76 replies to this topic

[placid]

Hi Soloman,

Sorry to be a bit slow in finishing these prophecies, but I will try to conclude it here.
A few more verses on the Branch, Jeremiah 23:
5. “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord,
“That I will raise to David a Branch of righteousness;
A King shall reign and prosper,
And execute judgment and righteousness in the earth.
6 In His days Judah will be saved, And Israel will dwell safely;
Now this is His name by which He will be called:
THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.

Zechariah 3:8. ‘Hear, O Joshua, the high priest,
You and your companions who sit before you,
For they are a wondrous sign;
For behold, I am bringing forth My Servant the BRANCH.

6:12. ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts, saying: “Behold, the Man whose name is the BRANCH!
From His place He shall branch out, And He shall build the temple of the Lord;
13 Yes, He shall build the temple of the Lord. He shall bear the glory,
And shall sit and rule on His throne; So He shall be a priest on His throne,
And the counsel of peace shall be between them both.”’
--- This refers to the building of the Spiritual Temple of the Lord.

--- And the counsel ‘between them both’ refers to the two offices of Priest and King.
--- He shall sit as a Priest upon His Throne, (where He sits as King).
This will be when Jesus returns to restore ‘Peace’ to the earth.

In Malachi 4, the reference to Elijah is fulfilled in John the Baptist:
5. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet
Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
6 And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,
And the hearts of the children to their fathers,
Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.”

--- Fulfilled in Luke 1:13. But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zacharias, for your prayer is heard; and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John.
14 And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth.
15 For he will be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor strong drink. He will also be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb.
16 And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God.
17 He will also go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, ‘to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,’ and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”

And now for the ‘transition’ from Malachi 3:
1 “Behold, I send My messenger,
And he will prepare the way before Me.
And the Lord, whom you seek,
Will suddenly come to His temple,
Even the Messenger of the covenant,
In whom you delight.
Behold, He is coming,”
Says the Lord of hosts.

Now to read it this way:
“Behold, I (the Lord of hosts) send My messenger (small m on messenger, meaning John the Baptist),
And he will prepare the way before Me (the Lord of hosts).
And the Lord, whom you seek (the Messiah whom the Jews were seeking),
Will suddenly come to His (God’s) temple,
Even the Messenger of the covenant (With a Capital M, the Messenger, Jesus),
In whom you (will) delight (with restoration to peace and joy which was promised).
Behold He (the new Messenger), is coming,”  
Says the Lord of hosts.

--- Notice, the Lord of hosts said “He (John) will prepare the way before Me.”
Now the Lord of hosts says “He is coming” referring to Jesus.
--- So John was preparing the way before Him

--- And this is the transition in John 1:
14. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

As I said before, the Word (Logos) was ‘the Lord of hosts’ through much of the OT. Now the change is made to the Word (Logos) being ‘clothed’ in a body of 'flesh,' in the Person of Jesus.
--- The name, ‘the Lord of hosts,’ is not mentioned in the NT, --- replaced by, the Lord Jesus, the Christ.


Placid

[placid]

And in conclusion:

It says In John 1:1. “In the beginning was the Word (Logos) and the Word was with God and the Word was God. (The Word manifested God in the world, --- first in the creative process, then through various appearances, then as the Voice of God in the Lord of hosts. --- and now, the Word [Logos] is manifested in the Person of Jesus.)
2. He (the Word) was in the beginning with God
3 All things were made through Him (the Word).

--- (Here is the error of the man-made ‘trinity’ doctrine. --- They try to place Jesus in the beginning with God, as though Jesus was the Word. --- Where it says ‘all things were made through Him,’ the doctrine indicates that it was ‘through Jesus,’ as though He was the Creator.)

Again in the Prophecies of Isaiah 48, --- it is the Lord of hosts who is speaking:
12. “Listen to Me, O Jacob, And Israel, My called:
I am He, I am the First, I am also the Last.
13 Indeed My hand has laid the foundation of the earth,
And My right hand has stretched out the heavens;

And concerning His coming to earth, as the Word, He says:
16. “Come near to Me, hear this:
I have not spoken in secret from the beginning;
From the time that it was, I was there.
And now the Lord God and His Spirit
Have sent Me.”
--- (So the Lord God, and His Spirit sent the Word, who was at that time, the Lord of hosts.)

And another Scripture in Hebrews 10 adds this:
5. “Sacrifice and offering You did not desire,
But a body You have prepared for Me.
6 In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin
You had no pleasure.
7 Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come—
In the volume of the book it is written of Me—
To do Your will, O God.’”

To go back to John 1, it says this:
14. “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
17 For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

The first law of Love was reinstated, Deuteronomy 6:
4. “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one!
5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength.
6 “And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart.
--- And as Jesus responded to the lawyer in Matthew 22:
37 Jesus said to him, “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

--- And the Ten  Commandments, ‘the criterion of right and wrong,’ were re-emphasized in Matthew 5, 6, and 7.
--- But the Levitical and sacrificial laws were set aside.

--- Notice what Jesus said in Matthew 11:
11 “Assuredly, I say to you, among those born of women there has not risen one greater than John the Baptist;
13 For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John.
14 And if you are willing to receive it, he is Elijah who is to come. (Malachi 4:5)
15 He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

Or, as Jesus said in Luke 16:
16 “The law and the prophets were until John. Since that time the kingdom of God has been preached, and everyone is pressing into it.”

John the Baptist was the last Old Testament Prophet, and was part of the transition from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant, where God would put His Laws in their hearts and minds through His Holy Spirit.
--- So Jesus brought in the New Covenant with the preaching of the Kingdom of God, being within the believer.

--- As Jesus said in Luke 17:
20 Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation;
21 nor will they say, ‘See here!’ or ‘See there!’ For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you.”

Even the calendar was changed, and started over with the New Covenant, --- and on Legal documents they often write the date, and add, “In the year of our Lord.”

So in response to the verse you mentioned in Isaiah 48:
11. “How can I let myself be defamed? --- (Which was happening in Malachi)
--- God’s honor was restored in the New Covenant.


Placid