The Good Shepherd

Contextual BackgroundThe context for the text this morning grows out of the sustained and continued conflict of the Lord Christ with His enemies, the Pharisees.  This particular conflict starts in John 9 with Jesus healing the man born blind. Much of what is said in this passage this morning reaches back to that conflict.  That this is intense verbal conflict can be seen by the fact that this incident is sandwiched between attempts to stone the Lord Christ (John 8:59; 10:31).

John 8:59 Then took they up stones to cast at him, but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the Temple: And he passed through the midst of them, and so went his way.

John 10:31 Then the Jews again took up stones, to stone him.

 It would do well to remember that the Pharisees were the ruling religious and cultural elite at the time. They were what we today would call “the Establishment.”  This Establishment was a ruling order whose goal was to operate in the name of the Law to destroy the law in order to justify and cloak their own twisting and violation of the law.


At this point of the conflict the Lord Christ has just engaged the formerly blind man who He had healed and who had been excommunicated by those who opposed Christ. The Lord Christ receives this outcast “sheep” as His own and talks about the blind who can see and the seeing who are blind (9:38f). This outrages His enemies who see the insult in Christ’s words.


The Lord Christ then illustrates this whole particular conflict with the Pharisees that takes place in John 9, with the words we find in John 10 as He contrasts images of the true, good shepherd (Himself), on the one hand, and the thieves and bandits who oppose him on the other; the false shepherds, who do not enter the sheepfold by the gate but climb in by another way, who do not have the best interests of the sheep at heart; they steal, kill, and destroy, while Jesus, who is metaphorically both the door to the sheepfold and the shepherd of the sheep, offers abundant life.

This is then the context of the text before us.

We should say at the outset that the Lord Christ has put on display for us here a couple realities already. The Lord Christ in this passage is

Judgmental — He has assessed the situation and has determined that those who are opposing Him are false shepherds. Every time the Lord Christ speaks of Himself as “The good Shepherd” the Pharisees would have understood instantly the implication of themselves as being false shepherds. The comparison of this idea of false Shepherds had a long OT History.

In Ezekiel 34 God complained of false shepherds

Woe be unto the shepherds of Israel, that feed themselves: should not the shepherds feed the flocks? 3 Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool: ye kill them that are fed, but ye feed not the sheep. 4 The weak have ye not strengthened: the sick have ye not healed, neither have ye bound up the broken, nor brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost, but with cruelty, and with rigor have ye ruled them. 5 And they were scattered without a shepherd: and when they were dispersed, they were devoured of all the beasts of the field.

Because of the false shepherds God promises a time when a Good shepherd will come

Ezekiel 34:22 Therefore will I help my sheep, and they shall no more be spoiled, and I will judge between sheep and sheep. 23 And I will set up a shepherd over them, and he shall feed them, even my servant David, he shall feed them, and he shall be their shepherd.

So,  the Lord Christ, in positing that He is the promised Good shepherd. He is, at the same time, given the immediate context, adjudicating that the Pharisees are false shepherds, or merely Hirelings. I point this judgmental disposition of the Lord Christ out in order to place a counter weight to the constant sniping one will often hear that Christians shouldn’t judge.

This idea of the absolute necessity to judge is all over this passage. It is not only Christ who is judging His false shepherd enemies here but the idea of judging is contained in the truth of vs. 5

5 And they (Christ’s sheep) will not follow a stranger, but they flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers.

You see. The sheep judges the voices that it hears. It knows the voice of the Good Shepherd and follows. The sheep judges between voices.

Fellow Christians — My fellow Sheep — we have to judge. All through our lives we have to judge. Now our judgments are to be made with charity and are not to be self-righteous. Further, we should gather all the facts so that we do not make “unrighteous judgments,” but we have to judge.

Isn’t our lack of judging rightly a great fault of the Church today? Our problem is not that we are too judgmental but that we aren’t judicious in the slightest. The sheep who comprise the visible Church today seem to have very little discernment at all for they follow almost any voice that is raised.

