(Ver 1.3)  This is Part 1 of a brand new advanced Bible study series concerning the seldom mentioned or taught Bible subject entitled “Biblical Division”.  I have personally never heard anyone teach on this subject in the church but this is what God is directing me to share today on the internet to all those that are willing to receive the message.  However, I will warn everyone upfront like in many of my other Bible studies that this is a very advanced Bible Study series and it is intended primarily for only spiritually mature Christians to attempt to learn from.  This lesson series represents a very unconventional spiritual meat topic presentation and it may not easily be chewed (be received) well by many of my milk drinking younger or spiritually new born Christian brothers and sisters in Christ.  I do so hope and pray that you understand what I mean.

Biblical division is definitely a brand new topic to most Christians which has rarely been studied, known or understood.  Therefore this subject could be potentially judged controversial or even easily offensive and rejected by a non-serious Christian disciple.  People in general are usually closed minded to an unknown or a first heard Bible topic never encountered before.  For example, men like Martin Luther brought forth radical new teachings that departed from the normal traditional dominate Church doctrines of the 1500’s.  His thoughts and views were fundamentally fresh to most and very dissimilar to anything at that time period that was popularly taught and accepted.  Martin Luther was a Bible professor in Germany and he condemned the Catholic Church for their corrupt practices of selling indulgences (forgiveness of sins).  His writings were viewed as the catalyst for the Protestant church.  However, these seemingly new views have been determined to be very sound theological scriptural teachings and they have now been widely adopted to conform more to what Jesus and the early church actually taught.  Martin Luther was still branded a heretic by the religious church leadership and excommunicated from their church.  We can clearly learn from this example that religious deception in the church can occur even as it did in the popular church of Martin Luther’s day.

Even today, we must know that not everything that is taught by a modern church is always completely accurate.  The only way to prove any subject’s truthfulness is to let the Bible and the Holy Spirit on the inside of us; become our final authority.  That is exactly what I want you to do today as you read these lessons.  Please get your Bible out and then pray and ask God to open the eyes of your understanding to see what He wants you to see.  Prove everything that is stated with your own Bible research and personal relationship with Almighty God.  Never and I do mean never believe me or anything that I teach or anyone else teaches unless you can see it in the Bible with sufficient evidence and the Holy Spirit on the inside of you confirming that it is true.  The Word of God and the Spirit of God will always agree.  Please learn to verify everything and assume or accept nothing just because someone teaches it.  Don’t be a David Koresh or Jim Jones type of blind faith follower.  Let God be your guide and not any man.  It could be a matter of life or death.

While this subject of Biblical Division is a new revelation to most of you today it is actually a very old concept that existed with God from the beginning.  It is only becoming new to us today because God is revealing something that has seldom been studied much less noticed or mentioned in any modern church.  Of course the reason why it has not been mentioned is probably one of two reasons.  First, some Bible teachers have not made the subject of division a real priority to search for or search out to discover it in the Bible.  Second, some Bible teachers may have seen the subject while reading in the Bible before but did not consider it important enough to spend time on and therefore made no effort to understand what it could mean.  Either way the root cause for “Biblical Division” not being taught is human ignorance.   No one can teach what they do not yet know and have learned.  I hope that this Bible lesson on the internet will spur interest to learn what God has done.

Therefore I ask that each of you judge yourself before continuing to read in these advanced Bible study lessons.  I certainly do not want to offend anyone with any spiritual meaty lesson that I publish.  But, I do wish to help everyone grow and mature spiritually in the faith of Jesus Christ.  Thank you in advance for using your own sound judgment to being led by His Spirit to know how to proceed.  Let’s get started with the subject of Biblical Division.

INTRODUCTION TO DIVISION

What is division?   Division is defined in one dictionary as the “action of separating something into two or more parts”.  In other words division is a deliberate and intentional act of taking one item that represents a whole and complete named entity and changing it by the thoughtful application of power, force and effort into 2 or more separate and distinct disjointed pieces. This would be very much like a baker slicing their whole and complete freshly baked loaf of bread and cutting it into separate and smaller edible slices.   Or division could be viewed like the cook taking their whole baked fresh apple pie and cutting and serving it in 8 individual slices for their guests to eat.  Therefore we learn from these examples that division always represents the creation of new individual pieces consisting of a reduced size or nature where each is less than the original greater whole portion before it was split.  It is also very important to note that each new divided part is of the same substance as before but just in a reduced portion.  Do you see and understand this?  This is exactly what division represents in the Bible.   There is absolutely no difference.  Here are four main points that you should have just learned from this basic definition:

