Avenger Of Blood Order Printed Copy

Author: John Hagee
Size: 1.69MB | 354 pages
|

Download Read Online

Continue with

Google Twitter

Email Register

Others like avenger of blood Features >>

Life In Vene-Ah Kingdom (Novel)

About the Book

"Avenger of Blood" by John Hagee follows the story of FBI agent Monica Alden as she investigates a series of brutal murders that appear to be linked to a biblical prophecy. With the help of an Israeli detective and a Jewish scholar, Monica must uncover the truth behind the killings before it's too late. The novel delves into themes of faith, redemption, and the power of forgiveness.

John Newton

“Amazing Grace” is one of the most beloved hymns of the last two centuries. The soaring spiritual describing profound religious elation is estimated to be performed 10 million times annually and has appeared on over 11,000 albums. It was referenced in Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin and had a surge of popularity during two of nation’s greatest crises: the Civil War and the Vietnam War. Between 1970 and 1972, Judy Collins’ recording spent 67 weeks on the chart and peaked at number 5. Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson and Elvis are among the many artists to record the song. Recently, President Obama burst into the familiar tune during the memorial service for Reverend Clementa Pinckney, a victim of a heinous church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina. The song was written by a former enslaver Ironically, this stirring song, closely associated with the African American community, was written by a former enslaver, John Newton. This unlikely authorship forms the basis of Amazing Grace, a Broadway musical (written by Broadway first-timer Christopher Smith, a former Philadelphia policeman, and playwright Arthur Giron) which tells Newton’s life story from his early days as a licentious libertine in the British navy to his religious conversion and taking up the abolitionist cause. But the real story behind the somewhat sentimental musical told in Newton’s autobiography reveals a more complex and ambiguous history. Newton was born in 1725 in London to a Puritan mother who died two weeks before his seventh birthday, and a stern sea-captain father who took him to sea at age 11. After many voyages and a reckless youth of drinking, Newton was impressed into the British navy. After attempting to desert, he received eight dozen lashes and was reduced to the rank of common seaman. While later serving on the Pegasus, an enslaved person ship, Newton did not get along with the crew who left him in West Africa with Amos Clowe, an enslaver. Clowe gave Newton to his wife Princess Peye, an African royal who treated him vilely as she did her other enslaved people. On stage, Newton’s African adventures and enslavement are a bit more flashy with the ship going down, a thrilling underwater rescue of Newton by his loyal retainer Thomas, and an implied love affair between Newton and the Princess. Newton converted to Christianity after a miracle at sea The stage version has John’s father leading a rescue party to save his son from the calculating Princess, but in actuality, the enterprise was undertaken by a sea captain asked by the senior Newton to look for the missing John. (In the show, the elder Newton is wounded during the battle for his son’s freedom and later has a tearful deathbed scene with John on board ship.) During the voyage home, the ship was caught in a horrendous storm off the coast of Ireland and almost sank. Newton prayed to God and the cargo miraculously shifted to fill a hole in the ship’s hull and the vessel drifted to safety. Newton took this as a sign from the Almighty and marked it as his conversion to Christianity. He did not radically change his ways at once, his total reformation was more gradual. "I cannot consider myself to have been a believer in the full sense of the word, until a considerable time afterward,” he later wrote. He did begin reading the Bible at this point and began to view his captives with a more sympathetic view. In the musical, John abjures slavery immediately after his shipboard epiphany and sails to Barbados to search for and buy the freedom of Thomas. After returning to England, Newton and his sweetheart Mary Catlett dramatically confront the Prince of Wales and urge him to abolish the cruel practice. In real life, Newton continued to sell his fellow human beings, making three voyages as the captain of two different vessels, The Duke of Argyle and the African. He suffered a stroke in 1754 and retired, but continued to invest in the business. In 1764, he was ordained as an Anglican priest and wrote 280 hymns to accompany his services. He wrote the words for “Amazing Grace” in 1772 (In 1835, William Walker put the words to the popular tune “New Britain”) It was not until 1788, 34 years after leaving it that he renounced his former slaving profession by publishing a blazing pamphlet called “Thoughts Upon the Slave Trade.” The tract described the horrific conditions on the ships and Newton apologized for making a public statement so many years after participating in the trade: “It will always be a subject of humiliating reflection to me, that I was once an active instrument in a business at which my heart now shudders.” The pamphlet was so popular it was reprinted several times and sent to every member of Parliament. Under the leadership of MP William Wilberforce, the English civil government outlawed slavery in Great Britain in 1807 and Newton lived to see it, dying in December of that year. The passage of the Slave Trade Act is depicted in the 2006 film, also called Amazing Grace, starring Albert Finney as Newton and Ioan Gruffud as Wilberforce.

