The Kings Of The North And The South
Another excellent article by Jack Kelley. I was also encouraged to recently hear that Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel has stated that he believes that the Islamic End Time Paradigm is very likely. Many across the Body of Christ are awakening to both the Scriptural and the real world support for this emerging paradigm. The Lord is faithful to prepare His Bride for what is about to take place.
By Jack Kelley: This is an update of an article I first posted 2 years ago. Two things prompted me to post it again at this time. First, it’s a good follow up to last week’s article on the growth of Islam. And second, last week, at the last minute, Turkey booted Israel out of a joint training exercise also involving Italy and the US. When they withdrew in protest, Turkey responded by scheduling a training exercise with Syria instead. The reason Turkey gave was Israel’s inability to deliver an order of Heron surveillance drones to Turkey on the agreed schedule, even though it was the failure of a part produced by Turkey that made on time delivery impossible.
Turkey has been distancing itself from Israel since the Gaza offensive, and, on top of the canceled training exercise, recently began airing a TV series depicting Israeli soldiers as child killers. Inside sources indicate that Turkish PM Erdogan has become convinced that Turkey is destined to play a more pivotal role in Middle Eastern politics by reviving the Ottoman Empire. To that end Turkey has been more involved in MidEast diplomacy, acting as a mediator between Syria and Israel, and has formed a pact with Syria and Iran that features increased military and commercial involvement among the three. Some see in this the re-birth of an end times military force known as the King of the North in Daniel 11. Let’s take a closer look.
The Kings Of The North And The South
“At the time of the end the king of the South will engage him in battle, and the king of the North will storm out against him with chariots and cavalry and a great fleet of ships. He will invade many countries and sweep through them like a flood.” (Daniel 11:40)Three separate kings are in view in this one verse and their identities must be discovered to fully understand what will happen in the days leading up to the end. They are the King of the North, the King of the South, and the one who was identified in Daniel 11:36 as the king who exalts himself. We call him the anti-Christ. All of Daniel 11:4-35 has been taken up with a discussion of various generations of the King of the North and the King of the South, but the King who exalts himself is neither, and subdues them both.
First, the King of the North. The vision of Daniel 11 was given in 536BC and begins with an angel telling him what would happen to the Persian Kingdom then in power. After 3 more Persian Kings, a fourth would arise, an especially rich and powerful King. This Persian King, who we know as Xerxes I, took as his queen the Jewish woman Hadassah, called Esther in the Persian language (Esther 2:16-17). He put together a mighty army and mounted an unsuccessful attempt to conquer Greece in 480BC. About 150 years later the tables would be turned and a King from Greece would conquer the Persian Empire. This was fulfilled by Alexander the Great.
Then Daniel was told in effect that Alexander’s Kingdom would be divided into four pieces according to the four winds of heaven, not going to his offspring. (After Alexander’s death his four generals divided up the Kingdom among them.) The next 30 verses are devoted to the families of two of the four, Seleucus, known in Daniel 11 as the first King of the North and Ptolemy, the first King of the South. 135 historically confirmed prophecies are contained in the first 35 verses of Daniel 11, most having to do with the descendants of these two men. The other two generals, Cassander (West) and Lysimachus (East) are not mentioned here, but in fact Cassander went back to their homeland and ruled over Macedonia, and Lysimachus eventually lost his portion to Seleucus.
So the first kings of the North and the South were Seleucus and Ptolemy. For territory Seleucus eventually got control of what we now know as Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and parts of Turkey. Reigning for a time from Babylon in modern Iraq, he built a new capital city 20 miles to the south east on the Tigris river and named it Seleucia. Ptolemy took Libya, Egypt, the Sudan, Israel and Jordan, and chose Alexandria in Egypt as his capital.
Through their descendants, these two kings fought each other for control of the known world for the next several hundred years. Then Daniel 11:33-35 brings us to the Macabean revolt when the last important King of the North, Antiochus IV Epiphanes, was defeated.
