Wednesday, August 29, 2018

Power found 292 times in KJV

Paul finishes Ephesians 3 with, [19] And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.
[20] Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
[21] Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

Of this passage, Bible teacher Keith Blades, author of Satan and His Plan of Evil, explains, “As Paul makes clear, God’s power today ‘worketh in us.’ This is done through the effectual working of His word and the Spirit of God in us. Hence, all the issues in this prayer are inner man issues. This, once again, is the sphere of the operation of God’s power in this dispensation.

“This stands in marked contrast to Israel’s program in which God covenanted to do marvels among them so that they would ‘see the work of the Lord’ in their midst as He worked in the outward circumstances of their lives.

“In addition to this, however, Paul also makes it clear in this prayer that the power of God’s word at work within us today is the most excellent display of God’s power. The exceeding great power that belongs to God’s word is able to be put on display today in an unprecedented and impressive manner.

“This is because not only is God’s word working within us able to do ‘exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think’ regarding the condition of our inner man, it is also able to do exceeding abundantly above all that Satan thinks he can do, as he works to show the capacity he still has to influence us in our inner man.

“That Satan desires to show that he is still able to affect our inner man, is something Paul makes clear throughout our epistles.”

*****

Paul writes in Romans 13:1, “Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God.”

“God established that His universe would be run by some controlling authorities; there’s no power--no authority to control things, run things, operate things--but of God,” explains Preacher Richard Jordan. “He’s the one who set that up. God established government, rule, authority, order. It’s the methodology by which His business is going to be carried out in the universe.

“When it says, ‘the powers that be,’ that’s the subdivisions of the power structure. The thrones, the dominions, the principalities, the powers, the mights, the magistrates--all those things that He established at creation.

“It says, ‘The powers that be are ordained of God.’ That’s why Jesus told Pilate, ‘You’d have no power if it wasn’t given you of God.’

******

In Genesis 2, God puts Adam “into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.” He gives Adam “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.” Adam was only told not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

Jordan explains, “What God in essence told Adam is, ‘Here’s creation. I want you to go out there and explore it, I want you to learn from it, I want you to see the wisdom and knowledge and understanding that I put in it and use it to enhance it; be an entrepreneur in my creation. But the choice of deciding what’s good and not good; that’s mine. You don’t do that.’ ”

*****

“In John 5:19, Jesus Christ says, “Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.

“Be careful about that to understand that as God the Son, if Jesus Christ had chosen to do something independent of His Father’s instruction, He would have never contradicted or disappointed His Father. He couldn’t do that. You know the verse: ‘God cannot lie.’ There’d be no way as God that He could do something that would disappoint God because of who they are.

“When He says, ‘The Son can do nothing of himself,’ in verse 30 He says, ‘I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.’

“He chose to demonstrate the superiority and excellence He placed in the Father’s will by putting it in front of His.

“You see, the faith of Christ is that He made a choice to personally depend on what His Father’s will and word was. What He’s doing in this is not like saying, ‘Well, I could have done something that would have disobeyed Him,’ because He couldn’t have disobeyed Him; it wasn’t His nature.

*****

“Everything He does—the words He preaches, the works He accomplishes—is what the Father planned to do, so it’s a great statement that He’s demonstrating how completely and thoroughly . . . it’s that oneness with the Father that demonstrates, actually, His deity.

“The verse in Amos says, ‘Can two walk together, except they be agreed?’ God says, ‘I’m not going to do anything that I don’t show it to my servants the prophets.’ So Christ says, ‘The Father has completely shared with me His heart,’ and there’s an intimacy there and that oneness is part of the thing the (persecuting Jews in John 5) were so angry about.

“Verse 5:21 says, ‘For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even so the Son quickeneth whom he will.’

“You see the ‘as’ and the ‘so’? That comparison, using ‘like’ or ‘as,’ ‘as’ and ‘so,’ is one of the great tools in Bible study.

“Whatever the Father can do, the Son can do and then He adds, ‘The Son quickeneth whom he will.’ In other words, He’s got this capacity to give life. Only God can do that. He’s got this equality with the Father, of divine rights and privileges. He’s not any less than the Father.

“Verse 22 says, ‘For the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son.’

“Not only can Christ raise people from the dead, He can quicken them (giving them life) and that, by the way, is going to talk about what He told Nicodemus about being born again and regenerated.

“Verse 21 is really talking about spiritual resurrection, in addition to the physical resurrection that will come in a minute.

“As the Father does, the Son has equal authority, equal rights, equal privileges as the Father. For the Father judgeth no man. Now, if anybody has a right to judge, it’d be God the Father.

“You know that verse in the Old Testament: ‘Shall not the judge of the whole earth do right?’ He is the judge of the whole earth.

*****

“David said it in Psalm 51 after he confessed his sins with Bathsheba, and the murder of her husband and the betrayal of his nation, he has that great prayer of repentance: ‘Against thee and thee only have I sinned.’

“When you realize that the sin, in the final analysis, isn’t really against Uriah or Bathsheba, or the little baby that died, or even the nation that he led; he sinned against all of them grievously, but the real sin was against God.

“That’s why he says it’s like ‘the breaking of the bones.’ That’s what he described guilt as. ‘Blood guiltiness.’

“When you get to the place where you see God--the holiness and the righteousness of God and His justice; His right to avenge His offended righteousness—and you see that your sin is against Him, that’s where you really have a problem.

“Compared to God, Uriah was just a flash in the pan. What David did with the nation . . . it was against God, and if you sinned against God, God’s justice has a right to judge.

“So the Father has the right to judge, but the verse says the Father doesn’t exercise that right, instead committing all judgment to the Son. The Father gave the Son the responsibility to do the judgment; it’s His right but He gave the privilege to the Son.

“The reason is, as verse 23 says, ‘That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent him.’

