STAR GAZING AND THE SOLAR ECLIPSE WITHOUT THE HYPE

STAR GAZING AND THE SOLAR ECLIPSE WITHOUT THE HYPE

STAR GAZING TO READ GOD 

The Patriarchs were Star-Gazers

The messianic program was God’s design not the patriarchs, nor was messianism inaugurated by Israel. Adam, Seth, Enos, Canaan, Mahallalel, Yared, Enoch, Methuselah, Noach, Shem, Avraham, Yitzack, Yaacov, Yoseph and his brothers all knew God’s messianic plan. The messianic design was not a standby remedy for man’s fall. God’s son and messiah was crucified before the foundation of the world (1 Peter 1:20), meaning God intended a messiah prior to man’s need and thus, man’s fall was in His eternal plan (Romans 5:14). Messiah Yeshua had committed to His fathers plan before His incarnation, and it was premeditated. God intended to accommodate man’s sin that He foreknew. Elohim (“Gods:” God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit) would redeem man with His own human body on a tree (1 Peter 1:20). God also intended that the hallmark of His revelation, the Holy Scriptures be the portrayal of His Son as messiah Who was coming. Man would be required to desire and seek Him to discover and identify Him in the sacred Holy Scriptures (Luke 24: 27, 44). 

God’s revelation or logos or His Word was in the beginning (John 1:1), and before His Word was written on clay, papyrus, or vellum, or, before that, spoken by holy men who were breathed upon or inspired by the Spirit of God, His Word was written in the heavens. God’s first ‘sign system’ or venue of communication, were the stars. God first announced His messianic plan of a virgin, a dragon, and of a lion by the stars, and men became stargazers to read God since He chose to communicate by the stars. Yacov (Jacob) and his dozen knew this. When his favorite son, Yoseph told his cosmological dream to Abba Yacov, the dad (and his other sons) immediately interpreted the sun in Yoseph’s dream to represent himself, the moon of the dream to represent Rachel, and the eleven stars (better, “constellations”) of Yoseph’s dream to represent the eleven brothers. All the stars would one day bow to Yoseph. They did! And, they will!

The oldest narrative we have in the bible is Yov (Job). Yov lived 650 years before Moshe (Moses) who wrote the first five books of the OT called the Torah (Hebrew) or Pentateuch (Greek), and Yov was a contemporary of Avraham. The book of Yov tells of the stars. Elohim challenged Yov concerning Pleiades, the small circular coterie of stars in the heavens which year after year appears exactly on time, in concert with spring. The question was asked of Elohim to Yov if he could bind Pleiades, which would be like binding the season of spring? Elohim spoke to Yov of the constellation of Orion, the constellation of the ‘mighty hunter’ strutting across the December skies, again, always on time, in the season of winter. Could Yov bind the seasons? Elohim asked Yov if he could “lead out the Bear and its cubs?” The Bear, what we call the Big Dipper, always points north, symbolizing the dwelling place of God (Job 38:31-33) which some interpret to be Mount Hermon, Israel’s northern boundary (see Psalm 68; my blog, Dark Spirits from the Beginning Still Battling for the Golan). Yov also mentions the  mazzaroth or the 12 signs of the zodiac (9:9).

The Jewish historian, Flavious Josephus wrote of Seth, the son of Adam who knew the zodiac and its language. Josephus suggested that God gave the early patriarchs, the antediluvians, long lives so that they might perfect their astronomical inventions. (Book 1; Chapter 2; Section 3).

”Now this Seth, when he was brought up and came to those years in which he could discern what was good, became a virtuous man; and as he was himself of an excellent character, so did he leave children behind him who imitate his virtues. All these proved to be of good dispositions.

