Write The Vision And Make It Plain Issue 3

Habukkuk 2:2 Issue 3

Few people truly understand the full meaning of the salvation they receive when they accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their savior. They never realize that they are missing the greater portion of the birthright; they do not understand the covenant of salvation that they are offered through the blood of Christ---often because it is misrepresented, distorted, or simply not taught. They lack understanding of a covenant-keeping God who wants them to be made whole, delivered, or protected, literally or figuratively, to be healed, preserved, save self, do well. You should be healed when your sins are forgiven. The problem frequently begins even before a person accepts Christ. It is not uncommon for ministers to offer the following invitation to receive the Lord Jesus as Savior:

**How many here have the assurance in your hearts that if you died tonight, you would go to heaven? Would you please raise your hands? Thank you. You may put your hands down now. Would those of you who don’t have the assurance in your hearts that you would spend eternity in heaven if you died tonight, please raise your hands? Thank you. Now those of you who would like to have the assurance in your hearts that if you died tonight you would spend eternity in heaven, would you please come forward? If you want the assurance in your heart, come forward and receive Jesus as your savior.**

Scripturally, there are serious problems with this approach. It does not teach believers to see salvation in Jesus the way God ordained it; this approach only provides them with “fire insurance”. Romans 10:9-10 reads, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”

A closer look at key words in this passage makes it clear that God offers more than fire insurance. The work “confess” means to assent to covenant or acknowledge. Jesus (Iesous in Greek and Yeshuwah in Hebrew) means the salvation of Jehovah or Jehovah the Savior. The word “save” is sozo, which means “to be made whole, delivered or protected literally or figuratively, healed, preserved, save self, do well.” So, when one confesses or assents to covenant with Jesus, the Covenant Lamb (the salvation of Jehovah), one has come into agreement with Jehovah, the Covenant-keeping God, for Him to be your rescue or safety, (physically or morally), deliverance, health, save saving.

Confession has been preached without giving the real understanding behind it. This has caused most Christians to be robbed of a binding blood contract or covenant with God Almighty through the blood of Jesus Christ. They miss out on all that God is and wants to be to them---their complete salvation (rescue or safety, physically or morally).

Webster’s Dictionary defines covenant as “a formal, solemn and binding agreement.”

Making It Plain

Romans 10:9 If thou shalt make a covenant with your mouth – (a verbal binding agreement)

The Lord Jesus -The Master, the Covenant Lamb of the All Mighty God, who is the rescue or safety, physically or morally, deliverance, saving health, save (make whole) saving, of Jehovah or Jehovah the Savior

And shalt believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, thou shalt---be made whole, delivered, or protected, literally or figuratively, healed, preserved, save self, do well.

Romans 10:10

For with the heart man believes unto righteousness---believes all that is written in Isaiah 53

And with the mouth confession---covenant, an agreement

Is made unto---rescue or safety (physically or morally), deliverance, health, save, saving (daily living by the Covenant-keeping God’s saving grace). The Greek word for saving is peripoiesis, which means preservation of a purchased possession. We are purchased by the blood of the Lamb of Jehovah.

Saviour: (Hebrew) YASHA: means to be open, wide or free (i.e.: by implying to be safe; the causative means to be free or succor; succor means to run to; defend, deliver, e.g. help, preserve life, rescue, be safe, bring (having) salvation, save (-ior), get victory. It is translated salvation, save, savior in Isaiah 62:11, 12; Zechariah 9.9; Ezekiel 38:29 (25-29).

Soul: the Greek work (psuche). That same Greek word is translated 105 times in the New Covenant (New Testament): translated as “soul” (58 times) ; “life” (40 times); “mind” (three times), “heart, heartily, us, you” (one time); “souls were saved by water”---(total person ---eight times ), as in I Peter 3:20; the man with the withered hand in Luke 6:6, 8; life or soul was made whole, sins forgiven, body healed.

Jesus was put to death to bear the sin curse of this world. We enter into the New Covenant by the blood of Jesus Christ. The blessings and curse of scripture are found in Deuteronomy 28. God said that as long as His people (who verbally agreed to the blood covenant by the blood of bulls and goats) walked in covenant with Him, He would not permit the sickness and disease and the calamity of the sin-cursed world to come on them. If they broke the blood covenant, they broke their protection or covering from God. Galatians 3:13-14 reads, “Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” Deuteronomy 28:61 informs us to be redeemed from every sickness and plague.

In Acts 2:38 Peter preached to Jews who understood the meaning of covenant, “Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.” Even today, we Gentiles receive this scripture without first understanding that the Lord Jesus Christ is now the covenant Lamb. We are seldom taught that we should verbally assent or agree to Almighty God’s kind of salvation (rescue or safety, physically or morally) found in Isaiah 53 and made plain in Galatians 3:13. Finally, we do not understand what the Lord Jesus has redeemed us from (Deuteronomy 28) before we turned from our sins to the living God. By His blood we enter into contract or covenant with the Almighty God to be made whole (saved). Romans 10:10 reads, “For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession (contract or covenant) is made unto salvation.” (Rescue or safety, physically or morally; deliverance; saving health; save [make whole]; saving.)

To the Jews that Peter preached to, Jesus was a stumbling block. No other nation had a covenant or contract with Almighty God for salvation (Yeshuwah: deliverance, aid, victory, prosperity, health, help, save [make whole], saving preservation of health, welfare). The Jews of that day understood that when the Ark of the Covenant was with them and they were in right covenant with God, they would live under covenant blessings. They would be victorious in battle, the sickness and disease of the world would not affect them, and they would be financially prosperous. It also meant that their land would be healed of any plagues (even their animals would be healed) and their kingdom would be restored to them. That is the understanding they had. That is also the understanding that Gentile Christians have missed. For the Jews of Jesus’ time, when they believed Jesus to be their Lamb of God, everything else fell into place---their history with a covenant-keeping God, their understanding of covenant, and the benefits of keeping covenant with Almighty God.

