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Bible Basics: Recognizing the Voice of God!
(Ver 1.3) This is a inttoduction to an important Bible subject for every Christian to understand on “How to Be Led by the Spirit of God”. I generally don’t get into Bible basics in any great depth. But I realize that there are many people who are new to Christianity so we should try to help them in their spiritual growth. There are so many people who want to hear from God. So many people that want to know that God is real. So many people that want God to speak to them from a cloud or a burning bush. These people want proof that God exists and that He cares. However, the system that God has designed is based upon faith. God purposely hides Himself from our view. God has not revealed himself to us in order to challenge us to believe in the One that we have not seen. But that does not mean that God has not spoken to you. It means only that you probably didn’t know it was God when it happened. So how does God speak to us? Why don’t we hear it normally with our outer ears? We can see that people in the Bible also struggled with this reality and often times questioned God, “Where are you?”. One significant story that has great meaning is given to us in the Old Testament book of 1st Kings. Here we have the story of Elijah the prophet in a struggle with the children of Israel who were rebelling against God and His covenant. Israel would even kill the prophets of God whenever they would bring words of condemnation against them. They didn’t want to hear about their sin or the error of their ways. This resulted in Elijah asking God where are you? How come God who has all power, cannot or will not do anything to stop evil in this world? It is still happening today and people are still asking the same questions. We have murderers, terrorists, child predators, and just a multitude of evil at work in the world today. Why does God not stop any of it? It is a fascinating question, but since it is not my subject I’ll leave it for another blog. Today is about hearing the voice of God. Do you think that God only speaks to a few? Are there any requirements that are necessary for God to speak to you? Or could it be that God is speaking and most people are just not listening or just not hearing His voice? I am a firm believer that God speaks if we will only be quiet and listen.
In the story of Elijah you find some very powerful truths about how God speaks and these can be directly applied to us today. Let’s start by looking at chapter 19 and verse 11 of 1st Kings:
1Ki 19:11 And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake:
Here we have a statement that declares a pending interaction between the natural and the supernatural is about to take place. The prophet Elijah is standing before God, but we know from scripture that NO MAN has ever seen God (John 1:18). So we know that God while speaking to us can not normally be perceived by our five physical senses. This verse then declares a strong wind comes with great force. It sounds like a tornado or a hurricane force wind. But the verse says God was not in the wind. That should tell you something about who originates these storms. Then comes a mighty earthquake, but it informs us that God was not in the earthquake. Today in the news a large earthquake leveled Haiti. This was not an act of God either. God was not in the earthquake. As we continue in the chapter we are given more information.
1Ki 19:12 And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.
Then comes a great fire, but the Lord God was not to be found in the fire either. We can see in these verses some of the greatest natural disasters given to us and each time the Bible clearly says that God did not have anything to do with any of them. It is the mention of these three most destructive forces in our earth system that God teaches us that He is not found in them. But now we are finally told how God comes to us and to speak. The Bible declares that God was found in a “still small voice”. I think that is what trips most people up when desiring to hear from God. God doesn’t speak to them in a thundering voice that knocks them off of their feet and thus they conclude in error that God did not speak. I believe most people are looking for the hugely spectacular demonstrations of God’s power and missing the greater supernatural small things that God does every day to help them. You see when God says something to you, it will be easily overlooked and easily ignorable. Why, because God does not interrupt or do things in a rude or obnoxious manner. God is the ultimate gentleman. God will normally always wait for you to get quite enough to hear before he actually says anything. Then He will normally only speak to you in a really quite whisper. Many times if you are a Christian you will find this voice originating in and near your heart or the center of your spiritual being. Sometimes these words will rise up to your mind as a thought. Many times you will wonder where did that come from? God might tell you not to take a certain flight today. God might tell you not to take a certain way home today. God might tell you to slow down and drive 10 miles an hour slower. These are all just small examples of God trying to keep you out of harm’s way. God knows that an accident will occur at a specific time and place, because of a drunk driver and if you only turn one block sooner than normal you would miss it. The problem is people don’t understand that these things are from God and they ignore them and follow their own agenda and normal routines. Then when they are laying in the hospital they ask God why did you let this happen to me? Most of the time if they would just think back and analyze what they were thinking before it happened they would understand that God was trying to stop it.
Too many times people are wanting some spectacular sign. They want the earth to open up or the clouds to part. They want a bright light to shine down from heaven or an angel to suddenly stop them from getting hurt. Most of the time God refrains from the spectacular demonstrations of His power, in order to get you to hear this quite whisper. If you learn that this is God’s Modus Operandi, you could possibly be saving your life from a tragic outcome. Evil has a covenant right to be in this world, until the time comes when Adam’s allotted time period expires. We are truly almost there, the end of the age is very near. I hope you will begin to pay close attention to the still small voice and then learn to obey it. Many times it is called intuition. Just a knowing, that I should do this and not that. Other times it will be a whisper to do this. Learning to hear from God involves you learning how God speaks. Then it involves you learning to listen. These are valuable truths that will help you tremendously if you learn to recognize and follow them.
If you would like to continue reading about How to Be Led by the Spirit of God you may go to “Part 1” in the series.
The True Identity of the Woman in Revelation 12! Pt 3
(Ver 3.2) This is now the third part in an advanced series of Bible lessons on the subject of discovering the “True Identity of the Woman in Revelation 12”. These lessons are intended for spiritually mature Christians with an open mind and a willing heart to dig deep, study and learn from the Bible. It is not for anyone with a closed mind believing they already understand the subject found in Revelation 12 fully. I love one quote that a man named Will Rogers said “We are all ignorant, just about different things”. This means that none of us knows everything, especially me. But, it is my desire and goal to learn and know more today, than I knew about God and His Word yesterday. I pray that this is your goal also. If you have not been reading this series from the beginning I would highly recommend that you go back and start with “Part 1“. We have covered a tremendous amount of new revelation that has been hidden by God in the Bible. We will not be able to repeat the previous lessons in today’s.
INTRODUCTION AND REVIEW
OK, in the last lesson, we talked about the identity of the symbolic moon found in Revelation 12 as being Satan. I believe this information was encoded (hidden) in the Bible by God’s design using some very intelligent techniques. One of these techniques for hiding information that has been used by God is the method of calling one person or spiritual entity by many different names, titles, symbols and descriptions. If you have ever studied the Bible you know that Satan is referred to as the serpent, the great dragon, the devil, Lucifer, Beelzebub, the father of lies, the ruler of darkness, the prince of darkness, the god of this world, the deceiver, the tempter, the thief, the accuser of the brethren, etc., and as we learned in the last Bible lesson the symbolic “moon”. That of course was not a complete list of Satan identifiers, but just an example of what is being taught. If you would like to see a more complete list of “Names, Titles, Symbols and Descriptions for Satan” you can click on that link and go there.
There are many reasons why I believe that God has concealed information in the Bible, but one of the main reasons is to allow Him to reveal the true meaning at the appointed time. Another great reason is to keep the information hidden from His enemy Satan. If God told Satan everything He had planned in a straightforward plain way of speaking it would allow Satan the ability to narrow his attempts to stop God’s plan on the earth. But, hiding the information provides us the blessing of finding it and Satan the opportunity to be surprised by him not knowing what to expect next from God.
For example, the Old Testament was full of the prophecies of the coming Messiah, but yet Satan didn’t understand them and neither did any of the Jews who kept the scrolls. Jesus went through the scriptures and began to reveal Himself in the O.T. to His disciples and to the apostle Paul only after He was risen from the dead (Luke 24:32, 45, Romans 16:25) . There are many reasons for this hiding of information. It also establishes a pattern of how God works with humans. It gives us notice that if He did it once, He can do it again if He so chooses. You might call this a part of God’s modus operandi.
God has given to us a huge book of divine information, which contains a countless number of prophetic scriptures and God can reveal them to us even now and I believe that is exactly what He is doing (Dan 12:4). I have quoted this verse in this series at least two times but it represents one of the foundational principles of truth that applies to us understanding the woman in Revelation 12 that is clothed with the sun, standing on the moon with a crown of 12 stars. This would be a good verse to memorize and perhaps that is God’s goal for repeating it:
Rom 1:20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
I would like to review this verse from Romans again to place new emphasis on what it reveals to us. What we can see in this verse is a very powerful spiritual truth being revealed to us about God’s visible and perceivable creation. This verse proves there was intelligent design contained within all of the physical components of our universe. Nothing came into being by random chance or accident.
Every created natural entity has a design and a purpose to reveal something that is not yet understood by most humans. This verse claims that God created all these natural things in our visible world to reveal greater spiritual things that we need to understand to help us know about Him. By knowing these, God informs us that we will be able to understand even parts of His awesome omnipotent power and His divinely gracious Godhead. That is why it is important to note how created things like the sun, the moon and the stars fit by His design into the greater spiritual picture. By understanding these naturally created things God is revealing some very powerful spiritual truths to us. I just can’t say that enough.
In Revelation 12:1 we have been studying a descriptive picture or a symbolic woman with a specific purpose and design. For emphasis I believe that I should review these featured symbolic elements and what we have learned so far. This woman is said to have the following distinctive characteristics and features:
- A Woman (an unnamed female)
- Her head covered by a crown of 12 stars (emblem of victory in a contest)
- Her body clothed with the Sun (the Greater Light, Jesus Christ)
- Her feet standing on the moon (the lesser light, Satan)
- The location of the woman is said to be heaven
- Finally from Rev 4:1 we learned Rev 12 is a prophetical future view into events being described.
These are basic statements of revealed facts. They are all so very significant. We have discovered though study that the head of the woman is crowned with a symbol of victory from winning a contest like an Olympic event. We have discovered by study that the body (the church) is clothed with Jesus Christ who is the revealed symbolic Sun. We have discovered by study that the woman’s feet are standing on the ruler of the darkness, the moon, who is revealed to be Satan. We have discovered by study that this event occurs in the future during the coming soon tribulation period of 7 years of time. We have read numerous scriptures to back these explicit and implicit asserted truths that we cannot repeat here. Knowing this revelation and understanding it will now help us to clearly identify the woman. However, we will now go over some new verses that are recorded by God to confirm this information:
Psa 136:7 To him that made great lights: for his mercy endureth for ever:
Psa 136:8 The sun to rule by day: for his mercy endureth for ever:
Psa 136:9 The moon and stars to rule by night: for his mercy endureth for ever.
We can see that the Genesis 1 day 4 account of day 4 of creation is being repeated as a second witness of confirming truth here in the book of Psalms. This information verifies what we have already learned and provides greater emphasis to the importance of the information. The Sun rules the kingdom of the “day” and we are told that the moon and the stars rules the kingdom of the “night”. I like to provide at least two or three witnesses to every Bible truth so that you will know that I am not taking things out of context or just making stuff up as I go.
UNDERSTANDING WHAT IT MEANS
FOR SOMEONE TO BE UNDER HER FEET
Today, we need to explore this subject using a much deeper application to its position to the woman to help confirm the identity of the symbolic moon in Revelation 12 we know is called the ruler of darkness. We will do this from a different perspective to determine if we can establish precedence from the scripture for Satan to be declared under the feet of any woman? We will do this specifically by studying these women suspect candidates that could represent the woman in Revelation 12:
- The Church (the body and bride of Christ)
- Israel (the Old Covenant Wife of Jehovah)
- Mary (the virgin natural mother of Jesus).
We all know that the woman in Revelation 12 is said to have the moon under her feet. It must have been important to God to specifically mention these two symbols in this relationship. Technically we should know that by standing on the moon this is synonymous to the moon being under her feet? Let’s start by asking God what does it mean in your Word to have something or someone under your feet? Is there a figurative meaning to this expression that is important for our correct interpretation. I believe the answer is YES! I believe that any good Bible student has seen this in the Bible before and can probably teach this section of the lesson..
From my Bible research and study I believe that anything or anyone that is stated to be under someone’s feet in the Bible is a symbolic reference to them being lowered in position of order, power, rank or authority. Someone being under foot is a figurative sign or symbol of their defeat by the person that is standing in triumphant victory over the one underfoot. The person underfoot is certainly the implied enemy of the one standing upon them being conquered. For example, God told Joshua in the Old Testament, everywhere the sole of your foot shall tread, I have given to you (Joshua 1:3). To “tread on” literally means to walk over something or someone with your feet to be given their possessions.
We learn from this established Joshua principle that whatever God has already given to humans, they are required to fight and to possess including overcoming the enemies holding that land. This is an established spiritual law of faith. These were God’s ways of demonstrating to Joshua that he was going to be victorious over his enemies. It is clear to me that the natural nation of Israel had many natural enemies. This Old Covenant between Israel and Jehovah was a physical battle between natural physical forces being backed by opposing spiritual powers. It is also clear from reading just Joshua that natural Israel won their victories over most of their enemies by being led and obeying the voice of Jehovah. I believe this was a type and pattern for the church in the coming spiritual warfare in the New Covenant.
The spiritual enemy to the church is of course, Satan and I won’t go into every scripture that we could use to verify this. I believe that what God spoke to Joshua was a prophetic utterance that further applies to a pattern for us in the spiritual church to follow. What I will do now is give you some Biblical backing for “treading” on an enemy.
Psa 44:5 Through thee will we push down our enemies: through thy name will we tread them under that rise up against us.
Here we see a powerful prophetic principle given to us. This is a statement that can clearly be taken either naturally or spiritually. Symbolically speaking, God is referring to the enemies of the church being under our feet. It definitely also applies to the natural nation of Israel. I cannot see any application of this verse to Mary. If we can find this principle in the Bible, it will make the task of identifying the woman in Revelation 12 easier to confirm. Here is another interesting Old Testament scripture that must be related to Revelation 12:
Psa 91:13 Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.
Did you notice the references to an “adder” and a “dragon”? Do you see the symbolic parallels related to Revelation chapter 12? I don’t think there are very many dragons in the Bible directly named and said to be under someone’s feet. I believe that this verse is directly related scripture that further points us to the identity of the “moon” under her feet, as being the defeated Satan, also defined as the dragon and the old serpent in Revelation 12:9 and 20:2. As I ran references in the Bible looking for the principle of treading down I ran into verses like this one:
Job 40:12 Look on every one that is proud, and bring him low; and tread down the wicked in their place.
Maybe you recall how Satan was lifted up in pride in the Old Testament (Eze 28:7, Isa 14) and some of the statements that he is said to have made. God makes a prophetic declaration in these verses in Isaiah 14:11. God informs Satan that “His pomp will be brought down to the grave… and worms will be under and over him. That sounds like someone in a natural grave that humans walk over all the time. Notice the similarities found here in Job when God says that everyone that is proud will be brought low. Then it also speaks of the wicked being tread down (walked upon). I think these references apply to Satan.
It is interesting to note what God told Adam in Genesis 1. God gave Adam some specific instructions and here is one that is very relevant to our discussion:
Gen 1:26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
We understand from this verse that God created the man to look like Him. God then turned His control of the earth over to His creation. God specifically says man has been given “dominion” over all the earth, and everything that moves on the earth. That is a very powerful bit of information for us to understand. It is also important that we know the Hebrew word translated as “dominion” has the following definition in the Strong’s:
H7287
A primitive root; to tread down, that is, subjugate; specifically to crumble off: – (come to, make to) have dominion, prevail against, reign, (bear, make to) rule, (-r, over), take.
Uh, oh! This Hebrew word has far reaching implications attached to it. It declares that man was intended to rule the earth. But, did you notice the word literally means “to tread down”. That is an active command for Adam to walk with his feet on every enemy to demonstrate their defeat. This Hebrew word clearly means to “prevail against” an enemy.
We must realize that God intentionally and prophetically declares the end from the beginning in this statement (Isa 46:10). God is saying in Isaiah that the end will be like I intended it to be from the beginning. I believe that is why we are learning about this woman in Revelation standing on the defeated moon object.
Adam was given charge over the earth and the instructions to defeat every enemy that came against him. God knew there was coning an enemy to defeat. But, instead Adam let Satan into our world and Satan became the god of our world system (2 Cor 4:4).
If we look at verse 28 in Genesis 1 God repeats His instructions to the man, but this time the man is told to “subdue”. This Hebrew word again means to “tread down”. In other words walk on. The word literally means to conquer and to bring into subjection every enemy. By placing someone underfoot they have been clearly defeated. These are all historical and prophetic words of a warfare that should have occurred 6000 years ago but is waiting to be fulfilled.
I believe that the church will be used by God to demonstrate Satan’s defeat. You see the man was created on the last part of the 6th day of creation. If you understand how the days of creation are prophetic this would indicate that man will again become spiritually mature at the end of the 6th day or near the end of the 6000 year time period that God has given humans to have dominion. This would also mean that what God intended for the man to do this on Day 1 but since the first Adam failed, God introduced the second Adam and I believe will use His bride to soon make this happen. This must occur very soon before the end of the 6000 years (Day 6).
I believe we are this phase of God’s plan now with it occurring at the end of the Church age. God speaks of this by declaring us to be the victorious one (1 Cor 15:57). Victory was the way that God intended it to be in the beginning and this is the way that it will be at the end of human history. I believe that the church will go out victorious with Satan under our feet. But, let us look for and confirm all of this in the Bible.
Let us continue now by looking at what Jesus says to the church right before He ascends into heaven. At this point and time Jesus was already crucified, and after 3 days arose to live forever more. Here in Luke we see some instructions being given to someone. We must ask this question “were these instructions given to us, the church or just the natural Jew?” In the book of Luke Jesus makes this amazing statement:
Luk 10:19 Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
In this verse, I believe that God is talking to the future saved church who began with all Jewish men about their spiritual enemy. I know the statement is made to the group of Jewish men that were sent out in pairs to cast out devils and healed the sick. But if you read the context of this statement you will find clues that indicate we in the church are also included in this promise. For example, in verse 20 Jesus said “don’t rejoice because spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven.” Wow that has to be saved Christians. We know this from studying the Book of Revelation and reading the scriptures about the book of life in heaven (Rev 3:5, Rev 17:8, Rev 20:17). This book of life contains all of the living and those whose names are not found written are forever declared dead and this is the second death. Wow!
Jesus is referring to a spiritual enemy and not a fleshly, carnal or natural enemy. We know this very clearly because Jesus said “spirits are subject to them”.. In this verse, Jesus clearly delegates His authority from His victory on the cross to the church. But, did you also notice the referenced connection to an enemy symbolically called a “serpent”?
Please understand that this serpent is defined to be Satan in our study chapter of Revelation 12. Three times in Revelation 12 Satan is called by the name of the serpent. This Greek word G3789 is translated as “serpent” in 14 New Testament verses including Luke and Revelation. That makes them related by God’s choice. Where was “the serpent” suppose to be according to Jesus our Lord and Savior? We are informed that this symbolic evil being is intended to be under the feet of the church, yes? Tread on means to put under your feet and walk on just as God instructed Joshua and commanded Adam to do.