“God the Father has set the situation up so that the Son receives the same honor the Father has a right to. If you’re going to honor the Father, you’ve got to honor the Son. And if you honor the Son, you’re honoring the Father. Because there’s equality when it comes to the issue of honor, and esteem and approbation. That’s the way the godhead works, by the way.

*****

“The members of the godhead have no thought about glorifying or honoring themselves; it’s always honoring the other one. When you think about that, it kind of explains to you some of the things about the trinity.

“If there were two people in the trinity you couldn’t do that. If there was only one person there would be no one else for them to love and be loved by. If there’s two, you can share it back and forth and you could take your love and give it to the other and their’s back to you, but really to love and be loved requires that third person because now ‘I love freely them and they love freely each other and yet they love me too.’

“There are three people in the godhead and that’s why the life of the godhead is each living for the other in this unique and distinct way. There could be 50 people in the godhead and it wouldn’t make any more difference than if there’s three.

*****

“Jesus continues in the passage in John 5, [25] Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.
[26] For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself;

“Again, He’s talking about spiritual life being imparted to those who believe. The Father has appointed the Son to be the one who can give life inherently. He holds it and He can apply it to others. He has it in Himself. God’s life isn’t derived. Your life is. Prior to your conception, you didn’t exist. You derived life. Where’d you get it from? Your parents.

“Ecclesiastes calls it ‘the silver cord.’ It goes all the way back to Adam who begat sons and daughters in his own image. And that silver cord of human life, the spirit of life that’s passed down, we don’t have it inherently, but God does. He is life . . .

“And not only does the Father have it, the Son has it, and He’s given it to the Son to manifest the fact that He does have it by allowing the Son to be the one who imparts it to others, because it’s His.”

Sunday, August 26, 2018

Inner-man power taught 'from the inside'

A classic hymn from 1864 begins, "Loved with everlasting love,
Led by grace that love to know;
Spirit, breathing from above,
Thou hast taught me it is so!
Oh, this full and perfect peace!
Oh, this transport all divine!
In a love which cannot cease,
I am His, and He is mine"


A famous quote by philosopher Robert C. Solomon says,
"Love can be understood only 'from the inside,' as a language can be understood only by someone who speaks it, as a world can be understood only by someone who lives in it."

The Apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 3, [16] That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;
[17] That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
[18] May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
[19] And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.
[20] Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
[21] Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

*****

“I don't think Believers appreciate near enough the fact that just by taking God at His Word--truly believing the Bible, dispensationally considered, contains absolutely everything God wants us to know about Him and our relationship to Him--lends real power,” says Jordan. “It's internal power that shatters anything the world has to offer.

"It's that ability God gives in the inner man, strengthened with might. It's an energy in your inner man to endure. That's spiritual power. There's something about that strength, that power that God gives. No great open physical displays and things that make everybody 'ooh' and 'ahh,' but that 'patient continuance in well doing.'

“He's saying not only can we know something about the breadth, length, depth and height of Jesus Christ's love for us, but we can truly know it and its power to work in us. The power is in the faith in it.

“Through knowing the measurements, dimensions and parameters of exactly what God is doing today, there's a maturing of the relationship that is extremely intimate and lends deep, deep communion.

"You can not just know about His tremendous love, but KNOW it, appreciate it, enter into it and find out how it passes knowledge. Just as it is in a momma's touch with a newborn baby, there's a love there and a communication there that passes any ability to understand and explain it.

"It's that kind of a bond, that kind of a connection. It's as though it were a mother's touch that reaches down and assuages the hurt and salves the wound and dispels the fear and gives untold strength and stability.

*****

Paul writes in I Thessalonians 1:5, ‘For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in POWER, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.’

“He says in chapter 2, ‘For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.’

“Jesus says, ‘The flesh profiteth nothing,’ meaning all of OUR wisdom and OUR resources aren’t the issue.

“You got to start there! You never want to glory in yourself: ‘It isn’t me; it’s Him.’

“Jesus said, ‘The words that I speak unto you they are spirit and they are life.' The need is, 'Not I but Christ.' You're to constantly be learning this at a different level; that's part of what maturity is all about.

"The words on the pages are the Words of the Spirit and when I believe that Word, and put my faith in it, it WORKS; it becomes energizing activity and life.

“Paul writes in II Thessalonians 3:1: ‘Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified, even as it is with you.’

“Paul’s saying, ‘I want the Word of the Lord to be set free; to run without obstacles, without needing to stop and be glorified.’

“When you glorify something, you demonstrate how valuable it is; how much of a treasure it is. How important it is.

“How would you glorify the Lord Jesus Christ? How do you demonstrate in your life that you cherish Him—His wisdom, His thinking--more than anybody else?”

(new article tomorrow)

Saturday, August 25, 2018

Supposing Him to be the Gardener

In the last week of Jesus Christ’s life before He was crucified, He went into the temple in Jerusalem, as Malachi foretold, cleansing it and casting out the money-changers.

Presenting Himself as the priest, Christ temporarily restored the temple back to God’s intended purpose for it, teaching in it daily, as Luke 19:47 reports.

“Not only is He the king and the priest, but He’s also the prophet of Israel,” explains Jordan. “He’s the ‘interpreter of the ways of God,’ as G. Campbell Morgan once said. He’s teaching in the temple and the people hear Him, and this extends to the last day of His life.

“Luke 21:37 says, ‘And in the day time he was teaching in the temple; and at night he went out, and abode in the mount that is called the mount of Olives.’

“From this, we know Christ didn’t spend His nights in Jerusalem, but went outside the city up on the Mount of Olives and slept under the stars.

“The point is there’s no place for Him; not in the beginning of His life in Bethlehem and not in the end. Jerusalem has rejected Him and He leaves the city, understanding He’s been rejected.

“The leadership of the nation has rejected Him so finally He withdraws Himself from public preaching to the masses and educates only His disciples for the ministry they’re going to have after He’s gone. He instructs them, ‘Don’t go tell them I’m the Christ.’ It’s that withdrawal stage.

