Godsloveandlaw's Blog

One of the most clear  descriptions that the Spirit of Prophecy gave to us in knowing the identifying mark of the Elijah to come (Test. to Min.p.475), was to say he would be known as an ” interpreter”. What we’d like to show this week is some selected  interpretations of  Scriptures. This is just a snipet of the end time prophecy interpretations available to learn.

As we proceed in our walk, we can enjoy learning more and more of His word, as spoken through the prophets. For example, we’ll learn the following.

1) What is the meaning of “altars of brick” and “altars of stone”?

2) What is the meaning of incense in the Bible?

3) How many specific parts were in the Mosiac law, and what did each part consist of?

4) What are we required to keep today?

5) Are there Bible verses illuminating the employee/employer relationship?

6) Can we know how fast the Lord can travel?

7) What are some of the things that happen when God begins the judgment for the living here on earth?

 Brother Houteff’s words are in bold.

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(Isaiah 65:3) “A people who provoke Me to anger continually to My face; who sacrificeth in gardens, and burn incense on altars of brick..”

The last part of verse 3, is quoted here: “That sacrificeth in gardens, and burneth incense upon altars of brick.” We must understand that these are symbols, but they are not hard to deciper. Had it been impossible to be understood, no one could profit by it, therefore the symbol would not have been used in the chapter.

“Gardens” are used for display. “Sacrifice” is the same as gift. “Incense”, according to Rev.8:3,4, is the way prayers are sent to God. Nowhere in the Bible can we read of any of God’s people building altars of brick. Altars to God were always built with stones.

The difference between brick and stone will now be considered. Brick is the product of man, but stone is the workmanship of God. Let us now consider the lesson intended here. “Gardens”, display; “Sacrifice”, gifts; “Incense”, prayers;  “Bricks”, man-made proposition. The charge is, we sacrifice for display, we offer our prayers to God (upon altars of brick); we follow after man instead of God’s pure word, as given to the church. (Shep. Rod. vol.1, p.162-163)

(Micah 4:4) “Verse 4, “But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid: For the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it.”

 The meaning of the verse is that God’s church is in an absolute security, and none need fear. Remember that the 144,000 are sealed before this time, and their life is sure; none can harm them nor touch their present life, or the life to come, for they are living saints, to be translated. Having this assurance, none can make them afraid, and they shall triumph with victory. Quoting Isaiah 60:17, last part, and 18: “I will  also make thy officers peace, and thine exactors righteousness. Violence shall no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within thy borders; but thou shalt call thy walls Salvation, and thy gates Praise.

(Mal.4:4,5) — “Remember ye the law of Moses My servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments.  Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.”

You know by now that Malachi, chapters 3 and 4, prophetically speak to the people of today, to the people just before the great and dreadful day, to the people to whom antitypical Elijah the prophet is sent.  And what wise counsel does the Lord give through Malachi? — He says, “Remember ye the Law of Moses My servant.”  Which law? — The law of “statutes and judgments” which the Lord commanded “in Horeb.”  Since this is God’s faithful advice to His people of this day, we would do well to restudy this law of Moses, and to remember it, for we cannot disregard His counsel and still expect His blessings.

   Broadly speaking, the law of Moses consists of three parts.  The first is the Ceremonial law, the law of the temple — the sacrificial law.  This law, of course, we today must not observe, except in antitype, for it foreshadowed things to come, particularly Christ’s first advent.  Thus it is that if we had lived in Old Testament times and had failed to comply with the sacrificial law and system of that day, we would thereby have demonstrated unbelief in Christ, Who was to come.  But since we are living in the Christian era, if we should now observe the typical sacrificial law and system, we should thereby demonstrate unbelief in Christ, Who has come.

   And so, as this law was nailed to the cross (Col. 2:14), we need not, and must not, observe it now

The second part of Moses’ law, is the law by which Israel was to rule its people, the civil, or legal law, — the law which defines what penalty the government should impose upon those who are caught stealing, killing, or the like.  Now, since we as Christians do not have a government of our own, but are still under the governments of the nations of today, we personally, or as a group are not required to enforce the legal law of Moses either.