They also inhabited the same country without dissentions and in a happy condition, without any misfortunes falling upon them until they died. They also were the inventor of that peculiar sort of wisdom, which is concerned with the heavenly bodies and their order. And that their inventions might not be lost before they were sufficiently known, upon Adams prediction that the world was to be destroyed at one time by the force of fire, and at another time by the violence and quantity of water, they made two pillars, the one of brick, the other of stone. They inscribed their discoveries on them both, that in case the pillar of brick should be destroyed by the flood, the pillar of stone might remain and exhibit these discoveries to mankind. Now this remains in the land of Siriad to this day”

Persian and Arabian traditions ascribe the understanding of the zodiac (from the Hebrew tsodi meaning “the way” or “the path”) to son, Seth and great, great, great, great, grandson, Enoch. The science of astronomy has been developed so that we may learn today that the sun is on a journey, traveling within the zodiac, and tabernacling or dwelling in its journey within twelve major stations in its path. The twelve cosmological stations we call constellations. These 12 stations or constellations in the galaxy we call months (Hebrew, “moons”), which really do govern the earth as designed by God. Ancient Rome, Greece, Persia, Babylon, and Egypt understood there to be twelve periods or stations in the heavens. It is interesting that Yacov, the father of the Jews ascribed the meaning of the twelve constellations or stations that dominate twelve months of God’s year made up of the 365 days, to his twelve sons. If this was and is true (it is), the station or constellation of Yoseph might be worthy of study. It is! The constellation called Taurus today is that of Yoseph, its two horns [of the bull] representing Ephraim and Manasseh.

Avraham the grandfather of Yacov had been told by Elohim to count the stars; with exhaustion from the count he would also know the magnitude of his descendants. Count the stars, count your children! Ridiculous right? Study the heavens on a clear moonless night and note the wonder of the stars. You are beholding prophecy of the nation called Israel. As you stargaze you may think you are seeing millions of stars. Nope! Not hardly! The number of stars is far beyond a mere million. Scientists suggest that there are near 100,000,000,000,000,000,000 stars in our Milky Way galaxy alone, and ours is one of thousands of other galaxies. And, the light we see tonight in the black sky is light that left the star myriad centuries ago, light years ago as light travels 186,000 miles per second. If Andromeda were to be extinguished today due to some cosmological catastrophe we could not know it on earth for two million years. The light or stars we see tonight in the heavens left its star [source] long, long, ago. How long ago? Maybe when Moshe led Y’srael from Egypt, or when the song of Troy was sang, or when Greece and Rome rose and fell, or when the Dark Ages came and went. Is it possible that the stars have already fallen and we can not know it until the last days? The scriptures say that satan was beheld [like a star] as fallen.

The Bible predicts in the last days that one-third of heaven’s stars are to fall from their courses. But, perhaps the stars have already exploded and fallen, yet we do not know it because of the distance from us?

Constellations are groups of stars that imaginative patriarchs saw as pictures of animals and/or renown people. What is interesting is that people distantly separated over centuries and even millennia, with no means of communication, saw the same animals, figures, or giants in the night sky, and they knew that these signified communication from the creator to His creatures. Neutron stars, protostars, pulsars, quasars, spiral galaxies, ring galaxies, Seyfert galaxies, white dwarfs, brown dwarfs, red giants, magnetars, X-ray busters, nebulae, globular clusters, globular clusters, circumstellar matter, dark matter, etc., all make up what is called “a cosmic zoo” (Stedman 202). There are 48 ancient constellations and 40 more modern ones. Thus, the entire sky is divided into 88 constellation areas, and God’s cosmological zoo of animal and man figures communicates God’s plan. An interesting note, is that God’s chosen language, Hebrew did the same. Hebrew was a language of pictures (aleph, an ox; beit, a house; gimmel, a camel; etc.)

The heavens declare His glory wrote, David (Psalm 19:1). The sky is a wonder and like David we too exclaim the glory of God when we see His script in the night sky. How amazing! The heavens declare “day-to-day” (Psalm 19:1) and night-to-night (Psalm 19:2). The night sky is myriad pictures, therefore, worth a thousand of thousands of words! There is not a language group or culture in the world where the heavens do not preach (19:3). Glorious are they, and the glory they communicate is of their creator who hung them.

In Genesis 1:14 Moshe wrote that ha-kokav or the stars were created by God, for lights, signs, seasons, days, and years. They were hung in the heavens for illumination, but also for ot (Hebrew) or “signs,” meaning “signals,” “beacons,” or more literally “flags.” Stars were made to communicate, to wave or signal something. Stars or kokavim are blazing flags.

Stars were also created for seasons or in Hebrew, mowadah meaning “appointments,” or “fixed festivals, or “assemblies.” The stars announce God’s festivals, His holy convocations, His calendared assemblies. The Shabbat, the seven khag or feasts of Israel, and Jubilee are calculated. To put it simply, the stars in their course are a clock. God knows His times, and gave His clock to man, but the enemy corrupted the telling of it! The Greek equivalent in the New Testament found in Luke 21:25 and Matthew 24:30 is sema meaning “to mark” or “to indicate.”

