Message From The MessengerThe Foundations Are Destroyed
… AND WE SHALL FLY AWAY!

... a Message from the Messenger
Bible 1611.Com / Sluice Box Adventures.com / Old Paths Baptist Mission © 2014

In this message, it is chronicled how our churches and nation has come to its present state.

The men and woman who came to these shores in the centuries before were Bible believing God fearing people.

The “founding father’s" heritage has been lost.

• The Foundations Are Destroyed
• The Foundation Was Established In Government
• The Foundation Established In Education
• The Foundation Established With Real Conversions
• The Foundation Established In Straight-Hitting Evangelism
• The Foundation Established In Religious Tolerance
• The Foundation Established By A Biblical Standard For Marriage
• The Foundation Established For A Struggle
• The Foundations Are Destroyed In The Falling Away!
• After The Falling Away...We Shall Fly Away!

The Falling Away

Several hundred years ago there was an open door set before the true Church "which is his body."

 In the prophetic sense, this was the church of Philadelphia. (See the book of Revelation 1-3.)  Not only are these seven literal churches in Asia, they are also indicative of seven distinct and chronological periods in church history.

The church of Philadelphia had an open door set before it by the Holy Ghost, which no man could shut (1600-1900). "And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write; These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth; I know thy works: behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name." [Revelation 3:7-8]

Never was there seen such a moving of God's Spirit circling the globe of this Earth in a movement from the east to the west. 

Never was there such an exciting and fascinating time!    Never was there so much interest by so many of God's creation concerning the proceedings going on in the world in the hearts and minds of men.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ was literally going to the four quarters of the Earth with a resounding boom!  

Even the Devil, old Satan himself, had more than a passing interest in these proceedings.  Satan's anger over losing the souls of men by the droves to the Son of God during this Philadelphia period had caused him to kick and fuss and work even harder against his old enemy.  His enemy is THE ALMIGHTY GOD of The BOOK (The A.V.1611 Bible).

Remember, the Authorized Version of 1611, or any edition, thereof (1613,1644, 1676, 1680, 1701, 1767) is God's pure word preserved for us today.  Furthermore, the Devil hates the righteous, and loves nothing more than to accuse the saints.

Consider the story of Job!  "There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was perfect and upright, and one that feared God, and eschewed evil. [Job 1:1] Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them. And the LORD said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it" [Job1: 7].

Ever since that tremendous falling out occurred in Heaven (see the text in Ezekiel 28:17 "cast thee to the ground"), Satan has been seeking whom he may devour. "Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about seeking whom he may devour" [I Peter 5:8].

He will even dare to argue with God by contending with one of His Holy Angels over the body of one man!  "Yet Michael the archangel, when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses..." [Jude 9]

Yes, that Old Red Dragon had a vital interest in what was going on during these three hundred years.

 In England, the remnant of the superstitions of Popery (The Roman Catholic Church) was momentarily "forced back" in the years when Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth held sway (1640-1658).

I. The Foundation Was Established ...

The following is a brief account of our heritage as a nation.

In 1620, there came a people to the shores of New England who feared the God of The Bible.  Our forefathers were an English people that fled from the religious persecution that came with the attempt to institute popery (or Roman Catholicism) over the land of England. John Cotton, in his sermon God's Promise to His Plantation (1630), stated this:

"This placeing of people in this or that Countrey is from God's Soveraignty over all the earth, and the inhabitants thereof... Wee may not rush into any place, and never say to God, By your leave; but we must discerne how God appoints us to this place... But how shall I know whether God hath appointed me to such a place; if I be well where I am, what may warrant my removall?" 1   He gives five reasons.

First: "to gain knowledge through exploration." 2

Second: "for merchandize and gainsake." 3

Third: to plant a new colony "as bees doe so when the hive is too full." 4

Fourth: "for using their talents better elsewhere:" 5

Fifth: "for the liberty of the Ordinances"; ...

