observe how the Scripture is fulfilled in it. It is a wonder of Divine power and mercy that there are any saved: for even those left to be a seed, if God had dealt with them according to their sins, had perished with the rest. This great truth this Scripture teaches us. Even among the vast number of professing Christians it is to be feared that only a remnant will be saved."

Matthew Henry died in 1714. The "Concise Commentary" is an encapsulated version of Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible. Even back then he could see the apostasy of the church which would occur in the last days, as warned by Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:3.

Imagine!!!!! How sad! How many people .......... GENERATIONS..........may be surprised when they die, that their profession of faith was not a true one. That they were only playing at Christianity and teaching the next generation to do so as well???? Playing at going to church, sunday school, reading the Bible, going to church socials, insisting kids marry someone of their own faith, praying over Christmas and Easter dinner ...............etc. etc. etc. (all the obligatory outward things - "works") all the while not really being believers in Christ?!?!?

Rev. 20:12: "...and the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books, according to their deeds." (believers in Christ are not, their sins have been washed away by His blood sacrifice)

Gal. 2:16: "...a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified."

Why????
Ultimately the fault lies within us. It is out of our God-given free will to choose the redemption by the blood of His son or not. He loved us enough to give us the choice, because forced worship is no worship at all. Perhaps the worst thing that ever happened to Christianity is organized religion!!!!!!!!!!! As Dr. Tony Evans has said............"some of the worst Christians are the ones who are in church every time the doors open.......because that is what they think being a 'Christian' is about"!

Jesus was the most UN-religious person who ever walked the face of the earth. He taught in the synagogues, yes.........but by the example of the Pharisees (leaders of the 'church'), He showed us ALL, Christians and Jews alike, that we are to know God and His word ourselves..........NOT simply sit in church week after week listening to some man's dissertation of a few verses, which may even be taken out of context. READ THE BIBLE. Make up your own mind!

Jewish example: Psalm 22 was, in the past, considered by the rabbis as prophetic in nature about the Messiah. However, eventually it was decided by the rabbis that the Christians were onto this, and that it should be de-emphasized. Dr. Chuck Missler covers this in detail in his study on Psalms. Free to hear (his 66/40 radio show) online here - click on part 5. Psalm 22 reads the crucifixion of Jesus as if dictated from the cross!!! It opens and closes with the first and last words spoken by Jesus on the Cross. NOTE: this Psalm was written 600 years before crucifixion was invented by the Persians.

Christian example: By and large today's churches teach the unBiblical view that the church has replaced Israel due to Israel's rejection of their Messiah. WRONG!!!!!!!!!! There are hundreds of Biblical reasons to prove this wrong! To claim this is to call God a liar. The Book of Revelation revolves around Israel! The saved will be singing the song of Moses in heaven!

Salvation by Yeshua

An explanation of proof that Jesus Christ was the Messiah prophecied in the Old Testament: by Dr. Arnold Fruchtenbaum: Salvation by Yeshua

Know who He is: "A review of REAL MESSIAH QUALIFICATIONS [this link includes Scripture cross-references to make each point] makes it obvious that God has provided us with a resplendent resume in Scripture we can use to identify the Messiah. There is only one man in history who fulfills these prophecies. He is not just a man, for no mere man can fulfill all of these supernatural requirements. Messiah is both God and man. The storms of life compel us all to seek out and know the truth. Life is not a game show. Why simply guess, make unstudied assumptions, or apathetically “go with the flow” about something of such eternal consequence?"

The Blood-Red Moon, the Temple Mount and the Bible

The Blood-Red Moon, the Temple Mount and the Bible - Bill Koenig – www.watch.org

August 28, 2007, had very revealing headlines:

A Blood-Red Moon Rises over North America, Olmert Offers Temple Mount Sovereignty to the Palestinians, Olmert and Abbas Meet on Israel's Land and Jerusalem, Bush Says Iran's Actions Could Lead to a Shadow of a Nuclear Holocaust, and Bush Arrives in New Orleans for his 15th Post-Katrina Visit

These were the news headlines on the day of a total lunar eclipse that produced a "blood-red" moon, the second one in seven years. The last total lunar eclipse/"blood-red" moon occurred on July 16, 2000, while U.S. President Bill Clinton, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat were at the Middle East Summit at Camp David. The sticking point that caused the summit to fail had to do with who would have sovereignty over the Temple Mount — the Israelis or the Palestinian Arabs.

During this year's total lunar eclipse/"blood-red" moon of Aug. 28, 2007, that rose over North America, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert offered the Palestinians sovereignty over the Temple Mount. What was so incredible about the timing of this offer is that it didn't take place days, weeks or months after the "blood-red" moon but on the very same day. In other words, the Temple Mount’s sovereignty was a central focus during both total lunar eclipse/ "blood-red" moons in 2000 and this week.

Blood-Red Moon

The Old and New Testaments speak of blood-red moons prior to the Tribulation.

Joel 2:31 (KJV) The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the LORD come.

Acts 2:20 (KJV) The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come.

The Jewish Talmud (book of tradition/interpretation) says, "When the moon is in eclipse, it is a bad omen for Israel. If its face is as red as blood, [it is a sign that] the sword is coming to the world."

Total-eclipse “blood-red” moons are rare. The next total-eclipse/ "blood-red" moon will occur on Feb. 21, 2008. Having another total eclipse this close to a previous one is extremely rare; to say the least, we will be watching that day with much interest.

News From the Last Two Blood-Red Moons

During the "blood-red" moon of July 16, 2000, President Clinton, Prime Minister Barak and President Arafat were participating in the Middle East Summit at Camp David from July 11-25.

According to Mitchell Bard, the executive director of the nonprofit American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE), Prime Minister Barak offered to withdraw from 97 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of the Gaza Strip. In addition, he agreed to dismantle 63 isolated settlements. In exchange for the 5 percent annexation of the West Bank, Israel would increase the size of the Gaza territory by roughly a third.

Bard said Barak also made previously unthinkable concessions on Jerusalem, agreeing that Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem would become the capital of the new Palestinian state.

The Barak proposal also addressed the refugee issue, guaranteeing them the right of return to the Palestinian state and reparations from an international fund that would be collected to compensate them.

Barak began referring to the 'Holy of Holies' (Aryeh Dayan, Ha'aretz)

In early September 2000, about two months after Ehud Barak and Yasser Arafat returned empty-handed from the failed summit at Camp David, a series of clandestine meetings was held in Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians. Most of them took place in an isolated private home in the western Jerusalem suburb of Ein Karem and were meant to find a formula that would resolve the harsh dispute that broke out at the summit around the future of the Temple Mount.

The talks were held at the home of Dr. Moshe Amirav, the man who was appointed the day after the Camp David debacle as the prime minister's adviser on the issue of a permanent settlement in Jerusalem.

Seated alongside Amirav during some of the conversations was Danny Yatom, who headed the political-security staff at the Prime Minister's office at the time. In these conversations, the late Faisal Husseini, who headed the Palestinian negotiating team on Jerusalem, represented the Palestinians.

The dispute over the Temple Mount had nothing to do with practical arrangements that would be implemented there. The crux of the dispute centered on sovereignty, and nothing else. While Arafat demanded that the entire Temple Mount — Haram al-Sharif in Arab terminology — would be under full and exclusive sovereignty of the Palestinians, Barak demanded that partial sovereignty over the site — which, to the disbelief of several of his colleagues in the Israeli delegation, he suddenly began to call "The Holy of Holies" — would remain in Israel's possession.

Amirav and Husseini, whose Ein Karem conversations took place with Barak and Arafat's knowledge, worked out a formula that both men believed would be able to circumvent this difference of opinion.

According to the proposal they drafted, the United Nations would establish a "commonwealth of states," in whose hands the Temple Mount would be entrusted. This commonwealth of nations would have 11 member states: the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian state that would be established as part of the peace treaty and Israel.

Ongoing administration of the Temple Mount, stated the document, would remain in the Waqf's domain, and Yasser Arafat "could be the guardian of the sites holy to Islam."

The Temple Mount, claims Amirav, is what prevented the sides from reaching agreement.

"The Camp David summit," explained Amirav in conversation with Ha'aretz, "became a 'Jerusalem summit,' perhaps even a 'Temple Mount summit.'" The three leaders who took part — Barak, Arafat and their host, U.S. President Bill Clinton — devoted, claims Amirav, "hundreds of hours" to discussions on Jerusalem in general and the Temple Mount in particular. "It may be hard to believe," says Amirav, "but Clinton himself spent hours poring over maps with Barak and Arafat."

It was Arafat's and Barak's stubborn insistence on sovereignty that prevented an agreement. rafat insisted on full and exclusive Palestinian sovereignty "both because he wanted to go down in history as having liberated the Temple Mount and because he wanted the Temple Mount to provide a pan-Muslim counterweight to the little State of Palestine."

But Barak wanted to go down in Jewish history as the man who gave Israel sovereignty, if only partial, over the Temple Mount.

Moshe Amirav calls this a "groundless assertion." He says in exchange for conceding the Temple Mount, Israel could have received the recognition of the entire world — including the Arab and Muslim world — both of its sovereign existence and Jerusalem as its capital. Sooner or later, he says, Israel will be forced to "get rid of the Temple Mount." He proposes that Israel "give the Temple Mount as a gift, not to Arafat, but to the leaders of the countries of Islam." If it does so, he believes Israel will receive the recognition of the entire Muslim world.

