INTRODUCING CHRIST TO THE JEWISH PEOPLE

Repaying Them for Introducing Jesus to Us

Thought for the book taken from the message

delivered on November 8, 2015

Dawsonville, Georgia U.S.A.

INTRODUCING CHRIST TO THE JEWISH PEOPLE

Repaying Them for Introducing Jesus to Us

Greetings to each one of you this morning. I appreciate you in the Lord; and I appreciate the Lord Jesus Christ who gave His life for us at Calvary, for He has blessed us abundantly with all spiritual blessings. Please turn with me to the Book of Romans, Chapter 11. We will start our reading there today. And as we usually do, we will have other scriptures to read; for the Word says in Isaiah 28:10, “For precept must be upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little:” That’s the way it goes in the preaching of God’s Word.

So I want to minister on a line of thought, Introducing Christ to the Jewish People: Repaying Them for Introducing Jesus to Us. As we speak on this thought, you will understand its significance as we go further into the message. But before reading, let us pray.

Heavenly Father, we come praising you, Lord, for your goodness and your mercy upon us. And, Lord, as we are gathered together here in your name, you have said, “I will be in the midst.” And now, Lord, you’re not only in the midst, but we’re in you as a member of your body, baptized into the body of Christ by one Spirit. And we thank you for accepting us as part of your wife. Bless us and anoint us together and help all the hearers of the Word to receive from it that which you are giving us in this day. In Jesus Christ’s wonderful name. Amen.

Let’s go to Romans 11:13; Paul is writing to the Romans here and he speaks of taking the gospel to the Gentiles. And as Paul began to preach the gospel (taking it to the Gentiles), a small group, containing both Jews and Gentiles, began to really hear what he had to say. They believed his preaching concerning the Kingdom of God and blended together as a virgin that was destined to become the wife of the Lamb. And although God told Paul that he was the apostle to the Gentiles, many of the Jews heard his message; even though Romans 11:13 says, “For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office:”

At the beginning of Paul’s ministry, he went preaching the gospel of Christ to many Jewish congregations with the other twelve apostles that were called to preach to the Jews. But problems began to arise; for Paul soon found that what God gave him for the Gentiles didn’t work very well with the Jewish believers. And it wasn’t until the church leaders sent Paul away did they have peace. In Acts 9:28-31, it says, “And he (Paul) was with them (the twleve apostles at Jerusalem) coming in and going out of Jerusalem. And he spoke boldly in the name of the Lord Jesus, and disputed against the Grecians: but they went about to slay him. Which when the brethren knew, they brought him down to Caesarea, and sent him forth to Tarsus. (Please notice the remainder of this scripture.) Then had the churches rest throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria, and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied.” Here we get a clearer understanding of what Paul was called to do. Because it seems that as long as he tried to stay at Jerusalem and work with the twelve apostles who were sent to the nation of Israel, there was trouble in the Jewish churches.

Now everything that was happening to Paul at Jerusalem was working towards getting him into the calling wherewith God had called him. It was working God’s perfect will, pushing him in the direction of stepping out with a message that would call the Gentiles and the Jews into God’s perfect will where they could become a part of the body of Christ.

Here we are seeing the earlier signs of God’s plan to call from both the Jewish people and the Gentiles a number from both to be espoused to Christ to be His wife here at the end time. Now we are beginning to see God’s plan as it is unfolding unto us; even as Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13:12, “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.” So as we take this journey in the Word today it will become very clear to the wife of the Lamb what God’s plan was from the beginning.

Now the Jews were already acquainted with God’s laws and the things of God, but the Gentiles were not. The Gentiles had many gods. When Paul was in Athens, on Mars Hill (which was one of the places that Paul went as shown in the Book of Acts, Chapter 17), he saw many different altars to many different gods. Then he saw an altar with an inscription that read, “TO THE UNKNOWN GOD.” Can you imagine how shocked Paul must have been when he saw the many altars to the different gods? It’s here that we begin to understand the depth of the thinking of many of the Gentiles.

There were many different gods in the minds of the Gentiles that they were ignorantly worshipping; but they did not know the God that made heaven and earth. (This reminds me of the different religious denominations of our day.) This shows us what kind of life many of the Gentiles lived before the light of the gospel that Paul preached came to them (1 Corinthians 6:9-11), which caused their thinking to be different.

Since the day of Pentecost, Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the King) was known to the Jewish Christians. But these things were totally unknown to the Gentile world other than the fact that they knew about a place called Jerusalem, and that there were people there that worshipped some kind of a god and that they only worshipped this one God. So as Paul was shocked at all their gods, likewise it was probably shocking to the heathens (Gentiles) to know that Israel worshipped only one God. They no doubt would have said to the Jews, “You mean you have only one god?” Because at that time, the Gentiles had a god for this and a god for that, why they had all kinds of gods, but they did not know the God of the Jews, the one and only true God.

To summarize the story in Acts, Chapter 19— In Athens there was a great economy built around the making of images to the different so-called gods. So when Paul began to preach and tell them, “Those images are not gods,” a certain man named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made his living by making shrines to the goddess Diana, went to the other workman of like occupation and began to turn the people against Paul. Demetrius felt he had to protect himself and his fellow laborers, so he said, “You see brethren how our occupation is in danger. This one comes presenting another god that is going against our trade of making images. And we will soon be out of business if we don’t stop him, because he is saying our images made with hands are not gods. And not only will we be put out of business, but that the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised and her magnificence should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worships. So went their argument against Paul’s preaching. But the point here is that Paul came preaching to this type of people and he began to introduce them to Jesus the Christ, because they knew nothing about Jesus Christ or a Messiah to come.

