ANTICIPATION OF THE MESSIANIC KINGDOM If God granted them favor in the eyes of Alexander the Great, and successive conquests in the era of the Maccabees, but the need is to enter into the Messianic kingdom, when the meek King comes, the, Grantor of salvation and the inner peace to the Gentiles; for in that kingdom we will have the following: 1‐ The enjoyment of the latter rain 1 2‐ The enjoyment of the personal care of God 2 ‐ 3 3‐ The enjoyment of the conquest and the restoration of the kingdom 4 ‐ 12 1‐ THE ENJOYMENT OF THE LATTER RAIN: “Ask the Lord for rain, in the time of latter rain. The Lord will make flashing clouds. He will give them showers of rain, grass in the field for everyone” (1) In the old, because of evil, the prophet Elijah stopped the rain three years and six months, to chastise every one. Therefore, it is our sins that stop the abundant flow of God’s grace on us, and deny us of His rain that turns the barren wilderness into a garden that brings pleasure to the heart of God (Song 5: 1). In our study of the book of Hosea (6: 7) we noticed that in Palestine, early rain falls to sow the seeds, and latter rain falls to complete the maturation of the crop. The former rain refers to the work of the Holy Spirit through the law and the prophets, etc………. before the coming of the Lord; while the later, refers to the abundant flow of the Holy Spirit on the church of the New Covenant, proclaimed by the prophet Joel by saying: “I will pour out My spirit on every flesh” (Joel 2: 28). We can say that the early rain is the law and prophecies that God granted men of the Old Covenant; while the latter rain is preaching the gospel that reveals the secrets of God, and grants us deep knowledge and vision of the divine life. According to St. Dedymus the blind, the early rain means, as well, the teachings concerning the incarnation of the Savior; while the latter rain means the enjoyment of His divine secrets. Anyway, I wish we do not cease to seek from God to shine in our hearts the splendor of His glory, granting us His latter rain, to water our land by His divine love, and to grant it increase. 2‐ THE ENJOYMENT OF GOD’S PERSONAL CARE: If God gives rain on both the righteous and the wicked; yet He grants His spiritual rain only to those who seek it. Now, to care spiritually for His flock, this flock has to forsake the deceitful divination, magic, and dreams, of the false prophets, in order to care personally for His people. “For the idols speak delusion; the diviners envision lies, and tell false dreams; they comfort in vain. Therefore the people wend their way like sheep; they are in trouble because there is no shepherd. My anger is kindled against the shepherds, and I will punish the goatherds, for the Lord of hosts will visit His flock, the house of Judah, and will make them as His royal horse in the battle” (2 – 4). The people in the old, used to keep ‘idols’ in their houses to protect them, and to consult them before they act. God will never receive the care of His people as long as they trust in idols, ask the diviners, and resort to the dreams of the false prophets; for those all deceive man by sweet words, but those who trust in then will fall into humiliation. Now, in case the people forsake those vain deceptions, the Lord will carry out two things: He will declare His anger on the corrupt shepherds, and receive the care in His own hands. And as He confirmed in the book of Ezekiel: ”For thus says the Lord God: ‘Indeed, I Myselof willsearch for My sheep and seek them out ……. I will feed My flock and make them lie down” (Ezekiel 34: 11, 15). He punishes the wicked goatherds, cares for His flock Himself, and “gives His life for the sheep” (John 10: 11); He grants them His life, to set them as a horse in the procession of salvation, capable of fighting against the devil and his works; and as it is said: “O Lord, Were You displeased with the rivers; Was Your anger against the rivers, Was Your wrath against the sea; that You rode on Your horses, Your chariots of salvation?” (Habakkuk 3: 8) 3‐ THE ENJOYMENT OF CONQUEST AND THE RESTORATION OF THE KINGDOM: The fruition of the personal care of God is their enjoyment of the conquest, security, and joy, and the restoration of the kingdom in them. (1) “From Him comes the cornerstone; from Him the tent peg; from Him the battle bow; from Him every ruler (oppressor) swiftly comes out” (4). The true divine care appears by the transfiguration of the Lord Christ among His people as “a Cornerstone” that binds all together in Him; and supports all by one Spirit. He also appears as “a tent peg” to support their