History To Prophecy
Up till now this has all been a recounting of history. Beginning in verse 36 we fast forward to the time of the end when modern versions of these two kings will go after the anti-Christ. What would make them do that? Well, here’s where we get a little more speculative. There’s a growing body of evidence suggesting that a struggle is underway between Arab Moslems and non-Arab Moslems for control of the emerging Islamic Empire. The goal of Islam is a single Islamic World Empire, or Caliphate as it’s called, and there’s fierce competition to see who can bring it about. This competition finds Iran, and the countries aligned with it, pitted against Egypt and its allies. The Iran group is largely non-Arab and Shiite and the Egyptian group is largely Arab and Sunni.
It should not surprise students of prophecy to learn that Iran’s group is almost identical in territory to the Biblical King of the North and Egypt’s group is a modern equivalent of the King of the South, with the addition of Saudi Arabia and absent Israel. (Of all the countries involved, Syria is the biggest anomaly here, being Arab speaking and predominately Sunni. Maybe this is why Iran reportedly has a contingency plan to depose Bashar Assad if it becomes necessary.)
But remember, according to Daniel 12:1 we’re talking about the beginning of the Great Tribulation here. Both Isaiah 17 and Ezekiel 38-39 will occur before this competition for Moslem supremacy comes to a head. This tells us that while Syria will cease to be a factor after Isaiah 17 and is not even mentioned in Ezekiel 38, Iran will neither be pre-emptively destroyed by the US and/or Israel (even if an attempt is made) nor completely taken out of play because of Ezekiel’s battle, and will recover to contend for Moslem supremacy.
Ezekiel’s phrase “ send down fire” (Ezekiel 39:6), which many believe to be a reference to nuclear warfare, is directed at Magog, the distant coastlines (somewhere beyond the Mediterranean) and the battle field in Israel. No mention is made of any destruction in Persia (Iran). Whatever Iranian forces are involved in Israel will be decimated, but Iran itself will survive.
Followers of middle East politics can already spot the jockeying between these two groups for Islamic supremacy. For instance, remember how Osama bin Laden, a Sunni from Saudi Arabia, condemned the Shiite Hezbollah for “prematurely” going to war with Israel in the summer of 2006? Even though Israel is their common enemy, he warned the Arab world not to support the Hezbollah action. Lately it’s been rumored that if push comes to shove, Saudi Arabian air space will be opened to Israeli jets on their way to bomb Iranian nuclear targets. (Although reported in the British news, Saudi Arabian officials deny this.) And notice how Iran has displaced Saudi Arabia as the primary sponsor for Hamas, even though Hamas is Sunni. To win this competition, you have to control Jerusalem. All of Iran’s positioning with Hamas, Syria, and Hezbollah is directed toward that end.
If this view is correct we should expect to see more jockeying between these two groups, building to a point where at the outset of the Great Tribulation only a king superior in power and authority to both can unite them. This superior King will have to be an Islamic figure with an even greater right to head the Caliphate than either the King of the North or the King of the South, and even then they won’t give up without a battle.
A Non-Traditional Perspective
Of course this view requires that the one world religion of the last days will be Islam, not some version of Catholicism or New Age pantheism. And it makes it more likely that when the anti-Christ emerges, he’ll come from the Eastern leg of the Roman Empire, not the West. Constantinople (Istanbul) is also known as a city on seven hills, is a former capitol of the Roman Empire, and can just as easily fulfill the prophecy of Rev. 17:9 as Rome does.As details of Islamic eschatology become more widely known, prophecy students are discovering striking similarities between descriptions of al Mahdi, sometimes called the Moslem Messiah, or 12th Imam, and a figure from Christian eschatology called the anti-Christ. I’ve made mention of them in previous articles, how in their respective prophecies both come on the scene during a time of great turmoil on Earth, both come claiming a desire to restore peace, both have a seven year reign, both head a one world religion and one world government, both claim supernatural origins, and both reigns end in a battle between good and evil that brings Earth’s final judgment.
