https://youtu.be/4BCwPoe2eyE
https://youtu.be/E66BgO-9eGU
Arc of the Covenant
Most people readily recognize that the
Star of David,
the
national symbol of Israel, is apparent in the symbol.
However, what is less intuitive is that the Star of David
is NOT an additional or separate part
of the overall symbol.... it is rather MADE
by the
combination of two other symbols.
Ephesians 2:11-22
Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh--who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands-- 12that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
But now in Christ Jesus you
who
once were far off
have
been brought near
by
the blood of Christ.
For He Himself is our peace, who has
made both one,
and has broken down the middle wall of separation,
having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is,
the law of commandments contained in ordinances,
so as to create in Himself one new man
from the two,
thus making peace, and that
He might reconcile them both
to God in one body
through the cross,
thereby putting to death the enmity.
And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off
and to those who were near. 18For through Him we both have
access by one Spirit to the Father.19 Now,
therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens
with the saints and members of the household of God,
having been built
on the foundation of the apostles and prophets,
Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone,
21in whom the whole building, being fitted together,
grows into a holy temple in the Lord, 22in whom you
also are being built together for a
dwelling place of God in the Spirit.
God has made
ONE NEW MAN from TWO distinct parts....
Jewish and Gentile believers in
ONE BODY of MESSIAH..
A Messianic Seal from the Christian church in ancient Jerusalem has been rediscovered after 2,000 years. This ancient symbol was found on Mount Zion. It is believed to have been created and used by the Jewish believers who called themselves Nazarenes in the first Messianic Church. Three companies -- Olim Creative Products of Tiberias, News About Israel (NAI) of Jerusalem, and Christian Floral Delivery of Colorado -- jointly announced the discovery of this ancient symbol, which has been copyrighted by NAI. It consists of three separate but integrated symbols: a menorah at the top, a star of David in the middle, and a fish at the bottom. In each of the renditions of the three-part symbol the star is created by interlacing the stand of the menorah with the tail of the fish.
The Messianic Seal was found etched or inscribed on eight ancient artifacts. The artifacts were presented to Ludwig Schneider, editor in chief of NAI's magazine Israel Today, in 1990. They came from Tech Otecus, an elderly monk who lived as a hermit in the Old City of Jerusalem. Otecus said that in the 1960's he had personally excavated about 40 artifacts bearing the Messianic Seal from an ancient grotto located in the immediate vicinity of the Upper Room on Mount Zion. What was once the main entrance to the grotto is now covered with a jail-like heavy wire mesh enclosure. Its door, leading down into the ancient baptismal place, is tightly secured with a heavy chain and lock. According to Schneider, the last remaining entry to the grotto was sealed shortly after he excitedly told the priests at the local monastery about the discovery of the Messianic Seal.
Schneider photographed eight artifacts which were given to him by Otecus, and showed the pictures to the curator of the Israel Museum. "When he had carefully studied my pictures," Schneider recalled, "the curator immediately promised me that these artifacts and their unique symbol were an important find. He told me that the museum already had seen other artifacts bearing the same three-part symbol from some other sources he did not specify." According to Bob Fischer, president of Olim Creative Products and co-author with local historian and artist Reuven Schmalz of their book, The Messianic Seal of the Jerusalem Church, the ancient three-part symbol has, since 135 AD, been suppressed by various Israeli groups or agencies, such as the Israel Museum and Orthodox rabbis in the Old City of Jerusalem, while simultaneously being buried for these nearly two millennia by the church.
According to Fischer, at least two of the eight artifacts were obviously ceremonial pieces which may well have been used by James the Just, the brother of Jesus, who is said to be the first pastor of the church, or perhaps even by one or more of the Twelve Apostles. One of the eight artifacts is a brick-sized block of well-worn local marble. This piece bears an etched version of the Messianic Seal with a Taw (the last letter in the ancient Hebrew alphabet that looks exactly like a sign of the cross) in the eye of the fish symbol, as well as the ancient Aramaic lettering proclaiming the use of this artifact as a stand to hold a vial of anointing oil. The ancient Aramaic is transliterated as, "La Shemen Ruehon" (For the Oil of the Spirit). Another of the eight artifacts is a small, almost intact, vial which could well have sat on top of the marble stand.