 "When God wrappes us in his Ordinances, and warms us with the life and power of them as with wings, there is a land of promise." 6

Richard Mather wrote in his journal of his safe arrival in Boston harbor. "His holy name be blest forever ... Ye Lord graunted us as wonderful a deliverance as I thinke ever poeple had, out of as apparent danger as I think ever people felt ... The Lord so imprint ye memory of it on our hearts, yt wee may bee better for it ... Agayne, let our gracious God be blessed forever." 7

Years later, Increase Mather said of his father who he had heard preach many times "that he aimed 'to shoot his arrows not over people’s heads, but into their hearts and Consciences”.  He studiously avoided obscure phrases, exotick words or an unnecessary citation of Latin Sentences, which some men addict themselves to the use of." 8

 

A. The Foundation Established ... In Government

The design of the government foundation of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Bay Colony was primarily by John Cotton (1584-1652), and Richard Mather (1596-1669).

 Their work resulted in "an abstract of the Lawes of New England" in 1636.

 Imagine that, a plan of government produced by "fire and brimstone" preachers of God's Holy Bible. "An Abstract of Lawes and Government", 1641, contained the democratic process, which carried forth with its principles to eventually frame our American Constitution. "While they did not believe that citizenship should be divorced from moral and religious standards, they firmly believed in separating the offices of church and state, and in providing guarantees from both in behalf of personal liberty and the commonwealth." 9

B. The Foundation Established ... In Education

Our first educational system was born out of John Cotton's book: Milk For Babes, Drawn out of The Breasts of both Testaments, 1646, and in its condensed form, became the New England Primer which is how many earlier generations of Americans migrating west learned their ABC's.

The Primer posed questions like this, "What hath God done for you?"  Answer: "God hath made me, he keepeth me, and He can save me."

Hello!  No evolutionists here!  Just straight-shooting Bible-believing folk here!  The New England Primer's influence was felt for nearly three hundred years in America. (The Dallas, Texas, public schools maintained a Bible study curriculum (a credit course) in 1946.)

C. The Foundation Established ... In Religious Tolerance

True New Testament salvation will produce in the heart of men the "fruit of the Spirit."  For example, it was recorded that Richard Mather was "saved by the blood of the Lamb of God" when he was eighteen years old. 

This wasn't just some quick profession of faith made in response to some church altar call.  He got saved! 

Richard Mather experienced true repentance towards God and faith in Jesus Christ. "Testifying both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ" [Acts 20:21].  For him, "The pangs of the new birth were severe while they lasted, but 'the Lord revived his broken heart" 10

Fruit came as a result of the new birth!  Then what is this fruit?  "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law." [Galatians 5:22-23]

Richard Mather said: "As for bitternesse of spirit and tartnesse of contests, I have never thought that to be God’s way of promoting truth amongst brethren ... For those who must live together in the heavens, I know not why they should not love one another on earth, whatever differences or apprehensions may for the present be found amongst them in some things." 11

His son, Increase, relates this of his father: "he was exceeding low and little in his own eyes. Some have thought that his greatest error was that he did not magnifie his office, as he might and sometimes should have done." 12 

The Spirit produced this fruit in Richard Mather (and indeed in many of the inhabitants of early New England).

D. The Foundation Established ... The Conversions Being Real

The following is Increase Mather's (1639-1723) testimony. "During his fifteenth year, he was visited by two misfortunes: an attack of what was diagnosed as kidney stones, and the death of his beloved mother. Shortly thereafter he underwent 'a conspicuous change'. For about three months he was 'in extremity of anguish and horror, and, everyone observed that I was strangely changed. ...I gave myself up to Jesus Christ, declaring that I was now resolved to be his servant, I his only, and his forever." 13

Can you imagine the conglomerate effect of 50,000 saved and washed by the blood, Bible thumping and believing, redeemed men, women and children out of a population of 250,000 people in New England which was the case after THE GREAT AWAKENING of the 1730's and 40's occurred?

