The Blessings and the Curses (No. 75)

When God issued the Law through mediators, and had the Messiah as the Angel of the Presence or Covenant deliver the Law to Israel through Moses, He set up a system which would not fail or be deficient. However, the system was made deficient in its implementation by the traditions of Judaism. The blessings and the curses apply to all of Israel and not just Judaism. More importantly, they show that God deals with nations specifically, and a multi-national Church structure wrongly seeks to obviate the specific system that God had set up to deal with peoples.

Importantly, Israel was to be set above all the nations of the Earth, and will be set above all the nations of the Earth at the return of Messiah. They will become a light and a nation of priests; thus we are not dealing with unjust allocation of power and material well-being. Each nation can share in the relative well-being based upon their acceptance of the Commandments of God. They thus become part of Israel. However, if Israel obeyed the Law continually they would not have needed to wait, and would have achieved a pre-eminent position beforehand through Messiah and the Host.

Deuteronomy 28:1-68 "And if you obey the voice of the LORD your God, being careful to do all his commandments which I command you this day, the LORD your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. ²And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you, if you obey the voice of the LORD your God. ³ Blessed shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field. ⁴Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, and the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your beasts, the increase of your cattle, and the young of your flock. ⁵Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading-trough. ⁶Blessed shall you be when you come in, and blessed shall you be when you go out.

The blessings of the Lord extend to cover all aspects of the nation, both in the towns and in the fields. Material well-being is thus tied to the Law.

⁷ "The LORD will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you; they shall come out against you one way, and flee before you seven ways.

Here the enemies of the nation are dispersed by the actions of God through the Host. The united attacks of enemy alliances will be defeated and dispersed.

⁸ The LORD will command the blessing upon you in your barns, and in all that you undertake; and he will bless you in the land which the LORD your God gives you.

The retention of the blessings is dependent upon the command of Yahoveh within the areas granted by Yahovah Elohim. Thus Messiah commands blessings within the bounds allocated to the nations by God.

⁹ The LORD will establish you as a people holy to himself, as he has sworn to you, if you keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and walk in his ways.

Here the statement is made that the establishment of the nation as a people holy to God is the specific aim and promise of God, and that it is conditional upon the keeping of the Commandments.

¹⁰ And all the peoples of the earth shall see that you are called by the name of the LORD; and they shall be afraid of you.

Here the promise is made that the Lord will make people afraid of us, because we are called by the Name of God. The Interlinear texts show that the wording is that the name of Yahovah is named on you. Thus the identification of the elect involves the naming of the people and an understanding of the nature of God. The Philadelphian Church is noted because it has only a little power, but keeps the word and does not deny the name of Messiah (Rev. 3:8).

¹¹ And the LORD will make you abound in prosperity, in the fruit of your body, and in the fruit of your cattle, and in the fruit of your ground, within the land which the LORD swore to your fathers to give you. ¹² The LORD will open to you his good treasury the heavens, to give the rain of your land in its season and to bless all the work of your hands; and you shall lend to many nations, but you shall not borrow.

Thus the promises here involve two aspects as a mark of the blessings of the Lord: the Lord will give rain in due season, and the nation shall be a net lender not a borrower. Thus drought is a mark of being out of sequence with the Jubilee Calendar and not keeping the Laws of God. The net result of keeping God’s Laws is that the nation has wealth and does not need to borrow. The fact that the world is now in such a mess is proof of the poor spiritual relationship of the world with God.

¹³ And the LORD will make you the head, and not the tail; and you shall tend upward only, and not downward; if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you this day, being careful to do them,¹⁴ and if you do not turn aside from any of the words which I command you this day, to the right hand or to the left, to go after other gods to serve them.

The Commandments are clearly identified with the approval and assistance or bounty of God. The failure to keep the Commandments is of itself identified as following after foreign gods. Thus the aspect of idolatry does not rely on the specific and wilful worship of demons. The mere fact that one follows the doctrines of demons, albeit within his or her own frames of reference, places one in enmity towards God.

