Coming out of Babylon

Revelation 18:4-8

Then I heard another voice from heaven saying,

Come out of her my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues;  for her sins are heaped high as heaven, and YHVH has remembered her iniquities.

Pay her back as she herself has paid back others, and repay her double for her deeds;  mix a double portion for her in the cup she mixed.

As she glorified herself and loved in luxury, so give her a like measure of torment and mourning, since in her heart she says, I sit a queen, I am no widow, and mourning I shall never see. 

For this reason her plagues will come in a single day, death and mourning and famine and she will be burned up with fire;

for almighty is YHVH Almighty who has judged her.

Revelation 18 tells us how the "city" of Babylon will be destroyed before the second coming of the Messiah. Completely vanquished in a single hour!  OY!  And we are commanded to come out before this happens, lest we take part in her sins and hence her judgement!  I don't know about you, but it seems to me that it is pretty darn important that I understand this and act out of obedience, because the alternative is - well - DEADLY!
Ani  has been contemplating the idea of what exactly it means to "come out of" Babylon for the past five years and recently she and I decided to do a little more in-depth study into the question...what exactly IS Babylon?  And how and when will we be expected to "come out of her"?

This is a pretty heady concept to be sure...hence the reason it has taken so long to put some of this into perspective.
Babel or Babylon - meaning confusion!  "Come out of her my people!" "Come out of confusion my people!"

So historically speaking, what WAS Babylon?

-An ancient city built by Nimrod after the flood
-The first city to set out a code of man-made laws
-Financial market/trade capital
-Represented by symbols of gold, dragons and winged lions
-Known throughout history as one of the seven wonders of the world for its hanging gardens
-Built up and populated in rebellion to YHVH - in opposition to YHVH's command to spread throughout the earth
-The antithesis to YHVH"s city of Jerusalem
-Men attempted to build a strong tower with which to defy YHVH to gain their independence from Him
-After his death, Nimrod is worshipped as a god (the sun-god)
-Became the birthplace of Ishtar worship (The "Ishtar Gate")
-Ishtar, also known as Semeramis, was Nimrod's wife who claimed to become pregnant with their son after Nimrod's death, hence his god-status
-Home of Tammuz, son of Ishtar and Nimrod
-Tammuz was later worshipped as a god as well by pagans - (see Ezekiel 8)
-Home to Nebuchadnezzar who declared himself to be god, demanded worship, set up an idol and killed all who would not bow down to the idol.
-The israelites were taken captive in Babylon for 70 years, including the prophet Daniel
-Daniel was persecuted for his faithfulness to YHVH and thrown to the lions

What is Babylon today?

-Does not yet exist in physical space
-Exists as a state of humanity - luxury, indulgence, licentiousness, idol worship, sun worship, mother/child worship, goddess worship
-World commerce, global banking system ~ InterAc, Credit Cards, Veri-Chip, VEri-Sign, Google
-Unified government
-Man controlling events normally lefy to YHVH ~ weather manipulation (chem-trails, HAARP)
-Man controlling every aspect of life for "the good of the people" ~ every aspect of life governed by ever increasing powers of man-made laws (while YHVH's laws continue to be rejected)
-Beauty cult ~ plastic surgery, fashion, glamour, princess complex, entitlement mentality (I sit a queen!  I shall never see sorrow!)
-Harlot-mother of prostitutes and abominations of the earth
-Unbridles sexuality
-Drunk on the blood of YHVH's people
"Do as thou wilt, this shall be the whole of the law" ~ Commandment of the Satanic Bible
-Unified religion, based on the notion that the commandments have been done away with ("It's all good!")
-celebration of lawlessness
-Accomodation for the unrepentant believer who has been deceived by the beast!

What is yet to come??