Commenting on what he characterized as the "monumental importance" of this archaeological discovery, Fischer said, "Beyond the historical background of the Nazarenes, the first Jewish believers who founded the Jerusalem Church, the Messianic Seal itself proclaims to the world the pervasive Jewishness of Jesus Christ and the decidedly Jewish foundation and roots of the church founded in His name. The Messianic Seal of the Jerusalem Church," Fischer continued, "strikes at the very roots of anti-Semitism while proclaiming a compelling message that restores unity: Jew with Jew, and Jew with Gentile. The importance of this discovery cannot be minimized.
The Messianic Seal
is not only just the key to understanding the
Dead Sea Scrolls,
it can and should shake the foundations
of the church and orthodox Judaism
with its incredible
message of unity and
love.
It breaks down barriers
that have
existed for millennia
and
points the way toward restoration."
Yes, this symbol does give us an understanding,
visually,
of how the
EARLY church viewed itself!:)
When we understand that this was a prominent SYMBOL for Messianic followers of Jesus (as opposed to the more modern Christian use of the fish by itself), we may infer their understanding that Gentile believers were grafted into and were spiritually a part of Israel by means of faith in Yeshua of Nazareth, the Son of God. Instead of just the Jewish people being the "covenant" people of God (i.e. ISRAEL), now BOTH Jewish and Gentile believers in the Messiah could be part of the SAME FAMILY of FAITH, the SAME INHERITANCE, and the SAME OLIVE TREE by the CROSS. Paul says that we (Gentiles) have been BROUGHT NEAR by the blood of Messiah... we are no longer STRANGERS and FOREIGNERS of the household of God (the Children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob). Now, we are fellow citizens that are being fitted into the holy temple that is founded upon the prophets, apostles, and Jesus the Messiah Himself (who, if you have not taken the time to notice, are ALL Jewish).
This symbol may cut cross-grain with the notion that somehow the church has "replaced" Israel in God's operation and promises. Instead, God has called (the predominantly Gentile church) to come along side those of Israel who do not believe (yet) to intercede for them, witness to them of Jesus as the Messiah, help materially, and bless them till they find their restoration as a nation of priests unto the Lord. It vitally re-establishes the fact that the "CHURCH of Jesus" should be the strongest ally of the Jewish people and Israel itself--especially given the world tide against them. It reminds us that we are Gentiles grafted as a "wild" BRANCH into a Jewish vine. We did not replace the vine--and, more importantly, not ALL the Jewish branches have fell off either, only some... (Romans 11:11-24) Somebranches have remained, all throughout history, and many Jewish people today are embracing Jesus (Yeshua) as the true Messiah.
We as Gentile believers in the Jewish Messiah have been BROUGHT NEAR, MADE MEMBERS of the COMMONWEALTH of ISRAEL (the HOUSEHOLD OF GOD), by our faith in Jesus. Jewish believers in the Jewish Messiah have been BROUGHT to true fulfillment of the LAW by their faith in Jesus as well. Both groups (as Paul says further in Romans) are under the condemnation of sin and both groups need salvation by faith in Jesus, the Messiah, based on His atoning work. We are one family now by this common faith-- what Paul also calls the "One New Man". It is the ONE NEW MAN that this symbol of the "early" (predominantly Jewish) church so clearly illustrates. We as Gentiles believers have become a PART of the same heritage that Israel has... our spiritual roots are NOT in Rome, Tulsa, Colorado Springs, or Constantinople... IT IS IN JERUSALEM!
Though Gentile believers are not called to live Jewish or Hebraic lifestyles culturally in this age, our identity as believers in Jesus is forever tied to ISRAEL and the Jewish people.. and as the FULLNESS or MATURITY of the GENTILES is being witnessed, we need to be ever watchful of what our role should be as the Church in this hour to Israel and the Jewish people (Scripture has much to say about this).
It also reminds us that the Gospel is to the "Jew" first ...
and that we are nearing the time of history when the LORD
is going to lift the veil off Israel and Jewish people as a whole--
the coming day when "all" Israel will be saved.
