ISON and The Parable of the Tares
I have no issue with prophetic speculation that's educated and based on the scriptures, and that's what's happening in this video. I don't think he's got enough evidence to convince on the date he puts forward, but there's no harm in thinking and examining. The reason the Lord gave signs is so that His people would see and recognize those signs at the appropriate time. He does make one important point that is absolutely true. That is the Antichrist will appear before Messiah Jesus returns. This is clearly written (Matt. 24:15-31, 1 Thes. 2:1-4) and perhaps one of the most important things believers should be prepared to encounter.
Worshipping the serpent "within" in our age of apostasy - Part 1
Lots of descriptions of the occult practices, thoughts and methods here, but the central point should be easy to pick up. Satan and his disobedient archangels are behind the central attacks on Christianity and all of the organized false religions. Not behind in terms of a subtle influence, but behind in terms of direction, at times even to the degree of immediate personal intervention.
Remember the temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4, when Satan offered the Lord all the kingdoms of the this world. It was not a temptation if it wasn't true, as Jesus would have known that, and He did not rebuke Satan based on a false offer, but simply on the idea of tempting God. What was once hidden (and for good reason) is now being revealed openly today.
By Linda Kimball
In the classic work, "Earth's Earliest Ages" English theologian G.H. Pember (1837-1910) examines the role of satanic forces in the first destruction of earth under God's judgment and compares them to the explosion of spiritism (open intercourse with evil spirits), ancient Egyptian Hermetic magic, Theosophy, Buddhism, reincarnation, karma, the Mysteries, astrology and mesmeric healings sweeping across Christendom.
It was during the Renaissance that many influential Christians at the highest levels of Church and society had returned to the occult Wisdom Teachings that originated in ancient Egypt with Hermes Trismegistus. In his own time, Pember observes that ancient occult traditions are no longer veiled in mystery but boldly presented by the powerful occult brotherhood as the fruit of modern science, especially evolutionary philosophy, which the brotherhood assert was included in the instructions given,
"...to the initiates of the Hermetic, Orphic, Eleusinian, and Cabbalistic mysteries, and were familiar to Chaldean Magi, Egyptian Priests, Hindu Occultists, Essenes, Therapeutae Gnostics, and Theurgic Neo-Platonists." (Pember, pp.243-244)
In the impeccably researched "Scientific Analysis of the Writings of Alice A. Bailey and their Applications," Robert A. Hermann Ph.D. affirms Pembers claim with respect to the occult origins of the evolutionary science so widespread in our time. Herrmann traces modern evolutionary thinking – which has infiltrated the whole body of the Church – back to 1750 and the Spanish-French occultist the Martine's de Pasqually (1715?-1779) whose biological conception predates Darwin's theory and held that an adept spiritually evolves into higher and higher forms on various evolutionary levels. (raherrmann.com)
Pember knows that occult teachings are grounded in knowledge received from evil spirits, thus he particularly connects evolutionary philosophy to spiritism. This teaching said Pember, made the world ready for the deeper teachings of the Brotherhood (fallen angels):
".....the Brotherhood decided that the time had come to communicate with it, and openly influence its religion and philosophy. They have, however, become so etherealized by their practices that they are unable to endure contact with coarse human nature; it was, therefore, necessary to employ intermediaries. The first person known to have been chosen for this purpose was a Madame Blavatsky." (pp. 243-246)
In affirmation, Corinne McLaughlin and Gordon Davidson, the politically influential co-authors of "Spiritual Politics: Changing the World from the Inside Out," admit that their book is based on the Ageless Wisdom teachings preserved by occultists since the Egyptian pantheon (27th-30th centuries B.C) and handed down over the ages to modern occultists in the time of the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and on into our own time:
"For centuries, the Ageless Wisdom in the West was shielded from an unprepared public.... The unveiled truths were handed down only orally by individual teachers to tested disciples or by certain religious groups and secret societies, such as the Cabbalists, Druids, Essenes, Sufis, Knights Templar, Rosicrucian's, Freemasons, and others who carefully guarded the teachings down through the centuries. A study of these secret societies would reveal powerful influences on the history of nations...." (Spiritual Politics, McLaughlin, Davidson from "Reinventing Jesus Christ: The New Gospel," Warren Smith, crossroad.to)
Beginning with the work of the Brotherhood and/or Masters acting through Blavatsky, Ageless Wisdom has succeeded in over-spreading W. Europe and America and made deep inroads into the whole body of the Church over the last one hundred years. Blavatsky's important book, 'The Secret Doctrine' (1888) paved the way by synthesizing,
".....Christian, Jewish, and Islamic mysticism with the Eastern teachings of Hinduism, Taoism, and Buddhism, showing their common roots and comparing their sacred texts...."
