21. The Seventh Trumpet

You see, I know, now, what happened to the body in which Jesus ascended in the eyes of His disciples. I know exactly where it is. And, yes, I am convinced that Jesus returns in that very same body. I am very familiar with Jesus' ascended body; in fact I have seen it lo these many years every time I have looked in the mirror. And so have you. Jesus has shared His own body with me; He and I live in it together. Am I not flesh of His flesh? Am I not bone of His bone? Does God not tell us the truth? This is the mighty energy by which Jesus subdues all things to Himself.

© Daniel Yordy - 2013

Within the seventh trumpet is the final blow of Christ by which all victory is known across the entire earth.

Now, I want to position the Battle. The earth is our inheritance; the meek shall inherit the earth. Yet the Beast claims the whole earth as its possession. Every government claims absolute possession of all people and all property within its borders. We are seeing it exercise that claim more and more. The governments of men have defined themselves as god over all.

The claim of the natural Judaic to the inheritance focuses only on a small part of the earth. The entire earth is our possession, the possession of Christ, including the hills of Is-, yet the government that presently sits upon those hills threatens destruction upon all, the “Samson” option: “If we go down, everyone goes down.”

The people and the land do not belong to the Beast. He is an imposter, a usurper.

And that is why the first strategy I placed in “The Battle” comes first, the strategy of Elijah, let the church be the church. Every claim of the Beast over any individual person is a personal offense to me. Every claim of the Beast over one acre of property or one building is a personal offense to me.

The earth is the Lord's and all the fullness thereof.

Yet possessing the earth must begin with our own physical body, our mortal flesh.

However, that is the female side of the Battle. The male side is the Word God speaks.

The nature of the enemy is the key to understanding the purpose of the Author. The hero is not truly known until He responds to the attack of the enemy. That is when we see Him as He is. God placed the nature of the enemy at the very beginning of His story so that we could understand the Lamb all the way through.

“Did God indeed say.”

God's story is all about proving His Word true in the earth, in human flesh. And the Word says, “My strength is made perfect in your weakness.”

I hope, somehow, to shed a brighter light on what that really means, for us now, at the end of human folly. Here is a passage I quoted recently that seems to remove Christ from the earth at present.

 Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began. Acts 3:19-21

Let me bring in, once again, the nature of the Word.

“While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of light.” These things Jesus spoke, and departed, and was hidden from them. –  He who rejects Me, and does not receive My words, has that which judges him—the word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day. John 12:36 & 48

The Word will always speak first, and then hide Himself. We are free to do anything we wish with what He speaks. But the whole point of the Battle is that the Word will prove Himself true in every direction more profoundly than either heaven or earth has ever imagined.

Now – I insert here something I have never seen. I did not see it until I read “The Battle” into audio; in fact, as I was reading Tolkien. What I saw took my breath away.

Jesus possessed the power to strike the earth with all plagues as often as He wished. He had the power to call upon ten thousand angels to defend Him by striking down His enemies. In all ways He would have been fully justified in doing so. 

Yet Jesus did not once use that power. Here is what Tolkien said: “But the only measure that he (Sauron – evil) knows is desire, desire for power; and so he judges all hearts. Into his heart the thought will not enter that any will refuse it, that having the ring, we may seek to destroy it.”

Jesus refused “the ring.”

Think of what that means. If Jesus had not had the power to strike down His enemies, then the fact that He did not would have meant nothing. More than that, His death would have meant little – millions of people have been executed. However, in just the same way that Jesus did not kill Himself, that is, He did nothing against Himself, so He did not “fight against” any desire to use the power He fully possessed.

NO!!! Jesus did not use that power BECAUSE He did not want to use it. The thought of inflicting pain on anyone was beyond Him.

God exalted Jesus above all, not because He “achieved” something but because He was like God, because God showed Himself through Jesus.

God's whole purpose is to prove that the image of Lucifer/Adam, the image promoted by the Nicene Christ is the very opposite of Himself. You see, Did God indeed say strikes at the express image of God, and it does so by promoting a different image, an image that God “should be.” Actually, we should say it this way, God intends to reveal His true image, that is, God revealed through you and me, by casting down the false image.

Look at the wording of Revelation 11. Just because the second witness of Christ possesses all power to strike the earth with all plagues as often as they wish does not mean they ever do so.

The operative word here is “as they desire.”