1. Division of One Substance
2. Separation into New Individual Parts
3. Reduction of Size from the Original Whole
4. All New Parts are of Like Substance

Does this subject of division, separation and reduction have anything to do with anything found in the Bible, you might be asking?  That is a very excellent question to consider.  But God’s answer to that question will always include “division plays a very main role in the Bible even if we do not yet understand how it fits into God’s overall designed plan”.  That answer is very incomplete and just begs us to ask more questions.  We will soon discover that the subject of division has a very significant and strategic role while also being potentially hidden within the Bible.  However we must learn that the subject of division is covered by God from the beginning book cover to the ending book cover and we just have not always seen it very clearly.  I will tell you at the beginning of this lesson that God’s plan from the start of creation was not only to save man but also to divide man.  Also know that God will divide other spiritual and natural entities in the Bible that we will discuss later.

Perhaps you may not believe me when I claim that the subject of division plays a very major role throughout the Bible.  That is very wise of you to follow what I asked you before to do.  Remember I said don’t follow blindly.  So I’ll introduce you to this Bible subject using the Bible interpretation law of first mention.  Where, is the subject of division first mentioned in the Bible?  If you initiate your reading from the very beginning of the Bible you will only need to go forward three verses in order to find the subject. The very first verse containing a directly revealed, intentional and deliberate act of division by God occurs within the recorded creation event of the Day 1 creation of our world and you will find it in Genesis 1:4.  This first named division in verse 4 represents a divine sovereign display of His power and His will and it further embodies an act of God’s supreme intelligence, wisdom and ability.  Let’s take a quick look at this in case you have never seen this concept being mentioned so early before in the Bible:

Gen 1:3  And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

Gen 1:4  And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

Gen 1:5  And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

These three verses describe Day 1 of the 7 day creation event of our present world.  Six days God worked and the seventh day He rested (Gen 2:1-2).  How do we define work? Work represents an activity of mental or physical energy or power designed to achieve a specific purpose for a positive end result.  This is entirely what God was doing during the Genesis Day 1 description.  Did you notice what type of “work” God performed on this given Day 1?  God speaks “Light Be” and then “Light was”.  At this time of declaration darkness had already covered the earth in verse 2 so we know that God did not create any darkness on this day.  We know from Genesis 1:2 that darkness pre-existed Day 1 of the creation work thus stating the need for light’s existence in the earth’s current situation.  I need you to pay attention to what I am trying to say because this will become more important later in the series.  Darkness existed prior to Day 1 and God uses His power to make the light to shine on the earth in Day 1 to counter the pre-existing presence of darkness.

God then declares in verse 5 the reason for the introduction of light to our planet.  God had spoken the light to shine on the earth in order to “divide” the light from the existing darkness.  Next in verse 5, God gives each of these division results a new and separate distinct name calling them “day” and “night”.  Wow, this could really get very spiritually deep if I was going to attempt to teach all of the given implications found in these verses but I will save it for another lesson later.  Remember what we just learned, that the act of “dividing” light from darkness by God and naming the day and night was all called His own work by His own definition.  This divine work was the exact same concept as the baker cutting his loaf of bread or pie into new separate pieces.  There is no conceptual difference in the type of work being described by God here in Genesis.

What did God accomplish on Day 1?   Without the introduction of light on the earth there could have been no concept of time here.   In fact until God named Day and Night the earth had no way to measure time.  A day (the period of light) consists of 12 hours and a night (the period of darkness) consists of 12 hours which when combined represent one 24 hour period of time also called a day.  One day as you should know is a 24 hour period of time corresponding to one rotation of the earth.  This represents a single cycle of what God created to occur repeatedly.   It is very interesting to note we would have no concept or understanding of God’s work if He had not named the Day and Night and then called it Day 1.

While all of this is what I believe a literal reality, I believe God did this to teach us a greater symbolic spiritual truth.  But I do not have the time to go into this.  All I need you to do is to grasp that God’s Day 1 work was something that represents a constructive progress step to accomplish God’s plan for a good outcome for us.

Have we not just learned that even God’s “dividing” work can achieve a positive purpose and end-result?  Keep this in your mind that this divine work of dividing introduced to us by God here in Genesis 1 is good.  Then think of it as being like a parallel when a baker slices their loaf of bread to eat.  Isn’t the slice of bread much better than the entire loaf when you just want a sandwich?  Can we begin to now learn a little bit about the impact, value and positive purpose of God’s designed work to divide light from darkness from just this one single Day 1 creation reference?  Division appears to me to be very important just based upon this limited understanding so far.  Ask yourself “Why was it so important for God to divide at the very beginning of His 6 days of creative work?”    We will learn more about this as we progress to understand this subject better.