The next development came through the teachings of Alice Bailey, an apostate Evangelical:
".... In 1919 Bailey was contacted by a Tibetan master, Djwhal Khul, who asked her to write a series of books with him telepathically that would continue Blavatsky's work. Over a period of thirty years, Bailey received eighteen books from him on the nature of the cosmos and the human being, outlining principles for individual spiritual growth and humanity's next evolutionary steps. In 1923 Bailey founded Lucis Trust [originally called Lucifer Publishing, ed.] to bring the teachings in her books to the public. A year later she began the Arcane School. The books were written to apply to several levels of consciousness at once and thus can be read by both beginners and advanced students. Her works have been especially helpful to the two of us in our own spiritual growth and have provided much of the inspiration for Spiritual Politics."
Central to ancient Egyptian and modern Hermetic orders such as the Order of the Golden Dawn, Theosophy and New Age is ophiolatry (worship of serpents/Lucifer) and the theme of a pantheon of nine Sun Gods or with modern orders, an occult Hierarchy of nine evolved Brothers or Masters: god-men who have finished their cycles of reincarnation and material evolution but have chosen to remain here on the earth (Gaia) to serve people in their own conscious evolution as well as guide Gaia's spiritual evolution:
"(The solar deity Kneph was pictured as a serpent in a fiery circle and Osiris) was essentially identical with Kneph...The worship of Isis, the moon-goddess, was equally entwined with ophiolatry. Her emblem was the horned viper...The Egyptians often represented Isis and Osiris together, as two serpents." (The Cult of the All-Seeing Eye, Robert Keith Spenser, p. 35)
Depending on who they are speaking to, the nine Masters variously call themselves the Brotherhood, Space Brothers, Ascended Masters, the ancient Ennead of Egypt (the nine Sun Gods), Nine Principles of God, the Deep Space Nine, the Group, Sirians and Council of Nine. Today there is a vast and growing network of channelers purporting to receive messages from the Nine and still others calling themselves Light Workers who claim to have presented briefings from the Group five times at the United Nations.
Another important theme connecting all ancient and modern Hermetic Orders and Mystery religions is the Sirius star system. From the time of the Egyptians, Sumerians and Babylonians occult teachings have invariably attributed to Sirius a special status in connection with Isis (Sirius A), Osiris (Sirius B), astrology, Hermeticism, the Mysteries, secret initiations, conceptions of transmigration, reincarnation, astral plane travels and other forms of occult evolutionary philosophy.
Hermetic Mystery schools and orders teach that Sirius is the divine "sun behind the sun" that is both the true source of the sun's energy which keeps the physical world alive, as well as the divine substance that keeps the spiritual world alive. Whereas the sun illuminates the physical world, which is considered to be an illusion, Sirius is the "real light," the Great Dragon, Cosmic Serpent, Chaos, Abraxas, Star Maker, Ground of Being, or Essence of material phenomena, meaning that the material universe exists only as a grand illusion or mental construction as it does for example in the mind of Brahman:
"Brahman is real, the world is unreal." (swamij.com/mahavakyas)
The two most important figures associated with Hermetic Theosophy, Madame Blavatsky and Alice Bailey, considered Sirius to be the source of mystical serpent power: the seething energies of Lucifer that exert a spiritual influence over the entire Sephiroth or cosmic tree of life and therefore directly link with every great religion of antiquity because these energies extend into the psyche of mankind.
Bailey taught that Sirius is the "Great White Lodge" and believed it to be the spiritual home of the "Spiritual Hierarchy." For this reason she considered Sirius as the star of initiation:
"This is the great star of initiation because our Hierarchy (an expression of the second aspect of divinity) is under the supervision or spiritual magnetic control of the Hierarchy of Sirius. These are the major controlling influences whereby the cosmic Christ works upon the Christ principle in the solar system, in the planet, in man and in the lower forms of life expression. It is esoterically called the "brilliant star of sensitivity." (The Mysterious Connection Between Sirius and Human History, vigilantcitizen.com, Dec. 12, 2012)
Baily also taught that Luciferian energy emanating from Sirius is the energy of thought: a mind force that reaches the solar system from a distant cosmic center via Sirius. Sirius acts as the transmitter,
"...or the focalising centre, whence emanate those influences which produce self-consciousness in man." (ibid)
The Hermetic Way of the Dragon
The Hermetic way of psychic power and self-salvation is the antithesis of the Way of Jesus Christ God Incarnate (Romans 3:24; 6:23; 10:9-10; Eph. 1:7; 2:8-9) and began with a mysterious man known as Hermes Trismegistus.
The ancients identified Hermes with Mercury and Anubis (brother to Osiris). His emblem, the caduceus, was a talismanic serpent representing the power of Mercury as a Sun-god. Speculations abound on exactly when and where Hermes lived. Some modern New Age occultists believe he was a contemporary of Noah in the pre-flood world which they call Atlantis. Others believe he lived in ancient Egypt during the time of Moses.
In "Biographa Antiqua" the English occultist Frances Barret writes that Hermes "communicated the sum of the Abyss, and divine knowledge to all posterity." The word "Abyss" refers to ancient and modern pantheist and/or panentheist conceptions such as the Watery Abyss, Divine One Substance, Primordial Matter, or with Hermes, the Universal Life personified by the Great Serpent or Dragon from whose body and wings stream illuminating serpent power, or with Bailey, 'those influences which produce self-consciousness in man.'