He will also invade the Beautiful Land. Many countries will fall, but Edom, Moab and the leaders of Ammon will be delivered from his hand. He will extend his power over many countries; Egypt will not escape. He will gain control of the treasures of gold and silver and all the riches of Egypt, with the Libyans and Nubians (Sudan) in submission. (Daniel 11:41-42)
This view also provides the first plausible explanation I’ve seen for why Daniel was told that present day Jordan will be spared in this Grand Caliph’s “holy” quest to put the world under submission, even though Egypt, Lybia and the Sudan will be forced to bow. Sunni Moslems believe that the Grand Caliph has to be an Arab from the Hashemite family of which King Abdullah II of Jordan is the current patriarch. This helps explain Abdullah’s extra-ordinary influence in middle eastern affairs and why he “unofficially” controls the Temple Mount. The Hashemites once held sway over the entire Middle East and served as custodians of all Moslem Holy Sites.
I’m not saying that Abdullah II is the anti-Christ. Remember, Daniel 11:41 says that Jordan and its leaders will be delivered from the anti-Christ’s control. I believe Jordan will be left alone out of deference to King Abdullah’s genealogy as the 43rd direct descendant of the prophet through Mohamed’s daughter Fatima, and his closest living relative.
No, it’s more likely that al Mahdi (also known as the anti-Christ) who will be senior even to Abdullah II, will bring the Kings of the North and the South into submission while sparing Jordan. Incredibly, in a way only God could manage, this makes Petra, a mountainous area about 3 hours south of Jordan’s capitol Ahman, the perfect hiding place for the believing Jews during the Great Tribulation.
And this view explains why, with all the quicker and easier ways of executing people available, the one mentioned in Revelation is beheading. We’ve only recently been made aware of Islamic terrorists’ preference for this method. For generations Biblical scholars were ridiculed for their insistence on a literal understanding of beheading as the method of execution in Tribulation times. That all changed when we got to Iraq.
The biggest mistake the West makes is to ignore the religious undercurrents in the Islamic Middle East. As recent events have already shown, Moslems will always choose to be governed by Islamic law rather than western style democracy, given the chance. Their religion teaches them that Islamic law is more just. And the goal of Islam is a world wide Caliphate where there are only two kinds of people, those who submit and those who are targets for execution.
He was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that it could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed. (Rev. 13:15)
And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Jesus and because of the word of God. They had not worshiped the beast or his image and had not received his mark on their foreheads or their hands. (Rev. 20:4)
If you listen carefully, you can almost hear the Footsteps of the Messiah. 10-17-09
October 18th, 2009 at 7:54 pm
The past is prologue. It’s been said before, with correctness, and I am confident that it applies to this situation sketched out by Mr. Kelley.
October 18th, 2009 at 8:52 pm
This will be our near future and we are reading in this article, the cable news headlines BEFORE they broadcast it on our tv sets…if I didn’t know better it would be creepy…
October 18th, 2009 at 9:52 pm
I read this article when Jack Kelley posted it back in 2007. It was because of this article that I began to visit Joel’s website to gather further information. I highly respect Mr. Kelley’s teaching.
October 18th, 2009 at 10:03 pm
The Calvary CHapel leaders are careful to follow scripture, but have been strongly doctrinaire regarding what I call the “Hal Lindsey School of Prophecy.” That means they have insisted the AC must be out of Western Europe, that Russia is Gog, that China is the Kings of the East, and that the Pre-trib position is unassailable.
I can not say any of these positions are categorically wrong, but do not believe that is where the evidence leads. It is to Chuck’s great credit that he is willing to reconsider his European paradigm.
October 18th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
“Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel has stated that he believes that the Islamic End Time Paradigm is very likely.”…………..That’s just great news. Shows a lot of integrity. It ain’t easy for someone in his position to make such a change.
October 19th, 2009 at 2:21 am
excellent article
October 19th, 2009 at 9:40 am
The pre-Trib position is unassailable? I beg to differ.
Spiritually, the king of the South is Sin and the king of the North is Death, the 3rd and 4th horses of the Apocalypse.
