Trumpets 2011

Ron Weinland

September 29, 2011

Before we get started on the sermon today I do want to remind everyone about the offering on the High Days.  And for those who may be new, we generally go back to the area in Deuteronomy 16:16.  Actually, before that it’s talking about the various Holy Days.  Chapter 14 is going through and talking about the tithing system and the like.  In chapter 16 we come to the point where it starts talking about Passover and observing it and the Days of Unleavened Bread; and then of course in verse 10 it starts talking about keeping the Feast of Weeks/the Feast of Firstfruits/the Day of Pentecost as it’s called in different areas throughout scripture here.

And then of course verse 13 - You shall observe the Feast of Tabernacles seven days; and so it starts talking about that period of time as well and certainly dividing it up here into three seasons of the year as its doing, and by the time we get down then to verse 16 it says...(Deuteronomy 16:16) - Three times, or three occasions, three seasons in the year shall all your males appear before the Eternal your God in the place which He shall choose; where God places His name.  And of course understanding that in the Old Testament times there, again, it’s referring to those who are responsible for coming before God as they were, the adults, of the adult males at that point in time for various things of accountability.  Understand that certainly today in the Church that includes everyone, especially those who are baptized, are commanded to come before God three times in the year; we understand the Days of Unleavened bread period, the second period of Pentecost, and then in the fall that were in right now.

Just like yesterday and last night driving home – everyone around the region here is doing a lot of farming right now, they’re bringing in the crops, and that was a beautiful sight, some beautiful crops it looked like. A time to bring in the crops in the fall time which has great meaning for God’s plan as well, obviously, but it begins with the Feast of Trumpets, and then of course Atonement here coming up in another Sabbath here and then we’re going to be in the Feast period.  But it’s reminding everyone at this particular occasion; in the Feast of Unleavened Bread, in that season, in the Feast of Weeks, and in the Feast of Tabernacles season as well: and they shall not appear before the Eternal empty handed as it says in the New King James, and it has to do with the offering they were to bring before God that’s different from tithes, obviously.

Every area has their own way of collecting the offering.  Some have a basket at the back of the hall, as we do here today, and some areas, some individuals where they’re not able to meet together simply just send it in.  It’s not a recommendation from God, it’s a command seven times in a year that on the High Days that we do this.

That brings us to the sermon.  As we heard in the opening prayer, the last one of this age.  It’s an awesome thing!  Today marks the final - the last Feast of Trumpets that will be observed in this long period of man’s self-rule on earth.  It is an awesome day, truly is!  This whole year, the Holy Days, they are indeed awesome because of the timing and so forth, and of course this day marks the last observance of the Feast of Trumpets for the first 6,000 years of mankind.

So it is a profound time for mankind, especially when you understand what the Feast of Trumpets is all about and what it pictures.  The world, totally oblivious to what it’s about, what it means, especially right now in what’s taking place, being fulfilled in this very day the things that this end-time that we’re living. It’s an awesome thing!

As we consider the magnitude of the meaning of this Feast of Trumpets, it would be good to do a quick review even as we did around Pentecost, of the Holy Days and the appointed times that precede this in order to get a deeper perspective of the importance of where we are in God’s plan.  God wants us to be deeply excited at what He is doing.  He’s waited a long time for all of this in ways that we can’t even begin to comprehend.  We live what?  Three score and ten as a whole. I’ve been in the Church since I was nineteen, am sixty-two now, it’s been a lifetime in that respect for me from my perspective.  But very short in comparison!  And I look back and I think of all the things that have taken place since I’ve been in God’s Church, all the things I saw during the time of Philadelphia, all the things I’ve been blessed to witness, to grow in, and to be moulded and fashioned by God, and yet my desire for what is taking place and where we are in time is very small.  We can’t even begin to relate, in that respect, to the desire of God Almighty, and yet even at last year’s Feast we started talking about some of these things, and now this year and the Holy Days that we’re observing, because we are right there, this is a very moving thing for God and He wants to share that with us.

We’re very blessed!  He blesses us to share in His spirit and His power to be able to drink in, very mightily so if you will, of what He is doing.  And it’s exciting to Him and it should be awesomely exciting for us, indeed.

Let’s begin by going back and looking at Passover again as a reminder here.  God’s plan and how He is working everything out.  And I am in awe when I think about this, and it’s good that we consider it – Jesus Christ experienced and fulfilled Passover completely in one day.  In one day!  We’re experiencing different phases of God’s plan, different things of God’s plan are revealed or being fulfilled at different stages of time, but here in one day...and of course everyone who has been called experiences the process of the Days of Unleavened Bread.  We don’t think about it that way, but coming out of Egypt, coming out of spiritual sin, that process of change and conversion that takes place in us.  And so again, the Days of Unleavened Bread, becoming unleavened, a life-long process as we fight against sin, as we seek to draw closer to God and definitely every day using the Passover, because of the blessing of being able to be forgiven of sin, going before God and repenting.

So, again, people are able to experience the Days of Unleavened Bread that last for a lifetime, but we don’t generally think in those terms.

And then Pentecost, we just observed that not too long ago; carried a great impact upon the Israelites of course when the 10 Commandments were given, because this is a beginning of a fulfillment in that respect as far as something that God was doing in a very powerful way, giving the 10 Commandments there at Mount Sinai on Pentecost.  And then so much longer, later, finally Jesus Christ came along and then on the Day of Pentecost after His resurrection another Pentecost and God gives his holy spirit; something experienced in that day, uniquely so, in the way that it was poured out and God revealing mightily so that you can’t live His law, you can’t live His way of life, the Israelites are proof of that.  That’s an awesome thing to understand!  Unless God gives you help of His holy spirit you can’t live His way of life!  So, a powerful thing of what the Israelites were witness of; not a good example.  Some become jealous and envious of things that happened to the Israelites.  If they understood that it wasn’t a good example, well, that’s going to help them in the future obviously.

And of course, as we talked about Pentecost it’s one of the longest in that respect to be fulfilled, in a powerful way, because of what it means when the section there, the part, not talking of the giving of the law and the holy spirit, but talking about firstfruits, 6,000 years of what God has been doing with people, moulding and fashioning different ones through the ages to become a part of something so incredible, the part of God’s government that will be with Jesus Christ when He returns.  And so again, we discussed that on Pentecost, the calling, the working with as God has moulded and fashioned 144,000 through 6,000 years so that they are all prepared then to return with Jesus Christ.

And so now we are at Trumpets. I don’t know all that is in the meaning of this day but there’s more than what we’re just talking about here today.  This is an important Feast of Trumpets, truly is. And again, the Feast of Trumpets has always been understood, in the last several decades, as picturing the ‘trumpeting’ or the ‘announcing’ of the return of Jesus Christ – the Messiah – the King of kings.  We just didn’t understand the timing.  And it began to be believed through time that it was going to be on this day that He would return, until finally God solidified that with the 50th Truth and helped us to understand, no, Trumpets announces His return but it’s on the Day of Pentecost that He actually does so, because of the greater meaning then of the two wave loaves and the timing involved there, and it’s an awesome thing, truly is.

So, in the last Feast of Trumpets, this has taken on a deeper and more profound meaning and we find that we’re now living, as we talked about even last Feast of Trumpets, living during the time of the Trumpeting that the very Feast of Trumpets pictures.  Starting in 2008 we started living it.

As I mentioned here, Jesus Christ lived Passover in one day, and we’re living the Feast of Trumpets through a period of time, 1335 days if you will, because it’s all inclusive of a period of time that God gave beginning in 2008 on the Feast of Trumpets.  And so the Feast of Trumpets taking on deeper and deeper meaning as we’ve gone forward.

Leviticus 23: again, God tells us to focus on the meaning of the days, to read about these things, to discuss these things on the High Days, on the Holy Days, and so indeed doing so here.  And so just a brief review here of what is written here as these things are spoken of; from Holy Day to Holy Day to Holy Day we go back to Leviticus 23.

Leviticus 23:23 - And the Eternal spoke unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, so in God’s calendar, in God’s timing, this is the seventh month; in the first day of the month you shall have a Sabbath, an annual Sabbath, a memorial of blowing of Trumpets, so again here, something that’s plural, means a great deal that it’s written here as plural.  It’s not just a matter of a Trumpet, it’s the Feast of Trumpets, plural!  ...having great meaning and calling it here, an holy convocation.  It’s a commanded assembly!  It’s holy because God’s in it, it’s what God established so long ago in the very beginning of time, and God set up appointed times that we’re to come before Him and to rejoice before Him and to be thankful for His great plan and purpose.  It’s every Holy Day He has us review and go back through and be reminded of what the days mean.  And so we do that, faithfully so, because when people don’t do that they begin to lose understanding of what the days are about – when we don’t do things the way God says to do it – and so we focus upon the meaning of the day. And when focusing on the meaning of this day it’s important that we understand, as I so often do anyway, talking about the uses of trumpets in the Old Testament.

And so again, a quick review of that today.