This is a descriptive symbolic representation of where Satan (the serpent Rev 12:9) is to be in relation to where the church is suppose to be. It is not coincidental or by accident that the identity of the serpent is clearly given to us in Revelation 12:9. But, where does this statement and concept first originate in the Bible? The “serpent” is found in the Bible for the very first direct reference in Genesis chapter 3 verse 1 before Adam and Eve sinned. Satan deceives the woman. Uh oh, here we go with a woman. Could this be another divine connection of prophecy being made? After Adam and Eve sinned God comes on the scene of the garden and speaks the following words directly to the serpent, who we know from Revelation 12:9 is Satan:
Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
I am going to challenged here, because the translators made a huge mistake. But I’ll attempt to explain it and hopefully you will understand it. God is speaking to Satan, the ancient serpent. Therefore, we know who at least one of the primary subjects or nouns in the verse represents. God says to Satan “I will put enmity between thee…” and let me stop right there. What is enmity? It means hatred, it is an emotional status between two enemies! It seems to indicate an implied confrontation or even an assumed warfare.
How is this going so far? Now God reveals the other primary subject or noun in the verse and He calls this one “the woman”. Let’s stop there again and figure out which woman. Since there was only one physical woman on the planet, was it Eve or was this woman a prophetic statement of a different spiritual woman to come? Since at no time in scriptures do we ever see that the physical Eve crushed the head of Satan, I feel we can rule out this natural woman Eve as being the woman that God is referring to.
Many have tried to claim that this woman is Israel who gives birth to Jesus and that is certainly one possibility for interpretation. But we really need scriptural evidence to confirm this interpretation. Since we are studying a woman in Revelation 12 and there are verses that we have not learned yet, I have eliminated this prophesied woman to be Israel. Therefore, I am convinced that this Genesis 3 woman is a prophetic statement concerning the church and I will tell you why soon.
Then God seems to change the subject focus off of the woman and Satan in Genesis 3, and He says “between your (Satan) seed and her (a woman’s) seed”. Here we have the first reference in the Bible to “the seed of the woman“. This of course is an interesting and complex concept. But, what we need to determine is, according to the Bible, what is a “seed”? If you would like to read the series on this subject in depth you can go to “Understanding Seeds“.
There are many different definition of seed given to us in the Bible, from natural seeds found in fruits and vegetables that you plant into the ground, all the way to the sperm in a male. Then, children are also called seeds in the Bible. These are all examples, of natural seeds. But, there are also spiritual seeds in the Bible and if this is a prophetic reference to a spiritual woman, I would logically claim that “her seed” is a spiritual reference also.
So what are spiritual seeds? Jesus tells us in the Gospels that the sower, sows the word of God (Mk 4:14). We can learn from this statement that the seeds that the sower was sowing were God’s Words. These are spiritual seeds that are planted into the hearts of men (Mat 13:19). These seeds are either fruitful or they die or get eaten by birds (symbolic devils) or choked out by the enemy’s seeds (weeds which are symbolic words from Satan) because the hearer did not understand them.
There are multiple parables in the gospels about seeds, gardens and harvests that all apply to the spiritual realities that I am referring to and I will not attempt to include these in order to keep this lesson as short as possible. If nothing else you should have learned that there are many possibilities for what the seed of the woman could be and we could apply the principle of Satan’s seed being his words that are attempting to overrule God’s Word to eliminate spiritual fruit and salvation from humans. That is at least one valid and good interpretation for what we are studying in Revelation 12 and Genesis 3. But, maybe you are like me and have heard it taught for years that the “seed of the woman” is Jesus Christ and He is the one to bruise the head of the serpent on the cross. That is a common misinterpretation of God’s word and I will attempt to explain why I say this.
So here is where I may lose some readers, the next statement in Genesis 3:15 is the part of the prophecy that I believe was mistranslated by two little words. This is what the King James Bible says “it shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel. The first word is the word “it” and this is a Hebrew word that is often times translated as “she” or “her”. In fact if you look back at Genesis 3:12, Adam’s response to God’s question is for him to call his wife by this word and it is translated as “she”. In this verse it is translated “the woman that you gave me, she (H1931) did give me of the tree and I did eat…” For some reason the translation was changed to the word “it” instead of the word “her” for verse 15.
Now the last part of verse 15 says “and you shall bruise his heel”. That is very interesting because a male child is never referenced in this verse anywhere. However I believe that in verse 15 the translators thought (assumed) God was talking about a prophetic statement of Jesus Christ so they changed the verse to reflect the male gender of Jesus to be the one whose heel was to be bruised. This reflected in the term “his heel”. From what I could see by studying, there was no Hebrew word for “his” included in the verse so it was also added for the assumed clarity by the translators. However, if we change the verse to what I consider to be a more correct translation it would read like this:
Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity between thee (Satan) and the woman (Church), and between thy seed (words) and her seed (words); she (H1931) shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise her heel.
Right now this is just a minor technicality, but I believe based upon more scriptures that I will show you it will become very significant. Remember this, Jesus told His church to walk on serpents. Jesus knowing Genesis 3 very well selected the symbolic name for Satan (serpent) to give them the “authority” to tread on him. Therefore, Jesus knows and understand who Satan represents. Right there ought to tell us plainly that Jesus did not already do it! Jesus would have never delegated something that He had already accomplished and completed.
Notice in Luke 10:19 how God has give to us all of the same nouns and verbs directly and indirectly that were found in Genesis 3:15. I believe there is an implied “enmity” between two opposing parties. One is the person (implied woman called the church) that is to conquer her enemy Satan and his demons. Therefore we have the serpent, the church’s feet, and Jesus’ instruction (words) given to her (the church) to walk with her feet (including her heels) on Satan. I know some of these are indirect references yet they are there if you can see them. Let me give you another valuable scripture found in the New Testament that will shed significant additional light on the subject. In the book Romans, God makes this statement that is truly another outstanding prophecy:
Rom 16:20 And the God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen.
Again we have the primary subjects and nouns including verbs found in Genesis 3:15 and Luke 10:19, but using slightly different terminology and perspectives. We see God speaking to the Church, the bride of Christ a spiritual woman saying to her that He (God) will bruise Satan (the serpent) under her (our) feet (heel) very soon. You see there is a major problem if Jesus has already put Satan under His feet. Why would God still need to crush Satan’s head again using the church’s feet later in the future tense?
God gave Paul the book of Roman’s many years after the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ and at the time of this writing, according to the inspired Word of God the bruising of the serpent’s head had not yet occurred. Did you also notice the very parallel specific term “bruise” in Romans 15:20? Isn’t that exactly what God said would happen to the serpent in Genesis 3:15? Again, we can see a spiritual woman, her feet and Satan the serpent being bruised. All of this is mentioned in relation to a pending future action that was to soon occur. We can see in God’s timetable that the time of this crushing of the serpent’s head has to occur very soon. From prophetic words that we studied in Genesis 1, we can see that the church age only lasts two days, or 2000 years. So if it is going to happen it has to happen very, very soon. Here is one more verse that I will end this lesson with. In this verse we again see the pending status of God’s enemies:
Heb 1:13 But to which of the angels said he at any time, Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool?
Here we have another verse that states Satan, the enemy of God is not yet completely under the feet of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is now seated at the right of the Father and He waits for His enemy to be made His footstool. A footstool is a place you rest your feet, yes? If the church is the body of Christ (1 Cor 12:27), where are Jesus’ feet right now? I believe that we are the feet of Jesus walking on the earth and Jesus is now seated in heaven waiting for the God of Peace to bruise Satan under our feet.
How is the church supposed to do this? Read Ephesians 6:13-18 for God’s clue to how this bruising will soon occur. We will find in these verses God’s command to the church to be clothed with the whole armor of God. What was included in this armor? There are two main parts of the armor that I believe are the most important parts for our current study.
The first armor necessary for victory over Satan is found in Ephesians 6:15 where the church’s feet should be shod with preparation of the gospel of peace. Wow, isn’t that interesting? Wasn’t it the God of Peace that was going to bruise Satan under our feet shortly? Then notice and learn the Greek word G5265 translated as “shod”. This word literally means to bind on sandals under your feet. Wow again. Can we put on and tie God’s sandals on our feet so that we can walk on Satan? It appears to me that we can.
The next armor piece that I want focus upon and include here is the Sword of the Spirit found in verse 17. We are told that this is the Word of God. Wow again. Isn’t that the Seed of God? Doesn’t that sound familiar between our two enemies found in Genesis 3:15? God said I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between her seed and your seed. Now in Revelation 12 we have a woman clothed with the Sun (the armor of light) with the moon (Satan) under her feet. Remember what God said in Romans 13:12? God said to cast off the works of darkness and put on the armor of light. Wow, wow, wow!
CONCLUSION
I believe it is time to demonstrate the defeat of Satan under the feet of the spiritual woman. So what I have attempted to do today is to demonstrate scriptural precedence that establishes a woman that has Satan under her feet. By establishing this in the Bible it helps us to better understand the woman in Revelation 12. The woman is clothed with Jesus Christ and has Satan defeated under her feet. Who else can it be? I have not found any witnesses to these truths being Mary or the natural nation of Israel. So far it appears to only fit the church accurately.
Thanks for taking the time to study the Word of God. If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons you can continue with “Part 4“.
Is It A Good Idea to Teach The Bible Verse By Verse?
(Ver 1.2) I’ve seen many pastors and teachers attempt to go through a book of the Bible and teach it independently verse by verse. While you can certainly learn stuff by doing this, is this really the best way to approach the Word of God? In my opinion it is not. For example, take the book of Revelation. Probably the most complex, confusing and hard to understand book in the Bible. I’ve seen teachers stand up and attempt to do a verse by verse walk thru of this book in isolation and the end result is usually just more confusion. When you teach even a single verse of scripture independently of the rest of the Bible, many times you miss God’s commentary on the subject. I believe one of the keys to understanding the Bible is letting the Bible interpret itself. You do this by getting God’s definitions and commentary on all of the subjects that you are studying. When you do this, you have a much better chance of getting it right. For example, in books like Revelation that is filled with symbolism, you absolutely have to let the Bible define what these symbols mean or you will get it wrong.
Many times people are guilty of introducing their own opinions into what the Word of God means. God being so much smarter than us, knew we would do that, but yet did not make the information in the Bible any clearer or easier for us to understand. There must have been a reason for that and I’ve addressed some of those in other lessons. One of the reasons was to allow man to have the freedom of choice. Another reason was to hide information from His enemies. Finally, I think another reason was to give us a challenge to figure it out and allow God the opportunity to reveal it at His perfect timing. It’s funny but humans are naturally curious and they like puzzles, riddles and intellectual challenges. God did not create humanity to be cave men, they were just created ignorant of so, so many things. Ignorance is a reality for everyone. No matter how much you learn and know, you haven’t come close to what God knows. Will Rogers said “We are all ignorant, just about different things.” How incredibly true that statement is.
The information, clues, explanations and commentaries of God are spread throughout the Bible. Sometimes or many times they are very difficult to find. We are faced with challenges because God uses various techniques to conceal information in the Bible and I will get more into them in other lessons. One technique that God uses is symbolism. Another is allegory. Another technique is calling one object by many different names and descriptions. Another technique is to call multiple objects by the same name making it more difficult for you to figure out which one God is talking about. There are many other techniques that God uses to hide the truth and I call this “hiding the truth in plain sight.” The truth is all right there for anyone to view and read, but yet it causes so much debate as to what it all really means. Isn’t this fun? You see the other day I did a search on the just one subject on the internet. I searched Google for “The Identity of the Woman in Revelation 12” and guess what I was returned with over 6000 opinions what she meant. That is a classic of example of how 6000 different people can have 6000 different interpretations on what God calls only one truth.
So is it a good idea to teach the Bible verse by verse, I guess it depends on how you do it. If you research, study and see what God says about a subject in other places in the Bible and include that also in the teaching I would say that it would be OK to do it that way. If however, you isolate yourself into a verse, chapter or book of the Bible and teach it independently of what God says about it in other places, then you are making a huge mistake. Don’t become a Robinson Caruso Bible teacher and strand yourself on a verse island. When you do this you will eventually starve your spirit, which will cause you die of spiritual malnutrition. I hope you enjoyed my little Bible lesson about teaching in isolation and that it will help you to learn more about God’s Word.
What Does God Think About Abortion? Pt 3
(Ver 1.4) We have been going through the Bible on the subject of abortion. More specifically in relation to what God thinks about this subject and ignoring the opinions of men and women. This is now Part 3 in the series. So if you have not read these lessons from the beginning I would recommend strongly that you go back and start reading with “Part 1” first. What else does the Bible reveal to us about the thoughts of God on abortion? Obviously, we have seen some very significant things in previous lessons from the book of Judges and Isaiah. These only become obvious when we study the subject searching for the truth that is related to the subject. But once we see it and understand it, then no one can take it away from us or deceive us into believing a lie. The Bible says in the mouth of two or three witnesses, let every word be established (2 Cor 13:1). So we don’t take a single scripture and make it a theological doctrine, but if we can find more than one verse that says the same things we better take it to heart, believe it and put it into action. I found another very good example given to us by God in the book of Genesis with the story of Isaac and Rebecca. Let us read the verse:
Genesis 25:21 And Isaac intreated the LORD for his wife, because she was barren: and the LORD was intreated of him and Rebekah his wife conceived.
I read this verse and saw several similarities to the first scriptures that we read in the book of Judges in the first lesson. Here we have a story of a woman who was barren. This simply meant she was not able to have a child but yet she wanted to have one. Isaac prays to God and his wife Rebekah was able to conceive. So where did the child come from? Was he a gift of answered prayer from God? If this child is from God due to an a answered prayer request, does this imply that every child comes from God? Ask this question. Did God withhold the child from being conceived? It is obvious to me that Isaac and his wife tried many times to have a child and failed. Is this normal? Some couples do have a lot of trouble conceiving for many medical reasons, some are on the female reproductive side and others are on the male reproductive side. A barren women seems to indicate in this case it was Rebekah that had the problem.
One problem with abortion that needs to be addressed is that there are a lot of infertile couples in the world that would like to receive an aborted child and take care of him or her to raise them as their own. This is a very significant answer for women that get pregnant and feel like they are unable to keep or take care of the child. There are so many options other than murdering an unborn child for us to consider.
I knew of a lady that this happened to. She got pregnant when she was not married by falling into a trap of Satan to sleep and be intimate with a guy from a fit of temporary passion and pleasure. She did not consider the consequences of having this relationship at that moment but found out shortly afterwards what had happened. I mean this lady already had two daughters so she knew how things worked and what would happen. But, we all do foolish things on a spur of the moment poor choice.
This woman did not want to keep her child because of her single status and the fact her guy friend did not turn out to be so responsible for his part in the creation of the child. I’m sure this nice woman regretted her choice and even considered having an abortion. However, she found a friend that wanted the child and after she was born the friend took her and raised her. The real mother that gave birth was still able to watch her child develop and grow in a loving complete family environment. And the other couple that is caring for the child is thrilled that they had a child to love. We must understand that this other couple was unable to conceive and this solution that God provided kept the child alive and made everyone involved, including the child happy. God is able to do much more than we can think if we give Him the chance and believe (Eph 3:20).
If all this is true, about God’s ability, God’s involvement in the process, and God’s desire to meet and answer the prayers of people, who are we to terminate the pregnancy of God’s gift? Please understand the child that is killed has no one to defend them or stop even their mom from taking their life. This miraculous gift from God is a new him or her that has a purpose to exist! We can choose to do right to answer someone else’s prayer for a child or fail and resist what God desired to do for someone else. We should really think about that a long time before we end a pregnancy. Now let’s continue reading in this story in Genesis.
Genesis 25:22 And the children struggled together within her; and she said, If it be so, why am I thus? And she went to enquire of the LORD.
This time of pregnancy there is not one child but twins, two children that are formed as gifts from God and answers to prayer. Did you notice that in verse 22 of Genesis 25, that God called them “children” even before they were born? They are still both within their mother’s womb and God calls them living “children”. Not a fetus, not an embryo, not a potential life form, not a future or potential child. God calls them H1121 the Hebrew word that means sons and children, the same title and name given to born babies. This Hebrew word literally means a person who is the builder of the family and the continuation of the family name. Wow, I pray you understood that definition.
If God calls them both “son family builders” and children while they are in the womb, who are we to call them anything else? Doesn’t this recognition provide us a very clear divine viewpoint of what God thinks of children in the womb? This is of course the antithesis of what Satan thinks about children in the womb. Satan knows the truth but uses a technique to deceive humans by relabeling the truth as a false concept by calling something truthful by a different false name. Satan does this in order to dehumanize and devalue them. This is also the plan of Satan today to end the design of the God created family structure. Satan has done this by calling babies an embryo, a fetus, a beginning nucleus, the stage after fertilization, developing tissues, rudimentary development or something else worse like a germ. I’m sure you have heard slang terms for a developing child as being called a bun in the oven, or a woman that is knocked up, or even she is just “late” (for her normal monthly cycle).
Satan brainwashes people into believing by the media and education institutes that narrate a constant flow of repetitive untruths that are used to distract us from learning the truth. For example, liberals do not call the murder of a child ant abortion anymore, it has been falsely promoted to “women’s healthcare” choices. WOW! But, what about the child’s healthcare choices? No, this goes along with the brainwashing that he or she is not a child being dehumanized to be only a blob of potential life. Liberals have designed this approach so that whatever we use to believe was the truth we can’t call an unborn child what God calls them. Let us get back to our Bible verses. Rebekah understood the children insider her were living beings and that they were struggling and fighting each other on the inside of her already. She uses wisdom in her situation and goes to God and asks Him about what is happening inside her body between her children. This is what God’s response was to her question.
Genesis 25:23 And the LORD said unto her, Two nations are in they womb and two manner of people shall be separated from they bowels; and the one people shall be stronger than the other people; and the elder shall serve the younger;
If this verse is not enough to set us straight on the subject of abortion and what God thinks about these unborn babies, then I do not know what is. God says these two children corporately represent two independent nations and two different groups of people living on the earth. That is really a very heavy statement made by the living God, our creator. What if there had been abortion available to Rebekah and she had ended the lives of these children? A great number of people would not have been born and two nations would not exist today. Remember that God called them nations and people while they were still unborn children and in the womb. God recognized who they were and what they would become long before they were ever born. That is pretty plain and very clear if you ask me.
Please recall who these two children were! The firstborn was named Esau and the second born son was named Jacob. Esau originates a nation called Edom with his descendants being called Edomites. Jacob on the other hand originate the nation of Israel having 12 sons that originated the twelve tribes of Israel and eventually our LORD Jesus Christ. Wow, thank God that both of these nations were born!
So we learn and confirm the fact that God knows not only who you are before we are born, but He also knows every descendant that will come from us after we are born. WOW! So how does a woman’s right to choose the life or death of her child, affect all of the potential human beings that were supposed to be here, but are not because of this personal decision to terminate the life created within them? Is God going to hold us responsible for the children that were not born here because of what we decided? I believe with all of my heart that He will and I do not want to find out the consequences for making that decision or for even voting for people that promote that right to choose. Are we willingly participating in murder by how we vote? Again I believe we are!
There are many other verses in the Bible like these that I can give you that will tell us the same thing. God knows us before we are born, even while we are in our mother’s womb and He already has a plan and a purpose for each of us to fulfill. God knows our name before we are born, he knows where we will live, work and play. God knows every child, grandchild and descendant that will come from us. We can go through the Bible and we will see this repeatedly if we are looking for it. However, let me show you another set of verses that I think is directly related to this subject and speaks volumes about a spiritual truth and a Bible principle that is relevant to this subject of abortion.
Hebrew 7:9 And as I may so say, Levi also who received tithes, paid tithes in Abraham.
Hebrew 7:10 For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him.