*****

“In Luke 20, Christ, knowing He’s about ready to go to the Cross, brings out the final issues with the leaders of Israel.

“There’s a back and forth where they question Him and He answers them, and they question Him some more and He answers them and they try to trick Him and He’s not tricked. At the end of the chapter, you see He turns around and asks them one question, and then they’re afraid to talk to Him anymore. What He’s doing is pressing the final point.”

“Luke 20:1-8 says, “And it came to pass, that on one of those days, as he taught the people in the temple, and preached the gospel, the chief priests and the scribes came upon him with the elders,
[2] And spake unto him, saying, Tell us, by what authority doest thou these things? or who is he that gave thee this authority?
[3] And he answered and said unto them, I will also ask you one thing; and answer me:
[4] The baptism of John, was it from heaven, or of men?
[5] And they reasoned with themselves, saying, If we shall say, From heaven; he will say, Why then believed ye him not?
[6] But and if we say, Of men; all the people will stone us: for they be persuaded that John was a prophet.
[7] And they answered, that they could not tell whence it was.
[8] And Jesus said unto them, Neither tell I you by what authority I do these things.”

“The chief priests, scribes and elders had been questioning Him, and He responded to them about His authority, demonstrating they weren’t sincere. He then asked them about where did John get his authority, and His point was obvious. Then they wanted to know by what authority He was doing what He was doing, teaching in the temple.

“And He says, ‘Where did John get his authority?’ John, of course, was the one who witnessed of Him; ‘he bore witness to the truth’ and identified Christ as the Messiah, and he was not relying on his own personal claim—he relied upon the witness God the Father gave him through others.

“Well, they wouldn’t answer Him, thinking, ‘Well, if we say, [From God,] He’s going to say, [Why didn’t you believe him?] and if we say, [Well, John didn’t get his authority from God], the people think John’s a prophet and they’ll get mad at us,’ so they took the dodge and said, ‘We can’t tell.’

“By the way, that’s the academic approach of scholarship and these were the scholars in the nation. There’s this professional courtesy among religious academics that says you can sit around the table, and you can have your convictions, but everyone else has their own tradition so, ‘We just really don’t know for sure what’s right. We just all agree we’re sitting at the table.’ I’ve been in those meetings. That’s one of the reason I don’t go to them. It drives me nuts to be in a crowd like that.

“So now Christ’s going to turn to the people. And He spoke to them the parable: ‘a certain man planted a vineyard.’ He’s going to trace the history of Israel and then He’s going to talk about the fact that some people are going to try to kill Him and will succeed, but it’s going to wind up being their ruin.”

*****

In Jesus’ day, the Garden of Gethsemane, on the slopes of the Mount of Olives, was sought by citizens of Jerusalem for rest and relief from the sun.

The same author and composer of the classic hymn Dwelling in Beulah Land (“I’m living on the mountain, underneath a cloudless sky”), Charles Austin Miles (1868-1946), is responsible for one of the greatest gospel hymns of all time, In the Garden.

According to Helen Salem Rizk’s 1964 book Stories of the Christian Hymns, Miles was asked in 1912 to “write a hymn poem that would ‘breathe tenderness’ and bring hope and rest for the weary.”; Miles visualizing Mary Magdalene at the Garden brought forth the words:

I come to the garden alone
While the dew is still on the roses
And the voice I hear, falling on my ear
The Son of God discloses


And He walks with me
And He talks with me
And He tells me I am His own
And the joy we share as we tarry there
None other has ever known


He speaks and the sound of His voice
Is so sweet the birds hush their singing
And the melody that He gave to me
Within my heart is ringing
And He walks with me
And He talks with me
And He tells me I am His own
And the joy we share as we tarry there
None other has ever known

Wednesday, August 22, 2018

Life of Job in troublous times ahead

Job, the first written book of the entire Bible and the book the Israelites escaped with across the Red Sea, has always had skeptics and detractors who tell you Job was a fictional character set into a fictional situation.

In Ezekiel 14, a passage about the Day of the Lord and the judgment of Christ when He comes back to destroy His enemies and pour out His wrath, is this verse: “Though these three men, Noah, Daniel, and Job, were in it, they should deliver but their own souls by their righteousness, saith the Lord GOD.”

As Jordan reasons, “If I were going to reference three men, I wouldn’t say, ‘Noah, Daniel and Mr. Magoo.’ I wouldn’t say, ‘Noah, Daniel and Mickey Mouse.’ In other words, if I’m going to use two real people, and the third one isn’t, there’s no reason to believe any of the people are real people, so there’s the assumption built-in of the real identity of Job. Now, I know there are a lot of people who won’t believe that.”

*****

The author of the Book of Job is Elihu, a young man who kept a first-hand chronicle of all that happened to and was said by Job and his three friends, or the “miserable comforters,” as they’re called.

“When you read in Job the repeated phrase, ‘Moreover Job continued his parable, and said,’ you know that’s the writer putting that in,” reasons Jordan. “Elihu understood that what he was writing was more than just the life story of the man Job. Job’s life and the things that were happening to Job were a parable. Job’s life paralleled something bigger.”

Job fits at the head of the five “poetry” books that deal with the heart of the “believing remnant” in Israel as it endures the plight of satanic captivity.

Just as you’ll find the best physical description of Jesus Christ in the Song of Solomon (the last of the five “poetry” books), the Book of Job gives the best physical description of the Antichrist.

“When you think about the fact Job was written early, that means Israel knew this information all along and could have understood some tremendous things,” says Jordan. “There are places in Moses’ writings where he’s literally using words out of Job to tell Israel what God’s going to do for them.”

*****

“From the beginning of the book, we know Job was an extremely prominent, powerful figure in the community in his day.

