Jonathan Cahn - The Harbinger Companion with Study Guide

Since religious Jews continue to mark the Shemitah, this means that on the very day of the stock market crash, they were unwittingly bearing witness to its significance through their ritual acts of symbolically wiping away credits and debts, even as it was literally occurring on Wall Street.

The Sign of the Shemitah and America

The economic collapse of 2001 was caused by 9/11. That means that even the timing of 9/11 had to be woven into the mystery of the Shemitah. Moreover, for the crash of 2008 to have happened exactly seven biblical years later to the day, all of the key events, from the fall of Lehman Brothers to the vote on Capitol Hill to the Federal Reserve’s actions, to the global crisis and every other event which affected the economic realm, had to be part of the same ancient mystery.

Finally, the Hebrew word Shemitah has still another meaning: the fall or the letting fall. So the Shemitah year may be called “the year of the letting fall.” And everything that took place in the global economic collapse—from the housing market, to credit, to commerce, to economic indicators, etc.—constituted a fall. And it all began with the fall of Lehman Brothers, which was literally a “letting fall, ” since the Federal Reserve literally had decided to let it fall. The entire global collapse began with America’s government performing an act of Shemitah.

And yet, neither the government nor any other human agency could have possibly orchestrated the countless actions, reactions, and transactions that caused everything to happen precisely as it did at the exact times ordained in the ancient mystery. Thus, ultimately, it must be viewed as God’s Shemitah—His letting it fall.

Given to ancient Israel as a blessing, the Shemitah became a curse through disobeying it. For America, it was a sign that as a nation it had forgotten its foundations, trusted in its own power and riches, and ruled God out of its life.

In the stunning facts and realities that lie beneath the two greatest collapses in American history, originating with 9/11, we find not only a sign of judgment but also a warning and foreshadow that if America does not return to God, her prosperity, her blessings, her financial and economic global preeminence—the American age as we know it—will also be allowed to fall.

WEEK 8 EXPLORE and APPLY

Read chapter 17 of The Harbinger .

Watch or listen to the accompanying resource The Mystery of the Shemitah I and II , two DVDs/CDs from The Harbinger: The Full Revelation eight-disc album.

Read Leviticus 25:2–5; 26:33–35; Exodus 23:10–11; Deuteronomy 15:1–2; 2 Chronicles 36:20–21.

Explore

What was the purpose of the Shemitah or Sabbath year?

What were the key commands or observances of the Shemitah?

What happened on the twenty-ninth day of the biblical month of Elul?

What is it in Deuteronomy 15:1–2 that reveals these verses are speaking about Elul 29?

How many reasons can you think of for why the people of ancient Israel broke the Shemitah—and what did their breaking signify?

How did the breaking of the Shemitah turn it from a blessing to a curse?

Where in the Bible does it tell Israel what would happen if they broke the Shemitah? What would be the consequences of violating it?

How would the following effects of the Shemitah translate into modern economic terms?

• The nation’s production dramatically decreases as its fields lay fallow.

• The nation’s labor is greatly reduced or comes to a cessation.

• The fruits of the nation’s fields are abandoned.

• Seed is not sown.

• Financial accounts are wiped away.

The Shemitah becomes a sign of judgment against a nation that does what?

The Shemitah and its last day, Elul 29, specifically affect what two realms of national life?

The Shemitah is based on a seven-year cycle. Between the first and second shakings of America in The Harbinger , how many years were there?

In what month did both shakings take place? In which week of that month?

The global economic crisis and collapse is dated from the fall of Northern Rock on September 13, 2007, to the greatest crash in American history, the peak of the global implosion, on September 29, 2008. What exact period began and ended on the same days?

The greatest stock market crash in American history took place on what day on the Hebrew biblical calendar?

What did that biblical day have to do with the economic or financial realm?

How did the economic collapse of 2008 follow the pattern of the Shemitah in outward form, the wiping away of financial accounts?

How many economic phenomena of the collapse and the Great Recession involve wiping away financial accounts, finances, numbers, credit, or debt?

If you start on the day of the greatest Wall Street crash in American history in 2008 and go back seven Hebrew biblical years, on what day do you end up?

What happened on that day seven years earlier in 2001?

Only one Elul 29 in seven years can end the Shemitah. On which Elul 29, out of seven years, was the date on which the greatest crash in American history took place in 2008? In 2001?

The Hebrew word Shemitah can be translated not only as “the release” or “the remission” but as “the “letting fall.” How many different things can you think of that fell in the economic collapse? How might this be a warning to us concerning America’s future?

Spiritual Truths

What factors that led Israel to break or stop observing the Shemitah are also now at work in America?

How can a nation’s prosperity lead it away from its godly foundations?

How can a nation’s turning away from God’s Sabbath or rest lead to the worship of idols, materialism, and the serving of money?

What does the Shemitah as a sign of judgment say about the connection of a nation’s relationship with God or turning away from God and its blessings such as prosperity?

Mission to Apply This Week

Have you lost or diminished your own Shemitah rest, daily quiet time with God?

What can you do this week to come back to or to create a Shemitah break or rest every day of your life from here on in so you can refocus on God, dwell in His presence, and receive His blessings? Write it down as your mission for the week in the space provided.

Take time now to commit this to God and pray for His help and anointing.

Seal this commitment in prayer (individually, in small groups, as a class, or congregationally).

Prepare for next week (groups only): This week read, go over, and explore the next chapter, “The Three Witnesses.”

Write Down

1. Your thoughts, notes, and insights

2. What you believe the Lord is calling you to do

3. Your mission for the days ahead

Chapter 9

The THREE WITNESSES

The Law of Three Witnesses

THERE IS A law in Scripture that a matter of judgment must be confirmed by two or three witnesses. Each witness must bear witness consistent with the others.

By the mouth of two or three witnesses the matter shall be established.

—DEUTERONOMY 19:15

By the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established.

—2 CORINTHIANS 13:1

What happens if this principle is applied to the realm of nations? This study will explore what happens when the law of two or three witnesses is applied to the realm of nations, and particularly to that of America.

To set the stage, take note of the ancient vow of defiance and judgment in Isaiah 9:10: