There is a most moving testimony, almost none like it in recent church history, of a dear man, a Scottish man, a highlander, Duncan Campbell. Who, when he was a young man saw revival, but then for 25 long, cold years thereafter, he was backslidden…

After being truly converted in his teen years, he subsequently backslid after being drafted into the military during WWI, but upon being, as it would seem, mortally wounded, and bleeding to death with a broken back, suddenly the scripture came to him…

“Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.”

— Heb. 12:14

He knew that he was unfit to stand before God. But in the providence of God, a man heard his groan on the battlefield, and returned to his aid; and as his dying body was cast over the horse’s back, he cried from the depths that old prayer of M’Cheyne: “O God, make me as holy as a saved sinner can be!” And right there, in that instant the Lord graciously received him, and the waves of glory again washed over his unworthy soul! The text came to him, “Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases” (Psa. 103:3)… The result: AWAKENING! Souls began to be converted immediately beginning in the casualty clearing station, and over the course of the next year as he recuperated in hospital.

What followed into his early 20’s was what has become known as the Mid-Argyll Revival, in which the Lord was pleased to use him instrumentally as a voice to the backslidden church of Scotland, and to the conversion of many souls.

But all of this came to a tragic halt. As he grew older, and desired to be married,  the question posed itself: “How will you take care of a family?” He was a part of the Faith Mission, and hadn’t a penny to his name! And with this seed of doubt, he (in his language) “went in for the ministry”… and thus committing himself to his professors of theology, according to his own testimony, by the time they were done with him, he didn’t even believe the first three chapters of the Bible anymore!

Thus was the beginning of the sad declension of this good man of God.

For the next quarter of a century, Duncan grew in his influence throughout Scotland, was a well established and respected Presbyterian minister, was a much sought out conference speaker, being known as “Campbell of the ’21 Revival”... and yet he lacked that first love, and was thus powerless to do the first works (Rev. 2:4,5)… Yet he did not leave off preaching of his first works, and being esteemed as a man of revival, though he hadn’t even seen it in 25 years!

But one fateful morning, at 5 a.m., as he was preparing a sermon for that evening’s meeting in the Keswick Convention, he heard what sounded to him as an angel singing through his house, “Coming, coming, yes they are…” — it was his daughter! He wandered out to where she was, and when she finished her song, she came to him, and throwing her arms around his neck, said, “Daddy, isn’t Jesus wonderful?… I just spent an hour with him!” Up at 4 a.m. seeking the face of Jesus, Duncan’s daughter, Sheena, had a question for her father. So they moved back to his study, and there she opened her matter, “For several days, Daddy, I have been battling against facing you with this question, but I must do it… When you were a young pilgrim, before you went in for the ministry, you saw revival… How is it, Daddy, that you’re not seeing revival now? Daddy, you have a large congregation, and many are joining the Church, but Daddy when did you last kneel beside a poor sinner, and lead him to Jesus?...” In his own words,

“THAT SHOOK ME!”

That would prove to be the beginning of the end.

For many years, he knew that something was not right in his soul, and that it was somehow linked to his departure from the Faith Mission, but the way back was hidden from his eyes, and so for 25 years he moved through a barren wilderness, feeling “out of touch” with God. But that evening after preaching his message, he returned home in great distress of soul, and while on his way, alone in the car, he vowed that if the Lord didn’t bring him back to the experience of personal revival (on the horse’s back), then he would give up the ministry and go back into business… He would be anything BUT a deceiver!

Upon his arrival, he refused supper, telling his wife and daughter that he was going to have a “session with God”, separating himself with singularity unto God as Jacob of old to wrestle with the angel of the Lord… And, there in his study, he threw himself prostrate before God, praying that He would again forgive him. As he cried unto God, he repeated, “I am marred… I am marred… I am marred…”, feeling as the marred vessel of Jer. 18. After praying thus for an hour, suddenly the Lord came into the room, and revealed to his soul that though he was marred, yet as at conversion, and as at his earlier restoration on the battlefield, he was still in the hands of the Potter! It was then that the old text came rushing back to his conscious awareness,

“Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases.”

— Psa. 103:3

But no sooner had the Lord spoken this word, Duncan was in an agony as he received a vision from the Lord: a vision of hell.

“Multitudes, multitudes streaming over the caverns of death, to be damned and doomed eternally!”

Suddenly his daughter entered the study, and began to pray for him that the Lord would not let him lose his mind!

But at that moment, a voice came to him, “Give up the ministry. Go back to the Faith Mission!” But with it, the old question returned, “How will you take care of a family?” And with this, for a moment, darkness entered his soul! Then Sheena put her hand on her father's body, and spoke, “O Daddy, Daddy, whatever it costs, go through with God!… I believe that you’re facing the question, that if you go back to the mission — because I’m fully persuaded that God is asking you to go back — Daddy, perhaps you’re wondering how you’re going to look after us… I know, Daddy, that you’ve promised to give me a new coat on my birthday, but, Daddy, Mommy will be quite willing to change my old coat, and you needn’t buy me a new coat!…”

In Duncan’s own words, “IT WAS THAT THAT DID IT!… I said ‘Yes’ to God, and the flood tides of glory came over me again! And, O, if I had a vision of hell, I had a vision of the risen Christ: able to save to the uttermost!”

On the following morning he wrote three letters: one to the secretary of his congregation, one to the presbytery clerk, and another to the clerk of assembly: resigning his charge in that town!… Now he was free — free to return to the old battlefield where he had left off with God in childlike faith and sincerity. Thus he returned immediately to the Faith Mission, and within about one year’s time God granted that this man, Duncan Campbell, should be the instrument in His hands to operate revival on the Island of Lewis, in the outer Hebrides.

Thus and thus was this man, Duncan Campbell, “Made again” (Jer. 18:4).

What a different spirit is now at work in the leaders of God’s remnant, than that which breathed through the life of those holy men of God, whom these men of our day claim as their fathers!

It is truly dreadful to behold the deceitful workers (transformed as the ministers of righteousness), which the Lord has now allowed for a little space to bear rule over His people (according to His righteous judgment for the sins of the Church)! These have been truly groomed to this end, as, I am convinced, many of them have heard the call of God in this generation, and have assayed to go up, while yet ignorant of the inviolable rules & means of attaining! And, by and by, they have become disillusioned, discouraged, and depressed, and their only “gathering together” is unto the mutual deterioration of former convictions, and the soothing of their troubled consciences, by the one accord of failure, and backsliding among the best of them… And this for years in continuance! May the Lord truly undo this web of hypocrisy, and save all whom He wills, and bring these fallen heads into subjection with mighty signs and wonders!

I mean, there are many men in this hour, who have been stricken with those piercing words of the Puritans, or the radical acts of the Reformers, or the meticulous ways of the Methodists — but, alas, where is their purity of heart and life, their reformational zeal, their methodical relationship to the glory of God?! When once they heard the penetrating rhetoric of the late great Ravenhill, who called them to a life conformed to the doctrine’s which they ascribed! Or Aiden Wilson Tozer, who vehemently stirred them to many hours of closet-prayer, oft times in silent awe and adoration!… Where is such conformity now to be found, such lives of devotion? I have seen, and heard with my ears, the self-professed “sons” of such men, nowadays disclaiming the very righteousness of their fathers which they once praised as the adder sting which drove them to a look at the Savior!

O what a miserable revolting spirit is this!

Are these not the days of Josiah’s sons, who so suddenly turned out of the way which their father had commanded them! Imagine it, after a 13 year revival, wherein it was said, "And Josiah took away all the abominations out of all the countries that pertained to the children of Israel, and made all that were present in Israel to serve, even to serve the LORD their God. And all his days they departed not from following the LORD, the God of their fathers" (II Chron. 34:33). Then — SUDDENLY! — when Josiah was conveyed from this world's stage to glory, his sons, every one, forsook the ways of their father, and apostasized, though they kept the form, saying, "The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, are these" (Jer. 7:4)! This utter hypocrisy of Josiah's treacherous sons warranted the flaming remonstrance, and nigh martyrdom of the by-then venerated prophet Jeremiah, the friend, and comrade-in-revival of this Josiah (see, Jer. 7:1-10:25; 26:1-24)!

O my soul, are these the days of Uzziah, who sought God in the lifetime of his seer, and spiritual mentor Zechariah, and when he died, quickly turned out of the way which he commanded him (see, II Chron. 26)!

Are these the days of that once admirable Joash, who did that which was right in the sight of the Lord all the days of his spiritual father, that noble priest Jehoiada, then capitulated, and forsook the law of Moses (in which Jehoiada instructed him), forsook the house the Lord, forsook the prophets, and even killed the son of Jehoiada who protested the declension — till there was no remedy! (see, II Chron. 24).

I consider Edwards, who many of these men take to be a chief captain of the faith: “Most excellent in his generation, nor yet to be surpassed,” so they say! This man was filled with contempt, and scorned the slightest thought of the conformity of his mind, merely, to the truth of divine wisdom, and not his life and character also! It was enough to him, that the truth to which he ascribed with all of his heart, would become the reflexive practice of his life — anything short to him was utterly contemned! Behold, but a few of his RESOLUTIONS, which he made early on in his pilgrimage, and which ruled his entire walk with God to the end!

Resolutions:

Resolved, That I will do whatsoever I think to be most to the glory of God, and my own good, profit, and pleasure, in the whole of my duration; without any consideration of the time, whether now, or never so many myriads of ages hence. Resolved, to do whatever I think to be my duty, and most for the good and advantage of mankind in general. Resolved, so to do, whatever difficulties I meet with, how many soever, and how great soever.

Resolved, To be continually endeavouring to find out some new contrivance and invention to promote the forementioned things.

Resolved, If ever I shall fall and grow dull, so as to neglect to keep any part of these Resolutions, to repent of all I can remember, when I come to myself again.

Resolved, Never to lose one moment of time, but to improve it in the most profitable way I possibly can.

Resolved, To think much, on all occasions, of my dying, and of the common circumstances which attend death.

Resolved, If I take delight in it as a gratification of pride, or vanity, or on any such account, immediately to throw it by.

Resolved, That I will live so, as I shall wish I had done when I come to die.

Resolved, To live so, at all times, as I think is best in my most devout frames, and when I have the clearest notions of the things of the gospel, and another world.

Resolved, To endeavour to obtain for myself as much happiness in the other world as I possibly can, with all the power, might, vigour, and vehemence, yea violence, I am capable of, or can bring myself to exert, in any way that can be thought of.

Resolved, To study the Scriptures so steadily, constantly, and frequently, as that I may find, and plainly perceive, myself to grow in the knowledge of the same.

Resolved, To strive every week to be brought higher in religion, and to a higher exercise of grace, than I was the week before.

Resolved, To be strictly and firmly faithful to my trust, that that, in Prov. xx. 6. ‘A faithful man, who can find?’ may not be partly fulfilled in me.

Resolved, Constantly, with the utmost niceness and diligence, and the strictest scrutiny, to be looking into the state of my soul, that I may know whether I have truly an interest in Christ or not; that when I come to die, I may not have any negligence respecting this to repent of.

Resolved, That I will act so, as I think I shall judge would have been best, and most prudent, when I come into the future world.

Resolved, That I will act so, in every respect, as I think I shall wish I had done, if I should at last be damned.

Resolved, To endeavour, to my utmost, so to act, as I can think I should do, if I had already seen the happiness of heaven and hell torments.

Resolved, Whenever my feelings begin to appear in the least out of order, when I am conscious of the least uneasiness within, or the least irregularity without, I will then subject myself to the strictest examination.

On the supposition, that there never was to be but one individual in the world, at any one time, who was properly a complete Christian, in all respects of a right stamp, having Christianity always shining in its true lustre, and appearing excellent and lovely, from whatever part and under whatever character viewed: Resolved, To act just as I would do, if I strove with all my might to be that one, who should live in my time.

Resolved, When I find those ”groanings which cannot be uttered,“ of which the apostle speaks, and those ”breathings of soul for the longing it hath,” of which the psalmist speaks, Psalm cxix. 20. that I will promote them to the utmost of my power; and that I will not be weary of earnestly endeavouring to vent my desires, nor of the repetitions of such earnestness.

— Psa. 19:10,12

When hearing the tender tones, and condescending, compassionate reasonings of the Son of God disclosed particularly in the upper room discourse of John 13-17, it is a surprise to find the spiritual status of the disciples — after three years of intimate discipleship! — discovered to be that of “spiritual babes”… But so it was! Unable as yet to hear the words of life, without which they would die! “I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now” (John 16:12).

“Do ye now believe” (John 16:31)? Was this of no major significance, their persistent lack of understanding — unto the end?! Beloved, these dearly beloved of the Lord Jesus, even his own familiar friends, were filled with self-confidence and pride, assuring the Lord of glory that they now understood His speech, and they were indeed going to be faithful to what was revealed, and the Lord Jesus answered, “Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me” (John 16:32)! The disciples' plaguing ignorance would prove to be the cause of their soon apostasy, though they thus flattered themselves!

Is it but a light transgression to you, the disciples unrelenting hardness of heart to steadfastly believe upon the Lord for all of His mighty deeds? I remind my reader that this is not a “Jesus movie”, or a Sunday school felt board: THESE MEN WERE ABOUT TO FORSAKE CHRIST, DENY HIS NAME, AND ONE WOULD EVEN BETRAY HIM! Do not mistake the kind tones for an absence of danger! Satan was putting them in his sieve! As it was written, “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat” (Luke 22:31).

Digressing, one of the foremost testimonies of God’s people is spoken of in Psa. 78; namely, that of the backsliding and eventual reprobation of the Exodus Generation: whom the Lord genuinely, and gloriously “SAVED” out of Egypt, and afterwards “DESTROYED” for their impenitent unbelief — in spite of all of His mighty acts which He did in their sight in delivering them, time after time (Jude 5; Heb. 3:16-4:2; I Cor. 10:1-12)! One of the most provocative of these testimonies is recorded in the above mentioned text, Psa. 78:18,19 (cf. Num. 11:4), “And they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust. Yea, they spake against God; they said, Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?” This was one of the primary testimonies which God gives, highlighting their damnable degree of hardness of heart, which would tend to their eventual destruction, if not corrected!

[For more on the salvation of the Exodus Generation]

If this is so, and this sin of God’s people is so great, that it would merit the eternal judgment of 600k men, then should we not be alarmed if an identical manifestation of unbelief is manifest in biblical testimony as time moves on — even among the beloved disciples of Christ? Yes, dear reader, we most certainly should be alarmed, and most certainly will be inasmuch as we are well instructed in Biblical Church History (that which is infallibly recorded in the chronicles of holy Scripture)! Well, this very strain of sin is faithfully rehearsed by Mark in his gospel.

There is an undeniable subplot discovered in the Gospel of Mark, namely, in the consecutive testimonies of the miraculous feeding of the multitudes. It is in this storyline that we find here — almost verbatim! — the very confession of the Exodus Generation in the mouths of the disciples: “From whence can a man satisfy these men with bread here in the wilderness?” There is an irresistible likeness of this confession to Psa. 78:19, and the same cause is declared by Christ, as was formerly revealed by the Spirit of Christ through the prophet Asaph! As it was written,

“And he charged them, saying, Take heed, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, and of the leaven of Herod. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, It is because we have no bread. And when Jesus knew it, he saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? perceive ye not yet, neither understand? have ye your heart yet hardened? Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember? When I brake the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve. And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? And they said, Seven. And he said unto them, How is it that ye do not understand?”

— Mark 8:15-21

“And might not be as their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation; a generation that set not their heart aright, and whose spirit was not stedfast with God… They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law; and forgat his works, and his wonders that he had shewed them.”

— Psa. 78:8,10,11

From the first feeding of the five thousand (Mark 6), and the Lord Jesus Christ’s first rebuke of their failure to “consider the miracle of the loaves: for their heart was hardened” (Mark 6:52), they still were not attaining to a vital understanding of what it was the Lord Jesus was seeking to reveal to them; thus the stronger rebuke referenced above, after the feeding of the four thousand (Mark 8:15-21).

This is why (according to Mark’s gospel), after the resurrection of Christ from the dead, the disciple’s unbelief yet prevailing over them, neither did they believe the report of the women who had seen Him risen, that the Lord Jesus came to His disciples, “and upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart” (Mark 16)! And this is why according to Luke’s gospel, as the two walked along the road to Emmaus that the Lord Jesus devastatingly rebuked them, saying, “O fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken: ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory?” (Luke 24:25,26).

The Faithful Lord Jesus Christ did, at last, overcome the mountains of unbelief and pride of His beloved disciples!

Notwithstanding the testimony of God’s pardon, the severity of the crimes against God which were committed in the meantime were of no small magnitude, and 1 of the 12 were eternally lost! Let us therefore judge ourselves, beloved reader, by the testimony of God’s word, and thereby learn to lay it to our heart (Isa. 42:25; 57:11; Mal. 2:2)!

“Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults. Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great transgression.”

— Psa. 19:12,13

For Further Study:

The Attributes of God in Christ

The Attributes of God in Christ

The Church of Wells

The Preincarnate Jesus Christ

The Preincarnate Jesus Christ

The Church of Wells

Throughout the annals of Redemption there has always been a progressive REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST. A pilgrimage of all saints, ever upward, ever onward – the absence from which is no slight doctrinal infraction merely, but, rather, a treasonous betrayal of the Captain of salvation Himself, Jesus Christ, who is marching to Zion!

Literally speaking, all of redemptive history is in one ongoing climactic crescendo leading unto, not only the present-tense situation of the saints so gloriously put in the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter 12, "Ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem" (v.22), but unto the much-more-glorious bringing of this heavenly reality – upon earth! – at the fruition of the New Covenant, in the 2nd Advent of Christ from heaven!

What if the Lord has called you into the ark, but you remain without (Gen. 7:1)? What if the Lord called you out of Ur of the Chaldees, but you will not come (Gen. 12:1)? What if the Lord called you out of Egypt, into the Promised Land, but you wish to return (Num. 14:4)?! What if the Lord called you into the campaigns of His kingdom's progress in the earth, but you remain at home (II Sam. 11:1)? What happens if the invisible God forsakes the visible Church (of the OT), and makes Babylon "the weapons of His indignation", but you rebel against your captors (Isa. 13:5; Jer. 27)? What if the Lord made you recipient of unprecedented sovereign mercy, and yet you rejected the commandment of the Lord, and would not worthily respond to His mercy (Mal. 2:1-3)?! What if Christ came to you, and said "Follow me," but He was not as you had expected, so you received Him not (John 1:11; Matt. 23:37-39)?!...

This real and present danger of refusing to follow the Lord Jesus in every covenant and dispensation is undeniable. And shall we now turn a blind eye to this same danger that has now loomed overhead for 20 successive centuries? What is most troubling is when the virtues of dependence, and loyalty, as concerning former words and revelations of the Lord, while inordinately related to, become the causes of practical apostasy. Practical apostasy (Tit. 1:16), I say, like a shrine built about the base of one mighty mountain-like revelation – when God meant it not as the end of a hallway, but as an open door, to usher you into greater corridors of grace and truth! This is a subtle refusal to go on with God, though it be for the greatness of the soul's love for "the principles of the doctrines of Christ"! This is an inordinate relationship to the "foundation".

"Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation."

– Heb. 6:1

The above text perfectly represents my point of emphasis. This is not a despite for "the principles of the oracles of God" (Heb. 5:12)! This is a proper relationship thereto – a truly pure, ardent flame of love! It is "leaving", not a forsaking; as a man would leave off laying the foundation when it had once been situated and established, unto the full improving upon that foundation: the mighty superstructure to be built thereon! A man would be a fool to dig 100 feet into the earth, sinking his pillars into the immovable bedrock below, and yet never to build into the heights of the heavens! This is the treachery which abounds in our day, as with the priest, so with the people, and they love to have it so!... For it is all done in the name of Christocentric preaching!

God is looking for lovesick, and jealous defenders of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and all that it entails! Christ does not admire your superstitious adherence to the "red letters", beloved...

Do you see Christ in all the scriptures (Luke 24:27,32,44-46)?!

• Do you know that the gospel was not first introduced in the NT, through the preaching of John the Baptist & Jesus Christ, but was first explicitly declared through the prophet Isaiah (Isa. 40:9; 41:27; 52:7; 61:1)?
• Do you know that their are elements of the gospel (particularly declared by David and Isaiah), which were not fully declared through the preaching of Jesus Christ in the first four gospels of the NT, hence the necessity of Revelation for the closing of the canon?!
• Do you know that this present dispensation of Christ in the Gentiles is a mystery hidden from all ages (Rom. 16:25,26; Col. 1:26,27), which was unrevealed in the 1st Advent of Christ, in the days of His flesh, but was afterwards revealed exclusively to Paul the Apostle, called "the gospel of the uncircumcision" (Gal. 2:7; Eph. 3:1-12); hence the necessity of Acts and the NT epistles for the perfection of the canon?! [A mystery warranting NT apostolic explanation!]
• Do you know that the gospel does not climax with the mighty revelations declared in the Gospels and the subsequent Epistles, but most breathtakingly summits at the grand finale of the end of the world, captured in the book of REVELATION!?

"For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope."

– Rom. 15:4

When one comes to understand the seamless garment of the progressive revelation of the Scriptures, it truly works a deep patience in the soul; and it is this virtue of the Spirit which the saints shall most have cause to thank the Lord for in the looming tribulation, just upon the prophetic horizon. As it is written,

"Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus."

– Rev. 14:12

It is truly astonishing to behold the NT witness of the apostle's perseverance (i.e. patiently enduring) in the testimony of Jesus Christ, and how this was the sure course to the opening of further, formerly undiscovered, yet vital mysteries of the gospel of Christ unto them! For example, the apostle John persevered in the testimony of Jesus Christ, not that only which was preached unto Him by Christ (in the days of His flesh, John 3:11; 5:39), but that also which was further revealed unto the apostle Paul (Rom. 16:25,26; Gal. 2:7); until, finally, on the island of Patmos, where he was suffering tribulation for this "testimony", Lo! he received yet more: THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST!

"I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ..."

– Rev. 1:9

[This is not only borne witness here, but all throughout the NT, as demonstrated here...]

While most Christians are saturated with the idea that the Book of Revelation is a mere peripheral topic, and divisive, they err in their hearts, and alienate themselves from the mountain peak which their Lord is summiting, leading His captivity captive in one of the closing scenes of Redemption: Mt. Zion with His 144k (Rev. 14:1-5)!

To have jettisoned this vital understanding from your fellowship with God, and your affections in heavenly places, is to threaten the jeopardy of your standing with the Lord Jesus in the Last Days!... I am sure the only way that a sincere, blood-bought saint of the Most High would ever do this, is through the misconception that this is irrelevant, and essentially has nothing to do with the GOSPEL of Jesus Christ... Well, the book of revelation has much to say about the Gospel, and is inextricably a part of it, and even the climactic pinnacle of it, as before proved.

My reader, Babylon is rising. You have been warned.

For Further Reading/Resources:

"The Gospel of David -> The Gospel of Isaiah -> "The Everlasting Gospel"

"The Testimony of Jesus"

"The Breaking of the Seals of the Book: Explaining / Vindicating the Past"

“But and if that servant say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to beat the menservants and maidens, and to eat and drink, and to be drunken; The lord of that servant will come in a day when he looketh not for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in sunder, and will appoint him his portion with the unbelievers.”

— Luke 12:45,46

What is so surprising about the Day of the Lord to hypocrites (Isaiah 33:14)? What is so alarming to the unaware backslidden church members of the earth (Zeph. 1:14-17)? What will utterly stun to speechless astonishment the sleeping virgins of the 21^st Century Gentile Church Age (Ezek. 4:16; 12:19; 23:33)?

When speaking of the 2^nd Advent of Christ, there is much to mystify the minds of the modern-day saint. “Why is the season well known, but the day and hour is unknown?” Or, “If the exact number of days (even 1,260) is set forth as the duration of the Man of sin's reign of terror, until the time of Babylon's  judgment, then why is this coming of the Son of man so surprising?”

To the uninformed, or misinformed, churchgoer, the coming news that the Lord Jesus has come will be a startling surprise, and NOT because there was a sudden rapture, and they have all been “left behind”, as the heresy goes… Be not deceived! There is something much more dreadful than the fancies of carnally-minded Christians, you can be sure of that.

To this terrible message which is soon to seize the entire attention of the general masses of  professors of religion worldwide, and utterly envelope their minds and bodies with overwhelming, and exquisite terror (far beyond the fleeting pangs common to a horror film experience), the prophet Habakkuk says: UNBELIEVABLE! “Behold ye among the heathen, and regard, and wonder marvellously: for I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe, though it be told you” (Hab. 1:5).

