Monthly Archives: August 2010
Who’s Sending the Storms in Your Life?
(Ver 2.1) This is “Part 3” in a series of advanced lessons about “Understanding Hard Sayings” found in the Bible. We live in a pretty crazy world at times. Some Christians like to believe that God is in complete control of everything that happens to us, but what do you do with the times when it seems like you are facing some very challenging overwhelming circumstances? Did God send these negative circumstances to test you, prove you or maybe just to keep you humble? It is funny what many churches teach on this subject and most of them ignore what the Bible says in order to teach something that they have created in their minds. Human reasoning and religious thinking usually results in things that are directly opposed to the truth of God. Learn to be careful who you follow and make sure what they are teaching you is based ONLY upon the scriptures being correctly divided and interpreted. Also allow the Spirit of God inside of you to be your quide into the truth. He will also keep you from what is not the truth if you let Him. Always remember that whatever God says to you by His Spirit will always be in perfect alingnment with what He has said to you in His written Word.
Joh 16:33 These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.
The Greek word translated as tribulation literally means “trouble” and “pressure”. So we have all been faced with the storms of trouble and pressure in our lives. These are things like losing your job and wondering what you are going to do now for money to pay the bills. How about getting attacked physically with sickness and disease? Having a child die suddenly? What about being pregnant and having a miscarriage?
Facing natural disasters like hurricanes, tornados, wild fires, earthquakes and floods. Look at the world’s economies on the brink of collapse. The plunging real estate markets and the rollercoaster stock markets. What about the price of food and inflation, droughts, famines, wars and I could go on and on We are all faced with an enormous amount of different kinds of pressures being put on us from every side it seems. The verse above in John 16:23 speak of these “pressures” in life. Jesus told us that tribulation is a part of the world that we live in. However, Jesus did not say God was sending them your way. Jesus said be of good cheer for I have overcome the world. Jesus directly links this “pressure” to the “world” that we currently live in. Jesus did not say be of good cheer because these are just God’s way of testing you, changing you, proving you or whatever else people like to think. I personally believe that if there was nothing to overcome in life that nobody would seek God for help. But, yet I also believe that God never sent any of these storms of life that we are faced with. I personally believe that God warned Adam not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and that Adam is the one that allowed evil to enter into the world that we reside within. I’ll try to talk more about this as we go to show you who the originator of these adversities and evils really is. Here are some Bible verses that I have found that helped me tremendously when I was studying this subject and I hope they are a blessing to you also:
Luk 8:22 Now it came to pass on a certain day, that he went into a ship with his disciples: and he said unto them, Let us go over unto the side side of the lake. And they launched forth.
In this story found in Luke, Jesus has been ministering to a group of people and it was now getting very late in the day. Jesus sends the people away and goes with his disciples to cross the sea in their boat . So far nothing new is happening that is very news worthy.
Luk 8:23 But as they sailed he fell asleep: and there came down a storm of wind on the lake; and they were filled with water, and were in jeopardy.
This is where the story starts to get really good. There are many people in churches that teach that Jesus was God in His full deity power. However, this verse should cause them a major problem, because the Bible says that God neither sleeps nor slumbers (Psalm 121:4). You can obviously see the potential conflict to that kind of teaching by simply reading the verses in the Bible that reveal to us the truth. I believe that Jesus Christ was fully God and fully man. However, I also believe when God became a man, He stripped Himself of His deity powers in order to lay down His life for us. You see it is impossible to kill an omnipotent God. Understand that how you are now is how God had to become. If you sleep Jesus had to sleep. If you eat then Jesus had to eat. If you ever get thirsty then Jesus got thirsty. If you could sin, then it was possible for Jesus to sin. These are just basic realities found in the Bible. So I got off of the subject for a quick side trip to help someone today. This verse informs us that as they were sailing, Jesus went to sleep. The winds picked up and a storm came upon them and it looked very bleak to the disciples. Some of the disciples were men who made their living on the water; they were intimately familiar with this sea, the weather there, boats and sailing. They obviously thought the situation was life threatening. So they had a problem; one of those storms of life had arisen around them that I talked about earlier and they believed it could be the end of them. The boat was taking on water, the wind was very strong against them and the outcome looked very bleak. Fortunately for them they had Jesus in the boat asleep. Let me ask you a quick question; do you have Jesus in you right now? If you do He is not sleeping!
So let’s stop right here and determine something. Who sent these winds and this storm to Jesus and the disciples? Was this the work of God? I thought God was in the boat? Of course God in the flesh was in the boat but God who is a Spirit was also everywhere else at the same time. But, did God send the storm? People like to think that the storms are the acts of God because He is the highest power in control? Certainly men on the earth believe they did not cause the storm, therefore they understand cause and effect so someone had to cause the storm! Insurance agencies like to have “Acts of God” clauses to define what they will cover and what they will not cover. I’ve even heard ignorant ministers claim a hurricane that almost destroyed New Orleans was an act of God’s judgment upon a sinful city. People sure can be ignorant and accuse God of doing some crazy things that I doubt if He is pleased with. Please let me introduce you to a new concept that is related to our subject today of who caused the storm:
Mat 12:26 And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; how shall then his kingdom stand?
Did you know that Satan had a kingdom? That is not why I picked this verse, but it is an interesting point to keep in mind. Jesus says that any kingdom divided against itself will be brought to nothing. This is a spiritual law from the mouth of God! What do we learn from this law? Can you apply this knowledge to our discussion today? Jesus claims that one party or one kingdom cannot fight against itself and survive. That is a very important concept to keep in your mind when thinking about did God cause the storm. So what is my point? If God sends the storm and then God is awakened in the boat to stop the storm, would that not be God working against Himself? That would make God divided against Himself, not in harmony and certainly not in unity. It is more like a Jekyll and Hyde type of God. You cannot send a storm just to give you something to do or to provide an opportunity to prove that you can stop it. It would not make any logical sense. The Kingdom of God would clearly be divided against itself if God sends the storm and then stops the same storm. Do you understand what Jesus is teaching?
Luk 8:24 And they came to him, and awoke him, saying, Master, master, we perish. Then he arose, and rebuked the wind and the raging of the water: and they ceased, and there was a calm.
As you can see the disciples woke Jesus up and said Master look we are perishing. Jesus got up and looked at the problem and spoke words to it! The wind stopped and there was a great calm. So let’s stop right there again and think. If Words stopped the storm, could words have started the storm? I think that is a very valid question. If it were Words that caused the storm, they cannot be the words from God or He would be divided against Himself. The Bible clearly says God does not change! To speak words to cause a storm and then to speak words to stop the same storm would cause God to be a shifting inconsistent unstable God! I find that a very interesting concepts to understand. As a result of spoken words there was a great calm that surrounded them. If the storm was intentionally sent to Jesus and the disciples what would have been the end result of the storm, if Jesus had not stopped it? For what purpose would the storm have served? Would the storm have been a blessing or a curse? I recently saw a post on the internet that said “adversity can be a blessing in disguise” and I thought immediately how confused this writer was. If you can read in Luke from the fear that the disciples possessed the storm seems to be designed to kill them, to destroy their boat and to steal their life, their time and their money away from them. There is absolutely no logical way to think that the storm in Luke could be viewed to be a blessing in disguise. What else is a storm good for? Right here is an amazing time to use your brain and think again. Is any major storm of life ever a blessing in disguise? I do not think anyone recently in Joplin Missiouri would think it was. So who does Jesus say causes these types of adverse destructive events in our lives? Did you know that the Bible tells us who is responsible?
Joh 10:10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
The thief is a synonymous reference or title for Satan. There are those in churches that think that God sends the storms of life upon them and if that is the case then God is the thief. I cannot speak for your God, but my God is not a thief. Anything that steals from you, tries to kill you or destroy what you possess, Jesus called it an act of the “thief” Satan. 
We also know that God is not the one who kills, steals or destroys because Jesus said in this verse that He came to give us life abundantly and that would be the opposite of someone who was coming to give us death. Hopefully you can see the difference and know who is behind each event that happens to you. Jesus said that the pressures of life would come, but that we should be of good cheer because He had overcome all of the pressures. Why is that important? Because according to 2 Cor 2:14 God declares us triumphant “In Christ”. Did you know you were in Christ? I guess I do not have time to teach that today, but this is why God can tell you to be of good cheer when storms come!
Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
There are just too many people in churches who do not realize that we have a spiritual enemy and an adversary of spiritual opposition. This enemy is only interested in taking you out of this world. He wants to deceive you any way that he can. The term to wrestle is a physical conflict between opponents. If you are wrestling a friend you are not wrestling. The opponent is described to us as not being a physical being, but is clearly described to be a spiritual force. The term principalities refer to the chief rulers in the spiritual realm. These spiritual forces are described as being “wicked” that means evil and hurtful. They do not play the game or fight the battle by any rules. They are in a no holds barred match of spiritual wits against you. They will send whatever they can against you to take you out.
Luk 8:25 And he said unto them, Where is your faith? And they being afraid wondered, saying one to another, What manner of man is this! for he commandeth even the winds and water, and they obey him.
Getting back to our main lesson story found in Luke, Jesus calms the storm with words and turns to the disciples and asks them a very funny question that most people do not understand. Jesus did not say “Sorry fellows, I did not know, why didn’t you just wake me sooner”. I think that is what most religious people would like to do or think that Jesus said. Jesus was asking “Where is your faith?” Why was Jesus asking them like they should have had faith to do something about the storm? When you read the Bible you need to pay close attention to every word. What is said and what is not said. You do not ask a question like this if you did not expect something different. Everyone likes to pray to God and ask him to calm the storms of life and God’s response will always be “Where is your faith?” That is something that people do not grasp easily, because they do not know what faith is. The implied meaning of the question that Jesus asked was the disciples could have done the same thing that Jesus just did. I know that is going to go over big with some people and others it will be like I’m speaking heresy. We can’t do what God does, can we? We certainly are not God! I know that for sure. However, I’m just studying the Bible and trying to understand what it says. You can choose to believe something else if you like; I’m not your judge.
What I take away from this lesson of Jesus and the disciples is that Jesus is more than capable of solving all of our problems. But, His question will always be “Where is your faith?” I also learn from this story in Luke that God is not causing the storms in your life so He or you can calm them. God’s house is not divided and God must be consitently good or we woould not know if we should try to calm the storms, ask God to calm the storms or to simply let the storms kill us. After all if God sent the storm and you prayed to have the storm stop you have made yourself a new enemy to the will of God and that is why I peronsally believe that God never sends the adversities in your life. You of course can choose to believe what you like. God Bless!
If you would like to continue reading in this series about “Understanding Hard Sayings” you may go to “Part 4“.
God’s Definition of Eternity! Are there any Limits to What We Can Learn?
(Ver 1.1) Today I want to do something different to stimulate and exercise your mind. I want to get you to thinking of some things that you may have never thought of before. God woke me up last night and taught me some new concepts about eternity that I have never even thought of before. I hesitate to tell people on the Web that God does this to me, because people sometimes think you’re crazy to believe things like God can actually talk to you and you can actually hear and understand Him. However, if this is not possible, then we have found something else that God can’t do, He can’t communicate with humans. Actually if you have ever read the Bible you have seen too many examples of God speaking to Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Elijah and I could go on and on. Today, the problem with most people is that they are not spiritually aware enough to realize when God is saying anything to them. Knowing how God talks to you is the key to hearing from God and I will not comment on that any further. So this is what the Spirit of God said to me, “Are there any limits to what you can know?” I took this to mean will there ever come a time when we are in eternity with God that we will reach a point that there is nothing else for us to learn? I mean forever is a very long time. Humans cannot even fathom the definition of what eternity is. After we go beyond billions or trillions, most people stop trying to process what those kinds of numbers mean in our brain. We have no reference point to the experience of eternity that even comes close to what forever means. You see my computer has a 1 terabyte hard drive in it. That is a far cry from my first computer hard drive of 10 megabytes. However, even 1 terabyte is nowhere close to having an infinite hard drive space available to you. I mean even Google doesn’t have infinite hard drive storage space. We are born on this planet with a limited perspective and we may live even 100 years and this is nothing compared to eternity. It would be like one cell out of every cell in our universe combined. Even Adam or Methuselah in the O.T. never lived to be older than 1000 years old. Methuselah the oldest recorded living man in the Bible, only lived 969 years. This is a nothing numbers compared to living in eternity. So there is no human on the earth that has any clue of how long eternity is. So here is the key question today to challenge you to think; how much could you learn if you had forever to do it in? Are there any limits to knowledge? Are there any limits to what God knows?
Isa 57:15 For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
As you can clearly see, the Bible says that God lives in eternity. I looked up the word “eternity” to see the definition and it means “forever” or “without end”. Eternity is clearly just a concept to us that we have great difficulty in comprehending fully. God exists outside of the realm of time and yet sent Jesus Christ into the realm of time at the perfect time to accomplish what God needed to accomplish. So I believe that the dimension of time does not limit God. Einstein theorized that as we approach the speed of light that time would slow and then finally stop. I find that very interesting since the Bible says that God is Light! That is pretty awesome stuff to think on.
So here is where I’m going to start to get a bit controversial, surprise, surprise. Does God know everything? Is there anything that God does not know? These are almost trick questions. Because I do not know, if we have the answers to these questions. Most people believe that God knows everything. After all only He is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient to name three known qualities used to describe God. The term omniscient is a theological term that is used to describe God and it can actually mean “All knowing”. God can be described as having an infinite amount of capacity for knowledge and this is probably a very good thought. But, I also think that this is dependent upon your perspective. God certainly is All Knowing concerning us and the rest of His creation. The Bible certainly says that God knows some amazing details about us. God knows our every thought and with over 6 billion people on the planet, I do not understand how this is even possible. The Bible says God knows how many hairs are on our heads at any given time. Do you have a clue of how many hairs are on your head? Unless you are totally bald, you do not have a clue. This proves that God is the most detailed oriented being that I can conceive of. So what is the controversial part of my thought process today? If God holds the capacity to know everything that is possible to know but still does not know everything, then there is a possibility of an infinite amount of knowledge being available to learn. If God knows an infinite amount of information already, then there is nothing that He does not know. Which one is it? Either way, we have to conclude that there is no limit to what we can know and learn in eternity. Maybe this will come out clearer as I go forward; probably right now I have a bunch of people just scratching their heads and saying what did he just say?
Let me see if I can rephrase what I tried to say, either God already has infinite knowledge or the realm of knowledge is infinite and God has the capacity to know it all. I really cannot say which one is true using the Bible. If you say that God knows everything already, then you have to conclude there is no creativity in anyone else. Every book that can be written has already been written by God. Every song that can be written has already been written by God. Only God has creation power and the rest of us are just puppets imitating God’s preconceived ideas. That would mean that the Bible says we are made in his image but we do not have His power to create so the Bible lied. I haven’t found a Bible verse to describe any of this per say. If you know of one or two, please let me know. I would love to learn. I did see some verses in Job that describes God as having “perfect knowledge”. The term “perfect” would tend to mean or at the least imply “whole” or “complete” knowledge.
All I know is somewhere something or someone has to be infinite. Either the amount of knowledge available is infinite or the knowledge of God is infinite. Otherwise it would mean somewhere in the course of eternity we could potentially reach a point of the end of all learning and come to a state of knowing everything. If this could occur, what would we do then? Can you even wrap your mind around this deep subject today? Here is what I took away from what God said to me last night. There is no limit to how much you can know, because there is no limit to the availability of God’s knowledge. You see I totally believe that God has the capacity of knowing everything. I totally believe that God’s knowledge compared to my knowledge right now is a like a comparison of all of the water in all of the oceans in the world compared to my single drop of water, if that much. But, I also believe that eternity is a long, long time. So the bottom line is no matter how much we learn even in a trillion years of time, we would have just begun to learn what God can teach us.
Also God when he spoke to Abraham told him that his seed would be as the stars of the heaven or as the sands on the seashore (Gen 22:7). In other words more than you could count right now. However, if you had eternity to count them all, is it possible to do it. This has to be a finite number, just a very big number. Do you understand big number concepts? Is there any limit to how high you can count? I don’t think so, if you have the time to do it.
So I probably just turned off a bunch of religious or non-intellectual type people. I seemed to imply that there could be stuff that God still has left that He can learn and I certainly do not have any Bible verses to demonstrate or confirm this logic. But I will tell you this also; this is what else God said to me in the middle of the night. He told me to think about the number “Pi”. If you are not a math type person you probably do not know what I’m talking about. The number “Pi” is a number used in math and geometry in relation to measuring circles. A circle is a symbol of completeness. A circle could also be a symbol of infinity, since as long as you want to go around in the circle it will let you keep going. A circle is a line without ends. So a circle could possibly be representative of a picture of God. Here is the Web definition for “Pi”:
Pi: the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle
Pi is an irrational number, in decimal places it never ends and never repeats with any know pattern. To me I can see Pi as a picture of God. He has no end and never does He do the exact same thing exactly twice. However, God does utilize patterns to repeat things in the natural realm from the spiritual realm so we have some additional complexity to ponder. If anyone ever told you that studying the Bible was easy, they lied to you. What do you think of the concepts behind pi and how this number relates to God? So I believe that God invented math for us to learn about natural concepts and laws that we can apply to spiritual things. If you can learn from them and apply them correctly you will begin to see how they relate to other spiritual things. I use math laws in my Bible interpretations all the time. God taught me this method so I stick with it. So here is the problem that I am faced with, Pi is an infinite never ending number. No matter how many digits that you calculate the number Pi to, the number never ends. This is the definition of eternity again, demonstrated to us in the concept of a never ending number. When I was in the 10th grade I memorized Pi to like 8 or 9 digits; to me “Pi” was 3.141592653…” and I thought I was doing pretty well. Later in life when computers came along, I learned that “Pi” had been calculated out in the astronomical realms of numbers. However, even with all of this work they were not any closer to the end of the number than I was. Why did God create infinite things like this? Never ending number concepts? I believe it was to show us that there is no limit to what we can still learn in eternity. I mean think about it, if God can create a number that He cannot find the end of; that tells me that we have something truly amazing in store for us. So I probably offended someone again saying God could not solve Pi, but yet God would have to change the definition of Pi or round it off somewhere in order to stop computing the number. Do you understand this? God, who has far greater computing power than any computer we have on our planet, could spend the rest of eternity at calculating Pi and still never reach the end. That is the definition of something that is infinite, yes? So can an infinite God solve an infinite math problem? I think that is a very tough question for me to even try to think of how to answer. You see I think that an infinite God who lives in eternity could calculate Pi forever and still never reach the end of the number. There would always be another digit to add to the list of numbers. Wow, that is very deep, I know. So we can still look at this subject in different ways. We can say that the possible realm of knowledge is infinite or we can say that God already holds infinite knowledge. To me if God held infinite knowledge then God had Pi solved before we were given it. However, this means by definition that Pi is solvable and is not an infinite number. Then there is the concept of writing books or songs that I mentioned earlier. Is there a limit to the number of books that God could write? Is there a limit to the number of songs that can be written by us? I personally do not believe that there are a finite number of songs available for us to create. Do you understand the complexity behind these concepts that God has given to us? They are truly amazing, but yet they are nothing compared to what God has in store for us in the future:
1Co 2:9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
When you start to think differently you begin to see old Bible verses in new enlightening ways. Is it beginning to get into your heart like it is mine? I think if it is, then we have only scratched the tip of the iceberg of knowing who God is and how much He loves us. Be a thinker, but begin to see God as He sees us. The Bible says that we have the mind of Christ, so begin to think like God. I know that I can hardly wait for the eternity of good things to come from God. I hope that I at least stimulated your mind to think today, like God did my mind last night. You may not agree with the things that I said, but that is OK also. Today was not a lesson on how to be saved so it really doesn’t matter that much. Today’s lesson was designed to get you to think eternally, infinitely, as a course for your future existence with God. If you disagree with anything that I said I’ll read it, but I probably won’t respond to the negative words of critics’ unless you can show me some Bible verses. You see I don’t know everything and I am perfectly willing to change to be right as long as I can see it in the Bible. In the meantime I’ll do my own search of the Bible using my computer to see if I can learn anything about what God has challenged me to think on. Mathematics is full of never ending number sequences and there must be a reason why God created them to be this way, so it is a challenge for you and I to find out why. Be continually blessed and encouraged in growing in the knowledge of Him.
Is there Life after Death? The Bible Evidence for Understanding Spirits!
(Ver 1.4) This is a serious Bible lesson on the important Bible subject of understanding death. Today I will discuss a very basic foundational subject but also an extremely important Bible truth in an attempt to make a potentially complex subject as simple as possible. I always like to emphasize that the Bible is a highly complex spiritual book of information that the natural human mind is incapable of understanding. This is the greatest and number one problem with why people read the Bible and do not understand what it says. God is the most intelligent being in both the Spiritual and Natural realms. God designed the Bible in an intelligent spiritual manner to give man the right to be wrong in everything that they believe. There is really no clear evidence for anything in the Bible, because people can put their own interpretations upon every verse and ignore all the other verses that do not fit with what they want to believe and thus they come to the conclusions that they desire to hold on to. That is a pretty stupid way of interpreting the Bible, but people do it every day. By not being consistent and by not taking every related verse into account they have concluded some vastly erroneous teachings. Today’s lesson surrounds what the Bible says about “Is there Life after Death?” This is obviously a highly controversial subject with a wide variety of opinions to the possible outcomes. Here is the difficulty that most of us face, none of us have died and come back to tell what happened to us after we died. The majority of dead people on the earth are dead and have not been able to return form the dead to tell anyone about the after life experiences. And if anyone did die and come back would anybody believe them, since they would hold no evidence or pictures to convince anyone of what they were trying to tell the rest of the world? Our experience of death would only help to motivate us personally and would not have a real effect on most other people, especially to those who do not believe like we do.
So what then do we do? I believe that we are given a Bible by God for the basis for all of our knowledge and for what we believe in our faith. If what you believe is not based upon what the Bible says, then you really have no ability to be confident of anything that you believe in. Faith is believing in something that we have no physical proof or evidence of possessing. The Bible also informs us that our faith is based upon the Word of God. So a Christian should be most concerned with what does the Bible say and reveal to me on the subject of death and the afterlife experience. Here is why I am addressing this subject today. I had a very deceived individual who believes that when people die, they go into a state of sleep, until wakened for judgment day. These types of believers do not believe in the existence of hell or eternal damnation or punishment. They want to believe that after this life there are no consequences for what we do here on the earth, how we believe, or whether we make Jesus our Lord and Savior or not. According to them those that are not saved by God are eliminated from future existence, they will have no consciousness of ever having been here on the earth or for ever existing at any time on this planet. This type of teaching is one that I have heard proclaimed for many years. It is called a doctrine of “Soul Sleep” or a “Spirit Sleep” theology. They claim that everyone who dies goes to sleep until God chooses for the time of judgment. These people have many Bible verses that they believe that they can stand on and I do not deny that these verses exist. However, I do deny their weak erroneous interpretations of them and how they have twisted them to determine how they use and apply them with their natural minds to drive others into believing the lie of an eternal solution for an end of natural life with no eternal consequences. This is a classic example of ignorance being combined with stupidity going to seed and being multiplied into deception. God says in Hosea 4:6 “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge”. Therefore what you don’t know will end up killing you and sending you to hell. You better make sure you know the truth before you believe something someone tells you is the truth. The only way you can be insured is for you to read the whole Bible and make sure there are no other verses that conflict with what someone is telling you is the truth.
So rather than telling you about all of the verses that they have misinterpreted, I want to focus mostly in on verses in the Bible that will put holes in their theological erroneous teachings. These are the verses that they purposely ignore or are forced to explain away so that they can hold on to their fantasies. Let’s look at some of these verses about death and life after death today and you can be the judge and see what the Bible is saying for yourself.
Deu 34:5 So Moses the servant of the LORD died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the LORD.
This verse in the Bible is very plain. Moses we are told died a physical death exactly like every other human on this planet in our history has done also. I guess I should clarify that last statement, because there are two men in the O.T. that did not experience death and the Bible says God took them and these were Enoch and Elijah. The Bible says it is appointed unto man, once to die and then comes the judgment (Heb. 9:27). This is where people like to believe that the in between natural death and the time of judgment is a state of nothingness, because the Bible says there is nothing or does it? People need to realize that God does not tell you everything in any one place anywhere in the Bible. You MUST put the puzzle pieces together correctly in order to have a valid interpretation of the Word of God. Let’s confirm that Moses died before we go any further:
Deu 34:7 And Moses was an hundred and twenty years old when he died: his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abated.
We can again clearly see that God says Moses lived a 120 years on the earth when he died a natural death. I find that it is very interesting what this verse says. It does not say Moses died of any illness, weakness, infirmity or even any natural cause does it? It says that Moses was physically strong and had good eye sight. Oh well, I guess I won’t go there and create any more controversy. Can we at least agree that Moses died? So then according to many people who believe in Soul Sleep, Moses is now in spiritual “la, la land” of non-existence. I assume that this is a state of blissful nirvana or an unconscious state of rest according to what they want to believe occurs after death. I hope that you can see this is pretty crazy to believe this way, you have to ignore so much of the Bible to believe wrong. Here is the main reason that I call this an erroneous teaching. Please read this carefully:
Luk 9:28 And it came to pass about an eight days after these sayings, he took Peter and John and James, and went up into a mountain to pray.
Here we have an account written by God in the New Testament that declares that Jesus went up on a mountain to pray. He took with Him, Peter James and John. So we have 3 key witnesses to what is about to happen next. Is this a real story? You bet it is a real story. God is not a liar. So Jesus is praying and what happens?
Luk 9:30 And, behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and Elias:
Uh oh? Moses is there with Jesus on top of the mountain and he is supposed to be asleep somewhere in la, la land. I really thought he was supposed to be sleeping until judgment day according to what these people care to try to teach us. Do you understand how wrong some people’s teaching can beceom? Here Moses died at least 1500 years before Jesus came along and he appears with Elijah to talk to Jesus. I guess God must have awakened them from their sleep? Maybe God sent a princess to kiss Moses so that she could awaken him from deep spiritual sleep? Do you understand what happens when you deviate from the Bible? You have to start making stuff up and your lie is then as good as anyone else’s lie. Let’s stop here and think about this logically. If Moses and Elijah were asleep for the last 1500 years or so, and do not remember their life on the earth and were just awakened for some quick purpose of God, what would they have to talk about with Jesus? Do you think that Jesus was the only one talking here and they were just getting filled in on the updates of the last 1500 years? You see there are certainly ways to explain away what the Bible says if you do not wish to embrace it. However, it is so obvious to me that since Moses and Elijah were present with Jesus on the mountain top, they were clearly not asleep and could remember things to talk about. It would be a very far stretch to say that they were ever spiritually asleep either. So you believe whatever you want to believe, I’ll still stay with the truth.
