Mike,

As always, it’s great to share with you… appreciate the feedback. It’s an interesting process God has set forth.
He first calls us; gives us a testimony (change in character, behavior, attitude, etc.) with our idols of our heart getting deeper and deeper roots we begin to witness to the non- church world with our testimony and encouraging words of what Christ has done in our lives and what He can do in theirs. A few become ‘believers’ and are called, THEN after many years of service and wonderful experiences in ‘the church’, when we least expect it He calls us out of the called church and gives us another testimony and shows us the sin and errors of our ways (spiritually), and opens our eyes, strengthens us and we begin to get to know the True Word and Who He really is and what He really has said in sum. Then He commands us to be a witness for Him with the ‘believers’ who were right where we were, though we cease ‘trying’ to do so much, but rather wait and rest in Him to do it as He brings the opportunities to witness to us So our works are truly in Him.
Yet it seems much more difficult to be a witness to your ‘brothers’ who believe wrongly like you than it does to be a witness to the non- church world.

Blessings,
M____

Hi M____,

That is a very good summary of the plan of salvation. Being in Babylon is being “under the law.” And being ‘under the law’ is how we are brought to Christ.

Gal 3:24 Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.

So while we experience deliverance from Egypt, and we even gain mastery over the giants who have ruled the land for so long, we still have to acknowledge that we must be, and have been, carried away into Babylon, and have served the king of Babylon, and we must acknowledge that we must, and have partaken of God’s wrath on our ungoldly ways. If we are given to acknowledge this truth, and we do not try to avoid God’s wrath by either a “place of safety” or a “secret rapture,” then we will “come out of her,” be the firstfruit figs God speaks of in Jer 24. As these “figs that are first ripe,” we will acknowledge that we have indeed been “children of wrath even as others.” If we cannot see what you have outlined in this letter, then we are the “evil figs” which cannot be eaten and who proclaim that they will not partake of the cup of God’s wrath:

Jer 24:1 The LORD shewed me, and, behold, two baskets of figs [ were] set before the temple of the LORD, after that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the carpenters and smiths, from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon.
Jer 24:2 One basket [ had] very good figs, even like the figs that are first ripe: and the other basket had very naughty figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad.
Jer 24:3 Then said the LORD unto me, What seest thou, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs; the good figs, very good; and the evil, very evil, that cannot be eaten, they are so evil.
Jer 24:4 Again the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
Jer 24:5 Thus saith the LORD, the God of Israel; Like these good figs, so will I acknowledge them that are carried away captive of Judah, whom I have sent out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans for their good.
Jer 24:6 For I will set mine eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land: and I will build them, and not pull [ them] down; and I will plant them, and not pluck [ them] up.
Jer 24:7 And I will give them an heart to know me, that I [ am] the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.

Look at that. Being sent into Babylon is “for our good.” The next chapter tells us why this is so. It is because it is there in Babylon that we partake of the cup of God’s wrath, and “no man can enter into the temple until the seven vials of the seven angels is fulfilled” within “every son who the Lord receives.”

Rev 15:8 And the temple was filled with smoke from the glory of God, and from his power; and no man was able to enter into the temple, till the seven plagues of the seven angels were fulfilled.
Jer 25:28 And it shall be, if they refuse to take the cup at thine hand to drink, then shalt thou say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Ye shall certainly drink.
Jer 25:29 For, lo, I begin to bring evil on the city which is called by my name, and should ye be utterly unpunished? Ye shall not be unpunished: for I will call for a sword upon all the inhabitants of the earth, saith the LORD of hosts.

God is not an abusive Father as some seem to think. It is “all working together… for our good” as any loving father knows:

Heb 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Heb 12:7 If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?

But the truth is that we are all “vile figs” and “children of wrath” before we become the firstfruit figs which must also drink of the cup of God’s wrath, and that is what is so hard to witness to others. The words “evil figs” proceeded out of the mouth of God, just as surely as did the words “good figs.”

Mat 4:4 But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

So we are all children of wrath, even as others, we are all children of disobedience before we become the sons of God.

Eph 2:2 Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this worl d, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:
Eph 2:3 Among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

We have no record of the apostle Paul “fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind” other than “breathing out slaughter” against the body of Christ, and yet he acknowledges that all that is in Adam is in his own flesh and as such he himself has been a child of wrath.

Rom 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but [ how] to perform that which is good I find not.

The concept that it is “God who is working all things… even the wicked for the day of evil,” is a completely foreign concept to the Babylonian world, out of which we must come.
Yes, indeed, it is harder to be a witness to that than it is to be a witness to the goodness of God.

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.
Pro 16:4 The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

Eph 1:11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

Your brother in Christ,
Mike