Here is what I wrote in “Judgment on Earth”:

There are particular people walking this earth right now whom you could trust if you placed them in positions of governmental power over others. You could pick them up, sit them down in the seat of power over, put all earthly authority into their hands and trust them to do the right thing. They are those who would look around slowly, rise slowly, turn their backs and walk away, saying nothing at all.

The ones who “should” rule are the ones who would never rule. They are the only ones that can be trusted.

God places those who are just like Him upon His throne. Those who, having power to inflict pain, refuse to do so BECAUSE they don't want to. BECAUSE they are the image of God.

And by this means, God judges ALL who chose the image of Lucifer/Adam.

He judges them by laying down His life for them – as us.

Now, as I shared in “The Battle,” let me unveil to you the crafty mind of our Savior. I never looked closely at this passage until I saw Peter's words in Acts 3 in light of the battle of the lambs.

After these things Jesus walked in Galilee; for He did not want to walk in Judea, because the Judaics sought to kill Him. Now the Judaics’ Feast of Tabernacles was at hand. His brothers therefore said to Him, “Depart from here and go into Judea, that Your disciples also may see the works that You are doing. For no one does anything in secret while he himself seeks to be known openly. If You do these things, show Yourself to the world.” For even His brothers did not believe in Him.

Then Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil. You go up to this feast. I am not yet going up to this feast, for My time has not yet fully come.” When He had said these things to them, He remained in Galilee. But when His brothers had gone up, then He also went up to the feast, not openly, but as it were in secret. Then the Judaics sought Him at the feast, and said, “Where is He?” John 7:1-11

This is so fascinating. This little scenario is the very strategy of Christ Jesus to bring all that speaks against the Word God speaks to complete shame, to demonstrate the true speaking of God.

First, this is the final Feast of Tabernacles celebrated by Israel as a symbol of the real Feast of Tabernacles yet to come in the life of the church.  It is at the end of this Feast, on its final day, that Jesus does show Himself openly and speaks, “If any man thirst…”

Notice the voice of unbelief. “If you are really the Son of God – show yourself openly.” Notice that Jesus is present in person through the entire feast, although no one knows He is there. Jesus speaks and then hides Himself, leaving His Word as Himself, sitting quietly. He attends the Feast in secret; no one knows He is there, yet He is.

This is our present reality. You see, when we fully accept that Jesus IS all that we are, we have passed the Day of Atonement, having accepted the full Atonement of God in the only way that will ever please God – by faith. We are now in the final part of the Feast of Tabernacles. In the Feast of Tabernacles, our flesh IS His flesh. He is here, though in secret. Yet unbelief demands a visible appearance for Him to be real.

A reader posted my recent comment on Facebook, that most do not believe that we ARE Jesus' body. Someone responded out of the normal thinking (non-thinking) of Christianity. “My daughter is in Atlanta…..I am in Tulsa. We talk every day. Are we severed from each other by physical distance? Not at all. That's a very bad argument.”

Is this man his daughter's BODY, literally, physically, actually, really, because he talks to her long distance? No, he is convinced that “body of Christ” is only a metaphor, that we are not His actual body.

You see, I know, now, what happened to the body in which Jesus ascended in the eyes of His disciples. I know exactly where it is. And, yes, I am convinced that Jesus returns in that very same body. I am very familiar with Jesus' ascended body; in fact I have seen it lo these many years every time I have looked in the mirror.

And so have you.

Jesus has shared His own body with me; He and I live in it together.

Am I not flesh of His flesh? Am I not bone of His bone? Does God not tell us the truth?

This is the mighty energy by which Jesus subdues all things to Himself.

Jesus fooled the accuser by walking this earth as a man (the accuser has never known God). He is doing exactly the same thing again. His strategy is succeeding more powerfully than the first time because the entire argument of the accuser and “Christianity” is that Jesus and His body are not One and the same, that a bunch of fleshy, weak, stumbling, vain, and idiotic humans CANNOT be Christ Himself in Person.

Now, you might be thinking, “Yordy, your title is 'The Seventh Trumpet'; where does that fit in?”

It is impossible to know what anything is unless you know that thing inside its place, fitting together with all other things, inside the great story of God. You can study a spark plug for 10,000 years, but you will never understand it until you see it at work in its place in an engine, with power flowing through it. Thus, the largest part of knowing “The Seventh Trumpet” is to know the place in God's story in which it fits.

