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J oshua-gate
Part 3. The
Jezebel Conspiracy: the Downfall of Kings
March 30, 2008
By Ron and Karen Schwartz
1 John 2:27
As for you, the anointing you received from him remains in you, and you
do not need anyone to teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about
all things and as that anointing is real, not counterfeit — just as it
has taught you, remain in him.
Consider the magnitude of these words: “the
anointing you received from him remains in you, and you do not need
anyone to teach you.” Most
Christians don’t really believe this. They feel insecure concerning
their ability to hear from God, so they want to be taught. But that is
just the tip of the iceberg. They are also insecure in their faith,
their trust in God’s love for them, and even their salvation. Yes, this
is normal for most contemporary Christians, but should it really be that
way?
Ask yourself this: Are you secure in your relationship with your spouse?
Do you trust him or her? Do you doubt whether or not s/he truly loves
you? Do you feel as though something is wrong? Do you feel like s/he is
holding back affection? How about your relationship with your parents?
Do you trust their love for you? Do you believe that they truly care
about you? Are you in the least bit concerned whether or not they will
help and support you? If you don’t trust someone, or if you feel
insecure about that relationship, then something is wrong. It should NOT
be that way. You should have absolute trust, security, and
confidence in your spouse. You should have absolute faith in your
parents’ support and love. Trust, faith, confidence, and security are
all marks of healthy relationships, and when these positive
characteristics are missing, it is symptomatic of a serious problem.
The same holds true in our relationship with God. When we lack trust,
faith, confidence, and security, then something is wrong. We should
consider why it is so. When we are initially saved, we have no such
doubts. Rather, we are overcome with joy, faith, and security. We do not
wonder whether God loves us, nor are we insecure in our relationship
with Him.
Church people tell new converts that their spiritual “high (i.e., their
passion and love for God, their absolute faith in His promises, their
simplistic trust in His love, etc.)” is nothing more than a “honeymoon”
period with God. “Just give it some time,” they say, “and you will
become normal. You will be just like the rest of us.” And of course
“normal” to them is insecurity, lacking joy and faith, and questioning
their salvation. “Normal” is spiritually dry and wondering why God has
abandoned them.
Spiritual insecurity, lack of faith, and doubt of God’s goodness are not
marks of spiritual maturity but an indication of something wrong in
one’s relationship with God. Healthy Christians should not feel this
way. Apostate, compromising, and idolatrous Christians feel this way
because of the conviction of God’s Spirit. But since these feelings have
become the norm for contemporary Christians, they are told not to worry
about it. Churches encourage Christians to dismiss their conviction as a
dry spell, deep inner spiritual growth, and normal Christian living. But
it is a lie. It is part of the Joshua-gate conspiracy.
The Great Seducer
There is a story in the Old Testament about a great whore who married a
king of Israel and helped to bring about his downfall. Her name was
Jezebel.
1 Kings 16:29-33
In the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, Ahab son of Omri became
king of Israel, and he reigned in Samaria over Israel twenty-two years.
Ahab son of Omri did more evil in the eyes of the Lord than any of those
before him. He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of
Jeroboam son of Nebat, but he also married Jezebel daughter of Ethbaal
king of the Sidonians, and began to serve Baal and worship him. He set
up an altar for Baal in the temple of Baal that he built in Samaria.
Ahab also made an Asherah pole and did more to provoke the Lord, the God
of Israel, to anger than did all the kings of Israel before him.
When Jehu was anointed king, he made the
following observation concerning Jezebel:
2 Kings 9:22
And he [Jehu]
answered, What peace, so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel and
her witchcrafts are so many?
Now “Ahab… did more to provoke the Lord, the God
of Israel, to anger than did all the kings of Israel before him,”
because he “sold
himself to do evil in the eyes of the Lord, urged on by Jezebel his wife
(1 Kings 21:25).”
Jezebel introduced her pagan culture into Ahab’s life and pushed him
into it.
Ahab did not do evil because he hated God. He did evil because he was
religious. He misconstrued his religion as true worship. Right up to the
end, he believed He was doing what was right. However, even though he
was a religious man and may even have had good intentions, it did not
prevent God from actively bringing about his destruction.
