Melchizedek was the greatest mystery man

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Melchizedek was God in a body of flesh made from a handful of dust.

He gave Abram bread and wine, the items of the Last Supper that represent the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. The Law could not produce the resurrection of the Old Testament saints. Melchizedek was Priest and King which the Law would not allow. Thus He was above the Law and He would later magnify the Law. Abram paid Him tithes. You only pay tithes to God. Abram asked for Eshcol to get his portion. Levi collected the tithes. In 1967 the Jews won a big portion of their Promised Land after the 6-Day War. Their President was Levi Eshcol. It pays to pay tithes.

Melchizedek left Abram and went back to Heaven. His body returned to dust.

Remember, human life comes in two stages

A baby spends nine months growing in the womb with a complex spark of life from conception. But that is a form of life that cannot survive out of the womb in the outside world. When the baby is born it has to also receive a breath of life from God so that the baby can breathe oxygen from the air. Thus it takes two steps for us to gain life in the real world.

It also took two steps to gain Eternal Life. The Old Testament and the New Testament.

God chose Abram as the start of the Israelite nation. God set up this first form of spiritual Israelite Life for the nation (like a baby forming in the womb) as the Old Testament Law.

But the Law was severely limited.

First, the Law could not produce a resurrection from the dead in an immortal body.

Isaiah 14:15  Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit.

Unbelievers die and are kept in Prison, in "caves" in the sides of the Pit, until Judgement Day.

Those found guilty will be cast in the Lake of Fire.

EPHESIANS 4:8   Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men.

Dead Old Testament saints went down to Paradise, a "cave" in the sides of the pit where they were captives, as they could not ascend up to Heaven. Elijah was an exception but he needed horses, a chariot, horsemen to guide him, and the helping push of a strong whirlwind to get him up.

Michael the Archangel, Who is Christ in the body of an Angel, had to contend with Satan in order to get the body of Moses up to Heaven.

When Jesus died, He went down to hell and took the keys of death and hell from the devil. He began His ascent by preaching to the sinners in Prison who were totally lost. He then ascended higher to lead the captive saints out of Paradise so that they could resurrect just after His resurrection.

Paradise was the womb of the Old Testament.

Jesus took them out of Paradise and gave them each Eternal Life, the gift of the Holy Ghost. That enabled Jesus to take them up to Heaven with Him as a cloud of witnesses.

MATTHEW 27:53   And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.

In the New Testament, Christians repent and are baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. They then receive the gift of the Holy Ghost which enables them to go to Heaven when they die. The Old Testament Paradise is no longer needed.

The Blood of Jesus forms a scarlet lifeline that takes the soul of the dead saint over the pit of hell and into Heaven.

Secondly, the Law could not change a living body into an immortal body.

In other words, the Law could kill but it could not make a person alive in a perfect human body.

Thus, the Old Testament spiritual Life was inadequate, just like the life of a baby in the womb that can only last for nine months.

The Old Testament involved various great men who did great deeds but at the end, it was all a total failure as the nation of Israel killed their Messiah. When the Law-keepers met the only Man who could keep the Law, they killed Him. We humans just make dumb decisions and cannot save ourselves.

The biggest failure of the Law was that it could identify sin but it could not take away the desire to sin. People have to struggle hard to overcome certain sins. That is not an easy process.

Our last enemy is death. Born of sex, we will surely die if the Lord tarries long enough.

Only the resurrection can deliver the dead from Death.

Another human weakness is that power corrupts men and women.

Under the Law, the kings came from the tribe of Judah and the priests came from the tribe of Levi.

Thus, no king could ever be a priest or high priest.

This limited the power that the elevated kings and elevated priests had over the people.

Kings could tell them what to do, what way to live, but not what to believe.

Priests could tell them what to believe, what thoughts to have concerning God, but not what to do concerning politics, work, or where to live, etc.

So, a time-honoured pre-eminence was first given to the priest-king Melchizedek, some 430 years before Moses was given the Law.

GENESIS 14:18   And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God.

Who was this priest-king Melchizedek? He was a priest and a king. Nobody else in the Old Testament held those two titles. He must be a very exceptional Person as He was above the Law, long before the Law was ever given.

No tribe of Israel could be priest and king. Thus, He belonged to no tribe. He was above tribalism, above the petty conflicts of humanity. Melchizedek was the only man who was above the Law in the Old Testament. God picked up a handful of dust and created a body for Himself.

