2022-02-04
Good Morning Dear Ones,
Last week, I wrote about God’s Book of the Living. Not all humans will automatically be written in it, nor will some gain eternal life while they are young. A friend, who is the rabbi of a Messianic Jewish temple in FL, was diagnosed with prostate cancer. There were several options for him to choose from in how it was to be treated. He chose surgery and promptly went north to the famous hospital in Baltimore, MD for it. He was put in a room with an elderly traditionally Jewish man in the bed next to him. His wife, a talented pianist, was playing down on the piano in the lobby, wonderful faith-based tunes and collected quite an audience from patients who were ambulatory. In the conversations her husband was having with his roommate, the subject of his struggles with God came up. This rabbi did what came natural to him; he witnessed to his own faith in Yeshua (Jesus) despite having been raised in a traditionally Jewish home. The condition of his roommate was deteriorating, but on the last day of his life, he accepted Christ as his personal Savior! As he lay at the doorway of his physical death, the roommate opened the door to eternal life. He passed away the next afternoon. My friend went through his surgery, and it was successful. Our Lord is always giving us opportunities to witness to our faith to others who will listen. We need only look for them and act on them. As for this rabbi and his wife, he has passed on himself now and his wife continues to be a leader in her congregation.
Just as God has His Book of the Living, there is also His Book of the Dead. This is mentioned in REV 17: 8. “The beast who once lived but now does not will come up out of the Abyss and go to his destruction. The inhabitants of he Earth whose names have not written in the Book of the Living from the creation of the world will be astonished when they see the beast, because he once lived and now does not, and yet will come.” This chapter of REV is using such symbolic language to describe the fulfillment of long ago made prophecies regarding the end times.
What Christ revealed to the apostle, John, was the fate of the seven churches and His warnings to them before it was too late. An example is found with what He had to say in REV 3 about the church in Sardis. REV 3: 2-5, “Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of My God. Remember, therefore, what you have received and heard; obey it, and repent. But if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what time I will come to you. Yet you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their clothes. They will walk with Me, dressed in white, for they are worthy. He who overcomes will, like them, be dressed in white. I will never blot out his name from the Book of Life but will acknowledge his name before My Father and His angels.”
The events of the Tribulation, that great “salt- shaker that sifts out those granules which don’t belong”, is the pictographic and symbolic language that describes the separation of the living from those who die spiritually. This kind of language is used liberally in the book of Revelation to make intangible principles understandable. REV 20 tells us that once Christ comes, there is a 1000 year “clean-up” period called the Millennium. REV 20: Once this has elapsed, the Holy City, the new Jerusalem comes down from heaven sent by God, prepared as a “bride beautifully dress for her husband.” We are told that God will live with His people and be their God. Every tear will be wiped away, and there will be no more death or mourning, crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away. “He who was seated on the throne tells the people, “I am making everything new! I am, the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End.” Those who are evil will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death (spiritual death apart from physical death which all people except a very few must endure). Those who are good never die spiritually—not so with those who do are in God’s Book of the Dead. A surprisingly detailed description of the Holy City, new Jerusalem follows. That will be discussed in an upcoming devotion.
PRAYER: O Lord, the painful and eternal fate of those in Your Book of the Dead gives us great motivation to avoid such a fate. Long ago, in DN 7: 13-14, You gave authority to judge the fates of people to our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the only One Who could open the seven seals and decide such an end as each inhabitant of the earth deserves with fairness and equity. Our human criteria for who is deserving is fatally flawed, for You aren’t using education, wealth, titles, or other such things to decide the fate of individuals and groups. Instead, You use criteria that matters, such as the condition of one’s faithful obedience, his ethics as compared to Your teaching, and his use of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. We offer You our thanks and praise for Your wisdom, fairness, equity, and kindness in deciding the eternal fate of each individual or group being considered. We also thank You for hearing every prayer and loving us in a way that is not faulty or uneven. We dedicate ourselves to being ever obedient and faithful to You, in the holy/mighty name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
NEXT WEEK: We will examine REV 20 and 21 with attention to how the Father separates the sheep from the goats [see MT 25: 32]. If space permits, we will look at the new Jerusalem and the amazingly detailed description of heaven we are given. There are four main theories about how the end times lay out. I urge each of you to look into these theories about the rapture with the understanding that no one on earth knows which is true. These theories have to do with when the “meeting with Christ in the air” [1 THESS 4: 16-17] takes place and how to explain the end times. It doesn’t matter which theory one believes, as the truth will be seen by all at the time. So, allowance for these differences should be extended to each person or group. That is one way, we can still walk that “hard path through the narrow gate” that leads to eternal life. Praise and thanks be to God!
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn
JS 24: 15
© Lynn Johnson 2021. All Rights Reserved.
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