I just want us to begin to realize how much we potentially do not yet know or understand about the subject of division in the Bible.  Before I proceed deeper let’s at least examine the Hebrew word that was translated as “divided” in verse 4 of Genesis 1.  This word is H914 and it represents a base Hebrew root word that has the following Strong’s definition:

H914

A primitive root; to divide (in various senses literally or figuratively, separate, distinguish, differ, select, etc.): – (make, put) difference, divide (asunder), (make) separate (self, -ation), sever (out), X utterly.

This Hebrew word’s definition is in tremendous harmonious alignment with the English dictionary definition of “division’ that we examined earlier.  As you can read, this Hebrew word means “to divide asunder”, “make separate” and I also want you to see the phrase “sever out”.  All of these phrases are valid parts of our Bible subject study today even if we don’t yet fully understand them all right now.  However, even if we do not yet understand them completely, please do not let them slip from your minds.  Let me give you the list of important points from this Hebrew word definition:

1. Divide Asunder
2. Make Separate
3. Sever Out

To conclude this short subject introduction I will tell you that there are actually at the very minimum 5 major named “divisions” that take place within the very first two chapters of the book of Beginnings also called Genesis and we will look at these in greater detail later in the lesson series.   What we just need to understand right now is that these divisions took place during God’s work within creation and therefore each of these divisions must have had a positive divine purpose for us to learn from.  Let’s review some of the major things that you should have learned about division:

1. Division concerns one Substance Being Cut Apart
2. After Division Occurs there are New Individual Pieces
3. That which was Divided is a Smaller Portion of the Original Whole
4. All New Parts are of Like Original Substance
5. Division is Work
6. God’s Work on Day 1 was to Divide by Speaking
7. New Divided Parts can be Named

Since we have covered the basic introductions to division and its definition let’s start building a foundation for the subject now.

BUILDING THE DIVISION FOUNDATION

A foundation represents the part of a building process that all of the other following parts are raised or built upon.  A foundation is the underpinning of the structure and the groundwork of the entire rest of the building process.  Nothing can be created structurally sound without a very firm foundation and so it is with Bible study subjects.  In the first section of the lesson I already gave you basic foundation definitions and those were very important.    But, let me stop right here and provide the main foundation Bible verse that these definitions apply to for the entire series of Bible lessons on this subject of Bible division.  Let’s turn to the book of Luke and chapter 12 to begin our construction process to read the foundational verse for the subject of Bible division spoken directly from the mouth of the Lord Jesus Christ:

Luk 12:51  Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:

This is my LORD Jesus speaking to me and He literally makes a very shocking and a very controversial statement here in this verse.  We must first understand who is speaking.  Jesus was literally God incarnate.   He is called by the Hebrew name “Emanuel” which meant “God with us”.  Whatever Jesus said were words that God spoke personally and directly to all of mankind.  Therefore God was teaching us about one of the key reasons for His personal appearance upon the earth and it is a very outrageous declaration to say the least.  He tells us in this verse “to bring peace on earth” was never His appearance objective but rather He had come into this world to divide it.  This announcement from the Lord is a potential major conflict to several other Bible verses and this should raise new questions in our minds.  For example let’s review some of the potential conflicts:

Luk 2:14  Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

We should be able to begin to see from this angelic announcement the rising conflict.  At the birth of the Lord Jesus in the city of David called Bethlehem the angels appear to shepherds tending their flocks and they bring them the great news of God’s appearance on the earth.  As part of this announcement they declare that there should be peace on earth because of His appearance.  However, that is definitely not what Jesus said He came to bring.  Both verses contain the same Greek word G1515 that is translated as “peace”.  So they both are related by God’s word selection.  But there is still the problem of an apparent conflict.  Let’s read another verse:

Isa 9:6  For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.

There are several Bible verses that appear to conflict with the Lord’s statement in Luke, but especially this one verse found in Isaiah 9:6 where Jesus is clearly called the coming “Prince of Peace”.  Isaiah informs us of a prophesied future “Prince of Peace” that will come to the earth and this was certainly an important title describing Jesus.  However, Jesus who was this Prince of Peace claimed that to bring peace on earth was not His objective at His initial appearance on earth in Luke 12:51.   Whoops I just gave you an important clue in that last statement.  I hope you did not miss it.

At least 5 times in the New Testament (Rom 15:33, Rom 16:20, Php 4:9, 1 Th 5:23, Heb 13:20) our God is called the “God of Peace”.  Wow, how should we even begin to understand how to resolve these statements of God being peace and Him saying I did not come to the earth to bring any peace?  How can the Prince of Peace and the God of Peace not appear here physically on the earth to bring us peace?  How do we resolve this conflict?

