EVANGELISM & GEOPOLITICS OF JUDEA AT THE TIME OF THE SEIGE OF JERUSALEM - A VISION FOR BROTHERS' KEEPERS.

BROTHERS’ KEEPER & GEOPOLITICS OF JUDEA DURING THE PERIOD OF ROMAN OCCUPATION

I recently found myself in a quagmire when I was required to give a presentation in my church. I believed that I had a beautiful and interesting topic and a well-structured outline with which to deliver it. But after my name had been announced to the whole church and I was walking to the lectern, a brother in the church took a look at my topic and outline; and told me that I had a wrong presentation altogether. He said that he had sent the topic and outline to the pastor on our WhatsApp group line. I wondered why he was the one to write out a topic and outline for what I was to present. It was a fiasco because I couldn’t even remember the topic that he chose for me to present. When God gives us a vision, He always tells us how to go about managing it. Don’t delegate that vision’s execution to anyone else, unless you absolutely know that you two have the same vision or a similar take on it. I had assumed that he was to make a presentation on evangelism, while I was to give a presentation on the geopolitics of JUDEA at the time of the roman occupation of the general area known as Judea or Palestine at the time when the roman empire was at or just passed   the  pinnacle of its reign at the demise of the antichrist Nero. So, I consider that rickety presentation, not as an exercise in intellectuality but one in BROKENNESS, because if it was a secular assignment, I would have made my excuses and either abandoned it or postponed the date of presentation. But since it was a church project, I didn’t have the power to show any form of defiance or displeasure. This dislocation together with the effects of an ingestion of a prescribed medication that left my mouth dried made the exercise very tedious. Right there, was the brokenness. I simply soldiered on. Please let me explain.

At one time, I noticed chaotic scenes in bus stops where large numbers of people milled around waiting for buses to their various jobs in the morning. Some of this people, were women with little children in school uniform, which meant that they would  drop off their children at school first before heading to their various places of work or business, unless they were teaching at the same schools where their children schooled. Apart from the long intervals between buses, several of the buses that eventually come would not fully come to a stop. They merely slow down a bit and people start jumping in and out of the slow-moving buses. Many people have fallen that way with serious injuries. If I was using my official car, I was always with my driver leaving 3 places available. If I was driving in my private car, I would have 4 places available. And I was always playing pastor Kumuyi’s message cassettes. I had just moved from New Estate Baptist Church to Deeper Life Bible Church, where HOLINESS inside and outside, according to pastor Kumuyi, was the overriding doctrine. Don’t forget that in the first place, I was from an Islamic background and a Muslim before I gave my life to Jesus Christ. The few spaces available were too little to make any difference but I decided to do what little I could to help, so I would stop and pick up anybody going in my direction, making sure they understood that I wouldn’t branch out of my way onto side streets. Mind you, I didn’t pray. It was a spontaneous act of generosity or charity that I felt was just mundane and pedestrian. I felt that I didn’t need to pray to give somebody a glass of cold water to drink on a hot day. That was my frame of mind when giving rides to people at the overcrowded bust stops.

Tongues began to wag. My driver, I believe, told his colleagues in their drivers’ office, and the others told their bosses, other departmental heads. I was blissfully unaware of the swirling gist about me. One day there was a knock on the door of my office, and my boss walked in. That was his first day in my office. He usually would call me on his intercom or tell his secretary to call me. I was pleasantly surprised to see him. He sat down and using my initials, said, “M. S. I hear you have converted your official and personal cars into a free people’s cab.” Surprised, I started to explain that I wasn’t incurring any costs for the company to bear because I never strayed out of my actual intended route but will always drop people off along my normal intended route, so there wasn’t any additional cost to the company. He cut me off before I could finish and said he wasn’t in my office to accuse or scold me, but actually to appreciate me. He was a Muslim. He said that during the last Friday sermon, his Imam stressed such acts of generosity to people who are total strangers and who have no possibility of paying back beyond just saying “Thank you.”  He said that most car owners are always angry when some of these people at the bus stops spill over onto the roads in their anxiety about catching a bus by all means to get to their respective places of work. Such impatient motorists refuse to appreciate the predicament of the people. I confessed that I was like the motorists, and perhaps Jesus Christ through pastor Kumuyi’s teaching helped me to look beyond myself to appreciate better the predicaments of others beyond myself. Then to spoil things in a somewhat pleasant way, he reminded me that though I wasn’t a Muslim anymore, my Muslim background was responsible for that act of charity. I laughed and told him that if I was caught an armed robber, he wouldn’t have said so but would have blamed Christianity.

