The Storm of the Lord

Dear friends,

The whole world seems to be turning upside down lately. The stock market has been plummeting worldwide. Europe is in a deep financial crisis and there is mayhem in the streets of England. American debt is rising exponentially. Japan is still cleaning up from the great 8.9 earthquake and tsunami back in March. And let’s not forget that Haiti is still a mess a year and a half after the earthquake. And now Israel has once again experienced a brutal terrorist attack that killed eight Israelis near the Egyptian border. This is just the tip of the iceberg regarding the headlines. What the headlines won’t tell you is what God has to say about what’s going on. Without knowing your Bible and walking with the Lord it would be impossible to make sense of the times we live in. The Prophet Jeremiah wrote about a great end-time storm of the Lord: “Behold the storm of the Lord has gone forth in wrath, Even a whirling tempest; It will swirl down on the head of the wicked. The anger of the Lord will not turn back until He has performed and carried out the purposes of His heart; In the last days you will clearly understand it,” Jeremiah 23:19-20. As I write this letter, Hurricane Irene is barreling up the East coast of the United States. And an earthquake in Virginia left cracks in the top of the Washington Monument, The National Cathedral’s spires, and as yet unknown structural damage to the Pentagon… Has the Storm of the Lord begun? Jeremiah told us that we would clearly understand it. To help demystify it, let’s look at the context of Jeremiah 23 and other related Scriptures.

False Prophets and False Shepherds:

Jeremiah 23 begins with the prophet lashing out at false shepherds, false prophets and false priests. Israel had turned away from following God. The people were worshipping idols, the sun, and foreign gods; they were seeking pleasure and not keeping God’s commandments or the Sabbath. God sent the Babylonians to place Israel under siege as a warning of imminent destruction. The false prophets and the false shepherds were telling the people not to worry about the Babylonians and that everything would be alright and that things would get better. They were giving the people a message of false hope unlike Jeremiah who was warning the people that unless they repented and even yielded to the king of Babylon, Jerusalem would be destroyed, laid waste, and many people would go into captivity as slaves and prisoners. Most people didn’t like Jeremiah’s message. They thought he was just “a doom and gloomer”.

“Woe to the Shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of My pasture! Declares the Lord… You have scattered My flock and driven them away, and have not attended to them; behold, I am about to attend to you for the evil of your deeds, declares the Lord. Then I Myself shall gather the remnant of My flock out of all the countries where I have driven them and shall bring them back to their pasture; and they will be fruitful and multiply. I shall also raise up shepherds over them and they will tend them; and they will not be afraid any longer, nor be terrified, nor will any be missing declares the Lord,” Jeremiah 23:1-4. God is specifically addressing the Jewish people because we were driven out of the Holy Land and scattered among the nations. In Jeremiah’s day, God was angry with the Jewish rabbis, priests and prophets who didn’t look after His sheep. “I shall also raise up shepherds over them and they will tend them; and they will not be afraid any longer…” Jer 23:4. I believe that God is raising up Messianic rabbis to teach the remnant of His Chosen people about their Messiah. For example: in traditional synagogues they never read Isaiah 53 or Daniel 9 because Isaiah 53 is clearly speaking about Jesus and Daniel 9 tells us that the Messiah would be cut off before the destruction of The Second Temple in 70 A.D. That means that the Messiah had to come before 70 A.D.! He did. Yeshua (Jesus) is His name. But the prophecy of the Storm of the Lord is also about the latter days or the end-times. And God still “has a beef” with the false shepherds and not just the Jewish ones.

I wonder if God is pleased with pastors and priests who don’t preach the Gospel or who compromise on issues of sin in their sermons and in their personal lives. Then there are those ministers who compromise the truth for fear of running off large donors. There are even many so-called “Christian” pastors out there who don’t even believe that Jesus is the only way to be saved. Many pastors teach that there are many ways to God and Jesus is just one of them. These shepherds expose their flocks to the teachings of other religions such as Islam and more. These shepherds preach religious tolerance, except they are not so tolerant when you tell them that Yeshua (Jesus) is the only name under heaven by which men are saved. If the words of Yeshua are true, “I Am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me,” John 14:6, then preaching the Cross is the most loving thing anyone can do for a fellow human being. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life,” John 3:16. The Angel Michael told the prophet Daniel, “And there will be a time of distress (Storm of the Lord?) such as never occurred since there was a nation until that time; and at that time your people, everyone who is found written in the book (the book of Life), will be rescued. And many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt,” Daniel 12:1-3. Who will awake to everlasting life and not perish? Those who trust in Yeshua (Jesus).

In the same way, there are many false prophets out there. Moses told us that we would know a prophet if his words came to pass. There are thousands of people prophesying out there. But do their words come to pass? We are also told to test a word that we receive. Don’t just accept a prophecy about your life from someone, seek confirmation from God and from spiritual authorities.

Then there are the false prophets on television saying that the economy will turn around and that things will improve. People want to hear that as they did in Jeremiah’s day, but it’s not getting better folks, things are getting worse and will continue to do so unless we repent. Remember “The Storm of the Lord”, which you will clearly understand in the last days? Wouldn’t we all like to keep riding the gravy train of the past twenty years? Nobody wants to suffer and we don’t want things to change, so we just keep listening to the false prophets on TV telling us to keep investing our money in the stock market and that things will turn around, but will they? How’s your 401K doing? The problem is that the television prophets of the mainstream media are not adding God’s word into the equation when they prophesy.