-A physical location once again
-Empowered by the beast, and dependant on the beast
-Will require worship of the beast!
-Controls every aspect of human existence on earth
-Under the strong delusion (2Thess 2:11) ~ no ideal that her actions are anaethma to YHVH and will be judged harshly
-No love for the TRUTH!
-No love for the prophets (she drinks their blood)
-No shame at all that her harlotry is exposed - mixed worship and love of pagan worship
-Loved by all the kings of the earth
-Unrepentant after many rebukes
-Sins piled up to heaven
-Judged by YHVH with plagues and total destruction!

Coming Soon...

Ooh, it has been a while since a new post...oops!
Next post..."Coming out of Babylon"
.........Tomorrow...hopefully :-)

My Exodus

So I know I told you that my family and I quit going to church earlier this year, but the truth of the matter is that I more or less got bounced out.  You see, like Ani, I became self-aware.  Something happenned in my soul that made me suddenly aware that there was messy, smelly stuff everywhere!  ("But Mother...the Emperor has NO CLOTHES ON!?")  Our beautiful little country church...proudly Evangelical, a true seeker church, was openly practicing and preaching another gospel.  I was unable any longer to ignore the smell.  When I began to question my pastors teaching privately on his own personal blog that was not associated with the church whatsoever, my comments were deleted, and I found myself trying to stave off a visit to my home from the pastor and the Chairman of the Board.  They just wanted to have a "chat", a "good-old-fashioned-pastoral-visit" they called it.  I was picturing brass knuckles and a cheesy line about sleeping with the fishes.....
All kidding aside, I was actually a little scared.  Having two men threatening to pay me a little visit if I didn't lay off the challenging comments did in fact intimidate me quite severely.  They really hoped I would just fade away, but then again, they don't really know me very well (*grin*).  It didn't entirely end there, but it was the beginning of our exodus.
But what was it that was being preached that was so wrong? 
  
*They were practicing Idolatry

*They were speaking against the Commandments, breaking the Commandments and teaching others to break the Commandments.

So before I go into a description of what idolotry looked like in my church, I would like to ask you...what do you think idolatry would look like in a modern evangelical church?  Think about your own chuch...is there any idolatry being practiced there right now?

As for the Commandments....if the "Law" is written on our hearts as according to Jeremiah 31:33, what does it say?  What is the Law, or Commandments(s) that is written on our hearts?

And I leave you with this as "borrowed" from another blog because I thought it so beautifully clever and thought provoking: 

Two Questions:

1)Which of these statements is correct? (They are mutually exclusive, so you can only choose one.)
a.    Gentile believers are accountable for Jesus’ TWO Commandments: to love God and love your neighbor
b.    Gentile believers are accountable for FOUR laws (Acts 15 – fornication, idols, blood, things strangled) and Jews must obey all the Law (Acts 21 – believing Jews were zealous for the Law)
c.    Gentile believers are accountable for NINE of the 10 Commandments (not the Sabbath)
d.    Gentile believers are accountable for the TEN Commandments
e.    Gentile believers are accountable for all of Paul’s commands in his letters
f.    Gentile believers are accountable for all of Paul’s commands in his letters PLUS tithing
g.    Gentile believers are initially accountable for the 4 laws given en Acts 15, and gradually (as they mature in the faith and learn the Torah every Sabbath, per Acts 15:21) become accountable for ALL of God’s Law as revealed in the Old and New Testaments combined, which is summed up in Jesus’ two commandments, and includes the 10 Commandments, all of Paul’s commands, and many other instructions.

2) Define Sin

Stay tuned...