And yet our Lord Christ says here that sheep will not follow the voice of the stranger.  The Lord Christ says here that the Sheep know His voice and follow Him. This perhaps suggests how vast the necessity is within the Church to do Evangelism and Apologetics. If it is really the case that sheep of Christ will not follow the voice of a stranger and yet so many sheep in the visible Church are following voices of strangers then the only thing we can conclude, it seems, is that those sheep who are following the voices of strangers are not sheep and so need to be evangelized.

As we consider vs. 11-18 we note a clear theme here. The theme here is that the goodness of the Noble Shepherd is demonstrated by the cost that He bears. The “good Shepherd lays down His life.” This phrase is repeated 5 times between vs. 11-18 and suggests that this is the theme of these verses.

Read in light of the cross this emphasis thus has a soteriological emphasis to it. The Good Shepherd demonstrates His love for the Sheep by doing all to keep the flock. Unlike the hireling or false shepherds the Noble Shepherd consistent with His calling (cmp. vs. 18) prioritizes the flock.  When we deal with the accusations of old slewfoot … when we are burdened by our Sin … we need to keep in mind that the Good Shepherd gave His life for the flock. In the giving of His life for the flock there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are resting in the offices of the Good shepherd.

We might also employ here a greater to lesser argument. If the Noble Shepherd will do the greater work of laying down His life for the Sheep will He not also do all the lesser works that a Shepherd does with respect to the Sheep? If the True Shepherd will lay down His life for the Sheep, will He not also provide for, care for, and protect the Sheep?

This is an important point to note because Sheep are notoriously frightful and skittish beasts. And so we are. When we are tempted to be frightful and skittish we must remind ourselves of the Good Shepherd and how He keeps His own. He is the Good Shepherd. He will not abandon us nor leave us defenseless. Because we are His flock He will continue to care for us come what may.

This good Shepherd who lays down His life is more than merely a Shepherd though. This good Shepherd is divine. The divinity of the good Shepherd is already hinted at by the fact that Christ is the Divine Shepherd spoken of in Isaiah 40:11. There we find the promise of the Divine King

10 Behold, the Lord God will come with power, and his arm shall rule for him: behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him. He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall guide them with young.

This note of the Divinity of Christ as the Good Shepherd is sounded throughout this passage with the 4 “I am statements in   7, 9, 11, and 14 and made most explicit in 10:30.

30 I and my Father are one.

So this good Shepherd who lays down His life for the Sheep is a Divine Good Shepherd. This is a passage then I would go to in order to set forth the fact that the Lord Christ was very God of very God were I dealing with someone like a JW or a Muslim.

We should note the echoes that we find here of the truth of the particularity of the Atonement. Christ is going out of His way to insist that there are sheep that hear His voice and follow Him and sheep who do not hear His voice and do not follow Him (cmp. 26-27). Further, the Lord Christ says here that He lays down His life for those sheep who know Him (10:15). This pushes us to observe that the death of Christ was particular only to those Sheep that have belonged to the Shepherd from all eternity. Christ did not die for those who were not, nor ever were, nor ever would be His Sheep.

To insist that the Lord Christ died for those who were not His sheep, and never would be His Sheep would be to insist that the death of  Christ failed in its intent, and in its design to protect His sheep. It is to insist that God had an intent and design that failed. But if God had an intent and design that failed then that would require someone or something that caused God to fail in His intent and design. Whatever or whoever caused God’s intent and design to fail then would at that point be greater than God and so God would be no God. The good Shepherd who lays down His life for the Sheep gathers only the Sheep that for whom He died.

What else might we say here concerning Sheep and Shepherd?

Well, He knows his own (and loves them, 13:1). And they know him (10:14) ( see also 10:4). This is a statement that was put on display by the man born blind who at the end embraces Christ  (9:38). This reciprocal knowing is placed in parallel with the knowing intimacy between the Father and the Son (15). What is being communicated is that just as there is this harmony of interpersonal knowing between the Father and the Son so there is a interpersonal harmony of knowing between the Sheep and the Shepherd.

