Tag: greater exodus
Torah Teachers’ Round Table – Tanakh Edition – Isaiah chapter 11
Isaiah chapter 11 again contains some of the most famous verses and references in the Book, and...
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 88 (The Red One)
The Red One is a monster you already know about. In the Book of Revelation, the scarlet beast is a fearsome creature, hunting the children of Israel. It is a conglomerate beast of Babylon, Persia-Media, Greece, and Rome. How The Red One unfolded through history from Day Six of Creation to Esau to the Edomite/Idumeans to the Roman Empire to the current conglomerate of organizations that facilitate the scarlet beast is important to understand. It helps the reader understand the Scriptures as one continuous, unfolding prophetic text.
Oddly, The Red One holds a place of special concern during the Chanukkah season because of the Seven Shepherds and Eighth Prince prophesied to deliver Israel from invading enemies. This is also concerning because so many believers don’t understand the place of Chanukkah in prophecy, preferring instead to debate whether it is “adding to the Torah” instead of studying its seeds in the Torah and Haggai, and even how it unfolds in the Gospels and Revelation.
In Truth, Tradition, or Tare?, I demonstrated Yeshua’s approach to “man’s traditions” and how some he observed and others he dismissed. Better yet, I gave the reader a template to use based on Yeshua’s teaching so that one could test traditions against the pattern. In The Seven Shepherds: Hanukkah in Prophecy, I demonstrated how we can use Yeshua’s template concerning celebrations like Chanukkah and even learn prophecy, especially expectations concerning The Red One.
What follows is the first section of The Seven Shepherds’ chapter entitled The Red Shadow. As we delve so deeply into the prophecies of the Footsteps of Messiah, sometimes it helps to review the basics for newcomers:
The Torah holds the Seed words from which the rest of the Older Testament (TANAKH) and Newer Testament grow. Those books of Scripture between Joshua and Revelation document traditions grown from the Torah. In fact, even the Torah seeds the idea that customs will grow from the Torah itself:
Therefore, to this day the sons of Israel do not eat the sinew of the hip which is on the socket of the thigh, because he touched the socket of Jacob’s thigh in the sinew of the hip.
This ancient battle between Esau and Jacob is a Seed pattern demonstrating both the struggle of mankind and the practice of traditions to preserve the memory of a Seed event in the Torah.
The sensitive areas of both the foot and the hand are symbolic in Scripture. The foot, specifically the heel, represents the soul. In Hebrew, the soul is the nefesh. The shortest definition of the soul is a bundle of appetites, emotions, desires, and intellect. The heel becomes very hard and calloused, but the sole (Hebrew: caph) remains highly sensitive. When Jacob is born, he is holding onto red, hairy Esau’s heel, pointing to the place of Esau’s vulnerability, his appetites. The heel is the point of vulnerability to Eve’s “seed,” yet the point of vulnerability to the serpent-beast is the head, the symbol of the spirit.
In his appetite for the “red stuff” and Canaanite women, Esau is both hardened predator and vulnerable prey, like a beast. He hunts for game and that which pleases his soul, and this is exactly how Jacob deceives his father Isaac out of Esau’s blessing and bargains with Esau for his birthright in Genesis 25. His soul appetites were what made Esau the prey, for all that is needed to bait a Red One like Esau is food, the hunt (competition, games), sexual pleasure, emotional pleasure, or intellectual achievement. Being governed by these desires instead of mastering them with the Spirit are the beast’s vulnerabilities.
Esau represents the red stuff, a rowdy soul seeking pleasure and achievement. When Jacob returns to the Land to face Esau, he struggles one night with a “man,” whom he declares has the face of God, and Jacob names the place of the wrestling match Peniel. This struggle resulted in Jacob being smitten in the thigh socket, the caph.
Before Jacob could face his twin Esau, he had to wrestle the Esau within. Jacob was notorious for relying on his own heel, which in Jacob’s case, was the hardened intellect of his soul, to obtain the result he wanted. Jacob, too, needed for his spirit to prevail over his red soul in order to conquer Red One within, for this is a competition worth winning. It changed Jacob’s walk to do so, as it will any disciple’s walk when he practices walking after the Spirit instead of his soul. When a disciple walks in the Spirit, it is with the sensitivity of the sole of his foot to the Spirit, not the vulnerability to his red desires.
In Revelation Three, the fifth assembly is Sardis. It literally means “Red Ones.” In rabbinic tradition, Esau (Edom) is the Red One, for he was born red and hairy all over like a beast, and Esau’s Biblical nickname Edom comes from adom, or the color red. The Sardinians are singled out as conforming to the image of the hairy beast Esau, a man controlled by his appetites.
The Seed of the Torah hints to the principle of the first born beast, for in Day Six of Creation, the beast was created first, yet the second-born man was created to rule over the beasts, for the man was made in the image of Elohim, who is Spirit.
When he walks into to his father’s tent not knowing that Jacob has already deceived his way to the blessing, Esau tells his father, “I am your firstborn, Esau.” Because his father Isaac has been deceived through his own red soul, his vulnerable appetite for wild game, the Red One Esau is right on target. Isaac began his walk with the God of his father Abraham by sowing seed in the field and reaping a hundredfold, yet at a critical time of rendering the blessing to the firstborn, Isaac is vulnerable to the appetites of a man who hunts in the field instead of sowing seed in it!
These are critical links between the serpent, the most cunning beast of the field (Gen. 3:1) and the man of the field, Esau (Gen. 25:27).
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 87 (Blood of the Righteous Part 2 )
This is a continuation of Blood of the Righteous Part 1.
Vayera “And appeared”
Genesis 18:1-22:4
2 Kings 4:1-37
Psalm 11
This week’s Torah portion Vayera gives insight to a city (actually five of them) cited often in Scripture, even in the New Testament. The infamous city is Sodom and its four satellite cities. This was often the case in ancient times: there was a main city, then it was surrounded by smaller satellite towns. In the case of Sodom, the wickedness of Gomorra, Zoar, Admah, and Zevoiim were simply on a smaller scale, but reflective of, the main city of the district. In fact, ancient districts were called a kikar, meaning round, like a kikar, a round loaf of barley. Sodom was likely the center of the round district, or at least the biggest and most influential. In terms of wickedness, Sodom set the example for the others. Lot chose to settle in Sodom even though he’d lived a nomadic life with Avraham and Sarah.
Oddly, Lot retained a modicum of “righteousness” even living in Sodom:
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority. (2 Pe 2:1-21)
Most of us are thinking: “Ummm…righteous? Compared to what?”
And then we’re probably very thankful that Adonai doesn’t compare us when He judges us, that we have an advocate in Yeshua just as Lot had an advocate in Avraham who would pray for him and intercede. Avraham can possibly teach us something about how to intercede for those who have embedded and surrounded themselves in places of wickedness.
Peter gives us a clue about Lot. Lot benefited from living in Sodom, yet he hadn’t completely lost a sense of morality. The wickedness really did vex him day after day. The real question is why did Lot remain in such a wicked place? Why do any of us refuse to leave things from which we benefit, yet we know in our hearts that it is eaten up with immorality?
We can be a lot like Lot, surrounded by twisted thinking and sin, yet preferring to keep a low profile in order to derive a good income. Lot had held onto some shred of righteous behavior, and he tried to protect the angels by urging them to leave the city square where they would be vulnerable to sexual assault, robbery, torture, and murderous violence. He hadn’t forgotten Avraham and Sarah’s hospitality to strangers and a sense of responsibility to keep them safe.
Unfortunately, Lot’s attempt to protect the angels was found out. Sexual and blood lust had overtaken the city, and they would not rest until they’d brutalized and killed the heavenly visitors. When they were struck with blindness, the Sodomites couldn’t process logic and reason. It was a supernatural blindness. No matter how physically blind a person is, it would take only a few minutes to locate a door.
They were confused-blind, not just blind-blind. How did they attain that level of wickedness so that logic and reason made no difference whatsoever? This takes us back to our Wars of Kings lessons, the siege tactics that parallel the plagues of Egypt, another nation that would be supernatural blinded and eventually pursue the Israelites beyond all logic and reason. After all, the score was Moses-10 Pharaoh-0. And yet, they were drawn after the Israelites in insatiable bloodlust. Confused blind.