I think I have already given you the clue if you were paying attention for the resolution of the conflict of peace.  The answer that will become more prevalent is based upon timing.  Everything that occurs in the plan of God has a set time of appearance.  At the first coming of Jesus on the earth there can be no hope for any peace based upon the statement made by Him in Luke 12:51.  However, that does not mean that He cannot bring peace later to the earth at a future time and I don’t have the space in this lesson to go into any great detail to when this coming peace will occur.  But I want us to understand that when Jesus came to the earth the people of the city of Jerusalem were expecting a natural King but they only saw a spiritual King that did not come to rule them at that time on the earth.  It was not God’s timing to rule on the earth during His first appearance.  This truth of reality teaches us how to learn more about God’s timing for peace and I hope this will help us all to understand how to resolve what Jesus was saying in Luke 12:51 more clearly.  Here are the main three points that you should have learned in this foundation:

1. Jesus Came to the Earth to Divide
2. And Not to Bring Peace
3. But No Peace Now Does Not Mean There Can Be No Peace Ever

Luke 12:51 is my foundational Bible division verse concerning the complete subject of Bible division.  Jesus very clearly teaches us that to divide was one of the main purposes for His arrival on the earth.   We will now continue this lesson by attempting to understand what Jesus said He did not come to do.  Jesus said He did not come to bring peace.  So what is peace?  I think we need to know more about what Jesus said He did not come to bring us.  So let’s find out.

WHAT IS PEACE?

As we continue learning we need to understand as much as we can about what Jesus said that He did not come to do during His initial earthly appearance.  Jesus informs us very clearly in Luke 12:51 that He did not come to bring peace during this specified time.  Therefore, we need to ask the question “What is peace?”  Peace in one English dictionary means “cessation from war”.  A cessation of war means there is no longer any aggression, no fighting, no conflict, and no longer any hostilities one towards another.  Peace can also mean “a place or state without any disturbance”.  Some synonyms of peacefulness could be calmness, tranquility, serenity or quietness and Jesus told us that these were not the purpose for His arrival.  We can learn what peace represents in order to better comprehend why Jesus came to the earth.   It should become apparent that if Jesus did not come to bring us peace then the opposite of peace was His goal.  Can we agree?  Let’s review the quick list of what peace represented:

1. PEACE = No Wars, No Conflicts, No Fighting, No Hostility
2. PEACE = Calmness
3. PEACE = Tranquility
4. PEACE = Quietness

If Jesus did not come to bring peace then I believe very firmly that He must have come to do the opposite.  What is the opposite of peace based upon just these 4 definitions?   Jesus must have come to bring a war, a storm of agitation or even a raging wave and force of noise to the earth.  I believe all of those that I just stated are true.  However, we also need to understand that according to Jesus the opposite of peace appears to be the stated purpose of “division”.  Division by the definition of the Lord Jesus is the opposite of peace.  Once we consider what division represents it becomes very clear that it is truly the antithesis of any state of undisturbed peace.  Please keep thinking on these concepts of what peace “is” and “is not” as we continue to learn why Jesus said He appeared on the earth.  Based upon the definitions of peace we can begin to see Jesus came to bring us the opposite and these would be:

1. War
2. Agitation
3. Turbulence
4. Noise

I’ll say this again; Jesus speaking in Luke clearly claims that one of His chief purposes for being here on the earth was not to bring anyone or anything peace, calm, quiet or tranquility during His first appearance.  Then Jesus claims that one of His actual purposes for being here was to “divide” or bring “division” to something or even someone unnamed here on the earth.  What exactly was this on the earth that Jesus came to disturb, to bring unrest to, to disquiet it and to interrupt it with a wave of force of noise and power to cause or effect a division to occur?

We have just briefly covered the subject of peace exploring some synonyms and some antonyms in this section of the lesson.  But I believe that I introduced you to some new things to consider.  We should have learned that God came to disrupt whatever was considered normal here on the earth.  We should have learned that God came to divide the status quo and cause what God desired to occur.  We know this because we learned division is a positive work of God and God’s work will always bring about positive results with a purpose.  So we should have learned God’s appearance was to bring war on the earth and not any peace.  Any war is an act of force between enemies against each other.  War is a very clear separation by force and power and a strong division between factions and it will always result in a reduction of the former whole.  We should be able to see that war fits very well into the definition of “division”.

1. Who is Jesus at war with?
2. What does Jesus intend to divide with His appearance on the earth?
3. What will be the positive result for this division after it has occurred?