1. To call to assembly.  We’ve just been told, and this is to be in our life at all times that God calls people to an assembly.  We just read where it’s called a ‘holy convocation’, a holy convening.  And so this has great meaning in the sense of (especially for the Church) in order to be given direction.  God calls us to assembly every Sabbath.  He has called us to assembly every High Day.  He calls those who are baptized to assembly, to come together on Passover day to observe Passover, to assemble before Him.  Sometimes we have to do it by ourselves wherever we are, if we’re not able to get somewhere else or to be with other people.  If you’re blessed to be with others that’s an awesome blessing; but again, it’s a matter of coming before God to be trained, to be taught, to be given instruction by God.

And so again here, when the various trumpets were blown, they knew what the trumpets meant.  They understood by the sound and the type of trumpet and the kind of blast that was made, the kind of sound that came out of it – they knew exactly what to do.  When you go back to the Old Testament it’s really awesome to read about several million people camped as they were, and there were times when the trumpets were blown that they did it in an orderly fashion, they knew how to do it.  They knew how to get together and how to begin marching and doing all that they did – all this through the sound of trumpets.  They didn’t have cell phones like we do. They just heard the sound and they knew immediately what to do.  They’d been instructed what to do. So it’s a time of hearing.

And so those examples of things that we learn from; ‘having ears to hear’.  Do we hear what God instructs us and gives us, and that having a great deal to do with the meaning of the Feast of Trumpets. To be called before God, for the Church, in order to be given direction.  So it’s not just the Feast of Trumpets, it’s every High Day, every Sabbath that God has given us.  Do we have the ears to hear?

1. To sound an alarm – especially to war.  And so again, a unique sound that was given.  They knew what they had to do at a time like that, when that blast went out.

And all these things having meaning with the Feast of Trumpets; to sound an alarm.

1. To proclaim a time for rejoicing, a time of thankfulness, and praise – especially as we understand the meaning of Trumpets – especially in the announcing/heralding/trumpeting of a new king.

We’re almost there.  Awesome to understand!

As you go through scriptures and you see various things in the book of Revelation, especially when it talks about the return of Jesus Christ and the things that happen at that time, and another meaning of trumpets and the way it’s most generally translated is a matter of ‘loud shouting’, because it has to do with the vocal chords, it has to do with the air and the passage, just like through a trumpet or through a shofar.  And the same thing is true, it’s the sound that comes out of us even, and that sound then that comes out, and the air that travels through to make a unique sound, and to do all these things as well...all the uses of a trumpet.

So it is often translated as a ‘shouting’, especially with loud voices and how it’s used. That usage will come out as we go through some of this sermon today and the scriptures we read here.  Let’s go to an area of scripture, over to Joshua, where ‘alarm’ and ‘trumpets of war’ are used prior, again, to the return of Jesus Christ and at the return of Jesus Christ.  And we’ll come back and look at that a little bit later. We’re going to focus upon an area of scripture that has been growing in importance to us and has tremendous bearing on the meaning of this day – the story of Joshua beginning in chapter 5.

I marvel when I think back before we came to 2008.  We started focusing on a different area of scripture.  It was the story of Gideon and running down the hill, the mountain if you will, the sides of the hill together and the small group that was together at that particular time and all the things we went through in all of our thinking; and what God gave to us was inspiration, to realize how small we were and the power then that God gave to us, that encouragement if you will, to do the job that was ahead of us.  And we were blessed to be a part of that in a spiritual sort of way.

And now this one here has taken on great meaning for us, and as we go through this is going to have a great deal more meaning to it as well.

Joshua 5:1 - And it came to pass, when all the kings of the Amorites, who were on the side of Jordan westward, and all the kings of the Canaanites, which were by the sea, heard that the Eternal had dried up the waters of Jordan from before the children of Israel, until they had passed over, that their heart melted, unique expression here, their hearts melted and neither was there strength in them anymore, because of the children of Israel. This wasn’t that long ago that they heard stories.  They knew what happened to Egypt.  They heard about what happened to Egypt, about a Pharaoh and about his army and about the crossing into, through the Red Sea and what God did there.  And so all of a sudden 40 years later at a time when the Jordan River is flooding and there are those who can testify that the fact that the water was backed up way back beyond the river farther upstream, and to see a dam of water there, to be witness of that kind of thing – something that doesn’t happen physically and yet is backing up.  Not parting this time, backing up; it’s a river, it’s not a sea, and so God just dammed it up on one side, a lot of water in this season of flooding.

And so when this story began to go out and the children of Israel are no longer staying where they’ve been for 40 years, now they’re making movement and they’re coming toward us, it says, their hearts melted and there wasn’t any strength in them. Incredible the power that was here!  So much so that Jericho shut up her gates immediately; they were in fear!  The Israelites were on their doorstep.

Verse 2 - At that time the Eternal said to Joshua, Make sharp knives and circumcise again the children of Israel the second time. So there was a first time that God told Moses and the children of Israel to do this, and now this is a second time because this didn’t take place while they were in the wilderness.  It’s an incredible story, truly is; one that many minsters in God’s Church have messed up royally and gone astray because they just haven’t listened to God.  It’s an awesome story, it really is.  And so He says, make sharp knives and circumcise again the children of Israel the second time.  And Joshua made sharp knives; now, when it says Joshua did it they didn’t all bring their knives to Joshua and Joshua is sitting there and sharpening all the knives.  There were a lot of people helping. Okay?  We’re talking about several hundred thousand people out here that are going to go through this so a lot of knives.

So it says he had this done, in essence, and it says; and circumcise the children of Israel at the hill of the foreskins.   And Joshua had all the males of the people circumcised because all who came out of Egypt, who were all men of war, died in the wilderness by the way after they came out of Egypt. It’s an unusual thing here; God’s going through and talking about something like this, and to think that there are people in God’s Church who have stumbled at some of this in a very great way and have made stupid comments changing the timing of Pentecost because of it, changing things having to do with the observance of Passover because of it, because they... well, you know, there’s an awesome thing – if you don’t serve God, if you don’t live God’s way of life, receive what God has and are not faithful to it you begin to lose it and your mind doesn’t think clearly anymore.  It’s what happens.  That’s what happened during the apostasy when people started making a choice in just one doctrine, whatever that doctrine might be: going to heaven, whatever.  As soon as they did that their minds started going off in different tangents and different directions and they couldn’t think clearly anymore.  It’s an incredible thing!

We have to be close to God to continually be fed by God, to be able to receive the truth of God; but you have to be close to God, you have to have God’s spirit in you on a continuing basis to even hold onto what God gives you.  You can’t hold onto what God gives you without His help!  The time we begin to cut ourselves off from God’s spirit, the time we let down spiritually in our lives and begin to be lukewarm (as I have mentioned has been happening in God’s Church), because I’ve lived lukewarm, I know lukewarm!  I know lukewarm inside and out!  I’ve seen it all around me!  Lived through it!  Lived through horrible times because of it – and anyone who lived during Philadelphia and on into Laodicea – and not even necessarily in Philadelphia, those of you who were a part of the period of Laodicea before the apostasy, you saw lukewarmness as well.  You saw what happens to a Church that begins to let down and begins to coast.  You can’t coast in God’s Church!  You can’t straddle a fence in God’s Church!  You’ve got to be on one side or the other!  You can’t be warm in God’s Church – there’s no such thing!  You’re either cold or your hot!  If you’re warm you’re cold as far as God’s concerned, spiritually.

And so again, things we need to be mindful of; of all times in history to allow ourselves to begin to be lukewarm at this time, to let down spiritually in our relationship with God, it’s a horrible time to do it! Isn’t it? ...horrible time to do it!  And it amazes me sometimes to think that people all the way to the end are going to go by the wayside.  You think your trials are over with?  You think you haven’t been tried yet?  I can just tell you right now, the longer it goes that we have peace around us the harder it’s going to be for you!  The longer it might take for the 2nd Trumpet to sound – I don’t know when it’s going to be – it could be today, it could be tomorrow, it could be next week, it could be next month, it could be January, it could be April.  I Don’t Know.  That’s in God’s hands!  But I can tell you, absolutely, just as much as the 50th Truth gave people a difficult time, that if you’re not close to God and staying close to God that can become your stumbling block.  Truly!  ...where doubts and questions begin to come into your mind.  That’s why we’ve just recently gone through the Truths that we have, discussing them, reviewing them; because they’re your strength, they truly are. They are your strength, boldness and confidence!

And so again here in the story, talking about circumcision, and a very simple statement is made here about how ...all who were men of war died in the wilderness by the way after they came out of Egypt.

Verse 5 – For all the people who came out were circumcised: but all the people born in the wilderness by the way as they came forth out of Egypt had not been circumcised.  Something that ministers and people in the Church in times past here, and not too long ago, because this was even after the apostasy that some of this stupidity took place amongst some of the ministers who were minsters at one time in God’s Church; went off on tangents and began to count Pentecost in an improper way, and Passover in an improper way.  And this here is a very simple story and how people can trip over it, something that’s so clear and something so plain – you think, “How?  Why can’t they see something so obvious?”  Because of what’s in the story here, what’s contained in the story, comes up a little bit later on when some say that because of the circumcision that took place they couldn’t have gone in and did the things they did.  They couldn’t have gone in and harvested the land, that crop.  They couldn’t have gone in and did the things they did against Jericho because it takes a while to heal; so they couldn’t have been a part of that.  Dumb, dumb, stupid, stupid, ignorant, ignorant, dumb!  Truly!  It says only those that were born in the wilderness had not been circumcised. Because you see, all the children, the babies all the way up to age 20, all the way up to whatever age they were, they were all circumcised before they came out of Egypt – every one of them.  But the ones who were called ‘men of war’ who died were 20 years old and upward.  There were a lot of people who had already been circumcised, who became men of war later on, who became of age of accountability later on – perhaps several hundred thousand, we don’t know; whatever it was, it was a huge army of men.