“You read in chapter 1 about the wealth he had and all the stuff but he was not just a wealthy guy sitting off behind a fence somewhere. Job was a wealthy businessman who was involved in the government and judicial system of his community. Everybody knew who Job was and everybody loved him.

“He says, ‘When I went down to the courthouse to work, the young men saw me and hid themselves. The aged men rose and stood up.’ They’re honoring him. The young guys quit playing and got out of the way and the elders respected him—he was an honorable, respectable man.

“Further in Job 29, it says the ‘princes refrained talking, and laid their hand on their mouth’ and ‘the nobles held their peace, and their tongue cleaved to the roof of their mouth.’ That’s saying, ‘When E.F. Hutton speaks, everybody listens.’

“Job says, ‘When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me:
[12] Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to help him.
[13] The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me: and I caused the widow's heart to sing for joy.’

“You know what he’s doing? He’s doing exactly what that Believing Remnant in Israel is told to do in the Book of James and I John. Exactly what Isaiah 58 told them they had to be doing in the tribulation. What does James 1 says pure religion is? ‘To visit the fatherless and the widow.’ Job is an example of that little flock.

*****

Job continues, “I put on righteousness, and it clothed me: my judgment was as a robe and a diadem.
[15] I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame.
[16] I was a father to the poor: and the cause which I knew not I searched out.
[17] And I brake the jaws of the wicked, and plucked the spoil out of his teeth.”

Jordan explains, “He says, ‘When I see a wicked man going over and devouring somebody, I want to sock him right in the chops and bust the teeth out of his mouth.’ He’s upholding justice.

“Job goes on yet, ‘Unto me men gave ear, and waited, and kept silence at my counsel.
[22] After my words they spake not again; and my speech dropped upon them.
[23] And they waited for me as for the rain; and they opened their mouth wide as for the latter rain.
[24] If I laughed on them, they believed it not; and the light of my countenance they cast not down.
[25] I chose out their way, and sat chief, and dwelt as a king in the army, as one that comforteth the mourners.’

“He’s saying, ‘They just couldn’t get enough me.’ You ever see somebody out in the rain try to get water like that? You get thirsty. He’s saying, ‘When I talked, people were so hungry to hear what I had to say it was just like that. If I laughed on them they believed it not. The light of my countenance. I dwelt as a king in the army.’

“You remember what the army of Israel said to David? They said, ‘David you can’t go, you’re the king! One of you is worth 10,000 of us! You’re too valuable!’ Job says, ‘That’s the way they looked at me!’

“And then, all of a sudden, it’s gone. And then Job’s sick, hit twice. Can you understand why he says over there, ‘I’m confused?’ . . .  This was not some isolated little fellow; a hermit off on a mountain somewhere who just got head lice and developed boils. This was the ‘big man on campus.’ ”

*****
“The name Job means ‘persecuted one’; ‘afflicted one’; ‘one who’s caused to suffer.’

“All those acquaintances of Job—you ought to go back to Job 19 and read what they say—
 it was, ‘Job who? Huh, don’t know ya.’ Even his house servants, his butler and his chauffeur wouldn’t acknowledge knowing him. You know, you could expect that of your lawyer, but your chauffeur? Your gardener?

“And then it says his wife . . . it’s a strange verse over there. He says, ‘My breath was a stranger to my wife.’ You got to get close to somebody to know what their breath smells like.

“But you know what happened? His wife left him. You remember the old bat back in chapter 2, don’t you? The verse reads, ‘Then said his wife unto him, Dost thou still retain thine integrity? curse God, and die.’

“Well, he’s probably better off that she left him. She sure was no comfort to him. She took up the devil’s line. She literally said to Job what Satan was saying to God Job would say.

“Notice that when Job got back everything double (at the end of the Book), it didn’t include his wife. Now that may have been a blessing in and of itself, considering the kind of wife she turned out to be.

“She was a source of the working of the satanic policy of evil in Job’s home. You go over and study I John and he tells the Believing Remnant how to know whether they’re in the true fellowship or not. He tells them how to spot the real Israel of God and how they could know for themselves whether they really had the Spirit of God working in them or whether they were phonies.

*****

“II John says this issue of being able to discern the seducing policy of the Adversary has to be carefully practiced in the home. III John says it has to be practiced in the ministry in the local church. And the two things that he adds on to I John as appendixes—
II and III—don’t tell them how to do it; it tells them where to do it.

“People like to quote II John in regards to ecclesiastical separation, but it’s about separation in a home—in a house, among a family. That’s what’s happening in Job’s house.

“When Job’s seven sons and three daughters died, he knew he didn’t really lose them because he believed in resurrection.

“In Job 19, he says, ‘For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God.’

“Job’s supposed friend Bildad actually accuses Job of being at fault for the death of his children. He reasons in Job 8, ‘Doth God pervert judgment? or doth the Almighty pervert justice? If thy children have sinned against him, and he have cast them away for their transgression.’

“Oh, it’s a cruel shock—a terrible thing. Bildad says to him about his kids being dead, ‘If they had been living for the Lord, they wouldn’t be dead now.’

“Man, wouldn’t that be a cruel thing to say when you just lost 10 kids?! ‘God’s just and if your kids hadn’t been living in sin, they’d still be with us.’ Oooh. Can you understand why Job wouldn’t consider these people a great comfort? They were ‘miserable comforters,’ as he called them. ‘Forgers of lies,’ he calls them. That’s why it’s so remarkable he later has this change of heart about them.

******

“Job didn’t suffer because of anything he did; he suffered because of something God was doing—he suffered according to the will of God.

“God has allowed Job to be in satanic captivity because of something bigger than what’s going on with Job. It had nothing to do with anything Job was doing wrong. In fact, if you look at chapter 1, when Satan comes on the scene here, it says:

‘Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.
[7] And the LORD said unto Satan, Whence comest thou? Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in it.
[8] And the LORD said unto Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job, that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man, one that feareth God, and escheweth evil?
[9] Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought?’