God again picked up a handful of dust and created a body for Himself when He went to speak to Joshua.

Joshua saw Him as the Captain of the Host. Joshua asked if He was for Israel or for their enemies. The answer was “Nay”. This was God speaking. God does not stoop to our human level as His thoughts and ways are much higher than ours. God even uses evil to achieve His aims. Six million Jews were murdered in the awful Holocaust due to German hate. But that is what it took to make the nations sorry for the Jews and to grant them a portion of their Promised Land in 1947. God uses hard times to develop our characters. Look how tough the Jews are today. Soft living and luxury (which we call good) do not do us much good.

Being Priest–King, hints that Melchizedek was God because the Law did not apply to Him.

Melchizedek upstaged the Law by providing a PROMISE of two things that the Law could not produce.

First, Melchizedek gave a promise of a future resurrection from the dead.

Secondly, He gave a hidden preview of changing an old living body into a young body. This symbolized the mysterious and secret future catching up of the church to meet Jesus in the air which can only happen when our sinful bodies are changed into glorified bodies.

I CORINTHIANS 15:52   In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.

Speaking of Melchizedek (Hebrew) or Melchisedec (Greek).

HEBREWS 7:3   Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life;

He has no human parents. He was not descended from any person. Thus, he was free from any taint of original sin that caused life to be brought forth by sex.

The Law could only set up a framework and outline that would have to be magnified by a deeper and more spiritual New Testament fulfilment of Grace. The Old Testament prophesied events concerning a rejected Messiah and the future church, as well as God turning back to the Jews. The Old Testament had no real value unless it is fulfilled by the New Testament reality of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. Then God poured out the Holy Spirit into the hearts of the men and women who formed His true church so that they could live out their lives during the seven church ages that covered 2000 years of history.

ISAIAH 42:21   The LORD is well pleased for his righteousness' sake;

he will magnify the law,

and make it honourable.

The only proper New Testament Eternal Life would be the Life of Christ and then the church that was filled with His Holy Ghost. That meant that it would be Christ in His church fulfilling all the conditions of the Old Testament. Christ as the perfect High Priest and the perfect Sacrifice.

His body as the perfect Temple.

JOHN 2:21   But he spake of the temple of his body.

New Testament Christianity is the only religion that is built on the framework of a previous Old Testament religion. The Old Testament Law was helpless but it was prophetic, telling us what must happen in the reality of New Testament grace. The helpless baby in the womb provides the genes and body parts that are magnified to produce the talents of the adult.

God started a new line free from human contamination

God, as Melchizedek, picked up a handful of dust and made a human body for Himself to dwell in. No humans were involved in this process. God did it all.

Bread and wine set the conditions requiring the death, burial, and resurrection of the future Messiah. God alone, in the future body born from a virgin, could be that Messiah.

GENESIS 14:18   And Melchizedek king of Salem

brought forth bread and wine:

and he was the priest of the most high God.

GENESIS 14:19  And he blessed him, and said, Blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth:

God created heaven and earth. Thus, He alone can save humanity.

ISAIAH 43:1   But now thus saith the LORD that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine.

The first time God appeared as the Man, Melchizedek, He served the bread and wine as symbols of His future death and resurrection when He finally appeared as Jesus Christ, a perfect Kinsman born of a virgin.  The virgin birth freed Jesus from the corruption of original sin.

God only used the womb of Mary, none of her cells. God created a perfect body in her womb that had nothing to do with her. She was just an incubator.

That is why Jesus never calls her mother. He always called her “Woman”.

JOHN 2:3   And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine.

:4   Jesus saith unto her, Woman, what have I to do with thee? mine hour is not yet come.

When Jesus was on the cross.

JOHN 19:26   When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son!

Jesus never called Joseph His father.

Jesus was a perfect Baby Who was born, free from any human contamination. Every cell in His perfect human body was created by God.

For the first time since Adam, perfection appeared on planet Earth.

HEBREWS 10:5   Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not,

but a body hast thou prepared me:

This was a brand new start that only God could produce.

The first Adam was a perfect man but he messed up. Now the second and last Adam appeared. No other perfect man would appear on earth after Jesus.

Going back to Melchizedek.