In Genesis chapter 11 the whole earth is moving away from Eden and toward Babel. In the land of Babel man built the tower of Babel, which was a ziggurat. The tower was not an attempt to build a stairway to heaven. Rather, it was religious depravity displayed by a worship of the sun and the moon and the planets Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, those stars that can be seen with the naked eye. It was primitive astrology, which is why God moved in and confounded the languages. He disturbed their communication with one another less they cease to hear from Him (by-the-by, this was reversed on the Day of Pentecost when every tongue on earth was brought to Jerusalem to hear His communication which was the Gospel).

In Genesis 12 and forward God moved Avraham to star-gaze and count the stars, and seven times it is said to Avraham and his sons, “you are as the stars” (Genesis 15:5; 22:17; 26:4; Exodus 32:13; Deut.1:10; 10:22; 28:62). Interestingly, the eighth mention of the stars is in reference to the stars “fighting in their courses for Israel” (Judges 5:19-20). To Y’srael this was certainly reminiscent of the cosmic judgment against Egypt, a cosmological blackout for three days.

Later, in Numbers 24:17-19 Moshe records the prophecies of Baalim and “the star that shall descend out of Yacov.” We know from our studies that the star descending from Yacov was Yeshua. This was the star that the star-gazing Magi saw in the east and that brought them to Jerusalem where the king was to sit. This was the star (not an apparition or ghost star) in its course that led them the Magi to BeitLechem. The Magi were “wise men” or Zoroastrian priests whose duties included the mapping and interpretation of the movement of stars. These were perhaps descendants of the Jewish captives in Babylon (609, 597, 586 BC) who remained behind from the 50,000 who returned to Jerusalem. They lived close to a Jewish seminary and were certainly familiar and studious of the messianic predictions. There are many scriptures that speak of the stars and God’s meaning for them.

Psalm 147:4 – He numbers and names the stars, all of them!

Isaiah 40:26 – He leads them by number, calls them by name

Isaiah 13:9, 10 – His stars are in eschatology

Amos 5:8 – He made Pleiades and Orion

2 Kings 23:5 – Good King Josiah destroyed those who worshipped the sun, moon, and

 constellations (warned in Deut. 4:19) (cf. Isa.47:13)

Acts 28:11 – the Apostle Paul tells us the figurehead of the ship, the Twin brothers, today

called Gemini, then Castor and Pollux

The colors of the stars are due to heat. The hotter the surface the whiter or bluer the color; ‘cool’ stars are orange or red. Our sun is a yellow star with surface temperature of some 11,000 degrees F. The sun is earth’s star, and the earth orbits its star in 365 days. Actually, all stars are suns, some larger than the sun, some smaller than the sun, and that “twinkle, twinkle” of the stars is caused by the variable density and motion of the layers of atmosphere through which the light passes; the starlight is twisted and bent, spread out and collected in a rapidly changing fashion. If the twinkling is noticeable astronomers say the “seeing” is poor; if the stars shine without the twinkle the “seeing” is good.

The planets, Earth, Jupiter, Saturn are not stars, but cold bodies of mass orbiting the sun on a belt and shining only due to reflected sunlight. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn are the five bright planets that can be identified.

SOLAR ECLIPSE: IS GOD SPEAKING?

THE STARS WERE GOD’S SIGN SYSTEM

God’s 1^st sign-system He used to give man His divine revelation was HaShamayim, the heavens. Think of space, not as the final frontier, but as the first Bible. Is God still speaking from the heavens? Is He speaking on August 21, 2017 when the US experiences the solar eclipse? Once every 360 years [approximately] the sun and moon lineup to form a total solar eclipse which is darkness in daytime at those points on earth in the path of totality. The brightest stars come out in midday, and during totality they appear in seasonal reverse. In summer, the winter constellations emerge; during a winter solar totality, summer’s stars appear. Shadows behave strangely, wiggling and waving across the ground. A total solar eclipse makes an impression on people, as well. Farmers Almanac says, “many observers shout and babble, some weep, many are speechless, and even animals exhibit odd behavior and fall silent. 