temporal tent, namely their temporary life, so that the winds of the foreign teachings, or tempests of the love of the world and the evil desires of the body would never shake. This is the divine tent peg that support the body (the tent) by sanctifying it to the account of the kingdom of God. The Lord will also, in them, be a battle bow aimed by the believer to fight evil and sin; to be said about them: “One of you can chase a thousand, and two can put ten thousand to flight” (Deuteronomy 32: 30). They, being hosts of the Lord, bearing the Lord Christ, the true arrow, would say: “We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but , against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6: 12) As to saying: “From Him every ruler (oppressor) swiftly comes out”, refers to His work in His church, which receives Him as the Cornerstone, the tent peg, and “the spiritual bow”; uprooting from it every oppressor and corruptor, so that all in her would be sanctified by Him. (2) “They shall be like mighty men who tread down their enemies. In the mire of the streets in the battle, they shall fight because the Lord is with them; and the riders on horses shall be put to shame” (5) Such is their might, and such is their conquest, they would tread down the mire of the streets, so as not to be like the one who buried his talent in the ground (Matthew 25: 18), but, by the heavenly Lord they would rise above every material thought, soaring up in the heavenlies; however violent is this thought like the riders of horses. St. Dedymus the blind discerns between the ‘horse riders’ and the ‘horsemen’. The ‘horse riders’ are those who ride their horses without a brdle by which to control them. If the hoses refer to the body, In case the soul rides the body, but leave it to its stubbornness and disobedience; she will be put to shame because of the evil desires of the body. The horses, as well, refer to the suffosticated and haughty thoughts, ridden by the soul, to fall into pride, and be denied salvation. About the horse riders it is said: “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the Lord our God” (Psalm 20: 7); and A horse is a vain hope for safety” (Psalm 33: 17). Concerning the ‘horsemen’, on the other hand, they refer to those who ride their horses with a bridle to control them; It was said to the prophet Elijah: “My father, My father, the chariot of Israel and its horsemen” (2 kings 2: 12 To make up to them for the years eaten by locusts, Instead of the losses they suffered when God rejected them, they will get great blessings that cover all the past losses; saying: “I will strengthen the house of Judah; and I will save the house of Joseph. I will bring them back, because I have mercy on them. They shall be as though I had not cast them aside, for I am the Lord their God, and I will hear them” (6) Why does He talk about the house of Judah and the house of Joseph? For from the former came Jesus the Grantor of salvation; and from the later appeared Joseph, the symbol of Christ, who provided the grain, after they were crushed with hunger and draught (Genesis 41: 56). If Israel has passed through years of draught, the true Joseph satisfies them, as according to St. Mary: “He has filled the hungry with good things” (Luke 1: 53). He is the Lord their God who responds to their requests, and satisfies their needs, so that they would not remember the past with its cruel spiritual famine; for the joy of the present cover all the sorrows of the past; hence he says: “Those of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man, and their heart shall rejoice as if with wine” (7). That is the feature of the Messianic era: the joy of the Holy Spirit, that the world could never take away from the heart. Here he mentions Ephraim as a mighty man full of joy; probably as a reference to the northern kingdom that lived in captivity a longer duration than Judah; hence He confirms His support for her.. And He probably means the tribe of Ephraim in particular, for it was the violent tribe, that was the foremost provoker of corruption in the northern kingdom; particularly that ‘Jeroboam’ who provoked the ten tribes to revolt against Judah, was from Ephraim (1 Kings 11: 26; 12: 2); and who set the idol‐worship in Israel (1 kings 12: 25‐33). Now the Lord confirms to Ephraim that he will be spiritually might, and will be filled with joy. (3) He will gather thyem and make them increase in His bosom: “I will whistle for them and gather them; for I will redeem them, and they shall increase as they once increased” (8) Like a bee keeper who whistles to his scattered bees to