Notice, he didn’t introduce them to Jesus the King of the Jews who is going to come and set His throne up in Jerusalem to be the King of all the earth. No, he had to preach Christ Jesus to them in a way that would give them a part of God’s Kingdom at that present time. Paul knew that most of the Gentiles had very little respect for the Jews and their religious laws. This is the reason that he came preaching the good news about Christ Jesus to them, instead of preaching Jesus, the King of the Jews. This was by the wisdom of God; and this was the way Paul began to bring in the good news of Christ to the Gentile people, to give light to their darkened souls by the light of the gospel of Christ.

Now Christ came on the day of Pentecost in the first leg of His spiritual coming as the Holy Ghost. And at that time, it was not known that there was more of Christ to come (as the second leg of His spiritual coming is seen in Revelation, Chapter 10). And as Paul began to preach Christ to the Gentiles, many of them began to rally to what he was saying. And as he was introducing the Gentiles to Christ, he was also telling all that would hear him (both Jews and Gentiles) that God told him to go to the Gentiles. It was of most importance, especially to the Jewish people, to let them know this. It was his main calling to let the Gentiles know that God had sent him to them, who previously were not part of God’s covenant. That’s why Paul said in Ephesians 2:11-13, “Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the common-wealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.” It was after this that Paul began to talk about one body that consisted of both Jews and Gentiles, saying that by one Spirit we are baptized into that one body. He said that God has broken down the middle wall of partition. The wall that was broken down was between a selected number of predestinated people from the Jews and Gentiles as He has made of twain one new man whom he referred to in other places as being a virgin that he espoused through his message to Christ to become His wife. Here Paul is speaking of the same group of believers as shown in Ephesians 2:14-18.

So we see that as time went by, more and more Paul began to bring out the fact that his prophetic message would make of both the Jews and Gentiles one new man created in Christ Jesus. So there had to be a new covenant for this new man that’s shown in Ephesians 4:13-16, which shows that this man is not under the covenant that governed the church ages; for it is made clear to us in Revelation 10:6-7 that this time period of the church ages came to a close. And it was at this time that the authorization came from heaven, as the Almighty God spoke again and said, “Go and take the little book which is open in the hand of the angel which stands upon the sea and upon the earth.” And we went to the angel and said, “Give me the little book.” And the angel said, “Eat it up and prophesy again.” (Revelation 10:8-11) That brought us into the new covenant for the wife of the Lamb which completely delivered us from the church age covenant.

Therefore, as Paul began to preach his message, it came into conflict with not only the Jewish church but the Jewish society and even with the Gentiles. But some of the Jewish people began to really get interested in what he was saying. They began to want to know more about God’s plan. In Romans, Chapter 16, Paul began to make mention of some of the saints of both the Jews and the Gentiles who were the espoused virgin. He mentioned Priscilla and Aquila, who were Jews that had a church in their house; as a small group of the Jews and the Gentiles began to come together in Christ by the message that Paul was preaching. This was taking place even though there was still that group of Jewish people that believed in Jesus and believed that He was coming back to this earth to rule and reign. By this time it was very clear that the Jewish church still didn’t go along with Paul’s teaching concerning circumcision, the Sabbath day, meats and drinks, and being baptized into the body of Christ. They seemed to be perplexed by Paul’s teaching concerning the espousal of the virgin to be married to Jesus Christ, God’s Son, and his teaching about the rapture of the one body made up of both Jews and Gentiles.

We find in Galatians 2:6-9 where Paul went to one of their meetings in Jerusalem, and he took Titus with him. And remember Titus was a Gentile. The Jews wanted Paul to have Titus circumcised, because that was the Jewish way; for they were still keeping many of the customs of the law, such as the Sabbath days and other holy days. But Paul told them, “I am afraid of you, because you still want to keep these customs when Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. (Romans 10:4, Colossians 2:16, and Galatians 4:10-11)

So Paul came with a gospel to call out a people of the Gentiles. And as he called out a people of the Gentiles, some of the Jewish people were also coming in and hearing what Paul had to say, and they believed it, as many as were ordained to be a part of the wife of the Lamb. And they all, both Jews and Gentiles, became the engaged virgin to become the wife of the Lamb, while the other Jewish people went on their own way with the Jewish church to fulfill their part of the Word.

In Romans, Chapter 15, Paul writes about the ministry of Jesus Christ, who came to confirm the covenant to the fathers. The fathers were the Jews; and God made many promises to them. The promise was to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that from the Jewish people a king would come. And then to David, He said, “I will raise up a son to sit on your throne.” And on and on the promises go.

We see that Jesus Christ couldn’t go to the Gentile world and He commanded His disciples not to go to anyone except the lost sheep of the house of Israel. So the Jewish apostles preached the gospel as they were instructed by Jesus Christ in His earthly ministry. In Matthew, Chapter 10, He told them, “Go not to the Gentiles. Go not to the Samaritans. But go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” And in Acts 11:19, it says concerning the Jews, that as they were scattered abroad they went everywhere preaching the Word to none but unto the Jews only. This clearly establishes the fact that the people that the twelve apostles were preaching to were Jews. Hence the need for Paul and his preaching to the Gentiles.

