SID: I am amazed, Rabbi Jonathan, how big this is. This isn’t some little principle. This affects everything. Explain.

JONATHAN: Yeah. The Shmitah has so many facets. It’s not only, now we just touched on how it’s affected the economy, Wall Street, everything. But it actually affects even physical realities. And the first thing, one of the mysteries, it’s called the Mystery of the Towers. And the Bible word for tower is “migdal”. It comes from the Hebrew word “gadal,” which means greatness. So there’s a link between towers being built and greatness or, you know, a nation’s greatness or it’s pride, it’s glory were great.

SID: You know what that reminds of? The Tower of Babel.

JONATHAN: Exactly.

SID: That’s what they were trying to do. We’re going to make a name of ourselves.

JONATHAN: That’s exactly it.

SID: We’re going to build a tower up to Heaven.

JONATHAN: That’s exactly it. Now could there be, now there’s a mystery here, could it be that the rising of the highest towers in the world actually mark the rising of nations and powers. And we’re going to see, it’s linked to the Shmitah. It’s amazing. For instance, up from the Middle Ages the highest towers were in Europe, the center of power was Europe. But a change took place in about 1870, there’s the greatest tower rises up in a new land. It’s America, 1870. The next year, America becomes the strongest economic power on Earth. The mantel goes from Britain to America. So the rise of the tower actually marks it. From then on, America builds the highest towers on Earth as its power keeps growing and growing, and growing, and growing. But we’re going to see there’s a link with the Shmitah. Because in 1945, at the end of the Second World War, height of American power, there’s a plan to build a new tower that’s going to represent America’s greatness. It’s the World Trade Center. 1945 is the year of the Shmitah. The tower is conceived, the World Trade Center, the year of the Shmitah. It’s begun, they start building it in 1966, year of the Shmitah. It’s built for a seven-year cycle, the exact cycle of the Shmitah, seven years of the Shmitah. Finished in 1973, year of the Shmitah. And then finally, 2001, it’s destroyed in the year of the Shmitah. Now here’s a link. Now what’s the link? The towers. Tower is about rising. The Shmitah is about falling. It actually means “let it fall”. The tower is about the glory of man. The Shmitah is about humbling the pride of man or the pride of a nation. So here we see in the Bible, you know, the Shmitah wipes out accounts, we saw, that are built up. It also wipes out realities that are built up, too. And so here in the year of the Shmitah, actually as the Shmitah gets to its peak, that’s when 9-11 happens. 9-11 happens at the peak of the Shmitah. Last week, when it’s getting ready for the day of nullifying, wiping things out, and actually the collapse of the tower causes the collapse of Wall Street. You have the greatest, the collapse of a tower, I mean, pride of a nation, and you have the collapse of Wall Street the same time on the day of the Shmitah, which means that even the timing of 9-11 was to term, had to be determined exactly by the ancient mystery of the Shmitah. And what, here’s the prophetic thing with this, Sid. This is just one of the things. That if the rise of a tower speaks of the rise of a nation, what does the fall of a tower speak of? It speaks, it’s a warning of the future of America.

SID: So as you point out, the harbinger was 9-11.

JONATHAN: Yeah.

SID: It’s a warning. How many warnings do we get before judgment? What’s the pattern?