I don’t know about you but I read these verses and they revealed so much, that I had great difficulty knowing where to start talking about them. The primary subject matter is about tithing, but the underlying revelation is far, far greater than that. Hebrews 7:9 speaks of a man named Levi who was a priest that received tithes from the nation of Israel. But did you notice that this verse also says Levi paid tithes in Abraham? I’m really not sure if you totally grasp the principle being given here. Levi was a great-grandson of Abraham. Abraham had a son named Isaac, Isaac had a son named Jacob and then Jacob had 12 sons and one of them was named Levi. How can Levi great-grandson of Abraham pay tithes long before he was born back in when his great-grandfather Abraham paid tithes? Verse 10 gives us the answer, it says he (Levi) was still in the loins of his father Abraham. The Greek word for loins here is a word that can mean the hip area. In other words the sexual organ area of Abraham. What we are learning is that whatever Abraham did, Levi also did. We are also learning that Levi existed in Abraham years before he was even conceived in his mother. Wow, wow, and wow! That is very strong and powerful information. People clearly do not have a clue what is in them and what they are doing to their children today. The spiritual law implications given here are incredibly far reaching. Out of the millions or billions of sperm cells in Abraham, God already recognized that one of them was representative of a future descendant named Levi. God then teaches us that whatever your father did, you also did because you were physically present inside your father, your grandfather and even your great-grandfather. If you can see it this of course is directly related to abortion, because everyone still comes from the union between one man and one woman. God sees and knows the exact individual specific parts on the inside of us (the exact egg and sperm) that will create every baby and He calls them by their name long before they arrive into the world.
CONCLUSION
I hope and pray that you are grasping the concepts being taught here by the Holy Spirit from His living Word! If you do grasp them, you should never think about having sex casually and aborting the resulting child in the same way again. This child is known by God. God knew exactly the two cells that would come together to form this child and He knew their name and their purpose for existence. He also knows every descendant that was supposed to come from them whether to create a new nation, a new President, a new scientist, etc. Please take this information and share it with others. We are in a spiritual warfare on this planet between good and evil. Satan is evil and he desires to kill every descendant and potential threat to conquering and overcoming his evil. God is good and came to give everyone life and that life even in abundance (Jn 10:10). Therefore we should do what God recommends to us in Deuteronomy 30:19, when He says “I have set before you life and death, therefore choose life that you and your descendants live”. Wow, that is an amazing recommendation and I pray I helped someone today to make the right choice. Thank for reading and studying the Word of The Creator God. I pray that it is a blessing to you and will help enlighten the choices that you may be faced with today. I love you and God loves you. There are alternatives to death and their are greater benefits to giving life than you can imagine right now.
If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons you can go to “Part 4“.
Genesis 2:8 The Confrontation Between East and West
(Ver 2.0) When you read the Bible and begin to understand that every word has significance and meaning, you start to pay much closer attention to which words God selected to describe the events within creation. Knowing that God is so much smarter than we are and that He could have chosen any words that He desired to convey His thoughts to us, we must realize that He chose these exact words found in Genesis to describe creation to us. Recently in my blogs I have been skipping around in Genesis 2 for no particular reason, just giving you glimpses into the variety of subjects found there. Today we are going to look at verse 8 of Genesis 2 and see what God says to us.
Genesis 2:8 And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
I often times wondered why God said that he planted a garden eastward in Eden. We can clearly see from the information in this verse that man or Adam came from or was created somewhere to the west of Eden. Isn’t that interesting? Why is this so important that God included this fact in the Bible out of all the information that He could have given us? We don’t know exactly where Eden was located; we are only given the general location of Eden using the names of 4 rivers which are said to have flowed through it. We can assume using the general information of the location of these four rivers given to us that Eden must have been somewhere in or near the area between Israel and Iraq or in that general vicinity. I don’t really feel that the exact location is that important, but I believe that the general principles and concepts surrounding them are very important to today’s lesson. We can also assume based upon this location that somewhere to the west, probably in Northern Africa, the Man was created and then moved to the Garden. So why is this significant? It is the first mention of any compass direction in the Bible. The first mention of any subject in the Bible always has significance. There are many implied truths given to us in this scripture. We can see that much clearer later when we get to what happens later in chapter 3 after the fall of man.
What I will tell you now is just some overall concepts of the differences between human civilizations and the developmental differences between the east and the west. If you’ve never thought of this before, it is very fascinating to see the spiritual implications of east vs. west. The Far East as it is called has always been dominated by spiritual darkness; religions of the mind, religions of the body and the religions of idol worshippers. All of these types of religions focus more upon worshipping creation and ignoring the creator. You can go to places in China, Japan, Indonesia and other places and see the temples and idols of gods that have dominated that part of world. These are gods made by the hands of men and worshipped by ignorant and deceived humans. As a result we can see the rise of communism and dictatorships of godless governments that do everything in their power to attempt to limit and restrict Christianity, the Bible and the spread of the truth. Nowhere else in the world is this so prevalent as it is in the eastern Asia.
Then we can see another conglomeration of religions centered around the region of Eden which are primarily dominated by Judaism along with Islam and some Christians. Moving to the west we see the rise of more dominate Christianity and free societies and governments. What we begin to see is a dividing line and a growing trend of a clash between the cultures of the east and the west. Of course we understand that we wrestle not with flesh and blood but the spiritual forces, the rulers of the darkness of this world (Eph 6:12). It seems that these spiritual forces while attempting to make inroads into the west have predominately through history have controlled more of the far eastern nations. In the book of Acts and in the Epistles there are a couple of mentioned times that Paul is not allowed by God to go to the Far East.
Acts 16:6 Now when they had gone throughout Phyrgia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia,
Paul is directed specifically by God to go west only. In fact it specifically says God forbid them from going into Asia. I would assume from this that it was too dangerous and the people in those regions would have just killed them. If you look at the world today, the hardest places for Christians to go into and teach and preach are still predominately in areas of the Far East and the continent of Asia. In recent news articles there were several aid workers who were giving the people of Afghanistan free medical care; these good Samaritans were executed by the Islamic extremist. The claim was that they were preaching the Bible trying to get Muslims to convert. Isn’t that religious tolerance and freedom and the free will exercise of the people’s mind? Why is it that Islam wants to force you to become a Muslim and then once you are a Muslim they will kill you for leaving? There are no choices in Islam your decisions are made for you, is that your God? The control of people by fear seems to be their only message. Other than fear they have no message of salvation. They cannot stand up to the truth so they have to shut up those who try to teach it to others. What I want you to think about is how different the cultures are in these two parts of the world. Communism still dominates China and Russia. The country of India is dominated by people who revere cows. Between those three countries lies almost half of the world’s population. I cannot thank God enough for being born in the free country of the United States of America. We are not a perfect country but at least I can go to church without fearing that the Government will come in and throwing everyone into prison, at least today I can. I’ll bring out more information about east and west as we get into chapter 3 of Genesis, but I just wanted you to start thinking along these lines and notice what God said about it in chapter 2.
What Does God Think About Abortion? Pt 2
(Ver 1.4) This is Part 2 in a series of advanced Bible lessons about the subject of what God thinks about human abortion. If you have not read this series from the beginning, I would recommend very highly that you go back and start reading with “Part 1” first. This series was designed to build upon each of the preceding lessons. If you missed the first lesson then you have missed the basic foundations necessary to continue the study. Thank you for joining this Bible study and please do go and get your Bible out or your tablet or phone and open your Bible Application to verify everything that is stated is what you find in your Bible. There are really so many scriptures in the Bible that deal with the subject of abortion. But, they are only found if you look for them. God says seek and you will find (Luke 11:9). Which means if we do not seek correctly, we will never find. Therefore there is a prerequisite requirement that stipulates that people must search for the truth, instead of searching for lies. What I am teaching, is that it matters what we are looking for. Truth never changes, but our knowledge of the truth will change only if we search to find God’s wisdom and His point of view on the subject. I will say that there are people who look for verses to justify their belief in abortion and a woman’s right to choose. According to the Law given by Jesus if that is what we seek for we can find verses that seem to justify that position. But, does that make it the truth? Absolutely not! God wrote and designed the Bible to give humans the right to choose to know the truth or to not know the truth. If He had not given us this right then we would have been created as pre-programmed robots that could only follow His will imbedded in our internal software. But, we know this is not happening simply by observing human behavior all around us. God wrote 10 fundamental commandments in Exodus 20, and I have never met a human yet on the earth that has not violated at least one of these edicts. Therefore, none of us are robots and everyone has come short of the glory of God by sinning (Rom 3:23).
In my last lesson, I introduced us to the subject of abortion in the Bible. We saw a key definition of abortion from the Merriam-Webster dictionary that correctly defined the meaning of the word to include the “death” of the child during the termination of the pregnancy. Wow, that was important. Here we have a fundamental confirmation that this was a developing life form. You should know that a child is created by the union of the female egg and the male sperm and Webster was smart enough to understand that this was a life form that can die or be killed. In fact if we sent a probe to the planet mars and found these two cells and brought them back to earth for analysis, there would be such great excitement of the discovery of life on Mars that we cannot imagine it. Scientists would be so excited that life could exist on another place other than earth, that we would not be able to keep them silent. This would help them prove that life could evolve anywhere and evolution was a viable theory. But, these cells in the womb of a woman on earth are deemed unimportant by the same scientists.
Today, I will continue with the subject of what else God thinks about abortion today. Please let us stop and pray and ask the Holy Spirit to open our eyes to see how He sees the termination of a child in the womb before birth. So let’s get started.
OBSERVING NEW GOD THOUGHTS
Here is another interesting verse of God’s Word specifically concerning one of His major prophets:
Isa 49:1 Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name.
This verse says God knew the prophet Isaiah even while he was still in the womb of his mother. It also claims that He already knew his name. This proves that God knows the names of every born and unborn and even aborted child. Then God says “I know what Isaiah will do, I know the plan for his life, his calling, and his purpose”. I’ve said this before but, it will be beneficial to repeat it, if God knew Isaiah in his mother’s stomach, then he knew you while you were yet in your mother’s stomach also. If God knew Isaiah’s name, then he definitely knew your name before you were born. I am totally convinced that God knows the name of every aborted child that has never breathed a breath of fresh air, tasted food, had a drink of milk or lived to see the sun rise. God knows more than you can imagine right now. It is when people don’t know that they have a purpose in life that causes them to believe that NO human life is valuable in the eyes of God. But, in actuality the opposite is true. To God, ALL HUMAN LIFE IS VALUABLE!
Here are some more very powerful words from the Word of God concerning abortion. God speaking to another prophet said the following words:
Jer 1:4 Then the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
Jer 1:5 Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.
Here is another prime example of what God thinks about abortion. God clearly says to Jeremiah that He knew him and set him apart even while he was still in his mother’s womb. This verse said God also formed the child in her. Have you ever studied the complexity of internal human development from the union of two different cells? The join together and make one cell first. This creates a combined unique complex DNA pattern that is used to by God to created entire individual containing trillions of cells when fully grown. But, this process initially begins by cell divisions that eventually start dividing into very unique and different cell types. Some cells form the head, some form the heart and other living organs, while others form the bones and skull tissues. Every unique organ has originated with a designed intentionality. What makes the union of just two cells create such a differing amount of tissues that cooperate and coordinate in specific order to work in harmony? God claims He is at work in this process and if you knew how complex that it was, you would understand how smart God is. I say this because He is capable of doing this to millions of people on earth simultaneously.
If God formed this child named Jeremiah, we know that He also forms every child. The Bible says that God is no respecter of persons. What God does for one He is required to do for all. If a woman decides to terminate her child after God has formed him or her, then exactly who is this woman working against? This verse says that God sanctified Jeremiah while he was still in his mother’s womb. If God sanctified Jeremiah today in our world of aborted children, I wonder if God would have selected someone else who was going to be born or would we have just lost this book of the Bible.
People who believe that God is in sovereign control of everything that is happening in the world are greatly ignorant or confused and don’t understand what the Bible says. God does not override the will of a human male or female. People do whatever they want to do, even if God doesn’t want them to do it. So if a woman aborts her child and God had big plans for that child what is the result of that abortion? So we must ask how do we know that God has plans for me nd my child? Because His word says He does:
Jer 29:11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.
This is an amazing verse of truth. The word here translated in the KJV Bible as “thoughts” but it has the following definition in the Strong’s:
H4284
From H2803; a contrivance, that is, (concretely) a texture, machine, or (abstractly) intention, plan (whether bad, a plot; or good, advice): – cunning (work), curious work, device (-sed), imagination, invented, means, purpose, thought.
The underlying definition of this word in the Hebrew means “purpose” or “plan”. God is saying I had a plan for you long before you were conceived or born, and I have a purpose for you after coming into this world. You have a specific purpose from God in arriving and being here on this planet. It goes on and says in that verse that it is a good plan and not an evil plan. Here is the same verse in a more literal translation of the Bible:
Jer 29:11 For I know the purposes which I am planning for you, says Jehovah; purposes of peace, and not for evil; to give you posterity and a hope.
That verse really says a lot to me personally and we can clearly see that if God knew Isaiah and Jeremiah before they were even born and He knew what they were supposed to do, then God is revealing to us that He does the same thing for you and I and every other child that is soon to be conceived.
CONCLUSION
The Bible teaches us to establish every truth in the mouth of two or three witnesses (Mat 18:16) and I have done that very conclusively with these verses written by two different prophets over two thousand years ago. But, But we are not finished with this subject, so we will continue on it again in the next lesson. I thank you for your time in reading about God and His Word. Please leave me a comment if you have the time and be blessed in your study of the truth.
If you would like to continue reading in this series of lessons about what God thinks about abortion, please continue to “Part 3“.
What Does God Think About Abortion?
(Ver 1.5) This is Part 1 of a series of advanced Bible lessons about what God thinks about the subject of abortion. In the news a while back there was a great controversial clash of opinion between the left and the right that took place. It appears that one of the nation’s biggest Catholic Universities invited one of our liberal Democratic Presidents to speak at their graduation commencement. The single point of confrontation was a delicate subject that has divided our nation since 973. So what is this subject that has caused such a major division and debate? It is the subject of abortion. This subject came to the forefront of U.S. history in 1973 when the Supreme Court ruled abortion to be legal in a case named Roe vs. Wade. It still amazes me how 9 people on a court can make such sweeping broad rulings of moral values. The 7 members of the Supreme Court that ruled in favor of legalized abortion were named 1) Harry Blackburn, 2) Warren Burger, 3) William Douglas, 4) William Brennan, 5) Potter Stewart, 6) Thurgood Marshall and 7) Lewis Powell. According to Deuteronomy 19:10 I believe these seven men have a lot of innocent blood upon their hands. I hope that they regretted their choice and repented before they died.
INTRODUCTION
Let’s begin with the basics. What is an abortion and how is it defined? One dictionary say abortion is “a medical procedure to end a pregnancy”. It uses medicine or surgery to remove the embryo, fetus and placenta from the female uterus. That was a medical description from an abortion provider. But the Merriam-Webster dictionary puts it this way gaining additional new and important information. They say abortion is the termination of a pregnancy after, accompanied by, and resulting in the death of the embryo or fetus. Wow, that changes things dramatically. Isn’t it interesting how some organizations omit words that are not desired to promote a result that would not be allowed after birth? One definition admits there is a death that occurs while the other just leaves this detail out completely. I think as we study the Bible we will learn that Merriam-Webster was more in alignment with God.
It seems that almost everyone in the world has some opinion on this matter and that is really the basis and the root of the entire problem of conflict. You see what I think about the subject of abortion and what you think about abortion really doesn’t matter or count for anything after we die. I mean who are you and who am I? The University speaking Liberal Democrat President’s opinion was that we should all just try to find some common ground and get along on this subject of abortion. But what he thinks really doesn’t matter or count for anything either. In fact what the Supreme Court’s opinion is on the subject of abortion doesn’t really matter or count for anything at all. All human opinion is baseless unless we agree with the one that created us.
What should only matter to you and I and concern us, is what does God think about the subject of abortion? If we could go instantly up to heaven and stand before the throne of God to ask Him a direct question on His thoughts on the subject of abortion, what would His answer be to us? Would God’s opinion change our opinion on the subject or would we still hang on to our opinion in spite of whatever He said about the subject? We should really think about that before we answer.
I wonder if we were confronted by God and told we were wrong about something, what would our response be? We could say I’m sorry, I didn’t know I was wrong and I’ll change immediately to be right. That would be the response of someone that was humble and feared God. Or we could say, I was wrong but then try to explain why we believed what we did was right at the time to justify our thoughts, opinions and actions. We could even try to be like an Adam or an Eve and pass the responsibility to someone else and redirect the attention away from ourselves and say it was just not my fault that I believed abortion was good and right, the court and the President made me believe it was right. We could be a real idiot and say sorry God, you’re wrong and I’m right and I’m not going to change my opinion or what I think no matter what You say or do. This last type of person has absolutely no fear of God. Or we could just care less and be indifferent. Our attitude could be just let people do whatever they want to do, it doesn’t have anything to do with me.
Which kind of person are you? What is your attitude towards this subject? If you are here on earth and can read this lesson from the Bible you must have not been aborted by your mother. Are you happy that your mother didn’t kill you before you were born? I personally believe that now is the time to learn the truth and change our opinions to conform with God’s thoughts on this subject. I’ll let you know right now that there will be no opportunities on judgment day to defend our wrong thoughts, opinions and actions we lived today. If we think there will be this chance, please show us the Bible verse that says this.
BEGINNING TO SEE GOD’S VIEWPOINT
If we proclaim ourselves to be a Christian then we should be aware that the Bible is the inerrant Word of the Living Creator God. The Bible is a directly written personal message to us from our God. The Bible was written for our benefit so that we could know this awesome God who none of us has ever seen before. So what a Christian does should follow God’s Word, His thoughts, His commandments, His instructions and the examples that He has given to us in this book. Let me show something that Jesus said to help confirm this point:
Mat 7:24 Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock:
Jesus said a wise man is one that hears the Word of God and does it. What is the opposite of that statement? The antithesis truth would be “a fool hears the word of God but does not do it”. What are you today a wise man or a foolish man? We all make this choice everyday in everything we do. So what does the Bible say on the subject of Abortion? And of course what would make us become a wise man that we could learn to change to do? Wisdom always begins with knowledge and knowledge must begin with learning about what God says on the subject abortion?
Like many other modern day Bible subjects the the word “abortion” is not found in the entire book, but that does not mean that God did not give us His thoughts on the subject. All we have to do to become wise is to study and find out what He has said on the subject using the other synonymous words that ARE found on the subject, so let’s do that. I want us to start this lesson by reading a very important foundational verse that is short but directly to the point on the subject of abortion.
Exo 20:13 Thou shalt not kill.
