It is indeed a momentous occasion for America. Four hundred years ago, on November 11, 1620, the Pilgrims came ashore on land. That is now in Provincetown on Cape Cod. The Pilgrims’ story is a central theme in the history and culture of the United States of America. The Pilgrim Fathers were that band of Puritans who founded the colony of Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620.
A pilgrim is defined a person who journeys a long distance to some sacred place as an act of devotion. They were escaping religious persecution and going to the Promised Land.
The Pilgrims Landing
“PROVINCETOWN – The year 1620 is etched in the annals of world history. It is the year a group of English settlers known as the Pilgrims seeking religious freedom boarded their ship, Mayflower. They braved a hazardous trip across the Atlantic Ocean to establish a new home.”
Seeing this date etched in Plymouth Rock is like seeing the writing on the Wall. “Mene, mene, teckel, upharsin” in the time of Daniel spelled the end for the Babylonian king and the end of the Babylonian captivity. It marks an especially important date for the people of God.
Four Hundred Years Ago
After enduring miserable conditions to make the voyage, the Mayflower passengers sighted land on November 9, 1620. William Brewster led them in reading Psalm 100 as a prayer of thanksgiving:
“A Psalm of praise. Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands. Serve the LORD with gladness: come before His presence with singing. Know that the LORD He is God: it is He that has made us, and not we ourselves; we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture… be thankful unto Him and bless His Holy Name. His mercy is everlasting; His truth endures to all generations.”
Psalm 100
The Pilgrims were the English settlers who came to North America on the Mayflower. Their leadership came from the religious congregations of Brownists, or Separatist Puritans, who were fleeing religious persecution in England. They were being fined, imprisoned and killed for their disobedience to the crown. But truly:
“We ought to obey God rather than men.”
Acts 5:29
Woe be to the Wicked Shepherds!
“Woe be to the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of My pasture! Saith the LORD… I will gather the Remnant of My flock out of all the countries where they have been driven and will bring them again to their folds…”
Jeremiah 23
“…Thus saith the LORD God, Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! …The diseased you have not strengthened, neither have you healed that which was sick, neither have you bound up that which was broken, neither have you brought again that which was driven away, neither have you sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty you have ruled them.
They were scattered, because there is no shepherd: and they became meat to all the beasts of the field, when they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill. Yes, My flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them.”
For thus saith the LORD God; Behold, I, even I, will both search My sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeks out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out My sheep, and deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark Day. And I will bring them out from the people, and gather them from the countries. And I will bring them to their own land and feed them upon the mountains of Israel….
I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away. I will bind up that which was broken and strengthen that which was sick: but I will destroy the fat and the strong. I will feed them with judgment.
And as for you, O My flock, thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I judge between cattle and cattle, between the rams and the he goats. Therefore thus saith the Lord God to them; Behold, I, even I, will judge between the fat cattle and the lean cattle. Because you have thrust with side and with shoulder and pushed all the diseased with your horns, till you have scattered them abroad…”
Ezekiel 34
To the Promised Land
These Pilgrims held Puritan Calvinist religious beliefs. They maintained that their congregations should separate from the English state church. The Anglican church of England is a break away denomination from the mother, the Roman Catholic church. They determined to establish a new settlement here in the New World. To them it was the “Promised Land” where they could live in peace and worship their God freely. They established Plymouth Colony in 1620, which became the second successful English settlement in America, following the founding of Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607.
The Mayflower departed from Plymouth, England on 6/16 September 1620.
Some of these had previously fled to France where they were known as the Huguenots. They were slaughtered in large numbers by Catholics there in the 1572. It started with what became known as The Saint Bartholomew’s Day Massacre.
The Mayflower Compact of 1620
This Compact was an iconic document in the history of America. It was written and signed aboard the Mayflower on November 11, 1620 while anchored in Provincetown Harbor in Massachusetts. This Compact stresses the importance of “just and equal Laws,” i.e. “When the probability of a debt being re-payed is null, Christians ought to lend according to the rule of mercy, which expects nothing.”
They regarded themselves as being in Covenant with the God of their fathers. Therefore they based their Laws on His Laws. They expected nothing less than Divine Wrath if they were to break His Covenant.
God’s Covenant with Abraham
God made a Covenant with Abraham. He renewed it with Isaac and Jacob and said it would be for an inheritance to their seed after them. Jesus “took upon himself the seed of Abraham.” He was the heir. Hebrews 2:16
“The Word of the LORD came to Abram, saying, ‘Fear not, Abram: I am your shield and your exceeding great reward’.
Abram said, ‘Lord GOD, what will You give me, seeing I go childless and the steward of my house is Eliezer of Damascus? Behold, to me You have given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is my heir.’
And, behold, the Word of the LORD came to him, saying, ‘This shall not be your heir; but he that shall come forth out of your own loins shall be your heir’. Then He brought him forth outside and said, ‘Look now toward heaven, and declare the stars, if you are able to number them’: and He said to him, ‘So shall your seed be’. He believed/trusted in the LORD; and He counted it to him for righteousness…
He said to Abram, ‘Know of a surety that your seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; And also that nation, whom they shall serve, I will judge…’”
Gen 15:1-14
“Comfort ye, comfort ye My people, says your God. Speak comfortably to Jerusalem and cry unto her, that her appointed time is accomplished. that her iniquity is pardoned… The voice of him that cries in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the LORD. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God…
The grass withers, the flower fades: but the Word of our God shall stand forever.
O you that brings good tidings to Zion, get up into the high mountain. Lift up your voice with strength, lift it up and say: “Your God reigns!”
