Bully’s Blog

This post concerns the Covenant-literary structure of 2 Thessalonians 2. The context and audience are first century, but it amazes me how willing we modern Christians are to do intricate hermeneutical acrobatics to avoid the obvious conclusion that the particular “coming” of Christ referred to here was also a first century event - the end of the Old Covenant in AD70.

A reasonably close look at the text makes it inescapable. A very close analysis makes it inexcusable, especially once we are versed in the literary mechanics of the Bible Matrix. Continue reading

or The Changing of the Guard

Structure of Daniel 7 - Part 2

“You shall not at all do as we are doing here today — every man doing whatever is right in his own eyes.” (Deuteronomy 12:8)
And the people kept shouting, “The voice of a god and not of a man!” (Acts 12:22)

We’ve seen the source of Daniel’s Transcendent vision in Creation, the calling out of a new Gentile Hierarchy to shelter Israel in Division, and their forming, lifting up, into a new, greater Altar-Land at Ascension. We are up to Testing, and just like the original Covenant pattern in Eden — or just unlike it, actually — at the centre of Daniel 7 is the judgment of the deceiver under the Ethics of the Law.

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or The False Bride Will Never Get A Management Position

“…the only unity that will be allowed by the Father is the unity that Jesus requested from the Father in John 17.”

One of the interesting “universal themes” that James Jordan has uncovered in the Bible is that of Satan’s various attempts to “gather the nations” against the Church. You can read about that in a series of blog posts called Amalek Debunks Hyperpreterism (click here and scroll down).

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“…falling headlong, he burst open in the middle…”

Todd Robinson commented:

“I’ve enjoyed your particular brand of orthodox preterism. Working through Acts recently, I began to wonder what Michael Bull’s take on Acts 1:11 and 3:19-21 would be… Thanks for any insight.”

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or His God, is God

When it comes to the miraculous spiritual gifts, I’m a bit of a hybrid.

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A blog post from my friend Albert Garlando, republished here with his permission.

Marriage, Divorce and the Gospel

Jesus is interrogated by the religious ‘mob’ concerning his views on divorce (Mark 10:1-12). The mob are trying to get him to make a call on the Old Testament (Deuteronomy 24:1-4) provision for divorce and remarriage. The 1st Century rabbis did not agree in their own interpretations of this, so they pestered Jesus about it.

Their big question was: “What makes divorce OK?”

True to form, Jesus’ response is, “You have missed the point and are asking the wrong question.”

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A Christmas sequel to Joseph Gets Passed Over.

I believe the writers of the New Testament fully employ the literary structures of the Old, to a degree far beyond the level discussed by modern scholarship. [1]

Matthew begins his gospel with the Genesis of Jesus, a genealogy summarised as a 7 x 7. He then demonstrates the Exodus of Jesus with a similar 7 x 7. The destroyer at the original exodus was angelic. In Joshua (matching the exodus chiastically), the Lord gave the sword to a human messenger, an Adamic redeemer/avenger. Herod is a corrupted Joshua, a mediating head willing to sacrifice (ironically) his own body, his own future, his own true succession, on the Altar of the Abyss. Herod had become a murderous Pharaoh, and he turned first century Israel into Canaanite child-killers.

(For the skeptics of this process of analysis, I am using the New King James, and my previous experience of the Bible Matrix made it obvious to me where the English word order did not follow the Greek. Each instance was verified with a Greek-English Interlinear. The best example would be the end of verse 12.)

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The Word of God is architectural. Like Solomon, the apostles understood that there is a time to build up and a time to tear down. Here is one of John’s blueprints: Continue reading

“Now Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until the late rains poured on them from heaven. And she did not allow the birds of the air to rest on them by day nor the beasts of the field by night.” 2 Samuel 21:10

At the heart of the Bible Matrix is Testing. Although all the major narratives follow the pattern, many of the minor ones do too. If Adam had not failed his initial “qualifying round,” he would have progressed to the next stage of dominion. We know this because we see others later in the Bible move beyond this first round to greater glory. For instance, Daniel’s first challenge mirrors Adam’s challenge exactly. He was offered kingdom food and refused it.

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or Behold, I Make All Things Bloody

A critic wrote that Mel Gibson, with The Passion of the Christ, invented a new cinematic genre: the religious splatter film. This was intentionally disrespectful, but of course there is some truth to it. Perhaps more truth than we realise. God desired a world covered by blood.

The content of this post has been revised and included in Bible Matrix II: The Covenant Key.

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[1] A summary of James B. Jordan, Re-Creation in the Ascension Offering. Notice that the Tabernacle furniture itself, of course, also aligns with this structure of events, being a microcosmos.
[2] See Half the Blood.
[3] See also The Whole Bloody Bible.