“When you go to and fro in something, and you walk up and down in it in the Bible, that’s a gesture, a posture of ownership. God told Abraham in Genesis 13 to, ‘Go over into that land and walk up and down in it because it’s yours.’ It’s an exercise that speaks of possession; ownership.

“When you have free access to something it’s because you’re at home; you possess it; you own it, and that’s what Satan’s doing. ‘As a roaring lion he walks to and fro on the earth, seeking whom he may desire.’ He’s going around in the earth looking for anybody arguing with him on the earth, and if they are, he’s going to eat ’em up, chew ’em up and take them captive and spit them out.

“He says to God, ‘Hey, I’m down there possessing the earth! It’s mine!’ You see, the issue between God and Satan immediately is the possession of the Planet Earth. And in the context of that contest between God and Satan—in connection with his contention with God over the earth—the Lord said unto Satan, ‘Whence comest thou.’ Then the Lord said unto Satan, ‘Hast thou considered my servant Job?’

“Notice Satan didn’t answer saying, ‘If you knew Job like I know Job, you’d know he was a dirty rotten rascal.’ You read down through there and you’ll never find Satan say anything bad about Job.

“Job’s a good guy, and the issue isn’t going to be Job’s conduct in the sense of ‘he’s doing something wrong; we’re going to get even with him.’ The reason Job’s going to suffer is there’s this conflict between God and the Adversary in the angelic realm, and involved in that conflict . . .  in order for God to bring Satan, the proud one, low, as Job 40 says He’s going to do, Job’s suffering has to do with the fact God’s doing something in the earth.”

Saturday, August 18, 2018

Old E-li-jah w-as a pro-phet . . . in de-spair

Next to Moses, Elijah was probably the most impressive man in the Old Testament and yet he suffered with depression.

Elijah had the ability to perform tremendous miracles: Heal the sick, raise the dead, call fire down from heaven, stop the rain from falling for three years and then make it start up again, etc. Malachi talks about how before Jesus Christ’s return to set up His kingdom, Elijah will reappear on the stage of events in the "last days." In Revelation 11, he is seen again performing miracles.

“One of the best stories in Scripture takes place in I Kings 18 when Elijah (single-handedly) did battle with 450 prophets of Baal,” relays the book, 1001 Surprising Things you Should Know About the Bible. “Placing a bull on an altar on top of Mount Carmel, he challenged the prophets to make fire come down and consume the sacrifice. When they failed, he taunted them, suggesting that their god must be asleep or away on a trip.

"Elijah then had water poured on the bull, stepping forward and saying a short prayer: ‘Let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant.’ Fire suddenly came down from heaven and burned up the sacrifice—leading the crowd watching to prostrate themselves before God, then turn and slaughter the false priests.”

*****

“Elijah’s a key figure in Israel’s history,” says Preacher Richard Jordan. “He established the school of the prophets. His ministry forestalled apostasy in Israel for decades and generations.”

“Nevertheless, I Kings 19:4 reports that Elijah ‘went a day's journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a juniper tree: and he requested for himself that he might die; and said, It is enough; now, O LORD, take away my life; for I am not better than my fathers.’

“He goes right down into the pit. He’s not just going to quit, but he says, ‘C’mon, Lord, just kill me.’ Everything’s reversed itself suddenly and now Elijah is running for his life out in the wilderness, sitting under the juniper tree all in a punk; in the throes of despair.

“And you have to appreciate he’s going from the mountaintop of Carmel in chapter 18— where he wins a great victory in his ministry and life—to the slew of despond under a tree in the desert in chapter 19, asking God to kill him.

“It was an overnight event. It didn’t take a long process to get there. Sometimes depression comes on you that way. Sometimes it comes on quickly. Sometimes you move from the joy and excitement of victory right into the agonies, defeats and dark doldrums.

“In I Kings 19:10, Elijah explains of himself, ‘I have been very jealous for the LORD God of hosts: for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.

“Now, if you can’t see the series of bad-thinking in that you’re not listening. Elijah’s whole problem is he’s got unrealistic thinking and expectations; some misplaced dependencies.

“He says, ‘Look at what I’ve been doing.’ He’s talking about his own activities. Where’s his dependency been? ‘Israel’s failed, but I alone. . .’ You know, in reality there were 7,000 other people who were faithful too. Elijah thought he was all by himself and yet there were 7,000 men in Israel who hadn’t bowed their knee to Baal. But all Elijah sees is himself. He misplaced his dependencies onto what he was doing and then got expectations.

*****

“Self-pity blinds his eyes to the resources he has, maximizing the difficulties against him. And that’s always what happens. In your life, when you begin to focus on yourself, it’s the self-pity that’s present in every depression. I don’t care what it is, where it came from, how it’s induced; it always has an element of self-pity in it. That’s the part of the formula you have to attack.

“Self-pity involves two forms of thinking. One is past thinking, where you remember; you rehearse the injury, the rejection, and you just go over it and over it in your mind.

“The other is future thinking where you project the insult or injury into the future and you begin to have anxiety and foreboding, worry and fear about it happening again; about it coming into your life in the future. And those things will eat your lunch. You won’t live above the snake line with thinking like that. That will put you in an absolute tailspin of despondency and despair.”

Tuesday, August 14, 2018

Arguing 'I believe in science' for fools

The word science appears twice in Scripture, first favorably and then negatively. Daniel 1:4 says, [4] Children in whom was no blemish, but well favoured, and skilful in all wisdom, and cunning in knowledge, and understanding science, and such as had ability in them to stand in the king's palace, and whom they might teach the learning and the tongue of the Chaldeans.

Paul writes in I Timothy 6:20, “O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called.”

“The Bible’s against things that purport or pretend to be knowledge but really are not,” explains Ohio preacher David Reid in a study. “Verse 21 continues, ‘Which some professing have erred concerning the faith.’


