In Matt 24/25, our Lord’s disciples asked Him what would be the sign of His coming and of the end of age.  He gave 4 consecutive parables in the parable of the faithful servant, the parable of the talents, the parable of the wise and foolish virgins and the parable of the sheep and goats.  The parables gave instruction and responsibility to His disciples as stewards to care for His Kingdom.  The main instruction of the first and the last parable was to care for His people, especially the least of the brothers.  All four parables expect faithfulness from the stewards. 

In the parable of the talents, our Lord expected the disciples to understand both the spirit and the letter of His instruction to invest in His Kingdom while He would be away for a considerable period of time.  The first and second servant understood perfectly and invested with the resources given as faithful stewards.  These two servants fully knew their Master well that He expected them to be faithful in fulfilling His instruction. The third servant failed to know the character of His Master well and avoided any risk AT ALL COSTS. Thus he was not faithful in fulfilling the instruction of His Master.  

If our Lord expects us to bear fruit in every good work (Col 1:10), how often will we avoid sharing with the least of the brothers by hoarding our wealth – choosing to believe that giving is loss and not gain ?  If our Lord expects us to bear fruit as in sharing the gospel with all, how often will we avoid all risks to our jobs and career as not to share the gospel so that we do not step on toes in a woke and all inclusive society today ? Besides, how often are we rich towards ourselves first without being rich to God when we are given material blessings ?   The landowner in the parable of the rich fool was not greedy.  He had an unexpected abundant harvest that his present barns could not hold.  His first thought was to build bigger barns instead of caring for God’s people with the excess abundance. How often do we think of upgrading our standard of living FIRST when we receive a promotion, salary raise, big bonuses or unexpected abundant business profits ? If we are not obeying His 3 demands of discipleship in the first place (Luke 14:26,27,33), how can we be faithful servants till the end ?

As our Lord’s disciples, we have no excuse if we do not invest in His Kingdom of the highest priority and we should be content with just food and lodging.  1 Tim 6:6-10. But sadly the majority of Christendom in the western capitalism states tend to live with indifference to our Lord’s warning and instruction in these end times as goats rather than sheep.  And not being faithful to investing in His Kingdom at all.

Luke 12:13-21

¹³ Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”¹⁴ Jesus replied, “Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?” ¹⁵ Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.” 

¹⁶ And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest. ¹⁷ He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’¹⁸ “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain.¹⁹ And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’ ²⁰ “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’ ²¹ “This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.”

Since I believed and was baptized in 1976,  I have heard numerous sermons on this parable.  The sermons would emphasize that having wealth is not a sin but only the love of it.  It is such a relief to many believers who live in such an affluent society as mine thinking that as long as we are not greedy to gain more, we are fine.  Is the parable that warns against all kinds of greed really says so ?

Our Lord already stated that life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.  In another word,  having an abundance or being rich is already a red flag.  Is the rich man in the parable greedy ?   It was his own land that yielded an unexpected abundant harvest.  It was unexpected because his present barns could not hold all.  This situation is no different from what we will face when we have an unexpected salary increase, promotion or a good business year.   There is no greed to gain more in such a situation.  Yet God was displeased with his mind being rich towards himself and not towards God.  The rich man’s first thought was how to place the abundance and to store up enough for him to take life easy from then. He could very well used this extra abundance to bless others –  to satisfy both spiritual and physical hunger – and thus laying up treasure for himself in heaven.  Ambrose once said,”The bosoms of the poor, the houses of widows, the mouths of children are the barns which last forever.”   Actually our Lord Jesus said a lot about the danger of riches, sometimes calling riches unrighteous or deceitful.  God even called this rich man a FOOL.   Yet how many affluent believers really feel the serious danger in the warning ?

If Christ comes today,  how are we going to answer what we do with our possessions ?  

Gen 1:14

And God said,”Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years…”

The Hebrew word for signs is “avah” which means to mark.  Scripture has frequent mention of the star constellations and from the above verse, they can be used to mark the seasons and years.  Thus when Scripture mentions certain events by marking the position of the constellations, stars and planets, we can know the date of the events by studying astronomy.  We must not confuse astronomy with astrology which is forbidden by God.   Astrology is the occultic belief that interprets the influence of the stars and planets on the lives of people.  Scripture mentions that Magi from the east came to look for Jesus our Lord, the King of the Jews, when they saw His star.  Matt 2:1-2.  This substantiated that certain unique astronomical signs in the heavens could reveal certain significant events.