Melchizedek was showing His future superiority over the Law because the Law could kill (represented by breaking the bread) but the Law could not produce a resurrection (represented by the life or spirit in the wine).

Promising a bread-and-wine future death and resurrection is beyond any human ability.

No wonder Abram gave Him tithes. You only pay your tithes to God.

God actually appeared twice in a Body of flesh to Abram/Abraham.

The second time God appeared to Abraham in a body of flesh as a Man, was to discern Sarah’s thoughts and reveal the fate of Sodom.

Abraham was about 100 years old and Sarah 90. They were too old to have children by sex.

Then He changed their bodies into young people so that they could produce the promised son, Isaac. This was just before Sodom was destroyed. This symbolized the changing of the bodies of the living Bride into immortal bodies so that they can be caught up to meet the promised Son of God, the Lord Jesus, in the air.

Abimelech, king of Gerar, now wanted to marry the beautiful Sarah. But she was an old lady of 90.

However, this had happened 25 years before when Abram went to Egypt. Sarah as a much younger woman had been very beautiful and they were prepared to kill Abram in order to marry the much younger Sarah.

So, if an Egyptian now, 25 years later, wanted to marry the beautiful Sarah, it was because God had turned her into a young woman again.

This was the hidden event. The changing of the body.

GENESIS 14:20   And blessed be

the most high God, which hath delivered thine enemies into thy hand.

And he gave him tithes of all.

Abram never won the battle. God won the battle for Abram.

Abram's tithes expressed his thanks.

Then came the second time when God (Melchizedek) appeared to Abraham as a Man.

GENESIS 18:1   And the LORD appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day;

When LORD is written in capital letters it means Jehovah. God Himself appearing to Abraham in a body of flesh made from a handful of dust. This was the second time that Melchizedek appeared to Abraham.

GENESIS 18:2   And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground,

GENESIS 18:3  And said, My Lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant:

Abraham was not a Trinitarian. He saw three men but knew that only one Man was God in a body of flesh that God had made for Himself from dust. Thus, Abraham only addressed one Man and called Him Lord [Jehovah]. The other two were angels in bodies of flesh. Angels are important, but they cannot be compared to God.

The Law was given by Moses some 430 years later, but the Law would fail as it could not produce a resurrection. Nor could the Law change living bodies into immortal bodies.

Two great events have to be fulfilled

HEBREWS 6:13   For when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he sware by himself,

HEBREWS 6:18   That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us:

First, the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus at the beginning, to give a foundation to the church.

Secondly, just before the end when fire fell from the sky on the city of Sodom, God revealed the thoughts of the woman Sarah to His prophet Abraham. God also revealed a future prophecy of the fate of Sodom to His prophet Abraham.

A woman symbolizes a church.

So, near the end of the seven church ages, God will send a prophet who can discern the thoughts of people. God will also reveal the mysteries of the Six Seals of Revelation Chapter 6 to that end-time prophet. That will give the wise virgins a spiritual situational awareness. They will know what happened in the past due to the antichrist spirit’s ride through the seven church ages. The last church age will also realize the present need to return to the beliefs of the first church age as they seek to puzzle out God’s final mystery Plan for His Bride.

PHILIPPIANS 2:12   Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

Our works cannot save us from hell. We must work to understand the mysteries of Scripture in order to be saved from great Tribulation.

The last church must be restored back to the first church age of the apostles, as our modern events come to pass. As sodomy, gay rights, and same-sex marriage infiltrate the end-time church, just before the fire of nuclear missiles falls from the sky.

HEBREWS 6:19   Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil;

There is an important veil that stops us seeing spiritual truth. The flesh.

HEBREWS 10:20   By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us,

through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;

Moses, representing the Law, had a veil placed over his face. That stopped clear vision.

The flesh with its lusts and wants and illusions and its self-pride is the veil that stops us from seeing the truth. We humans stupidly only believe what we want to believe. We detest correction.

Only Christ, by His extreme self-sacrifice could move beyond the Veil of the flesh that hid the mystery of the Truth of God’s Word from our human eyes.

Melchizedek was God in a body made from a handful of dust. He was not a Kinsman as we are born of a woman.

Remember, Christ was God in a body born of a virgin woman.

Thus, Christ is a Kinsman Redeemer. He shared our human experience.