2 Timothy 4:2-4 …
2 - Preach the message, be ready whether it is convenient or not, reprove, rebuke, exhort with complete patience and instruction.
3 - For there will be a time when people will not tolerate sound teaching. Instead, following their own desires, they will accumulate teachers for themselves, because they have an insatiable curiosity to hear new things.
4 - And they will turn away from hearing the truth, but on the other hand they will turn aside to myths.
1 Timothy 4:1 …
1 - Now the Spirit explicitly says that in the later times some will desert the faith and occupy themselves with deceiving spirits and demonic teachings.
Jeremiah 5:30-31 …
30 - Something horrible and shocking is going on in the land of Judah:
31 - The prophets prophesy lies. The priests exercise power by their own authority. And my people love to have it this way. But they will not be able to help you when the time of judgment comes!
What alarms me most about Christendom is the doctrine of the Rapture, a false teaching that has been taught, and taught, and taught since the 1800’s to the point where its ingrained into the Christendom mindset that a Rapture will occur at some point in time, thereby humankind will be whisked away to safety without enduring to the end, and to declare that there will be no Rapture will only garner a stone throwing or false prophet allegations against the one saying there won’t be a Rapture.
But I can draw strength from the fact that Jeremiah wasn’t too popular in his day either and the way to heaven is thru the narrow gate not the wide one, and I trust God and His word waaaaay more than some pastor’s word, whether its Calvary Chapel, Dallas Seminary College, or a rural Church.
In essence, Christendom has bought into the message emanting from the pulpits, hook, line, and sinker assuming that because pastor was preaching the Rapture message it has to be true, without getting into the Word and discovering for themselves that it really isn’t.
There will be a Second Passover Liberation of Israel {the Church} which will begin the Tribulation. The kingdom of this world will become the Kingdom of God with the outpouring of the Spirit 3.5 years later, and from there all that ENDURE to the end will be saved.
Does Matthew 24:9-13 read like a Rapture to you?
9 - Then they will hand you over to be persecuted and will kill you. You will be hated by all the nations because of my name.
10 - Then many will be led into sin, and they will betray one another and hate one another.
11 - And many false prophets will appear and deceive many,
12 - and because lawlessness will increase so much, the love of many will grow cold.
13 - But the person who endures to the end will be saved.
14 - And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the whole inhabited earth as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come.
A pre-Trib Rapture is unassailable? How does God’s word of “enduring to the end and being saved” read as a sermon on the Rapture doctrine? Wake up Christendom.
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, Theos and Theon and their respective Breaths
October 19th, 2009 at 9:45 am
Amazing, plus “Both Isaiah 17 and Ezekiel 38-39 will occur before this competition for Moslem supremacy comes to a head”.
October 19th, 2009 at 10:00 am
Very very encouraging to see the advancement of this paradigm. This is another fine article and an affirmation of what I have been sensing and feeling in my spirit and in prayer. Its amazing that I was just saying these very same things to a friend on the phone only 2 days ago. We must work continually to expand the kingdom and witness now while we have time and let us be relentless in our strengthening of spirit in Christ Jesus in wisdom, discernment and knowledge of the Word that we may be used by God in the harvest to come.
October 19th, 2009 at 10:19 am
Thanks for sharing this stuff, Joel. I’ll be speaking at a Bible class on Revelation at my old high school tomorrow morning, and I’m planning on touching on the Islamic aspect - so this review of information from Jack Kelley over the past week or so has been helpful.
FaiththatWorks, you said, “Does Matthew 24:9-13 read like a Rapture to you?” - and no, it doesn’t. But Matthew 24:30-31 does:
“At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. And He will send His angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather His elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.”
This is particularly so when read in light of 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18:
“Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest of men, who have no hope. We believe that Jesus died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him. According to the Lord’s own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words.”
But that’s how it’s understood from a pro-Rapture position. After all, the Rapture refers to the whole being-caught-up-in-the-air-with-the-Lord thing, which Paul clearly describes.