The first phase of the Great Awakening started in 1734 with Jonathan Edwards.  He was preaching a series of expositive messages to his people out of the book of I Corinthians chapter 13.  They were powerful and cutting to the cold hearts of the people, and God's Spirit visited with a tremendous outpouring of His Grace and mercy, and souls were saved.  After a few years, the revival fire was lessened in fervor.

Then, in the second phase of "The Awakening", the Holy Ghost again chose to begin His work with Jonathan Edwards.

In Northampton, Massachusetts, in the month of June 1741, Jonathan Edwards preached with no apparent effect to his congregation a message called, Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God.

 However, the next month when he preached the same message, "People 'yelled and shrieked, they rolled in the aisles, they crowded up into the pulpit and begged him to stop.' One observer reported, 'One waited with the deepest and most solemn solicitude to hear the trumpet sound ... And was deeply disappointed when the day terminated and left the world in its usual state of tranquillity." 14

E. The Foundation Established ... In Straight-Hitting Evangelism

George Whitefield, in 1746, delivered "one of his most celebrated speeches.

 It was a conversation with Father Abraham in which Whitefield would bellow to the sky: 'Have you any Congregationalists upon there? any Presbyterians? any Baptists?' After a pause to allow suspense to generate, Whitefield would report that father Abraham had told him, 'We know none of these names up here." 15

F. The Foundation Established ... For A Struggle

Edwards wrote one of the opponents to the awakening, the issue divides "us into two armies, separated and drawn up in battle array, ready to fight with one another, which greatly hinders the work of God." 16   Satan will kick ... fuss ... fight ... to hinder wherever God's work of grace is evident.

G. The Foundation Established ...  By A Biblical Standard For Marriage

"The Puritans took marriage very seriously. Wives were well protected by law, and a man could be punished for using "harsh words" to his wife, while a woman was fined for a "shrewish tongue." The stability of a family was immensely important to the continuity of the new society that had ventured so far across so perilous an ocean." 17

 II. The Foundations Are Destroyed ... In The Falling Away!

In 1702, Increase Mather lamented and was horrified as he looked at the spiritual apathy and the state of the local churches in New England. Stoddard was for lowering the standards for church membership.  The preachers up and down the countryside took sides in the debate between Stoddard and Mather.  It caused "a great noise in the country." 17

“The Declension in the Churches of New England"  or the spiritual rot in the heart had come to the surface and grieved those who could remember the former days (1620-90) when the people of the colony sought the LORD.

Their present condition brought grief because of the remembrance of their former condition. 

This reminds me of the old men of Israel who came back from the captivity remembering the former temple of Solomon, and as they stared at the new temple before them, they cried. "But many of the priests and Levites and the chief of the fathers, who were ancient men, that had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept with a loud voice..." [Ezra 3:12].

With a heavy heart, Increase preached this message to his congregation at the North Church. Ichabod, "A Discourse Shewing what Cause there is to Fear that the Glory of the Lord is Departing from New England." 

Increase could see the dry rot in the churches of New England.  He died just ten years before the work of the Spirit of God in The Great Awakening.  Increase would have rejoiced to see that day!  Yes, the fruits of that Awakening helped to form (from biblical principles) the foundation of the emerging new nation.

• The very first book to be printed in the United States was The New England Primer, and it was used in our public schools for 200 years thereafter.

• John Quincy Adams was our sixth President, who studied as a boy in the Primer, referred to the "insoluble bond" between Christianity and our form of government.

• The Supreme Court said we must "select and prefer" Christians for our elected rulers (or officials).

Our forefathers believed that religion and morality could not be divorced from politics.

• The House Judiciary Committee Report (March 27,1854) said of the adoption of the Constitution and its amendments that "the universal sentiment (of our founding fathers) was that Christianity should be encouraged."

• Two months later, the House Judiciary Committee Report said: "The great and conservative element in our system ... the thing that holds our system together is the belief of our people in the pure doctrines and the divine truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ."

• Our forefathers wanted to keep Christian principles in our government.

• Blackstone's Commentaries On Law are Bible based and were used by our Supreme Court for guidance for over 150 years of our nation's history.