Christ, the spiritual Son of Abraham, died 2300 Bible-years (of 360 days) after Isaac, the natural son of Abraham, was born. His death at Calvary cleansed the sanctuary.

DANIEL 8:14   And he said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.

A day can be a year.

EZEKIEL 4:6   And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou shalt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days: I have appointed thee each day for a year.

Jesus is the High Priest of the order of Melchizedek

HEBREWS 6:20   Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.

Jesus is now called a High Priest. How did He qualify? Melchizedek was always a priest, He was never called a High Priest.

HEBREWS 7:1   For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him;

HEBREWS 7:2   To whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of Salem, which is, King of peace;

:3   Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually.

He had no father or mother. Thus He had no natural birth. God’s Spirit was wrapped in a handful of dust that looked like a Man.

He had no end of life. He never died. The Spirit of God returned to Heaven and His Body returned to dust.

There is no room for two High Priests. There is no room for two priesthoods.

And Moses would establish the Levitical Priesthood (or Aaronic Priesthood) about 430 years later. Also, Melchizedek performed his functions quickly and then stayed off the scene until the High Priest Caiaphas tore his robe which broke the Law and ended the Levitical Priesthood.

MATTHEW 26:65   Then the high priest rent his clothes, saying, He hath spoken blasphemy;

LEVITICUS 10:6   And Moses said unto Aaron, and unto Eleazar and unto Ithamar, his sons, Uncover not your heads,

neither rend your clothes;

lest ye die, and lest wrath come upon all the people:

MARK 15:38   And the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom.

God tore up the Aaronic or Levitical Priesthood. Tearing it up meant it was an utter failure.

A new Priesthood was waiting to take over, the order of Melchizedek.

How did Jesus qualify as the High Priest?

The High Priest had to be washed and anointed.

EXODUS 40:12   And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons unto the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, and wash them with water.

:13   And thou shalt put upon Aaron the holy garments, and anoint him, and sanctify him

John the Baptist washed Jesus in the River Jordan and then watched as the Holy Spirit came down like a Dove and rested on Jesus to anoint Him.

MATTHEW 27:35   And they crucified him, and parted his garments, casting lots: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots.

The 4 soldiers around the cross tore up His garments into four pieces but not His vesture (coat).

JOHN 19:23   Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout.

:24   They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots. These things therefore the soldiers did.

Because Jesus was the true High Priest, even His enemies could not tear up His coat. What a rebuke to Caiaphas, the Jewish High Priest, who had torn up his own clothes and thus ended the Levitical Priesthood

This means it was time for a new High Priest, Jesus Christ, Who was also the final Sacrifice for sin so that the blood-stained animal sacrifices could cease.

As both High Priest and Sacrifice, Christ far out-performed the Levitical High Priesthood.

The burnt offering had to be washed as a sacrifice for sin.

II CHRONICLES 4:6   He made also ten lavers, and put five on the right hand, and five on the left, to wash in them:

such things as they offered for the burnt offering they washed in them;

but the sea was for the priests to wash in.

When John the Baptist baptized Jesus, he was also washing the sacrifice or burnt offering.

There is no elevated Priesthood of Pastors

Christ introduced something that the Law of Moses could not do, the resurrection.

The Melchisedec priesthood calls every born-again Christian a priest. There is only one focus of our praise, the High Priest Jesus Christ. Nobody can compete with Him in any way.

I PETER 2:9   But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood,

an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:

Peter is writing to born-again Christians and saying that they are all Priests. The Melchizedek Priesthood does not make the mistake of elevating a holy man above the laity or congregation.

All Christians are equal.

Only the High Priest, Jesus, is above a Priest. The only Person who is above a Christian is Jesus.

Men can have ministries and different talents, but that does not elevate them above anybody.

After all, ministers are just servants.

During the second church age, the Catholic church elevated Priests and then Bishops to be the head of a church. God hated this human elevation of a holy man above the congregation or laity. It is called Nicolaitanism. Nico means conquer. Conquer the laity or congregation. Born-again Christians are all equal as brothers.

REVELATION 2:15   So hast thou also them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate.

Church people love the elevation of a Pastor as the head of the church. But God hates that idea.

