The Kingdom of the Bride - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0933451318 ISBN 13: 9780933451315

Inhaltsangabe

The Kingdom of the Bride is a story on the end times. As an exposition on the last days of our planet and the Second Coming of Christ, it represents a blending of the old and the new. The intermingling of the traditional and the novel is what I believe makes this book unique amongst all others on the subject of prophecy.

Much of the confusion I believe that pervades other books on eschatology--the study of the last things-- most of which reflect the present day evangelical teaching on Christ's return, stems from a misunderstanding of two things. First, from what is actually meant by the term the Consummation (which literally means completion), and second, from what is meant by the term the Day of the Lord. The prophetic view presented in this book is quite simple. The Kingdom of the Bride takes the elementary historical view that the Consummation, or the climax of human history, will be brought about on a literal, final day, referred to as the Day of the Lord, in which the Lord Jesus Himself will return from Heaven to rescue those who believe in Him.

Resultantly, Christ's Second Coming is presented as a single, stupendous event. Coincident with His return on that day--also called the Last Day--will be the resurrection of the dead, the rapture or translation of living believers, the final judgment of the living and the dead, the ultimate victory of life over death, the destruction of our present world and universe, and the creation of a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Any prophetic system that teaches otherwise ignores the scriptures. This view, called Amillennialism (meaning no millennium) pervaded the church for well over fifteen hundred years both before and after being established as Christian doctrine by the renowned early church father Augustine. It was also vigorously defended against the premillennialists (those who teach of a 1000 year earthly reign of Christ after His Second Coming) by the Protestant reformers Martin Luther and John Calvin. Amillennialism still is a central tenant of the Roman Catholic Church and many of the mainline Protestant denominations.

In regards to the new, this book introduces a revolutionary new paradigm on end time eschatology, one I call "Kingdom Amillennialism," that builds upon the classic amillennial thought of Augustine, Luther and Calvin. Kingdom Amillennialism says there will be an appointed season of time after the great tribulation and the destruction of the Antichrist and before the Christ's Second Coming and the end of the world. During this epoch Christ's Bride, the church, will reign upon the earth. For it is written of her, "then the sovereignty, the dominion, and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the people of the saints of the Highest One" (Dan. 7:27a). Henceforth, The Kingdom of the Bride represents a monumental paradigm shift from the premillennial, and particularly from the pretribulational, teachings that pervade the evangelical Church today. It is my desire that all who read The Kingdom of the Bride will gain fresh new insights into the prophetic scriptures and the drama that is presently unfolding before them, a drama that will climax with the soon return of the Son of God for His beloved Bride. I sincerely hope this will likewise serve to inspire all to a new level of devotion in serving their Master, the beautiful Bridegroom, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Martin Bachicha is an adept scholar of Biblical Prophecy and has appeared on national radio and television programs including The American Freedom Network. He and his wife Helen make their home in Albuquerque, New Mexico where he works as an engineer for Intel Corporation. A native of Albuquerque, he has previously worked for IBM Corporation as an engineer and computer and manufacturing industry consultant. He holds Masters degrees in Mechanical Engineering and Robotics from the University of New Mexico and in Engineering Management from Colorado State University. He also has attended graduate school at the University of California at Berkeley. As a Computer Industry Consultant and Systems Engineer he is qualified to write regarding the role the Transnational corporation will play in the end-times. The Kingdom of the Bride is his first book.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

From Chapter 1, The Bridegroom is Coming ... (But is the Bride Ready?): The Bride of Christ is a prophetic term. In the Nineteenth Chapter of the Book of Revelation, the apostle John writes, "Let us rejoice and be glad and give glory to Him, for the marriage of [Jesus] the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready."

Yet just who is the Bride of Christ? The simple truth is most people, including Christians, don't know. Today if you mention the term "Bride of Christ" many may be reminded of one of the 20th centuries most controversial films, The Last Temptation of Christ, and its offensive dream sequence where Jesus fantasized of forsaking the cross to marry an enticing Mary Magdalene. The world will ask, "If Jesus was truly human, wouldn't he have desired what most men desire--a beautiful, elegant bride?" The answer to this question is yes. Even so, the bride for which Jesus yearned and still does is not a beautiful woman as some may envision, but a glorious bride composed of his very body, the Church of his people (Eph. 5:25-32).