   The only law of Moses, therefore, that we can possibly be admonished to remember, is the third part of his law: the moral law, which consists of the things that pertain to us as individuals, the things that we as individuals must perform, the things that perfect our character, the things that make us a peculiar people.  We therefore need to search out and do the things contained in the moral law of Moses — “The commandments, and the statutes and the judgments.” Deut. 5:31.

And the surest way to select these moral essentials from among those things which pertain to the sacrificial and the legal systems, is to go to the book of Deuteronomy.  This book is the summary of all the laws and statutes which Moses spoke to ancient Israel, his last words. (Timely Greetings, Vol.2, no.15, p.14-16)

(Deut.24:6, 10-15 — “No man shall take the nether or the upper millstone to pledge:for he taketh a man’s life to pledge…”

“When thou dost lend thy brother any thing, thou shall not go into his house to fetch his pledge. Thou shall stand abroard, and the man to whom dost lend shall bring out the pledge abroard unto thee. And if the man be poor, thou shalt not sleep with his pledge: in any case thou shalt deliver him the pledge again when the sun goeth down, that he may sleep in his own raiment, and bless thee: and it shall be righteousness unto thee before the Lord thy God. Thou shalt not oppress an hired servant that is poor and needy whether he be of thy brethren, or of thy strangers that are in thy land within thy gates: at his day thou shalt give him his hire, neither shall the sun go down upon it; for he is poor, and setteth his heart upon it: lest he cry against thee unto the Lord, and it be sin unto thee.”

God’s people are here told not to pledge their means or tools (not to pledge “the nether or upper millstone”) with which they make a living. And they are not to be exacting with their poor brethren. They are not to collect by force, and they are not to delay paying wages to the poor.”(Timely Greetings, Vol. 2, no.37,p.21)

How Can Christians Get To Heaven If The Distance Is So Great?

   The fastest speed on earth known to modern science at this present time is light which travels at the rate of 186,284 miles a second.  If one was to take a flight on the wings of light to the great nebula Orion, it would take him 600 years to reach that far-distant wonder in the heavens which has drawn an earnest attention of modern science.  Quoting from Early Writings, page 41, we read: “The atmosphere parted and rolled back; then we could look up through the open space in Orion, whence came the voice of God.  The holy city will come down through that open space.”

If the holy city is to come through that space we may well suppose that that glorious open space in Orion is the gateway to that long-continued highway to heaven (God’s throne).  But think of the great distance to this most wonderful gateway.  If it would take 600 light years to reach the entrance to that far-distant highway, then we ask ourselves, How many light years would it take to reach the other end of that heavenly highway to the city of the great King in the sides of the north?

   We mortals can not give a direct answer to this great question only to say the distance from earth to the center of the universe (God’s throne) is so vast that we finite beings only stand awestruck.  We are amazed with the difficulty to compute mileage, or even light years.  But if the distance is so vastly beyond human comprehension, then we, like the previously-stated Indian, ask the question, How would Christians ever get to heaven? 

Suppose that great wonder (train) which takes the redeemed would move at the tremendous speed of light, traveling 186,000 miles a second, it would take a good part of eternity to reach the city of the Great King (heaven).

   Here we shall see what we consider a terrific speed.  Heaven esteems it very dilatory.  For an example, we shall consider Jesus after the resurrection.  It was Mary who met Him first.  As she reached for her Lord, Jesus said to her, “Mary, touch Me not; for I have not yet ascended to My Father.” John 20:17.  Eight days later Jesus again appeared to His disciples.  “Then saith He to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, …and thrust it into My side; and be not faithless, but believe.”  John 20:27.  If Jesus would not let Mary touch Him because He had not yet been to His Father after He had risen, we may not suppose He would let Thomas thrust His finger in His side except He had been to heaven by His Father.  Jesus, in a week or less, made a round trip from earth to heaven.(Shep. Rod, Vol.1, p.205-207)

(Isa. 2:4 )– “And He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”

   Not the nations, but Inspiration Itself declares that in the day God judges the living, then those nations who go to the mountain (Kingdom church purified) of the Lord “shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks” — they will go farming instead of spending their strength in war. 