What does God say in this verse? It is one of the stated 10 commandments of God from the Old Testament. Are these a part of the words and of the commandments that Jesus was speaking of for a wise human to do? The Hebrew word H7523 translated as kill in this verse means “You shalt not commit murder”. What exactly is abortion if not murder? We learned earlier that Webster defined abortion as a death. To cause an innocent life to cease from continuing and developing in existence is clearly murder in Bible terms. What is the difference from a developing child inside the womb to one that has exited the womb and is still developing for another 18 years. If it is OK, to kill a developing child inside the womb, would it be fine to kill the same developing child outside the womb? Why is it today that outside the womb killing a child is called murder and killing a child inside the womb it is called abortion? They are both the same child! They are both in developing stages of growth. They both have the exact same DNA structure. Here is where the liberals have become creative to redefine that a living baby in the womb is not really a child but rather just a embryo or fetus and therefore not a viable self sustaining life form. By redefining a living developing child to be simply being labeled as an embryo or fetus they have dehumanized the living child, him or her and eliminated them for qualification as a living being for murder. Why do they not use this same logic when they have passed laws to protect the eggs of unborn eagles? Please answer this question, can a newly born baby child survive on its own outside the womb without assistance? Who is going to feed the child? Who is going to care for the child? Since they are not self sustaining do they fall into the same category and the unborn child that is fed by the umbilical cord that is attached to their mother? Do you see any problems with this type of thinking between how we should treat the child on the inside differently than how we treat them on the outside?
Did you know that destroying an unborn baby eagle bird in its egg is a punishable criminal offense? People can go to jail for killing (murdering) an eagle egg! Clearly it is the exact same type of stated unsustainable developing life form as the child (embryo or fetus) in the mother. Can you tell me what the difference is between an eagle egg and an unborn human baby? Yet one developing life form has gained a much greater value than the other in some people’s mind based upon some unknown reasoning. Why is that? How can that not be viewed as the same logical comparison that should not be ignored? Is the value in one species increased simply based upon the numbers of that species; are numbers what really matter? Because the eagle is endangered, does that make them more valuable to be protected than humans that are more populous on the earth? What do you think? Does God care more about eagles or for people? Did you know Jesus answered this question for you? In Matthew 10:29-31 Jesus speaking of two sparrows says God knows about them, but then tells humans they are much more valuable to Him than many sparrows.
Let me ask you this question, did God come to the earth to save just sparrows and eagles or did He come to save human people? If we do not know the answer to that question then we are in big trouble. John 3:16 gives us the answer by informing us that God loved us in the world so much that He died to save all those that believed in Him. Only a human is capable of believing.
Let us permit God to speak to us further on the subject of abortion and tell us His thoughts and then let us see how we react to His words:
Jdg 13:4 Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not any unclean thing:
Jdg 13:5 For, lo, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and no razor shall come on his head: for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb: and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.
Jdg 13:6 Then the woman came and told her husband, saying, A man of God came unto me, and his countenance was like the countenance of an angel of God, very terrible: but I asked him not whence he was, neither told he me his name:
There are so many things to learn from the Bible, if we are open to the truths that it contains. We begin to learn when we allow God to show us what it actually means. Here is an example of a woman that had not had any children and the messenger of God shows up at her house and tells her that she is going to have a son. How did God know this? I think that is a really fair question and that the answer is probably more revealing than you can imagine. God knew of the child and what he was going to become and do long before he was even conceived. I will tell you that knowing this Bible fact alone will eliminate a woman’s right to choose an abortion. If God knows every child before they are born or even conceived and what they are supposed to be and what they are supposed to accomplish within their life, then who is a woman to overrule God to decide that the child should not be worthy to be born?
We know for a fact from biology class that the sex of a baby is determined by the male sperm from the father. Yet God knew which sperm cell was going to fertilize the egg in this woman in order for a male baby to be born. God knew that there was a future deliverer about to be born and according to many today, they would have said that this decision for him to be born should have been left up to the woman who conceived him. Is that what God thinks? Does a woman’s desire play a role in the plan of God for a child? Would a woman wanting a child be different from another woman not wanting her child? I personally do not believe it does based upon the Bible. We will hopefully look at this question more later.
Did you notice that God gave this woman specific instructions about what she did before she gave birth or this child was even conceived yet? In verse 4 God tells the woman not to eat or drink things that are bad for her or for the future baby. WOW, that is clearly a message that is very profound. God was basically informing us that what she did would affect the future child’s ability to fulfill his purpose. This truth places human responsibility on the mother that is way beyond what the world thinks right now. I believe that women and men will be judged for what they did to their future children good or bad.
This woman, the future mother described in Judges was told not to drink or eat any unclean thing before she conceived and while she carried this child in her womb. Why is this significant? If this was not a viable life form, why does it even matter what a woman eats or drinks? No, you see it does matter because this is not just an embryo or fetus in the eyes of God, or a blob of developing cells. In the eyes of God this was a child and God said it matters what you feed him. If it matters to God about this child and what he is fed in the womb, then it also matters to God and what every other child is fed in the womb. If it matters to God what this child was fed before it was born, then it clearly matters to God if this child was born at all.
Whose responsibility was it to eat the right things and drink the right things for the development of this baby? Was it God’s responsibility to see that his mother did the right thing or not? Did God make her do the right things here? These are not loaded questions! These are not hard questions to figure out the answers to either. If it matters to God about one baby in the Bible, then it matters to God about every baby that is supposed to be born. God does not treat one baby differently than the other, only people do that.
So what happens to all of God’s future planned roles and responsibilities of all of these babies that are aborted in our world by the mother’s choice to override God’s will? Do you think that the aborted children’s responsibilities in this life are just given to others that were not aborted? Or do you think that it is possible that there are a bunch of things that are not taking place and getting done, because the one that was going to find the cure for cancer was aborted? What if this child in Judges would have been aborted? What if his mother would have drunk wine and ignored the commandment of God? Would God had another deliverer to raise up or would Israel not have been delivered? I personally believe that this is a major problem with abortion and that there would have been no other one to take this child’s place.
Therefore, how many doctors, lawyers and teachers do you think have been aborted since 1973? Who or what exactly are we missing out on? Because of the abortion of the millions of future skilled workers, tax payers and roles that are being unfulfilled. How many church pastor’s, preachers, teachers and evangelists have been eliminated from coming into the world to help others get saved and not go to hell? Satan has used murdering people that some call doctors to create a population imbalance and reduction. Satan is trying his best to eliminate humans from coming into this world because they are threat to him.
CONCLUSION
This was just the introduction to the subject of “What does God think about Abortion?” I pray that you can begin to see from just one story in the Bible that it must matter greatly to God if a child is born. Why do you think Satan wants to kill all of the future children and keep them from entering the world? Could it be that one of these are the preacher that will reach the whole world with the truth? Does Satan think by eliminating future Christians that he can remain on this planet a little longer? I tell you that there are many things to consider on this subject. One is why has Satan been motivated to kill human children even since early in the book of Genesis? When Moses was born babies were tossed into the river to be drown, if they were males. This was a repeated occurrence when Jesus was born in Bethlehem and every child under 2 years old was killed. You see Satan is attempting to fight against whatever God has planned and is doing. We need to learn the truth and figure out whose side we want to be on. Abortion is a demonic evil plan of Satan to eliminate future humans and potential Christians. God is a pro-life God and is opposed to ALL abortion. We will continue to learn this as we go through this series of Bible lessons. Thanks for reading and studying the Bible with us today. I pray that what was stated has helped you to see what God really thinks on the subject and importance of future life.
If you would like to continue reading in this series of lessons on what God thinks about abortion, please continue to “Part 2“.
Is God Really in Control of Everything? Pt 2
(Ver 1.2) This is now Part 2 in a series of Bible lessons concerning the nature and character of God and the subject of “Is God in Control of Everything that Happens”. If you have not read “Part 1“, I would recommend that you go there to begin your study in this series. In first lesson I asked a direct question that has bothered a lot of people in the church. Is God really in control of everything that happens in the world? This question often goes into deeper thoughts of why is there so much evil in the world if God is really controlling everything and that becomes a much more difficult question to answer. While we can come up with many of man’s opinions and theories on this subject, we should determine what God thinks about it by examining His Word for clues to determine the actual truth. I have already given you several great scriptures on this subject in my last lesson that conveyed a transfer of ownership and responsibility from God to man, concerning the dominion of the earth. I don’t know if people think I provided enough evidence or not for this belief, so I will provide another verse witness that also says God put man in control of what happens on this planet:
Hebrews 2:7 Thou madest him a little lower than the angels, thou crownedst him with glory and honour, and didst set him over the works of thy hands:
If you read the preceding verse you will see this is speaking of Man or Adam and the sons of Adam. It says God has crowned us and that denotes that we were given rule and authority of this earth. Then the verse says man was put over the works of God’s hands. To be put over something denotes clear responsibility and accountability for not performing what was expected. Again if I gave you a million dollars, do I have any say after you take it as to what you do with it? No I don’t. The money would belong to you and now you are responsible to keep it or to burn it or do whatever you want to do with it. That is called a transfer of power and authority. This is exactly what God did for Adam in Genesis 1:26.
Then in my last blog I ended up with a verse in Matthew that had Jesus telling us that “All power both in heaven and earth has been given to me.” The clear inference given is that before His resurrection and ascension, not everything was under God’s control. So now we have a dilemma that God is controlling everything again and we still see evil, murder, terror, rape and death still prevalent in the earth. So what is the situation and who is really in control still needs to be resolved using the Word of God.
Before I go there, let’s determine who had dominion over the World before the resurrection of Christ. We can see from earlier scriptures that dominion and authority was given to Adam to control everything on the earth and in the earth, including the air and the sea. So what happened? Did Adam transfer this gifted ownership, rule and authority to someone else? I gave you a clue that Adam did this by showing you what God said about Satan in 2 Corinthians 4:4 being called the “god” of this world. What we learn from this single scripture is that if Satan has become the god of this world then how can God be in control of everything that happens here? This is a hotly debated new topic. Many theologians believe that Satan is God’s pawn and can do only what God gives him permission to do but that is in violation of most revealed scriptures. For example, we should be able to see this more clearly by examining this verse when God was present on the earth in the flesh:
Luke 4:5 And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.
We can clearly learn and see that Jesus in this temptation of Satan is being taken up to a very high mountain and is shown “ALL” of the kingdoms of this world. That information would leave nothing out, would it? Then Satan makes this statement to Jesus that is absolutely critical to see and understand:
Luke 4:6 And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me, and to whomsoever I will I give it.
This is an incredible statement of revelation being given to us by God’s Word. According to what is spoken by Satan all authority over the planet was “delivered” or “given” to him by someone. That statement denotes new ownership and control rights thereof. Satan then says that he is able to give it to whoever he wants to. Remember who Satan is speaking to, this is God in the flesh who created him and he is either very stupid or he is telling the truth. God would certainly know if Satan is not speaking the truth and He would have just said you are a liar, leave me and Satan would have had to leave if God was in control. So we can see a very clear statement concerning who is in control of what happens on the earth and that it is not God. This is of course Satan speaking so many will say it is just a lie, but if it is just a lie then it could not have been a temptation to Jesus. It has to be a real offer to Jesus in order for it to be a temptation for Him to take it. Remember when Jesus walked the earth during his ministry? Demons and religious people would constantly question his authority and his right to be here and to do what he was doing. You’ll find instances like this in Mark 1:24, Luke 4:34 and Matthew 8:29. Demons when confronted would question Jesus and call him God and ask what right do you have to do these things to them.
Mat 28:18 And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth.
This verse occurs after Jesus was raised from the dead. Here Jesus literally tells us that authority has been given back to him here on the earth and even in heaven. Why would God tell us that this authority was again transferred to Him if He already had it? Can you answer me that? So apparently Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection caused something to occur to transfer control back from Satan. In 1 Corinthians 2:8 we have a statement about Satan and his demon cohorts that says, “If they would have only known what was going to happen, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory.” That was my paraphrase of the verse, but that is what it basically says. You are free to go and study this verse for yourself. The demons are called “princes” and that Greek word simply means a ruler of this world. Therefore we know that if Satan would have known the consequences of killing Christ on the cross then he would not have done it. So apparently killing Christ caused a major and even devastating blow to his plan. I hope that you are grasping these concepts give to us by God.
Apparently from what I can see in the Bible God got back what Adam had lost and given away to Satan through the works of Jesus Christ who was a literal son of Adam (man) by his death on the cross. Jesus was a direct descendant of the first man Adam. Jesus being a man, had the right to take man’s authority back, as God in heaven He did not have the right to do this since it was God in heaven that gave the authority to man and man could do with it whatever he liked. If you go through the law in the Old Testament you will see what gave Jesus the right to redeem what Adam had sold, but I won’t go into all of that detail today in this lesson.
So who is in control today? We still have a problem with responsibility? Who’s responsibility is it to preach the gospel? Who is going to get men saved? Who is going to be the missionary to Africa and Asia? Is this God’s responsibility? Is God going to send angels to preach His Word? I don’t think so. No what we have is a statement by Jesus that helps us to see what happened. Earlier I gave you the verse in Matthew after Jesus was raised from the dead and He said “all power is given to me both in heaven and the earth, what was His next statement to us in the church? Let’s read this verse and see what Jesus did with His new authority:
Matthew 28:19 Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:
Did you see it? Here we have another transfer of authority and responsibility. We have been given the highest authority on the earth again being transferred this authority by the LORD JESUS! Jesus said “I have been given all power, now you go.” The “Now you go” is a conveyance of authority back to the church. Have you ever asked yourself this question “Why if all authority was given to Jesus, wasn’t Satan just cast out into hell?” That of course is a very interesting question to think on. Apparently something still gives Satan the right to be here on the earth, even if he doesn’t have authority over Christians any more. Perhaps you need to go back and read the verse that I mentioned earlier in Matthew 8:29. This demon that Jesus confronted in this verse knew that there was a set time for them to be here. That is why this demon said are you come to torment us before the time? We need to understand what this time is because it is rapidly approaching. There is coming a time when the devil and his demons will be cast into hell and that will be the end of them until after the 1000 year time of rest occurs but I will not teach that in this lesson today.
The Bible is such a rich and complex book, with so much deep information spiritual information given to us in it. It certainly is challenging to put all of the puzzle pieces together correctly, but with God’s help I believe we will come to a mature understanding of the truth before Jesus returns. Thank you for taking the time to read my Bible studies. I hope and pray that something positive was planted in your spirit that will produce much fruit for the kingdom of God. Be continually blessed and come back and share these lessons with your friends.
Is God Really In Control of Everything?
(Ver 1.3) This is Part 1 in a very basic series of Bible lessons on the revealed nature and character of God. In these lessons we are going to confront a popular and controversial misconception that is being spread in many churches by many confused preachers. This belief has been transferred to their church members and is often spoken in public by Christians. I hear it on Facebook very often. People will post little things on their walls passing on the responsibility for everything that occurs in their life to God. On the national news recently I heard a precious Christian couple accuse God of their house burning to the ground. In tears they said to the reporter “God does not put more on us than what we can bare”. In stating that, they had just attributed the loss of all of their natural possessions to the acts of Almighty God and implied that He was in complete control of the situation. I then heard more of the news report and wondered why the police were still looking for an arsonist that started the fire when it was actually God’s fault according to the couple. I often wonder what people think when they say things like this and then I wonder what the message is being presented to the world that is listening to these kinds of statements. Let me ask you this question and see what you think today:
Is God really in control of everything?
I am sure that there are a lot of opinions on this subject, but is opinion the thing that is really important in the world? Do you believe that everything that happens to you is what God has planned? If yes, how do you know for sure that God controls what happens to you? How would you ever prove that to anyone? What evidence do you possess for that accusation? A lot of religious people are driven by the idea that God is absolutely sovereign and therefore they have taken that truth and extended it to include that whatever happens to them must have been something that God has instigated, has caused to occur, commanded to transpire or at the very least has allowed or permitted to happen. After all they have reasoned that if it was not the will of God for it to happen, then He could have stopped it since He holds the power and ability to do that. Insurance agencies often times have clauses in their contract that state “Acts of God” are not covered. They of course are referring to natural disasters like fires, hurricanes, tornados and floods. But are these the works of God? How can they be? If they kill people and destroy their homes, lives and property? Are these the works of your God? I can tell you for sure that they are not the works of my loving God? So we must have different Gods? Recently we saw on the news a crazy man that stood up and shouted “Allah is great” and started shooting soldiers and civilians. In other shooting in Colorado we saw a man walk into a movie theatre and kill a bunch of people. Were these all of the orchestrated works of God? If it was then I don’t want that God.
The humorous thing that I have noticed about people who claim that God is in control of everything is that they never give us any scriptures to back that belief statement. Do you know of any scriptures that says “I am the LORD and I am in control of what happens to you.”? How about “I AM the Lord that sends you every clamity, test and trials”? I’ve never seen it, if it exists. So if there is no scriptural basis for your beliefs, what are your beliefs based upon? What kind of foundation are you standing upon? It sounds like your opinion or your theory and that is worth less than 2 cents to me. I once heard someone give a great definition of what a theory is and it went something like this:
Theory: A supposition based upon ignorance of the subject under discussion.
What a true statement that is. Too many people have a theory about what God is like, who God is and what God does. But how worthless is that information. Here is the number one problem with saying God is in control of everything that happens, good, bad or indifferent. You see when so many evil things happen to someone, no one can come up with a Bible answer for why it happened? They always just claim that God is smarter and wiser than we are and we can’t understand His ways, He must have had a higher purpose in taking your child. That is another idiotic opinion that I don’t mind telling you repels me away from a God who says in His Word that He loves us while causes a terrorist plane to fly into the side of a building killing hundreds and even thousands of people.
Of course religion quickly answers God had a purpose in it. Why? Because He did nothing to stop it from happening? So how did you come to the conclusion that it was God’s responsibility to stop it or do anything about it? What Bible verse is that logic based upon? Can you help me? The religious minded person, very often resort to a theory of what I call a “No Fault” Religion. No matter what happens to me in life, it is not my fault. I hope you see the problem, that means it doesn’t matter what you do, how you live, where you go, who you marry, where you work, if you live in sin or you become a nun, it just doesn’t matter. According to that philosophy, God is going to let happen to you and me everything that He desires regardless of what you or I do. I can’t find that in the Bible any where either. You know what I found in my Bible was a statement that says “God is not mocked, whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Gal 6:7). So apparently according to this verse it is not up to God after all what happens to you. It appears to matter more what you do and the seeds that you plant in this life to determine what you will reap. If you are getting a poor crop of bad, evil things happening to you, start checking to see what you have been sowing. This is a spiritual law of planting and reaping, but that is not my subject primarily, so I’ll move on.
So if God is not in control who is? This is an interesting question that is answered with the Word of God. I’ll start with Genesis 1:26:
Genesis 1:26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
This verse is obviously ignored by people who teach God is in control. God himself speaking in this verse says “Let them have dominion over all the sea, air and earth and everything that is in them or on them”. That doesn’t leave anything out does it? Dominion is a term denoting authority and ruler ship. It is God’s delegation of control. It is a transfer of responsibility from God to man. That is obviously tough for many to swallow and to comprehend. How can God turn over the earth to a man that was going to screw it up and fail? But before we go there let’s confirm this verse with another witness:
Psalm 115:16 The heaven, even the heavens are the LORD’s: but the earth hath he given to the children of men.
Obviously another scripture religious people like to ignore, but this verse says the Heavens belong to God, but the earth was given to Adam and his children. Let me ask you to think about this, have you ever given someone a present, maybe something really nice and very valuable? After they took your gift and left was it your responsibility to guard it and protect it so that nothing would ever happen to it? Of course not! Once given and received, tt was out of your hands, you no longer had any right to say what happens to it, they could throw it in the trash or give it away to someone else and you don’t have any right to it anymore. Do you understand that concept? This is exactly what God did with the earth.