So let me approach this subject of Soul Sleep from a different angle now. When you are asleep naturally speaking, are you ever aware of anything that happens? What about your dreams? Do dreams ever happen, do you ever remember them? Are there accounts in the Bible of anybody dreaming? You should probably understand if you have ever read the Bible that there are many people who have heard from God in a dream. Do you understand this? You have the story of Joseph in Genesis 37:5. Then in Matthew 1:20 we have another man named Joseph who heard from God in a dream about marrying the virgin Mary. So people do have dreams and people can remember them and hear from God even when they are physically asleep. So what is the problem? How do you ever remember a dream? After all you were sleeping. That is a million dollar question to ponder. You see your spirit inside your body never sleeps. Even when your body is asleep your spirit is awake and capable of hearing from God. Interesting isn’t it? The Bible says in Psalms 121:4 that God neither slumbers nor sleeps. This tells us very clearly God does not get tired. A spiritual being never needs a nap, to rest up or regain spiritual strength. The problem with most people, they think that man is somehow different from God and this is their downfall. Because they think naturally, they come to the wrong conclusions concerning spiritual truths. This is the most significant way that God keeps people from seeing what the Bible really says. In their minds they have the wrong basis of reference or the wrong perspective on things that were written. If you are driving in a car, when you start out going in the wrong direction, it is sometimes very difficult to get to the right destination. So it is with Bible interpretation. So people forget that the Bible says that Adam was made in the image and likeness of God. God said “Let US make man in our image after our likeness…”. When you don’t believe what the Bible says in one spot it makes it doubly easier to disbelieve another spot. So my point is if God (who is a Spirit) does not sleep or nap, the spirit of man does not sleep or nap either, because we were made in the image and likeness of God. If you want to see what the Bible really says, sometimes you have to change your perspective. Sometimes this requires you seeing things like God sees them. Sometimes it requires you to see things the way others see them around you. This is just part of the complexity of understanding the Bible. So why did I go through the explanation of dreams while you are in a natural sleep? It was only to show you that your spirit never sleeps and that is the only way that you would remember what you dreamed. So you decide what you want to believe, I’m still going to stay with what the Bible actually says.
So those who teach fictitious “Soul Sleep” have a predicament , we can clearly see that Moses died literally hundreds and hundreds of years before Jesus came along and yet there he was appearing with Jesus to talk about spiritual subjects with the transfigured Lord. We also should know that Judgment Day is not coming for many more hundreds of years in the future when this event occurs. Where has Moses been previously and where will Moses wait until the Day of Judgment finally comes. Think about it, where is Moses during all of this past and future time? You first have to understand that Moses is a triune being. That just means that Moses is a spirit being that has a soul that lives in a body. When his body died his spirit and soul left his body. We know this from other Bible verses like this one:
Jas 2:26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.
As you can see the Bible says that man is a spirit. The absence of the spirit from the body deems the body to be dead. The death of the body means that the spirit is no longer present in the body. Either way there is a clear separation of the two. When you go to a funeral and look in the casket you are not looking at the person, just the body that this person used to lived in. So as you look into the casket do they appear to be awake or asleep? If you are bright at all you have to say they look asleep. So all of the Bible verses in the Bible that “Soul Sleep” teachers like to grab hold of and use are from our perspective on what death is and looks like. The body is asleep and the spirit has departed and gone somewhere else. The spirit must still exist and must be awake because it is made in the image of God. So let’s look at another lesson of what God used Paul to tell us:
Php 1:23 For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better:
People who choose to believe in a “Soul Sleep” ignore verses like this one in the Bible. Here is Paul writing to the Philippian Church and he is speaking of a decision that he is trying to make. He is trying to determine if he should stay here in his body and help them or to leave his body and go be with Christ. Uh oh? That is a pretty strong indication that there is no sleep time in between death and what occurs afterwards. Paul calls death for a Christian something that is a “FAR BETTER” thing than staying here physically and living on the earth. So what would make death far better for anyone that would only go to sleep until judgment day? Sleep is not better than being awake, alert, aware and conscious, is it? If you think it is you are a vastly deceived individual. Christians, who die according to what Paul just said, leave their bodies and go into the spiritual realm of heaven to be with Christ. That is what would be far better than being here. You walking on the streets of gold, you beholding the face of the one that died for you, you standing before the throne of the living God and you surrounded by all of the angels, and your Christian relatives and friends that have gone before you. That is the definition of a “FAR BETTER” time if you ask me. That is the only explanation of this verse that makes any sense to me. Seeing my earthly father again, seeing my son again, seeing my Heavenly Father for the first time, seeing Jesus Christ and the nail prints in his hands and feet, that is what gives me hope. Spiritual sleep is not hope, it is nothing to look forward to, it is nothing that you can call better even a little bit. What is FAR BETTER to you? How do you define “FAR BETTER”? It could make all the difference in the world.
So I could go on and give you many other Bible verses, that talk about death, heaven, hell and other related subjects, but I have gone long enough for today. I pray that you will take the truth of God’s word and hold fast to it so that no man will deceive you with lies from the enemy. I have found that some people are not capable of being helped. No matter how much you try to show them. These are what I call “Concrete Christians”; they are thoroughly mixed up and firmly set in their ways. They do not read the Bible with an open mind to allow the Spirit of God to teach them anything. They do not wish to see the truth, because they are happy with their perception of reality. They have extreme tunnel vision and only see what they want to see. Whatever you do, do not become as one of these types of people. Always stay open to change, but always base your change upon the Bible only. It saddens my heart tremendously when I encounter people like this if they are that easily deceived then they are open to other deception as well. The Bible says that there will be many in that day that come before Christ and say Lord, didn’t we do this and that in your name and Jesus will look at them and say depart from me for I never knew you. Do not be one of these! May God Bless you and help you to see the truth of His glorious Word!
Understanding Seeds in the Bible! We Are the Seed of Abraham! Part 10
(Ver 1.3) Today I am writing Part 10 in the series of lessons that I have been doing on the spiritual concepts and laws surrounding God’s designed Seed planting principles. If you have not read this series from the beginning, I would strongly recommend that you start with “Part 1”. If you have been reading this series, then welcome back. When you get a hold of this teaching it will change a lot of what you think and know about God and the Bible. The concepts given in the Bible about seeds cannot be overly simplified because they are vastly complex in how God applies them throughout the Bible. The concepts of seeds are overlapping and run in parallel at the same time. Seeds concepts are truly woven threads in the fabric of God’s truth found throughout the Bible. The subject of seeds is a common theme given to us in every part of the Bible. You can find seeds mentioned in the beginning of Genesis 1 all the way to references to seeds in the last chapter of the Bible in Revelation 22. Seeds are everywhere in the Bible if you know what to look for and if you understand the concepts behind them. You see in Revelation 22:2 God speaks of the “Tree of Life” on each side of the river flowing from the throne of God. These “Trees of Life” produce 12 kinds of fruit. If you recall we learned that Fruit comes from planting seeds, naturally and spiritually. You plant a seed, you get a tree and then it produces the fruit to produce more fruit trees. It is a simple concept, yet so profound. So who are these symbolic fruit trees in Revelation 22? Do you recall reading back in Genesis 2 about the first mention of the Tree of Life? God created a Garden for man. In the garden God placed two trees, named Adam and Eve, I mean the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life. It would appear to me that God’s plan was for man to eat of the Tree of Life and live forever, since this is the way it is described to end up in Revelation 22. So what can we learn here? We learned from the Parable of the Sower that the Word of God was the seed of God. We learned that the hearts of men and women in the world were the soil where seeds are planted. Let’s stop right there and analyze that statement. What is a Garden? A garden is where you plant your seeds to grow your fruit. Genesis 2 describes vast amounts of seed principles being applied by God. We have a symbolic Garden and we have 2 trees that are symbolic of something also. One tree is OK to eat from and one tree is not OK to eat from. Sounds like a good time for making the right decision. Since Adam did not make the right decision we still see that God says I will make the right decision and it will end up the way that I planted it to end up. After all it is my garden and my seed. Are you beginning to see the concepts being given?
When you begin to understand just a little bit about seeds you can begin to see that God is smarter than us all put together. I am a firm believer that God’s stated beginning in Genesis 1 & 2 was a symbolic representation of how He wanted it to end up when our time on this planet is completed. We know that God is the giver of the “Good” Seed. We know that we (the people) are God’s Soil or Garden. That would make God the Ultimate Farmer! Do you understand this?
Jas 5:7 Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.
Here is an amazing verse of scripture that describes God’s Farm System. The Lord God is described as being the “husbandman”. This Greek word translated as husbandman in the KJV Bible means “a worker of land” or literally a “farmer”. We can again see in this verse that Fruit is the desired anticipated outcome of God’s laborious seed planting. God sowed the good seeds to produce the good fruit from the earth. This verse is very symbolic in nature. The “Husbandman” is the Land Owner who Works the Soil to plant His seeds in. We can clearly understand that God owns the Earth, but that is only natural soil. God is not talking about a natural crop of corn in this verse. God is referring to a spiritual crop of fruit. But, realize that seeds do not produce fruit, seeds produce trees that produce fruit. This is a very critical part of the seed principle. This is why I called Adam and Eve trees that had no fruit in Genesis 2 and 3. Adam however, chose the wrong seeds and allowed the wrong fruit to grow, sinned and died. Adam in effect sold his birthright for some wrong fruit to Satan. We (the church) are now the purchased possession of God, by the redemptive price that He has paid with His own blood. Christians have been purchased, redeemed without money the Bible says. So we are God’s gardens that have allowed His Seed into our hearts to grow and produce fruit. We produce the Fruit that God is after. So when you read Revelation 22:2 and see the Trees of Life on each side of the river flowing from the Throne of God, we can understand that we are these trees producing this fruit every month of the year for an eternity to come. That is pretty cool stuff, if you ask me. If you can see it you will think it is pretty amazing also. Only by rightly dividing the Word of God have I come to these conclusions. By letting the Bible interpret itself and by understanding simple spiritual concepts like Seeds, Soil, Gardens, Planting, Sowing, Rain, Watering, Fruit, Reaping and Harvests.
So that was a quick introduction to an overview of how to apply the knowledge that we have gleaned from the Bible subject concerning Seeds. Like I told you before there are over 250 scriptures in the KJV Bible that directly mention the word “seed”. In many modern translations the literal meaning of the word “seed” is translated as offspring, children, or some other word that loses the true meaning that God was trying to get you to see. So while I do not try to tell you what to do, that is why I do not read many translations. They take too many liberties with God’s Word and change it too much. The best translation would be no translation, but since I do not speak Hebrew or Greek, I just look up the words in the dictionary and do the best that I can with God’s help. So the best translation of the Bible is the one that is the most literal and I can’t tell you which one that is, I just know some that they are not. People need to realize that God could have used any word that He wanted to and He picked “Seed” to describe these things we have been talking about. I guess translators think that God is stupid and He did not know the right word to use. Plus I use the KJV version because it is a FREE version of the Bible that is readily available to everyone without charge, limitations or restrictions. Jesus said freely you have received so charge the heck out of everybody and get all that you can. I think that is what some Bible manufacturers think, because this is the way that they act. It is only for the money they think. Oh, well I guess I’ll get off my soap box and keep teaching on the subject of seeds. Let me briefly review two concepts that I have touched on before, but this time using some new scripture verses.
Heb 11:11 Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.
Hebrews chapter 11 is one of the most important chapters in the Bible. But most people do not see what it says. The chapter is dominated by one Subject and that is “Faith”. We can learn that even though God did not reveal “Faith” in the Old Testament, He definitely made it a determining factor to what people received in their life. This chapter goes through many examples of Bible faith and in this verse we are told of Sarah’s faith in God’s Word. Sarah believed that God was faithful because He had promised them a child. Now she was 90 years old when this child came, but yet God was not too late was He? Many times God’s timing is not your timing, but yet we should not question God, just believe that it will happen like He said. In this verse there is the direct mention of “seed”. Sarah was able to “Conceive” Seed. Did you know that this is how that Mary got pregnant with Jesus also? These were examples of conceiving two different types of “seeds”, but yet the end results were both the same. Sarah conceived natural sperm of her husband Abraham’s natural seed. While Mary conceived the “Word of God”, God’s also known as spiritual seed. Both women were required to believe that it would happen like it was told to them. Both women heard the message, before it actually happened to them. Neither woman had any evidence or proof that it would ever happen, did they? There was no proof? This is a pattern of how to receive anything from God. If you want a baby and have not been able to conceive a child, here is your answer. God does not show any favoritism to anyone! God is no respecter of person! What God did for Sarah and for Mary, He will do for you if you choose to believe also.
So I got off the subject of the Seed of Abraham. That is what this lesson was supposed to be about when I started. I guess God wanted to talk to somebody out there and tell them there was hope. before I more on completely I also want to point out that God can exachange one seed type for the other by the lessons of Sarah and Mary. What God has created in the natural can still happen by an equivalent type of substance usage or exchange from the spritual realm. A spiritual seed can replace a natural seed and still give the same result. Let’s move on to an example of this using the seed of Abraham. The Bible clearly tells us that Jesus Christ came into the world as the Seed of Abraham. Let’s prove that statement by reading this verse and see what God reveals:
Heb 2:16 For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.
The Bible is so complex, that it is impossible to teach everything that just one verse says in a short lesson like this. Why would God mention that Jesus was not born or created as an angel? That is a much more complex subject that I guess I shouldn’t have mentioned because I cannot talk about it in this lesson. It only gives you something new to think about. Learn to ask God questions when you read the Bible and you just may be amazed when He shows you the answers. So Jesus was not an angel, just load that basic fact into your mind for a future reference to a new unkown question. However, Jesus was born the “Seed of Abraham”. We need to review the basic seed concepts again that we have previously learned that should be firmly established in you by now. We learned that a man is a physical being that has “Seed” within himself. I showed you several times now that when Abraham paid tithe, his future descendant Levi was reported to have also paid the tithe at the same time. This was because the physical future seed Levi was in his great grandfather Abraham. If you do not recall this you should go back and review the earlier lessons, because this is a very critical piece of spiritual information to fully grasp. The principle revealed to us in this lesson was that every natural descendant of Abraham did exactly what Abraham did because they came from Abraham’s physical seed. Now that would be really good information if you were a natural seed of Abraham and I’ll tell you why soon. What about the rest of us on earth? We were called Gentiles by the laws of flesh in the world that were not born from natural seed of Abraham? Are we all left out because we were not born from the natural seed of Abraham? We will find out as we continue.
Keep in mind that the Bible is so much more complex than you give it credit to be. Also keep in mind that God is smarter than you and I are. His ways are not your natural ways, so it makes it very difficult for us to grasp these very spiritual things being taught to us. Let’s turn to Galatians and learn something brand new about seeds:
Gal 3:19 Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator.
You can see that this is a verse with wide seed applications attached to it. We talked earlier about that the word seed can either be singular or plural and you really have a very difficult time in determining which one it is by only reading on the surface. The word in this context is clearly singular. Jesus Christ is again called the Seed of Abraham as we can see. This verse tells us clearly of all the natural seeds that were “IN” Abraham, only one of them carried the hope of the promise that was given to Abraham. This was a very literal one in some several millions of future natural seeds, type of prophecy. God singles out and separates “One Seed” to be the “Chosen Seed”. We know that this Seed was God Himself. Knowing this now doesn’t sound very good for all the other natural seeds that came from Abraham. Can you see how the Bible presents us with puzzles and paradoxical predicaments? We read in one place that being a seed of Abraham seems to be a good thing, but now we read that only one of the seeds actually carried the promise. Wow are things getting complicated or what?
Gal 3:18 For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise: but God gave it to Abraham by promise.
Let’s back up one verse in Galatians and see some of the context of what is being discussed around this subject of the “Chosen Seed”. I’ll try to stay on subject, according to what we just read in verse 19, we are talking about the Seed called Jesus Christ who we can see in this verse was promised the inheritance. So the inheritance was not promised to every seed, just the One! That is a pretty complex thing to think about and it can become a point of confusion, if we are not careful. What is an inheritance? Do you understand this concept? Have you ever seen or been to a lawyer’s office who reads someone’s last will and testament? Someone had to die in order for there to be an inheritance available to anyone. Do you understand this? This will certainly get more complicated than you can imagine when I tell you who died. Who died to leave an inheritance to the Chosen Seed? If you guessed that the Chosen Seed died you would actually be right! God gave Himself to be the sacrifice for man’s sin. God became the Chosen Seed of Abraham. This Seed died and was planted into the natural ground for 3 days and rose up spiritually alive again forever. God is the only one that I know of that is capable of experiencing death and then coming back to life to inherit that which He had left as an inheritance. I don’t know if you understand these concepts or not, but I know they are staggeringly powerful spiritual laws in action. Do you see how God used seed concepts and laws in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ?
What does all of this have to do with you and I? How does it affect us personally in the church? How do I apply seed information to me if I am not a natural seed of Abraham? I think that is what interests many people, what is the bottom line for me today? That is where I want to get to now. If you are a true Christian, a born again believer in Christ, then it has everything to do with you.
Gal 3:22 But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.
As you can see in this following verse of Galatians 3, the promise was by the faith of Jesus Christ that it might be given to us who believe. Do you see why I included the scripture about Sarah? Do you see how she was given a promise by God and trough her faith in His promised words, she conceived seed? God has implemented a system within Christianity that is based totally and completely upon faith and seeds. Let’s look at Faith in the terms of “Seed” concepts briefly. If you went to your garden and planted some seeds in it, did you have any faith when you plant your seeds? Do you believe that what you are doing is going to result in anything good in the future? You see if you did not have any faith in these seeds you would not have planted any of them in the first place. A seed is not a magic potion; you do not plant them and poof there they are like some magic bean stalk! Faith is never a Jack in the Bean stalk reality or fantasy. It always takes time and care to develop and produce that which was planted. So farming is a faith lesson. God planted a seed and expected a harvest. That is the definition of what faith is in a nutshell; believing in a harvest by only planting seeds in the ground. Remember that natural seeds are invisible substances when placed in the ground. You see nothing for many days and only believe they are there by faith.
Are you a believer today? Then you believe in God’s Seed principles. Even though you have never seen Jesus personally, you believe that He is faithful who has promised. The Bible says “Why stare ye into heaven? This same Jesus that you saw go up into heaven, will come back down in the same way” (Acts 1:11). Believing only in the words of angels written down in a book with no basis of proof and no physical evidence that you can take to court, that is what faith is. God’s Word is the Seed, remember? If you believe God’s Word it will conceive in your spirit the same as it did for Mary. No, you won’t have a virgin birth, God did not promise you that, but you can go into the Bible and see what He did Promise you and believe for that.
Gal 3:7 Know ye therefore that they which are of faith, the same are the children of Abraham.
This verse near the beginning of Galatians 3 makes a declaration that is not widely understood. As you can see this verse is addressed to the Church of Jesus Christ. How can a widely Gentile congregation of people be called the children of Abraham? If you look up the definition of the words, it actually calls Abraham our “father”. I thought God was our Father? Here is another perplexing puzzle given to us in the Bible. You see there is NO WAY that I am a natural descendant of Abraham. I was not born of the natural nation of Israel. But, yet God still calls Abraham my father. People obviously just ignore verses like these in the Bible, I guess? Since I am not a natural child of Abraham that only leaves me to be a spiritual child of Abraham. Do you understand this logic? There are only two realms of existence and these are the created natural realm and the original spiritual realm. If you are a living born again Christian on this earth you exist within both of these realms simultaneously. If you are not a Christian you only exist in the physical realm until you die physically. If you look at the context of this verse you can see that Abraham was justified by faith. Abraham believed God, Galatians 3:6 says to us. So this means that we have also been justified by the same faith that Abraham possessed. Not just believing in God, but believing God came to the earth personally and died for your sins and was raised from the dead. This is faith in God’s personal accomplished works and His Words.
Gal 3:14 That the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.
You should make a valid attempt at understanding every verse in this chapter of Galatians. It describes who you are and reveals how you became what you are in very clear in-depth terminology. Let’s start by realizing that Abraham was extremely blessed by God. The natural descendants of Abraham have always been extremely blessed by God. The natural nation of Israel has controlled vast amounts of the world’s wealth ever since they left Egypt and took all they could carry. But, this verse says that the blessings of Abraham should come upon us, the Gentiles. How did this occur? It could only occur by you getting born again by your faith in Jesus Christ. Now that makes you of the same faith as your father Abraham. Again we see a principle of the seed within itself concept being given. Whatever our father spiritual Abraham did, that is also what we who believe God have done. Faith is a spiritual force of the human spirit. So you cannot see Abraham’s faith unless he does something to demonstrate his faith to us. When the lame man was brought to Jesus at the house where they tore the roof up to lower him to Jesus, the Bible says that Jesus could see their faith. So faith can be seen depending upon what people do. So what did our father Abraham do to demonstrate his faith? If you recall you might remember that God changed his name. When God changed his name from Abram to Abraham, Abram could have said that is not who I am and refused to go along with it. The name Abraham means “father of nations”. So by Abraham going around saying his name he confirmed that he was the father of nations even without having the promised child yet. This is another faith lesson that is an excellent story to show you how God works with people. But, this verse also says that the promise to Abraham was for us to receive the Spirit of God by this same faith. I honestly do not know how to explain that verse of scripture, so I just accept it by faith for now and trust the Lord God to reveal it to me later. Let’s skip down to the end of the chapter and see the last verse to wrap this lesson up:
Gal 3:29 And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
This chapter of Galatians ends with another seed concept and statement. If you are Christ’s, meaning that you belong to Him, then you are Abraham’s seed and heirs according to the promise. We again see a reference to the promise of God made to Abraham and to his seed. God promised the Seed of Abraham that He would be the heir. This seed was Jesus Christ. But, now it calls us this same seed at the same time. Since you and I are not Jesus how do we explain what this verse says? That is a very strong question that many people do not fully try to comprehend how that we in the church have become an equal heir with Christ. God again exhibits His extreme intelligence in how He designed these things to work. We are joint heirs with Christ by marriage covenant. The church is the Bride of Christ and if you do not understand this, you should read the series of lessons that I did on this subject. By being joined to Him by marriage covenant we have become one with Him. The law of Genesis says that the two shall be even as one! We have just seen another paradox being presented to us. We have one body or seed but two heirs. We can only resolve this paradox by studying how Eve came from the one body of Adam to make two. So the Bible is complex I know and you may struggle with many of the things that I teach. I hope and pray that you at least go and read all of these verses in your Bible and look up the definitions and meanings of every word you can find and see for yourself if they are true or not. Do not ever take my word for anything, I am a man that makes mistakes, I am capable of failing since I am an imperfect growing Christian just like you are. So the bottom line of today’s lesson was the Church was called the Seed of Abraham. Did you know you were a seed? I bet you are beginning to see that you are a seed in more ways than one. I apologize for covering too much in one lesson and making it so long today. God Bless You, until next time.
If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons on “seeds” you can go to “Part 11“.
Understanding Seeds in the Bible! How are Spiritual Babies Conceived? Part 9
(Ver 1.4) I have been doing a series of Bible lessons on the significance of understanding how Seeds work. Only by understanding how natural seeds work, can we really ever focus on how spiritual things operate. God gave us the natural things in our world to teach us about the unseen spiritual things using the wisdom of His intelligent design. Using many Bible verses and the Seed laws from Genesis 1 I have explored several subjects applying the knowledge of seeds to other scriptures in the New Testament. We have discovered that the Bible says there are multiple things that are all referred to by the title of a “seed”. This is just one of God’s techniques of concealing the truth in plain sight. God calls many things by the same name, title or description. This makes it more difficult for the reader to determine what type of seed He is talking about. From our study we have seen that there are natural seeds, like fruit seeds or grass seeds mentioned in the Bible. We have seen children called seeds all over the Bible. We have seen the male sperm called his seed. We have seen spiritual spiritual things like God’s Word being labeled as the seeds that are spread by teachers in the spiritual soil of man’s heart. We have discovered that there exists two types of seeds in the Bible; one is the Good Seed and other is called the Bad or Evil Seed. By pattern association we can conlude these can be representative of the good words from God versus evil words from Satan. The Good seed was always sown by God exclusively and the evil seed was always sown by his enemy Satan. These are such important concepts to fully grasp. If you have not been reading this series from the beginning you should stop and go back to start reading with “Part 1” first. If you haven’t read from the beginning you have just missed more than I can possibly teach you in my simple introduction.
Today I want to discuss the previous seed concepts and seed laws in more detail to apply them to how a person becomes a Christian. I have alluded to this subject before in other lessons, but I will address it more completely today filling in some gaps. We have already seen that Jesus told us that the most important parable to fully understand is the Parable of the Sower. From this parable we should now know that God’s Word was the seed that the sower was spreading. We also learned that the soil in this parable was always the hearts or spirits of the men and women in the world. There were 6 revealed types of soil presented to us in this parable; 3 types of soil did not produce spiritual fruit and 3 types of soil did produce spiritual fruit in varying degrees of multiplication. This parable demonstrates Salvation to us very clearly and fully describes how you became a Christian. Those that hear the Word of God and allow other factors (spirits, natural attartions, etc) over rule their decision to be a Christian are those that were not saved. Those that hear the Word of God, understand it and choose to believe it, they are the ones that are saved and born again. All of this is really not that complex to me but I guess many people have not understood it and therefore do not apply it to the subject of how people become Christians.
So based upon the intimate knowledge of this parable of the sower, it would appear to me that the more Word of God we know the more fruitful we will become. Conversely the less you know about God’s Word seals your fate to hell. You do understand this don’t you? Jesus teaching the parable of the sower was Jesus spreading the Word of God to the entire world. Every man, woman and child born from Adam represents the symbolic soil that is responsible to allow or permit God’s seed to be planted. It is much more the human rejection of the Word of God (the Seed) from the soil (the spirit) that causes people to go to hell than anything else that they will ever do. People like to think that sin is the key factor for going to hell, but this is simly not the case based upon the Word of God. The Bible says that everyone has sinned and come short of the glory of God (Rom 3:22). If everyone is a sinner there must be another factor for who is saved and who is not and it basically boils down to what type of soil we each choose to be. Do you realize that only you make the choices in your own life and for your life? I can’t do it for you, your wife can’t do it for you, your mother can’t do it for you and even God can’t and will not do it for you either. Do you also know that you have a spiritual enemy that is helping you to make the wrong choices? Only by studying the Bible can we better recognize the devices, plans and traps of this spiritual enemy. Only by continuing to study in the Bible are you able to grow and mature to being the overcomer that God has designed you to be. God is expecting to come back for a victorious church and not a defeated church.