Learning how to answer these questions will be what this lesson series will now be focused upon.  However we still need to increase our foundational understanding for the subject of division and we will do that by looking at the subject of “disunion”.

WHAT IS DISUNION?

Let’ review the Greek word translated as “division” that was used by God in Luke 12:51.  This Greek word was translated as “division” in this verse.  This is a very unique Geek word.  In fact this Greek word is only found one time in the entire Bible here in Luke 12:51.  This Greek word is G1267 and here is the Strong’s definition:

G1267 – From G1266; disunion (of opinion and conduct): – division.

The Greek word G1267 translated as “division” in this verse in Luke 12:51 literally means something has been divided.  It also literally means “disunion” (of opinion and conduct).  Wow, that is a new amazing and very essential declaration that Jesus is trying to teach us concerning His positive purpose to divide here on the earth.  A state of “disunion” is clearly the opposite of a state of “union”.  A union is a representation of two or more entities becoming one single entity with unified authority.  Therefore disunion is like the one loaf of bread becoming many individual slices of bread that was mentioned earlier.   Disunion conforms to what we have learned about division up until this point of the lesson.

Disunion is a word that literally means the breaking up of a federation or union.  Disunion comes from a lack of unity and agreement.  Whenever even one person in a group is not in full agreement there can result a state of disharmony, discord and conflict.  Disagreement is the root cause for much disunion.  I wish to introduce you to two new potential reasons for Jesus appearance on the earth to divide using Strong’s definition.  First, Jesus was saying I came to divide the opinions or “beliefs” of men on the earth.  Second He was further saying that He came to divide the conduct of men here on the earth.  Either of these acts of God would bring about a war like state of disunity.  That is so very important what I just said.  We will definitely be talking about that a lot more in this lesson later.  But we need to look more into the subject of “disunions” first.

Let’s talk about the concept of “disunions”.  The word “disunion” means to break up something that was a whole or complete named entity into smaller distinct separate pieces.  For example the disunion of an earthly sovereign federation will result in the division of that nation into smaller nations.   Take for instance the disunion of the U.S.S.R. that took place back in 1991. Do you remember what U.S.S.R. stood for?  The U.S.S.R. stood for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The U.S.S.R was one sovereign named union containing states that were broken apart to form the new D.S.S.R = “Disunion of Soviet Socialist Republic”.   Of course that was just a joke but what resulted from the disunion were several new separate smaller sovereign states.   The united nation of the U.S.S.R. clearly qualified to be a candidate for division and disunion.  Down throughout human history there have been many nations, empires and kingdoms that have risen to only become divided, conquered and fall.  Nation and kingdom partitioning is a very constant and prevalent example of divisions and disunions. Could this concept be related to something that Jesus was referring to that He came to do?  We will soon find out that it is exactly what He came to do but let us look at another prevalent type of natural disunion first.

The natural case of divorce from the divinely created institution of marriage also represents a form of very prevalent natural disharmony, disruption and disunion occurring in our world too frequently.  A divorce is the dividing into individual pieces and the separation from God’s defined condition of being in the state that God called a “One Flesh” union (Gen 2:24).  Marriage represents the “union” of two individuals (1 male and 1 female) into one new family unit but divorce is the clear antithesis state called disunion.  Divorce occurs when the one named married family entity becomes two separated, partitioned and disjointed individuals that can no longer be considered a sovereign family covenant union.  If Bob and Sally Jones get a divorce the Jones Household and family has become disjointed in disunity and can no longer even exist.  This will always result in two lesser named entities lacking completeness and wholeness.

I have only briefly introduced you to two types of “disunions” and “divisions” so far in this section.  One is that of a natural sovereign nation being divided and the other is the concept of a natural sovereign family being divided up by acts of force or power.   Both are differing levels of sovereign authority.  Both can be divided by force and power.  Viewing them to be a positive work is another dilemma since neither sound like positive end results and I would definitely agree with that for now looking only at things from a purely natural perspective.  But there are other ways that we need to consider and I will talk about them soon enough.

Let’s continue our Greek word study and move down a level to the root word.  The Greek word G1267 that means “disunion” comes from another Greek root word G1266 which means “to partition thoroughly”.  This just keeps getting better and better, deeper and deeper and more and more complex doesn’t it?  To partition means “to divide something”, “to split apart something” or “to break up something” using a stated or implied wall of separation.  Partitioning is an understood act of constructive building through a display of intelligence combined with a force of power to create the divide.  This concept of partitioning is further based upon a rule of authority hierarchy.  Those which are building the partition are of much greater authority than that which is being affected by the division.  What I just said was so important I want you to see it again:

PARTITIONING = an Understood Act of Constructive Building through a Display of Intelligence Combined with the Application of Force or Power to Create A Divide.