God Knows

At the end of Exodus 2, Moses is a fugitive in Midian, hiding from Pharaoh and the people of Israel are groaning in Egypt, crying out for deliverance from the oppressive, abusive death grip of slavery. And the chapter ends with these words: “God saw the people of Israel — and God knew” (Exodus 2:25). Those words, “God knew,” are pregnant with hope. God Knew God knew. God was aware of each person’s suffering. He understood what was happening to them and how it was affecting them. God knew the dehumanizing degradation and routine rapine that is part and parcel of a slave’s experience. He knew the premature breakdown of bodies ruthlessly subjected daily to exhausting manual labor (Exodus 1:11). He knew the bitter erosion of hope that occurs when all labor only benefits ungrateful abusers (Exodus 1:14). God knew the horror and trauma of legalized, enforced infanticide (Exodus 1:16). And he knew the resentment and anger that is on constant simmer in a culture of hopelessness, sometimes boiling over into vengeful violence against oppressors (Exodus 2:11–12), and other times into tragic violence within the oppressed community (Exodus 2:13). God knew and he was preparing to take action in a way that would leave a permanent, indelible imprint upon the collective memory of the human race. God Foreknew But God didn’t only know this when it all happened. He knew it was going to happen long before it even looked remotely possible that it could happen. Centuries earlier God had told Abram (later Abraham), the founder of the Israelite nation, Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. (Genesis 15:13–14, italics mine) The nature and implications of God’s foreknowledge — what he foreknows and how certain this foreknowledge is — have been debated for millennia. Admittedly, this is deep water for human intellects to swim in. But in this text we have a direct quote from God himself on the subject. And he says it so plainly a child could not mistake it: “Know for certain that your offspring will be [enslaved] and will be afflicted for four hundred years.” This was not a qualified expert making an educated guess about the future decisions of free moral agents on the basis of probabilities. This was clear, specific, certain foresight. God certainly foreknew that the Israelites would experience desperate suffering. And his revealed foresight also clearly revealed a divine purpose in this horrible experience, a purpose whose scope extended way beyond just Israel. God Knew What He Was Doing Two verses later in Genesis 15, God tells Abram, “And [your descendants] shall come back here [to Canaan] in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete” (Genesis 15:16, italics mine). This statement about the Amorites is a multi-layered gift for the saints of God. To unpack its implications would require a book. In it is a world of God’s precise patience, justice, judgment, and more. But with regard to Israel’s suffering, we see in the Amorite allusion a rare jewel of God’s rationale for his timeline. The enslaved Israelite’s prayers must have sounded much like their future royal kinsman’s: “How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever? . . . How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?” (Psalm 13:1–2). God rarely provides an answer to such a question. But here he provides an answer before the question was ever raised. How long, O LORD? Four hundred years. Why so long? Because my purposes involve far more than just Israel and Egypt. They also involve the sin of and my righteous judgment on the peoples of Canaan. When the time is ripe for me to fulfill my covenant to Abraham, it will also be ripe for me to judge the wickedness of the Amorites. In the bloody, sweaty, tearful, agonizing experience of slavery, it would have looked like God had forgotten. He had not. He knew. He had foreknown. And he knew just what he was doing. God Knows The reality expressed in the words “God knows” is a well of profound comfort and peace for us in our afflictions. Yes, there remain unanswered questions. No, they do not themselves remove our pain. But in Exodus 2:25 and Genesis 15:13–14 we see why these words are pregnant with hope. Your affliction has a purpose. You likely don’t know what it is yet, but someday you will. And your affliction has a timeline. You likely don’t know what it is yet, and likely it already seems too long. But someday you will understand. And you will understand that the purposes for both your affliction and how long you were required to endure it extended far beyond the range of your perception. And then it will make sense. Jesus Christ has guaranteed your exodus. And it is a far greater exodus than the mere escape from your affliction. There is coming an end to your sojourning in this foreign land (Hebrews 11:13). There is a Promised Land far greater than Canaan. And when you reach it, no matter what you suffered in this veil of tears, you will have no regrets. God will have worked it all for such good that you will wonder that you ever questioned his judgment or goodness (Romans 8:28). In your affliction, cry out to God for help (Exodus 2:23). He hears. And when the time is right, God will answer you. For God sees you — and he knows. Article by Jon Bloom