The sign; The LORD our righteousness

[jamesonofthunder]

“On Christ’s coronation day He will not acknowledge as His, any who bear spot or wrinkle or any such thing. But to His faithful ones He will give crowns of immortal glory. Those who would not that He should reign over them will see Him surrounded by the army of the redeemed, each of whom bears the sign, "the Lord our righteousness.”-Mrs. E. G. White. {COR 8.2}

But how do you get the sign?

In all of the Hebrew feasts and ceremonies representing the Lord in all His dimensions, there is only one ceremony that included a 'sign' placed over the entrance to the temporary dwelling, or booth they had to move into 'outside of the camp' if they touched a human corpse.

It was in the Red Heifer cleansing ceremony, which you had to endure if you were ceremonial unclean, that after the seven day cleansing they put a sign over the door of their tent, aiming towards heaven that read "I am not my own, Lord I am thine". (To the Lord our Righteousness)

Every couple of hundred years, or as a sign from God that the temple could be rebuilt an all red heifer would be born, a miracle birth in that not one hair would be any other color but red.

They used the ashes of the miracle birth Red Heifer to mix with pure water and sprinkle the temporary dwelling of the unclean and all of the immediate family and all their belongings for seven days, with special emphasis on the third and seventh days. The ashes of one Red Heifer sacrifice could be made to last a thousand years, one pinch at a time, mixed with copious amounts of living (running) water.

The Jewish people became averse to this forced exile every time they touched a dead body. They didn't want to do any of the necessary work, and to avoid the banishment from ceremony, they would walk around someone in need to avoid the resulting banishment. And this is the point of the parable of the "good Samaritan".

Many Judeao-Christians believe that a Red Heifer must be born so they can rebuild the temple, which Mrs White said would never be rebuilt.

Listen to what Mrs White said about this important ceremony...

“Some may look upon this slaying of the (Red) heifer as a meaningless ceremony, but it was done by the command of God and bears a deep significance that has not lost its application to the present time.” {4T 122.1}

If this ceremony is so important then why do we never hear sermons on this with any authority in how it was fulfilled or it's symbolic relevance?

“a sign was put over your families tent which read ‘I am not my own, Lord I am thine’ {RH, January 9, 1883 par. 9}”. How perfect to illustrate that the Red Heifer cleansing has to be part of the sealing. As in the Red Heifer cleansing service, a sign was applied above the dwelling place of the cleansed, we need to receive the seal of God in our foreheads—“it is not any seal or mark that can be seen, but a settling into the truth, both intellectually and spiritually, so we cannot be moved.” {Mar 200.1}

This is the sign, this is when the Lords Righteousness is indelibly connected to our cases. The cleansing of the Red Heifer service allowed the unclean to become clean so they could enter into the gates of Jerusalem again and take part in the Atonement. Imagine how important this was.

http://redheifersbloodysweat.blogspot.com/2011/12/red-heifer.html

[jamesonofthunder]

“We have an altar… outside the camp”

Hebrews 13:10-13 “We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat. The high priest carries the blood… into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore.”

The Miphkad altar on the Mount Olives, (see illustration) was the only Altar outside the “gate” of Jerusalem used for any part of the temple service. Not only is it where the Red Heifer was sacrificed, it was where the body of the 'goat for the Lord' in the atonement, and all unburned sacrifices was burned. The ashes of the sacrifices that were burned at the brazen altar in the court of the temple, were thrown off the bridge into the valley of the bones.

This altar is also on the same spot as the gate to the Garden of Gethsemane, which is just down the hill from the altar. When the priest flung the blood of the Red Heifer in the direction of the temple seven times, (see also; atonement) the blood would land on Gethsemane, just as Jesus’ blood landed there that night. The Jewish record also states that this sacrifice only occurred SEVEN times in the history of Israel, the last time being in 70AD just before the Romans destroyed both Jerusalem and the Bridge of the Red Heifer. This can’t be coincidence. The priest flung the blood seven times towards the temple, equivocally their were seven times that the sacrifice took place!

But the last time the Red Heifer was sacrificed in 70 AD didn’t count, because the seventh was literally Jesus in the Garden 39 years earlier in 31 AD. He was the seventh and perfect Red Heifer sacrifice.

