Chag sameach Rosh Chodesh chaverim and welcome to this assembly for today's message. I pray that you are all by now securely established outside the cities and that you have enough food, water, medicines and other essentials to see you by 'off the grid' for a minimum of one year and that you have something (not cash, as they're trying to eliminate that as quickly as possible), preferably precious metals, with which to reboot your private economies after this is all over. Though there will be much that is similar everywhere, the situation will differ from place-to-place. You should have vegetable gardens either in operation now or some sort of indoor food production, or gardens planned for your warmer seasons.

As predicted a long time ago, inflation is on the rise and will get worse. You, like us, are doubtless making large cuts already to economise! Winter is upon us here and we, no doubt like most of you in cold climates, are having to learn to get by. I've noticed that in parts of the UK, they are already having power-cuts of up to 11 hours a day! It will be tough in cities like London. And to think that those foolish British politicians not only closed down their coal-burning power stations but, in an irresponsible fit of green virtue-signalling, actually blew up most of them so they can't be restarted! Thanks to their reckless doctrinaire politics and stupidity, many will freeze to death this winter.

Our lifestyles have already begun to change, and likely permanently. The good news is that it will wake up those who have been spiritually asleep all this time. So, unless you have a lot of extra cash, which I wouldn't want to hang on anyway while we wait for economies to crash and bank accounts get wiped out, it's probably too late for most, save the3 most ingenius and daring, to get a food storage program going or to arrange accommodation outside the cities. I am relieved to hear that many of you have quit the cities, in some cases just in the nick of time, and are adjusting to your new lives, often in radically different (and sometimes challenging) climates where at least you will be safer from the élites who are addicted to their creature-comforts. As the first believers were often on the move because of persecution, so we too must, in some cases, be prepared for a semi-nomadic lifestyle. Once you have moved, find out as quickly as you can if there are any reliable networks where bartering is possible and join one. Some may even have their own credit systems and private currencies as individual German cities once did after the First World War. Moreover, the 'crash' hasn't actually happened yet and when it does, in a few weeks' time, it will likely be worse than the Great Depression that began in 1929. So keep preparing in whatever way you can!

Let's be grateful it's not as bad...yet...as it was in the first century where we learn that Yahweh's servants "went about in sheepskins and goatskins [and were] destitute, persecuted and mistreated - the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, and in caves and holes in the ground" (Heb.11:37-38, NIV) though in some parts of the world this is already a reality. We must not forget them. Every day I get pleas for help because people are both being oppressed and many are starving. Even in our own poverty, which I know must seem like plenty to them, we are still expected to put aside a third of the tithe for the poor so that Yahweh can bless those not doing as well as we are comparitively-speaking. Yahweh will show you who you are to help - the deserving cases - I guarantee it. We here in Sweden are committed to helping starving Burundian children right now so I am sorry to have to turn away the many others who seek help as our resources are tiny. It's virtually impossible to send money abroad through the banks now anyway as we have found out unless you have someone actually on the ground at your proposed money destination who is willing to be a third party.

I did warn our friends, again and again, in poor countries that the 'Western Cash Cow' would suddenly come to an end and it did, this year (2022). And I say again, for the benefit of those who ask for help, we don't support anyone we don't know well personally because we have been scammed so many times in the past. We have to be picky to be good stewards over our limited resources. May Yahweh have mercy on those criminals who effectively stole money from the poor and needy for their own selfish gain when they scammed us! Believers are mostly going to have to rely on locals for their help in the future or, more likely, quickly learn to become self-sufficient. Again, Yahweh will show you the right place to go to and be in order to survive provided you follow the instructions I will be giving you in a few minutes.