As it turned out later, the church brother’s vision of evangelism is cast in the mold of RECRUITMENT. He must have believed that he was recruiting me. And that we were going to recruit the people we talk to about Jesus Christ during our field evangelism exercise. That explains why he decided to draw up the topic and outline of my presentation without even notifying me or seeking my opinion before sending the topic and outline to the pastor. My vision of evangelism is PROMOTION. For another of our brethren, it is HARVESTING.  So, I promote only one thing – JESUS CHRIST. All the recruitment required had already been done by the lord Jesus Christ when he commanded us to go and make disciples of all nations. Those marching orders were for the first generation of his disciples; and for those of us following behind, we had already also been pre-recruited.

Matt 28:19-20

19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:

20 Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

Mark 16:15-18

15 And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.

16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.

17 And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;

18 They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

Luke 24:47

47 And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.

Acts 10:42

42 And he commanded us to preach unto the people, and to testify that it is he which was ordained of God to be the Judge of quick and dead.

Since then for me, it has been promotion and advertisement of JESUS CHRIST and his 3-fold ministry of Salvation, Healing and Deliverance all the way. The positions are quite nuanced, but all geared towards one thing, which is to populate the kingdom of God.

When I told brethren at the FGBMFI (Full Gospel Business Men Fellowship International), many of my brothers there warned me against giving ride to total strangers because it was dangerous to do so. They advised me to beware because many could be robbers, witches, etc. I replied that if we agree that this world wasn’t our home why should we be scared of dying because we were obeying our lord. I insisted that death could come at anytime, and if it came because we are doing God’s will, then so be it. One brother said “Remember your family my brother.”

I then prayed about it mainly for my protection since some brethren rightly pointed out the potential danger that might rear its head from giving rides to total strangers. And I believed that The Lord approved of it and also encouraged me to do so whenever I was driving past a bus stop and people were waiting for buses. I had early confined it to morning times when people were going to work. It became a clearly delineated vision for me to religiously execute though brethren at the FGBMFI mostly warned me against it for my safety. I also started looking carefully at the people I picked up for any signs of potential danger. What I didn’t know was that I was carrying out a serious act of evangelism. I didn’t know the religious persuasions of the people and I didn’t care. I just gave rides to people who needed it.

A few calls came in from people I didn’t know. A certain pastor Ralph called and said he was in charge of a lunch time fellowship and that one of their members  gave a testimony about a sister who gave her life to Jesus Christ. According to him, the sister talked about me and my regular help to people at the bus stops. She talked of pastor Kumuyi’s messages and prayers playing in my car stereo. She said that she said she would hear pastor kumiyi’s voice all through the day in her mind. Her two friends also joined her in giving their life to Jesus Christ. I assured him that I was merely giving ride to people and I wasn’t interested in their religion. I would give ride to anybody, not minding their religion. Religion was the farthest thing from my mind. One of the guys, Ade George, a printer, who became a regular pick-up, said that whenever he bought a car, he would give rides to people like I was doing. He told me he was a roman catholic, but he would give ride to anybody who needed a ride. He was a printer working in a printing press owned by the father of his old schoolmate. During one of those crazy traffic jams, a trip that was supposed to take us about 40 minutes stretched to about 3 hours. We listened to 3 messages from pastor Kumuyi that day. The message on BROTHER’S KEEPER was very touching. Kumuyi, rounded up with a powerful prayer for God to help Christian believers be true brother’s keepers, helping to bear the pains and burdens of brethren. The following week, Francis showed me a card he printer, showing my name as the coordinator of BROTHERS’ KEEPERS INTERNATIONAL, a fictitious entity. It was very funny that some of my pick-ups were taking the whole thing so seriously. I don’t know what happened after I got another job appointment in another state. I moved on to MFM (Mountain of Fire & Miracles from Deeper Life Bible Church.

The brethren at FGBMFI who did not buy the idea of giving ride to “total strangers” were also very committed Christians, but they had another vision or a different take on my vision. They were also doing charitable things in different ways. I did not seek to coopt them into my vision.  