In both cases, the populace were deceived and believed lies. Their thinking process operated on petrified lies, petrified because they continued to believe them even when the Spirit of Adonai within them had to be contending with them each time they worshiped an idol, hated their brothers, robbed, or stood by while unjust laws were enacted and used to torment the innocent.
The first plague on Egypt was blood. The bait for the final judgment on Egypt was bloodlust. Blood is actually an attractant to demonic activity, so sacrificing to idols as the Egyptians did was part of their process of making idols for themselves. In its own realm, an idol is nothing. That’s where it was assigned and that for which it was designed. When human being entice the spiritual being into the human realm to which they were not assigned, it is often through setting a “table” for demons:
Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to wise men; you judge what I say. Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one bread. Look at the nation Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar? What do I mean then? That a thing sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, but I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God; and I do not want you to become sharers in demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we? (1 Co 10:14-22)
We are warned in Leviticus 19:4 “Do not turn to idols,” which is explained, “If you turn after them, you thus make them into gods…” (Sefer HaChinnukh §213)
Deuteronomy explains that these entities that human beings turn into gods by sacrificing to them are actually shedim, or demons:
They provoked Him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they Him to anger. They sacrificed unto devils [shedim], not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not. (Dt 32:16-17)
In general, “species” of spirits such as shedim or elilim are created for other realms and do not interact with human beings. They have their own assigned “business.” They have form, but not matter. They are nothing to us and we have no business communicating with them. We communicate with their and our Creator. When we attempt to access them, or we perform actions to attract them, then we make it an idol, not its purpose. We have to do specific things to attract them or repel them.
To benefit from the innate “iron dome” against demons or unclean spirits, one must follow the life manual of human beings, the Torah. Unclean spirits (things not of our realm) are repelled by:
Holiness as defined by the Word.
Righteousness as defined by the Word.
Reading, praying, or singing of the Word (as young David playing for King Saul)
Those spirits willing to leave their realm are unclean. They are attracted to the soul (nefesh) of a human being or secondarily, animals. The life is in the blood. The life is the “nefesh,” or appetite, desire, emotions, and intellect. The unclean things can “drink” from a cup or “feed” upon a table of unmanaged:
Bloods (the life/nefesh is in the blood), including violence (chamas) and bloodshed, bloodlust
Impure sexual activity
Appetites, desires
Emotions
Thoughts, especially prideful ones
Given access to these unmanaged according to the Word, they can begin to manipulate them. This is why walking according to the Torah of Life is a must. It is protection against many oppressive things, but especially against believing lies that are pleasing and comforting to the soul. The ruach [spirit] of a human being is guided by “It is written…” The soul of a human being is guided by “I think, I feel, I want…” The walk of a disciple is to discipline the saved soul into thinking, feeling, and wanting the precepts from the Book of Life, not the Egyptian Book of the Dead.
While the “food of your God” at the holy altar is understood to be the devotion of the heart to Adonai-He doesn’t literally “eat” sacrifices, it is the repentance and devotion of the soul/nefesh which Adonai consumes. With a pure heart, we give Him the opening to manipulate our souls, purifying and making holy, acceptable to Him. We allow His thoughts and desires to become ours.
Offering the soul to a shed or even a ministering angel is idolatry, activating “nothing” into something, opening to them to manipulate our souls. The demons feed on the life of the undiscipled soul devoted to appetite, emotion, desire, and intellect, and the consequences are observable: more bloodlust, more immoral sexual appetite, more addiction, more twisted thinking, and so on.
When concentrated within a particular group of people, a particular sin may proliferate, for the people united in sin are feeding what they are creating, and as Yeshua taught, the unclean spirits are masterful recruiters to attach things even more wicked than itself to a willing host. Other species of spirits “more wicked” do more than feed on the nefesh-they move in and possess and attempt to destroy the host, for they “davak,” or cling to the host, whereas a shed may be willing to simply “feed off” a host for a prolonged period because it provides steady “meals” from its darkened soul:
“Then it goes and takes along with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first. That is the way it will also be with this evil generation.” (Mt 12:45)
Leviticus is the management manual for all unclean things. Of all the precepts of Leviticus, perhaps the most well known is: Love your neighbor as yourself.
The malevolent forces of evil have been fed liberally from the altars of human sexual lust, ideological rebellion against the Word, twisted justice, unbridled emotions, and especially hatred and bloodlust. They have been gathered like vultures to locations like Sodom and Egypt where humans have thrown open the doors and windows for those unclean beings to cross into our assigned realm, not theirs. They first oppress, then possess.
In our Wars of Kings series, we saw how the plague of frogs was actually a spreading of lies. The frogs call and gather to battle; they are a step in the process that is advanced by sound. Pharaoh’s magicians also produced frogs, not just blood. The governments and people of this earth are being gathered by lies.
And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs; for they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them together for the war of the great day of God, the Almighty.” (Re 16:13-14)
The serpent is a deceiver
The beast is the human soul apart from the discipline and truth of the Ruach HaKodesh, “It is written.”
The false prophet intentionally speaks a word or performs a sign that leads away from the Torah.
The Mishneh Torah (8) clarifies the work of the false prophet:
What is this [false prophet] similar to? To witnesses that testify to a man concerning something that he saw with his own eyes, [but they claim to have] seen something different than what he saw. [And so] he does not heed them, but rather knows with certainty that these are false witnesses. Therefore, the Torah states that [even] if the signs and wonders come [true], “You shall not heed the words of this prophet” (Deuteronomy 13:4), as behold, this [false prophet] is coming with signs and wonders to contradict something that you have seen with your own eyes. And since we only believe in wonders because of the commandments that Moshe commanded us, how can we accept this sign that is being brought to contradict the prophecy of Moshe that we saw and we heard?
The frogs spread lies that to a logical mind are clearly lies. Not so to those who do not use “It is written…” as the guide to truth. To them, the truth is incomprehensible, for it is confusing. It doesn’t fit their chosen twist of the heart and mind.
The Jewish scholars’ discussed whether it was many frogs or one frog spawning many frogs in Egypt, which at first sounds strange, but it is especially salient considering our lesson on how the entire army of Egypt was “one” chariot wheel because it was of one heart and it was influenced by the spiritual entity appointed over Egypt named “Egypt.”
One frog? Yes. Many frogs? Yes. One lie? Yes. Many liars? Yes.
Sanhedrin 89a:15 The mishnah lists among those liable to be executed as a false prophet one who prophesies that which he did not hear.
The Three Liars usher in a period of rampant lying. The rise of mass media, especially digital communication, enables the proliferation of lies, especially intentional ones. The lies originate with the serpent, the father of lies, are aimed at the beast’s vulnerable essence [appetite, emotion, desire, intellect], and “verified” by false witnesses who have no firsthand knowledge, or “hearing.” When mixed with the confusion of the tzirah (hell-bugs) from Abaddon and the plague of darkness, the liars will experience mental and emotional anguish and an inability to derive truth from either natural logic or the Word.
The lies will be amazingly uniform once translated into many languages:
Same slogans or tropes
Same symbols
Same misconstruction and re-construction of facts and history
A Lot of Prayer
In Creation Gospel Workbook Two, you learned about the tzirah. These are the HORNET-LOCUST-HORSE-SCORPION-SERPENT-MANLIKE CREATURES whose work was to shoot venom at the foes of Israel, cutting off the root and fruit and blinding the eyes:
Moreover, the LORD your God will send the hornet [tzirah] against them, until those who are left and hide themselves from you perish. (Dt 7:20)
Then I sent the hornet [tzirah] before you and it drove out the two kings of the Amorites from before you, but not by your sword or your bow. (Jos 24:12)
They mark periods of:
Torment and confusion
Destruction of reproduction and offspring, or “fruit”
If we marvel at the world’s sudden extraordinary inability to process logic and reason, then we can look to the siege tactics of the Wars of Kings. The bloodlust symbolized by the bloody water and the lies of the frogs set the stage for the succeeding plagues. We should not be amazed at the bloodlust, lies, darkness, confusion, and mental anguish we see around us, for this is what the Egyptian-Sodomites have chosen to offer on their altars to demons:
The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea, and it became blood like that of a dead man; and every living thing in the sea died. Then the third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of waters; and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the waters saying, “Righteous are You, who are and who were, O Holy One, because You judged these things; for they poured out the blood of saints and prophets, and You have given them blood to drink. They deserve it.” And I heard the altar saying, “Yes, O Lord God, the Almighty, true and righteous are Your judgments.” (Re 16:3-7)
Drink up.
