I BET YOU CANNOT DO IT

 Matthew chapter four is about the temptations of Christ by the Devil. Jesus was the “last Adam” — “The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit” (1 Cor 15:45); “There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body… the natural body is sown, it is raised a spiritual body” (1 Cor 15:44).

Hence, Adam was sown by the breath of God, and Jesus was raised from Adam an alive (quickening) Spirit to make us truly alive again. All that to say two things: (1) Jesus was the second man made in the image of God, and (2) His body was not only natural as Adam’s kind but spiritual as well, as God’s Kind, and without a flaw!

Whereas the first Adam was tempted and failed, the last Adam was tempted but overcame temptation. The two first Adams — the man and the woman — were both Adam’s kind who were made glorious but failed due to temptation. The last Adam, Jesus, was tempted but did not fail God. Jesus remained glorious whereas both Adam and Eve became inglorious.

About sin, James wrote: 

⁸ If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself,” ye do well: ⁹ But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are convinced of the law as transgressors. ¹⁰ For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all. (Jas 2:8-10)

 The point to that scripture is that love by itself is not efficacious for salvation. Adam and Eve loved God in the sense that they had no ill will for their Maker, but they also showed respect for the “Serpent.” Mankind’s issue all along is not that they did not love God but loved to transgress as well. With that said, although Jesus loved His Father, if He had loved the things that He was tempted with, He would have failed.

Jesus was tempted: 

1.       He was hungry and Satan offered Him bread.He did not take it.

2.       Upon the pinnacle, Satan asked Jesus to prove Himself to be God by daring God. It was a test of whether Jesus would trust His Father in Heaven.

3.       He was taken up to a high mountain and shown the world, specifically the Garden of God within the Kingdom of David. Satan said it could be all His if he only worshiped him. It already was His, albeit His real Kingdom was not of this world. 

Now look at the sins of the first Adam: 

1.       He was offered food (the fruit of the forbidden tree) and he took it.

2.       He was tested in whom he believed. He failed to believe God and trusted the Serpent by disobeying God and not doubting the Serpent.

3.       Hidden in Adam’s sin was whose Garden it was. Adam was already king and high priest in the Garden, having dominion over all things. However, it was the Garden of God (Gen 2:8) and Adam and Eve were only to rule and tend it. The Serpent planted the idea that the two could be “as gods,” hinting that the Garden could be their kingdom! 

Adam and Eve (the first two “Adam’s”) broke one law — they ate of the forbidden tree but by breaking that one Law, they broke as many as Jesus was tempted. Adam and Eve as well have broken all the Laws of God by breaking one Law because even one Law broken makes the difference who is the Last Adam and who is not.

Adam was created glorious since the two were made in the image of God. Think of glorious as one with a perfect image (with the genetics of God); their genes would be without any depravity at all. Adam and Eve were created genetically pure just like Jesus who was of the same “Image” as the first Adams.

Sin was not discarding the Image of God but taking on a secondary image (nahas in the Hebrew). Whereas Jesus is the Son of God and the son of man (Adam), the original Adams were the sons (genetically speaking) of God and the sons of the Wicked One since their nature (DNA) changed. They kept their desire for God and even wanted to be like Him, but they took on a second nature as well as children of the Wicked One. Their father and lover had become the Devil as they fornicated against God with another invisible being.

Jesus proved that He was God by overcoming the world that was offered Him. Jesus said, “In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). Jesus had overcome the Devil and the world that he offered Him. You could not have done that! Most of us cannot go two weeks without food, but Jesus overcame the Devil with His hands tied and even nailed down. He overcame death for us, and if we eat of the Tree of Life from that wooden yoke, then we are made free of the world.

We are sons of Adam and are as such failures, not gods. Jesus is the last Adam — our last hope. Whereas Adam failed and so do all of us of his kind, Jesus overcame temptation, the Devil, and Hell on our behalf!

Those temptations that Jesus overcame; they were tribulations. Those temptations that we have; they are tribulations. They are nothing compared to the “Great Tribulation” wherein we must choose who our master will be.