Bailey is expressing the Hermetic principle which speaks of the correlation between the substance of the Great Serpent and the mind of man expressed in the world famous magic formula: "As above, so below."
The substance (body) and seething powers of the Great Dragon or Serpent are symbolized by the Oroboros, a powerful occult symbol also known as the Sephiroth, great chain of being, cosmic tree of life, and with Darwin the tree of life. The Oroboros 'above' corresponds to a number of different evolutionary levels and realms comprising the habitation of all supernatural entities and various heavens and hells such as the Black Lodge. Thus the substance of the Great Dragon's body with its supposed multiple dimensions and life and thought-giving serpent energies not only powers the Divine Substance above but reaches down into the psyche, capturing the imagination, stunting and befouling the conscience, causing evolutionary change, and conferring psychic powers and divinity (you can be as God).
The Luciferian Manly P. Hall (1901-1990) concurs. According to Manly, Hermetic Freemasonry is an occult science of the soul,
"...a divine symbolic language perpetuating (by) certain concrete symbols the sacred mysteries of the ancients." When a Masonry adept has learned the "mystery of his Craft (then the) seething energies of Lucifer are in his hands and before he may step onward and upward, he must prove his ability to properly apply energy." (New World Order: The Ancient Plan of Secret Societies, William T. Still, p. 30)
The foundation of Hermes occult way is forbidden knowledge revealed to him during self-induced trance and/or meditation states resulting in altered states of consciousness that opened his mind to contact with the Great Dragon:
"Meditation is the doorway between worlds....the pathway between dimensions." (The Layman's Guide to Enlightenment, Celeste G. Graham, 1980, p. 13)
The Dragon revealed to Hermes that his own nature is divine, meaning that God and psychic power is "within." The Divine Pymander of Hermes Trismegistus relates Hermes mystical encounter with the Great Dragon who called itself Poimandres, the Mind of the Universe that is within Hermes. (themystica.com)
Upon transforming itself into a glorious being of Light the Dragon proceeded to enlighten Hermes with the forbidden knowledge that over time found its' way into Christendom during the Renaissance giving birth to an array of Secret Societies as well as to pantheist theological liberalism and its' primary doctrine evolution, William James theory of the subconscious, the demon-haunted Carl Jung's transpersonal and depth psychology, occult New Age, Phillip Pullman's dark Gnosticism, Mind Science, New Thought, the Alpha Course, Silva Method, Word of Faith, Positive Imaging, Visualization/Dreaming, and the multi-million dollar best-sellers "A Course in Miracles" and "The Secret." The common denominator of these societies, theories, books and techniques is "God and psychic power is within:"
"People go through their whole lives chasing everything in the material world, and they fail to discover the greatest treasure of all, which is within them. Shut your eyes to the outside world. Direct your thoughts and words inside of you. The Master within you is the key to all the treasures in the world." (Rhonda Byrne, "The Secret Daily Teachings")
"Since the unconscious is God all along, we may further define the goal of spiritual growth to be the attainment of godhood by the conscious self." (A Different Drum, M. Scott Peck)
"....all is mind and...everything is governed by law (thus man) can create, or have created for him from his own thinking. He can create such a strong mental atmosphere of success that its power of attraction will be irresistible. He can send his thoughts throughout the world and have it bring back to him whatever he wants." (Creative Mind and Success, Ernest Holmes, New Thought practitioner)
"Your unconscious mind (has a) power that turns wishes into realities when the wishes are strong enough." ("Positive Imaging," Norman Vincent Peale, 1982, p. 77)
Word Faith teacher Kenneth Copeland tells people to visualize any image,
"...that you get down inside you that is so vivid when you close your eyes you see it, it'll come to pass. When God came at the Tower of Babel, He said, 'Anything they can imagine, they can do." (Inner Image of the Covenant, side 2, Copeland)
Yonggi Cho similarly teaches that through visualizing and dreaming you will,
"....incubate that which we want God to do for us....If you have not visualized clearly in your heart exactly what you hope for, it cannot become a reality to you..." (The Fourth Dimension, Vol. 1, Yonggi Cho, 1979, 9-35, vol. 2, 18-33)
Read more at - http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/kimball/130827
Remember the temptation of Jesus in Matthew 4, when Satan offered the Lord all the kingdoms of the this world. It was not a temptation if it wasn't true, as Jesus would have known that, and He did not rebuke Satan based on a false offer, but simply on the idea of tempting God. What was once hidden (and for good reason) is now being revealed openly today.
In the classic work, "Earth's Earliest Ages" English theologian G.H. Pember (1837-1910) examines the role of satanic forces in the first destruction of earth under God's judgment and compares them to the explosion of spiritism (open intercourse with evil spirits), ancient Egyptian Hermetic magic, Theosophy, Buddhism, reincarnation, karma, the Mysteries, astrology and mesmeric healings sweeping across Christendom.