All of this doesn’t mean that God can’t participate in helping man out or doing something if he is asked to do it, but it does mean that God must ask permission to do something on earth, since He has given it to man to control. I know that really bugs religious people, since God is sovereign, omnipotent and if He wants to do something they believe that He can just do it. I really don’t understand that kind of logic when it is associated and applied to a God who cares about His integrity, His reputation, His character, His moral values, His self worth, His honor, and above all His Word. That sounds more like Satan than God. God will not violate your rights to choose. God will not force you to do anything. God will not override your will, your desires or your intentions. God will not make you believe in Him. God will not save you if you do not want to be saved. Etc. etc. If He did that He would be the great puppet master and a control freak and not a loving God. God will let you strap on a bomb and blow yourself up, but is that what He wanted for you? Was that God’s plan for you life, NO WAY!
So when people say God is in control just ask for a Bible verse that says that before you believe something so ridiculous. Before I close I’ll give you some more Bible verses to consider. In 2 Corinthians 4:4 Satan is directly called the God of this world. I thought God was in control of this world? Un Oh? It appears someone forgot to tell Paul. If Satan is the god of this world, that explains tornados, hurricanes, and floods much better to me. Remember when Jesus was in the boat crossing the sea and a storm came up and almost sank the boat. The disciples woke Jesus up and told Him they were about to perish and Jesus went to the front of the boat and looked at the wind and the waves stopped the storm by speaking to it. Uh OH Again? If God caused the storm and then stopped the storm He must be confused, or schizophrenic or maybe His house is just divided working against itself. Today I like storms and tomorrow I don’t. He just cant’ seem to make up His mind do I want a storm to sink them or do I want it calm. Maybe God starts storms and only Jesus stops them. How crazy is that? I know that my Bible says Jesus was God in the flesh and He said when you have seen me you have seen the Father. So whater Jesus did is what God does. Therefore there is no way that God starts the storm and then stops it. There are just too many problems with the theory that God is controlling everything.
What we need to realize is that Jesus said in John 10:10 “The thief has only come to kill, steal and destroy, but I came that you might have life…” If it kills, if it destroys something you own, or if it is stolen from you, that was not God in control causing it to happen, that was Satan demonstrating his power and you letting him do it.
I’ll do one more scripture that helps us to understand who is in charge now. This verse is a statement made by Jesus Christ after His resurrection and it goes like this:
Matthew 28:18 And Jesus cam and spake unto them saying, All power is given unto me in heave and in earth.
Again we see a major problem with the God is in control of everything theory; Jesus who is God says that all power is now given to Him in heaven and on the earth. But, I thought God already had all power over heaven and earth? According to many theologians He did. Obviously Jesus is just confused and He doesn’t realize what He is talking about. Please don’t be ignorant! Jesus knows exactly what He is talking about and the authority of both heaven and earth was transferred back to God at the resurrection of Christ. But, what did Jesus immediately do with it and who did He get it back from? So many good questions to ponder. But I’ve given you enough to think about for now. I hope that you do the research in your Bible to answer these questions. Until next time, God bless you in your Bible study.
If you would like to continue reading in this series you may goto “Part 2“.
Keys to Understanding: Having an Open Mind
I’ve been going through some of the key elements that people need to know in order to understand the Bible correctly. Knowing how the Bible is written and why it is written like it is helps us to better understand what is written. Seeing things clearly and thus better understanding God’s goals and purposes. So continuing in this line of thought I want to address a key personal characteristic that will help you to increase your understanding.
Reading and studying the Bible has to be done with an open mind. What I mean by that is people who are already set in what they believe, will have an extremely difficult time learning about and accepting the truth. People who are indoctrinated with traditions of their church, the theological thoughts and concepts of error will probably never really understand the Bible. I’ve heard those types of people as being called “Concrete” Christians, thoroughly mixed up and firmly set. Think about it, why did Jesus go around and constantly say “let him who has ears, hear”. Apparently, what people received from him was not up to what he dealt out or said. Jesus put the responsibility of hearing on the hearer and not the speaker. You can say the most profound and important thing in the world and if no one cares to hear it, then it really does no good to say it. Some heard what Jesus said and some didn’t. Judas was with Jesus the same as Peter, James and John. Judas obviously didn’t hear anything Jesus said.
Acts 28:27 For the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing and their eyes have they closed; lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart, and should be converted and I should heal them.
This is probably one of the key scriptures to Bible interpretation that many wouldn’t associate with it. But I feel the application is right on. So what is the subject of this verse in Acts 28:27? It would appear it is the heart of the people and their ability or inability to understand with it. Isn’t that what we are talking about? Why don’t people read the same Bible and come to the same conclusions? Why do some see things one way and others don’t see them at all? It is a perplexing puzzle? But the Bible tells us that people close their eyes to the truth and they therefore refuse to see it or allow it to effect their lives. It is not God’s fault is it? Unfortunately, a lot of people want a God on their terms and conditions. They want a God that they want. The want to see a God that fits their concept of God. That is the definition of religion whether you realize it or not. Religion is man’s attempt to please a God they don’t know. Christianity should be radically different than a religion. Christianity is based upon a relationship with the Creator. Here is another scripture from the book of Acts that speaks to the subject of being open minded:
Acts 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily whether those things were so.
This verse speaks so very much that it should not be bypassed. It directly compares two different groups or types of people. One was said to be more noble than the other. Nobility is a term often times inferred upon royalty, kings and queens. The word “noble” literally means “of a higher rank”. Did you realize that your rank in Christ can grow or diminish? It is all up to you however. What made these more noble than the others. It tells us they had a ready and willing mind. I’ve often heard a mind described like a parachute, it only works when it is open and engaged. This is so true that God put direct conformation in his word. But also notice that these more noble ones just didn’t swallow anything anyone was teaching them. No, you see an incredibly important lesson given here for the entire church of God. This is an example to learn from and to follow. It tells us that they searched the scriptures daily to see for themselves if what was being taught was really what the Bible says. So whoever is teaching, including me you should do the same. Never accept the words of any man or woman unless it totally agrees with the word of God.
So what is the net, net, or bottom line of this blog? What is the primary take away? I’ve heard it called low hanging fruit. What you should take away may be an attitude adjustment. If your attitude is that you already know everything you need to know about the Bible you need to change. If you hear something new that you’ve never heard before, you should be open to at least research it in the Bible and study it out for yourself before you reject it. That is one of the most obvious problems that I have observed with many pastors and Bible teachers today. God raises up someone with a new focus on a part of his word and because it doesn’t fit what they learned in seminary, they automatically throw it under the bus, not knowing they just threw God under the bus with it. How can God get over something new if no one is open to hear it. How can God teach you something radically different when you think it is from the devil?
The eyes and ears are windows to your mind and to your spirit. In order to get things into your heart, you are going to have to leave your windows open and get them past your mind. The mind is the battle ground for Satan. If you let something in your eyes and your ears, Satan will come immediately to steal it by attacking your mind. If he can get you to reject it before you understand it with your heart, you are defeated and he has won. This is a spiritual battle and it takes place inside of you. If you learn about it and understand how he works you can use it to defeat him.
Varying Stages of Spiritual Growth
God created natural things to give us views into spiritual things. Jesus taught us in the parable of the sower, that there are six types of or conditions of the human heart. Only 50% of these six types produced any lasting harvest. Jesus told us that of he 50% who produced good fruit, that 1/3 of them produced 30 times, 1/3 produced 60 times and the other 1/3 produced 100 times. But, we can see that the other 1/2 of the people who also heard, allowed circumstances, persecution, lack of understanding and the cares of the world kill the harvests that God had wanted to give them. It is interesting to note that they all had the same seed sown in them, but only 1/2 produced anything worth while. We should all take note that the seed is constant, it is only the soil that changed what was produced and how much. This is a very critical lesson to learn. The seed or Word of God will never change, so that leaves only one place that changes can and should occur. Guess where that is?
So getting back to natural things showing us spiritual things, there is a comparison given to us in the Bible about Christians being born again. Jesus told us in John 3, “ye must be born again.” He of course was speaking of a spiritual rebirth. When Nicodemus asked him can a man go back into his mother’s womb? Jesus replied that “What is born of flesh is flesh, but what is born of the spirit is spirit”. Jesus was speaking of a spiritual birth process, that many times corresponds to a physical birth process. What are the implications of being born spiritually? You can see by looking at new born natural babies that these children are completely helpless and totally dependent upon someone else for nourishment and care. Well even though new born Christians can be fully grown natural people, from a spiritual stand point they need the same level of care that any new born needs.
As babies grow, they begin to develop more and more skills and abilities. By the time they are 4 years old they can do a lot of things that grown ups can do, but just not as quickly or as well. With continued training and development these children will eventually become responsible adults. So all of these physical developments are analogous to spiritual development. Just like a college student can not have a calculus conversation with a 2 year old, so are there many things in the Bible that are as equally as hard for a new Christian to accept. By realizing there are differences and by placing yourself somewhere on the following scale, you should be able to determine how much you need to grow.
| New Born | Jesus/Mature | ||||||||
| 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |
So where would you fall on the scale? Zero being a new Christian and 9 being where Jesus is today. It think we all are striving for the 9, but none of us are very close to it yet. What does all of this have to do with Bible interpretation and understanding the Bible. Well more than you can imagine. Most of the dissension within the Body of Christ is coming from baby Christians. Babies holler the most, cry the most, complain the most, ask why the most and oblivious to what they are doing to others. Babies are self centered and focused only upon themselves and what they need or what they want. Children do many things that are harmful and hurtful without regard to anyone else. They’ll take toys away and bite and fight not caring about anyone else. Sounds like a lot of Christians I know. When a two year old comes to me and criticizes something that I do, I don’t let that bother me. Why because I’m older and I know they don’t know any better. It is funny, Jesus took the same attitude towards the Jews, while hanging on the cross, Jesus said “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.”. It is no different today, when someone criticizes me for something I say, I just say “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”
Is Everything in the Bible True?
(Ver 2.1) Today’s Bible lesson is Part 1 in a series of lessons on understanding truth in the Bible. This of course is a very difficult and tricky question to answer correctly. How do you approach this subject without offending someone? Too many people approach the Bible like every word came from the mouth of God and therefore the entire book is completely true from cover to cover. I am forced to disagree with that assumption but before you write me off, you should hear why. You see, I do know that God is the author of the Bible and every word it contains was inspired by Him for us. But is everything in the Bible the truth? That would be like asking is everything you watch on the ABC World News the truth? I don’t mean to say that the national news correspondent is intentionally trying to mislead us or lie to us. That is not what I’m saying at all. You see, if you’ve ever watched the news, you probably know what I’m going to say. You may remember when we had a president get up on the news and say ‘I did not have sex with that intern’. So was that the truth? Did it make it true because it was on national TV or reported by a popular news anchor on a respected news program? You see the problem, don’t you? The Bible has many quotes from similarly unethical and ignorant people and just because it is in the Bible doesn’t mean it is the truth.
This is in fact a very important and a key element to correct Bible interpretation, first determine who is speaking and then determine what their character and moral background is before you embrace what they say to be the truth. If they are the words directly from God, like it says” Thus saith the LORD”; or if they are the words in red ink in the New Testament from Jesus, or the words of one of God’s chosen prophets or apostles then it can be easily confirmed to be the truth. If however, Moses, David, Paul, John or Luke or whoever, quotes what somebody else said like Ananias or Sapphira in Acts 5, then it is very possible that what is said is not the truth. Again it depends upon the speaker. If the speaker is Satan for example, whatever is said could be a partial truth, the complete truth or a complete fabricated lie. So it definitely matters who is speaking before you can judge whether it is a truth or not.
In the book of Job, in the Old Testament it contains a lot of words from Job, Job’s wife and Job’s friends. Now while there are many valuable lessons in the book of Job, not every word spoken is the truth. You see here is Job’s problem, he didn’t have any Bible. He couldn’t understand most of the things of God. He couldn’t really know or understand what he was saying, after all what would it have been based upon? There is not any established basis for the thoughts of Job. For example, Job said “God has given and God has taken away.” I’ve heard preachers in church and at funerals stand up and quote this like it was God speaking. However that is not the truth. It is true Job said it, it is true it is in the Bible, it is true that God inspired someone to record what he said, but it is not a statement of truth. I’m sure I’m going to get a lot people upset at me for saying this, but this is the way the Bible was written. If you read later in the book of Job 38:2, you will see that God asks Job a simple but direct question and it says this “Who is this that darkens counsel with words without knowledge?” It is very clear to me that God is saying that at least some of Job’s words are baseless ramblings from an ignoarant man. Yes, Job believed they were true and was not intentionally deceiving anyone, but according to God they were just the words of an ignornat man. So you must judge what Job says by what God says about Job’s words and then and only then will we better understand the Bible. According to 2 Timothy 2:15 there is a right way to divide the Word of Truth and by reverse/antithesis implied truths there are also potentially many wrong ways to divide this exact same Words of Truth. You have to make a determination how you want to do it. You can do it your way or you can do it God’s way. The Bible is much more complex than you can imagine and there are specific rules and guidelines which God has given to us to follow and if you learn them and follow them you will not fall into error very often.
So if the Bible contains specific historical information such as names of cities, countries, dates, times, and people can we count on them to be accurate? Absolutely, the Bible is not a book of mythology, fables, fairy tales or man made legends like Paul Bunyan, Atlas or Methuselah. The Bible contains actual historical events, places and people. You can count on every one of them to be more accurate than any text book or history book you had in school. God knows exactly what happened when and where.
If the Bible has an account of some miraculous event transpiring in a supernatural story, like the parting of the Red Sea, can we rely on that as being a true fact within human history. Absolutely, people who don’t believe in God will of course try to convince you that this is fiction, but I know better. God who is capable of creating the world and everything we can see, is certainly capable of doing something on a much smaller scale that is still very spectacular.
Knowing how to read and study the Bible will greatly increase your understanding of God’s Word. Understanding that not every word in the Bible is the Truth will help you figure out what is the truth. You do realize that if everything in the Bible was the truth, it would not be necessary to “divide the truth”. What is a division? A division is a separation of one thing from another thing. To divide something entails effort, work, tools, study and understanding. If you were a doctor about to do surgery on someone you are about to cut them open or divide their flesh to look inside. If you don’t know what you are doing your patient is in trouble. Well dividing the word of God is somewhat similar, if you don’t know what you are doing, you are the patient that is in trouble.
If you would like to continue reading about Understanding Truth in the Bible please go to “Part 2“.
Who Wrote the Bible? Where Did the Bible Come From?
(Ver 1.1) This of course is an interesting question. Technically speaking you have 66 books of text within the standard KJV Bible. We know that approximately 40 different men shared in the writing of the Bible over a span of approximately 1600 years.
Here are some basic Bible facts that I found on the Internet:
There are 8,674 different Hebrew words in the Bible, 5,624 different Greek words, and 12,143 different English words in the King James Version
- Number of books in the KJV Bible: 66
- Chapters: 1,189
- Verses: 31,101
- Words: 783,137
- Letters: 3,566,480
So let me ask you a simple question. What would happen if you attempted to get 40 different writers together in order to publish a book of such volume. What would the net results be? Could you get any of them to agree? How many times would they contradict each other? How many times would they cross paths and overlap information? How many times would they come up with anything that could predict what was going to come to pass a 1000 or more years in the future? I think you see the problem? Here we have a book that many approach with wrong assumptions, based upon wrong information, drawing incorrect conclusions and are generally just screwed up. I’ve heard so many people who want to write an exposition of why Paul said this, or Moses said that, like it was their ability and knowledge that produced what we are reading. If you approach the Bible with wrong ideas, you generally get back wrong ideas. There is a basic computer programming law that says if you put garbage in you get garbage out. That is the way the studying the Bible works.
What you first must do is understand who wrote the Bible? Establish a correct focus first. Forget the names of the 40 different men that copied the words onto the pages or scrolls I should say. Forget the commentaries of men who don’t understand or have a clue what God is saying and focus on this, God spoke and dictated the exact text and words that He wanted recorded and He gave the task of recording these words to 40 men over 1600 years. Now that changes everything in my view. Now you are not attempting to explain why Moses wrote anything that he did and left out other things that were not recorded. If you approach every word as being important and a word directly from God that has purpose and meaning you start looking at the Bible differently and can now begin to see it correctly.
2Ti 3:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
Jer 30:2 Thus speaketh the LORD God of Israel, saying, Write thee all the words that I have spoken unto thee in a book.
According to 2 Timothy 3:16, the Bible was inspired by the Spirit of God. I guess it actually says given by inspiration of the Spirit of God. While the Bible has multiple scribes or men that were given the task to record the words of God in book form, we must realize that all of the words were given and inspired directly from God. This book says nothing that God would not want you to know and to understand right here and right now. It doesn’t say anything that God wouldn’t say to you if you could stand before His throne in heaven and ask Him questions directly. This book contains the thoughts, ideas, wisdom and knowledge of God and is available to you 24 hours a day. It is totally up to you to tap into this vast treasure of information.
The Bible Contains Riddles, Puzzles, Mysteries and Secrets
(Ver 1.4) This of course is a very difficult subject for many Christians to accept or acknowledge. So many Christians struggle with believing the concept that God would intentionally hide important information from us. How could a loving God ever keep us from easily finding that which He desires us to learn and know? I once heard a minister say that studying the Bible is like a natural man searching for natural gold and I found that I could really not improve on that analogy so I’ll use it to help you understand how the Bible was written by God’s design. If you’ve ever panned for gold in Colorado or California you will have already discovered how difficult it was to find anything of significant value on the surface. I tried it but I came up empty even after several attempts when I was in Colorado, I guess it was fun, but it would have certainly been better if I had left with something that I could have said WOW, look at this!!! Look at what I found. This is a lot like reading the Bible and many do it everyday, but never walk away with the WOW, look at this. “Look what I found in the Word of God”. Why is that? There are probably a lot of reasons and I cover many of them in this Blog. Here is a verse of scripture about God and it describes a characteristic of His nature that must be understood if you are going to be a serious student of the Bible:
Proverbs 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing, but the honor of kings is to search out a matter.
What an amazing statement of universal truth. This verse clearly states that God is glorified by Him hiding information for us to find. Oh yes, I should have told you first that we are the kings and priests of God that He is referring to in this verse. Jesus is called the King of kings and the Lord of lords (Rev 19:16). The reference to “kings” is us! I know that bugs the heck out of religious people, but please get over it see what the Bible says.
Like digging for gold in the natural world so it is in the spiritual world with the Word of God. People don’t usually find many big gold nuggets of truth on the surface of God’s Word by just reading the it. There we must ask, how do we find them? We find them by digging deep for them. It involves work and that is a four-letter word to many. Proverbs 25:2 said that the honor of kings was in the searching of the information. Searching involves effort and that is spelled W O R K! There is a lot of information that can be found on the surface of reading the Bible, but the really good stuff is always found much deeper within the text. Did you ever notice the world’s largest gold producers are finding most of the valuable stuff deep underground using tunnels, blasting, digging and a whole bunch of effort. Occasionally they might find a large vein and strike it very rich by digging deep. Bible study is the exact same thing. I noticed this scripture in the Old Testament that confirms that God has secrets:
Amos 3:7 Surely the Lord GOD will do nothing, but he reveal his secret unto his servants the prophets.
This verse informs us that God has secrets, but it also says that God will not do anything without first revealing his secrets to His servants, His prophets. That tells me the Old and New Testaments both have the potential of an extraordinary number of hidden secrets of God. Some we have discovered and most that we have not yet found.