The nations that do not accept the Lord’s “rebuke,” in that day, though, will madly arise against the “mountain” of the Lord, as forecast by the prophet Joel, saying: “Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong.  Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O Lord.  Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about.” Joel 3:9- 12.

   Since Inspiration has dedicated these publications to the announcement of this most important event in connection with the gospel — the climax and the triumph of it, the separation of the good from the bad (Matt. 13:30, 47, 48), the goats from the sheep (Matt. 25:32); and the establishment of the mountain of the Lord’s house; there is therefore no escaping the conclusion that these chapters of Isaiah were penned especially for the church today. 

Now that we are the forerunners of this great and glorious event, we must give special heed to what these chapters have to say.  This we must do if we are to prepare the way of the Lord (Matt. 3:3; Isa. 4:3-5).  This message to the church, you plainly see, is to prepare her members for the Judgment before the “great and dreadful day of the Lord” begins (Mal. 4:5).  For this very reason the Scriptures at this time are unsealed.  Let us now hear the Lord’s plea.

(Isa. 2:5) — “O house of Jacob, come ye, and let us walk in the light of the Lord.”

   Because the church greatly needs this light, the light that now illuminates the Judgment Day, the Lord makes the foregone plea to the antitypical “house of Jacob,” the house in which are the 144,000 Jacobites, the descendants of the 12 tribes of Israel, who down through the ages became assimilated by the Gentile nations, and thus lost their racial identity.

   The Lord’s concern, that the church walk in the light of the Lord (in Inspiration’s light for today) definitely implies that she is not now walking in His light; and His command, found in the last verse of Isaiah’s chapter, clearly reveals that she is walking in the sparks of uninspired men.   The Lord, therefore, commands:

(Isa. 2:22) — “Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be accounted of?”

   The reason that her members should immediately cease from men is told in the verses that follow:

Isa. 3:1-4 — “For, behold, the Lord, the Lord of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread, and the whole stay of water, the mighty man, and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet, and the prudent, and the ancient, the captain of fifty, and the honourable man, and the counsellor, and the cunning artificer, and the eloquent orator.  And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them.”

   For over a century we as Seventh-day Adventists have been preaching the work of the Judgment for the Dead, and should now with ease see that when the Judgment for the Living begins it is to separate the saints from the sinners — the wheat from the tares (Matt. 13:30), the good fish from the bad fish (Matt. 13:47, 48), the sheep from the goats (Matt. 25:32-46), the wise virgins from the foolish ones (Matt. 25:1-13).

   Plainly then, Isaiah 3:1-4 reveals that among those who are found wanting, are some of the mighty men, men of war, judges and prophets (teachers of religion), prudent and ancients, captains and honorables, counsellors and cunning artificers and eloquent orators, and that God is not a respecter of persons, but only of penitent sinners; that He is not dependent on so-called great men.

   Those who have been exalting themselves and who have thus caused His people to follow learned men instead of Inspiration and thus the Lord’s advancing Truth, are all to be carried away as chaff!

   The brethren who for years have been preaching the Judgment for the Dead have gone spiritually blind and foolish, do not even expect a message of the Judgment for the Living and are insultingly saying. “These prophecies are never to be fulfilled!”  Now is the hour for them to ponder over this light along with the statement: “In the last solemn work few great men will be engaged.” — Testimonies, Vol. 5, pg. 80. (Timely Greetings, Vol. 1, no.5, p-5-8)

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We  hope you’ve enjoyed these enlightening passages and we that you look into the message of Elijah more thoroughly as it can only bring blessings and more importantly– instructions on how to “stand” in the very soon to come “great and dreadful day of the Lord”.

This entry was posted on July 6, 2013 at 5:02 am and is filed under Proper teachings, Victor T. Houteff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.