JUDEA AT THE PINNACLE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.

At the pinnacle of the reign of the roman empire, the conquered territories of the empire stretched from Britain in the north to the coast of north Africa in the south and from Spain to Syria in the east. The roman authorities introduced their laws and civilization wherever they ruled. In Judea, they met a very well-structured society. This was because the children of Israel already had a monotheistic religion, in which God gave them rules for governance. The 10 commandments formed the bedrock of their laws, with other specifics given them by Yahweh. Their mandated sacrifices and offerings for every aspect of their transgressions and worship of JEHOVAH were also spelt out for them. So, the romans allowed them to retain their system, and only stressed taxes and other acts of obeisance to Rome. Roman consuls were appointed for Egypt, Judea and Syria.

At the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Jewish zealots had already started to encourage and mount resistance to the roman rule, and there were sporadic acts of sabotage and ambushes and killing of roman soldiers and their Jewish collaborators which were seen as traitors. It is said that Barabas who the people of Israel asked Pontius Pilate to release instead of Jesus, was a zealot of freedom fighter as you might call them nowadays. Jesus Christ predicted a time of great upheavals and devastation in Judea. “Do you see all these things?” he asked. “Truly I tell you, not one stone here will be left on another; everyone will be thrown down.” Matthew 24:2. Jesus warned that they will be scattered all over the world and that they will be hated of all men because of him.

Vespasian started the siege of Jerusalem in AD 69, though actual year is put at AD 70 after Emperor Nero who committed suicide, and who is seen as a form of Antichrist, and two others who reigned very briefly after him died. Vespasian was ordered to pacify Judea where Jewish zealots were in a state of constant revolt against the occupation of Judea by Rome. But while setting up the siege, news came from Rome that the senate had elected him the new emperor. Before leaving Judea or Palestine for Rome, Vespasian appointed his son Titus who was also a very fine roman general to continue the siege. According to the writings of the great Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, Vespasian had indicated to Titus that the temple at Jerusalem was to be taken intact, so Titus must order his commanders to avoid fighting within the temple grounds though some zealots remained inside the temple grounds. Titus’s siege started in AD 70 when his father Vespasian returned to Rome for his coronation.

Inside Jerusalem, the forever quarrelsome Jewish fighters were in factions warring against each other. Vespasian’s initial strategy was to allow the infighting amongst them to help weaken the various factions, while ensuring that nothing went in or out of the city of Jerusalem. The zealots were very brave and courageous fighters, but their fighting among themselves undermined their defense strategies, thus inevitably weakening them. General Titus maintained that strategy of his father’s and let the zealot factions destroy themselves before moving into the city. The suffering in Jerusalem was so bad that cases of cannibalism were reported amongst the people of Israel. Flavius Josephus, the famous Jewish historian narrated the story of a woman who was caught eating her child. This is a fulfillment of the prophecies warning Israel of immense suffering from disobeying God, when enemy forces would besiege them.

Deut 28:53

53 And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daughters, which the Lord thy God hath given thee, in the siege, and in the straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee:

Lev 26:29

29 And ye shall eat the flesh of your sons, and the flesh of your daughters shall ye eat.

When the forces of Titus eventually breached the wall and defenses, the fight on the streets of the city of Jerusalem was brutal and bloody from street to street. Human blood flowed on the streets of the ancient city. During the fight, against the express orders of Vespasian and later General Titus, the second Jewish temple was set ablaze. It is said that nobody knows how the temple caught fire and was razed to the ground, as Jesus Christ predicted. The voice of the master had decreed, and man would try to defy it.

Here we see once again the victory of Christ’s prophecy over the machinations and power of man. Vespasian and Titus skillful generals commanding the best army of the world at that time gave orders that opposed the prophecy of our lord and savior Jesus Christ who had very long ago already determined that the temple must be razed to the ground.  