So, you think that you are saved? Then you think that the rapture will precede the Great Tribulation. That is our hope but that is the “assurance” that Calvinists need for their doctrine.

What if we must endure the Great Tribulation? How well will you do? Will you overcome the world and the Devil inside the Antichrist? Our hope is that you need not because Jesus has already done that!

If you were to do it on your own; commence now: Go forty days and decline food, cling to God like you will die, and lastly deny the world and what it has to offer. Turn your backs on entertainment, luxury, the social programs of the government, your home, your automobiles, and even your fun-loving friends. Can you do that? I bet not because you have not! Neither have I; and that is the reason that Jesus has done so for us! The world is in our nature and only Jesus can change who we are.

(Picture credit; Wikimedia Commons)

 

 

 

 

CHOICES

  There have been several movies made about choices. With every step in life, there exists two choices. Each choice has different outcomes. If things are done differently, the outcome would have been different. Our choices provide our destinies.

  This moment, I have two choices; to write or not to write.  I write because of two previous choices; because I read the Word, or I did not. I read the Word because I had two choices; to arise from my bed or not; ad infinitum.

  Life is the most imperative choice in my existence. I could not choose mortal life, but God and my parents did. God conceived me, then Dad did. Mom received me, then God did. We all are elected. Why is that so? “For God so loved the world that… you should not perish” (John 3:16). That you never perish, God perished Himself. That was His choice, His decision, and His grace.

  “Should not” is ambiguous. It is not even in scripture. The Greek actually is written, “apollymi me apollymi” meaning “die not to die”(Strongs’s Dictionary). It is neither should, shall, nor will. Of course, none should die because of choices. Some shall die, but they need not, albeit some will die. Conversely, all should live, some shall not live, and some will live; depending on their choice to live or die.

KEY VERSE: ¹⁶ …Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: ¹⁷ But Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. (Gen 2:16-17)

  Therein are choices: (1) To eat or not to eat what is forbidden, and (2) to die or not to die — apollymi me apollymi. Hidden within the key verses is the most famous choice in the Bible — to die or not to die, or conversely, to live or not to live. God’s hidden Words therein are that none should perish, knowing full-well that many shall perish, and many thereafter will perish.

  Angels are immortal with one contingency; that they are allegiant to God. That is known because rebellious angels shall be thrown into the bottomless pit to perish. Angels who honor God are immortal. When God said that Adam was created in “our image, after our likeness” (Gen 1:26), He was not referring to the angels, except for that one aspect; obedient angels are immortal, but their “image” is nothing like Adam-kind.

 With Adam and Eve, given two choices — to eat or not to eat, there was a consequence for each choice: to die or not to die (apollymi me apollymi). As such, disobedience results in the choice between life and death, or to perish or not to perish. Death can indirectly be chosen over life. The question remains, What is death?

  Apparently, Adam thought death was the flesh perishing. Eve ate, and her flesh did not seem to perish. It began to wither that moment but undetectably so. Eve shall die thereafter… some time in the future she would die. Time, then is the coordinate for death. “Withering” is the process of dying. The medical field calls that slow process "apoptosis,” ironically “like a leaf falls off a tree.” (National Genome Research Institute). Eve began to die, ironically, like a leaf falls off a tree. She is as a tree, not as God, and Adam, once he ate, was like a dying tree as well.

  Infants have no choice. The norm for them is to be born robust. They are quite alive, but soon after, their cells begin to die. “We are programmed to die” (TheScientist.com). Sin programmed all to die, and the “programmer” is Satan. God’s “program” is DNA which scripture indicates, was “entirely good” (Gen 1:31).

  Like a computer virus, iniquity (immorality) is the spiritual virus that the “hacker” Seraph programmed into Adam. Adam was programmed to be Satan’s son as he tricked Adam into emancipating Himself. By the Way, the “patch” for that is a “reprogram” that Jesus called, “born again” (John 3:7) until regeneration (reprogramming) is compete. ironically that occurs at death when Satan’s DNA withers and dies. That is why “To die is gain” (Phil 1:21) because Satan can no longer “hack” God’s reprogramming.