The full return of all of Israel to their Messiah
should be a primary prayer focus for the Church of Jesus.
The Incarnation ennobles us, draws us up into God, and thus makes us our “best selves”As well as pointing up our moral nature and demanding that we choose well, the Incarnation, for Lewis, performs an astounding work of drawing us up into the divine presence. Lewis launches into his key apologetic work Mere Christianity with this observation: “At the beginning I said there were Personalities in God. Well, I’ll go further now. There are no real personalities anywhere else. Until you have given up your self to Him you will not have a real self.”[1] This is a version of the classical Christian teaching of theosis, formulated by Athanasius, who said that “God became man so that we can become gods.” That startling language does not mean that we become what God is in his essence, but rather that we are re-attached to the divine life, which overcomes the death at work in us because of the Fall. He came to earth, to flesh, in order to lift us back up with him.
“Lewis has a couple of unique ways of describing the Incarnation. In Letters to Malcolm, he suggests that the Incarnation can be described as Heaven drawing Earth up into it. He asserts that when God the Son took on the human body and soul of Jesus, he took on with it the whole environment of nature—locality, limitation, sleep, sweat, aching feet, frustration, pain, doubt and death. The pure light walked in the darkness and the darkness, thus received into the heart of Deity, was swallowed up. In his uncreated light the darkness was drowned.
In other words, by not just creating us, but also becoming one of us, Christ ennobled and raised up all of humanity. The truest things about ourselves are all areas where we reflect the image of our Creator—not just as he is in the Trinity, but also as he is in the Incarnation: “Our own composite existence,” said Lewis, is “a faint image of the divine Incarnation itself – the same theme in a very minor key”.[3] The fact that we are spirit dwelling in a body parallels Christ’s divine spirit dwelling within his human spirit.[4]
To get a sense of Lewis’s deep devotional engagement with the theme of the Incarnation, remember that Miracles was published in 1947, and Lewis had first read his Greek edition of Athanasius’s De Incarnatione on Christmas Eve, 1942 (years previously to writing the introduction to his friend Sister Penelope’s translation). The date of this and a subsequent reading (Good Friday, 1958) indicate that he read the book not only with a scholarly interest, but also devotionally.
Moreover, he had started reading his friend Dorothy Sayers’s earthy sequence of radio plays on the life of Christ, The Man Born To Be King, sometime around 1943. Writing soon after (May 1943) to Sayers, he confessed that he had even had the properly medieval affective response to her appropriately earthy portrayal the Incarnation: “I shed real tears (hot ones) in places: since Mauriac’s Vie de Jesus nothing has moved me so much. . . . I expect to read it times without number again.”
This he indeed did. At Sayers’s 1958 funeral, he said that he had read it “every Holy Week since it first appeared, and never re-read it without being deeply moved.” That would mean that by the time of his eulogy for Sayers, he would have read Sayers’s deeply incarnational play sequence at least 16 times, and likely he continued to read it five more times before his own death Nov. 22, 1963.[6] In 1949, in answer to an American Nazarene man’s question about modern authors, Lewis replied that although he usually didn’t read modern authors, “I think D. Sayers Man Born to be King has edified us in this country more than anything for a long time.”
Lewis engaged the doctrine of the Incarnation on a deeply imaginative level. He uses a set of striking images for the Incarnation and what it did for us and for all of Creation. One is that of the deep-sea diver. Like the diver working on a salvage project, Christ goes down into his own creation “in order to bring the whole ruined world up with him to new life.[n. 66: Miracles 115].”[8]
The beautiful, organic, mutual vision of this coming down and drawing up seemed, to Lewis, like a great dance: “The partner who bows to Man in one movement of the dance receives Man’s reverences in another. To be high or central means to abdicate continually: to be low means to be raised: all good masters are servants: God washes the feet of Men.’”[9] The whole final section of the Fall-redemption story Perelandra shows us this dance, in strongly Incarnational terms: “The Incarnation was for Lewis the turning point of the universe. In Perelandra, he has this reflection: “All which is not itself the Great Dance was made in order that He might come down into it. In the Fallen World He prepared for Himself a body and was united with the Dust and made it glorious for ever. This is the end and final cause of all creating, and the sin whereby it came is called Fortunate and the world where this was enacted is the centre of worlds. Blessed be He!”