 Matt 24:1-2

1 And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple.

2 And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

Luke 21:5-6

5 And as some spake of the temple, how it was adorned with goodly stones and gifts, he said,

6 As for these things which ye behold, the days will come, in the which there shall not be left one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

Many have speculated on the main reason Vespasian and by extension Titus following his father’s orders wanted the temple captured intact. Very many people have suggested and ascribed all kinds of reasons and motives. My own candid opinion is that these two romans didn’t just fall in love with Jewish religion and culture. They weren’t out to preserve the structure for posterity’s sake. The very suggestion that a roman wanted the temple preserved by all means, merely reminds me of the expression of “Abomination of Desolation” or “The Abomination that Brings Desolation.” This can actually be succinctly captured in the expression of “DOUBLE CALAMITY. This is a desecration of astronomical proportion of the Jewish holy sites by pagan captors and occupiers. This has happened 2 occasions in the history of the people of Israel; and they are often linked with periods of heinous sinning among the children of Israel. On the events of this calamities, righteous punishment from God is seen as the main punishment after it, had been triggered by monumental sinning by God’s people. The actual desecration was by Antiochus Epiphanes, a pagan. He desecrated the temple by going into the temple with his pagan self and sacrificing a sow – female pig on the alter of God. The desecration occurred when he a pagan gained entrance into the temple and sacrificed a sow which is an unclean animal by Jewish law, on the revered alter of God. It’s logical to suggest that Vespasian intended to also desecrate the temple, because roman emperors had elevated themselves to the position of gods, with their compliments of full cults, temples, priests and worshippers. It stands to reason that Vespasian wanted to use the temple for his cult. God overruled this many years before through the prophecy of Jesus Christ that nothing would save the temple from total destruction. First to punish the Jews for their years of disobedience and secondly, to prevent Vespasian from using it for pagan worship.

Some of the surviving zealots escaped to regroup in Masada in a fortress built by King Herod the great on a hanging cliff in the Judean desert. In order for the roman army in pursuit of the zealots to access the stronghold, a ramp was built. It took time and many of the builders died from arrows and other projectiles hurled at them by the zealots inside the fortress of Masada. When the ramp was completed and the roman soldiers entered, they found that the fighters had killed themselves and their families. They preferred to all die instead of being captured alive and executed or sold into roman slavery. Recent archeological research and diggings around the Judean desert have also found that several caves dotting the Judean desert also contained skeletons of whole families who all committed suicide instead of being caught alive to go to shameful execution, mainly by crucifixion or deportation into roman slavery. Usually, the very fit men would end up as gladiators to die in the colosseum fighting till death, to entertain the depraved roman audience.

The coming Antichrist in the present end times will also sit in the temple demanding his worship by the people of God 2 Thessalonians 2:4 and Revelation 13:14 – 15, just before Jesus Christ returns after the rapture had already taken place to destroy him and establish his eternal kingdom.

2Thess 2:4

4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

Rev 13:14-15

14 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.

15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.

Increasingly Christian believers are warned to look out for signs of the imminence of Christ’s return that would take place in 2 transactions thus:

1.       To take his people away in the rapture.

2.       To destroy and exert judgment on a totally corrupt world.

From my recent experience with Artificial Intelligence and contact with people in the requisite field, I have no doubt that the first transaction in the coming of our lord known as the rapture is nearer than most people think. I don’t fully understand the AI thing and it’s ramifications for the world. But recently, I tinkered with it to test it for the very first time, and was astonished at the devilish implications of its capabilities, including writing Bible Studies, Christian Themed Books, etc. In fact, AI can pretend to be God Almighty, Jesus Christ and The Holy Spirit. A group contacted me to do ghostwriting for my next book. Their writing would rely on the use of AI. Yes, you heard me right. So, AI can be a pastor, evangelist, etc. Just name it. Because of this AI danger to Christians, I believe that the lord’s coming is at the door. I certainly don’t want any AI near me for any spiritual engagements.

But note that the fact that you want to do the right thing by God doesn’t mean that Satan and his children will leave you alone. No. Not too long ago, I wrote to thank my doctor and someone for helping me with my health. And the whole world broke loose, with all kinds of surveillance mounted, attempted job sabotage and wilful destruction of my property. Calls were made to friends and associates and damaging slander let loose. It’s the stuff of which spy thrillers are made. However, I have the victory of Christ Jesus. I have continued with my work for The Lord because as his coming draws near, a lot of distractions are being manufactured by Satan and his children to keep the children of God occupied with profitless concerns and ventures. They fight God when they fight me. Maranatha. Even so come Lord Jesus Christ.