By contrast, in Romans 10:9, Paul preached to the Gentiles, an uncovenanted people or a godless-people, with no history of covenant with God. Paul had to preach covenant: “That if thou shalt covenant with thy mouth, thou shall be made whole (delivered, protected literally or figuratively, healed preserved, safe self, do well) by the Word.”

The church world today, as a whole, does not covenant or acknowledge with its mouth, by faith in the blood of Jesus, to be “made whole; delivered or protected, literally or figuratively; to be healed, preserved, to save self, do well.” Many Christians do not believe in their hearts and covenant with their mouths for a Savior who at all times avenges, defends, delivers, helps, preserves, and rescues. When they accept the invitation described earlier, they receive a savior that might kill them or let them die prematurely, maybe before the night is over. A story is sometimes told about someone not responding to the call to receive Christ as their savior. As the person left the meeting, he or she was killed in an automobile accident. Those who did respond, however, came forward to prepare to die. They did not come forward to live in covenant with the Most High God through the blood of Jesus, and therefore be protected in an auto accident. The Most High God will judge the ministers for their unfaithfulness in issuing this watered-down invitation to Christ.

Christians without the protection of the covenant will face the perils prophesied in Revelation. The following article by Jack Anderson appeared in The Times Recorder, Zanesville, OH, on June 3, 1987.

Cashless Future?

“Federal Reserve Board economists have looked into their crystal balls and seen a brave new world where paper money will be an endangered species, used only for small purchases and lighting bankers’ cigars. Your paycheck will be deposited and drawn against electronically, loans will be approved (or rejected) by computers and your funds will draw interest immediately. There will be no such thing as “idle cash” within 10 years, the Fed’s seers predict. One drawback to this instantaneous banking, of course, is the elimination of the 30-day “float” currently enjoyed by millions of credit-card addicts.”

Get chipped, then charge without plastic --- you are the card

**Rev. 13:15-18; Rev.14:9-11

Strong’s Definition: G5480 χάραγμα charagma khar'-ag-mah From the same as G5482; a scratch or etching, that is, stamp (as a badge of servitude), or sculptured figure (statue): - graven, mark.

G5482 χάραξ charax khar'-ax From “charasso” (to sharpen to a point; akin to

G1125 through the idea of scratching); a stake, that is, (by implication) a palisade or rampart (millitary mound for circumvallation in a siege): - trench. G1125 γράφω graphō graf'-o A primary verb; to “grave”, especially to write; figuratively to describe: -

** ID Chip Ready for Implant

** If you missed the earlier article on this chip last month please be sure to review it. Applied Digital Solutions designed the VeriChip - about the size of a grain of rice - to hold information that could be read with special electronic scanners. The company has touted the chip as a potential way to hold a person's medical records or security codes. They plan to begin selling a computer ID chip that can be embedded beneath people's skin, now that the Food and Drug Administration has said it will not regulate the implant as long as it contains no medical data.**

We should understand that the Federal Reserve Board’s plans bring us one step closer to the time that the Spirit of Almighty God inspired John to warn of in Revelation 13. John warned of a false religious man---a world leader called Antichrist (or “instead of Christ”) ---and a number of nations, combined, will make up what is referred to as a “beast”. The instead-of-Christ, with the financial power of the nations that support him, will cause the people of the world to take the number 666 in their right hands or in their foreheads. When what Jack Anderson reports comes to pass, you won’t be able to enter a hospital, get glasses or dental work, pay taxes, get a driver’s license, or buy food without the number 666 in card form. It, along with your Social Security number, will be in a bar code. Later, the card will be replaced with a chip---inserted under the skin in your right hand or in your forehead.

Many Christians have been deceived into believing that they will be “raptured” out of the world before all of this happens. The word of God says, in Matthew 24:15, “When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand.”) You cannot be gone and see it, too. According to II Thessalonians 2-4, we will not be leaving here until the great falling away first comes, which means great apostasy or falling away from the truth. Nor will the Lord come for His people until the man of sin (meaning the instead-of-Christ) be revealed. The false preacher will make war on the saints, killing some of us and adding to the numbers of those that were slain for the work of God (see Revelations 6:9-11).

The covenant-keeping God of the Bible does not want His people dependent on an apostate political and religious system. He does not want them under the rule of the Antichrist, for He has provided for all their needs through the blood of His covenant lamb, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ is the only head of the church, the only king, president, or provider in the kingdom of God. The Lord Himself should be your complete welfare, thereby fulfilling all the meanings of salvation.

You, who are already born again, already children of God through the Lord Jesus Christ, need to add to your faith experience a covenant with God to be made whole. The covenant will be for victory now and for the time to come when all your needs will be met through the Lord, not through the Antichrist system with the number 666.

The ministers among God’s people need to stand before God and His people and repent of being “unbelieving believers”. They first need to ask God and their people for forgiveness, then they should begin to add to the faith of their congregations using wholesome or sound words (I Timothy 6:3 and II Timothy 1:13). Those of you who are born again need to seek God with fasting, prayer, and repentance from unbelief. You should tell the Heavenly Father of our salvation that you want to enter into covenant with Him for all that He has to offer through the blood of Jesus Christ, making your calling and election sure.

This is the salvation doctrine of the Lord Jesus Christ that has not changed. It is the unfaithful, unbelieving ministers that have changed it in the hearts and minds of God’s people.