When the priests continued the sacrificial system after the veil was torn, the last straw was that mock Red Heifer sacrifice. God put an end to the whole system by letting Rome horribly destroy them days later.

“Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore.” This is what I experienced. I met with Jesus in the Garden to witness what the disciples slumbered or slept through. I witnessed my sins being transferred to the mind of Christ and His righteousness transferred to me. I experienced the Propitiation. Then He took my sins to the cross to die with them. We get sprinkled all along the path of the Red Heifer.

Why would Paul say to "go to Him outside the camp and bear His disgrace" after He had already ascended to heaven? It's not literally to earthly Gethsemane that we go to be cleansed, it is imagining the hell Jesus went through that cleanses us.

"At the altar of self-sacrifice, the appointed place of meeting between God and the soul, we receive from the hand of God the celestial torch which searches the heart, revealing the need of an abiding Christ". {Review and Herald, Jan. 31, 1907}. The Miphkad Altar, is His ‘altar of self sacrifice’, where Jesus took our sins on Himself. He became sin, by entering into our hearts in the Garden.

“…Separation from His Father, the punishment for transgression and sin, was to fall upon Him in order to magnify God's law and testify to its immutability. And this was to settle forever the controversy between the Prince of God and Satan in regard to the changeless character of that law”.

EGW (2nd death)

[jamesonofthunder]

The term 'sign' is also used by Jesus for a warning against the "wicked and adulterous generation" of the last days.

He said, that generation would ask for a sign, and no sign would be given them except the sign of Jonah, who was three days and nights in the belly of the great fish. Jesus said that the son of man will be in the "heart of the earth for three days and nights" and this would be the sign to the wicked and adulterous generation.

This is where to look for 'the Sign; the Lord our righteousness'.

The ‘Sign of Jonah’ mystery explained!

“For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”-Matthew 12:40.

With all of the controversy circling the interpretation of Matthew 12, it would be appropriate that we first see what the founders of our faith believed on this subject to discern the truth about Matthew 12, James White said;

“The ‘earth’ in this case must mean the powers of earth, or the power and control of wicked men, and the Devil… Thus, Jesus was in the heart of the earth, or controlled and held by the powers of earth and hell, from the time that he was betrayed into the hands of sinners, until he arose from the dead, in triumph and victory. Jesus was as much in the heart of the earth when before Pilate, and on the cross, as he was while in Joseph’s tomb. With this view, all the Scripture testimony will harmonize.” {PTJW December, 1849, Art. 5, p. 39.5}

In my vision, I could see Jesus willingly accept my sins and they were what were causing His shame. So innocent, He was being pressed by immense pressure, like Jonah in the belly of the great fish at the bottom of the deepest ocean, and I was permitted to view this. The pressure was so immense, that it forced “great drops of blood falling down to the ground.” (Luke 22:44)

The evening of His last supper, when He left the Eastern Gate and crossed the Brook Kidron, begins the three days and three nights ‘sign of Jonah’. This view gives a more perfect comprehension of the spiritual and physical death that Jesus suffered. Only when counting the days from the time Jesus entered the Garden on Thursday evening, does it come fully to three days and three nights. Perfectly fulfilled, this is the true understanding of the sign of Jonah. It is a sign that would be rediscovered in the last days, showing the people who discover it and the world, it is from God.

Thursday Evening (Last supper/ Gethsemane) ~ Friday Morning; the first day

Friday Evening (The Cross) ~ Saturday Morning; the Second day

Saturday Evening (the tomb) ~ Sunday Morning; the third day

When I later heard a sermon and learned that the name ‘Jonah’ means ‘Dove’, the Spirit of remembrance led my mind immediately to the Great Controversy, where it is said that in the Garden of Gethsemane, after the Messiah’s hour of torment, after the angel strengthened Him, “a dove-like form overshadowed Him.” {DA 694.5} Just as it did at his baptism of water in the Jordan! I knew God had proven to me this great truth, Jesus had His baptism of fire (blood) in the Garden of Gethsemane, and this begins the 3 days and nights sign of Jonah.

[jamesonofthunder]

Brother your response is confusing, in one post you say you "can't agree with me more", then without me responding you changed your tune and tell me I have left scripture behind, so which one of you is right?

Have you heard of inclusive reckoning?