A total solar eclipse, which is very rare, will occur across the United States, and its eerie wonders can especially be seen in what is called the path of totality, which crosses Tennessee August 21, 2017. Actually, all of the US, parts of South America, Europe, and Africa will see a partial solar eclipse, but those living or visiting within the path of totality which covers points in fourteen US states will see a total eclipse. The fourteen states in the path of totality are Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, in order of the beginning of the path from west to east (see path of totality at picture on right).

WHAT IS A SOLAR ECLIPSE?

An eclipse is a cosmological event where the moon in its orbit around the earth comes between the sun and the earth (see picture below). Because the moon is so close to the earth in comparison to the sun’s distance from the earth, the light of the sun is blocked by the moon. And, because the earth and its moon are traveling in orbit around the sun (once around the sun in a year) there is therefore a moving path of total eclipse or darkness. This path or stream of ‘darkness’ across the globe called the path of totality is a seventy mile-wide streak or ribbon that moves across the US from west to east, from coast to coast, and many will see a total eclipse. The longest period of time that the moon can completely block the sun’s light at any given location is two minutes and forty seconds.

The path of totality begins on land in the west at Lincoln Beach, Oregon and will appear at 10:16 AM Pacific Time. The streak of darkness or path of totality crosses through the other thirteen states (see picture below) and the total eclipse on land will end near Charleston, South Carolina at 2:48 PM Eastern Standard Time, its complete journey across the US being 1 hour and 33 minutes and 16.8 seconds. The moon’s path of totality continues on over the Atlantic and enters Africa 75 minutes later.

The path of totality crosses the state of Tennessee and citizens and visitors to certain locations will see a total eclipse: Clarksville (@ 1:25 PM), Springfield (@ 1:26 PM), Portland (@ 1:27 PM), Goodlettsville, Lafayette, Nashville (@ 1:27 PM), Hendersonville, Lebanon (@ 1:28 PM), Cookeville, Smyrna, Murfreesboro, and Crossville (@ 1:31 PM), Dayton (@ 2:31 PM), McMinnville, Harrison, Athens, Loudon, Maryville, Madisonville, and Cleveland.

As the moon comes between the sun and the earth not only is the sun’s light blocked, but solar heat is blocked as well. Because of the blockage of solar heat there is a steady drop in temperature, which causes haunting eclipse winds. You can only look at or toward the sun without protection during totality. However, extremely important is that you DO NOT look at the sun before or after totality without the appropriate protection. Eclipse glasses are necessary and sunglasses even welding glasses will not protect your eyes.

DOES AN ECLIPSE MEAN THE END OF THE WORLD?

Some people like to think of cosmological sightings and events as Armageddon or signs of the end of the world, or of a coming greater, celestial, or spiritual event to occur. However, solar eclipses are natural and can be calculated, in fact, can be mathematically predicted across thousands of years to the day, hour, and minute. This re-affirms that there is a sublime clockwork regularity to the universe as Sir Isaac Newton discovered 300 years ago. So, to know what the celestial movements mean, it is best to know what God has been saying from the beginning.

The Magi were not watching the heavens to check if by chance something new and/or sensational was out there to appear this evening, when suddenly they “saw His star in the east and came to worship Him.” These men had no confidence in happenstance, but were knowledgeable of an order to cosmological movements and sightings, which announced to them things God had said in His written Word, concerning His feasts, holidays, and the future coming of His messianic Son. These movements calculated like clockwork, occur predictably with mathematical certainty. “His star” was being anticipated as the Magi studied. Another example is the sign Isaiah spoke to Hezekiah, that Hezekiah would not die, but live an additional fifteen years allotted to him by YHWH, the Lord. The cosmological sign was that the shadow would move backward, rather than forward, on an outdoor stairway (2 Kings 20:10). How was the sign accomplished? God spoke through the heavens, His cosmological Word. “In 702 BC the 16^th year before Hezekiah’s death, a prominent solar eclipse appeared over the Middle East (documented by NASA; see online NASA’s Five Millennium Catalog of Solar Eclipse). If a stairway had been engulfed in darkness and then restored to daylight (as the moon orbited out from blocking the sun), the shadow would have appeared to retreat” (Frederick Baltz, Institute of Lutheran Theology). Unbelieving? Watch the shadows this August 21, 2017.

