Messianic Perspectives

Guest (Female): We often hear prophetic teaching about God's plan for end times, but did you know Satan also has a plan? Stay tuned as Dr. Gary Hedrick discusses Satan's plan for the end times right here on Messianic Perspectives.

Liz Aiello: Shalom and welcome to Messianic Perspectives, a daily program where we look into the scriptures from a distinctive first-century Jewish point of view. This is Liz Aiello. Today, our Bible teacher is Dr. Gary Hedrick, president of CJF Ministries in San Antonio, Texas. You can reach our offices by dialing 1-800-926-5397.

Gary's subject today is Satan's plan for the end times. I'll be back a little later with information about a special offer, so have your pencil and paper ready. And now, with today's installment, here is Gary Hedrick.

Dr. Gary Hedrick: All right, thank you. And welcome chaverim, welcome friends, to another edition of Messianic Perspectives. It's good to have you with us today because today we're starting a brand new series of studies with a rather unusual title, Satan's Plan for the End Times. And I know that sounds strange because we're not used to hearing about Satan's plan for the future.

We usually hear preaching and teaching about God's plan for the future, God's plan for the end times. And that's good because we need to know about God's plan for the future. That's one of the problems we have in our churches today, as a matter of fact. There's not enough teaching and preaching about prophecy and doctrine.

In fact, in some circles, doctrine is almost like the D-word because it's not fashionable. It's not something that people want to hear. Instead of good old-fashioned down-to-earth Bible study like we used to have on Sunday nights and Wednesday nights in our churches, now we have focus groups and care groups and support groups and 12-step groups and Red Cross blood drives and who knows what else.

And don't get me wrong, I'm not against some of those things. I'm not against fellowship, for example. There's a place for social development in the body of Messiah. The New Testament calls it koinonia. Koinonia is the fellowship we have with God and the fellowship we have with each other as believers. Vertically and horizontally, it's the same word, koinonia.

It literally means commonness. It's what we share with God and what we share with each other. A common purpose, common priorities, common likes and dislikes, common concerns, a common bond, if you will. In the koinonia of the saints, we become so intertwined with each other and with the Lord that we become one. One with Him and one with each other.

Our identities become so intertwined. If something happens to you, it affects me just as if it happened to me. And if something happens to me, it affects you just as if it had happened to you. That's horizontally. But the same thing is true vertically. We become so intimately identified with our Lord. If something happens to us, it's just as if it had happened to Him.

Remember in Acts chapter nine when the Lord struck down Saul of Tarsus on the Damascus Road? Remember that story? Saul was a great persecutor of the church or the Messianic community. It says he went to the high priest and asked for authorization to bring Jewish Christians to Jerusalem where they would be tried for blasphemy before the Sanhedrin.

But something happened to Saul one day on that Damascus Road. It says he was struck down by a great light and a voice spoke to him. Do you know what the voice said? It said, "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? Why are you persecuting me?" This was Yeshua the Messiah appearing to Shaul of Tarsus and He said, "Saul, why are you persecuting me?"

You say, Gary, he wasn't persecuting Jesus. He was persecuting the Christians, those Messianic believers. So why did Jesus say he was persecuting Him? And you see, that's exactly the point. That's the koinonia. Our identities become so inextricably intertwined. Whatever happens to you also happens to me.

And whatever happens to me also happens to you. That's horizontally in our relationships with each other. And it's also true in our vertical relationship, our relationship with the Lord. When we are persecuted, He is persecuted. When we hurt, He hurts. When we suffer, He suffers.

That's why when Saul said, "Lord, who are you?" The Lord said, "I am Jesus, the one you are persecuting." You see, even though Saul of Tarsus had never actually seen Yeshua or Jesus because he didn't come on the scene until 25 or 30 years after the Lord was resurrected and after He went back to heaven, even though Saul had never seen the Lord, he was nonetheless persecuting the Lord.

Because when he persecuted those Jewish believers, he was persecuting Jesus. Everything he did to them, he was also doing to Jesus. Everything he said to them, he was also saying to Jesus. You see, that's the Greek word koinonia, the fellowship of the saints. And we need that.

