From an old Iron Maiden song to the movie Omen, the media has had a field day with the number of the beast. I do not think I personally know a single person who do NOT know of this number.

After getting saved, I’ve read many different theories on this, from computer chip implants to some US Presidents (why only US, I do not know) and even it being Islam. Since the Bible told us that “it is the number of a man”, I did not give much credit to that.

Now I have come across something that I felt I should share, not because I am convinced of it, but because I felt it is worth looking into.

The theory goes like this.

• In the Greek manuscripts, the number 666 in Revelation 13:18 is rendered in Greek numerical form as χξϛʹ, which then got rendered in the written form as as ἑξακόσιοι ἑξήκοντα ἕξ, hexakósioi hexēkonta héx, “six hundred and sixty-six”.
• “number of a man” in Rev 13:18 is better translated “Multitudes” of a man thus: “Here is chochmah. Let him that has binah consider the multitude of the  beast: for it is the multitude of a man; and his multitude is encoded in ‘chi, xi, sigma’” Gilyahna (Revelation) 13:18 (RSTNE).
• John the Apostle was not shown the number 666, but rather three symbols which he copied down to the best of his understanding. In other words, what John saw was not the number 666, but symbols which he wrote in Greek as χξϛʹ (chi, xi, sigma).
• The hand written text from codex vaticanus shows that the last Greek letter is an accent not a letter and that the first Greek letter ‘chi’ looks like two crossed swords.

Based on the above points, the proponents of this theory believe that what is written as “χξϛ” is the very symbol of Islam!

I found the following video illustrating this in what I felt was the most unbiased manner possible. If you are interested in pursuing this more, google Walid Shoebat. Please note that I did not make this video and have nothing to do with its host site.

If the above video does not load, please try this link

“Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison” Henry David Thoreau.

Thoreau wrote this on an essay on non violent civil disobedience that inspired a certain lawyer in South Africa about a 100 years later. This lawyer, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, took this to heart and went on to become the father of my nation.

Being resurrection Sunday, my meditation took me to the time right after Pentecost in Acts 5. The freshly anointed apostles had already been in jail once for preaching about Jesus, had then been sprung out of jail by an angel, got caught again for talking about this Jesus and now are in front of the Jewish authorities who decide not to throw them in jail but order them never to say Jesus’ name in public.

We live in a world warped by the influence of sin. The Devil has put in systems in place which ensure that it becomes very unpleasant for anyone to open their mouth and talk about Jesus. In some countries, he has made it illegal, punishable by death, and in others, he has made it culturally irrelevant where people have heard of this Jesus and it is nothing new to them. They do not know the power behind the name. How can they?

The very people who are supposed to be called to demonstrate this power sit passively thinking only about what God can do for us and not what we can do for the one who purchased us with his very own blood.

The truth is that Jesus is the only way, the only truth and the only access to eternal life with our father in heaven. We can not apply the six degrees of separation theory to this.

This means that people are going to perish unless they get a chance to know him. As Paul said in Romans 10:14, how can they believe in the one of who they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?

The fact is that we live in a culture which makes us feel bad or which even make us a criminal if we say that the ‘unsaved’ who does not know Jesus is bound for hell.

However unpleasant or socially unacceptable that might sound, that simply is the truth.

This was the message the apostles preached in Acts and nearly all of them ended up in jail for that.

When we who have been justified and made the righteousness of God, the temples of the Holy Ghost and the custodians the spiritual truths of the victory that is in Jesus, proclaim to a world blinded, bound and ruled by the god of this age, we will quickly find that there is no part for us in this system.

From not being given the freedom to speak about the solution that can save mankind from eternal death, to being killed for proclaiming the one who died for us, we will find that there is no welcome mat from those who now rule this world (I am referring primarily to those authorities mentioned by Paul in Eph 6: 10-18). How can there be? What fellowship is there between darkeness and light? 2 Cor 6:14

“Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison”

Prison need not mean just behind bars, but it could mean anything from that to being a social outcast or to just not being invited to the neighbor’s BBQ. If that is the outcome of our preaching Christ, then why am I trying so hard to stay out of that predicament?