What a joyous reunion it will be when the Bridegroom at last returns for His bride. In America this imagery seems inconsequential. For today engaged couples spend time with each other right up until the wedding. Only on American wedding days is it still traditional for a bride and bridegroom not to see each other prior to the marriage ceremony. If we were, however, to examine the Hebrew wedding custom of Jesus' day, we would better appreciate the significance in comparing Jesus Christ's coming for His church to a bridegroom returning for his bride.

In those days the Jewish bridegroom would return to his father's house after the betrothal and would remain separate from the bride to be for an extended period, usually around twelve months. Only after this long year of isolation would he return to receive her. Doing so consummated the wedding. If the couple loved each other (which wasn't usually the case since most marriages were prearranged), you can imagine how this prolonged parting must have intensified their desire for one another. So it is with Christ and His church. Christ longs to receive His bride and His bride longs for His return, the moment when they will be forever joined. For close to 2000 years she has anticipated their reunion. And judging from the signs He told her to expect prior to His return, she now knows the moment is near.

From Chapter 2, Daniel's Four Wild Beasts: "And behold, another beast, a second one, resembling a bear. And it was raised up on one side, and three ribs were in its mouth between its teeth; and thus they said to it, `Arise, devour much meat!'" (Dan. 7:5)

Can there be any doubt about the identity of this second great beast? If the first beast is the British Empire, then the second has to be Russia--or the former USSR. The beast's form, "resembling a bear," is clearly the symbol of the former Soviet Union and of present day Russia.

According to Paul Carell, author of the book Hitler Moves East, 1941-1943, the main event in Russia's rise to world power occurred at the battle of Poltava near Kiev where "Tsar Peter the Great inflicted a crushing defeat on the Swedes in 1709. The battle was the death-blow to Sweden's Nordic empire, and marked the emergence of Russia as a modern great power in history." The Bear being raised up on one side symbolizes how the Soviet Union's populace and its military and industrial prowess have historically been more heavily weighted towards its western European frontier.

In order to interpret the meaning of the three ribs between the beast's teeth, one needs to know the locale of the Bear's head and mouth. Quoting the Russian poet Alexander Pushkin, Carell writes: "Novgorod the father, Kiev the mother, Moscow the heart, and St. Petersburg the head of the Russian empire." The Bolshevik revolution did not alter this. Communism's mind evolved in the shipyards of St. Petersburg. Lenin spawned his revolution there and to honor him the Bolsheviks changed the city's name to Leningrad. For this Carell calls Leningrad "the conscience of the Red Empire." Astonishingly, the democratic counter-revolution sweeping over the Soviet Union has caused its name to be changed once again to St. Petersburg.

Not only is Leningrad-St. Petersburg the ideological head and conscience of the Russian empire, but its port located on the Gulf of Finland (an arm of Baltic Sea) is the largest in Russia. During his reign, one of Peter the Great's prime objectives was to obtain a major seaport for his empire. Cut off from the sea throughout much of her history, Russia had developed in isolation from Western culture and technology. Tsar Peter believed the new city would provide a port for trade through the Baltic Sea, giving Russia a "window on Europe." For years millions of tons of imported raw materials and foodstuffs, in particular U.S. wheat, have flowed through Leningrad. In retrospect, the Baltic Sea route to the "head" Leningrad-St. Petersburg is the mouth of the Soviet Union.

If the Baltic sea is the Bear's mouth, then the three ribs clenched between its teeth must undoubtedly be the three recently independent Baltic Republics of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia, countries annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940, and recaptured by it in 1944 after Nazi Germany's three year occupation during World War II. Being themselves victims of Soviet repression, their phrase "devour much meat" appropriately symbolizes the violation the Bear inflicted upon them over nearly 50 years of totalitarian rule. The Bear is Russia. Now who is the third beast?

Details zur Ausgabe

• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0933451318
• ISBN 13: 9780933451315
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar