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| MARC WROTE:
I sure wish Jesus would come SOON!
Yesterday would be just fine with me. The world is getting to be such a
bummer—the headlines could have been lifted from the Book of Daniel and the
Book of Revelation, pretty near. Hello Marc, Good to hear from you again. With all the end-time signs being fulfilled all around us, don't you know that all of the Saints are looking for and expecting our Lord's return? You referred to the prophecies of Daniel; and lately, I have been reflecting on one of the end-time signs he set forth.
Today is my birthday and I have turned the "big 70." I bring this up to make a point, for a great part of this explosion of knowledge has happened in my lifetime. (According to the Strong Concordance, the word translated as "increased" actually means "to increase greatly or exceedingly.) So if you will, let me reminisce for a while. One of my earliest memories is of my Dad walking behind a mule that was pulling a plow. (It wasn't because he couldn't afford a tractor—it was because there were no tractors available at the time.) I remember him hollering "Gee" and "Haw" and the old mule understood that he was to turn right on "Gee" and left on "Haw." (The more prosperous farmers would plow with a "double tree" which would let them hook up two mules or horses to the plow.) Also, when it was time to harvest the hay and put it away for the winter, the horses were the source of "horse-power" in that day. However, by the time I was old enough to work in the fields, the wealthier farmers were using trucks in the fields and tractors for plowing, etc. I can also remember when our family got electricity. We lived in Galloway, Missouri—a small town outside of Springfield. Until I was 6 years old, my mother cooked with a "top of the line" kerosene stove. Our lights were either kerosene or candles. Our refrigerator was actually an icebox which was about the size and shape of our present refrigerators—only it was cooled by "ice." Twice a week we would get a 100 pound block of ice from the neighborhood store which had a large ice house with walls about a foot thick with insulation. I don't know how they made the ice, but it was delivered once a week to the store by train in an insulated car. (It was a spanking offense when my brothers and I would sneak a piece of ice on a hot day—letting the cool out of the icebox.) There was no such thing as "running water." Our bathroom was known as the "outhouse" and it was just that—i.e., far enough "out" from the house that the odor didn't bother us. (Actually, it was years after we got electricity before we got indoor plumbing and indoor bathrooms, which are taken for granted today!) When the electrical lines final arrived to our community, our homes became "modernized"—having a few bare light bulbs hanging from the ceilings and, if you were lucky, the hand pump at your well was replaced by an electrical pump. Soon after this, our community was connected to the rest of the country by the latest marvel—the telephone. As a young lad with big eyes, I watched as the "telephone man" put our first telephone on the wall. What a wonder!!! We now could send our voices thousands of miles over a "wire"!!! When we would pick up the phone, the operator would say "number please" and we would give her the three digit number that we wanted to call. (In those days there were "party lines" which meant that you shared your "line" or connection with two other families who could pick up the phone and listen in on your conversation if they wanted to—but nobody really minded unless you happen to have a "nosy Susan" on your line.) It then seemed like only a matter of weeks before we purchased another wonder of wonders: the electricity powered radio! It wasn't enough that we could send our voices flying over telephone wires; now, we could listen in "live" to a program taking place thousands of miles away—seemingly just "taken out of the air"! I can remember the neighborhood men gathering together at someone's house around the radio—listening to a blow-by-blow description as the world champion boxer would defend his title. Myself, I couldn't wait to get home from school to listen to the latest episode of "The Lone Ranger." While all of this was going on, even greater, more astonishing things were being invented behind the scenes. When I was in the sixth grade, we had a teacher who invited visitors from organizations that were at the front of modernization: the telephone company, manufacturing companies, chemical companies, etc.; to inform us of the latest breakthroughs. For example, a representative from the telephone company informed us that the telephones were installing "dial-tone telephones" and there would be no more operators or party lines. This, our young minds could grasp; but we laughed when he said it wouldn't be long before we would have "phones" that would allow you to see who you were talking to. Next, we had a visitor from a chemical company demonstrating a new hard substance made from liquid petroleum called "plastic." So what, I thought, it will never replace wood and metal. (Little did I know!) And then the field trip I'll never forget. We got to visit an ice cream factory and watch machines make all kinds of ice cream goodies. It was utterly amazing to see machines do the work of men and women—but I think the best part was eating the free samples. Today, most everyone has one or more television sets in their homes; but this didn't exists until I was almost a teenager! (And one doesn't have to be very old to remember when the popular computer and Internet and cell phone came into existence!) Not only have I lived to see amazing things taking place in communications and manufacturing in my life time, but many, many great achievements have taken place in the medical world in my lifetime. New antibiotics have saved countless lives. The understanding of the human body has grown almost exponentially. New surgeries and treatments have become possible as the new achievements in other fields made new medical machines available. In addition, we've figured out how to save lives by transplanting organs—even the human heart! (Where do we go from here???) Of course, we've split the atom! We've walked on the moon! We've developed Space-age weapons of war! We've learned how to clone living beings! All of this gaining and use of knowledge (and I'm sure there is much more that our visitors can think of) has come to pass in my life time. What makes all of this even more astonishing is that from the time of Christ (actually, from the time of the descendants of Noah's family and the flood) until just decades ago, people seemed to be satisfied with their horses and their buggies and a few tools made of wood and metal. Surely all of the things I have mentioned would satisfy Daniel's prophecy of an end-time "increase in knowledge"!!! Keep looking up, Don B'Ann Wrote: To Marc I have been thinking about the word "Maranatha" in the Bible. The people were instructed to greet each other with this saying. During my lifetime, this was taught as "asking Jesus to hasten His Second Coming"; however, it meant much more. It was a "prayer in season and out of season". The greeting was asking God to (1) finish the promises of the Old Testament; (2).meet the present needs of the person spoken to; and (3) to remember any and all future promises. It is a powerful word!!!