Yet, again, what is so unbelievable about this work the Lord is soon to do?! It is because there is something MYSTERIOUS about the Day of the Lord...

Dear reader, do you care to know what this is?

Have you never seen how that a vast doctrine, established in the scriptures of the Old Testament, by means of divinely inspired ancient testimonies, forging biblical eschatology, building one single "spirit of prophecy", which is none other than "the testimony of Jesus Christ" (Rev. 19:10), all bear record to an ulterior work of the Lord, denominated as THE DAY OF THE LORD, antecedant to THE DAY OF THE LORD in the 2nd ADVENT OF CHRIST?

This is that which Paul spoke of in I Thessalonians 5, when he declared the Day of the Lord to be as “sudden”,  and impossible to “escape”, as a “thief in the night”, or unexpected as “travail upon a woman with child” (v. 1-3)! That is, for those who saints who are legally in “darkness”, and thus “asleep”, and drunken, even as “children of the night" (v. 4,5,7)! But for "the children of the day", and "of the light", who are not "asleep as others", but are "sober" and "watchful" (v.5-8), this DAY comes not as a thief upon them, but, so much the rather, they are fully aware of the "times and seasons" of this (v. 1), even as watchmen, who love the appearing of the one whom their eyes wait to behold (Matt. 25:6; I Thess. 1:10; Tit. 2:13; II Tim. 4:8; Heb. 9:28; etc.)!

This is not the Day of the Lord in the 2nd Advent of Christ, which was spoken of in the previous chapter (I Thess. 4:13-18), this is another work, also called THE DAY OF THE LORD, but necessarily preceding the Coming of the Lord... It is THE DAY OF THE LORD THROUGH BABYLON.

Now consider, the cause of Babylon (as discovered through almost an entire 1/3 of Old Testament scripture) is none other than that the Church of Jesus Christ has all but wholesale made shipwreck of “the faith once delivered to the saints” (Jude 3), and “the salt of the earth" (i.e. the Church) has “lost his savor”, and is henceforth “good for nothing, but to be cast out, and trodden under the foot of men” (Matt. 5:13). Therefore, the Lord's PLAN: "B" (for "Babylon"), revealed through ancient biblical prophecy comes into action for the judgment of the Church, and afterwards the judgment of the world, "For", as it is written, "... judgment MUST begin at the house of God" (I Pet. 4:17)!

Reader, if you have failed to fully perceive the import, and impact of these most dreadful realities of biblical prophecy, which have hitherto fueled the redemptive judgments of many centuries and millennia of God's people, then I solemnly declare to you that you are prepared (even this moment!) to be one of these sleeping virgins suddenly wakened in the midnight hour of Babylon's NIGHT, with a good chance (from a biblical perspective) of perishing in your ignorance of those things which all along belonged to your peace!

God help your poor soul while it is yet day!

If you desire a much more comprehensive treatment of these subjects in particular, please, I implore you, read further...

BABYLON & THE COMING OF THE LORD

Most “Christians” today believe in the bodily return of Jesus Christ in a 2nd Advent. Literally, and visibly , this is the Coming of the LORD. However, what’s rarely considered or even completely...

THEOLOGY FOR THE SANCTIFIED

The Day of the LORD

What is the Day of the LORD? It is the most highly anticipated Day of the New Testament, the most fearful reference point essential to pastoral rhetoric , and the most dreadful situation forthcoming...

THEOLOGY FOR THE SANCTIFIED

When coming to consider the end of days (or, “eschatology”), or the matters pertaining to the revealing of those hidden mysteries of the last days (or, “apocalyptic prophecy”), we must understand that the greatest aid to a truly saving knowledge of Church futurity will be established to the soul by none other means than that of a deep, spiritual understanding of biblical Church history! Though certainly counter-intuitive to the worldly-wise, high-minded men of our day, the way of humility before the holy Scriptures is the only way the Lord has ordained, and the only way of blessing! Men who want something for little to no effort at all, will wail at the last for the hunger pains which shall rack their souls in the straits, and in the famine of hearing the words of the Lord (Gen. 3:19; Prov. 5:11-13; Amos 8:9-14); for that they loved the willful ignorance of conceited, and self-centered apostates (Rom. 1:18-22,28; II Pet. 3:5)! Men and women also who have tragically reduced the glory of God in the hidden wisdom (I Cor. 2:6-16), which can only be attained unto by His Spirt teaching the contrite heart of the soul which humbles itself before the God from whose mouth cometh knowledge and wisdom (Prov. 2:6; Jas. 1:5,17)!… Therefore, let us humble ourselves quickly before this way in which the Spirit of the Lord leads us! To the holy Word of God!

Thus if we wish to look upon THE FINAL PROPHETIC MINISTRY, then we must bow ourselves to fully lay to heart, and attend diligently to the pulpits of the biblical-past. We must first become the sons of the prophets, if we would ever dream to be made the partaker of Elijah’s falling mantle, forecasted to fall one last time in this Last Time! The very thought of seeking understanding of prophetic fulfillments to come, when one has not abandoned their heart to first perceive the prophetic ministry in its former dispensations, must be blasphemy! For this is to wholly disregard, and disgrace the precedents which God has established through the thousands of years of foregoing Redemptive History, and this is beyond asinine — it is folly to the nth degree! As if some prestigious earthly justice, sworn to adhere to the most austere code of conduct, so dishonored his office by seeking to establish judgment in the land, void of all former case law relevant thereto! Or, would a dignified earthly attorney, ever seek to make a successful deposition before such an honorable judge, without having studied long, and duly applied himself to cite exhaustively the laws formerly established by the very judge himself? This is unthinkable, and laughable if it were not so great an offense to the decency of these noble offices!…

O my soul, how we must weep and howl, and gird up with sackcloth, for the so-much-more overwhelming offensiveness of unprepared men, who tread the holy loft of heaven’s courtroom, without all solemnization of mind, as they stand before the Judge of all the earth, to speak unto Him of all of the judgments, statutes, precepts, and laws which His heart and hands have framed with infinite wisdom, prudence, and awful dexterity!

“O that my ways were directed to keep thy statutes! Then shall I not be ashamed, when I have respect unto all thy commandments. I will praise thee with uprightness of heart, when I shall have learned thy righteous judgments. I will keep thy statutes: O forsake me not utterly.”

— Psa. 119:5-8

[Further reading vindicating the judgments of God in past time prophecies and their fulfillments, unto the present-day expectation]

A brief but thorough survey of Church history as it pertained to the ten northern tribes, known as Israel, is relevant therefore as we come to consider the finality of the prophetic ministry in the Last Days. After the general departure from the faith, under the influence and carnal policy of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, the northern land of Israel was overwhelmingly apostate, and without the knowledge of God, for they had departed from the practical infrastructure of redemption, established by God in the days when Moses led the children of Israel unto mount Horeb. This seminal act was so plainly declared by the son of Rehoboam, Abijah, in II Chron. 13:4-12, as it is written,

“Hear me, thou Jeroboam, and all Israel; ought ye not to know that the LORD God of Israel gave the kingdom over Israel to David for ever, even to him and to his sons by a covenant of salt? Yet Jeroboam the son of Nebat, the servant of Solomon the son of David, is risen up, and hath rebelled against his lord. And there are gathered unto him vain men, the children of Belial, and have strengthened themselves against Rehoboam the son of Solomon, when Rehoboam was young and tenderhearted, and could not withstand them. And now ye think to withstand the kingdom of the LORD in the hand of the sons of David; and ye be a great multitude, and there are with you golden calves, which Jeroboam made you for gods. Have ye not cast out the priests of the LORD, the sons of Aaron, and the Levites, and have made you priests after the manner of the nations of other lands? so that whosoever cometh to consecrate himself with a young bullock and seven rams, the same may be a priest of them that are no gods. But as for us, the LORD is our God, and we have not forsaken him; and the priests, which minister unto the LORD, are the sons of Aaron, and the Levites wait upon their business: and they burn unto the LORD every morning and every evening burnt sacrifices and sweet incense: the shewbread also set they in order upon the pure table; and the candlestick of gold with the lamps thereof, to burn every evening: for we keep the charge of the LORD our God; but ye have forsaken him. And, behold, God himself is with us for our captain, and his priests with sounding trumpets to cry alarm against you. O children of Israel, fight ye not against the LORD God of your fathers; for ye shall not prosper.”

[See, "Lawful Terms Communicating NT Redemption"]

This is an accurate caricature of the attributes which would sadly comprise the spiritual and moral climate of Israel for the two and a half centuries of their vain existence as a nation.

From Jeroboam to Omri the father of Ahab, there were numerous uprisings, none of which availed at all to reform the fallen religious standard from the days of Jeroboam. These upheavels led to Omri’s usurpation as the 4^th dynasty over Israel. His son Ahab, would plunge the land into a greater, more deplorable low than had ever before been accomplished, for upon his marriage to Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, he became no more than a puppet fulfilling all of the idolatrous, blood-thirsty lusts of this filthy woman (see, I Kng. 16:30-33).

His father had built Samaria (which would remain the capital of Israel from thenceforth), after the capital of Israel had been resituated from Shechem in the days of Jeroboam, to Tirzah in the days of Baasha, but Ahab after his marriage to Jezebel built a temple therein to Baal, and a grove, yea the whole city was established around the worship of this image of jealousy! It was also at this time that many of the prophets had been cut off (I Kng. 18:4), so that as far as Elijah knew he was the only prophet of the Lord left in Israel (I Kng. 18:22;19:10,14).

Not surprisingly, on the threshold of one of the most impactful prophetic ministries to ever grace the coasts of earthly Canaan, it was at this very time in which the once solemnly-cursed city of Jericho was rebuilt, according to the final verse of I Kings 16,

“In his days did Hiel the Bethelite build Jericho: he laid the foundation thereof in Abiram his firstborn, and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son Segub, according to the word of the LORD, which he spake by Joshua the son of Nun.”

This may seem as a relatively insignificant detail in the overall narrative, almost haphazardly inserted, perhaps for the sake (merely) of it not being left out… Not so, dear reader. Understanding the end from the beginning – namely, how that the prophetic ministry of Elijah would extrapolate out over the subsequent generations, and millennia of God’s people, and become the watchword for the very END OF THE WORLD – this immediate preface to the tale of Elijah’s prophetic ministry, is an inexpendable piece of furniture setting the stage!

In the smaller, and more brief setting of Israel proper (in reference to the grand scheme of all of redemptive history, which is not confined to a relatively little, isolated region of the Middle East, but covers the face of the whole earth, as it is written, “The God of the whole earth shall He be called,” Isa. 54:5), Jericho served as a counterpart of that worldwide precedent which the Lord at first set forth in the ancient city of Babel (see, Gen. 11), and which arose once again in prominence above all other kingdoms in the just wrath which the Lord ordained against His rebellious people, revealed in the Babylonian Captivity. This same world-renown city of Babylon is foretold in the pages of ancient prophecy to arise once more at the end of time, in the final punishment of the almost entirely fallen Gentile Church Age, as well as the utterly blind and deluded physical seed of the Jewish people.

Jericho was the localized expression of this more excellent and consummating reality of BABYLON!

As in the beginning of time Babylon was thus set forth (see, Gen. 11), only to arise again in the end of the world; thus, likewise, was Jericho set forth at the beginning of time for the nation of Israel, yea, at their very nativity (Josh. 6).

The relevance that this testimony of the rebuilding of Jericho bears in the opening scene of the prophetic ministry of Elijah, is that it is the precursor of the end of Israel, just as the rebuilding of Babylon is a signal forerunner of THE END OF THE WORLD. Thus this was the dreadful catalyst to the “end of the world” as far as Israel was concerned. Even as the inferior rebuilding of Babylon, ordained to make war against Jerusalem and Judah (approximately 586 BC), meant the “end of the world” for the chief seat of all religion and light in the world!

Therefore, Elijah was in very deed an end-time prophet, and thus the precedent for all restoration generations to follow, and would prefigure THE FINAL PROPHETIC MINISTRY like no other prophet before him, and everyone following bearing his same mantle, would only shed further light upon the spirit and power of the anointing upon this original prophet.

This is the ominous backdrop for the ascension of Elijah the Tishbite.

[Further Reading: Do you understand THE DOCTRINE OF BABYLON?]

