Click Here For Christian Media's First Video Channel

Christian Media

Communiqué

DEAD MEN'S BONES

Part VIII

Dead Men's Bones has established that the Israelites, under Moses, collectively agreed to the covenant with the LORD, and that He had elected the nation to host His Spirit to the rest of the nations.

"This day the Lord thy God hath commanded thee to do these statutes and judgments…And the Lord hath [declared] thee this day to be his peculiar people…and to make thee high above all nations…" (Deuteronomy 26:16, 18, 19).

"And Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and laid before their faces all these words which the Lord commanded him. And all the people answered together, and said, All that the Lord hath spoken we will do" (Exodus 19:7, 8).

By arranging for Israel to be a separate people from the nations of the world, it is essential that we see that Israel was chosen by the LORD to mediate between God and the Gentile nations. This covenant between God and Israel, wherein Israel agreed to their status as chosen by God for this glorious role, was formally agreed to by the people. Years later, after Moses died (and the mantle of the leadership of Israel passed to Joshua), the people reaffirmed their role as the chosen of God:

"And they answered Joshua, saying, All that thou commandest us we will do, and whithersoever thou sendest us, we will go" (Joshua 1:16).

Similar acts of repentance on the part of the people are seen when Ezra rededicated the 2^nd temple, after the LORD brought Solomon's corrupted temple to rubble; yet Israel kept turning back to worship the star gods (referred to as Baalim and Ashtaroth in the Scriptures). 

Through prophets and periodic good kings, the LORD consistently warned Israel to turn back to Him, and keep their covenant. For instance, when Hezekiah (a contemporary of Isaiah) came to power, he even sent letters to the dispersed Northern tribal leaders, and urged them to repent, come to Jerusalem, and keep the Passover.

"And Hezekiah sent to all Israel and Judah, and wrote letters also to Ephraim and Manasseh, that they should come to the house of the Lord at Jerusalem, to keep the Passover unto the Lord God of Israel" (II Chronicles 30:1).   

Hezekiah issued a decree, throughout all Israel, instructing the entire nation that if they did not turn back to the LORD, God's wrath would be unleashed against His covenant people.

"So they established a decree…that they should come to keep the Passover…for they had not done it of a long time in such sort as it was written.…[the decree said] turn again unto the Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel…And be not ye like your fathers, and like your brethren, which trespassed against the Lord God of their fathers, who therefore gave them up to desolation, as ye see…so the posts passed from city to city through the country of Ephraim and Manasseh even unto Zebulun; but they laughed them to scorn, and mocked them" (II Chronicles 3:5, 7, 10).

Nevertheless, a small Remnant did respond to the call of God through Hezekiah; but this cycle of repentance, followed by a Falling Away, incessantly continued. Ultimately, the LORD gave them up to follow the star gods worshiped by the Gentile nations.

"Then God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven…wherefore God gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonor their own bodies between themselves" (Romans Acts 7:42, 1:24).

Although Israel had many desperately wicked kings (particularly Ahab and his queen Jezebel), the first national leader to set the example of turning to other gods was definitely Solomon. Thus, he not only represents a turning point in that he set the standard for the entire nation, he was the prime example of the flesh and blood version of the "Son of David," in that he represents the chosen of God with an external shell of righteousness, whereas on the inside, there was only Dead Men's Bones.

Most know that Solomon was the actual Son of David and, since a crucial prophecy had said the "Son of David" would be the Messiah who would save Israel from their sins (and bring in the everlasting glory in which Israel was to represent the light of God to the Gentiles), Solomon assumed the prophecy applied to him. 

"And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines: and his wives turned away his heart. For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father. And Solomon did evil in the sight of the Lord…For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians….then did Solomon build an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech" (I Kings 11:3-5, 7, 6).

In Part VII of the present work, we showed how the huge blessings of peace and prosperity which occurred in Israel were inherited by Solomon – who used it to spread his apostasy to Europe and the Americas. The blessings were largely due to David (Solomon's father), as the LORD repeatedly recorded David's faithfulness:

"The Lord hath sought him a man after his own heart, and the Lord hath commanded him to be captain over his people" (I Samuel 13:14).