So the twelve apostles presented the Messiah, the King, to the Jewish believers. But Paul was looking at a truth in the gospel that God kept hidden from the twelve apostles, as his gospel was different in many ways. His message was showing Christ in you, the hope of glory; rather than just looking for Jesus Christ to come back and sit on His throne in Jerusalem and take over the earth and put down the enemy. In Acts 3:19-21 Peter told us about King Jesus coming back to this earth to start His Kingdom at the beginning of the millennial reign. And although Paul knew this, he presented the gospel in a different manner, saying things such as, “Ye are dead and your life is hid with Christ in God.”

When Paul came to see Peter, James, John, and the other apostles who were there at Jerusalem, it was made clear to them that Paul had the gospel for the Gentiles. So they told Paul and Barnabas, “You go to the heathens, and we will go to the circumcision,” thus separating the gospel of the circumcision and the gospel of the uncircumcision and making the gulf very wide between the Gentiles and the Jewish people who both were looking for the coming of the Lord, but in two different manners. (Galatians, Chapter 2)

Again, we find in Acts 3:19-21 (right after the Holy Ghost began to move on the Jewish people), Peter began to tell them about Jesus Christ coming back again. He said, “Repent ye, therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; And he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you: Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.” In Acts 1:6-9, we see where the apostles asked Jesus before He went away, “Lord, will you at this time restore again the Kingdom to Israel?” And Jesus said unto them, “It’s not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in His own power.” So Peter picked up that same thought and said, “The heavens must retain Him until the times of restitution (meaning the millennium).” And that’s when God will send Jesus Christ back to this earth. And, of course, that will be after the tribulation period. But what’s being said here completely ignores a great truth that wasn’t made known to the Jews at that time. It was only made known to Paul and those that heard him, that Christ would come in the fullness of His spiritual coming to rapture the wife out of the earth before the great tribulation period.

We read in 1 Thessalonians 4:15-17 where Paul spoke of the coming of the Lord and it was from an entirely different viewpoint than what Peter presented in Acts, Chapter 3. Paul said in 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17, “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” That’s the rapture, where the living saints (we which are alive and remain) will be changed into glorification without going by the way of death. This takes place immediately after the dead saints that are part of the wife are resurrected; then together we will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air.

Nowhere did Peter or the other apostles to the Jewish people speak of being caught up to meet the Lord in the air. They spoke about the Lord coming back to start His Kingdom, which He will. But there was something hid in God that only Paul revealed unto the body of Christ to those from both the Jews and the Gentiles that would be in the resurrection to be a part of the wife. Paul said, “This is a mystery that God made known to me, the mystery which was hid from the foundation of the world.” And for the body of Christ in our day we find where Christ came back to earth not as the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, although He is coming that way later, but first He comes in the fullness of His Spirit and we are baptized into Him as His wife. (Revelation, Chapter 10)

Now this part of the gospel was not preached to the nation of Israel in the fullness that is seen in Revelation, Chapter 10, and Ephesians 4:13-16. Paul only prophesied about it. Neither did the Gentiles have it in its fullness until now. Although Paul did tell them about the waterless baptism at that time; and in doing so he was giving the virgin the Word for that hour which would baptize them into the first leg of the spiritual coming of Christ. Much of this Word that we are now hearing was not available until we received the second leg of the spiritual coming in this last day, which brings together those that have gone on before us with the living part of the body of Christ, as we all receive the fullness of both legs of the spiritual coming as seen in Revelation, Chapter 10. Please keep in mind that this did not take place in its fullness in Paul’s day. And now God has made known to the wife (we which are alive and remain) these secrets, including the fact that it was unknown to the wife until now. That’s because it has been hid in God since the foundation of the world. And now is the time for this gospel to go forth by the sounding of this last trumpet.

We see that when the Jewish part of the church fell away, the Gentile part of the church fell away also; and both went into the dark ages. And, of course, the Jewish people for the most part went back to doing the things that you see today in their worship services, keeping many of the customs of the Law of Moses; and most are looking for the coming of the Messiah. And the Lord is not going to disappoint them. The Messiah is going to come back to this earth and He is going to put down the enemy. He is going to come and sit on His throne there in Jerusalem. And He will take His position as the King of the earth. Zechariah 14:9 says, “And the Lord shall be king over all the earth; in that day shall there be one Lord, and his name one.” Thus satisfying the desire of all the children of God.

Now that is all so beautiful and so true. But if we stop here and leave out or skip over what’s taking place in our day, then we miss an entirely different working of God. We would be leaving the wife totally out of the picture when we speak of the Millennial Kingdom. But when speaking of God dealing with Israel after the Pentecostal baptism (Acts, Chapter 2) that happened for the Jewish people, here’s where we see in God’s plan a place for Paul’s message to be highlighted in revealing the mysteries that were hid in God from eternity. (Ephesians 3:9) In showing these mysteries of God that He revealed through Paul, it makes Paul’s work shine as an apostle to that part of God’s working in the first leg of the spiritual coming of Christ, as Paul was laying the foundation for us to build on in this second leg or the fullness. So Paul’s job included reaching over to the Gentiles to get them involved in a special part of God’s plan. But some of the Christian Jews did not like that. Read Acts, Chapter 13, where Paul was trying to get the Jews, also, to understand what he was preaching. But they could not understand without it being revealed unto them by the Holy Ghost.