Disobedience to the Laws of God is punishable, both individually and collectively. God deals in nations as he deals in families. Those nations are also judged as is the Host that governs them (see the paper The Angel of YHVH (No. 24)).

¹⁵ "But if you will not obey the voice of the LORD your God or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command you this day, then all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. ¹⁶ Cursed shall you be in the city, and cursed shall you be in the field. ¹⁷ Cursed shall be your basket and your kneading-trough. ¹⁸ Cursed shall be the fruit of your body, and the fruit of your ground, the increase of your cattle, and the young of your flock. ¹⁹ Cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out.

The Commandments and the statutes are to be kept. Punishment is ongoing for disobedience and is reflected in the produce of the land. The nation is dealt with as a people. The people will be given cleanness of teeth; that is, they will experience famine. The bounty of the Earth is interrelated with the Laws of God.

²⁰ "The LORD will send upon you curses, confusion, and frustration, in all that you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and perish quickly, on account of the evil of your doings, because you have forsaken me.

The Lord deals with the people by curses and confusion and frustration. This confusion extends from the top down. The leadership or government of the nation is struck with stupidity and imbecilic decision-making, which works counter to the welfare of the people. Decisions made not in accordance with the Testimony and the Law plunge a people into darkness. The destruction of a people in rebellion to God is rapid. Think of how quickly the United States of America has gone downhill. Think how quickly Australia degenerated by following the American example. Look now at Sydney and the Mardi Gras. This nation will be put to the sword, and rather quickly unless it repents.

²¹The LORD will make the pestilence cleave to you until he has consumed you off the land which you are entering to take possession of it. ²² The LORD will smite you with consumption, and with fever, inflammation, and fiery heat, and with drought, and with blasting, and with mildew; they shall pursue you until you perish. ²³ And the heavens over your head shall be brass, and the earth under you shall be iron. ²⁴ The LORD will make the rain of your land powder and dust; from heaven it shall come down upon you until you are destroyed.

The pestilence will be unleashed on the people until they are destroyed. Look at the diseases that are becoming endemic in this country. The conditions for outbreaks of dengue fever and mosquito-borne diseases are serious. Parasites and weeds are being imported through incompetent administrative decision-making. This paradise is being turned into a wilderness by incompetence and perverted mindsets.

²⁵ "The LORD will cause you to be defeated before your enemies; you shall go out one way against them, and flee seven ways before them; and you shall be a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth. ²⁶ And your dead body shall be food for all birds of the air, and for the beasts of the earth; and there shall be no one to frighten them away.

Whereas we were given the birthright promises, and took them through the intervention of God so that the inhabitants of those countries might also benefit by the introduction of the just Laws of a merciful God, we perverted the Laws and persecuted those people. Only now are those people being rehabilitated. The American Indians and Australian Aborigines should have been made strong nations under the power of God; instead, they were made to disassociate themselves from the Law through our perversion of it and our false religious principles. The Americans never kept a treaty with the Indians. Australians were not much better.

²⁷ The LORD will smite you with the boils of Egypt, and with the ulcers and the scurvy and the itch, of which you cannot be healed. ²⁸ The LORD will smite you with madness and blindness and confusion of mind; ²⁹ and you shall grope at noonday, as the blind grope in darkness, and you shall not prosper in your ways; and you shall be only oppressed and robbed continually, and there shall be no one to help you.

The types of diseases that are increasing daily are becoming more horrific. The AIDS epidemic appears to be prophesied in Romans 1:25-27. The increase of madness in world society is evidence of the breach of the Laws of God. The function of insanity is that it is inflicted nationally on those not exercising the Holy Spirit. It occurs from the affliction of society and is often not the direct responsibility of the individual, being bound up with the chemical properties of the food chain and water storage. Rome used lead pipes through administrative incompetence and as a result the nation suffered with endemic lunacy. Drugs in this society increase psychotic illness and also genetic disorders.