So it goes on with the story; For all the people who came out were circumcised: but all the people born in the wilderness by the way as they came forth out of Egypt had not been circumcised. For the children of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, until all the people who were men of war who came out of Egypt, were consumed; so all the rest didn’t die who were circumcised, only those who were 20 years old and older – they were of the age of accountability, they were classified as men of war, they were of that age.  So that’s why even within God’s Church, even when it comes to something to do with something that would be called an age of accountability for us is far greater than something that happened physically. For us it’s a spiritual thing and we come into that when we’re baptized.  And that’s why baptism as a whole doesn’t happen before age 18, sometimes not even at age 18, generally at age 19 and up.  That’s generally the earliest.  Many times girls are even able to be baptized before boys, a year perhaps, on the norm, because it’s a common thing to understand there’s a maturing process there that happens quicker at that particular age, at that particular time in life.

And so again here, that’s why within the Church we don’t baptize people as a whole, obviously, when they’re 16-17; 18 -it’s going to be less often.  19 – more often.  20-12, yes, obviously.  It’s a far greater thing to come to a point in time where you make a commitment before God on a spiritual plane than it is something here that had to do with physical war, physical fighting and accountability as it was stated at that particular time.  It was just given as a particular age then.  It’s guesstimated there were six million plus people that came out of Egypt.  Incredible!  Incredible there could have been that many people!  How many of those were of that younger age, from babies on up to age 20?  And by the time they were coming here into Jericho how old were they?  Let’s see...40+0... so 40 at the youngest that were maybe a week old, two weeks, whatever it was to wait 7 days.  So again here, from the youngest here that was circumcised all the way up to almost age 60.  We’re talking about individuals who were indeed men of war and individuals who were ready to go to war and did.

Going on: For the children of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness until all the people who were men of war who came out of Egypt were consumed because they did not obey the voice of the Eternal: They didn’t obey God, and so God wasn’t going to let them come into the Promised Land!  ...unto whom the Eternal swore that He would not show them the land which the Eternal swore unto their fathers that He would give us, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.  It’s an awesome thing when you think about those promises.  I think it means more now than it’s ever meant because we understand it in a greater way, obviously.  It’s like the truth, it’s like what God gives; it’s an unfolding revelation through time. The truth has been something that God has revealed more and more of through time.  If you go back through time and you look at different ones like Abraham, he didn’t have anything compared to what God gave to Moses, and Moses didn’t have anything compared to what God gave later on to the prophets, the Minor Prophets, to Daniel.  They had much more of God’s plan and understanding of certain things by that time.  But they didn’t have anything compared to the time of Christ and the disciples, the apostles later on, when God opened up a whole new chapter then in a massive way and brought Old Testament scripture to light that they had no knowledge of what was hidden there.  And then through time God has continued to reveal more through Mr. Armstrong.  He had far, far, far more than what the disciples even had, the apostles had after Christ – FAR MORE than what the apostle Paul had and John who lived on beyond the other apostles and what he wrote in the book of 1st, 2nd, 3rd John and then Revelation.  Mr. Armstrong was given far more beyond that.  Incredible!  And now God continues to give more and more and He’s getting ready to give a lot more when Jesus Christ comes back again, this time as the Messiah, the King of kings.  He just continues to give more.  So God’s plan is a continual process of revelation to us, of being given to mankind, and the things that He gives; the same thing is true here of the promises.

The promises He gave to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, they’ve just grown through time.  What they were getting ready to go through and go into, the Promised Land, that was a beginning of a process.  And then as time went on peoples became lost, Israel became lost, they didn’t even know who they were, but God fulfilled His promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, things He continued to give to Ephraim and then Manasseh, with Manasseh right up to the end of the age, and then to the various nations here that we still don’t know the full meaning of that are a part of the scattered nations of Israel.  God has continued to bless them.

And now we’re getting ready to go into another greater, mightier fulfillment of what God gave to, literally, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, as promises of that which would come in time.  And especially through the seed – speaking of Christ – that began with Passover but it’s going to become greater at the return of Jesus Christ when He’s the Messiah, as the Messiah.  And so it just get’s greater and greater and greater the farther we go into time.  It’s inspiring to recognize what God fulfills and accomplishes.

Going back to the story, it says, they didn’t obey His voice… He gave promises unto their fathers, a land that flows with milk and honey. We’re getting ready to go into another one, a land that flows far beyond, physically and spiritual in every way - a land that flows with milk and honey.  Blessings, blessings, blessings, but now for all of mankind and not just a physical people in the sense of a nation.

And the children He raised up in their stead, and them Joshua circumcised: for they were uncircumcised, because they had not circumcised them by the way. And it came to pass, when they had finished circumcising all the people that they abode in their places in the camps until they were whole. And so some look at this and this is where their eyes just snap shut and like, “Okay, these things didn’t happen and the fulfillment of what God commanded them back in Leviticus 23 concerning ‘when you come into the Promised Land there are certain things you’re going to do and you’re supposed to do in a certain way’...and they say, “Well this didn’t... it wasn’t fulfilled at this time, it was fulfilled later on, but it wasn’t fulfilled here.”  Incredible blindness!

The things that people have said I’ve already explained most of.  It ought to be an encouraging thing too when you understand the power of God to deliver exactly as He says.  There were only two out of that entire several hundred thousands of people that died in the wilderness; there were only two that God let come into the Promised Land.  And when you understand the power of God to deliver just as exactly as He says it’s an awesome thing!  Because everyone else...everyone else, the moment they came through the Red Sea, who had been, they were 20 years old - if they were accounted as men of war - all the way up; every one of them died in the wilderness except two, and then the others He brought into the Promised Land.  And I think of the scattered Church and what has happened there.  I think, “What a horrible thing that because of what we’ve gone through and what we’ve done...”  But God’s going to deliver exactly as He says and all those who are not going to be drawn back, all those who are not going to be awakened – and God knows who they are.  God knows the number of those He’s going to bring through and draw through this and they’re not going to come into this Promised Land either.  Not now.  They have to wait a thousand years and then come into it...to the number, whatever that is.

Let’s turn over to Numbers 13.  I want to go into this section and discuss what took place.  There are a lot of lessons in here for us, of things we’re to learn from, that we’re to be admonished in, to understand that this process of going into a Promised Land was not a one-time fulfillment, that this is where we are in time; a far greater Egypt that God is taking us out of, the world out of, than what this occasion was here.  Numbers 13:25: This is the occasion where Moses told 12 spies to go scout out the land and they went and scouted out the land and this is their return.

Numbers 13:25 - And they returned from searching out the land for/after forty days. You know, you read stories like this and sometimes it’s hard for us to grasp that this was all by design.  It wasn’t 39 days, it wasn’t 20 days, it was exactly 40 days.  You think God can work with a situation, with people in such a way that things are going to happen exactly the way He says in what He has planned?  You think God knew what was going to happen when this took place?  Do you think God had it planned already that they were going to spend 40 years in the wilderness?  You think this was all a fluke?  You think God doesn’t know us as human beings, what we will do and how we will do it?  We have the choices to make when circumstances are placed before us, but the reality is without His spirit we’re going to make the wrong choices and He knows exactly what those will be.  And yet God was going to work with two out of these twelve for a purpose, that they would be different than the rest.  It’s because of what God was doing with them, moulding and fashioning them so they would come back with a different report than the other 10.  It’s because of God’s plan, and so He did something different within them because His spirit was working with them to mould and fashion them.

When God works with people for a purpose for His plan, for 144,000 through time, He works with them.  He knows what it takes.  He moulds and fashions; and it says ‘many have been called and few have been chosen’.  Those things are there for example.  Another sermon...

And so here it talks about and they returned from searching of the land forty days. And they went and came to Moses, and to Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the wilderness of Paran, to Kadesh; and brought back word unto them, and unto all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. And they told him, and said, We went into the land where you sent us, and indeed it flows with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it. Nevertheless the people are strong...  the people are strong who dwell in the land, and the cities are walled up and very great: and moreover we saw the children of Anak there.  Now, we read a story like this and we don’t get the full impact of it, but by the context of what’s being said here they were not happy.  And the way the story came across was quite ugly in the sense that these people are fierce, these are mighty walls, they’re fortified, armies of people, huge!  We’ll get into that in a moment here.  They’re a strong people; greater than we are.  This is the context of what’s being said.