The “angel of the waters,” a spiritual ministering angel, is agreeing that punishment must be poured out on his assigned domain. The altar agrees, for the holy altar has witnessed their sacrifices to demons. This may also reflect the voices of those righteous under the altar awaiting resurrection, testifying to their blood that was spilled. While the wicked poured out their blood to demons, it was actually the martyrs’ own holy sacrifice on the altar sanctified by Yeshua’s sinless life, death, and resurrection. They share in that holy altar, that holy table, that holy cup.
The Sodomite and Egyptian populations invested in the prolific lies preceding their judgments and destructions. Those eras were characterized by rampant lies, unjust legal edicts, blood, sexual immorality, and twisting not only of the Word of Adonai as they were given it, but common-sense human ethics. Love your neighbor.
When the Egyptians could process not a shred of truth in their confusion, they followed Pharaoh headlong into the flood of the Reed Sea:
“As Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they became very frightened; so the sons of Israel cried out to the LORD.” (Ex 14:10)
The English translation tries to fix an anomaly. The text actually says ”Egypt was journeying after them…”
Singular.
Rashi explains the singular Egypt thus:
“With one heart, as one man…” like the frog-liars
“…the Israelites saw the ministering angel of Egypt traveling from the heavens to aid Egypt.”
The army was united by its bloodlust. The second explanation also explains 14:25, which alluded to “Egypt” oddly as well. “He removed the wheel of his chariot…Egypt said, ‘I shall flee before Israel, for YHVH is waging war for them against Egypt.”
Rather than ofanayim, wheels, the text states ofen, “wheel.” Egypt is referred to by the Egyptians as if it is an entity outside itself, perhaps alluding to the spiritual prince of Egypt. It is thought that their willingness to accompany Pharaoh and the “King of Egypt” was due to the loss of the power of reason, the end result of hardening the heart. One’s complicity with an idol activates it in the physical realm. One unifying lie marked the Egyptians for destruction.
Drink up.
In our Wars of Kings lessons, we saw one of the other siege tactics was the plague of wild beasts. Wild Beasts is equated to attack by foreign mercenaries. These people are hunters for sale, unrooted, unstable mobs, living in the fervor of the moment. They may not even have any personal connection to the conflict, but they “feed” on it, and in turn, feed those strong emotions to idols. The plague of wild beasts was not first exercised on the Egyptians, but the Egyptian wild beasts upon the Hebrews. They plundered the Hebrews in the same way the cities of Sodom plundered travelers and rioted against its own citizen, Lot.
Social justice may demonstrate for just or even religious causes. Historically, however, the cause has frequently been unjust, twisted, an opportunity for the swarms of wild beasts to hunt People of the Book. Pogroms, Kristallnacht, the Inquisition, Farhud, etc. An entire population can be frozen in fear that the roving bands of beasts will attack and tear them, too, which silences their objections and hands the potential power of many to the few. This was Lot’s position in riotous Sodom. The Sodomites complained that Lot thought could judge their morals. The ethical laws Lot learned from Abraham were not their laws. That made Lot the enemy.
Some sages offer an alternative view of Avraham’s prayer in this Torah portion Vayera. While we often cite the bargaining prayers as evidence of Avraham’s lovingkindness toward the lost, a question is asked:
Is it really “righteous” to pray that wickedness be allowed to prevail and perpetrate endless violence against its population or unwitting passersby so that ten righteous people may not be destroyed with the wicked? Was there a better prayer in the circumstances?
Why not pray that with “righteous” Lot, they would leave the wicked cities with supernatural help? Why not pray that the strong hold of economic prosperity (or whatever they loved) over them be broken and they depart so that their souls would not be consumed by the wild beasts, confused by lies, torn and violated by demonic oppression?
Why not pray the citizens of the five cities would repent? It’s apparent that neither Avraham nor Lot understood the severity of wickedness. The demonic oppression and suggestion was proliferating, feeding on bloodlust, greed, and immoral sexual behavior. It had become the habitation of every unclean and demonic thing, a human meal. Eat up.
And he cried out with a mighty voice, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place of demons and a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird. For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the passion of her immorality, and the kings of the earth have committed acts of immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich by the wealth of her sensuality…I heard another voice from heaven, saying, “Come out of her, my people…’ 8 For this reason in one day her plagues will come, pestilence and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for the Lord God who judges her is strong. (Re 18:2-8)
Because the burning of Sodom is referenced so many times in judgment, and the story of Lot takes place during days of unleavened bread, we should be more prepared than ever at Pesach this year. Egypt’s final judgment was at Passover. The tzirah, or “hell-bug” of Revelation may be tormenting during these five dark months between the Seventh Month and the First Month of Nissan, Passover month.
To those whose souls are offered on the table of Adonai, sanctified by Yeshua the Living Word, sealed by the truth of the Ruach HaKodesh, there is no confusion, no lie, no darkness, no hatred, no bloodlust. We must, however, pray a lot. Pray for repentance. Pray that the righteous and innocent be supernaturally delivered from wicked cities. As Peter wrote, Adonai DOES know how to deliver the godly from temptation and destruction.
Pray that it happens before the full Revelation plague of hail and fire descend, a plague much more devastating than any hail or fire that a human army could ever muster.
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“Come out of her, My people” Show ~ Mark Call weekly
This week Mark welcomes back special guest Harmon Taylor, who encourages an understanding of...
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 86 (Blood of the Righteous Part 1 )
Vayera “And appeared”
Genesis 18:1-22:4
2 Kings 4:1-37
Psalm 11
This week’s Torah portion Vayera gives insight to a city (actually five of them) cited often in Scripture, even in the New Testament. The infamous city is Sodom and its four satellite cities. This was often the case in ancient times: there was a main city, then it was surrounded by smaller satellite towns. In the case of Sodom, the wickedness of Gomorra, Zoar, Admah, and Zevoiim were simply on a smaller scale, but reflective of, the main city of the district. In fact, ancient districts were called a kikar, meaning round, like a kikar, a round loaf of barley. Sodom was likely the center of the round district, or at least the biggest and most influential. In terms of wickedness, Sodom set the example for the others. Lot chose to settle in Sodom even though he’d lived a nomadic life with Avraham and Sarah.
Oddly, Lot retained a modicum of “righteousness” even living in Sodom:
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will also be false teachers among you, who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority. (2 Pe 2:1-21)
Most of us are thinking: “Ummm…righteous? Compared to what?”
And then we’re probably very thankful that Adonai doesn’t compare us when He judges us, that we have an advocate in Yeshua just as Lot had an advocate in Avraham who would pray for him and intercede. Avraham can possibly teach us something about how to intercede for those who have embedded and surrounded themselves in places of wickedness.
Peter gives us a clue about Lot. Lot benefited from living in Sodom, yet he hadn’t completely lost a sense of morality. The wickedness really did vex him day after day. The real question is why did Lot remain in such a wicked place? Why do any of us refuse to leave things from which we benefit, yet we know in our hearts that it is eaten up with immorality?
We can be a lot like Lot, surrounded by twisted thinking and sin, yet preferring to keep a low profile in order to derive a good income. Lot had held onto some shred of righteous behavior, and he tried to protect the angels by urging them to leave the city square where they would be vulnerable to sexual assault, robbery, torture, and murderous violence. He hadn’t forgotten Avraham and Sarah’s hospitality to strangers and a sense of responsibility to keep them safe.
Unfortunately, Lot’s attempt to protect the angels was found out. Sexual and blood lust had overtaken the city, and they would not rest until they’d brutalized and killed the heavenly visitors. When they were struck with blindness, the Sodomites couldn’t process logic and reason. It was a supernatural blindness. No matter how physically blind a person is, it would take only a few minutes to locate a door.