After the Reformation of Martin Luther, the church elevated a Priesthood of Pastors. Each Pastor is claimed to be the head of a church. This was never done by the apostles in the New Testament. The Pastor, unscripturally, claimed the tithes money belonged to him. Then Pastors wanted to keep the money in the family, so Pastor and Son became a good business model. The son became co-pastor (unscriptural word). Worse still, the wife became co-Pastor.

The high Priesthood stayed in the family as Aaron’s oldest son would become High Priest when Aaron died. That is the model that the "Pastor and Son" business-imitation still follows.

But this Levitical Priesthood ended with Caiaphas. It must not function today.

1 TIMOTHY 2:12    But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.

Women preachers are not allowed.

Each local church was supposed to be ruled by the local elders as a group. No domination by one man or one family. Favouring family or friends is nepotism, which is condemned in law as corruption.

But two priesthoods are not allowed.

Only the priesthood of all born-again believers is acceptable to God.

Thus, the priesthood of Pastors is unscriptural and the one-man-head-of-the-church Pastors (which is almost all the churches these days) and their followers are demoted to the fooled or foolish virgins. Virgins are clean women. They are saved but fooled by the denominational church structure that they have copied from the Roman Catholic Church, the mother church that the Protestant churches came out of.

EZEKIEL 16:44   Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall use this proverb against thee, saying, As is the mother, so is her daughter.

Protestants with a Pastor as head of the church have formed an image of the Roman Catholic church that has a Priest as the head of the church.

The Protestant churches become the image of the beast as they copy the Roman Catholic church structure.

Abram is linked to the Six-Day War of 1967

Melchizedek, Who was God in a Body of flesh, appeared to Abram some 430 years before the Levitical Priesthood was established by Moses.

Abram paid Him tithes. You only pay tithes to God.

GENESIS 14:24   Save only that which the young men have eaten, and the portion of the men which went with me, Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre; let them take their portion.

Then comes an unexpected verse where Abram asks for Eshcol to get his "portion" from the king of Sodom. Some 430 years later, Abram’s great-grandson Levi collected the tithes from the 12 Tribes of Israel.

In AD 70, pagan Rome conquered Jerusalem and by AD 135 exiled the Jews from Israel.

In 1947 The United Nations allowed Israel to fight for a small piece of their Promised Land.

In 1967, after the Six-Day War, the Jews won a big portion of the Promised Land.

The Jews had lost their Promised Land for almost 1900 years.

Incredibly, about 4000 years after Abram and Melchizedek, the President of Israel, who got this big "portion" back, was Levi Eshcol. God has a long memory, especially if you pay tithes.

Melchizedek is associated with the Last Supper of Jesus (the bread and the wine) as well as the name accuracy concerning the restoration of Israel, which happened some 4000 years later.

Who is this incredible Person? Why does He only come onto the stage in the New Testament when Paul writes about Him in the Book of Hebrews.

Melchizedek was not a Kinsman Redeemer because he came briefly onto the scene as an Adult.

About 2000 years later God was born as a Baby in a stinking stable. Now God was a Kinsman Redeemer, coming to save us from our stinking sins and serve the bread and wine to His disciples on His last night.

ISAIAH 9:6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

COLOSSIANS 2:9 For in him [Jesus] dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.

People want a church system between them and God

A Jew always had a human mediator, a Priest, elevated between himself and God.

This Levitical Priesthood elevated one tribe, the Levites, to stand between God and the Jews.

The children of the Priests were the next generation of Priests. The Priesthood stayed in the family. Then the 24 courses of the Priesthood were elevated above the rest of the Levites so that these Priests could be in charge of the Tabernacle and the Temple. Finally, the High Priest, was elevated above the Priests. The religious hierarchy was born.

But this family hierarchy was abolished at Calvary.

Today, the church has wrongly developed a hierarchy where the son follows the father as both claim to be Pastors, and both claim, unscripturally, to be the head of the church. This copies the Jewish Priesthood that finally failed and was destroyed by pagan Rome in AD 70. But it is a good business model as it keeps the money in the family, because the Pastors claim, unscripturally, that the tithes belong to them.

Pagan Rome died when the barbarian tribes destroyed the power of the Capitoline Hill from which the Caesars ruled the world. In the chaos that followed, the Roman Catholic Pope rose to power and later ruled Europe from the Vatican City. The deadly wound recovered because the Headquarters of the Roman Catholic church is the Lateran Palace on the Caelian Hill.

The map of the original seven hills of Rome.

The Roman Catholic Church is thus the resurrection of the pagan Roman Empire on the ruins of the pagan Roman Empire. The Succession of Popes goes back 2000 years, the longest line of Nicolaitan rulers in the world. The Pope is the only Dictator in Europe. One man is the elevated head of the entire Catholic Church of 1.4 billion Roman Catholics. This is the original Nicolaitan system that the other churches try to copy.

Each church elevates the Pastor as the head of the church to stand between them and God as they claim, wrongly, that only the Pastor can find God’s Will for that church. Regular church attendance and being in submission to the elevated Pastor is now, wrongly, considered to be the evidence of being ready for the Coming of the Lord. (Somehow, this also includes those who believe that the Lord has come. That is a real mental muddle).

This system of a cozy organized religion had certain advantages as it provides a known religious environment where people can complacently sleep amidst their deceptive illusions of self-praise. The downside is that this can easily produce an illusion of knowledge, where we just hear what we want to hear. Preachers soon learn to say what their followers expect to hear. The followers become an echo-chamber for the preacher. Church-goers no longer think for themselves as they follow the herd.

Consequently, going to church does not stop people from rapidly becoming Bible-illiterate as they just pick a few verses that suit them and ignore the Bible criticisms and condemnations of the end-time church.

In the Old Testament, religious man-made traditions of synagogues, Sadducees, and Pharisees became firmly established and the Jews stopped growing in the truth. The Priest did the religious thinking as he explained the Old Testament to the Jews and the Jews stopped thinking for themselves, as humans easily choose the lazier path.

For the Jews, submission to a human head, a Priest, and regular Sabbath attendance became their proof of serving God. This was how God dealt with the Jews as a nation. God did not save the Jews as individuals, they got saved as a group.

But God works with the Gentiles as individuals and thus God wants no church hierarchy, no elevated priesthood of Pastors. God works very differently in the New Testament. He does not want paid Pastors to behave like the paid Levitical Priesthood that failed.

Elevated church leaders are always flawed

Just think of how many sex scandals and how much money dishonesty occurs in the churches.

Jesus whipped the money-makers out of the Temple. Imagine if Jesus was let loose in today's churches.

Right from the start, the Levitical Priesthood was flawed. God spoke to the Jews through the prophet Moses, not through the High Priest Aaron. A prophet was superior to the High Priest. Aaron the High Priest was persuaded by the Jews to make a golden calf as a false idol of worship.

"Golden calf". Notice the obsession with money-making amongst the religious people.

The heads of religious (or church) organizations maintain their popularity by moving away from Scripture and listening to what the people want. (Churches today condone fornication, living together while unmarried, gay rights, and same-sex marriage).

Aaron, as the religious leader was swayed by popularity to introduce error. The major errors in the church will also be found in the church leadership. Human leaders are corrupted by power and money, especially if they have the self-claimed power to take your money. Listen to a TV preacher and within 30 minutes he will make a pull for money or sell you something.

The Jews worshipped the golden calf in a naked orgy with loud enthusiastic singing that Joshua and Moses heard as they came down from Mount Sinai.

EXODUS 32:18   And he [Joshua] said, It is not the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being overcome: but the noise of them that sing do I hear.

People think they can disobey the Scripture but still please God because they sing well.

God is more impressed if we obey Scripture which reflects our faith rather than ignore Scripture and sing His praises.

EXODUS 32:19   And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount.

An angry Moses smashed the Ten Commandments to illustrate that the Levitical Priesthood would also be broken. This happened when Caiaphas, the last High Priest, condemned Messiah instead of accepting Him.

EXODUS 32:25   And when Moses saw that the people were naked; (for Aaron had made them naked unto their shame among their enemies:)

The modern-day dress of many Christians has a stress on displaying the flesh. Modesty has been lost.

Only sacrifices in the Jerusalem Temple are accepted

Another problem with the Levitical Priesthood was that God only accepted a sacrifice for sin if the sacrifice was offered in Jerusalem. Thus, the Temple that Solomon built as the son of David, became the centre of sacrifice. No other sacrifices could be offered in any other place.

This created many problems for the Levitical Priesthood.