Of course this knowing here, though never less then a mental understanding, is more then that.  This knowing implies a fondness and a relational standing. I might say “I know my accountant.” This is more of a mental understanding. I can also say “I know my Son.” In that knowing there is more then mental understanding. In God’s knowing of us there is a intimate knowing that includes a commitment of Redemption, and the preserving of us on His part.

Now, don’t miss here an important fact. If the sheep know the Shepherd and if the Shepherd knows the Father then by necessity the Sheep know the Father. Here is the great truth that the only way to know the Father is through the Son. There is no knowing God naked. If God is to be known by the believer it is only as mediated by Christ. The knowing of the Father is only done by the knowing of the Shepherd.

Considering the other sheep of 10:16

Not of this fold — This fold doubtless refers to the fold of Israel.

What is being communicated here is the intent of the Gospel to go to the Nations.

They will hear my voice — Irresistible Grace

One Flock …. One Shepherd —

Unity and diversity here.

The diversity is found in the reality that the sheep who are to be gathered in the future are from other folds. There are distinctions between folds. Israel and the Nations are distinct.

The unity is found in the fact that these diverse folds will form one flock with one Shepherd.

The way I read this unity in diversity is that in the flock of Christ (Unity) will be many folds comprised of different nations (Diversity). There will be a Spiritual Unity comprised of Nations that are diverse by God’s creative work. The One and the Many is thus satisfied and we avoid both a Unity that gives a amalgamated Unitarianism and a diversity that would yield the war of all against all.

There is thus a Missionary impulse here. We are to be aware that the Gospel is to go to the Nations. Woe be to the person who suggests that Christ is not available for some people or nation.

 

 

The Reality of Hell

“At that greatest of all spectacles, that last and eternal judgment how shall I admire, how laugh, how rejoice, how exult, when I behold so many proud monarchs groaning in the lowest abyss of darkness; so many magistrates liquefying in fiercer flames than they ever kindled against the Christians; so many sages philosophers blushing in red-hot fires with their deluded pupils; so many tragedians more tuneful in the expression of their own sufferings; so many dancers tripping more nimbly from anguish then ever before from applause.”

“What a spectacle. . .when the world. . .and its many products, shall be consumed in one great flame! How vast a spectacle then bursts upon the eye! What there excites my admiration? What my derision? Which sight gives me joy? As I see. . .illustrious monarchs. . . groaning in the lowest darkness, Philosophers. . .as fire consumes them! Poets trembling before the judgment-seat of. . .Christ! I shall hear the tragedians, louder-voiced in their own calamity; view play-actors. . .in the dissolving flame; behold wrestlers, not in their gymnasia, but tossing in the fiery billows. . .What inquisitor or priest in his munificence will bestow on you the favor of seeing and exulting in such things as these? Yet even now we in a measure have them by faith in the picturings of imagination.”

Tertullian
De Spectaculis, Chapter XXX

For the Augustinians…….“They who shall enter into the joy of the Lord shall know what is going on outside in the outer darkness. . .The saints’. . . knowledge, which shall be great, shall keep them acquainted. . .with the eternal sufferings of the lost.”

Augustine, The City of God

SECTION 1.“In order that the happiness of the saints may be more delightful to them and that they may render more copious thanks to God for it, they are allowed to see perfectly the sufferings of the damned. . .So that they may be urged the more to praise God. . .the saints in heaven know distinctly all that happens. . .to the damned.”

Aquinas
Summa Theologica

(When the saints in glory shall see the wrath of God executed on ungodly men, it will be no occasion of grief to them, but of rejoicing.)