  Hidden in Paul’s words is a choice. The full passage is “To live is Christ; to die is gain.” That points right back to the key verses! The Tree of Life is Christ. The choice was the Tree of Life to live or the Tree of Knowledge to die. Adam and Eve could freely eat of all the other trees, including the Tree of Life, and live. They could “eat” of Christ. The Tree of Life provided manna from heaven as did all the other trees. The Forbidden Tree only provided withered fruit. Of course, like Eve, it was spoiling as well. We learn from scripture that the fig tree withered. Rather than the “Parable of the fig Tree,” better nomenclature is perhaps “Parable of the Tree of Knowledge.”

  Dying doesn’t seem to be disparaging in scripture since to die is gain. However, it is conditional. A choice must be made: the Way of Christ or not the Way, but those two ways are the Law of God or the law of sin, to wit: “I (Paul) thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin” (Rom 7:25).

  There again are choices: serve God or serve sin, and by default, serve Satan. Mankind was programmed to serve God with both the mind and flesh (Gen 2:15). Since men are as trees, and death is as leaves falling, then “dress and keep” the Garden takes on a new meaning… to serve and preserve the “trees” that would be seeded by Adam into Eve as his own seed.

  Mankind has three faculties and one power: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength” (Mark 12:30). “Heart” is cognition. Our thoughts are to be on God in all things. Our mind must be on God continually. When Paul said that his mind served God, that is rebirth, because theretofore, his mind was on the Law that was written. 

  However, thereafter his mind was on implied “Law” — the Law of Love. From the time, he was Saul reprogrammed to Paul, and how he looked at the Law was much different. His mind had changed because Jesus had persuaded him. Paul, as all Christians, also serve the law of sin with the flesh. Paul’s mind battled with his flesh, and each time the flesh demands (commands) something, his mind has a choice to make.

  Offered the Bible or television, which would you choose? I make that choice every day and choose God’s Word. This morning I took a rest from my routine. I watched a history program rather than read my Bible. Immediately realizing that I made the wrong choice, I returned to my routine, and herein are the results. I chose God over entertainment, and now I am content.

  Since death is gain, then something about death is rewarding. The contingency is choosing the Way of Jesus over your own way.

  Adam had his way, began to die, and failed to even perceive that he had begun to wither. Aging is indeed a slow process that is almost indetectable. On the other hand, both Adam and Eve experienced guilt.

  Unresolved guilt is the sign that a person is dying spiritually. Although they did not know that their days on Earth had been numbered, they already felt spiritually dead because Satan had isolated them from God. He called them to his (so he thought) tree and God had already called them to come to His. Their decision was to stand under the “Judas Tree” because just as Judas had Satan in him, the Tree of Knowledge had Satan in it.

  How is it known that the sinful pair felt guilt? They perceived their nakedness and hid their shame with aprons of fig leaves (Gen 3:7). They tried to cover their shame. The works of their hands were not efficacious, and when Jesus approached (God was walking), they hid themselves. Did they hide because of their poor aprons, or because Satan had sucked the breath of life from them that God had originally breathed unto Adam, and also with which Adam suscitated Eve?

  With the loss of God’s “Breath,” the two were as dead. Indeed, they had died spiritually! God did not breath life back unto them, but he did the next best thing; He covered them from the elements with coats of skin (Gen 3:21) to keep them safe and preserve them until God breaths life unto them again.

  When will that happen? “For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first” (1 Thes 4:16). That will be when God “snatches up” the dust of Adam, and again breathes life back unto Him.

  Death removed the need for the coat to protect Adam’s flesh when he lives again. Why? Because he will have new flesh to contain his soul, Paul wrote there as well, the words “in Christ.” Adam was in Christ. Pre-incarnate (pre-flesh) Jesus provided the two with skins to cover them as a coat.

  Sacred literature reveals that a lamb was killed for the first time to preserve them. Jesus provided innocent flesh that came from His Hands to cover their guilt. He would do the same thing to cover all the guilt of all Adams and Eves thereafter. All have sinned because all are Adams and Eves.