So the Parable of the Sower gives us the basic overview for the whole plan of God for our Salvation. Jesus told us to “Go into all of the world and Preach the Gospel AKA the Word of God” (Mk 16:15). By preaching the Word of God you are sowing the Seed of the Word of God into the hearts of more people who can choose to let it grow. This is salvation or damnation in action. The soil decides its outcome and what kind of fruit that it produces. Let’s look at this in action in the Bible:
1Co 3:6 I have planted , Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.
The Apostle Paul is writing to the church at Corinth and to you and I. Paul says that He has planted. So what does it mean to plant something? What was planted? As you can clearly see these are seed concepts that are repeated for us. Maybe you do not understand these concepts fully because you have never planted a natural garden in your back yard, but I have. You always start the process by putting seeds in the soil and you then conintue the process by watering the soil and they grow over time into something that you desired to have. If you look back at the previous verse you will see that Paul and Apollos were “ministers”. A minister is anyone that sows God’s Word by God’s design. If you hear someone speak in church that is not teaching from the Bible they are not a minister of God. If you go to a church and the speaker is teaching from a Reader’s Digest you need to find another church that works like God said it should. Paul sowed only from the Word of God to the people in Corinth and they believed it. Then there came along another preacher named Apollos and he watered the seed that was in the hearts/spirits of the people with more of the Word of God and this helped the seed to continue to grow. But, it says that it was God that gave the increase. In other words God caused His Word to Grow! Therefore only God gets any glory in the salvation of any man. Do you understand that no farmer can take credit for what is grown in his field? Does the farmer understand how corn is produced from seed? Did the farmer create the seed that produces the corn crop? I think you can see that he did not. Neither a farmer or a minister created the seed they are sowing or invented the growth process that takes place, only God did this. They just plant the seeds, water them and watch them grow like it was magic. However, this is just the designed seed process from God using His created Seed. This is a really amazing concept of how the spiritual New Birth process works. It is a partnership effort with God working through men and women who preach to spread the Seed of the Word of God. So the man that is planting the seed is not that important, it is only the word of God being planted that is the critically important part of the process. It is really a paradox and a puzzle, without men and women sowing the word of God no one would ever be saved. However, without the Word of God no one is saved either. If you are sowing seeds of Buddhism no one will be saved no matter how much you teach on it. If you are sowing the seeds of Islam you are sowing words that never produce salvation. If you are sowing the words of Judaism you are also not going to be saved. It is not very good news for any world religion out there; God made only One Way into the Kingdom of Heaven and that was through His Son Jesus Christ. So do not throw stones at me, I’m just a farm messenger. I did not write the Bible!
1Pe 1:23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
So I think I have given this verse before in another lesson on seeds, but it bears repeating for our current discussion on how people are born again. The fact that we have been “Born Again” is attributable to us receiving the incorruptible Seed of the Word of God into our spirits. There are two terms given to us by God in this verse that are critical to understand. These are “Corruptible” vs. “Incorruptible”. The term corruptible means able to “decay” and you can state this to be equivalent to a man’s mortal body. The natural realm is a temporary realm of decaying particles. The laws of thermodynamics dictate that everything around us is decaying and not reorganizing like evolutionists like to believe. If you build a new car today and never drive it; it will become a pile of rusted metal in the course of time. The opposite of mortal is immortal. We have been born again from an immortal seed. You may recall that Jesus said “heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away” (Mat 24:35). So the Word of God is immortal, and not capable of being eliminated. The Word of God is the incorruptible SEED that causes us to be born again spiritually.
Corruptible seed can be viewed as either a physical or a spiritual type of seed. The sperm of a man is a corruptible natural seed. But also the spiritual words (seeds) of Satan are also considered to be corruptible towards the human spirit. Jesus never says that the words of your enemy Satan will stand forever. So every false teaching and false religion will be eliminated someday. So we now have a dilemma of sorts of how to discuss natural things so that we do not offend anyone by comparing them to spiritual things. You see if being Born Again is s comparable pattern to being born in the natural the first time, then how are natural babies conceived? You can begin to see my difficulty, can’t you? God created sex for a reason and it wasn’t just to make you feel good. Sex is a part of the reproductive pattern of new life on our planet. So sex must be related to new spiritual life also. So how does natural sex relate to the spiritual New Birth? That is where we are today in this discussion. Get ready for a new concept that you may have never though of:
Gen 4:1 And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD.
We are informed that Adam “knew” his wife Eve and she conceived his physical seed. This is God’s definition of natural sex in the Bible. By the law of first mention, God again gives us the definition of what it means to conceive revealed in terms of spiritual information and descriptions. God could have described this act differently, but He specifically chose this Hebew word translated as “knew”. The definition of this word is therefore very critical for us to understand in order to see how it applies to spiritual things like being born again. The Hebrew Word translated as “knew” means “to ascertain by seeing”. This is truly complex because men are visual types of people, they like to see. Women are not visual people and they do not want to see anything generally speaking. There is a widely used term for natural sex that is called “carnal knowledge” and this phrase is more in the line with the spiritual realm information that we need to apply correctly instead of thinking of the human term “intercourse”. We need to correctly transfer God’s definition of sex as “knowling” into the spiritual New Birth process. We should be able to see using our knowledge of the Parable of the Sower that in order for any human to be born again, they must have “spiritual knowledge” with the Lord God’s Word (Seed). This is not sex as you are thinking right now is it? However it is still spiritual sex according God’s definition of the act. The human ability to “see spiritually” God’s Words causes them to conceive it. However don’t forget there still exists an enemy to that salvation process trying to steal the seed from being sown. The success or failure of the salvation seed process is completely dependent upon the fact that some people understand the Word of God and some people do not. This enemy’s method of causing some people not to understand is revealed more clearly in the New Testament scripture that says “the god of this world has blinded the minds of them that believe not” (2 Cor 4:4). You see spiritual blindness is the inability to see or literally understand spiritual things. If you recall in the parable of the sower, Satan came immediately to steal the Word of God that was sown in their heart and he was able to do this only because they did not understand it (Mat 13:19). Therefore, spiritual eyesight is the key to having spiritual knowledge and understanding. I could talk a lot more about that part of the subject, but I’m running long in this lesson. I do pray that you are following me on these points and beginning to understand how people are born again. Let me end this lesson with one more verse from Paul:
Gal 4:19 My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you,
So here we have another very difficult complex deep scripture to try to swim through. The apostle Paul is not a natural female yet he speaks in the terms of being a spiritual female. Can you see this? Only females give birth, yes? According to what I have seen in the Bible God created only females to give birth. So what exactly is Paul talking about? Paul is saying I have spread God’s seed into your hearts by teaching God’s Word to you and I am now waiting for Christ to be formed in you as a result. What is the key to this spiritual birth happening? It was the spiritual ability to see or the “spiritual knowledge” of the person who heard the word of God that will determine whether they will conceive Christ and be born again. Paul can sow all of the seed he wants to, but none of it will grow unless the soil of the hearer allows it to stay by understanding what was said. You can easily see how that you can read verses in the Bible and totally miss what is said, can’t you? You can also see that there is an implied reality that Paul is a part of a spiritual woman, called the Bride of Christ. So the complexity of the Bible is so great that it causes many people to stumble. People will never see the spiritual truth of God’s Word trying to figure it out using only their natural minds. What we can see is that Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus was not the be all and end all for his Christian experience. He was now responsible for getting more people born again by sowing the incorruptible seed of the Word of God. Getting more people Born Again of the Incorruptible Seed, that is the goal of every Christian. This is the expansion of the new spiritual family of God and the multiplication of the Spiritual Seed of God by sowing the Incorruptible Seed into new soil. Today’s lesson has been some of the basic Bible ideas of how people are born again using the laws and concepts surrounding Seeds in the Bible. I know I did not cover everything that I could have, I know I left out many verses that could have been included, but I did the best that I could in a limited time and space forum. God Bless you to see and to understand His Word! Thank you for your time in studying the Bible.
If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons on seeds you can go to “Part 10“.
Where DO BABIES Come From? Dealing With A Religious Spirit! Part 3
(Ver 1.1) This is Part 3 and followup to a previous lesson on the subject of “Salvation” and “Where do Spiritual Babies Come From?” If you have not read the series from the beginning I would recommend that you go back and start your reading from “Part 1“. Some people are more interested in arguing with you than they are about learning and seeing the truth in the Bible. These are people used by the devil to distract you and take your time from you. I recently had a commenter that clearly knows more than God Himself come to me to give me his opinions on everything. In his mind he has exalted himself to be the only authority of the truth in the Bible. He never says anything positive, and only criticizes and tells you all of the places where you are wrong. What a prideful arrogant attitude of mindless boastings. These are EMPTY WORDS from EMPTY HEADS. I tried to be nice just to get him to see another perspective. But obviously his vast knowledge must not allow him to be a blessing to others. He acts as the Judge Jury and Executioner and makes Himself God! His knowledge must go way beyond the capacity for any simple minded men like me to understand. So I guess I’m just going to have to be a little more direct today in my final response to his religious arrogance. Hopefully if he doesn’t want to know the truth, he will go away and read somebody else’s blog that will agrees with what he wants to see in the Bible. I am not changing to fit the ideas of a fool. God has taught me too much in the Bible for me to go away and follow the leadings of false teachers. I have learned from Jesus that He only confronted one type of person in the Bible when he was here personally on the earth and that was a religious person who thought they knew it all. If you do not understand this you should go and read the gospels again and see what Jesus said and did. You might think that I have been too confrontational with this man for a web site devoted to spreading the Love of God (Agape). However, Jesus looked at the Pharisees and called them a “generation of vipers” (Mat 23:33). Jesus said “You are of your father the Devil!” (John 8:44) Jesus did not mix words up and I will follow His example today of loving those who want to be loved and those who think too highly of themselves, well you can already see what I think of them.
In my first lesson on this subject I discussed the “New Birth” process as being a parallel to the “Physical Birth” process. If you know when the physical birth takes place, you can also know when the spiritual birth takes place by God’s design. What you must realize is that this is a “limited knowing” being described to us and that is what I will discuss today. None of this that I wrote obviously helped the man that wants to argue because he says that I did not address his scripture of John 3:7-8 which he claims is the answer to Nicodemus’ question of how a man is born again. I left this verse out because it had nothing to do with how a man is born again but he thinks that I am just being ignorant and wrong. For some reason this man wants to ignore everything that I have just said in the last lesson for something that he thinks is so important that this verse in John 3:8 says. He just could not understand why I intentionally left it out of my discussion. Oh well? I guess that I have just not learned how to teach everything found in the Bible in ONE LESSON! I guess some people want you to teach everything you know in a single sessioon and there is just no way that anyone can do that. I bet you this guy would criticize Jesus for the way He taught. I do not recall Jesus ever trying to teach everything He knew in any one lesson. I left John 3:8 out because it was really not that important to the subject being discussed about the New Birth. But, I will spend some time today to explain it and why I left it out. I doubt very seriously if any of this will help him, but there will be someone out there that will be able to use it. Most of the times religious people are too closed minded to see the truth, they are just too narrowly focused in on what they want to see as being important and you cannot help them no matter what you try to say. This is why this is my last response to this commenter about the subject of salvation. So here we go with the verses he thinks are so critical for us to understand:
Joh 3:7 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.
If you recall in verse 6, Jesus taught us that those who are born of flesh are flesh but those who are born of the spirit are spirit. Meaning there is a major distinction between these two types of births. One is totally natural and one is completely spiritual. One you can see and one you cannot see. However both are still called “births”. Get it? This is just not that hard to understand. Now in verse 7 Jesus says to Nicodemus not to be shocked that He said that you must be born again in order to enter into the Kingdom of God. Jesus is saying to Nicodemus don’t try to wrap your natural mind around this spiritual birth truth, you are not going to be able to grasp it right now! The Bible says the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God! (1 Cor 2:14) So how can I discuss spiritual things with a man who does not even understand natural things. It is probably just impossible!
Joh 3:8 The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit.
So I do not see this verse to be that highly controversial, but yet my commenter obviously changes it to say something that it clearly does not say. Isn’t that interesting how the Bible is written that way. God always allows you to be wrong. So what exactly is Jesus talking about here in this verse? What is the intended purpose for this statement? 
We can clearly see that Jesus is talking about the natural “wind” in the first part of this verse. What does the natural wind have to do with spiritual things? What is the point that Jesus is attempting to make? What I can see in this verse is the fact that here in the natural, no man can explain the wind. They do not know where it comes from, they do not know where it is going and they do not know how it got started in the first place. It could have been a butterfly in Africa flapping his wings that causes the breezes in Australia for all we know. There are jet streams in the upper atmosphere, wind patterns, pressures zones and vairous factors that determine our weather. I mean the weather man on TV gives you his best guess at what he thinks will happen tomorrow but this is not always very dependable. I assume that this is what my commenter is so focused in on. He thinks that because Jesus is comparing the wind to the spiritual birth birth process and since we do not understand the wind, we cannot understand the spiritual birth either. I assume this is where his natural mind is at? This would be a typical wrong interpretation for this verse by a carnally thinking man. Since I try to think spiritually this is not the way that I interpret this verse. All you have to do is use your brain just a little bit to see a new and different perspective on the subject. Quit trying to interpret the Bible in the dark! Stop ignoring the rest of the Bible by focusing in on just one verse in complete isolation. The Bible will always interpret itself, so God gives us the meaning of this verse in the other parts of the Bible if you want to look for them. You must change your perspective to see things spiritually. What Jesus is talking about here in John 3:8 is that to the outside natural observer, they cannot see an internal spiritual birth take place with their physical eyes. Just like you cannot see the wind blow, you cannot observe when someone is actually saved from a natural point of view. Jesus is linking the natural wind process to the spiritual birth process of a man as both being unseen events. The wind is a natural thing that we cannot see, like the spiritual birth is something that we cannot see. We are always required by God to take spiritual events by faith only. Here are the Words of Jesus again on the exact same subject in a different book of the Bible, but notice what He says here:
Luk 17:20 And when he was demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, he answered them and said, The kingdom of God cometh not with observation:
Here the religious Pharisees ask Jesus a direct question about the when is the Kingdom of God coming to the earth? They said “When will this happen?” Didn’t they? Isn’t this what my religious commenter was trying to ask me? This is a clear example of naturally minded men thinking only of physical things and asking Jesus a purely spiritual question. Is Jesus going to answer their question naturally or is Jesus going to answer their question with a right spiritual answer in His mind from His point of view? Jesus takes a natural question from natural men and gives them a spiritual answer. However, notice that instead of telling you that you can’t understand the new birth, Jesus says you can’t see when this New Birth happens. We are still talking about the coming into the Kingdom of God? Yes? Jesus clearly answer that the Kingdom of God comes without observation of any man! No natural man will ever be able to see the Kingdom of God. But, yet it is still here inside of me right now. They do not observe it coming into the life of any man, they do not perceive when it occurs and they do not understand why they have changed. Only the spiritual realm can see it when it happens, God sees it when it happens, the angels can see it happen, Satan can see when it happens, but us in this world live in the natural realm and we are dominated by our 5 physical senses. So I assume that because my commenter cannot observe this spiritual birth act of God taking place he does not believe that it has taken place? That is pretty ignorant! If you want to observe something in the natural to prove it has happened in the spiritual realm you will never experience it. The Bible says that the JUST shall live by FAITH and NOT by what they SEE, TOUCH, TASTE, HEAR, SMELL!
Luk 17:21 Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.
Jesus continues His explanation of the Spiritual NEW Birth by saying no one will be able to say here is the Kingdom of God or there goes the Kingdom of God, because the Kingdom of God is WITHIN YOU! This is an internal SPIRITUAL KINGDOM, a SPIRITUAL BIRTH from the Spirit of God that only occurs on the inside of a person within the unseen spirit realm. That is why you cannot see it come or go. You have never seen your spirit! You have never seen God’s Spirit. You probably have never seen a spiritual angel. You have never seen Satan. However, all of these spiritual beings exist in the unseen spiritual realm. You cannot observe the spiritual birth outwardly no matter how you try to do it. If you want to observe something before you believe it Heaven help you to see the truth. This is the reason that Jesus compared the Spiritual Birth process to the natural wind on our planet. It wasn’t because we can’t understand it, it was simply because an outside observer can’t see it happening. Just because I cannot see you being born again, does not mean that you after being born again cannot know when it happened. This is also true of you not being able to see me being born again and that does not prove that I will not know that I am born again. People cannot mix scriptures up to make them say what they do not say. There is a major difference in me seeing you get saved verses you knowing that you are saved. Just because YOU cannot observe the fact that I was saved does not discount the fact that I KNOW that I am saved! Do you understand this? Can’t you see that this was Jesus’ main point in His statement of John 3:8? The verse in John 3:8 has nothing to do with how people are Born Again but has everything to do with whether anyone else in the natural realm can see it happen. Obviously you will see what you want to see so that is all I can do to help you. God can’t make you see the truth and I can’t make you see it either.
God wants to help people and that is the only reason that I responded to this man’s ignorant comments. However, neither God nor I can help anyone who does not want any help. He is the one that is trying to get me to change. But, ignorance becomes way too obvious once you have been exposed to the truth. I have not named any names to who this individual is, so as to protect his identity. I have also deleted his comments from my site so that you cannot find him either. This will give him an opportunity to do the right thing and remain anonymous. I have found that religious people just want to challenge your faith with there erroneous ways and for you to buy into their wrong beliefs, because only they see themselves to be so right. They neither know God or have the love of God in them so they do not know how to be nice to others. What this man needs to do is to get saved, born again and he will then be able to understand spiritual things. God says that the “carnal mind” is an enemy to the Spirit of God (Rom 8:7). So no matter how much I would like to help this man, only his mind is responsible for what he lets into his heart. My Bible says that the god of this world has blinded the minds of them that believe wrong so that they cannot perceive the truth of God! (2 Cor 4:4) So to all of those out there who read my blogs and can see spiritual things, please forgive me for trying to help someone who hasn’t seen. To my ignorant commenter, I will not respond to any more of your critical comments so DO NOT LEAVE THEM! I will not accept any more of your comments either. Perhaps you can unsubscribe to my blog so that you are not bothered with the truth any more. This will allow you to walk in your ignorance and be happy. So if I haven’t offended you enough by now I’m going to leave my response with this cartoon lesson because it seems to be more at your current spiritual level of understanding. Learn the lesson of Thumper in the Disney Movie Bambi, whose mother told him “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all!” If I wasn’t having to deal with such a religious spirited person I would not have had to be so blunt! I pray that you see the truth before Jesus comes back very soon.
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If you want to know how to get saved and know that you are with confidence you can go to: How do I get saved?
Understanding Seeds in the Bible! If You Abide IN ME and My Words Abide IN YOU! Part 8
(Ver 1.2) This is now Part 8 of a series of lessons on the concepts and laws surrounding seeds found in the Bible. The Seed is a natural divinely inspired design principle revealed in creation that demonstrates vast complex spiritual revelation. In the previous lessons I taught on the laws surrounding seeds and demonstrated some of their applications given to us in the New Testament. Today I will be doing another one of those lessons about seed applications using the New Testament. If you have not been reading this series from the beginning I would highly recommend that you go back and start reading with “Part 1”. Only by following the series from the beginning will you have much of a chance at understanding what is being taught. Let me review briefly the Major Seed Laws from Genesis 1 that we have already covered:
- Fruit with Seed within Itself!
- Every Seed produces after its Kind!
- Seeds Produce Trees that Produce More Fruit!
- You Always Harvest more than You Sow! Seed Multiplication.
Seed concepts are not widely known in modern America. Very few people plant gardens and grow their own fruit, vegetables and crops. The farm concept was a widely known principle in early Bible days. This is one of the key reasons Jesus taught using these principles so often in the parable lessons that he gave us. In Jesus’ days on earth, if you wanted to eat you better grow it. Today modern children just think everything is magic that appears at the grocery store or at the market and they probably do not even have a clue how it is produced. As a result of this they have lost the essential concepts and laws of planting seeds and getting harvests. To lose sight of these concepts is to lose sight of God’s designed ways. The Seed concept is still a vital part of the End Time Plan of God. God has never lost sight of what seeds are and how seeds work. That is one of the key reasons I have spent this amount of time on this subject. I believe it to be absolutely critical to understand how God works in the spiritual realm and since we do not have any personal experiences in this realm we must rely on the natural realm that God created as a pattern of information for the unseen spiritual realm. Of course you do not interpret nature, you interpret the Word of God, using the Word of God to define the things that you find in nature and this is the key to seeing these Bible truths and hidden spiritual things.
Today I am going to expand on the topic of the “Seed within Itself” Law of Genesis 1 using some fresh New Testament verses. In earlier blogs on this subject we discussed how that Levi had paid tithes in Abraham, because he was a seed of Abraham (Heb. 7:9). Levi was a future descendant of Abraham, yet God counted what Abraham did as applying to what Levi had done. This is one of the most profound truths in the Bible that I have ever seen, yet I have not heard hardly anyone teach on it. The concepts behind this teaching are far reaching and apply to many things in the spiritual realm. Today I am going to give you an example of these concepts. Let’s start the lesson with a verse found in Galatians:
Gal 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.
There are verses like this one in the Bible that will totally confuse you unless you understand the Seed Laws and apply them correctly. How can Paul have been crucified with Christ, when he was not even there physically with him? I hope that you are beginning to see how this is possible. Paul was not there physically, but he was there spiritually as a future spiritual seed of God. If natural children are natural seeds in the Bible, then spiritual children are also seeds, but of a spiritual kind. Remember everything produces after its own kind. Jesus was called the Seed of Abraham and the Seed of David in the Bible. Paul was calling himself a seed of Christ Jesus. Whatever happened to Jesus is what happened to US who are born again. Since the spiritual birth is a spiritual process that is patterned after the natural birth process we can very easily begin to see that Paul considered himself to be a spiritual descendant of Jesus. Paul looked at Jesus as being his spiritual father. Paul looked to Jesus as being the head of a new spiritual family of God as you and I are also in this family. Here is another verse that use to boggle people’s mind:
Eph 2:6 And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus:
As you can see this verse says that we have been raised from the dead with Christ and that we now sit with Him in heaven. Have you ever been to heaven? If you have then you probably died or saw a spiritual vision of heaven. No, again we see the application of the “Seed within Itself” Law being applied to us in the spiritual realm. Whatever our father Jesus accomplished we accomplished because we were “IN HIM” when He did them. Wow, that is so awesome! That is just a totally RADICAL concept to try to wrap your mind around, isn’t it? Everything that Jesus did, we did if you are born again! This is why in the New Testament you can search and find so many verses in the Bible that describe how we are IN CHRIST, IN HIM, IN WHOM. By finding out what Christ did, you find out what you DID!
1Co 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
There are just too many scriptures in the Bible that repeat the “Seed within itself principle for me to give you them all. I think I gave you this one before, but it is so good that I will briefly go over it again. Because the human race was “IN” Adam all must die. Adam’s death passed death to every one of His Seeds. This is the natural picture of the seed within itself concept being described to us very clearly. Then there is a spiritual contrasting truth that is now revealed to us that Jesus who is the Last Adam and that He is the spiritual procreator of a new people that will live. Because Jesus was raised from the DEAD, we have been raised from the dead because we were IN HIM! As in Adam all died, so those IN Christ will all live. You better make sure that you are IN Christ if you want to live spiritually in God’s family!
2Co 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
Being IN Christ is essential to understanding your position today in the spiritual realm. Those who are spiritually born again have become a NEW CREATION of Almighty God. This means that we are something that never existed before. Adam had a spirit within his body, but did not have the Spirit of God in union with his spirit. You can see in this verse that translators have added 3 words that are not in the Greek. If you take these out, they basically say the same thing, but review it without these words:
2Co 5:17 Therefore if any man in Christ a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.
You can see a subtle difference now. The fact that we are IN Christ has not changed but only because we are IN Christ makes us a new Creature with Christ! God the Almighty Creator became a part of His creation by His designed purpose. I could try to elaborate why this was necessary but I might just cloud the current subject with too much extraneous information, so I’ll pass by that for now. What I want you to focus on is the fact that a man is now IN Christ and that is what also makes him able to participate as being a New Creature!
2Co 5:19 To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
Now we can see why Jesus Christ was so different and why Satan did not know what to do with this man. Jesus was born a human male that had the Spirit of God within His Body. This is the SEED within Itself Concept being repeated. God provided Himself the Seed for our reconciliation. These seed concepts are so important for you to understand. It truly helps you to see what was accomplished by God and how He did them. God was IN Christ; the church was IN Christ so we are now IN God. Christ IN Us, the hope of Glory! Now the reverse concept is also applicable in the New Testament Bible. You can see that not only are we IN Christ, but Christ must also be IN us! It is a two way seed street reality. How do you get Christ in YOU?
Joh 15:4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it Abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye Abide in me.
More seed concepts are given in this verse statement of Jesus Christ. You can see the concept of fruit being given. Fruit is the end result that God is looking for in the lifes of every Christian. This fruit will always contain seed to produce more fruit. This is again the seed within itself concept. But we can also see the two way street that I just referred to and how that this works. While the SEED of God is in us, we are in the VINE of God. The VINE represents Christ and we are in Him. We the church, are the branches that produce the fruit as long as we abide in Him, Christ the Vine! But, we the church are also the ones that have the Word of God in Us! If you recall from earlier lessons on this subject, the Word of God was the Seed of God. We have been born again not of corruptible seed, but of the incorruptible seed, which is the Word of God (1 Peter 1:23). So we are beginning to see how it is a full circle concept of Seed Salvation. Everything starts with the Word of God and everything continues to exist with the Word of God.
Joh 15:7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done untoyou.
Do you see what Jesus is telling you? Do you see how the seed concepts and seed laws are affecting what you get in life? Do you see how that if you abide in Christ the Vine (the Spiritual Seed of God) and if you allow the Word of God (also the spiritual seed of God) to live in you a natural seed (the Seed within Itself) that you can not only produce fruit but that you can also get your prayers answered by God? Everything hinges upon the Word of God which is the Seed of God that produces the results that God is expecting to harvest very soon. Seeds are everywhere in the Bible. The concepts of seeds are everywhere in the Bible. Different Seed types and seed patterns are repetitious, overlapping and intersecting with each other and this can make them vastly complex to understand. The intelligence of God is so much greater than our minds and therefore we are challenged to come up to a higher dimension of how to think about these spiritual things and God’s Word. May the God of Peace enlighten your minds so that you can comprehend these Seed Principles! God Bless, until next time!
If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons you can now continue with “Part 9“.
Where DO BABIES Come From? A Bible Review of the Salvation Process!