JONATHAN: God is merciful. With the harbinger, exactly right. This follows, the harbinger, not only was that a harbinger, but then we are, there’s a tower going up right now at Ground Zero, which, it’s the fourth harbinger. Well that’s linked to the Shmitah as well. There are things happening, since the book “The Harbinger” came out, it’s becoming true and it’s linked to the Shmitah. That there are signs appearing, we can’t get into it, but the signs have to do with that tower about what is rising up at Ground Zero, which is linked to defiance. Because remember, you know, this tower also, the tower that’s rising now, was conceived in the year of the Shmitah at the same time, with that vow about defiance that was made on Capitol Hill. And it’s probably going to be completed most likely in the year of the Shmitah that’s coming. So that’s just a little bit of the Shmitah and the tower. But this also is about the rise and fall of nations. The Shmitah gives the key about when nations rise and fall, has to do with America. Let me give you an example how this mystery is so big it’s affected everything. Shmitah, it actually can be taken, as I said, shaking or falling, or collapsing. 1917, you have the year of the Shmitah. You have a collapse on Wall Street, but you also have a shaking of the nations called the First World War. The Shmitah is about collapsing. In that war, you have the collapse of powers, collapse of four empires. The German empire, the Hungarian, the Russian, the Ottoman all collapse in the year linked to the Shmitah. And you also have, it’s linked to the Shmitah, which is linked to the rise of nations. 1917 is the year that begins America’s rise of world power on the stage. It enters the First World War. Consider that. And so you have the beginning of this rise. But if you take four Shmitahs later, which is 28 years. Interesting, “4” in the Bible is the number of kingdoms. It takes you to 1945, and you have another global cataclysm. You have the shaking of the world, shaking, World War II coming. You have literally, actually, you know, Hitler’s attacks began in 1938. That was the year of the Shmitah. Go seven years to 1945, until it’s over, Shmitah. The Holocaust, Kristallnacht, it’s noted as 1938, as the faithful year, year of the Shmitah, ends 1945, year of the Shmitah. When you reach the peak of the Shmitah, you also get the peak of World War II, summer of 1945. You’re approach the Shmitah’s day of nullifying things, the day of wiping out. Unleashed on the world is the greatest power of wiping out ever, the atomic, nuclear warfare comes on at the end of the war. It’s like this crescendo. The war ends in the last week of the Shmitah, this whole seven-year period. And when, actually in Berlin, the allies have a victory parade. It’s on the day of the end of the Shmitah. And so world history, this launches America as the super power of the world. Even the Cold War, in the year of the Shmitah. Now if you go one more period, you go four Shmitahs later, 28 years, Shmitah can mean also the fall of a nation. It gets you to 1973. Key point. 1973, America decides to legalize the killing of unborn children, same sin, ancient Israel was judged for. And that same year, also is the year America loses its first war. Vietnam collapses on the same day, August 15, that America won the war before in the other Shmitah. And so you have this thing of the fall now. And the same year of that fall, you have the World Trade Center, which marks the same year that America legalized the killing of its children.

SID: Okay. Now with the amazing precision we’ve just seen in the past, what does that tell us about now and the future?

Sid: We want families of born again believers to be role models for the world. We want to provoke Jewish people and all people to jealousy. Our families are not what they’re supposed to be, children even in Christian homes are estranged from their parents. Husband and wives are bickering and fighting and flying in the wrong direction. And I believe that God has put into my hands a course called “What God has Joined Together, God’s Plan for a fulfilled Marriage.” I am raving about this teaching, I believe that if you have a bad marriage, if a husband and wife listen to this course and if it’s so bad that only one spouse will listen I believe that through using God’s word with the revelation knowledge that God gave Gary Whetstone that your marriage is going to turned around. If you know young people getting married or newlyweds, I urge you to get this into their hand. The course “What God has Joined Together” 6 audio cassettes plus a booklet “Life Changing.” I have on the telephone Pastor Gary Whetstone Pastor of Victory Fellowship in New Castle, Delaware. He is also the head of Gary Whetstone Worldwide Ministries and has founded over 207 Bible Schools worldwide. On yesterday’s broadcast we found out that Gary had a freak accident and went as we say in Hebrew mashuga, crazy, locked up in a mental institution, nothing to be done with him. They wanted to do an electronic lobotomy that would leave him as a vegetable. Two days before he get’s led to the Lord, he urges the head psychiatrist to let him out and not have this lobotomy. They don’t listen to him they thought “Oh, talking about God that proves he’s crazy.” And supernaturally he escapes from the institution, he runs on the highway and he doesn’t even remember this except he met the woman. This woman goes right through him on her car and she’s shocked. She recognizes that he’s a mental patient that has run away because she’s connected with that institution and she’s ready to call the police and a voice said to her Gary.