Our present world recently observed four blood moons, a natural occurrence where the earth, between the sun and the moon, casts its shadow upon the moon, making the moon appear red. It is natural and occurs from time-to-time. Unlike J. Haggai and others who are interpreting these natural manifestations as omens of some horrific fate upon Israel or the Unites States, these natural events in the heavens should cause us to study what God has said in His Word is to come upon Israel, the US, and to all the inhabitants of the earth, that is unnatural, supernatural, horrific, terrorizing, and eschatological. God has my attention, and I continue to study!

THE MAGI AND THE 

STAR OF BEIT-LECHEM

THE MAGI FROM THE EAST

Who were the magi from the east? Were these “wise men” Zoroastrians, Medes, Persians, and were they Arabs at all (biblically, all “desert dwellers” opposed to Israel were Arabs or Arab-like)? Or, perhaps they were Jews, descendants of those Jews exiled in Babylon in 605 BC, 597 BC and 586 BC who did not return to Y’srael with the 40,000 Jews who made aliya back to the land with Zerubabel, Ezra, Nechemyah and others returning to rebuild the Temple. Or, were they Arab Iraqis, descendants of the Babylonians who had been influenced by the Jews while in captivity who had taught them the biblical prophesies and the secret of astronomical calculations?

The magi were not court astrologers

The Magi were esteemed students of prophecy and astronomy observing the seasons and stars and interpreting their signs -the purpose for which stars were created (Genesis 1). These wise-men considered the kokavim or “stars” that appeared to them in the east, to be what is called in Hebrew an ot, or a “sign.” There is no reason to take the word “star” in Greek to mean anything else. The star was a sign of a new king. They saw the star in the east and they came to the city, David’s Yerushalyim where mashiach was to rule that the star referenced. They were expecting a king on the throne, not a babe in a manger, and in some other locale. The heavens were and are as musical notes, a grand cantata, signposts of God YHWH’s design. Can we read His music today? Not so good!

Messianic jews Two-thousand years ago

Messianic (or, Christian) Jews knowing the Holy Scriptures were reading the heavens and were awaiting His coming. Miriam was hailed by Gavriel six times as “blessed,” and was told that she would be remembered and called “blessed” by generations in the future. Anna was a messianic believer from the tribe of Asher praying night and day in the Temple; she saw Yeshua as a new born babe and knew He was her messiah!  Sh’meon believed the messianic prophesy of the nevi, Isaiah, saw the few day’s old babe, and knew that baby was his messiah. He took Him, held Him, and holding the eight-day old baby king high in his arms declared he was now ready to depart this world; he had seen His salvation. In name, Yeshua means salvation; in person, Yeshua was the Lamb!

Not just selective Jews were messianic, but many Arabs also were awaiting the Jewish messiah. The magi from the east were believers perhaps descendants of the Medes whom the prophet Daniel referenced as magoi (Daniel 1:20; 2:2; 4:7; 5:7), who were also on quest for truth. The magi of the NT era studied the biblical/Jewish prophecies and calculated their fulfillment according to astrological equations. These men were not rogues or charlatans, but disciples of the Word of God who set out for the holy city, with gifts of gold for a king, incense for the king’s death, and myrrh for the king’s resurrection. Because of the three gifts tradition has deduced there were three, though they came according to the Jewish prophecy of Isaiah in numbers,

arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of YHWH has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples; but YHWH will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising. Lift up your eyes round about and see; they all gather together, they come to you. Your sons will come from a far, and your daughters will be carried in the arms. Then you will see and be radiant, and your heart will thrill and rejoice; because the abundance of the sea will be turned to you, the wealth of the nations will come to you. A multitude of camels will cover you, then your camels of Midian and Ephah; all those from Sheba will come; They will bring gold and frankincense, and will bear good news of the praises of YHWH (Isaiah 60:1-5).

Tertullian (AD 225) is responsible for the tradition that the magi were kings though as this prophecy of Isaiah suggests (and other prophecies, Ps. 68:29, 31; 72:10-11; Isa 49:7) kings would come.  Tertullian and the tradition are correct. It was in the 6^th century AD that names were given to these magi: Melkon which later evolved to Melchior; Balthasar; and Gaspar.