Paul spoke of the spiritual coming of Christ, which he made very clear in the scriptures of 1 Thessalonians 4:13-16, 1 Corinthians 15:51-57, and Ephesians 4:13-16 of which the twelve apostles showed very little interest. Well, they didn’t want what Paul had to offer. They had what they wanted, they were waiting on the Messiah; although the predestinated saw what Paul was bringing. And now in this last day, some of the Jews are believing in Christ Jesus as our Savior, Husband, and King by hearing this last trumpet sound and by revelation of this anointing.

When Paul talked about the spiritual Kingdom, he was talking about Christ. But when the Jews talked, much of the emphasis was on the Savior, the Messiah, and an earthly Kingdom. That was some of the difference in their thinking. And when they looked for the coming of Jesus Christ, they looked for Him to come as the Savior and their King. Not one place in the Bible did Peter ever say that He was going to come back and we were going to be caught up to meet Him in the air, or that at the last trumpet there is a coming together where we are married. Not one time did Peter talk about engaging a virgin. Not one time did Peter talk about being married to Christ and becoming bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh. Not one time did he talk about Christ being our righteousness in the way that Paul did. Romans 9:30 says, “What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith.” This scripture shows how the Gentiles obtained righteousness, whereas Israel as a whole sought after it partially by works. (Romans 9:31-33 and Romans 10:1-4) Also, in Acts, Chapter 21, it shows that upon Paul’s return to Jerusalem that he was rebuked because he was not including the works of the law in his preaching concerning the righteousness of God.

Now the title of our message, Introducing Christ to the Jewish People: Repaying Them for Introducing Jesus to Us, is coming into view; for here we see that the Jews indeed did let us know there is a Savior and we indeed owe a debt of gratitude to these wonderful people for sharing with us their Savior and King, which is also our Husband. They were telling us that He is coming back to earth, He’s going to take over this earth, and that there is a millennium. That is laid out so clear, especially in the Old Testament books. And it was continued by Jesus Christ as He preached to Israel. Then Peter and the other eleven apostles continued the same.

So we see that Paul came as an apostle to introduce the Gentiles to Christ; not to the Jewish Messiah, as this was not his main message. But the sad thing about this is that the Jews didn’t receive Paul very well back then; and they haven’t since then, with the exception of the predestinated Jews that are to be part of the wife of the Lamb. These are the ones that Paul said unto, “Your names are in the Book of Life and have been there before the foundation of the world.” (Philippians 3:3) That’s those that, by revelation from God, can receive this Word.

So it becomes very clear that the Jews, as a people that were given the Law of Moses, are not the Lamb’s wife. Jesus spoke in a parable concerning this fact in the Book of Matthew 22:1-14. Here a king is shown preparing a marriage for his son. He sent invitations to those of his kingdom (which were the Jewish people). But they made light of it and would not come. Then the invitation was withdrawn as the king became angry and sent and destroyed their city and slew those evil men. And he said concerning this marriage supper (Luke 14:24) that none of those men which were bidden shall ‘taste’ of my supper. That’s when he said, “Go out into the highways and hedges and bring in the lame, the blind, the poor, and all who will come, that my house may be full.” The truth we see here is that the wife of God’s Son does not come out of those religious Jews because of any special privileges that they might have as a Jewish nation. Paul understood this, as he came on the scene preaching that God does not take out of the Jews as a privileged people to be His Son’s wife. He let us know that the door was open to the Gentiles, also. This created the opportunity for God to create the new man, taking from both the Jews and the Gentiles and bringing them into the plan of God; making them a part of the body of Christ, as it existed under the baptism of the Holy Ghost which was the first leg of the spiritual coming of Christ. Now the body of Christ is neither Jew nor Gentile, but has become Christ the wife.

So we must look to the Word of God in order to see that Christ is the Spirit that is the anointing. And more than that, He is the Spirit of the soul of the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s what came out of Him on Calvary and came back on the day of Pentecost in the first leg of His spiritual coming. And by that first part of His coming, He (through Paul’s message) got a people engaged of both the Jews and Gentiles. And Paul says in 2 Corinthians, Chapter 11, “I’ve espoused you as a chaste virgin to Christ, that I might present you unto one husband.” In other words he was looking for and expecting a marriage. And that was the purpose of gathering a people from the Jews and the Gentiles to make one new man—Christ, who now by marriage has made us Christ, His beautiful wife.

Now nowhere in the Jewish gospel do you find such writings as that. But I am here today to introduce to the Jewish people this marriage message, just as they introduced their Messiah, Savior, and King, to us. And they also showed us what would take place in the earthly Kingdom of one thousand years. I’m so glad that they shared these wonderful blessings with the Gentiles. And now I am here to share with them the blessing of being part of the wife of the Lamb which is the Christ in the earth that came back in Revelation, Chapter 10, and it is totally hid from all but those that are predestinated to be part of Him. The predestinated will see it, they will receive it, and nothing can stop them. So introducing Christ to the Jewish people—that’s the message that we are anointed to bring, just before the rapture.