[A poem about the course of a saint in the Last Days, who has seen the Lord, and thereby was conveyed His salvation, but who in following on to know the Lord, finds himself in the conflict of backsliding, and attempting to relate to the Lord based upon the first revelation of Christ to his soul, finds his sanctification tragically stalled, then temptation to disillusionment arises as the attempts are found to be futile, as the darkness of Babylon sets in, all this that the Lord might drive the troubled saint to the greater revelation of His glorious life, MUCH MORE than His death, and not only His life to overcome the darkness within the individual saint’s soul, but much more as it relates to the Day of the Lord (through Babylon)! This is the inevitable conflict that every saint in the Last Days will find themselves in (while yet without pastors after His heart), and thus we must labor to behold Christ as He is in His greatest glories and ministerial offices... And so the necessary casting of the soul’s gaze unto the consummation and restoration of all things, as displayed in the book of Revelation!]​

Wounded in soul, and blackened by sin,
Weary I was, and wretched within.
What could avail to save my soul so dear?
“I died for thee, do not fear,”
Gently whispered the Voice so still,
Turning, I saw Jesus, and twas so real --
Suffering, wounded, bleeding for me,
All this He suffered upon the tree.
At once I knew my sins were planted!
A change of garments to me were granted!
I could not but sing of his salvation,
For Jesus had become my meditation!
Thus I followed His way awhile
Till all around me, sin so vile,
Did show itself to my soul so dear,
But again I heard, “Do not fear,”
And turning, the risen Lord I saw --
At once the burden seemed to fall,
My head on Christ’s bosom I laid,
“Tis my Christ”, is what I said!
And, weeping for joy, I carried on.
Years passed by, and so the dawn,
Till at length I felt the Night,
And turning I saw the flash of light,
On distant horizon from whence I came,
(Whence I first saw Christ, the same)
As the sun had set, then suddenly,
A horror of darkness, painfully,
Surrounded me all like a flood,
So that I cried, as of old, to see the Blood!
I remembered all that I had known,
The Jesus that to me was shown,
My heart was warmed by the memory,
As I mused upon the old, old Story,
But the temptations still arose,
And oft times twas sin I chose.
As time passed by, my heart would sigh,
That, as a dove, I could fly,
From the Tempest — the dreadful Storm:
Which by that time, above had formed;
My desire ungranted, my heart grew cold,
For no longer could I behold,
The clear, shining revelation,
Which to me was given at salvation!
Bleak and drear became my world,
For I could no longer see my Lord!
In this condition, for a space I wondered,
Till on a sudden, a mighty Voice behind me thundered!
Turning I saw what ne’er I dreamed,
(My life departed, or so it seemed,)
For with my eyes, I saw the Son of man,
Holding seven stars in His right hand,
Walking among seven golden candlesticks, He
Shined like the sun in all his strength,
I beheld His feet like burnished brass,
His eyes like fire, I saw them flash!
His hair was white, white like the snow --
I have seen, and thus I know --
Like many floods (His voice once still,)
Rushed upon my soul: all made me feel
That I had died, and thus I fell,
At His dear feet (though once I lay
Upon his breast), then heard Him say,
(While His right hand on me did rest),
“Do not fear, I am the first, and I am the last:
Now I live — alive forevermore --
Though I died, behold me, and be thou sure,
The keys of death and hell are mine,
Write all things you see, line by line!”
Thus I revived, and wrote the vision down,
That I might ne’er forget what I was shown;
This revelation of Jesus was to me,
The dispelling of all mysteries:
How I would walk as in the Light,
Though the day had passed, and twas the Night,
How I could fly, not on wings of dove,
From the stormy Tempest high above,
But into the fire on eagle’s wings --
A new song my soul now sings,
Of the majesty of Christ, which I have seen,

A testimony, and a gospel it’s always been
But in my ignorance, I despised the riches,
And preferred to eat from other dishes,
Of Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection,
But saw not the full scope of His redemption;
Abandoned to my own imaginations,
I graved a god in my own image:
I felt no need for His greatest glory
To be the chief end of my own story!
O the tragic end it must have been,
Had His greatest glory I not seen!

But sovereign mercy to me was given!
Now I dwell, while in this world, at the gate of heaven!
Now I feel His Kingdom, power, dominion, might,
So much more than the horrors of Night!
Now more persuaded of His power to save,
Than all the power of the grave!
Now I see the blood as ne’er before,
How for this cause the vail He tore,
That into the Holiest I may come,
Yea, without fear, but boldly run,
And behold the Son in all His splendor --
Beholding His glory will I render,
All praise in absolute surrender,
Of my body, soul, and spirit!
Now I know that I must see,

Christ’s greatest glory diligently --
This the purchase of His blood
(That precious, eternal, crimson flood,)
And I must pay Him what I owe,
Behold His glory, and by this show
The world the same, in darkest Night,
This the way, and my Lord’s right!

The Hebrew inscriptions among the Psalms (superscriptions/headings, subscriptions/footnotes, as well as the “Selah” & “Higgaion” markings/inscriptions) are often obscure, and thus controverted among Bible commentators, and therefore they have remained untranslated, though where it was more plain, the KJV translators have placed the sense in the margin. The overwhelming presence of these inscriptions when coming to the Psalms, can be troubling, due to the questions which they pose to the conscience, which typically will go unanswered for a lifetime. This is so troubling to the conscience, particularly of one who is cleaving to the eternal value and weight of “every word of God”, and here we can hardly approach a Psalm, without being thus confronted with some unknown term, which we dare not discount as uninspired, and yet we feel that a sound working knowledge of them is beyond reach. We have (and will continue to) read, quote, write, and even sing these words, and therefore an understanding is vital; notwithstanding, a good conscience alone must not be the only inducement that draws us to garner a good understanding upon this point.

It seems in general that the purpose of these annotations was more to annotate the musical performance of the song than to establish the vital key of interpretation, and so have been thought to be somewhat obsolete due to the various revolutions in music over the past 2-3k years since these Psalms were written. And though secularly there is little to be known concerning the understanding of Hebrew music, yet within the sacred scriptures we are permitted to learn much of what the Jews (under the spiritual inspiration and guidance of David) knew of music. Thus the history of David’s establishment of the musical-Levites in the Tabernacle/Temple is of vital importance (with the Psalms, particularly, coupled with the recorded improvements thereupon of subsequent generations in the infallible history) in forming a spiritual understanding and conclusions on this wise.

“After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up: that the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things.”

— Acts 15:16,17

Holy obligation is upon us, therefore, as the Spirit of God begins to rebuild — to perfection — the fallen Tabernacle of David (namely, the spiritual Temple of the Gentile Church, according to James’ verdict in Acts 15:16,17), that we would, by the selfsame Spirit which inspired David of old to declare “the pattern” thereof (I Chron. 28:11,12,18,19), be directed into an acceptable form of worship and praise to the worthy King of Israel. Thus it behoves us, as the ancient ruins are being raised up (Isa. 58:12), to look into the heart of David (the Psalms), and while looking therein, fall into a holy contemplation awhile of what tone he set his songs to, and upon what instruments they were played — not in some futile pursuit of self-conceited vain imaginations, but rather by embarking into the lawful, though uncharted, waters of what was WRITTEN… Unto those who affectionately know the God of David, and through consecration, have begun to tread the paths of righteousness he was made to take (Psa. 23:3) — to these, the heart of David will be discovered, and words which were forever shrouded in mystery and wonder, will soon burst into the full vibrance of some luminous garden, shining of sights and colors rare and wonderful to behold!

To those who are thus acquainting themselves with the God of David, and his experience, such inscriptions will become suddenly very relevant to their progress down these pathways of pleasantness (Prov. 3:17). They feel these to be as beacons upon the mountains, beckoning them still further upwards, till their souls, all enraptured in the excellencies of divine worship, are made to sing as one with “the sweet psalmist of Israel” himself (II Sam. 23:1) — being so led by “the selfsame Spirit” (I Cor. 12:11)!

It is truly a sweet thing to find oneself in the same inner chamber of communion with the King as one of those, His beloved-ones of old… To find that, though you knew it not, you were singing the same song as them! How much more profound to discover that it was to the  very same tune! Surely the Spirit of the living God will so guide His saints into the very same spiritual discoveries of grace and glory, though they be sundered across many centuries of time, and musical reformations. The Spirit of God does not change, and what edified His saints 3k years ago, still edifies them today! Don’t be deceived, as though David was mumbling around with some backslidden, dark-aged Gregorian chant upon his lips, as if thereby to “make His praise glorious” (Psa. 66:2)!

The praises of Israel were truly, “LIFTED UP”! This was actually the fundamental understanding they had of singing: it was a LIFTING UP of voice, a LIFTING UP of musical instruments — “And David spake to the chief of the Levites to appoint their brethren to be the singers with instruments of musick, psalteries and harps and cymbals, sounding, by lifting up the voice with joy” (I Chron. 15:16) — a LIFTING UP of hands (Psa. 63:4; 134:2), a LIFTING UP of heart (Lam. 3:41), and a LIFTING UP of soul (Psa. 25:1)! We must reconcile ourselves to the praises of the man after God’s heart (I Sam. 13:14), or we will bereave ourselves of our own mercies. If we cannot learn to weep like him, then we will never know his triumph, and if we fail to attain to his victories, then perhaps it is that we have not yet learned that secret to conquest which he well knew — PRAISE.

“I will call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised: so shall I be saved from mine enemies.”

— Psa. 18:3

David was not anxiously awake by the candle light of his tent reviewing his stratagems of war, the night before some historic — truly epic — and eternity altering battle! No! Knowing full well the stakes which awaited the never-dying souls of myriads and myriads of men, he awoke up his harp, and played some solemn sound upon the strings, while his host huddled round about the curtain walls, hanging their souls upon those hopeful notes! These were truly age-ending revival hymns, with age-ending revival tunes! O with what confidence, and blessed assurance did they march forth to war with perfectly tuned hearts to sing his grace! And though beloved David was not found worthy to experience this Age-Ending Revival, notwithstanding, he was worthy to prepare the generations to come! O how we must learn this heart of David, these ways of David, this patience in the presence of God which David exemplified above all other men, or else we must be abandoned to the darkened understanding of those who have failed the elementary principles of worship!

Thus do these holy, and inspired, directions of praise, offered in the Hebrew inscriptions present to us a glance within the tent of David, as to what instrument he takes in hand, as to what tuning he sets his song, at which point he rises, and when does he pause… Let it not be an empty endeavor that we would look upon these little directives, and enquire at the Lord as to what posture of spirit is being commanded by the heart of David therein.

1. Alamoth — This term literally means “young maidens”, and is first referenced in I Chronicles 15:20, and seems to intend, not only the way in which these psalteries would be played, but more so, how that these holy Levites here named were to direct these sisters to order their praise acceptably unto the Lord, when they would come into his house.
   