Yahweh will not turn His back on those who truly love Him. He may appear at times to be in no hurry to help but He is never late. Don't forget that because He will not be hurried by our impatience. More than at any other time in recent history, He wants us to closely look at the motives of our hearts. Those who are fake the Enemy will be allowed, in most cases, to bring down. I recently saw a vision of siege works arrayed spiritually against a certain home. Many years ago I was shocked when a former brother, who turned out to be a complete sham, told me with a Cheshire cat-like grin on his face that all his countrymen were liars when I complained about scammers. It turned out he was one of the biggest himself and after he was caught engaging in criminal activity defrauding his own brethren no less, and is still posing as a Christian and active in a congregation. All liars and thieves will be exposed during this time of Penultimate Judgment and all fake churches will either collapse under the pressure of emet (truth) or, because they are already the devil's, eagerly allow thremselves to be absorbed into the emerging One World Religion that the Pope and others are currently pushing so hard for. A great separation is underway. So this is absolutely not a time to be spiritually lax but to be separate for righteousness' sake.

This Book of Revelation study that we're taking a break from today which we have been doing for some months now, has been a great spiritual stimulus to me personally. Once its spiritual tavnith or patterns are discerned, it becomes of enormous worth practically-speaking. Many a time I have found myself in vision seeing the things that are described. Some of them have been decidedly unpleasant, others very uplifting especially in those times when it has seemed as though Yahweh wss distant and not saying anything much. There is so much to be learned from this concluding biblical book.

Part of the reason for those silences, though by no means always, is that we are expecting from Him things that are both unrealistic and not in His will. What if you want something so badly that isn't in His will and you keep pressing Him for it? Sometimes He gives us what we want in order to teach us a lesson we wouldn't learn any other way because of our stubbornness, and stubbornness is something He most certainly will seek to break down. We get what we ask for but it turns sour. Only then do we realise what we asked for was wrong. Israel demanding a King when Yahweh wanted a Tribal Confederacy led by the Cohen Gadol (High Priest) and an anointed navi (prophet) is one example. They got Saul who started well but soon went off the rails. Yahweh's navi (prophet), Samuel, spent half his time having to counter the king when his time could have been better spent elsewhere.

I think all of the people in our own time who want to be raptured away to escape what we have been reading about in the Book of Revelation. It's often that in tribulation that we are forced to face and deal with spiritual issues we would otherwise have ignored because we loved the darkness more than the light. Tribulation forces us to make serious choices. Yahweh wants better for us and so He uses whatever means will accomplish that in the most loving possible sort of way even if the disciplining and chastisement may be very painful at times. I think of all those Californian believers who so much love their homes and the fantastic climate there who won't leave in spite of the many, many warnings that have been given by the nevi'im (prophets) because they either believe in the contrary testimony of false prophets or, for example, because they think they are going to be whisked away in a Rapture before it gets too bad. I don't know how many evangelical preachers are experiencing hardship, or are seeing their flocks going through hardships, who beg Yahweh to whisk them away instead of telling them to leave the danger areas and prepare to bunker down for a while elsewhere. Some places, after all, are marked for destruction because that's what happens in times of judgment. So obstinately staying put no matter what, no matter how perilous, and just 'trusting' is nowhere taught in Scripture. It is reckless and foolhardy. But neither are we to flee when He has specifically told us to stay put and have faith in His provision. Pray, therefore, for a discerning ear first and foremost.

I worry a lot about my adoptive country of Sweden as it faces critical choices, the most recent being whether to join NATO or not. I want the best for the people here and for good government to prevail. I pray for both as we should. It's a land marked for great things in spite of its having taken some very dangerous and destructive turns politically and socially over the last century. On the whole it did well during the pandemic scare all things considered. It wisely stayed out of two fratricidal world wars. And in the past, as a superpower, it defended Protestantism against tyranny. It's not perfect because none of us are. But because of the difficulties and exposés, people here are very slowly waking up. It's happening all over Europe and the Western world. But whether that awakening leads to repentance or not is the main question because new self-knowledge always requires a change in direction in order to become alligned with the Creator.