The idea that God may actively work to destroy His people is lost in our
generation of apostate Christians. Contemporary Christians believe that
God is so merciful and longsuffering that He would never harm them (for
they are His children), but instead He would find some way to change
their hearts and to forgive them: certainly God would never destroy
them. But this, too, was Ahab’s opinion. He was ordained king of Israel
by God. Therefore, it was beyond comprehension that God would seek to
destroy him.
Like Ahab, contemporary Christians have become enculturated by
society and its social and moral values. It has fallen victim to the
culture of humanism, relativism, post-modernism, and the political
climate of tolerance and equality. So benign does our culture appear
that its characteristics have become a part of every facet of
contemporary Christian worship and religion. Our culture seems so right
and harmless… but then, certainly this is also what Ahab thought. The
parallel between Ahab and our contemporary Christian culture is
remarkable.
After the death of Ahab and his wife, the name “Jezebel” vanishes from
the scripture, at least until the end. Then her name and her actions
suddenly reappear.
The name “Jezebel” recurs in the book of Revelation where Jesus says
this to His church, “I
have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls
herself a prophetess. By her teaching she misleads my servants into
sexual immorality [whoring]
and the eating of food sacrificed to idols. I have given her time to
repent of her immorality, but she is unwilling. So I will cast her on a
bed of suffering, and I will make those who commit adultery with her
suffer intensely, unless they repent of her ways (Revelation 2:20-23).”
Then again later:
Revelation 17:1-2
1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and
talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the
judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:
2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the
inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her
fornication.
In Revelation, John writes about his
vision of the last days. In his vision, he saw a great whore whose goal
was to bring about the downfall of kings. The great whore began as a
single church but has eventually grown to cast her deception over the
entire world. The great whore may have begun as a single church (i.e.,
the Catholic church) but she has expanded herself to fill the earth with
the institutional churches of this age.
Once again, we find Jezebel arising to deceive kings. From these
passages, we know the following concerning her:
1) She wants to seduce kings (i.e.,
“with whom the
kings of the earth have committed fornication”).
Who are these
“kings of the earth”
whom she has seduced? In the first chapter of revelation, we read, “And
from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten
of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that
loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, And hath made us
kings and priests unto God and his Father; to him be glory and dominion
for ever and ever. Amen (Revelation 1:5-6).”
This time Jezebel is not after “a” king
of Israel, but after the
“kings of this
earth.” She longs to
replace Christ as the true “King
of kings (Revelation 17:14).” She is not after the sinners and
fornicators but those who have committed their purity to God. She longs
for their innocence – to make them into a whore as she is. Have you ever
noticed how the truly anointed of God’s Spirit are sought after by
institutional churches? They are attracted to the true anointing of God,
but as soon as they have control of the anointed, they try to either
make them into the same spiritual whore that they are, or they seek to
kill them if they refuse to comply.
2) Christians today have “been made
drunk with [her]
wine.”
In the beginning of this note, we
discussed the fact that it is not normal for relationships to suffer
with doubts, insecurities, and a lack of trust and faith. Yet this is
exactly how most contemporary Christians feel toward God. They are
insecure in their faith, their salvation, and even their standing with
God. They doubt whether God will answer their prayers. And they doubt
whether or not God loves them. These things are all symptomatic of a
deeper problem.
What does this tell us? The insecurity that contemporary
Christians sense in regard to their faith, salvation, and the leading
and teaching of the Holy Spirit (an insecurity that was inexplicably
missing during and immediately following their spiritual rebirth) is
conviction from the Holy Spirit. The great whore churches try to
numb this conviction by telling contemporary Christians that their
conviction is not from God but is instead the work of the devil in
trying to get them to doubt the grace and mercy of God. Church leaders
tell their compromising, backslidden, apostate congregations that all
they really need is more faith and confidence. Therefore, Christians, in
the face of spiritual conviction, force themselves to believe that there
is nothing wrong with their spiritual state. They force themselves to
believe that their feeling of lack, their “dryness,” and their
dissatisfaction is normal, that it is simply an attack by Satan, and
that they should ignore it. These lies perpetrated by church leaders are
all part of Joshua-gate: the conspiracy of the end time.