Proverbs 1:23 Turn you at my reproof: behold I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.
God says in this verse in Proverbs that He will make known His words after He has poured out His Spirit. We can see that the work involves the Holy Spirit. We can also see the clear implication that the meanings of the words must be hidden if God is going to make them known. You see we have had these words recorded for us to read for thousands of years. But yet the implication is that there is still more to know. Many will try to explain this away as having happened back with the apostles. But that event was only the former rain and now is the time of the later rain. Now is when God is again pouring out His Spirit unto men. Now is the time for the harvest. There are so many scriptures that tells us the same information, here is one from the book of Daniel:
Daniel 2:20 Daniel answered and said, Blessed be the name of God for ever and ever: for wisdom and might are his: 21 And he changed the times and the seasons: he removes kings and sets up kings: he gives wisdom unto the wise and knowledge to them that know understanding. 22 He reveals the deep and secret things: he knows what is in the darkness and light dwells with him.
You see from these verses that God is the one that holds all wisdom and that He gives it to us so that we can become wise. But verse 22 says the main point of this Blog, God reveals the deep and secret things to us. A “Deep” thing is an implied truth that is not easily understood or seen. These are very strong statements of truth and teach us a lot about the Bible. It tells us that everything in the Bible is not shallow and easy to find or understand. It implies that there is an extended effort and a commitment necessary from those who want to find these “deep” secrets. Let’s jump into the New Testament and look at another verse:
1 Corinthians 2:7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, the hidden wisdom which God ordained before the world unto our glory.
Here we read another verse that declares God has hidden things in the Bible and it even refers to them as mysteries. What is a mystery? A mystery to me would be a complex puzzle, a code, riddle or something that is not plain or obvious. If you could look at it and immediately know what it was, it wouldn’t be a mystery would it? So apparently if you haven’t figured it out, the Bible is written in a style that conceals many things and makes hidden much of the knowledge, understanding and wisdom of God.
Romans 16:25 Now to him that is of power to establish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began.
This is another great example of the fact that God hid the revelation of Jesus Christ from the very beginning of our created world. We can observer clearly in this verse that God must reveal this information to us in the form of a revelation given to us in this instance by the writer Paul. If you didn’t know it, there are still Pauls in the world today that God uses. God is revealing things, giving revelation to many within the body of Christ and all you have to do is recognize it when you hear it. Yes, there will be false teachers, prophets and etc. in this world But, the Word of God will always be correct when rightly divided. Judge what people say by the Bible. So we can see so many verses that declare that the Bible contains the mysteries and secrets of God, here is just one more:
Colossians 1:26 Even the mystery which has been hid from ages and from generations, now is made manifest to his saints.
This is a fantastic verse if you are one of God’s saints. For if you are a saint of God then this verse assures that you are potentially destined to know these hidden secrets. The implication is clearly given that they are intended for God’s saints to know and understand. Some will attempt to explain, that was only for them, the early church and not for us now. I can hear it all now. But there is no way it is not for us right here and right now. This is what Jesus said about the secret things of God:
Luke 8:17 For nothing is secret that shall not be made manifest: neither anything hid that shall not be known and come abroad.
This is of course a little difficult to see in the King James version of the Bible, but it basically says that there is nothing that was hidden or secret that will not be made known or revealed so that we can see them, understand them and know them. That is a powerful prophecy and the words of God himself speaking. Has this occurred yet? I really only think we have scratched the surface of this prophecy, but I believe it will be fulfilled before Jesus’ return. You of course can believe whatever you like. You might ask how can this be, is it possible that the body of Christ could unify and see the truth? I think it is possible if we allow God to do it. This scripture in Daniel shows us what God is capable of by just one Old Testament prophet:
Daniel 2:47 The king answered unto Daniel, and said, Of a truth it is that your God is a God of gods and a Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets seeing that thou could reveal this secret.
So the King of Babylon, Nebuchadnezzar recognized the power of God. By God revealing a bit of information to him the king was convinced that he was the true God. You see God just has to reveal a few key things to get people to see and He knows what those are. I believe that is why we will see major changes in attitudes and major changes in the true church of the living God.
So what have we seen? That the Bible contains mysteries, secrets, riddles and puzzles that God is starting to reveal to us in these end times. If you start looking for them, and expecting them to happen, God will make sure that they do happen. But since there are so many false teachings going around, here is what the Bible recommends for us to do:
Acts 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
You should follow this example of the early church. Be open to hear and learn, but search God’s Word everyday to see if they are really true. Don’t buy into anything I say or anything anyone else says just because they said “Thus saith the Lord” or I have a revelation from God. Too many ignorant people have done that and burned or died in a compound when their leader suddenly said it was time for them all to die. God can and will show us if what is being taught is true or not in His word if we stop and ask and listen to His leading. If God doesn’t bear witness within your own spirit that its right, reject it and run far away very fast. Just remember that God still expects us all to search and work for it and to see what His word says. God will reward them that diligently, meticulously, conscientiously, thoroughly seek Him. It will be up to you, what you learn in these last days, more than it will be up to God. Thank you for reading these Bible lessons and I pray that they are all a blessing to you. Please tell someone about this website and help the Gospel go forth to as many as we can reach.
Understanding Correct Bible Interpretation! The Bible was Written to Give Man a Choice!
(Ver 1.2) This Bible lesson may be a brand new perspective for you and it just may be something that you may have never considered to think on. Have you ever studied the many different writing styles of books? College text books are written radically differently than fictional literature. Technical writings and software documentation are written consderibly different than a President’s biography. Realizing that there are so many different writing styles, let me ask you what literature style is the Bible written in? I believe that is an interesting and very important question to consider. From my research and study I’ve discovered that the Bible is significantly different than anything else that I’ve ever read. I believe that this makes it difficult to label it as just one writing style and say that it is only that one. For example Psalms many times resembles a poetry writing style but it certainly cannot be labeled that alone because it contains so much more than that alone.
It is almost easier to determine what the Bible is not rather than to try to assign it a specific style. For example, the Bible was certainly not written in a text book style using technical documentation methods. However, the Bible does contain great technical information about creation. Why didn’t God write these creation facts, events, descriptions and dates using more revealing, plain and indisputable evidence? Do you think that God is not capable of describing all of the little creation design intricate details of DNA, Sound Waves, Laws of Physics, etc. using the scientific terms involved and the background proof data behind every part of His creation? Can God not compete intellectually with the modern PHD professors in our colleges and universities? Are the scientific discoveries and the theories of men superior to God? Do believe that God not able to dispel the theory of human evolution using His knowledge of creation?
I personally believe that God’s intelligence is so far beyond the Einstein’s in our world that He could solve the debate with only a few lines of specific information. But, if He did that, what would be the end result of that type of information? It would be like the classic movie “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, when the man from another world went to the professor’s house and solved a very complex technical equation on the chalk board, that the professor had been trying to figure out for a long time. What that information did was take away any doubt that he was not from this planet and that he was much smarter than the professor and anyone else in the world.
If God provides us undeniable evidence that proves His awesome power, knowledge and ability to us all, the net result would be that every human man would no longer have any other option but to believe what God says is truth. I believe that this type of strong evidence would result in the loss of all human freedom for a man to believe whatever they wanted to by faith. If God proved that He was God, no longer does any man have any freewill choices or decisions to make about the existence of God. It is an interesting paradox. The God who proves His love for us by coming personally and shedding His blood to pay the cost of our sin and He doesn’t even write down one letter in any book or leave any evidence proving His appearance. He doesn’t us leave any photographic proof of His existence. He doesn’t leave any scientific or DNA evidence other than the words of a few witnesses, some people who are told to go and tell the world that He appeared. He tells these witnesses that those that believe their words spoken to them will be saved, but those who do not, will be damned (Mark 16:15-16).
Therefore, every man on the earth is left with only one choice, to believe or to not believe in God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. The ball of decision is not in court of God, but was specifically designed to give man the choice in a human court of faith. A man must be sent to preach the good news to others (Romans 10:15-16). This preacher man must believe that he is called to preach and then choose to preach. Then men that he is sent to must choose to listen, hear, understand and believe the message. This method of salvation is a spiritual system called faith that was designed, created and implemented by the sovereign God alone. Knowing this should change everything about our perspective when we read the Bible. We should change to begin to look for the hidden evidence in the Bible and we should start by believing in things that we can not understand completely without overwhelming evidence.
We can learn from just the simple story of Adam and Eve in the first 3 chapters of Genesis, that God provided everything that they had need of and it was all said to be created good in the eyes of God. But, God said there was one thing that they shouldn’t do and that was to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He didn’t say they couldn’t do it, but He did warn them that the day that they did eat they would surely die. The Bible does not say that God fully explained what death was or that Adam remotely understood the consequences of disobedience. But yet, God gave man the choice to make. This is called freewill and every man has a right to it.
Apparently, Adam didn’t listen to the warning when he was faced with one of the world’s greatest decision choices that anyone could possibly make up until that time. I do not believe that Adam understood the consequences of his choice for himself or all of his descendants and he definitely chose wrong. Could God have stopped Adam from making this bad choice by providing more information, proof and evidence? I believe the answer is YES! Should God have stopped Adam by force from making this bad choice using His great knowledge? I believe the answer is NO based upon His love alone! Those are both interesting questions that only God can fully answer, but I believe the further involvement of God would have taken away the free will of the man to make his own choice to choose to obey and that is something I believe that God does not do.
So why is the Bible written in such a controversial way that appears to allow men to believe whatever they choose to believe? I believe the primary reason is the fact that God has continued to give man a freewill choice in everything that he believes. We can believe in Jesus is the LORD GOD or we can choose to believe that Jesus was just a prophet like Islamic teachings say. We can believe in the existence of eternal damnation and hell or we can choose to believe in universal salvation. We can believe in evolution or creation. We can believe in whatever we want to believe in. God wrote the Bible in this manner to allow us to find whatever we wish to search for in the Bible. But, of course that right to believe in something that is so wrong will not help us on judgment day. On judgment day, God will not be interested in our opinion or our beliefs. It won’t matter if we think we are right with all of our heart. We’ll not get to share our opinion with God on why we believed what we did on earth. We better make sure what we believe is right here, right now and is based upon the most truthful and accurate information that we can search and find in God’s word.
Thank you for reading this little Bible lesson. Infinite choices are presented in the Word of God. However, there is always only one true interpretation and understanding and this will agree with God’s opinion and not mine or yours. God Bless you and keep you and please leave a comment if can.
Genesis 3:1 Was there a Talking Snake in the Garden?
(ver 2.6) This is “Part 1” in a series of advanced Bible lessons on the study of hidden spiritual subjects found in Genesis 3. In this lesson I am going to confront a popular misconception and misunderstanding found in the chapter. Was there a literal talking natural snake in the Garden of Eden? Did a naturally created snake approach, walk up to, or slither up to Adam and Eve and start a conversation with them to deceive them? I’m sure most of you have seen the paintings of the temptation, the naked man and woman holding an apple with the snake creature nearby. We’ve all heard this story taught this way in Sunday School as a child. However, is this what the Bible really says? Must we take every scripture, verse and word literally in the Bible? What if God intended the verse to hide a greater spiritual meaning? If so, then how would we know when to take something inspired by the most intelligent Spirit literally in the Bible and when to view it as only a symbolic reference, a figurative expression or even as a figure of speech? Please don’t misunderstand what I am saying. There are literal statements and stories in the Bible. The Genesis 3:1 account is a very true and real story of what actually happened during the fall of man. We just need to begin to understand what was actually given to us to read.
Too many Christians want to take everything written by God completely and totally as if the Bible was written in a school text book style with every truth obviously presented in a straightforward and plain ordered bullet point or numbered manner. But the problem is that the Bible is not a textbook and it contains many, many hidden mysteries, puzzles and concealed truths that are not self-evident on a surface only reading of the text. You can also find there are truths written on the same subject anywhere in the Bible from front to back, cover to cover, Genesis to Revelation. The Holy Bible is written in a multitude of literary styles by around 40 different men that were given the words by God to write for us to read, study and learn from. God purposely hid many of these truths, not from us, but for us to find (Prov 25:2). So here is the divine challenge, how does God encode secrets for someone to find without using a standard encryption system that makes the text totally useless? The government encrypts information to keep it out of the hands of other enemy governments. Web sites encrypt credit card and customer information to keep it out of the hands of hackers and criminals. What we can learn from this principle is that God obviously had an enemy that was trying to steal information and use it against us. Therefore, I believe based upon scripture that God has encoded within the natural text message a spiritual message within so that He could reveal it by His Spirit in us His people at the appropriate time, which I believe is now. I call this technique, God hiding the truth in plain sight.
THE CREATED SET CALLED BEASTS OF THE FIELD!
So the question remains was there a literal physical talking snake in the garden of Eden? I’ll have to tell you right now that there is absolutely no way based upon rightly understanding scriptures that I have found in the Bible that there was a physical talking snake in the garden. You can clearly see where I stand upon this issue so let’s find out why I am a firm believer in this. Here is what the beginning of Genesis 3:1 says to us, read it very carefully and then I’ll explain it.
Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field that the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?
I am only going to be focusing on the first phrase of the verse in this Bible lesson. But I did give the entire verse to help avoid criticism from those that would like to criticize and find fault. Let’s begin by doing some close analysis of the exact wording or phrasing of this initial statement “Now the serpent was more subtle than any beast of the field that the Lord God had made”. You should be able to understand from reading the entire verse that the primary subject of the verse is a “serpent”. This Hebrew word is H5175 and does mean “a snake” in the literal definition and this is why people begin to believe that God is speaking of a literal talking snake in Genesis 3. This Hebrew word being translated as “serpent” is used 31 times in the Old Testament and is found in 28 verses with 5 references being found within 5 verses of Genesis 3. But let’s change the perspective in order to see the characteristics of this “serpent” being described by God and maybe this new knowledge will begin to change how we think.
Now observe that this “serpent” is stated to be more subtle than “any beast” of the field that the Lord God had created. I want to focus upon the Hebrew word H6175 which is translated as “subtle” in Genesis 3:1. The Hebrew word translated as subtle means “cunning” in an evil, negative or bad manner. The ESV and NASB versions of the Bible translated this word as “crafty”. The CEV Bible translated it as “sneaky”. The Young’s Literal Bible translate it as “subtile”. This Hebrew word is clearly represents an evil connotation being applied to this class of being labeled or named as the “serpent”. Right there that should raise some red flags in our minds to teach us something that is very important. How did God create every beast (living) animal on this planet? Didn’t God create the beast of the field and say that they were all “good” in Genesis 1:25 and “very good” in Genesis 1:31? Good is not evil and very good is definitely not anything that is bad. There were no evil connotations placed upon any of the created beings found in Genesis 1, so that is something brand new for us to consider and learn from. It would contradict with Genesis 1 if this was a created literal snake in the Garden of Eden. I hope and pray that you can see that but we also need to learn what else this verse is saying or should I say is not saying.
This is what the Holy Spirit said to me when I studied the verse and it changed my entire perspective dramatically when I saw it and fully understood it. I read this verse and suddenly the still small voice of the Holy Spirit asked me this question, “Did you notice that didn’t say ‘other‘?”. Almost immediately I knew what He was asking me because of divine revelation. When I studied Geometry in High School, I remember a part of the class dealt with the subject of mathematical “sets” and “set theory”. 
Do you understand what a “set” is? A set is a grouping of related items. Let me give you a more complete definition of a set. A set is “a well defined collection of distinct objects. The objects that make up a set (also known as the elements or members of a set) can be anything: numbers, people, letters of the alphabet, other sets, and so on.” Within mathematical sets you can also have subsets. Then you can have multiple sets with some common or overlapping members that are in more than one set. For example, a set could be Animals, under that set could be a subset of mammals, under that set could be a subset of birds, fish, land animals and on and on. Each set or subset is a grouping of related items. In other words every member of the set has the same characteristics and can be easily identified as belonging to the group. So why did I just spend so much time going through all of that math explanation and set theory overview? Do you see it? Was the primary noun serpent of this sentence a created beast of the field that the Lord God declared a member of the set of created beings of the field defined by God to be very good? I’d like to ask you a question and I want you to consider it with great thought. What would change if God would have added the word “other” to the verse? Read this modified verse with the word other added and observe what changes:
Genesis 3:1 Now the serpent was more subtle than any ‘OTHER’ beast of the field that the Lord God had made.
Now do you see it? What comprises the set “beasts of the field”? What are the members of that set? Beasts of the field would be the superset of all created animals, birds, reptiles, etc. Isn’t a natural and physical snake one of those beasts of the field that the Lord God has made? So what happens when you take out the word “other” like the verse really says. The logical conclusion has to be that the serpent was not a member of that category of the made or created creatures of the field. Let me teach it to you like this, if the adjective “any” is placed before the noun “Beasts” we have to conclude that there are no beasts omitted from this grouping. The Hebrew term (H3605) translated as the English word”Any” is an “all inclusive” statement that omits none of them. The Hebrew word translated as “Any” literally means “All” or “EVERY”. By God NOT putting the word “Other” after the word “any” we know concretely that the referenced “serpent” in the beginning of the statement was not a member of that set of created living creatures. In other words, there was no physical literal created talking snake based just upon the correct reading, understanding and interpretation of this verse. I hope and pray that you understand basic logic and math laws and how they apply to the correct interpretation of the Word of God. God is a highly intelligent being and has designed and implemented the Bible using Laws that we must follow in order to correctly understand what is written.
NATURAL OR SUPERNATURAL TEMPTATION?
So let’s find some other scriptures that help us to confirm what God has just taught you by the omission of the word “other”. Here is one verse that I know most don’t immediately associate with Genesis, but it is related even though you’ve never seen it or applied it to what we have just read in Genesis 3:1.
1 Corinthians 10:13 There hath no temptation overtaken you but such as is common to man:
What is God’s primary subject that is occurring in the beginning of Genesis 3? What is the initial theme of Genesis 3? Some say that Genesis 3 is about the fall of Man, but what happened before that. Before the fall there was a state of everything being created good without sin on the earth. Then Satan appears and does what? Of course we are talking about the “temptation” of Adam and Eve by the serpent or Satan, right? So what did God just teach us about the subject of human “temptation” in 1 Corinthians? This is another law or principle of correct Bible interpretation, the Bible always interprets itself. So you must go and search the Bible for related scriptures that help to explain what is written in the Old Testament.
In 1 Corinthians God says every time we (humans) are tempted by the enemy (Satan) it is a common human occurrence. The Greek word that was translated as “common to man” is G442 and it means “after the manner of men”. In other words any satanic temptation is one that is a natural temptation, meaning it is NOT a supernatural temptation. Did you realize that according to what God has just written in His word that it is illegal for Satan to tempt you supernaturally? What is a supernatural temptation? That would be any temptation that did not occur naturally by created design or created laws or any temptation of a non-created material substance or nature. Have you ever seen a talking snake? If you can find me one I would love to see it and this would provide the evidence to support a literal talking snake in the garden being the tempter. Seeing talking snakes in the past and today would make this type of temptation a common occurrence for man. However, I’ve been to many zoos and if there were any talking snakes, I didn’t see them. No you see a talking snake would be a supernatural temptation, a non-common human temptation occurrence and that would cause God’s word in 1 Corinthians 10:13 to become a lie. Since God does not lie I have to conclude there was still no literal talking snake in the garden.
