Go With the Flow - with Jesus

Many of you know that I'm a bit of a Bible junkie.
I just love Bible study and exploring God's purposes and the plans He has chosen to achieve them.

However, for much of this year I have been diverted to a study of us - in particular, the heart, spirit and soul of us.
What are they, how do they interact with each other, how are they impacted when the Holy Spirit comes to live in us?
It's been a fascinating exploration.

But more recently I have returned to focus on God's plans and have commenced my fifth (?) study of the The Revelation, the last book in the Bible.
And loving it - learning and understanding a bit more on each time through.

Even so, when I take a step back and ask myself what value there is in such studies, I have to admit they are of little eternal worth.
Knowing the Bible inside out or being a scholarly theologian will mean nothing without a relationship with Jesus.

Last week I was discussing the current state of affairs in the world with one of my adult grandsons.
Eventually the topic of prophecy came up and the possibility that our current situation could be seen in the yet-to-be fulfilled prophecies of the Old and New Testaments.

But we finished the discussion agreeing that ...
If you're connected to Jesus then it won't matter what or how events and situations happen, because you'll travel through them in good company.

Our concluding slogan became, "Just stay connected to Jesus and go with the flow."

For believers, this is really good advice.
Also for believers ...
Be ready to share the good news about Jesus with not-yet believers as and when the Holy Spirit leads, so that the others God brings across our path whom He has chosen to become believers in this age will become connected to Jesus too.

"And this is life in the Age; that they may know you, the sole true God, and him whom you sent, Jesus the Anointed."
[John 17 : 3  DBH]

Blessings, Barry

God's Unconditional Love

Yesterday I attended a baby dedication service for the son of a lovely young couple who are Youth Ministers in Melbourne.
It was the first time we have been to a gathering of so many people (suitably spaced and wearing masks) for many months.

The minister leading the service offered some excellent thoughts and prayers.
The first line of his opening prayer thanked God for His unconditional love.
What a great affirmation to start the afternoon!

God's unconditional love is the key to God's involvement with His creation.
God's unconditional love describes who He is. God is fundamentally and essentially love.

God is love.
[1 John 4 : 8b  NIV]

God's unconditional love is described this way:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.
[1 Corinthians 13 : 4 - 8  NIV]

God's unconditional love compels Him to be the Saviour of all.

That is why we labor and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all people, and especially of those who believe.
[1 Timothy 4 : 10  NIV]

God's unconditional love sent Jesus to earth to take the death penalty for the sins of the world.

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
[1 John 4 : 10  NIV]
He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.
[1 John 2 : 2  NIV]
But we do see Jesus, who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.
[Hebrews 2 : 9  NIV]

God's unconditional love requires Him to keep no record of our wrongs.

God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people's sins against them.
[2 Corinthians 5 : 19a  NIV]

God's unconditional love has a plan involving the whole creation.

He made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ,
to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.
[Ephesians 1 : 9 - 10  NIV]

God's unconditional love, expressed by Jesus, will ensure all people are in this final gathering.

"And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself."
[John 12 : 32  NIV]

Although the phrase "God's unconditional love" just rolls off the tongue of institutionally-trained ministers, I wonder how many really believe it.
Indeed, so many in the Christian religion, and their ministers, not only miss all of these wonderful promises, but are hostile to them.

I just don't understand how people who acknowledge God as having unconditional love can then describe their god as one who will willingly oversee the eternal torture of the majority of His creation.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is really good news for all - because of God's unconditional love which "never fails".

(It is clearly not just for believers, although believers do have a special calling as the advance party.)

Blessings, Barry
 

Children in the Rapture

Recently I was asked, "At the Rapture, what happens to children who are too young to have faith in Jesus?"

This is a rarely addressed question as most discussions on the Rapture focus on the different outcomes for those in, or not in, the Body of Christ, and discussions about children usually centre around their eventual heavenly prospects should they have been too young to have heard and responded to the gospel.

Before we begin to discuss this uncommon question, let's remember that everyone gets saved in the end, including young children, at the consummation of the ages.

That is why we labour and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Saviour of all people, and especially of those who believe.
[1 Timothy 4 : 10  NIV]

For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.
[1 Corinthians 15 : 22  NIV]

But what about youngsters at the Rapture, which is well before the end of those ages?

At the outset, I need to say that I cannot find anything in the Scriptures that directly addresses this question. (If you can, please show me in the Comments section below.)
So I admit that my answer can best be described as 'informed speculation'.

Do the Hebrew Scriptures throw any light on this question?
God made a distinction between those who rejected Him and their children when announcing who would enter the Promised Land..