Verse 29 – The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south: and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains: and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and by the coast of Jordan.  And Caleb calmed the people before Moses, the way they said it was so bad!  It wasn’t just a matter of saying the truth, that these people are out there... sure they were!  They’re mighty people, there are a lot of people out there and they have walled cities... but it’s the way it was said, it was the way it was presented; so much so that Caleb had to get up and calm the people down because they were reacting to this bad story of how bad it was, because they knew that’s where they were going.  “I don’t want to go there if they’re that way!  I don’t want to go up there and lose my life!”  Because that’s the way the story was coming across.

And Caleb calmed the people before Moses and said, Let us go up at once, it’s like, “GO!  We can do this!” ...and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it. Just by words it’s hard to grasp the power of what’s being said to a group of leaders, the leading men and people that were out there in the audience listening to the story.  Because that’s how it worked; they had those that they could reach by sound, by voice, those who were the leaders of various areas within the camp, leaders of thousands and whatever it was in the very orderly fashion it was organized.  They in turn would take those stories out, which they did, and it didn’t go over well because they listened to the 10, not to Caleb and not to Joshua.

It amazes me sometimes what people are willing to listen to, what people are willing to believe because of their spirit.  It’s an awesome thing to understand human nature.

But the men, the other ten, not Joshua and not Caleb, obviously, it just spoke about him; But the men who went up with him said, We are not able to go up against these people; so it got worse!  “We can’t do this! They’re too great!  They’re too mighty!  We can’t do this!!” ...for they are stronger than us.

And they brought up to the children of Israel, that’s how it’s reported here, an evil report... an evil report of the land which they had searched out saying, The land through which we have gone to search out is a land that eats up the inhabitants; anyone that comes into it, if you’re not a part of it you get chewed up, spit up, eaten up, and that’s it, you’re over with.  ...it eats up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature.  These aren’t just mighty people and mighty fortresses and the like there, these are men of very great stature we have to go up against.

And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, who come of the giants: and we were in our sight as grasshoppers, we felt like grasshoppers before them, and so we were in their sight.  So here they build it up even worse.  These men are so great and so mighty, towering above us, and we look puny compared to them and they look down up us.  Its lesson after lesson after lesson, you go through stories like this; your eyes on God or are they on the world?

Even in the Church, are your eyes really on God or are they on the world?  What do you fear?  Whom do you fear?  I think we talked about this even a little bit last Sabbath.  Whom do we fear and honour?  God or man?  Whether it be on the job, whether it be in families, whatever it is...  So there’s a difference here in attitude and spirit then depending upon our boldness and our confidence regarding God and our relationship with God.

Numbers 14:1 - And all the congregation lifted up their voices and cried; and the people wept that night. We can’t imagine!  Again, it’s a very condensed story, and to grasp what was taking place here: they had been brought out of Egypt and they were being told after all the suffering that had gone past them, and all this marching that had taken place, and all the things they saw, and now they come to a point in time and now they don’t want to go on into the Promised Land.

So again here, weeping and crying because now they’re there and some of their very fears they had when they left, the murmuring they did as soon as they got through the Red Sea, it was like, “We want to go back.”  It didn’t take very long and they talked about going back – and now they’re even more convinced than ever before because the spies have come back with this evil report and, “We are not going in there!”

So it says, all the congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night.  Because of the slanted and evil report that was given.  And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron: so they were upset at them; and the whole congregation said unto them, Would to God... Would to God that we had died in the land of Egypt! “It would have been better for us than to go up against these people, if we’d just died in the land of Egypt.  It’d be better if we’d just died before we ever started this process, rather than we’d ever come out here in the wilderness.  It would be so much better if we’d just died back there.  It wasn’t that bad!  We had food, we had shelter, it wasn’t that bad being in captivity!”  It’s an astounding thing – people sometimes prefer captivity.  I think of where we are in time and how the world isn’t going to totally respond in a very good way toward what God says is coming to pass.

Would to God that we had died in the land of Egypt or would to God we had died in this wilderness! “It’s better that we just die right here, right now, or that we’d died already.  Better if we’d never been called!  Better if we’d never been called by God than we have to go through all this suffering!”  People have said that in God’s Church in essence, spiritually.  A lot of people!

So why has the Eternal brought us unto this land, to fall by the sword, I think of the apostasy; “This is God’s Church!  How could this be God’s Church?!  How could this have ever happened to God’s Church?!  Someone got up and told us that now we don’t have to keep the Sabbath and the Holy Days...”  And so people were disillusioned, that’s why so many people just quit.  Incredible!  So why has the Eternal brought us into this land to fall by the sword, so that our wives and our children should be a prey? It’s awesome here what God does with this story – that our wives and our children should be a prey? ...wouldn’t it be better for us to return unto Egypt? After everything that happened!  And they said one to another, Let’s make a captain/let’s make us a leader, a new leader, not Moses, not Aaron, and let’s go back to Egypt.  ...let’s return to Egypt.

It’s amazing to me sometimes what’s happened in the Church and the attitude of mind sometimes of people willing to jump to a leader to do something different.

Verse 5 - Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel. Why did they do that?  Why did Moses and Aaron do that?  They knew what God was going to do.  They believed; they saw the things that God had already done to Egypt and they knew how wrong it was to cry out against God – because that’s in essence what they were doing by crying out against Moses and against Aaron.  It was not about them, it was about God.  And so Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel. And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, says who were of them who searched the land, ripped their clothes: And they spoke unto all the company of the children of Israel, saying, The land which we passed through to search out is an exceeding good land. That’s what God’s going to give to us.  That’s what He’s promised us.  It’s an exceedingly good land!  And if the LORD...if the Eternal delights in us, then He will bring us into the land, What an awesome thing!  Saw what happened to Pharaoh’s army, saw what happened at the Red Sea, and not to continue going forward, not to have confidence, a boldness that God’s going to give us this land.... it’s a small thing for God to do!

...so if the Eternal delight in us then He’ll bring us into this land and give it to us; a land which flows with milk and honey. Only do not rebel against the Eternal, neither fear the people of the land; for they are bread for us: and their defence is departed from them, and the Eternal is with us so don’t fear them. But all the congregation declared that they should stone them with stones. It wasn’t very well received.  Here they’re ready to kill Joshua and Caleb just for speaking out like this.  “Don’t try to talk us out of this!  We’re going back!  We’re going back to Egypt!”  And so here they wanted to kill them!  Human nature hasn’t changed too much through time.

And the glory of the Eternal appeared in the tabernacle of the congregation before the children of Israel. So God let them know immediately, “I am in your presence.” And all of a sudden the glory, the power, the shining, whatever all took place there, it was right there on the tabernacle and tended to have a calm on the people – fear.  Changed a little bit of their attitude.

Going on in verse 11 it goes on to say; And the Eternal said to Moses, How long will this people provoke Me? It’s an awesome story here because there’s a lot to be learned in this story about Moses and how God was working with him.  God knew!  This wasn’t a mystery to God.  It wasn’t a mystery that this all happened.  That’s the same sort of thing that if you think about Adam and Eve and you start with the beginning, there are some teachers, there are some ministers, who used to think it’s like God hits Himself on the forehead and says “Now what am I going to do?!  They’ve sinned!  Adam and Eve have sinned!  This changes My whole plan!  What am I going to do?!”  And so somewhere along the line He was going to have to come up with the idea of a Saviour, of a way of saving them, of someone that was going to die for them.  No, it was all decided long before man was ever put here.  It’s amazing how the human mind works, that our minds are so narrow, so puny that God has to show us who He is and reveal these things to us so that we can understand how great He is.  And so here it is, God’s working with Moses.  That’s something that as a whole is not understood about the story here.  It’s an awesome story, it truly is.

...and how long will it be before they will believe Me? A few thousand years. God knew!  He had a plan!  There’s only a few. He already had the plan of 144,000.  He knew those were the only ones who had the ability to believe Him.  If you don’t have God’s spirit you can’t believe God! If you don’t have God drawing you...that’s why in families right now and different ones on the job and different things that are going on in the world around us, there are things we’re seeing more and more of, we recognize by seeing the news that’s going on out there.  It’s incredible what’s taking place in Syria and Cyprus and why they’re stirred up, in Turkey, in Israel, in Egypt and all these places, why that part of the world is stirred up in itself.  Pakistan and the United States, rubbing, rubbing, close to war!  Sometimes we don’t understand how bad things are.  How far will it go?  Are they going to do it?  They probably won’t do it because of knowing what happened with Iraq and Afghanistan. They can’t put themselves into another one, and not only that, Pakistan has nuclear weapons so you have to tip-toe a bit more carefully.  But the words are strong, the words are sharp.  All over the world!

We were talking about Putin and Russia before services today.  The world doesn’t have any idea what’s taking place!  He’s taking power back!  He already had it anyway but now he’s going to be in the forefront once again.  They’ve already made this little switch between Medvedev and himself, they’re going to switch back around again, agreed to do so.  He can now be elected again.  Wonder if he’s going to get elected?  He’s a powerful man, but he’s stirring up things.  You know where he’s stirring up some things too?  Cyprus and Syria.  Why?  We see those things. We understand what’s going on in the world; but people don’t.  They don’t understand where we are prophetically with China and Russia and what’s going on with those two nations and how they’re going to align as we go forward here.  Incredible things!  Let alone the economies of the world and the struggle that’s taking place.  Every once in a while now you see some saying, “War.”  They know!  Now they’re talking five and ten years up the road, but they know that if things continue on their current course, inevitably what happens in time with things this bad – that tends to be man’s solution – war.  This time it’s going to happen a little bit differently.  Incredible what’s taking place!

