The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil?

When God created Adam and Eve, he put them in the Garden of Eden and told them they could eat from any tree they wanted, except from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The day they ate of it, they would surely die.

And, you know how the story went: Eve was tempted by the serpent, ate the fruit, gave some to Adam, and because they sinned, they were separated from God, kicked out of paradise, death entered the picture, all creation was sent into upheaval, and everyone born of the seed of Adam, that's us, are under the same curse, born into sin and fallen from grace. Way to go, Adam.

But wait a second: If God is all-knowing, and he knew that eating the fruit would result in the fall of mankind, why'd he even put the tree there in there in the first place? Isn't this his fault? Well you know, Adam tried blaming God, too. "The woman you put here with me gave me some of the fruit and I ate it!" Guess how that went for him?

In Psalm 119, David said, "Oh, how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day." In other words, there is great joy when we obey God. Adam and Eve lived in perfection, and God showed His goodness all the more by giving them a command to obey that they would experience the greatest joy imaginable, needing nothing else but God.

Then the devil came along and convinced them that God and all his blessings were not enough. God is selfish and is keeping something from you, he said. So they ate the fruit, believing they needed something other than God to be satisfied.

Such is the case with our sin, too. We are all willing participants in Adam's sin. But God so loved us, He sent His Son Jesus to destroy the work of the devil. All who believe in Jesus have their sins forgiven and will be restored to eternal paradise with God when we understand the text.

Mark of the Beast?

In Revelation 12 and 13, the Apostle John described an unholy Trinity, an imitation of Triune God, consisting of the dragon or Satan, the first beast who is the Antichrist, and a second beast, the false prophet. The second beast makes all the earth worship the first beast, performing great signs and deceptions, and causes those who wouldn't worship the beast to be slain.

"Also it causes all... to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is the name of the beast or the number of its name. It is the number of a man, and his number is 666."

The most popular theories about the mark of the beast pop up in end-times fiction. In the old film, "A Thief In the Night," the mark is a binary code for 666. In the Left Behind series, it's a computer chip in the back of the hand or the forehead.

But is it possible this mark is not something physical but spiritual? Notice the beast causes all people to be marked, and the mark is on the right hand or the forehead.

In Deuteronomy 6, God told Israel, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes." And Isaiah 41:13 says the Lord God holds our right hand.

We are marked by the deeds we do with our hands and the thoughts we think with our mind. Are you doing the works of God or the works of the devil? Are you thinking with the mind of man or with the mind of Christ? This calls for wisdom, and something we should consider all the time, though it may also have a future fulfillment, when we understand the text.

"Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast of the number of its name. This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666." Revelation 13:16-18

"Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates." Deuteronomy 6:4-9

"But turning to his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, 'Get behind me, Satan! For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.'" Mark 8:33

"By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother." 1 John 3:10

Christians Swearing?

Is it okay for Christians to swear? No, it isn't. "But wait, what about that time Paul said I count all things as dung in order to win Christ! Isn't that the same thing as, you know, a certain swear word that means the same thing?"

Nice try, but no. Elsewhere, Paul gives a very clear instruction in Ephesians 4:29, "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear." So for the Christian, our words are not to tear down but build up, speaking grace to others.

Think about what you communicate when you curse. By using the harshest of words to describe a person or situation, you are actually cursing God. A person is made in the image of God, and you would curse that image? The Bible says to be thankful and rejoice in all circumstances (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18), and you would tell God that his way isn't good enough?

Will outsiders believe you when you say you trust God's way and then swear when things don't go your way? Or when you say you love others and then curse them?

Paul said to put away obscene talk from your mouth, and to walk in wisdom toward outsiders. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer each person (Colossians 3:8; 4:5-6). James said if a person can't control his words, even when he's alone, his religion is worthless (James 1:26). The Lord hates perverted speech.

Jesus said out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. So pray as David prayed: "Let the words of my mouth and meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer" (Psalm 19:4), when we understand the text.

"[The tongue] is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not be so." James 3:8-10

"The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance and the way of evil and perverted speech I hate." Proverbs 8:13

Modern Apostles?

In the Roman Empire, a person who was given the power to speak on behalf of the Emporer was called apostolos, or "apostle," meaning "sent one."  Likewise, an apostle of Jesus Christ was given the authority to speak the very words of God.

To disobey the word of an Apostle was to disobey God, and that's still true today. When we read the New Testament, we're reading the words of the apostles as given by God. Ephesians 2:19-20 says that the church has been "built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone."