They were confused-blind, not just blind-blind. How did they attain that level of wickedness so that logic and reason made no difference whatsoever? This takes us back to our Wars of Kings lessons, the siege tactics that parallel the plagues of Egypt, another nation that would be supernatural blinded and eventually pursue the Israelites beyond all logic and reason. After all, the score was Moses-10 Pharaoh-0. And yet, they were drawn after the Israelites in insatiable bloodlust. Confused blind.
In both cases, the populace were deceived and believed lies. Their thinking process operated on petrified lies, petrified because they continued to believe them even when the Spirit of Adonai within them had to be contending with them each time they worshiped an idol, hated their brothers, robbed, or stood by while unjust laws were enacted and used to torment the innocent.
The first plague on Egypt was blood. The bait for the final judgment on Egypt was bloodlust. Blood is actually an attractant to demonic activity, so sacrificing to idols as the Egyptians did was part of their process of making idols for themselves. In its own realm, an idol is nothing. That’s where it was assigned and that for which it was designed. When human being entice the spiritual being into the human realm to which they were not assigned, it is often through setting a “table” for demons:
Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. I speak as to wise men; you judge what I say. Is not the cup of blessing which we bless a sharing in the blood of Christ? Is not the bread which we break a sharing in the body of Christ? Since there is one bread, we who are many are one body; for we all partake of the one bread. Look at the nation Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices sharers in the altar? What do I mean then? That a thing sacrificed to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, but I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to demons and not to God; and I do not want you to become sharers in demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons; you cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. Or do we provoke the Lord to jealousy? We are not stronger than He, are we? (1 Co 10:14-22)
We are warned in Leviticus 19:4 “Do not turn to idols,” which is explained, “If you turn after them, you thus make them into gods…” (Sefer HaChinnukh §213)
Deuteronomy explains that these entities that human beings turn into gods by sacrificing to them are actually shedim, or demons:
They provoked Him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they Him to anger. They sacrificed unto devils [shedim], not to God; to gods whom they knew not, to new gods that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not. (Dt 32:16-17)
In general, “species” of spirits such as shedim or elilim are created for other realms and do not interact with human beings. They have their own assigned “business.” They have form, but not matter. They are nothing to us and we have no business communicating with them. We communicate with their and our Creator. When we attempt to access them, or we perform actions to attract them, then we make it an idol, not its purpose. We have to do specific things to attract them or repel them.
To benefit from the innate “iron dome” against demons or unclean spirits, one must follow the life manual of human beings, the Torah. Unclean spirits (things not of our realm) are repelled by:
Holiness as defined by the Word.
Righteousness as defined by the Word.
Reading, praying, or singing of the Word (as young David playing for King Saul)
Those spirits willing to leave their realm are unclean. They are attracted to the soul (nefesh) of a human being or secondarily, animals. The life is in the blood. The life is the “nefesh,” or appetite, desire, emotions, and intellect. The unclean things can “drink” from a cup or “feed” upon a table of unmanaged:
Bloods (the life/nefesh is in the blood), including violence (chamas) and bloodshed, bloodlust
Impure sexual activity
Appetites, desires
Emotions
Thoughts, especially prideful ones
Given access to these unmanaged according to the Word, they can begin to manipulate them. This is why walking according to the Torah of Life is a must. It is protection against many oppressive things, but especially against believing lies that are pleasing and comforting to the soul. The ruach [spirit] of a human being is guided by “It is written…” The soul of a human being is guided by “I think, I feel, I want…” The walk of a disciple is to discipline the saved soul into thinking, feeling, and wanting the precepts from the Book of Life, not the Egyptian Book of the Dead.
While the “food of your God” at the holy altar is understood to be the devotion of the heart to Adonai-He doesn’t literally “eat” sacrifices, it is the repentance and devotion of the soul/nefesh which Adonai consumes. With a pure heart, we give Him the opening to manipulate our souls, purifying and making holy, acceptable to Him. We allow His thoughts and desires to become ours.
Offering the soul to a shed or even a ministering angel is idolatry, activating “nothing” into something, opening to them to manipulate our souls. The demons feed on the life of the undiscipled soul devoted to appetite, emotion, desire, and intellect, and the consequences are observable: more bloodlust, more immoral sexual appetite, more addiction, more twisted thinking, and so on.
When concentrated within a particular group of people, a particular sin may proliferate, for the people united in sin are feeding what they are creating, and as Yeshua taught, the unclean spirits are masterful recruiters to attach things even more wicked than itself to a willing host. Other species of spirits “more wicked” do more than feed on the nefesh-they move in and possess and attempt to destroy the host, for they “davak,” or cling to the host, whereas a shed may be willing to simply “feed off” a host for a prolonged period because it provides steady “meals” from its darkened soul:
“Then it goes and takes along with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first. That is the way it will also be with this evil generation.” (Mt 12:45)
Leviticus is the management manual for all unclean things. Of all the precepts of Leviticus, perhaps the most well known is: Love your neighbor as yourself.
The malevolent forces of evil have been fed liberally from the altars of human sexual lust, ideological rebellion against the Word, twisted justice, unbridled emotions, and especially hatred and bloodlust. They have been gathered like vultures to locations like Sodom and Egypt where humans have thrown open the doors and windows for those unclean beings to cross into our assigned realm, not theirs. They first oppress, then possess.
In our Wars of Kings series, we saw how the plague of frogs was actually a spreading of lies. The frogs call and gather to battle; they are a step in the process that is advanced by sound. Pharaoh’s magicians also produced frogs, not just blood. The governments and people of this earth are being gathered by lies.
And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs; for they are spirits of demons, performing signs, which go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them together for the war of the great day of God, the Almighty.” (Re 16:13-14)
The serpent is a deceiver
The beast is the human soul apart from the discipline and truth of the Ruach HaKodesh, “It is written.”
The false prophet intentionally speaks a word or performs a sign that leads away from the Torah.
The Mishneh Torah (8) clarifies the work of the false prophet:
What is this [false prophet] similar to? To witnesses that testify to a man concerning something that he saw with his own eyes, [but they claim to have] seen something different than what he saw. [And so] he does not heed them, but rather knows with certainty that these are false witnesses. Therefore, the Torah states that [even] if the signs and wonders come [true], “You shall not heed the words of this prophet” (Deuteronomy 13:4), as behold, this [false prophet] is coming with signs and wonders to contradict something that you have seen with your own eyes. And since we only believe in wonders because of the commandments that Moshe commanded us, how can we accept this sign that is being brought to contradict the prophecy of Moshe that we saw and we heard?
The frogs spread lies that to a logical mind are clearly lies. Not so to those who do not use “It is written…” as the guide to truth. To them, the truth is incomprehensible, for it is confusing. It doesn’t fit their chosen twist of the heart and mind.
The Jewish scholars’ discussed whether it was many frogs or one frog spawning many frogs in Egypt, which at first sounds strange, but it is especially salient considering our lesson on how the entire army of Egypt was “one” chariot wheel because it was of one heart and it was influenced by the spiritual entity appointed over Egypt named “Egypt.”
One frog? Yes. Many frogs? Yes. One lie? Yes. Many liars? Yes.
Sanhedrin 89a:15 The mishnah lists among those liable to be executed as a false prophet one who prophesies that which he did not hear.
The Three Liars usher in a period of rampant lying. The rise of mass media, especially digital communication, enables the proliferation of lies, especially intentional ones. The lies originate with the serpent, the father of lies, are aimed at the beast’s vulnerable essence [appetite, emotion, desire, intellect], and “verified” by false witnesses who have no firsthand knowledge, or “hearing.” When mixed with the confusion of the tzirah (hell-bugs) from Abaddon and the plague of darkness, the liars will experience mental and emotional anguish and an inability to derive truth from either natural logic or the Word.