   As an anecdote to set forth how that the Spirit of the Lord has not changed, even through the many centuries, millennia, and musical tradition, I will share of one of the first times that we had ever sung Psa. 46 (the only instance in the Psalms where this inscription appears) with musical instruments in a corporate setting. As we began to sing, a dear sister’s voice suddenly began to ascend through the others, and establish an astonishing, and deeply edifying to the spirit, harmony! Afterwards, upon hearing the recording, I was overwhelmingly aware in the Spirit that this was inspired of the Lord, and was compelled to call all of the sisters (“young maidens”) to learn this part, and to begin singing it from thenceforth… Little did I know at that time that I was merely establishing what was anciently declared by David of Psa. 46, that it was to be sung “upon Alamoth”!
2. Altaschith — Three of these four Psalms that contain this inscription, are declared to be written by David (Psa. 57-59), while the other (Psa. 75) is written by “Asaph the seer” (II Chron. 29:30), which itself was most likely prophetically declaring the trials of David. This term, signifying, “Destroy not”, is a clear illustration of the relationship of David to his God in the midst of all of his tribulation; namely, how that his appeal was still to God  — not Saul — for mercy, even seeing his own sin before the Lord Himself enough to condemn his soul, if God would but “mark his iniquity” (Psa. 130:3), though Saul was unjustly seeking his soul to destroy it. This was an indelible mark of David’s humility, and an undying testimony to the spiritual realities which are the all consuming visions of the saints of God in the earth; which, when clearly observed, tend to swallow the soul into the higher realms of spirituality (where God alone rules and works all things), and draw them away from the broken cisterns of man, and carnal confidence in this lower world.
3. Gittith — This is some musical instrument (as it would appear, from Gath), or perhaps some special tone whereupon to set these three specific Psalms (8, 81, 84). I tend to believe that it was upon a harp he picked up while in Gath, which was of some peculiar quality, or more likely, which would carry with it rich affection of this particular season of his sojourning. Thus if we can call to memory this specified season of David’s wanderings, and God’s unfailing faithfulness therein — or better yet, if, after bethinking ourselves thus, we are able to apply his glad experience to our own, and so take up these Psalms into our mouths, then we have, effectually, sung “upon Gittith”.
4. Higgaion — Once inscribed in all the Psalms, in the midst Psalm 9, and coupled together with a “Selah” — as if declaring what was just stated to be of the utmost significance to provoke a standing to attention, and a period of silence and sober reflection of what was just stated. This term is the same which stands behind the English words, “meditation” 0f Psa. 19:14, and “solemn sound” of Psa. 92:3, and more than likely describes some solemn sound to be struck in the musical orchestration, which would provoke sober meditation upon the words uttered.
5. Mahalath — This is very obscure, and appears alone in Psa. 53, and in connection with the word “Leannoth” (meaning “affliction”) in Psa. 88. It is more than likely denoting some doleful mode upon which these two peculiarly plaintive Psalms were to be sung.
6. Maschil — These 13 Psalms (Psa. 32,42,44,45,52-55,74,78,88,89,142) where this term, indicating, “instruction”, stands at the head of them (though not exclusive to them alone), represent certain Psalms wherein some precious lesson had been learned through prophetic experience, and was deemed invaluable for all of God’s people to thereby be instructed, to the end that a vital degree of corporate unity among the people of God might be achieved, that the name of God might be magnified through the assembly of saints. For instance, consider Psa. 44,74,78, and 89 — these four “Maschils” — how that they would have been of vital necessity in the generation where the kingdom of God was being greatly established (under David, and subsequently Solomon) through the singular act of God’s repentance, to the acknowledging and performance of his own covenant. It is a dreadful consideration, the thought of what this generation would have done, had they not had the vital elements of the faith ministered unto them, which are so illustriously instructed in these Psalms!
7. Michtam — There are 6 Psalms (Psa. 16,56-60) which bear this inscription, and according to the translators it seemed to clearly to denote, “Golden”. This could be due to certain undeniable messianic attributes these Psalms bear, though not all of these are so eminent among many other Psalms which do not have this title. It would seem to me, therefore, that this title signifies more of a personal significance in the heart of David, that these Psalms epitomized something “golden” in his own experience — though could it really be argued that there was not something “golden” in every Psalm? And thus should the saints, walking in the ways of David, feel that they have found “gold” when they look upon these words.
8. Neginah(oth) — Multiple Psalms bear this term in their title, and it means, indisputably, “Stringed instrument(s)”. This is plain to see when comparing with the subscripts/footnotes of Hezekiah’s & Habakkuk’s songs (Isa. 38:20; Hab. 3:19), when they declare these to be played upon the “stringed instruments”, which stands for the Hebrew, “Neginoth” (the plural form of “Neginah”).
9. Nehiloth — This seems to denote “wind instruments”, and is only used in Psa. 5. It seems that many times David was relegated to the use of whatever instrument he could find, or make, or purchase abroad (for instance in Gath, see “Gittith”); and therefore, at times he may have only had space for a pipe to carry with him (like when he fled from Saul out of the window of his house, I Sam. 19:11-24; Psa. 59). And when in one of his various haunts, he would pen these Psalms, and would make use of whatever instrument he had occasion to take with him — Lo! — as he would play he would find that even the very instrument upon which he played was inspired, though brought to him by such a seeming chaos of circumstances!
10. Selah — This marking, appearing overwhelmingly more than any other, though found in no title, but as inscriptions throughout the Psalms, was doubtless the most prominent way they would govern the dynamics of their praise in the house of God. It stands apart from “Higgaion”, in Psa. 9:16, and thus cannot carry the common misnomer, “meditation”,  often given it, as that is the certain significance of “Higgaion”. Therefore the understanding is, accurately, “pause”, and probably being extracted from the Hebrew word “Shelah” (meaning, “to rest”), would mean a resting from (or upon) the former thought, or from the singing, thereby allowing the musical instruments to swell, causing a musical interlude to be given place unto. This latter understanding would tend to reconcile a controversy over the term as well, as another primary (though less justifiable) conjecture has been that this term was extracted from the Hebrew, “Saalal”, signifying, “to lift up”, and therefore was taken to mean not a pause of the music, but rather a emphasis upon the music. Well, if this indeed is a pause to the singing, giving way to the lifting up of a musical interlude (as an emphasis of the words just spoken, or as an appropriate introduction to the words soon to be declared), then this would fully reconcile all principle schools of thought upon the matter — to the glory of God!
11. Sheminith — Appearing for the first time in I Chronicles 15:21, immediately after “Alamoth” (I Chron. 15:20), these musical-Levites ordained to play upon their harps, were charged to play upon “Sheminith” (meaning, “the eighth”), and being that it was directly following the Alamoth directive, it would seem this was to be some lower, more masculine part, that would cause the music “to excel”!
12. Shiggaion/Shigionoth — This term is used in two places only, and both represent very solemn instances of God “arising” in judgment (Psa. 7; Hab. 3:1). Thus the common understanding of these terms to be “Prayer(s)” seems to be self-evident, but with further clarification, that these prayers were most solemn, and dreadful.
13. Shoshannim/Shushan — This term means, “Lily”, which was a common, yet remarkably beautiful flower in Israel (Song 5:13; Matt. 6:28). This title, therefore, would set these Psalms upon a common, and remarkably beautiful tune, though by no means a light and treacherous tune, as in all of these Psalms there are found tragic elements lacing, if not dominating, the song.

[Further Reading: David's precedent of prayer and praise into, and in the midst of, a Divine Repentance]

– Rom. 16:25-27

This secret that God was keeping from the beginning of the world until the beginning of this new era of redemptive history (which was set in motion by the ministry of Jesus Christ of Nazareth: His life, His death, His resurrection, and His ascension), was suddenly revealed — when once the Lord of glory Himself apprehended, and seized upon this chiefest sinner to bring to light this long sealed matter in His heart! Surely the Lord had a plan in the sad event that His elect people (the Jews of the 1^st century) would not receive His Son; yea, even that which from the beginning of time He was revealing to His holy prophets, and recording and inerrantly preserving through the scriptures of truth… Nevertheless, there were components of this plan of redemption which were staggeringly veiled in holy mystery, so that none (not even of the prophets to whom the prophecies were originally given) would have been able to anticipate this entirely new, unexpected, and astonishingly protracted event, called THE GENTILE CHURCH AGE! Take for instance:

—> All the prophetic utterances which comprised the body of doctrine concerning what God said the Messiah would do in judgment/war TO Babylon (THE DAY OF THE LORD UPON BABYLON), are now the fuel which propels the salvation of the Gentiles in the present dispensation!

—> All the prophetic utterances which comprised the body of doctrine concerning what God said He would do in judgment/war THROUGH Babylon (THE DAY OF THE LORD THROUGH BABYLON), are now the fuel which propels the salvation of the Gentiles in the present dispensation!

—> The foretold conversion of the Gentiles THROUGH the conversion, regathering, and restoration of the Jews is equated to the Gentiles being converted THROUGH the fall, and failure of the Jews to be converted, regathered, and restored!… Instead of their conversion being to the credit of the Jews, now it is at the expense thereof… This is, therefore, the reversing of the normal FLOW OF REDEMPTION!

Beholding Paul’s first missionary journey of his apostolic ministry, it becomes very clear what he had been revealed of the Lord in the knowledge of THE MYSTERY. In a holy complexity, this modern-era MYSTERY is equated to what in the past dispensation was called by the prophets, THE STRANGE WORK. I say a holy complexity, because the two do not exactly translate. THE STRANGE WORK was, definitively, that which God was determined to do THROUGH & TO Babylon for the sake of his people’s chastening and redemption — their salvation — of old time. This was manifested in various ways in past-time examples (Egypt, Assyria, etc.), but was most manifestly set forth in the divinely ordained and orchestrated vehicle of Babylon (through the Babylonian captivity)...

Now this divine past-time tutorial does have a direct translation into the New Covenant, namely, in the for to come wilderness experience of the future (also called: MYSTERY BABYLON THE GREAT), which is being risen up for the beautifying of the Bride of Christ (the presently defiled Gentile Church), and for the slaying & saving of the presently apostate Jews of the 21^st century (Rev. 12:6,11-14; 13:5-10; 14:8-12; 16:9; 17:1-8; 18,  etc.). But there is also a present-tense, and even more strange, and offensive (to despisers), fulfillment of THE STRANGE WORK happening right now, and has been underway for the past two millennia! This is what we have come to commonly call THE GENTILE CHURCH AGE.

“Beware therefore, lest that come upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets; Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish: for I work a work in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you… And the next sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. But when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were filled with envy, and spake against those things which were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.”

— Acts 13:40,41,44-48

Paul, in the above reference extracted from his first missionary journey, is declaring very important prophecies which represent a specimen for us of the revelation that the Lord had given unto him. On purpose, this is the longest recorded sermon of Paul in the New Testament, and is given at the beginning of the chronicling of his apostolic ministry, that the tenor of his gospel which he preached among the Gentiles (Gal. 2:2) might be set forth as a representation from thenceforth how he was declaring THE MYSTERY. Throughout the sermon he references very important Messianic prophecies which the Lord no doubt had clearly given him understanding in in application to the present work of the Messiah’s unprecedented redemption of the Gentiles.

For instance, before what is referenced above, Paul had just quoted Psalm 2, which is one of the most descriptive Psalms of what the Lord Jesus would accomplish upon His resurrection from the dead and ascension (as interpreted by the apostle Paul in Romans 1 & Hebrews 1), and which is one of the most shocking prophetic declarations of what Christ would call (to the untoward Jews of the 1^st century) THE SIGN OF JONAS (Matt. 12:39)!… That is, when Christ arose from the dead in His own resurrection by the glory of the Father (Rom. 1:4; 6:4), that marked the moment when it was said of Christ by the prophet David, “I will declare the decree: the LORD hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee,” and, subsequently, in his ascension, “Yet have I set my king upon my holy hill of Zion” (Psa. 2:6,7)! It was at that exact moment when it was prophetically declared by the Father unto His newly coronated Son, Christ Jesus, “Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession” (Psa. 2:8)! This was not a mere coincidental quoting at random of the scriptures, that just so happened to merge seamlessly together to declare flawlessly the eternal purposes of God in His foreordained plan of redemption in all the world — to the Jew first, then also to the Gentile — NO! This was, rather, a thoughtful, premeditated portrayal of what the Lord had always intended (“God in the ways of God”, and from an eternal perspective) to do among the Gentiles, and yet was veiled in a formerly unknown, mysterious interpretation of the scriptures which he breathed into the souls of holy men of olden times!

Certainly, Paul was understanding what he was declaring and implying in what he was referencing! This is THE SIGN OF JONAS! Paul was literally standing right in the middle of THE SIGN being fulfilled, and was even (in a special and spiritual way) the vessel through which it was being fulfilled! After referencing Psalm 2, Paul ended this sermon by warning the Jews of Antioch (who were of that generation which was relentlessly heaping upon themselves, and their children, the wrath of almighty God through the bloodshed of his servants, and His own dear Son) with no other warning but that which was uttered of old time by Habakkuk — that trailblazing prophet — concerning THE UNBELIEVABLE WORK  of the coming of the Lord, THROUGH the heathen nation of Babylon!

“Behold ye among the heathen, and regard, and wonder marvellously: for I will work a work in your days, which ye will not believe, though it be told you. For, lo, I raise up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation, which shall march through the breadth of the land, to possess the dwellingplaces that are not theirs.”

— Hab. 1:5,6

Paul’s warning to the Jews may appear to be ambiguous at first, regarding what what STRANGE WORK the Lord was being provoked to work among them, if they persisted to deny the Lord, but upon the coming of the next week, as the Jews were moved to envy at beholding the abundance of Gentiles flowing to the preaching of the gospel, and they began to contradict and blaspheme the Lord, the apostles were compelled to make the direct application of the solemn warning forespoken! “Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth” (Acts 13:46,47). Do you see! Paul was standing in the heart of the great forsaking amongst the Jews of his day, and right in the middle of ground zero of the repentance of God towards the Jews of the 1^st century! Thus he is led of the Spirit to warn them one Sabbath, and condemn them the next! This is truly dreadful to behold!