October 19th, 2009 at 10:42 am
@ faith that works,
Sir,
You took up a lot of ink to attack El gallo’s words: “the pre-trib position is unassailable.” What you failed to notice is the context. El Gallo was saying that in the Calvary Chapel denomination, that many leaders/teachers are (in his words) so “stongly doctrinaire” that the (pre-trib) position is never questioned. He was pointing out that some folks are “closed minded” to other opinions regarding doctrinal matters. He was not saying that the pre-trib positon is so “correct” that no one should question it. Next time before you climb up on your high horse to ride, take a breath and read what was actaully written. You are prettty “strongly doctrinare” too!
October 19th, 2009 at 10:57 am
Kelley writes an excellent “summary” article- it reminds me of Stephen in Acts 7 as he preaches to the San Hedrin- he goes over all the history and arrives at the present with one conclusion. Jesus is the Messiah. Here Kelly does the same he takes us back through history showing the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecies right up to the present and gives us a a clear conclusion. Of course they stoned Stephen, but of course, Stephen was right!
October 19th, 2009 at 11:03 am
Mishael,
Matthew 24:30-31 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 are Scripture detailing the end of the age.
Those left alive, those who have taken the Passover Sacraments on the night that Jesus was betrayed, Abib 14, thereby covering themselves as Israel covered themselves while in Egypt, …. will have withstood the Tribulation of the Man of Perdition’s rule … will have been baptized with the Spirit when the kingdom of this world is given to the Son of Man … and will have endured to the end of the prophetic 7 endtime years, until the Last Trump declares the end of the age.
At the time of Matthew 24:30-31 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 everyone who doesn’t take sin back within themselves {i.e. Mark of the Beast, or stealing food since saints won’t have purchasing power, or Sunday worship service, or not taking the Passover Sacraments on the night Jesus was betrayed, etc.} will put on immortality and have life eternal.
Christianity interprets “caught up” as “Rapture words”, however in the Greek it means “catch, seize, take by force.” Then combining “caught up” with “clouds” only reinforces their mistinterpretation because the clouds are in the sky, so it must mean the risen Rapture.
But “clouds” is a “large dense multitude,” its the same Greek word used by Paul in Hebrews 12:1 - “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, we must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for us.”
The saints {living or dead} have endured here on earth and the Last Trump will be changed not raptured by putting on immortality.
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, Theon and Theos and their respective Breaths
October 19th, 2009 at 11:18 am
David A. Crisp,
And respectfully sir — you’ve misinterpreted the context of post — it was not an attack on anyone — it was merely a counterpoint to the Rapture false doctrine.
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, Theon and Theos and their respective Breaths
October 19th, 2009 at 11:34 am
My son attends Calvary Chapel Bible College and gets to talk with Pastor Chuck. He has talked to him about Islam vs. Eu and he was open to the Islamic viewpoint as long as it didn’t conflict with scripture.
October 19th, 2009 at 12:19 pm
http://www.joelstrumpet.com/?p=880
look here….
October 19th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
Daniel was instructed that a scroll and some mysteries and prophecies would be sealed up to the very end before we could or would understand them. I think it is very likely that Satan has tried to deceive the world by having the world focus believe and watch Rome and Europe as where he would show up through. All the while that he was deceiving the world to watch there he was literally strengthening his base in Islam and throughout the middle eastern world until it comes to late to stop. He is still doing it by having Islam promoted as a religion of peace. Maybe this is a part of what is referred to as peace, peace everywhere, everyone will be speaking about peace. ?? Also Ge 16:12 He will be a wild donkey j of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward 76 all his brothers
October 19th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
Sorry for the mistakes above I accidently posted it before I could make the spelling corrections - I was suggesting that the prophecy about Ismael given in Genesis quite possibly is a first or very early referance reference from where the anti Christ will come from out of the Wild Donkey of a man Ismael.
October 19th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
FaiththatWorks -
Okay, if that’s how you want to interpret it. =/ We’ll have to agree to disagree (about a number of things it would seem, based on other comments in your post). We’ll see how it looks when it actually happens.
