Voice of the Kingfisher speaks out …from a different perspective
by Elinor Montgomery
Rick Warren Plays Footsy with the Candidates
August 18, 2008
Once Israel was given over to King Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylonian Empire, the nation never again was able to separate the leaven of religion from her borders. Within that short time-frame, from Israel’s exile in Babylon to the advent of Jesus, the nation had become so completely engulfed in Judaism that she no longer resembled the nation called out by the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
The Israel of Jesus’ day was a religious Israel. It was resting on the idols, which the first commandment of the Law had forbidden them to worship. Her priesthood, the Pharisees, could not be called sons of God; they were exactly what Jesus called them – the sons of their father, the devil.
The leaven of religion had grown to fill the entire loaf of Israel. Another exodus was right at hand, and Jesus would be the Leader of it, just as Moses had led the Hebrew children out of Egypt. It would now be time to take spiritual Israel, the church, out of Judaism. It would require His partner and His voice to become His witnesses to the truth before the antichrist spirit, which would fill the entire world when the time of the gentiles comes to its fullness within a one-world-order of religion.
At Creation, God said, “Let there be light”, and the darkness was separated from the light, and the sea waters from the dry land. In point of fact, a religious-free zone was established in the truth, under the ruler-ship of God. Only obedience to the truth would keep it free of the leaven that would destroy the entire creation, and separate it again from God in the darkness, which the light had originally expelled.
The minute man opened the door to the belief system by rejecting the truth in his life, death took over from life, and the sin of man, being disobedience to God, immediately turned him into a slave who was captive to death. Darkness settled in over the earth once again, as Satan took over ruler-ship, to become the prince of this world, a prince who would never survive his own downfall in pride to become a king.
Liberty, in obedience to the truth, immediately gave way to liberalism from God in a faith-based religious society. Religion always leads to tolerance and faith-based thinking, which declares it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you believe. Truth, on the other hand leads to the Word of God, principles, and a firm stand, which is based on Jesus, and is intolerant of any statement that would suggest there is another way to God. Such are the statements of multiculturalism, which is nothing more than a gathering together of the religious cults.
In the slavery of Israel in Egypt, God allowed Israel to discover what it meant to serve the men of the world instead of serving Him. After all, God was the King of this world in the original government of Creation, ruling over men, instead of men ruling over men. Man was called to tend the earth and have dominion over the creatures of the animal world, but men were God’s domain, ruled in truth by a God Who required obedience to His commandments. Man’s life would depend upon utter and total obedience to the truth.
Once Israel had grown, fully understanding what it meant to be a slave to the religious world of man-made gods and man-made rulers, God was ready to separate His chosen nation unto Himself. It was time for her to fulfill her part in the covenant of Abraham with God by which she was required to be a light to the rest of the nations of the world.
The nation of Israel was called to reveal the glory of God through obedience to Him and the victory, power and benevolence that come with such a privileged position. She was to be the only nation to have liberty in the Law of God, after having miraculously been taken out of captivity under the world government of Egypt, ruled by Satan, the prince of this world.
Now the key message of the exodus of the Hebrew children from Egypt came loudly and clearly from God to them. The only way they could keep the curse of death away, which was about to come upon the first-born Egyptian children, would be by the placing of the blood of the sacrificial lamb on the two doorposts and lintels of their dwelling places.
If God could not see this sign, then death would also fall upon the first-born of the Hebrew children, who eventually would have to have the sign of the blood of Jesus upon the doorway to their lives, just like all of the other peoples of the world. At this point Israel would have to choose to cross through the cross to come out of the world and into the liberty of the house of Israel, or go down with the wicked nations of this world.
No privilege would be extended to the Hebrew children simply because God had chosen them to be the pattern for the rest of the world. Their choosing could be either a blessing or a cursing depending on the choices they would make. They were subject to the lures of Satan like everyone else.
They were to eat the flesh of the lamb, along with bitter herbs and unleavened bread. Unleavened bread represents truth and the bread of life, which is presently our Bible that is unmarred by religion. This became known as the Lord’s Passover, for it meant the angel of death would pass over the children of Israel as those of Egypt would die in the judgment that their leader Pharaoh (a type of Satan) had brought upon them.
God was going to execute judgment upon the idolatrous religious gods of Egypt, as well; for He was the God of truth. The plague of Egypt would not be on the children of Israel when death would strike, if the Passover were kept according to the exact or fundamental word of God.