I sometimes watch some Jewish programs on television, and what they teach is as far off of the Word of God as what some of the reprobate Gentile preachers are teaching. Many of them have gone to eight candlesticks. And I saw one yesterday on a Jewish station where the young folks were dancing to something like rock-and-roll with their little skull caps on their heads. Some of those traditions are nothing more than the figment of some rabbi’s imagination and some of those things date back to the dark ages. It’s not in God’s Word for our day. But, praise God, help is now here; for we are here to introduce the real Christ to you that has come in this last day. Our Jewish brothers already know very well about the Messiah, and that He is their King. They know He is coming. But I’m telling them about Christ—those that have an ear to hear.

So as the Jewish apostles introduced Jesus, the King, to us, we are now here to repay them for their goodness by introducing Christ to the Jewish people, telling them that, “In the Spirit, He has already come.” He came in Revelation, Chapter 10. So come on Jewish folks and accept the message that will make you part of the Word that has become the very wife of the Lamb! Let us break down that middle wall of partition again! And that is what I am doing in this message. Don’t miss it!

We’re talking about introducing Christ to the Jewish part of the wife. The Bible speaks of the Lord and His Christ. That’s in Revelation, Chapter 11. A great truth is seen here as now we have the understanding that our Lord Jesus has put the Christ part of His name upon us, His wife, and we rejoice in the fact that we are now bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh.

Today many people can see the Lord, but they know not His Christ (the anointed one), which is His wife. Adam and Eve is a good type of this. God took from the spirit of Adam all the feminine attributes and created Eve his wife. And Paul used this same example, saying that we would become bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh and would have His Spirit, making each member of the body part of Him. (Ephesians 5:30-32) We have been baptized into Christ; not into Jesus, not into the King. We’re going to sit by the King’s side. We have been made keepers of the King’s papers! We’re riding in the second chariot! Like Joseph in Egypt, he rode in Pharaoh’s second chariot, and there was nothing above him except the king. It’s the same way with Christ the wife in the earth that carries His name and rides in His second chariot. And we are introducing Christ to the Jewish people, as they introduced their Messiah to us in earlier times.

We are introducing Christ to them, and the predestinated will hear and accept it, making them part of the wife; while those that are not the wife will be looking for the King to come back and set up His Kingdom on earth, which He will after the tribulation. In Revelation 19:11-14, we see King Jesus and His wife coming back. And at that time the other saints will be raised from the dead with glorified bodies to see the King sitting on the throne and His wife sitting by His side dressed in fine linen, clean and white. So as we received of their mercy, now, in return, they receive of our mercy to them. So here’s the message introducing Christ to the Jewish people as they introduced Jesus as their Messiah unto us!

Paul said in Romans, Chapter 15, “I am the minister of Jesus Christ to you Gentiles.” Jesus couldn’t go to the Gentiles because of a covenant with the Jews, but God had a man that could, a man that loved those Gentiles. It was Paul that said, “I am the apostle to the Gentiles.” Not Peter, James, nor John, but Paul! And he introduced Christ to the Gentiles as a Spirit to be baptized into. He said, “You’re dead and your life is hid with Christ in God, and when Christ comes you’ll be like Him, and the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven.” All of this is in the Spirit. But with the Jews it’s mostly in the natural—Jesus Christ, Savior, and King. But let me tell you something, Jews; the King has a wife and she has the Christ part of His Spirit. She has that part of the name. That’s why the Word says, “The Lord and His Christ.”

In Acts 13:42-49, Paul went and preached to those Jews; and the religious leaders didn’t like it at all. But the Gentiles besought that these words might be preached to them. Well, the Bible says that on the next week he spoke to the Gentiles and almost the whole city came out to hear him. Well, those Jews got jealous and they were angry, and they began to contradict and blaspheme everything Paul said. They threw him out of the city, but Paul shook the dust off his feet and he said, “It was necessary for the Word to be preached unto you first, but seeing you have rejected it and put it away from you, lo we turn to the Gentiles; for thus did the Lord command me saying, ‘I’ll make you a light to the Gentiles.” Well, that’s now reversed, and it’s the Gentiles that have rejected this truth. We are telling the Jews, “There is a light. And Christ is that light that is shining through us, His wife, that lights a way for you to become part of the wife of Lamb.”

Here, God takes us into the knowledge of the spiritual man, Christ Jesus, by revelation, whereas the twelve apostles that preached to the Jews saw Him as the physical man, Jesus Christ, and spoke of His coming in that manner. They also showed Him as the King of the earth. And when the twelve saw Jesus Christ go up, they saw a man going up to heaven. A cloud received Him out of their sight. And two angels came and stood there and they said, “This same Jesus (not Christ) that you see go up, He will come in like manner.” And we now understand that the Lord Jesus, the King, comes to begin His one thousand years reign as the King of Kings, and the Lord of Lords.

When Paul spoke of Christ in 1 Thessalonians 4:13-17, he spoke of His coming as a spiritual coming. And John saw Him coming in this same way in the Book of Revelation, Chapter 10. Paul said, “God has made known to me this mystery that has been kept secret from the foundation of the world.” And although the Book of Revelation wasn’t written at the time, Paul spoke of the same spiritual coming of Christ which is recorded there. And now we’re making known to you this mystery that has been kept secret from the foundation of the world that Christ came back in the fullness of His Spirit and there are three parts of His ministry—the shout, the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God. And it is the trump of God which is sounding right now. And this is what raises the dead and changes the living! And then we’ll be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. That’s the Christ that came back in Revelation, Chapter 10. He put one foot on sea and one foot on earth.