The lies will be amazingly uniform once translated into many languages:
Same slogans or tropes
Same symbols
Same misconstruction and re-construction of facts and history
A Lot of Prayer
In Creation Gospel Workbook Two, you learned about the tzirah. These are the HORNET-LOCUST-HORSE-SCORPION-SERPENT-MANLIKE CREATURES whose work was to shoot venom at the foes of Israel, cutting off the root and fruit and blinding the eyes:
Moreover, the LORD your God will send the hornet [tzirah] against them, until those who are left and hide themselves from you perish. (Dt 7:20)
Then I sent the hornet [tzirah] before you and it drove out the two kings of the Amorites from before you, but not by your sword or your bow. (Jos 24:12)
They mark periods of:
Torment and confusion
Destruction of reproduction and offspring, or “fruit”
If we marvel at the world’s sudden extraordinary inability to process logic and reason, then we can look to the siege tactics of the Wars of Kings. The bloodlust symbolized by the bloody water and the lies of the frogs set the stage for the succeeding plagues. We should not be amazed at the bloodlust, lies, darkness, confusion, and mental anguish we see around us, for this is what the Egyptian-Sodomites have chosen to offer on their altars to demons:
The second angel poured out his bowl into the sea, and it became blood like that of a dead man; and every living thing in the sea died. Then the third angel poured out his bowl into the rivers and the springs of waters; and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the waters saying, “Righteous are You, who are and who were, O Holy One, because You judged these things; for they poured out the blood of saints and prophets, and You have given them blood to drink. They deserve it.” And I heard the altar saying, “Yes, O Lord God, the Almighty, true and righteous are Your judgments.” (Re 16:3-7)
Drink up.
The “angel of the waters,” a spiritual ministering angel, is agreeing that punishment must be poured out on his assigned domain. The altar agrees, for the holy altar has witnessed their sacrifices to demons. This may also reflect the voices of those righteous under the altar awaiting resurrection, testifying to their blood that was spilled. While the wicked poured out their blood to demons, it was actually the martyrs’ own holy sacrifice on the altar sanctified by Yeshua’s sinless life, death, and resurrection. They share in that holy altar, that holy table, that holy cup.
The Sodomite and Egyptian populations invested in the prolific lies preceding their judgments and destructions. Those eras were characterized by rampant lies, unjust legal edicts, blood, sexual immorality, and twisting not only of the Word of Adonai as they were given it, but common-sense human ethics. Love your neighbor.
When the Egyptians could process not a shred of truth in their confusion, they followed Pharaoh headlong into the flood of the Reed Sea:
“As Pharaoh drew near, the sons of Israel looked, and behold, the Egyptians were marching after them, and they became very frightened; so the sons of Israel cried out to the LORD.” (Ex 14:10)
The English translation tries to fix an anomaly. The text actually says ”Egypt was journeying after them…”
Singular.
Rashi explains the singular Egypt thus:
“With one heart, as one man…” like the frog-liars
“…the Israelites saw the ministering angel of Egypt traveling from the heavens to aid Egypt.”
The army was united by its bloodlust. The second explanation also explains 14:25, which alluded to “Egypt” oddly as well. “He removed the wheel of his chariot…Egypt said, ‘I shall flee before Israel, for YHVH is waging war for them against Egypt.”
Rather than ofanayim, wheels, the text states ofen, “wheel.” Egypt is referred to by the Egyptians as if it is an entity outside itself, perhaps alluding to the spiritual prince of Egypt. It is thought that their willingness to accompany Pharaoh and the “King of Egypt” was due to the loss of the power of reason, the end result of hardening the heart. One’s complicity with an idol activates it in the physical realm. One unifying lie marked the Egyptians for destruction.
Drink up.
In our Wars of Kings lessons, we saw one of the other siege tactics was the plague of wild beasts. Wild Beasts is equated to attack by foreign mercenaries. These people are hunters for sale, unrooted, unstable mobs, living in the fervor of the moment. They may not even have any personal connection to the conflict, but they “feed” on it, and in turn, feed those strong emotions to idols. The plague of wild beasts was not first exercised on the Egyptians, but the Egyptian wild beasts upon the Hebrews. They plundered the Hebrews in the same way the cities of Sodom plundered travelers and rioted against its own citizen, Lot.
Social justice may demonstrate for just or even religious causes. Historically, however, the cause has frequently been unjust, twisted, an opportunity for the swarms of wild beasts to hunt People of the Book. Pogroms, Kristallnacht, the Inquisition, Farhud, etc. An entire population can be frozen in fear that the roving bands of beasts will attack and tear them, too, which silences their objections and hands the potential power of many to the few. This was Lot’s position in riotous Sodom. The Sodomites complained that Lot thought could judge their morals. The ethical laws Lot learned from Abraham were not their laws. That made Lot the enemy.
Some sages offer an alternative view of Avraham’s prayer in this Torah portion Vayera. While we often cite the bargaining prayers as evidence of Avraham’s lovingkindness toward the lost, a question is asked:
Is it really “righteous” to pray that wickedness be allowed to prevail and perpetrate endless violence against its population or unwitting passersby so that ten righteous people may not be destroyed with the wicked? Was there a better prayer in the circumstances?
Why not pray that with “righteous” Lot, they would leave the wicked cities with supernatural help? Why not pray that the strong hold of economic prosperity (or whatever they loved) over them be broken and they depart so that their souls would not be consumed by the wild beasts, confused by lies, torn and violated by demonic oppression?
Why not pray the citizens of the five cities would repent? It’s apparent that neither Avraham nor Lot understood the severity of wickedness. The demonic oppression and suggestion was proliferating, feeding on bloodlust, greed, and immoral sexual behavior. It had become the habitation of every unclean and demonic thing, a human meal. Eat up.
And he cried out with a mighty voice, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great! She has become a dwelling place of demons and a prison of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird. For all the nations have drunk of the wine of the passion of her immorality, and the kings of the earth have committed acts of immorality with her, and the merchants of the earth have become rich by the wealth of her sensuality…I heard another voice from heaven, saying, “Come out of her, my people…’ 8 For this reason in one day her plagues will come, pestilence and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for the Lord God who judges her is strong. (Re 18:2-8)
Because the burning of Sodom is referenced so many times in judgment, and the story of Lot takes place during days of unleavened bread, we should be more prepared than ever at Pesach this year. Egypt’s final judgment was at Passover. The tzirah, or “hell-bug” of Revelation may be tormenting during these five dark months between the Seventh Month and the First Month of Nissan, Passover month.
To those whose souls are offered on the table of Adonai, sanctified by Yeshua the Living Word, sealed by the truth of the Ruach HaKodesh, there is no confusion, no lie, no darkness, no hatred, no bloodlust. We must, however, pray a lot. Pray for repentance. Pray that the righteous and innocent be supernaturally delivered from wicked cities. As Peter wrote, Adonai DOES know how to deliver the godly from temptation and destruction.
Pray that it happens before the full Revelation plague of hail and fire descend, a plague much more devastating than any hail or fire that a human army could ever muster.
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 85 (The Greater Exodus Pt 15 – Wars of Kings Pt 10: The Great Gift Return)
In our Footsteps of Messiah series, we’ve been taking a close look at the prophecies of the Song of Songs, and our current text is from Chapter Four:
Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, may you come with me from Lebanon. Journey down from the summit of Amana, from the summit of Senir and Hermon, from the dens of lions, from the mountains of leopards.
This passage is thought to be a prophecy of exile from and return to the Land of Israel. In the traditional interpretation, “Come with Me,” refers to Israel’s exile from the Temple when she was conquered by the lion-beast Babylon. Although exiled into the kingdoms of the Beast, Adonai was with her. “Lebanon” is seen as a metaphor for the Temple in that context, for its timbers were made of Lebanon’s cedars.
The second “come with Me” is thought to be the return from the Beast kingdoms of lion, bear, leopard, and Roman conglomerate beast that extend to the world. They will attain a summit of emunah, faith, in their exile in preparation for return to their inheritance and a rebuilt Temple. It is this “mountain” of Amana that is the subject of our Shabbat livestream this week.
As we watch the war unfolding in the northern mountain range between Lebanon and Israel, the Song of Songs hints that this can help us understand how the exiles of Israel will return home. Strangely, it also explains why the “three wise men” brought the gifts they gave to Yeshua.
In our Footsteps of Messiah series, we’ve been taking a close look at the prophecies of the Song of Songs, and our current text is from Chapter Four:
Come with me from Lebanon, my bride, may you come with me from Lebanon. Journey down from the summit of Amana, from the summit of Senir and Hermon, from the dens of lions, from the mountains of leopards.
This week we relate the weekly Torah portion, Lekh Lekha, to the Holy One’s command to Israel to journey with Him.