It is not only the sight of God’s wrath executed on those wicked men who are of the antichristian church, which will be occasion of rejoicing to the saints in glory; but also the sight of the destruction of all God’s enemies: whether they have been the followers of antichrist or not, that alters not the case, if they have been the enemies of God, and of Jesus Christ. All wicked men will at last be destroyed together, as being united in the same cause and interest, as being all of Satan’s army. They will all stand together at the day of judgment, as being all of the same company.

And if we understand the text to have respect only to a temporal execution of God’s wrath on his enemies, that will not alter the case. The thing they are called upon to rejoice at, is the execution of God’s wrath upon his and their enemies. And if it be matter of rejoicing to them to see justice executed in part upon them, or to see the beginning of the execution of it in this world; for the same reason will they rejoice with greater joy, in beholding it fully executed. For the thing here mentioned as the foundation of their joy, is the execution of just vengeance: Rejoice, for God hath avenged you on her….

At the day of judgment, the saints in glory at Christ’s right hand, will see the wicked at the left hand in their amazement and horror, will hear the judge pronounce sentence upon them, saying, 191 “Depart, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels;” and will see them go away into everlasting punishment. But the Scripture seems to hold forth to us, that the saints will not only see the misery of the wicked at the day of judgment, but the fore-mentioned texts imply, that “the state of the damned in hell will be in the view of the heavenly inhabitants; that the two worlds of happiness and misery will be in view of each other.

Jonathan Edwards
The End of the Wicked Contemplated by the Righteous
or
The Torments of the Wicked in Hell, No Occasion of Grief to the Saints in Heaven
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In God’s providence, a few days ago I found myself in two different discussions in two different situations with two different people who do not know each other concerning the reality of Hell. Both of these folks were what has come to be known as “Annihilationists.” Annihiliationism is doctrine that some of have embraced (J. W. Wenham, John Stott) which denies most especially the eternality of Hell. Some practitioners of Annhiliationism insists that those outside of Christ cease to exist upon death (soul sleep), while other practitioners will allow for a Temporal Hell where the Rebel against God suffers the torments of Hell for a season that is fitting for their crime whereupon God snuffs them out of existence.

What I am going to do below is give a few observations about the importance of the doctrine of Hell as a concept. I am not trying to here, build a Biblical case for Hell. I am not doing so, not because it can’t be done, but rather because the reality of Hell as well as its eternality is so obvious to a natural reading of Scripture it strikes me that the people who deny the doctrine of Hell or its eternality are beyond convincing. The denial of the doctrine of Hell as well as a denial of the eternality of Hell is like the denial that Scripture prohibits women from serving in ecclesiastical office. In both cases, the Scriptures are so obvious in their articulation that trying to convince those, who are reading through or past the Scriptures, that they are in error is largely a waste of time given the pre-commitments of those who are doing the denying.

So, what I’m doing below is just giving a few observations surrounding the denial of Hell.

1.) The denial of the eternality of Hell is all the more dangerous because on the surface it seems so benign. This denial is not like the denial of the Resurrection or the Virgin Birth. No one doubts that someone who denies Hell can be in Union with Christ. (Though I would insist that such a view leaves them open to the charge of having low views of Scripture.) I do insist though that people who are Annhilationists aren’t looking under the hood of that denial to see the implications of what they are denying.

2.)  The denial of the eternality of Hell is another example of putative Christians or unlearned Christians or immature Christians attempting to make God out to be nicer than He makes Himself out to be. It is an attempt to save God from being God. It is sentimentality trying to rescue the alleged mean glowering character of God. It is another example of do gooders, who by doing their good, end up making Christianity crueler then any Devil could. This denial of the eternality of Hell is taken up by those who, at the very least think, “My God would never be that mean.” It is the argument which attempts to make God “reasonable.”

3.) Annihilationism, does not seem to comprehend that by altering the anchor example of God’s eternal justice (The condemnation to Eternal punishment for those who rebelled against God and His Christ) that the effect is a relativizing of temporal justice and punishment. If the anchor of justice is set loose and diminished in the Cosmic Divine realm the effect is to set adrift any ideas of absolute justice in the temporal realm.  If God’s justice is altered in terms of Hell and / or its duration then justice is the realm of man can be relativized and altered as well.