For example, a criminal after conviction is divided or partitioned from the mainstream population by a greater force of authority and placed behind a separating barrier which can be named or labeled as partitions or the prison walls of separation.  Within our society the greater government authority created these partitioning walls of separation.  The separating walls of the prison will keep the prisoners in but also will keep all others in the general population out.  We can certainly see some potential positive aspects of division in this example.  Therefore, we should learn that division is defined as an act of separating one whole and greater item (the general population) into smaller or lesser items (prisoners and free people).  Using my quick example, our population is being separated by an act of law and authority into those that are free and those that are incarcerated. This is just a natural concept that helps us in understanding the spiritual Bible concept more clearly and God’s stated plan of division.

What was Jesus partitioning through His physical appearance here on the earth?  What walls were being constructed by His appearance on the earth?   I’ll begin to answer these questions in the next section.  The information covered in this section  should begin to give you some major clues to why Jesus came to earth.  Jesus has built a dividing wall partition with His appearance on the earth.  Let’s review the list of points we learned in this section:

1. Disunion is a Force of Disagreement Dividing Two or More Groups
2. Disunion is the Division of a Single Kingdom
3. Disunion is like the Division of a Whole Family
4. Division is the Separation of Two Entities using a Partition or Wall of Separation

There were other good points made in this section but these are the ones that need to be carried forward into the next section.  We will now take a look at God’s plan of division and how it was prophesied to be implemented by the coming Lord of Glory.

GOD’S PLAN OF DISUNION/DIVISION

In the last section I talked about the disunion of a natural nation, empire or a kingdom as well as well as the disunion of a natural family.  Both of these types of disunion that were going to be implemented by God’s design and plan in order to protect the righteous from the unrighteous.  God came to the earth in the form of a man in order to divide His kingdom and to divide His family.  God does this primarily to separate and partition that which was good from that which was judged as evil.   I believe this is an excellent time to introduce you to a prophecy that applies directly to what God was doing in Jesus.  Please turn to the book of Malachi and read what the LORD says:

Mal 3:16  Then they that feared the LORD spake often one to another: and the LORD hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the LORD, and that thought upon his name.

Mal 3:17  And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him.

Mal 3:18  Then shall ye return, and discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth him not.

These are verses prophesying a coming division.  Did you see it?  These are the works of the LORD that were coming through Christ Jesus.  God is going to separate the righteous from the wicked.  He is going to make it known (able to discern between) those that serve Him and those that do not.   The Hebrew word H996 that was translated “between” in verse 18 reveals to us this story.   This word means to make a “distinction” between two or more things.  It is a comparative stipulation that is used as a preposition to describe those that are named after the statement.  This Hebrew word H996 comes from the root word H995 which means “to separate” mentally.  To separate mentally is just another synonymous phrase of division that means God will divide them with a partition of thought so we can understand that there is a difference between them in our minds.  The ability to distinguish between good and evil and right and wrong is a mental partitioning process.   God actually warns us about this in the Bible:

Isa 5:20  Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

We can clearly see these happening even in the world today if we observe the actions of people closely.  It has become increasingly difficult for people to “discern” between good and evil.  The lines have shifted to allow what we use to believe was evil to become good and vice-versa. God is warning all those on the earth that cannot discern between two opposites in this verse.   God says you are in trouble if you call good evil or evil good.  That is exactly what is transpiring in our world today.  It is everywhere on TV, in movies and on the internet.  Good is being called evil and evil is clearly being promoted to be good and normal.  God is teaching us about one of the walls of separation that will and is dividing us all.

The blurring of distinct lines of good and evil today is the devil’s plan to undo what God has already accomplished in Christ Jesus.  Satan wants us to not be able to recognize between good and evil and that is what is happening in this world.  Satan would like to get Christians to regress and become passive to accept sin, evil and etc.  I still believe that God’s plan will prevail in those that desire to follow Him as Malachi predicts.  Real Christians will know what is right and good and what is wrong and evil even if the world does not.

I want to stop here and teach you why things are named by God.  God gives things, people and places names to show that they are different.  Giving objects and people names are a form of the process of division.   When your child is born you name your son or daughter to give them distinction.  This new name separates them from the other children and makes them unique.  Do you remember what God did in Genesis 1:3-5 on day 1 of creation?  God spoke to introduce the light into the world which was then separated from the darkness and after God did this He named the light “day” and the darkness He called “night”.  Did you notice that in the verse in Isaiah 5:20  God also mentioned light and darkness?   Is that a coincidence?   No, it certainly is not.  Light represents good and darkness represents evil symbolically throughout the Bible.  This is God’s way of connecting the dots for us to learn His plan.  God was going to separate good from evil from the very beginning of creation.  Can you begin to see this?