Indeed, I am more and more convinced that we none of us will ever get things 100 per cent right, but we must always try. The best we can, and must, do, as I've said before, is to face in the right direction, to keep moving and trust Yahweh to guide our feet thereon. Change is often slow because we are sluggish beings at best - we're slow learners except in major crises, a reason I believe we are often permitted to go through crises to rapidly grow and mature. Life is like a dance - a journey, a movement - that can be experienced and expressed in as many valid and lawful ways as there are humans. Torah is not a matchbox into which Yahweh's people are crammed, but a protective fence around a decently-sized area. Breach the fence and trouble results, our world starts to fall apart...slowly at first but then ever faster and faster the longer we remain on the wrong side of that fence. Stay within the fence and we prosper because that's where the sustaining life and protection of the Creator is to be found.

As human beings we have been very carefully crafted by Yahweh. We were designed exclusively for a Torah lifestyle - morally, ethically and rhythmically (temporally). Perhaps it's the infinite variety that we are capable of that delights our Heavenly Father so much. No two people are alike, not even spouses, though they do come to resemble each other more and more over time if they can get a dynamic based on emet (truth) and ahavah (love) going. And because no two people are exactly alike, no two communities of people are either, even if I do believe that those who are on the right Way are converging rather than diverging. The end of convergence of the unity spoken of by Paul (1 Cor.8:6; Eph.4:3-6,13; Tit.1:9; ).

Think of all the different foods we enjoy, the way we clothe ourselves, the music we have composed over the millennia. Not all of it is good or right, of course, but yet there is still plenty of room for varied expression in that which is. Yet we all instinctively, deep down, know what true love is and we react in the same way to the story-telling of that love whatever culture or from whatever age it comes out of. We may perceive or sense details of it a little differently from one another (because we have trained ourselves to focus on particular things) but the overall shape or spirit of love that we experience is the same. We understand Prodigal Son-type stories as one example, a reason Yah'shua's (Jesus') parables are timeless and are so important. Story-tellers still need the theologians but the theologians need the story-tellers too.

Tragedy only results in life when we choose to go down the wrong track. Everything seems OK at first but slowly and surely the world around us begins to darken, often so slowly that we are not aware of it until the darkness has a hand gripping our throats, a bit like the frog slowly being boiled alive. There is only one track, path, road, or way, I'm afraid to say, and the wise discern that early on before they throw years of their life away pursuing futile philosophies, religions and goals in the mistraken belief that it doesn't matter which one you choose. The further down a wrong track you go, the more backtracking you will have to do later because there's no instantaneous relocation until you recongise the identity of that Track, Road, or Way, who is Yah'shua the Messiah (Jesus Christ). "I am the way, path, road, track" Yah'shua (Jesus) said, and "no one comes to the Father except through Me" (John 14:6, NIV). He said that, not some writer of fiction who supposedly invented Yah'shua (Jesus), and His claim to being the way, truth and life, is an exclusive one, because a pure and holy (set-apart) Elohim (God) cannot be inclusive of sin or falsehood. If you think you have found Elohim (God) without Him, you have deluded yourself, and either you must throw out everything He taught or you have to repent and change direction. All spiritual, religious and spiritual roads don't lead to Elohim (God) and those roads that do lead to a singular place (like Rome) don't do so indefinitely. All other roads, including the best intentioned ones, lead to...well, you already know where (hell), even if you might not like to hear that. So are you going to learn the easier way or the harder way - the low road or the high one? You can waste so much time and life, which you only get once, choosing the harder way.