The full impact of Paul’s words cannot be fully grasped unless there is an understanding of the scripture he is referencing here. For, one may think that Paul is simply spiritualizing the text, in the sense that Paul and Barnabas are the “light” (in Christ, who is the Light) to the Gentiles, saying, therefore, “For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles…” (Acts 13:47). But Paul is actually stating in this verse the reason they are now turning from the Jews to the Gentiles!

“And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth.”

— Isa. 49:6

Paul had said, “It was necessary” that they would have first declared the word unto the Jews, because of what is declared in the prophecy of Isaiah! Namely, that the Jews will be restored, and regathered, and then — and consequent thereto — the Gentiles shall be converted, and brought into the covenant. This text is most staggering, because in this one single verse THE FLOW OF REDEMPTION is definitively set forth! But what Paul is manifestly declaring, is that the Lord had revealed to him that He was reversing THE FLOW OF REDEMPTION, based upon the stubborn impenitence of the Jews, and the willing reception of the Gentiles! That is to say, redemption must flow on, whether the Jews will receive it or not! And because the time had come for salvation to go unto the ends of the earth, and the Gentiles will receive it, then they shall, even at the expense of the Jews, though it was originally declared that the Gentiles would be made the glad recipients of salvation through the Jews and for the Jews!

In conclusion, and moving forward, by this apostolic witness, we are able to behold that: THE STRANGE WORK, which was originally intended to be fulfilled historically in Babylon/Assyria, would then be spiritually applied by the apostles in the 1^st century toward the Gentiles pressing into, and taking, the kingdom (see, Rom. 9-11); thereafter, and in futurity, these prophecies shall climax in the Great Tribulation: both SPIRITUALLY, as the Gentile Church arises as never before (by the special “mercy” — Ruhamah — of God, see, Rom. 11:31), to the effectual “provocation” (Rom. 10:19; 11:11,14) of the Jews, and LITERALLY, while Mystery Babylon the Great performs all of the sovereign purposes of wrath and mercy in the hand of the Lord of sabaoth. All this will amount to, essentially, the most unprecedented & unparalleled WILDERNESS experience of the Jews to date (see, Ezek. 20); which shall be employed in the hand of almighty God as the express means to execute the most unprecedented & unparalleled experience of sovereign mercy recorded in the annals of the history of the Jews — ALL in a most stunning display of the infinite majesty of the only wise God, and our Lord Jesus Christ!

“O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!”

— Rom. 11:33

[Further Reading on The Strange Work: In the 1st Century & The 5th Trumpet]

Being that the selfsame prophecies established to power the coming conversion, and subsequent restoration of the Jews, are the present fuel propelling the conversion of the Gentiles in this present dispensation (now 2k years in the works), it is plain to see that the Lord has bound the Jew and Gentile by an indissoluble tie in a staggering, divinely-inspired symbiotic relationship! [See, "The Holy Complexity"]... So then, the Gentiles are converted, due only to what the Lord had prophetically promised to work for the Jews (and God is justified in the application of these seemingly exclusive prophesies to carnal Jews, by converting the Gentiles into spiritual Jews… see, Rom. 2:25-29). [See, "The Flow of Redemption"]... From the opposite direction, therefore, it could otherwise be understood that the Jews (who are made spiritual Uncircumcision through their unbelief) will therefore be brought to conversion, regathering, and restoration through nothing less than the culminating fruition of the Gentile’s (who are become spiritual Circumcision through conversion) great — Ruhamah — mercy in the end of the world! According as it was prophesied, and originally, and exclusively intended, that the carnal Jews finalizing experience of sovereign mercy, would be to the breathtaking ingathering of the Gentiles,  which prophesies have now laid hold upon the spiritual seed of Israel — the Gentiles!  

Or, otherwise said, they are made by the handiwork of an omniscient God to redemptively cooperate in the salvation one of another; so that, to the exclusion of one, the other is brought into covenant, that when they are cast away, the other would be made partaker of their same covenant, and as the exquisite experience of their mercy crescendos, then, again, the first is thereby redeemed, even unto the greatest display of mercy to those originally excluded!

O may our hearts stand in awe at the ineffable wisdom of His eternal counsels!

Thus the Gentile Church Age — as related to “Israel after the flesh” (I Cor. 10:18; Gal. 4:23,29) — is the worst of times, and shall yet be the greatest of times! It is easy enough to understand how that this Gentile Church Age is the worst of times (as pertaining to Israel), for it is made possible only by their general fall (Rom. 11:12), blindness (Rom. 11:25), and the breaking off of their branches to make room for Gentiles (Rom. 11:16-21); and, therein do we become this great spiritual WILDERNESS unto the Jews. But this shall be, truly, the greatest of times, for as Paul said, “Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy” (Rom. 11:11). That is to say, the “riches of the world” (Rom. 11:12) being brought to Christ — and, much more, the final display of mercy to them — is the greatest means of mercy that the Lord will ever display to the Jews, as the Grand Finale of all Redemptive History as we have known it!

This orchestration of sovereign mercy is the great object in the eyes of Paul, as he is clearly seeking to definitively establish the parameters of the present-tense situation in which Gentile redemption has been set in the book of Romans as in none other of his epistles. And in no other portion of the book is this relationship so illustriously put forth, as in the 9^th — 11^th chapters of the epistle. What we must come to understand, is the undergirding of Paul’s arguments, for if we know not what is substantiating his claims, and what is establishing the moral fortitude thereof, then we will never come to deeply appreciate, and be forever impacted by the profound relevancy of Paul’s gospel. In this epistle, as in none other of his writings will we find the forcibleness of divine argumentation put on display for us to behold. This is a wonder, for are we to suppose that every answer, alone, is inspired, and that when Paul breaks into a pivotal, vitally-placed rhetorical question, then the inspiration suddenly comes to an end?… God forbid! But, rather, we are instructed by faith that the inspiration here continues, and that thus there is some great argument that God wants to set forth before the consciences of His saints, forever memorializing the fallacies of the carnal mind, and the irrefutable wisdom of God!

“What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God?”

— Rom. 9:14

Moreover, these questions, some of which seem to us to be inconceivable, unthinkable, or, at least, unspeakable, which well-meaning Christians nowadays would seek to self-righteously alienate themselves from, as if never a thought would come into their mind… And thereby do offer to themselves the proof of how far they are from ascertaining the truth at hand, for that the ready conclusion of many, stated by God omniscient, is far above out of their sight!… And would to God it were so in very deed! But the alarming reality is that they have never come quite close enough to the truth, so as to feel how razor sharp it is — discernible only by the living presence of God with a man — and how vulnerable one would be left, and utterly defenseless one is to error and heresy, if the Spirit of God does not well-balance the truth of all the scriptures in the mind and heart! (Remember, for instance, “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?” Rom. 6:1, etc.) Do we truly hear, perceive, and believe what is written, as it is written?…

This is a proper trembling of soul when one choice vessel begins to approach the tremendous shoreline of His eternal counsel.

As referenced above in Romans 9:14, the crucial question was posed before the consciences of the saints, “What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God?” THE JUSTICE OF GOD IN THE REDEMPTION OF MAN (JEW & GENTILE) is a vital point that Paul is seeking to establish from literally the very opening of his mouth in the doctrine of this book of The Romans, as it is written,

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith” (Rom. 1:16,17).

This text is exceedingly broad, but the emphasis that I desire, particularly, to extract is this: there is something of God’s justice in the present manifestation of man’s redemption (as declared in “the gospel of Christ”, Rom. 1:16), which, according to what has been revealed through the Law and the Prophets, seems to be unequal, or, that there is “unrighteousness with God” (Rom. 9:14), according to the crucial question before referenced, at the opening of Paul’s most clear treatise upon this point from the 9^th — 11^th chapters. There is to be a necessary searching of the scriptures, which one who is conscientiously observing what is being presented will be compelled unto with jealous care that the integrity of the righteous Lord’s righteousness is not trespassed!

What I am speaking of is nothing less than a prophetic burden and anguish in the soul to understand the wisdom and righteousness of God’s judgments, which oft times overcame the loyal soul’s of the prophets, and prostrated them in God’s presence, and posted them upon their watch-towers to behold, and see what the Lord would say unto them, and what they would answer when reproved of Him (Hab. 2:1).

What could seem so unrighteous about God’s dispensation of sovereign mercy, you ask? Well, if you consider that THE FLOW OF REDEMPTION which Paul purposefully set forth in the very first word of the doctrine: “To the Jew first, and also to the Greek” (Rom. 1:16); and if you are considering the profound depth of what is being declared in that statement, namely, that the Jews are first in the order of redemption, and afterwards the Gentiles; and, furthermore, the Gentiles conversion THROUGH the mercy of the Jews, and not at the expense thereof! If you are remembering, the present Gentile Church Age is due to a repentance in the heart of God, made known through the rejection of His people in the 1^st century; so the Lord devised means whereby his banished (Gentiles) be not expelled from before Him (II Sam. 14:14) — and in so doing, the Lord must needs cause His word to flourish in unforeseen courses, to the fulfilling of all of His holy, and unstoppable intentions, to the grand fulfillment of all of His word! And in this process an interpretation and vindication was found necessary for the apostle Paul to furnish for the Church in Christ. How that the Lord is just and right in this display of sovereign mercy: in the breaching of the Jews, and the present ingathering of the Gentiles otherwise than was originally and ultimately intended!

[Remember, "The Holy Complexity"]

Furthermore, it is a true statement that the vocabulary and framework of the present-tense situation of this dispensation was forged in the fires of God’s wrath towards His rebellious people — whether directly or indirectly. Directly, when the prophesies being drawn upon for the framework and vocabulary of the present Gentile Church Age are from "the strange work" prophesied of by the prophets of old, which prophecies literally foretold Babylon of old, and to come, but now appear to be spiritually foretelling the mystery of The Gentile Church Age. And, indirectly, when Israel is bypassed in application, as concerning the prophesies of the Messiah's restoration of his chosen people, and the application instead made to The Gentile Church Age!

Much more to be declared, dear reader... we will continue this discourse upon THE JUSTICE OF GOD IN THE REDEMPTION OF MAN (JEW & GENTILE) next...

[For a more comprehensive defense, see, "Warranting NT Explanation"]

God had reserved this man, Saul of Tarsus, and his conversion, for such a time; for, He would genuinely strive for the restoration of the Jews of Jerusalem and Judea particularly through the original Apostles whom he had ordained and sent forth, and, through this means, any potential repentance in the heart of God was then unobserved, as concerning the immediate purpose to eminently “restore again the kingdom to Israel” (Acts 1:6). Thus were the apostles placed into the throes of the repentings which were kindled together in the heart of God over the 1^st century Jews who had rejected his dear Son.

Though by no means unaware of the ability of God to repent (which is bewrayed even in the very question they asked, “Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?”, Acts 1:6), they were unaware of how the Lord would ultimately reach the “uttermost part of the earth” (Acts 1:8)! The mystery of this was not that he would save the Gentiles at all, but rather when, and in what manner! This was revealed to none other, but him whom the Lord Himself had appointed to the task — the apostle Paul!

Therefore at the appointed time, namely at the threshold of the Jew’s utter perversity having overflowed unto the martyrdom of Stephen (Acts 7); when the Pharisees — the strictest sect among the Jews — could not refute that mighty signs and wonders were wrought in the name of this Jesus of Nazareth by the hands of His disciple’s (Acts 4:16-18), they stopped their ears with their fingers, and gnashed upon the man of God with their teeth, and stoned him with stones… a young man, Saul of Tarsus, standing by consenting to his death (Acts 7:58; 8:1). This was the moment that THE SHIFT is defined in the book of Acts, for it was this act of persecution which ushered the move of the apostles and ministers of the 1^st Church, out of Jerusalem & Judea, and unto Samaria (Acts 8:1). From thenceforth THE SHIFT from the exclusive call for the Jew’s repentance, unto the general, and overwhelming, call to the Gentiles to trust on the name of Jesus the Messiah for justification of life (Rom. 5:18), is being introduced and vindicated.

Therefore, is Paul here, at this vital point in this tragic narrative, being introduced; for of him it was declared — at his conversion — “He is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel” (Acts 9:15)! And from what we have hitherto observed through the formative understanding of apostles being entrusted with the interpretations of parables/proverbs/mysteries, then we must, at this stage in the narrative, wonder in amazement at what Christ is about to reveal to this newly ordained — and at that, strangely ordained —  Apostle to THE GENTILES!