And by the way, there's a corresponding word in Hebrew. It's chaver. It means friend, someone you're bonded to. Chaverut means membership or fellowship. If you're a member of a congregation in Israel, you are a chaver, a member of a kehila, a congregation or a church.

But you know what's interesting about this Hebrew word chaver? In the Hebrew New Testament, which we call the Brit Hadasha, in the Hebrew translation of the Greek New Testament, this word chaver or variations of it is used to express the fellowship we have with each other and with God the Father and with His Son, Yeshua the Messiah.

First John 1:3 says our chaverut, our fellowship, is with the Father and with His Son, Yeshua the Messiah. And he goes on to say that if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have chaverut, we have fellowship, we have koinonia with one another and the blood of Yeshua his Son cleanses us from all sin. First John 1:7.

So this Hebrew word chaver or chaverut, fellowship, is used to describe both our horizontal and vertical relationships. We have fellowship with one another and we also have fellowship with the Lord. In fact, if we had time to go through the whole book of First John, we would find that this word fellowship is used to describe our relationship with the Godhead.

We have fellowship with the Father. We have fellowship with the Son. And we have fellowship with the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit. That's what we call tri-unity, the fact that the Godhead exists as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But here's the thing. This is the teaching of the New Testament.

Now, when you go back to the Old Testament, guess what? This word chaver is never used to describe a person's relationship with God. You might say, Gary, what about the fellowship offerings in the book of Leviticus? Ah, yes, that's a very good question. But guess what? It's not the same word for fellowship.

In Leviticus 3:3, the fellowship offering is Zebach Hashlamim and the word shalem is not the same as the word chaver. Shalem has the idea of reconciliation. God and man were separated but now we've been brought together by an offering. That's shalem. It's where we get the word shalom, which means peace or wholeness.

It's like something that was unfinished, but now it is complete. Now it is whole. That's the word shalem. But the word chaver means friend. It means there's a bond. It's not just shalem. It's not just two parties being brought together by an offering. Chaver has the idea of a bond or an intimate communion.

There's an intertwining of identities in such a way that it's difficult to tell where one person ends and the other one begins because whatever hurts one also hurts the other. Whatever affects one also affects the other. So I am not opposed to fellowship. Fellowship is a very, very important thing in the body of Messiah.

We need it. And I'm not just talking about potlucks and parties in the church basement. That can be very superficial. True fellowship means believers coming together in a way that bonds them together in a common purpose. It means you would die for your brother or your sister if the need ever arose.

And it could happen in this country, my friend, one of these days when persecution breaks out and believers will be called on to lay down their lives, and sometimes to lay down our lives for one another. So yes, fellowship is important. But do you know what is just as important as our koinonia?

The preaching and teaching of God's word. And that's where we see a great famine in the church in our generation. Instead of preaching and teaching God's word, we've got sharing time and testimonies and singing and announcements. There's a place for all of those things, but they can never take the place of the proclamation of God's holy word.

They will never compensate for a lack of Spirit-filled, Spirit-led, Spirit-empowered preaching and teaching. Now, does that mean I have to huff and puff and holler and jump up and down when I get up to preach? Not necessarily. Some of the most powerful preachers I know are men who are soft-spoken.

They said Jonathan Edwards, the great Puritan preacher, spoke in a monotone and read from a manuscript when he preached. But he was so anointed with the Spirit of God when he preached his sermon on Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, there were grown men in the congregation who threw their arms around the wooden columns in the sanctuary and held on because they didn't want to slip into the fires of hell.

And Jonathan Edwards was reading from a manuscript in a monotone, but the power was there. So it's good that we still have churches that are preaching and teaching God's word. And it's good that we know something about God's plan for the future. But Satan also has a plan for the end times and that's what we're going to be talking about for the next few days here on Messianic Perspectives.

Well, that's all of our time. We'll pick it up here on the next program. Until then, this is your friend, your chaver, Gary Hedrick, on behalf of all of us here at the Christian Jew Foundation saying, God bless you. Take care. Bye-bye.

Liz Aiello: Thank you, Gary. And thank you, listener friend, for tuning in today. Today, we've been listening to our Bible teacher, Dr. Gary Hedrick, talking about Satan's plan for the end times. If you found today's program especially helpful and insightful, you'll be glad to know that we have placed the entire series of programs on compact disc.

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