This concept is exactly what God was doing here in these Malachi verses also.  God says there will be one separate group called the “Righteous” and another group called the “Wicked”.  Those are the names of distinction and separation given by divine appointment and purpose.  These represent the dividing lines between two groups of beings.  This certainly includes mankind but it also must include angelic heavenly beings also.

Wow, I just introduced so much potentially new information to you so fast that I pray that you understood it all.   We could go through other prophecies of division but I am trying to keep this lesson as concise as possible to not overwhelm anyone with too much information.  I hope to cover this subject in much more detail as the series continues.  So please be patient and kind and believe with me that God will say everything that needs to be said in His right timing.  Let’s recap what we should have learned from this section quickly.

God is going to build:

1. A Mental Wall of Partition for Discernment in People
2. A Wall Between the Righteous and the Unrighteous
3. A Wall Between the Good and the Evil
4. A Wall to Perceive Between Right and Wrong
5. A Wall of Separation Between the Light and the Darkness

We could literally talk for many hours on these subjects but I just want you to begin learning the basics for and of division now.  I think today I am going to only go into one more introductory topic to help point us to future lessons.

CONFIRMING JESUS’ PURPOSE FOR DIVISION

I have already introduced you to the concept that God came to earth to divide His kingdom and to divide His family but we need further scriptural confirmation to assist in these statements and beliefs.  Both a nation and a family dissolution are very clear examples of types of extremely prevalent earthly natural disunions.  However, both of these natural examples of disunion have direct application to what Jesus said that He came to do here on the earth believe it or not.   Let’s look at a new verse that Jesus spoke about this direct subject of division to help us to confirm the reality of one of God’s primary purposes for sending Jesus into our world was to divide His kingdom and family.

Jesus actually talks about this subject of division much more than many realize.  It is very clear to me from learning this subject now that Jesus understood His reason for coming into the world far better than anyone else at that time including Satan and all his angels and demons.  We will now turn back to the book of Luke again and read a verse found in close context with our initial foundation division verse found in Luke 12:51.  Please, turn back to chapter 11 and begin to read in verse 17:

Luk 11:17  But he, knowing their thoughts, said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and a house divided against a house falleth.

Jesus begins the statement with the word “Every”.  “Every” is the Greek word G3956 that literally means “every”.  I am just being funny with that last statement but that is exactly what the Greek word means.  The Greek word G3956 means “every”, “any”, “all” and “the whole”.  Therefore, G3956 is an all-inclusive adjective describing the noun “kingdom” that leaves no kingdom out of the statement.  Do you understand that?  There cannot be any “kingdom” in existence either past, present or future that is omitted from this statement of truth given to us by the Lord Jesus.  I cannot say that more plainly and this is such a very important concept to learn.  Jesus is not a liar and He would have phrased the statement differently if there were any kingdoms that could be excluded from being mentioned.  I do hope you understand what God is saying by His selective use of the word “EVERY”.

So we learn immediately from the mouth of Jesus that “any” or “every” kingdom named or unnamed directly or indirectly will fall if it is divided against itself.  Therefore we learn from the Bible what we already know from human history that any kingdom can be divided into two or more smaller pieces and even cease to exist completely.  For example the Roman Empire ceased to exist.  The Persian Empire has ceased to exist.  The Babylonian Empire has ceased to exist, and etc.   Today division of nations is still a very prevalent topic with the nation of Israel.  Peace talks are dominated with the division of Israel into two nations giving their land to a new nation called Palestine.   Satan is using God’s law of division to try to eliminate Israel and you should know that.

Did you know that this statement from Jesus absolutely must include the “Kingdom of God” and the “Kingdom of Heaven”?  You probably never thought of that, did you?  Does that sound offensive to you for me to imply that the omnipotent God’s kingdom can be divided, fall and possibly cease to exist? Please understand that I did not say it.  I just gained that knowledge from what Jesus said because He included these two kingdom references in the statement by selecting and speaking the word “EVERY” in union with the noun “KINGDOM”.  Wow, I think there could be a lot of upset religious people not very happy with this lesson after reading that but this statement is still true.