• The branches of Government: The Legislative, the Executive and the Judicial branches, have their roots in the Scripture. [Isaiah 33:22].

• In 1844, The Supreme Court, in Vidal Vs. Girard, affirmed that our public schools will teach that Christianity is our nation's foundation.

• In 1892, the Supreme Court decision in Church Of The Holy Trinity Vs. United States stated that "We are emphatically a Christian nation."

• From our nation’s birth right up to 1947, our Supreme Court had steadfastly maintained that the intent of our "founding fathers"  was for our nation to preserve its Christian principles in order to perpetuate its existence as a nation.

• In 1947, the Supreme Court, in Everson v. Board of Education, totally pulled out of context Thomas Jefferson's reference to a "wall of separation between church and state" in his letter to the Danbury Baptist Association of January 1, 1802.

The letter was to express to the Danbury Baptist Association that there was nothing to fear with respect to the federal government establishing a national church (or a national denomination).

 The 1947 decision, in essence, declared that we were no longer a Christian nation.  Ever since then, the Supreme Court has over and over used this phrase "separation of church and state" to remove Jesus Christ out of our government and out of our public schools.

• The Supreme Court, in Engel v. Vitale, decided to strike out against school prayer (June 25,1962).  The goal simply was to get God out of our public schools.

• On June 17, 1963, in Abington v. Schempp and Murray v. Curlett, the Supreme Court outlawed Bible reading in the public schools (without regard to any historical or legal precedent).  In this decision, "Bible reading" was considered psychologically damaging. 

Downward we go!

• With Dekalb v. DeSpain (1967) the decision was to not allow the "Ten Commandments" to be posted in the public schools of our land.  Children would not get to see "The Ten Commandments" posted on the wall of the school telling them not to lie, cheat or steal!  Those "wooly-headed, bleeding-heart, knee-jerking Liberals" saw to that!

• And if that was not enough, in 1980, with "Stone v. Graham", the Supreme Court decided that the word of God could not even be mentioned in a public school. 

This was a long, long way from our beginnings as a nation.

• President James Madison once said that we should "govern ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God."

"Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, and by our gathering together unto him, That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first..."

The Holy Ghost through the Apostle Paul is saying to the believers in Christ steady as she goes.  Do not be "shaken" or "troubled" concerning the "day of Christ", and it coming.

 It will not happen until there is " a falling away FIRST".

The last church of the seven churches, listed in Revelation chapters two and three, is the church of Laodicea.

This church is ... in the prophetic sense ... a figure of ... a period of time from 1900 till???

Jesus Christ said of the church of the Laodicean's, "I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." [Revellation 3:15-16)  These are pretty strong words, would not you say?  This church was apostate!  (Websters, 1828 Dictionary says: "An abandonment of what one has professed; a total desertion, or departure from one's faith or religion.")

Little by little the stuff just snuck in!

The Illustration

I remember in the backyard of our house in Palmer, Alaska there was a large, beautiful spruce tree.  The boll of that tree was as straight as an arrow, and many a time I would stand in the yard and marvel at that tree.

 In that snow-capped, mountain-rimmed glacial valley formed by the Knik River, surely there was no tree as perfect as this tree.  We named the valley "The Hidden Valley".  This Hidden Valley was located 45 miles north of Anchorage, which is Alaska’s largest city.  This tree could not have had a more perfect setting, for the lower reaches of the nearby Pioneer Peak afforded shelter from the worst of Alaska's winter winds.  Little did I know concerning the true state of our tree in our back yard?  The story goes like this.

In the early spring of 1991, the snow was rapidly melting from the mountains above our home.  Our brook, which cut across our property, was loudly gurgling a melody in the night as we all slept.  Then a Knik wind came up in the darkness of night, and all a sudden we all awoke when the sound of a loud snap, and a strong shudder reverberated throughout the house.  I wondered, “Was it an earthquake?”   In Alaska, earthquakes are quite common.  I looked out the window from my children's room into the darkness of the night.  Everything seemed to be all right. “Oh well,” I said to myself, “it's nothing to worry about,” and I went back to bed.