Family relationships break down and the society disintegrates. Our women will become whores for occupying armies and our produce will be given to other people.

³⁰You shall betroth a wife, and another man shall lie with her; you shall build a house, and you shall not dwell in it; you shall plant a vineyard, and you shall not use the fruit of it. ³¹ Your ox shall be slain before your eyes, and you shall not eat of it; your ass shall be violently taken away before your face, and shall not be restored to you; your sheep shall be given to your enemies, and there shall be no one to help you. ³² Your sons and your daughters shall be given to another people, while your eyes look on and fail with longing for them all the day; and it shall not be in the power of your hand to prevent it. ³³A nation which you have not known shall eat up the fruit of your ground and of all your labours; and you shall be only oppressed and crushed continually; ³⁴ so that you shall be driven mad by the sight which your eyes shall see. ³⁵ The LORD will smite you on the knees and on the legs with grievous boils of which you cannot be healed, from the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.

This sequence is needed to set in train the process of repentance. Without this process we could not be made to see the consequence of what we do. It has to be speedy and hard; more so to drive home the lesson of comparisons.

Here we see that Moses prophesied that the monarchy would be established. The service of other elohim is coupled with wood and stone, but does not mean that the elohim were made from wood and stone. The main text of the Interlinear separates them by comma.

³⁶ "The LORD will bring you, and your king whom you set over you, to a nation that neither you nor your fathers have known; and there you shall serve other gods, of wood and stone.

This captivity is to a foreign nation that we do not know. They will use foreign language and be given a heart of stone to deal with us. Moreover, our ways are so perverse that what we say is religion is totally disassociated with the worship of the One True God and the success that comes from that Faith. Up until now, the nation was protected and given its birthright because of the promises given to Joseph through his sons, Ephraim and Manasseh.

Genesis 48:15-22 And he blessed Joseph, and said, "The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has led me all my life long to this day, ¹⁶ the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads; and in them let my name be perpetuated, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac; and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth." ¹⁷ When Joseph saw that his father laid his right hand upon the head of E'phraim, it displeased him; and he took his father's hand, to remove it from E'phraim's head to Manas'seh's head. ¹⁸ And Joseph said to his father, "Not so, my father; for this one is the first-born; put your right hand upon his head." ¹⁹ But his father refused, and said, "I know, my son, I know; he also shall become a people, and he also shall be great; nevertheless his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his descendants shall become a multitude of nations." ²⁰ So he blessed them that day, saying, "By you Israel will pronounce blessings, saying, `God make you as E'phraim and as Manas'seh'"; and thus he put E'phraim before Manas'seh.²¹ Then Israel said to Joseph, "Behold, I am about to die, but God will be with you, and will bring you again to the land of your fathers.²² Moreover I have given to you rather than to your brothers one mountain slope which I took from the hand of the Amorites with my sword and with my bow." (RSV)

The Angel who redeemed Israel was Messiah as the Angel of YHVH. The blessings given to Israel were through Joseph, and Ephraim was made the focus of those blessings. Judah would bear the sceptre from which would spring Messiah. However, Joseph had the birthright blessings and they have not been taken from him; but they are conditional to obedience.

Deuteronomy 28 continues:

³⁷And you shall become a horror, a proverb, and a byword, among all the peoples where the LORD will lead you away. ³⁸You shall carry much seed into the field, and shall gather little in; for the locust shall consume it. ³⁹ You shall plant vineyards and dress them, but you shall neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes; for the worm shall eat them. ⁴⁰ You shall have olive trees throughout all your territory, but you shall not anoint yourself with the oil; for your olives shall drop off. ⁴¹ You shall beget sons and daughters, but they shall not be yours; for they shall go into captivity. ⁴² All your trees and the fruit of your ground the locust shall possess. ⁴³The sojourner who is among you shall mount above you higher and higher; and you shall come down lower and lower. ⁴⁴ He shall lend to you, and you shall not lend to him; he shall be the head, and you shall be the tail.