(Ver 1.6) This is Part 2 in an essential basic Bible study series on the subject of Savlation and the Spiritual New Birth of God. What is it and how it occurs will be what I teach on today. If you have not read the first lesson I would suggest that you go and start reading with “Part 1” first. I had a Reader(?) try to tell me that being saved is not tied to any certain or specific observable process or stated steps found in the Bible. He told me that “Salvation” was not a formula! He implied that you just can’t ever be assured of your eternal destiny here in this life. He clearly said that there was just no single point event that you could observe of when you were saved. By stating that he implied that there are no given steps, instructions or ways in the Bible to be saved. He implied you can just never know if you are really saved. Call me different, call me unique, call me stupid I don’t care, that is just not what I see that the Bible says. My question to this guy is, “Where do Babies Come From?” Do you know how natural babies are made? Can you ever know if you will have a baby or your wife will have a baby? Does the mother ever know when she is pregnant? Does the mother of a baby know when it is time to deliver a baby? Is there a single point of time reference that goes on the birth certificate of when a natural baby was born? Is not the birth of the natural baby the entry of the child into our natural present world? This may not be a good set of questions to ask a male, but I bet you any mature female could answer these questions correctly. This is what Jesus taught us in John 3:3.
Joh 3:3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
So have you ever thought about what Jesus said here? Jesus says that a man must be “born again” in order to see the Kingdom of God. To be “born again”, implies they were born once naturally already. Doesn’t it, isn’t this what this verse says? However, being born ONCE in the natural is not enough to get you into the Kingdom of God according to the words of Jesus. If I said, I’m going to drive to Detroit again tonight. Doesn’t that tell you that I have already driven to Detroit before? If we are required to be born again, how was the first birth accomplished? What you must realize is that Jesus is speaking of a first birth that is a completely NATURAL process. Was there a formula for making natural babies in the world? This is not a trick question! Is it a difficult or unknown process to create natural babies in the world? Come on and think with me for a moment! God is comparing a natural process to a spiritual process. Or are you spiritually blind enough to believe that THE spiritual things of God are somehow completely different than the natural things that God has created. I believe that many people think that God created natural things to be totally separate and independent from spiritual things and this is just NOT the truth (Rom 1:20). The natural process of things clearly point us to the unseen spiritual process and FORMULA! Naturally created things are clearly patterns of spiritual things that existed prior to God creating our world. God created natural sex as a pattern to spiritual things that you cannot see. Maybe you just don’t know or understand what it means and that is the root of your problem right now. But you should search your Bible and find the truth and then you will see that what I am trying to say is right. Let’s look at some more verses in John 3. When Jesus was speaking about being “born again” He was talking to a man named Nicodemus. This was his response to Jesus’ statement of being born again:
Joh 3:4 Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother’s womb, and be born?
Because Nicodemus was a carnally minded man, he was thinking only in natural physical terms. He asks Jesus how can a grown man enter back into his mother’s womb to be born again? Nicodemus obviously was smarter than a lot of men today, at least he knew where babies come from. However, Jesus was speaking of spiritual things and Nicodemus was focused on the natural process of birth only. This is the repeated problem with most Christian in the world today. They think like Nicodemus and not like Jesus when they read the Bible. Do you understand the difference and why it is important to see things from God’s point of view?
Joh 3:5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
So Jesus starts giving us the spiritual answer to Nicodemus’ carnal question. Jesus in this verse speaks of both kinds of births, the first and the second in a contrasting comparison. To be born of water is the natural process of you coming into the world when your mother’s water breaks and she gave birth to you physically. This is the “First Birth” of all humans and it is only natural. However, this natural birth is contrasted with the spiritual birth process of being born of the Spirit. Being born of the Spirit is the “Second Birth” process that a man can experience. Jesus clearly tells us that if you are not born naturally first and then spiritually second you will never see the kingdom of God. Also note that Jesus did not say that you will be born again and again. In other words spiritual brith is a onetime event, just like being born into the natural world is a one time event. Your natural mother does not birth you over and over and like this process when you are born again spiritually it happens only once. Always keep that in mind, that a man is never born again, again. Let’s look at the next verse in John 3:
Joh 3:6 That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
Jesus confirms what I have been saying in this next verse. You can clearly see that only natural mothers give birth to natural babies. You can see that only spiritual mothers give birth to spiritual babies. A natural mother does not birth a spiritual baby and a spiritual mother does not give birth to a natural baby. This is by God’s design and God’s laws of reproduction and procreation. Is this too complicated for you so far? Did you know that there were spiritual women who could give birth to spiritual babies? So I’m going to stop and ask you again, where do natural babies come from? Is there a formula for making natural babies? If there is a known formula for making natural babies then there is also a known formula for making spiritual babies. I am not spiritually blind to this truth like so many in the church! Are you understanding this new spiritual principle that I am attempting to teach you today? All you have to do is to open up your spiritual eyes, stop to look and study your Bible to find out the truth.
Let’ me now teach you that if you were “born again” to become a Christian right now that you had a spiritual birth mother. Did you know that you had a spiritual mother? Do you know that you had a physical natural mother? If you are here in this world reading this article posted on the internet you must have had a natural mother. It is just a biological fact of God’s designed creation. Again I will say if you had a natural mother to be born here in the flesh the first time into the world, then you must have a spiritual mother to be born into the spiritual Kingdom of God. So is there a corresponding spiritual mother for being “born again” into the salvation of the Lord? Of course there has to be a spiritual birth mother. You either never searched your Bible to find her or you must have just ignored her in the Bible and read right over the information. Here is your spiritual birth mother if you are born again:
Gal 4:26 But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the MOTHER of us all.
Who was this letter and this verse written to? You should be smart enough to see that it was written to us in the church of Jesus Christ. If you are “born again”, here is your “spiritual mother” who gave birth to you to be in the new spiritual family of God. God tells us very clearly in a statement written to the church that the “Jerusalem Above” is our spiritual birth mother. Do you understand this? Is this complicated? So where do Spiritual babies come from? Do spiritual babies come into existence the same way that natural babies are conceived? Obviously NOT! Spirits do not have sex with each other, but that does not mean that the spiritual process is not very similar to the natural process symbolically. Natural things are most often used to symbolize spiritual truth that you cannot see. It also does not mean there is not a process to be saved or to be born again. If a natural woman gives birth to a baby and she knows when it occurs then a spiritual mother who gives birth to a spiritual baby would also know when she gave birth to a new child. Before we go there, let’s establish who this woman “Jerusalem Above” is and where this spiritual mother lives using the Bible.
Heb 12:22 But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
So we now have an established point of reference for the identity of the woman who gives spiritual birth to the church. In this verse in Hebrews God says that this is the “Heavenly Jerusalem”, the city of the Most High God. The location of which contains the throne of God and where the angels of the Lord reside and surround and praise God’s throne. Did you know that a city can be a spiritual woman? Did you even know that this spiritual woman Heavenly Jerusalem existed? You should go back and study the Old Testament and see how many times the Earthly Jerusalem is called a woman, the wife of God, the whore, the harlot. Read, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Hosea to name a few great places to start. See how many times God describes Israel as His wife in covenant. See how many times she is described as being unfaithful and sleeping with other gods. See how many times you can find where God says “I divorce” you for your unfaithfulness to me. What we begin to see is a pattern that a woman to God is a nation of people in covenant with Him. You can clearly see that if Jerusalem Above or Heavenly Jerusalem exists from the verses that I just gave you that this is a pattern of another woman called Jerusalem Below or Earthly Jerusalem. What we have established is that we have a city on the earth called a woman and a city in heaven called a woman, both with the name Jerusalem. You can clearly read about both of these women in more depth by exploring Galatians 4. The Jerusalem Below is said to be a type of Hagar in the O.T. The Jerusalem Above is said to be a type of Sarah. Sarah births the child of promise and Hagar and her son are cast out. Sarah was the older of the two women in the Bible and existed before Hagar. Hagar had a child before Sarah had her child. These are all physical patterns of the spirit realm and the woman that gave birth to the church. So I probably just taught you a bunch of new things that you did not know. Yet they are there in the Bible and you can choose to see them or go ahead and reject them like a spiritually blind man. So let’s get back to the fact does a woman know when she has a baby? A natural woman certainly does, but how about a spiritual woman? Here is what Jesus taught us about this birth process:
Luk 15:10 Likewise, I say unto you, there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth.
As you can see the angels of God rejoice when just one sinner repents. What happens when one sinner repents? They are born again! Isn’t that what we are talking about? Are we talking about a single point in time when a sinner is saved and born again? If the angels rejoice when this occurs, they obviously have observed the second spiritual birth of the man. Where are these angels? You may recall that we read in Hebrew 12:22 that there were an innumerable company of angels in the Heavenly Jerusalem. Are these the angels of God that rejoice over the new birth of one spirit on the earth? You can try to explain it away if you want to, but I am convinced that these are the angels who rejoice. After all it is that city which is said to be our mother and every mother knows exactly when she gives birth to any new baby. People need to be smart enough to learn to put the pieces of the puzzle together correctly. I can see it very clearly, I guess you can too if you choose to believe what you read.
Did you know that only people who want to be saved, will be saved? No one repents if they do not want to repent. God does not force salvation upon anyone. Jesus says in Revelation 3:20 “Behold I stand at the door and knock, if any many will hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him and I will sup with him and him with me”. 
That was the basic formula for salvation and being born again in a nutshell. Jesus first Knocks! The man either ignores the knock or listens for who it is that is knocking. Let’ me stop there and tell you that Jesus is speaking figuratively or symbolically in this verse in Revelation. Jesus is not going to come to knock on your physical house or apartment personally. No, your house where your spirit lives is your physical body. God’s Spirit is the Spirit of Christ that comes to knock on your heart’s door. The door that Jesus knocks on is your ears when a man like me comes and preaches the salvation Gospel. Yes, the Spirit of God is the Key partner to any salvation. No man comes to God unless the Spirit of God draws him. But, God doesn’t come in person, physically anymore to save anyone. Jesus Christ was God in the flesh and He came for a short time to fulfill the plan of God for our Salvation and Redemption. But, He went back to heaven and has now turned over the responsibility of teaching and preaching to people like me and you. So when a man comes to you and tells you the good news of salvation, that is Jesus working through that man to help you see the truth. Then the individual who hears the words of God, now stands at a crossroad and at a time of decision; to either accept it or reject it. If they accept it, they believe what was said and can ask Jesus to come and be their Lord with a repentant heart. This invites Jesus to come in to sup. Jesus them comes in at that exact point in time. That is when you are saved, that is when you are born again. If that person refuse to hear the Gospel, then Jesus has no choice but to walk away from the door. Jesus is not going to kick the door down, just because He wants to save someone.
Any new born physical baby when first entering our world is sometimes smacked on the bottom and they take their first breaths of air and begin to cry. This is a joyous sound for the mother who has gone through 9 months of pregnancy and then labor. She now knows that all of the discomfort and pain was worth it. So also then the baby knows when he or she is born into the world because they can cry and the mother knows when she has given birth to the baby because she can hear their cry, something that they never did before. Is it any different in the spiritual realm? No I do not believe it is. Once a person believes in their heart that God raised Jesus from the dead and they accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior like Romans 10:9-10 says they are “born again”. The Spirit of Christ comes into their spirit and they are saved. The angels see the birth and rejoice. The mighty cloud of witnesses in heaven also see the birth and they now rejoice (Heb 12:1). This is just how it works by God’s design, if you do not believe it, that is your problem and not mine and it does not change the facts. I know that I am saved and I know how I got saved. Salvation was not a long process, it was not a complicated proces, it was just following the formula that God gave us in His Word that worked for me. So I’ll ask you one more time “Where do Spiritual Babies Come From”? I believe that you can see that we still have a lot to learn about how God does things in the unseen spiritual realm. If you are not a “born again” Christian and have had the pleasure of this new spiritual birth it is not difficult to make happen in your heart. If you want to read about how to be saved, you can go to “Salavation and How to Know if You are Going to Heaven” and follow the instructions. God Bless!
If you would like to continue reading in this series you may proceed to “Part 3“.
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If you want to know how to get saved and know that you are with confidence you can go to: How to know that I am saved?
Names, Titles, Descriptions and Symbols of Satan in the Bible
(ver 2.0) This is Part 2 in a series of reference documents about the multiple Names, Titles, Descriptions and Symbols of named Spiritual Individuals in the Bible. This document will focus only on the subject verses of the enemy Satan found in the Bible. It is not designed to teach anything other than give you a place to search from to find references to Satan in the Bible. This is a living document of references and it will change and be updated as I am led to additional scriptures. A Name is a direct reference to the individual. A Title is a given direct identifying appellation signifying status or function. A Description is something that represents the individual in expressive words. A Type is a real named person, place or thing that can be viewed to apply to a pattern of the spiritual individual not directly named. A Symbol is a natural object that describes the characteristics or features of a spiritual being that you cannot see or understand without first understanding the symbol. I will now give you the list of my references to Satan in the Bible and if you have others that I have not found yet, please share them with me in a comment.
|
Name, Title, Symbol, Type for Satan |
Description |
Scripture Reference |
| 666 | The Number of the Beast | Rev 13:18 |
| Abaddon | Destroying Angel | Rev 9:11 |
| Accuser of the Brethren | Legal Opponent in Court of Law | Rev 12:10 |
| Adversary | The Opponent to the Church in a Lawsuit | 1 Peter 5:8 |
| Angel of Light | Impersonator, Actor, Stage Performer; Masquerader | 2 Cor 11:14 |
| Angel of the Bottomless Pit | Ruler of the Darkness | Rev 9:11 |
| Anointed cherub that coverth | The Winged Angelic Defender | Ezekiel 28:14 |
| Antichrist | Opponent of the Messiah | 1 John 4:3 |
| Appolyon | Greek Name of Hebrew Abaddon; Destroyer | Rev 9:11 |
| Baal | False God of the O.T. Type of Satan | Rom 11:4; |
| Balaam | False Teacher | Jude 1:11 |
| Bear | Kingdom of Satan Symbol | Rev 13:2 |
| Beast | Dangerous Animal; Venomous | Rev 14:9-10; Rev 16:10 |
| Beelzebub | Lord of the Flies; A god of Babylon | Mat 12:24, 27; Mark 3:22; Luke 11:15, 18-19 |
| Belial | Worthless One | 2 Cor 6:15 |
| Bird, Hateful | Loveless | Rev 18:2 |
| Bird, Unclean | Foul, | Rev 18:2 |
| Blasphemer | Name of the One Who Vilifies God | Rev 13:1 |
| Cain | Murderer from the Beginning | Jude 1:11 |
| Chief of Demons | Prince of demonic gods | Luke 11:15 |
| Cherub | Winged Anointed of God | Ezekiel 28:14 |
| Cockatrice | The Viper | Isa 14:29, 59:5; |
| Deceiver | The One Who Deceives | Rev 12:9 |
| Devil | False Accuser; Slanderer | Mat 4:1-11, 9:33, 11:18, 12:22, 13:29, 15:22, 17:18, 25:41; Mk 5:15-18, 7:26-30; Luke 4:2-13, 4:33-35, 7:33, 8:12, 8:29, 9:42, 11:14; John 6:70, 7:20, 8:44-52, 10:20-21, 13:2; Acts 10:38 13:10; Eph 4:27, 6:11; 1 Ti 3:6-7; 2 Ti 2:26; Heb 2:14; James 4:7; 1Pet 5:8; 1 John 3:8-10; Jud 1:9; Rev 2:10, 12:9, 12:12, 20:2, 20:10; |
| Dragon | Fabulous Serpent | Rev 12:7 |
| Dragon, Great | Powerful Fabulous Serpent | Rev 12:9 |
| Edom | Type of Satan, twin brother of Jacob | Eze 32:29; Joel 3:19; Mal 1:4; |
| Enemy | Adversary | Mat 13:39 |
| Esau | Lord Hates | Mal 1:2-3; Rom 9:13 |
| Evil One | Malicious; Wicked One | John 17:15 |
| False Light | The Opposite TRUTH of True Light Jesus | 1 John 2:8 |
| Father | Male Parent | John 8:44; Acts 13:10 |
| Father of Lies | Fabricator of truth | John 8:44 |
| Fiery Flying Serpent | Satan | Isa 14:20, 30:6; |
| Fiery Serpent | Satan | Num 21:8; Deu 8:15 |
| Frog | Unclean Spirit | Rev 16:13 |
| Fox | Cunning Spirit | Luke 13:32 |
| Goat, He (devils) | Devils (Hebrew Word for He Goat) | Lev 17:7; 2 Chron 11:15 |
| God of this World | Ruler of the Night | 2 Cor 4:4 |
| Gog | Symbolic Name for the Anti-Christ | Rev 20:8; |
| Great Red Dragon | Serpent of Increased Power | Rev 12:3 |
| Herod | A Type of Satan the Murdering King | Luke 13:31 |
| Judas | Judah The Betrayer of Messiah | John 6:70-71; John 13:2 |
| King of Babylon | Ruler of Jerusalem | Isaiah 14:4 |
| King of the Bottomless Pit | Ruler of the Darkness | Rev 9:11 |
| King of Tyrus | Ruler of the Rock | Eze 28:12 |
| Laban | A type of a Deceitful Man | Gen 31:7 |
| Leopard | Kingdom of Satan Symbol | Rev 13:2 |
| Lesser Light | Moon who Rules the Night of Darkness | Gen 1:16 |
| Leviathan | Serpent Monster of Babylon | Isaiah 27:1 |
| Liar | Falsifier; Deceiver | John 8:44 |
| Lion | Kingdom of Satan Symbol | Rev 13:2 |
| Little Horn | Rising King | Daniel 8:9-11 |
| Lucifer | Bright and Morning Star | Isaiah 14:12-14 |
| Man of Sin | Man faced Trespasser | 2 Thes 2:3-4 |
| Moon | Ruler of the Night | Psalm 136:9; Rev 12:1 |
| Murderer | Man Killer | John 8:44 |
| Oppressor | He Who Makes Sick | Acts 10:38 |
| Perdition | The Destroyer | 2 Thes 2:3; |
| Pharaoh | He who rules Egypt a type of the World | Eze 31:2-18; |
| Power of Darkness | Superhuman Ruler of the Night | Col 1:13-14 |
| Prince of the Devils | Ruler of Evil Spirits | Mat 9:34, 12:24; Mark 3:22 |
| Prince of the Kingdom of Persia | Ruler of the nation of Babylon | Daniel 10:13 |
| Prince of the Power of the Air | Ruler of the Authority of Spoken Words | Eph 2:1-2 |
| Prince of this World | Ruler of the Evil Darkness | John 12:31-32; John 14:30; John 16:11; 1 Cor 2:6-8; |
| Roaring Lion | Powerful Sounding King of the Beasts | 1 Peter 5:8 |
| Ruler of the Darkness | Moon who Rules the Night | Ephesians 6:12 |
| Satan | The Accuser, the Opponent; Adversary | 1 Chron 21:1; Job 1:6-12; Job 2:1-7; Ps 109:6; Zec 1:3:1-2; Mat 4:10, 12:26, 16:23; Mark 1:13, 3:23-26, 4:15, 8:33; Luke 4:8, 10:18, 11:18, 13:16, 22:3, 22:31; Jo 13:27; Act 5:3, 26:18; Rom 16:20; 1 Cor 5:5, 7:5; 2 Cor 2:11, 11:14; 1 Thes 2:18; 2 Thes 2:9; 1Tim 1:20, 5:15; Rev 2:9, 2:13, 2:24, 3:9; 12:9, 20:2, 20:7; |
| Seducing Spirit | Imposter; Deceiver | 1 Tim 4:1 |
| Seraphim | Fiery Serpent | Isa 6:2 |
| Serpent | Symbolic Name for Satan | Gen 3:1; Rev 12:15 |
| Serpent, Old | Symbolic Name for Satan; First Ruler of the earth | Rev 12:9; Rev 20:2 |
| Son of Perdition | Destruction’s Child | 2 Thes 2:3 |
| Son of the Morning | Satan a son of God’s First or Early Light | Isaiah 14:12-14 |
| Spirit, Foul | Perverted Spiritual Being | Rev 18:2 |
| Spirit, the | Satan a spiritual being | Ephesians 2:2 |
| Spirit, Unclean | Leprous Spiritual Being | Luke 9:42; Rev 16:13 |
| Star | Angel Cast Down to Earth | Rev 8:11; 9:1 |
| Star, Great | Angel Cast Down to Earth | Rev 8:10 |
| Star, Wandering | He Who Departs the Path | Jude 1:13 |
| Tempter | He Who Proves and Tests | Mat 4:3 |
| Thief | Robber; Burglar | Mat 24:43; Luke 12:39; John 10:10 |
| Viper | The serpent Satan | Isa 59:5; |
| Waster, the | He Who Destroys | Isaiah 54:16 |
| Wicked | Law Breaker; Evil Degenerate | 2 Thes 2:8; Eph 6:16 |
| Wormwood | Type of Bitterness | Rev 8:11 |
If you would like to references other documents in this series you may go to one of these:
Names, Titles, Descriptions and Symbols of Jesus in the Bible
(ver 2.3) This is Part 1 in a series of reference documents about the multiple Names, Titles, Descriptions and Symbols of named Spiritual Individuals in the Bible. This document will focus only on the subject verses concerning Jesus found in the Bible. It is not designed to teach anything other than give you a place to search from to find references to Jesus in the Bible. This is a living document of references and it will change and be updated as I am led to additional scriptures. A Name is a direct reference to the individual. A Title is a given direct identifying appellation signifying status or function. A Description is something that represents the individual in expressive words. A Type is a real named person, place or thing that can be viewed to apply to a pattern of the spiritual individual not directly named. A Symbol is a natural object that describes the characteristics or features of a spiritual being that you cannot see or understand without first understanding the symbol. Here is what Jesus said to us about himself:
Joh 5:39 Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
We know from what Jesus just said that the Bible is primarily about him, but you cannot find him directly named until the Gospels. However he was indirectly mentioned in almost every chapter of the Old Testament. I will give you a list of my references to Jesus in the Bible and if you have others that I have not found yet, please let me know about them.
|
Name, Title, Symbol, Type for Jesus |
Description |
Scripture Reference |
| Abel | Brother (a type of Christ) killed by Cain a type of Satan a murderer from the beginning | Genesis 4:2; |
| Abraham | Covenant Man of God a type of Jesus Christ | Gen 12-20; |
| Adam | A type of Jesus Christ; Gen 2:24 A man who leaves His Father to come to earth | Gen 2:; 1 Cor 15:45; |
| Adam, Last | Jesus referred to as the brother of Adam | 1Corinthians 15:45 |
| Advocate | Jesus Our Lawyer | 1John 2:1 |
| Alef and Tav, the | The first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet | Genesis 1:1 not in the English translation of the Bible only seen in the Hebrew |
| Almighty | The Supreme Powerful One | Revelation 1:8 |
| Alpha and Omega, the | The first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, | Revelation 1:8 |
| Amen | God’s Final Word | Revelation 3:14 |
| Angel | God’s Messenger | Genesis 48:16; Exodus 23:20, 21 |
| Angel of His Presence | God’s Savior | Isaiah 63:9 |
| Anointed, His | God’s Anointed One | Psalms 2:2 |
| Appointed | He that was Chosen By God | 1 Sam 2:35; Heb 3:2; |
| Approved of God | He that Has God’s Favor | Acts 2:22; |
| Apostle, the | God’s Sent One | Hebrews 3:1 |
| Arm of the Lord | God’s Powerful One, The One at the Right Hand | Isaiah 51:9, 10 |
| Author and Finisher of our faith | God’s Inscriber of Faith | Hebrews 12:2 |
| Author of Life, the | Translated as Prince of Life in KJV | Acts 3:15 |
| Beginning and end of the creation of God | The Initiator and the Completion of all things made | Revelation 3:14; 22:13 |
| Beginning, The | Christ the Firstborn from the dead | Col 1:18; |
| Beloved | The One Loved By God | Ephesians 1:6 |
| Beloved Son | Son Loved by God | Matthew 3:17 |
| Bishop of Our Soul | Superintendent/Overseer of our Mind | 1 Peter 2:25 |
| Blessed and only Potentate | God’s happy Ruler of the Day | 1Timothy 6:15 |
| Boaz | A Type of Christ the Kinsman Redeemer | Book of Ruth |
| Branch, Righteous | God’s Seed that Sprouts Righteousness | Jeremiah 23:5; Zechariah 3:8 |
| Branch, The | The sprouting life of God | Zechariah 3:8 |
| Bread of God | The spiritual food of God | John 6:33; |
| Bread of life | God’s Spiritual Food | John 6:35, 6:48 |
| Brethren | The natural man of Israel | Acts 3:22; |
| Bridegroom | Jesus the Husband to the Church | Psalm 19:5; Matthew 9:15, Mark 2:19, Luke 5:34, John 3:29 |
| Bright Morning Star | Reference to Jesus Being the Sun, The Spiritual Light of the World | Revelation 22:16 |
| Brightness of the Father’s glory | God’s Sun Light Manifested | Hebrews 1:3 |
| Called of God | Jesus the Answer | Hebrews 5:10; |
| Captain of the Lord’s host | Leader of the Army of God | Joshua 5:14 |
| Captain of Salvation | God’s Deliverer | Hebrews 2:10 |
| Carpenter | God’s Builder of a Spiritual House | Mark 6:3 |
| Carpenter’s son | The Assumed Son of Joseph | Matthew 13:55 |
| Chief Shepherd | The Head of the Church | 1Peter 5:4 |
| Chief Cornerstone | The Stone the Builders Rejected, The First Stone in the New Jerusalem | Ephesian 2:20; 1Peter 2:6 |
| Chiefest among ten thousand | The Chosen One of Israel | Song of Songs 5:10 |
| Child | The Son of God and the Son of Man | Isaiah 9:6; Hosea 11:1; Luke 2:27, 43 |
| Chosen of God | The One Selected By God | 1Peter 2:4 |
| Christ | God’s Anointed One | Matthew 1:16; Luke 9:20; Acts 2:36; Heb 3:6 |
| Christ, The (Messiah) | God’s Anointed One | Matthew 16:20; Mark 14:61 |
| Christ a King | The Anointed King of Kings | Luke 23:2 |
| Christ Jesus | The Anointed Savior Jesus | Acts 19:4; Romans 3:24; 8:1; 1Corinthians 1:2, 30; Hebrews 3:1; 1Peter 5:10, 14 |
| Christ Jesus our Lord | Jesus the Anointed Supreme One | 1Timothy 1:12; Romans 8:39 |
| Christ of God | Acts 10:38 Says God Anointed Jesus of Nazareth | Luke 9:20 |
| Christ, the chosen of God | God’s Chosen Anointed One | Luke 23:35 |
| Christ the Lord | Anointed Supreme One | Luke 2:11 |
| Christ, the power of God | The Word Of God | 1Corinthians 1:24 |
| Christ the wisdom of God | God’s Application of His Understanding and Knowledge | 1Corinthians 1:24 |
| Christ, the Son of God | The Anointed Son of God | Acts 9:20 |
| Christ, Son of the Blessed | The Blessed Anointed Son | Mark 14:61 |
| Commander | God’s Chief Ruler, Prince | Isaiah 55:4 |
| Consolation of Israel | The One that Calls Israel to Good | Luke 2:25 |
| Cornerstone | The Stone the Builders Rejected, The First Stone in the New Jerusalem | Ephesians 2:20 |
| Counselor | The Giver of Advice | Isaiah 9:6 |
| Covenant of the people | The Divider of the People | Isaiah 42:6 |
| David Their King | Jesus the Seed of David | 2 Chron 6:6; Jeremiah 30:9 |
| Daysman | Jesus Our Attorney, Lawyer, Legal Representative | Job 9:33 |
| Dayspring From on High | Jesus the Sun or Righteousness, The Dawn of a New Day, The Rise of a New Light | Luke 1:78 |
| Day Star | Jesus the Sun Light of a New Day in our Hearts | 2Peter 1:19 |
| Deliverer | Savior and Redeemer | Psalm 18:2; Romans 11:26 |
| Desire of all nations | That Which Everyone Seeks | Haggai 2:7 |
| Door, the | The ONLY legal access to God | John 10:9 |
| Door of the sheep, the | The ONLY Access to God | John 10:7 |
| Elect | Chosen One | Isaiah 42:1 |
| Emmanuel (Immanuel) | God With Us | Isaiah 7:14, Matthew 1:23 |
| Ensign | God’s Signal/Sign to Man | Isaiah 11:10 |
| Eternal Life | Our ONLY Way to Know God | 1John 5:20 |
| Everlasting Father | The Eternal Father | Isaiah 9:6 |
| Faithful | He who is trustworthy | Isa 49:7; Heb 3:2; |
| Faithful and True | The Dependable Truth | Revelation 19:11; |
| Faithful Priest | The True High Priest of God | 1 Samuel 2:35; |
| Faithful Witness, the | The Testimony of Truth | Revelation 1:5 |
| Faithful and true witness, the | The Testimony of Truth | Revelation 3:14 |
| Father to the Inhabitants of Jerusalem | Jesus the Everlasting Father | Isaiah 22:21; |
| Finisher of faith | He Who Brings Our Faith to a Completion | Hebrews 12:2 |
| Fire, A | A Light of Israel; | Isa 10:17; |
| First and last | The Beginning and End of all things | Isa 44:6, 48:12; Revelation 1:17; 2:8; 22:13 |
| First begotten | Jesus the First Born Again from the Dead | Hebrews 1:6 |
| First begotten of the dead | Jesus the First Born Again from the Dead | Revelation 1:5 |
| Firstborn | Jesus the First Born Again from the Dead | Psalms 89:27 |
| Firstborn from the dead | Christ the Heir of God | Col 1:18; |
| Flame, A | The Fire of God | Isa 10:17; |
| Foundation | The Spiritual Building Block of the New Jerusalem | Isaiah 28:16 |
| Foundation, Sure | Indestructible Rock | Isaiah 28:16 |
| Fountain | God’s Supply of Living Water | Zechariah 13:1 |
| Forerunner | He Who Goes First, The Trail Blazer | Hebrews 6:20 |
| Fourth, the | The 4th man in the Fire | Daniel 3:25 |
| Friend of sinners | My Friend Jesus | Matthew 11:19 |
| Gift of God | God’s Present to Man | John 4:10 |
| Glory of Israel | The Best of Israel | Luke 2:32 |
| God | Supreme Deity | John 1:1 |
| God blessed forever | The Eternally Happy Supreme Deity | Romans 9:5 |
| God manifest in the flesh | Emanuel God in a Physical Body | 1Timothy 3:16 |
| God of Israel, the Savior | The Supreme Deity that has Saved Israel | Isaiah 45:15 |
| God of the whole earth | The Omnipresent Supreme Deity | Isaiah 54:5 |
| God our Savior
|
The Supreme Deity that has Saved Us | 1Timothy 2:3 |
| God’s dear Son | Jesus the Son Loved By God | Colossians 1:13 |
| God with us | Emanuel God in Person | Matthew 1:23 |
| Good | Opposed to Evil | Matthew 20:15; |
| Good Master | The Sinless Lord | Matthew 19:16 |
| Good Shepherd | Leader of the sheep | John 10:11, 14; |
| Governor | Supreme Leader | Matthew 2:6 |
| Great Light | Jesus the Sun of Righteousness arisen in our hearts | Matthew 4:16; |
| Great Shepherd of the sheep
|
Head of the Church | Hebrews 13:20
|
| Greater Light, the | Jesus The Sun of Righteousness, Ruler of The Day | Genesis 1:16 |
| He that shall have dominion | The Ruler of Heaven and Earth | Numbers 24:19 |
| Head | Chief of the Body | Col 2:19 |
| Head of All Principality and Power | Supreme and Preeminent Spiritual Ruler | Col 2:10 |
| Head of the Body | The Husband to the Church | Col 1:18; |
| Head of the Corner | New Jerusalem Cornerstone | Matthew 21:42; 1 Peter 2:7 |
| Head of the ekklesia (body) | Leader of the Church | Ephesians 1:22, 23; 5:23; Colossians 1:18, 24 |
| Heir of all things | The Inheritor of the Kingdom of God | Hebrews 1:2 |
| High priest | God’s Eternal High Priest | Hebrews 3:1, 4:14, 7:26, 8:1, 9:11; |
| Head of every man | Chief Among Men | 1Corinthians 11:3 |
| Head of the corner | The Corner Stone in the New Jerusalem | Matthew 21:42; Acts 4:11 |
| Holy | Morally Blameless | Isa 57:15 |
| Holy child | Morally Blameless Son | Acts 4:30 |
| Holy One | The Chosen Blameless Man | Psalms 16:10; Isa 10:17; Acts 3:14, 13:35; 1 John 2:20; |
| Holy one of God | God Sent Blameless Man | Mark 1:24; Luke 4:34; |
| Holy one of Israel, the | Blameless Man from Israel | Isaiah 41:14; 47:4; 54:5 |
| Holy thing | Our Example of Blamelessness | Luke 1:35 |
| Hope (our) | Our Great Expectation | 1Timothy 1:1 |
| Horn of salvation | The King that Saved Us | Luke 1:69 |
| Husband, One | The New Covenant Maker | 2 Cor 11:2 |
| Husband, Thine | The One we Covenant With | Isaiah 54:5 |
| I AM | Our Everything We Need, the ALL Encompassing One | John 8:58 |
| Image of God | The Restored Likeness of the Supreme God | Hebrews 1:3 |
| Israel | The Head of God’s Spiritual Nation of People | Isaiah 41:8; Isaiah 49:3; Hosea 11:1 |
| Isaac | A type of Christ, God’s only begotten Son | Genesis 1:17; Genesis 21:10; Genesis 22:2 |
| Jacob | Type of Jesus, The Spiritual Head of the spiritual house of Israel; He will Rule as God | Genesis 32:28; Isaiah 41:8; Malachi 1:2-3; Romans 9:13 |
| Jacob my Servant | Faithful to God’s service | Isaiah 44:2; |
| Jehovah | The Most High God | Isaiah 40:3 |
| Jehovah’s fellow | Son of the Most High God | Zechariah 13:7 |
| Jeshurun | Upright One, Chosen of God | Isa 44:2; |
| Jesus | Our Spiritual Leader and Savior Joshua/Yeshua/ Jehoshua | Matthew 1:21; Used in over 600 verses in the N.T. for the name of God. |
| Jesus Christ | The Spiritually Anointed (Messiah) Joshua | Matthew 1:1; John 1:17; 17:3; Acts 2:38; 4:10; 9:34; 10:36; Romans 1:1, 16:18; 3, 6; 2:16; 5:15, 17; 6:3; 1Corinthians 1:1, 4; 2:2; 2Corinthians 1:19; 4:6; 13:5; Galatians 2:16; Philippians 1:8; 2:11; 1Timothy 1:15; Hebrews 13:8; 1John 1:7; 2:1 |
| Jesus Christ our Lord | Spiritually Supreme Anointed Leader | Romans 1:3; 6:11, 23; 1Corinthians 1:9; 7:25 |
| Jesus Christ our Savior | The Anointed Leader who Saved Us | Titus 3:6 |
| Jesus of Nazareth | Jesus the Natural Man/the Nazarene | Mark 1:24; Luke 24:19 |
| Jesus (of Nazareth), King of the Jews | Spiritual Leader of the Spiritual Jews | John 19:19; Matthew 27:37 |
| Jesus, the Son of God | The Son of the Most High Deity who is our Leader | Hebrews 4:14 |
| Jesus, the Son of Joseph | The Presumed son of Joseph | John 6:42 |
| Joint Heir | Co-Inheritor | Romans 8:17 |
| Joseph | A Fruitful Bough; A type of the coming deliverer | Gen 49:22 |
| Joshua | Leader into the Promise Land a type of Jesus | Joshua; Zechariah 3:8 |
| Judge | Supreme Lawyer of Justice | Acts 10:42 |
| Just man, Just person, Just One | Righteous Individual; Blameless Individual | Matthew 27:19, 24; Acts 3:14; 7:52; 22:14 |
| Justification, Our | Him who Justified Us | Romans 4:25; |
| King | Supreme Ruler | Isa 43:15; Matthew 21:5 |
| King Eternal | Everlasting Ruler | 1 Tim 1:17; |
| King of Israel | Supreme Ruler of Spiritual Nation of Israel | John 1:49 |
| King of the Jews | Supreme Ruler of the Spiritual Jews | Matthew 2:2 |
| King of Saints | Supreme Ruler of Spiritual Nation of Israel (the Church) | Revelation 15:3 |
| King of Kings | Supreme Ruler of the Church (New Jerusalem) | 1Timothy 6:15; Revelation 17:14 |
| King of Glory | Supreme Deity Ruler | Psalms 24:7-10 |
| King of Saints | The Ruler over the rulers | Rev 15:3 |
| King of Zion | Supreme Ruler of the Daughter of ZION (Church) | Matthew 21:5 |
| King over all the earth | Supreme Ruler of the planet | Zechariah 14:9 |
| Lamb | God’s Sacrifice for the Sin of humanity | Revelation 5:6, 8; 7:9, 6:16; 10, 17; 12:11; 13:8, 11; 14:1, 4; 15:3; 17:14; 21:9, 14, 22, 19:7, 9; 23, 27 |
| Lamb of God | God’s Sacrifice for the Sin of humanity | John 1:29 |
| Lamb that was slain | God’s Sacrifice for the Sin of humanity | Rev 5:12; |
| Lawgiver | God’s Scribe of Justice | Isaiah 33:22 |
| Leader | Military Commander | Isaiah 55:4 |
| Life, the | Our Source of Being | John 14:6 |
| Light | Jesus our internal Spiritual Sun | Mat 4:16; John 8:12 |
| Light, everlasting | Jesus our Spiritual Eternal Sun | Isaiah 60:19-20’ |
| Light of Israel | The Rising Sun of Spiritual Israel | Isa 10:17; |
| Light of the world | Jesus our Spiritual Sun who shines out of darkness | John 8:12, 9:5 |
| Light to the Gentiles | Jesus our Spiritual Sun who lights the way to God for every nation | Isaiah 42:6, 49:6; |
| Light, True | Jesus our Spiritual Sun and Source of Truth | John 1:9 |
| Lion of the tribe of Judah | Spiritual Ruler of the spiritual Jews (church) | Revelation 5:5 |
| Living Bread, the | The Word of Life | John 6:51 |
| Living God | The God of Eternal Life | 1 Tim 4:10; |
| Living Stone | The Living Corner Building Block of the New Jerusalem | 1Pet 2:4; |
| Lord | The One with Supreme Authority | Acts 2:36; Rom 1:3; |
| Lord and Savior – Jesus Christ | Supreme Ruler Who Saves | 2Peter 1:11; 3:18 |
| Lord Christ | The Anointed Supreme Ruler | Colossians 3:24 |
| Lord From Heaven | God Who Came From Heaven | 1 Cor 15:47 |
| Lord God Almighty | The All Powerful Supreme Deity Ruler | Revelation 15:3 |
| Lord Jesus | Supreme Ruler Jesus | Luke 24:3; Acts 1:21; 4:33; 7:59; 8:16; 9:29; 11:20; 19:5,10,13,17; 20:24,35; 21:13; Rom. 10:9; 14:14; 1Co. 5:5; 6:11; 11:23; 2Co. 1:14; 4:10,14; Gal. 6:17; Eph. 1:15; Php. 2:19; Col. 3:17; 1Th. 2:15; 4:1,2; 2Th. 1:7; Phm. 1:5; Heb. 13:20; Rev. 22:20; |
| Lord Jesus Christ | Anointed Supreme Ruler Jesus | Acts 11:17; 15:11,26; 16:31; 20:21; 28:31; Rom. 1:7; 5:1,11; 13:14; 15:6,30; 16:18,20,24; 1Co. 1:3,7,8,10; 5:4; 8:6; 15:57; 16:22,23; 2Co. 1:2,3; 8:9; 11:31; 13:14; Gal. 1:3; 6:14,18; Eph. 1:2,3,17; 3:14; 5:20; 6:23,24; Php. 1:2; 3:20; 4:23; Col. 1:2,3; 1Th. 1:1,3; 2:19; 3:11,13; 5:9,23,28; 2Th. 1:1,2,8,12; 2:1,14,16; 3:6,12,18; 1Ti. 1:1; 5:21; 6:3,14; 2Ti. 4:1,22; Tit. 1:4; Phm. 1:3,25; Jas. 1:1; 2:1; 1Pe. 1:3; 2Pe. 1:8,14,16; 2Jn. 1:3; Jude 1:4,17,21; Rev. 22:21; |
| Lord Jesus Christ our Savior | Anointed Supreme Ruler Jesus Who Saves | Titus 1:4 |
| Lord of all | Supreme Ruler of Everyone | Acts 10:36 |
| Lord of glory | Supreme Ruler of God’s Splendor | James 2:1 |
| Lord of Hosts (armies) | Supreme Ruler of the Army of God | Isaiah 44:6, 47:4; |
| Lord of Lords | Supreme Ruler of rulers | 1 Tim 6:15; Rev 17:14; 19:16 |
| Lord of the dead and living | Supreme Ruler of Everyone | Romans 14:9 |
| Lord of the Sabbath | Supreme Ruler of the Day of Rest | Mat 12:8; Mark 2:28 |
| Lord Our Righteousness, the | Supreme Ruler Who Makes Us Righteous | Jeremiah 23:6 |
| Lord over all | Supreme Ruler of Everything | Romans 10:12 |
| Lord, mighty in battle | Undefeatable Supreme Ruler | Psalms 24:8 |
| Lord’s Christ | Supreme Ruler of the Anointing | Luke 2:26 |
| Lord, strong and mighty | Undefeatable Supreme Ruler | Psalms 24:8 |
| Lord, your holy one | The Blameless Supreme Ruler | Isaiah 43:15 |
| Lord, your redeemer | The Supreme Ruler Who Has Purchased Us With His Blood | Isaiah 43:14 |
| Maker, Thy | Our Creator | Isaiah 17:7, 54:5 |
| Man, a | The Word of God became flesh (Adam) | Ezekiel 1:26 |
| Man Christ – Jesus | The Anointed Son of God/Man | 1Timothy 2:5 |
| Man of sorrows | Man of Pain | Isaiah 53:3 |
| Master | Head of the House | Matthew 23:8; Eph 6:9 |
| Master In Heaven | Head of the House of God | Col 4:1; |
| Mediator, the only | Our Reconciler, God’s Go Between Us and Him | 1Timothy 2:5 |
| Meek | The Humble God of all Power | Matthew 11:29; |
| Melchisedec | The King and High Priest of Jerusalem a type of Jesus Christ | Hebrews 7:15; |
| Messenger of the covenant | The Distributor of the News of Division | Malachi 3:1 |
| Messiah | God’s Anointed | John 1:41 |
| Messiah the Prince | The Anointed Ruler | Daniel 9:25 |
| Mighty God | The Undefeatable Deity | Isaiah 9:6 |
| Mighty one of Israel | The Undefeatable One of Israel | Isaiah 30:29 |
| Mighty one of Jacob | The Undefeatable One of Jacob | Isaiah 49:26 |
| Mighty to save | The Undefeatable Savior | Isaiah 63:1 |
| Minister of the sanctuary | Our High Priest | Hebrews 8:2 |
| Morning Star | Jesus Our Spiritual Sun who Rules the Day | Revelation 2:28 |
| Moses | A Type of Christ the Deliverer; the Lawgiver; Faithful servant; | Acts 7:35; Heb 3:5; |
| Most holy | Ultimate Blameless One | Daniel 9:24 |
| Most mighty | Omnipotent One | Psalms 45:3 |
| Nail, A | The Fastener of God | Isaiah 22:23 |
| Nazarene | Set Apart Man | Matthew 2:23 |
| Offspring of David | Descendant of David the King | Revelation 22:16 |
| Only Begotten | The Only Physically Born Son of God | John 1:14; John 1:18; John 3:16; John 3:18; 1John 4:9 |
| Only wise God, our Savior | The Unique Deity Possessor of Wisdom Who Saves | Jude 1:25 |
| Passover, our | The Lamb of God | 1Corinthians 5:7 |
| Plant of renown | God’s Seed of Righteousness | Ezekiel 34:29 |
| Potentate | Supreme Ruler | 1Timothy 6:15 |
| Power of God | The Word of God | 1Corinthians 1:24 |
| Physician | Healer | Matthew 9:12 |
| Precious Cornerstone | The Living Foundation for the New Jerusalem | Isaiah 28:16 |
| Priest Forever | Eternal Blood Shedder that Lives Eternally | Hebrews 7:17; Hebrews 7:21 |
| Prince | Supreme Ruler | Acts 5:31 |
| Prince of Life | Supreme Ruler and Giver of Life | Acts 3:15 |
| Prince of Peace | Supreme Ruler and Restorer of Tranquility | Isaiah 9:6 |
| Prince of the kings of the earth | Supreme Ruler of the rulers of the earth | Revelation 1:5 |
| Prince of the princes | Supreme Ruler of the rulers of the earth. | Daniel 8:25; |
| Prophet | The Anointed One Who Prophecies | Deuteronomy 18:15, 18; Matthew 21:11; Luke 24:19; Acts 3:22; |
| Propitiation (expiation, our Sin-offering) | The Lamb of God | 1John 2:2 |
| Rabbi, Rabboni | Teacher | John 1:49; 20:16 |
| Ransom | The Price Paid For Our Freedom | 1Timothy 2:6 |
| Redemption | He Who Purchased Us Back | 1Corinthians 1:30 |
| Redeemer | Purchaser of our field | Isaiah 59.20 |
| Redeemer of Israel | He who ransomed spiritual Israel with His blood | Isa 49:7; |
| Redeemer, Thy | He Who Purchased Us Back | Isaiah 41:14, 54:5 |
| Resurrection and the Life, the | Raised Back From Death to Life | John 11:25 |
| Redemption | He Who Purchased Us Back | 1Corinthians 1:30 |
| Righteous Branch | God’s Sprouting Seed of Righteousness | Jeremiah 23:5 |
| Righteous Judge | He Who Judges Fairly | 2Timothy 4:8 |
| Righteous Servant | Lawful Just Worker | Isaiah 53:11 |
| Righteousness | Our Justification | 1 Corinthians 1:30 |
| Rock, The | Cornerstone of Salvation | Deu 32:15 |
| Rock, Spiritual | Supernatural Stone | 1Corinthians 10:4 |
| Rock of Offence | The Stone that Offends | Isaiah 8:14; 1Peter 2:8 |
| Root of David | The Source of Life for David | Revelation 5:5; 22:16 |
| Root of Jesse | The Source of Life for Jesse | Isaiah 11:10; Romans 15:12 |
| Rose of Sharon | God’s Fragrant Flower | Song of Songs 2:1 |
| Ruler in Israel | King of the Jews | Micah 5:2 |
| Salvation | The One that Saves | Luke 2:30 |
| Salvation, My | He who Saved Us | Isa 49:6; |
| Sanctification | He Who is Set Apart | 1Corinthians 1:30 |
| Sanctuary | Our Holy of Holies | Isaiah 8:14 |
| Savior | The One that Saved Us! | Luke 1:47, 2:11; John 4:14; Acts 5:31, 13:23; Php 3:20; 1 Ti 1:1, 2:3, 4:10; 2 Tim 1:10; Titus 1:3-4, 2:10, 2:13, 3:4, 3:6; 2 Pet 1:1, 3:2; Jud 1:25; |
| Savior Jesus Christ | The One that Saves Jesus the Anointed | 2Timothy 1:10; Titus 2:13; 2Pet 1:1, 2:20, 3:18; |
| Savior of the body (ekklesia) | The One that Saved the Church | Ephesians 5:23 |
| Savior of the world | The Only Hope For Those in Darkness | Jn 4:4; 1Jn 4:14 |
| Sceptre | The Living Rod of God | Numbers 24:17 |
| Second Man, the | The Brother of Adam | 1Corinthians 15:47 |
| Seed, the | The Seed of God | Galatians 3:19 |
| Seed of Abraham | He Who Was In Abraham | Hebrews 2:16 |
| Seed of David | He Who Was In David | 2Timothy 2:8 |
| Servant | He who serves others | Isaiah 42:1, 49:6; |
| Servant of rulers | He who washes the feet of others | Isaiah 49:7 |
| Shepherd | The Overseer of the Flock | Gen 49:24; Psalm 23:1; Mark 14:27 |
| Shepherd and Overseer of souls | He Who Watches Over the Mind and Thoughts of Man | 1Peter 2:25 |
| Shepherd, Chief | The Overseer of the overseers | 1Peter 5:4 |
| Shepherd, Good | The Blameless Overseer | John 10:11 |
| Shepherd, Great | The Omnipotent Overseer | Hebrews 13:20 |
| Shepherd of Israel | The Overseer of God’s Israel the church | Psalms 80:1 |
| Shepherd, One | The only one that feeds us | John 10:16 |
| Shiloh | He Who Prospers | Genesis 49:10 |
| Solomon | Son of David the Builder of God’s Temple; a type of Christ | 1 Chron 28:9; 1 Chron 29:19; |
| Son | The Son of God | Mat 28:19; John 3:17; John 3:35-36; John 5:19-26; John 6:40; John 14:13; John 17:1; Rom 1:3; Rom 1:9; Rom 5:10; Rom 8:3; 1 Cor 15:28; Gal 1:16; Gal 4:4; 1 Th 1:10; Heb 1:2; Heb 3:6; Heb 5:5; Heb 7:28; 1Jn 1:7; 1 Jn 2:23-24; 1 Jn 4:10; 1 Jn 4:14; 1 Jn 5:9; 1 Jn 5:11-13; 2 Jn 1:3; |
| Son, Beloved | Son Loved By God | Mat 3:17; 2 Pe 1:17; |
| Son, dear | Loved Son of God | Col 1:13; |
| Son, My | The Son of God | Hosea 11:1 |
| Son, Only Begotten | The Only Naturally born Son of God | John 3:16; |
| Son Jesus Christ | The evidence that Jesus the Son was Messiah | 1 Cor 1:9; 1 Jn 1:3; |
| Son of God | He Who Was Born From God | Daniel 3:25; Mat 4:3; Mat 4:6; Mat 8:29; Mat 14:33; Mat 26:63; Mat 27:40; Mat 27:43; Mat 27:54; Mar 1:1; Mar 3:11; Mar 15:39; Luk 1:35; Luk 4:3; Luk 4:9; Luk 4:41; Luk 8:28; Luk 22:70; Joh 1:34; Joh 1:49; Joh 3:18; Joh 5:25; Joh 9:35; Joh 10:36; Joh 11:4; Joh 11:27; Joh 19:7; Joh 20:31; Act 8:37; Act 9:20; Rom 1:4; 2Co 1:19; Gal 2:20; Eph 4:13; Heb 4:14; Heb 6:6; Heb 7:3; Heb 10:29; 1Jn 3:8; 1Jn 4:15; 1Jn 5:5; 1Jn 5:10; 1Jn 5:12; 1Jn 5:13; 1Jn 5:20; Rev 2:18; |
| Son of Man | He Who was born of a natural woman a Son of Adam | Mat 8:20; Mat 9:6; Mat 10:23; Mat 11:19; Mat 12:8; Mat 12:32; Mat 12:40; Mat 13:37; Mat 13:41; Mat 16:13; Mat 16:27; Mat 16:28; Mat 17:9; Mat 17:12; Mat 17:22; Mat 18:11; Mat 19:28; Mat 20:18; Mat 20:28; Mat 24:27; Mat 24:30; Mat 24:37; Mat 24:39; Mat 24:44; Mat 25:13; Mat 25:31; Mat 26:2; Mat 26:24; Mat 26:45; Mat 26:64; Mar 2:10; Mar 2:28; Mar 8:31; Mar 8:38; Mar 9:9; Mar 9:12; Mar 9:31; Mar 10:33; Mar 10:45; Mar 13:26; Mar 13:34; Mar 14:21; Mar 14:41; Mar 14:62; Luk 5:24; Luk 6:5; Luk 6:22; Luk 7:34; Luk 9:22; Luk 9:26; Luk 9:44; Luk 9:56; Luk 9:58; Luk 11:30; Luk 12:8; Luk 12:10; Luk 12:40; Luk 17:22; Luk 17:24; Luk 17:26; Luk 17:30; Luk 18:8; Luk 18:31; Luk 19:10; Luk 21:27; Luk 21:36; Luk 22:22; Luk 22:48; Luk 22:69; Luk 24:7; Joh 1:51; Joh 3:13; Joh 3:14; Joh 5:27; Joh 6:27; Joh 6:53; Joh 6:62; Joh 8:28; Joh 12:23; Joh 12:34; Joh 13:31; Act 7:56; Rev 1:13; Rev 14:14; |
| Son of the Father | The Son of the First part of the Trinity | 2John 1:3 |
| Son of the Blessed One (God) | Son of the Happy One | Mark 14:61 |
| Son of the Highest One (God) | Son of the Omnipotent One | Luke 1:32 |
| Son of David | He Who is Born from David | Matthew 9:27 |
| Star out of Jacob | The Messenger from Jacob, the Sun of Righteousness | Numbers 24:17 |
| Stone, Tried | The Foundation of the New Jerusalem | Isaiah 28:167; |
| Stone, the | God’s Cornerstone of the New Jerusalem | Psalm 118:22; Matthew 21:42; Mark 12:10; Luke 2017; Acts 4:11 |
| Stone of Israel, The | The Spiritual Cornerstone of Israel | Gen 49:24; |
| Sun, the | The Sun that Rules the Day | Psalm 19:4, 84:11,136:8; Matthew 17:2; Rev 1:16; |
| Sun of Righteousness | The Sun that Shines Righteousness | Malachi 4:2 |
| Surety (Guarantee) | He Who is Trustworthy | Hebrews 7:22 |
| Stone of Stumbling | The Building Block Rejected by the Builders | Isaiah 8:14; 1Peter 2:8 |
| Sure Foundation | He Who is Trustworthy and Strong | Isaiah 28:16 |
| Teacher | The Knowledge Giver | John 3:2 |
| True God | The Opposite of the false god | 1John 5:20 |
| True Vine | The Real Source of Life | John 15:1 |
| Truth, the | He who is Faithful and True | John 14:6 |
| Unspeakable Gift | The Indescribable Present | 2Corinthians 9:15 |
| Very Christ | Unlimited Anointing | Acts 9:22 |
| Vine, the | The Source of Life to the branches | John 15:1-5; |
| Way, the | The Only Path to God | John 14:6 |
| Which is, which was, which is to come | The Eternal One God | Revelation 1:4 |
| Wisdom | The Application of Knowledge and Understanding | Proverbs 8:12 |
| Wisdom of God, the | The manifestation of God’s knowledge and understanding | 1Corinthians 1:24 |
| Witness | He Whose Testimony is True | Isaiah 55:4; Revelation 1:5; |
| Witness, Faithful | He Whose Testimony you can count on | Revelation 3:14; |
| Witness, True | He Whose Testimony is True | Revelation 3:14; |
| Wonderful | The One Beyond Compare | Isaiah 9:6 |
| Word, The | God’s Power | John 1:1; John 1:14; 1 John 5:7 |
| Word of God | The Power of the Omnipotent Deity | Revelation 19:13 |
| Word of Life | God’s Power to make Alive | 1John 1:1 |
| Worthy | Jesus the Highest | Heb 3:3; Jas 2:7; Rev 4:11, 5:9, 5;12 |
If you would like to read other reference documents about Names, Titles, Descriptions and Symbols here are some others that are available:
My Blog Post Version Control System!
(ver 1.0) One thing I learned as a computer programmer is the usefulness of an organized control system for determining the version of what we are releasing, using, writing, reading or whatever. So I have decided to implement a version control system for my postings. Since I am constantly attempting to make them better and eliminate mistakes, I will post a document version at the very beginning of every document posted. The first posting will be (ver 1.0) and this one usually has a lot of typing mistakes in it. As I continue to update the document I will increment each posted document with a new version number (ver 1.1, ver 1.2… etc.) Since software has for a long time done this, I believe it is only fair to tell readers that I am not perfect and I make mistakes. I then go back and reread the posts a few days later or even weeks later and try to improve them. Sometimes I put in new things God has taught me about the subject. So each version may have enhancements as well as fixes. Feedback also helps when I get questions about specific things that I may have omitted or not fully explained. This is why I have implemented the version system for my posts. It would be really nice if the WordPress people would implement some automatic version control system that would keep track of your revisions. However, until they do, I will try to take on this task manually. God Bless!
Understanding the Concepts of Deception Used by Satan!
(ver 1.9) This is Part 2 of a series of Bible lessons on the subject of deception. If you have not read “Part 1” I would suggest that you go there to begin your study. Let’s read one of the series foundational Bible verses to get us started:
Rev 12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
Today will be a different type of Bible lesson for me. As you can see from our Key Bible verse above, Satan is called the deceiver that is trying to deceive the whole world. That means, Christians and non-Christians alike. Satan is an equal opportunity deceiver and he shows no favoritism. He is interested in causing us to be deceived from believing and knowing the Truth of God by any means that he can. So I’m going to introduce you to some new things to think about that God has taught me personally. You will hopefully see that these few things that I present you to think about could be a very effective tool of our enemy Satan. I do hope that you understand that God’s enemies are Christian enemies also. If Satan is an enemy of God, then he is our enemy here and now on the earth. Satan’s greatest weapon on the earth has always been the subtly of deception. But, Jesus told us that if we continued in His word we would be His disciples and that we would know the truth and that the truth would set us free (John 8:31-32). That sounds like our freedom is dependent upon us continuing in the word, recognizing the truth, knowing the truth and then using this knowledge of God’s truth to set us free. If Satan can keep you from knowing the truth you will be forever bound by his deception. That is why he is trying diligently to do everything in his power to distract you and to keep you from knowing more about the Bible. In fact deception is one of his only weapons that he has to defeat you. If he can get you to think and believe wrong, he has accomplished his plan of deception and you are now a party working in conjunction with him to deceive others in the world. There are false prophets, false teachers and false apostles in the world everywhere we look. The numbers of these false distributors of lies are so many today that it is becoming increasingly difficult for Christians to recognize all of the ways that Satan uses to deceive people. I will discuss just a couple of the ways that God has taught me over the years that Satan uses and I pray that you can see them also.
I am going to start with one method of deception which I feel is critical for all Christians to understand. This method of deception is to take a small but critical piece of the truth in the Bible and then to possess it or claim it is something that it is not. False teachers take bits of information out of context and then teach it in a false religion with new imbedded lies attached to it. For example, we can find the “Golden Rule” of the Bible found in almost every religion of the world in some alternative form. Because all of these other religions have attached themselves to this verse in the Bible, they have in essence diluted the true meaning as having come from God and they change it to fit what they prefer it to say. Most Christians just automatically discredit the teachings of Satanism and Cultic organizations. But, where did these false religious organizations get their information and why is it so important for them to claim it all as their own original ideas? Think about this a long time, where did all knowledge come from? Was it not our Almighty God who holds all knowledge? I think I should stop here and tell you that what I am saying I am saying to only mature Christians who have been in Christ for many years. I do not want you to think that it is OK to explore Satanism, or to go and study other religions looking for the truth. That would be very foolish to go to a source of predominately lies and try to determine which words are true and which ones are false. That is exactly what Satan wants you to do. What I am saying is study the Bible and ONLY the Bible and find the truth and then do not reject it because Satan has tried to pervert it. Do the sayings of Jesus from John 8:31-32. Continue in the Word was the first step of the command. That means you do not search history books, you do not search text books, you do not search other religions and you only stay with the BIBLE for your total and complete source of the truth!
I am not convinced that Satan has ever had a completely original idea in anything that he does or says on the earth. It would appear to me that Satan takes what God does and perverts into something useful for his purpose of deception. You must realize that Satan is a highly intelligent being that can run spiritual circles around what you know right now. Satan has been in the presence of God and seen what He does first hand, have you ever stood before the throne of God? I doubt seriously if you have. Satan has been deceiving man for the last 6000 years, how old are you? Does your experiences match Satan’s experiences? I say Satan has had a lot more practice at deceiving people than you have had at resisting him. What Satan likes to do is take little key principles from the Word of God and to pervert them so that many Christians will automatically reject them because they are taught as a part of a cult lesson. Do you understand how powerful this is? By taking a truth and by discrediting it, he can now cause many people to more easily reject that truth and be deceived into believing a lie. This is a common political tactic used in our political system. A candidate for office simply discredits his opponent with some perverted mixture of truth with lies. By discrediting them they make themselves to be a more positive answer for the people. I usually do not like to name names but I will give you an example of this type of behavior of Satan. I was told by a reader that a small part of what I teach is a concept that is embraced by the Mormons and used to promote evolution. Since the Mormon religion is a false cultic teaching, does that make everything that they teach a lie? If I do not teach evolution using this same concept does that make what I say a lie? No, what I say is not a lie, but it has been discredited by a cult taking it and perverting into their lies. Does what they teach discredit everything that I say using the Bible? Again, I am not telling you to go read the Book of Mormon and try to figure out what is true and what is false. That is clearly a ploy of the enemy. The book of Mormon is promoted as ANOTHER Testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ given to a false prophet and written down so that you will not read the REAL Testimony of Jesus Christ. Jesus actually warned us not to read things that people ADD to the bible. Jesus clearly told us not to take away any words or to add any words to those that have been written in the Bible (Rev 22:19). The enemy has produced this book of Mormon simply as a tool to get you to not read the TRUE Word of God and His Holy Book of Truth. As long as Satan can distract you with the false you are never going to recognize the Truth. But, if the Mormons try to teach something that is a part of the truth just to discredit the truth; that does not mean the truth is not present in the Bible.
So let me give you another example of something that I may teach that is perverted by a satanic symbol. A common satanic symbol is a five pointed star with a symbol of a male goat with horns on it. Why did Satan choose this symbol to pervert it? What is the significance of this symbol and the meaning of this symbol? Why did Satan pick a goat to pervert it? Now anything in the Bible that God uses for the symbol of the goat is tainted with this perverted image. Because the goat and the 5 pointed star symbols are used for a direct reference to Satan, anything that the Bible now attempts to use them for are more easily rejected by Christians. If someone suddenly came to you with a new revelation of what God said a “star” represents; you will more than likely retract from it. Now, if anyone comes to you with a revelation of what a goat is a symbol of in the Bible, you will automatically throw it aside. This is typical human nature to throw away even the good because someone used it for evil. It is an automatic death sentence for any symbolic object that Satan has used to describe himself. This death occurs by the simple association of any truth by associating with the lies or symbols for Satan. All Satan has to do is to get someone in the world to take a Bible symbol and to pervert it into a symbol for Satan and every Christian will automatically run very fast away from it.
The Bible informs us that Satan presents himself as an angel of light (2 Cor 11:14). Why would Satan then try to present himself with strong demonic images of himself being a very evil being with a pitch fork, horns and a pointed tail? It is because when he shows up looking like a glorious spectacular supernatural being or even as a normal looking person, he will be able to trick you into believing his lies. After all you are looking for an evil ugly being and not a handsome good looking fellow. It is the classic bait and switch approach to advertising; you present one image and then you switch out another new image that is completely different and try to get people to be a sucker for something they didn’t expect to get. This is a very prominent ploy used in deception. Make people think this is true and then present them with a set of lies that are believable. Satan used people like David Koresh and Jim Jones to deceive people. They looked normal, they sounded normal and presented some very subtle words of deception. As a result many people died because these men decided it was time to die. Understanding how your enemy Satan operates may save your life someday.
I’ll end this blog with one more example of deception. If you did not know it, the Ram is a Bible symbol for God the Father. However Satan uses this symbol for himself. Satan is attempting to exalt his throne to the equivalency of that of God’s throne. Satan is trying to deceive people into believing that he is god. When the anti-Christ comes in Revelation he will be setting himself up to be this most high god. So where is God a Ram in the Bible? We can find this several places in the Bible but we will start with Genesis 22:
Gen 22:13 And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.
When Isaac asked his father Abraham “Where is the animal for the sacrifice?” Abraham replied “God will provide Himself as the lamb”. Jesus is repeatedly called the Lamb of God in the N.T. This is a symbolic name for Jesus Christ our sacrifice Lamb. Who is the father of a Lamb? A Ram is the father of a Lamb! As you can see in this verse in Genesis 22, instead of Abraham sacrificing Isaac God provided a Ram. This Ram was a symbol of Himself being the sacrifice. Abraham sacrifices the Ram a symbol of God coming to the earth in the flesh to pay the price for the sins of all mankind with His blood. So God’s symbol is that of a Ram and Satan now produces this symbol to represent himself. What is Satan trying to do? He is trying to discredit the truth of the Bible. He is taking a real symbol found in the Bible and trying to present you a false symbol. This is a classic ploy of deception. Take the real and pervert it.
So this blog was different, I know! It was an attempt to challenge you to think. Use your brain for something more than a place holder of useless information. Take the real and reject the fakes, the false, and the lies of the enemy. God Bless you to know the difference!
If you would like to continue reading about deception you can continue to “Part 3“.
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If you want to know how to get saved and know that you are with confidence you can go to: How do I get saved?
Understanding Seeds in the Bible! The Seed of Resurrection! Part 7
(ver 1.2) This is now Part 7 of a series of lessons on the concepts and laws surrounding seeds found in the Bible. The Seed is a naturally divinely inspired designed principle that demonstrates vast spiritual revelation and today will be another example of that. In a previous lesson I taught on a parable that Jesus spoke on concerning the seed concept that if a seed ever produces fruit, it must first die and be planted (buried) in the ground (John 12:24). We looked at Jesus being this seed, but of course He was also a man like you and I in the world. The Spirit of God raised the man, Jesus Christ from the dead and He became the first man ever to be resurrected from the dead. We know that the man Jesus Christ was crucified on a cross in Jerusalem. We know that He hung there and died. We know the Roman soldier pierced His side and His blood and water from His body flowed from His side onto the ground. We then know His body was taken down and placed in a tomb. We can now begin to understand the seed concepts being presented. The body of Jesus was a seed. This seed died and was buried in a earthly tomb. But, after 3 days we know that God raised this man Jesus back to life in His own physical body. So far I’m just stating things that you should already know, especially if you have been reading this series. If you have not read this series from the beginning I would strongly suggest that you go back and start reading with “Part 1”.
Let us today start by discussing some basic seed concepts using a natural seed. Did you know that a seed contains 3 main parts? How many main parts does a man have? A man also has 3 man parts; man is a 1). spirit that has a 2). soul, who lives in a 3). body. So man has 3 main parts. I believe the parallels to natural things and spiritual things are quite amazing. God is also described as a 3 part spiritual being. God the Father, God the Word and God the Holy Ghost are the three parts that comprise the One True God. So what are the 3 main parts of a natural seed? They are the 1). Seed Coat, the 2). Endosperm and the 3). Embryo. These are the 3 major components of a natural seed. Let’s compare the makeup of a man to the makeup of a seed. The outer portion that we can see would be the “human body” and this would correspond to the “seed coat” which is the outer shell membrane. Then man’s next layer going from least important to most important would be his soul. The soul of the man is his “mind” and this component corresponds to the seed “Endosperm”. The final most important part of a man is his spirit. The “spirit of man” corresponds to the most important part of a seed, the “Embryo”. God can be very tricky to understand. As you might have seen God calls the children of humans their “Seed”. So God describes the human makeup of a man to be designed after a seed. As you can see from the natural description of a seed this information corresponds very closely. However, in another parable Jesus spoke of a man being the “Ground” that the seed is planted into. However, this time the seed is the Word of God. Jesus taught in the Parable of the Sower that man could be 6 different types of ground or natural earth. This is the part that makes many people scratch their heads and say “how can we be both”, yet God clearly calls us both of these. I believe it depends upon your perspective and the application that you are attempting to use it in. Clearly there are different types of seeds and this is part of the difficulty of interpretation, being forced to determine the context and the correct type of everything being discussed by God. No body that I know of says Bible interpretation is easy, if you think it is you have been deceived.
So I have gone through a long introduction, introducing some new things along with a review of some basic seed concepts that we should have all previously learned. Today I want to show you something new in the Bible that applies to God’s design of us being a type of seed. The subject of the resurrection is of course a potentially controversial subject, since not to many people know much about it. Some believe in it and some do not. It is no different today than when Jesus walked the face of the earth. You may remember in Matthew 22:23 that a group of people came to Jesus to ask Him a question. These people were members of the Sadducees, who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead. So it is really no different today, we still have people who do not subscribe to what the Bible teaches. So let’s discuss resurrection and what it is briefly. The “Resurrection of the Dead” is a basic foundational truth taught in the Bible (Heb 6:2). The Greek word in the Strong’s dictionary means to “raise up”, to “stand up again” or “to raise to life again”. These are those which were once alive who are stated to have died and behold are alive again. That is the concept of resurrection being described to us and this is a seed concept being clearly demonstrated. A seed lives, a seed dies and is raised again to a new life after being planted. So if a man is a seed and his makeup or design resembles a natural seed we should be able to see how God plans to use this concept in the resurrection of our physical bodies.
1Co 15:35 But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come?
In this verse Paul is writing to the church at Corinth and answering some basic theological questions. There must have been some raging debate on the subject to cause God to respond in this manner. Of course it also helps us to learn what was being taught since we were not present when Paul taught it to them personally. Two questions are presented to God. First, how are the dead “raised up” and second what kind of body will they have? I think these are two very good questions and we will see if God answers these questions.
1Co 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
Backing up in the chapter we see some contextual verses that are also in reference to the seed resurrection principle. Adam caused all men to die because we were all “in” Adam when he sinned. Christ will cause all men to live again because we that are born again were in Christ when He was raised from the dead. This is not a universal salvation, meaning that everyone will go to heaven however. You see there are people trying to deceive others using these types of teachings where they only use the parts of the Bible that they like and then reject the parts that they do not like or that don’t fit what they desire to believe. Here is a verse that Jesus gave us on this subject of resurrection.
Joh 5:29 And shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation.
To “come forth” is a Seed concept. You dig a hole in the soil, sow a seed in the ground, cover it with dirt and in the process of time it “comes forth” out of the ground. Then Jesus tells us that some who have done good things will be resurrected into life and these are the good seeds that God planted. However, then there is the bad news for the bad seeds, those that have done evil will be resurrected to damnation. Wow, not very good news for some people. Everyone is prophesied to be resurrected from the dead and come forth but there are two types of seeds being described and they are very different, even completely opposite. We learned this concept when Jesus taught us the parable about the man who sowed good seed (Mat 13). The enemy came and sowed tares among the seeds of wheat and they both came to bear fruit simultaneously. What we discover is that the resurrection for the dead is a reality that everyone will face in the future; it is really dependent upon what type of seed you are in to where they end up. Some will be very happy and some will be extremely sad.
1Co 15:32 If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not? let us eat and drink; for to morrow we die.
Here is a verse that I thought I would include simply because this is a common attitude found in the present evil world that we live in. People are massively consumed with self-indulgence and have a self-centered attitude towards life. If you have something and I want it I’ll just take it. After all there are no consequences to life, we are just the same as every other animal on the planet, they think and have been taught. If we evolved from monkeys and monkeys die that is the end of them so it is with us. There is no God, no Judge, no hell, no way are we going to bear any responsibility for our actions so live it up and be all that you can be for tomorrow you may die. People are so focused on themselves they do not know what they are doing to others. That is really going to be the hardest lesson to learn when it comes to judgment day.
1Co 15:35 But some man will say, How are the dead raised up? and with what body do they come?
So let’s get back to finding the answers to the two questions being asked by the skeptics. How is it possible that this resurrection will occur and what will I look like after it does occur?
1Co 15:36 Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die:
God begins to answer the first question using the seed principle. To quicken something means to be made alive. This is a changing or reversal from death to life. What God is describing is the basic seed concept we previously discussed. A seed is useless unless it first dies. Only after the death of a seed, can the new life come forth. I like Paul a lot. He is very straight forward and stands firmly behind what he teaches. He says that those who are ignorant are fools because they purposely reject the truth. You need to decide if you want to be a fool today or change to accept the wisdom of God. God is revealing to us seed principles that are very profound and they apply directly to us in this subject of the resurrection of our physical bodies. We wouldn’t be able to live again if Jesus did not die for us and plant the seed for our salvation. Here is the next verse so pay close attention to what it says:
1Co 15:37 And that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but bare grain, it may chance of wheat, or of some other grain:
God almost gives us a contradiction of terms. One of the seed principles from Genesis is every seed produces after its own kind. An orange seed will produce only an orange tree. But, now we see another extension to the puzzle. You plant a seed and you get a tree and not just another set of seeds. In other words you do not plant a tree and get a tree. Or you do not plant a seed and just get more seeds. No the basic law is that you plant a seed and you will get a new living plant. God is saying in this verse in 1 Corinthians that the physical body that you have right now is nothing but a bare grain of seed. What God is alluding to is that your physical body you have now is not the spiritual body that you will have after the resurrection.
1Co 15:38 But God giveth it a body as it hath pleased him, and to every seed his own body.
While wheat seeds only produce wheat, God is saying that every human is still a uniquely designed individual. So while we are all human seeds, we look differently and have unique natural features like individual fingerprints and DNA. These unique features will produce a similar design in the resurrected us. In other words everybody will not be clones in the resurrected spiritual realm. You can clearly see in this verse God is calling us each a seed, but at the same time also calling us all unique seeds. That makes our seed discussion a little bit more complex, but yet same seed principles and laws still apply. So let’s go through some of the other information revealed to us:
1Co 15:42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:
I skipped down to verse 42 because it seemed relevant to our seed discussion. God says He will take the corruptible natural part of us and sow it to produce the new incorruptible part of us during the resurrection. That is pretty cool stuff, if you ask me.
1Co 15:43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:
What was dishonorable and weak will become glorious and powerful. God is giving you a clue comparison of the difference between the old and the new. That which will become a new is highly better than that which was sown. This is a result of being born again of the incorruptible seed of God and not the corruptible natural seed of man.
1Co 15:44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
Our natural bodies will be planted as a seed that will produce the spiritual resurrected bodies. God clearly declares that our future spiritual bodies are not the exact same as our current physical bodies. The new spiritual body will not get sick, or grow old, will not fail, or even grow tired. There are just too many new features to describe this new body. The new body will certainly have many of the same features of the old body and still be able to do many of the things that old body could do. The best of the old will continue to be present in the new. Jesus after being resurrected from the dead would still eat natural food with his disciples. So eating is a future good thing to look forward to and all the church people said amen! So I think I have gone long enough on the subject of the “Seed of Resurrection”. I hope and pray that you enjoyed the lesson and derived some benefit from reading it. God continue to bless you until the next time.
If you like to continue reading this series you can go to “Part 8“.
Understanding God’s Design of a Man! Man Made In the Image of God!
(Ver 1.2) There is a vast amount of confusion surrounding the makeup of the human design of man. Natural and carnal people think they are just a physical body much like every other mammal on the planet. Certain intellectual people in the world think and believe that they are just a mind in the universal consciousness of Nirvana, or some C.R.A.P. (Christian Reasoning Applied Poorly) like that. Please forgive my bluntness, but God is not an intellect or a mind over matter concept of a religion. There are only a certain number of Christians that realize the truth and of course not all of them really know very much about the details of the design of man and they mix up the components when speaking about them. There is just too many differing man made opinions on the subject and the definitions given to us in the Bible are being ignored. So today I will attempt to explore and to explain the 3 separate parts that make up the human design and teach you how they are related, what they are and where they exist using only the Bible to explain them. This will probably be a very long lesson on the subject, so I apologize for not breaking it down into a series of shorter lessons. We should start with the basics from Genesis, because this was the beginning of man and it states God’s initial design concepts and purpose for a man. Why is it important to study this subject? Primarily because how you see yourself reflects whether you came from a monkey or from a created design of God. Based upon the correct interpretation of Human design found in the Bible alone proves that the evolution theory of man is a myth. In Genesis, God gives us His stated purpose for creating a man and what we will quickly discover in Genesis is that God designed man after a divine pattern of Himself:
Gen 1:26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the…
So here is the stated beginning of man. Man is a created being. Man had a specific stated point of origin. You could call it a point of origination, but God calls it a beginning. Genesis means a book of beginnings. However we can see that humans are uniquely designed after a pre-existing pattern of God. Uh Oh? That probably bugs natural thinking people who believe only in evolution. God who is a Spirit (John 4:24) existed before time and space existed. God is an eternal spiritual being. This of course is not the complete verse and I left out the ending to simply concentrate on the subject at hand of where did man come from? The rest of the verse speaks about man’s responsibilities and purpose for being here. However, I want to focus in on two specific words in this verse, one is “image” and the other is “likeness”.
Image
From an unused root meaning to shade; a phantom, that is, (figuratively) illusion, resemblance; hence a representative figure, especially an idol: – image, vain shew.
This is an interesting Hebrew word from the Strong’s definition. It overall means a resemblance. In other words you could have looked at Adam and seen his family resemblance to his father God. I know there are many religious people who do not like me to call Adam a son of God, but yet that is what the Bible says so I’ll stick with it. I did not say that Adam was the Son of God, so put down your stones. Now let’s look at the word “likeness” and see the Strong’s definition for this word:
Likeness
From H1819; resemblance; concretely model, shape; adverbially like: – fashion, like (-ness, as), manner, similitude.
While this is a very similar word to the first, it is also a completely different word. So either God is trying to teach us something, or He is just repeating Himself and confused and I do not think that God gets confused. The key meaning of this word is “resemblance” as in the “family resemblance” was with Adam resembling his father God again. Similitude is another definition of this word. One definition of the word “similitude” is “One closely resembling another”. Adam when created closely resembled his Creator. What we can clearly see is that if Adam closely resembled God, then whatever God was, man was a very closely designed pattern of this God. You cannot look at one and not recognize the other. Adam possessed the traits of the family resemblance of God. When my son was born and grew up, everyone looked at him and said “He looks just like his father” and he did. What I want you to see is this same family resemblance is handed down from generation to generation. Here is a verse in the Bible that says something about Adam’s son resembling Adam:
Gen 5:3 And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth:
As you can clearly see the same two Hebrew words are presented for another father and son combination. Adam’s son Seth bore the resemblance of his father Adam. Do you recognize a pattern? It is the same pattern between God and Adam, just being perpetuated down the line. Every generation of Adam contained the same resemblance to God. Man has never lost the family resemblance to the Most High. What I want you to realize is that whatever God is, that is also what man is on a smaller limited scale. If God is a Spirit, then man is a spirit. If God is a triune being, then man is a triune being. If God is a speaking spirit, then man is a speaking spirit. There are just too many qualities of God to list them all in this lesson. If you do not understand the trinity of God, I have written a blog on “Understanding the Trinity of God”. So go and read about God the Father, God the Word and God the Holy Spirit being One God in that blog. Now, what I want to do is introduce you to the concepts about the triune makeup of man. Man if created to look like God, must precisely follow the pattern of the makeup of God’s design.
What are the three parts that make up a man? Also, I use the term man generically as “mankind” and I’m not leaving women out, so please understand this. According to the scriptures that I have read and studied, the human makeup of man is that primarily of a spirit being. After all God is a Spirit. If a man had no spirit we would be purely just like a monkey. Animals do not have spirits. No animal was ever made in the image and likeness of God Almighty. Therefore, man did not evolve from animals. There are many idiots in the world that disagree and think God used evolution to bring us into the world, but they do err and make themselves to be fools.
Jas 2:26 For as the body without the Spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.
