Hello folks today, I write on Sunday word to the Church. The word was on being deceived. Let us look at some scripture from the Old Testament.

The scripture is from Joshua 9:1:20, the scripture is very big so allow me to summarize it for you. A man called Joshua, who took on the leadership from Moses, is out to claim the land, God promises to the children of Jacob (Israel). God was with them and the Israelites had many victories even in the most ridiculous of odds. Now there were a people from a land called Gibeon who stayed in a part of the land that Joshua was to claim for Israel. The Gibeonites were however smart and decides to trick the Israelites into a peace treaty so that they could continue to live in that land. What they did was they went to the Israelites is worn out clothes and footwear, taking with them stale bread and carrying wine is patched up wine-skins. When they reached the camp of Joshua and the Israelites they claimed to come from a distant land and was outside the land God promised to give the people of Israel (Jacob). They lied and said that when they had left from their land, the bread was fresh, wine-skins new, along with presentable clothes and footwear but now that they have traveled this far and for so long, their clothes & footwear were now worn out, the bread had turned stale and the wineskins carrying wine needed to be patched up. They presented themselves as a people who were willing to serve the Israelites. Joshua and the leaders did not consult God and took an oath of peace & friendship with them in the name of God, based on what appeared to be true. Three days later the Israelites realize that they have been deceived because the Gibeonites were a people who lived on part of the land that was promised to Israel but having made an oath in the name of the God of Israel, Joshua and the leaders have no choice but to stick to their promise. Joshua had a spotless Biblical record of leadership other than this and Achan’s sin (Joshua 7:1-28).

We must remember every believer in Jesus has 3 enemies

1. The World (Gal 3:22)

Gal 3:22

But the scripture says that the whole world is under the power of sin;….

1. His flesh (sinful desire: Gal 5:17)

Gal 5:17

17 For what our human nature wants is opposed to what the Spirit wants, and what the Spirit wants is opposed to what our human nature wants.

1. Satan

The Bible says in John 10:10 that Satan is like a thief that comes to steal, kill and destroy. Satan is referred to as a thief not because he steals money or someone life or brings destruction. He may do all or some of the same but his purpose is mainly to steal our peace. Satan is one creation who has the most experience in deceiving & he also has been the most successful. 2 Corinthians 11:14 says that Satan can even easily disguise himself as a angel of light, does it now strike you from where all false belief that leads people away from the salvation in Lord Jesus, comes from? Satan can even perform miracles (2 Thes 2:9) to add some icing on the cake of false doctrine.

Satan appeared as a crafty servant and tempted Eve into eating the forbidden fruit that lead them to sin.

Rev 12:9

9 The huge dragon was thrown out — that ancient serpent, called the Devil, or Satan, that deceived the whole world. He was thrown down to earth, and all his angels with him.

It must be noted that just like Eve, you too can be deceived and be lead away from the true Christ that saves (2 Cor 11:3). Our fight is not flesh against flesh but against the principalities and powers that corrupt that world.

People often say we must resist Satan but they forget goes before that, according to scripture.

James 4:7

So then, submit to God. Resist the Devil, and he will run away from you.

Submitting to the will of God is recognition that you put God first before yourself and this claim is what shows the Lordship of Jesus in a person’s life. Consider this, even though Jesus created the whole universe (Hebrews 1:2), as per the Biblical record of His life on earth, he submitted to the will of His Father (Mat 6:10; Luke 22:42) all the time.

To conclude, what we must know is that in all that we do we need to seek Jesus’ will in our lives. Walk by faith and not by sight or else you will wind up being deceived as Joshua was.  Remember even what appears to be good may not be necessarily good because it may not be from God.

Many Jesus lovers & trusters have begun their walk confidently in Jesus but Satan desperately attempts to bring in doubt and in doing so deceives. Like the story of Peter getting of the boat to walk on water with Jesus.

Matthew 14:22-33

22 Then Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side of the lake, while he sent the people away. 23 After sending the people away, he went up a hill by himself to pray. When evening came, Jesus was there alone; 24 and by this time the boat was far out in the lake, tossed about by the waves, because the wind was blowing against it.

25 Between three and six o’clock in the morning Jesus came to the disciples, walking on the water. 26 When they saw him walking on the water, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost!” they said, and screamed with fear.

27 Jesus spoke to them at once. “Courage!” he said. “It is I. Don’t be afraid!”

28 Then Peter spoke up. “Lord, if it is really you, order me to come out on the water to you.”

29 “Come!” answered Jesus. So Peter got out of the boat and started walking on the water to Jesus. 30 But when he noticed the strong wind, he was afraid and started to sink down in the water. “Save me, Lord!” he cried.

31 At once Jesus reached out and grabbed hold of him and said, “How little faith you have! Why did you doubt?”

32 They both got into the boat, and the wind died down. 33 Then the disciples in the boat worshipped Jesus. “Truly you are the Son of God!” they exclaimed.

So remember friend in all things seek God’s counsel and when you feel you are drowning call out to Jesus this will keep you from the deceit of the world and of Satan.

