Love God

31 December 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Today is the last day of 2017. Tomorrow we start again. I don't know if this is an appropriate message for such an occasion or not but the Lord spoke to me through our cat last week.

There are various levels of relationships we have with animals. Some animals are dangerous – they will attack you. Other animals are spooky – they are afraid and will run from you. Some are curious and will come to you. And some like to be with you. A couple of months ago a little black kitten from the house down the street wandered in our yard and came in the house. She seemed to like Pammy and adopted us. Pammy put out some food and slowly the little kitten became our cat.

I like animals. I love dogs and horses. I like nearly all animals and like to pet them. It took a little doing before Blackie got used to me and was willing to come to me. The main event in my life every day is sitting in my chase lounge chair on our balcony having devotions with Jesus. Blackie has figured out that the balcony is an interesting place to be. I like to have Blackie sit with me but she wasn't too sure how safe that was. After a little coxing she jumped up to sit with me and at length fell asleep on my lap. That was the ultimate. Blackie was perfectly relaxed with me and I loved to hold her.

In a somewhat perverse way the Lord showed me this is the relationship He desires with us. For an animal to come and fall asleep on your lap is the ultimate expression of being relaxed and trust you. Beyond that it also means they like you and desire to be with you.

One time I was staying with some friends on a ranch in Colorado. They had an unbroke horse that was pretty skidish to be around people. As I stood outside the fence the horse finally got curious and came to see me. Holding out my hand, the horse finally got curious enough to lick my hand. Very carefully I got to where I could pet the horse's nose, then pat him on his neck. After spending quite a bit of time with the horse he decided I was safe and I could stand next to him and pet him all over. The ultimate was when I would go to the corral he would come to me and follow me around inside the corral. This is what God wants with us.

­It has been accurately said, fallen nature has a fear of God. Allah certainly is not a loving heavenly Father. God was not known as Father in the Old Testament. It wasn't until Jesus appeared that He told us, “When you pray say, “Our Father...”. That was an entirely new relationship. And Jesus told us, “Fear not little flock, it is our Father's good pleasure to give you the Kingdom” (Lk. 12:32). Mentally we give theological consent to that truth but in practice we aren't too sure how it works. It is safe to say that God has a lot of things He wants to give us but He is having difficulty getting us to come close enough to where He can do all that He wants to for us. I thought that cat sleeping on my lap is the relationship that God is trying to bring us to. And that cat perfectly secure lying on my lap was a good illustration of faith.

I was preaching in a Lahu church this morning . It was awful. That place is so bad to call it dead religion would be an exaggeration. If they had a corpse in a casket, at least that would be an improvement. That place is supposed to be part of the Body of Christ but it is more like one leg bone and three ribs. The Holy Spirit is so far from there that it s doubtful that you could reach Him by email. As for burning hearts and being on fire for God, with our body temperature being 98.7 F I would estimate their spiritual temperature as being around 34 or 35 F. But my heart wasn't much better hovering around 53 F. Apart from the pastor there were only three old ladies and one man, two of which looked like they were sound asleep. How you are supposed to speak to a congregation like that is beyond me.

I started out by saying last Tuesday was the 13^th anniversary of the historic Sumatra tsunami that killed 250, 000, 000 people. That tsunami completely devastated Phi Phi Island and Phuket, Thailand. When the people on Phi Phi got up that morning they had no idea that three hours later 800 people would be washed away never to be found and another 5,000 would be lying dead on the island. In answer to the question what the world would be like when Jesus comes again, the Lord said it would be like the days of Noah (Mt. 24:37,38). The main interest then was eating, drinking, and marriage. It would be business as usual, planning for the future. In Noah's day they had no idea that the clock was ticking and soon everybody on this planet would be dead; although they had 100 years notice with Noah's preaching. My preaching this morning had the effect of a light breeze blowing on a rock. Then I went on, “With the impending end of the age bearing down on us, how can we prepare, and what should be our spiritual condition?”.

When a scribe asked Jesus what was the most important commandment, the Lord answered, “That is easy – love God and love your fellow humans” (Mk. 12:29-31). I said to the folks this morning, “I doubt that that is news to you. I'm sure you have heard that before”. And then I took a dive trying to strike reality, and asked, “Do we really love God?”. There is a simple test for love – how badly do we want to spend with a person? When I was young I had girl friend. Man, I counted the hours when I would see her again. And then when we had a date the thing I dreaded the most was saying good night and going home. “How about that? Do you know what I am talking about?” For the first time there was a faint glimmer that I mentioned something they could identify with. “You say you love God. How much time do you spend with Him every day? How much time do you spend reading His Word? Do you just relish your time of devotion every day?” It is doubtful that these Lahu had ever had devotions.

I said, “You can't love someone that you don't know. If someone asks me, 'Do you love the people in Uzbekistan?' I would reply, 'I don't know. I have never been to Uzbekistan and have never met anyone from there. How can I love them?'.” The reason we don't love God is because we don't know Him. If we knew Him better no doubt we would love Him more.

Knowing God is one of the three promises of the New Covenant – “all shall know Me” (Heb.8:11). The only way this is possible to know God is by the Holy Spirit. One of the unique characteristics of someone born-again is that they say “I know God”. Without the Holy Spirit it is impossible to know God. Anyone who is not born-again and says, “I know God” is either lying or deceived. One of the blessings of salvation is that God gives to us eternal life. But having eternal life doesn't just mean we will live for several thousand years. Jesus said, “This is LIFE ETERNAL, that they might KNOW YOU” (Jn. 17:3). Eternal life isn't how long you will live; it is knowing God.

The name-of-the-game is loving God. But the only way we can love God is by knowing Him. How do we know God? First of all ye must be born-again. Secondly the Holy Spirit must have free access to your heart. He must be the sole possessor of your heart. It can't be Jesus plus xxxx. But most of all we must love to spend time with Him. You can't know God by having hurry up, canned, 5 minute devotions. Love takes time. True love is loving to be together with your lover.

I don't know if anyone out anything out of my message this morning. I doubt it. But the Word certainly convicted me. May 2018 be a year when we close in with God and love Jesus more.

Have a holy, fruitful, new year loving Jesus,

                                                          bill

2017 christmas Message

24 December 2017

Dear Phyllis,

On the 24^th of December it is unthinkable to write anything but a Christmas message. The greatest Christmas message I ever heard was by Roald Lidal at the Manza Hotel in Kusatsu. We were having a Christmas party there and Roald was the speaker. Roald told the story of a elderly Chinese Christian man.

This dedicated man and his wife had prayed for many years for a child and, in her later years, his wife quite miraculously had conceived and bore a son. Because the baby was so unusual, and asked of God, they named him Samuel.

While the lad was still very young, the Christian man got embroiled in a legal controversy with a man in town that hated him, and unjustly took him to court. While the case was still under litigation the Lord spoke to the Christian man and gave him the most obscene instruction imaginable. The Lords said, “I want you to give your son to your enemy”. The poor man recoiled in horror, but the Lord's message burned in his heart. At last, with a trembling voice, he spoke to his wife about the subject and was stunned when she replied, “Yes I know. The Lord told me the same thing”. Such a thing was unheard of in China – to give an only child to an enemy??. Unbelievably, the enemy accepted the offer, but that still didn't slow him down. Tragically the case went against the Christian man, and he was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

During his incarceration his wife died, and when, at last, he was released from prison there was nothing else left for him to do but travel around sharing what he knew of the gospel with people who had no hope. He had been a traveling evangelist for several years when one night he was riding in a bus that broke down in a rural area in central China. It was a cold snowy night and the passengers had to fend for themselves to find shelter. As the poor man was walking along the road, he passed a farm house, and stopped to ask if they would give him shelter for the night. The people turned out to be Christian and gladly offered to let him stay with them for the night; but they were going out. They were on their way to a dendo (evangelistic) meeting in another town. There was a well known gifted speaker that would be speaking that night. If he was interested, they would be glad to have him go with them. Of course he was delighted to go.

