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The nations in prophecy, Part 2

The year 1492 was a pivot point in prophetic history. It provided the dispersed ex-Israelites (God’s ex-wife) with an opportunity to fulfill the Great Commission by using the Sword of the Spirit. However, after centuries of church carnality and Old Covenant administration, most of the people had long forgotten the principles that Jesus had taught. The Bible was just starting to be translated and printed on books that were affordable to the average person. The newly-discovered printing press (The technology had been brought from China during the Mongolian raids in the thirteenth century.) had printed the first edition of the Gutenberg Bible just 40 years earlier.

The Israelites under Joshua might be excused for using a physical sword in Canaan, simply because it was too soon in the divine plan for the real “Joshua” to lead them into the Kingdom under the New Covenant. But even they had been given opportunity at Mount Horeb to hear the voice of God and to receive the law written on their hearts. Hence, they must be held liable to some degree for the carnage that their bad decision brought about. If they had used the Sword of the Spirit, Joshua would have given them the Great Commission which Jesus gave His disciples in later times. The Canaanites would have been converted and “killed” by baptism and by putting to death the “old man.” Hence, they could have come under God’s covenant and joined the nation of Israel in the Kingdom of God.

This is the heart of God, not Canaanite genocide on account of Noah’s curse on Canaan. Neither was it the desire of God, years later, for the Europeans to adopt the same genocidal policy toward the Native Americans. If they had all come to the New World in the power of the Spirit, instead of under the spirit of greed, slavery, and force, history would have had a very different outcome once again.

Nonetheless, the church still reigned as the fulfillment of its type, King Saul. He was the king crowned on Pentecost, or the day of “wheat harvest” (1 Samuel 12:17). It was a leavened feast, a mixed bag so to speak, and by 1492 the Pentecostal offering was fully leavened (Leviticus 23:17), or corrupted. The Pentecostal fire of the Holy Spirit was only a dim memory and long relegated to past saints long dead.

Nonetheless, Israel’s “seven times” tribulation was nearing an end, when God was obligated to set them free from the sentence of the law. Israel had been deported to Assyria from 745-721 B.C., ending finally with the fall of its capital city, Samaria. The earliest date ending their 2,520 years of tribulation (360 x 7 years) fell in 1776. So we see in that year the start of the American Revolution, which soon formed a new nation that was relatively independent.

1776 was 2,520 years from 745 B.C., when the Assyrian deportations had begun.

This phase of prophetic history ended in the year 1800, when Washington D.C. was completed, and the fledgling government moved its headquarters to that new location.

1800 was 2,520 years from 721 B.C., when Israel’s old capital had been destroyed.

During that time, preachers in the American colonies excitedly preached many sermons about the prophetic significance of this new nation. They saw the nation as the New Israel, and contrasted it with the Old World of Europe, which was portrayed as Egypt and Pharaoh. They saw the immigrant settlers crossing the “Red Sea” of the Atlantic Ocean. They saw the Roman Church as Babylon, and themselves as builders of a New World Order after the pattern of Ezra and Nehemiah. Some even saw their new nation as the Stone Kingdom striking the image on its feet, as per Daniel 2:35.

But they did not see the whole picture and could not understand the whole plan that God had in mind. The judgment of God on Israel came in two parts, because Israel had already split into two nations by the time of their Assyrian captivity. Hence, the “seven times” of divine judgment struck Israel first but Judah was spared for another century. This would also meant that the END of that tribulation would also be staggered over time.

Israel’s 2,520 years of tribulation came to an end from 1776-1800, and the United States was the result. This nation, then, was clearly connected to the old House of Israel in prophecy. But what of Judah? The House of Judah went into its Babylonian captivity in 604 B.C., shortly after Babylon rose up and conquered Assyria.

Judah’s “seven times” of tribulation began in 604 B.C. and ended in 1917 A.D. when British General Allenby took Jerusalem from the Ottoman Empire toward the end of World War 1. Yet at the same time, Communism was arising in the East, and the so-called “Russian Revolution” occurred in 1917 just a few weeks before Allenby took Jerusalem.

Likewise, in the United States, the Federal Reserve Act had been passed in late 1913, bringing this nation (and soon the rest of the world) into financial bondage. The Fed represented the rise of the New Babylon, called in the book of Revelation, “Mystery Babylon,” that is, a secret or hidden form of Babylon. It was formed 2,520 years after the original Babylon had organized into an empire in 607 B.C.

So whereas we might have seen the year 1917 as the final end of tribulation for both Israel and Judah, instead, we saw the rise of a new financial power, which extended their captivity. This puzzled those who had understood the “seven times” tribulation periods, because historical events in 1776, 1800, and finally in 1917 had proven the importance of this 2,520-year cycle.

It was not until recently that it occurred to me that there was a hundred-year extension that needed to be considered. God had given Judah and Jerusalem a reprieve for one century from 163-63 B.C., giving them independence under the rule of the Hasmonean dynasty of priest-kings. Being independent meant that the 2,520-year rule of the beast empires was interrupted for a full century, depriving them of their legal right to rule.

The beast empires, collectively, were given 2,520 years to rule, because this was the time of tribulation prophesied in Leviticus 26, when God sold Israel and Judah into captivity. Babylon became an empire in 607 and conquered Jerusalem in 604 B.C. So if we count 2,520 years from those dates, it comes to 1914-1917. When we give the beast empires back their “lost century,” it comes to 2014-2017.

