OLD SHEPHERD:
Oh BTW I noticed you havent responded to most of the scriptures I have cited. For example, I have mentioned Isaiah 34 twice.
GW:
So, you're not going to explain how Yahweh was seen over Greece blowing a trumpet and defending his people in battle in Zech 9:13-16?
While I must have missed your comments on Isaiah 34 somewhere in these threads, I can only say that this is another great example of apocalyptic language. Here we see another of Yahweh's comings--the Day of the Lord (Isa 34:8) against all nations back in the 500s BC. The particular mention of God's sacrifice of the nations (including Edom) found in Isa 34 harmonizes with Ezekiel 25 and 26, where Edom's doom is particularly listed in Ez 25:12-14. It also harmonizes with Jeremiah 49:7-22 and the entire prophecy of Obadiah. As the prophecies said, Edom was destroyed at that time. Here again we see the usual apocalyptic metaphors: Jehovah comes down for battle to bring his sword against nations (Isa 34:5-9), the universe colapses (Isa 34:4), the destruction of these civilizations is compared to a blood sacrifice on God's alter (34:6), it's the Day of the Lord's vengeance (Isa 34:8 -- compare to the Day of the Lord's vengeance of AD 66-70 spoken of in Luke 21:20-22) and so on. We could find many more apocatlyptc metaphors by seraching the Ezekiel and Jeremiah and Obediah accounts. All this, of course, shows us how Christ's coming in the glory of the Father at AD 66-70 was precisely of the same nature as all the previous Jehovhah-comings foretold by the prophets and fulfilled in OT times.
OLD SHEPHERD:
Youre not reading again. I clearly said it was fulfilled, my argument is that nothing in the entire passage indicates that the Assyrian, or any other, army represents God coming in the clouds.
GW:
It is evident that the various disasters of Isaiah 19 upon Egypt are personally doled out by Yahweh's coming. Yahweh rides a cloud down to Egypt (19:1). He leads a civil war in the country (19:2). Yahweh turns them over to the cruel Assyrian Monarch (probably Sargon). Yahweh brings disasters upon them (19:16). This passage was fulfilled, and serves as another strong context for how we are to understand the Lord's coming against Israel and the nations back in the first century when the commonwealth was destroyed, Rome burned, the demonized Temple worship both at Jerusalem and Rome were leveled, and the Kingdom of God triumphed as the New Covenant Church was established forever.
OLD SHEPHERD:
Prove it!. Prove that YHWH was not physically seen.
GW:
John 1:18
No one has seen God at any time
1 John 4:12
No one has seen God at any time
Exodus 33:20
But He said, "You cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live!"
You see, for as much as the prophets said Yahweh was seen leading marches and organizing wars, and launching arrows and bringing his sword to battles and such, they meant none of this in optical terms. Yahweh is not seen doing such things with earthly eyes, but with the eyes of faith and the understanding of the covenant promises. God promised them in their covenant Law that God would do such things according to contract, and they fully understood when He did. And they knew their God as a great warrior. So also Christ came in the glory of the Father in their generation and destroyed them by his presence (Matt 24:33-34; Matt 16:27-28; Matt 10:22-23).
OLD SHEPHERD:
Your God is incapable of causing the sun and moons to be dark, without destroying the world and all of mankind? Read Isaiah 55:8
GW:
Again, you show that you have a very long way to go on understanding the apocalyptic language of the Hebrew prophets. The prophets don't mean the literal cosmology is being destroyed--the use of such metaphors speak of downfall of kings and princes and civilizations. For example, Revelation 6:12-15 is St. John's use of nearly identical apocalyptic language to past apocalypses, and we see there that the truth of the passage is symbolic in the same ways the OT prophets used the terms for apocalypses in their days:
Revelation 6:12-15
I looked when He broke the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth made of hair, and the whole moon became like blood; and the stars of the sky fell to the earth [compare to Isaiah 13:10; Ez 32:7,8] , as a fig tree casts its unripe figs when shaken by a great wind. The sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up, and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. [compare to Isa 34:4]. Then the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains [compare to Is 2:10,19,21]
In the same way as these things had been fulfilled in ancient times through the fall of kings and nations and civilizations, so also were these things fulfilled back in the first century when Christ and the apostles declared them and they came to pass, especially in the desolation of apostate Israel. Again, since you seem to agree with me that such things have been fulfilled in the past, pertaining to various OT judgment-comings of Yahewh, join me in declaring that Christ and the apostles were true prophets in their declaration of such things in their generation.
OLD SHEPHERD:
You have not proven that Isaiah 32 did not literally occur and when Matthew 24 was spoken it was still in the future, not fulfilled.
GW:
I think you mean Ezekiel 32, and since you and I both believe the passage is fulfilled in all its apocalyptic sense, then join me in asserting that when Christ and John used the same language about events of their generation, we rightly understand that the fall of Israel and the disasters of the Empire are meant:
Matthew 24:29,34
Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken...This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.
Revelation 1:1,3
The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass...Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein for the time is at hand.
OLD SHEPHERD:
You have not proven that Revelation referred to the Roman destruction of Jerusalem. In fact, the preponderance of, and most credible, evidence, which I provided, proves that Revelation speaks of events after 95 AD.
GW:
Note that the timeframe and the subject of the destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem can only refer to AD 66-70:
Revelation 1:1,3
The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto him to show unto his servants things which must shortly come to pass...Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein for the time is at hand.
Revelation 11:1-2; 8; 13
And there was given me a reed like unto a rod: and the angel stood, saying, Rise, and measure the temple of God, and the altar, and them that worship therein...it is given unto the Gentiles: and the holy city shall they tread under foot forty and two months....And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified [i.e., Jerusalem]...And the same hour was there a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell, and in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand: and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven.
Revelation 22:6-7
And he said unto me, These sayings are faithful and true: and the Lord God of the holy prophets sent his angel to shew unto his servants the things which must shortly be done.
OLD SHEPHERD:
Note, this asinine comment from a person who couldnt locate a Hebrew verb if he had a gun to his head. But since it contradicts your presumptions and presuppositions then resort to ad hominem , "Zionistic", etc. blah, blah, blah.
GW:
The interpretation you offered up from the Zionists there was a laughable allegorical interpretation--it was a travesty of scripture. The book of Job is not some allegory for modern day political Israel and her Zionistic political hopes. What nonsense that was. Their interpretation is tantamount to me saying that the meaning of Job is that Job is a symbol of the people of Ohio, who by our suffering will eventually see her liberation from the commenwealth of States to gain her place as the head of North America by which the world will then be redeemed under Bob Taft!
C'mon, get your head in the game.
