Introduction

An interesting thought came to me recently regarding Elijah and The False Prophet. This consideration would rarely come into the minds of most in the prophetic community because of the popular interpretation that Elijah will be one of the Two Witnesses.

In my article, Can We Know the Identity of the Two Witnesses? I lay out why the Elijah prophecy found in Malachi 4:5-6 has already been fulfilled in John the Baptist. The reader can access that article for more details on who these mysterious Two Witnesses could very well be, but I did want to cite a portion of the article regarding Elijah below.

From Can We Know the Identity of the Two Witnesses?

The Passage Without Refute?

The following passage is considered the go-to portion of Scripture identifying Elijah as one of the Two Witnesses:

“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord: And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse” (Malachi 4:5-6). (Emphasis mine)

Notice that God states that He “will send you Elijah… before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD.” This is very important: The Two Witnesses have their ministry “during” the day of the Lord, not “before.”

(Please see my article, An Examination of the ‘Day of the Lord’, for a detailed look at what the “Day of the Lord” entails.)

Now, let’s examine what this prophecy in Malachi is actually referring to.

What Did Jesus Say?

Jesus, answering his disciples’ questions regarding just this topic, paves the way for us to know how Malachi’s prophecy was to actually be fulfilled:

“And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elias must first come? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things. But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them. Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist” (Matthew 17:10-13). (Emphasis mine)

Is there other Scriptural support for what the Lord had revealed to His disciples?

What Did the Angel of the Lord Say to Zecharias the Priest and Father of John the Baptist?

The answer to this question shows the fulfillment of Malachi’s prophecy:

“And there appeared unto him an angel of the Lord standing on the right side of the altar of incense. And when Zacharias saw him, he was troubled, and fear fell upon him. But the angel said unto him, Fear not, Zacharias: for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John. And thou shalt have joy and gladness; and many shall rejoice at his birth. For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor strong drink; and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb. And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” (Luke 1:11-17). (Emphasis mine)

Some similarities to note between Elijah and John the Baptist:

Both were described as hairy and wore a leather belt (2 Kings 1:8 & Matthew 3:4).

Both lived in the wilderness (1 Kings 19:4 & Mark 1:4).

Both preached repentance from sins (1 Kings chapter 18 & Mark 1:4).

Both had enemies in power (1 Kings 21:20 & Luke 3:19-20).

As we can plainly see, Malachi’s prophecy was fulfilled in John the Baptist. Therefore, Elijah – based on Malachi’s prophecy alone – is not one of the Two Witnesses.

Additional Thoughts on Elijah

The following is from the Chapter Prologue of Can We Know the Identity of the Two Witnesses? in my book, The Day of the Lord & Beyond, which is currently unpublished.

When Jesus and the disciples came down from the Mount of Transfiguration, the disciples asked Jesus a question:

“And his disciples asked him, saying, Why then say the scribes that Elias must first come? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things” (Matthew 17:10-11).

Jesus confirmed the scribes’ assertion that Elijah must come first and restore all things. But He did not say that Elijah must come later in relation to their time or in regard to His Second Coming.

Thus, when Jesus replied to the disciple’s question concerning Elijah, Jesus only confirmed that the scribes were right in saying that “Elijah truly shall first come, and restore all things,” and that he did come in John the Baptist when He stated:

“But I say unto you, That Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the Son of man suffer of them. Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist” (Matthew 17:12-13). (Emphasis mine)

Additionally, some may point out that John the Baptist, himself, denied that he was Elijah in John 1:21. John, obviously, knew who he was and didn’t consider himself a fulfillment of Malachi’s prophecy. But Jesus did!

“Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force. For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John. And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come. He that hath ears to hear, let him hear” (Matthew 11:11-15). (Emphasis mine)

And, as I stated, John fulfilled the prophecy in full (compare Malachi 4:6) when the angel prophesied of John to his father:

“But the angel said unto him, Fear not, Zacharias: for thy prayer is heard; and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear thee a son, and thou shalt call his name John. And thou shalt have joy and gladness; and many shall rejoice at his birth. For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink neither wine nor strong drink; and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb. And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord” (Luke 1:13-17). (Emphasis mine)

Finally, the Hebrew word for “before” in Malachi 4:5 is 6440 פָנִים “panim” and means “at the face” or “in front of.” We see this same word in Joel 2:31, with Christ giving His testimony to when this event will happen in Matthew 24:29-30, and how these signs will be “at the face or in front of” Christ’s Second Coming:

“The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before [panim] the great and terrible day of the Lord come” (Joel 2:31). (Emphasis mine)

“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: And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory” (Matthew 24:29-30). (Emphasis mine)

In the above context, these signs in the heavens will be present “before” or “at the face of” or “in front of” Christ’s Second Coming when the Antichrist, the False Prophet, and those who have taken The Mark of The Beast will be fearful at “the great and terrible day of the Lord come” as He personally comes back to earth to destroy His enemies and then sets up His Millennial Kingdom. Always keep in mind that the day of the Lord’s main focus (other than God’s wrath during the seven-year Tribulation) is Christ’s 1,000-year reign in Jerusalem with Israel reigning over the earth and God fulfilling His numerous promises to His chosen people.

Christ’s First Coming was, in fact, the initial stage of the day of the Lord, but was cut off by His crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension into heaven – just as Daniel’s 70 weeks prophecy (or 70 7’s) was cut off for the church age to commence – and the rest of the day of the Lord will resume with the rapture of the church, go into Daniel’s last 7 years of the Tribulation, and proceed on into the Millennial reign of Christ on the earth.

[Simply put, Daniel’s 70 weeks – or 70 7’s – prophecy (Daniel 9:24-27) was initially fulfilled in the first 69 weeks – or 7’s – (69 x 7 = 483) by the 483 years between the commandment to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until Jesus was crucified. The remaining seven years – the 70th week – or last 7 – will be completed during the seven-year Tribulation period, beginning with the covenant signed by Antichrist, Israel, and “the many.” Antichrist will break the covenant in the middle of the seven years and reign with absolute authority for the last three and one-half years until Christ comes back to earth (Daniel 9:27).]

Therefore – with everything we have learned – John clearly was “at the face of” or “in front of” Christ at His First Coming and confirms Malachi 3:1,

“Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me …”

Thus, John fulfilled the Malachi prophecies completely. John the Baptist came in the form – or “in the spirit and power” – of Elijah, as he turned the hearts of the people and prepared the way for the Messiah as the Lord’s messenger!

The 400 ‘Silent Years’ Between the Old and New Testaments

It should come as no surprise that the very last book of the Tanakh (Old Testament) is Malachi, and the very last chapter of Malachi is chapter 4.

It is widely acknowledged that there were approximately 400 ‘silent years’ in between the Tanakh and the Brit Chadashah (The New Testament), where there was silence in relation to God’s revealed Word.

Therefore, it should also come as no surprise that the very last prophecy of Malachi 4:5-6, concerning “Elijah” coming before the face of the Lord, is immediately followed by John the Baptist preaching the Word of God in the power and spirit of Elijah in Matthew chapter 1 – with Malachi’s 4:5-6 prophecy being fully realized according to Luke 1:16-17 and Christ confirming twice that this prophecy was fulfilled in John the Baptist – after the 400 years of a famine of God’s Word!

Thus, there is a three-fold confirmation of John fulfilling the prophecy of Elijah; once by the angel of the Lord to John’s father Zacharias, and on two different occasions by the Lord Jesus Christ, Himself, in the gospels.

Elijah and The False Prophet

Beings the Jews expect that Elijah will come back to herald the coming of the Messiah, should we expect that the False Prophet will claim to be Elijah? I believe he very well could, and this would explain a lot!

Remember, Yeshua said that Elijah had already come in John the Baptist, yet here we are with Israel waiting for Elijah to come back and introduce the ‘Messiah’ to Israel and the world. The chair is empty, the cup is full, and the table seems to be set for ‘Elijah’ when it comes to the deception of the Antichrist and his right-hand man.

This reminds me of when Jesus said:

“I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive” (John 5:43).

Israel is waiting for ‘Elijah’ and the ‘Messiah’ – an expectation they think will be fulfilled when The False Prophet and Antichrist come on the scene. Both of these deceitful men will claim to be fulfilling prophecy – and indeed they will be! Just not the prophecies they will declare to be fulfilling.

Speaking of prophecies concerning the False Prophet, consider what we read about him in Revelation 13:

“And he [The False Prophet] exerciseth all the power of the first beast [Antichrist] before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men“ (Revelation 13:12-13). (Emphasis mine)

Does this remind the Bible Student of something the prophet Elijah did in the past?

“And Elijah answered and said to the captain of fifty, If I be a man of God, then let fire come down from heaven, and consume thee and thy fifty. And there came down fire from heaven, and consumed him and his fifty” (2 Kings 1:10 and 2 Kings 1:12). (Emphasis mine)

Coincidence? I think not.

Just like Jesus said that He and the Father are one, so, too, will the Antichrist and Satan be one.

And just as John the Baptist introduced Messiah to Israel, so, too, will the False Prophet (masquerading as Elijah) introduce Antichrist (masquerading as Messiah) to Israel and the world.

Satan’s counterfeit trinity will be alive and well during the Tribulation!

Conclusion

As always, when it comes to future prophecy, let the reader be the judge.

