Category: writings

And then I saw

And then we saw Jesus, crucified, dead. So we bound him up and put him in the earth. We rolled a stone over the tomb(pit) and Pilates guards set a seal on it. They thought someone might steal the body. This they did because they remembered while he was still here that He said He would arise after three days.

All of us that remained steadfast in our faith died with him. It was like we were there with Him for those three days He spent in the grave. Through His death we also died in spirit and when He raised up we too were raised up with Him.

We are blessed. We are truly resurrected and Continue reading And then I saw

Sickle or Reed

Revelation 14:14-20 Then I looked, and behold, a white cloud, and on the cloud sat One like the Son of Man, having on His head a golden crown, and in His hand a sharp sickle. And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to Him who sat on the cloud, “Thrust in Your sickle and reap, for the time has come for You to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe.”
 
Thrust in your sharp sickle and gather the clusters of the vine of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe.” So the angel thrust his sickle into the earth and gathered the vine of the earth, and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. And the winepress was trampled outside the city, and blood came out of the winepress, up to the horses’ bridles…
 
So He who sat on the cloud thrust in His sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped.
—————-
 
Matthew 27:27-31 Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole garrison around Him. And they stripped Him and put a scarlet robe on Him. When they had twisted a crown of thorns, they put it on His head, and a reed in His right hand. And they bowed the knee before Him and mocked Him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” Then they spat on Him, and took the reed and struck Him on the head. And when they had mocked Him, they took the robe off Him, put His own clothes on Him, and led Him away to be crucified.

J Equals W?

Revelation 1:5 …Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth.

Revelation 17:18 And the woman whom you saw is that great city[Jerusalem] which reigns over the kings of the earth.”

Jesus Christ = the woman = Jerusalem rules and reigns over the kings of the earth.

The Kings of the earth = Those who are saved

Revelation 21:24 And the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it.

The Kings of The Earth

The Victory of The People – The Kings of The Earth.

70th >> 3.5 years Gospel of Jesus X Revelation of Jesus 3.5 years. << week.

Daniel’s 70th week runs concurrently from Jesus baptism to Stephens martyr.

The temple destruction spoken of in the olivet discourse is Jesus at the cross. When Jesus’ disciples saw him(the city-Babylon) surrounded by armies(soldiers), they fled.

Jesus reigns over the kings of the earth. Revelation tells us that the scarlet woman that rides the beast is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth, therefore, Jesus is Mystery Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots and of the abominations of the earth.

John 2:18-22 So the Jews answered and said to Him, “What sign do You show to us, since You do these things?” Jesus answered and said to them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” Then the Jews said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and will You raise it up in three days?”

But He was speaking of the temple of His body. Therefore, when He had risen from the dead, His disciples remembered that He had said this to them; and they believed the Scripture and the word which Jesus had said.

Revelation 1:4-6 Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.

From Jesus Christ, the ruler over the kings of the earth.

Revelation 6:15-17 And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?”

Luke 21:20-22 “But when you see Jerusalem[JESUS???] surrounded by armies, then know that its desolation is near. Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those who are in the midst of her depart, and let not those who are in the country enter her. For these are the days of vengeance, that all things which are written may be fulfilled.

Mark 15:16-18 Then the soldiers led Him away into the hall called Praetorium, and they called together the whole garrison. And they clothed Him with purple; and they twisted a crown of thorns, put it on His head, and began to salute Him, “Hail, King of the Jews!”

A common judgment motif. When judgment comes, run for the hills. It’s what the kings of the earth do…8)

Revelation 21:24 And the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it…The New Jerusalem.

Revelation 17:1-2 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me, saying to me, “Come, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters, with whom the kings of the earth committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth were made drunk with the wine of her fornication.”

Think Jesus and the last supper followed by the garden.

Revelation 17:15-18 “The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. And the ten horns which you saw on the beast, these will hate the harlot, make her desolate and naked, eat her flesh and burn her with fire. For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill His purpose, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God are fulfilled. And the woman[Jesus] whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth.”

Acts 2:1;46 When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place…continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread.

Atheist, Fool or Both?

A fool in their heart says that there is no god. I completely agree with this statement, but you see, I am also what some would call an atheist. Maybe I can clear this up.

I cannot say that there is no god because I don’t know the future. I have yet to in 47 years find demonstrable proof that can be duplicated, or somehow replayed via some form of verifiable recorded medium. That’s not to say that I haven’t at some time in the past believed that I had proof of the existence of a god, because I did. I have close to 1500 hours of podcasts online to prove it.

What I once believed to be proof I now better understand as someones testimony of what they believed on some level at some point in time. I also don’t question other people’s experiences because they are subjective, I can’t verify them and I have shared in many of the same.

The reason I am now what some would call atheist is because of my prior belief. As a believer in the god of the Bible I dedicated much of my life to that faith and its many different facets. And it is precisely my understanding of the Bible that lead me to my understanding.

It is my understanding of Johns Gospel and Revelation as a literary unit that formed the nature of my belief.