As they were on their way to the meeting the old man shared his testimony how he and his wife had prayed for many years for a son. Then in the midst of the court battle. they gave their son to their enemy. While he was in prison his enemy had moved to a distant city. There had been a serious earthquake and everybody was killed. With his son gone and his wife dead there was nothing else left for him in life but what he was doing.

They were late getting to the meeting; the house was packed, and they had to sit in the back. The old mans eyes were dim; and the seating was so bad he stood to try to get a better view. When the speaker up front saw the old man standing in the rear, suddenly he stopped in the middle of his message and exclaimed, “Are you my father Zhau?”

The amazing gift of love had born fruit. Some time after the court case the enemy and his family had been converted. They raised the boy Christian and told him the story of his actual parents. The report about the earthquake was true, and the family had been killed, but the boy was spared. He had been wonderfully saved and became a powerful evangelist. It was on Christmas eve as he was preaching in a house church meeting that he saw the old man standing in the back of the room that looked like it might be his father.

What a meeting! What a night! What a sight! The people there saw two men standing up front. The man who gave his only son to his enemy. The wonderful fruit that had come from that act. The gift of love had borne tremendous fruit. The enemy had been saved and the lad they gave away had become a mighty man of God. And the Lord brought this all together to present His Christmas gift to the father on Christmas eve.

The angels were singing the night Jesus was born in a barn. And the angels must have been singing the night the story of Christmas was reenacted in a house church in China. I don't know if the angels were singing the night Roald Lidal related that testimony at a Christmas party in Manza but I know there was one man sitting in the back so broken up by this story that he couldn't move. As the people filed out of the room, I just sat there sobbing.

Sometimes it takes a long time before we see the results of our sacrifice for Jesus. Very few people have offered to Jesus such an expensive gift as that couple did in China. And very few people have received such an amazing reward as the father did that night. More than that, the loss was only for a very few short years, but their reward will last for eternity. It may be trite to say we can't out give God. It is true that at times it may look like we are slightly ahead, but when the books are balanced we will be on our face wondering and worshiping the Father that gave His only Son to the most undeserving enemies (Rom. 5:8). It is only spiritual blindness that keeps us from weeping so hard now that it would seem tears would wash away our eyeballs.

Gomen, I don't know what to say. I don't want to talk about Santa Clause. I don't want to talk about a Christmas tree. I don't want to talk about Christmas presents. Even the very story of Baby Jesus in a manger seems out of place. I can scarcely share this story that I heard 17 years ago in Manza. When the reality of what God did for us in giving to us His only Son breaks through my dull mind like a small shaft of light in a dark room; that just faltens me so badly I am speechless.

Oh, Lord, please be merciful to this poor man. There is no way I can come close to repaying my inestimable debt. Please, Lord, please give me something I can offer to Jesus. As unworthy and as unfit as I am, if there is any way You can take the tatters of this life and put it in the plus column to bring honor to Jesus, all I can say is that it is unconditionally Yours. Oh, thank You Father for sending us Jesus.

                                     bill

God's Timing

17 December 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Last week I was preaching at a Lahu church. As we are into December I was supposed to bring a Christmas message. I didn't feel very Christmasy but choose to speak on Gal. 4:4 - “When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son made of a woman”.

There are many things about God that are utterly amazing. No one can fully comprehend the love of God. When we examine it, the mercy of God and His forgiveness are mind-boggling. How He does it is utterly beyond me. The various attributes of God are so far beyond our human experience to fully appreciate Him is like getting a 6 foot ladder to pick stars. Among the amazing features of God is His patience. We are always in a hurry and want everything right now. This is particularly difficult for children but for all of us waiting is hard.

But God is in no hurry. Somehow He is able to wait millenniums. Shortly after the dawn of creation God promised the day would come when the seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent. It is with bewilderment that we read of God's dealing with humanity from the days of Noah, through Abraham, Moses, the time of the judges, the kings, and the Babylonia captivity; that in every conceivable way God would extend mercy to His people only to see things go sideways. Then we read, “When the fullness of time was come”. God was in no hurry. He could wait. He knew what He was doing and when the fullness of time was come He sent forth His Son.

This sheds a little light on some of our perplexing problems. In Isaiah 30:18 we read, “Therefore will the Lord wait, that He may be gracious unto you”. The problem isn't that God is unwilling to give us good things,, but there is the need for Him to work in our hearts before we are prepared to receive them. God is waiting that He might give us His best. We want what we want now; but God is waiting that He might give us His best.

After Rosemary left my life went to zero. I lost everything. For a long time I felt like I was a sub-species of humanity. In reading the 22^nd Psalm I saw where Jesus cried, “I am a worm and no man” (Ps. 22:6). I said. “Me too”. I was reading my Japanese Bible at the time, and the Japanese said, “I am not a 'ningen' (human)”. For the next several years I adopted the attitude that I was no longer a ningen. I had a great desire to rejoin the world of homo-sapiens but I had to be content that I was no longer a ningen. There were many hopeful candidates that appeared on the horizon that I would have loved to marry but everyone fell through. The Lord waited 21 years until I was burned out, then He gave me a partner was was a run-away freight train evangelist.

Sometimes God gives us what we want right now but usually there is a period of waiting. One of the reasons for this is that waiting adds value to the gift. Things that come cheap are cheap. Things that come after years of waiting are of great value. The longer we wait the more valuable the gift.

Sometimes it is a lifetime. One of the finest Christians I ever met was Bob Holsten. But I never met a man that had more things go south on him. His entire life was a series of great hopes only to see it explode in his face. I don't know one thing that ever developed into real fruition. But one thing it did produce was Christian character like you seldom see in anyone.

Some times we never see what we have hoped for. For several years Lavinia McCart was my secretary. I never had a friend that was more devoted. But Lavinia's life was a tragedy. She was as dedicated a Christian as ever walked on God's green earth. She had been a missionary in Cambodia for eleven years. When things went sour in Cambodia with Sihanouk she was put out with the rest of the missionaries. From Cambodia she came to Japan to work with Kyoritsu Girls school. That didn't work out. Then she joined TEAM, but nothing major ever happened. Like all women Lavinia had her dream of being married with a nice family. There was a man in her life that she deeply loved but heart-ache was all she ever got. After I stated working in Cambodia I wrote Lavinia telling her how wonderfully God had heard her prayers and Cambodia was blooming like a flower. I had gone through the horrible Pol Pot years with Lavinia when all her dearest friends were being slaughtered. Now the Gospel was in Cambodia and thousands were being saved. I thought she would be thrilled to hear the fantastic reports of what was happening there. To my surprise Lavinia's sister replied to my letters thanking me, but said Lavinia was in a nursing home a very sullen person. She said Lavinia had never told them much about anything. They were delight to hear reports and information that Lavinia had never shared. Lavinia died with a broken heart.

