TRIBULATION AND AFFLICTION PART II
THE 144,000 ( THE REMNANT )

The Ministry of Jesus Christ

This is Jesus Christ who is speaking, saying "Behold, look and see, open your eyes and see, I , the Messiah, and the man-child company, who are my valiant and anointed warriors, chosen by my Father, and were given by God to Israel, for signs and wonders in the land". Now, the man-child company, who are the 144,000 are mere men. Jesus Christ was also a man but he was not just a man, no he was and is God Almighty. He is the very Son of God, so even though he came as a man, he was God in the flesh. But the man-child company, they are just men, until the spirit of god Almighty comes upon them without measure and then they too will become vessels who are filled to overflowing and they will become the Princes in Israel who will rule in the hour of judgment that is coming during the Great Tribulation.



This mystery is revealed in the following prophecy: "Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness and his princes shall rule in judgment." The man-child company is the army of God. They are the mighty ones whom the Lord has called.



"I have commanded my sanctified ones; I have also called my mighty ones for my anger, even them that rejoice in my highness. The noise of multitude in the mountains, like as of a great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of nations gathered together: the Lord of of hosts musters the host of the battle. They come from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the Lord and they are the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land. Howl ye; for the day of the LORD is at hand. Isaiah 13:26



They first come as the Lord's Sheriff department and they perform search and rescue missions for the children of God who are lost and then they will be revealed as the military arm of the kingdom of God, for they will age war for the Lord and ultimately overturn the kingdom of the beast.



Our God is a King and he has a kingdom and in his kingdom he has a family, a people that he loves, for his subjects are actually his family. He is the King in his house and he had people of all sorts; little boys and little girls, young men, vessels of honor, and he fashions them for worship and for holding his glory. He has pastors, teachers and evangelist but he also has an army. He has men of war that he has prepared for fighting and not everyone is in the military.



He can fashion us to be whatever type of vessel he chooses. He makes out of the same clay one vessel and then another. He makes one a vessel of honor, another, a vessel of dishonor. He makes vessels of worship but he also makes weapons of war. A cup is used for rejoicing in his house. If he fashions you as a cup, he starts with clay, then he adds living water and then you need some heat so you are going to have a little trial and tribulation. God is going to turn the what up and he is going to mold you in his hands. He is going to shape you into a beautiful cup. Then he will place the cup back into the furnace to sear and harden the cup into the beautiful form that it is. Then he is going to glaze it over and it will become a beautiful goblet in the hand of the Lord. Then the Lord is going to say, "That is mine and I will use this cup for rejoicing. I made this vessel to worship before me and to be filled with my joy and to sing forth my praises." He sets it as his right hand and says, "That one is mine and maybe I'll put a few jewels in it too."



Then the Lord says, "I have a war coming and I am going to have to fight my old enemy and it is going to be the final conflict. So, I am going to raise an army and I am going to fashion myself weapons of war.



This time he does not start with clay, for it would not work well as a sword. In stead, he reaches down into the earth and he pull out iron ore. "I am not making a cup; I need a sword for this job." So he takes the purest iron ore he can find and heats it up but does not heat it like you would heat clay in pottery class. No he has to first melt the iron ore, so instead of 200 degrees, he uses a blast furnace of 6,000 degrees. Instead of molding it with his hands, God gets out his sledgehammer. He pounds the sword and if it is going to be a two edged sword and razor-sharp, how many blows will it need? How hot will the furnace need to be and how pure must the instrument become?



If there is a slight imperfection in the clay, the cup will still work fine for rejoicing but any defect in the sword, and it will break in battle. So, the sword must become perfectly purified which is what we all become when we enter the new Kingdom and receive our new bodies but we are talking about the ministry for which the 144,000 were called in this present hour.



The Lord speaks of them in the prophecy of Isaiah 13 saying, "I have commanded my sanctified ones" for they have been purified totally, in a furnace like Job. The life of Job is a picture of the preparation of the 144,000 and of the blast furnace God uses to fashion his weapons of war. Isaiah continues saying, "I have called my mighty ones: and the word in this text for mighty means, champions and warriors. This is God's Delta Force and they are a serious group of people. The Lord put them through some serious preparations, and they are going to do some serious business for the King because they are going to be used by God as weapons of warfare, as we shall see. Isaiah continues, "I have called my mighty ones for my anger."