Gary: “Do not report him that this young man belonged to God and God had a call on my life.” Incredible isn’t it? Just think about that Sid that a person who was ready to take an action God intervened blinded the eyes of all of those guards, spoke to that woman, and now that woman was in our church and she did not even know that I was that young man until she had been in the body to Christ in our church for about 7 years. Incredible of the power of God delivering a person. You know Sid we had stopped with a fact that that car like went through me and then I literally did escape and did go to Florida. And I remember praying a second time in Florida the only time that I had talked to God that I remember and I said “God if You’re really real I want to be able to go back to Delaware and have a clean bill of mental health.” For some unknown reason this incredible peace came over my life which I now know is the peace of God. And I came back to Delaware they put me through months of evaluation again and tests and could find absolutely nothing wrong. Salvation Sid was a complete absolute turn around and transformation of my life. As soon as I got out of the mental hospital which was now in 1972, a young man that we know that anybody who was in a tremendous traumatic state of that nature is looking for security. What I did is I went back to some of my former girlfriends that I had had prior to becoming locked away in the mental hospital.

Sid: Now you really, although you were born again, you really did not know the word of God, you had not been discipled.

Gary: No knowledge whatsoever.

Sid: Okay, go ahead.

Gary: No knowledge, I mean to tell you. Well, actually I went to a church right after getting out of the mental hospital and the pastor invited me to leave. Because he said “We don’t have your kind here.” And it was really turned me off to even want to know God anymore. I started dating again a former girlfriend her name was Faye O’Neal, and she had known me all of my life growing up and knew what had happened to me in the mental hospital and all of the things and drugs and everything. And literally I married her on the 12^th of May in 1972. You know sometimes when we understand the situation of a person prior to marriage we can look back and say “Oh yes, if they’d only had fixed that before they got married they would have been able to successfully been married.” Well, that’s what happened with me, I came into the marriage with all of the baggage of having such an incredibly tormented life. Even though I had salvation Sid I did not have knowledge. I didn’t know what the Bible said about marriage, I didn’t know what God wanted to do with marriage. My wife was not born again, we never went to church and after a period of just a few years I mean I went back into college and started growing academically in business and finance and industry that I was in industrial engineering. All of a sudden one day, now this happens to so many people I tried drugs one time just marijuana nothing serious. In 1975 all of a sudden all of this incredible torment came back upon my mind. One open door to the enemy caused a complete mental relapse. Sometimes we have people that are in our church and see that happen with drugs or alcohol and we don’t really give enough credit to the power of that mental torment and abuse. My wife said “Listen if you ever have a situation where you go back again to that mental process I’m out of here.” Well, she was and she sued me for everything and got it all. But what’s interesting is during that time my mother ended up in the latter part of ’75 had given herself to the Lord, had received the power of the Holy Spirit. She said to me “Gary, you know you’ve got a problem here.” Well I said it’s pretty evident got two small children that child support has given you $15 left a week to live on.” She said “No, no, no that’s not the problem; the problem is you’ve got demonic spirits that have really been tormenting your mind and you need to get set free.” I didn’t understand what that meant believe me Sid at all but I did know this it sounds far better than the mental hospital. During that time, and many of those that are listening today you’ve had similar experiences. Tremendous pangs of depression and mental anguish had gripped me to the place where I had attempted suicide in 1975 three times.

Sid: I read about that time you actually drove your car on the railroad tracks, heard the train and you were going to be… I mean that wasn’t Russian roulette that was suicide.