Little did I know!   Later, with the early light of dawn, I could see what really happened.  Snapped off about eight feet from the ground, was my beautiful spruce tree!

What a strange thing, because the trees in Alaska typically have a shallow root system, and if a tree does go down, it goes down because it was uprooted.  This spruce failed at what I thought was its strongest point!

Later that spring, I searched for the reason why my marvelous tree failed, and this is what I found.  You see this spruce tree had a bad heart. Inner decay!  It was rotten inside but majestically beautiful on the outside.  It's true state of health was deceptively hidden.  Never did I imagine during the many times I admired this tree for its beauty that just below the surface that death was very imminent.

The churches in the main since 1900 have abandoned the faith.  The so-called Christianity of today is very traitorous to Jesus Christ! In Increase Mather's day, (that period of time identified as the era of the church of Philadelphia) the old stalwarts of the faith lamented over the spiritual condition of the churches in New England.

 With the clarity afforded by hindsight, we can see the mighty moving of God's Spirit in the hearts and minds of the people of England, and in all the American colonies in The Great Awakening.  The falling away (or apostasy) in Increase Mather's day was only momentary, and was remedied by God's people turning to the Lord with their hearts being prepared through fasting, through prayer and the seeking for revival.

The "falling away" that we see in II Thessalonians 2 is a reference to a final apostasy for which there will be no remedy nor national revival possible.   The era of the church of Philadelphia is gone! 

The kicking and fussing of the Devil has been successful in the blinding our nation.  Our true heritage found in the old historical narratives, lies unread, and rejected.   We would rather re-write history so that we can get rid of God.  Political correctness is the order for our day.  The people's rights movement serves for nothing in our land but as an excuse … to live in ungodly wickedness and in rebellion to God.

We are now in the era of the church of Laodicia.  The last true wave of revival or awakening for America was experienced when J. Frank Norris, Mordecai Ham and Billy Sunday were preaching up and down the breadth of our land.  Those old soldiers are now gone ... gone ... gone.

The true Holy Ghost national revivals are now done ... done ... done.

(The only revivals to be experienced now will occur only here and there on a local level.)

Again, in this century the churches have fallen away or rotted out from inside ... undetected ... little by little ... until all that is rotten has come into view for everyone to see.  The glory of the Lord hath departed. Ichabod!  "If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?" [Psalm 11:3]

They will fly away!  Amen! Amen! Amen!

III. After The Falling Away... We Fly Away!

The next event to occur after "the falling away" is revealed in I Thessalonians 4:16-17 as the pre-tribulation "rapture" of the true Church ... which is His body ... composed of all true believers and will leave Earth "to meet the Lord in the air."

"For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord."

We need to comfort one another with these words [vs.18].  This is known as the blessed hope in Titus 2:13. "That Wicked" one can not be revealed in a temple to be built in Jerusalem until we believers (the Christians) are removed from this Planet Earth!

In this dispensation the Holy Ghost inhabits the believer's heart and not some building made with hands. "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit dwelleth in you?" [I Corinthians 3:16]

 Therefore, when Jesus Christ comes in the clouds (now look at verse 7 in II Thessalonians 2) "he be taken out the way" takes place. "... the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let, until he be taken out of the way. And then shall that Wicked be revealed," AND NOT UNTIL THEN! "For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ," [I Thessalonians 5:9] "And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come." [I Thessalonians 1:10]

Some time ago, in my message Josiah, it was shown that Josiah was a type of a New Testament believer who lived on the threshold of a coming judgment on the nation of Judah for their sins.

We ourselves are living on the threshold of the time of the coming translation and judgment The Great Tribulation (or Jacob's Trial). God in His mercy took Josiah out before the judgment came.

God will take us out before the Great Tribulation judgment begins.

"Wherefore comfort one another with these words." [I Thessalonians 4:18]

We Shall Fly Away!  Amen!