And thus we come to purpose. Here, we are not speaking of God's end purpose, but rather, of His purpose in the climax of His story. Think of The Lion King. The final purpose, many sons through whom God reveals Himself openly, is like Simba's fully restored kingdom at the very end. But the moment of climax, when Simba faced and defeated the lie, also had great purpose. In fact, through the story, the climax, facing and defeating the lie, ruled the story and everything in it much more than the final purpose.

Simba ran from the lie; he sang “No worries” in order to drive the lie from his mind. When Nola and Rafiti confronted him, the lie came back front and center in his life. When Mufasa spoke to him from the heavens, it was the courage he needed to return and face the lie head on. His companions fought with him to defeat the lie. Simba's moment of truth happened when the lie was exposed for all to see. You see, although it was the accuser who spoke the lie into Simba, it was Simba who cursed himself and all who depended on him by that lie, by believing that the lie was the truth.

You want to know where “go to” heaven fits in this story line? “Heaven is our home” is the Christian version of “Hakuna Matata,” no worries. It is the great effort of Christian unbelief to bury the lie without ever confronting it.

I just saw it again on Facebook, a commenter of grace, speaking of a recently departed brother that he has “gone on, now, to his eternal reward in glory.” Hogwash! He was executed because of sin; his body and his spirit were ripped apart contrary to God, and now he is dead. He is tucked away in Christ, yes, his just spirit is made perfect, yes, all the while waiting until a body of people right here on this planet face the lie as Christ Himself and defeat it. Only after that will he know the measure of glory belonging to him.

The fantasy of Hakuna Matata never does anything for those laboring under the curse. All of those, who are with the Lord in heaven only, continue under the curse. They want their bodies back; they are looking with all eagerness to the resurrection of their ripped off bodies, to the day when they are full humans again. Our singing of Hakuna Matata right now doesn't do them one bit of good.

We are still heading towards the place of the seventh trumpet. PURPOSE.

There is a way of thinking found in the present revelation of the grace and goodness of God that is void of any knowledge of God having great purpose for all things. That thinking goes something like this. God made everything, then everything went bad, but that's okay, because all of it is God doing whatever, and since He is love, He just forgives everybody. For that reason, let's abandon all the “negative” things God says in His Word, because those things HAVE NO PURPOSE inside this general, all-pervasive forgiveness.

The problem is not found in rejoicing in the all-pervasive forgiveness of God, no purpose could ever be accomplished except entirely inside that forgiveness.  The problem is eliminating PURPOSE from the picture.

God has a great purpose for the accuser, for the lie, for the curse, for the continuation of evil upon this planet. God has great purpose for the battle, for the false lamb and his empty woman. Every single element in the Great Story of God, every event and circumstance upon this planet through all the age of human folly, has great, great purpose. That great purpose ends in the restoration of all things, yes, but the final end does not drive the story.

God's great purpose is the proving of His Word.

God's purpose for the accuser is to prove His Word. God's purpose for the lie and the curse is to prove His Word. God's purpose for the false lamb and the false woman is to prove His Word. God's purpose for the execution of death continuing on unchallenged for these last 1984 years is to prove His Word in the most stupendous way God has conceived.

Jesus is the Word God speaks. Jesus speaks and then hides Himself, leaving His Words for us to do whatever we wish with them. He returns secretly in the Feast of Tabernacles AS that very Word, this time in our mouths.

The word is in your mouth.

The great purpose of God, this Word He intends to PROVE in all incredible glory, is in your mouth.

God has placed the proving of His Word, this thing that means everything to Him, in the mouth of babes, inside of utter human weakness. God intends to show in all reality against all opposition that His Word births God, right here on this earth. God is known as He is by His victory. All that opposes God and that victory match that victory negatively in every conceivable way. That's how story reveals the hero.

The action verb of God's story is nike, overcome; the means by which that happens is symmorphos, Christ Jesus having become us – and fooling everybody (everybody who treats God's word, including His Word in our mouths, as anything less than Himself) up until the moment of the revelation of Jesus Christ, when God in victory stands triumphant and seen by all.

We know that this scenario means everything to God; it is the great beating of His heart.

One final thing before we can draw the seventh trumpet into its place.

But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.Romans 13:14

I've been pondering this verse for some time. Now, looking up the Greek text as I write this, I discover that all that I thought concerning these words is confirmed overwhelmingly by the actual Greek that Paul spoke to the brother who wrote down these words. First, let me give a paraphrase of how this line very well could read.