In Ani's Words...Removing Splinters

The small splinters are hard to remove on your own, aren’t they?  I mean, if you’re buried under a heap of 2X4’s you might want help getting those off your back, but even a tiny sliver can be very hard to get, which is why we often ask for help.  Just the other day, I had to ask for assistance with a wood sliver I managed to get from my milking stool (yes, there.)  This morning, my son asked for help removing a sliver from his hand.  Where would we be if we didn’t have trustworthy people to help us with splinters?  We can’t just leave them, can we?\
How does one remove a splinter with love?  I personally cannot imagine jabbing a trusting/trembling child with a needle just to get a reaction, or just to see the look on their face as their trust is betrayed...  Even if I was in a foul mood, I could not imagine inflicting pain for my own recreational purpose.  Nope.  Not at all.  But the splinter has to come out, so, as gently as possible, we work on it, right?  And sometimes it hurts, right?  Children know and understand this; even the animals in the farmyard understand that having porcupine quills/nails/parasites removed is a good, kind and loving thing for the farmer to do, and they DO show their gratitude.  (possibly not at the time, but certainly later on, when the relief comes)
Honestly, I would rather do anything than clean up another mess, fix another fence, pull out another nail, etc.  For me, these things are done out of necessity, and not recreation.  And yet, fixing and cleaning up are a regular part of life in this world.  It has to be done! Why should we pretend we are all perfect? Sure, we would likely all prefer that everyone come to the sandbox right side up and ready to be fully accountable for their own actions and responses?  Ha ha!  Life is messy, and interacting with people is messy.  Maybe that's why I enjoy interacting with animals...the messy smelly part is there and we all know it.  With people, the messy stuff is hidden.  You might not know its there at all until you get a weird reaction...like a door shut in your face, or being lied to, or being completely ignored when you try to address someone.  Rude behaviours like this usually indicate something smelly is being covered up.  I have observed that what most people seem to want is for everyone else to IGNORE the smell.  Their own smell, the neighbour’s smell – everyone must agree we all smell fantastic!!  If you don’t want to play by the rules, you can’t play at all.  Imagine my cow trying to hide the fact that she just dropped a five pound load of steaming shyte on the barn floor?  What a joke!!  Its just there, and it gets cleaned up promptly, so it doesn’t get in the milk, right?  Do I love mucking out the barn?  No, but I love my cow…and I love the fruit of our relationship – fresh milk, cream, butter…ahhh.  What’s not to love?  So she digests and eliminates.  This is not a surprise to me!  I’m still IN!! Did I mention that I love my cow?  I brush her lovingly.  When she kicks at the milk pail, I don’t love that, and I say so.  I don’t pretend I didn’t notice.  I don’t pretend I don’t care one way or the other.  I don’t run off and leave her tied there, wondering what happened. 

Oh well.  Three days to prepare mentally and emotionally for another family get together where the agreement is that no one smells any shyte.  Not in my pants, not in yours.  Its not there, your senses are deceiving you if you think anyone stinks.  The guilty party is the one that breaks the code of silence about the shyte.  I anticipate a migraine as I try to play by these rules…because, I know when I walk in the kitchen, my sister in law is going to bend over and drop a nasty one right on my shoes.  This makes it really hard to ignore…what to do, what to do… trying to come out of this bs is just very difficult to do.  Doesn’t mean I’m perfect, doesn’t mean I don’t know how to love – I just can’t promise I can do this lying and covering up thing anymore.  OK??
(I anticipate I won’t be getting invited to many tea parties now?)

Love.  What is that again?  That perfectly patient, kind, longsuffering quality...oh yeah, thats the part where you get offended at me, and instead of speaking to me about it you go into "longsuffering" mode.  How long have you been suffering?  Maybe it would have been a good idea to just talk about it when it happened?  IT might have been a complete misunderstanding, after all.  There are two sides to every story, right?  Today, I am going to try hard to make sure that I get both sides of every story straight away, without judgement of right and wrong until the whole matter has been heard.

Have a TRULY fresh air day

Ani

I am NOT a vegetarian...