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 84 (The Greater Exodus Pt 14 – Wars of Kings Pt 9: War Prayers for the Dead)
Was there any prior clue that the Simchat Torah war would break out last Shabbat?
The Creation Gospel is a pattern that links the days of Creation, the Seven Spirits of Adonai listed in Isaiah, the Seven Feasts of Adonai, and even the Seven Assemblies of Revelation to demonstrate the significance of the numbers 1-7. The video series is free to watch on YouTube. Beginner classes are free on Zoom and routinely announced in our newsletter and Facebook. The Creation Gospel workbooks are not free because they fund LaMalah Orphanage in Kenya.
The paradigm of Days 1-7 is the seed prophecy from which every other prophecy sprouts in the Word.
Day One: separation of light and darkness
Day Two: separation of waters from water (the day not declared “good”)
Day Three: separation of dry land from water, seed-bearing trees with fruit
Day Four: establishment of the sun, moon, and stars to “govern” the day and night, seasons (moedim-feasts)
Day Five: first living creatures with a breath of life, birds and fish in swarms
Day Six: beasts to reproduce after their kind; human beings to reproduce after the kind and image of their Creator
Day Seven: Shabbat rest from creative work
Creation Gospel students analyze the symbols and patterns of each day, including linking the creation characteristics to the corresponding seven feasts. For instance, Day Two is a day on which separation begins to work with the chaos of fluidity. Because there is only separation, it is seen as a “death” day, for death occurs when the the soul and body separate along with the spirit. These await resurrection to life or judgment. Day Two is not pronounced good until Day Three when the chaotic waters are finally gathered into one place. Only then is it declared “good.” What good comes from Day Two? Although chaotic, the process of gathering is begun, a day in which the pain of separation must occur. Perhaps this is why Day Three corresponds to resurrection with its symbolism of first fruits from the dead.
In the cycle of shmittah years, we have now entered into “Day Two,” or Year Two of the cycle. What should we expect between now and next Feast of Trumpets? Chaos. Fluidity. Uncertainty. Separation, separation, separation. Exposure and assignment to upper or lower realms. In the pain of this coming year, the “gray area” of faith will be obliterated. One’s true heart will be exposed. Since Day Two is connected at its base on the menorah to the Sixth Day, then expect one’s conforming to be exposed. Do we conform to the image of the beast or the image of Elohim? Nothing in between. No fence riding. Heaven and earth are the two witnesses who will be the first to speak:
“I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants by loving the LORD your God, by obeying His voice, and by holding fast to Him; for this is your life and the length of your days, that you may live in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them.”” (Dt 30:19-20)
A fence is a dangerous place this year. Run to truth; embrace it; proclaim it. Don’t be embarrassed by it. Learn to begin sentences with “It is written…,” not “I think… I feel… I want…” I could add words here to emphasize the importance of this, but those who don’t have ears to hear at this point have already sunk too low in the lower waters. Their confusion will likely not improve, although we should continue to pray that it does. It feels as though Covid somehow began the process of sorting those who would continually harden their hearts to believe lies. When you talk to them, it is like talking to a a walking human lie. What they believe and proclaim as truth defies all heavenly or earthly logic.
Believers must continue to shine the Light of the First Day so that if a fence-rider should look up to the surface, he or she can re-orient and make an effort to swim upward to the Light of the Word.
Here is another way of applying the pattern using the relationship to the seven feasts, or moedim:
We use the menorah to show chiastic relationships (mirrors). On Day Five, birds and fish were created. They are prophecies of many peoples, and so Yeshua later refers to the fish as “men,” which his disciples will go fish out of the nations with the Good News. Two of his post-resurrection appearances involved fish as food. Yeshua knew where to find good fish, and so his disciples would be dispatched to find them, too. The Fifth Feast is the Feast of Trumpets, which heralds the resurrection of the dead, or the Greater Resurrection of the faithful. It is also known as Rosh HaShanah, referring the “change” or turn of the year. These swarms of fish would be fished out the waters, which represent nations, and be resurrected to life in the waters above, the heavenly waters.
From Rosh HaShanah until Yom Kippur, or Yom HaKippurim, ten days later, the standard greeting among Jews is “May your name be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life for a sweet year.” The decrees are written, but they can still be modified or discarded if an individual repents and returns to Adonai and His Word. If there is no repentance by the conclusion of the tenth day, Yom HaKippurim, the decrees are sealed and handed off to the angels for execution upon each person, whether for good or evil, life or death.
After a week of joyful feasting in the sukkah during the Feast of Sukkot, Israel removes themselves from their celebratory shelters (sukkot) on the Eighth Day for Shemini Atzeret, which is “rejoicing in the Torah,” Simchat Torah. Things come uncovered. The seals begin to break. When the gates closed on Yom HaKippurim (Day of Atonements, Coverings), one’s fate was sealed. If one repented, he or she was covered, atoned for. If not, he or she remained uncovered, vulnerable. This covering blood was a precious price paid by Yeshua, the letter to the Hebrews cautions believers not to take it lightly and keep on sinning, or there was “severer punishment.” (He 10:29)
This year, something interesting happened in Israel during the Days of Awe, the ten days between Rosh HaShanah and Yom HaKippurim. Heaven and nature warned the nation with a fish kill during the Days of Awe. Heaven and nature are warning the rest of the world through the uncovered slaughter of Shemini Atzeret. Not so incidentally, heaven and earth, the natural world, were summoned as witnesses to the warnings in the Deuteronomic Song of Moses, a song repeated in the Book of Revelation.
Here is the text of an article published on 9/26/23 in YNet News, the day after Yom HaKippurim. Reported the day after the decrees on the world were sealed up:
“Thousands of dead fish have been spotted on one of the beaches in Hadera in recent days. A dead sea-turtle was also found in the area, and the Nature and Parks Authority said that its death is unrelated to the fish. The Environmental Protection Ministry estimated that since these fish were not of commercial use, they were likely discarded by fishermen.
Shelly Goldsmith, a travel blogger, shared her distress, saying, ‘This morning, I headed towards Hadera beach, which is a beautiful spot. As I reached the shore, I saw large quantities of dead fish scattered along the beach, numbering in the thousands. I also noticed a dead sea turtle. I realized that pollution must have caused this.’ Goldsmith added, ‘It’s truly a terrible and heartbreaking sight. This is not the first time we’ve witnessed such a horrifying phenomenon with thousands of dead fish washing up on the shore. It’s a sorrowful morning.’
According to the Environmental Protection Ministry, ‘In recent days, reports were received about dead fish on Hadera’s beach. The images were sent to Dr. Nir Stern from the Israel Oceanographic & Limnological Research, who identified them as young and non-endangered fish. The small size of these fish indicates that they were likely discarded by fishermen. The ministry and other authorities are not aware of any pollution in the area that could have caused the fish deaths.’”
Knowing what we know of the events of Simchat Torah, the words of the article take on predictive horror. Young fish. Not endangered. Or so they thought. Discarded by evil fishermen. It was indeed a sorrowful morning. We came out of the covering of our sukkot to see the decrees came unsealed with lightning speed. In an unbelievable coincidence, the YNet fish article yesterday held photos of a young lady kidnaped and mutilated by Hamas on Shabbat, splayed unnaturally in the back of a pickup truck, broadcast to the nations.
Some rejoiced. Some were horrified. The waters, the nations, are separating into upper and lower realms. What happened to Israel happens next among the nations. We think it was unfortunate “her”? Evil fishermen are among the nations. Adonai is marking, sealing, and gathering His fish. He sent His Good News with fishermen to call those who would listen and love truth. His Word is truth. The beast is doing the same. Gathering, marking, directing with demonic, hateful, deathly lies. It is a year of exposure. The illusion of safety on the broken fence is exposed, so get off of it and get away from it. It is dangerous.
If none of this makes sense to you, it’s not too late. Don’t complain about it being over your head. These things are plainly written in Scripture from Genesis to Revelation for anyone to read, learn, verify, live by. Read it until you do understand. Buy a book on the Biblical feasts. Enroll in a Creation Gospel Zoom class to learn the paradigm. Read your Bible. Believe it.