No doubt that Paul’s calling was the vital catalyst to the reaping of the Gentiles into the kingdom of God, just as the apostle Peter was the vital instrument under Christ to open the door of the kingdom to the Gentiles. Of this vital necessity of Paul’s part in regard to the declaring of the gospel of Christ to the Gentiles, Paul writes in Galatians 2:7,8, “The gospel of the uncircumcision was committed unto me, as the gospel of the circumcision was unto Peter; (for he that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles).” Moreover, in a most staggering declaration of what significantly marked Paul’s ministry, and set him apart to such a degree, Paul states, “But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST” (Gal. 1:11,12)!

This declaration, I must remind you, came from the man who declared himself as, “one born out of due time” (I Cor. 15:8)… That is to say, as reads the margin, he was “an abortive(tion)”! So unworthy was he, unprepared, unfit, unformed — and that, relative to those apostles that were with Christ in the flesh for the entire duration of His earthly ministry! He called himself a “botched abortion”! One that should have never come to the position of stature  to which he had been called! His conversion experience was not even typical, as with sudden violence and force he was brought by divine blows out from the womb of his relentless slaughter of the Church of God, and his weariless zeal to persecute the Body of Christ on earth! This man was unexpectedly brought to the light, even as a premature infant is  suddenly seized from the womb of his mother by the violence of some external force, which without question will mean certain death to the child — yet, Lo, the child survives to tell the story! Thus is the testimony of the Apostle to THE GENTILES!.. No doubt that this is to set forth a testimony to all these peoples to whom it was said by God — “Loammi” (i.e. "not my people”)!  “For ye are not my people, and I will not be your God” (Hos. 1:9). And yet, “it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God” (Hos. 1:10)!

This staggering confession of Paul (Gal. 1:11,12) was not, as some might deem it, an unfounded, proud self-aggrandizement above the other apostles, but was soberly reckoned upon due to the undeniable REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST which he received (Gal. 1:12)! This staggering statement — THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST — is used only in two other places in the New Testament, and is exceedingly strong in what it implies! Once it is used by the apostle Peter in speaking of the 2^nd Coming of Christ, and therefore is exceedingly glorious, and ineffable, worthy to be declared with such strong emphasis! Another instance, most famously, is that which is spoken of in the 1^st verse of the 1^st chapter of the last book in the New Testament, in which is transcribed the rapturous, and inexpressibly sweet scenes of glory, and the unutterable woe, torment, and distress reserved for the wicked in the end of time, and in eternity, which was given to John exclusively, in what is therefore called: THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST! And with this cloud of the mysterious unknown of the dispensations of God, hid in Christ from the beginning of the world, surrounding this statement, Paul steadfastly affirms: “For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by THE REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST” (Gal. 1:12)!

This revelation of Christ was not that which he was made to see of Him “in the way”, according to Barnabas, in Acts 9:27 (which of itself was enough to have authorized the apostolic ministry of Paul, I Cor. 15:8), this revelation was, moreover, a further revelation not only of Christ Himself, but “hidden wisdom” (I Cor. 2:7) from Christ Himself to Paul for the unveiling of the hidden purpose of God in redeeming the Gentiles — at the expense of the Jews, and not to their credit (as was originally detailed in the pages of Holy Writ), and this is what needed special REVELATION OF JESUS CHRIST!

Presumably, while Paul was in Arabia, he was granted to behold mysteries that the Lord had reserved, even  from His apostles that continued with him through all of His temptations of His earthly ministry in the days of His flesh! Namely, the Lord had hidden the mystery which pertained to the redemption of the Gentile/Heathen nations of the earth, for this was not ready to be disclosed of the Lord till the persistent rebellion of the Jews was manifested through the strivings of the 12 apostles, whom He sent to this end. It was needful, therefore, that an apostle would be granted to the Gentiles, in like manner to the Jews, for, what had been successfully established through approximately 2k years of Jewish Church history (from Abraham —> Christ) — the Lord establishing salvation in the Jewish national context, and, furthermore, how that THROUGH their conversion, regathering, and restoration in the end of time, He would orchestrate the grand and superior GENTILE CHURCH AGE ("grand and superior”, in respect to the present-tense fulfilling of THE GENTILE CHURCH AGE) — was not yet established for what would be (existing then in the mind of God alone) another 2k year period of redemptive history, only now among the Gentiles of the earth! This unforeseen situation in the end of the world (which occurred 2k years ago) requires revelatory knowledge to be imparted from heaven! And of this Paul wrote in Romans 16:25-27, “Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began but now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith: to God only wise, be glory through Jesus Christ for ever. Amen.”

This specific body of doctrine (in which are “some things hard to be understood”, II Pet. 3:15,16) was that which the Lord chose to specifically reveal to the apostle Paul in the gospel of the uncircumcision which was given to him (Gal. 2:7,8). These things which men through their ignorance perished for the want of in the midst of the 1^st century (II Pet. 3:15,16), comprise now, and fuel the machinery which is presently, effectually saving all the Gentiles across the vast regions of the formerly unknown world, who have believed on His name!

“For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: how that by revelation he made known unto me the mystery; (as I wrote afore in few words, whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ) which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit; that the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel: whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord: In whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him.”

— Eph. 3:1-12

[Further Reading: The Mystery of The Gospel Revealed to Paul]

— Num. 10:35,36

To understand the vitality of this DIVINE INVOCATION to the performance of the Abrahamic covenant, which was first uttered from the lips of Moses, as the ark of the covenant was first setting out before the hosts of Israel into the treacherous journey from Paran (Hab. 3:3), is to approach with prepared heart the threshold of this most breathtaking Psalm — 68. “Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered: let them also that hate him flee before him. As smoke is driven away, so drive them away: as wax melteth before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence of God. But let the righteous be glad; let them rejoice before God: yea, let them exceedingly rejoice” (Psa. 68:1-3). This DIVINE INVOCATION stands above the many other instances where David (or one of his companions) called upon the Lord in like fashion, for it is in this instance alone where David precisely quotes the invocation of Moses; whereas, all other instances are allusions thereto in principle only. Psa. 68:1-3 is no mere allusion, reckoning upon the inherent principle, but is, rather, an undeniable equating of the two occasions upon which the invocation was declared (the same instance also being spoken of in, Psa. 132:8)!

Here David was bringing the ark on its final ascent, into its final resting place — Zion… This is in direct parallel to Moses bringing the ark upon its first embarkment into the wilderness of wandering! Therefore, David taking up THE DIVINE INVOCATION is, essentially, his estimating of the value of the experience of which he was made to partake at the final ascent — namely, that this final ascent under his hand was as epic as its first under the hand of  Moses, and that this rest to which David was conducting it to was the fulfillment, which Moses, at best, only foresaw through the spirit of prophecy (Num. 10:36) — and this prophetic equality Solomon also attributes to his final transferring of the ark, finally into the temple (II Chron. 6:41). David’s invocation here may seem quite audacious of the man, and it would be if it were not for the very staggering events which had transpired in the forgoing (approximately) 50 years.

[Consider diligently: "Divine Acceptance or Divine Rejection"]

Consider, David was raised in a generation wherein the ark of the covenant — the throne of God — had even itself been taken captive by the Philistines! And upon its return to Beth-shemesh, and settling in Kirjath-jearim, it abode there for 20 years even, before anyone mourned after the Lord (which is the sense of I Sam. 7:2)! David was raised with the ark of the covenant in obscurity, and no one enquiring at it in the days of Saul (I Chron. 13:3)… all of this in the context of the Lord “forsaking Shiloh” (Psa. 78:60), and that at the close of approximately 450 years of dark ages in the times of the judges! Therefore, for David to successfully accomplish a recovery of the glory of God (“between the cherubims”, II Sam. 6:2; Psa. 99:1), by bringing the ark safely up to Zion (which the Lord had revealed unto David that he had chosen for himself as a perpetual dwelling place, see Psa. 68:16; 78:68,69; 87:2; 132:8,13,14), and into the tabernacle which David himself (as a modern-day Moses for his generation) had pitched for him (I Chron. 15:1), was no insignificant achievement!

Thus David, most accurately estimating the full scale of the operation of God’s glory which the Lord was reviving in the midst of his reign, was poised to fully realize the magnitude of the work the Lord was doing in this most staggering and singular event portrayed in Psa. 68. Therefore, he is led to seamlessly interweave the events of God’s glory chronicled at Sinai, with his present day experience throughout the song, crescendoing in v. 18, wherein he (referencing Moses) quotes Deborah! “Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive: thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the LORD God might dwell among them.” His reference to Moses in this text is undeniable from the immediate context, but when compared to Judges 5 — the song of Deborah — it is plain to see the correlation between the two passages!

Deborah is singing her song in a very similar context to David’s, as she was in the midst of a divine repentance as well (though it would prove only to be partial); thus was made to glorify God in the very same spiritualized language of the the glory of God among the Church first defined at Sinai, just as David was compelled so to do in his generation! That is to say, when Deborah beheld Barak the son of Abinoam ascend Tabor, she was beholding a reenactment of the glory of God as it was, when in days of yore, one Moses, led his captivity captive from Egypt, unto the mount Horeb, and then he ascended up on high, and received gifts for men (elders, prophecy, a law, etc.)!

This must have been a most affecting scene to this dear mother in Israel, and yet her experience is improved upon, for not only did she behold Barak lead the 10_k oppressed Israelites unto mount Tabor, but he led them up the mountain with him! This is, therefore, an improvement upon the type of Christ offered in Moses to the Exodus Generation; for Moses brought them to “the mountain that might be touched” (Heb. 12:18), though it was strictly forbidden to be touched (Exo. 19:12,13), but Barak brought them up the mountain with him (Jdg. 4:6,12,14), even as Christ, who would avail beyond all inferior divine repentances (by reason of His perfection), bringing his people to a mountain that may not be touched (for its spirituality), and ascend the “Holy Hill” of "Mount Zion” in “The Heavenly Jerusalem”, WITH his captivity He has taken captive (Eph. 4:8; Heb. 12:22; Psa. 2:6; 24:3)!

All this in view, we find David in Psalm 68 standing atop the cresting wave of the fulfillment of the Abrahamic Covenant! Essentially, all that was laying hold of Deborah, concerning that which had laid hold of Moses, was suddenly laying hold of David! Not to say this was the end of his warfare, or that this wave would not finally crest in the close of his reign, but this moment was pivotal, and served as the manifest turning point, where all that would follow were the mere propitious events which must surely seize such an elect and chosen vessel.

This would have been enough if this was simply all that David was seeing, but there was more! More that, though hidden from his eyes, would be progressively revealed through the generations of the Kingdom of God still to come. Namely, this breathtaking moment of David’s realization of the divine repentance, would be taken yet again into the lips of another, as yet another divine repentance in the heart of God would be realized in the future, to the performance of the covenant to end all covenants, by the hand of the Worthy One, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the root of David: Jesus of Nazareth! This is the 1^st Century Divine Repentance.

Thus did Paul, standing atop the crested wave of the New Covenant in the full volume of all that was then revealed, declare, “Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men” (Eph. 4:8)! Paul is quoting David, who is quoting Deborah, who is referencing Moses, that he might declare — IN ITS GRAND FULFILLMENT — what Christ (the prophet like unto Moses, Deut. 18:15) has achieved in his heavenly ascension, far above all that any other mere man had ever been able to attain! Hereby, one can easily perceive that this passage (Psa. 68) is exceedingly broad, and serves as A COLLIDING POINT of divine repentances for many generations.

[For a more comprehensive study on the Divine Repentance in the days of David...]

Even so, it does not end there, but after the death of all of the apostles, save John, and after Rome had sacked and burned Jerusalem, scattered the Jews, and plucked down the temple — and yet the end of the world had not come! — then did the Lord reveal yet one more divine repentance to come in the end of the world! And so, John remembering Paul quoting David, who was quoting Deborah, who was referencing Moses, declares, “And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father's name written in their foreheads” (Rev. 14:1)! This is, we hope, the 21^st Century Divine Repentance.

A further necessary application of this doctrine (Realizing the Divine Repentance), is now most timely that we would consider. In the light of all that is before us, we are now plainly able to see that from Moses —> Deborah/Barak —> David —> Paul —> John, that each of these redeemed saints were made to behold something clearly set before them at the focal point of THE DIVINE REPENTANCE — men of God’s right hand (Psa. 80:17)!