But some time later, as I was praying, I saw Lavinia in heaven in my mind. I am not a spiritual person and don't have visions, but I believe what the Lord showed me was true. On earth Lavinia was a very plain person. She was a long ways from anything you might call good looking. But what I saw was a beautiful, radiant, woman. Lavinia was gorgeous in her wedding dress married to Jesus. She was raving, “Oh the Lord is good! He has given me His finest”. And now she has this for eternity.

I believe this is another chapter in the Inverted Kingdom. I believe heaven will be just like Abraham told the rich man in hell- “Remember in your lifetime you had the good things and Lazarus the bad, but now he is comforted and you are tormented”. I believe this is one of the laws of the Kingdom of God. The people of this world have their part right now, but the people of the Kingdom of God will get their part in the life here after. I am sure that in heaven we will see this in very clear contrast. The cute girl that was so poplar here, that married the guy who became the pastor of the 1^st church and had a wonderful life, will be in the bleacher section; and the poor, lonely, wall flower that got left behind here will be the most joyous soul in the front row in heaven. They might have to wait a lifetime, but God is good as His Word and He will make it all up.

The Father waited a long time before He sent His Son, but in the fullness of time Jesus came. After He left the last thing Jesus promised us was “behold I come quickly”, and He repeated that twice (Rev. 22:7, 12). He has been away a long time, but eternity runs on God's clock – not ours. When we see Him I am sure we will all agree that He kept His promise. In the mean time, “blessed are they who wait for the Lord” (Isa. 30:18)

                                                       bill

Heaven

10 December 2017

Dear Phyllis,

I don't know what is going on. As usual Pammy is going wild telling everybody in sight about Jesus. For the past year or more she has had extensively contact with the Lahu minority people. SEA is filled with millions of different ethnic people that have their own culture and language living within the borders of the various counties. The Lahu are one large group here in northern Thailand. The children all go to Thai schools which means that they can speak Thai, but among themselves their native tongue is still Lahu. A large number of Lahu are Christian, but their church worship services are in their Lahu language. Last Sunday a small group came to our house for church. Of course I was expected to preach. My heart really wasn't in it and I had done no preparation, so, desperately, I asked the Lord for a message to deliver. A thought came of something the Lord had been sharing with me recently.

It is surprising that the Bible tells us very little about heaven. I suppose the reason for this is that it is impossible for us to comprehend what heaven is like. For children in Thailand it is impossible for them to know what snow is like. They have never seen a snow flake. They have never seen a frozen pond and it is impossible for them to know what it is like to ski down hill. Heaven is so much out of our known environment that it is impossible for an angel to tell us what it is like. Apart from Revelation, the Bible only gives us two or three briefs glimpses. One of them is what Isaiah saw in chapter 6. There he saw the Lord sitting on the Throne with the seraphims crying ceaselessly, “Holy, holy, holy”. Six hundred years later John had a similar experience and the scene hadn't changed. The seraphims were still crying “Holy, holy, holy” (Rev. 4:8). Then he saw the Lamb and millions of saints worshiping Him, but their message was different. From Rev. 4:11 to 5:12 we see the word “worthy” uttered five times. The thing about God that impressed the seraphims the most was His character. But the greatest impression of the Lamb upon saints is His worthiness. Seraphims and saints are looking at the same Being but His main impression on them is different. I say the same Being but here we are talking about the difference between the Father and the Son. To say He is holy is to admire His character, but to cry “worthy” is to marvel His performance. The reason for the different impression is that Jesus never died for seraphims, but when saints look upon the Lamb of God they know that I was for them that He died. It is because of what He did that makes Him so worthy. If we had never sinned perhaps we might look upon God and marvel at His character, but when we look at the wounds of Jesus and know it was for us that He came, lived, and died; is there anything else that could escape from our mouths than “WORTHY”? If we were responsible to arrange the seating order in heaven who is the one who is worthy to sit in the front seat? Oh, thank God they have it right in heaven but the scene here on earth is mind-boggling insanity. Even among Christians self sits up front and Jesus gets to sit in the back row.

Last Sunday the Lord gave me an illustration of the worthiness of our Savior. Suppose there were two men who both had one son. The son of one man had a very bad heart. The father took him to the hospital and the doctor told him that his only possible chance to live was a heart transplant. It is only in the past 60 or so years that medical science has been able to do organ transplants. Today they are fairly common. Kidney transplants are the easiest. We all have two kidneys, and if someone needs a kidney transplant a downer can give one and still survive on the one left. But we only have one heart. To get a heart transplant we have to wait until someone dies. But suppose there were two men with one son and one boy needed a heart transplant. Then the father of the healthy lad said, “I will donate the heart of my boy to save your son.” What do you think of that? That is utterly obscene. But what God has done for us is infinitely greater.

What do you think about the performance of Jesus? For 30 silent years He was spectacular. When Jesus was baptized God broke His silence in heaven and in an audible voice He said, “Thou art My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased” (Lk. 3:22). The ball game isn't over yet. Jesus has only played 7 innings but the Father couldn't help but remark, “Son, You have done marvelously well”. It was only in the 9^th inning that Jesus hit the winning home run.

My illustration of the two fathers with sons is imperfect as it features the fathers. I don't know which is greater - what the Father has done for us or what the Son did. It is the character of the Father who would give His Son, but it is the performance of the Son who did so well when He became a man and trounced the devil by His sinless life and sacrificial death. Oh my goodness, is there anything else we can say but “Worthy! Worthy! Worthy!”? In heaven we will get that right and Jesus will be in the front seat. Is it possible that any human being could put themselves up front. Astoundingly, here on earth even among Christians self gets to sit up front and Jesus is relegated to the back row. If Jesus is so worthy, how is it possible that self could challenge Him for supremacy in our lives? How is it possible that we could be half-hearted in our devotion to Him?

The message of surrender just blows my mind. The only thing that I can think of that is more mind-boggling is salvation. Somehow we have got the salvation message utterly inverted, and now we present God as the supplicant pleading with sinners to please accept His offer of forgiveness and eternal life. I can only wonder at the bewilderment of angels as they observe pastors in thousands of churches pleading with sinners to please come forward and accept what God is trying to give them. It is sinners who should be crying and begging God to please forgive their treasonous transgressions. How we got that upside down to make God the supplicant is utterly beyond me. But then the message of surrender. Somehow we think that we can be saved - we can accept God free gift of salvation – and still be in charge of our own lives. Question. Who is worthy to possess everything we have? I have never surrendered my life to Jesus. I didn't know you were supposed to. When I asked Jesus to come in to save me from sin, I assumed He was to control my life. All I have ever tried to do for the past 60 years is to follow and obey Him.

The other day Pammy was talking to me about all the people we need to reach to save them from going to hell. I said, “Yes that is true. If we love them we should do everything possible to keep them from going to hell. But there is a better reason. Jesus came and paid the price for their salvation. He needs to get His money worth of the full price He has paid for.” No one is worth of salvation but Jesus is worthy to receive what He paid for.

I don't know if anyone else got anything out of my message but the Lord certainly spoke to me. What I am trying to say is that Jesus is worthy. Oh for grace to love Him more.