And he shall feed His flock like a shepherd…”
Isaiah 40
Comfort ye My People, Medley
Weighed in the Balances
The four-hundred-year time limit has come. God has judged those who have been serving themselves of His flock and shedding the innocent blood of His people since the beginning, from Abel to Zachariah. He has numbered their kingdom and finished it. Their kingdom/house is divided! They have been weighed in the balances and found wanting. Their time has come to an end. They will know that the Most High God rules in the kingdom of men and He appoints over it whomsoever He will. And those who have exalted themselves will be abased.
“I will bring upon that land all My words which I have pronounced against it, even all that is written in this book, which Jeremiah has prophesied against all the nations. For many nations and great kings shall serve themselves of them also: and I will recompense them according to their deeds, and according to the works of their own hands.”
Jeremiah 25:13-14
The Mark of the Beast
The ‘Mark of the Beast’ is in the process of being required by law in order to transact financially, medically, for employment, school, travel, and purchases. Of those who will not take it will be caused to be put to death. But those who do take the ‘mark’ and worship or serve the ‘Image of the Beast’ will suffer the Wrath of Almighty God. The time to choose is now! This warning is found in the Book of Revelation 14:9-11.
“The Tech Tyrants” have grown so large and oppressive that today they wield unchallenged power over a nation they themselves have impoverished, sitting pretty, high above it all as they systematically dismantle our most cherished freedoms…”
Big Tech Tyrants, How Silicon Valley’s Stealth Practices Addict Teens, Silence Speech and Steal Your Privacy, by Floyd Brown and Todd Cefaratti
It is time now for the people of God to come out from among the people where you have been scattered and gather together in return unto the heart of God and His Word. The Day of Judgment is at hand. Those tyrants in the earth are facing that Divine Judgment for the affliction of their oppressive ways upon the people. They have rebelled against all of God’s commands and caused the people to go astray from God, just like the ‘Serpent’ in the Garden at the very beginning. He deceived Eve, contradicted God, and persuaded her to go against His command. She thought that tree “looked good to make one wise.” Let no one deceive you! This represents absolute tyranny. They will come to the realization:
“And I beheld the sixth seal… And the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men and the chief captains and the mighty men and every bondman and every free man hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; and said to the mountains and rocks, ‘Fall on us, and hide us from the face of Him that sits upon the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: For the great Day of His wrath has come; and who shall be able to stand?”
Book of Revelation 6:12-17
Religious Persecution
The religious persecution the Pilgrims were trying to escape followed them here. It reared it’s ugly head during in the infamous Salem witch trials which began during the spring of 1692. A group of young girls in Salem Village, Massachusetts, claimed to be “possessed by the devil” and accused several local women of witchcraft. The Calvinists at that time held to the Malleus Maleficarum. They borrowed this book from the Roman Catholic Inquisition. It was used for witch-hunts in Europe where millions of women were burned at the stake. They were accused of being witches. Again in April of 1993, the Branch Davidians were burned alive in their own home. They were accused of being a “cult” and “demon possessed”. Jesus himself was accused of being possessed of a demon and called Beelzebub. He said, “Satan is the accuser of the brethren.” Revelation 12:9-10
Hear the Word of the Lord!
“All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door. By me if anyone enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out and find pasture.”
Jesus – John 10:8-9
“And it shall come to pass that whosoever shall call upon the Name of the LORD shall be saved.”
Acts of the Apostles 2:21
“It shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the Name of the Lord shall be delivered. For in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the Lord has said, and in the Remnant whom the Lord shall call.”
Joel 2:32
The Remnant
“I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion/Zion, and with him an hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father’s Name written in their foreheads… And they sung as it were a new song before the throne: and no man could learn that song but the hundred and forty and four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth. …These are they which follow the Lamb wheresoever he goes. These are redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb.”
“And I heard the number of them that were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel.”
The Book of Revelation 14:1-4, 7:4
Isaiah said that except the LORD had left us a very small remnant, we would be like Sodom and Gomorrah. Jesus said the end times would be like the days of Lot. He narrowly escaped the hail and brimstone that came down from God on that wicked place. The Trumpet has sounded!
“And they shall know that I am the LORD when I have broken the the bands of their yoke, and delivered them out of the hand of those that served themselves of them. And they shall no more be a prey to the heathen… but they shall dwell safely and none shall make them afraid… neither shall they bear the shame of the heathen any more. Thus shall you know that I the LORD their God am with them and that they, even the House of Israel, are My people, saith the LORD God. And you My flock, the flock of My pasture, are people and I am your God, saith the LORD God.”
Ezekiel 34
The Sheep of His Pasture
He said to Abram, ‘Know of a surety that your seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them. They shall afflict them four hundred years; And also that nation, whom they shall serve, I will judge…’”
Genesis 15:13
“For I would not, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery… That all Israel shall be saved: as it is written: There shall come out of Sion/Zion the Deliverer and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. For this is My Covenant unto them when I shall take away their sins.”
Paul – Romans 11:25-27
Four Hundred Year Playlist
Comfort ye My people (Isaiah 40:1-2), Handel’s Young Messiah
O thou that tellest good tidings to Zion (Isaiah 40:9, 52:7)
My Shepherd (Psalm 23), Michael Card
He shall feed His flock (Isaiah 40:11, Matthew 11:28-29)
The Lord will surely comfort Zion (Isaiah 51)
Comfort ye (Isaiah 40:1-3)
And the Glory of the LORD (Isaiah 40:5)