In the Hebrew, the word is zah'-am and it means; fury, indignation, anger and rage. Their ministry is the anger of the Lord, and they rejoice in lifting his name up. For their ministry is not to exalt themselves but the Lord. In verse four, the Scripture declares, "The Lord of hosts gathers together his army for the battle." These are not women and children, these re men of war. In verse five we are told, "They come from a far country, from the end of heaven" and who could come from heaven? The Scripture tell us the answer. "Even the Lord". So it is the Lord in these men and who are they? They are the weapons of his indignation and they come to destroy the whole earth. They will bring the final judgment upon the whole world. Theirs is an interesting ministry, don't you think? And what do they do? They first deliver God's saints form the battle that is going to take place in the Great Tribulation and then they are sent back to deal with the kingdom of darkness. In Isaiah 13:6, the Scriptures declare the hour of their ministry, "Howl ye for the day of the Lord is at hand."



The life of Job is a picture of the fires of preparation the Lord puts his anointed ones through that have been called to this special purpose. God put Job through the same process and Job's reference to a "man-child" having been born is a prophetic picture of the preparation of the man-child company and the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. It is a picture of the price the Lord paid for the suffering of Lord cannot even be quantified. If you have never been in the blast furnace of the Lord, where you learn the real meaning of the word, suffering, then you cannot even imagine it. Some saints walk through this kind of fire. The martyrs go through this fire. In the case of Job, his time in the furnace of affliction went on for months.



We do not know how long Job's furnace burned, and how long this experience lasted for him but we do know from the scripture that it was months long at a minimum. As Job begins praying in chapter 3, not only does he tell you about the birth of the man-child but after, he reveals the events of the Great Tribulation, which are going to take place as soon as the man-child is born.



In chapter 3, Job declares, "Let the day perish when the man-child is born." When the man-child of the book of Revelation is born, than a time such as never was, shall begin. Jesus referred to to this in Luke 17 when he said, 'On the day you see the Son of Man revealed, do not even go back into your house for then there shall be days of tribulation such as have never been." On the day the Son of Man is revealed, when the man-child of the book of Revelation will be revealed, and when Jesus Christ is revealed within the remnant of his people, the Great Tribulation shall begin In the account given in Matthew 24, the Lord says, "When you see the abomination of desolation." This is the event which marks the beginning of the Great Tribulation, while in the account in Luke, the Lord does no mention the abomination of desolation, rather he says, "On the day you see the Son of Man revealed, "Therefore, both occur on the same day.



The man-child company must first pass through the cross and the fires of purification before they can begin their ministry. God has to completely empty them of themselves so they will not get in the way of the work the Lord want to do, because he is going to use their lives for the revealing of the Son of Man. Christ in all of us, the hope of glory. Why this is not commonly understood within the church is beyond me, because this the revealing of Jesus Christ. One of the reason, I suppose, is that much of the church believes they are simply going to disappear before the tribulation even comes.



Other people, even entire denominations claim that they are the 144,000. If the truth be told, you might not want to be among this company of men, because of the suffering they had to endure and the price they had to pay, even unto their very lives being lost. During the Great Tribulation, they will be the mighty ones of God and beyond the reach of the Dragon but this is the military and would you really want to join the Army?



You first have to go through Boot Camp and then Ranger training. Then you must be trained in Special Forces operations and you have to go through Delta force training, and then survive the Navy Seal program. Is that what you want to do? This is who these guys are and that is a picture of the fire through which they have walked. It cost them everything to be this company of men. The have lived lives that can be best pictured by the life of Job, for everything that they had and everything that they were, the Lord burned utterly in the fire.



The level of pain and suffering, which they have endured is beyond the comprehension of the many who will be delivered by this company of men. This is the Lord's Navy Seal unit and these guys are hard-core. They have been through some hard-core preparations. I do not think you get to volunteer for this job, you get drafted by the Lord for this one. And I do not think the Lord asked any of them, "Would you like to be part of my army?"



The suffering of Job is also a picture of the process of redemption, for the Lord uses the fires of affliction to bring us to righteousness, particularly when we refuse to voluntarily cooperate in the process of sanctification. God literally burns the sin and the pride right out of us. God is using the Great Tribulation and the persecution of this life, which has been here from the beginning. Job's name means, "persecuted", so God has been using the furnace of affliction from the very beginning to bring his saints to a place of total repentance, for some things can only be understood through suffering.