At the same time as the Feast of Passover, God initiated the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread, during which time the Hebrew children were not allowed to touch any leavened bread. This points to the food of truth being compromised by religion. God will not tolerate such compromise throughout the entire seven millennia of man’s history. In Exodus 12:1-20, the Lord denounces leaven ten times, in the same manner as He warned against the leaven of the religious men called the Pharisees.
Jesus prepared His church for a second exodus, whereby she would come out of her religious slavery to the Judaism of the Pharisees. They thought they were serving God, but Jesus told them in no uncertain terms that, as sons of the devil, they served the beast, not God. Leaven was at the source of their problem.
While feeding bread, multiplied for the multitudes, Jesus explained to His disciples about the large baskets of crumbs left over. They symbolized the foods that are not to be used for sustenance, which were the religious doctrines (leaven) of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Today, Jesus would be asking His church, as He asked the disciples, in words such as these: “How is it you do not understand I do not speak to you concerning bread, but you should beware of the doctrines of the religious priesthood of your mega-church religious systems (see Matthew 16:8-12)?”
What a sham it all was, with the cutesy, smiley, best-selling author, priest of the mega-church and promoter of the “purpose-driven” life ministry, all of which would fit perfectly into the Crystal Cathedral, playing moderator to political hopefuls! When did Rick Warren ever ask the two presidential candidates the really penetrating questions, which would show he meant business about keeping America a nation under God?
Did he ever dare to ask them, point-blank, whether or not they were willing to return the Bible to its rightful place as the Book of truth over the courts and the nation, and stop treating it as if it were just another religious book? When the Bible rules, what does it matter what men believe?
Me thinks he cannot go there and maintain his mega people-pleasing church at the same time. Me thinks he might lose his place as popular interviewee on Larry King Live, if he were to really get down to the main issues, which are causing the downfall of the nation. Me thinks that his book sales might drop if he actually declared his position in Jesus Christ and for one moment dropped the importance of being Rick Warren. How in the world would these men manage to deceive the world, if it were not for the fact that they take after their father?
It is not what the candidates know or believe about abortion or when life begins that is going to change this nation. It is about the action they are willing to take with respect to the object of their so-called faith in Jesus Christ and His Word, which could make a difference in changing the nation. None of them risked going there. Too bad, for it just might get them elected!
Well might you ask why Warren was interviewing McCain and Obama and did not include Chuck Baldwin, who is also a candidate for the presidency, a man who truly would stand on the truth of the Bible. I am afraid you would find that he could never hold up his hand to hit the hand of such a man who stands on principle. Did he not hit hands in great chumminess and agreement with Obama, a man dedicated to multiculturalism and a multi-faith nation that does not adhere to the Ten Commandments, or to the absolute truth of God?
Such endorsement was of a man, who bumbled his way through a mass of lack-luster questioning without giving a single clear answer, which might be construed as lining up with the Scriptures of God. Warren is an agent pushing for the leaven-filled unity of religion about which God so warned the Hebrew children and about which Jesus, in turn, warned His apostles. His purpose-driven doctrine has the leaven of the Pharisees written all over it.
Compare the coziness of Warren with political leaders and a liberal media to the principled separation of the former Olympic gold-medalist, Eric Liddell, from all such worldliness. One is a big up-front sham, seeking the honor of men, while the other was like the rock of Gibraltar, seeking only the approval of God. Eric Liddell was a shining star of the heavens, one which Warren would do well to emulate.
Another exodus of the apostolic church is right at hand. There can be no leaven, no leaven, no leaven, or death is waiting at the doorposts of cathedrals and mega-religious church systems, which are known by the name of Christian, but are full of the leaven of religious doctrines and false priesthoods.
The apostle Paul ran the good race, but he came out of the religious system before he ever left the starting line. What kind of a race will you run as an individual and as part of a nation under God? John, the apostle, wrote the words, “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, and lest you receive of her plagues (Revelation 18:4).” He is talking about that great harlot, Babylon, the mother of all harlots and abominations of the earth.
They are the multi-cultic religious belief systems, which war with the truth of God. It is a battle that began when Adam and Eve went over the wall from liberty under God’s ruler-ship into captivity to death under the ruler-ship of Satan.
America is about to go over that wall, and I saw no sign of Rick Warren drawing out this fact, as he played footsy with the presidential candidates. It would seem to me that he would be much better suited to a career in politics, where hypocrisy abounds, rather than trying to squeeze himself into the robes of an ambassador for Jesus Christ, where truth leads to transparency.