My intimate understanding of the Gospel and Revelation of Jesus is what made me understand that the war is over. Death was defeated. The enemy had been destroyed and the the victory of the people was won at the cross.

It was and is finished. I was born into a kingdom established almost 2000 years ago.

Satan Cast Out

The center of Revelation is Revelation 12, where the Satan is cast out of heaven. The center of John, the literary center of John, which is between the two foot-washing narratives — Mary of Bethany and Jesus washing the feet of the disciples. The center of John is the triumphal entry where Jesus says, “I beheld Satan cast out of heaven.” That’s the axis of these two books, and that will become significant. They’re both describing the same event, but they’re describing it from different perspectives.

One is heaven and one is earth.

Health Quest, Knowledge Quest

I got a flat tire on my way to the apocalypse.

In September of 2017 I found myself on a bit of a non-negotiable journey. I needed a better understanding of my health, or lack thereof. How I could have ended up in the state of disease I found myself and how to avoid it again should it decide to reappear in the future. And even more importantly how to navigate my way through and away from this mess. As a result I found myself re-examining a lot of different things about and throughout my life.

In 2012 I found myself looking at what I would later understand to be cancer. In 2017 what I thought was a food allergy became something more serious; clearly something systemic, but it wasn’t until November 2018 that someone with the disease who had been surviving it for many years looked right at me and corrected my wrong thinking. At that point I consulted with an oncologist and learned how to better manage my diagnosis. Fortunately the lifestyle and dietary changes I made in 2017 were paying off in spades. By the time I did find out what had been going on in my body there wasn’t any urgency to take any further drastic measures. The improvements my body had been making due to the whole-food, plant-based kosher diet had remedied what ultimately would have been a really bad and painful outcome.

Though I am not quite 100% I am a lot closer to being whole than I ever have felt in my entire life. It’s like…I was an old man turning ninety-eight; tweaked a few things and woke up three years later looking twenty-eight. Bonus right?

Funny thing though about cleaning the inside of the cup with diet and a few other kosher practices. It seems to make problem solving easier. Things between the ears and behind the eyes just seem to work a whole lot better. I wish there were some way to measure the difference between who I was cognitively and the person I am now.

I’ve always been a student. My mind doesn’t idle well. This is why classroom environments never really suited me well. I didn’t want to learn at the pace that schools are designed to function at.

So what does a learner do when presented with a challenge they know nothing about? Well, they learn everything about it, which I have. Well, just enough to be dangerous anyways. That said, I have been studying biology for the last 3 years pretty much nonstop. Specifically system sciences applied to microbiology, virology and parasitism.

Systems science is an interdisciplinary field that studies the nature of systems from simple to complex in nature, society, cognition, engineering, technology and science itself. To systems scientists, the world can be understood as a system of systems. -Wikipedia

Systems thinking about the society.svg

Well…I think there is a point where you don’t need to learn any more about a system unless you are going to be using it practically. That being said I needed a break from the cold digs of biology, so I decided to take another gander at a prior learning loose end from my past. Theology.

Some of you might be scratching your head wondering why someone who self identifies as a theological atheist would end up back at the Bible. Why would someone that doesn’t have a dog in the fight even be in the theological ring, right?

There did come a point in time somewhere in 2013 that I started referring to myself publicly as an atheist when necessary. I found it to be a rather good time saving device in conversation. It also seemed to free people up to tell me their beliefs or seek further clarification of mine.

I cannot definitively say that there is no god. I cannot say that there never has been a god or that one might not manifest after all of my future is used up. I cannot be at all place where matter exists to say, “there is no god here.”

My stance is this:

  1. There is no god that I have been able to observe with any of the senses or technologies available to me as of today.
  2. I choose, in this case, to not speculate about something(gods)I don’t have the sensory ability to observe.
  3. If there is a god I believe that every faculty I have would be a direct result of that gods will, intent and purpose and if with those faculties I come to erroneous conclusions that said god would be understanding with me, a lesser creature.
  4. I am a determinist. The thing we call free will is best understood as freedom within borders. A fence looks a whole lot less like a border fence when you can paddle out and surf its point break.

Loose ends and me just don’t get along. For me loose ends are like a car driving down the street with a sign in the back window that says, “JUST MARRIED,” with a bunch of tin cans on strings tied to the bumper. Those cans are my thoughts that I don’t wrap up. They just keep on following me around reminding me that they are there.

And so I am going to try this again.

Wouldn’t that be a hoot if there were a time coming where anyone that looked at the Bible would interpret it the same way as everyone else. If there were only a slight adjustment that needed to be made so that the whole story from beginning to end, from Genesis to Revelation would just make sense.

I think I might have it. I’ve been sitting on it for ten years but I think it took a cleansing of the body for long enough to eventually cleanse the mind to be able to think more clearly.

Maybe it also just took enough time outside of the gated institutional narrative of the first forty years of my life to finally be able to see clearly that which should lack ambiguity. The following are different titles that I would use to describe different aspects of my view. Linked definitions to follow.

Michael J Loomis

Bi-millennial Preterism

Covenant Millennialism

AD30 Preterism

Apocalypse Now; Not Later