But in light of how John the Baptist fulfilled Malachi 4:5-6, and the Jews recognized him not; and how Yeshua came as Israel’s Messiah, and the Jews recognized Him not; and how Israel expects ‘Elijah’ to come back to introduce the ‘Messiah’ at the end of the age, deliver them from their enemies, and usher in Israel’s kingdom on earth — well, at least for me, it sure seems like the prophetic scenario is lining up.

Please pray for Israel and her people; for one day soon, she will be all alone on the world stage… But God!

Love, grace, mercy, and shalom in Messiah Yeshua, and Maranatha!

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The Jesuits, who were founded by Ignatius of Loyola in 1540, were an order of the Catholic Church whose mission was to stamp out the Protestant Reformation.

The church of Rome had become utterly corrupt to the point where it began to resemble the Whore of Babylon of Revelation 17. The totalitarian tactics, false doctrines, false accusations, and the blatant immorality of the Roman Church led numerous Christians to stand against it at the cost of their lives. It was the job of the Jesuits to put an end to this rebellion against its authoritarian rule and establish its dominance over the earth.

By 1606, the Jesuits had devised a long-term strategy to ensure that the rebellion against the Roman Church could never happen again. They needed a nation of uncivilized people that they could easily control and manipulate to enforce their agenda upon an unwary populace.

The unhappy victims of their ‘missionary’ work were the Guarani Indians of Paraguay. These so-called ‘missions’ were not designed to proclaim the Gospel of Christ but rather were a staging ground to end all rebellion against the authority of the Roman Catholic Church.

The first order of business of the Jesuits was to subjugate the population, which they did initially through acts of kindness. Once they had gained the trust of the Indians, they divided them into 57 reductions, or communes, and forbade them to mix with anyone from the outside world, especially the Spanish and Portuguese. Each of these communes constituted the ‘Jesuit State,’ and each member was initiated through the ceremony of baptism. The Jesuit State, which was essentially a police state, contained all the attributes of the most oppressive totalitarian regimes that have existed throughout history.

According to Richard W. Thompson, a former secretary of the American Navy,

“In order to teach the confiding Indians that obedience to authority was their chiefest duty, they were subjected to rules of conduct and intercourse which were enforced with the strictest severity. They were watched in everything, the searching eyes of the Jesuits being continually upon them. They constituted, in fact, a state of society reaching the Jesuit ideal completely; that is, docile, tractable, submissive, obedient, without the least real semblance of manhood. Having thus completed their subjugation, energetic measures were adopted to render any change in their condition impossible.”

It is interesting to note that one of the Jesuits’ primary goals was to destroy all manifestations of manhood.

Thompson goes on to write,

• “That [the Jesuits] had under them thirty-one [in fact, 57] great populations, producing immense riches to the society, while the people themselves were kept in the most miserable slavery;
• that no Spaniard or Portuguese, were he even governor or bishop, was ever admitted into the Reductions;
• that ‘with strange deceit,’ the Spanish language was absolutely forbidden;
• that the Indians were trained to an unlimited, blind obedience, kept in the most ‘extraordinary ignorance,’ and the most insufferable slavery ever known, and under a complete despotism as to body and soul;
• that they did not know there was any other sovereign in the world than the fathers, and knew nothing of the king, or any other law than the will of the ‘holy fathers,’ that the Indians were taught that white laymen adored gold, had a devil in their bodies, were the enemies of the Indians, and of the images which they adored;
• that they were consequently taught to kill white men wherever they could find them, and to be careful to cut off their heads, lest they should come to life again.”

Thompson’s assessment of the ‘reductions’ is extremely relevant today as it appears that a small group of extremely wealthy people has adopted the tactics of the Jesuits.

I believe that this ‘cabal’ is addressed in James 5:1-6 and will be thoroughly dealt with when Babylon falls at the end of the seven-year tribulation (Revelation 18:9), so there is no sense in railing against them. This wealthy elite appear intent on forcing the nightmare of the reductions of Paraguay onto the entire world. It is amazing how much success they have had in this country in creating a society that is docile, tractable, submissive and obedient.

They have subjected the American people to their totalitarian desires with such ease that this nation can no longer be called the land of the free and the home of the brave.

It now seems that they own a large portion of the bureaucrats and politicians of Washington D.C. They appear to be the real power which is very frightening because they are unelected and unaccountable to the American people. They are also Godless and evil.

With surprising speed, this cabal is beginning to eliminate any semblance of manhood with their police state accusations of ‘toxic masculinity,’ forcing ‘transgenderism on our children and destroying their sexuality, and attempting the overall feminization of society. The threat of ‘cancel culture,’ in conjunction with a completely corrupt press corps whose sole goal is to suppress the truth, Washington D.C. can now force its will on anyone with little concern of any push back from the population at large.

