Saturday, April 14, 2012

Revelation 2:22


22 Take note: I will throw her on a bed [of anguish], and those who commit adultery with her [her paramours] I will bring down to pressing distress and severe affliction, unless they turn away their minds from conduct [such as] hers and repent of their doings. 
Jesus is very zealous over His true church. Remember when He came into the Temple, He personally overturned the money changers as the merchants tried to take advantage of the common people. Here we see Jesus’ same enthusiasm to protect His own as we are told that Jesus Himself will throw Jezebel down! People like to always say that such things only come from satan, but the Truth is that Jesus alone holds the keys to death and Hades. The Truth is that satan is not always the one causing bad things to happen for humans.  
This is important to remember, Jesus is doing the things to Jezebel and her followers. Now ask yourself this question, is our Father love? According to the Bible He is, 2 Corinthians 13:11. So why would our Father’s flesh, Who is Jesus, Who is one with Him, be the one who would attack Jezebel? It has to be because of love, because Jesus is love. Our Father is not so insecure that He must go and attack people just because they disagree with Him. That is what dictators and tyrants do. Our Father is love, so why would He be the One who does these things? He is the One doing the attacking to correct and bring those who are in error to the Truth that will set them free.
Satan would just kill these people off. But our Father does it in love. The hardships of His attack are for the betterment of the eternal spirits of these people. The flesh of these guys was glorying in the delight of immoral sex: adultery, fornication, and whatever else. They were only thinking of themselves. So our Father brought them hardships to bring them to Him. Many of these people probably ended up in Hades. 
The trials and hardships of this life and Hades cause people to look towards the well being of others. Look at the Rich Ruler in Jesus’ parable of Lazarus. The Ruler was consumed with himself and then he died. He went to Hades and the first thing that Jesus tells us is the he wanted something for himself and he was told no. Then the Truth set in and he began to change and he started to want to help others. Our Father is always love. He even loves the spirits in Hades that attacked Him and He is always working at bringing us to the Truth. Hades isn’t just a place for our Father to get His revenge, it is a place of correction and enlightenment. Which is exactly what happened to the Rich Ruler, Luke 16. 
Our Father never stops His Grace and He does everything in love, that is why He alone does the attacks. Hardships make our Father stronger in us, Romans 5:3. This is what is so often missed when people talk about the end of the world. Everything that happens is done in love and everything will be controlled by our Father. People will suffer, but that suffering will bring them closer to the Truth and they will be set free through it. People will deny our Father, they will attack our Father, and He will love them and He will not lose any of them. Jesus has been given all flesh and He was glorified so that He may give eternal life to all that He has been given, John 17:2. Some of us may have to go through the fire of Hades and lose every reward, but we still will be saved, even though we passed through the fire, 1 Corinthians 3:15. 
As we continue to read Revelation keep all of this in mind. It just isn’t our Father opening up a can of whoop *&%. The glory of the Great Tribulation is our Father doing whatever it takes to bring everyone to the Truth. What good would it be to be God if most of what He created would be destroyed and eternally separated from you? That would mean that the sacrifice of Jesus was really weak and insufficient. If Jesus only succeeded in saving a few of us, then what Adam did would be far more impressive, because his act effected far more people. But the glorious Truth is that Adams sin is in no way to be compared to the victory and power of Jesus’ sacrifice, Romans 5:15. Grace is active all of the time. It is even active during the end of the world. Because the Truth is where sin abounds, Grace much more abounds, Romans 5:20.  

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