Gary: Absolutely, you know I had no plan of ever living. I had failed in suicide attempts before and I would watch the Amtrak Train coming up the east corridor here in Newark, Delaware which is right outside the church that I pastor in New Castle, Delaware. And I sat on the tracks of that train that sped by at about 80 miles and hours in my little Volkswagen waiting to be killed. That train was on a different track, I mean it’s incredible what God does. It turned out that the train had had some track problems several miles between Baltimore – Delaware and the rerouted the train to another track. It sped by me and missed me. Well, that was it. I ended up being majorly offended by these attempts of suicide, but one thing I did do which really brought a change. I got Spirit-filled in a small home meeting during that time. And a person ministered to me a Pastor in the region here and he got me set free mentally. Sid, that’s when I gave myself to the word of God. And I said “If God can deliver a mental patient like me, if God can take the pain of attempted suicide and the horrific areas of depression and mental torment that was in my life and break it, God could restore a marriage.” As I shared yesterday, I spent 7 years studying the word of God because of the failure that I was as a man, as a father, as a husband. And I realized that the word of God was only truth that had power to bring change and as well with the Holy Spirit. After I gave myself to that intense time of study and prayer for my wife Faye it was very incredible. As we were going through out divorce proceedings I would pray for her. And then I want you to listen to this if you’re listening because God gives you the same ability. I could see in the Spirit what was happening with my wife, I mean at first she took off with one of my best friends the very day that we separated. You think that anybody with this type of experience with marriage would become very embittered and have a lot of hatred and judgment. But you know God taught me something and that was that love literally has no account of sin or hurt. That love covers a multitude of sin. And I can tell you I remember when we published that article in Charisma Magazine which you’re referring to many times. I had pastors call me right after that and they say “Gary you should never own up to anything that is so controversial in your past.” And you know I said to pastors I said “Look what are we hypocrites to think that pastors don’t have challenges.” Any of you that are listening you know pastors that have fallen to immorality, areas of compromise and sometimes even ministers have the worst marriages in the church. And you know I settled in my heart that year that God was going to restore our home. I not only had conviction, but I gave myself 100% to the understanding of the word of God because the word of God is like it says “That which God has joined together let not man put asunder.”

Sid: But very briefly, at your divorce did… you did get divorced.

Gary: Oh yeah.

Sid: What did you tell the judge and put in demand to be put in the record?

Gary: You know this is kind of interesting my wife is you know standing there and I’m standing there and he asked me, “Do you have anything to say Mr. Whetstone before this divorce decree is final?” And I said “Yes.” The Stenographer is there typing all of the words being said. And I took the Bible off of the area that the judge kind of has you raise your hand to or whatever. He said “What are you going to do with that?” I said “I’m going to read a sentence. He said “We only use that as a point of reference for you to speak truth.”   I said “Well, it’s to me more than a point of reference, this is truth.” And I open up the Bible to 1^st Corinthians chapter 7 verse 11. And I said “And I want it to be on the record that this statement governs greater authority than the courts of Delaware, greater than my wife’s desire to be divorced, it says ‘But if she departs let her remain unmarried or be reconciled to her husband.’” And I said “I want it to be on the court record that I’m only going to permit Faye Whetstone to remarry me.” That judge looked at me like I came from Mars and he said “What you’re going through a divorce today.” I said “I realize that and I know that the law is bringing a closure to this area of marriage but I want you do know I will remarry this woman and I will not permit her to stay unmarried, she will remarry me.”

Sid: Our time is up.

Gary: I know.

SID: You think Hank Kunneman had problems. He had an adoptive father. He was a disciplinarian. Never said I love you, never affirmed him. His teachers said, you should never publically speak, you should never write. I mean, he would go into his bedroom and weep. But at 18, he became a believer in the Messiah, and in his bedroom, he was filled with the Spirit of God and began to speak in supernatural languages. What happened?

HANK: I had a vision of Heaven that night that I was filled with the Spirit of God. My mom, in fact, was yelling at the top of the steps trying to get my attention. Had no idea what was going on. And as I was praying in tongues, all of a sudden, I saw myself in a place where there was like a golden river and I could see a light all around me. It was so bright. And I could see a figure on a throne. I fell immediately down. I couldn’t stop weeping in the presence of what I believe now is I was getting a glimpse of Abba, Abba Father sitting on His throne. But the Glory was so great I couldn’t see beyond it. And that was a very, very dramatic experience for me.

SID: Now how did your parents take to the fact that you are now a believer in Jesus?