These images evoke the old idea – rooted in Athanasius’s thought and dominant in the East but shared as well by Augustine and the Western tradition – of salvation as theosis, usually translated in English as “deification” or “divinization.” What happens to us in that process is akin to what happens to the creatures who had been turned to stone in the White Witch’s courtyard: static pictures of God, made in his “sculptor’s shop,” “some of us . . . some day [are] going to come to life’”[10] under the vivifying power of the breath of the dying-and-rising Aslan:
“We are not begotten by God, we are only made by him:
in our natural state we are not sons of God, only (so to speak) statues. We have not got Zoe or spiritual life: only Bios or biological life which is presently going to run down or die. The whole offer which Christianity makes is this: that we can, if we let God have his way, come to share in the life of Christ. If we do, we shall then be sharing a life which was begotten, not made, which always has existed and always will exist.”
“This is touching doctrine with the glow of imagination. L’s fundamental insight is that, by entering the dance or drama of the Trinity, we truly become sons and daughters of God; we truly become persons. This is mainline Christian doctrine, expressed in an imaginative form.”
Restoration is At the Door
TWO TIMES the anti-Christ tore down the Temple
https://youtu.be/E66BgO-9eGU
According to the Bible (Genesis 22:1–14), God told Abraham to bring his son Isaac to the land of Moriah (meaning “Chosen by Yah”) and offer him as a sacrifice on a mountain there. As Abraham was about to complete the sacrifice, God stopped him and provided a ram as a substitutionary sacrifice. In this same location, nearly 1,000 years later, God led Solomon to build the First Temple (2 Chronicles 3:1).
David had identified this location as the place for worshiping God because it was here the plague was stayed when he confessed his sin, and he purchased the place so he could build an altar (1 Chronicles 21:18–26). Solomon’s Temple stood until the Babylonians destroyed it in 586 BC. Zerubbabel led the efforts to build the Second Temple, which was completed in 516 BC, then enlarged by Herod the Great in 12 BC.
The Second Temple was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70,
fulfilling Jesus’ words in Mark 13:1–2.
According to the prophecy of Daniel 9:27, it appears that there will be another temple built, for there will be sacrifices that are stopped by the Antichrist. Since the other parts of Daniel’s prophecies were fulfilled literally, leading up to Jesus’ life and death, we look for this part to be literally fulfilled also.
The Hebrew prophets all proclaimed that in the last days, the exiles of Israel would return to the Promised Land and that the Temple would be rebuilt.
“Then the nations will know that I the Lord make Israel holy, when my sanctuary is among them forever.” (Ezekiel 37:28)
These phenomenal end-time events are unfolding before our very eyes!
The Prophetic Return to Israel and the Third Temple
“I will bring back my exiled people Israel; they will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them.
They will plant vineyards
and drink their wine;
they will make gardens and eat their fruit.
I will plant Israel in their own land,
never again to be uprooted
from the land I have given them.”
(Amos 9:14–15)
So many skeptics around the globe like to proclaim
that God has rejected the People of Israel
and that Israel has been rebirthed
by man alone.
Yet, we find in Scripture that God never
intended to reject His People forever:
“You, Israel, My servant,
Jacob whom I have chosen, Descendant of Abraham My friend,
you whom I have taken from the ends of the earth,
and called from its remotest parts and said to you,
‘You are My servant, I have chosen you and not rejected you.”
(Isaiah 41:9)
God always planned to bring the Jewish People back
to
the Land on His terms not man’s.
And just as the prophets foretold,
the Jewish People
are returning to the Holy Land from the
four corners of the earth
after 19 centuries of global exile:
'Do not fear, for I am with you;
I will bring your offspring from the east,
And gather you from the west.
“I will say to the north,
‘Give them up!’ And to the south, ‘Do not hold them back.’ Bring My sons from afar
And My daughters from the ends of the earth.”