Those who want to see what the Bible says clearly will accept verses like this one. However, those who do not want to accept the truth will be deceived into believing the lies of Satan very easily. Many times you just have to read the Bible and accept it for what it literally says and this is one of those times. Man’s body we are told is dead without his spirit being inside of his body. You can also read into this a complimentary implied truth that is given to us, if the body is dead, then the spirit has departed and is no longer in the body. People who do not want to believe this fact try to say this word “spirit” means breath, to respire, to inspire, to take in oxygen physically. After all God when He created Adam “breathed” the breath of life into his nostrils, Genesis 2 says. When you think naturally you think wrong and this is most people’s problem with their interpretations of the Bible. They forget who the author is; God is a Spirit and not a physical being. Because God wrote the Bible in a manner to give man a choice to be wrong, many think they are right and do not understand they are completely wrong. The Bible says that the “carnal” mind of man is enmity to God. Natural thinking is an enemy to the thoughts and ways of God. If you think that God came down to the earth and did mouth to mouth resuscitation on Adam to get him breathing and to live, you are clearly deceived. God breathed His Spirit into the body of the man Adam and Adam became a living soul. If you go back and look up the references in the Bible using the Greek word translated as “spirit” in James 2:6; you will find that it is used in context with every type of spiritual being. God’s Spirit or the Spirit of God, who is also called the Holy Spirit are examples found with this same word. The spirits of demons, unclean spirits and evil spirits are also defined using this word. Does God breathe oxygen? Does Satan breathe oxygen? Do Angels breathe Oxygen? If you said No!; you are correct. So then do not think that man only breathes oxygen and that is what makes us human. So man’s spiritual makeup is no different than God’s spiritual makeup, the makeup of angels, Satan or demons. The only difference is that we exist physically here on this planet and that means, we eat, drink, sleep and breathe to be here. Do not confuse natural things with spiritual things or you will be totally confused. I guess I still need to discuss the triune nature of man so I will introduce you to this using the Bible:
1Th 5:23 And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
To declare something to be whole is to declare it to be complete, missing no parts. Man is clearly described as a “triune” being in this verse. Man has three distinct and separate parts that make up our “whole” existence. These are listed in order of priority from most important to that of least importance. The first part of man and the most essential component to man is the spirit of a man. The spirit of man is the part that God breathed into Adam from His Spirit. God is called the “Father” of spirits in Hebrews 12:9. So if God is called the Father of spirits then God is only the Father of Adam’s spirit and not the father of Adam’s body. Do you understand the difference? When Jesus was born into the world as the Son of God, He is called the “Only Begotten”. That means only Jesus was God’s naturally born physical Son. God became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). You can clearly see the difference between Adam and Jesus. Jesus was born here and Adam’s body came from the dust of the ground. These are two radically different creative works of God. So getting back to our verse in 1 Thessalonians 5:25; we can see that Adam when created had to possess all three of these qualities in order to live on this planet. The Bible says that when God breathed the Spirit of Life into Adam; Adam became a living soul so we can see that the soul of Adam is different that the spirit of Adam. God did not put His soul into Adam, it says that Adam only “became” a living soul after God breathed into his nostrils and that is completely different. We have not discussed what a soul is, so that is probably the point of confusion for many people right now. The final component of man listed in this verse in 1 Thessalonians 5:25 is the physical body of the man. This is the part that we all can see and touch, but yet it is not the man, just the house that the man lives in. These are the three components that make up the human design. We are a triune being, consisting of three distinct parts. We exist in three different dimensions or realms of existence. These realms are the spiritual realm, the mental realm and the physical realm.
I have been in many churches and they sometimes use the words spirit and soul interchangeably. They seem to think that they are one in the same things. They will say after a church service that God saved 15 souls today in church. Or they will pray for the soul of Brother John, because he is going through a hard time right now. Or they will say God bless the soul of our dear sister. So what is the difference between a soul and a spirit? I guess we should first determine there is a difference. So let’s start with this verse:
1Co 15:45 And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
So here we have a verse with the two key words used in contrasting styles and references. God calls the first man Adam a Living Soul; but then He calls the last man Adam a quickening Spirit. If the spirit of man was the same as the soul of the man, it would not be necessary to use different Greek words, would it? Jesus Christ is called the Last Adam and He causes spirits to live. The inferred reference or opposite truth to this is the clear association that the first Adam has caused spirits to die. Since it is impossible for spirits to die, then we have to figure out another explanation of what this means. I believe that it means that unrighteous people who are alive in the world are soul dominated or controlled. In direct contrast to this, true Christians in the world should be Spirit aware and controlled. If a person dies without knowing Jesus Christ and accepting Him as their personal Lord and Savior, they are now separated from God. So any way let me give you another verse that declares the reality that the spirit and the soul are not the same thing.
Heb 4:12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
If God can divide the soul from the spirit, they are not one in the same things. What God is revealing to us is that these two things are clearly closely related or even work in conjunction with each other in a joint function or purpose, but that they are clearly and distinctly different components of the human design. God actually gives us a clue in the very last statement to the definition of these two words. The Word of God is said to be a “discerner” of the thoughts of a man’s heart. This word translated as “discerner” comes from a Greek word meaning a “Judge”. The Word of God is able to judge your thoughts. Where are your thoughts? Your thoughts exist within the realm of your mind and intellect. However, God declares that the thoughts are associated with your heart. Your heart is your spirit. So we can conclude that your mind is how you get through to your internal spirit. I think this is a good time to introduce you to the Greek Word translated as “soul”. Here is Strong’s definition:
psuchē
From G5594; breath, that is, (by implication) spirit, abstractly or concretely (the animal sentient principle only; thus distinguished on the one hand from G4151, which is the rational and immortal soul; and on the other from G2222, which is mere vitality, even of plants: these terms thus exactly correspond respectively to the Hebrew [H5315], [H7307] and [H2416]: – heart (+ -ily), life, mind, soul, + us, + you.
No wonder people are so confused. Using this definition is very confusing. It would seem to apply to everything from people down to plants and did you know that in a way this is correct. You see every animal on our planet has a soul. The predominate thing that I take out of this definition is the usage of the reference to the word concerning your “MIND”. Maybe you can clearly see that the Greek word “psuche” is where we get our words like “psyche” or words like “psychology” or “psychiatrist” come from this word. These are all Mind related curriculums and references. These are the study of your mental health and the human mind. This is the predominate realm of the soul of man. To have the ability to think, rationalize, process, calculate, make decisions, among other mental functions are all related actions of the soul of man. Your mind is of course a very complex part of your being, the ability to reason and to create come from God’s nature being imparted into man at creation. This is part of the makeup of man that makes him different than animals. All animals have limited soulish realms, but they do not create nor are they self-aware of their own existence! Sure animals have limited feelings but not like those of a human. Sure in very limited forms animals build themselves houses or things like that. But, I’ve never seen an animal write a song or even try to play the piano on their own without the prompting or training of a man. Animals are not wondering “Why am I here?” and “Who am I?”. Creativity is a part of the soul of man that is unique to us. We learned this trait from our creator God. But, your mind is more complex than just that. How about your memory? The ability to learn information and to recall facts and material on a subject in an organized fashion is definitely a mental function of the human mind. Many naturally thinking people in the world associate or attribute this to the physical human brain. However, this is not what the Bible teaches. Your mind, your reasoning, your memory have nothing to do with your physical brain and I can prove that to you using the Bible.
Luk 16:22 And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried;
Jesus, God in the flesh tells us a real story about two men who both died. One man was a beggar on the earth and the other a rich man. The bodies of both the beggar and of the rich man are buried. The Angels of God come and take the beggar. Did you understand this? The spiritual angels of God came and took the spirit of the beggar to the bosom of Abraham. Now we are immediately told what happened to the rich man:
Luk 16:23 And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom.
The rich man now suddenly appears in hell. We are not told if the angels carried him there or if this is just where you go by default after you die. I find this story to be fascinatingly informative about the afterlife experience. Before Jesus was resurrected, a human could not die and go to heaven, so the righteous ones who died were transported to a place called “Abraham’s bosom” and this is a place different than hell. It is also interesting to note that the rich man could still “see”. Spirits have eyes. Interesting isn’t it? The rich man tries to ask Abraham who was a far off from where he was in hell, to send Lazarus to give him a drink of water because he was being tormented in the flames. Then the rich man asks Abraham to send Lazarus back to the earth so that he could tell his brothers not to come to this place of torment called hell. Are you seeing anything here? The rich man had all of his memory, his mental reasoning abilities; his entire soul realm was with him in hell. Jesus told us that his body was buried in the ground so that means your soul works outside of your body. Abraham was also physically dead and his body was buried and they were holding a conversation and using their minds to do it.
Luk 16:25 But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented.
Here is one of Abraham’s responses to the rich man in hell. He told the rich man to remember and this is clearly a mental function of the soul realm. People in hell even without their bodies can remember, think and process things using their minds. Many try to say this story that Jesus told is a parable and not a real story, but they make Jesus a liar then. Is Abraham a real man? Then if Abraham is real, the beggar is also a real man named Lazarus and finally the rich man must be a real man but one who is not identified by name. I don’t think Jesus wanted to name the rich man or you could see that he didn’t make it to heaven and feel very sad if you knew him personally or he was one of your family members.
This story of Lazarus in the Bible, clearly describes all three components that make up the human design. Every component is clearly identified and separated in one story. It starts in the physical realm and ends in the spiritual realm. The mental or soulish realm transfers wherever the spirit resides. There are just many other Bible verses that speak about the triune nature and the design of man to resemble God, but I guess I have gone too long for one lesson. I have certainly introduced you to some new concepts about the spiritual, mental and physical parts of the human design by God and I hope and pray that you can see them clearly. God Bless!
Understanding Seeds in the Bible! Seed Laws Applied to New Testament Truths! Part 6
(ver 1.3) This is Part 6 in the study series about seeds in the Bible. In my last few lessons on this subject, I have been going through some of the parables of Jesus concerning the subject of Seeds. In these lessons we learned some very valuable spiritual information that apply to every Christian believer and unsaved non-believer. Jesus used these natural Seed concepts and laws to describe vast complex spiritual realities that we have never seen or could even attempt to understand. The Bible contains more than 200 direct references to seeds in the KJV Bible and certainly many, many more indirect references on the subject can be found. If you have not been reading this series of lessons from the beginning I would recommend that you go back and start with Part 1 first. Today I want to teach you some New testament truths by reviewing and applying some of the basic seed law concepts that we learned from Genesis. We will read and study several New Testament verses that we have not discussed up to this point and learn how seeds apply to them.
THE SEED WITHIN ITSELF LAW
One of the first seed concepts that I gave you was the “Seed within Itself” law and concept revealed in Genesis 1:11. If you do not understand correct Bible interpretation, one rule or law of correct Bible interpretation is called the “Law of First Mention”. By going into the Bible and finding the first occurrence of a subject you are introduced to some basic concepts that are usually critical to understanding the entire subject. So Genesis 1:11 says that the earth brought forth trees with fruit “whose seed was in itself”. We understand this to be a natural law which applies, to fruit as well as to the natural man and woman. This law represents a self-sustaining reproductive system that was designed and created by God. God created one thing and this thing contained the built in capability to reproduce indefinitely, sustaining the existence of the species.
1Jn 3:9 Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.
In reviewing the parable of the Sower we learned that the Seed of God was the Word of God. It was the Seeds of God’s Words that produces the spiritual fruit in our spirits. So this verse in 1 John 3:9 tells us that we are born of God. We should be able to clearly understand that this is a spiritual birth and not a physical birth and we can confirm that by reading the words of Jesus in John 3. We have previously seen that the human male sperm was called “seed” in the Bible and we can now begin to see a spiritual application taught from the pattern found within the naturally created reproductive process. This verse says that when we are born spiritually, and it came as a result of us accepting the truth of God’s Word. Now God’s Seed is in us and this is a spiritual repetition of the “seed within itself” law. The more of the Word of God you learn, the more of the Seed of God you have in you and the more fruit of God is potentially produced. It is a very basic concept, but yet very profound.
1Pe 1:23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
So here is another New Testament verse that describes the spiritual Seed of God to be the Word of God. This Spiritual Seed is compared and contrasted with the natural seed of the created man. The sperm of a man is called the corruptible seed. The Greek word translated as corruptible means “decaying” or “perishing”. This is interestingly enough related to the laws of thermodynamics that states everything is in a state of decay around us. Humans are in a state of aging from the moment they are conceived. However, we the body of Christ are Christians that are spiritually “born again”. This birth is not a natural birth, but is a spiritual birth that came as a result of us hearing the Spiritual Words of God. This would be symbolically analogous to our spirits being like the womb of a woman with the fertile egg present. By us lending our ears to God’s Word and hearing it and then understanding it, God’s Word becomes one with our spirit and then God’s Spirit becomes one with our spirit (1 Co 1:16). 1 Peter 1:23 teaches us that God’s word/seed will now “Abide” within us. Abide means to indwell and live in our spirits. This is clearly the seed within itself law from Genesis 1:11. If you have heard the Word of God and have accepted it and know it you have His spiritual seed on the inside of your spirit. Always remember that the Seed of God is in you!
EVERY SEED PRODUCES AFTER ITS OWN KIND LAW
Gal 6:7 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
God is talking to us about another law concerning seeds in this verse in Galatians. This law is also revealed to us in the first chapter of Genesis 1 in verse 11. However, here God is telling us about the seeds that are sown by a man. Sounds familiar doesn’t it? God says that every man will reap whatever kind of seeds that he sows. This is a basic spiritual application of the first law of seeds that every seed produces after its own kind. When I talked about this law originally, I told you that an apple seed will produce only an apple tree and an orange seed will produce only an orange tree. So what you get in life is determined by what you plant. This verse also says that God is not mocked by those who say this is not true and by those that say that this does not apply to them. In other words God is saying this is the way everything in the world works whether you believe it or not. That was a very strong statement from God. You should be beginning to understand a little better about the power of the seeds that you sow, if you have read this entire series of lessons. If you decide not to believe what you just read, God says you are not mocking the messenger Agapegeek, you are mocking God and I would be very concerned about doing something foolish like that.
Gal 6:8 For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.
The next verse in Galatians is just more conformation to exactly what God has said before. This verse reveals to us that there are two types of seeds that every man can sow in this world. The first type of seed is a natural or carnal seed type and this is another example of a corruptible seed type that will reap only natural death. Then there is a spiritual seed type that can be sown and this seed reaps life everlasting. So let me stop right there and ask you this, what is life everlasting? This certinaly does not mean that you will never die physically if you sow to the spirit. It also does not mean that you will ever cease to exist, if you do not do this. Man was created as a spirit being that will never cease to exist, after we die physically; our spirit will either go to heaven or to hell based upon our current relationship with Jesus Christ. The problem with most Bible interpretations is that people do not attempt to get God’s definition on any of the words that they are reading. They read every word and assume they know what they mean and then miss what God is trying to teach them. Here is a verse in the Bible that gives us God’s clear definition of what “eternal life” is in His eyes:
Joh 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.
To me this definition changes the meaning to what I thought it meant to live eternally dramatically and it causes me to shift my thinking differently than I had ever thought before. Eternal life is not living forever; eternal life is your ability to know the True Living God and Jesus Christ whom He has sent forever. That is just a radically different perspective of life eternal. Those who die without this spiritual eternal life will never know God or Jesus Christ and will probably not have a clue why they went to hell. I guess they may have some idea since God speaks of a coming time of judgment and there will certainly be some discussion to the charges against them before judgment is passed if God’s court is like our courts. I guess that last two statements was just my opinions so please do not take them as scripture. I also briefly got off of the subject of seeds to define a term that I think is important for you to know.
SEED SINGULAR OR SEED PLURAL?
Gal 3:16 Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.
I alluded to this seed concept in an earlier lesson on this subject. I talked about the fact that the word “seed” can be taken as either plural or singular and that it is only determined which one it is referring to by the contextual usage of the word and even that can be very difficult figure out. This is just one of the intentionally designed methods of God used to conceal the truth in the Bible. In this verse in Galatians God is referring to the promise made to Abraham. Since Jesus was in Abraham when God made this promise Jesus was the “Seed” within himself that was to receive the promise. Abraham naturally fathered several children. Ishmael and Isaac are the two obvious sons that everyone remembers from Sunday school. However, Ismael was cast out of the house by Abraham’s wife Sarah and is not the promised child. Isaac was the promised child, the future grand-father to the nation of Israel. But, yet Galatians say that Isaac was not the seed that was to receive this promise. However, again Jesus was also in his father Isaac as the seed. Then the two sons of Isaac were born, Jacob and Esau. Esau, the firstborn was not the selected path either, but the younger son Jacob was. Jesus was in His father Jacob as a seed. I could go on and on through every generation from Israel to Mary and see that Jesus was in each parent. But, none of these were the selected “seed”.
Galatians 3:16 says that the promised “seed” that was in Abraham was only Jesus Christ. This was clearly a singular occurrence and not a multiple pattern of seeds being referred to. Hopefully you can better understand how God can look at Abraham and make a promise about his seed, when God was speaking about Jesus Christ who was in Abraham. The Son of God was the promised seed able to fulfill the requirements of God’s conditions, to fulfill the law, to live a sinless life, to die and shed his blood for you and I and to be raised from the dead so that we could forever go and live with Him. To me that is just an awesome display of the wisdom of God. I think I will end this blog today right here. I have just selected a few New Testament applications of the Seed concepts and laws and tried to show you how God used them to fulfill His plan of redemption. Hopefully you are deriving some benefit from these lessons. God Bless!
If you would like to continue reading this series you may go to “Part 7“.
Understanding the Eucharist! What is the Eucharist and Why do we Receive it? Part 1
(Ver 1.3) This is a difficult question to answer and a much more difficult subject to understand than many people give it credit to be. I had a reader ask me a question about why Catholics receive the Eucharist at every Mass? He said that the Eucharist is given out every day in thousands of languages. Do we have any scriptural basis for this and why would we do it so often? This is Part 1 of a series of lessons on the subject of the “Eucharist”. We will discuss; what it is, why we do it and how it applies to the modern church from a Bible perspective. I will explore many different aspects of this subject and give you quite a few new perspectives on this subject. I challenge you to read the entire series before you become a critic of any small part of the lessons. I will definitely warn you up front what I teach you will be different than what you might expect me to say on the subject, but yet I will only use the Bible to explore this subject and I will do my best to keep my opinions completely out of the discussion. What I am interested in is what God thinks about the subject and not what you or I think about it. I find that God’s opinion is much more important to me than your opinion.
In asking Catholics why they participate in receiving the Eucharist, I found that a vast number of answers to that question was “I don’t know”. Not one could give me a Bible verse or a Bible reason for receiving the elements of the Eucharist. Some knew that the bread and the wine represent the Body and the Blood of Christ. But why we receive it and participate in the ceremony, they could not tell me. Is there any benefit to participating in this ceremony? Is there a blessing attached to it? Or do we do it just because it is the right thing that we should do? What makes it the right thing to do? This might become a widely controversial subject before I’m through, so if you are interested in learning the truth keep reading, otherwise you might want to stop here and go to another website or blog.
So now I will begin to teach you some of the things that I know from the Bible about this subject of the “Eucharist”. There is absolutely no way I could tell you everything I know about this without writing a small book, so I will not be doing that. So today is just the introduction to the subject and like I said, it will probably be totally different than what you might expect. The Bible says that God is a Spirit (John 4:24). God existed throughout all of eternity, outside of the dimensions of time and space limitations that we exist within right now. The Bible says that God created the heavens and the earth (Gen 1:1). So God existed prior to the existence of this physical universe. We therefore know that the physical universe had a specific point of origin. When God created man in this world, God breathed the breath of life into him and this was Adam’s spirit which came from God’s Spirit (Gen 2:7). Hebrews 12:9 says that God is the Father of all spiritual beings. Therefore, man is technically a spiritual being that lives within a physical natural body (1 Th 5:23). Why is all of this important? Sometimes I just need to state the Bible basics before I try to introduce you to more advanced spiritual subjects found in the Bible and I do this to help refresh your memory. If you disagreed with anything that I have said so far, you will have greater difficulty with the remaining things to come. Let’s take a look at a verse that is not directly about the Eucharist but yet applies indirectly by the stated application.
2Co 4:18 While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.
The Bible says that we need to focus our attention away from the natural physical things that we can perceive with our senses in the world and instead focus on the things that we cannot see. This is a contrasting verse that is comparing the natural dimension to the spiritual dimension. The Bible tells us clearly that those things that are natural and physical are just “temporal”. The English word temporal is translated from a Greek word (G4340) that means “temporary”. Anything that is considered temporary is not eternal. What God is saying is that this world is disposal and will change to the permanent some day in the future. Therefore, physical things can be viewed as being “here today and gone tomorrow” or “easy come and easier go”. What God is saying to us is that there exists nothing in this physical world that is visible that we can call “permanent”. Do you understand this? Only your unseen spirit which is present inside of your body right now will exist forever after your death and this existence will be either in heaven or in hell depending upon what you have done in this life to receive or reject the finished work of Christ Jesus. Of course God will create a New Heaven and a New Earth someday and these will exist forever and we who have received salvation will live there (Rev 21:1).
So I have probably just confused you up to this point. I have not even mentioned the “Eucharist”, or have I? Let me ask you this, can you touch the “Eucharist”? Can you smell the “Eucharist”? Can you taste the “Eucharist”? If you answer yes to any of these questions then they are natural physical things. These natural and physical elements according to the verse that we just read in 2 Cor 4:18, these are just more temporary things that God says we should not be focused on. Uh oh? I warned you that this was going to be controversial, didn’t I? That may make it sound like I am saying we should ignore them, but that is not what I’m saying at all. What I am saying is that we should be focused on the eternal spiritual objects represented by these natural symbolic elements that are only temporary physical things used to teach us. I am definitely not saying not to partake of these; I am just asking you to figure out why you are partaking of these and focus on the meaning behind partaking of them and not to focus on the physical bread or wine. You see after you die, you can take the meaning with you into eternity, but the physical bread and wine will remain here on the earth and turn to dust. Do you understand the difference between what I just said? What I am attempting to do is to change your perspective from a physical viewpoint to a far greater spiritual viewpoint. Let’s see what Jesus says about the Eucharist:
Mat 15:11 Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man.
Uh Oh? Jesus didn’t even mention the Eucharist, did He? As you should be able to clearly see He did talk about the Eucharist in an indirect reference. Jesus is talking about something going into your mouth as natural food. Unleaved bread and wine (grape juice) is normally used in the Eucharist church ceremony. What exactly is Bread and Wine? Here is another verse of scripture that is difficult to understand for many people. Jesus is speaking about the difference between natural things and spiritual things again. Jesus is saying that anything that you eat naturally and put into your mouth does not cause you to be “defiled”. To defile something is to cause it to be “unclean”, “polluted”, or to be “profane”. You can clearly see that Jesus is saying that it is not what you physically eat that causes you to sin and to become spiritually unclean. What would be the opposite truth (antithesis) to this statement that Jesus just made? I believe that it would be “There is nothing that you can physically eat that will make you “clean”, “pure” and “undefiled”. So what am I saying? I am saying that the “Eucharist” is a physical representation of something that is a spiritual truth that is more important than the physical pieces that you handle with your natural hands and put into your natural mouths. Jesus continues in this context to describe the things that you physically eat as being only natural things that are processed by the physical body and expelled down the toilet (Mat 15:17). So what makes the Eucharist elements any different? I think that is a very excellent question to consider. It would only be different if you knew what it all meant and how it all applied to your life as you partook of these elements. Without the knowledge and the reason for the action the action seems to be worthless to me based upon what Jesus just taught us about eating physical food. What we are seeing now in the Bible is a pattern of truths being revealed to us. There is a major difference between natural things and spiritual things. The natural things are placed here as temporary teaching tools and the spiritual things are the eternal things to be focused upon. Doing natural things without understanding the spiritual things behind them actually does you no good physically, emotionally or spiritually. I pray that you are grasping these important concepts.
What I am trying to say is DO NOT do things just because you are told to do them or asked to do them by a preacher or a priest. Do not do something just because others around you are doing them and you want to fit in. People have been poisoned and died by following that type of reasoning, simply because the cult leader that they were following determined it was time for everyone to die. What I am saying is find out why you are doing something in the natural realm using the Word of God and what it means and then use that information to determine if this what you should be doing. Follow God’s Word and not any man, any priest, any preacher, any denomination, group or whatever. Let God be True and every man a liar (Rom 3:4). I am attempting to teach the difference between religion and a real relationship with Jesus Christ. Religion is anyone partaking of a ritual set of elements without any knowledge of why they are participating. Relationship with Christ is worshipping the God in the knowledge of the one that offered His body and His blood so that we could be saved while we remember Him through partaking the elements. Let me give you another example of what I am trying to say from the Words of our Savior Jesus:
Mat 23:25 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
Jesus is again contrasting the differences between temporary natural things and far greater spiritual things. Jesus is telling those that He was speaking to, that they were hypocrites. Why were they this way? Jesus said they were focused only on the outside of the cup (body) and not the inside of the cup (spirit). This was of course more symbolic representations for the temporary natural things of this world and the eternal spiritual things. Being focused just upon the taking of the “Eucharist” without knowing the reason why you are taking it would be an example of this type of hypocritical religious behavior. If you do something lacking any knowledge about why you doing it, the act becomes a pagan ritual or a religious rite that is attempting to please a god that you do not know and these are what Jesus was calling the actions of ignorant hypocrites. By only doing something externally while not knowing the reasons why you are doing it internally, you could be falling into a deceptive pattern found within any godless religion in the world. Do you understand that? What would make the taking of the Eucharist in a church any different than participating in an Islamic temple rite? I can literally see no difference between the two if they are both done in religious acts of ignorance. This is another statement Jesus said about these hypocrites:
Mat 15:9 But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.
Jesus is clearly saying that these men worship God in vain, because they were teaching the “doctrines” and “commandments” of men. So when you do something that you do not have any reasons for why you are doing it, how do you know it is not a humanly created doctrine of man? Perhaps it could even be something that was designed by Satan to deceive you into a lie? Jesus said by adding your thoughts on top of the Word of God, you render the Word of God to be of No Effect! (Mat 15:6) These are all very strong words of warning to all those who practice religion and do not know God. Your religion will not save you. The partaking of the elements will not saved you. Going to church will not save you. Becoming a member of the church will not save you. Being baptized in water will not save you. I could go on and on but you get the point, I hope.
In these verses Jesus is talking about a strongly religious group of people of the Jews called the “Pharisees”. These men came up with their own set of rules and outward traditions that they thought made them righteous in the eyes of God. What you must know is God is much more concerned with the eternal spiritual you than He is with the temporary physical you. What I am attempting to teach you today is that doing things in the natural are worthless if you are not aware of the reasons why they are to be done. The Pharisees clearly did many good looking things externally in this world but internally they were corrupt and this was their downfall. If we die physically and know Jesus Christ the Bible says that we will go to be with the Lord (2 Cor 5:8). However, if you die physically and do not know Jesus Christ, then you are eternally lost in hell. Physical things done in your natural body are just temporary things and God is much more focused upon your eternal spirit and your soul that is inside your physical body that you cannot see. Real salvation always starts on the inside in your spirit and shows up on the outside in what you do and say. God changes your heart inside of you and this will always show up in the things you do on the outside later. The opposite of this is Religion which is man’s attempt to change himself to please God and God said this will never work. (Gal 2:6)
Any Christian who can not give a scriptural reason for why they are participate in the “Eucharist”, do you now see why it might be important to find that information before the next time you blindly participate? Does it make a difference if you do something with our without knowledge? Is it just the fact that we did something that makes it right? Is the fact that someone blindly participates in something that causes them to be in God’s favor? I do not think that God would have written the Bible, if He wanted you to blindly parrot and monkey religious rites. What makes Christianity different than any religion in the world? It is the fact that we have a personal relationship with God and in other religions they are trying to just please a god that they do not personally know or understand. So I’ll ask you again, does blindly following a ritual cause you to derive any benefit from what you did? Not according to what Jesus just said in Matthew 23. Jesus told us these were just the action of religious hypocrites. Please do not be offended at what I just said. I am not naming names and I did not call anyone this by name. I’m just reading the Bible and people need to decide if the Bible applies to them or not. I’m not your judge, so I will not judge you or whatever you do.