I was studying on that when I was writing the book entitled, The Interpreted Book of Revelation in 1978-1979, and I had come to Revelation 10:1-2 where it says, “And I saw another mighty angel come down from heaven, clothed with a cloud: and a rainbow was upon his head, and his face was as it were the sun, and his feet as pillars of fire: And he had in his hand a little book open: and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth,” And I was wondering about those feet in that scripture—and he set his right foot upon the sea, and his left foot on the earth. And I just left my Bible opened and went on to bed and fell asleep immediately. And I had a very short dream, but it was a powerful dream. In this dream, I was walking down through a meadow towards an old farmhouse. It looked like it was pretty much broken down. I didn’t believe that anyone lived there, so I walked up to the house. Then suddenly the door opened. And there stepped out a man with a bull horn in his hand. He put it up to his mouth and said very loudly, “Remember the feet!” And with that being said, he lowered the bullhorn down to his side and turned and walked back into the house and I was suddenly wide awake. I got up and read that again, “Right foot upon the sea and the left foot on the earth.” That’s when it came to me that there were two parts of the spiritual coming of Christ back to earth. See, the first part of His spiritual coming was on the day of Pentecost, which was the baptism of the Holy Ghost. The second part of His spiritual coming was fulfilled by the coming of Christ in His fullness as the Mighty Angel.

So when the Jews received the Holy Ghost, they received a portion of the life of Christ, now known as the first leg of His spiritual coming. And they went forth. But they didn’t receive this gospel that we’re preaching now, known as the second leg, or fullness, of the spiritual coming of Christ. That’s in Revelation, Chapter 10. It shows the fullness of Christ, both legs of His coming. So Paul looked down through the eyes of prophecy and he recorded the three parts of this spiritual coming that brings the fullness as seen in Ephesians 4:13-16. That is both legs of His spiritual coming which is the fullness. And as God is introducing this to the Jewish people, the Lord Jesus is not seen ‘hopping’ into Jerusalem on one leg. But He is coming in the fullness of Christ and all those that’s to be part of the wife will see and understand by spiritual revelation.

Notice, I’m not talking about the coming of the Messiah to start the one thousand years Kingdom age here. Get that out of your mind. That’s altogether a separate thing and it takes place about seven years later at the end of the 70th Week of Daniel. So the wife which includes those Jews that have heard and accepted this Word are like-minded. This includes Jews, such as Priscilla and Aquila. Because when they heard Paul’s preaching, by revelation they saw it and accepted it. And there are those like Apollos and some of the others that heard what Paul said, and you couldn’t pry them away from it with a big pry bar. You take Timothy, you take Titus, they just stayed right with it. All are part of the virgin of Paul’s day, and they become part of the wife by the sounding of this last trumpet message.

In the Jewish realm of Christianity they were progressing well until about 70 A.D. when Jerusalem was destroyed and the churches were destroyed within the city. The Jews were taken to all nations into captivity and many of them were sold as slaves. And from henceforth, when you found a Jewish congregation, they were doing much like they did in the Old Testament. So from the time Jerusalem was destroyed, the Jewish church went down, down, down, as far as Christian beliefs were concerned. But I’m happy to say there were a few that were still believing in Jesus. But many others had the hope that, “We’ll build that temple back.” “We’ll offer that lamb on the altar for our sins.” And on and on it went like that as they went into darkness. And that’s why this last trumpet message is so important here at the end time for the Jewish part of the wife as it is for the Gentiles.

After the destruction of Jerusalem and the Jews being scattered into all nations, the Jews still worshipped in synagogues, while there was a Gentile church coming through the seven church ages. But there were not very many Christian Jews to be found after this. There were only a very few Jewish believers amongst the believers in Christ Jesus in the Gentile congregations. For we find that most, both Jews and Gentiles alike, got away from the Word. That’s why they didn’t get the little book that Paul wrote. For the Spirit of it was taken up to heaven with Paul, while the written Word of it stayed here. The revelation of Paul’s prophetic message was put within the Book of Redemption, which was then sealed with seven seals, and remained thus until the seals were loosed in this last day and the Book of Redemption was opened and that small portion (the little book) was taken from it and brought down to us by the Mighty Angel. And once the seven thunders uttered their voices to clear up the mystery (which is now history) of what had happened in the church ages, the Almighty God told John (a type of the Lamb’s wife) to take the little book out of the hand of the Mighty Angel and eat it up (our part of the Book of Redemption). And upon our asking, it was given unto us, the wife. We asked for it and received it and ate it up. And the revelation of it baptized us into Ephesians 4:13-16 where we are now prophesying again. Amen.

So we ate the little book while we were coming through Revelation 10:8-11, which brought us into Ephesians 4:13-16 where we’ve reached the fullness of the body of Christ. So have we been baptized into the body of Jesus? Absolutely not. Are we baptized into the body of the physical King that’s coming back to sit on the throne? No. We’re baptized into the body of Christ by one Spirit. And our spiritual baptism makes us part of Him, makes us bone of His bone, flesh of His flesh, spirit of His Spirit, and mind of His mind. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ.