HANK: Well my dad and I had a working relationship. I worked for him and that was basically how I would sense any kind of love from my dad. We had a great working relationship. But he didn’t like the fact that I had just gotten saved because I didn’t use a lot of wisdom. Sometimes you know, when you’re first saved the tendency is you want to get everybody saved. You don’t use a lot of wisdom in the sense that you beat them over the head. I was pretty aggressive, over-zealous.

SID: Okay. They’re not happy with that. I get it. You had severe acne.

HANK: Yes.

SID: How bad was it?

HANK: Well that’s the part that made my dad even more angry. I had severe acne. Obviously, I worked at a service station, gas station, oil. And the Lord healed me at a service that I was attending. The pastor starts speaking a supernatural word of knowledge, calls out that somebody is being healed with severe acne. And I’m thinking, I didn’t what miracles were about. I had just gotten saved. But somebody next to me, an older woman who became a spiritual mother to me, said, “God’s healing you of acne.” All of a sudden, within a matter of days, it looked somebody took their handprints and went to my cheeks and left their fingerprint imprints, and little circles were appearing, different sizes on my face. My dad could not deny it. I began to tell him that I not only got saved, but I was being healed.

SID: But wait a second now. He saw severe acne. He saw it all gone.

HANK: Yeah.

SID: Did you see those fingerprints?

HANK: Yes. But he said this: “It would be a cold day in hell before I believe in miracles.”

SID: But he just saw one. So how could he say that?

HANK: Well I think part of it was, was my over-zealousness and my desire for him to get saved. Something happened. My dad was so angry with me declaring that I was being healed, even though he did see my face was clearing up, he said something to me. We got in a heated exchange. He said, “Hank, deny this Jesus or get out.” We were face to face. He was that close to me. I couldn’t believe it. Why am I in this confrontation with my dad? I don’t want this to be happening, but it was happening. And I said, “I won’t deny Jesus.” Now what he was saying is he thought I was an occult because he hadn’t heard of Divine healing like this. So he said, “Deny this Jesus.” Really, deny this cult in his mind or get out. And I said, “I will not deny this Jesus.” And the next thing I know, Sid, I’m tumbling down the stairs.

SID: He pushed down the stairs?

HANK: I don’t know exactly. I’m not going to say that my dad did that. But all I know is however it happened, we had a physical confrontation and I landed on the bottom of the stairs. I looked up and my dad was raging with anger. He said, “Get out!” I had just graduated out of high school. I had just accepted Jesus, been filled with the Spirit of God. I had nowhere to go. I didn’t know what to do. And so I began to pack my clothes and I remember the surreal feeling of backing out of that driveway that day not knowing where to go, questioning in my mind, is this Christianity really worth it? It just cost me my home. It cost me my dad. And I thought, well maybe I could just go back and patch this up. But I knew if I went back, I’d have to deny the expressive radical Christianity that I was living.

SID: And then his father develops terminal cancer. What happened?

HANK: So fast-forwarding into the future some 20 years later, my dad develops stage 4 cancer. I begin to talk to him about the Lord and about healing. I asked him, I said, “I know somebody who has a healing ministry, Dad. Have you ever heard of Oral Roberts?” He said, “Yeah.” But again, his thing was, he would say it often in life, it would be a cold day in hell before I believe in miracles. So he didn’t believe in it. But he said, “You know what? I know who Oral Roberts is.” I said, “Well I know his son, Richard Roberts who has a healing ministry. He’s having tremendous success praying for people with cancer. Can I have him call you?” I was surprised. He agreed. Richard prays for him. The doctors are amazed because the spots on my dad’s lungs are disappearing and they don’t have an explanation for it. My dad is seeing healing—

SID: Now did your father believe that was a miracle?

HANK: He said, yes. He told me, “Hank, I cannot deny.” In fact he said, because his words were, it would be a cold day in hell. He said, “Hell has a little bit more ice on it than it used to.”

SID: Hold that thought. We’re going to be right back because you are going to capture a revelation of how much God accepts you, loves you and is for you. Don’t go away.