                                                       bill

Daniel 2

3 December 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Last week my niece Pam Gill wrote me asking if I could write about Daniel 2. Unquestionably Daniel 2 is one of the major chapters of the Bible. It is the the corner stone of all eschatology that everything from 400 BC clear through the end of the Bible in Revelation 22 is built upon. I don't know how concise I can be in getting the basics in one letter but I will try. Gomen nasai if this letter is 10 pages long, and if it gets boring you can delete it and go get some coffee.

The book of Daniel is unique in scripture. Daniel was a young Jewish boy who was captured in Jerusalem and taken to Babylon in the first captivity. Because of his exceptional gifts he was chosen to be sent to a special college for training to be one of the king's wise men. He was in the inner core of the palace for the period of four kings.

Nebuchadnezzar had had a dream and called his wise men to explain it to him. He couldn't remember what the dream was, and was furious with his wise men because they couldn't tell him the dream and the interpretation. He ordered all of them executed, which would have also included Daniel. Daniel pleaded, “Let me have a crack at it”; and in answer to prayer the Lord revealed the dream to Daniel. When Daniel explained the dream and interpretation to Nebuchadnezzar, the king fell down to worship Daniel. This gives undeniable validity to the accuracy of this prophecy.

Nebuchadnezzar saw a dream of a statue with a head of gold, arms and chest of silver, belly and thighs of brass, legs of iron and feet of a mixture of iron and clay. Then a little stone that was cut without hands struck the statue on it toes shattering everything and became a great mountain that filled the whole earth. The interpretation was that there would be four successive kingdoms, and “in the days of these kings (the ten toes) the God of heaven would set up a kingdom that would never be destroyed” (verse 44). The first kingdom was Nebuchadnezzar (Babylon), and the last Kingdom obviously is the time when Jesus comes back to set up His menial reign of Christ and beyond (Rev. 19-22). The first three kingdoms of the gold, silver, and brass, are right straight forward. Daniel said to Nebuchadnezzar, “Thou art the head of gold” (Babylon) (verse 38). The next one would be silver (Media-Persia), and the following one, brass, was obviously Greece (Alexander the Great). But the fourth kingdom (iron) is not so clear. The traditional interpretation is that the fourth kingdom (iron) is the Roman Empire and the ten toes of the feet that get smashed by the little stone (Jesus) is the revived Roman Empire. Four decades ago everyone confidently said that this is the European Union, and we were all waiting until it came to ten; then the anti-Christ would make his appearance. But then the EU went to twenty eight. Today I am not so sure. I feel very strongly that anyone who dogmatically says he understands exactly who the fourth kingdom is demonstrates that he really doesn't understand anything at all.

In recent years several scholars have come up with a Middle East position. Personally, I feel Joel Richardson is the closest. Richardson has set forward some highly radical views. He has some excellent arguments; much of which I feel he is right on. But there are some holes in his position that are troubling. Looking at the big picture as for the occupation of Israel and the Middle East; the four successive major kingdoms are Babylon, Media-Persia, Greece, and Rome. No question that the Roman Empire was the dominant kingdom at the time of Christ. But if we take the literal position that the day “God will set up a Kingdom that shall never be destroyed” is the menial reign of Christ we have to accept that there is an enormous gap between the first century and now.

Daniel 9:24 give a very significant statement when it says, “70 weeks are determined upon thy people and thy holy city.” To try to interpret end time prophecy on anything other than Israel and Jerusalem is to engage in foundationless, unbiblical, speculation. There is absolutely no warranty to suggest that the lion is England, the eagle is America, and the bear is Russia. Accepting that Israel is God's time clock we see in Daniel's 70 weeks the Bible predicted to the day that Jesus would present Himself to Israel as her Messiah. When Israel's Messiah was cut off the clock stopped, and God started another clock that is called the time of the gentiles (Lk. 21:24). This has been running for the past 2, 000 years where God has opened the door to all nations and whosoever will may be saved. But when that time is full God's Israeli clock will start ticking again and that will be a specific period of seven years that is left. Then Jesus will come to set up His Kingdom.

The problem with the legs of iron in Nebuchadnezzar statue is that we have to deal with the connection of the legs with the feet. Very clearly the feet with the ten toes is the end time kingdom. Daniel 2 is the corner stone and the rest of Daniel is the further explanation. To go into any serious discussion of the legs of iron would take an in depth study of the entire book of Daniel. This would require a very large book, and I can't cover this in one short letter. But let me mention just the highlights.

Daniel had four visions, two of which were dreams – chapter 2, 7, 8, and 10-12. Chapter 7 is a further explanation of chapter 2, and 8 is tied to 10-12. (10 to 12 are all one vision). Chapter 7 and 8 are two visions separated by three years, but 8 is a more detailed explanation of 7. Putting them all together is one piece of fabric.

The identification of the first three kingdoms of Daniel 2 are perfectly clear. But when we come to the legs of iron we have a very blurred transition from Alexander to the anti-Christ. Chapters 7, 8, and 11 give more detail about the anti-Christ than any other portion of scripture. Jesus mentions Daniel and points to the abomination of desolation (Dan:11:31; 12: 11) as one of the most significant end time events (Mt. 24:15; Mk. 13:14).

For centuries Bible scholars have taken the western position of Rome and the revived Roman Empire; and have speculated the the anti-Christ would be the head. Scholars have identified the anti-Christ as anyone from a Jew to the Pope to Barack Obama. Joel Richardson has come up with a very compelling position that the ten toes of Nebuchadnezzar's statue is not the EU but an Islamic caliphate of ten countries and the anti-Christ is the Islamic mahdi (twelfth Inman).

Had you asked me to explain Daniel 2 five years ago I could have laid it out in a very clear presentation. Today I have no idea what it means. I believe I know a great deal more about Daniel today than I did 40 years ago, but I am increasingly convinced that spiritual truth is not as black and white as we wished. There is a lot in scripture that just doesn't make sense, and I am willing to put Daniel 2 in that category. But on one point I will be absolutely dogmatic; that is, in heaven the Lord will explain all this to us and we will agree He was 100% correct. I am absolutely sure that God's prophecy of the end time stared out with Babylon and will culminate in Jesus being Lord and King over all the earth. But the details of transition in the legs of iron is not as clear as I wish. Looking at the world situation today it is difficult to imagine that we have much time left on the clock. The stage is being rapidly set and if we ever had a time to look up it is today. Let's let it all hang out for Jesus.

Gambarimasho, bill

Truth is a Treasure

19 November 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Many years ago I was preaching in a small church in Florida. After the meeting my spiritual father said to me, “The first 30 minutes of your message was very good, but the next 30 minutes undid what you accomplished in the first half. No one can remember all of Ronald Reagan's speeches but his one liners are legendary. From now on I am going to totally revamp my letters to you and stop sending lengthy expositions and try to cut them to brief single thoughts.

I am increasingly impressed that God has hidden Himself so that the wise and noble can't see Him but He reveals Himself to the humble and simple (Mt. 11:25). In like manner spiritual truth is a treasure. A treasure is not something that can be found on the shelf of any 7-11 store. Treasures are rare and frequently hidden. You don't find diamonds lying on the sidewalk. Diamonds are only found by digging. Digging means hours of Bible study not 3 minute devotions reading Our Daily Bread.

Finding Jesus is well worth the time.