4.) Those who insist upon the conditionality of Hell or deny the eternality of Hell are those who will, in themselves or in their generations, become those who rebel against the whole concept of fixed Justice. When we deny the proper required Justice applied (eternal Hell) against those who commit crimes against God’s character and who do not find forgiveness in Christ, we will, over the course of time, deny the proper required justice against those who commit other lesser crimes. If the required proper punishment is denied, in our thinking, against those who commit the greatest of all crimes (unrepentant rebellion against the Character of God) then the consequence of that will eventually be the denial of justice implemented against all other lesser crimes.

Getting rid of the eternal character of Hell guarantees the eventual arise of Hell on earth.

  5.) The Holiness of God is infinite and as such rebellion against God’s Holiness requires eternal punishment for those who do not close with Christ. The denial of the eternality of Hell is a denial of the august and majestic character of God. Low views of Hell insure, and in turn cause, low views of God.

Envision my point this way. If one was to change the penalty for murder from the death penalty to a $100.00 fine the obvious impact would be to cheapen the value of a life. Just so when we argue that Hell is not eternal punishment but only ceasing to exist we cheapen the value of God’s Majesty, Holiness and Transcendence.

The doctrine of Hell is a case where the punishment fits the crime. Any lesser punishment would suggest a lesser crime. The suggestion of a lesser crime would suggest that an offense against the person of God is somehow an offense that shouldn’t have the fullest possible consequences.  The eternality of Hell corresponds to the Majesty of God and His Law.

6.) Another way to frame this is to note how a threat on a President’s life brings greater punishment then that same threat levied against a homeless drunk. There is a greater punishment because the President is a greater person. The same principle applies here. When we offer up lesser penalties we communicate that God is more like the homeless drunk then He is like the President.

Metaphor On How Worldview Shifts Happen

Imagine a line that begins in a fire red color. As the line continues the Red is diluted more and more until you get to a point where you barely notice that there is any redness in the line. From there you notice a almost imperceptible change in the color of the continuing line. Now, ever so slowly, the line is turning Green. Th e transition is ever so slight, but eventually the line goes from the slight Green to a Green that is as flaming bright as where the line started as Red.

I have just described how Worldviews shift. Starting ever so slightly the worldview Red loses its pungency but at the same time it loses its pungency a new pungency is taking its place ever so subtly. Like our metaphoric lines Worldviews do not change over night but over time. However, they never change without being replaced at the same time. The line becomes less Red because a new worldview is diluting the intensity of the Red.

Eventually, things (Worship habits, behaviors, tastes, morals, family life, etc.) that made sense in a Red worldview no longer make sense in the least in a Green Worldview. To change the metaphor slightly this is due to the fact that there is a new sacred canopy backdrop against which the rhyme and reason of life makes sense.

Historically, this has often been referred to as a “generation gap.” But this is no generation gap. This is a ideological / worldview gap. The disconnect between generations is not due to age difference but instead is due to the change in the color of the sacred canopy.

We have allowed our sacred canopy to change colors. Christendom is no longer Red from the blood of Christ but it is now Pagandom as it is Green from the worship of Mother Earth. Worship habits, Sexual chastity, Moral Integrity, Definitions of modesty, now find their meaning in the context of a Green sacred canopy. The previous definitions from Red Christendom no longer make sense to the Green people and are indeed even often offensive.

The danger point in a social order though is when a strong push from Red to Green is being made. Those who are already Green are impatient with the Red people and the Red people are intent on pushing back. All this goes on amongst a small percentage of the population as the larger percentage of the population just waits to see who will win out with a willingness to go in whatever the direction the Red or Green colored cultural gate-keepers will take them.

Jonah & The Charge Of “Racism”

The post below was inspired by this sermon though I have collected other information and it is in my own words.