Thus, it appears that we are now coming into a three-year time of release from the very long tribulation of Israel and Judah. It is now time to discuss and debate the precise year that God sold Jerusalem into the hands of Babylon, so that we might know the year that this contract ends.

In my view, I suggest that the “sale” in the divine court occurred when Babylon rose up and became an empire in 607 B.C. This was the legal date of the court case. However, Babylon actually took possession of Jerusalem three years later in 604 B.C. One might argue for this later date as well, yet contracts are always signed before possession takes place. It seems clear that whatever the case, the coming three-year period from 2014-2017 should be a transition into the full release of the captives of this beast system.

Yet there is more to the picture than this. The pattern of God’s deliverance from Israel’s captivities in the past (that is, in the book of Judges) shows that before they are delivered, the people must repent and cry out to God. In other words, they must come to some understanding of what they had done to bring about their captivity in the first place. This indicates that if God intends to set the world free, He must first bring about a worldwide repentance through a move of the Holy Spirit.

It seems likely, then, that this is what should occur during this transition period from 2014-2017. The Open Door Ministry is our participation in this outpouring of the Spirit.

Moreover, we see that God is working not only with single nations represented by Israel and Judah but also with the entire world. The sin of Israel and Judah resulted in all nations being enslaved by the Babylonians. We read in Jeremiah 27:5-7,

⁵ I [God] have made the earth, the men and the beasts which are on the face of the earth by My great power and by My outstretched arm, and I will give it to the one who is pleasing in My sight. ⁶ And now I have given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, My servant, and I have given him also the wild animals of the field to serve him. ⁷ And all the nations shall serve him, and his son, and his grandson, until the time of his own land comes; then many nations and great kings will make him their servant.

Up to this time, God had given the Dominion to the nation of Israel/Judah, but when God sold them into the hands of the beast nations, the Dominion Mandate was transferred to those beast nations, beginning with Nebuchadnezzar. The Dominion Mandate was the right to rule the whole earth which God had created. Therefore, all nations, which originally had been given to Israel/Judah, were given to Babylon in 607 B.C.

In the end, when the Dominion Mandate is removed from the hands of the beasts, all nations are said to be given to “the saints of the Most High” (Daniel 7:27). This is a monumental event, representing a global shift in the history of the earth and of the Kingdom. It seems that this ought to take place by 2017 after the Holy Spirit has been poured out upon the earth.

The question is this: Who are the saints of the Most High referenced in Daniel 7:27? Why does Daniel not just say plainly that the dominion will be given to Israel or Judah, as one might expect if the Mandate were to be restored to the same nation as before? I believe that the reason is quite simple. This Mandate will never again be given to carnal nations or carnal people who would again misuse it. A change has taken place, which has been prophesied in the law and prophets and also discussed in the New Testament writings.

History has shown that when carnal men rule, the people suffer. Up to now, all nations have been ruled by carnal men whose right has been based upon bloodline. This was the case with Judah’s bloodline, extending through King David, and even the bloodline of Jesus Himself, as the genealogies of Matthew and Luke tell us. Jesus, however, was different, because only His mother had the bloodline from Judah. His Father was from heaven, for He was begotten by the Holy Spirit. So He established the pattern of something new, which the New Testament presents in the dual personality of the Son of God and the Son of Man.

Jesus Christ received the Dominion Mandate of Judah, and when He died on the cross, His Last Will and Testament passed this Mandate to His children, the beneficiaries of His Will. The death of the “Testator” (Hebrews 9:16, 17, KJV) made it possible for His heirs to receive the inheritance of their Father. Who are those beneficiaries? Hebrews 9:15 says that “those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.”

Who is “called”? The context makes it clear that they inherit under the New Covenant. Secondly, one must be a son of Jesus Christ in order to inherit. How does one become a son of Jesus Christ, since He died childless? There is only one way. One must become a legal son by the path set forth in Deuteronomy 25:5-10. If a man dies childless, his brother must beget sons in the name of his older brother. These sons are biological sons of the brother, but they are the legal sons and heirs of the man who died childless.

Hence, since Christ died childless, and He was not ashamed to call us brethren (Hebrews 2:11), the only way to be an heir of Christ and receive the Dominion Mandate is by a legal process. And because “the law is spiritual” (Romans 7:14), the sons of Jesus Christ are those begotten by the Holy Spirit, not by carnal means, nor begotten from the First Adam. That embryo that is begotten by the Spirit is Christ in you, the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27).

If this legal provision had not been made, then the brothers or near kinsman (by bloodline) would inherit the estate of their childless dead brother. The consequence of raising up legal or spiritual children is to prevent his estate from being inherited by the rest of his near kinsmen. So also, Jesus Christ’s estate and scepter will not be passed to those of his near kinsmen (race, or genealogy), because some of His brethren have been obedient to the law and have raised up legal seed to their elder Brother.

When this spiritual pregnancy is completed, the sons of God will be brought to birth and will be manifested in the earth for all to see. These are the only heirs of Christ who will be given the Dominion Mandate. Carnal men need not apply, regardless of their bloodline from the First Adam. If anyone thinks that his genealogy makes him a brother to Jesus Christ, then let him also raise up seed to his elder Brother, so that the Christ in him may become an heir. If he does not follow the legal process, he will inherit neither the Dominion Mandate (scepter) nor the estate (birthright).

These legal sons are the “saints of the Most High,” as defined in the law and in the New Testament.