                                                     bill

CITIES OF REFUGE

12 November 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Paul's wife, Marisa, recently opened a new restaurant. It is just awful. She has some of the best food I have ever eaten at a give- way price. The problem is that I can only eat one meal at a time. That means that I have to postpone the rest of the menu until a later date. It is a grief to know that there is such delicious food waiting but I can't eat it right now. I had a Marisa Eden Garden restaurant meeting with Jesus last week.

The Word was exploding with such delicacies as I seldom see and there was little I could do to handle them. I felt like Jesus gave me a bushel basket of apples but no sack to carry them in. What a frustration! There were apples all around me but I only had two hands and could only carry two apples at a time. I don't know what to say. There is so much I would like to share with you but I am incapable of sorting all this material out to present it in any coherent manner.

One thought is the cities of refuge. I have known for many years that the Lord commanded Moses to set aside six cities in the promised land for a sanctuary for a man who had accidentally killed another. Justice demands retribution. The law demands that the land can only be cleansed by the man who shed (caused) the blood (Num. 35:33). That is one of the most reasonable laws of God. You kill a man – you die. Who can argue with that? God has put it in the heart of man that there should be an avenger of blood. If a man murders a child there is something intense in the heart of the father that says, “If I get my hands on that bird I will kill him!”. It is not immoral for a man to say to another, “You hurt my brother you will have me to deal with.” That is the spirit of the avenger of blood. That is a God-given instinct. But in the case where the killing was not intentional God made a provision for deliverance. This is not to be confused with intentional murder. In that case God says the murder should be killed.

There is no excuse for sin. God has given to every man a free will and he is 100% responsible for what he does. In this, we have the same option that Adam had in the Garden – to obey God or violate His law. And yet there is one basic difference between us and Adam. Adam was created perfect. He had no sin nature. We are born with two strikes against us before we get to bat. It is guaranteed that we will sin. Last week I was talking to Sangha about original sin. He protested that not all men are bad. I showed him Rom.3:23 - “ALL have sinned...”. I asked, “Are your boys sinners? Do they do bad things?” “Yes. Of course.” “Why? Did you teach them to lie and steal?” “No” “Why are they bad?'' Silence. Then I said, “Because they have a bad father. They got it from you” In that sense we are not totally responsible. David, in self-defense, said, “I was born in sin. In sin did my mother conceive me” (Ps. 51:5). When we see a man with an ugly face we can say, “Poor thing. But it really isn't his fault. It is his fathers fault”. Considering the fact that we sin because we are born with the nature to do so we are like the man who accidentally kills another. Law demands justice but God has provided a city of refuge for us. We can flee to Jesus and be safe. I have known this ever since I have been saved. If a man doesn't like to flee to a city of refuge he will pay the price and get killed. But I never understood what the death of the high priest had to do with it. The killer could flee to a city of refuge and be safe, but he couldn't go home until the high priest died (Num. 35:25,28). Last week the Lord explained that to me.

There is a bewildering passage in Hebrews 9:16. Hebrews 7, 8, 9, and 10 all talk about the New Covenant. Tragically very few people understand what the New Covenant is that God has provided for us. Basically it is God has placed us in Christ so that, we are saved by our identification with Him, and He has placed Christ in us giving us a new nature that doesn't want to sin. And Jesus is our High Priest to represent us before God. But Heb. 9:16 says that the Covenant is not enforced until the priest dies. The answer to that mystery is linguistic. In our English language there is a basic difference between a contract and a last will and testament. In English, the contract is only good as long as both parties are alive. And a last will and testament is only valid after the rich man dies. You might have fortune coming but you can't get your hands on the money until Uncle Herbert dies. But in Greek the word COVENANT applies to both the contract and a last will and testament. Most of the provision of the New Covenant applies to a contact, but the the writer of Hebrews drops back to also insert the function of a last will and testament, that is only applicable after the author dies.

In the city of refuge the man who has fled there is really not free to go home until the High Priest dies. This tells us two things about our relationship with Christ. One is that the function of the New Covenant doesn't really take hold until death takes place. I cannot go into detail about this here other than to say this is Romans 6 – our death with Christ. The power of sin will still keep us captive until we learn that when Jesus died we died with Him and His death delivers us from the power of sin. But there is another wonderful aspect about the death of our High Priest. This is the last will and testament function (Heb. 9:16).

After Rosemary left I was really in bad shape. I lost everything. At one point I was building a house for my friend Rody. I had no home but he let me stay in a shack that he used for a mono oki (storage shed). It was filled with mattresses and junk, and had no heat or running water. It was about an 8x10 foot shack. There was a place for me to sleep like a rats nest but no drawers or any luxuries. It was freezing cold. One night I was feeling sorry for myself. I thought, “Man howdy, I am kawai so (pitiful)”. Suddenly the Holy Spirit spoke to me in almost an audible voice; “Son, thou art always with Me and all that I have is thine”. When it dawned on me where that was I was stunned. That is what the father said to the elder brother in the parable of the prodigal son (Lk. 15:31). I thought, “That poor turkey was in worse than me. He had everything but wasn't enjoying it”. I wondered; is it true that God could say to me “All that I have is thine.”? Then the Holy Spirit showed me that the Father has given heaven to His Son. It is a fact that God has given to Jesus everything. And God emptied heaven when He gave us Jesus. When Jesus died we inherited everything that was His. This is the second half of what Heb. 9:16 is telling us. We are the inheritors of Jesus wealth when He died. Oh my goodness, is that true?

There is another way of looking at it. By the law of God a man and a woman become ONE by marriage. When God placed us in Christ we literally became one with Him. It is an undeniable fact that we are joined by marriage to Jesus. That means we are coheirs with Him. All that He has is ours.

Oh my goodness, I can't begin to tell you what it was like when God gave me a bushel of apples and I didn't know which one to eat first. Gomen nasai. I wish I could tell you how wonderful Jesus is but I only have two hands. I guess you will just have to get some for yourself. All I can say is Jesus apples sure are oishi (tasty) (S. of S. 2:3).

                                               bill

Mark of the Beast

5 November 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Last week I had an amazing time with Sangha. At the moment the Lord has not given me a public ministry of proclaiming Jesus; but in the absence of a public ministry the Lord has given me one special brother that I speak with for an hour every morning.

Last week Sangha asked me about the mark of the beast in Revelation 13. I told him that is a hotly discussed subject in Christian circles and hundreds of books have been written.. I'm sure there are many theories, but I told him about four that have been banished about in recent years.

For generations the basic theory of the 666, mark of the beast, was a tattoo that would be placed on the forehead or right hand of everyone in the world. Without that tattoo no one would be allowed to buy, sell, or engage in any financial transaction (Rev. 13:16-18). When I was saved 60 years ago that was the only position I heard.

But 40 years ago, when the bar code took over the financial world, someone noticed that the basis of the bar code was 6-6-6. That made sense that without the bar code financial transactions looked impossible.

Then more recently microchips made their appearance. It is possible to record all personal data on a tiny microchips that could be implanted in a persons right hand or forehead that could be used in place of a credit card. We were told that the day would come when, not only would paper money disappear, but plastic money (credit cards) would no loner be used for buying and selling. All financial data would be recorded on these implanted microchips and read at check out counters. It was suggested that the microchip would be the compulsory mark of the beast.