The Torah is the first five books of the Bible, the covenant with Israel. Its seed prophecies are expanded throughout the rest of Scripture. The Torah is the Word. We are to rejoice in obeying the Word, not evil. Take a side. Make a decision. Heaven and nature are screaming that the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is judging His creation. Call upon Him. Swim up if you know you’re drowning in doubt, anxiety, and confusion.
Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. (2 Pe 1:10-11)
It was a sunny Shabbat morning on the beach, close to the fence like thousands of others. Until it wasn’t.
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 83 (The Greater Exodus Pt 13- Wars of Kings Pt 8: A Time for War)
Was there any prior clue that the Simchat Torah war would break out last Shabbat?
The Creation Gospel is a pattern that links the days of Creation, the Seven Spirits of Adonai listed in Isaiah, the Seven Feasts of Adonai, and even the Seven Assemblies of Revelation to demonstrate the significance of the numbers 1-7. The video series is free to watch on YouTube. Beginner classes are free on Zoom and routinely announced in our newsletter and Facebook. The Creation Gospel workbooks are not free because they fund LaMalah Orphanage in Kenya.
The paradigm of Days 1-7 is the seed prophecy from which every other prophecy sprouts in the Word.
Day One: separation of light and darkness
Day Two: separation of waters from water (the day not declared “good”)
Day Three: separation of dry land from water, seed-bearing trees with fruit
Day Four: establishment of the sun, moon, and stars to “govern” the day and night, seasons (moedim-feasts)
Day Five: first living creatures with a breath of life, birds and fish in swarms
Day Six: beasts to reproduce after their kind; human beings to reproduce after the kind and image of their Creator
Day Seven: Shabbat rest from creative work
Creation Gospel students analyze the symbols and patterns of each day, including linking the creation characteristics to the corresponding seven feasts. For instance, Day Two is a day on which separation begins to work with the chaos of fluidity. Because there is only separation, it is seen as a “death” day, for death occurs when the the soul and body separate along with the spirit. These await resurrection to life or judgment. Day Two is not pronounced good until Day Three when the chaotic waters are finally gathered into one place. Only then is it declared “good.” What good comes from Day Two? Although chaotic, the process of gathering is begun, a day in which the pain of separation must occur. Perhaps this is why Day Three corresponds to resurrection with its symbolism of first fruits from the dead.
In the cycle of shmittah years, we have now entered into “Day Two,” or Year Two of the cycle. What should we expect between now and next Feast of Trumpets? Chaos. Fluidity. Uncertainty. Separation, separation, separation. Exposure and assignment to upper or lower realms. In the pain of this coming year, the “gray area” of faith will be obliterated. One’s true heart will be exposed. Since Day Two is connected at its base on the menorah to the Sixth Day, then expect one’s conforming to be exposed. Do we conform to the image of the beast or the image of Elohim? Nothing in between. No fence riding. Heaven and earth are the two witnesses who will be the first to speak:
“I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants by loving the LORD your God, by obeying His voice, and by holding fast to Him; for this is your life and the length of your days, that you may live in the land which the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give them.”” (Dt 30:19-20)
A fence is a dangerous place this year. Run to truth; embrace it; proclaim it. Don’t be embarrassed by it. Learn to begin sentences with “It is written…,” not “I think… I feel… I want…” I could add words here to emphasize the importance of this, but those who don’t have ears to hear at this point have already sunk too low in the lower waters. Their confusion will likely not improve, although we should continue to pray that it does. It feels as though Covid somehow began the process of sorting those who would continually harden their hearts to believe lies. When you talk to them, it is like talking to a a walking human lie. What they believe and proclaim as truth defies all heavenly or earthly logic.
Believers must continue to shine the Light of the First Day so that if a fence-rider should look up to the surface, he or she can re-orient and make an effort to swim upward to the Light of the Word.
Here is another way of applying the pattern using the relationship to the seven feasts, or moedim:
We use the menorah to show chiastic relationships (mirrors). On Day Five, birds and fish were created. They are prophecies of many peoples, and so Yeshua later refers to the fish as “men,” which his disciples will go fish out of the nations with the Good News. Two of his post-resurrection appearances involved fish as food. Yeshua knew where to find good fish, and so his disciples would be dispatched to find them, too. The Fifth Feast is the Feast of Trumpets, which heralds the resurrection of the dead, or the Greater Resurrection of the faithful. It is also known as Rosh HaShanah, referring the “change” or turn of the year. These swarms of fish would be fished out the waters, which represent nations, and be resurrected to life in the waters above, the heavenly waters.
From Rosh HaShanah until Yom Kippur, or Yom HaKippurim, ten days later, the standard greeting among Jews is “May your name be inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life for a sweet year.” The decrees are written, but they can still be modified or discarded if an individual repents and returns to Adonai and His Word. If there is no repentance by the conclusion of the tenth day, Yom HaKippurim, the decrees are sealed and handed off to the angels for execution upon each person, whether for good or evil, life or death.
After a week of joyful feasting in the sukkah during the Feast of Sukkot, Israel removes themselves from their celebratory shelters (sukkot) on the Eighth Day for Shemini Atzeret, which is “rejoicing in the Torah,” Simchat Torah. Things come uncovered. The seals begin to break. When the gates closed on Yom HaKippurim (Day of Atonements, Coverings), one’s fate was sealed. If one repented, he or she was covered, atoned for. If not, he or she remained uncovered, vulnerable. This covering blood was a precious price paid by Yeshua, the letter to the Hebrews cautions believers not to take it lightly and keep on sinning, or there was “severer punishment.” (He 10:29)
This year, something interesting happened in Israel during the Days of Awe, the ten days between Rosh HaShanah and Yom HaKippurim. Heaven and nature warned the nation with a fish kill during the Days of Awe. Heaven and nature are warning the rest of the world through the uncovered slaughter of Shemini Atzeret. Not so incidentally, heaven and earth, the natural world, were summoned as witnesses to the warnings in the Deuteronomic Song of Moses, a song repeated in the Book of Revelation.
Here is the text of an article published on 9/26/23 in YNet News, the day after Yom HaKippurim. Reported the day after the decrees on the world were sealed up:
“Thousands of dead fish have been spotted on one of the beaches in Hadera in recent days. A dead sea-turtle was also found in the area, and the Nature and Parks Authority said that its death is unrelated to the fish. The Environmental Protection Ministry estimated that since these fish were not of commercial use, they were likely discarded by fishermen.
Shelly Goldsmith, a travel blogger, shared her distress, saying, ‘This morning, I headed towards Hadera beach, which is a beautiful spot. As I reached the shore, I saw large quantities of dead fish scattered along the beach, numbering in the thousands. I also noticed a dead sea turtle. I realized that pollution must have caused this.’ Goldsmith added, ‘It’s truly a terrible and heartbreaking sight. This is not the first time we’ve witnessed such a horrifying phenomenon with thousands of dead fish washing up on the shore. It’s a sorrowful morning.’
According to the Environmental Protection Ministry, ‘In recent days, reports were received about dead fish on Hadera’s beach. The images were sent to Dr. Nir Stern from the Israel Oceanographic & Limnological Research, who identified them as young and non-endangered fish. The small size of these fish indicates that they were likely discarded by fishermen. The ministry and other authorities are not aware of any pollution in the area that could have caused the fish deaths.’”
Knowing what we know of the events of Simchat Torah, the words of the article take on predictive horror. Young fish. Not endangered. Or so they thought. Discarded by evil fishermen. It was indeed a sorrowful morning. We came out of the covering of our sukkot to see the decrees came unsealed with lightning speed. In an unbelievable coincidence, the YNet fish article yesterday held photos of a young lady kidnaped and mutilated by Hamas on Shabbat, splayed unnaturally in the back of a pickup truck, broadcast to the nations.
Some rejoiced. Some were horrified. The waters, the nations, are separating into upper and lower realms. What happened to Israel happens next among the nations. We think it was unfortunate “her”? Evil fishermen are among the nations. Adonai is marking, sealing, and gathering His fish. He sent His Good News with fishermen to call those who would listen and love truth. His Word is truth. The beast is doing the same. Gathering, marking, directing with demonic, hateful, deathly lies. It is a year of exposure. The illusion of safety on the broken fence is exposed, so get off of it and get away from it. It is dangerous.
