Faith over Fear

Current Happenings related to Prophecy 

Enoch walked with God, and he trusted in God and the Word of God…and that pleased God…we want to please God also.

So, how did Enoch please God?

First, he walked with God…to walk with someone means you are walking in the same direction, on the same path.

God said through His prophet Amos:

“How can two walk together unless they are agreed?” (Amos 3:3)

God will not walk with us if we are walking contrary to His Word!

Enoch walked his faith…meaning he walked in unison with the Word and the Heart of God…

Second, Enoch walked with God for over 350 years before God took him.

Enoch’s faith persevered; he didn’t grow weary in doing good.

Enoch had a consistent walk with God.

Third, Enoch was just, he knew what the right thing was to do, and he did it…even though he lived in a time when the earth was being corrupted.

James would later write:

So, for one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, for him it is sin. (James 4:17)

Fourth, he submitted his life to following God, when Jesus told us to pick up our cross and follow Him…it requires a life fully summitted to Him for us do that.

Fifth, Enoch was obedient, whatever God placed on his heart to do…he did…we can imagine, that like Noah…he was mocked for his obedience.

So, if you want to please God, believe, walk in union with Him, practice righteousness, and submit your whole being to the Lord.

Prophecy in the news update

Revelation 2:4: Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.

Jesus says Nevertheless…you have done all these things…you have been faithful in ministry…

BUT…I have this against you…You have lost your first love!

The Letter to the Ephesians was written by Paul around 60AD…In that letter, Paul writes about the sacrifice of Jesus…

How He redeemed us with His blood…he writes about His rich mercy and love for us…

And some 35 years later…they had lost their first love…it took less than a generation for them to forget about the love of Christ.

The word Jesus uses for love is agape…a pure, sacrificial love…a love that is not concerned with self…but seeks the good of others.

Agape love describes God’s love for us…and our love for God…as we are to love God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind.

The greatest example of Agape love in the Bible…is Jesus Christ dying for our sins…while we were still sinners!

And the best definition of agape love in the Bible is found in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8:

Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails

To love others with agape love does not come easy for us…because of our sinful nature…It does come naturally to God…it is who He is!

By staying close to Him…we not only experience His great love for us…we can better understand what true love is…

And through God’s love for us…we find it easier to love others!

Today…Lord willing…we will begin a journey along an ancient postal route.

A postal route that will lead us right up the time we live in now.

Mail would come from Rome…across the Aegean Sea…to the first stop on the route…and our first place of study…Ephesus…

From Ephesus, it would make its way to the cities of Smyrna, Pergamum, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and finally to Laodicea.

The seven churches addressed in Revelation 2 and 3 were real churches at the time…But they also represent the church age throughout history.

When Jesus told John to write the things which are…He is referring to these seven churches.

Seven in Scripture represents completion…So, the seven churches…represent the complete history of the church.

The first church Ephesus represents the Apostolic Age, the last church, Laodicea the last church represents the age Apostasy…the age we are living in now.

So, the church age began with the Apostolicage…meaning there was still an influence in the church from the apostles.

And it will end with the age of Apostasy…a falling away from the teachings of Jesus and the apostles.

Listen to what Paul said about the last age of the church:

Let no one deceive you by any means; for that Day will not come unless the falling away comes first, and the man of sin is revealed, the son of perdition. (2 Thessalonians 2:3)

The word apostasy means…a rebellion… a falling away…or an abandonment of the truth.

So, there will be a rebellion against God’s Word…and an abandonment of the truth of God’s Word in the last days…

Are we seeing that in the church today?

John sees a sharp two-sided sword coming from His mouth…

And in His glory, He shone like the sun…Jesus stands before John in all His Shekinah glory!

And the sword coming from His mouth is a sword of judgment…listen to this verse found in chapter 2 of the Book of Revelation:

Repent, or else I will come to you quickly and will fight against them with the sword of My mouth. (Revelation 2:16)

Again, in Revelation chapter 19 we read:

Now out of His mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should strike the nations. And He Himself will rule them with a rod of iron. He Himself treads the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. (Revelation 19:15)

In the Book of Revelation, the sword that comes from the mouth of Jesus represents judgment…

Make no mistake…this sword is a real sword used to exact judgmentjudgment…

But that judgement will come because people have heard the Word of God and still rejected the Son of God!

You see…the Word of God has the power to cut through the excuses…and the justification for our sin.

The Word of God can lay our sin condition bare…revealing our sinful heart to us…

The Word of God can do heart surgery on us…cutting away the sin that has kept us separated from Christ for so long.

The Word of God can cause us to want to be set free from…and forgiven of…our sin!

The Word of God is there to lead us to a place where we judge ourselves…so that we will not have to be judged.

And by that, I mean…to admit you are a sinner (Judge yourself) confess your sin…and turn to Jesus…and you will be saved…

The apostle Paul was gone…he was beheaded by orders of the Emperor Nero.

Peter was gone…we know from church history he was crucified upside down.

The other apostles had spread out around the globe…and we know from external sources that…all except John were martyred for their faith.

So, at this point John was the only one left…and the emperor Domitian tried to put him to death as legend has it…by having him boiled in a pot of oil.

When that did not kill him…but only caused John to preach the Word even more…the Emperor had him exiled to the Island of Patmos.

Where he gives us an amazing greeting…your brother and companion!

He was the only surviving apostle…the last one that had walked and talked, and touched Jesus…

I am sure that those who knew him revered him as the elder statesman.

But John never saw himself that way…he humbly says here that he is our brother in the Lord…we are equal!

And then he says we are companions on this journey…all those who are followers of Jesus…are in this together.

And that is what that word companion in the Greek means …we are “joint partners.”

So, John is saying we are joint partners in this journey as pilgrims traveling through this world on our way home to heaven!

John reminds us that we don’t travel alone on this journey…we have each other as companions along the way…

And we have Jesus Who walks with us the entire journey…as He told us He would never leave us or forsake us.

The Book of Revelation…which is both a Prophecy and a Revelation:

As a Prophecy the veil obscuring the last days from our sight…is pulled back…and God’s plan for the future of mankind is made clear.

And that is the purpose of this letter…to show us things which were, the things that are, and things that must come to pass!

As a Revelation…this letter reveals Jesus as the coming King!

This revelation comes from God…God gives the revelation of the end times to Jesus and Jesus by way of an angel…gives the revelation to John.

Prophecy is unique to the Bible…no other “religious” book contains prophecy.

The Bible contains a prophecy that has been fulfilled…and prophecy that is yet to be fulfilled.

Prophecy is God’s signature on the Bible…it says that there is a God…a God that knows the beginning from the end…

A God Who tells us these things so that when they come to pass…we will know that He is God…and He is Sovereign overall!