The latest suggestion has been made by Walid Shoebad. Walid Shoebad is a converted Muslim who was born in Bethlehem of Muslim parents. After his dramatic conversion to Christianity he has become a well known Bible scholar/speaker. Shoebad has come up with a very interesting argument based on his observation of the Codex Vaticanus. The Codex Vaticanus is the oldest known manuscript of the Bible dating back to the 4^th century. It is written in Greek. Greek numbers, as is true also of Hebrew, are not expressed in our Roman numerals but in Greek letters of the alphabet. But in Rev. 13:18 the numbers written are not the Greek chi, xi, sigma but in Arabic. Shoebad said, “When I saw the 666 in the Codex Vatanicus I could read it. It was Arabic.” Shoebad tells us that what those Arabic symbols actually say is “In the name of Allah”. Well known Christian speakers ranging from Chuck Missler to Sid Roth have endorsed Walid Shoebad as a reliable authority and have come down heavily that the mark of the beast is actually the headband worn by all Islamic warriors written “In the name of Allah”. This gives credence to the argument that the anti-Christ will be Islamic and Islam must be embraced by everyone in the world or you are gone.

I don't know where I got this. I don't know if I heard it from some source or it is actually my own thoughts, but there is one other possibility to understand the mark of the beast. I told Sangha that sometimes to understand the spiritual teaching in the Bible we must identify the verb that goes with the noun. To illustrate this I asked Sangha, “What is the verb that goes with feet?” He immediately responded, “Walking”. “What goes with legs?”. - “Stand.” “Teeth?” - “Eating” “Tongue?” - “Talking”. Then I asked, “What goes with forehead?” He thought for a minute and responded, “Brain”. Brain is close – it is a noun - but I believe the verb that goes with forehead is our thoughts. When I said “thoughts”, suddenly Sangha exclaimed, “Uuuuuh, my body is tingling all over”. Sangha is the most infallible sign of the Holy Spirit I have ever met. In our times of fellowship when there is something of the Holy Spirit, he suddenly breaks out with goose bumps on his arm. Time and again he will say, “Look at my arm:. In every time I agree with him. He is truly amazing. He is the most infallible physical sign of the Holy Spirit I have ever seen.

In our talk about the mark of the beast I had previously shown Sangha the mark on the forehead of the 144, 000 in Rev. 7:3,4; 14:1, and the marking on the forehead of the righteous before the destruction of Jerusalem in Ezek. 9:4. The forehead mark in Ezekiel and the 144, 000 are clearly a spiritual sign – not a physical tattoo. I have thought for some time that the forehead sign is actually our thoughts or attitude. The forehead and hand speak of our thoughts, attitude, and the things we do (hand). This is the distinguishing difference between a Christian and a non-Christian; what we think – our attitude – and the things we do – our activities.

As I was taking Sangha through the noun-verb teaching and came to the forehead and hand possibility of the mark of he beast, suddenly he broke out in cold chills and goose bumps all over. He rolled up his sleeves and said, “Look at my arms”. That was something like I had never seen before. Suddenly he became tremendously energized and said, “I am totally different than everyone else”. His wife, Lec, is not saved yet. He said, “My wife and I are totally different. I think one thing and she thinks the dead opposite”. I asked, “What was it like six years ago?” “Oh, then we were the same, but now that I am saved I am totally different”.

What is the mark of the beast? I don't know. I seriously doubt that it will be a tattoo. I really don't think it is the bar code. We have moved past that. I question that it will be a microchip. Walid Shoebad has a good argument. The Codex Vatanicus is interesting. It certainly looks like the world is moving in a Islamic direction at a very high speed. I have seen several You Tubes that demonstrate that Europe and England are irreversibly moving towards becoming Islamic states in the near future. And the mark of the beast could be a spiritual mark that is our mind set and activities. I really hadn't taken my own theory seriously until I saw Sangha's reaction. I wonder if that discussion hadn't been more for me than for him.

Paul has told me about the time he was working with the FBI in counter terrorist intelligence. He told me that he was monitoring Islamics that had stashed away a huge arsenal of military weaponry in remote houses in upstate New York. He said the only possible explanation for such arsenals was plans for war; and added, “If they are doing that in remote places in upstate New York they must have similar places all over the US”.

Whatever the scenario, the Lord is giving us ample warning and this is a good time to look up. Praise God we know the last chapter and it won't be long before Jesus is here to receive the full reward of his sufferings. And it is a pretty good time to settle whose side we are on. May God put a seal on our hearts and a mark on our foreheads that, not only angels can see, but all the world can see that we belong to Jesus.

                                                 bill

Japenese Earthquake of 2011

29 October 2017

Dear Phyllis,

In 2011 I had one of the strangest missions the Lord ever sent me on. I had just gotten back to Thailand from a trip to Japan when the historic Tohoku earthquake/tsunami leveled the Sendai area of Japan. Neil Verwey knew that I had been involved in relief work when the major earthquake struck Kobe in 1995 and called me asking how long it would take to get back to Japan to go to Sendai. Remembering that in Kobe thousands of people were buried under mountains of rubble I knew that time was critical and paid double price to get to Ikoma 12 hours early. Tim Cole was the director of missionary relief. He knew that I had been in Sendai building a Bible school there and called Neil asking if he knew how he could get in touch with me. Neil said, “Bill is in the air right now and will be here in two hours”. Japan Mission prepared a truck for me that was so overloaded that the tires waddled as I drove out of their headquarters. Nearly all the main roads from Tokyo to Sendai were closed. To get there I drove up the west coast of Japan and came down to Sendai from the northwest. I pulled out of the Japan Mission headquarters at 2:00 AM and drove nonstop 21 hours arriving at the Bible school at 11:00 PM Saturday night.

The next morning, after worship service at the Bible school, I asked Nagai sensei, the principal of the school, what he was going to do that afternoon. He said, “Cut firewood”. “Cut firewood??? Here we have one of the most historic earthquakes in history and you are going to cut firewood?” “I don't have any gas for my car.” “Look, I brought half a dozen jerry cans of gasoline and a truck load of relief supplies.” That afternoon we put some gasoline in his car and drove 20 K to Sendai. We went to a church in the center of Sendai to see if there was anything we could do to help. The pastor told us some believers had suffered a little but no fatalities. Unlike Kobe, in Sendai there was little visual evidence of collapsed buildings. Then we drove to the coast. Oh my goodness! I had never seen anything like it. For nearly two hundred miles along the east coast of Japan it looked exactly like someone had taken a giant spatula or putty knife and scraped the surface of the earth. They had placed everything in a blender, and then re-plastered that paste back on the earth. The earth was covered with a coating of trash about waist deep of huge piles of what had been buildings, refrigerators, cars, trucks, children toys, and what had been towns. The paste was so even there was no difference between what had been towns and rice fields. I knew in a moment that there were no survivors. Unlike an earthquake, in a tsunami there only two types of people – those who fled and those who didn't. If you are caught in a tsunami your chance of survival is zero.

The relief mission was maddening. There were tens of thousands of people who had lost everything but the civil governments had stepped forward to handle all the relief work. I met many teams who had come from all over the world to help and we were all milling around with nothing to do. Franklin Graham's organization, Samaritan's Purse, had leased a Boeing 747 to fly 97 tons of relief supplies to Japan. I talked to the director of that mission and he told me that he had been in 37 different countries on relief missions and the coordination of churches in Japan was the worst he had ever seen. It looked like my expensive relief mission had been one colossal waste of time and money.

