#1 ELLEN WHITE A PROPHETESS?

Is your town like ours?                                                         

                        

The Seventh Day Adventists have the newest church building with an adjacent school, and you couldn’t wish for better company: friendly, clean living, unworldly, modestly dressed, generous, community-minded, offering disaster relief……even God-fearing, prayerful, devoted, studying the Bible diligently in ‘Sabbath School’, active missionaries….                                   

But what does their General Conference leadership claim?

“The Advent movement was a truly Biblical interconfessional movement centred in the Word of God…that brought them together as God’s remnant.”                          

‘God’s Remnant Church’, hey?  Well there’s no such expression in the Bible so before we sign up as members to receive the ‘right hand of fellowship’ how about we check the current 28 Fundamental Beliefs of this church….              
...hullo…who’s this?...we’ve come to:                                    
Clause 18: “The Gift of Prophecy….manifested in the ministry of Ellen G. White. As the Lord’s messenger, her writings are a continuing and authoritative source of truth which provide for the church comfort, guidance, instruction, and correction….”

That’s odd – I don’t remember seeing ‘The Book of Ellen’ in my Bible…in fact, didn’t the apostle Paul order twice that women were to be silent in church and not teach?  (1 Corinthians 14: 34-35, 1 Timothy 2:11-12)   (Okay, that might sound a bit unreasonable but who am I to argue?)                     

Anyway, let’s see if this Ellen G. White (1827-1915) taught the truth….

Opening her best-seller, The Desire of Ages, we find Pacific Press Publishing claiming it is “written with authority…a source of inspiration and enlightenment to millions of readers all over the world.”  

In chapter 10 of her book she says: “When [Gabriel] came with a message to Daniel, he said, There is none that holdeth with me in these things, but Michael (Christ) your Prince. Daniel 10.21.”

Hey??  Michael is Christ??                                                   
You might recall that Michael is ‘the great prince which standeth for the children of [Daniel’s] people’ – Israel. (Daniel 12:1)  He is the archangel who contended with the devil about the body of Moses (Jude 9) and at some stage, leads the fight in heaven against ‘the dragon and his angels’ (Revelation 12:7).                          
Wherever would Mrs. White get the idea Michael the archangel is Christ?

“For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel…” 1 Thessalonians 4:16

No Mrs. White, this does NOT say the Lord Jesus is the archangel.                        
So let’s see what the Bible has to say about our Lord Jesus Christ:

“Being made so much better than the angels…                     

….let all the angels of God worship him…                               

…unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever…                    

...but to which of the angels said he at anytime, Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool?” Hebrews ch1

What about this one:

"Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.  For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily."  Colossians 2:8-9

Wow! “…all the fullness of the Godhead bodily”!  So, beware!

Despite this warning, Mrs. White also taught in 1903:  “The man Christ Jesus was not the Lord Almighty”  SDA Commentary V, page 1129

The General Conference has said: “her writings are consistent, accurate, and in full agreement with the Scriptures”, her predictions “have been fulfilled with an amazing accuracy” and “her balanced expositions [of Christ’s incarnation] fully agree with the Biblical view”.                 

Does her teaching seem like sound doctrine to you?…or more like blasphemy?

NEXT: What happened in 1844...or didn’t happen
Click on: http://hotspuds.blogspot.com.au/2014/02/great-disappointment-of-1844.html

 

Acknowledgements:  

adventist.org/beliefs                                                                                  

sdanet.org/atissue/doctrines/gc28           

whiteestate.org   

White E.G. ‘The Desire of Ages’, Pacific Press Publishing Assoc., Oshawa, Ontario 1898                                                                                                                                                                   

‘Seventh Day Adventists Believe…27 Fundamental Doctrines’, Ministerial Association, General Conference of SDA, Washington DC, 1988                                                                                                               

JAMES' OSSUARY - THE TORONTO BLESSING!

Following: http://hotspuds.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/was-yaakov-brother-of-jesus.html

They flogged, crucified and speared Yeshua (Jesus).
Then they stoned his brother Ya’akov (James). 
Surely they’d leave a fragile old bone box in peace?   

Despite nearly two thousand years of violent upheaval and destruction in Jerusalem, this ossuary survived for thousands to see it in Toronto’s Royal Ontario Museum in 2002/3 and 10 years later it is finally back in the custody of its owner, Oded Golan of Tel Aviv………DAMAGED!! 

Surely not!  Damaged, you say??  How come?   
The ossuary had arrived in Toronto full of cracks after being poorly packed and handled, necessitating painstaking repairs by a museum curator. In fact, one of the cracks ran straight through the inscription.....
  