You too, be patient and stand firm, because the Lord's coming is near.
Instead of shaking hands, as we do now, what would happen if we spoke The Word and said Maranatha. We would be asking God to meet the needs of a person in the past, present and the future. Why the person's past one might ask? We would be requesting the following Scripture:
God will then look through all His Scriptures/Promises and restore those things that are needful. We are just to bring to "His Remembrance" the Promises and Pledges that He made. We would be asking God to meet the present need whether it be a "born again" experience, salvation, healing, deliverance, etc. God would then look at that person and provide the "need" not the "want". We would be addressing the future of the person, as well as all the offspring in all future generations. So, I submit that we have been cheated of a powerful Word. Since I was always taught that it meant that we wanted God to hasten the "End time" and to do away with this present earth, I haven't used it to its fullness. We have not been taught the Scriptures during this generation. It has been presented as "weak and distorted." Jesus taught that even He did not know when the End time would occur. He was not fixated on that event.
Our work is the following:
So, may we stop worrying about doing away with this present earth and get busy harvesting "souls for the kingdom"! I salute you now with the Word "Maranatha" and may the speaking of this one word prayer have its perfect work in your life. Love, B'Ann |
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BROTHER GIDEON WROTE: Dear
Brethren, DON WROTE: You are in our prayers and we trust that you are also in the prayers of our visitors. Thanks for keeping us up to date. Maranatha, Don B'ANN WROTE: To Pastor Gideon in Kenya It is strange that you would mention the yellow corn. This past week, we heard a sermon about Israel's (1) eating of manna, then (2) their eating of parched corn before they reached the Promised Land. None of them wanted to eat of the "parched corn" but wanted God to continue to "baby" them by providing manna every morning. The "parched corn" represents the "growing up" of God's followers before they can continue their walk with Jesus.
Some 23 years ago, I heard a prophesy by an elderly lady in our church and that message was: "I hear the rustling of the Mulberry leaves and every thing that can be shaken loose will fall to the ground." I know that it seems that we have very little in the physical, but God is shaking everything loose that is not needful and will be replacing it with needful things for this generation. This generation of believers are going to be a generation like no other. We are in a new day in the United States. Most of the old things that made are nation great have been replaced by things from other cultures. During the first part of our nation's history, we were a people of many races and cultures that had to learn to live together in a new type government–adopting the best of each culture for the good of all. Now we are again faced with many cultures; this time, however, they each want to change our basic culture to reflect/embrace theirs. However, let me point out that CHRISTIANITY IS NOT A CULTURE. Christianity is the presence of a body of believers that have been washed in the blood of Christ Jesus, called out from every culture of the world, called out to be a SPIRIT-LED BODY. This is the scarlet thread of redemption that flows to people everywhere. So, it is imperative that we remain free to PREACH the "GOSPEL of JESUS CHRIST and HIM CRUCIFIED." He is our true manna. One might ask why so many people are starving across our world. The Bible talks about two famines. One is the absence of food and the other is absence of the Word of God. Do they parallel each other??? We need to look at some pertinent Scriptures:
Everywhere in the Bible, we find that people suffered because there was disobedience or lack/famine of the Word of God in the land. If we truly believed that the Word of God was the HOPE of the world; then, there would be more Christian getting off the church pews and going into the "highways and the hedges." We are at "ease in Zion" and God is going to have to discomfort us to make us move for Him. It is my belief that as a nation moves "toward" God they will start experiencing more and more blessings; and as the move "away" from God, as we have done in the United States, they will see a withdrawal of his blessings. Strangely enough, since He blesses His own people first, we will see the blessings leave them first and then to those that are not His. It is my fervant prayer that He will supply your needs in Christ Jesus and that he will provide your physical needs in the coming months. Maranatha, B'Ann |
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You Wrote:
questions/comments: Don Wrote: |
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You Wrote: Question-Comment: B'ANN Wrote: Hello |
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