October 19th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
joel,
i know this topic is a biggie for those who believe in the Western paradigm. You see the common response from them is they have no problem saying ‘islam indeed has a big role to play in the end times’ but then they put them in the Southern king of Daniels’ prophecy but only there. They believe the north is Europe. I think you should address this often in your seminar or discussions. We need to point to them that if Jerusalem is the center of this prophecy the South cant be Islam alone since Turkey and all the Stans are north of Israel. Their claims can easily be refuted here
October 19th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Seems to me the Islamic paradigm would come about much more quickly if indeed there was a rapture:)
October 19th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
Question for “Faith that works”:
Can you explain your sign off please?
“Theon and Theos and their respective Breaths”
October 19th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
He’s a “binitarian” or some nonsense…
October 19th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Joel,
Am I reading the above scenario presented by Jack Kelley correctly?:
The King of the North (Shia) confronts the King of the South (Sunni). The conflicts reaches a point where the Antichrist emerges to assume control of Islam and then a unified confederation is formed and Israel is confronted.
Is it his poisition that the battle of Ezekiel 38-39 occurs before and is therefore seperate than the battle of Armageddon?
October 19th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
Belief in two persons of the Godhead? (Binitarian) Come on!
“Second Passover Liberation of Israel {the Church}”
You keep posting this in these forums. Saying it a million times doesn’t make it Biblical.
“Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, Theon and Theos and their respective Breaths”
Again, do you feel that if you keep chanting this, we will follow soon after?
Two can “play” at this game:
1 John 5:7 “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one.”
Please, if you come to read and write in these forums, stick to the topic above. Stop trying to constantly inject your SPL of Israel and “Theon/Theos.”
Who is faiththatworks anyway, Homer Kizer?
October 19th, 2009 at 7:04 pm
David and Joel,
First David and explanation of signoff, Joel’s response is further down in the post.
Psalms 146:1 - Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul!
Psalms 148:1 - Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the sky! Praise him in the heavens!
Psalms 149:1 - Praise the Lord! Sing to the Lord a new song! Praise him in the assembly of the godly!
The Hebrew icons: Elohim is the regular plural of Eloah, which deconstructs to the radical {El}, the icon for God as in El Shadai {God Almighty, from Genesis 17:1 - When Abram was 99 years old; the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am the sovereign God {Theos}. Walk before me and be blameless}, and the radical for aspirated breath {ah}.
Thus Eloah is {God + breath}, and Elohim is {God + breath} + {God + breath} an undetermined number of times.
But the number of times is disclosed in YHWH, which deconstructs to the radical {YH} and {WH}, with {YH} or Yah used in the natural position and YHWH seen in the spiritual position in the thought-couplets of Psalms 146:1, 148:1 and 149:1.
So the multiple was two in the beginning, with these two being the Logos and the God, both being God and having the form of God and having none higher, with these two functioning as one deity in heaven as a man and his wife are one flesh in this world.
David was a man after God’s own heart, and his later Psalms reveal the fact that David knew there was a Father and a Son.
Joel, some would consider a Triune deity an inaccurate assumption, because assigning personhood to the Breath of God is unScriptural. The latter day church began when Jesus breathed on the Ten, John 20:21-22 … So Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. Just as the Father has sent me, I also send you.” And after he said this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Strongs #4151 is wind, spirit and not personhood. You are on the right track with the Islamic end-time paradigm, but you are missing the False Prophet’s works and wonders in that Islam will convert to Unitarian Christianity. I do enjoy your site, keep up the work.
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, Theos and Theon and their respective Breaths
October 19th, 2009 at 7:53 pm
Hmmm…so Jesus referring to the Holy Spirit as a “He” and as “Comforter/Counselor” - characteristics of an individual - in John 14-16 is merely figurative (and a bit misleading)? When He includes the Holy Spirit along with the Father and the Son in the Great Commission of Matthew 28:16-20, it doesn’t really mean anything significant? /:-|
Amongst other passages in the New Testament about the Holy Spirit. *shrugs*
October 19th, 2009 at 10:49 pm
Jesus himself also referred to “another Counselor” as in one other than himself. Jesus is a person, and the “other” is also a person.