"[God] raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfill all my will" (Acts 13:22).

In further examination of the three-fold architecture of the Spiritual realm, in which the LORD appointed Israel to mediate between Himself and the multitude of Gentile nations, we get a glimpse into the substance of the eternal. Just as the Scriptures outline the mysterious triune nature of God, as the LORD clearly said "Let us make man in our image" (Genesis 1:26), a close look at that construct is illuminating. Further, since Solomon is a key example of how man's fallen nature seeks to thwart the LORD's redemptive plan for humanity, we can learn much from the anecdotal data related to his actions.

At the top of the list, we may note the recurring instances indicating it was Solomon's "heart" that was imperfect before the LORD. A good example of the Biblical definition of man's "heart" is seen well before Solomon turns away from the God of Israel. As the famous king dedicated the great temple of the LORD, he spoke to the people.

"The Lord our God be with us, as he was with our fathers: let him not leave us, nor forsake us: That he may incline our hearts unto him, to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, and his statutes, and his judgments, which he commanded our fathers. That all the people of the earth may know that the Lord is God [through Israel's mediation], and that there is none else. Let your heart therefore be perfect with the Lord our God, to walk in his statutes, and to keep his commandments, as at this day" (I Kings 8:57, 58, 60, 61).

When the Word of God tells us that it was Solomon's many Gentile wives who "turned his heart" away from the LORD, we naturally think of the phenomena of romance as the stereotypical matters of the heart. However, the Scriptures characterize the heart in a broader fashion. In fact, the Bible even speaks of the "heart" of God, so it is certain the text is speaking of more than His intellect or His emotive relationship with mankind. For instance, when the LORD despairs of man's misbehavior at the time of the great flood of Noah, we see God's sadness at the evil which was running rampant in the creation:

"And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart" (Genesis 6:6).

In that same context just before the flood, the Bible assigns "thoughts" to the heart and, in what looks to be a euphemism for mankind's intent, we find the first of many references to our imagination.

"And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually" (Genesis 6:5).

Understanding the many references to images, and how mankind imagines evil things in his "heart," will help us to understand how our physical lives, apart from the Spirit of the LORD, routinely relegate our existence to the mortality seen in the phrase Dead Men's Bones. Indeed, in view of the fact that JESUS told us the end of the world would be "as it was in the days of Noah" (Luke 17:26), and an accurate appraisal of today's world shows "the wickedness of man [is] now great in the earth" (Genesis 6:5), we would do well to understand how these "thoughts of the heart" (I Chronicles 29:18) apply to the human condition.

Jeremiah tells us the heart is where deceit, which originates in the Spiritual venue, arrives in the world of Flesh and Blood.  

"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?" (Jeremiah 17:5).

Contemporary man certainly understands that intellectual activity is located in the mind, even as it is man's physical brain which constructs the detailed aspects of our lives. Paradoxically, even though physicians and scientists are certain the organic pump we call the heart cannot "think," there are dozens of Scriptures which tell us the place where the Spiritual realm intersects with our physical existence is the heart.

Thus, our fundamental design is three-fold as the Heart, the Head, and the Spirit are fused into a solitary existence.

"Let us [the Trinitarian God] make man in our image" (Genesis 1:26).

It is actually quite enlightening to realize this triune architecture has been embedded in the Scriptures all along. For instance, that which we call the Triuniverse is found in many, many verses.

"Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding" (Proverbs 3:5)

God, who is revealed in Scripture to be a Spirit, is paired in the above verse with the heart and the mind (with the latter seen in the concept of "understanding"). Further, we see the heart comes first, in terms of intent, in that the structure of the verse indicates that if we trust God with all our heart, then we won't "lean" on our own intellect.

Further, the "two parts" which are physical (the heart and the mind), are always seen to be finite, as they will inevitably come to an end.

"And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith the Lord, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the third shall be left therein" (Zechariah 13:8).