Babylon destroyed the Temple and took the Jews into captivity. Thus, there were no sacrificial offerings for sin for those 70 years. The Talmud of Jewish quotes rose up to compete with the Old Testament Torah. Human opinions began to be added to Scripture. Human quotes also began to replace Scripture. The ideas of synagogues, Sadducees, and Pharisees entered the Jewish beliefs during the Babylonian exile. The Jews focused on human Talmud opinions instead of the written Scriptural Torah.

When Cyrus the Persian set the Jews free in 538 BC, their rebuilt Temple was inferior to Solomon’s original Temple.

HAGGAI 2:3   Who is left among you that saw this house in her first glory? and how do ye see it now? is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing?

This gave the Jews an inferiority complex.

This problem was corrected by Herod who had falsely been made king of the Jews by pagan Rome. He built a magnificent Temple for the Jews but he tried to kill Jesus when He was two years old.

In order to get a new magnificent Temple building, the Levitical Priesthood were prepared to co-operate with king Herod who was a demonic Christ-killer, if only he could have gotten Jesus as a two-year-old Child into his hands.

As the false king of the Jews, Herod tried to kill Jesus Who was born as the true King of the Jews. Thus, Jesus said that Herod’s Temple would be destroyed and no stones left on top of each other.

Anything that harms the Word of God, the King James Bible, is doomed to destruction.

The Dome of the Rock was built where they claim the Temple was, on the so-called Temple site or Temple Mount (shown by the red rectangle).

But, there are two problems.

A = Al-Aqsa Mosque   D – Dome of the Rock

There is no spring of water in that vicinity for washing the sacrifices. The closest water is the Gihon spring.

The Wailing Wall is part of the red rectangle. It has many layers of the original huge blocks above the ground, and many layers also under the ground. Thus, the Wailing Wall was never part of Herod’s Temple. Jesus said that every stone would be torn down. Consequently, it seems that the original Temple was not in the modern Temple site. The Jews cannot rebuild the Temple today as nobody knows the original site of the Temple. The Roman Emperor Hadrian thoroughly destroyed the Temple to eliminate all evidence of its existence in AD 135.

JOHN 2:21   But he [Jesus] spake of the temple of his body.

The true Temple of the New Testament is the body of Christ. Thus His sacrifice on Calvary is the only acceptable sacrifice for sin.

Another problem is that the Levitical Priesthood had no connection with the Kingly line of Judah, except for the original Temple being built by the son of David, Solomon. But that Temple had been destroyed by Babylon.

Jesus, as the King, was the real Temple and the Sacrifice. As the High Priest, Jesus conducted the Sacrifice of Himself. Jesus was totally in charge at Calvary.

Thus Jesus united the offices of Priest and King which nobody else could do.

JOHN 10:18  No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

Another problem. There cannot be two High Priests. The Levitical Priesthood had a High Priest, thus Melchizedek could be a Priest of the most High God, but He could not be a High Priest.

In the Old Testament, Melchizedek is never called a High Priest. But that changes in the New Testament when Jesus is called the High Priest.

GENESIS 14:16   And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God.

HEBREWS 7:11   If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received the law,) what further need was there that another priest should rise after the order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron?

The Levitical Priesthood was not perfect. A warning to us.

Do not elevate a Priesthood of Pastors above the people because Pastors are far from perfect. Nowhere in the New Testament was a Pastor ever elevated to be the head of a church. Nowhere in the New Testament is a Pastor called a Shepherd. The Levitical Priesthood became greedy for money and power over the people. Especially the power to take their money. Are Pastors any different?

People overlook that Jesus chased the money-makers out of the Temple on Palm Sunday. He did it again the next day, on Monday. That was going too far. The Priests got the Jews to kill Jesus on Thursday. The Bible never says, “Good Friday”. That is a Roman Catholic invention.

Jesus had to be three nights in the tomb, like Jonah was in the whale.

Jonah is Hebrew. Jonas is Greek.

He rose on Sunday so He died on Thursday afternoon. Thursday night. Friday night. Saturday night, in the tomb.

MATTHEW 12:40   For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.

The Law was perfect but it made nothing perfect

Our best works cannot make us perfect.

The biggest weakness of the Levitical Priesthood was the Law.

Keeping the Law did not make anyone a better person.

The Law could condemn and kill but the Law could not resurrect anyone from the dead.

Being unable to produce a resurrection was the biggest defect of the Law.

The thing that dead people need most is a resurrection.

The Levitical Priesthood failed totally on that issue.