“if you love me, obey my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another counselor, who will never leave you. He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth. The world at large cannot receive him, because it isn’t looking for him and doesn’t recognize him.” John 14:15-17
“But when the Father sends the counselor as my representative- and by counselor I mean the Holy Spirit- he will teach you everything and will remind you of everything I myself have told you.” - John 14:26
New Living Translation
October 19th, 2009 at 11:38 pm
TO: FaiththatWorks
Introspection is interesting, but much of your struff sounds like something from beyond left field. I am not sure of where you are coming from but I think its from the wrong place.
I do not recall any posts around a consensus that Islam will convert to Unitarian Christianity. Neither this site nor Joel’s books have ever alluded to that. Also, I do not think anyone here is missing the False Prophet’s works. I would suggest that you return to the basics and when you have the Christian doctrine well in hand then offer comments.
It is my position that offering praise via correct doctrine is the appropriate way to approach the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
October 20th, 2009 at 6:02 am
All in Asia deserted Paul. They threw Jeremiah down a well. They thought Ezekiel was crazy, only Joshua and Caleb gave a good report about the Promised Land, Jesus said, if they persecute you, remember they persecuted Me first.
So now the word “consensus” enters the discussion, as if a consensus makes a thought right. Please open up your Bibles, turn to Numbers 16 and read about Korah’s “consensus” rebellion, keeping in mind Jesus’ words declared John 5:46-47.
Ask yourself why does the Bible so often warn about false teachers with the perspective of Christianity being the most populous religion today? Might there be some connection?
I will leave you for now and so that you may continue watching Islam uninterrupted.
Praise the Lord {Theos}, praise the Lord {Theon} and their respective Breaths.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:17 am
FaiththatWorks - our questions are not persecution. We are using the Bible to question what you’ve said, as the Bereans did with Paul’s teaching (which they found to be true). In response, you imply that you are the persecuted victim who alone follows God’s Word, without showing how the verses presented agree with your view. You point out that a consensus isn’t always right, which is true. However, the consensus here is that the Bible describes the Holy Spirit as a Being, with scripture to support it; so the consensus is based on scriptural teaching. You have not shown otherwise. How are we to believe you when the Bible is clearly opposed to your view?
You speak of false teachers… *shrug* All I’m saying is check what the Bible says.
October 20th, 2009 at 9:25 am
Faiththatworks
Just because people disagree with you doesn’t mean you’re right. Before you leave could you answer some of the questions put forth by Mishael and others? Why does Jesus call the Holy Spirit “He”?
“The Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.” (John 14:26)
“When He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.” (John 16:13)
Are you a Jehovah’s Witness?
October 20th, 2009 at 10:41 am
Years ago I attended a United Pentecostal congregation because a good friend started attending first. I liked the services and the people was convinced they are true Christians. After going there for a time I was introduced to a fact about them that I hadn’t known, which is that they don’t believe in the doctrine of the Trinity! They believe that Jesus, The Holy Spirit, and The Father are all the same person. I began to have discussions with many of them about this ‘heresy’ and especially with the pastor who was a real nice guy. He gave me some materials outlining their views and beliefs, but try as I might, I couldn’t reconcile it with the Bible so I had to leave……..Although those people believe what to me is an heretical doctrine, I believe some of those people will be in the Kingdom of God because of his mercy.
October 23rd, 2009 at 5:32 pm
I disagree, this scenario is false, based on the text being used.
The king of Daniel 11:36 is King Herod, not the so called “anti-christ”. Vs. 40, is talking about Augustus who invaded Syria, so he could invade Egypt. In which, Augustus allied with Libya, southern Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan. To invade and over throw the Ptolemy dynasty and bring Egypt fully under Roman Control.
With all due respect, this interpretation is fantasy, based off an event/prophecy that all ready took place.
Read Augustus by Anthony Everitt, to read about this event.