In Gen 59:9-10, Jacob on his deathbed prophesized “Judah is a lion’s cub, from the prey, my son, you have gone up.  He stooped down; he crouched as a lion and as a lioness; who dares arouse him ?  The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff between his feet, until tribute comes to him; and to him shall be the obedience of the peoples…”  The Hebrew word for foot is “regal” and this is significant for it may refer to the star Regulus, the brightest star in the Leo constellation, known as the King Star since ancient times. The sign for Leo is the lion.  We know from other scripture references that Jesus our Lord is often referred to as the Lion of Judah and the King of Jews. Jupiter (the largest planet in our solar system) in Hebrew means “righteousness” and Venus, the second planet from the sun, is known for its brightness in the dawn sky.  Our Lord Jesus is called “the bright and morning star”.  Rev 22:16.  Jupiter was often referred as the King planet by ancient astronomers.  Jupiter came into conjunction with Venus in Leo at 5 am, 12 August, 3 BC.  On 14 September, 3 BC,  Jupiter came into conjunction with the Star Regulus.  Could the Magi see these particular events or other similar conjunction of Jupiter with other celestial bodies around the time of the birth of our Lord Jesus and started planning to set off to visit and worship our Lord ?

Then between the dates of the above two astronomical events, a “great wonder” event happened that fitted the description in Rev 12:1-5.

Rev 12:1-5

A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. ² She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. ³ Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. ⁴ Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. ⁵ She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter.” And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. 

The description of the great sign started by saying a woman was clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet. The woman referred to the Virgo constellation. And there was only one day – 11 September – that the moon was at her feet and the sun was at the upper torso. This configuration could be seen in Palestine between sunset at 6.18 pm and moonset at 7.39 pm on Wednesday 11 September, 3 BC. The Hebrew calendar month begins on the evening that the new moon appears, so the evening of 11 September was the first day of a new lunar month – the seventh month of Tishri. Tishri 1, Rosh Hashanah, is the New Year’s Day of modern Judaism.

There are other conclusive evidences in the gospels that point to the birth of our Lord in the month of September. Listen to David Pawson’s explanation on how he arrived at the conclusion that Jesus our Lord was born in September. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx50Pbf842E)

Postscript:

(I took the liberty to write a short summary of the information from the following articles and the book by Anthony Ray.

https://www.askelm.com/star/star004.htm

https://goodnessofgodministries.international/2011/12/22/when-was-jesus-christ-born-the-bible-says-september-11-3bc-the-day-of-the-feast-of-trumpets/

I was given the vision of 911 a few days before the actual attack and I was actually staying next to the World Trade Center then. And I was born on 11 September thus increasing the incredible odds of this string of events exponentially. I have been praying to know why the given Rev 18:17-19 central message has not happened yet and this recent knowledge that our Lord Jesus might be born on this same day may well be the Lord’s way of encouraging me to persist in preparing and waiting for it. Hab 2:3)

1 Cor 14

“If you speak to people in words they don’t understand, how will they know what you are saying? You might as well be talking into empty space. There are many different languages in the world, and every language has meaning. But if I don’t understand a language, I will be a foreigner to someone who speaks it, and the one who speaks it will be a foreigner to me.And the same is true for you. Since you are so eager to have the special abilities the Spirit gives, seek those that will strengthen the whole church. So anyone who speaks in tongues should pray also for the ability to interpret what has been said…If unbelievers or people who don’t understand these things come into your church meeting and hear everyone speaking in an unknown language, they will think you are crazy.

Well, my brothers and sisters, let’s summarize. When you meet together, one will sing, another will teach, another will tell some special revelation God has given, one will speak in tongues, and another will interpret what is said. But everything that is done must strengthen all of you…No more than two or three should speak in tongues. They must speak one at a time, and someone must interpret what they say. ²⁸ But if no one is present who can interpret, they must be silent in your church meeting and speak in tongues to God privately…Or do you think God’s word originated with you Corinthians? Are you the only ones to whom it was given?If you claim to be a prophet or think you are spiritual, you should recognize that what I am saying is a command from the Lord himself. But if you do not recognize this, you yourself will not be recognized.^[So, my dear brothers and sisters, be eager to prophesy, and don’t forbid speaking in tongues. But be sure that everything is done properly and in order.”

The context of the whole passage of 1 Cor 14 is about orderly worship.  It clearly stated that at most 3 can speak in tongues and with interpretation, otherwise none should speak.  It does not edify anyone who may not understand, much less the unbelievers who turn up and may think everyone has gone crazy. 

It is clear from 1 Cor 14:37 that orderly worship is a command from the Lord.  Yet we see the blatant disobedience in some charismatic worship services when many just blabbered away in unintelligible tongues and laugh uncontrollably. 

Cain offered an unacceptable sacrifice as compared to Abel. Heb 11:4. That is the way of Cain who worship God to his own whim and fancy.