It was during the Renaissance that many influential Christians at the highest levels of Church and society had returned to the occult Wisdom Teachings that originated in ancient Egypt with Hermes Trismegistus. In his own time, Pember observes that ancient occult traditions are no longer veiled in mystery but boldly presented by the powerful occult brotherhood as the fruit of modern science, especially evolutionary philosophy, which the brotherhood assert was included in the instructions given,
"...to the initiates of the Hermetic, Orphic, Eleusinian, and Cabbalistic mysteries, and were familiar to Chaldean Magi, Egyptian Priests, Hindu Occultists, Essenes, Therapeutae Gnostics, and Theurgic Neo-Platonists." (Pember, pp.243-244)
In the impeccably researched "Scientific Analysis of the Writings of Alice A. Bailey and their Applications," Robert A. Hermann Ph.D. affirms Pembers claim with respect to the occult origins of the evolutionary science so widespread in our time. Herrmann traces modern evolutionary thinking – which has infiltrated the whole body of the Church – back to 1750 and the Spanish-French occultist the Martine's de Pasqually (1715?-1779) whose biological conception predates Darwin's theory and held that an adept spiritually evolves into higher and higher forms on various evolutionary levels. (raherrmann.com)
Pember knows that occult teachings are grounded in knowledge received from evil spirits, thus he particularly connects evolutionary philosophy to spiritism. This teaching said Pember, made the world ready for the deeper teachings of the Brotherhood (fallen angels):
".....the Brotherhood decided that the time had come to communicate with it, and openly influence its religion and philosophy. They have, however, become so etherealized by their practices that they are unable to endure contact with coarse human nature; it was, therefore, necessary to employ intermediaries. The first person known to have been chosen for this purpose was a Madame Blavatsky." (pp. 243-246)
In affirmation, Corinne McLaughlin and Gordon Davidson, the politically influential co-authors of "Spiritual Politics: Changing the World from the Inside Out," admit that their book is based on the Ageless Wisdom teachings preserved by occultists since the Egyptian pantheon (27th-30th centuries B.C) and handed down over the ages to modern occultists in the time of the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and on into our own time:
"For centuries, the Ageless Wisdom in the West was shielded from an unprepared public.... The unveiled truths were handed down only orally by individual teachers to tested disciples or by certain religious groups and secret societies, such as the Cabbalists, Druids, Essenes, Sufis, Knights Templar, Rosicrucian's, Freemasons, and others who carefully guarded the teachings down through the centuries. A study of these secret societies would reveal powerful influences on the history of nations...." (Spiritual Politics, McLaughlin, Davidson from "Reinventing Jesus Christ: The New Gospel," Warren Smith, crossroad.to)
Beginning with the work of the Brotherhood and/or Masters acting through Blavatsky, Ageless Wisdom has succeeded in over-spreading W. Europe and America and made deep inroads into the whole body of the Church over the last one hundred years. Blavatsky's important book, 'The Secret Doctrine' (1888) paved the way by synthesizing,
".....Christian, Jewish, and Islamic mysticism with the Eastern teachings of Hinduism, Taoism, and Buddhism, showing their common roots and comparing their sacred texts...."
The next development came through the teachings of Alice Bailey, an apostate Evangelical:
".... In 1919 Bailey was contacted by a Tibetan master, Djwhal Khul, who asked her to write a series of books with him telepathically that would continue Blavatsky's work. Over a period of thirty years, Bailey received eighteen books from him on the nature of the cosmos and the human being, outlining principles for individual spiritual growth and humanity's next evolutionary steps. In 1923 Bailey founded Lucis Trust [originally called Lucifer Publishing, ed.] to bring the teachings in her books to the public. A year later she began the Arcane School. The books were written to apply to several levels of consciousness at once and thus can be read by both beginners and advanced students. Her works have been especially helpful to the two of us in our own spiritual growth and have provided much of the inspiration for Spiritual Politics."
Central to ancient Egyptian and modern Hermetic orders such as the Order of the Golden Dawn, Theosophy and New Age is ophiolatry (worship of serpents/Lucifer) and the theme of a pantheon of nine Sun Gods or with modern orders, an occult Hierarchy of nine evolved Brothers or Masters: god-men who have finished their cycles of reincarnation and material evolution but have chosen to remain here on the earth (Gaia) to serve people in their own conscious evolution as well as guide Gaia's spiritual evolution:
"(The solar deity Kneph was pictured as a serpent in a fiery circle and Osiris) was essentially identical with Kneph...The worship of Isis, the moon-goddess, was equally entwined with ophiolatry. Her emblem was the horned viper...The Egyptians often represented Isis and Osiris together, as two serpents." (The Cult of the All-Seeing Eye, Robert Keith Spenser, p. 35)
Depending on who they are speaking to, the nine Masters variously call themselves the Brotherhood, Space Brothers, Ascended Masters, the ancient Ennead of Egypt (the nine Sun Gods), Nine Principles of God, the Deep Space Nine, the Group, Sirians and Council of Nine. Today there is a vast and growing network of channelers purporting to receive messages from the Nine and still others calling themselves Light Workers who claim to have presented briefings from the Group five times at the United Nations.