But put on the Lord Jesus Christ without giving any forethought to the reality of a desiring flesh.

But let's consider the words as they appear in most translations. “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ”makes absolutely zero sense to the human mind. It has no meaning spiritually or symbolically, it's not real, no one has the slightest clue what it means or how to “do” any such thing.

As a result, every believer desirous of knowing God, of pleasing Him, yet ignorant of Christ present now as them, enters this verse at the word “AND.” Then, having entered at the word “and,” they turn their backs on Christ and proceed with all fervency to “make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill its lusts.”

Remember, there are two ways only to respond to any word God speaks, human effort or faith. Human effort knows instinctively that “put on the Lord Jesus Christ” is humanly impossible and inconceivable. Thus human effort busies itself as – flesh, making no provision for flesh – self, dying to self – the ego, turning it's back on the ego. You can see why God says that all of it stinks so very much.

Now, faith also enters at the word “and,” except faith instantly turns and faces Christ. BUT, having turned to face Christ, faith now has its back on whatever the flesh might be AND, how about that? That's what Paul actually told us to do.

You see, human effort always says, “I must in order to have.” Faith always says, “I have, though I see it not.” Faith is the evidence of things not seen; faith is not human effort forcing the things not seen to be seen, by gum! (The reply of Jesus' brothers who did not believe.) Human effort is the vociferous proclamation that, no matter what God might say, if I don't see it, it ain't real. All human effort does is say, “God lies.”

For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. Galatians 3:27

Same word, “put on” Christ.

The word “put on” is enduo in the Greek; incredibly, it means, “to sink into a garment.” I don't know of any better phrase to use to describe my knowledge of Christ as me. It is a continual sinking into Christ as my only life out of the horrific thought of a self not Him. I do so daily, and every single time I do, my heart is so glad that I am never found in that other horror.

The Greek word, enduo, “put on” is used for several things. We “put on” the armor of God, the new self, and bowels of mercy. But all of those things are just details inside of, “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Let's look squarely at these words. They are, in fact, ridiculous. Try, if you will, to make this line into a metaphor, into something symbolic. Try to spiritualize these words. What do you come up with? I come up with a big fat 0. I'm usually pretty good at coming up with a way to describe what is not. I can't come up with a thing here.

Either these words are 100% literal or they are nothing. And when I say 100% literal, I mean 100% literal as spirit, 100% literal as soul, AND 100% literal as physical body.

“Put on the Lord Jesus Christ” means that I sink into Him for real, Him in Person, Him as me, literally and absolutely, as my own spirit, as my own soul, and as my own body.

For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones… “the two shall become one flesh.” This is a great mystery (a hidden secret), but I speak concerning Christ and the church. Ephesians 5:30-32

Either God is telling us the truth or He is lying.

“Put on the Lord Jesus Christ” has no meaning metaphorically; it has no meaning spiritualized; it has no meaning after we “die and 'go to' heaven.” The dead in Christ cannot know “flesh of His flesh”; they ain't got any.

For me to “put on the Lord Jesus Christ” is for me to sink utterly into the reality that Jesus has become me, that He does walk this earth, right now, as me, literally and in Person.

It means that the literal physical body in which Jesus ascended up into the clouds in the sight of His disciples IS come again. That same body walks this earth again; I'm looking at it right now, and if you will look down, so are you. Abraham did not consider his own body, now dead; we give no thought to whatever our body appears to be at present – that's what Paul meant when he said, “Give no thought to the flesh.”

And now we come to the seventh trumpet.

…there should be delay no longer, but in the days of the sounding of the seventh angel, when he is about to sound, the mystery of God would be finished, as He declared to His servants the prophets. Revelation 10:6-7

Now lets look at where this word hinges in Paul's gospel.

Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed —  in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” 1 Corinthians 15:51-52

Remember that the key action verb in any passage rules everything, both all other words and all ideas (life of God) being carried by those words. And what action verb, repeated four times, is found ruling over this great proving of all the Word God speaks?

Enduo, “put on.”

And thus enduo, “put on” is the connection between nike, the full and open defeat of death andsymmorphos, Christ having become us, the one outer and the other inner. Symmorphos, hidden from all and nike, seen by all.

For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.

Incorruption is Jesus' soul; immortality is Jesus' body, details, huge and glorious, yes, but still just details found inside of “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”

We enter all the way in entirely and only by faith. And what causes all that we are to travel in the direction of our faith? What is the rudder that steers the whole ship? Our tongue.