The only way that this feat could have been accomplished, even by ultra-wealthy people, is if our society no longer honored God or gave thanks to Him. Our thinking has become futile, and our foolish hearts have darkened because of our rebellion against God. This society now imitates the ancient theocracy of Israel when it declined into evil and Godlessness.

God condemned this generation of Israelites in the harshest of terms through his prophet Isaiah when he proclaimed, “So justice is driven back, and righteousness stands at a distance, truth has stumbled in the streets, honesty cannot enter. Truth is nowhere to be found and whoever shuns evil becomes a prey” (Isaiah 59:14-15). This is now the state of our government and many other western governments around the world. This was the Jesuit’s ideal society, and it is now the ideal of a cabal of hyper-wealthy people who clearly have control of most Western governments, including our own.

Fortunately for the Guarani Indians, in 1767, the entire world began to turn on the Jesuits, and they were eventually expelled from 83 counties. Pope Clement XIII called for a consistory to disband the Jesuits due to the world’s hatred of them, including the preparation of a Papal Bull for the pronouncement. But on February 2, 1769, the night before the Bull to disband the Jesuits was due to be promulgated, General Lorenzo Ricci had the Pope murdered. The Jesuits were finally disbanded in 1773 by Pope Clement XIV due to political pressure from Europe.

After being restored in 1814, they have apparently turned to new tactics to fulfill their mission to overturn the Protestant Reformation, with the primary target once again being the white male. They are apparently serving as advisors to the ‘cabal.’

The cabal has now attempted to demonize white men because they have deduced that white men pose the greatest threat to their totalitarian schemes. We can only speculate as to why they have singled out white men, especially when the majority of the cabal are themselves white, but clearly, they are attempting to wipe out a certain ideology. It is apparent that the annihilation of Christianity, rather than their false accusations of racism, is their target, and they will engage in the most idiotic of arguments to fulfill their mission. Even other ethnic groups who express a Christian worldview are not immune to the mindless accusations of ‘white supremacy.’

The similarities between what the Jesuits attempted through the Reductions of Paraguay and what is being attempted now around the world are too great to deny. The emphasis on miseducation, eliminating freedom, extreme sexual perversion, suppressing the truth in favor of a false narrative, demoralizing society with extreme immorality, and falsely accusing white males of evil are in full force.

All references to the truth about what the Jesuits actually attempted have been scrubbed from the internet in order to suppress the truth of what they did. All that’s left are references to how the Jesuit missionaries were successful at creating a wonderful utopia for the Guarani Indians.

We are now beginning to witness what this wonderful utopia looks like as it is being implemented in this country and around the world.

We find ourselves, now, inching closer to the end of God’s timeline. There is no question that Christians, especially white Christians, are on the wrong side of history. Fortunately, history is on the wrong side of God, and if those who side with history do not repent, they will spend eternity in the lake of fire. Those are the stakes that we are facing at this time, and it is the responsibility of every Christian to ensure that God’s Word is proclaimed throughout the world.

Bearing false witness against one’s neighbor is a terrible sin against God, and those who engage in it are supremely evil. After all, it made God’s top ten of things not to do. However, the ‘cabal’ has discovered that this is a great way to gain power in a faithless society, and they have no intention of stopping until this evil begins to backfire on them. The only way to cause this sick strategy for gaining power to backfire is for Christians to begin to proclaim the Gospel once again to the faithless populace.

It is incumbent upon the few Christians who are left to share the Gospel with this dying and unsaved world. That means we are to share God’s law and share his Gospel and thereby doing stand firm in the faith. When the heathen attempt to destroy your reputation by calling you a racist or white supremacist or falsely accuse you of being a ‘homophobe,’ inform them that they are violating God’s law and bearing false witness against you. Then politely inform them that Jesus died for that sin too and that Christ calls them to repent and be forgiven in his Holy name. This is called ‘sharing the Gospel,’ and it is a practice that has apparently been abandoned by most churches in the Western Hemisphere.

We have been commanded by our Lord and Savior to proclaim repentance for the forgiveness of sins in the name of Jesus. Most of our true pastors have apparently passed on, and this generation of ‘hirelings’ seems incapable of sharing the Gospel. Since most of our churches have achieved “Sardis Status” and are now dead, this responsibility now falls upon the laymen to stand upon God’s Word in our towns and cities around the country. Christ has called upon the Christians who are left to fulfill this obligation to the Lord and to stand firm on the Gospel in the face of persecution. We have been purchased at a great price, and time is short; we must not neglect our duty.

Jesus wondered aloud if, when he returned, would he find faith upon the earth. Will he?

www.gospelist.net

March 14, 2022