A teaching and prophecy
1 Peter 4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?
Isaiah 26:9 With my soul have I desired thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early: for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.
With all the warnings of Judgment lately, I thought about doing a little teaching on the topic. Then the Lord woke me up early to add a prophecy to the teaching, which I will add on at the end.
If you look at the two opening quotes you will see two of the major ideas connected with God’s judgments. One is that judgment begins at the house of God, and the other is about the ‘redemptive purpose’ of his judgments. The house of God can have various meanings but we will simply refer to it as God’s People. The redemptive purpose is to save the souls of men.
So there is an important issue here. We naturally want to avert judgments because after all they consist of largely of death, destruction, famine, plague, pestilence, disease, privation, wars and other sorts of disasters. But if God has a higher purpose in all this, do we really want to avert his judgments? Would that be acting counter to God’s purposes? Any judgment that is stopped before God’s purpose is met, can only be a judgment delayed. What should be our response?
Now this is like any situation where we just plain don’t know how to pray. We have some other options beside guesswork. They are:
- Praise.
- Worship.
- Seek the Lord in our prayer closet.
- Pray in the Spirit.
- All of the above.
All of the above will work. Ultimately we should realize that a certain amount of Judgment must come. Then there needs to be a certain response from God’s people that can reduce or avert further judgments. That response is repentance and worship. To see this, we will look at some examples from the bible where this happened.
Moses offered incense, David offered sacrifices, Esther petitioned the King. All of these show prayer or speak of prayer. All these instances are times when judgment was in motion or actually being carried out against God’s people. And all resulted in the judgment being halted. For this discussion we are going to look at the story of Balaam.
Now this story just involves one man whose judgment was averted. Even though he was not a part of Israel, he still knew and served the Lord. The interesting part comes in when you see that Balaam is a type of God’s people and the story is an allegory of the end times.
The Sword of Judgment
First let’s set out the meaning of certain symbols and relate them to scripture.
When you speak of the Word of God, you are speaking of God himself. As in John 1.
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
This is reinforced by other verses like Revelation 19:13, speaking of Jesus.
Revelation 19:13 And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.
Next we need to see that the Word is also shown to be a sword.
Ephesians 6:17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God:
Revelation 1:16 And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.
The quote from Ephesians identifies the word as a sword. The one from Revelation illustrates this same idea, showing the sword coming out of his mouth as a word would come out when spoken.
The sword also speaks of judgment, of course. Here is an example from Jeremiah.
Jeremiah 25:29 For, lo, I begin to bring evil on the city which is called by my name, and should ye be utterly unpunished? Ye shall not be unpunished: for I will call for a sword upon all the inhabitants of the earth, saith the LORD of hosts.
Here are two examples where we see the Angel of the Lord, who is the Lord himself, appearing with the sword of judgment. In each case the response of God’s people is repentance and worship.
1 Chronicles 21:15-16
15 And God sent an angel unto Jerusalem to destroy it: and as he was destroying, the LORD beheld, and he repented him of the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed, It is enough, stay now thine hand. And the angel of the LORD stood by the threshingfloor of Ornan the Jebusite.
16 And David lifted up his eyes, and saw the angel of the LORD stand between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem. Then David and the elders of Israel, who were clothed in sackcloth, fell upon their faces.
Joshua 5:13-14
13 And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?
14 And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the LORD am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my lord unto his servant?
The Revelation Of Jesus Christ
What is special about these examples is that they show the sword is drawn. It’s not put away or hidden in the sheath but revealed for all to see. We have seen the sword speaks of the word, and the word is Jesus. So this drawn sword is an illustration of The Revelation Of Jesus Christ. This is important to realize and gives us a clue to an end time application of the story. It shows us that judgments being carried out are an aspect of The Revelation. It’s one way God reveals himself. Psalms 9:16 speaks of this quite clearly.
Psalms 9:16 The LORD is known by the judgment which he executeth: ….
These following quotes speak of the purpose of God in his judgment; of the results he is looking for.
Psalms 64:9 And all men shall fear, and shall declare the work of God; for they shall wisely consider of his doing.
Isaiah 1:27 Zion shall be redeemed with judgment, and her converts with righteousness.
Isaiah 1:27 is especially important in showing the purpose of God. Without the judgment, there will be no redemption. [Zion also speaks of God’s people.] The second part of that verse, speaking of converts, shows that after Zion’s redemption will come the harvest. Therefore without judgment there will be no harvest either! So it’s no wonder that it says in first Peter that judgment comes to Gods people first.