In Psalm 68, as a starting point for us, consider again that David uttered THE DIVINE INVOCATION (v. 1-3), and ere long scaled his way to the staggering height of Realizing the Divine Repentance (v.18), but in the meantime he revealed to all what was the method, or by what means did the Lord ordain that His ascent would be manifest: “Though ye have lien among the pots, yet shall ye be as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold” (v. 13)! What was in focus to David was the reality of the defied Israel rising from the ignominy and reproach among which she lay, and from the dunghill of apostasy in which she wallowed (I Sam. 2:8), then for many centuries standing. To David, this was, inexorably, the course of God’s repentance in his generation, and to this end alone did he live — that Israel might arise (Psa. 45:16,17; 72:17-20; 145:4-7; Acts 13:36)!

This reality is the selfsame thing which Asaph saw, expected, and took careful record of as both a contemporary and companion of David (consider his prayer for the Lord’s guidance of His people, Psa. 77:1-6,20, and the answer received in David as a shepherd over Israel, Psa. 78:65-72). Behold this man’s words, “Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand, upon the son of man whom thou madest strong for thyself. So will not we go back from thee: quicken us, and we will call upon thy name. Turn us again, O LORD God of hosts, cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved” (Psa. 80:17-19). This is very plain, and thus it must be, for our hardness of heart, and our persistent unwillingness to arise, and our unrenewed desires that God himself alone (without human instrumentality) would arise! O God, help us to see what these men saw!

Asaph’s desire was that the Lord would arise! Thus he opened, “Shepherd of Israel, thou that leadest Joseph like a flock; thou that dwellest between the cherubims, shine forth” (Psa. 80:1)! He will reiterate this supplication throughout this peculiarly crafted testimony (so the sense of the title, “Shoshannim-eduth”, or, Lily of Testimony), in the terms of the Lord’s countenance shining upon His people (v. 3,7,14,16,19)! The testimony of Psalm 80 is this: when the Lord shines the light of His countenance upon His people they are “turned”, “made strong”, “saved”, and, “quickened” (v. 2,3,7-11,15,17-19) — or, in other words, they arise!

The reason behind this method is plainly declared in the text, “Before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh stir up thy strength, and come and save us” (Psa. 80:2). Asaph is remembering the very moment when the Lord went forth in the wilderness, when THE DIVINE INVOCATION was first brought forth (in Num. 10:35,36), when the ark of the Lord’s glory AROSE, and literally set forth immediately before the blessed eyes of three tribes — Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh (Num. 10:21-24), which were the 3^rd rank among the Israelites in their setting forth (Num. 2:17-24), two ranks before the ark and two behind! Therefore, when Asaph is invoking the Lord to “stir up his strength” before these tribes, he is essentially saying, “Arise, like you did at the first before our fathers in the wilderness!” But more than this, he is stating the most express way a man may arise — he must set the Lord’s rising ever before him (Psa. 16:8)!

It is certain, those who most clearly behold the shining forth of the Lord from between the cherubims, behold His strength stirred up, and they shall arise and follow — captivated —behind him in His glorious train! It was in the language of Divine Repentance which Asaph described the Lord’s arising in the Exodus Generation (“Stir up thy strength”, v. 2). And rightly so, for it was after that the Lord had said he would not go among the armies of Israel (Exo. 33:3), and after that he had determined the destruction of all of the tribes for their whoredoms at mount Sinai (Exo. 32:10), that, Lo! Asaph beheld Him “stirring up His strength” before Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh! This same signal language is understandably employed by David (Psa. 35:23; 44:23-26), and Isaiah (Isa. 42:13,14) in describing this most staggering act of Divine Repentance as well!

O that the Lord would thus cause His countenance to shine upon His people in this day!

Understanding this application of the Divine Repentance (God raising up men of His right hand), we can clearly see why David, after calling upon the Lord to “lift up” and “shew” Himself (Psa. 94:1,2), was looking about him, on his left and right, saying to his companions, “Who will rise up for me against the evildoers? or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity” (Psa. 94:16)? David, like the Lord, sought a man (Isa. 59:16; 63:5; Jer. 5:1; Ezek. 22:30)!This is why the closing chapters of the chronicles of David are so significant.

God sought to teach David this lesson, in a most impressive way in the closing scenes of his life. If the the closing chapters of David’s earthly ministry are II Sam. 21-23 (24 being an appendix, to transition between the life of David and Solomon), then there is immediately discovered a shocking theme! II Samuel 21 closes with David’s last battle, and the subsequent riddance of the giants from Canaan, by the hand of other men than David! We hear then, in II Samuel 22, the song at this time which such exploits of the Lord (wrought in love), inspired from the lips of David. Finally, in II Sam. 23, as David reflects, at first with subtle (though resigned) lamentation upon the state of his house in reference to the covenant of the Lord with him, yet he can abide there but briefly, and at last closes with a catalogue of the exploits of what the Lord had done through the mighty men which He had made strong for Himself! And through this divinely inspired progression in the narrative, we can clearly perceive the instruction the Lord is boldly teaching David in the closing scenes of his life — “Stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord”!

It was not that David was forgetful or unaffected by all that the Lord had wrought through his own earthen vessel, for this was a reality that he could not escape since his rise in the sheep cote, but there was something new that was taking the preeminent place in his soul. David was deeply instructed of the Lord to behold His arising in His people, yea, even till he felt his life hanging in the balance before his eyes, and that the Lord must arise for him!... and then, at his wit’s end, the Lord arose — in Abishai (II Sam. 21:15-17)! The Lord himself caused David once to pray, “Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength faileth. For mine enemies speak against me; and they that lay wait for my soul take counsel together, saying, God hath forsaken him: persecute and take him; for there is none to deliver him. O God, be not far from me: O my God, make haste for my help” (Psa. 71:9-12)… This was, undoubtedly, the Lord causing him to soberly anticipate in this prayer, when a young, strong, man of war, the hour when he would fail of his own strength (even that which he had always reckoned upon in, and by, the Lord). This would almost seem to cast a shade upon the glorious testimony of David as a worthy contender for the promises, and promised land of God, for the worthy testimony of war, according to the covenant, was, “[They] waxed valiant in fight” (Heb. 11:34)! But here, David’s strength failed him, and he “waxed faint”! But God’s glory in this man’s testimony is preserved in this particular, most astonishing — crucial to behold — manifestation of the Lord’s salvation… by the hand of His people! For, it was through Abishai, that the Lord Himself came to “help” David (Psa. 71:12)! As it is written, “But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succored him” (II Sam. 21:17)!

The end of David’s story is not so much what the Lord did through him, as much as what the Lord did for him, through his friends. To behold this operation of God’s glory in the establishment of men of His right hand, is, as it were, to see what only the seasoned seaman should hope to see of the heights, depths, length and breadth of the vast, unfathomable ocean, at his final voyage… It is the ascent of Pisgah’s height, and the casting eye of a life worth three lifetimes, finally beholding the desired haven… It is the blinding effulgence of “salvation”, to the eyes that have lived a long life to behold it! And thus beholding this blissful scene of — THE LORD ARISING — was David laid to rest with his fathers in peace.

These realities which so illustriously have been set forth in the testimony of the life of David and his companions, will be the fuel which shall finally propel THE DIVINE REPENTANCE to end all divine repentances — in THE COVENANT to end all covenants — to THE GENERATION to end all generations!

[Further Study: "The Gospel Mystery of God's Repentance"]

The New Testament saints of the 1^st century needed apostolic authority to establish and open that which was declared by Christ, and yet was purposefully couched in parables, “That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them” (Mark 4:12); but, as it was written, “It is given unto you [the apostles] to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given” (Matt. 13:11).

“And he said, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand.”

— Luke 8:10

The parables of Christ were designedly obscure that the hearts of all men would be revealed, and that many would fall, and many would rise through His words, according to the prophecy of that old man of God Simeon, “Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against; (yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also,) that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed” (Luke 2:34,35). His words which were gracious and forcible, which seized the consciences of all men upon whom they did fall, were also holy, and exceeding broad (Psa. 60:6; 119:96)! His words brought all men into an irresistible confrontation with eternity, and the searching question came: “Will they hear?” (Luke 16:31; Acts 28:28).

Therefore some stumbled and fell backwards, and perished, while others were exalted to inherit the throne of glory, and were staggeringly saved, BOTH through the operation of His word (Isa. 28:9-13)! The same operation, exercising the hearts of mankind in two dramatically different, eternally decisive ways! The eternal doom of some sealed, and others gloriously liberated into the pure sun light of heaven’s perfect day — through the word of Jesus the Nazarene!

The obscurity was intended to be dissolved through the instruction and interpretation of Christ, and truly it was (though only in part), as it was written, “Jesus saith unto them, Have ye understood all these things? They say unto him, Yea, Lord” (Matt. 13:51). Yea, He was daily devoting Himself to the private instruction of His beloved friends, “And when they were alone, he expounded all things to his disciples” (Mark 4:34). Of this supernatural and discriminate revelation, Christ giveth praise to the Father in the great forsaking in the midst of Jerusalem, saying,

“I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight.”

— Matt. 11:25,26

Notwithstanding all this labor, their eyes were still partially holden (Luke 24:16), and their ears dull of hearing, till after the resurrection! “But they understood not this saying, and it was hid from them, that they perceived it not: and they feared to ask him of that saying” (Luke 9:45). Thus did Christ miraculously and instantaneously open the understanding of his apostles after the resurrection, as is stated in Luke 24:45, “Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the scriptures.” And it was at this point, for forty days long, as Christ walked and dwelt among the apostles, that he instructed them and made them worthy preachers and teachers of his gospel from thenceforth! And therefore it was ordained that they would go into all the world, “Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world” (Matt. 28:20).

In other words the 12 disciples which Christ entrusted with the interpretations of his parables (or, proverbs — see, Prov. 1:5,6), were charged by Christ to go into all the world and themselves make disciples, bringing them into this very same manner of relationship which they had to Christ! This particular and fundamental understanding of discipleship (namely, the instructing in interpreting proverbs) is vitally formative to our approach to the NT of the apostles of Christ, and how the Spirit of the Lord led them to interpret the prophecies  concerning the ministry of the Messiah (see, Appendix I)! For they did not speak of themselves, but rather were opening and confirming the words of Christ, and were instructing and committing to “faithful men” (II Tim. 2:2) "the mysteries of God” (I Cor. 4:1)… O how we need to behold the methods of interpretation which were entrusted to their stewardship!

“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life; (for the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.”

— I John 1:1-4

You see, the vital reality of the New Testament saints — which we cannot live without steadfastly beholding! — is that, as the saints came under the spiritual influence of the witness and instruction of the the apostles of Christ (through discipleship), were instantaneously brought into the same manner of fellowship which the apostles had with Christ Himself! Hence, the first disciples saved at Pentecost, first of all, “continued  steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine” (Acts 2:42)! Understanding, therefore, this organic band, through which they were brought into this staggering degree of gloriously near and real fellowship with the Father and the Son (namely, an understanding ministered unto them through the word of the apostles), then, from thenceforth they would hold dear to these words! Therefore, in application, if we would devote ourselves in the same manner, and to the same doctrine (ministered with its original, and unadulterated  intent), then we would effortlessly be ushered thereby into this glorious reality of communion with Jesus Christ, even as the apostles had themselves!

The ministry of the apostles was, therefore, an in-expendable component to the opening and establishment of those things which would have otherwise been left in obscurity! God all wise, rose up these 12 men in particular for this express purpose: to declare the gospel of the coming kingdom of Christ (which was just established in heaven, and was set to be restored in Israel upon the Jew’s repentance and reception of the Christ of God, Jesus of Nazareth)! They succeeded to make this midnight cry in Jerusalem, and throughout all of Judea, and even unto Samaria (Acts 1:8; 8:1); but, ere long, as the Jews stiffened their necks still yet further (Acts 7), the time arose, in the which the Lord ordained that the gospel would go unto the Gentiles (Acts 10 & 11)! And, therefore, it is on purpose that the conversion of the foreordained apostle to THE GENTILES was at this crucial juncture (Rom. 11:13; Gal. 2:7,8; Eph. 3:1; 4:1; I Tim. 2:7; Tit. 1:11)!

[Further Reading: "Warranting NT Apostolic Explanation"]