This Feast Depicts Hope!

I am writing today on the seventh day of the Feast of Tabernacles. (As most of you have learned, tomorrow, the day after the feast of tabernacles ends, is called “that great day of the feast” [John 7:37] of this Eight Day Festival and it is one of the seven annual Holy Days, God has given us to observe.) The entire eight days of the Feast depicts HOPE! (Read about God’s Holy Days in Leviticus 23).

There’s not a lot of HOPE in this “present evil world”, is there? Our modern news media has the technology to gather news and information from every corner of this globe; but how much “good news” do you hear from these sophisticated, well informed individuals, who bring us reports of various “happenings” and events around the world? We get information about wretched human government, to horrible accidents, to sickening growth in crime and evil - especially those involving rape, mutilation and murder of helpless children. Even the largest, so-called “Christian” organization, is fraught with pedophiles in its priesthood!

The Bible gives us dire warnings of where all these events are leading up to!

Most of you reading the articles from our website are familiar with what BIBLE PROPHECY reveals about mankind’s future.

IF THERE WERE NO GOD (but there is!) THERE WOULD BE NO FUTURE!!

Matthew 24:21 “For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. 22 And except those days should be shortened, THERE SHOULD NO FLESH BE SAVED: but for the elect’s sake, those days shall be shortened.”

Here is that sure HOPE that WE can have, as God’s ELECT, if we REMAIN FAITHFUL. Verse 13 “But he that shall ENDURE UNTO THE END, shall be saved.”

BUT WHAT ABOUT THE REST OF THE WORLD; THE DECEIVED (Rev. 12:9)?

AND, WHAT IS THE FATE OF PHYSICAL ISRAEL (Romans 11:7, 8, 32)?

These are questions we want to address and answer: Is there HOPE for them?

Jeremiah 30:4 “And these are the words that the LORD spake concerning Israel and concerning Judah. 5 For thus saith the LORD; we have heard a voice of trembling, of fear, and not of peace, 6 Ask ye now, and see whether a man doth travail with child? Wherefore do I see every man with his hands on his loins, as a woman in travail, and all faces turned into paleness? 7 Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob’s trouble (tribulation); but he shall be saved out of it.” (Some hope indicated here!) Joel 2:1 “Blow the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the LORD cometh, for it is nigh at hand. 2 A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there has never been the like, neither shall there be any more after it, even to the years of many generations. 3 A fire devoureth before them; and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the Garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea and nothing shall escape them. This “great tribulation” is primarily directed toward God’s “chosen people”!

(If you will request our free publication of, “The Blessings of Abraham”, from our Church headquarters: Church of God, New World Ministries, P.O. Box 5536, Sevierville, TN 37864 ; Ph. No. (865) 774 - 8485; or from our web-site: WWW.COGNWM.ORG, you will be able to prove to yourself, that the English speaking people of this world are the Modern day House of Israel of your Bible. It’s a fascinating, eye opening of the Truth!)

WHY would He allow such suffering and punishment to come upon modern day Israel (Jacob) and Judah (the Jews)? Isn’t the United States and Britain among the most “Christianized” people of the world? GOD SAYS NO! Look at some of the descriptive titles He labels us with: Mark 7:6 “He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you (Isa. 29:13) HYPOCRITES, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. 7 Howbeit in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrine the commandments of men.”

Isaiah 10:5 “O Assyrian (modern day Germany), the rod of Mine anger, the staff in their hand is Mine indignation. 6 I will send him against an HYPOCRITICAL NATION, and against the people of My wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire in the streets” We’re a nation of hypocrites! We don’t worship God “in Spirit and in Truth”, as it says we “must” (Read John 4:23, 24)

Another GROSS SIN God accuses us of equates us with Sodom and Gomorrah! Isaiah 1:5 “Why should ye be stricken anymore? ye will revolt more and more: the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. 6 From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds and bruises, and putrifying sores: they have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment. 7 Your country is desolate; your cities are burned with fire: your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers (Gentiles).” God then applies this LABEL to us: Verse 9 “Except the LORD of hosts had left us a very small remnant, we should have been as Sodom, and we should have been like unto Gomorrah (totally destroyed!). 10 Hear the word of the LORD, ye rulers of Sodom; give ear unto the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah.”

Chapter 3:9 “The shew of their countenance doth witness against them; and they declare their sin as Sodom, they hide it not. Woe unto their soul! for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.” They even have the audacity to call it “gay pride”! Proverbs 16:18 (It looks like the Supreme Court may allow every state in the union to sanction same sex marriages, before this push for equal rights is over!) These perverted people are “coming out of the closet” by the thousands and demanding that this “alternative life style” be accepted by the rest of society. If you don’t, you could be accused of being prejudiced or even of a “hate crime” and be jailed for it! But we’ve got a responsibility to “show my people their sins” (Isa. 58:1). As a result of these sins, plus all the other indescribable evils, God may spare about ten percent: Amos 5:3 “The city that went out by a thousand shall leave as an hundred, and that which went forth by an hundred shall leave ten, to the house of Israel.”