In this wilderness your bodies will fall—every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me.
Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.
As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected.
[Numbers 14 : 29 - 31  NIV]

And the little ones that you said would be taken captive, your children who do not yet know good from bad—they will enter the land.
I will give it to them and they will take possession of it.
[Deuteronomy 1 : 39  NIV]

Jesus shines some light on the future of children as well.
He is speaking regarding membership in the Messianic Kingdom, which is to follow a little while after the Rapture.

At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”
He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them.
And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.
[Matthew 18 : 1 - 5  NIV]

Then people brought little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them.
But the disciples rebuked them.
Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”
[Matthew 19 : 13 -14  NIV]

But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple courts, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant.
“Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him.
“Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read,
“‘From the lips of children and infants you, Lord, have called forth your praise’?”
[Matthew 21 :15 - 16  NIV]

Paul's letter to Timothy also encourages me on this question.

Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
[1 Timothy 5 : 8  NIV]

I cannot imagine that God would counter His own advice, given through the Apostle Paul, by taking members of the Body of Christ to be with Jesus at the Rapture while requiring them to leave their young children behind to face the challenges of the Tribulation alone.
Can you?
And I think I'll join Abraham who asked God, "Will not the judge of all the earth do right?"
I am sure He will.

So my speculation, informed by these Promised Land and Kingdom Scriptures and reinforced by my belief that 'God is love' and a 'righteous judge', persuades me that children will be taken with the church, transformed into their spiritual bodies, and take their place with Christ in the kingdom - the Magnificent Messianic Millennial kingdom.

Blessings, Barry

Christians and the Mark of the Beast

About three weeks ago I mentioned two questions I had been asked concerning the Corona Virus COVID-19.

With so much reporting and discussion about the need for universal vaccinations and digital records of those receiving them, I have now been asked a further question about the "Mark of the Beast" mentioned in Revelation 13.

Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth...
It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name.
[Revelation 13 : 11 - 17  NIV]

Scientific R&D in nano technology and the production of invisible inks, often alongside world-wide vaccine research, together with the hugely increased capability of the new 5G internet standard, could easily provide the ingredients for a compulsory system of global control of the distribution of goods and services.

You can read about some of this R&D on sites like www.sciencedirect.com and www.sciencealert.com and news.mit.edu.
Here's one example:

MIT researchers have now developed a novel way to record a patient’s vaccination history: storing the data in a pattern of dye, invisible to the naked eye, that is delivered under the skin at the same time as the vaccine.
[MIT News, December 2019]

So, although we could be swiftly heading towards having suitable technology for mandating such a global scheme, I don't believe its possible implementation as the "mark of the beast" is just around the corner.
Why?
I think the "mark of the beast" is due in the middle of the Tribulation, a 7-year period of conflict and devastation, and to be experienced after the Body of Christ, the universal, invisible church composed of all the true believers in Jesus, has been taken from the earth.

I know the Biblical study of the future, sometimes called eschatology or the study of end times, has produced hundreds of thousands of books, sermons and videos (and almost as many opinions), and my current view might be just one of them.

Nevertheless, my estimate is that the "mark of the beast" is at least 3 1/2 years away, even if the taking of the Body of Christ to be with Jesus happens as you are reading this.
And every day we find ourselves still here, the count for those 3 1/2 years has yet to begin.

So should Christians be concerned if a universal vaccination for flu and other corona viruses with accompanying quantum dot ink or other nano technology registration becomes obligatory and we are still here?
I don't see this as a problem until such an obligation is used as a passport for social/political acceptance or commercial transactions.
And we won't be around to see that!
We'll be gone by then!

For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.
After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever.
Therefore encourage one another with these words.
[1 Thessalonians 4 : 16 - 18  NIV]

But even if my understanding of end times is not correct, I am sure of God's love and protection that doesn't depend on my accurate description of the future.
Check out these promises to God's faithful.

To his Hebrew saints of the Old Testament era:

Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
He will call on me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life I will satisfy him and show him my salvation.”
[Psalm 91 : 14 - 16  NIV]

To his Hebrew saints of the New Testament era:

"I’ve told you all this so that trusting me, you will be unshakable and assured, deeply at peace.
In this godless world you will continue to experience difficulties.
But take heart! I’ve conquered the world.”
[John 16 : 33  MSG]

To his saints in the early New Testament churches.

You obeyed my message and endured.
So I will protect you from the time of testing that everyone in all the world must go through.
[Revelation 3 : 10  CEV]

Summing up:

• God's saints will not be here when the "mark of the beast" is mandated in the world.
• Restrictions or obligations introduced before then will not be the "mark of the beast", but may be used to produce it after we've gone.
• In the meantime, we should live confidently in God's love and providence through Jesus, our Saviour and Lord.

Blessings, Barry