Church leaders routinely numb their congregations to the convicting
power of the Holy Spirit. Think about it. Haven’t you ever wondered why
it is that when you go to church, you leave feeling good about yourself,
but the longer you are away, the more insecure you begin to feel? The
longer you are away from church, the more the numbness to the conviction
of the Spirit wears off. That is why you feel almost desperate to get
back to church. That is why you feel the “need” to hear a preacher.
Contemporary Christians have become alcoholics, and like every
alcoholic, they are in denial. They know that they are not growing
spiritually. They know that their churches are carnal, apathetic, and
backslidden. They know that their churches reflect the values of this
world and are poor “wannabe’s” to the Church that Christ established,
but they do not care. Their intoxication has made them numb to the voice
and conviction of the Holy Spirit. That is why it is useless to try to
get Christians who are addicted to that system to see it for what it is.
Like all alcoholics, they are in denial.
The great whore institutional church system of this age has not just
ensnared the people of God but the gifted Christian leaders. Christian
leaders are seduced by the institutional church with the promise of
ministerial fulfillment along with financial support. It provides gifted
Christian men with a captive audience and the money to meet their needs.
It hands them a cup of wine and tells them to drink and everything will
be okay. Few Christian men today are able to escape its appeal, and most
give in to its flattery eventually. Once they give in to her charm and
drink from her wine, they begin to believe all her flatteries. They
begin to see how “special” they are and how much the church needs them,
and as she invites them to take their rightful place as the head of the
church, somehow it all seems right. Before long, they are intoxicated
and addicted, too. Pretty soon, they are unable to leave, and in the
end, they go into denial along with the people. The snare has tightened
around their necks and slowly strangles the life of the spirit from
them. And as their spiritual gifts depart, the great whore hands the
Christian leader another cup of academics and education. The whore then
leans in close and whispers in their ears, “There are no spiritual gifts
today. My seminars and colleges can give you everything you need to be a
great speaker and a great leader.”
How many great men in scripture have lost their power and position with
God through the seduction of a woman? What about Samson? His enemies
told Delilah to “lure
him into showing you the secret of his great strength and how we can
overpower him so we may tie him up and subdue him (Judges 16:5).”
In the end, it was she, not his enemies, who stripped him of his power.
Both Christians and their leaders are being seduced by their church
whores and stripped of their power. And because of the intoxication of
the social and financial fulfillment, they don’t even care. The
intoxication has made them numb to the conviction of God.
It grieves us to see good men whom we know to be gifted in teaching and
prophetic gifts selling themselves out to the whore system. They know
the people who come to them are not spiritual (but carnal), yet they
preach to them as if they are disciplined, functional, responsible
Christians. We ask you, Christian leaders, why don’t you set the wine
aside and step away from the whore? Why not speak the truth and trust
God rather than the whore’s money?
What about King David? “One
evening David got up from his bed and walked around on the roof of the
palace. From the roof he saw a woman bathing. The woman was very
beautiful, and David sent someone to find out about her. The man said,
"Isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam and the wife of Uriah the
Hittite?" Then David sent messengers to get her. She came to him, and he
slept with her (2 Samuel 11:2-4).”
David fell because he lusted after a beautiful woman. How many great
gifted men have similarly fallen victim to the great institutional
church whore? How many men have sold out to her financial support? How
many have come to believe, though her seduction, that they are great
preachers and prophets and teachers?
If you are telling the people what they want to hear so that you can
maintain their support and following, then you have sold out to the
whore. If you are telling this age of carnal Christians that God wants
to bless them, then you have sold out to the whore. If you are
continuing to advance the agenda of the contemporary institutional
church system, drawing from its financial support and believing that you
are indispensible (the church “needs” you), then you have sold out. You
have made yourself part of the intoxicating wine that has been given to
God’s people to drink. You have made the people need you instead of God.
And if you fail to free yourself from the seducing power of that
whore, then you will be part of her judgment.
3) She
claims to be anointed
(“a prophetess”),
or inspired, and she offers her inspiration to the saints.