Listen up, Jews. Would you like to be part of the wife of the Lamb? Then here’s the gospel. As you introduced Jesus, the Messiah, to us, we introduce Christ to you. And here it is! It’s shining as a bright light. It’s here to give you life! It’s here to translate these mortal bodies. It’s here to take you out of this earth before tribulation begins, and that’s before that temple is ever built again in Jerusalem, your city of the King.

Now here at the end time, Christ has come back in His fullness as a bright shining light. It was said to Paul in Acts 13:47, “I have set you to be a light to the Gentiles, delivering them from the power of Satan to the power of God.” And now here’s a message sent which will deliver the Jewish people, those that want Christ and want to be part of the wife of the Lamb. It will bring them home, which is the heavenly Jerusalem (the body of Christ). So my Jewish brothers and sisters, this will make you part of the wife of the Lamb. This trumpet message is sent to those that want to be one with us as part of the wife, those that want to have the righteousness of Christ Jesus, those that want to be married to Him, clothed in fine linen, clean and white, and go up in a rapture.

There is only one body of Christ. This message that Paul laid the foundation for is the message that has broken down any part of the wall between the Jews and Gentiles that has been erected through time by religious leaders and reformers that were less enlightened to God’s plan for the wife of the Lamb. Now we see there is no separation in the body. It’s just as Paul said in Ephesians 2:14. And in this last day that middle wall of partition has been broken down, making of twain, one new man! And that new man is the man Christ Jesus and we became that when we were baptized into the fullness of Christ. We do His work, we express Him; and now you can’t see the wife without seeing the man Christ Jesus. And now when someone looks at us, they are looking at Him, who is now our King and Husband. The Messiah is going to be the King of Israel, as well as the King of the whole earth. But I’m telling you about the King of Saints, Christ Jesus, the same yesterday, today, and forever!

So here we are with a message that is opening doors! Hallelujah! It is opening doors that have been sealed closed. It is opening doors that religious leaders said couldn’t be opened! And there are people today that stay out of the land of Israel because they believe that the Jews will not accept the Lord Jesus Christ until the two prophets come (the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks) of Revelation, Chapter 11. And so they say, “Stay out of Israel with the gospel.” Well, those that have that kind of thinking should definitely stay out of Israel. But we know that Israel’s time has come and that they are hearing this trumpet sounding. But also we know Israel, natural, (the nation) will stay right where they are; for they are not going to accept being the wife of the Lamb.

Just like these denominational churches out here—if you say, “I’m the wife of the Lamb,” they’re going to look at you like you are crazy. A man told me awhile back that he let someone hear one of my audio messages, and after they heard it, the person asked, “What did that preacher mean by saying, ‘We are the wife?’ What’s he talking about when he says the wife? Where is the church?” Yes, there’s a church. But that is not what we are talking about. I’m talking about the wife. She’s the one that is baptized into the body of Christ. She’s the one that has become bone of His bone and flesh of His flesh. She’s the one that recognizes that He came in Revelation, Chapter 10, and gave us that prophetic Word and we ate it up. Praise God, and now we are prophesying!

In Paul’s day, those Jews that heard his message were drawn to it, just like a magnet, drawing them to Christ; and they became part of that engaged virgin. And now, those that have a spiritual ear are drawn to Christ by this message, by this light. This is the light going forth. There’s a light that shines forth to those that sit in darkness. When Jesus Christ came forth walking on the seashore of Galilee, the Bible says those that sat in darkness saw a great light. Well, here’s the great light again! And His face is shining as the sun! And here He is, Christ back in the earth again! Not one person, but the body. Christ is the Spirit that came down and we were baptized into that Spirit and have become Christ the wife. The Christ of all ages is now in the earth. And now He is here as the wife of the Lamb.

The Messiah is going to come. Yes, He is! Somebody said, “Well, you’re trying to preach against what Peter said.” No. I believe what Peter said one hundred percent, that the heavens must retain Him until the times of restitution, meaning the millennium. (Acts 3:20-21) Peter said that God would then send Jesus and He will come and sit on His throne—and that’s true. But remember what Peter said was before the Book of Revelation was written. So Peter didn’t see some of these things.

The Apostle John, being caught up in the Spirit on the Isle of Patmos, saw Him coming back (as he wrote in Revelation 19:11-14) on a white horse, meaning the power of the Word. And they that were with Him were on white horses, clothed in fine linen, clean and white! That’s the wife of the Lamb that was caught up before the tribulation ever begins; for there is only one group in the Bible shown in the New Testament that is clothed in fine linen, clean and white. (Revelation 19:7-8, and Ephesians 4:13-16) What is that fine linen? It’s the righteousness of God—and this message of righteousness is going forth! Some will harden their heart against it and reject it, and because of this, they can’t go backward nor forward. They are stuck in their ways. And therefore when tribulation comes, after the rapture takes place, they will still be preaching, “The Lord is coming back some day.” And He will. But what they don’t know is that there’s a people that leave before the tribulation period begins. And it’s after that when Jesus Christ, the King, comes back to earth with His Christ wife.