  Adam and Eve finally understood the death of flesh with the killing of the lamb, and they had themselves experienced the deaths of their souls. By grace, God provided a way to revive both — the regeneration of the soul and the resurrection of the flesh!

  Those not in the flesh of Christ are outside it. They are vulnerable to the wiles of the Devil.

  The flesh that Christ provided warded off the barbs of Satan just as those coats of skin with thick wool warded off the backbiting of the Serpent.

  “Born again” is the only “must be” relative to the nature of men in the New Testament (John 3:7). That refers to putting on Christ and a determination to live in Christ. The flesh of Jesus died just as the lamb in Genesis. Those with a new mind desire to put on the coat of skin that Jesus provided when He was crucified. It is a large enough “tent” to cover all that choose to be covered. The choice is yours — to put on Christ or not; to be in Christ and live, or to be out of Christ and die.

(picture credit: Garmnentory; "Karl Donahughe Lambskin Coat")

 

JOB’S DAUGHERS, JOB’S SONS, AND JOB’S FAMILY

KEY VERSES: “Is there not a time of hard service for man on earth? Are not his days also like the days of a hired man? Like a servant who earnestly desires the shade, and like a hired man who eagerly looks for his wages, So I have been allotted months of futility, And wearisome nights have been appointed to me.” (Job 7”1-2; NKJV)

  Job was faithful to God, and was blessed. However, was Job only faithful to God because he was blessed? The Adversary, Satan, questioned God as to whose allegiance was Job; was his allegiance to God or mammon (Mat 6:24). “Mammon” is not specifically avarice but generally the things of the world. Satan wanted God to demonstrate that Job would fail God when he revealed whereon Job’s confidence and comfort lied.
  The prosperity gospel is that God does not take-away from those who are His, but provides not only nourishment but material comfort and wealth. Job was quite wealthy and comfortable. God did, in fact, provide for and protect Job, his family, and his wealth because Job knew from whom it came. Using Hebrew logic and reasoning, as Eliphaz did in his council with Job, if I can show that the faith of Job was not indicative of material wealth, then it should demonstrate that neither should it be to Christians in general.
  The destiny of mankind, because sin is harbored in us all, is hard service (Gen 3:17-19). Although God had grace on Adam, he still suffered the consequences of sin. That should be argument enough against the prosperity gospel, but the story of Job provided additional confirmation. Therefore, because we have faith, God does not promise prosperity in this life. In the Abrahamic Covenant, God seemed to have promised the Hebrews prosperity in Israel, but Abraham understood it not to be the land of that country, but the promise of eternal life with Heaven on Earth at the end-of-time.  Christians, to this day, continue to misunderstand where prosperity lies!
  The Book of Job begins with a happy family: father, mother, seven sons, and three daughters; all of which were of one accord. As head-of-the-household, Job was a righteous and upright man. Satan saw that and was jealous because the family belonged to God. Family is a divine institution. The family system consisted of the titular head – Job – the family itself, and God. We find in the New Testament that there is spiritual unity when God has the father and the entire household (e.g., John 4:53). A more specific example is with the Gentile Cornelius:

There was a certain man in Caesarea called Cornelius, a centurion of what was called the Italian Regiment, a devout man and one who feared God with all his household, who gave alms generously to the people, and prayed to God always. (Acts 10:1-3). 

  For the household to love and fear God, the head-of-the-household must first. Parents are responsible for bringing up children in the Way of the Lord (Prov 22:6). Of course, they still have their own free will, but their training increases their knowledge. Wise children will remain in the Lord if they are brought up to love and honor God. Job did his parental duty. Most of us fail in that!