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=419151036335

Many in the Evangelical world (those who write commentaries and those who preach) insist that Jonah’s sin for not wanting to go to the Ninevehites is a early world example of the Racism that God hates. For example, John Piper does just that in this quote from one of his sermons. Piper here has imagined God speaking to the prophet Jonah ,

“Jonah, forsake your racism. Forsake your nationalism and follow me.” 

Earlier, in the same sermon, Piper had explicitly said,

“Jonah was a racist, a hyper-nationalist. He did not want to go to Nineveh because he knew God would have mercy on his enemies.”

Now, Piper isn’t alone in this error of reading the 20th century sin du jour back  into the ancient world and on to the Prophet Jonah but he is a glaring example of it.

We should note here that “Racism” has become the sin that most preachers love to hammer. It is a politically correct sin to hate and it makes for great points among the Politically Correct indoctrination crowd. It’s become so bad that I have in my memory a ordination from years ago where the candidate up for ordination, though knowing literally nothing regarding the doctrine of the Christian faith, passed the exam because he could impressively denounce racism.

Now, the points for calling Jonah Racist that many of the commentaries give are as follows, 

1.) Jonah did not want to go to Nineveh.

This by itself proves that Jonah was a Racist. If Jonah hadn’t been a Racist he automatically would have had no problem in going to Nineveh.

2.) Jonah did not want the Ninevehites to Repent.

This is construed to mean that Jonah did not want them to repent because he was an evil racist.

3.) Jonah was disappointed and angry when Nineveh did Repent.

This clinches the “Jonah was a Racist” argument.

However, when examining matters more closely it may be that modern commentaries and modern preachers like Piper are wrong.

There are ways of understanding that allow us to not call Jonah a “Racist.”

Jonah’s sin is not found in his putative “racism” but in his falling into the sin of Rationalism. Jonah lifted his well intended reasoning above God’s Revelation. God had told Jonah to go to Nineveh. That is all Jonah needed in order to go. Instead Jonah reasoned that God would be dishonored by his going to Nineveh and by the Assyrians repentance. Jonah didn’t want to go to Nineveh because he knew that God would give repentance to Assyria (Nineveh) and Jonah reasoned that would detract from God’s glory if the God haters who were not God’s people repented while the Northern Kingdom who Jonah labored in calling to repentance did not repent.  Jonah understandably believed that if those who were not God’s people repented it would blacken God’s glory because those who were God’s people (Northern Kingdom) did not repent.  Jonah had labored all his life in Samaria among his own people calling for repentance with no fruit.  Those of the Northern Kingdom were God’s people. It was there that repentance should have been expected.

Secondly, Jonah did not want “to be the instrument that God would use to bring Nineveh to repentance, because such a action would make Jonah look like a traitor to his own people. The rabbis held a similar position. According to M. Avrum Ehrlich, many rabbis concluded that “their actions (Nineveh’s repentance) would show the Hebrews to be stiffnecked and stubborn.”  Another Midrash explains that “Jonah… chose to disobey God so as to save his own people.”

So, contrary to modern evangelicalism’s knee jerk insistence that Jonah was a racist, we might instead see Jonah, whose sin was not Racism, as committing a sin of a rationalism that found Jonah lifting his own ratiocination above God’s explicit command. Jonah’s sin was born of two instincts gone wrong,

1.) A wrong headed desire to protect God’s glory that defied God’s explicit command
2.) A desire to protect his own people, born of love now misguided, from being shamed

This great affection of Jonah’s for his people is something that was shared by others in God’s Revelation. Paul could say in Romans 9,

1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience bearing me witness in the holy Ghost, 2 That I have great heaviness, and continual sorrow in mine heart. 3 For I would wish myself to be separate from Christ, for my brethren that are my kinsmen according to the flesh,

 And Moses uttered this same desire, that somehow his death may be the propitiation for his people when he said in Exodus 32:32,  “Therefore now if thou pardon their sin, thy mercy shall appear: but if thou wilt not, I pray thee, raise me out of thy book, which thou hast written.”