And so God has given us so much to understand, to comprehend what’s coming and what’s taking place, but people can’t see it.  You can, and only those whom God is calling and drawing.  And that’s why we can look at the world around us and realize God’s not drawing them yet.  We know when He’s going to start doing it, and He uses the physical things that are going to take place with the Trumpets to do so.  Then!  Because they work in conjunction with each other.  It has to do with fear.  It has to do with how people are able to begin to receive God.  They can’t the way it is right now.

And so the story is here as well, as we go through this and look at this, God knew exactly.  So He says, again here how long will this people provoke Me and how long will it be before they will believe Me for all the signs which I have showed among them? How long will it be?  All the signs of what took place – physical signs – in the land of Egypt.  All those incredible plagues that they were hit with!  In the beginning they had to suffer through the first three, and then when the others took place they were separated, God made a distinction, but they knew what happened to the rest of the land of Egypt.  All those plagues, all the way up to the first born and putting the blood on the doorposts – they saw all those things – and then they saw a change in attitude in the Egyptian people, that all of a sudden they were able to go out there and anything they said they needed; carts, oxen, sheep – they gave it to them – valuables.  They were willing to give it to them because they believed that if you don’t get out of this country we’re all dead people!  So the Egyptians believed to that point.  They didn’t believe God, but they believed to that point that if you don’t get out of here this God that is working with them is going to destroy us.  And then they go through the Red Sea.  Incredible!  Over and over again.  God knew exactly what they would do – murmur, murmur, murmur.  He knew what they were going to do because they didn’t have His holy spirit, He wasn’t working with them, they had carnal human nature.

And so they had physical things; we are given spiritual things.  We are given truths.  See?  And even with God’s spirit through time there was an apostasy, although God had given and given back to the Church, and even given more concerning 18 very powerful truths that were added on to what was Sardis – 21 by the time he died.  Awesome, powerful, powerful those truths are, because it has to do with the Holy Days, it has to do with so many of the most powerful and basic things that God’s plan, that we’re to be gods in the God Family.  Something the world doesn’t grasp and comprehend, why man exists.  They’d rather think about floating around up there on a cloud or fishing in some kind of a spiritual stream, or whatever it is, for eternity...  or looking on God’s face.  Some talk about that; just looking on His face for all eternity.  You think God’s going to get tired of that after a little while?  ...let alone the individual doing it?  Incredible!  Don’t underestimate sometimes what God has given to us, because every year people leave the truth.  Every year!  Even with God’s spirit!  You have to fight for this way of life!  You have got to want it and fight for it day in and day out.  Truly!

Verse 12 - I will smite them with the pestilence, and disinherit them, and will make of you a greater nation and mightier than they. Now what you need to understand; God was not going to do that! God wasn’t. God told this to Moses for a reason.  It wasn’t part of God’s plan to do it through Moses, to all of a sudden destroy all the Israelites except for the few there.  That wasn’t God’s purpose.  The purpose was in what He moulded and fashioned within Moses and Moses’ response.  It’s an awesome thing!  But I wouldn’t have understood it a few years ago, couldn’t have understood a few years ago.

Verse 12 – I will smite them with the pestilence, and disinherit them, and make of you a greater nation and mightier than they. And Moses said to the Eternal, awesome, because this is where Moses was now spiritually in his relationship with God. Then the Egyptians shall hear it, (for You brought up this people in Your might from among them;) And they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land: for they have heard that You Eternal are among this people, that You, Eternal, are seen face to face, and that Your cloud stands over them, and that You go before them, by day time in a pillar of a cloud, and a pillar of fire by night. Now if You shall kill all this people as one man, or as one, then the nations who have heard the fame of You will speak, saying, Because the Eternal was not able to bring this people into the land which He swore unto them, therefore He has slain them in the wilderness. They will think what kind of a God is this? And now, I beseech you, let the power of my LORD be great, according as You have spoken, saying, The Eternal is longsuffering, said, this is God, this is You; the Eternal... let the people say this, let the people see this, the Eternal is longsuffering and of great mercy.

I think of what God has given us since Trumpets of 2008 and helped us to understand in a greater way who He is!  Not as we had thought beforehand, but of His most powerful inner part of His being, one of mercy and patience toward His creation.  Says a lot, truly does.  The might and power of God, that He would far rather do that.  We can learn great lessons from these things in our own lives, of what it’s like to deal and work with other people in God’s Church and outside of God’s Church.  How merciful are we?  I would far rather err on the side of being too merciful than to be too hard.  I’ve seen what it’s like to be hard in God’s Church.  And I say this because sometimes it still happens within God’s Church, where we have some who still tend to be, especially some who have come out of that past, a little too hard on people!  ...expecting a little too much sometimes of others.  ...of being a little too strict and maybe a little too controlling and a little too condemning.  And that isn’t God; it’s us if we do that.

As I said earlier, I’ve seen what it’s like to be Laodicean.  I have lived Laodicean.  I have lived being lukewarm.  I have repented of that.  I have repented of what it’s like to be too hard on people, to be lacking in mercy in how people are dealt with and worked with.  I would far rather err now on the side of being too giving mercifully, if you will, than on the side of being anything like a sheriff or controlling in people’s lives, demanding of people in their lives.

..the Eternal is longsuffering; and I’ll just tell you candidly, I’ve been blessed to grow in that in the last few years.  You’ve been blessed to grow in that in the last few years if you see it, to the degree you see it.  From what you have learned, from what you are learning about God’s mercy, don’t just experience it.  That’s what grace is.  Grace is living what God gives to us.  If God’s forgiving to us, grace is that which lives through us, we are learning to be forgiving toward others.  Doesn’t mean it’s to be stupid.  Doesn’t mean to be ignorant of the repercussions of how others... you have to be careful, you have to be wise sometimes in how you deal with various situations and circumstances in life, but to be of a forgiving spirit – always, always, always.  To hold things against people in the sense of how it affects your mind?  That you can’t let go, that you can’t let go to let someone else be free in your mind, because that affects how you treat them and how you talk to them and how you think about them – to let go.  That’s what God’s desire is for, to let go...but for Him we have to come to repentance.  For us, it’s just the spirit we should have, to realize that’s God’s right and prerogative and He judges everyone – we don’t!  Now we have judgment in our lives... another sermon in itself again.  We had better be learning mercy and how to be merciful to others – being patient with others, caring for others, forgiving toward others.

...the Eternal is longsuffering and of great mercy; forgiving iniquity and transgression, a ready mind to forgive!  God is ready to do that, but a person has to come to the point where they’re willing to repent, and then it’s gone – especially in God’s Church.  It’s gone!  That’s the power of that covenant we entered into at baptism; when we repent, it’s gone.  And we can’t misuse that either.  There’s a fine line in some of those things and a constant struggle if you will, to continue to fight and never quit fighting.

...the Eternal is longsuffering and of great mercy; forgiving iniquity and transgression, and by no means clearing the guilty, see, there’s that balance, by no means just clearing the guilty. People can be forgiven but still have to carry a penalty in their life.  See?  We can be forgiven of sin but sometimes there’s a penalty to be paid regardless; that’s the way it works.  So sometimes things are done, things have been done in our past, whatever, doesn’t mean that all the penalty is taken away.  If everything’s taken away then so often we don’t learn and we’re not reminded of what happened back then or what we did back then or how we thought back then or how we did something to someone else or treated someone.  And so some things are allowed to be up here in our mind and not totally freed from them so that we can hopefully learn from the lesson.

It reminds me of something in scripture that I thought about using at the Feast, that maybe will, maybe we won’t, maybe we’ll go into but saying it now we won’t need to unless God has me do it again.  But one of the things God told them over and over again was how you treat other people!  Because you should never forget you were prisoners, you were captive in the land – don’t forget what that’s like in how you treat others later on in your land.  Powerful lesson there!  How do you treat other people?  How do you treat people that are different from you?  Don’t you know what it was like when you were back there in Egypt?  ...how you were treated by the Egyptians and what it was like in captivity?  Don’t ever forget it He said.  Powerful lessons and something for us on a spiritual plane – don’t ever forget what it’s like to not be in God’s Church!  Don’t ever forget what it’s like to be ignorant of the truth! Don’t ever forget what it’s like to be Protestant or whatever you were and the bondage that people have, that they’re in.  They can’t help it. See?  Don’t ever forget what it’s like because it can affect sometimes how we treat others around us, and that’s a battle.  It’s a battle in dealing with the world that’s filled with selfishness and getting worse and worse and uglier and uglier...but it shouldn’t change the way we treat others and the way we talk to others.