The propheCY OF Isaiah

The Prophet Isaiah predicted hat Israel was to “rise from darkness for your light has come.” Israel was indeed in darkness. They had experienced the oppression of Babylon, of Persia, of Antiochus and the Syrians, and now the oppression of Rome. Israel was under spiritual darkness as the Pharisees, Sadducees, scribes and chief priests did not know the Lord. They were blind guides of those sitting in darkness. Isaiah also prophesied that the kavod or glory of YHWH was to rise upon Israel. Think of how those studying prophecy may have interpreted that prophecy. Yeshua, that babe born in Beit L’chem raised in Nazaret was that glory of YHWH. The prophecy of Isaiah reiterated the presence of darkness that would cover the earth, deep darkness would cover the peoples, even beyond the Holy Land. But, included in that prophecy was the promise that nations would come to Israel’s light and that kings from beyond the borders of Israel would come to the brightness of the rising star! The messianic hope extended beyond the Holy Land, to all the families of the earth, to all the peoples. This bright light would attract Israeli sons and daughters from far away, and they would come home to see this illumination; Israel would rejoice, their hearts thrilled, nations would bring their wealth, and a multitude of camels from Midian, Ephah and Sheba would cover the land, and gold and frankincense would be gifts along with good news and praises of YHWH.

Who were these [Arab/PERSIAN] believers

Median was a son of Avraham and Keturah (Genesis 25:1-6). Thus, Median was a half-brother to Isaac. Ephah was the son of Midian and also a descendant of Avraham and Keturah (1 Chronicles 1:33; Genesis 25:4), a nephew to Isaac. Sheba was also a son of Avraham mentioned in relation with Dedan (Genesis 25:3) as Cushites. The peoples of Sheba or Sabeans were traders of gold and spices. In fact their Queen of Sheba had once traveled in likeness from the east having heard of the grand Temple of God and its builder, Shlomo in Jerusalem. She had brought incense, spices, gold, and precious stone (1 Kings 10:1-2, 10). Her pilgrimage foreshadowed the future and prophetic pilgrimage of Arab believers to a greater Temple of God, the Lord God Himself, Yeshua at His birth.

The prophet, Yirmeyahu noted frankincense “coming from Sheba” (Jeremiah 6:20); the prophet Ezekiel spoke of the merchants of Sheba bringing gold and spices (Ezekiel 27:22). Hebrews Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yacov had sons, half-brothers, nieces and nephews who were Arab kinfolk. The magi were distance cousins of the Jewish people, estranged Arab relatives.

Christian Ministry to Israel

Christian Ministry to Israel is an independent faith Mission Board celebrating its 73^rd year (1944-2017) of affectionately proclaiming Yeshua (the Jewish way to say Jesus) to the Jew first and also the Gentile, according to NT protocol of missions (Romans 1:16). Christian Ministry to Israel is represented by six families  and messianic congregations in Israel, twelve families in Ukraine, two families in the US, and family in Buenos Aires Argentina who provide leadership in the following facets: Hebrew-Christian congregations; summer camps Jewish and Arab youth; deaf ministries; music; teaching; preaching; and distribution of videos, Bible, books, CDs, Jesus videos, and other literature in Hebrew, Arabic, Russian, Ukrainian and English. Christian Ministry to Israel also provides assistance to humanitarian soup kitchens, eyeglass clinics, and pastors conferences. Christian Ministry to Israel publishes many publications and music CDs and a monthly newsletter with reports of its missionaries including articles and important biblical studies (FREE). Reginald K. Lisemby is the Executive Servant of Christian Ministry to Israel, and is a graduate of the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago completing his Jewish and Modern Israel Studies in Nazareth, Israel. Rev. Lisemby completed his Masters degree program at Temple Baptist Seminary in Chattanooga, TN, and holds a Doctor of Ministry and honorary Doctor of Divinity. Dr. Lisemby is a licensed and ordained minister with thirty-five years experience in cross-cultural ministry to the Jew, Arab, Korean, Kenyan, Ukrainian, Russian, English, and Native American peoples. Reggie Lisemby continues his studies in Bible and Hebrew, and is the radio rabbi’ of Hear O’ Israel a radio broadcast of Christian Ministry to Israel heard on Moody radio in Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, western North Carolina, and Louisiana.  Reggie is married to the former Crystal Faith McNeely of Monterey, Louisiana and they have three children, Jacob, Faith, and Judah Christian; they also have a pet schnauzer named Lewis (after C. S.). The Lisembys are home in Chattanooga, TN.