Bad Omen: Olmert Offers Palestinians Temple Mount Sovereignty

Aaron Klein of WorldNetDaily reported that on Tuesday, Aug. 28, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert presented the Palestinian Authority with a formal plan in which the Jewish state would forfeit the Temple Mount — Judaism's holiest site — to Muslim control, according to top Palestinian sources.

WND reported the sources said Olmert's plan calls for the entire Temple Mount plaza to fall under Arab sovereignty; Jerusalem's Old City holy sites near the Mount to be governed by a Jewish, Christian and Muslim task force; and the Western Wall plaza below the Mount to be controlled by Israel.

According to Palestinian negotiators who took part in the Olmert-Abbas meeting, Olmert also presented Abbas with a plan for Israel to evacuate most of the West Bank and cede eastern sections of Jerusalem. The plan called for Israel to retain three main settlement blocks; in exchange, Israel would offer the Palestinians Israeli-Arab towns in the north of the country, the Palestinian negotiators told WND.

Bush, Iran and Katrina

Later on Tuesday, Aug. 28, President George W. Bush told the 89th Annual Convention of the American Legion in Nevada: Iran's active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust. Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywhere. And that is why the United States is rallying friends and allies around the world to isolate the regime, to impose economic sanctions. We will confront this danger before it is too late.

Bush also said, "We seek to advance a two-state solution for the Israelis and Palestinians so they can live side by side in peace and security. We seek justice and dignity and human rights for all the people of the Middle East." In another very symbolic and relevant irony, President Bush arrived in New Orleans later that day for his 15th trip to survey rebuilding progress on the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, which occurred on the heels of the expulsion of 9,500 Jews from their homes in Gaza and northern Samaria. The White House reported that the federal government has provided more than $114 billion for relief, recovery and rebuilding efforts — over $96 billion of which has been disbursed, or is available for, the states to draw from. Summary

This year’s total lunar eclipse/"blood-red" moon that rose over North America, occurred during a very symbolic and significant news day not only in Israel but in the United States too, this was not be accident or coincidence.

We also know the Bush Administration seems committed to a peace deal before they leave office. In Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's keynote message to the American Task Force on Palestine Inaugural Gala, "Helping Palestinians Build a Better Future," given in Washington, D.C. on Oct. 11, 2006, she stated: I can only tell you that I, too, have a personal commitment to that goal because I believe that there could be no greater legacy for America than to help to bring into being a Palestinian state for a people who have suffered too long, who have been humiliated too long, who have not reached their potential for too long, and who have so much to give to the international community and to all of us. I promise you my personal commitment to that goal.

Israel's secular leadership of Ehud Olmert, Ehud Barak and Shimon Peres are leading their nation into a very dangerous direction, not to forget the role George W. Bush and Condoleezza Rice are playing. As I have shown over and over again in my book, Eye to Eye — Facing the Consequences of Dividing Israel, the future won’t be good to those who attempt to divide God's covenant land and interfere with His plan for the nation of Israel and the Jewish people.

Source: Prophecyupdate.com

Jesus Is Ready for Judgment Day.....Are You?

Thought the title might catch your eye ;o). Actually I just wanted to point out what I noticed while studying my Bible yesterday and also the importance of paying attention when we study. God means what He says and says what He means!

James 5:9 Do not complain, brethren, against one another,
so that you yourselves may not be judged; behold,
the Judge is standing right at the door.

1 Peter 4:5 but they will give account to Him who is ready

to judge the living and the dead.

As Acts 10:42 tells us, this Judge is Jesus Himself:

"And He ordered us to preach to the people, and solemnly to
testify that this is the One who has been appointed
by God as Judge of the living and the dead."

Jesus is ready to return in the blink of an eye, and if anyone doesn't believe the Bible is current information, he should take a closer look and see all of the prophetic signs which are coming to pass. You can read Matthew 24 and/or Mark 13 to see the "signs of His coming" in Jesus' own words.

Abraham was Saved as a Gentile

I once heard: "The first Jew [Abraham] was a gentile, and the first gentile [Jesus] was a Jew". A simplistic yet profound statement of God's grace - salvation! What must we do to be saved? It's a question which Christians and Jews (from the beginning of the church - read Acts 15) have been interpreting differently.

Abraham, the father of the Hebrew race, was saved (Gen. 15) 40 years before God instituted circumcision, which was a sign of the covenant He made with Abraham in Gen. 17. Abraham was made righteous (saved) before he was circumcised. He was not under the law, which was not given until much later. Thus, he could not be saved by keeping the law. However, in Gen. 15:6 we read "Then [Abraham] believed in the Lord; and He reckoned to him as righteousness"

In Acts 15, a council of the church of Jerusalem came together to discuss a big issue, as some believers (remember, these are Jews), even "some of the sect of the Pharisees who had believed" (Acts 15:1 & 5), were teaching that "Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses (a gentile become a Jewish convert first), you cannot be saved" (v. 1). Some in the early Jewish church thought one must be a Jew before he could become a Christian.........yet, Abraham was not circumcised until 40 years after his salvation.