And even if you do decide to trust Him, undoing the habits of potentially a lifetime of ambling down wrong paths can take a long time because they have to be expunged from the subconscious too where we are propelled to do so much of what we do. The Creation Calendar is a good example of that because being convinced intellectually that it's true isn't enough. I know a lot of people who are but didn't want to obey - didn't want to live that way, even claiming it was impossible in the modern world. That much they're right about - it is virtually impossible to live that way without becoming separate from the world system. But our Elohim (God) is an expert in dealing with the 'impossible' and showing us how to do the same too, something the Remnant has to learn early on. Truth exists to be incorporated and lived, not toyed around or played with. I've know many a person who, when not in the company of a community living the rightway, soon revert to their old habits using the Gregorian world system because that's what everyone around them is doing and they want to 'fit in'. They soon forget the luni-solar sabbath and annual festivals and find themselves exclusively involving themselves in Saturday or Sunday activities with other believers...and even dropping that if they lose faith altogether. It's easily done when the truth hasn't become properly established in mind, heart and lifestyle choices.

The same is true with morality. The company we keep can, if we are not properly grounded spiritually, soon start to influence and leaven us with, for example, it's bad language and bad habits. That's why personal evangelism is a key ingredient of a Torah-based life in Christ. If we're not evangelising - trying to win souls for Messiah - we will soon discover that we are the ones being 'evangelised' by the company we keep, whether consciously or subconsciously, a reason we're told (amongst other things) not to marry unbelievers. Now I have friends who chose to marry unbelievers who today bitterly regret that choice. It meant carrying a lot of dead weight in life which otherwise would have freed them to do so much more that was right. It takes character to obey and choose aright and the will-power to keep one's focus on Yah'shua (Jesus) when all around us we are surrounded by the temptation to go with the crowd. Does the crowd know where it is going? I've never come across one that did. They're simply 'taking their chances' based on numbers with no assurance or security whatsoever except blind faith. Isn't that ironic given how unbelievers often accuse Christians/Messianics of living by 'blind faith'. We don't. We live by very informed faith indeed. And if you've read any of my writings you'll know that's true of me and most of my closest friends - we study things out very carefully. Indeed, I believe we are dealing with reality in a way that the crowd never dares, seeking as it does paths in life around major truth issues.

I want you to notice that the Master's (Lord's) Prayer does not include a petition to escape temptation but to be protected during it and delivered from the evil that lurks within it. The "lead us not into temptation" part often confuses believers (Lk.11:4; Mt.6:13) - it often stumps believers who think the Saviour is saying something He isn't. It confused the founder of Mormonism so much that he had the gall to rewrite the Master's Prayer to read, "suffer us not to be led into temptation" (or 'don't allow us to be tempted') which no ancient manuscript of the New Testament agrees with but which the fleshy mind might be seduced by. I was for a while. I thought it was a brilliant 'explanation' for a short while but I was ignorant as well as being led by my carnal preferences. Those who are not diligent Scripture-readers often forget that Yah'shua (Jesus) elsewhere explains exactly what He means in His Prayer:

"Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak" (Matt 26:41, NIV).

"When tempted, no one should say, 'Elohim (God) is tempting me.' For Elohim (God) cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death" (James 1:13-15, NIV).

You see, many people read the Lord's Prayer as the sinner begging Yahweh not to lead them into temptation...because that's what He apparently does! And yet that's just what He doesn't do. If you read on in the Lucan text (vv.5-13) you will see that Yah'shua (Jesus) gives a discourse on how we must be bold and persistent in prayer (vv.5-8) with the assurance that Yahweh answers prayer (vv.9-13). So there you have it. The petitioner is asking Yahweh to intervene when temptation besets them when they pray boldly and persistently. Yah'shua (Jesus) nowhere promises that He will steer us away from temptation; rather, He promises to empower us to navigate unharmed through it as we boldly and persistently approach Him in prayer because by this means we become spiritually fortified and leavened. Temptation will always be around us; the solution is to be spiritually kitted with armour to fend it off (Eph.6:10-18) as we pass through its murky waters.