If none of this makes sense to you, it’s not too late. Don’t complain about it being over your head. These things are plainly written in Scripture from Genesis to Revelation for anyone to read, learn, verify, live by. Read it until you do understand. Buy a book on the Biblical feasts. Enroll in a Creation Gospel Zoom class to learn the paradigm. Read your Bible. Believe it.
The Torah is the first five books of the Bible, the covenant with Israel. Its seed prophecies are expanded throughout the rest of Scripture. The Torah is the Word. We are to rejoice in obeying the Word, not evil. Take a side. Make a decision. Heaven and nature are screaming that the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is judging His creation. Call upon Him. Swim up if you know you’re drowning in doubt, anxiety, and confusion.
Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you. (2 Pe 1:10-11)
It was a sunny Shabbat morning on the beach, close to the fence like thousands of others. Until it wasn’t.
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 82 (The Greater Exodus Pt 12- Wars of Kings Pt 7 : Locusts in Your Face)
Your neck is like the tower of David,
Built with rows of stones
On which are hung a thousand shields,
All the round shields of the mighty men. (So 4:4)
Our working text for the Footsteps of Messiah is the Song of Songs. From the above text, we previously connected the shields of a thousand generations with the offspring of Abraham, the righteous remnant in each generation forming the faithful shield of their generation. These are faithful warriors of the Word. Deuteronomy gives us insight into how Israel is instructed to prepare for war:
“When you go out to battle against your enemies and see horses and chariots and people more numerous than you, do not be afraid of them; for the LORD your God, who brought you up from the land of Egypt, is with you. When you are approaching the battle, the priest shall come near and speak to the people. He shall say to them, ‘Hear, O Israel, you are approaching the battle against your enemies today. Do not be fainthearted. Do not be afraid, or panic, or tremble before them, for the LORD your God is the one who goes with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you.’ The officers also shall speak to the people, saying, ‘Who is the man that has built a new house and has not dedicated it? Let him depart and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man would dedicate it. Who is the man that has planted a vineyard and has not begun to use its fruit? Let him depart and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man would begin to use its fruit. And who is the man that is engaged to a woman and has not married her? Let him depart and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man would marry her.’ Then the officers shall speak further to the people and say, ‘Who is the man that is afraid and fainthearted? Let him depart and return to his house, so that he might not make his brothers’ hearts melt like his heart.’ When the officers have finished speaking to the people, they shall appoint commanders of armies at the head of the people.
When you approach a city to fight against it, you shall offer it terms of peace. If it agrees to make peace with you and opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall become your forced labor and shall serve you. However, if it does not make peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it… (Dt 20:1-12)
Before a soldier could go to war, he was required to enjoy the fruit of his labors. A soldier who built, planted, and betrothed without consummating the joy of his labors expected to die in battle, an attitude that would discourage his fellow soldiers. Comfortable shelter, food and drink, and a family relationship are the building blocks of human joy. The feast time of Sukkot teaches this pattern. Every family comes to Jerusalem to commemmorate the Divine provision of food, drink, shelter, and family relationships, including the extended family who will share in the offerings along with strangers, aliens, Levites, and even the kohanim:
“There also you and your households shall eat before the LORD your God, and rejoice in all your undertakings in which the LORD your God has blessed you.” (Dt 12:7)
“You shall not do at all what we are doing here today, every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes; for you have not as yet come to the resting place and the inheritance which the LORD your God is giving you. When you cross the Jordan and live in the land which the LORD your God is giving you to inherit, and He gives you rest from all your enemies around you so that you live in security, then it shall come about that the place in which the LORD your God will choose for His name to dwell, there you shall bring all that I command you: your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution of your hand, and all your choice votive offerings which you will vow to the LORD. And you shall rejoice before the LORD your God, you and your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, and the Levite who is within your gates, since he has no portion or inheritance with you. (Dt 12:8-12)
In the passage above, there are some interesting questions: If Israel is at peace, then why instructions for war? What do the Three Questions suggest about the spiritual state of the nation at war? Why is joy so important in a festival of shelter, food and drink, and family?
Each question asked of a soldier involves his “wife”: house, vineyard, and betrothed. Each of those in certain contexts represents one’s wife. A wise woman builds her house; a man’s wife is his vineyard (Ps 128:3); his betrothed is his future wife with nothing left but the consummation of the marriage to complete it. It’s not as if such a man is lazy; quite the contrary! He has labored hard to build, plant, and consider a family. He simply hasn’t allowed himself the final commitment to fully enjoy it! These are the gifts of Adonai to human beings. He gives us the ability to build, plan, create, and imagine. Part of the joy is in that process, but the crown of joy is to eat the fruit of one’s labor. Strangely, it is the Feast of Sukkot that celebrates the partnership of Adonai and His People to build, plant, and live in intimate relationships.
If a young man works, yet refuses the fruit, instead leaving it for someone else, he is cutting himself off from faith in the root and fruit of blessing. Not only is he entitled to it, he is OBLIGATED to it. It is as if he plans to die in battle, a hidden mindset that will discourage his fellow soldiers on the day of tribulation. This hidden fault can be exposed by the priest and remedied if he will go back and enter into joy in the commandment. If not, he will likely die in battle and another man will enjoy the blessings of fulfilling his unfulfilled mitzvot, which ironically, is what the hopeless soldier expects to happen.
Sukkot is about embracing the joy of offspring, whether one’s own household or the household of faith, even those just curiously sitting in. Sukkot defies the fear of death. Sukkot says that the Holy One will shelter us in His sukkah on the day of trouble; He will feed us and give us drink without sorrow; He will betroth us in righteousness. The blessings He’s enabled us to set before our families and friends is the proof of even greater blessings of peace and prosperity yet to come if we believe and obey His Word.
Having joy in the commandments is a type of armor on the day of battle. Don’t live a life of ascetism in the Name of Heaven. Fast when you must, but like Yeshua, don’t refuse the joy of this life for which he was criticized:
But to what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces, who call out to the other children, and say, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon!’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Behold, a gluttonous man and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds. (Mt 11:16-19)
Others want us to conform ourselves to the childish emotional flavor of the day. Instead, we conform to “it is written.” There is a time and season to everything, appointed times for fasting and feasting. Do not be so consumed with tribulation that you fail to invest in joy, nor so gluttonous as to refuse days of sober fasting and intense prayer for war. This life is a brief investment window from which we will continue eternally to enjoy its yield from the Root of Jesse and his fruit which the Father has placed in our hands.
Your joy at Sukkot is part of the battle plan. Arm yourself with a lulav. Can’t you just imagine Yeshua sitting among his parents, his brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles and cousins, and all his disciples and their families in Jerusalem at Sukkot, laughing big belly-laughs while he watches the nieces and nephews romping around the barbecue pit? What a mitzvah! What a war hero!
Wars of Kings is a foundation for using the template of the first Exodus to understand the Greater Exodus and the accompanying plagues in the Book of Revelation. Click on Wars of Kings to go to the first segment of the Wars YouTube video. Last week’s teaching explained up to plague five, and this week’s video will continue the plagues, providing examples from our time to connect with the texts.
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 81 (The Greater Exodus Pt 11- Wars of Kings Pt 6 : Hail of Plagues)
Wars of Kings is a foundation for using the template of the first Exodus to understand the Greater Exodus and the accompanying plagues in the Book of Revelation. Click on Wars of Kings to go to the first segment of the Wars YouTube video. Last week’s teaching explained up to plague five, and this week’s video will continue the plagues, providing examples from our time to connect with the texts.
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 80 (The Greater Exodus Pt 10: Interview with Howie and Aline George)
Discussing how the hell-bug of Abaddon is overcome by believers who connect the generations with the Word. with special guests Howie and Aline George from Mishkanim. (mishkanim.com)
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Dr Hollisa Alewine – Footsteps of Messiah Part 79 (The Greater Exodus Pt 9: Wars of Kings Pt 5)
Wars of Kings is a foundation for using the template of the first Exodus to understand the Greater Exodus and the accompanying plagues in the Book of Revelation. Click on Wars of Kings to go to the first segment of the Wars YouTube video. Part of this week’s teaching will continue with the rest of the plagues, providing examples from our time to connect with the texts.
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