I think I will stop this introduction to the subject of Eucharist right here for now. I know I did not attempt to define the term or explain what it is or how it applies to us today. I think these will have to be future topics that we discuss as we continue to learn. Today I wanted to get you to think afresh and I wanted to shift your focus off of physical natural things and get you to start focusing on lasting spiritual things. Quit being a person who does something and does not know or understand why they are doing it. There is a major difference between natural and spiritual things and it is time for the Church to realize it. Are the temporary things in the world more important to you than the eternal spiritual things of God in you? If they are God and anything else that I tell you from the Bible can’t help you. Be blessed in the knowledge of Him that is Faithful and True. If you have any specific questions or comments please feel free to share them with me. If you have any experience with participating in religious rites without understanding the reasons why you are doing them, please share those also. Until next time, God Bless!
If you would like to continue reading the next lesson in this series, you may go to “Part 2” now.
Understanding Seeds in the Bible! The Kingdom of God is Like a Man that Sowed Good Seed! Part 5
(Ver 1.2) This is now part 5 of a series of lessons on seeds in the Bible. Hopefully if you have been reading this series you have started to understand the importance of knowing and fully understanding this subject. Jesus seemed to indicate that this subject was the key to understanding every other subject in the Bible. God has designed and implemented a wide variety of natural objects and laws as views into the spiritual realm that we do not know very much about. The natural laws concerning “seeds” are just one prime example of this revelation. God believes that you can plant just a single seed and expect a vast harvest. God planted the man Jesus Christ as a seed and He has been waiting for all of the fruit of this sown seed for the last 2000 years. Since I can not fully explain everything or repeat everything that is said in every blog, I would strongly suggest that you go back and and start reading with “Part 1” if you have not read from the start.
In the last lesson we discussed that Jesus was a seed. As you may also recall I also implied in a previous lesson that Adam was a seed. However, Adam was a natural seed and Jesus the Last Adam was a spiritual seed. In Genesis 1, God spoke to Adam and told him to be “fruitful” and to “multiply”. These are seed concepts that we have already discussed in some level of detail. Fruit comes from seeds and the fruit has the seeds to produce more fruit. This is the natural law of multiplication. Most seeds that you plant in the ground always produce multiple or multiplied new seeds. If you plant a seed of corn in the ground it will grow a new plant that can have anywhere from one to eight new ears of corn on it. Each ear of corn can contain anywhere from 200 to 400 new seeds. So doing simple math, we can say one kernel of corn seed is potentially multiplied into as many as (8 x 400=3200) new seeds. If you take these 3200 new seeds and plant them; potentially you get 3200 x 3200 new seeds that is more than multiplied growth, it is now becoming exponential growth. This represents the power of a single seed in the Bible. It only takes one seed to have potential explosive growth. God started with just one man named Jesus and this has resulted in a very large number of believers today. This is exactly why Jesus could say the Kingdom of God is like a man that plants a seed.
Today I want to explore some new concepts of seeds in the Bible using another parable that Jesus taught us. In this parable the Kingdom of Heaven is again being spoken of and a man is again planting seeds into the ground. It seems that Jesus used this seed analogy repeatedly to try to teach us new spiritual things. So let’s see what Jesus is saying now:
Mat 13:24 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field:
So while Jesus is declaring another parable about a very similar subject, He is at the same time giving us additional information about the spiritual laws of seeds. In the last parable, Jesus qualified the noun seed with the adjective “mustard” meaning he limited the scope to a specific type of seed. In Matthew 13:24 Jesus does the exact same thing, but this time says this is “good” seed. With the addition of a simple adjective of “good” Jesus teaches us that there are also “bad” or “evil” seeds in the world. In my front yard I sometimes call these weeds, because these can be thorns and thistles and they are never anything that I planted. What we immediately conclude is that not every seed is “good”. Remember what God said was the “good” seed. Jesus taught us in the parable of the Sower that the seed was the “Word of God”. Obviously the Word of God is the Good Seed that potentially produced the Good Fruit. So what is “bad” or “evil” seed? I think we are about to find out:
Mat 13:25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.
It is important to note that God’s good seed is planted to produce “wheat”. Wheat is a very specific crop with a very specific purpose. It is critical for you to see if God would have wanted corn, He would have planted corn, if God would have wanted potatoes, God would have planted potatoes. What we learn is that God’s seed is specifically designed to produce a very specific crop for a very specific purpose. Wheat is normally ground up and we create flour with it and this is the key component to making bread. It is interesting Jesus talked about He was the bread of life. We can clearly see an association between Jesus the grain of wheat seed being sown to produce the future bread. After Jesus arose, the explosion of the Word of God grew very significantly. This growth was in both the new written words of the New Testament and the increased understanding of the Old Testament.
Many will try to interpret this parable and say things that it does not say. According to the Bible, God does not sleep or slumber, yet Jesus as a physical man certainly slept. However, now we are not talking about just God anymore. We must recall what the soil represented in the Parable of the Sower. The soil represented people in the world. Now that changes everything. People do sleep both physically and spiritually. Natural sleep is a pattern for spiritual sleep. We all normally sleep at night and work during the day. These are symbols and typology for the hearts of man also. Those in the night are those in darkness and they are spiritually asleep. God has given to us the “Good Seed”, the True Word, but yet God is not here personally to give it out and teach it to us in the flesh anymore. So this is a parable about the good seed creating the new spiritual Kingdom of God. Where exactly is the Kingdom of God located? Many will try to say it is in heaven, but this is not what Jesus taught. If you read in Luke 17:21, Jesus told us that the Kingdom of God is now “within us”. We therefore know that this Kingdom of God is within our spirits, right here and right now. So what do you call those that have the Kingdom of God in them right now? You call them Christians, those that are in the light! The opposite to those in the light are those who are in the darkness. These are those who spiritually sleep and slumber. These are the men who slept that Jesus is talking about in this parable. God didn’t begin to give us the Bible (good seed) for over 2000 years of human history. The Bible has grown over the next 2000 years from a few books into our current 66 books of the KJV Old and New Testaments. This is another example of the multiplication of seed. While men were in the darkness and spiritually asleep, Satan came and sowed tares. We clearly see that the tares came from a false, bad, evil set of words being spoken. You can call them lies, falsehoods, deceptive words, deceits, fabrications and you can even call them “leaven” even though we have not really discussed what symbolic “leaven” is yet. Leaven is something you mix with wheat and it changes the bread makeup. This is a spiritual principle that Jesus taught us to beware the Leaven of the Pharisees. The Pharisees would constantly take the word of God and add their own rules and words on top of the true words. Thus they diluted the truth with lies. I hope that you do understand who this enemy of God is? It is certainly Satan who has sown the seeds of the tares. Satan is a spiritual being created by God who was found to have sin in him. As we have learned that field represents the hearts of man. So we have seen that an enemy has come and planted “bad” seeds into the hearts of people in the world today.
Mat 13:26 But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also.
What we have clearly learned from what Jesus taught us is that God has enemies. Spiritual forces that manipulate and deceive people into believing things that are not from God. God has given to us the “Good Seed” and this implies that Satan has sown “Evil Seed”. That means that not everything that comes along being taught is what God said. We can clearly see that false religions in the world are a trick of the enemy to distract and deceive you. We can also understand that false teachers will also come along and try to deceive you with enticing words.
All of this is just the practice of people teaching right or wrong things. The sowers are the teachers in the world today and the seeds are the words spoken. It is very rare that any man on earth teaches the pure Bible concepts without tares. Why is this? It is primarily because no man knows the entire Bible and everything that is in it and everything that it means. There is no man on the planet that is God who knows everything. So therefore, we must all become tolerant of each other’s ignorance and strive to come up higher and learn the truth. We are all on the paths of learning, or at least we should be on these paths. If you are not still learning new things then you are stagnating in a cesspool of ignorance. God tells us all to “Get more knowledge, but with all of your getting, get also understanding”. Jesus taught us to “continue” in the Word. To continue is an ongoing process, a never ending state of learning. Only by continuing, Jesus said you could be called His disciples and only then would you actually know the truth and be set free.
This parable continues to discuss many things concerning the Kingdom of God. God tells us that the seeds of the Kingdom will continue to grow with the tares of the enemy as long as it is not time to harvest. God tells us, if he would have torn out the tares, he could have taken out some of the wheat because the roots can be entangled with each other. However, there is coming a harvest time and I believe it is very near. It would appear to me that those in the darkness are growing stronger in their evil ways. The evil in the world is running rampant and unless God does something soon this will not be a good place to be.
Seed concepts are critical to understand for every Christian. I believe that if you grow spiritually you will be able to know the times and the seasons and be able to recognize the times of the impending harvest.
If you would like to continue reading this series you can go to “Part 6“.
Mine Eyes Have Seen the End to All Perfection!
The Bible says some really strange things. Sometimes I read them and just scratch my head. What do they all mean? Today I am going to teach on one of these concepts that made me think a lot. Often times I have heard many people claim that God is perfect and that when God created our world, God made it perfect originally in the beginning. Both of these are very broad statements with potential conflicts. In your mind, can you come up with a definition to what “perfect” is? Is there anything in our world that qualifies as being perfect? According to the laws of thermodynamics, everything in our world is in a state of decay. Meaning you can build a brand new car today and just put it up on blocks and park it for 50 years and it will be in a complete state of disrepair and aging with yet still zero miles on the odometer. You leave it parked long enough it will become rust and dust. So can you think of anything in our current world that qualifies as perfect? How would you define “perfect”? To me something that is made perfect is something that is incapable of failing.
So if you have ever read my blogs, you know I’m not perfect. If I could become better in any areas, it would be my typing and proof reading abilities. I constantly go back and reread my blogs looking for typing mistakes and for places that I missed it. The other day I wrote a blog about spiritual power and thought I said one thing. But, since I left out one word “NOT” it changed it completely to say something that I didn’t want it say. So if you ever read my posts, especially those that subscribe by email, sometimes the current version on the web has been updated, corrected, improved and hopefully made easier to understand. Why is that? Simply because, I’m not perfect! However, at times it totally amazes me that God uses imperfect people to try to help others. I would guess technically speaking that God has no other choices, we are all just imperfect people on this planet.
Psa 119:96 I have seen an end of all perfection: but thy commandment is exceeding broad.
Did you know that if God is making a New Heaven and a New Earth, then there is at the very least some major flaws implied with the Old Heaven and the Old Earth? Have you read in Revelation about these new spiritual and physical places? Have you ever wondered why it was necessary for God to do this? I certainly have. This verse in Psalms 119:96 are the Words of God Almighty written to us. God declares that He has seen the end to all “perfection”. The Hebrew word “perfection” here means “completeness”. Have you ever thought about the fact that if God creates a new heaven and a new earth, what is wrong with these old places? Can’t God ever create anything perfect and incapable of failing? God created Lucifer and he failed. God created Adam and he failed. What is the deal? These are very difficult questions to come up with any good answers for. But, it would seem to me that in order for God to give His creation choices and free will, it would require that they are not created originally to be perfect. When God created our world in Genesis 1, I never see where God said anything was perfect. God said it was good and then very good, but that is a far cry from “perfect”.
Perhaps you have some ideas on this subject and I would be very pleased if you would share them with me. Today’s lesson is just a short thought provoking exercise into causing you to think about things in a new perspective. If God is “Perfect” and this verse in Psalms says “ALL” perfection will end, does that include God Himself? Now that is a very difficult question to answer also. But, as I think about Jesus coming to the earth as God in the flesh, I think that the Bible tells us that He was tempted in every manner as we are, yet without sin. The Bible tells us that God took on sinful flesh, to defeat sin and the consequences of sin. So if God was here on earth in a perfect form of His deity power it would have been impossible to tempt Jesus and it would have been impossible for Jesus to fail. It would have also been impossible for you to kill Jesus on a cross. I believe that Jesus in the form of flesh, was not perfect in the sense that God in heaven was perfect and incapable of failing. But, that is just what I have read in the Bible and I don’t know everything. Maybe you can come up with a better explanation of why God says “All” perfection will end. God bless you as you abide in the Word of God.
Understanding God’s Spiritual Power and the Power of Spirits!
(Ver 1.1) Today is the next lesson, “Part 9” in the series on understanding the Bible subject of spoken words. If you have not read this series from the beginning you should go and start reading with “Part 1“. Most Christians possess the belief that God is omnipotent. “Omnipotent is a theological term that is technically not found in the English translation of the KJV Bible. However the word “Almighty” (H7706, G3841) is found in the KJV Bible and it means “omnipotent. The word “Almighty” appears some 57 times in the KJV Bible with only 10 occurrences appearing in the New Testament and 9 of these are found in the book of Revelation. It appears to me that God emphasized His power and ability more directly in the Old Testament and has given the subject less emphasis in the New Testament based upon His word selection and distribution. The 9 instances of “Almighty” in Revelation seem to be related with God’s sovereign ability to execute judgment. Judgment is not a predominate theme of the New Testament except when you come to the book of Revelation. I did not say that you cannot find judgment in the N.T., I just said it was not the dominate theme of the church age. If you recall when Jesus was walking the earth, people brought a woman to Jesus who was caught in the act of adultery and Jesus’ response should have been that of a judge according to the law; however Jesus was mercy driven with compassion and told those who were without sin, to cast the first stone. However, did you ever think that the only one without sin in this group was Jesus and that He should have been the first one to cast the first stone, but did not? The mercy of God is a much greater predominate theme in the N.T. than the judgment of God. But that is another different subject to discuss at another time. Today we are talking about the subject of spiritual power and the power of spirits. Let’s look at the “Power” of God first. Does God have ALL Power?
2Co 6:18 And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
The Greek word G3841 translated as “Almighty” is a word meaning “all powerful” or “omnipotent”. God has the power, strength and ability to do anything. The power of God is massively demonstrated throughout the Old Testament. From the creation account in Genesis 1 all the way to the flood of Noah, to the scattering of people at the tower of Babel, to the demonstration of power before Pharaoh in Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, to the miracles in the wilderness. There are just too many examples found in the Bible to list them all. So we can easily understand that God has great and awesome power. But, does God hold “ALL” power? That was my question originally. Meaning ONLY God has any power? A lot of religious people think in these terms and miss what the Bible says on the subject.
Let me introduce you to a new concept and another term used to describe nature and character of God other than as the “Almighty”. This new term that I will show you is used in the KJV Bible approximately 48 times; again 38 times in the Old Testament and only 10 times in the New Testament. This term or name of God reveals Him to be the “Most High God”.
Gen 14:18 And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God.
Reading this verse we can clearly see that God is described as being “Supreme”. Meaning among spirits there is none greater or more powerful than He is. God is at the top of the spiritual food chain, proverbially speaking. What do we learn from reading this verse? If there is a “Most High God”, then there are other gods that are below him in rank, power and ability. That statement might get some people upset at me, but yet I’m just reading the Bible and seeing what is written there. Can you understand what was said by God? You do understand that the author of the Bible does not need to qualify the name “God” with the adjective modifier of “Most High” if there are no other gods that exist? It only takes limited basic logic and very simple reasoning to see what God says in this verse. Of course some will try to say that God is the only “True God” and all of the others are just false imaginary gods. However, the title “True God” is also found in the Bible and it is a different Hebrew word than “Most High”:
Jer 10:10 But the LORD is the true God he is the living God, and an everlasting king: at his wrath the earth shall tremble, and the nations shall not be able to abide his indignation.
We can clearly see that the LORD is called the “True God”. So we can automatically conclude that there are also false imaginary gods that also exist. But this verse also claims God is the “Living God” meaning these false imaginary gods are only defined as those that are dead or have no life in them. A false god would be like when people in the world worship idols, the objects made by the hands of man. These idols are “false and dead gods” and they have no power on the earth whatsoever. Another example of a false god would be like those found in mythology. False, gods like Atlas, Hermes, Mercury and etc. These are gods made up in the minds of men that do not have any basis for existence. So what we have learned is that there are several different types of gods in the world. We created the following list diagram explaining what we have just learned with our God on left and others mentioned or implied on the right.
| Biblical Title of God | Antonym Opposite |
| Almighty God | Limited god |
| True God | False god |
| Living God | Dead god |
| Most High God | Lesser god |
So what is my point? Where am I going with all of this? What I want you to see and learn is there are other gods in the world other than our Almighty God. I am not talking about Greek mythology or Roman mythology or any other kind of imaginary, fictitious of mythological deity powers. What I am about to show you are created spiritual beings in the Bible that God has called other types of “gods”. You can clearly see these gods exist by the implications that we have just read in the Bible from the names given to us by our God. Here is a N.T. verse that you should be aware of, but I’ll remind you of it:
2Co 4:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
So who blinded the minds of all those that believe not in this world? This verse is not speaking of humans since they are the ones that have their minds blinded. No this verse is speaking of another spiritual power that exists in the world. This spiritual power is Satan and he is called the “god of this world”. This Greek word translated as “god” in this verse means “deity”. It can also mean “supreme”. This word occurs over 1000 times in the N.T. and is most often used for references to our God. For example in Matthew 1:23 where Jesus is described as “Emanuel” translated as “God” with us it contains the same Greek word. However, in 2 Cor 4:4 we have a new mystery being stated using the same Greek word in reference to Satan. Who gave Satan this title? Or did he steal it from someone? If Satan is called a god by the Most High God, do you accept it? In other words is God a liar? You see that is the problem with many Christians, they do not know that Satan exists and who he is. So if Satan is a god, what type of god would he be? He is not the “Most High”, nor is he the “Almighty God”. I cannot call him the “True God” either. He is certainly alive so he might fall into the living god category. It really depends upon your definition of death. Satan is not a physical being so he cannot die naturally. If you do not know it, you cannot kill a spiritual being or cause them to cease to exist. But, yet the Bible does talk about a “spiritual death” which can be defined as a separation from God. I believe that Satan is now and has been separated from God ever since the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Bible tells us that if Satan would have known what was going to happen to himself, he would not have crucified the Lord of Glory (1 Cor 2:8).
Is Satan a lesser god than the Almighty God, I believe he is definitely on a lower spiritual plane than God Almighty. Satan is not omnipotent, and he is not omniscient, and neither is he omnipresent. So Satan qualifies as both a “lesser god” and a “limited god”. So the question arises does this god Satan have any power? I had one reader tell me that he didn’t think anyone could create anything other than the Most High God. God is the only being that has the power of creation. I’m not sure if I agree with that statement totally. Where in the Bible does it say that only God can create anything? If you know of a Bible verse like that I would be very pleased if you would share it with me. Also, please do not assume that I am saying anything that I have not said. God Almighty is the creator of everything that we see around us in our world. But, many people think that Satan has no power to do anything and that is just not what the Bible says. At least 3 times in Revelation the beast, the false prophet and Satan are stated as having done “miracles” (Rev 13:14, Rev 16:14, Rev 19,20). A miracle is defined as a “supernatural” sign and wonder. That tells me that Satan has significant abilities that he has not fully demonstrated to us. That tells me that Satan is not powerless. I learned a lot from what Jesus taught about Satan:
Luk 10:19 Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the pwer of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
Apparently Jesus did not think that Satan had no power either. There are two words in this verse, both translated as “power” but they are dramatically different Greek words. The first word translated as “power” (G1849) was spoken to us (the church) and it means spiritual “Authority”. Jesus gave the Church legal jurisdiction over Satan (serpent) and the rest of his demons (scorpions). The second word (G1411) translated as “power” is in direct reference to a symbolic serpent and some symbolic scorpions. These are the symbolic representations for the enemy of the church called Satan and his demons. This word for “power” means “miraculous power” or the “ability to do supernatural miracles”. So what is a miracle? A miracle would be anything that occurs that is not of the ordinary course of nature. If you scrape your leg and it bleeds, it will heal in the ordinary course of time and nature. However, if you lost your leg in a motorcycle accident and it grew back from a stump that is a miracle. So according to Jesus, Satan is capable of doing supernatural miracles. So do you understand that a spiritual being like Satan has a miracle working type of power? Jesus told us in John 10:10 that the thief came not but for to kill steal and to destroy. The thief is again a reference to “Satan”. To have power to kill and destroy something is the opposite power of giving life and creating new things. So does Satan have spiritual power and ability to do something supernatural in our world? I believe that the Bible says that he does. God’s word at the very least implies that Satan has great power in the spiritual realm. However, He is still well under the level of the Most High God in power and ability.
Then there are other references in the Bible that says people are gods. Jesus looked at the Jews in John 10:34 and said “is it not written in your law that I said ye are gods”? Jesus was quoting a scripture verse written in the O.T. in Psalm 82:6 where God told them they were gods. People in the church today struggle with believing that concept. Does man have the power and ability to do things in the spiritual realm or are we just limited to the natural realm? We understand from Genesis 1:26, that man was created in the image and in the likeness of the Most High God. If we were created to be like God Almighty that would mean that we had the similar features and characteristics that God had. If God had all power, we must have been created with the likeness of this power on a lower scale. You might call us gods of a lesser power. Here is another verse found in Psalms that speaks about the creation of man:
Psa 8:5 For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour.
As you can see, this verse places man in certain spiritual rank and position of ability. However, the translators really dis a very poor job with this verse ignoring what the original Hebrew language said. The translators did not believe that man had any spiritual significance. You see the Hebrew word (H430) translated as “angels” in this verse is the Hebrew name for God called “Elohiym”. This is the name of the Supreme God used in the O.T. Bible over 2000 times, and it is translated as “God” the majority of the time. What we discover from reading this verse, is that man (Adam) was created to be a little lower than the Supreme Most High God. That does not sound like anyone with No power or ability.
We are children of the Most High but not of the same ability to create worlds, planets and universes. One of our greatest weaknesses is that we lack the knowledge. While knowledge has increased rapidly in these last days that we live in, the ability of man to create real life in a test tube has not even come close to God’s knowledge. Man can create robots and simulated life but, we are not God and cannot create a human body. So man has creative power in a very limited form. Man can write new songs, books and create new movies. While all of these acts demonstrate God’s ability in us, we are still not anywhere close to God’s ability. We are lords, gods, and kings; we recognize our position but do not exalt ourselves above that position. We recognize that we have power, but note the fact that we are NOT all powerful. We can see ourselves as being so valuable to God that He came to purchase us with His own life and blood. We can therefore know that we are not worthless, we are not powerless and that we have great value to God. Knowing who you are and who you are not is very critical to knowing God. Recognizing your correct position in the spiritual food chain is critical for you to know your purpose in life. To know that you are not a nobody, while you recognize that you are also not the Most High.
So who knows how many religious people I have offended by telling the truth. If you are offended I’m sorry, but get over it and learn. We have learned from the words of God in the Bible that there are other spiritual beings in the Bible that are called gods. These spiritual beings have some power or limited power below the scale of the Most High God who holds Supreme Power. But, what is power? How does God define power in the Bible? To our natural minds power is simply someone’s strength and ability to use it. Naturally speaking the bigger your muscles are the stronger you are in this realm and this feature makes others think of you as being more powerful. Take the example of Olympic weight lifting. The strongest man can lift the greatest weight over his head. The winner is the one that lifts the most. That feat makes him the strongest man of the strong. That was a sports analogy of power. But, this is not what God says is power in the spiritual realm. What gives a spiritual being power?
Heb 1:3 Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;
You can read this verse and totally miss what God is saying. In this verse, God is informing us that His Word is His Power. The Word of God = the Power of God. Many modern Bible translations mix the words up in this verse and translate it as God’s “powerful word” or “mighty word”. However, if that is what God wanted to say he would have written it that way. God is not stupid; people are just ignorant and come up with these incorrect translations. The “Word” of His “Power” is exactly what God wanted you to see. This informs us that ALL of God’s power is in His Word. If you translate it the wrong way it only says God word has some of His power and this means that there is other power somewhere else not in His word. So if God’s Words are His Power, what are words? Words are thoughts, ideas, knowledge, understanding and wisdom expressed in a spoken language. I hope that you understand these basic concepts. To say that God is the Most High God would inform us that God holds ultimate knowledge, understanding and wisdom above all other spiritual creatures.
In the book of Revelation, Jesus is described 5 times as a being with a “sharp two-edged sword” coming out of his mouth (Rev 1:16, Rev 2:12, Rev 2:16, Rev 19:15, Rev 19:21). In Bible days when this was written, the sword was the weapon of war and wielded much power and strength by the one that was using it. It would be like someone with an AK-47 rifle today. These verses found in Revelation again confirm and demonstrate the location of the “Power” of God as being in His mouth and His spoken words. In Revelation 19:15 Jesus uses this sword to smite the nations that oppose him. In a recent news article I heard about a group of militia in some state that was arming themselves to help God fight the coming anti-Christ. I just laughed at their ignorance. Your little AR-15 will be no match for the Sword of God. What we have discovered is that God’s word is where His power is located and we can clearly understand this by reading Genesis 1 to observe how the world was created. In Genesis 1, God saw a problem, God said the solution and then the solution was. It is just very basic to conclude that it was the act of God speaking that released God’s power to create. I hope that you understand those concepts because I am not going to explain them in more depth today. Let’s move on to see what God says about this power in other verses in the Bible:
Heb 4:12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
Now we learn some new concepts. The sword of God’s mouth is not all of the swords that exist in the spiritual realm. If God’s sword is more powerful and sharper than all the rest, that makes God’s Sword the Sword Almighty, and the Most High Sword. But, do you see that there is more than one sword in the world? That is telling us that Satan has a sword coming out of his mouth, you have a sword coming out of your mouth and I have a sword coming out of my mouth. That implies power of a lesser or limited capacity. These are all just simple concepts, derived from reading the Bible. If you recall in Isaiah 14:13 Satan uses the sword of his mouth to say the following “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; I will sit…” and on I could go. Satan was wielding his power and making great plans to raise himself up to the Most High level.
But, God wielded His sword and said “Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit”. Whose sword is sharper? Whose sword is greater? Whose sword will prevail in the end? These are valuable lessons for your life. Humble yourself and do not allow pride to exalt your own power, ability or knowledge to cause you to think that you can also be like the Most High.
If you would like to continue reading about the power of words you can go to “Part 10“.
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