gather nthe honey from the pastures and gardens; He bwill embrace them to Himself, grant them blessing to grow and increase as they did in the past; Meaning, if He cared for them while they were under chastisement, under the bondage of the Pharaoh; when they increased as much as they humiliated them (Exodus 1: 7); How much more He bwould increase them when He redeem them of bondage?! He fulfills to them His promise to Abraham the father of fathers: “I have made you a father of many nations; I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you” (Genesis 17: 5, 6); and is said in Isaiah: “A little one shall become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation” (Isaiah 60: 22); and according to St. Dedymus the blind: {If these words are taken literally. It may seem difficult to fulfill; as many saints were childless like Elijah, Elisha, and John the Baptist, who, among those borne of women there has not risen one greater than him (Matthew 11: 11), in virtue and in knowledge of the holy secrets; we therefore should understand this spiritually]. On another aspect, they may have children in the spirit, like those borne by Paul in the gospel (1 Corinthians 4: 15), “for whom he labored in birth again until Christ is formed in them” (Galatians 4: 19); or like those whom the apostle Peter calls: “obedient children” (1 Peter 1: 14). On another aspect, they could have children in the heart, namely the fruits of the Holy Spirit proclaimed in us as children who bring pleasure to the heart of God. (4) Bringing them back to Him, to increase and have fruition by the Holy Spirit, He says: “I will sow them among the peoples, and they shall remember Me in far countries. They shall live together with their children, and they shall return.. I will also bring them back from the land of Egypt, and gather them from Assyria. I will bring them to the land of Gilead and Lebanon, until no more room is found for them. He shall pass through the sea with affliction, and strike the waves of the sea; all the depths of the River shall dry up. Then the pride of Assyria shall be brought down, and the scepter of Egypt shall depart”. So I will strengthen them in the Lord, and they shall walk up and down in His name’, says the Lord” (9 – 12) What a living portrait and joyful of the work of God in them! After He gathers them up from the captivity of sin and bring them back to Himself, He sows them among the peoples to testify to salvation in the far countries, and to have spiritual children in the Lord; But they will not walk with the spirit of the world, but their hearts will return from the symbolic land of Egypt, namely the love of the world; and He will gather them from Assyria, namely from the spirit of pride, and bring them forth to the lands of Glead and Lebanon. And so as not to understand this literally: He said: “until no more room is found for them”; for they are in a continuous state of migration, and perpetually setting fort from strength to strength, and from g;lorry to glory, their hearts are risen up in the heavenlies, and have no place on earth. Commenting on this phrase, being a proclamation of spiritual migration of the believer, St. Dedymus the blind says: [Crossing over from iniquity to virtue; this is truly the change of location; a change from sin to righteousness, and from evil to piety ….. he walks from virtue to virtue (Psalm 83: 8); and crosses over from the shadow of the law, from the literality that kills, to reach the spirit that gives life (2 Corinthians 3: 6) ………s the blind: [the migration to the spiritual Lebanon is a migration to a state of Diety, namely to the enjoyment of the features of the Lord Jesus, when the soul would enter into the glorious holy church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing (Ephesians 5: 27); to be said about her: “the fragrance of her garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon” (song 4: 11). Bringing them forth into the new Lebanon, namely into the holy church, He makes them cross the sea of affliction, like the living fish that have no problem to hide in the waters with all its disturbance, and the sea with all its waves…….. They enter into affliction in this world, yet its violent currents would not be able to swallow them, nor the depth of the River to draw them away! They come out from every anguish more powerful, to proclaim the kingdom of God inside them. Hence He ends His talk on the blessings of this era by saying: “So I will strengthen them in the Lord; and they shall walk up and down in His name’, says the Lord” (12)
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