The majority of people in our faith believe that Jesus was "IN THE GRAVE" three days and three nights, but they 'reckon' it this way.

They say Because He physically died on Friday evening just before sundown, this counts as a whole day in the Hebrew intellect. Then He was in the grave Saturday and resurrected the moment the sun rose, the beginning of Sunday.

This is called 'inclusive reckoning' by our denomination and although our prophet never mentions this theory it has become the predominant way of explaining the three days and three nights sign of Jonah by our brethren.

I believe God has held this information to be fully re-discovered by our people in the last days.

James White believed exactly as I have presented this message, and I did not discover his writing on this subject until years after God showed it to me.

If you want to take me on in this, then you will have to take issue with James White also, who wrote these words...

“For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”-Matthew 12:40... The ‘earth’ in this case must mean the powers of earth, or the power and control of wicked men, and the Devil… Thus, Jesus was in the heart of the earth, or controlled and held by the powers of earth and hell, from the time that he was betrayed into the hands of sinners, until he arose from the dead, in triumph and victory. Jesus was as much in the heart of the earth when before Pilate, and on the cross, as he was while in Joseph’s tomb. With this view, all the Scripture testimony will harmonize.” {PTJW December, 1849, Art. 5, p. 39.5}

Now think about this please.

The moment Jesus died on the cross the high priest was offering the 'daily sacrifice' on the altar in the court of the temple, and an earthquake shook the ground and the lamb escaped correct? Many people have said this is proof that Friday was the Passover and Jesus was keeping a different Passover than the priests but this is not so.

The 'daily' sacrifice was made at 'even' or 3 PM every single day in the court. This is the sacrifice that was being made when Jesus died on the cross, not the Paschal Lamb which was sacrificed the night before, after sundown, when the Passover began.

Jesus had told the disciples to prepare the Passover the night before, on Thursday evening. To know why he did this, we have to go to the original Passover in Egypt.

The pass over Lamb in Egypt was killed between the door posts "between the evenings" {Exodus 12:6} after sundown at 6 PM, and the meal was hastily prepared. Then the angel of death 'passed over' at midnight and all of the first born sons died who were not covered by the blood of the lamb. Then at day break they all the Hebrews and their sympathizers left Egypt. Then three days after the angel "passed over", in the morning the Hebrews came through the red Sea, the other side being symbolic of the resurrection of Jesus.

Jesus celebrated the Passover on Thursday evening at 6 PM, after sundown, He was the Passover lamb. Then He left the upper room saying "now is the hour of the power of darkness" while all of the Paschal Lambs were being sacrificed for Israel in the court of the temple 'between the evenings'. The blood of all those sacrifices flowed into the Brook Kidron which Jesus crossed to get Gethsemane.

Then at midnight the angel of death Passed over Jesus in Gethsemane!

In the ceremonial law evening was the beginning of the next day. So after sundown on Thursday was the beginning of the ceremonial Passover.

Jesus was in the Garden suffering the second death for every man while the angel of death passed over him Thursday at midnight. This begins the three days and nights sign of Jonah.

Now if you include inclusive reckoning, you can see the importance of the 3 days and three nights statement of Jesus.

Why would Jesus be so specific when He said "Three days and three nights" not just three days, which could be interpreted like Seventh Day Adventists have been presenting it for years through inclusive reckoning. But Jesus was specific and included the 'watches' days and nights. So the sign that we are looking for must touch three days and nights inclusively.

Thursday evening Jesus ate the Passover with the disciples, but He was the lamb. Symbolically His blood was applied to the door posts of the upper room when Judas left to go betray Him and Jesus said "now is the power of darkness" and the bible immediately says "and it was night" John 13:30.

After Jesus left the upper room he exited Jerusalem through the eastern gate and entered Gethsemane. At midnight the angel of death passed over while He was cut off from the Father.

Thursday evening till Sunday morning 'includes' Three days and three nights. Perfectly!

Peace Brother and thank you for the kind words. Happy Sabbath.

[jamesonofthunder]

Sorry Brother but I believe you're wrong, because I believe the Karaites are correct in their understanding here.