We believe, therefore we speak.

I said these words in another article I am working on: “As we see Christ, all that is not Christ is no more. Christ is always all BEFORE the not-Christ disappears. That makes no sense to the human mind, but it is always true.”

My body is the literal, physical body of the Lord Jesus Christ. I am He come again in Person and walking upon this earth.

No, we do not say, “I am Christ,” as ourselves, separate from His Person. It is actually He, the Lord Jesus Christ Himself, walking this earth in Person as us. We honor Him; we believe what He says.

But we haven't pulled the seventh trumpet all the way in yet.

Then the seventh angel sounded: And there were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!” – Then the temple of God was opened in heaven, and the ark of His covenant was seen in His temple. And there were lightnings, noises, thunderings, an earthquake, and great hail. Revelation 11:15 & 19

But what is the hinge that ties all this together?

This time we go to the heart of John's gospel.

By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. 1 John 3:16

Yes, John 3:16 is a wonderful verse, but 1 John 3:16 is infinitely more important. If we had no other word in the Bible, yet here we have all the revelation of Jesus Christ.

 When they finish their testimony, the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit will make war against them, overcome them, and kill them. And their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. Then those from the peoples, tribes, tongues, and nations will see their dead bodies three-and-a-half days, and not allow their dead bodies to be put into graves. And those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them, make merry, and send gifts to one another, because these two prophets tormented those who dwell on the earth.

Now after the three-and-a-half days the breath of life from God entered them, and they stood on their feet, and great fear fell on those who saw them. And they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, “Come up here.” And they ascended to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies saw them. Revelation 11:7-12

This passage in Revelation 11 CANNOT be anything other than the fulfillment of 1 John 3:16 in the Great Story of God.

AND WE ALSO.

There is no Lord Jesus Christ without in all fulness, in every nuance of meaning, and we also.

The seventh trumpet is “and we also.”

I had no idea I would say that when I titled this letter, nor even one page back.

The seventh trumpet is proving the Atonement in all fullness in the place in which it must be proven, our dying bodies.

“Put on the Lord Jesus Christ” is 100% literal.

All judgment of God upon all sin and disobedience, both human and angelic, is found in the words“and we also.” When God has a people who believe all that He speaks as the only thing real with no regard to outward appearance, God will prove all of Himself through their faith and through their bodies. He will do so by the Word that is in their mouths, by the prophetic Word of Christ our only life.

And thus Jesus' words, “The word that I have spoken will judge him in the last day,”standing upon this earth proven through human weakness as God intended from the beginning, ARE the judgment against all. All will see and know that all of their mental arguments against Christ were false.

Understand, that from our present point of view, we can see only the outline. From our viewpoint on the other side of God proving His Word through us, we will see the same thing in all glory as we have never imagined.

God's glory is revealing Himself through weakness, though His image, man. God's glory is proving His Word, Christ Jesus, true in all ways in heaven/earth.

Will some of us actually be in Jerusalem, gunned down in the streets? I have no way of knowing how “and we also” will play itself out in human and earthly reality. I have no way of knowing what parts of this picture are symbolic and which parts actually happen as described.

I do know this. Many of us will not die at all, rather, our bodies will be swallowed up by life without any experience of the ripping apart of spirit and body. Yet if a few do lay down their lives, as described in this story scene, it will be as the whole body of Christ. The experience of one member is the experience of all, and all of it is Christ. We are members of one another.

Put on immortality.

Sink into Jesus' immortal body as into a garment, fully made and fully clothed. It's already true,symmorphos. It will be demonstrated true, nike. To go from symmorphos, already true, to nike, demonstrated true, is enduo, put on, sink into Jesus' immortal body.

Yes, the full resurrection of Jesus' body applies in all ways now to us in contradiction to all human appearance. Yet we do not then call “death” anything other than the enemy of God. God does not speak anything without actual physical fulfillment upon this planet. Those who say, “I already have full resurrection” prove to all the universe that they do not believe it when death comes calling.

God will have a people who prove that they do believe. Jesus proves Himself true as us, laying down our lives for our friends.

Now, we must know where God gets His kicks. It's found in this line: and their enemies saw them. He just loves proving Jesus true against all contradiction through all weakness.

It is the full battle strategy of the only Mighty Warrior.

We are seized in His grip; He is determined to win through us.