I am having a crisis of conscience right now, that is somewhat related to the direction I want this blog to go...but it may take me a while to get there, so bear with me.
My daughters want to rescue a horse from going to the meat market. (Sigh).  While I do think it's a nice idea in theory, there are other factors that young people don't always take into consideration.  Like the fact that it's a stallion and that we only have mares on our yard.  But whatever...that aside, I just want to say that the biggest reason I am saying no is because I just don't really have a huge problem with horses going to the meat market.  I also think that anyone who does have a problem with horses going to the meat market should never eat any store-bought eggs, chicken or beef products.  I have been in barns with 10,000+ chickens in them, and it's not pretty.  Do you know what they do with them when they stop laying eggs??  I have family who have worked the kill floor of a meat processing plant....even worse.   Actually I think it's all bad...I can guarantee you I will never send a horse to the meat market!   And we rely on our laying hens for our eggs, I have got some nice steers that should be ready right about BBQ season next year, and at the moment my hubby is out hunting us some nice big game to stock our freezer for the winter.  I really like animals a lot.  In fact almost every animal on my yard has a name, and we spend time with each and every one of them on a daily basis.  On my yard, our food is loved!  So, I really don't want to rely on animals for food that have been raised in an Intensive Livestock Operation any more than I want to see a horse go to the meat market.  It's all nasty!  But I guess it's a matter of removing the plank from your own eye before you can see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's.  If I run out of hamburger meat, you can bet I will be heading on in to Safeway to get some.  Do you see where I am going with this?  From my point of view, I just don't have a leg to stand on to be fundamentally opposed to horses going to the meatmarket, because I support meat markets every time I go out for wings. 
So, this got me thinking more deeply.  I would equate that line of thinking to the same line of thinking that causes people to feel good about having a monthly payroll deduction to go to their favorite charity...let's say the United Way, that one's pretty common.  Many people will happily contribute money from their paychecks to be sent to the United Way, but how many people would actually go down and volunteer at a shelter, or a soup kitchen?  How many would really go down and fraternize with "those" people?  The scriptures tell us to have mercy on widows and the fatherless, but how many of us do?  Or better yet, we will send money to World Vision, but wont serve breakfast for the untamed and unruly children of our own streets. 
So this got me thinking more deeply.  What am I doing to have mercy on the widows and the fatherless??  Can I really bear the idea of putting money from an already tight budget towards feeding and caring for another horse, when it could be better used to improve the life of a fatherless child?  Or a lonely widow with no family to share her burden?
Sorry girls, the horse will have to wait.  I have something in my eye....

In Ani's Words...

Truly a sad scenario for the church when families are literally falling apart, victims of the sin condition that WILL NOT BE ADDRESSED!  While we writhe around in pain, we are still trying to get to the church on time, trying to look the part, trying to hide our failures from each other -- in essence bearing false witness about ourselves and our situation of feeling completely LOST.  and now we are being called upon to help our conference give a clearer definition to "the gospel".  We were sent out to preach it, but its not working very well I guess?  It needs to be polished up? tweaked even?  Oy!  Yah help us, we know not what we do.  If only people could see that the truth will set us free.  The freedom we think we have in Christ is to be able to sin with impunity as every pulpit in America reminds us "not to judge lest we be judged".  But we shall all be judged according to righteousness, and that day is not far off! Judgement will begin in the household of Him who judges.  If we love each other, brethren, would you not want to judge ourselves and one another unto repentence from sin, before the final judgement?

Proverbs 9 says that if you instruct a wise man he will love you, but if you instruct a mocker, that mocker will hate you and abuse you.

So, to all the mockers sipping coffee in churches everywhere, get ready for the coming judgement by your Maker, the creator of heaven and earth.  Have your eyes opened to your true condition and seek the relief that only your Maker can give you, repent and be free from sin as the way has been made possible for your redemption long ago.  Don't listen to anyone tell you that there are no rules in the church -- its become satans playground - Do as thou wilt (but wait - there are unwritten rules, you won't know about them until you break them...)
Blessings on your life, on your mind as you seek YHVH while He may be found.  the truth is out there.

Ani

The Inmates have taken over the Asylum...