The temptation to veer off the Way is always around us. The Enemy seeks to derail us at every opportunity which is why our spiritual vision must be clear and fixed daily - 24/7 - on the Master. He is the filter through which we must see everything else. You see, you cannot have one eye on Yah'shua (Jesus) and another eye on fornication or adultery or pork or alcohol or theft or murder or immodesty or anything that is unlawful - that's cock-eyed! Our eyesight is binocular and inside we have only one eye! Close your eyes, visualise something, and see if you can visualise something else simultaneously. It's not possible. Our eyesight insight is singukar as it's supposed to be on the outside - in the physical world - too...if we choose it to be so. Recall what Yah'shua (Jesus) said in Matthew 5:

"The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!" (Matt.6:22-23, KJV).

I like the Jacobean English of the King James Version here because of its use of the word 'single' which means 'devoted to' which is a metaphor for clarity - clarity of vision in this case. The Aramic word here translates to 'sound' or 'wholesome' that's related to a Hebrew word with which you'll be familiar: 'p'shat', in other words, 'basic' or 'simple'. Multitasking, which women tend to be better at than men, is a complex business but here the emphasis is on simplicity. The rule is 'basic' - you either have your eye on Yah'shua (Jesus) - and therefore by extension, New Covenant Torah - or you're trying to multitask with Elohim (God) and the demonic world system simultaneously, which is impossible, because that will, first, make you double-minded, then unstable, and then force you, in the end, to choose between Him or the world. In other words, we cannot have multiple, conflicting loyalties. That's a kind of schizophrenia. A wife must be faithful to her husband and to no other man just as the Bride of Christ (which is all of us) must be loyal to Christ alone (Eph.5:22-24; Col.3:18; 1 Pet.3:1). Our faith must be single-minded because anything else leads to instability and fluidity of character - in a word, unreliability. It's a question of citizenship: do you belong to the Kingdom above or to the world below? "But our citizenship," the apostle Paul said to the Philippians, "is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Saviour from there, the Master Yah'shua the Messiah (Lord Jesus Christ), who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under His control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body" (Phil.3:20-21, NIV).

Whether you are single-minded or not will determine how you face trials and temptations. James clearly discerned this when he counselled his readers:

"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask Elohim (God), who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Master; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does" (James 1:2-8, NIV).

The Remnant is not, and cannot ever be, double-minded or cock-eyed looking in two different directions simultaneously, because the Remnant is the Bride, and the Bride is fully echad (one and united) with her Husband. She cannot extend the liberties given to her within the fence of Torah to anything outside it, because beyond it is the world and its satanic ruler. We have been chosen by Christ "out of the world" and to stay out of its system in everything (John 15:19, NIV) for as He also said, true spiritually regenerated, born-again, Torah-obedient believers are "not of the world [system] any more than I am of the world [system]" (John 17:14, NIV). We're in it physically but not spiritually...or we should be.

Stability in life comes only through singleness of mind and purpose, but we were only built for one kind of living which means that any other kind of living we might opt for will at length bend us out of shape and interfere with our humanity, making us progressively more and more unhuman. To be perfectly human is to be in Christ in name, substance and deed. Everything else we see must be seen through Him so that we can know the safety that is inside the fence and the unsafety that is outside it. Inside there is true liberty and freedom and the infinite possibility of the smooth expansion of our lives. I therefore challenge and ask you today to do one thing - become fully in Christ...devoted, faithful, and single-minded. Then stability, inner peace and happiness will follow even if all around you is chaos.

The 14th century Persian poet Shams-ud-din Muhammad, better known as Hafiz, wrote a short poem about a fish who suddenly wakes up and realises he is making the wrong journey, and exclaims: "Something ain't right about this camel ride, and I am feeling so darned thirsty!" If that's how you feel, then perhaps it is time to dismount from the camel, whatever substitute for right-living it may actually be, and head for the water, which is Christ. Sometimes we're on wrong journey's because we're not living in, through, and by Yah'shua (Jesus) but through ourselves or someone else. And this is no time for camel-riding.

May the grace and peace of our Master Yah'shua (Jesus) be with you now and forever more as you seek out, or enter into, the Journey He has planned for you. Amen.