I was telling you some weeks back about talking to a man that said to me, “Now Ben, if I understand what you are saying, you believe that Jesus comes before the tribulation.” And he continued to talk, saying, “Ben, if you’ll just read your Bible, you’ll find out that Jesus doesn’t come back until after the tribulation period.” I said, “You are exactly right. But Christ comes back to resurrect the dead members of His body and changes the living before the tribulation begins. Then we go up with the Lord. And then we come back with Him after the tribulation period for He is our Husband and King and we start the millennial reign together.” It’s that simple.

Let’s go to Romans, Chapter 11. I’ll start with Verses 27-28, it says, “For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins. (That was to the Jews.) As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes:” And we’ve seen that. If you don’t believe it, read. Everywhere Paul went, see what they did to him. See what they did in Acts 14:19; they stoned him and threw him out of the city and left him for dead. But he got up and continued his preaching. But watch what the rest of Verse 28 says, (Paul writing)—“but as touching the election, they (the Jewish people) are beloved for the fathers’ sakes.” In other words, it’s going to be exactly like what Peter said. Israel is going to be the leading nation in the millennium. There will sit in Jerusalem the Lord Jesus the King and His wife by His side. Verse 29, “For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” What is he indicating here in this particular setting? In this particular setting there are promises that God made to Israel. There are promises He made to Abraham. There are promises He made to David. Paul said in Romans 11:28, “As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes (and still are in many cases). But as far as the election is concerned, they are beloved for the fathers’ sake.” Meaning that God will bring His seed into what He promised, in that great millennium.

Watch what he says in Verse 30, “For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief:” In other words, when they rejected the gospel, God turned to the Gentiles which was all in accordance with His plan.

Verse 31, “Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.” Here it is Jews! Here it is! You can have it! Through your mercy, through the nation of Israel, the Messiah came. And when God would have given you the gospel, as a nation you rejected it and God turned it over to the Gentiles—and we received your gospel. In the Book of Galatians, we see how the Jews were saying, “We’re Abraham’s seed,” but Paul showed them that Isaac wasn’t the spiritual seed, the prophesied one, but it was Christ. (Galatians 3:16) So everything Abraham had concerning the salvational blessing, we are part of it.

Again, “Even so have these also now not believed, that through your (our) mercy they also may obtain mercy.” In other words, what they brought to us, we’re giving it right back to them. And by our mercy they receive mercy (just like we received of their mercy). So as God ordained, here is a message that reaches out and makes them part of the wife of the Lamb to take them up in the rapture. And the remainder of the Jews will get the chance to hear the two prophets of Revelation, Chapter 11, at the beginning of the 70th Week of Daniel or the 144,000 Jews that preach the everlasting gospel starting at the middle of the week.

Verse 32, “For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.” In other words, He makes no difference in Jews and Gentiles when it comes to this gospel of Christ as far as being part of the wife. He’s saying, all of us were in trouble, Jews and Gentiles alike. God concluded us all in unbelief. Verse 33, “O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!” In other words, who would have known God would do it this way, that God would strike a man down and say, “Go to the Gentiles”? And who could know that in this last day that God would raise up a people called the wife of the Lamb that is seen in Ephesians 4:13-16 and say unto this body, “Take this gospel back to the Jews from whence it began.” For it has reached its fullness in the wife!

See, that’s the wisdom of God. That’s the unsearchable wisdom of God. And Paul said, “He made known to me these secrets, mysteries that have been hid since the world was. And now Verses 34-35, “For who hath known the mind of the Lord? (Paul said we have the mind of Christ.) Or who hath been his counsellor? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?” Paul is saying, “What you are seeing, this is what God is doing. It is by His wisdom.” And God knew all along before the world was that He would do it just like this.

So, Jews, it’s not a disgrace to accept this gospel from the wife of the Lamb. It is not belittling, but rather glorious, to come in and accept this gospel of Christ to be the wife of the Lamb, to be baptized into the body. All of this is by the unsearchable wisdom of God. And then the last verse, Verse 36, says, “For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be the glory for ever. Amen.” In other words, we glorify God. Who ordained it this way? God. Who could have figured it out? No man. No man could instruct God. But here it is in this hour. No one would have known the Gentile world would fall apart and go into apostasy, and that there would come forth a little group that loves Jesus, who are a part of Christ Jesus, who are baptized into the body of Christ, making us the very wife of the Son of God. And now to the Jews who have an ear to hear this Word, you can receive our mercy and come in and be part of the wife of the Lamb. God bless you. Let us pray.

Heavenly Father, we just thank you for your love, goodness, and mercy. I pray, Lord, that you will take these words that we’ve spoken here today and use them for your glory. And may the hearers of it, may those of the Jewish linage say, “I’ve never heard it on this order. I want this! I want to be the wife of the Lamb. I want to go out in the rapture.” O God, we pray and ask this. We ask for your mercy. As we received the mercy of the Jews, Father, as the wife of the Lamb we freely return all of our mercy, as we pray you give this mercy to the Israeli people to break down the middle wall of partition and make of twain one new man, the wife of the Lamb. O God, we love you and we appreciate you. In Jesus Christ’s name, we pray that you will bless each one. Amen.

AUDIO/VIDEO SERMONS AND BOOKS

All sermons by Brother Ben Howard are recorded on Cassette tape, CD's, DVD's, and Mp3 formats. Also, there is a collection of published books that are available for download or by request as well. Please feel free to visit us at our website often as new materials are constantly being added, or write to our postal address below.

Sound Of Liberty

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