(Isaiah 43:5–6)
Not only are the exiles of Israel
returning to the Promised Land,
but preparations to build the Third Temple
are progressing through the efforts
of the Temple Institute and the
Temple Mount Faithful Movement.
Why Build the Third Temple?
“Here am I,
and the children the Lord has given me.
We are signs and
symbols in Israel from the Lord Almighty,
who dwells on Mount Zion.”
(Isaiah 8:18)
You might ask yourself, “If the sanctuary was ‘a copy and a shadow of what is in Heaven (Hebrews 8:5),’ and Yeshua (Jesus) ‘serves in the sanctuary, the true tabernacle set up by the Lord (Hebrews 8:2),’ why contemplate building the Holy Temple?”
The Holy Temple in Jerusalem was never simply a building or structure, but an earthly dwelling place for the Divine Presence of God.
The Lord said,
“Let them construct a sanctuary for Me, that I may dwell [shakan] among them.” (Exodus 25:8; see also Exodus 40:34–35 and 1 Kings 8:11)
This dwelling (shakan) forms the related word Shekhinah, which is not found in the original Hebrew Bible, but it is used in rabbinic literature and Bible translations to describe the Lord’s Divine Presence.
The Prophet Ezekiel witnessed the departure of this Divine Presence from the Temple (Ezekiel 10:18–19).
But he also saw the rebuilding of an eternal and permanent dwelling place of God on the Temple Mount in the Holy City of Jerusalem.
“The glory of the Lord entered the temple through the gate facing east. … I heard someone speaking to me from inside the temple. He said: ‘Son of man, this is the place of my throne and the place for the soles of my feet. This is where I will live among the Israelites forever.’” (Ezekiel 43:4–7)
Rambam (Rabbi Moses Maimonides), a medieval Jewish philosopher and Torah scholar, said that the Temple has eternal significance.
He wrote in Hilchos Bais HaBechirah (The Laws of God’s Chosen House)
that the Temple had two primary purposes:
- To reveal to mankind the Divine Presence of God, which dwelt above the mercy seat of the Ark of the Covenant.
- To facilitate the offering of the required sacrifices.
(Temple Institute)
With no Temple in Jerusalem,
the Jewish people now
worship the God of Israel in their local
community synagogues and in the study of Torah.
Instead of offering animal sacrifices, they now offer
Tefillah (prayer), Teshuvah(repentance), and Tzedakah (charity).
Many think that animal sacrifices have been done away with forever, but according to Bible prophecy, this simply isn’t so. The Lord tells the Prophet Ezekiel that in a future Temple, the prescribed sacrifices will be offered:
“The north and south rooms facing the temple courtyard are the priests’ rooms, where the priests who approach the Lord will eat the most holy offerings. There they will put the most holy offerings—the grain offerings, the sin offerings and the guilt offerings—for the place is holy.”
(Ezekiel 42:13)
But a serious question arises not only for the Jewish community,
but for all Believers in Yeshua:
will the next Temple—the
Third Temple
be
Ezekiel’s Temple where
the
Divine Presence
will once again reside—or will some other
presence reside in another
Temple?
Daniel, Yeshua, the Anti-Messiah, and the Third TempleIn the prophetic writings of the Book of Daniel and the Brit Chadashah (New Testament), we find significant details about the role of a rebuilt Temple in the end times.
Both Daniel and Yeshua (Jesus) tell us that the Anti-Messiah will defile the Third Temple before the return of the true Messiah.
They both call this spiritual defilement in the Temple the abomination of desolation:
“So when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination that causes desolation,’ spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand—then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.” (Matthew 24:15–16; compare with Daniel 9:27, 11:31, and 12:11)
According to the Prophet Daniel, the Messiah would be cut off
before the Temple is destroyed:
“After the sixty-two weeks the Messiah [Mashiach] will be cut off and have nothing, and the people of the prince [ruler, nagid] who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary. And its end will come with a flood; even to the end there will be war; desolations are determined.” (Daniel 9:26)
This prophecy was fulfilled in AD 70 with the destruction of the Temple, just forty years after Yeshua HaMashiach (Jesus the Messiah) was cut off by his execution on a tree.