Just so you know, my family and I stopped going to church a while back.  Maybe about 8 months ago or so.  After I became a believer in my 20's I did all the things a young, married 20-something is supposed to do....I volunteered to work in the nursery, I taught children's church and vacation bible school,  we went to sunday school, we took our children to kids clubs one night a week, I helped in the kitchen for "fellowship meals", and weddings, funerals and baby showers, blah blah blah...The point is that we were very good at assimilating ourselves into the church culture, but actually, I don't really think I learned very much other than how to perform.  I learned how to dress (and how to dress my children) so that the older church ladies wouldn't give me the head-to-toe-followed-by-a-frown on sunday mornings.  I much preferred the head-to-toe-followed-by-a-smile!  I got pretty good at showing up on time, and I knew a heck of a lot of churchy songs now, even going so far as to start buying christian music cd's!  And  I loved it!  HA!  You thought I was going to say it was awful, didn't you?  Well, I did love it.  Maybe not all of it, I did find it quite stressful having to learn all the subtle expectations, but I loved God and I was happy to believe I was serving Him. 
I think things all started to go downhill for me early one sunday morning about a half-hour before sunday school was set to begin, and I looked around at all the people mingling...empty handed...so I cheerfully announced that I was going to put on a pot of coffee, and headed towards the adjoining kitchen.  Everybody looked at me like I suddenly had tentacles growing out of my face.  Why did they do that?  It was hilarious, and deeply disturbing at the same time.  I knew I had touched on something, I had broken some code.  Maybe even THE code.  I changed something, I challenged something.  It was a very tiny and seemingly irrelevant something, but the results were tangible.  I blew it off and never gave it another moment's thought, and in fact I never equated that incident as being the beginning of my journey until I sat down to write this blog post this morning...interesting.
Ok, well back to the title of this post.  Like I said, I don't go to church anymore, but my best and dearest friend still attends church with her family.  You will get to know her...she is my blog-partner here and I intend to tag-team with her.  I don't know if she knows that yet or not...I am pretty sure I told her....crap, I better phone her...
Anyway, so my friend goes to church with her family still, (I will let her share her story with you herself) and one recent sunday morning she sends me a text while she is sitting in sunday school.  She says that the leadership is asking for input from the congregation on what the definition of the "gospel" is so that they can share it more often.  You see, this chuch has a problem.  In fact all the churches in this particular confernce have a problem.  Their numbers are down.  Not good.  There are empty spots in the pews, and their growth over-all is stagnant, and after much study they have determined that it is because they are not sharing the gospel properly.  I am not making this up,  I got right off their website.  So "they" have come up with a new plan.  The plan is, let's all make it a concerted and deliberate effort to share the "gospel" with a minimum of one non-believer per month.   Yes We Can! 
And that's pretty much where they hit their next wall.  "Ummm, sir?  Yeah, um, I was just wondering.....what exactly is the gospel that we are supposed to be sharing?  I mean, what exactly is it you want us to tell people?" 
It's OK!  They came up with a solution to that problem.  Last sunday morning, while my friend was sitting in sunday school, they presented the solution.  They are essentially going to vote (I guess).  I believe they called it "asking for input", but this is essentially what they did....they presented two definitions of the "gospel", and want input on which version would be better.  I think that's what my next post will be.  Exactly what are the two versions that were presented.  Until then, I will leave you with this...
"I marvel that you are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of  the Messiah unto another gospel:  Which is not yet another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of the Messiah.  But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.  As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that you have received, let him be accursed." - Galatians 1:6-9

Warning!: this blog might be inflammatory...I hope

What exactly is a bull's-eye?  The dictionary lists it as "the center of a target", or  "to be exactly right or successful".  According to the Strong's Concordance, some of the definitions of sin mean "to miss" or to "go astray".  That makes me think of the archery, or sport shooting idea of "hitting the bulls-eye".  That's where I am aiming...right for the bulls-eye...straight for the center, not to miss or go astray.  So what exactly does that mean?  Wow, I wish it meant that my target was huge!  Like really huge, so it was easy to not miss that beautiful center.  But the path to righteousness is a narrow one (ever played darts?  How about blindfolded?)  That's what I think the church has been doing....it's been blindfolding us. 
Stay tuned...