Wilderness camping, little wandering

(new article tomorrow)

Bible skeptics like to ask, "How could you get lost in the Sinai Peninsula for 40 years?!"

“Folks, they weren’t lost in the wilderness," explains Richard Jordan. "The Bible doesn’t say that. I mean, a guy in a wheelchair could have found his way out in 40 years!

“I talked to a military guy who drove a Humvee in Desert Storm and got lost in the desert out there. He said, ‘We were out in the middle of nowhere, didn’t know where we were. We were in Iraq, but we were lost.’ I asked, ‘What’d you do?’ He said, ‘We took a compass, found south and went head for it!’ Well, at least he knew he was going in the right direction.

“The Israelites weren’t lost; they wandered. If fact, they didn’t do a whole lot of wandering. They camped. The Shekinah glory of God would move and they’d get up and move, and then it would sit and they’d sit, and they didn’t even wander a whole lot in the sense of moving their encampment. They just were there.

“The wilderness identified and shook out the unbeliever and left the Believers to go into the land. That’s exactly what’s going to happen in the tribulation. That’s exactly the purpose of the tribulation period.

“Ezekiel 20: ‘Son of man, speak unto the elders of Israel, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Are ye come to inquire of me? As I live, saith the Lord GOD, I will not be inquired of by you.

[4] Wilt thou judge them, son of man, wilt thou judge them? cause them to know the abominations of their fathers:
[5] And say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; In the day when I chose Israel, and lifted up mine hand unto the seed of the house of Jacob, and made myself known unto them in the land of Egypt, when I lifted up mine hand unto them, saying, I am the LORD your God;
[6] In the day that I lifted up mine hand unto them, to bring them forth of the land of Egypt into a land that I had espied for them, flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all lands.’

“That’s just like Hosea 2:14 (‘Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her’) and following.

"God's saying, ‘I’m gonna take you out into the wilderness and I’m going to plead with you directly, face to face, like as I pled with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt.'

“How many times have I said to you Exodus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, etc., are all a picture and dress rehearsal for what’s coming out over here.

“Ezekiel 20: 37-38 reads: ‘And I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant: [38] And I will purge out from among you the rebels, and them that transgress against me: I will bring them forth out of the country where they sojourn, and they shall not enter into the land of Israel: and ye shall know that I am the LORD.’

“Folks, He’s going to judge the nation Israel in the wilderness and purge out the rebel. The whole purpose of the Tribulation is judgment on Israel; to cause the unbelievers, those who don’t receive the love of the truth, to be damned by sending them a lie and strong delusion so they follow the Antichrist, because they believed the lie and received not the love of the truth."

*****

“You know, people have to be born, they have to grow up, and they have to come to faith in Christ and so on and so forth. The program has to be brought about, and if you begin to think about and understand that, then you begin to understand something about why all of this enduring and the pressing toward the end, and enduring to the end, and the whole thing is about inheriting the promises God gave them for when Christ comes back and sets up His kingdom.

“The whole issue in Hebrews is, ‘Look, Christ is going to come back and the kingdom’s going to be established. and the people in Israel who endure all the way over there to it, and have faith and patience to inherit the promises, are going to get them, and the ones who fall by the wayside aren’t going to get it.'

“With Hebrews 6, people take that concept and apply it to you and me today, and what happens is you get all balled up, see? The passage is a warning to Israel in the tribulation period when they are in their ‘low-am-I’ state. That’s Hosea 1:9: ‘Then said God, Call his name Lo-ammi: for ye are not my people, and I will not be your God.’ That’s when they’re in this cut-off condition in apostasy.

“God is taking them who are not His people and forming them back into His people, but there’s a mixed multitude in their midst, and this mixed multitude is, when He addresses them--it’s the same illustration we saw in Hebrews 3-4 about Israel in the wilderness with the mixed multitude in their midst.

Hebrews 3: [14] For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end;

[15] While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation.
[16] For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses.
[17] But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness?
[18] And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not?
[19] So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

“In Hebrews 6:1 the message is, [1] Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God,

"The message is, ‘Look, we can’t just stand in what we had; we have to go on into the blessings Christ has provided for us through His Melchizedekian priesthood. We have to move on into the provisions He’s made for us in the new covenant.’

“He warns them in verses 4-5 about not doing that:[4] For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,[5] And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,

"The issue is, ‘Guys, this is THE opportunity and there aren’t any others. You let this slip by and it’s just 'Katie bar the door'—it’s over with and there isn’t anything else left to do.’ ”