So if we are going to fault Jonah, let us fault him for the proper reason. Jonah’s fault was found not in some kind of 21st century version of racism. Jonah’s fault was that he loved his conception of God and God’s glory above the God of the Bible. Jonah was zealous for God’s glory according to his fallen human reason as opposed to being zealous for God’s glory according to God’s command. Secondarily, Jonah’s fault was that he loved his own people, just as Paul and Moses had done, above loving God’s command. Jonah’s sin was the sin of a wrongly directed love. Jonah’s sin was not the sin of a wrongly directed hate. Not wanting to go to Nineveh had to do with Jonah’s falling into the same kind of Rationalism that Adam and Eve fell into when they lifted their reason above God’s command.

In God’s economy the repentance of Nineveh was a delay to the upcoming judgment on Israel by the Assyrians. Jonah should have known the prophecies of Amos (3:11) and Isaiah (7:17) concerning the upcoming Assyrian invasion.

Amos 3:11Therefore thus saith the Lord God, An adversary shall come even round about the country, and shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled.

Isaiah 7:17 The Lord shall bring upon thee, and upon thy people, and upon thy Father’s house (the days that are not come from the day that Ephraim departed from Judah) even the King of Assyria.

Jonah knew that these Ninevehites would repent as a result of this missionary trip (Jonah 4:2).

Jonah 4:2 And he prayed unto the Lord, and said, I pray thee, O Lord, was not this my saying, when I was yet in my country? therefore I prevented it to flee unto Tarshish: for I knew, that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil.

Jonah should have been keenly aware that the generation which would invade Israel would be a generation who would have returned to its wickedness (Isaiah 14:25).

Isaiah 14:25  That I will break to pieces Assyria in my land, and upon my mountains will I tread him under foot, so that his yoke shall depart from them, and his burden shall be taken from off their shoulder.

This would mean that the same generation which heard Jonah’s message would not be the generation which would invade Israel, because Israel was not invaded by a righteous nation, but rather by an evil nation. This means that the Assyrian invasion would happen, at its earliest with the succeeding generation. As such God’s grace to Nineveh was God’s grace to the Northern Kingdom as Ninevah’s repentance would therefore buy Jonah and the Northern Kingdom some time and would give his own people, Israel, perhaps another 40 – 100 years (the time of a generation) to repent before God.

Jonah should have trusted to God’s reasoning and not his own fallen reason.

Jonah’s sin was not racism. Jonah’s sin was rationalism. Before we try to out think God we should remember Jonah’s attempt to do so. We should remember that obedience to God’s explicit command is our charge above our thinking that obeying God would lead to bad consequences. We should remember that God’s ways are higher than our ways and that God uses the foolish things of the world to confound the wise.





Hillary’s Logo And It’s Connection To Historical Symbols

Note Hillary’s logo.


Developed by a company called “Pentagram.” The two Vertical lines to the “H” look to be twin Pillars. If you remember Barack Obama made his acceptance speech for the Democratic Nomination in 2008 between fake twin Greek Pillars. Historically, in the Occult, the twin pillars are archetypal symbols representing an important gateway or passage towards the unknown. In Freemasonry, the pillars are named Jachin and Boaz and represent one of the Brotherhood’s most recognizable symbol, prominently featured in Masonic art, documents and buildings. It is interesting that a company named “Pentagram,” designed for Hillary a Logo with the Occult Twin Pillar Motif.

The horizontal “forward Arrow” in Hillary’s Logo is interesting also because the theme of “Forward” has been a Marxist theme since Lenin and company and was used as recently as a theme in the 2012 Obama campaign. Many Communist and radical publications and entities throughout the 19th and 20th centuries had the name “Forward!” or its foreign cognates.  The slogan “Forward!” reflected the conviction of European Marxists and radicals that their movements reflected the march of history, which would move forward past capitalism and into socialism and communism.