HEBREWS 7:19   For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw nigh unto God.

PSALM 19:7   The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple.

The Law had to be magnified in order to be of real value.

ISAIAH 42:21 The LORD is well pleased for his righteousness' sake; he will magnify the law, and make it honourable.

How could a different Priesthood rise up to take over from the Levitical Priesthood that had too many imperfections?

The Melchizedek Priesthood was in existence in Abraham’s day, some 430 years before Moses started the Levitical Priesthood.

Thus, the Melchizedek Priesthood has a time-honoured pre-eminence.

But, when Isaac was born, God waited another 2300 Bible-years of 360 days before implementing the Melchizedek Priesthood.

Abraham was prepared to sacrifice Isaac because he knew God would resurrect Isaac. Such was Abraham’s faith in the resurrection.

GENESIS 22:5   And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you.

Even if he killed Isaac, Abraham knew Isaac would return with him.

Belief in the resurrection was the key to Abraham’s faith.

Isaac and the Jews were Abraham’s natural seed, with whom God made a covenant.

Jesus was Abraham’s spiritual Seed, Who confirmed the covenant when He died and resurrected.

God made a covenant with Abram and his seed. The natural seed Isaac was spared dying.

The Spiritual Seed Jesus had to die to confirm God’s covenant with Abram/Abraham.

You can only confirm a covenant after you have first made the covenant.

GENESIS 15:18   In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates:

GENESIS 15:17   And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces.

What does this verse prophesy?

“The sun went down” at midday for three hours when Jesus died. It was not an eclipse as the longest eclipse of the sun is for 7½ minutes. So, this is referring to Calvary and the death of Jesus. The Light of the world being killed. Then comes the darkness of death. And a smoking furnace to symbolize hell. Our sins taking us down to hell when we die.

The two pieces of the dead sacrifice represent the Old and the New Testaments.

Between the Old Testament and the New Testament we have the four Gospels and the ministry of Christ. Technically, the Gospels are in the New Testament but the disciples had no clue what was happening. The church actually begins in the Book of Acts on the Day of Pentecost. From then on they began to understand and do what God wanted done.

“And a burning lamp that passed between those pieces”.

Holy Ghost is never mentioned in the Old Testament.

A ghost is the spirit of a dead person.

Only a sinful ghost, a spirit of a dead person, can go down to hell.

Between the two Testaments, Jesus died and His Holy Ghost (the burning lamp), being the Spirit of a dead Person, could now go down to hell. As a sinless Ghost, Jesus should not have been able to enter hell. The only reason He could do so was because He carried our sins down to hell to dump them on the devil. His cleansing blood on the cross and then His amazing action of carrying our sins down to hell, enabled Jesus to completely free us from our sins and we became saved, 2000 years ago.

The sacrifice of Jesus on the cross confirmed the covenant of slain animals that God made with Abram/Abraham and thus ended the animal sacrifices and the physical oblations that the Jews offered to God.

GALATIANS 3:17   And this I say, that the covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of none effect.

DANIEL 9:27   And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation.

Jesus was supposed to have a ministry of 7 years (one week if a day represents a year). But in the midst of the week, after 3½ years, Jesus was crucified as the Sacrifice for sin. This ended all the animal sacrifices of the Jewish Law. A cross-over effect was introduced. Our sins crossed over to Him and His righteousness crossed over to us. In addition, the Life in His blood, His Holy Spirit crosses over to us and lives in us, inspiring us to live above sin. Animal sacrifices could not do that. They could forgive sin but could not take away the desire to sin.

The pagan Roman Emperor Hadrian totally destroyed the Temple site in AD 135.

Around AD 692 the Dome of the Rock was built by the Muslims on what they thought was the original Temple site.

MATTHEW 24:15   When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:)

We must understand that it is not the actual holy place, but people will think that it is the holy place where the Temple stood. The Muslims thought to desecrate the holy place with their building as if that replaced the Temple. But the Dome of the Rock is just the abomination of Muslim error that spreads spiritual desolation as is seen by the violence of many Muslim nations. And that Dome of the Rock will remain there, keeping the place a spiritual desolation, until the end. The horror of the attack of the Muslim Hamas on Israel in October 2023 and then the attacks of Hezbollah from Lebanon and the Yemen Houthis means that the desolation continues.