An apostle had the power to speak in other languages, heal diseases, cast out evil spirits, and were given prophetic visions. The word of an apostle was the word of the Lord, equal in authority to the Old Testament Scriptures. And an apostle established and governed the church under Christ.

To be called an apostle, one had to meet two qualifications. They had to have been a witness to the risen Lord, and they had to have been personally appointed as an apostle by Christ himself.

Today many false teachers will claim to be apostles or that God will appoint new apostles. They'll say they've seen the risen Lord and were personally appointed by God. Some might not use the word apostle, but they will claim to have seen Christ and been given new revelation you won't find in the Scriptures. Avoid such liars and heretics.

The office of apostleship is closed. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:8 that he was the last apostle to be appointed. No others would come after him. When the Apostle John died at the end of the first century, the apostolic age came to an end. But their authority remains as having given us the word of God when we understand the text.

"For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ." Galatians 1:11-12

"So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone..." Ephesians 2:19-20  

Divine Personal Encounters With God?

 

Jesse Duplants: "Jesus is between 5-11 and about 6-foot-one. He's taller than I thought he was! ...And he put his hand on this shoulder. And he looked at me. He said, 'Go tell my people I'm comin'.'"

Mike Bickle: "I stood there, and uh, I was at the Lord's left hand, and this was not a dream, it was as real as life here... And he said, 'Young man!'"

Kim Walker-Smith: "I can feel him, like, it's like he's walking up to me across the room and just tapping me on the shoulder, 'Kim.' ...And I'm standing with Jesus. And I see God the Father in front of me."


There are teachers who will claim to have had a face-to-face conversation with God himself. But it's a lie. How can we know that? For lots of reasons. But in short, because Jesus warned that false teachers would claim such things.

"If anyone says to you, 'Look, here is the Christ!' or 'There he is!' do not believe it. For false christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders, so as to lead astray, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you beforehand. So, if they say to you, 'Look, he is in the wilderness,' do not go out. If they say, 'Look, he is in the inner rooms,' do not believe it.

"For as the lightning comes from the east and shines as far as the west, so will be the coming of the Son of man" (Matthew 24:23-27). The next appearance of Christ will be seen by the whole world -- not a select few in secret.

Joseph Smith claimed God the Father and Jesus Christ appeared to him and told him the church had become an abomination. So Smith started his own church full of destructive heresies. He was a charlatan, and so is every other modern day false prophet claiming to have had a personal audience with God. We will hear in their teaching many other lies when we understand the text.

This Is My Bible, I Am What it Says I Am?

"This is my Bible. I am what it says I am. I have what it says I have. I can do what it says I can do. Today, I will be taught the word of God. I boldly confess my mind is alert, my heart is receptive, I will never be the same, in Jesus name."

That's how Joel Osteen of Lakewood Church begins every sermon. So let's go back through this and break it down. "This is my Bible." Yeah, which he never opens and reads from, but I digress. We'll come back to that. "I am what it says I am." It says you're a sinner, an enemy of God, spiritually dead. The only person that can give you life and repair the relationship between you and God is Jesus Christ. So as long as you understand that, we're on the right track.

"I have what it says I have." If you have Christ, you have forgiveness of sins, eternal life, peace with God! If not, you're still under his wrath. "I can do what it says I can do." Correct. And the only thing you can do is sin. Unless the Holy Spirit is in you, and then you can please God.

"Today, I will be taught the word of God." Meditate on it day and night, Psalm 1. But unless the Spirit has changed you to receive it, you can't understand it, for the natural person can't discern spiritual things.

"I boldly confess my mind is alert." Now we're gettin' wonky. I boldly confess I have a million bucks. That doesn't make it true. "My heart is receptive." Again, only the Spirit can do that, not your declaration. "I will never be the same." And again, only if Christ has changed you.

"In Jesus name." Selfishly using  God's name is taking it in vain, also known as blasphemy. So about that first declaration: "This is my Bible." And you should read it. You don't declare anything over the Bible. The Bible declares authority over you, when we understand the text.

Praying In Tongues?

[Various audio clips of individuals praying in tongues...]

What you're hearing is commonly referred to as speaking in tongues. But it's not. It's just gibberish. No where in the Bible are we told to pray like this. In fact, there's not one verse in the Bible that encourages prayer in tongues.

What about the book of Acts? Well, the gift of tongues was given to share the gospel, so everyone could hear it in their own language.

What about in 1 Corinthians 14? Well it's there Paul says, "If I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays but my mind is unfruitful. What am I to do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also." That's not encouraging prayer in tongues, it's discouraging the practice.