Before I had left Ikoma Neil Verwey had given me almost unlimited funds to buy anything I needed for the mission in Sendai. I had gone to a hardware store in Ikoma and saw a come-along. A come-along is an unusual devise of a metal box with a ratchet and handle, where you can crank the handle back and forth to pull tons of pressure along an unlimited length of cable. They are a wonderful device, but very expensive – nearly $1,000. Remembering my experience in Kobe, I thought that is exactly the tool I will need in Sendai, and bought one. My chain saw was invaluable in Kobe so I bought a chain saw also.

While I was sitting at the Bible school day after day with nothing to do, a sister from the church came over with a desperate problem. An old bath house was sitting on her property that had tipped over during the earthquake and was leaning against the house next door. The neighbor was furious and demanded that she fix the problem. Was there anyone who could help her? Man howdy, that is a difficult job. You are talking about an awful lot of money. That could only be done by professionals with a crane. I was probably one of the very few carpenters in Sendai with a come-along and that was exactly the tool needed for that job. It took me three days using the chain saw and come-along, and I was able to successfully tear the bath house down. The dear sister was speechless with gratitude that I was able to solve that problem for free. It was a major miracle that I had exactly the tools needed to do that job. But that wasn't the main miracle.

While working over there I noticed that she had a large butsudan. A butsudan is a large cabinet where they keep idols and worship spirits everyday. Nearly every house in Japan has one, and when someone gets saved the butsdan is the first thing to go. If someone gets saved but doesn't get rid of the butsudan it is like having a speed boat with the propeller going, but the boat still tied to the pier. The sister had been saved for many years but had never thrown out the butsudan. I asked, “What in the world are you doing with that filth thing in your house?”, and offered to haul it away for her. But she answered, “I don't worship at it any more, and, yes, I know I should get rid of it, but...” The last day I pushed the issue to the limit. I did everything short of ringing blood out of her nose. If anyone doubts the power of the devil it was on full display that day. She finally wound up crumpled on the floor crying, but I couldn't move her. With mix emotions of disgust, sorrow, and frustration I drove away thinking, “I came all this way only to loose to the devil”. But God's miracle was on the way.

Two days later she called the school and asked, “Could you have Bill come back here to get my butsudan?”. I was huge- six feet tall – but oh the joy to load that thing on my truck and burn it at the Bible school. I was grateful that I was able to do that job, and the dear sister was floating with joy to be free from the devil who had kept her in bondage for years.

In retrospect it looked like my main mission in Sendai was to burn that butsudan. I wondered at the wisdom of traveling 12,000 kilometers to burn a butsudan. But then Jesus had gone on at least two trips to reach only one person. He had gone to the Gadarenes to free the demonic living in tombs (Mk. 5:1-20). And His longest trip was to Tyre to help the Syrophenician woman with the demonized daughter (Mk. 7:24-30). I thought, “This is amazing, the Lord thought so much of that sister that He sent me 12,000 kilometers to come from Chiang Mai, Thailand to Sendai, Japan; and then pay $1,300 to buy the tools I needed to do that job”. But then again when we consider that God sent His Son from heaven to this earth to shed His Blood for us, and the horrific price that Jesus paid to save us; maybe a little extra yen isn't too bad a deal.

Praise the Lord,

                              bill

Random Thoughts on Revelations

23 October 2017

Dear Phyllis,

Gomen nasai. I am sorry that I am a day late today. Actually I wrote you yesterday, but before I sent my letter, Paul came over for some fellowship. I told him what I had written and he pleaded, “Please don't send that letter. It is not of the Lord and won't help anyone.” I felt strongly convinced that I was right and my letter was true. Incontestably what I had written was true but Paul challenged me, “Will this help anyone?” I have been convicted that every (maybe most) stories have two sides. As Christians we tend to only tell one side. In the interest of honesty I felt the other side should be told. I told about the dark side of a couple of really good testimonies and then went into detail sharing about shocking flaws of several great men of God. I said “we all have clay feet”. I felt very strongly that I was right. But the argument was; a man might be a man of integrity with a good message, and yet have bad breath. Bad breath doesn't detract from his message. What he says may be wonderful, but if you stand near him he might smell bad. Who is going to be blessed by talking about his bad breath? Okay, I deleted my letter and didn't send it.

Now it is Monday morning and I really don't have much to say. I just have a few scattered thoughts. I love Revelation. John's experience on Patmos is of extreme importance. His opening remark is very interesting. He was on the island and heard a Voice behind him. The first lesson we can learn from that is that he was looking the wrong way. I wonder if that isn't true of some of us. It looks like I was looking the wrong way when I wrote you yesterday and had to turn around before I could see the Lord. Man howdy, it is hard sometime to turn around.

The second lesson that we can learn from John's experience is after he was turned around the first thing he saw was 7 candle sticks. This perfectly expresses the function of Christians in the world. Paul reminds us that, “Ye are letters known and read of all men” (2 Cor. 3:2) It has been accurately said “that the only Bible that many people will ever read is Christ in you”. In nearly all cases before anyone ever picks up a copy of the printed Word of God or hears the Gospel the only representation of Christ is what they see of Jesus in us. That was the first thing that John saw. Then He saw Jesus standing in the midst of the Seven Golden Candle Sicks.

I cringe when I think that the Church is Christ's representative on earth. Like it or not, that is the way it is. But fortunately the Lord is very honest is showing us an accurate view of the Church with all of her warts and blemishes. That is why I thought I was in the Spirit yesterday talking about the blemishes of high profile Christian leaders. But talking about bad breath isn't uplifting and no one gets blessed.

Innumerable messages have been preached on the Seven Churches of Rev. 2 & 3. Rolly Reasoner was preaching a series in Karuizawa many yeas ago and prefixed his messages by saying, “In looking at the churches; just because one thing is right does not mean that everything is right. And just because one thing is wrong does not mean that everything is wrong.” That was a word for me. I had a strong tendency to denounce somebody if they were off on some point. I am still very hard head on false prophets but reluctantly have to back off sometimes and give a few speakers I don't like a little slack.

There are three interpretations about the Seven Churches. The first is that this was John's message to seven actual churches in Asia Minor. That may be so. In John's day there were actually seven churches there, in what is now today Turkey. The second interpretations is that this is a chronological view of the history of the Church. I'll buy that. This is pretty accurate with Ephesus being the first church and Smyrna being the second persecuted church. Laodicea is a dead ringer for the disgusting affluent church today. The third interpretation of Revelation 2 & 3 is that these churches represent various weakness and sins in our personal lives. Who hasn't gotten under conviction when we hear a message about losing our first love for Jesus? Every sin that we see in the Seven Churches are red flags to be careful about in our own personal life.