What am I conforming to? Whose law, written or unwritten, am I trying to adhere to for social acceptance?

Who am I trying to not offend by not talking about the consequences of denying Jesus?

To me that is like saying “I’m not really a Christian, but I did see one on TV once”.

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This is an excerpt from my 2005 resurrection Sunday sermon.

My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us…

We are all familiar with this mnemonic for planets in the Solar system.

After Pluto’s demotion some years back, I read this:

“My! Very educated morons just screwed up numerous planetariums.”

My take on this is that humans, educated morons or not, came up with this classification system in the first place, and therefore inherently have the right to change it as necessary.

CRIRES model-based computer-generated impression of the Plutonian surface by ESO—L. Calçada, with atmospheric haze, and Charon and the Sun in the sky

Sentimentalism is another thing, but that is not the issue here.

Officially a “planet” is a celestial body that:

1. is in orbit around a star or stellar remnants;
2. has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a hydrostatic equilibrium (nearly round) shape;
3. is not massive enough to initiate thermonuclear fusion of deuterium in its core; and,
4. has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.

Change any of these parameters, and that celestial body ceases to be classified as a planet.

In January 2007, the American Dialect Society chose “plutoed” as its 2006 Word of the Year, defining “to pluto” as “to demote or devalue someone or something“, “as happened to the former planet Pluto.”

Don’t get plutoed!!!

God has set down some parameters too. It is all in the Bible.

The difference here is that God does not need to hold a referendum to adopt a new resolution because he has discovered something new, or because he now has a deeper revelation of something which he did not have before.

If we choose to live according to God’s parameters, then we qualify to receive what he has to give; both now and eternally, and I gladly add that he is only too happy and willing to give to those who comply and ask.

If we do not live according to God’s parameters, then we get to live with and as others who don’t; both now and eternally.

Another point to note here is that we are composed of materials that disintegrate if we choose to change the parameters set by our creator.”

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This entry first appeared on my old blog site on Sept. 05, 2006

The king offered him money and food, both of which the man of God turned down. All seem to go well as he started his journey home taking another route.

Now in Bethel lived an old prophet who invited this man of God for a meal. This man of God turned down the offer by stating “For I was commanded by the word of the Lord, You shall eat no bread or drink water or return by the way you came.”

Not taking no for an answer, the old prophet said “I too am a prophet as you are, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the LORD, saying, ‘Bring him back with you to your house, that he may eat bread and drink water.’” The the old prophet was lying!!!

To make a long story short, the man of God who came from Judah decides to eat with the prophet, and gets killed by a lion on the way afterwards.

After reading this passage, I thought about a couple of things:

• If there was a Prophet in Bethel, why did God have to send one from another city? Because this old prophet was not connected to God.
• Why did the old prophet want this man to eat with him so badly that he resorted to deceit? He knew he was not connected but wanted to show that he still in with the in crowd.  I’m sure there was some envy involved, and probably did not want to loose face.  After all, the man of God did heal the Kings hand which had shriveled as a punishment for rebellion to what God had spoken through him. These are the things that I might go through if I were in the old man’s disconnected and dry shoes.

What is shocking to see is that when the old prophet is called to identify the dead body of the man of God, he says  ““It is the man of God who was disobedient to the word of the LORD. Therefore the LORD has delivered him to the lion, which has torn him and killed him, according to the word of the LORD which He spoke to him.”” 1 kings 13:26

This serves as a warning for you and me. When we are on fire for God, when we succeed in what God has told us to do, be very careful of contrary visions and prophecies from ‘qualified mouths’. We need to “discern whether a message is from the Spirit of God or from another spirit.” 1 Corinthians 12:10

If God takes the trouble to tell me to go to Bethel from Judah, and come back another way, then I should be 100% sure that if “God changes his mind”, he has the means at his disposal to tell me of it personally.

Guard the fire and the vision God has put in you.