God admonishes the earthly ministers for tearing down and corrupting the Gospel of Christ. 

Click for a description of the mark of the beast.
Click for a description of the image of the beast.

“Is it too little for you to have eaten up the good pasture, that you must tread down with your feet the residue of your pasture—and to have drunk of the clear waters, that you must foul the residue with your feet?” Ezekiel 34:18

A pasture is a field suitable for grazing sheep and clear water is for the sheep to drink. Jesus Christ grazes His sheep with the Bread of Life and gives the Water of Life to drink. Jesus is the Bread and Water of Life. “And Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst.” John 6:35

The leaders of the Jewish culture have eaten up the good pasture by rejecting Jesus Christ and withholding the Bread of Life from their flock. The Bread is the Gospel of Christ, the entire New Testament. The Jewish culture only live by the Old Testament and have tossed aside the New Testament. They have tread down the residue of the pasture with their feet. The Jewish leaders have drunk of the clear waters of the Ten Commandments, but they foul the life-giving waters of Jesus Christ that gives nourishment to the spirit and soul.

The ministers of the churches of today have eaten up the good pasture by abandoning the Gospel of Jesus Christ. With that, they tread down the word of Life that exists within the spirit, words, and behaviors of the members of their congregation. They drink up the clear waters that should be nourishing the spirit and soul of their flock as they foul the waters flowing through the heart and mind of their congregation.

The entity that gives people what to think, feel, say, and do eats up the good pasture and tramples down any spiritual growth by hardening the spirit and conscience against Jesus Christ. This entity drinks up the clear waters of the spirit and conscience as it fouls the thoughts, feelings, words, and behaviors that would be flowing with Holiness. This entity enables the image of the beast to live and speak through people by treading down the Spirit’s pasture and fouling the Spirit’s waters. Its global flock is groomed to the mark of the beast by what they say and do.

In Matthew 23:13-36, our Lord Jesus Christ has plenty to say about the spiritual corruption of the Jewish leaders and of the ministers of today’s churches.

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“….to you who do not hold to her teaching and have not learned Satan’s so-called deep secrets,“
‘I will not impose any other burden on you, except to hold on to what you have until I come.’”
“I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take your crown.”
Revelation 2:24-25, 3:11