The sons and daughters of the nation shall go into captivity. The nation is not protected against these problems. Moreover, the elect are part of that nation. If we think that we can remain silent and still be protected when the curses fall on the land, then we are mistaken. The promise the righteous have is that their bread and water will be sure; but just that and no more. If we remain silent while this evil reigns the Lord will not hear us until we repent in sackcloth and ashes.

⁴⁵ All these curses shall come upon you and pursue you and overtake you, till you are destroyed, because you did not obey the voice of the LORD your God, to keep his commandments and his statutes which he commanded you.⁴⁶ They shall be upon you as a sign and a wonder, and upon your descendants for ever.

Israel is a spiritual people and the Commandments and statutes are a sign and a wonder on Israel forever. They remain forever on those who profess Jesus Christ and thus come under judgment.

⁴⁷ "Because you did not serve the LORD your God with joyfulness and gladness of heart, by reason of the abundance of all things, ⁴⁸ therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the LORD will send against you, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness, and in want of all things; and he will put a yoke of iron upon your neck, until he has destroyed you. ⁴⁹The LORD will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as swift as the eagle flies, a nation whose language you do not understand, ⁵⁰ a nation of stern countenance, who shall not regard the person of the old or show favour to the young, ⁵¹ and shall eat the offspring of your cattle and the fruit of your ground, until you are destroyed; who also shall not leave you grain, wine, or oil, the increase of your cattle or the young of your flock, until they have caused you to perish.

This is happening now. Our cattle are being sold in ever worsening terms of trade. Drought is destroying our people. We have imported wheat for the first time in living memory. We are deeply in debt and were put there by foreign entrepreneurs. Aliens devour our strength and we know it not. Grey hairs are upon us and we know it not. We are led astray by blind guides and apostates from Manasseh or, worse still, from foreign nations, particularly Europe.

⁵² They shall besiege you in all your towns, until your high and fortified walls, in which you trusted, come down throughout all your land; and they shall besiege you in all your towns throughout all your land, which the LORD your God has given you.

This promise relates to war within our territories. Next time we will be occupied and see the destruction of our people. We will not have finished fleeing from persecution through all the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes (Mat. 10:23).

⁵³And you shall eat the offspring of your own body, the flesh of your sons and daughters, whom the LORD your God has given you, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemies shall distress you. ⁵⁴The man who is the most tender and delicately bred among you will grudge food to his brother, to the wife of his bosom, and to the last of the children who remain to him; ⁵⁵ so that he will not give to any of them any of the flesh of his children whom he is eating, because he has nothing left him, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in all your towns. ⁵⁶ The most tender and delicately bred woman among you, who would not venture to set the sole of her foot upon the ground because she is so delicate and tender, will grudge to the husband of her bosom, to her son and to her daughter, ⁵⁷ her afterbirth that comes out from between her feet and her children whom she bears, because she will eat them secretly, for want of all things, in the siege and in the distress with which your enemy shall distress you in your towns.

This is a horrific text and yet it has happened, but not as badly as it will occur in the last and final destruction.

⁵⁸"If you are not careful to do all the words of this law which are written in this book, that you may fear this glorious and awful name, the LORD your God, ⁵⁹then the LORD will bring on you and your offspring extraordinary afflictions, afflictions severe and lasting, and sicknesses grievous and lasting.⁶⁰ And he will bring upon you again all the diseases of Egypt, which you were afraid of; and they shall cleave to you. ⁶¹ Every sickness also, and every affliction which is not recorded in the book of this law, the LORD will bring upon you, until you are destroyed. ⁶² Whereas you were as the stars of heaven for multitude, you shall be left few in number; because you did not obey the voice of the LORD your God. ⁶³And as the LORD took delight in doing you good and multiplying you, so the LORD will take delight in bringing ruin upon you and destroying you; and you shall be plucked off the land which you are entering to take possession of it. ⁶⁴ And the LORD will scatter you among all peoples, from one end of the earth to the other; and there you shall serve other gods, of wood and stone, which neither you nor your fathers have known.