Some of the horrors and results of our sinful conduct are graphically described in two chapters of your Bible, as you may be aware of. They are prophesied in: Leviticus 26:14 “But if ye will not hearken unto me, and will not do all these commandments; 15 And if ye shall despise my statutes, or if your soul abhor my judgments, so that ye will not do all my commandments, but that ye break my covenant: 16 I will also do this unto you;--- 28 Then I will walk contrary unto you IN FURY; and I, even I will chastise you seven times (more intensely) for your sins. 29 And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat.”

Then follows more of the severe punishments that God will administer, to eventually bring this nation to REPENTANCE and the HOPE that He desires to give them. Also we read in: Deuteronomy 28:1 “And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments, which I command thee this day, that the LORD thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth. 2 And all these blessings shall come on thee, and overtake thee, if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God.” Again, on the other hand: Verse 15 “But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee.” If you read the ferocity and magnitude of these punishments in these chapters, you will have to conclude that Israel has never in its history, been this severely chastised!

God gives a challenge to the House of Israel!

Ezekiel 18:30 “Therefore I will judge you O house of Israel, everyone according to his way, saith the LORD God. REPENT, and turn yourselves from all your transgressions; so iniquity shall not be your ruin. 31 Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed; and make you a new heart and a new spirit: FOR WHY WILL YE DIE, O house of Israel.”

Let’s go now to the GREAT HOPE that God has promised to His people and to which this FEAST DEPICTS!

(Re-read for emphasis) Jeremiah 30:7 “Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: It is even the time of Jacob’s trouble; but HE SHALL BE SAVED OUT OF IT. 8 For it shall come to pass in THAT DAY, saith the LORD of hosts, THAT I WILL BREAK HIS YOKE FROM OFF THY NECK, AND WILL BURST THY BONDS AND STRANGERS SHALL NO MORE SERVE THEMSELVES OF HIM. 9 But they shall serve the LORD their God, and David their king, whom I will raise up unto them.”

Now comes the BEGINNING of the HOPE of Israel!

Christ has returned and freed His people from their enslavement. He will have FORGIVEN THEM OF THEIR SINS, UPON REPENTANCE and began to RULE OVER AND BLESS THEM. (Continuing :) Verse 10 “Therefore fear them not, O my servant Jacob, saith the LORD; neither be dismayed, O Israel: for lo, I will save thee from afar, and thy seed from the land of their captivity; and Jacob shall return, and shall be in rest, and be quite, and none shall make him afraid. 11 For I am with thee, saith the LORD, to save thee: though I make a full end of all nations whither I have scattered thee, yet will I not make a full end of thee: but I will correct thee in measure, and will not leave thee altogether unpunished.15 Why criest thou for thine affliction? Thy sorrow is incurable for the multitude of thine iniquity: because thy sins were increased, I have done these things unto thee. 16 Therefore all they that devour thee shall be devoured; and all thine adversaries, every one of them, shall go into captivity; and they that spoil thee shall be a spoil, and all that prey upon thee will I give for a prey. 17 For I will restore health to thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the LORD; because they called thee an Outcast, saying, This is Zion, whom no man seeketh after. 22 And ye shall be my people, and I will be your God.”

The most important HOPE of Israel will begin to take place!

It will involve the SPIRITUAL SALVATION of these ISRAELITES and JUDAH: Jeremiah 31:31 “Behold the days come, saith the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: 32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD. 33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my laws in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and will be their God, and they shall be my people. 34 And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” In addition, notice this in: Joel 3:14 “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. 15 The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. 16 The LORD shall roar out of Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem; and the heavens and the earth shall shake: but the LORD WILL BE THE HOPE of his people, and the strength of the children of Israel. 17 So shall ye know that I am the LORD your God dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain: then shall Jerusalem be holy.”

This HOPE is expanded even more in the New Testament!

In a prophecy about Christ, notice this statement about HOPE: Acts 2: 26 &777ldquo;Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also my flesh shall rest in HOPE: 27 Because you will not leave my soul in hell (the grave), neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.”

We also have this sure promise! Acts 24:15 “And have Hope toward God, which they themselves also allow, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust.”

At the return of Jesus Christ and the setting up of His Kingdom on this earth, which this Feast represents, IT ALSO DEPICTS REAL HOPE FOR ALL OF MANKIND! I Timothy 1:1 “Paul, and apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Savior, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our HOPE.” My friends, there is very little hope in the world today. Mankind does not know the way to peace and happiness. Our hope lies in Christ. His day is coming soon!

 
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