Satan started out by trying to put God in a hard place; Job is only faithful because you keep in safe from the perils of the world. With Adam, it seemed that he was alone in the wilderness and had to provide for himself and his family. With Job, his life was much like that as Adam’s had been in the Garden of Eden, which by the way, surely had its own “hedge” (Gen 3:24) with cherubim keeping the hedge intact for some future use. Job seemed to have easy Christianity, and Satan wanted to see of Job would still be faithful when faith came at great expense! (Cheap grace versus costly grace.)
  I have often wondered, When the Antichrist comes, places a sword to my throat, and gives me a choice, would I lose my head or take the number of the Beast! For those Christians alive at the Great Tribulation, God will not prevent Satan from taking lives as he did with Job. End-time Christians will have a test of faith greater than what Job had! Job could have taken the mark of the Beast, but he did not because his faith was sincere and trusting. Sometimes I think, I will tell the Beast’s dark angels that I will take the mark, but still remain faithful. That is not how faith works! We must trust God, and not ourselves. The advice given by Job by his three friends was to essentially weasel his way using his own devices rather than depend on God. Peter tried that when he denied Jesus three times, but they all knew he was lying. In the end, Peter was required to do more than Job; he gave up his life for his faith!
  God allowed Satan to do as he may with Job, but he could not kill him. Job not only wanted to die to escape the calamities, but wondered why he was ever born! Of course, Satan commenced with destroying mere property, but that was expendable as Job still had his family, his health, and God. Then God allowed Satan to take his family. The family was one of God’s first institutions, following only the Church.  “Church” is an institution in that it is the family of God, commencing with Adam, Eve, and God all alone in the “Church house” - the canopy of the Garden and the first tabernacle of God!
  Satan cares little about the family. His focus is on the very idea of the Church – the relationship between God and men. God intent was to love man and mankind love Him back. Satan is jealous and seeks that adoration; so much that he will destroy the family to destroy the family of God.
  The family, as always, is under attack. It is so easy! Those who should love one another because they are of the same blood, are often those who hate each other because they have their own minds. Each family member is born with the same needs and allegiance to their parents, but at an early age, Satan begins to erode familial relationships. His first blood is drawn when family members are at odds with each other. Then, all he needs to do thereafter is to focus on individuals as he did with Job. With the family support system gone, Job was all alone with God and the Devil. His friends were with him, but the questions remain; Were they friends that Job needed, and were they God’s true emissaries? Job needed his family, but they were gone. Satan knew that, and destroyed them before he focused on Job.

Job was given a hard life. His life became much as Adam’s outside the Garden, and more like ours. In all that, God kept Job safe from death, until his faith returned his prosperity, and finally death became his gain as he had hoped for in his struggle with the Devil. That’s what Jesus does for his disciples. He keeps Christians safe from death until death comes. Then their death is the true gain. When Job died, Satan no longer had any type of control over Job. You might think that Job was saved when he demonstrated his faith, and indeed, he was as well as saved! He had endured to the end to the frustration and dismay of his Adversary. Indeed, the story of Job and his encounters with Satan is the prototypical experience of exercising enduring faith. It is the faith that Christians must maintain to the end, hopefully with not that degree of physical and emotional pain!
  Job was tested by taking away things which should have been important to him as a test of How important? With Adam and Jesus, Satan offered to give them things that they already had. The Garden already belonged to Adam as God’s heir, and the World already belonged to Jesus as he Is the Creator. Satan offers what is already ours as well as threatens to take away the peace that we have. Family disruption is an example of taking away the peace of Christian fathers and mothers. Dissenting members of the family are unaware, but they are doing what the Adversary wills for them to do as the first step in attacking individuals.
  Just as with Job, parents of lost sons and daughters have the same “wearisome nights” that Job had. Job surely thought often: My encounter with obstacles would be much easier with my family intact. With his children gone, and his wife soon to be deposed, Job was on his own. That is a lonesome feeling and many abandoned parents know the loss of their children even when they are merely elsewhere. My neighbor died, and his son thought so little about him, that he was apathetic to the loss of his creator. I mourned for my fine neighbor for the lack of respect his son had for him. Imagine that; an honorable man dying and his only son not even caring about his demise. I can’t fathom that as I still mourn the loss of my Dad and Mom after all these years. If only I could go back and undo the times that I caused them trouble! Mom and Dad laid awake many worrisome nights over my siblings and my safety.
  Do you dishonor your father? If so, know that they laid awake worrying about you. Do you dishonor your mother? If so, live with the guilt of not understanding her love and worry for you! Do you not honor God by honoring the Fifth Word of Jesus? He wept for you!

William Blake Painting: (Image released under Creative Commons)