Do you remember that I talked about a whole pie being cut into pieces?  Let’s change the pie to a Kingdom and ask if it can be divided in the same way?  Jesus is speaking about a whole kingdom pie that will be divided if it is fighting against itself and He tells us that it will become desolate (a dry empty place) if it is experiencing any condition of discord, disharmony or even disagreement.  What happens to a pie after it has been cut and divided against itself?  It is usually dished out and served and the pie dish has been left an empty dry mess of crumbs.  That is what Jesus is describing that will happen to any kingdom that is divided also.  There is an old proverb that says “United we stand but divided we fall” and that is an accurate phrasing of what Jesus just taught us about God’s Kingdom.

These truths are precisely the reason that I mentioned the U.S.S.R. previously.  The U.S.S.R. was a very good example of a modern kingdom that has been divided against itself.  This whole nation was split into several smaller nations even now which are still fighting among themselves.  There was even recently reported heavy fighting in the Ukraine and Russia was blamed to be fueling the discord.  Note the fact what Jesus said again.  Jesus said “Do you think that I came to bring peace?  I say No but rather division”.  That was my paraphrase of the original key verse statement but it does represent an accurate message of the original.  No nation or kingdom that experiences division can or will experience any peace after it has been divided.  Now ask yourself what Kingdom is Jesus from?  Where did Jesus come down from to enter into the earth?  These are basic fundamental questions that you should be able to answer in your sleep.  Jesus came down from the Kingdom of God and from the Kingdom of Heaven in order that He might divide them with war and I believe this very firmly.

Now consider the second part of the statement made by Jesus concerning division in Luke 11:17.  Jesus declares that a house divided will also fall.  This Greek word translated as “house” means a dwelling where a family resides.  This is why I talked about the concept of divorce earlier also.   A divorce represents the destruction of a sovereign family unit.  The result of the family division is a whole entity that no longer exists or we could say a family unit that has been brought to the state of non-existence.  This is exactly why Jesus was making this statement in Luke because it concerns His purpose for coming to the earth.

We should be able to find out by close Bible study that Jesus has come down from the Kingdom of Heaven directly from the spiritual family of God to bring about a division to both realities.   We can begin to learn this truth simply by reading verses like John 6:50-51 where He describes His flesh as the bread that came down from heaven.   In these words are found the concept of the loaf of freshly baked bread that I presented earlier.  His body was broken and we must eat of it in order to live.  All those that do not eat of this bread will die.  That is a very clear division of separation being inferred.  There are many other verses but I will help you with one about the family of God next for you to know that God has a family that can be divided.

If you study the Bible by searching for the word “house” you will find more than enough verses that will confirm what we need to know about the existence of God’s spiritual family.  For example, in John 14:2 you will find Jesus talking about His Father’s house.  He claims there are many mansions in this location.  The Greek word in this verse is G3613 and it comes directly from the Greek word G3624 that Jesus spoke of in Luke 11:17 about a house divided.  Both words were translated as house and both words mean a literal family dwelling place.   I can give many other references but I do not want to take the time in this lesson introduction.  Just begin to realize that God has a spiritual family and this family can and has been divided by the plan, will and the work of God through Jesus Christ.

If this is true what Jesus is teaching us then the implication of both of these divisions will dictate God’s need for a new spiritual family and a new spiritual kingdom since both will be brought to the level of non-existence as Jesus has prophesied.  I hope you realize that Jesus was a prophet also and spoke what would come to pass in many of His recorded statements in the Gospels.  I warned you that this Bible lesson would take us into some really deep waters which may go over the heads of some weaker carnal Christians.  If this describes you please just stop reading and go to a different Bible lesson.  So let’s review the main points from this section of the lesson.  We learned these Bible facts:

1. Every Divided Kingdom Will Be Made Desolate
2. Every Divided Family Will Fall
3. God Has a Kingdom Which Can Be Divided
4. God Has a Family that Can Also Fall

All of these Bible facts of Truth point us in the direction for God’s personal appearance on the earth to divide.   These help us tremendously to understand a very complex hidden Bible subject.

CONCLUSION

I hope and pray that you have learned at least a little more on this subject of Biblical Division than you ever knew before.  I know there was a lot of new information given but I also know that there is a whole lot more to learn.  I would recommend that you go back and at least reread the main points from each section of the lesson. This will help us put the pieces of the division puzzle together correctly.  I will be continuing in this series with more confirming scriptures to help us believe in God’s Word.  Thank you for taking your time to read and study the Bible with me.  I do value your time greatly and I do not wish to waste any of it.  If you would care to leave me a comment or question I would appreciate it.  Also please share this website with your friends and relatives so everyone can learn more about the Lord and the soon coming King Jesus Christ.  God Bless you.

Click now if you would like to continue reading “Part 2“.