And so an awesome thing was taking place here with Moses.  He had something in his mind that he didn’t have previously to the same degree – the Word, the Logos.  God’s spirit was in him and his mind was being changed to where he could...well, he repeated the very things of who God is.  He knew who God was at this time.  He was so deeply convicted of it he said, and so he was reasoning with God.  How pleasing to a parent when a child is able to give those things back; when those things of whatever you’ve done in life, they come back.  That’s the way it is in life; that’s the way it works, and that’s what was happening here.  God Almighty working with Moses and now Moses of that same mind and repeating those things back.  Moses telling God, no, this is the way you are, this is the way it is – because he was in agreement, he had the same mind.

...the Eternal is longsuffering, forgiving iniquity and transgression, and by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon/to the children unto the third and fourth generation.   It’s not that they shouldn’t be punished here – that’s what he was saying.  It’s not that the people should go without anything happening to them for what they have done, for the sin they have committed, but to destroy them – that’s not you God.  To do something different through me now – that’s not you God.  Awesome!  Awesome what he said!  It’s an awesome thing because of God in him and the mind of God, being at one with God.

Verse 19 – Therefore pardon, I beseech You, the iniquity of this people according unto the greatness of Your mercy...that’s what God’s will was and that’s what God did.  But Moses was able to speak it so it could be written as well and recorded for us to learn from.  Therefore pardon, I beseech You, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of Your mercy and as You have forgiven this people from Egypt even until now.  “This isn’t the first time God, and basically it won’t be the last. This is the way they are and you’ve forgiven them, you’ve had mercy upon them, so please continue to do so and deal with them accordingly.  They don’t get off scot-free, but...”

Awesome story and awesome lessons in all of this in things that in time and through time we become more and more at one with God.  We are of the same mind as time goes on and we become of the same mind.  It’s a beautiful thing, it truly is.  That’s why I repeat it over and over and over and over again about the Thunders.  That wasn’t mine.  That was God’s – stated it that way for people.

Numbers 14:20 - And the Eternal said, I have pardoned according to Your words: But as truly as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Eternal. Because of those men who have seen My glory and My miracles which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have tempted Me now these ten times, how many times?  ...these ten times, and have not listened to My voice; Surely they shall not see the land which I swore unto their fathers, neither shall any of them who provoked Me see it: includes the women, includes everyone, says they’re not going to see it, those who have provoked Me now, who’ve been a part of this.  And who was it?  Everyone who wasn’t being drawn by God, everyone who was lacking of God’s spirit and God’s help, because on their own, on our own, humanity, mankind, on his own cannot live God’s way of life, cannot be in agreement with God.  It’s an impossibility.  ‘The carnal mind is enmity against God.  It is not subject to the law of God neither indeed can be.’  It wasn’t for the Israelites, they had carnal minds, it’s at enmity with God, to fight God.  It’s an awesome story!  Israel wasn’t a good example of a right relationship with God!  They show, indeed, you can have the law but your relationships are going to be bad because you don’t have His help, His spirit.  That’s what God gave to the Church, showing what we have to have as human beings to live this way of life.

And so the story goes on here then.  And so He said His glory is going to be seen by what He’s going to do.  Because of what takes place here now He’s going to magnify His name, by what He brings along here now, by what He says, by what He shows He’s going to bring to pass – down to the very number of individuals that will go in and those who won’t go in.  By His great power, by His great glory He’s going to show the power of His might and His glory to mankind, to be in awe of it – and we should indeed be in awe.

Verse 24 - But My servant Caleb, because he had another spirit within him, and has followed Me fully, him will I bring into the land whereunto he went; and his seed shall possess it. It says here, (Now the Amalekites and the Canaanites dwelt in the valley.) and it goes on to say... Tomorrow turn, and go back into the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea. You’re not going forward now; you’re not going into this land.  Now turn around and go back by the way of the wilderness, of the Red Sea.  Go back!  Go back where it’s hot, where it’s miserable, where there are no trees, where it’s desolate.  Go back!  Go back to what you just came out of, toward the wilderness here, because you’re not going into this land that flows with milk and honey that you can see on the other side.

If you’ve ever seen that part of the world it’s horribly desolate!

Verse 26 - And the Eternal spoke unto Moses and to Aaron, saying, How long shall I bear with this evil generation, who/which murmurs against Me? Speaking of the generation.  He knew exactly how long. He had a plan of things that were going to work out.  I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against Me. These things are written for us.  They’re written for us to learn from.  How long?  God knew how long – He had a plan.  We’re the ones to be in awe and dumbfounded by it, by human nature, by carnal human nature.  We’re to be in awe of that and to be in awe of what it means to have God’s spirit living within us, that gives us that help that they didn’t have access to at that point in time.  They had choices to make.  Some say, “Well, that’s not fair!”  Oh yes it is!

Say unto them, As truly as I live, says the Eternal, as you have spoken in My ears, so will I do to you: this is an awesome thing what He said here; exactly as you’ve said it is exactly how it will be. Your carcases shall fall in this wilderness; “Oh to God that we just die here in the wilderness.” ...and He said that’s what will happen.  That’s what you asked for, that’s what’s going to happen.  Since that’s what you wanted that’s what’s going to take place.  You’re not going to have to go in and face these people; you’re just going to die out here in the wilderness.  It’s going to take 40 years, but you’re going to die out here in the wilderness, (of the whole time, from the time they left).  ...and all who were numbered of you, according to your whole number, from twenty... now He spells it out even more so in this part, where it doesn’t back in Joshua.  Makes it very clear here what God said; From twenty years old and upward, because that’s the age of accountability.  But those aged twenty on down to being born were all already circumcised.  They came through.  They came into the Promised Land.

Notice what He says here; the whole number, from twenty years old and upward who have murmured against Me, Without a doubt you shall not come into the land which I swore to make you dwell therein; What an incredible thing!  So many people, hundreds of thousands of people that were a part of this – and yet over forty years every one of them was going to die – perhaps a day or two before they came in – I don’t know.  But every last one of them died exactly as God said.  Not a one of them got to go into the Promised Land, except for two.

Without a doubt you shall not come into the land which I swore to make you dwell therein, save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun. But your little ones, which you said would be a prey, them will I bring in, what an awesome thing – God’s promise, God’s power to do such things.  And I think of sometimes those called and sometimes individuals making comment along certain lines, or ever how it’s phrased, “If I’m able to live on into the new age...  If I’m able to be there when Jesus Christ returns...”  And my response back is, “That’s why God called you!  DON’T doubt it!”   That’s why He’s called you!  That’s why He’s given you of His spirit now...to live on into a new age, to have boldness and confidence as you go forward to go into a new age, to have the opportunities to learn what you can now, to witness what you’re witnessing now!

You know, there are not very many!  You think about that.  Of all the millions that are going to be called here that are going to live on into a new age, very few have the opportunity to have been moulded and fashioned ahead of time, to be able to experience the end of this age – especially at any point in time since then and especially beginning then – of Trumpets of 2008 onward.  And if you were called at some juncture in between and within that what an awesome thing, to be given that opportunity to be right in there as well; but to be witness of all this at the end, of all the Trumpets and the sound of the Trumpets and what God is doing, of the announcement and heralding of a King that’s finally coming – the Messiah – that the world has not understood, that Judaism doesn’t understand.  Awesome!!

But your little ones, which you said should be a prey, them will I bring in; if you continue to fight for this way of life and you want it, young and old alike, unbaptized yet, doesn’t matter – if you’re not baptized yet and you cry out, this is what you want, God’s with you, God has the power to deliver exactly as He says, in any kind of situation and circumstance you might be in, whatever it is, wherever it is.  It doesn’t matter what part of the world it’s in.

But your little ones, which you said would be a prey, them will I bring in, and they shall know the land which you have despised.  What an incredible thing!  God says, in essence, “You despise what I’ve placed before you.  You have not appreciated; you have not loved what I’ve given to you.”  You know, the same thing can be said to us on a spiritual plane.  How much do we love what God has placed before us?  And if we grasp that then we’ll fight for it.  I think of some sometimes out there, I’d wish they’d fight a little bit more!  I wish they’d get stirred up a little bit more!  I wish they would!  Because that’s what it boils down to as to whether or not we’re going to have those opportunities.  It’s not owed to anyone.  I guess I even asked the question in my notes here: Do we love what God has placed before us? How much?  How much do we really love it?  How much are we fighting for it or are we just kind of coasting along just waiting for the time to go past so we can ‘get into it’?

No coasting, because the reality is, you see, if you love something it’s going to be reflected in your life, it’s going to be reflected in your life in what you’re doing and how you’re doing it and what you’re preparing for, whether or not you really believe that the dollars you have, the euro’s you have, the pounds you have, the assets you have in the stock market, the treasury bills, the bonds you have – if you look at them like toilet paper or not.  I look at them like toilet paper right now, except not as good as toilet paper.  I like Charmin’.  I don’t know if you have Charmin’ over here, it’s soft.  That’s how they advertize it, soft and thick.  It’s not like bonds and Euros that are made out of plastic.  They don’t work as well, but some day that’s all they’re going to be worth.  We don’t even know what’s going to happen to the Euro; the way things are going right now, who knows!  Who knows what’s going to happen.  I don’t know!  But if your hope is in those things you’re missing the mark.  And so how you live and how you think – if you treat those things accordingly then it’s not going to mean a whole lot to you.  You realize what means a whole lot to me is what’s coming.  Hopefully we’re going to have this time of mercy extended as long as possible and hopefully and prayerfully it’s going to so shake this earth and so shake people then that in masse more people are going to repent than what would have repented if it had happened another way, any other fashion or form from the beginning.