Between the Evenings - Ben ha arbayim

The phrase "between the evenings" is from the Hebrew ben ha arbayim. It is this phrase that describes the time that the Passover lamb or goat was slaughtered on Abib 14. The exact definition of ben ha arbayim has long been debatable. The goal of this article is to establish a well-defined and scripturally supportable definition of ben ha arbayim.

There are two differing definitions attached to ben ha arbayim. The Pharisees, in accordance with their man-made Talmudic adherence, defined ben ha arbayim as any time from afternoon to sunset. Conversely, the Sadducees, Karaites, and Samaritans, in accordance with the Biblical Torah (law), all interpreted ben ha arbayim as being the time from sunset to complete darkness.

Exodus 12:6 reads, "And you shall keep it [the Passover sacrifice] up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening" (literally, "between the evenings."). The Pharisees interpreted this as meaning between midafternoon, when the sun’s heat abated, and sunset, whereas the Sadducees took it to mean between sunset and dark" (Interpreter’s One Volume Commentary, note at Ex. 12:6).

Another authority says, "In the evening. Hebrew, between the evenings. From very early days opinions have differed as to the exact time of the sacrifice. The Samaritans and the Karaites construed it as the time between sunset and complete darkness. The Pharisees held to the traditional explanation that it was from the beginning of lengthening shadows to sunset, approximately 3:00 to 5:00 p.m., and with this the Talmud agrees" (Wycliffe Bible Commentary, note at Ex. 12:6).

And yet another source explains, "Between the evenings – Different opinions have prevailed among the Jews from a very early date as to the precise time intended. Aben Ezra agrees with the Caraites and Samaritans in taking the first evening to be the time when the sun sinks below the horizon, and the second the time of total darkness; in which case, ‘between the evenings’ would be from 6 o’clock to 7:20…According to the rabbinical idea, the time when the sun began to descend, viz. From 3 to 5 o’clock, was the first evening, and sunset the second; so that ‘between the evenings’ was from 3 to 6 o’clock. Modern expositors have very properly decided in favor of the view held by Aben Ezra and the custom adopted by the Caraites and Samaritans" (Commentary on the Old Testament, The Second Book of Moses). [source; http://www.yrm.org/keeping_passover_proper_time.htm]

We as Adventists used the Karaite calendar to discern the beginning of the Day of Atonement in 1844 and it was supported by the Spirit of Prophecy. What God showed me will be proven correct also.

[jamesonofthunder]

"Even in the Passover chamber, at that solemn hour when their Master was already entering the shadow of Gethsemane, there was “a strife among them, which of them should be accounted the greatest.” Luke 22:24. {GC 348.2}

"The observance of the Passover began with the birth of the Hebrew nation. On the last night of their bondage in Egypt, when there appeared no token of deliverance, God commanded them to prepare for an immediate release. {DA 76.2}

"These types were fulfilled, not only as to the event, but as to the time. On the fourteenth day of the first Jewish month, the very day and month on which for fifteen long centuries the Passover lamb had been slain, Christ, having eaten the Passover with His disciples, instituted that feast which was to commemorate His own death as “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.” That same night He was taken by wicked hands to be crucified and slain. And as the antitype of the wave sheaf our Lord was raised from the dead on the third day, “the first fruits of them that slept,” a sample of all the resurrected just, whose “vile body” shall be changed, and “fashioned like unto His glorious body.” Verse 20; Philippians 3:21. {GC 399.3}

"Before the execution of this sentence the Lord through Moses gave direction to the children of Israel concerning their departure from Egypt and their preservation from the coming judgment. Each family, alone or in connection with others, was to slay a lamb or a kid “without blemish,” and with a bunch of hyssop sprinkle its blood on “the two sideposts and on the upper doorpost” of the house, that the destroying angel at midnight might not enter that dwelling. They were to eat the flesh roasted, with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, at night, as Moses said, “with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord’s passover.” {EP 189.4}

If the paschal lamb was slain before the setting of the sun it would not make sense, since the beginning of the ceremonial day begins at sundown.

[jamesonofthunder]

The point I was trying to make Gerhard is the fact that the Pharisees were the group who misunderstood inspiration more than any other class of people, (said Paul).

The second point is that the Karaites were found to be more accurate in their interpretation of Levitical law. So by the statement quoted I would follow the Karaite comprehension of "between the evenings" before I would ever listen to a pharisee.