There is no doubt that contemporary churches are fountains of
information and knowledge. They produce impressive universities and
floods of books and other media. Like the Hebrew leaders during the time
of Christ, who dissected and analyzed every word of every scripture,
Christian leaders have completely annotated and explained away the New
Testament into mountains of books, the quantity of which cannot be
numbered.
But for all the commentary, inspiration, and “feel-good” books she
produces, she fails to point Christians to their need for true humility
and repentance. Why? Because humility and repentance is not in the
hearts of her leaders. For them to point to the fact that the
contemporary church needs humility and repentance would mean that they
as its leaders need the same. Consequently, contemporary Christians
listen to Jezebel, the prophetess and whore, and fall victim to her
apparent wisdom and knowledge of the scripture. They fall prey to her
words of comfort, encouragement, and blessing.
4) She
“misleads
(Greek: planao , meaning ‘to cause to
wander, to lead astray, and to deceive.’)” through
“her teaching.”
The great whore will not tell you that
God does not exist or that you should live in sin. No, outright
statements like that would be immediately recognized as wrong. She will
not tell those things directly, but she will lead you in that direction.
Straying or wandering from the path means that you were on the path at
first. You stray from the path one step at a time. If you can remember a
time in your life that you walked with God and you knew it, then
consider where you are today. You didn’t just wake up one morning
changed. You did change, but it was gradual: one compromise at a time.
The whorish church system wants to change true believers into whores
like her. She knows that true believers will never buy into sin, apathy,
and apostasy, but they may compromise their values just a little bit
under the right circumstances. So she begins to offer them all the great
social pseudo-Christian benefits of her programs. Once again, we find
Bible precedence for this.
Numbers 16:2-3
2 And they rose up before Moses, with certain of the children of Israel,
two hundred and fifty princes of the assembly, famous in the
congregation, men of renown:
3 And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron,
and said unto them, Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the
congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them:
wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord?
Like the princes of Israel, church
leaders tell inspired and anointed believers that since all the
Christians in their church love God (that is, the backslidden and
compromising Christians), and they (the anointed believers) are the ones
who are different, then they like Moses are simply arrogant (i.e.,
“wherefore then
lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of the Lord”).
Church leaders explain to the new believers that they need to conform
and be like everyone else. They tell new Christians who are full of fire
and passion that their passion is simply a mark of immaturity and that
it is misdirected. They tell these fiery believers that they need to go
to their colleges and be mentored by them. Little by little, they get
them to stray from the path that God initially set them on until they
are as cold, apathetic, and apostate as the whore is. Christians don’t
start out to be whores; contemporary churches make them that way.
5) Her goal is to make those whom she beguiles to
“commit adultery with her.”
What is adultery? When Jesus talked to
the prostitute, he described her as having more than one husband. It’s
not that contemporary Christians don’t claim Christ as their Lord and
husband, it’s that He is not their one and only. They have others whom
they have placed as their spiritual heads. They place their church
leaders on pedestals and obey them over God. Remember, adultery is
having more than one husband, and therefore, when Christians elevate men
into the same spiritual position of authority in their lives as Christ,
they commit adultery. They become spiritual whores.
The contemporary church whore needs Christians to commit adultery with
her. Unless they do, they will be listening to and following God. If
they do that, God will expose her sin to them. So she denounces and
reprimands all those who stand independent or refuse to submit to her.
Where have we heard this before?
Daniel 3:5-6
5 That at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet, flute, harp,
sackbut, psaltery, dulcimer, and all kinds of musick, ye fall down and
worship the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king hath set up:
6 And whoso falleth not down and worshippeth shall the same hour be cast
into the midst of a burning fiery furnace.
It wasn’t enough for Babylon to have power and control over Israel.
Babylon also wanted Israel to freely submit. The same is true for the
contemporary church whore, Babylon the Great. It is not enough that she
controls virtually all contemporary churches. Her leaders also want all
Christians to submit to them and honor them voluntarily. So they
pressure Christians into voluntary subjugation.
6) The great whore draws Christians in by her charm and beauty.
John made note of this when he wrote, “And
the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold
and precious stones and pearls… and when I saw her, I wondered with
great admiration (Revelation 17:4, 6).”