When God determined to extract Israel from bondage in Egypt, we see repeated references to the fact that Pharaoh's heart was hardened.

"And the Lord said unto Moses, When thou goest to return into Egypt, see that thou do all those wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go" (Exodus 4:21).

A reasonably perceptive mind would have determined the Israelite God was far too strong for the Pharaoh to resist – and this would have been obvious after the first few miracles at the hand of Moses. However, the hardening of Pharaoh's heart involved deceiving him into believing he could prevail against God Himself. When the Pharaoh, "who knew not Joseph" (Exodus 1:8) came to power, the deceived "thoughts of his heart" (Genesis 6:5) planted the seeds that his mind processed into an intricate plan to oppose and suppress Israel.

"And he said unto his people…Come on, let us deal wisely with them…therefore they did set over them taskmasters to afflict them with their burdens. And the Egyptians made the children of Israel to serve with rigour: And they made their lives bitter with hard bondage, in morter, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field" (Exodus 1:9-11, 13, 14).

This sequence, where Spiritual deception enters in to our being through the thoughts of the heart, and is then manifested through the now corrupted machinations of the mind, is seen throughout the Scriptures. In this heavenly cycle we see the heart and the mind are the two finite parts which will inevitably be "cut off and die," whereas it is the "third part" (Zechariah 13:8), the Spirit of God, that has the power to resurrect the Dead Men's Bones.

In the quintessential case of Solomon, the legendary intellect of the Israelite king worked against him. The Scriptures tell us his many Gentile wives were the agency the Devil used to turn his heart away from the LORD.

"And Solomon loved the Lord…but king Solomon loved many strange women…women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Zidonians, and Hittites" (I Kings 3:3, 11:1).

Because the famous Israelite king was in the unique position of being acquainted with the legends of all the heathen deities, he could see the obvious parallel similarities between them. For instance, the first foreign wife was the daughter of Pharaoh, whose religion featured the goddess Isis, who had a divine son (Horus). Each of the adjacent religions also had a goddess mother figure with a divine son. In every case, the deities were associated in some way with the stars.

The rituals of each wife were also similar and, as a result of the religious common denominators, Solomon errantly concluded they all represented manifestations of God. In addition to the goddess-mother figure found in each of the Gentile nations (whose name was Isis, Ashtaroth, Astarte, or a host of other names which all connect to stars), every group had a story of lesser gods conspiring to overthrow the main deity – obviously ethnically derived versions of the Nephilim account.

As the great flood affected every nation, each religion also had a flood story, with the god (or gods) who executed a sinful world, just another variant tailored to the locale. For instance, Solomon would have had custody of the records of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which told of a great flood, wherein Yahweh preserved Noah and his family through the building a great boat. Conversely, each of the Gentile wives told Solomon of a similar story in which the star gods (who were frequently identified as El, Ea, Baal, Ra, etc) preserved their favorite.  

When Solomon acquiesced to the Spiritual demands of his many royal wives, he built a "high place" where each of the deities was worshiped – and the Israelite king tried to mingle the worship of the LORD with the male and female manifestations of the heathen deities.

"For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites [and] an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech…and likewise did he for all his strange wives, which burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods" (I Kings 11:5, 7).

Since he had hundreds of wives (with hundreds of religious variants) the collective of deities became known by the plural term Baalim, and the Asherah. The females deities, related to Ashtoreth  (or Astarte) and fertility, became associated with groves, where the seed was planted in the ground to produce trees, reproducing oak or evergreen trees, and Asherah poles which were cut down on a seasonal basis.

"And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and forgat the Lord their God, and served Baalim and the groves" (Judges 3:7).

By constructing the high places, Solomon had foolishly invited all of the devils into his kingdom and, by the time of Ezekiel, the various "gods" who were honoured through these Spiritual portals eventually penetrated the temple that Solomon had built for the LORD. The worst example was the image of jealousy (Ezekiel 8:3) -- which was an engraved image of a star, representing all of the deities, and this blasphemous symbol then resided within the temple itself.

-- James Lloyd

To Be Continued