“False science is the result of man’s desire not to retain God in his knowledge. Romans 1:18 says, ‘For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness.’


“Here’s what is commonly thought: Man likes to pretend that the truth is hard to find; that it’s elusive. People say, ‘Well, the reason I don’t believe is because the evidence is so confusing; it’s so hard to figure out.’


“But what does Romans 1 say? Verses 19-20: ‘Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
[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.’


“Is the truth hard to find or is it actually within man’s grasp? The problem is men hold that truth in unrighteousness.


“Don’t people say all the time, ‘Well, I’d believe if I just saw a sign. I mean, if you’ve never seen Him how do you know He exists?’


“Notice the verse says, ‘Being understood by the things that are made.’ That’s interesting because what people pretend all the time is that they don’t understand. It says ‘even his eternal power and Godhead,’ and this is the part they detest above all else--‘so that they are without excuse.’


*****


“Have you ever witnessed to somebody and they say, ‘Well, what about those who haven’t heard?’ That is an intellectual evasion. You know why? You’re trying to tell them!


“Whatever happens to those who haven’t heard is totally irrelevant to your situation because you’re being told! You know why people raise that? They want the answer to be that those who haven’t heard get a free pass, in which case, ‘Shut up!’


“You see, what man wants is there to be an excuse. What Romans 1:18-20 does is it says, ‘Look, guys, c’mon, you do know . . .  you know, you know, you know.’


*****


“Romans 1:22 says, ‘Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.’


“It’s fascinating to me that if you attain a PhD and then you obtain a full-time appointment with a university, what is your title? Professor. And the idea is you PROFESS; you assert to know something.


“Well, Romans 1:22 is exactly how men operate. He declares himself to be wise, and yet for the vast majority of mankind, they have rejected truth and, in the process, become fools.


“What man does is he refuses to retain God in his knowledge and then constructs a false wisdom to make it appear that his refusal is wise. They don’t want to think they’re doing something dumb, so they invent all sorts of false things like science to claim they’re being wise.


“I Corinthians 1:20 says, ‘Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?’


“Notice verse 21: ‘For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.’


“Is that God’s wisdom or man’s wisdom? For in the wisdom of God, men decided to create their own wisdom to defend their not knowing God. What that tells you is man has all sorts of false things that he believes; that he constructs for the purpose of excusing, defending or rationalizing why he’s rejected the knowledge of God.


“When man rejects God, he rejects true knowledge; he rejects true science because science is knowledge. But what happens is nature abhors a vacuum, so when man rejects truth, what’s he left with? He’s only left with worshipping something that’s false. Man’s going to worship something.


*****


“You may think this is an exaggeration, but I would say to you that men worship science. I came across the following quote from a professor in a college alumni magazine I was reading recently:

‘Many people believe we will never bridge the moral and, thus, political divide in the United States. I’m a little more optimistic. You see, I believe in a higher power that does have the ability to provide this country with answers. Some may even say it speaks to me directly; it’s called science.’


“That’s where a lot of mankind is. They are looking for the answers to life—‘It can bridge the world divide in our country! It can solve the problems of life!’ And what it is, 'It speaks to us! It’s science!' And what they mean by that is ‘man’s science.’


“The professor’s not referring to studying the Scriptures and getting a better understanding of God’s science; it’s a reference to man’s wisdom solving the issues of life.


*****


“If you study the history of evolution at all, you know it’s a history of hoaxes where they have believed that, ‘Oh, this proves something,’ and then years later they find out it’s a hoax.


“Let me suggest this, evolution is a faith. Some dictionaries will define faith as ‘something that is believed in the absence of proof.’ That’s not faith. That’s silliness. That’s superstition. If you believe things in the absence of proof, that’s just conjecture or being naïve.


“If you have faith in the Word of God, you’re believing something because there IS abundant proof that the Scriptures are true.


“When you read the Old Testament, there are all these specific prophecies that are then fulfilled in the New Testament that could not have happened by chance. When you believe the Word of God is true, it’s not a belief in the absence of proof; it’s a belief supported BY proof.


“The correct definition of faith is it’s something you did not see. Why do I say that? II Corinthians 5:7: ‘For we walk by faith, not by sight.’ So faith and sight are what? They’re opposites. Hebrews 11:1 says, ‘Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.’


“Faith and sight are opposites. If you didn’t see something happen, then you believe it by faith. So, for example, you take it by faith that George Washington was the first president of the U.S. The point is, if you didn’t SEE it, it’s faith.


*****


“Evolution is the belief that all life arises from a single common ancestor; a one-celled organism. So evolution is a belief about the origin of life; how it all started.


“Think through this with me: How many people, including scientists, were there to observe, to witness the origin of life? If you believe evolution, by definition there couldn’t have been anybody because nobody was there! It took billions of years for man to even arrive! So for him to say, ‘Yes, evolution is a fact,’ he never witnessed it and no man EVER did.


“So evolution is a faith, and evolutionists will just freak out about that, but that is true. No one witnessed evolution in the past, and can I tell you, no one observes it today. If anyone thought they could observe evolution today, they would record it and put it on YouTube and say, ‘The creationists are idiots; just watch this video.’


*****


“The first step of the Scientific Method is, make an observation, which in a word is ‘sight.’ The way the Scientific Method works is it observes some physical phenomenon and it tries to measure and evaluate it, but the point is it’s based upon observation, yet no one has observed the origin of life.


“May I suggest to you, evolution itself is not science according to the Scientific Method because the Scientific Method is based upon observation, and there was no one here to observe it! It’s all just guesswork and speculation to try and apply it.


“The origin of life is not something that can be studied using the Scientific Method and therefore evolution is unscientific. The bottom line is, God created the universe and He has said what happened and He didn’t say evolution happened.