This insanity is happening in Australia now. Aliens establish foreign idols here and our people worship them. Doctrines of demons abound. Vegetarianism is touted as virtuous and the insane thought-processes of the apostate become open ravings and mantras.

When the destruction of the Last Days erupts on this nation it is the elect that will be persecuted. Firstly, their brethren who will seek to save themselves will betray them and, lastly, the Great Multitude will make their robes white in the blood of the Lamb. If we cannot stand for the truth now and attempt to save this nation, we will betray our brothers and sisters when it is expedient. Thus the plagues of the Last Days will descend upon each of the weak and that which they feared will be a reality.

⁶⁵ And among these nations you shall find no ease, and there shall be no rest for the sole of your foot; but the LORD will give you there a trembling heart, and failing eyes, and a languishing soul; ⁶⁶ your life shall hang in doubt before you; night and day you shall be in dread, and have no assurance of your life.⁶⁷ In the morning you shall say, `Would it were evening!' and at evening you shall say, `Would it were morning!' because of the dread which your heart shall fear, and the sights which your eyes shall see. ⁶⁸ And the LORD will bring you back in ships to Egypt, a journey which I promised that you should never make again; and there you shall offer yourselves for sale to your enemies as male and female slaves, but no man will buy you." (RSV)

The Lord promised that we would not go back to Egypt again, thus there will be a system set in motion which will deal with the apostasy of the nation. No one will buy us because they cannot feed us, and we are so riddled with diseases that we are a liability to other people.

Yet, the nations will be tested by us. God punished us to deal with us, but He also uses us to judge the nations.

Jeremiah 30:11-24 For I am with you to save you, says the LORD; I will make a full end of all the nations among whom I scattered you, but of you I will not make a full end. I will chasten you in just measure, and I will by no means leave you unpunished. ¹² "For thus says the LORD: Your hurt is incurable, and your wound is grievous. ¹³ There is none to uphold your cause, no medicine for your wound, no healing for you. ¹⁴ All your lovers have forgotten you; they care nothing for you; for I have dealt you the blow of an enemy, the punishment of a merciless foe, because your guilt is great, because your sins are flagrant. ¹⁵ Why do you cry out over your hurt? Your pain is incurable. Because your guilt is great, because your sins are flagrant, I have done these things to you. ¹⁶ Therefore all who devour you shall be devoured, and all your foes, every one of them, shall go into captivity; those who despoil you shall become a spoil, and all who prey on you I will make a prey. ¹⁷ For I will restore health to you, and your wounds I will heal, says the LORD, because they have called you an outcast: `It is Zion, for whom no one cares!' ¹⁸ "Thus says the LORD: Behold, I will restore the fortunes of the tents of Jacob, and have compassion on his dwellings; the city shall be rebuilt upon its mound, and the palace shall stand where it used to be. ¹⁹Out of them shall come songs of thanksgiving, and the voices of those who make merry. I will multiply them, and they shall not be few; I will make them honored, and they shall not be small. ²⁰ Their children shall be as they were of old, and their congregation shall be established before me; and I will punish all who oppress them. ²¹ Their prince shall be one of themselves, their ruler shall come forth from their midst; I will make him draw near, and he shall approach me, for who would dare of himself to approach me? says the LORD. ²²And you shall be my people, and I will be your God." ²³ Behold the storm of the LORD! Wrath has gone forth, a whirling tempest; it will burst upon the head of the wicked. ²⁴ The fierce anger of the LORD will not turn back until he has executed and accomplished the intents of his mind. In the latter days you will understand this. (RSV)

There is thus a promise to Israel in all of this sequence. This lesson is given so that we might see the full horror of our inactivity and failure to perform within our people. Christ stands outside of the door of the Laodicean Church; he is knocking at the door. He will come in to individuals, but he is not within that Church. Wake up and repent and then help to call this nation to repentance before it is too late.

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