When John first saw her, he was captivated by her beauty and splendor.
The angel, unaffected by her charm, had to draw John’s attention back (“And
the angel said unto me, Wherefore didst thou marvel (Revelation 17:7)?”).
The institutional church is a powerful
force at work among God’s people. Its pseudo-Christian appearance
promises to the believer everything he wants for his social and
spiritual fulfillment. He can meet other believers, hear great
inspirational messages, find social interaction for his entire family,
and participate in any number of classes and programs. So Christians
everywhere give in to her charm. They sell out to her programs for high
school and college students, for singles, for child care during services
that gives them a break, and for concert-style entertainment. They can
acquire everything but spiritual growth, so why would anyone want to
give it up?
Some Final Thoughts
Why does God compare the institutional church to a whore?
Let’s consider the analogy. There are costs associated with both a whore
and a marriage. The cost is different, but so is the benefit. The cost
associated with marriage is much greater than that associated with a
whore. Marriage requires self-sacrifice and purity but carries with it
the benefit of reciprocation. The cost associated with a whore, however,
is usually nothing more than monetary, and its benefit is regret and
emptiness. When you consider it from this point of view, it is easy to
see the comparison.
The whore church requires very little from her members aside from money.
She certainly does not require abstinence (i.e., purity) from other
lovers. Like a marriage, God requires self-sacrifice and purity.
Moreover, whores don’t care how many lovers you have as long as they get
their money, but a spouse does. Similarly, a whore church doesn’t care
about your purity, or how many idols you serve, as long as she gets her
tithes. In fact, even the unsaved can become members as long as they pay
their dues.
In addition to the cost, the benefit one receives from the whore church
is empty. It lacks substance. Most leave her “services” having allowed
themselves to be deluded into believing they have done all they need to
do and closing their eyes to anything more. Others leave knowing in
their hearts that they are frauds and that their Christian experience is
hollow. They use all the familiar clichés and go through all the motions
to worship like all the other idolaters but there is little spiritual
substance to their lives. In contrast, a real relationship with God may
cost you your life but it yields the benefit of life everlasting.
Christians who truly experience a relationship with God don’t need whore
churches with their fraud and pretentiousness. In fact, they find it
nearly impossible to survive there.
At one time, Christianity could be described as an “explosion” of
evangelism. Christianity was defined by the “gospel” – the good news of
salvation. Today, however, Christianity can best be described as an
“implosion” of religious self-indulgence. It’s no longer a matter of the
church going out into the world, but the world coming into the church,
resulting in church whoredom.
At one time, the church was a force against which the gates of hell
could not prevail. It rallied around Christ and held Him up as Lord.
Today, however, the contemporary church is the victim of society and it
folds under social and cultural pressure. Christ is no longer at its
center. Today, everything about the church rallies around its members
and what is appealing to them.
When Christianity was great and powerful, it was because Christ was the
driving source at its center, molding the church into His likeness.
Today, the members are the driving source at its center, demanding that
it conform to their likeness. It isn’t Christ that Christians want but
social and emotional fulfillment. They “church shop” - not for Christ
but for which church offers the best benefits. In the contemporary
church, we find the ultimate form of idolatry: Christians now worship
their own pleasures. And since their pleasures are religious in nature,
Christians misconstrue their idolatry for godliness.
Contemporary Christians assign blame for God’s judgment to everything
but where it really belongs. They believe that judgment will befall
their countries because of social sins like homosexual marriage,
abortion, liberalism, and humanism that permeate their societies. But
God ‘s blessings or His curses are not dependent upon the actions of
society. They are dependent upon the actions of His people.
2 Chronicles 7:14
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and
pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I
hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
Stop waiting, hoping, and praying for society to change. Stop blaming
“them.” It’s not a “them” issue. Instead, examine your own heart. The
future does not hinge upon whether or not social corruption ends. It
hinges upon whether or not God’s people will repent. It may not be too
late for you or your church. There may still be time. There is ONLY ONE
HOPE for you, your church, and this nation: REPENT.
Amen
kmsrjs@triton.net
Ron's Thoughts |
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