And so we realize what an awesome thing it’s happening the way it is, because people have to be shaken to the core of their being – one thing after another after another.  I think of that last day, of what God says; because as a whole, if you look at China, Far East – even if you look in the world in the Middle East and other areas of the world.  You look into different countries and different regions of the world – those who have not much of a concept about God and those who have a very distorted concept about God – there’s going to come a horrible shaking at the very end in just one day.  I marvel at what God says He’s going to do just in one day!  And the reason it’s wham, wham, wham is so that when that day is over people aren’t going to be able to go home to their own country anymore; there’s not one there.  There isn’t going to be a government building, a government to return to – they’re going to be destroyed.  God’s going to destroy those things.  What hasn’t been destroyed already as far as government’s concerned, as far as institutions are concerned, in that one day God destroys every last thing that’s still standing.  And the reason being is because there is no other way to bring those who are going to live through it to a point of having a spirit of humility enough to even accept and receive the King of kings when He comes back with the kind of power He’s going to have.  Incredible!

Numbers 14:32 - But as for you, your carcases/your dead bodies, they’ll fall in the wilderness. And your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your whoredoms until your dead bodies are wasted in the wilderness. After the number of the days in which you searched the land, even forty days, again, forty is no accident.  The things about forty and judgment are not a matter of coincidence at all.  ...each day for a year you shall bear your iniquities, for forty years you shall know the breach of My promise. The results of breaching His promise, in other words.

I the Eternal have said, I will surely do it unto all this evil congregation that is gathered together against Me in this wilderness, and they shall be consumed, they were gathered together against Him because they were ready to kill Caleb and Joshua.  They hated Moses and Aaron.  They were going to pick for themselves someone else to lead them right back into Egypt, and that’s when God’s glory, shown in the temple area, in the tent there, the tabernacle area, and the people were then ready to listen.  God spoke through Moses then to them and told them these things.  I the Eternal have said it, I will surely do it unto all this evil congregation that’s gathered against Me in the wilderness, and they shall be consumed and there they shall die.

And the men, who Moses sent to search the land, who returned and made all the congregation to murmur against Me, by bringing up a slander concerning the land, Even those men who brought up the evil report about the land, died of the plague before the Eternal. God wasn’t finished, and so there was a plague right then and there that God brought on and all these ten and their families and so forth died of the plague.  But Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were of the men who went out to search the land, lived.

Let’s go back to the story of Joshua now.  Joshua 5: And so all these things going back to that period of time, talking about some of those things, talking about that which had to do with those who were circumcised twenty years old and upward and accountability of men of war.  And finally now they are at the end of that forty years coming into the Promised Land.

Joshua 5:8 - And it came to pass, when they had finished circumcising all the people, that they abode/dwelt there in their places in the camp, until they were whole. So again, the symbolism here of circumcision, one we understand, one of the heart and the healing that follows; and for us it’s a long process.  After we come into the Church we’re baptized, there’s a healing that takes place in us, but it’s a lifelong process, truly is, and one that’s getting ready to be granted to the entire world in the Promised Land that is a continuation of God’s promises that He gave to the forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but now in a much greater way.  So those things happened physical, we’re at the point of that which is spiritual.

Verse 9 - And the Eternal said to Joshua, This day have I rolled away the reproach of Egypt from off of you. Therefore the name of this place is called Gilgal; and the meaning of ‘Gilgal’ is ‘to roll away as with a wheel’.  So that’s why it has the name.  Names have a lot of meaning with God, truly.  And so to roll away with a wheel, until this day.  And the children of Israel encamped in Gilgal, and kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month at even, ‘ba ereb’ in the plains of Jericho. So just exactly the way God says Passover is to be kept.  They did it exactly that way as soon as it was sundown.  We know what they did on the 10th day.  They already put aside a lamb or a goat, the young ones, and prepared them after the 10th day there.  They kept it just like God said and then on the 14th, as soon as it was sundown they cut the throat, bled it out and started roasting it to keep the Passover.

And so it says, The children of Israel camped in Gilgal and kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month at even in the plains of Jericho.  And they ate of the...What an incredible lie!  You know, it’s an amazing thing; ‘the old corn’.  They took this out of Judaism, because even Judaism got the story so mixed up, so messed up, because they didn’t want to acknowledge that this was a fulfillment of what God gave back in the book of Leviticus.  ‘When you come into the land that I give to you there are certain things you’re to do...’  It’s a word that has nothing to do with corn or old, either one, it’s a word that just means ‘produce’.

And they ate of the produce of the land on the day after the Passover, unleavened cakes, and parched corn in the selfsame day; not even the word ‘corn’ is there again, but of the parched, and that’s a separate, another word by itself having to do with some of the produce of the land at that time, just a different word, in the selfsame day. It’s a beautiful story here because it shows exactly when the manna ceased.  Up to this point in time they were eating manna.  Forty years in the wilderness and they finally came to the Promised Land, but there was something they couldn’t do until the wave sheaf was offered up before God – and as soon as the wave sheaf was offered... the harvest was already taking place, but they couldn’t touch the grain or anything else until after the wave sheaf.  And even by knowing that (I don’t want to go in to the story right now), but even that tells you what exact day of the week Passover was.  Sabbath.  Incredible!  And what took place then at the point of sundown there and the wave sheaf that was offered up before God.  And it says, because after the day...let’s read it again.

And they ate of the produce of the land on the day after the Passover.  It solves the question of how to look at the Sabbaths, of what day you begin to count Pentecost, from what period of time that you’re to count Pentecost, from what particular day of the week, speaking of, in this case here, after the wave sheaf which was offered up on the first day of the week as soon as it was sundown...another story in itself.

Verse 12 - And the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten of the produce of the land; they didn’t have to eat manna anymore, they could eat of the new... of all that was in the land from that point forward, because you couldn’t touch the food, the produce, until after the event of the wave sheaf offering before God; then you could start eating of the produce of the land that year.

And the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten of the produce of the land; neither did the children of Israel have manna anymore; but they ate of the (and the word isn’t ‘fruit’) the increase... isn’t it amazing how they try to hide everything of what really happened?  They ate of the increase of the land of Canaan that year. It was what was given in that land of that particular year, not the old corn from the previous year or the old grains.

It’s amazing how many have stumbled at these things that are so basic and so simple; in times past people who have had extensive training and guidance and direction and yet have gone off base. These are covered more in the books that were written.

Verse 13 - And it came to pass when Joshua was by Jericho that he lifted his eyes and looked, and, behold a Man stood opposite him, the appearance of a man, stood opposite him with sword drawn in His hand: and Joshua went to Him and said to Him, Are you for us, or for our adversaries? He didn’t know who it was yet.  So He said, No; but as Commander, the word means ‘leader, ruler’ of the army of the Eternal I have now come.  And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshipped Him. It wasn’t an angel.  It was very much akin to ways that God has worked with different ones in times past.  It was like God appearing as Melchizedek to Abraham, it was like the one who wrestled with Jacob when He touched His thigh.  Incredible stories in the Bible here.  This is the same sort of thing here.  Here is this appearance of a man before him, and He lets him know who He is, that He is directly from God, He is God; but again here, He represents Himself here as a Commander.  I wish we had better translations out of Hebrew because I know what it says, but again, it’s the same presentation here of an individual that appears before him who is directly from God, out from God, a manifestation.  God can’t be in a man like that, but He’s... we’ll pass that one up to move forward with the story.

...but as Commander of the army of the Eternal I come now; So he fell on his face and worshipped and said, What says My Lord say to His servant? Then the Commander of the Eternal’s army said to Joshua, Take your sandals from off Your foot; for the place where you stand is holy. So it’s the same sort of thing when the bush was burning; God Almighty was doing it, He told Moses the same thing.  So they see this manifestation of something, but it’s God Almighty who is speaking to them directly.  It’s not through an angel, it’s not an angelic being; God does not allow them to be worshipped.  You don’t worship, you don’t bow down before an angelic being; it is not holy ground.  Whenever Gods presence is there He lets us know it’s holy.

That’s what’s an awesome thing about our lives. To understand what God says when He says we’re holy, we’re sanctified, we’re set apart, because God dwells in us.  It’s on a spiritual plane.  It’s not something that’s done physically in an appearance that some of these people had at different times in their life, in a very physical manifestation of a being that was in front of them, but it still wasn’t God, because He’s spirit, He can’t present Himself that way to human beings to be seen as He really is.  You can’t!  He’s spirit!  But He gives those things, the physical things that people have seen.  He’s allowed some things, like Moses when He came down from being with Him for so long that his face was shining.  And it was for the people, and it was for Moses to learn from, to see something from, that He had been in the presence of God.  But if you can really grasp it, how much more awesome it is to understand that God Almighty dwells in you.  By the power of His spirit He lives and dwells within us.  He sets us apart.  We’re sanctified, holy before God.  It’s hard for us to think in those terms sometimes and need to be reminded of some of those things sometimes.