But verse 39 says don't forbid speaking in tongues! Right, and the context is to prophesy, not private prayer. What is the gift of tongues for? It is "a sign not for believers but for unbelievers," to hear the gospel spoken in their own language. Read every passage on tongues with that understanding. It's not a prayer language, and it's especially not incoherent babbling.

Jesus said, "When you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the pagans do. Pray then like this: 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil."

Jesus prayed clear prayers, and so should we, when we understand the text.

Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders Said an Unborn Child Is a Person?

Hillary Clinton: "The unborn person doesn't have constitutional rights."

Bernie Sanders: "I do agree with the Secretary. I don't believe there's any constitutional protection for the unborn."

For decades we have been arguing: Is a child in the womb a person or not? Those who are pro-abortion have justified killing babies by denying they're babies at all. They call them "fetuses" and "tissue," avoiding any words that might attribute personhood.

But that's over now. It's out in the open, in print and on TV. A child in the womb is a person who deserves no rights. They claim their cause is noble, defending women's rights or health care, while denying rights and murdering those they acknowledge are people. How is this not an oppressive, murderous holocaust?

The Bible warns that in the last days, people will be lovers of self, proud, arrogant, abusive, unholy, heartless, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.

Among them are those who creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, always learning -- even understanding these children are people! -- yet never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.

Proverbs 31:8 "Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are destitute." The unborn are people, and even their enemies know it. Speak loud on their behalf. Call for repentance and preach the gospel of Christ, our only salvation from our murderous sins, when we understand the text.

Being Salt and Light?

"The Holy Spirit gave us the power to be witnesses, not to do witnessing. And so we need a generation of Christians that understand it's not about standing on a street corner to do witnessing, but to be witnesses on the earth. To bring salt and light in the midst of our darkness. That's what God has called us to do." ~Christine Caine via Lifechurch.tv

So according to Christine Caine, we're not to go preach the gospel, we're to just exist as Christians in the world. And not to judge or call out sin, rather we need to just bring salt and light.

I guess Peter and the rest of the apostles did it wrong when they were filled with the Holy Spirit and went into Jerusalem during a festival preaching the gospel, telling the people to repent of their sins, save themselves from this crooked generation, and to be baptized and to follow Jesus.

And Paul did it wrong when he went to the Areopagus and told the Greeks not to be ignorant but to repent of their sins because Jesus would soon return to judge the world. Then he went to Corinth and tried to preach to the Jews but they wouldn't listen to him, so he shook his garments of them and said, "Your blood is on your own heads."

And Jesus did it wrong when, in the same public sermon he preached about being salt and light, he said, "Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect." And "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only those who do the will of my Father. They will say, 'Didn't we do mighty things in your name?' And I will say, 'Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'"

Or maybe Christine Caine is wrong, and we should wage the good warfare lest by rejecting it we make a shipwreck of our faith. Being witnesses means that we speak truth and expose lies. Being salt and light means that we hold out the word of God and expose sin. Don't listen to anyone who tells you to just be and not do. They're liars when we understand the text.

Eternal Security?

In John 10, the Jews pressed Jesus to speak plainly if he was the Christ. Jesus answered, "I told you and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep."

"My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one."

It is God who gives us eternal life, and it is God who keeps us there. In Jude 24, we are told it is by the his power that we are kept from stumbling and presented blameless before him. In Ephesians 4:30, Paul writes that in Christ we are "sealed for the day of redemption." And in John 3:16, those who believe in Christ are given eternal life.

If it was possible to lose that gift of eternal life, then it wasn't eternal. If you could lose salvation, then you haven't been saved. It is by no work of our own that we are saved, and it is by no work of our own that we stay saved. It is from beginning to end the gracious work of God.

If a person confesses to being a follower of Jesus for a time, but then falls away, then they were never rooted in Christ to begin with, which Jesus explained in the parable of the sower.

But for those of us who have been called out of darkness and into his marvelous light, take heart, Christian. For nothing in all of creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord when we understand the text.

Do We Have to Prove God Exists?

Carl Sagan once said that "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." You know what? We agree! Though not in the way an atheist might think -- if it could be said that an atheist thinks. The burden of proof is more on an atheist to show there is no creator than it is on a Christian to prove that there is. Why? Because all human beings inherently understand design.

This is referred to as Empirical Adequacy. Pick any object and you inherently know it was created. But no atheist will ever be able to refer to anything coming into existence without cause or creator. Even if he were to cook up some example of random processes, he runs into the Implied Creator Paradox, because he had had to create an example of non-creation.