Ya'akof bar Yosef achui di Yeshua…or...'Jacob son of Joseph brother (...here!) of Jesus'

Well these things happen...the cracks were repaired…   

Ah, but this artefact aroused intense jealousy and once the Israelis realized the significance of the inscription, 40 criminal charges were laid on Golan in December 2004, while the ossuary was confiscated and subjected to destructive testing, leaving the left side of the inscription:   דישוﬠ (translated ‘of Jesus’) further damaged by red silicon!  

Surely the ossuary was found to be genuine and Golan’s name cleared?                          

Golan stands accused of adding the inscription: achui di Yeshua (‘brother of Jesus’). It took 7 years, 100 witnesses, and 12,000 pages of testimony for the Supreme Court of Israel to finally acquit Golan on 14^th May, 2012 of the fraud and forgery charges, leaving him convicted of illegal trading in antiquities to teach him a lesson.

We can be certain Jesus had a brother Ya’akov or James…but can we be absolutely certain this ossuary is his?                                                     
No.

There is photographic evidence the full inscription was in front of Golan for over 25 years, yet he didn’t realize the significance of the artifact in his custody?
Correct.

There is no evidence that the inscription is not genuine and this ancient Jewish artifact survived nearly 2000 years, only to be permanently damaged by the Israel Police Forensics Laboratory?  
Correct.

So the Jews begged the Romans to crucify a young carpenter-rabbi who had fed and healed thousands of people, free-of-charge, then publicly raised someone from the dead. Thirty years later they murdered his younger brother by stoning…and now they’ve deliberately damaged some old bone box that happens to remind us of all that?

Yes but that’s history that can’t be undone. What can we learn from all this?
Remember what James wrote?

 “…for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.”

The early Christians obviously went to great pains to keep the bones of their loved ones intact – exhuming their bodies for re-interment. 
Why?                                                                 
Even if your relatives had died, the hope was the same…                             
…the hope of resurrection!                                            
They expected Jesus to return for them all - dead or alive - any day!                
(Job 19:25-27, Hebrews 11:19, John 11:25-26, 14:1-3, 1 Corinthians 15, 1 Thessalonians esp. ch4,)                                

…but that’s nearly two thousand years ago…

Yes, but this hard evidence has remained hidden and wonderfully preserved…
…until now!

Now that’s what I’d call the Toronto Blessing!

Acknowledgements: 
wikipidea.org
Photo credits: 
ossuary / lastdays.com
inscription / jamestabor.com

                                                                                                                                                               

                                                                                    

                                                                                     

 

 

YA'AKOV, A BROTHER OF JESUS??

Following: http://hotspuds.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/one-old-ossuary.html

We’re shuffling along in a long, slow queue, hoping to see some ancient bone box (ossuary) that has miraculously survived nearly two thousand years of violent upheaval and destruction in Jerusalem.                                        

Finally it’s our turn to read the various translations of the inscription:

Ya'akov bar Yosef achui di Yeshua… or...Jacques, fils de Joseph, frère de Jésus

Frère de Jésus?  Now hang on a minute...did Jesus have brothers?        
This is what Catholic popes would have us believe:                                            
“Mary remained a virgin in conceiving her Son, a virgin in giving birth to him, a virgin in carrying him, a virgin in nursing him at her breast, always a virgin…”

…always a virgin??   That’s not what the Scriptures tell us…                       
“Joseph…knew her not til she had brought forth her firstborn son…”   In fact, twice we are told Mary produced quite a family:                                  

“Is not this (Jesus) the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us?”

So which brother is Ya’akov?                                         

Jacob in English comes from Ya’aqob in Hebrew = Ya’akov in Aramaic = Iakobus in Greek = Iacomus in Latin = Jaime in Spanish = James in English.   Yes, Ya’akov is who we call James - son number two!

What do we know about James?                                                    

Like his brothers, James didn’t believe Jesus was the Son of God, in fact they mocked this ‘disgrace’ to the family (John 7:5) who was finally crucified as the worst of criminals (Isaiah 53) but we know that after Jesus returned to heaven, James and his siblings joined in prayer with the disciples (Acts 1:14).

So what made James drastically change his mind?                                            

Jesus as the risen Christ “was seen of James…” (1 Corinthians 15:7) 
He saw that his brother Jesus who had been flogged, crucified and speared as the worst of criminals, had risen from the dead!

James was forced to believe, thanks to…..RESURRECTION!