The knowledge of good and evil within each of us only causes us to become religious. We become critical and judgmental and full of pride and when we are in that state of mind, filled with our pride, we are not going to listen to anyone, because we already know everything. We are going to see this from Job's friends in a moment. The Scripture says the instruction of a fool is folly for those who are lost in a mind filled with pride, have become fools so to try to instruct them is only folly. It is to going to work. But the Scripture also says, 'The rod is prepared for the back of the fool.' So when God brings the affliction, then we finally get rid of that attitude and then we all learn to humble ourselves.



Pride is so deceitful, you can have pride and not even know you have it. The human heart is deceitful, above all things. We could be walking in pride and rebellion and all the while thinking we are engaged in ministry. That is why the Lord must afflict the children of men. And that is why when God commands us to fast and pray in this hour, if we do not want to cooperate and follow the Lord's instructions, we give him no other choice but to do the work in us through fire. And to varying degrees depending on how stubborn and strong-willed we are or depending on how arrogant and proud we are or how brainwashed and deceived we are, God uses affliction and tribulation in every one of our lives.



God said, "I chose you in the furnace of affliction." He does not put you there, he chose you there and God keeps the heat on until all of the impurities are removed. He knows when you are pure; it is when he can see his own image in you, uncorrupted by the dark counsel of this wicked age, and no longer mixed with the sins of the lust of the flesh and the pride of this life.



"Confirming the souls of the disciples and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God." Acts. 14:22



We live amongst the generation of his wrath, for in these last days, a great apostasy has come. The people have turned from the truth and are no longer willing to receive sound doctrine rather they follow doctrines from the the imaginations of the mind of men, doctrines of devils and many of them are following them straight into hell. Even among the remnant, who are appointed unto salvation, there are so few who are actually overcoming the world, the flesh and the devil. It is only through the things that we suffer that we actually learn obedience unto righteousness. God offers us fasting and praying as an alternative but not many of us choose to obey and are willing to fast and pray. That leaves the only other alternative, the furnace of affliction.



Fasting and prayer is actually much more comfortable than the furnace of affliction but you have to do it to do it. And in the hour practically, no one wants to do the prayer and fasting which is required to break down the strongholds of the evil one in their lives. Jesus told us some things can only be broken through fasting and prayer. The tribulation that is coming, it will be more than adequate to get the job done in all of us. The good news is God does not forsake us in the furnace of affliction, rather he walks with us, right through it, like he walked with the Hebrew boys in the furnace of Babylon. None of us want to suffer and we do not choose that path willingly but the truth is, we only learn patience and obedience through the fires of affliction. The Scriptures tells us, we are to glorify the Lord in the fires and when the fires of affliction has purified our hearts, we will be able to worship God and give thanks in the midst of the affliction because we will be able to perceive through the eyes of fait the wonderful work of righteousness which he is working within us and that we AR nearing the end of God's strange work in our lives.



The furnace of affliction completely empties you of yourself. In mot churches today, the majority of believers are still walking in the flesh, and they are still subject to the dark counsel of this present fallen age. It continues to influence their ways of thinking and it continues to dominate their emotional responses to the events in their lives, such that many bring only an offering of strife and contention in the house of God. The Lord spoke to me regarding the condition of the many within the church saying, 'My people are full of themselves but I will empty them out." It is within the furnaces of affliction tat we get emptied out.



So, let us turn our focus back to Job and his time in the furnace of affliction. And bear in mind, God chose to do this work in the mot righteous man of that generation. God did not do this work in people that were walking in compromise, he id this in the man that he was most impressed with. The Lord held Job in very high esteem. God even brags about him before the host of heaven. God had looked upon the earth and he saw every man doing what was right in his own eyes and all of them altogether worthless. Every table was full of vomit and every heart full of sin and compromise within, such was the state of all mankind. Then, there was Job, the one man whose heart was right before God. And God chose him to be brought to the end of himself, through the furnace of affliction. God saw one man standing alone and he chose to do a work in him that you are not going to believe even if it is told to you, and it is good what God did in Job. And Job got blessed in the process; everything was restored unto him in the end, even a double portion from the Lord.


Pages 26-36 Search the Scriptures, Volume II, You Shall Know The Truth by Benjamin Baruch
You can purchase the book from this link:
http://www.amazon.com/Search-Scriptures-Shall-Know-Truth/dp/1511799374/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1437002697&sr=8-4&keywords=benjamin+baruch