Through the study of numerous end-time Scriptures, we believe that this prince or ruler (nagid)—the anti-Messiah—will appear just as Daniel describes.
Daniel says he will confirm a covenant of peace “for one week” (often interpreted as seven years) but break that covenant in the middle of the term.
“And he [the prince] will make [some translations say ‘confirm’] a firm covenant with the many for one week, but in the middle of the week he will put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering; and on the wing of abominations will come one who makes desolate [some interpretations say, set up an idol on the wing or precipice of the Temple], even until a complete destruction, one that is decreed, is poured out on the one who makes desolate.” (Daniel 9:27; see also Matthew 24:15; 2 Thessalonians 2:4)
The anti-Messiah will also proclaim himself to be God!
He [the man of lawlessness] will oppose and will exalt himself over everything that is called God or is worshiped, so that he sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be God.” (2 Thess. 2:4)
The Temple Institute as well as the Temple Mount and Eretz Yisrael Faithful Movement are the two main Jewish organizations responsible for making preparations for the Third Temple and the reinstatement of sacrificial worship.
Other organizations have plans, too. One wants to pitch a tabernacle-style tent on the Mount; another wants to build a synagogue in one of the corners of the platform.
Why? Because as Chaim Richman, the director of the Temple Institute states in his Myth Buster video series, “Buildings don’t fall down from heaven.” He adds that “it’s a mitzvah to build the Temple,” citing Exodus 23:8 and that Jews should be performing all 613 mitzvot, which requires a Temple.
He also says that the Third Temple will “bring the Light back into the world” that left the Temple Mount when the Lord’s Divine Presence departed.
Moreover, he believes the Temple will “reconnect all of creation with one another. It is the Holy Temple that enables all of humanity to engage in direct dynamic relationship with God and provides the opportunity for every individual to rise to our greatest potential.” (Temple Institute YouTube: Myth Busters Part 1)
Daniel 9 and 11 as well as Brit Chadashah writings, however, help us see that an alternate reality exists for the Temple.
Nevertheless, the ritual garments and vessels have been created.
Even the Golden Menorah—the seven branched candelabra—has been crafted, along with Levitical musical instruments, such as silver trumpets, lyres, and harps to worship the Lord, just as King David did 3,000 years ago (1 Chronicles 23:5).
The Temple Institute’s School is training certified, DNA-tested Cohen (descendants of the High Priest Aaron) to perform the Temple duties.
And the final element, the Red Heifer, is being bred in Israel to be sacrificed in the ritual purification of the priests and the vessels, so they may formally enter the holiest of holy area on the entire earth.
Everything is ready for the rebuilding of the Third Temple. Everything, that is, except the land on which to build it.
Since the liberation of the Mount in 1967, the Muslim world has made great efforts to claim the entire 37-acre (150,000 square meter) platform as its own sacred land, calling the site in Arabic al-Ḥaram al-Šarīf—the Noble Sanctuary.
To protect the Noble Sanctuary, the Muslim world has become expert organizers of riots on the Temple Mount and terror on the streets of Israel. Incitement to such violence increases whenever rumors spread that a Jewish presence will be established on the Temple Mount or its own Muslim structures harmed.
Only an incredibly respected, trusted, and honored man by both Muslims and Jews will be able to establish a peace plan that allows the Jewish People to worship the Lord in a Temple on the Mount that King David purchased(2 Samuel 24:18–25).
Whoever this man is and whatever trouble awaits us (known as Jacob’s Trouble) when he breaks the peace plan as Daniel 9:27 predicts, we can be confident that God is on the throne and in control.
Reserve your free bible nowAs King David writes in Psalm 121:4: “He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.”
We know that end-time Bible prophecy concerning the Third Temple is soon to be fulfilled because Israel was prophetically reborn as a nation in 1948 (Isaiah 66:8), and most of these Temple preparations only started in the last 30 years.
As we persevere through these end-times, join us in
introducing the Sar Shalom(Prince of Peace)
Yeshua HaMashiach to the Jewish People so that
He may dwell in them and bring them
a peace and Joy they have not yet known.
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