The statement made earlier about how atheists don't think? We aren't trying to be derogatory. We're simply following their logic. If we're nothing but the result of accidental process, than human beings are just walking sacks of chemicals. And chemicals cannot reason. They only react.

And that's a pretty good description of some atheists.

Romans 1:19-21, "For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened."

There's no reason to have to prove God's existence because everyone inherently knows God is real and His word is true. All of the evidence is already there when we understand the text.

You're David and Goliath Is Your Problems?

David and Goliath. Who doesn't know that story? Little shepherd boy faces a giant warrior and wins with nothing more than a stone and a sling and faith in God. It's a story about how God can help us be victorious when facing our biggest fears, right? Or, maybe there's more to it, when we understand the text.

The book of 1 Samuel, chapter 17, captures one of the most well-known stories not only in the Bible, but in all of human history -- the story of David and Goliath. From the time we're old enough to hold a crayon in Sunday school, we're coloring pictures of David and Goliath. We have a giant shown against a little boy, and already we're learning something out of context. David wasn't a little boy -- despite what Veggie Tales or this guy might tell you...

"So David is herding sheep. You might even say he could have been 8, 10, 12 years old." -Ray Vander Laan, "That The World May Know" video series distributed by Focus On the Family

In 1 Samuel 16:18, one of King Saul's servants describes David as "a man of valor, a man of war, prudent in speech, and a man of good presence, and the Lord is with him." Then Saul made David his armor bearer. So this isn't a mere boy we're talking about here. He was likely about 17 and a skilled slingsman, which was a valuable talent for Israel's army. Judges 20:16 describes 700 Benjimite slingsmen who could "sling a stone at a hair and not miss."

Israel was at war with the Philistines, a more advanced army equipped with swords and spears, while the Israelites basically only had farm tools. Every day, a 9 foot tall champion named Goliath (a common Philistine name), would go down into the valley and taunt the Israelites. "Choose a man for yourselves," he said, "and let him come down to me. If he is able to fight with me and kill me, then we will be your servants. But if I prevail against him and kill him, then you shall be our servants."

When David heard Goliath's taunting, he said, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?"

Long story short (because it is a pretty detailed story), David is brought before Saul, he says, "The Lord will deliver me." Saul wants him to wear armor, Saul's armor doesn't fit, so David grabs his staff and five smooth stones from a brook, though he'd only need one.

He comes out to Goliath who looks at David and says, "Am I a dog, that you come to me with sticks? Come to me, and I will give your flesh to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the field!"

Then David jaws back, "This day the Lord will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines to the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth that all the earth may know there is a God in Israel."

See? David's even a better taunter than Goliath!

Goliath drew near. David slung a stone at him which thunked him in the forehead, and he fell to the ground, face-first. Yup, the Bible even details which direction Goliath fell -- on his face (1 Samuel 17:49). Then David runs over, pulls out Goliath's sword, and lops his head off. Then David goes back in to see Saul, holding Goliath's head in his hand, but that's not the part of the story you colored in Sunday school. We like to leave the yucky stuff out.

But something else gets left out.

When we tell the story about David and Goliath, we like to talk about how we're David, and Goliath represents our problems, and with God's help, we can beat anything just like David beat Goliath. From the movies we watch to the songs we sing, and, yes, even this guy again...

"Now the lesson in that is, to me, God always wants you to simply use what he's given you to be good at." -Ray Vander Laan

But little guys do overcome the odds and win all the time. It's not like David was incapable. Remember, he was described as "a man of war." Prior to confronting Goliath, David had manhandled lions and bears. He absolutely knew that when he went out to face Goliath, he was going to beat him. David had no doubt. If we think of David beating Goliath as an underdog story, then we've missed the point.

David was not merely defying the odds to beat Goliath. He was the only person who could possibly have pulled it off. David is a picture of Christ.

David was the substitute who delivered the Israelites from certain defeat at the hands of the Philistines, just as Christ is the substitute who delivers us from the wages of sin. Christ, therefore, is the greater David, just as He's described in Hebrews 3 as the greater Moses and in Matthew 22 as David's Lord. So David wasn't the underdog. That was Goliath!

David went on to become known as Israel's greatest king. The Lord made a covenant with David and said that through his offspring, God would establish His kingdom forever. And so He did, through Jesus Christ, descendant of King David, the greater King than David.

We need to remember that the entire Bible points to Christ, Old Testament and New. You're not David and your problems aren't Goliath. David represents the Savior, the only Savior, who can save you from your sins.

And that's what we find when we understand the text.