We can therefore reason with great confidence that a talking snake being a tempter would be an illegal supernatural act and if Satan can’t tempt you this way, then he can’t tempt Eve that way either. This scripture is an example of a universal truth. In other words this scripture applies across the board to every person in the human race at any given time within human history. There are some scriptures that only apply to the natural nation of Israel; there are some scriptures that only apply to men; there are some that written to only women; there are some that are written only to the church and others that are written to other groups or sets of people. However, there are also those scriptures like this one that will apply to everyone equally. This is a verse that is in the Universal set of Truth. These represent spiritual laws and God enforces these. The Bible says God watches over His words to perform them and this would be an example.
HOW DOES SATAN TEMPT SOMEONE TODAY?
Have you ever been tempted by Satan? Sure you have whether you admit it or not. How did he come to you and try to tempt you? Did Satan have to manifest himself in the body of an animal to tempt you? Of course he didn’t. Satan when he comes he speaks in your mind, by using your thought life to tempt you to do something that you shouldn’t, or to say something you that you shouldn’t, or whatever. If Satan tempted you this way, then he tempted Eve this way also. Do you think we can find any scripture to confirm this? Of course we can if we look:
2 Corinthians 11:3 But I fear, lest by any means as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty , so your minds be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
It is amazing what the Bible says when you look for it, understand it and apply it to Genesis 3 interpretation correctly. You see this verse is written to the church and it said Eve was deceived by the serpent, because of his trickery. But did you notice how he did it? This temptation occurred in Eve’s mind and it was not carried out by a talking supernatural snake in the garden. How can we further confirm this? Ask yourself was there ever any mention in Genesis 3 of Adam hearing the snakes voice? If you read closely you will observe that God rebukes Adam for hearkening to the voice of his wife and never mentions the voice of the serpent to Adam. Was not Adam standing next to Eve in the garden? If there was a literal talking snake present then there would have been an audible voice for Adam to also hear. I really believe that Bible need to learn to read and see what is there and what is not there and quit adding tot he words to make them say something that they do not say. We have just learned from God’s commentary on the story of Genesis 3 that whatever Satan said to Eve was a thought in her mind and this caused her to be deceived. Satan is still the same subtle deceiver today and he works and operates in the exact same way that he has always worked. He tries to deceive you through the same avenues of your mind. This verse clearly warns the church to watch their thoughts in order to keep Satan from corrupting their minds. That is why we are instructed in the Bible in this way:
2 Corinthians 10:5 Casting down imagination and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.
Apparently our minds are still the battle ground for the attacks of the enemy and we are responsible to police this mental realm and exercise our authority to keep the enemy out of there. Because preachers and teachers believe that Satan had to borrow the body of a physical snake in order to manifest himself in the earth, they think this is the only way he can communicate to you. We have clearly seen that this is not the case using the Bible. Eve was clearly deceived in her mind; you can also be deceived in your mind if you let him operate there. God tells us what to think on in the Bible, perhaps you should go and search for them and learn to keep only those things in your mind.
WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF SATAN ENTERED AN ANIMAL’S BODY?
I think now would be a good time to introduce you to another set of scriptures that is certainly related to our subject study. If Satan had to borrow the body of a literal physical snake in order to manifest himself to Adam and Eve, what would happen if he actually did this? According to the Bible it is not a positive outcome for the natural snake. You can see in the Gospel where Jesus when He walked the face of the earth and came across a man who was possessed of devils in Matthew 8. The devils started to talk to Jesus and asked Jesus if they could go into the bodies of the herd of swine that were nearby. Jesus said Go! The devils went out of the men and went into the nearby natural animals. Then what happened to the animals?
Mat 8:32 And he said unto them, Go. And when they were come out, they went into the herd of swine: and, behold, the whole herd of swine ran violently down a steep place into the sea, and perished in the waters.
Apparently animals are aware when evil spirits enter into them. Did you see this? The animals were driven mad and committed suicide. After the suicide the evil spirits had no living bodies to possess, so they went about looking for another human to deceive. Did you learn anything from this story? Did you see how it applies to Genesis 3:1? Yes it is confirmed that a spirit being can enter into a body of even a snake but we must conclude from what was just presented that the snake would not have been a willing participant to the possession. God gives us clues like this in the Bible and we are required to put the clues together in order to understand what is being said. What we have learned is that even animals have a sensitivity to spiritual beings. Sometimes I think that animals are more sensitive than many people about pending disasters. Cats and dogs can sense earthquakes before they happen. Animals around the coast line ran to higher ground before the tsunami killed so many people a few years ago. Do not assume or think that any animal will just allow a devil to come into them and use them without them knowing about it. This is just another reason I do not believe there was a physical talking snake in the garden.
IS THE SERPENT LITERAL OR SYMBOLIC?
Now there is a major problem being presented for those who want to take every scripture literally. You see the problem is that the serpent must be a purely symbolic reference for a spiritual being that was not directly named or identified in the book of Genesis at all. You see I have been talking like you already knew that they serpent was Satan throughout this Bible study, but I have offered no Biblical proof to confirm this fact. How do we know that the “serpent” was Satan and not a literal talking created snake? I state the serpent was Satan based upon where else the serpent is mentioned in scriptures. God gives us the definition of the serpent in the last book of the Bible. You do understand that God is the author of the entire Bible, don’t you? You do understand that God can give new information for the same subject found in Genesis wherever He desires to, don’t you? You see God uses a symbolic serpent to describe Satan in several places in the Bible but I will only give you two verses that identifies the serpents real name to us very clearly:
Revelation 12:9 And the great dragon was cast out, the 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.
Rev 20:2 And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years,
We can see from these verses in Revelation the true identity of the symbolic “old serpent” is revealed to us to be Satan, the deceiver. These verses also contain another symbolic reference and calls Satan the “great dragon”. Apparently Satan’s strength and ability has increased substantially as the symbolic dragon at the end to a level greater than he possessed at the beginning as the symbolic serpent. You can clearly see why God selected to use symbolic references in both places of the Bible. By comparing these two symbolic references we can gain additional information about this unseen spiritual enemy named Satan. What I am doing is attempting to teach you that God reveals the true identity of the symbolic “serpent” found in Genesis 3:1. You can see two times in Revelation 12:9 and Revelation 20:2 that the “serpent” is a symbolic reference for the devil called Satan. If the “serpent” is not literal here in these verses there is NO legitimate way for the “serpent” to be literal in Genesis either. So we just learned a valuable lesson, of why we can’t take everything in the Bible literally. We have also learned that we can’t study any book of the Bible independently in a vacuum. We must always use the Bible to interpret the Bible! We must see what God’s says about the subject we are studying in the Old Testament in the other places of the New Testament, because He always provides additional information, explanations and definitions that are critical for us to see in order to correctly understand what was being taught.
I have just given you at least 4 good reasons why the Bible says there was no literal physical talking snake in Genesis 3:1. These are not all of the reasons that I could have presented but there were enough reasons why I can say with great confidence that there was no physical talking snake in the Garden of Eden! I thank you for you time and comments. Be blessed in the Lord and continue in the pursuit of the knowledge of His Word. Until the next lesson please tell your friends about what you have learned from God.
If you would like to continue to read Genesis 3 “Part 2 – Does Eating Fruit Kill You” please click.
Genesis 1:14-19 Day 4 Part 4
We have been exploring the revelation of night and day, light and darkness and have discovered that these are symbolic elements that represent the state of the heart’s of men. We have explored the fact that God created a division between two different distinct groups of people which Jesus Christ implemented with His death and resurrection. One group is those who belong to Christ and are said to be the children of the light and the day. Those who don’t belong to Christ are those who walk in darkness live in the night. Let’s look at another verse that confirms this:
Romans 2:19 And art confident that thou thyself art a guide of the blind, a light of them which are in darkness,
According to this scripture God writes to the church and declares them to be a guiding light to the blind, those who are in darkness. Right there we know that we the church are not in the darkness, but yet we are the one’s which can shine the light for those who are unable to see spiritually. What is blindness? It is the inability to see light. How is it that some people can see and understand the Bible and many others can’t? Here is the answer to that question:
2 Corinthians 4:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
This verse of scripture contains so much revelation that it is difficult to stick to the point at hand. However, it declares that the “god of this world” has blinded those who are in darkness. Let’s stop right there and determine who is the “god of this world”? Most of you should already understand that this is Satan, the dragon, the serpent, the devil, the deceiver, the thief, the accuser of the brethren, the adversary, the father of lies, Beelzebub, Lucifer and I could go on and on. This enemy of God and the church goes by a bunch of identities and names in the Bible but they all direct us to one spirit being called Satan. The verse in 2 Corinthians 4:4 tells us that there are those who are in spiritual darkness because of this enemy that has caused them not to believe. It in effect says that Satan is blocking the light from shining in so that they are not able to see spiritually. It also confirms that Jesus Christ is the light or the Sun that is trying to shine in on the hearts of those men in the darkness.
I hope you are grasping the powerful symbolism that Genesis is providing us. What we are beginning to see is two different rulers, two different gods, one god of this world and one God our Lord Jesus Christ. Two different kingdoms, one of light and one of darkness. Two groups of people those who live in the night who are unable to see and those who walk in the light and can see where they are going. It is a profound symbolic representation of the spiritual state of two completely different groups of people. We will continue more in the next lesson and hopefully finish up day 4.
Genesis 1:14-19 Day 4 Part 3
I knew this day would take a lot to explain and even more effort on your part to understand. But I’ll do the best that I can in a limited space to teach you as much as I can. In the last lesson we concluded with the revelation of the identity of Sun as being Jesus Christ. Before we move on to the moon, let’s back up and address the purpose of Day 4 from God’s perspective. We saw that Day 4 was an emphasis of a division occurring. I believe the divisions already existed back from at least Day 1 when God said let there be light. The implication of Day 1 was light did not reach the surface of the planet and therefore darkness prevailed upon the face of the earth. When God said let there be light He allowed the light to penetrate into the darkness. This is probably a mixture of my personal opinion and the implied references found in the word of God. Unless I find some scripture to back that statement I really don’t expect you to believe it.
Back to the subject of Day 4. We can see in the scripture the reference to the existence of two distinct realms or dimensions. One is called “Day” and the other is called “Night”. I think it would be good to look at the symbolism of these two divisions. Let’s start with the obvious, the day is the time where we experience the presence and warmth of the sun and it’s light. The night is the period of time when normal people sleep and the sun is not present. One division has the sun light and the other does not. From what we have seen Jesus Christ represents the Sun. Scripture also tells us that God is light. We can already begin to see a spiritual reality being stated. The day is for those who are in the light of the Sun of God, the night is for those who are without God. Do you understand this? This is the division that took place when Jesus died on the cross and after He arose.
In 1 Thessalonians 5:5 God writes to the church and says to them “You are all children of the light and children of the Day…”. I already mentioned this next verse in the last lesson, but I’ll show it to you again in 2nd Peter 1:19, God writes that “The Day will dawn out of the darkness and the Day Star will shine in our hearts.” I know I paraphrased that verse a little bit but I didn’t change the meaning. God is saying that Christ will dawn in our dark hearts and light them up with His light and cause us to be the children of the light. Let me give you one final scripture from Romans 13:12 God tells the church “the night is far spent and the day is at hand, let us therefore cast off the works of darkness and put on the armour of light”. All of the key elements are mentioned, day, night, darkness and light. Where do you stand today? The Day and Light symbolism goes through out the New Testament. You are welcome to study it and find out how the physical characteristics of the night and day are symbolic of the spiritual conditions of men’s hearts.
So we have established the identity of the symbolic night and day as being the spiritual condition of men’s heart. In our next lesson we will continue to expand the identities of the other symbolic elements that we have found in these verses.
Correct Bible Interpretation Rules Part 4 — Introduction to Symbolism in the Bible!
(Ver 2.2) This is Part 4 in the series of Bible lessons on Correct Bible Interpretation Rules. If you have not read this series from the beginning it would be advised that you go back and start reading at “Part 1” first and continue forward through the series. Getting a firm grasp on God’s usage of symbolism is very critical to correctly understanding and interpreting the Bible. Many times we read the Bible and see the mention of something that can be taken either literally or symbolically and this makes correct Bible interpretation infinitely more complex. The Bible is full of symbolism from the very 1st chapter of Genesis to the very last chapter in Revelation. We will eventually discuss why God uses symbolism but for now let’s attempt to define what it is. I like to view symbolism as a method used by God to convey hidden spiritual information in a coded format or reference. Symbolic Bible reference almost always describe concealed and hidden spiritual things using the terms, descriptions, names or titles of natural things, events or people that we all should be familiar with or at the least should be able to look at them and then learn to understand them with study. For example, have you ever seen God? No, God is a hidden spiritual being and the Bible says no man has ever seen God, but yet for you to get to know who God is, He describes Himself in the terms of natural things like the Sun so that we can understand Him and learn about His hidden qualities.
If while you are reading the Bible you encounter a reference to something or someone that doesn’t make a lot of sense to be a real physical entity it would be a good time to ask is this a symbolic reference to a higher spiritual truth. Let me give you an example in Genesis 3, the Bible speaks of a creature called the serpent in Genesis 3:1. Most Bible scholars agree that this is Satan, but the controversy comes when they attempt to say that Satan appeared in the garden of Eden as a physical snake. If you ever attended Sunday School as a child you have seen the picture of a naked man and woman in the garden with an apple in their hand and a talking snake near them tempting them. I guess this is the picture that these verses in Genesis 3 have conjoured up within the minds of men and women who have read the story. I could give you several scriptures in the Bible that directly contradict this account that helps us to see the real meaning behind this symbol, but I guess because of the time it would take to do that, I won’t go into that level of detail until we get to those verses in Genesis 3 later. What I will say is that this serpent in Genesis 3 is a symbolic reference and not an actual literal physical talking snake and you will have to wait for why I know this until later.
Please realize that the first three chapters of Genesis are heavily covered with symbolic references and not literal references. God is attempting to teach you about spiritual things and not about natural things and this is the failure that many Bible students fall into by simply ignoring which references are natural and which ones are just symbolic of a much greater spiritual reality. The book of Daniel has many symbolic references throughout the book. The beasts seen in the visions, are all symbolic of earthly empires and spiritual beings behind them. The book of Revelation is literally the most symbolic book that I know of. There are very literally few things in the book of Revelation that are mentioned that are not symbolic of something that is spiritual. You can find Daniel’s beasts repeated in Revelation, you can find the serpent from Genesis 3 repeated and finally being revealed to who this was in Revelation 12. There are two major symbolic women in Revelation, one in Revelation 12 and the other in Revelation 17 called the Whore of Babylon. There is another symbolic city called a woman in Revelation 21 named the New Jerusalem and the bride of the Lamb.
I hope that you understand symbolism and can learn to identify God’s usage of this technique. God Bless!
Genesis 1:3 – Let There Be Light!
Gen 1:3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
(Ver 1.3) This is now Part 5 in the Bible study series helping us to understand Genesis 1. We have been moving through the chapter verse by verse and studying it using some new ingsights from the written Word of God. If you have not read this series from the beginning I would recommend that you start with “Part 1” first and then move through it in numbered sequence. Genesis 1:3 begins the account of God’s creation of our present world system that we all currently live in. We have already looked at verses 1 and 2 and have seen that the world as described at that time was covered completely with water in a lifeless state of darkness and utter destruction. From God’s choice of words I have determined that there is enough scriptural evidence that this was not the way that it started initially in the beginning. Therefore, something catastrophic had to have occurred to cause the world that was originally created by God in Genesis 1.1 to perish and to become completely and utterly destroyed resulting in an uninhabitable planet. Why is it even important to study this part of the Bible and what relevance does it have for Christians today to know and understand this information? I think that is a very important question to ask and to answer. I want to answer that question by again telling you something else that God says about the beginning in another part of the Bible:
Isa 46:10 Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:
First notice God’s usage of the key Hebrew word “beginning” (Strong’s H7225). This Hebrew word is used in only 49 verses of the Old Testament and that is not too many to go and read them all to see if they apply or shed light on the subject of Genesis 1. In Isaiah 46:10 God uses the exact same Hebrew word translated as beginning in Genesis 1:1. Therefore we have a direct link to subject content based upon God’s word selection. Then notice what God declares and the implications associated with this statement. God says I speak of the end from the beginning. Wow, that is a radical concept and a revelation of monumental proportions. It means that if you do not understand the beginning that you will never be able to understand the end. Uh Oh? That does not sound good for a lot of Bible Prophecy teachers today. God says that you can read what I wrote in the beginning and see what is coming in the end. How is this even possible? Are you beginning to now see the importance of learning the correct interpretation of Genesis 1? I mean do you want to know what Revelaion means? If yes, then you better start with Genesis 1 and find out what that means because there you will find the keys to unlocking the understanding of the book of Revelation. Wow, I just taught you something that is so far off of the charts of current Bible teaching that I wonder why I said it. I just let you in on something else to look for in Genesis. The first thing that I mentioned was that Genesis 1 was about Jesus and I told you to look for Him in every verse. Now I have sprung another revelation on you and said in every verse to look for the end from the stated beginning descriptive words. Therefore we have three direct priorities in reading every verse. We want to understand what they mean in the stated beginning context first, we want to then know what they mean for Jesus the creator second, and then finally, we want to know what they mean for the future end of the world. Please allow me to list these again so that you can remember them and learn why it is important to study the creation account in Genesis:
- Study Genesis to see and understand the creation event first.
- Study Genesis to see and understand the God who created everything second.
- Study Genesis to see and understand the end of the world.
In studying just the first three verses of Genesis 1, I have counted over 15 different direct subjects to study in the entire Bible and I omitted the smaller more common Hebrew words from this count. Here is a list of the primary or dominate subject Hebrew words in these three verses. Every word occurs at least once and when more than once I included a count after the word in parenthesis.
- Beginning
- Created
- Alef-Tav, A-Z, Alpha-Omega
- God (3)
- Heaven
- Earth (2)
- Without Form
- Void
- Darkness
- Face (2)
- Deep
- Spirit
- Moved
- Waters
- Said
- Light (2)
Surely you can begin to see how complex the Bible is by examining this short list of subjects. Searching the Old Testament for every one of these words would be a large task, but one that would be very beneficial to our understanding. Then crossing over into the New Testament would be of even greater benefit if we could determine which Greek words corresponded to these 16 Hebrew words. That is possible and maybe I should teach you how to do that here in this lesson. In order to cross languages barriers to find the New Testament Greek words that are directly related or associated to the Hebrew O.T. words we need to find an Old Testament quoted verse in the New Testament with that word exact in it. This is difficult but not impossible to do with a computer and a version of the Bible that helps to identify them. For example I like the NASB version of the Bible for this cause. They capitalize every Old Testament verse quoted in the New Testament so that they are all easily recognicable. I then do a search for the words that I am looking for like “heaven” and “earth” and then find them in a N.T. quoted verse. I did this search and found both words in Hebrews 1:10. This verse quotes Psalms 102:25. Then I go to Psalms and verify that the Hebrew words in that verse for “heaven” and “earth” are the same words found in Genesis 1 and they are, so I now know that the Greek words G1093 and G3772 are equivalent words for the Hebrew words H776 and H8064 respectively. Do you understand what I just did and why? It can be a bit complex and take some time and effort to accomplish, but yet it is very important and very beneficial for the subject study.