Another important theme connecting all ancient and modern Hermetic Orders and Mystery religions is the Sirius star system. From the time of the Egyptians, Sumerians and Babylonians occult teachings have invariably attributed to Sirius a special status in connection with Isis (Sirius A), Osiris (Sirius B), astrology, Hermeticism, the Mysteries, secret initiations, conceptions of transmigration, reincarnation, astral plane travels and other forms of occult evolutionary philosophy.
Hermetic Mystery schools and orders teach that Sirius is the divine "sun behind the sun" that is both the true source of the sun's energy which keeps the physical world alive, as well as the divine substance that keeps the spiritual world alive. Whereas the sun illuminates the physical world, which is considered to be an illusion, Sirius is the "real light," the Great Dragon, Cosmic Serpent, Chaos, Abraxas, Star Maker, Ground of Being, or Essence of material phenomena, meaning that the material universe exists only as a grand illusion or mental construction as it does for example in the mind of Brahman:
"Brahman is real, the world is unreal." (swamij.com/mahavakyas)
The two most important figures associated with Hermetic Theosophy, Madame Blavatsky and Alice Bailey, considered Sirius to be the source of mystical serpent power: the seething energies of Lucifer that exert a spiritual influence over the entire Sephiroth or cosmic tree of life and therefore directly link with every great religion of antiquity because these energies extend into the psyche of mankind.
Bailey taught that Sirius is the "Great White Lodge" and believed it to be the spiritual home of the "Spiritual Hierarchy." For this reason she considered Sirius as the star of initiation:
"This is the great star of initiation because our Hierarchy (an expression of the second aspect of divinity) is under the supervision or spiritual magnetic control of the Hierarchy of Sirius. These are the major controlling influences whereby the cosmic Christ works upon the Christ principle in the solar system, in the planet, in man and in the lower forms of life expression. It is esoterically called the "brilliant star of sensitivity." (The Mysterious Connection Between Sirius and Human History, vigilantcitizen.com, Dec. 12, 2012)
Baily also taught that Luciferian energy emanating from Sirius is the energy of thought: a mind force that reaches the solar system from a distant cosmic center via Sirius. Sirius acts as the transmitter,
"...or the focalising centre, whence emanate those influences which produce self-consciousness in man." (ibid)
The Hermetic Way of the Dragon
The Hermetic way of psychic power and self-salvation is the antithesis of the Way of Jesus Christ God Incarnate (Romans 3:24; 6:23; 10:9-10; Eph. 1:7; 2:8-9) and began with a mysterious man known as Hermes Trismegistus.
The ancients identified Hermes with Mercury and Anubis (brother to Osiris). His emblem, the caduceus, was a talismanic serpent representing the power of Mercury as a Sun-god. Speculations abound on exactly when and where Hermes lived. Some modern New Age occultists believe he was a contemporary of Noah in the pre-flood world which they call Atlantis. Others believe he lived in ancient Egypt during the time of Moses.
In "Biographa Antiqua" the English occultist Frances Barret writes that Hermes "communicated the sum of the Abyss, and divine knowledge to all posterity." The word "Abyss" refers to ancient and modern pantheist and/or panentheist conceptions such as the Watery Abyss, Divine One Substance, Primordial Matter, or with Hermes, the Universal Life personified by the Great Serpent or Dragon from whose body and wings stream illuminating serpent power, or with Bailey, 'those influences which produce self-consciousness in man.'
Bailey is expressing the Hermetic principle which speaks of the correlation between the substance of the Great Serpent and the mind of man expressed in the world famous magic formula: "As above, so below."
The substance (body) and seething powers of the Great Dragon or Serpent are symbolized by the Oroboros, a powerful occult symbol also known as the Sephiroth, great chain of being, cosmic tree of life, and with Darwin the tree of life. The Oroboros 'above' corresponds to a number of different evolutionary levels and realms comprising the habitation of all supernatural entities and various heavens and hells such as the Black Lodge. Thus the substance of the Great Dragon's body with its supposed multiple dimensions and life and thought-giving serpent energies not only powers the Divine Substance above but reaches down into the psyche, capturing the imagination, stunting and befouling the conscience, causing evolutionary change, and conferring psychic powers and divinity (you can be as God).