1 Peter 4:17 For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: ….
The Story of Balaam
Numbers 22:20-35
20 And God came unto Balaam at night, and said unto him, If the men come to call thee, rise up, and go with them; but yet the word which I shall say unto thee, that shalt thou do.
21 And Balaam rose up in the morning, and saddled his ass, and went with the princes of Moab.
22 And God's anger was kindled because he went: and the angel of the LORD stood in the way for an adversary against him. Now he was riding upon his ass, and his two servants were with him.
23 And the ass saw the angel of the LORD standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand: and the ass turned aside out of the way, and went into the field: and Balaam smote the ass, to turn her into the way.
24 But the angel of the LORD stood in a path of the vineyards, a wall being on this side, and a wall on that side.
25 And when the ass saw the angel of the LORD, she thrust herself unto the wall, and crushed Balaam's foot against the wall: and he smote her again.
26 And the angel of the LORD went further, and stood in a narrow place, where was no way to turn either to the right hand or to the left.
27 And when the ass saw the angel of the LORD, she fell down under Balaam: and Balaam's anger was kindled, and he smote the ass with a staff.
28 And the LORD opened the mouth of the ass, and she said unto Balaam, What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three times?
29 And Balaam said unto the ass, Because thou hast mocked me: I would there were a sword in mine hand, for now would I kill thee.
30 And the ass said unto Balaam, Am not I thine ass, upon which thou hast ridden ever since I was thine unto this day? was I ever wont to do so unto thee? And he said, Nay.
31 Then the LORD opened the eyes of Balaam, and he saw the angel of the LORD standing in the way, and his sword drawn in his hand: and he bowed down his head, and fell flat on his face.
32 And the angel of the LORD said unto him, Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass these three times? behold, I went out to withstand thee, because thy way is perverse before me:
33 And the ass saw me, and turned from me these three times: unless she had turned from me, surely now also I had slain thee, and saved her alive.
34 And Balaam said unto the angel of the LORD, I have sinned; for I knew not that thou stoodest in the way against me: now therefore, if it displease thee, I will get me back again.
35 And the angel of the LORD said unto Balaam, Go with the men: but only the word that I shall speak unto thee, that thou shalt speak. So Balaam went with the princes of Balak.
Here Balaam is a type of God’s people. He is coming under judgment for disobedience. Notice the drawn sword in verses 23 and 31. The mention of vineyards in verse 24 is another clue, speaking of God’s people. The narrow place in verse 26 speaks of the straight and narrow entrance to eternal life.
In this story, Balaam is a type of God’s people; more accurately a type of our established religious institutions. Balaam’s ass, however, is a type of the prophets and intercessors among God’s people. You can see that the ass is clearly able to see the coming judgments, while Balaam is clueless. This is prophetic vision and insight. The ass also takes various actions to avoid the judgments and tries to warn Balaam. Up to a certain point, Balaam ignores the ass, then he begins to attack the ass. This speaks of the persecution of the prophets of old and the prophetic remnant of today. Eventually the Lord opens Balaam’s eyes and reveals himself. And the aspect of himself that he reveals is that of the destroying angel carrying out judgments. This is the drawn sword, and The Revelation of Jesus Christ.
Immediately Balaam’s response is the correct one, repentance and worship. Then the Lord shows mercy and allows him to pass thru the narrow place. This tells of entering into the kingdom. Balaam receives a commission and strict instructions to obey. This tells us that the established religious institutions will not begin to repent till they actually see the judgments being carried out, and understand that they are from God.
Now this is not to say that all end time judgments can be stopped or the time of tribulation cancelled. That would be like someone who figures when anti-Christ shows up, all we have to do is cast the devil out of him and everything will be ok. I don’t think so!
It’s not very likely because all these things have to happen, and scriptures must be fulfilled. But it does show us how we should be responding: with repentance, worship and obedience. Once God’s purposes are accomplished in one area, he will move on to judge other areas. Once Zion is redeemed with judgment, he will move on to reaping the harvest. And other judgments will be required for that.
The Prophecy
So it shall be with those of my people who humble themselves, repent and worship me. They shall enter in through the narrow gate, into everlasting life; and avert the sword judgments on themselves and their lands.
Whey they see my judgment being carried out, they shall know the Fear of the Lord. This shall be the beginning of wisdom and the entrance of my word in their lives and my sword in their heart. And thus many shall return to me.
My glittering sword shall mean death to many; but for those who repent it shall be death to the flesh and life to the spirit. And they shall be my overcomers; my late in the day vineyard workers.