When reading verse 3, it is very interesting to note that the first act of God in this creation event was stated to be the introduction of light back into the planet. Why was that God’s first action and how would that even be possible, if the literal sun did not exist already to shine on the earth? You see I believe the first chapter of Genesis is both literal and symolic of many greater spiritual truths simultaneously. This is the only way that one verse can teach you three different things using the same words. I believe that Genesis 1 was God’s way of teaching us some very complex hidden things by God selecting the specific stated order of every event performed, how it was recorded and described, how it was performed, and then by the timing of the event in the overall 6 day process. What God does is reveal to us greater hidden spiritual truths while creating our world system concurrently. In other words everything recorded in Genesis 1 is by divine superior design and has a hidden purpose to reveal a greater mystery.
We should know from reading and studying the Bible that God has described Himself to be Light. Light is an important concept found throughout the Bible in many forms using many synonymous terms. The first recorded mention of light is here in Genesis 1:3. One of the last direct mentions of light occurs in Revelation 22:5 and says some awesome things about this subject of how God will be to His people their eternal light. Therefore, when God said in Genesis 1:3 “Let there be Light”, what exactly did that mean and what are the imiplied reference for Jesus and the end of the age?
1Jn 1:5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
If you only think naturally or carnally you will miss all of the spiritual messages from God hidden in His word. This is why when Jesus taught us the scriptures that said repeatedly “Let him that has ears to hear, hear” (Mat 11:15). What Jesus was claiming was that there was more said in the scriptures than what their natural ears were currently understanding. Let’s get into what the symbolic meaning of the “Light Be” command could represent in Genesis 1:3. We can see from several other scriptures in the Bible that there is no place that we can go that God is not already present there (Psalm 139:8). God is clearly an omnipresent being and all that means is that the Spirit of God is present everywhere simultaneously. Therefore, to attempt to teach that God was introducing Himself into the world, I believe would conflict with the omnipresent part of God’s nature. What then can these verses possibly represent?
We can see from studying the rest of the chapter that God is repeatedly dividing something from something else and here in verses 3 through 5 God separates Day (light) from Night (darkness). In day 1 of the six day creation event God defines what day is and what night is and that is a much more significant revelation to consider than you know right now. It is also a stated major problem if the sun does not exist on this day of creation since day and night could not possibly occur without the existence of the sun and the earth’s rotation around it.
Here is the first time we see God doing anything specifically in direct reference to a specific creation task. We should begin to ask the question “How does God create anything by definition and revealed methodology”? This is a critical point to understand as we will later learn why it is so significant. Men typically create things with their hands, they build a car, write a song, mow the grass all natural things involving the work of our hands. Where were God’s hands during this work? As we see later in the chapter God rests on the seventh day from all His work so we know that He was working while He was creating. But, I believe we can clearly see that God’s work methods were by a radical new method of labor. I believe, knowing how God works will help us learn how we should be working. But, I guess I won’t go there today.
So what did God do? God looked out on the darkness that covered the earth in verse 2 and then what happened? What does darkness represent literally, figuratively and symbolcically? I believe this is a concept we need to define using the Bible. God spoke to the darkness and said “Light Be”. This is a pattern that will be repeatedly emphasized as we continue through the rest of the chapter and this work methodology is also found throughout the Bible in the lives of a number of key examples given to us by God. Most people who read the Bible don’t really understand what they read. As a result they gloss over their minds and basically ignore the words that are written for them to turn to alternative preconceived ideas or thoughts that they think that they do understand. It sure changes everything when you finally see what the actual words and meanings say; it will change your entire outlook on God and His Word if you let it in and accept it as truth.
Let me introduce you to a brand new concept called symbolism. I personally believe that practically everything in Genesis 1 is symbolically linked to a greater hidden truth of something that God is doing in the spiritual realm. Genesis chapter 1 is so heavily saturated with this symbolism that it has very rich and deep meanings attached to every verse. Every day of creation is symbolic of a spiritual day to God and I believe this is a new concept that you need to take hold of in order to understand how near we are to the end of our time here on this earth. As we will soon see the 6 days of God’s creation are symbolically representative of each day of human history on our planet. Since Adam’s creation man has been on this planet very nearly for 6000 years. We can calculate this duration using the genealogies found in the Bible and the ages of the men given to us in those geneaologies. This is how many Bible teachers have come up with the popular theory of the age of our earth being only 6000 years old. However, they are misapplying the information and missing the greater truth that God hid for them to find. Let me stop here and introduce you to some of God’s critical commentary of the creation events found in Genesis. You need to begin to understand that God reveals more information in other parts of the Bible that are essential for you understanding what is occurring in Genesis. If you only study Genesis in a vacuum void of these verses you will never perceive the truth of God. Turn with me in your Bible and read these verses found in 2 Peter:
2Pe 3:4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
2Pe 3:5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
2Pe 3:6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
2Pe 3:7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
2Pe 3:8 But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.
Notice what God reveals in these verses. In verse 8, God gives us the redefinition of the Genesis term “day”. This definition represents a new spiritual “day” concept and not a literal day reality. God is revealing a specific clue to the duration of the world by informing us that each day of creation represents a 1000 year period of God’s time. Peter is quoting a part of a verse found in Psalms to make this information plainer and to give it significance to our study. By examining the context of this statement you should be able to clearly understand that Peter is linking this new “day” length information back to the original Genesis creation account. Go back to verse 4 and you will see a clear reference to the “beginning of creation” a clear reference to the information found in Genesis 1:1. Peter immediately follows this verse with a statement concerning Genesis 1:2 where the world was completely covered with water. Then Peter in verse 6 declares that the world that then had perished. Did you know that there was a world that existed before our world? God was teaching us a revelation and giving us explanations concerning the first two verses of Genesis in this discourse. Next in verse 7 God declares information about the end of the age linking the beginning to the end again as we read in Isaiah. Immediately following this statement is verse 8 concerning the definition of a day as being 1000 years. God has placed such key detailed information here that it is amazing when you can see it.
Did you notice that in verses 5 and 7 were two significant references to the Word of God? This reference is also a critical part of the Genesis Bible study. I believe if you do a search in Genesis 1 for the phrase “and God said” you will find it written 10 times in 10 different verses. God places extraordinary importance on His Word in the creation of the world. Peter reveals to us that the world that perished was created by the spoken Word of God and that the world that we live in currently was also created by the spoken Word of God. We learn as we continue that this is how God worked so keep this information in your mind as we continue in this series.
Do not misapply 2 Peter to attempt to say each day of creation is a literal 1000 year period of time. That would be another misapplication of spiritual information. God uses natural things to help us to understand spiritual things. Therefore, I am a firm believer that the 6 days of creation are literal 24 hour periods of time. Take the information literally in Genesis whenever possible but also realize that every literal word has a symbolic meaning potentially attached to it. What I am doing is viewing the information as being literal and symbolic at the same time as I have stated before.
Genesis 1:2 Part 2
Gen 1:2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.
(Ver 1.4) This is Part 4 in the series of Bible lessons on Genesis chapter 1. We have talked about a lot of different subjects so far and I have introduced you to a new controversial debate that is raging between many Bible teachers. Some have said that the earth is relatively young and only 6000 years old and other Bible teachers like myself see it to be much older. Techinically speaking nowhere in the Bible does God give us the exact age of the earth or the universe so it would be foolish for any man to try to date it so precisely. That is why I do not give you any dates, but I only say it is very old based upon the Bible. If you have not read this series from the beginning I would recommend that you go back and start with “Part 1” first. Today I’m going to focus on the part of the words in verse 2 where God says “And darkness was upon the face of the deep…“. Genesis 1:2 continues with some revealing words, the implication is made that the earth is totally and completely covered by water and in complete darkness. This would imply that there was no dry ground anywhere and that the depth of the water that covered the ground was so deep that light could not penetrate to reach it. This information would further the concept definition that the world was an uninhabitable place. It sounds a lot like the movie “Waterworld” without any people, animals or even fish. Let’s examine this information baed upon what science tells us about light penetration in ocean water because I think this is fascinating to see what God is saying to us. After the first 3 feet of ocean water 50 percent of the light is absorbed by the water. That is not much depth is it? But it get’s even better. Sunlight is a compound source that when separated using a prism like device we can demonstrate that it is comprised of multiple colors. These can be viewed as red light, blue light, yellow light, green light, etc. Red light is completely absorbed in the ocean water in the first meter. Therefore red light is absent after the first 3.3 feet. The color with the deepest penetration is blue light and it will travel only to a depth of around 330 feet which is much deeper than the color of red. However after 330 feet there is no available light to see and we now have a state of darkness. Therefore the ocean dept that covered the earth in Genesis 1:2 must have been at the minimum of 330 feet to produce the complete darkness on the face of the deep.
I beleive this would be a good time to restate the information given to us in Genesis 1:1. Genesis 1:1 taught us that God created the heavens (implied sun, moon, planets, stars, etc) and then the earth. 
I based this conclusion on associated scripture context and the lack of direct creative accounts given to us anywhere else in the chapter. We must learn to see what the Bible actually says, but we also must be able to learn from what the Bible does not say concurrently. Both are potential sources of factual informaiton that are relevant to us having correct understanding. We know from scientific observation that the earth revolves around the sun in a designed concept that we call our “solar system”. A system is a set of individual compents that comprise a greater something that works togeither to produce a postive outcome or purpose. For example, a sound system is comprised of speakers, a receiver, an amplifier and possibly other components that work together to produce musical sound or voice amplification. Take one or more of the individual components away and the complete system fails to function correctly. This is the concept being taught to us by God in Genesis 1:1. The existence of the sun is a central required component for the earth’s viable existence. Since God does not directly tell us when the sun was created in chapter 1 we must conclude it was created in verse 1 by an implied reference and scientific system completeness if for no other reasons. 
I know that many people will try to say that the sun was created on Day 4 but that is techinically NOT what it says and only what you thought it said. We will talk more about that part of the subject when we get to those verses. Just try to see where I am coming from for now and then later try to see how I got there after you have all of the information that I can give you. From my understanding of scriptures and science there is an absolute requirement for the sun’s existence in verse 2 of Genesis 1 but the fact that the light does not reach the surface of the planet makes the reality more complex on why this is happening. The lack of light on the surface of the planet could be for multiple different reasons. I have heard many people theorize about a pre-Noah canopy of clouds that prevented the direct light from the sun from fully reaching the surface. But even on a cloudy day we can still have significant light to see by. No, I have conlcuded that it was the combined effect of both the cloud layers and the depth of the waters that covered the earth that were the contributing factors for there being no light that was reaching the earth’s surface.
Here is another interesting concept that is very important to understand when discussing Genesis 1 creation.
If the sun does not exist in verse 1, then no other part of the chapter makes direct logical sense. You see without the direct presence of the sun, there exists no concept of how to measure time or how to define day or night. Did you ever think of that? The creation account as you will soon see going forward is divided into 6 days of God’s labor and they are described to be evening and morning day 1, 2, 3, and etc. Without the sun, there is no evening and neither is there any morning. There is no concept of what a day is if the sun does not exist. This is exactly what I was teaching you about our solar system and the loss of one key compent. When you take the sun away from being created in Genesis 1:1 the rest of what we thought we knew in Genesis 1 begins to fail and fall apart. We have no basis for the truth to define what a day is if the sun does not exist. I hope you are at least thinking and trying to understand what I just said.
The last part of the verse says “and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” Again, this information is confirming that the entire world is covered with the deep liquid substance of water. Obviously this was a universal or global flood of the entire planet earth. If we recall from verse 1, it said in the beginning God created “earth”. The use of the word “Earth” implies by direct definition that there was dry ground that was inhabitable. You might ask me how I came to that definition of the Hebrew word translated as “earth” and I will have to tell you that it was defined to us by God in verse 10, but since we have not gotten to that verse yet, you will either have to trust me or stop and go study verse 10 out of sequence and then come back to verse 2 and apply God’s definition to verse 1. This brings up an interesting point again about how to study the Bible using the Bible. This is an example of why it is essential to not study ANY one verse in isolation. You must take the Hebrew word translated as “earth” and then go see how God defines it and uses it in context. This Hebrew Word (Strong’s number H776) is used 15 times in the first chapter of Genesis. Please go to them all and show me where they do not refer to dry inhabitable ground. In most of the verses it is more than obvious that this is the clear meaning. Therefore to exclude the first verse and say it is not referring to dry ground is inconsistent idiocy. It is an absolute necessity to be consistent in your interpretation of every word of God!
So we again see by the definition and the usage of the word “earth” in chapter 1, that something happened to cause the current state of water that destroyed it in verse 2. What happened in Genesis 1:2? The Bible doesn’t really tell us very many specifics, but God does give us some very relevant and important clues about this event. Finding the clues and then putting all of them together correctly is always the biggest challenge to correct Bible interpretation. We need to go search our Bibles for where God speaks of creation and floods in the same reference. We can do this by simply a word search.
I found a very major clue to what happened to the earth in Genesis 1:2 given to us in 2 Peter chapter 3 verses 4 thru 6. In verse 4 of 2 Peter 3, God specifically mentions “the beginning of creation” to help define the associated importance of the next two verses, 5 and 6 being directly associated with Genesis 1:1. Verse 4 points us to Genesis 1:1 in two ways. First, there is the obivous phrase of “the beginning of creation” referenence and that leaves no doubt in my mind that this is a reference to the first verse in Genesis and no other verse in the Bible will fit. Then second, there is the implied antithesis reference of Peter talking about the coming of the Lord at the end of the age. Both of these references help to point us back to the 1st verse and chapter of Genesis as I have taught you about Jesus being the Alpha and Omega God who created. This information in verse 4 connects the next two verses in 2 Peter back to Genesis 1 by context association and by the continuation of the same thought statement. Let’s go and read all of the verses in the correct sequence:
2Pe 3:4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
2Pe 3:5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
2Pe 3:6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
I’ve already talked about verse 4 so I will not repeat myself. Verses 5 and 6 speak directly and specifically about the earth being covered with water and this matches the information exactly that we saw in Genesis 1:2. In verse 6 God makes this very radical statement, “The World That Then Was…”. If you read this and are just a little bit smart, you will quickly realize that God is speaking of a different world other than the current one that “Now Is”. You see it says this world that was before our current world perished completely. What world can that possibly be talking about? The Greek word translated as “perished” is defined as the complete and utter destruction of a world with no survivors. Go look up the word for yourself, if you don’t believe me. The Greek word is G622 and it is a very interesting study being comprised of two root words that leave no doubt in my mind that this event being described represents a transition from previous life to complete and utter death. In other words you never use this word unless there existed a life and now that life no longer exists.
Obviously many people who believe in a young earth theory try to explain away these scripture references by saying they are talking only about Noah’s flood and not the Genesis 1:2 flood. But, you see that interpretation, contradicts with what this scripture in 2nd Peter says and makes God to be a liar. First, learn this simple fact that Noah’s flood was not at creation but occurs well over a 1000 years later following the creation event. How can you associate Noah directly with creation? Was Noah there with Adam? I really do not think so and that is the primary problem with a Noah application. Then take note of this very important fact that in Noah’s flood the world that “Then Was” is still the same world that “Now Is” and in the flood of Noah everything did not completely perish. There were many survivors of the Noah’s flood including the animals, the birds, the fish the plants, the trees and even 8 human people. After Noah’s flood the same descendants of Adam that inhabited the planet as before the flood, still inhabited the planet after the flood. The ancesteral lineage of Jesus in Luke 3 proves this by going from Mary all the way back to Adam. This proves that we are still in the same world system that was created by God in Genesis 1. This is a very important revelation to see and understand for it helps to explain a lot more things in the Bible than you can imagine right now.
There are certainly many other scriptures in the Bible we could bring in right here that shed more light on the “world that was”, but for now I’ll leave it at that. Just recognize and acknowledge this verse in Genesis 1:2 that we are studying today is talking about a universal flood that destroyed everything that was on the planet. I think I will end the lesson on that note and thank you for your time in studying the Bible with me. Please feel free to leave me a comment if you know of any scriptures that are relevant to what I was teaching about today. Please do not leave me a comment with your opinion, for like I said before I’m not interested in your opinions. Only God’s Word will prevail over the opinions of men. God Bless.
If you would like to continue to the next lesson in this series on Genesis 1 please go to “Part 5“.
Correct Bible Intrepretation Rules Part 2 — Recognizing that Every Word of God is Important!
(Ver 2.1) This lesson is Part 2 of the Correct Bible Interpretation Rules series. If you have not read from the beginning I would recommend that you start with “Part 1“. In this series I discuss the proper approaches and rules to interpreting and understanding what God has given to us to know. When reading and studying the Bible, I have learned that it is absolutely critical to pay close attention to every word that is written. If it wasn’t important, God would not have written it down for us to read and study. Think with me and consider the fact that God could have written us any words and these are the ones that the most intelligent being in the universe wrote down for you to personally read. That tells me that God thinks they are important. Did you ever notice that God pays attention to the smallest details in your life? The Bible says He knows how many hairs are on your head (Mat 10:30). Since this number changes on many people’s head daily this is an amazing attention to some details that we do not even know. That is an amazing revelation to the level of detail that God is interested in you. If He cares that much for you, I believe that He expects you and I to care that much for Him and His words.
2Ti 3:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
This scripture in 2 Timothy 3:16 informs us, that every word of God is important for us to see and learn. If you continue reading in the next verse you will that it claims that these words will help a man to grow up spiritually and become mature to do great works. Sometimes I think we either do not understand what this means or we forget that this is true. Especially when we read through boring genealogies or lists, laws or something that we are not interested in. Does “ALL” mean every word? I believe it does and we need to read it like God is saying something very important to teach us or correct our life’s course.
Luk 4:4 And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.
You can clearly read from the mouth of God some words that are extensively ignored by some Christians. According to God Himself, He says that man will only live by knowing every Word of God. God is comparing His Word to that of symbolic natural bread. It just so happens that I really like bread so I can relate to this analogy and type of symbolism with ease. You see I also like the Word of God and that is what makes me different than a lot of people. What I want you to see is the emphasized qualifier in this verse that it states that “EVERY” word of the Bible is important to feed on spiritually. The next time that you read a genealogy like in Genesis 5 you should change your attitude towards it and find out why God put it there and then try to learn what it means. When I discovered that the Genesis 5 genealogy had a hidden message within it, I changed how I looked at the Word of God. Suddenly every word seemed to have more significance and meaning attached to it than I ever realized before. I began to look at every word differently and just because I did not understand why it was there, it did not deter me from taking away what I could find out about it and then making notes about what I still needed to learn. Writing down your questions and praying to ask God to answer them will open the door for Him to show you what they mean.
Maybe I’m different than you are. I learned as a computer programmer to pay close attention to every jot and tittle that existed within the programming text. Every bit and byte of information had great significance to whether the program that I wrote worked or failed. Believe it or not, this is what God is trying to teach you today about the Bible. Become a detail oriented person in your Bible study and it will change your point of view and I will guarantee that you learn more than you ever have before. Learn to feed your spirit on every word of God and treat them all as being valuable for your life. There is a famous quote that states “Success is in the details” and I believe this more today than I ever have. I hope you do this also! Ignoring little details will most often lead us into errors of wrong interpretation. Taking a portion of a verse out of context is often a main way people fall into error.
I thank you for reading this short lesson on Correct Bible Interpretation. It had only one main point and I pray that you understood the significance. If you would like to continue reading in this series please continue to the next lesson called “Part 3“.
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