*****


“There are no observed instances of species-to-species evolution. When we define evolution, it’s the belief all life arises from a common ancestor, meaning there was a one-celled organism in the past that went to a two-celled organism to a four to an eight to a cat, dog, wolverine, etc.


“What science talks about all the time is they’re trying to find the ‘missing link.’ But if you think about that for even 12 seconds, you realize the problem is not a missing link; the problem is THOUSANDS upon thousands of missing links, where it goes from cat to dog to platypus to bear to horse to pig to monkey. That’s a big problem.


“Here’s the second problem. There are no observed, naturally occurring favorable mutations. What does that mean? What evolution presupposes is organisms reproduce and there will be a genetic mutation, and the organism that has that mutation will then be better adapted to its environment; it will live longer and reproduce more.


“The whole crux of that is then there have to be mutations that are actually favorable. The problem is when they look at mutations (deviations from the correct genetic code), they invariably make the organism less well-suited to survive.


“So if evolution is true, evolutionists ought to be able to give us a list of 25 naturally occurring favorable mutations, because to go from a one-celled organism to mankind, you need hundreds of millions. So asking for 25 doesn’t seem like much. I’d be happy with 10. They don’t have 5. Truth be told, they don’t have any.


“You know why there’s none? Because God, when He created dogs, He created the perfect dog. When He created cats, He created the perfect cat. There was no mutation; there was no deviation from what God did that could possibly be an improvement.


******


“Evolution is the idea that you go from the one-celled organism to the highly specialized and functioning man.


“Think about this: Your body tends to live to 80 years old despite what you eat. Your body does such a good job repairing itself because the Creator designed it that way.


“Well, what evolution then believes is you went from this one-celled organism to this extremely, well-functioning, specialized, complex organism. Let me just tell you, life doesn’t work that way.


“How about this, your child comes to you and says, ‘Hey, dad, I’ve got this one-thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle. Can you help me out?’ and you say, ‘Sure, son, here’s what you do. Take all the pieces, throw them in the dryer and put them on the spin cycle and just leave them for an hour. And what they’ll do is they’ll assemble themselves together.’


“What evolution believes is that order emerges from chaos by chance. They don’t believe there’s the application of external intelligence; they believe it’s by chance. So you put the puzzle on for an hour and what happens? Nothing! So run it again!


“The point is, if your philosophy for trying to put a jigsaw puzzle together is to use the dryer, you will be frustrated in life. Well, that’s what evolution believes.


*****


“Entropy is a measure of the disorder of a system. To make it simple, entropy is disorder. It’s lack of organization; it’s chaos.


“The California Poly Technical State University at San Luis Obispo has an article on the second law of thermodynamics that states, ‘Entropy is the measure of a disorder of a system. That disorder can be represented in terms of energy that is not available to be used. Natural processes will always proceed in the direction that increases the disorder of a system. All natural processes tend toward increasing disorder.’


“Did you get that? I call that the ‘law of the garage.’ What happens to your garage? Every six months or longer you have to restore it to a state of order. Because naturally it does what? It declines into chaos.


“What my children do, for example, is they follow my wife around, and as soon as she gets something done, they help her by ‘fixing it.’ What happens? Every progress you make is immediately undone. That’s life in a universe where there is entropy.


“All natural processes move in the direction of increasing disorder. Evolution doesn’t say you went from a one-celled organism to man in a week. It says there were billions and billions of years, so that by chance there was enough time, and given long enough they would eventually assemble themselves into the right shapes and order and so on.


“But you have to understand, the longer you make that period of time, what is the direction of the universe? Is it toward order or disorder? Making the period of time longer does not solve your problem. If anything, it makes it worse.


“No one believes in evolution because it’s compelling. It’s contrary to common sense. Do you go camping and take a nature hike and find an IPhone and say, ‘Wow, how did this assemble itself out in the woods?’


“Or do you assume some intelligent person left it there? That there was a designer who created it? You see, the design testifies to a designer.


******


“Some people claim that evolution can be reconciled with a literal belief in Scripture. Not so. God simply doesn't give you that option.


“First, God created all animal life in two days. That’s Genesis 1:20-30.


“One of the common things people do to make Genesis 1 not say what it says is when they see the word ‘day,’ they say, ‘Oh, well, a day means a lengthy period of time. It’s not just a normal day.’


“Genesis 1:5 says, ‘And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.’


“So this day has an evening and a morning.  If you go through all the days, it says that each time. It’s almost as if God knew the nonsense people would say and just put little things in there to disprove them.


“Genesis 2:2 says, ‘And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.’


“Do you say you did something ON a millennium? Or ON an eon? You do something IN a millennium, but you do something ON a day.


“Exodus 20:11 says, ‘For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.’


“Think through this with me. If you say in Genesis 1 that when it says ‘day’ it really means this huge period of indeterminate time, then what that means is we are still in the seventh day, a huge period of indeterminate time, and none of you should be working. (Exodus 20:8)

“The reason why the Sabbath was hallowed is because God Himself rested on that day.


*****


“The question’s often asked of a pregnant woman, ‘Do you know what you’re having?’ and there are only two answers. I’ve never had anyone say, ‘Well, we’re having a dog.’


“Genesis 1:24 says, ‘And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so.’


“It says ‘after his kind’ 23 times in the Old Testament. Here’s the point. Crazy people say things like, ‘Oh, well those are textural emendations. The ‘his kind’ and ‘their kind’ was copied over and over and it was a copyist’s error and it wasn’t in the original.’ Nonsense.


“If God had the power to create the universe, He had the power to preserve His Word for six thousand years so you have it as He wants. If the Holy Spirit said ‘his kind, his kind, their kind, their kind,’ it was because He was making a point He didn’t want you to miss!


“The point in Genesis 1 is that what animals do today is what they have always done since the beginning of time and that is they reproduce after their kind. The reason you can’t go from a one-celled organism to two, to four, to dog to cat to bear to horse, is the simple fact bears have bears and horses have horses and it will always be that way.