Along with Revelation we must read her sister book, Daniel. I have been an avid student of eschatology ever since I have been saved. Along with everybody else I bought into the traditional view of Daniel 2 – Nebuchadnezzar image. When I was saved in 1957, the bench mark of spirituality was the CI Scofield Bible. If a man didn't have a Scofield Bible it was questionable whether or not he was saved. This set the stage for the traditional western view of eschatology. But recently Joel Richardson and several prophetic scholars have challenged the traditional view saying that the Bible is Mideastern and the Bible seen through the eyes of people from the Middle East looks much different. I think they are right. For nearly a century nearly everyone was agreed that Ezek. 38 & 39 was Russia's invasion of Israel. Hal Lindsey eloquently forwarded that position. The key to Ezek. 38-39 is the identification of Gog, Magog, Meshech, and Tubal (Ez. 38:2,3). Scofield placed these participants in Russia on the basis that they come out of the land of the north (Ez. 38:15; 39:2). No reasonable prophetic scholar questioned that. But Richardson challenges, if you take a globe and draw a line directly from Jerusalem to the north pole it misses Moscow altogether. Russia is well to the east of true north. But the line goes directly through Ankara, the capital of Turkey. And every conservative Bible atlas list these areas as being located in northern Turkey. Richardson warns, the country to keep your eye on today is Turkey. All this is very much under the radar. Turkey is still held up as the model western Islamic nation. But there are a few voices warning that there a very intense nationalistic movement in Turkey today. Richardson says that Erdogan, the dictator of Turkey, is the Ayatollah Khomeini of Turkey. What Ayatollah Khomeini did in converting a very western Iran to a fanatical Islamic theocracy in 1973 Erdogan is doing exactly the same thing in Turkey today. Richardson also lays up a strong argument that Gog is another name for the anti-Christ. It doesn't take too much imagination to believe that the anti-Christ is Islamic. These are some major shifts I have made in my position of eschatology. All this makes a great deal of sense as we watch the kaleidoscope of the changing scene in the Middle East. I really believe we are in the day of “hold-your-hat-Hanna” as we are galloping towards the day of the fulfillment of what the Word of God has told is will happen in the last act.

Gomen nasai for being late this week and I apologize for a rambling letter. As they say in the south “Ya'll pray for us now, he'ya. bill

Abraham

15 October 2017

Dear Phyllis,

I knew a fellow in Japan who had a 10 watt radio transmitter in his attic. It carried about 100 yards. Every night he would go up in his attic and broadcast the Gospel over the radio. Unfortunately I don't believe many of his neighbors who were within the 100 yard range listened. This morning I preached to an overflow crowd at the church of two old ladies and two old men with an average age of over 65, plus one boy about 21. I have been pleading with the Lord for years for a voice to proclaim the cause of Christ to thousands and I will leave the results of today's message with the Lord. But I did have a marvelous time sharing a very important message.

The 15^th chapter of Genesis tells of a pivotal moment in the life of Abraham. Verse one begins with the statement “After these things”. Obviously that refers to what happened in chapter 14. There we read about the civil war going on in Canaan land and his nephew Lot being captured. In a moment of haste Abraham, armed his servants, took off after the captors, and rescued Lot. Returning back, the king of Sodom met him and said, “You keep the booty and just give me the souls”. Abraham said, “I won't take a shoe string lest you say, 'I have made Abraham rich'”. Would to God that we had more men of God today who would refuse to enlarge their bank accounts with the riches of Sodom.

Obviously Abraham had some serious thoughts on his mind when he went to bed that night and was worried if he had made a mistake. The last thing he wanted was to get involved in local skirmishes and he had just kicked that can of worms. And he had some second thoughts about giving back all he had won to the king of Sodom. Some time after midnight Abraham woke up realizing that the Lord was speaking to him. The first thing the Lord said to him was, “Fear not, Abraham, I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward”. That settled the two concerns on Abraham's mind. But then Abraham brought up the old problem about Sarah having a child. The Lord told Abraham to go outside and look up at the sky. It was a gorgeous night outside. He told Abraham that if he could number the stars that was what his seed would look like. The next verse says that “Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness”. Paul quotes this in Romans 4:3.

But then the Lord gave Abraham some very specific instruction about offering a sacrifice. There was a heifer, a goat, a ram, and two birds. Sometime shortly after dawn I'm sure Abraham was busy making an altar and getting the sacrifice ready. Then he sat down fully expecting the Lord's response. That was a wonderful place to be. The ball was in the Lord's court. He had done exactly what God had told him to do.

This was not something that Abraham had thought up; that he thought would be a good idea to try and see what God would do. In this Abraham is much different than 90% of Christian activity today where we think something is a good idea and hope that God will come on board to help us with our project.

Having done everything God told him to do, Abraham sat down to wait for the response of God. Nothing happened. After a while Abraham looked up and saw a black spot in the sky. Then two. Then three. Four. Then they got larger. Buzzards. Abraham picked up a stick and verse 11 says “When the fowls came down on the carcasses Abraham drove them away”. Here Abraham was expecting the glory of God on his sacrifice and instead he got buzzards on the carcasses. There is something depressing about that noun “carcass”. A sacrifice is something holy but a carcass is just dead meat.

What a bummer of a day! It started out with such high expectation. Abraham had every expectation of nothing but the best, and instead of meeting with God, all he got for the whole cotton-picken day was a stand-off with buzzards.

That is the way it works. We have such high hopes as we launch out to follow the Lord and instead of blessing all we get is a bucket of worms.

Paris Redhead was an outstanding missionary to Africa. He left the states to go to Africa with every expectation of success, but when he got there he was surprised that the Africans were not appreciative that he had come. Worse than that, he discovered that the Africans were really bad people. They were so bad they weren't worth saving. Finally he got genuinely angry with God. He protested, “Lord, this isn't fair. I have sacrificed so much to come here to save these people and they aren't worth it. They deserve to go to hell”. But then Jesus answered him; “You are right. These people aren't worth saving, but I am worthy to have them. I paid the price for their sin and I deserve to receive the reward of My sacrifice.” That is the reason why we preach the Gospel. It is not because people are in bad shape and going to hell. No one deserves to be saved. But Jesus paid the price for our sin and He deserves to receive the full reward of what He paid for.

Don't be surprised if you start off serving Jesus with full expectation of the blessing of the Lord and things go south. Abraham spent the whole day with the buzzards. He was wore out. Evening came and the Bible says, “When the sun was going down a deep sleep came upon Abraham; and lo a horror of great darkness fell upon him”. But then in verse 17 we read, “As the sun was going down, and it as dark, a smoking furnace and a burning lamp passed between those pieces”. This is the only place in the Bible we see the Lord responding this way. With Able, Elijah, Solomon, and a couple other places we see the fire of God coming down on the altar to consume the sacrifice. But here we see the fire of God passing between the pieces. We know there was a custom in ancient times when two people were to make a covenant they would slay an animal, cut it in down the middle and pass between the pieces (Jer. 34:18). Verse 18 tells us, “And the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abraham...”

This was one of the major moments in the life of Abraham. The night that started off worrying about what had happened the day before. But then that wonderful exchange with God during the middle of the night only to wind up spending one of the really bad days of his life with buzzards. But then when it got dark again and he was all wore out God made the major covenant with Abraham.

I don't know why I preached this message or if anyone got anything out of it, but the Word was as alive and powerful as it ever gets. I don't know if this is a word from the Lord for me. I don't feel the least bit old but one of these days the sun will go down for me. I know that frequently the Lord has to take us to the end of ourselves before He can use us. I qualify for that. It is pretty dark. I see little hope that the Lord will ever use me. There are only two things I am asking Jesus for. One is the salvation of my son Dave. The second is that before I leave this plant I would like something of my life to be a credit to the Lord. All of that is in God's hands.

Thank you for the privilege of your fellowship,

In our marvelous Lord Jesus,

                                                bill