Continuing on here in Joshua...and I’ll also mention here that it’s good to remember the name ‘Joshua’ too.  It’s the same name as ‘Jesus’, the word derived from ‘Yeshua’.  There are still some who at times want to... it means ‘the Eternals Salvation’ or ‘the Eternal is Salvation’ or ‘the Eternals salvation’; and God showing how He was going to bring the children of Israel into the Promised Land through a man who had this particular name, that God was going to do it, but it was through this particular individual, very powerful.  But Jesus Christ bearing the same name Yeshua, or Joshua, or Jesus.  Some think you can’t say the name Jesus.  Yeah, you can, it’s a derivation of Yeshua.  Some try to tie it into pagan gods and so forth, get off on tangents.  I say that because every once in a while we have that happen with some who come out of Messianic Jewish background and come into God’s Church.  You have to shake all that garbage off of you, get it out of your mind and get cleaned up.  The Jews aren’t right, the Messianic Jews aren’t right, no one’s right except those whom God calls, then they can become right.

Joshua 6:1 - Now Jericho was securely shut up because of the children of Israel: none went out, and none came in. They were afraid. The story hit them first, they were witness of this first before all the other countries around that said they lost heart, their hearts melted and there was no strength in them.  Well, Jericho was in that as well.  They locked it up tight! And the Eternal said to Joshua, See, See by this, they’re locked up tight, they’re not out here, they have shut the doors, they’re inside.  See, I have given you/delivered to you Jericho into your hand, its king and the mighty men of valour. You shall march around the city, all your men of war, you shall go all around the city once. This you shall do six days. And seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of rams' horns before the ark; so again here, something that happened in a very physical way that has a tie-in for us at this time, to learn from, to be inspired by, to recognize on a spiritual plane what God is doing with the Church today and with us, something that happened very physical with them.  Again, this matter of sevens that God is still using because it’s a matter of that which is complete, completeness. Just like forty is a matter of judgment, twelve is a matter of perfection; 12 – 12 nations, 12 people’s if you will, that are going to be used... names that are going to be used in the temple of God, the temple described as having four sides, three doors, three names on each side, 12 – all by design.  There weren’t going to be six sons, or five sons, or three sons.  There was a purpose that there should be twelve who’s names would exist in time.  Incredible stories, all by God’s moulding and fashioning and working with mankind for 7,100 years by the time it’s done.

So He told them, and seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of rams horns before the ark, but the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets.  Now Joshua had commanded the people, saying, You shall not shout; again, this thing about shouting.  It has a great deal of meaning in the book of Revelation later on when it talks about this shouting that takes place, or make any noise with your voice, nor shall any word proceed out of your mouth until the day I say to you shout; then you shall shout.

Verse 15 - And it came to pass on the seventh day, that they rose early about the dawning of the day, and marched around the city seven times in the same manner:  so for the first six days they went around the city just once per day; finally on this 7th and last day they went around the city seven times.  Again, the timing, specifically, is different.  What they did was in seven days, but for us we have seven ‘Times’, seven periods; but what happens at the end when we think about what God’s going to do on the 7th Trumpet with the 7 Last Plagues, there are differences, but the same story, the same kind of story as God is working with us in a matter of that which is complete, a matter of that which we’re to be inspired by of how God’s going to do it, but in a greater way because of all the things about Trumpets here and what they mean concerning the return of Jesus Christ.

Verse 16 – and the seventh time it was so, when the priests blew the trumpets, and Joshua said to the people, in this case, shofars, incredible piercing noise. And Joshua said to the people, Shout; for the Eternal has given you the city. And so the people shouted, again this same kind of word that’s used over and over again, a matter of shouting as war, alarm, and triumph all mixed together.  ...when the priests blew the trumpets, they blew the shofars: and it happened when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat. Then the people went into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city.  Again, these types shouldn’t escape us, when God talks about the walls of the city coming down, Jericho falling down, the type that’s there when He talks about Babylon, and the angel that shouts out, it says, cries out.  Same sort of thing of what God is doing but on a far greater plane at this time than what He did back then.

So again, what happens is a type at the end-time; is obviously not exact in the same timing, but indeed a matter of seven, seven being God’s number of completeness, that which completes; seven days or seven periods of time.  I’m inspired by knowing what God has given to us, that it wasn’t just a matter of ‘Time, Times and a Half a Time’, but the reality is it’s divided into seven periods of time and today is a unique period within that period of time, it truly is.  Not by accident.  Not by coincidence.  Symbolism over and over again here.

Let’s go over to Revelation 7.  I think back about the Feast of Trumpets in 2008 and God giving that to us in the Church to let us know that there was a countdown beginning, the final time leading up to, talking about the 1335 day countdown that began, 144,000 who were sealed.  We went into a unique time that we’re still in at this time.

Revelation 7:1 - And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree. And I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God: and he cried with a loud voice to the four angels, to whom it was given to hurt the earth and the sea, Saying, Don’t hurt the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads. The beginning of a time of 1335 days was on the Feast of Trumpets, 2008.

Revelation 8:1 - And when he had opened the 7th Seal, there was silence in heaven about the space of half an hour. And I saw the seven angels which stood before God; and to them were given 7 Trumpets. Over and over again here the use of Trumpets that God gives and it shouldn’t escape us; it shouldn’t escape us the story of Joshua and what that should mean for us.

Revelation 11; again here, the first 4 Trumpets, we understand primarily about the demise of the United States, and the loss, if you will, an end to the great physical blessings that God promised, that He gave to Manasseh, a continuation, again, of the promises given to the forefathers.  And yet we’re getting close to a point in time where the continuation’s going to continue to go on of far greater things for the entire world.

All the Trumpets lead up to the 7th Trumpet recorded here in Revelation 11:15 – And the seventh angel sounded and there were great/loud voices in heaven; again, to me incredible the things that are used here at this particular time, the actual sound of the Trumpet, the actual voices that come out.  It says, saying the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our LORD and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever. Again, because it’s about the return of Jesus Christ.  The Feast of Trumpets is about the return of Jesus Christ.  This day here is about the fulfilling of it, the accomplishing of it, finally.

Revelation 18:2 - And he, speaking of the angel, cried mightily with a strong voice, again this thing of trumpeting, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen; it’s just akin to, a type of what happened with Jericho, but now on a far greater scale because it’s about the entire system of this world, and we’ll probably talk about Babylon a little bit more later on as we go through preparing for the Feast this year, but again, all that that entails and all that means, the opposite of Jerusalem.  So again here, the 7th Trumpet is blown at the end of the 1335 days, the end of the 1290 days, the end of the 1260 days, the end of the 980 days, the end of ‘Time, Times and a Half a Time’, and at that time Jesus Christ begins a day long process of returning to this earth.

The Day of Pentecost 2012 is a day of transition from man’s 6,000 year rule to the next 1,100 years; a time that God has looked forward to for a long, long time, a time that we’d probably be wise today to take a little special time of our own in thanking God and crying out to God on our own about the importance of this day to us and what it means.

I think of where we are right now (some people like numbers), and to me this is an awesome thing to understand.  You know, it wasn’t but a few weeks ago when we talked about a new period of time that we went into, a time of Jacob’s trouble, and at that particular time we entered into the 6th period (or day if you will) of ‘Half a Time’. We have another complete ‘Time’ (two half-times which is also 2 prophetic days or 280 days) in front of us of from the ‘Time, Times and a Half a Time’.  (Probably lost half of you on that one.)

Today is exactly 40 days into the final 280 days remaining.  What an awesome thing!  40 again!  How many times we see these numbers over and over and over again that God has been giving, to learn very powerfully so what He’s bringing to pass; things that if you worked it out mathematically on a calendar you cannot do.  You look at other years – can’t be done – but it’s happening now.  Awesome!  This year’s Feast of trumpets falls on 40 days into the final ‘Time’ remaining of 280 days.  Today is 240 days until the Pentecost of 2012.

Some people have sent me some articles.  I remember one I received very early on that people are talking about now regarding pregnancy, of being pregnant, not in the terms of when I was growing up along the line of 9 months time.  Now in books it’s being written more and more as 40 weeks, 280 days.  40 weeks is the terminology that’s being used.

It’s an incredible thing because you think we’re at a time of a certain length into that period of ‘Time’ and as we go forward I think of what’s happened in just the last few weeks.  I’ve been dumbfounded. I hope you are too, by the news, by what’s going on, by the struggles that are going on, by what’s happening with the stock market; to go up so high in a day and go down so low in another.  It is so volatile right now. All the news from just last week, talking about some of the news articles and what’s happening.  We live in incredible times, we truly do.  Awesome what’s taking place!  There is so much more that’s in the news now than what was before of these very things we’re talking about here.  But as we go forward the pains will increase...and when are the pains the greatest?  At the end, toward the end.

It’s going to be awesome to see how this all comes to pass – it will come to pass.

~~~end

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