…and then what?                                                            

James was married (1 Corinthians 9:5), became respected as a leader of the early Church in Jerusalem (Acts 12:17; 21:18 ; Galatians 1&2) and mediated between Jewish and Gentile Christians (Acts 15).

So what happened to James?                            

Flavius Josephus the Jewish historian recorded that he was stoned by order of Ananus the High Priest in AD 62 - possibly after being thrown from a height near the temple.

Did James the brother of Jesus write the Book of James?    Probably - but more to the point…..             

What did James have to say?
Martin Luther dismissed this book as ‘strawy’ because he thought it contradicted Paul quoting Habakkuk: “The just shall live by faith”.   James was really saying: okay, “every good gift and every perfect gift is from above…”   but let’s get fair dinkum about this faith business –  “I will shew thee my faith by my works”.

This ossuary coming to light just recently reminds us of what James in effect said and wrote (using 30 illustrations from nature!)... 

“Tell those Gentiles to stay away from idolatry, fornication and blood.”                      

“You claim to be a Christian?...well, how about acting like one.”                    

“The Lord’s return is very soon….the judge is standing at the door!”

 

NEXT: James' ossuary - the Toronto blessing!    Click on:

 

http://hotspuds.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/james-ossuary-toronto-blessing.html

 

Acknowledgements:
Ben Witherington III,  Asbury Theological Seminary    
Shanks H. & Witherington B, ‘The Brother of Jesus’, Harper Collins, New York, 2003   
Josephus F, (Ed. Whiston W.) Works of Josephus, Master Books, Book XX, Chapter IX, Para 1, 2008  
Catholic Catechism clause 510    
Photo credits:    
ossuary / mtio.com     
fist / realcourage.org                                                                                         
 
   

 

                                    

 

                                                                                   

                                                                                       

                

 

 

YA'AKOV'S OSSUARY

In case you hadn’t heard this story before, here are ‘the bare bones’ for you to pick over…(excuse the pun!)

Archaeologists tell us that ossuaries (bone boxes) were only used within 20 miles of Jerusalem from 20 BC to AD 70 when Jerusalem was sacked by the Roman Army. They cost a tradesman about a day’s wages.

How did you end up in an ossuary?                                         
Your grieving family would assemble in the standing pit of a cave tomb and place your body in a loculus – a 6 foot long tunnel – sealed with a blocking stone. 
After about a year, the flesh would have desiccated enough for your bones to be recovered (any volunteers?) then stored in an ossuary large enough for the long femur bones.

Oded Golan of Tel Aviv, Israel, is a private collector of ancient artifacts who, in the 1970’s, bought this empty ossuary from an Arab antiques dealer who said it had been found in Silwan, an Arab village in Jerusalem. Like the Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in 1947, this find was not professionally excavated so was deemed ‘unprovenanced’.                               

Golan had no idea of its significance until visited over 25 years later by André Lemaire, a professor from École Pratique des Hautes Études at The Sorbonne in Paris.

The Geological Survey of the State of Israel then confirmed that this specimen had been cut from chalk limestone quarried from the Menuha Formation of the Mt. Scopus Group nearby, during the 1^st or 2^nd Century AD. A patina uniformly covering the ossuary – even within the entire inscription - showed its great age and there was no evidence of modern tools having been used on it.                                                   

Permission was obtained from the Israel Antiquities Authority for the ossuary to be shipped to Canada in October 2002, where it attracted the attention of thousands at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.                                    

Why the fascination with an empty bone box?                                          

This inscription on the face of the box is written in Aramaic, the language spoken by Jews of this era:

יﬠקובבריוסףּאחוידישוﬠ

What on earth does that say?                                                                            

Reading from right to left it starts with:           ‘Ya’akov bar Yosef…’                       
or in English:     ‘Jacob son of Joseph…’ 

Common Jewish names…nothing to get excited about. What about the rest of it?

Reading left from א it says:          ‘achui di Yeshua’

Yeshua?....isn’t that the Aramaic name for Jesus?

Sure it is. This guy was the achui di or brother of….Jesus.

Whoa!!...archaeological proof of Jesus Christ in the New Testament??  
Not discovered until this century??                                                       

So who is Ya’akov?.... (NEXT)
Click on: http://hotspuds.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/was-yaakov-brother-of-jesus.html

  

Acknowledgements:  

Hershel Shanks, founder Biblical Archaeological Society     

Shanks H. & Witherington B, ‘The Brother of Jesus’, Harper Collins, New York, 2003    

Photo credits:     

en.wikipedia.org    

normgeisler.com