What about Israel?

Many of the false shepherds and the false prophets aren’t telling you that God’s word says He will judge the nations that divide His Land (Israel, Joel 3:2) and that He will severely injure and crush the nation that interferes with His plan for Jerusalem (Zechariah 12:2-3). Unfortunately, all the nations of the world support a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capitol. They all want to divide Jerusalem and I think “The Storm of the Lord” has gone forth in response to folly of the kings and rulers of the earth (see Psalm 2). “Fear not, O Jacob My servant, declares the Lord, And do not be dismayed, O Israel; For behold, I will save you from afar, and your offspring from the land of their captivity. And Jacob shall return, and shall be quiet and at ease, And no one shall make him afraid. For I am with you, declares the Lord, to save you; For I will destroy completely all the nations where I have scattered you, Only I will not destroy you completely. But I will chasten you justly, and will by no means leave you unpunished… Behold the tempest of the Lord! Wrath has gone forth, a sweeping tempest; It will burst on the head of the wicked. The fierce anger of the Lord will not turn back, Until He has performed, and until He has accomplished the intent of His heart; In the latter days you will understand this,” Jer 30:10-24. Jeremiah tells us that the storm of the Lord comes at the time of the restoration of Israel: “Behold, I will restore the fortunes of the tents of Jacob and have compassion on his dwelling places,” Jer 30:18. A significant part of that restoration is Jewish people returning to the Lord through faith in Yeshua. There are more than eighty Messianic Jewish congregations in Israel today, many are run by native born Israelis! It’s time for more pastors to teach the restoration of Israel and not just leave it to Messianic rabbis to do the work. Lastly, many shepherds (and I include some Messianic rabbis in this category) just ignore what’s going on in the world altogether. These folks preach messages from God’s word, but they don’t apply them to what’s going on in the world! God’s people need to be ready for the things coming down the pike and a lot of preachers (some Messianic rabbis included) have their heads in the sand and just aren’t dealing with it. God is not pleased… We need to call His people to repentance, II Chronicles 7:14 style. The prophet Joel declared, “Yet even now declares the Lord, return to me with all your heart and with fasting, weeping and mourning; and rend your heart and not your garments. Now return to the Lord your God. For He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, abounding in loving-kindness. And relenting of evil. Who knows whether He will not turn and relent, and leave a blessing behind Him… Blow a trumpet in Zion, consecrate a fast, proclaim a solemn assembly, gather the people sanctify the congregation,” Joel 2:12-15. If God’s people repent, Joel promises that God will have pity on His people: “And the Lord will answer and say to His people, Behold I am going to send you grain, new wine and oil, and you will be satisfied in full with them,” Joel 2:19. He also promises to drive our enemies away from us and take away our reproach. So there is hope , God is merciful and will heal our land and forgive our sins if we repent and humble ourselves before him. You won’t hear that on CNBC, CNN, Fox News or any other major network. But that is the bottom line to calming “The Storm of the Lord.”

The Second Exodus:

In the context of the Storm of the Lord, Jeremiah also talks about a great Exodus of the Jewish people out of the nations and back to Israel: “Therefore behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when they will no longer say, As the Lord lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt, but, as the Lord lives who brought up and led back the descendants of the household of Israel from the north land (Russia) and from all the countries where I had driven them. Then they will live on their own soil,” Jeremiah 23:7-8. God told Moses that the Jewish people would return to the Lord (accept Yeshua) in the end of days and that He would bring them back to Israel and restore them to the Land promised to the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (See Deuteronomy 30:1-7). So this must happen. God also told Moses that He would judge all of Israel’s enemies who persecuted His people.

“The Storm of the Lord” is God’s judgment of Israel’s enemies and the distress it causes around the world will cause the Jewish people to want to leave their comfort here in the U.S. and other countries and go back to Israel!

Just as Moses led the children of Israel into the Promised Land, God will raise up leaders to shepherd the Jewish people back to Israel from the nations where they remain. This is prophecy, it must be fulfilled and I believe it’s coming soon!

Some will say Rabbi Joe, God already brought back the Jewish people to Israel. Yes He did, but look at the verse again. It says that the Second Exodus will be so great that we will forget about the first Exodus from Egypt… Such an Exodus has not yet occurred because we still remember the Exodus from Egypt. (Contact For Zion’s Sake Ministries for a more in depth article on The Second Exodus).

Conclusion:

The names of the tsunamis, earthquakes and hurricanes may change. The year in which the world economies crash may vary (2008, 2011, ?). There will be wars, famines and pestilences in various places. The New Testament refers to these events as birth pangs or sorrows. One of the ways in which the Tanach (Old Testament) refers to this period is The Storm of the Lord. Are you prepared for the storm? Does your family have a plan?

Finally God promises that the storm will fall on the heads of the wicked, not on the righteous. If we humble ourselves, repent, gather together for prayer and fasting, God will spare us. (See Zephaniah 2:3, II Chronicles 7:14, Joel 2, Daniel 9). We are holding a day of prayer and fasting for America and Israel on the 14th day of the biblical month of Tishrei. 7/14 on God’s calendar. We will begin fasting at sundown on October 11 and conclude with a prayer meeting at 6:30 PM on October 12 at The Manna Bagel Co. We will then break the fast together. Call our office for details (423) 652-1188. All are welcome to attend or we encourage your church or Bible study group to have your own II Chronicles 7:14 prayer event on God’s 7/14.

In the love of Yeshua,

Rabbi Joe Bell