The Luciferian Manly P. Hall (1901-1990) concurs. According to Manly, Hermetic Freemasonry is an occult science of the soul,
"...a divine symbolic language perpetuating (by) certain concrete symbols the sacred mysteries of the ancients." When a Masonry adept has learned the "mystery of his Craft (then the) seething energies of Lucifer are in his hands and before he may step onward and upward, he must prove his ability to properly apply energy." (New World Order: The Ancient Plan of Secret Societies, William T. Still, p. 30)
The foundation of Hermes occult way is forbidden knowledge revealed to him during self-induced trance and/or meditation states resulting in altered states of consciousness that opened his mind to contact with the Great Dragon:
"Meditation is the doorway between worlds....the pathway between dimensions." (The Layman's Guide to Enlightenment, Celeste G. Graham, 1980, p. 13)
The Dragon revealed to Hermes that his own nature is divine, meaning that God and psychic power is "within." The Divine Pymander of Hermes Trismegistus relates Hermes mystical encounter with the Great Dragon who called itself Poimandres, the Mind of the Universe that is within Hermes. (themystica.com)
Upon transforming itself into a glorious being of Light the Dragon proceeded to enlighten Hermes with the forbidden knowledge that over time found its' way into Christendom during the Renaissance giving birth to an array of Secret Societies as well as to pantheist theological liberalism and its' primary doctrine evolution, William James theory of the subconscious, the demon-haunted Carl Jung's transpersonal and depth psychology, occult New Age, Phillip Pullman's dark Gnosticism, Mind Science, New Thought, the Alpha Course, Silva Method, Word of Faith, Positive Imaging, Visualization/Dreaming, and the multi-million dollar best-sellers "A Course in Miracles" and "The Secret." The common denominator of these societies, theories, books and techniques is "God and psychic power is within:"
"People go through their whole lives chasing everything in the material world, and they fail to discover the greatest treasure of all, which is within them. Shut your eyes to the outside world. Direct your thoughts and words inside of you. The Master within you is the key to all the treasures in the world." (Rhonda Byrne, "The Secret Daily Teachings")
"Since the unconscious is God all along, we may further define the goal of spiritual growth to be the attainment of godhood by the conscious self." (A Different Drum, M. Scott Peck)
"....all is mind and...everything is governed by law (thus man) can create, or have created for him from his own thinking. He can create such a strong mental atmosphere of success that its power of attraction will be irresistible. He can send his thoughts throughout the world and have it bring back to him whatever he wants." (Creative Mind and Success, Ernest Holmes, New Thought practitioner)
"Your unconscious mind (has a) power that turns wishes into realities when the wishes are strong enough." ("Positive Imaging," Norman Vincent Peale, 1982, p. 77)
Word Faith teacher Kenneth Copeland tells people to visualize any image,
"...that you get down inside you that is so vivid when you close your eyes you see it, it'll come to pass. When God came at the Tower of Babel, He said, 'Anything they can imagine, they can do." (Inner Image of the Covenant, side 2, Copeland)
Yonggi Cho similarly teaches that through visualizing and dreaming you will,
"....incubate that which we want God to do for us....If you have not visualized clearly in your heart exactly what you hope for, it cannot become a reality to you..." (The Fourth Dimension, Vol. 1, Yonggi Cho, 1979, 9-35, vol. 2, 18-33)
Read more at - http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/kimball/130827
Aug 29, 2013
Holy work or troublemaking? Laying the groundwork for a Third Temple in Jerusalem
By Ben Sales, JTA
JERUSALEM (JTA) – No praying. No kneeling. No bowing. No prostrating. No dancing. No singing. No ripping clothes.
These are the rules that Jews must abide by when visiting the Temple Mount, the site where the First and Second Holy Temples once stood, located above and behind the Western Wall in the heart of Jerusalem’s Old City.
Although the area is under Israeli sovereignty, the mount — known to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif — is controlled by the Islamic Wakf, a joint Palestinian-Jordanian religious body. As the site of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock, whose golden dome overlooks the city, the Temple Mount attracts daily crowds of Muslim worshipers.
Under Wakf regulations, Jews may only access the mount for 4 1/2 hours per day and are forbidden from praying there.
But when Rabbi Chaim Richman stands only feet from the Dome of the Rock, surrounded by Muslim visitors, he whispers a chapter of Psalms.
“God will answer you on your day of trouble,” he mutters on a recent visit. “The name of the God of Jacob will protect you.”
On previous visits to the mount, Richman says he’s sung the entire Hallel prayer under his breath.
A frequent presence on the mount who knows the guards by name, Richman is the international director of the Temple Institute, an organization based in the Old City with a singular goal: to rebuild the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
Ahead of Tisha b’Av, the fast day next week that commemorates the destruction of the First and Second Temples, the institute released a video showing Jewish children donning tool belts and leading their fathers out of synagogue to begin construction of the Holy Temple.
“Our goal is to fulfill the commandment of ‘They shall make a Temple for me and I will dwell among them,’ ” Richman says, quoting Exodus. “The basis of a Torah life is action.”
Following the Second Temple’s destruction in 70 C.E., most rabbis adopted the position that Jewish law prohibits reconstructing the Holy Temple prior to the age of messianic redemption, or that the law is too ambiguous and that the messiah must come first.
The Temple Institute takes a different position.
“There are no Jewish legal barriers” to rebuilding the temple, Richman says, only political ones.
The institute isn’t shy about advocating what many see as a radical goal: replacing the mosque at the Dome of the Rock with a new Jewish Holy Temple. A painting in the institute’s exhibition depicts this scenario, with the city’s light rail line taking residents to the Temple Mount. The Temple Institute is dedicated to laying the groundwork for this vision.
The organization has formulated a program for where the temple will stand and what its vessels will look like, aided by 20 men who study Temple law full-time. The products of this research — 40 ritual objects — are on display in Plexiglas cases at the institute’s headquarters in the Old City.
Silver trumpets to be blown by priests and a wooden lyre are perched next to two deep pans with long handles — one for collecting blood from small sacrificial offerings and another for large sacrifices like the Passover lamb.
In another room, mannequins with beards wear the respective vestments for deputy priests and the high priest. The high priest’s outfit, with azure weaves, gold thread and a breastplate with 12 precious stones, took 11 years of research and $150,000 to complete. Next to it stands a massive 12-spigot sink with electric faucets — technology that Richman says will be permitted in the Third Temple.
The institute’s crowning achievement — the Temple’s golden, 200-pound, seven-branch menorah — stands outside in a case overlooking the Western Wall. Unlike art or history museums, the institute’s goal is to remove the objects from their cases and bring them to the mount for use as soon as possible.
Many Israelis view the goal as a danger to the status quo that has kept this site holy to Muslims and Jews from turning into a tinderbox.
In 1984, Israel’s security services stopped a group of Jewish terrorists conspiring to blow up the mosque at the mount who reportedly got very close to achieving their goal. Ever since, authorities say they have kept a close watch on any attempts to disturb the peace on the mount.
Though observant Jews pray thrice daily in the Amidah prayer for the Temple to be rebuilt, few do anything about it. That’s as it should be, says Michael Melchior, an Orthodox rabbi and former Knesset member who is considered a religious moderate.
“We pray for holiness, but we also need to be careful of others’ desire for holiness,” Melchior said. “The moment you want to translate that into building a Temple, you upset the sensitive balance we’ve created here, by which we exist here.” He called Temple construction advocates “irresponsible.”
Given the obstacles to breaking ground on a Holy Temple, the institute also has taken up a more modest cause: expanding Jewish rights on the Temple Mount to allow unrestricted access and prayer. In that endeavor, Richman is joined by several right-wing Knesset members and a group of archaeologists who say the Wakf is reckless with archaeological remains at the site.
“It has exceptional historical importance,” Eilat Mazar, a Hebrew University archaeologist, said of the site. “There needs to be access for everyone. Authorities don’t take care of it.”
Moshe Feiglin, a nationalist Likud Knesset member, made a practice of visiting the Temple Mount monthly until Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu banned him from the site in order to prevent provocations there. Last month, Feiglin wrote on Facebook, “Whoever turns his back on the Temple Mount is also giving up on construction in the city.”
Richman says support for the institute’s goals is growing. For him, the issue involves far more than politics, archaeology or even Jewish legal research. The Temple Institute, he says, is doing God’s work.
“The point is that we can’t live without the Temple,” Richman says. “It’s not about building, it’s about a concept: the idea that all of human experience can be elevated to a sense of divine purpose.”
Read more at - http://azjewishpost.com/2013/holy-work-or-troublemaking-laying-the-groundwork-for-a-third-temple-in-jerusalem/
A model of the Second Temple at an exhibit of Third Temple vessels in the Temple Institute’s offices in Jerusalem. (Ben Sales/JTA)
These are the rules that Jews must abide by when visiting the Temple Mount, the site where the First and Second Holy Temples once stood, located above and behind the Western Wall in the heart of Jerusalem’s Old City.
Although the area is under Israeli sovereignty, the mount — known to Muslims as Haram al-Sharif — is controlled by the Islamic Wakf, a joint Palestinian-Jordanian religious body. As the site of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock, whose golden dome overlooks the city, the Temple Mount attracts daily crowds of Muslim worshipers.
Under Wakf regulations, Jews may only access the mount for 4 1/2 hours per day and are forbidden from praying there.
But when Rabbi Chaim Richman stands only feet from the Dome of the Rock, surrounded by Muslim visitors, he whispers a chapter of Psalms.
“God will answer you on your day of trouble,” he mutters on a recent visit. “The name of the God of Jacob will protect you.”
On previous visits to the mount, Richman says he’s sung the entire Hallel prayer under his breath.
A frequent presence on the mount who knows the guards by name, Richman is the international director of the Temple Institute, an organization based in the Old City with a singular goal: to rebuild the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
Ahead of Tisha b’Av, the fast day next week that commemorates the destruction of the First and Second Temples, the institute released a video showing Jewish children donning tool belts and leading their fathers out of synagogue to begin construction of the Holy Temple.
“Our goal is to fulfill the commandment of ‘They shall make a Temple for me and I will dwell among them,’ ” Richman says, quoting Exodus. “The basis of a Torah life is action.”
Following the Second Temple’s destruction in 70 C.E., most rabbis adopted the position that Jewish law prohibits reconstructing the Holy Temple prior to the age of messianic redemption, or that the law is too ambiguous and that the messiah must come first.
The Temple Institute takes a different position.
“There are no Jewish legal barriers” to rebuilding the temple, Richman says, only political ones.
The institute isn’t shy about advocating what many see as a radical goal: replacing the mosque at the Dome of the Rock with a new Jewish Holy Temple. A painting in the institute’s exhibition depicts this scenario, with the city’s light rail line taking residents to the Temple Mount. The Temple Institute is dedicated to laying the groundwork for this vision.
The organization has formulated a program for where the temple will stand and what its vessels will look like, aided by 20 men who study Temple law full-time. The products of this research — 40 ritual objects — are on display in Plexiglas cases at the institute’s headquarters in the Old City.
Silver trumpets to be blown by priests and a wooden lyre are perched next to two deep pans with long handles — one for collecting blood from small sacrificial offerings and another for large sacrifices like the Passover lamb.
In another room, mannequins with beards wear the respective vestments for deputy priests and the high priest. The high priest’s outfit, with azure weaves, gold thread and a breastplate with 12 precious stones, took 11 years of research and $150,000 to complete. Next to it stands a massive 12-spigot sink with electric faucets — technology that Richman says will be permitted in the Third Temple.
The institute’s crowning achievement — the Temple’s golden, 200-pound, seven-branch menorah — stands outside in a case overlooking the Western Wall. Unlike art or history museums, the institute’s goal is to remove the objects from their cases and bring them to the mount for use as soon as possible.
Many Israelis view the goal as a danger to the status quo that has kept this site holy to Muslims and Jews from turning into a tinderbox.
In 1984, Israel’s security services stopped a group of Jewish terrorists conspiring to blow up the mosque at the mount who reportedly got very close to achieving their goal. Ever since, authorities say they have kept a close watch on any attempts to disturb the peace on the mount.
Though observant Jews pray thrice daily in the Amidah prayer for the Temple to be rebuilt, few do anything about it. That’s as it should be, says Michael Melchior, an Orthodox rabbi and former Knesset member who is considered a religious moderate.
“We pray for holiness, but we also need to be careful of others’ desire for holiness,” Melchior said. “The moment you want to translate that into building a Temple, you upset the sensitive balance we’ve created here, by which we exist here.” He called Temple construction advocates “irresponsible.”
Given the obstacles to breaking ground on a Holy Temple, the institute also has taken up a more modest cause: expanding Jewish rights on the Temple Mount to allow unrestricted access and prayer. In that endeavor, Richman is joined by several right-wing Knesset members and a group of archaeologists who say the Wakf is reckless with archaeological remains at the site.
“It has exceptional historical importance,” Eilat Mazar, a Hebrew University archaeologist, said of the site. “There needs to be access for everyone. Authorities don’t take care of it.”
Moshe Feiglin, a nationalist Likud Knesset member, made a practice of visiting the Temple Mount monthly until Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu banned him from the site in order to prevent provocations there. Last month, Feiglin wrote on Facebook, “Whoever turns his back on the Temple Mount is also giving up on construction in the city.”
Richman says support for the institute’s goals is growing. For him, the issue involves far more than politics, archaeology or even Jewish legal research. The Temple Institute, he says, is doing God’s work.
“The point is that we can’t live without the Temple,” Richman says. “It’s not about building, it’s about a concept: the idea that all of human experience can be elevated to a sense of divine purpose.”
Read more at - http://azjewishpost.com/2013/holy-work-or-troublemaking-laying-the-groundwork-for-a-third-temple-in-jerusalem/
Four Things We Need To Know About Fear
One of the shortest and most oft repeated sermons in the Bible is "fear not". Our only fear should be the fear of the Lord.
Pictures Of "Comet ISON" (Space Ship Resemblance)
This is from a week ago, so I've covered this ground already, but it's fun to hear Paul Begley talk about it, and he does make the immediate connection to prophecy, that is the "signs in the heavens". "Whaaaaaat?"
Check out the info on when comet ISON will be visible to us (late November through December), which is the season when we honor the first coming of the Savior, but pagans honor Saturnalia, and Theosophists honor the coming of the Antichrist. Also some of the unique features of this comet. Just whose SON is ISON?
Check out the info on when comet ISON will be visible to us (late November through December), which is the season when we honor the first coming of the Savior, but pagans honor Saturnalia, and Theosophists honor the coming of the Antichrist. Also some of the unique features of this comet. Just whose SON is ISON?
Aug 27, 2013
More on Comet ISON...Four Times Larger Than Comet Lovejoy
I think this Comet will be full of surprises, based on the way NASA is obscuring the interesting data on this November visitor.
see more at - http://www.youtube.com/user/BPEarthWatch?feature=watch
Aug 26, 2013
2,700 Year Discovered Ceramic Bowl "Prophecy Alert" - Paul Begley
Just in case you were feeling a little sleepy, I give you Paul Begley...with some interesting stuff.
What is Comet ISON? Something Strange This Way Comes
While I spent the last two weeks in hospital waiting rooms, I found this interesting segment on the approaching comet ISON. We only have a couple of months to wait and see it with our own eyes (if it doesn't disintegrate like Elenin). It should make quite a show as it is roughly 34,000 miles across according to NASA info. The name ("I" "SON") certainly has a Messianic ring to it, and if this video dissection is correct, something strange is headed our way. Check out these short videos and decide for yourself.
ISON COVER UP/May not be a Comet. Part 1
ISON Cover Up, Part 2
ISON Cover Up: Part 3
Follow his updates on http://www.youtube.com/user/BPEarthWatch?feature=watch