The question "what must I do to be saved" has always been made more complicated by man than intended by God. The Bible simply says there is only one simply thing we must do to be saved (have eternal life):

1 John 3:23 This is His commandment, that we believe in the name of His Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, just as He commanded us.

I am always thankful for the example of the thief on the cross (Luke 23:40-43), crucified to Jesus' right hand. He believed, and Jesus told him he would be in paradise with Him that same day. The thief did not have to come down and be baptized, join a congregation, give money to the church, etc.

I pray that you, dear brother or sister.............reader have faith in Jesus alone. That is ALL it takes to save your soul.

God bless you!

Tiny tablet provides proof for Old Testament

Tiny tablet provides proof for Old Testament

The sound of unbridled joy seldom breaks the quiet of the British Museum's great Arched Room, which holds its collection of 130,000 Assyrian cuneiform tablets, dating back 5,000 years.

But Michael Jursa, a visiting professor from Vienna, let out such a cry last Thursday. He had made what has been called the most important find in Biblical archaeology for 100 years, a discovery that supports the view that the historical books of the Old Testament are based on fact.

Searching for Babylonian financial accounts among the tablets, Prof Jursa suddenly came across a name he half remembered - Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, described there in a hand 2,500 years old, as "the chief eunuch" of Nebuchadnezzar II, king of Babylon.

Prof Jursa, an Assyriologist, checked the Old Testament and there in chapter 39 of the Book of Jeremiah, he found, spelled differently, the same name - Nebo-Sarsekim.

Nebo-Sarsekim, according to Jeremiah, was Nebuchadnezzar II's "chief officer" and was with him at the siege of Jerusalem in 587 BC, when the Babylonians overran the city.

according to Irving Finkel, a British Museum expert, is a bill of receipt acknowledging Nabu-sharrussu-ukin's payment of 0.75 kg of gold to a temple in Babylon.

The tablet is dated to the 10th year of the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II, 595BC, 12 years before the siege of Jerusalem.

Evidence from non-Biblical sources of people named in the Bible is not unknown, but Nabu-sharrussu-ukin would have been a relatively insignificant figure.

"This is a fantastic discovery, a world-class find," Dr Finkel said yesterday. "If Nebo-Sarsekim existed, which other lesser figures in the Old Testament existed? A throwaway detail in the Old Testament turns out to be accurate and true. I think that it means that the whole of the narrative [of Jeremiah] takes on a new kind of power."

Cuneiform is the oldest known form of writing and was commonly used in the Middle East between 3,200 BC and the second century AD. It was created by pressing a wedge-shaped instrument, usually a cut reed, into moist clay.

The full translation of the tablet reads: (Regarding) 1.5 minas (0.75 kg) of gold, the property of Nabu-sharrussu-ukin, the chief eunuch, which he sent via Arad-Banitu the eunuch to [the temple] Esangila: Arad-Banitu has delivered [it] to Esangila. In the presence of Bel-usat, son of Alpaya, the royal bodyguard, [and of] Nadin, son of Marduk-zer-ibni. Month XI, day 18, year 10 [of] Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.

Source: www.telegraph.co.uk

Mysterious Clouds Creeping Out of the Arctic

A new NASA satellite has recorded the first detailed images from space of a mysterious type of cloud called “night-shining” or “noctilucent."

The clouds are on the move, brightening and creeping out of polar regions, and researchers don't know why.

"It is clear that these clouds are changing, a sign that a part of our atmosphere is changing and we do not understand how, why or what it means," said atmospheric scientists James Russell III of Hampton University in Hampton, Virginia. "These observations suggest a connection with global change in the lower atmosphere and could represent an early warning that our Earth environment is being changed."

The "Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere” (AIM) satellite first imaged the noctilucent clouds May 25. People on the ground began seeing them June 6 over Northern Europe.

The clouds form 50 miles above the Earth’s surface, in an upper layer of the atmosphere called the mesosphere. The puffs of water vapor and crystals appear during summer months above the Northern Hemisphere's pole as well the Southern Hemisphere’s pole in summer.

AIM will record two complete cloud seasons over both regions, effectively documenting an entire life cycle of the shiny clouds for the first time. Researchers hope to figure out why noctilucent clouds form and how they might be related to global climate change.

Source:
Mysterious Clouds Creeping Out of the Arctic
By Dave Mosher, LiveScience Staff Writer
posted: 28 June 2007 05:38 pm ET

"And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken." (Luke 21:25-26)

These are not things to fear, we are to rejoice: ""And now I have told you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye might believe." (John 14:29)"