“Gen. 1:31 says, ‘And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.’


“If you believe evolution and want to reconcile that with Scripture, what that means is this:  By the end of Genesis 1 man is created, which means there’s been billions of years and trillions of deaths. Because all those inferior organisms had to live and die and live and die and live and die, and there had to be genetic mutation after genetic mutation, so in Genesis 1, God looks at an earth that has billions of carcasses and dead forms of life and says, ‘That’s very good.’ Nonsense.


*****


“People don’t believe evolution because it’s intellectually satisfying. There’s the thousands upon thousands of missing links. They can’t find any favorable genetic mutations. The very concept of disorder randomly assembling itself into order without any intelligence violates everything you’ve ever experienced in life.


“No one believes it because it makes sense. The reason they believe it is what we read about in Romans 1. God has revealed the fact that He has wrath against man’s unrighteousness. Not only has He revealed that, He’s revealed His eternal power. He has anger against man’s sin and the ability to do something about it and that offends man.


“The reason why people believe evolution is the old ‘any port in the storm,’ because they want to avoid the judgment of God and want to believe there’s a way out, and want to believe it’s okay. If it was okay Jesus Christ didn’t have to go to the Cross. He went to the Cross because there was no other way to deal with man’s sin.


****** 


“The engine that drives evolution is natural selection; survival of the fittest. In other words, there are these organisms that reproduce and the ones that have the favorable genetics--those are the ones who live longer and reproduce more.


“The reason for that is death catches the other ones. What underpins ‘survival of the fittest and natural selection’ is death. What evolution is really saying is life, where it really originated from, was death.


“Notice Proverbs 8:36: ‘But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul: all they that hate me love death.’


“When men hate God they love death. What I think of when I read that verse is Halloween. It’s skeletons, zombies, graveyards, vampires, spooky things, haunted houses, and all sorts of things that are all about death.


“When you see that obsession with death, the thing you should think of from Proverbs 8:36 is, ‘When I see that, what am I actually observing?’ The hatred of God.


*****


“Evolution is the belief that it was the death of trillions of prior organisms over billions of years that gave man life.


“John 1:4 says, ‘In him was life; and the life was the light of men.’ Life is inseparably connected to Jesus Christ, the Creator. What Romans 1 describes is when men reject the knowledge of God, they are rejecting the source of life itself, and so the explanation they are left with as to how life came about is death.

“Let me put it this way, if you’re trying to grow your church, I wouldn’t spend a lot of time looking for new converts in graveyards, right? I’m a huge believer myself in, look in the nursery.


“Evolution is an irrational, crazy philosophy where it views the origin of life as arising from death itself.


*****


“Man’s science correctly perceives that the universe is falling apart, but has no answers because God hid all the answers in Jesus Christ.


“What the second law of thermodynamics tells you is that the universe is falling apart. Entropy is always increasing; in other words, order is just decreasing, and the longer the universe is around the more disorder there is. Thermodynamics, as best I can tell, is true and what that means is science has an understanding that the universe is falling apart. It’s descending into chaos, but science can’t do anything about it.


“Now, by the way, the Bible explained the deterioration of the universe a long time ago. Thermodynamics came along in the 1800s. So what science views as this great advance, read Genesis 3. Can you get an inkling from Genesis 3 that now that sin has entered into the universe, the universe is going to decay?


“Romans 8:19 says, ‘For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.’


“What your physical being is subject to and can’t get out of is the bondage of corruption and that’s why the older you get, you don’t necessarily always start to look pretty. Verse 22 says, ‘For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.’


“Do you ever have those moments where you sort of exhale in exasperation at the insanity that’s going on in the world? I just think, ‘Wow, I’m a mess, the world’s a mess, it doesn’t seem like anything is getting better,’ and that’s because you live in a universe that’s under this bondage of corruption and man has this naïve view that if he just would create new and better laws, or just elect the right people, or just do something earthly, that things would then be better.


“ It’s this naïve, vain hope that, ‘Yeah, man’s going to get it right. Just give us more time and we’re going to get it right.’ No, the universe is falling apart!


*****


“Ecclesiastes 1:18 says, ‘For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.’


“What the writer’s lament is, ‘The more you learn about this earth, is that going to cheer you up?’ You realize there are more wars going on then you thought. There’s more slavery still in the world. There’s more human trafficking. There’s real, real persecution against Christians going on.


“Science can observe some of these phenomena that the world is falling apart but it can’t do anything to fix it.


“Proverbs 1:7 says, ‘The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction.’ Proverbs 9:10: ‘The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.’


*****

“When man rejects God, how much wisdom do they have? They haven’t even started! Proverbs 15:33 is the best definition of what the fear of the Lord is that I've seen: ‘The fear of the LORD is the instruction of wisdom; and before honour is humility.’


“What we know from Colossians 2 is God took ‘all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,’ the things that would give life meaning and purpose and understanding--and give you comfort as to what’s going on in the universe--and put them in Jesus Christ and hid them there.


“And you know what the vast majority of mankind is doing? They reject Jesus Christ, and while they don’t perceive it at the time, you know what they’re also doing? They just rejected all wisdom and knowledge, because God put it all in Him.


“God gave man a perfect map to allow him to navigate through life, but man hates the mapmaker so much he’d rather stumble around lost and in the dark, bumping into things, then read the map. That’s what Romans 1 says.


“Let me conclude with this: All truth is God’s truth. Science that is true is God-honoring, because the universe was created by God and it belongs to Him. But man creates ‘science falsely so-called’ because they want to get rid of the Creator, and evolution is just one example of that.


“Science falsely so-called is completely unable to address the real issues of life. It can’t give you peace or contentment or help you understand your eternal destiny, and it can’t help you resolve it because what God did is, all that wisdom that you need, He hid it in Jesus Christ. The answer to all the questions in life that really matter is the Lord Jesus Christ.”