Jesus is the most dominant figure in history, he is pinnacle figure of true Christianity. Yes there many contrary view and books that claim that the real Jesus was not the Jesus of the Bible. These views or books may claim to be fictitious for entertainment sake or may claim to be true. But a trust-worthy story of Jesus can only come from those who were with Him while he was on earth, these stories/accounts of Jesus can only be found in the 4 Gospels that is Matthew, Mark, Luke and John in the New Testament (Bible). These accounts started with the Jesus’ disciples (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) themselves and were then passed on orally, while adhering to Church to maintain accuracy and were then all penned down all before 70AD. All heretic views/books date much after this and lay a less than genuine claim to be true.

I would like to present you with a book from the United Church of God, who bring into this dark religiously deceived world the light of the real Jesus. Please visit the URL below to read this rather interesting book.

Click to access JC.pdf

Hi people, today I’ll be writing on God’s Love. Yeah, this to is from a sermon I heard. I can’t help but share this with you all because it is so soul stirring. I am actually starting to live of sermons…lol, may be someday I’ll get back to writing my own. Anyways coming back, let me share with you what I understood so far of what he spoke of on God’s love, I would like to tell you guys that the Bible is founded on the Love of God. In the Old Testament, God declares to his people how much he loves them and in the New Testament, he actually proves it in action. Let me give you an example.

Isaiah 49:15 (Old Testament)

So the Lord answers, “Can a woman forget her own baby and not love the child she bore? Even if a mother should forget her child, I will never forget you.

1 John 4:10 (New Testament)

This is what love is: it is not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the means by which our sins are forgiven.

As you know, God (Jesus) endured being tortured and put to death to pay the price of our sins, which was death itself. This was the will of the Father. This is something, which shows that Faith in Jesus is the only Faith that you can have in God because this is the only faith in the whole world that shows God’s Sacrificial Love not only in word but also in action. Do not get me wrong, I am not trying to show you some “new age love stuff” or some sought of “hippy love idea”, you know like “make love not war” or like in the 60’s when a hippy would give a soldier a flower. What I am talking of is what message the authors of the Bible were talking of. Let me add a drop of water to your ocean of what you already know. Well for starters the New Testament was written in Greek because at that given time Greek was the most popular language. So the Bible was written in a time & in a language that the majority could understand. Now the “love” that was written of in the New Testament was written as “Agape”, which is Greek. Check the definition given below.

Agape/Agapao defined:
Agape (noun)/Agapao (verb) is an unselfish, unconditional, sacrificial love, and is a love that can also be given to one who is NOT worthy of it. It is often referred to among Christians as the God kind of love.

Here is a break down on “Agape/Agapao”:

Agape (noun) is used 116 times in the New Testament.
Agapao (verb) is used 146 times in the New Testament listed below.

So you see this kind of love existed even during the time the Bible was written, which was a few decades into AD for the New Testament and many of years into BC for the Old Testament. Let me emphasize that the Love spoken of here is “unselfish, unconditional, sacrificial love”, this kind of love exist fictionally only in movies & in reality only from God. This kind of Love is given not because the recipient is deserving, infact the recipient does not have the potential to Love the same way because human nature takes advantage of what is good not to give back good but to make use of what is good to the fullest ….that is what human nature is by itself. Let me put it this way, God love us so much that he gave up his own Son to save us, fully knowing that we would never deserve or be able to repay such love. Let me quote Titus 3:5-7.

Titus 3:5-7 (he is God)

5 he saved us. It was not because of any good deeds that we ourselves had done, but because of his own mercy that he saved us, through the Holy Spirit, who gives us new birth and new life by washing us. 6 God poured out the Holy Spirit abundantly on us through Jesus Christ our Saviour, 7 so that by his grace we might be put right with God and come into possession of the eternal life we hope for.

If you would allow me to be very blunt then I would say that man is worse than an animal. I’ll give you 2 examples.

1. Consider a dog, you will know that a dog by nature will never bite the hand that cares for him but you cannot say the same about a mans nature.
2. We all know that 90% of the damage caused to the environment is because of no animal but because of man.

Don’t get me know wrong people I do not hate mankind. I am a man myself and I love the new life that Christ has given me but what I was trying to show you is that God love us so much that he saved us by his grace even though we are sinful by nature. Here is some supporting scripture.

Ephesians 2:5

that while we were spiritually dead in our disobedience he brought us to life with Christ. It is by God’s grace that you have been saved.

Another thing that I would like to enlighten you with is that it is God’s love that saves us. Let me light you up with some more scripture.

1 John 4:16

16 And we ourselves know and believe the love which God has for us.

God is love, and those who live in love live in union with God and God lives in union with them.

1Corinthians 13:4-5

4 Love is patient and kind; it is not jealous or conceited or proud; 5 love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs;

From the first piece of New Testament scripture you can see that God is love. The second piece of scripture tells you among other things, that Love does not keep a record of wrongs. Linking the two, you can see that it is God’s love that will make sure that your wrongs are forgiven. I repeat it is God’s Love, which is the reason you are forgiven… again I would say God’s Unconditional Love. I have shown you from above that this unconditional is from the Bible (Agape). So my friends your sins are NOT forgiven because of what you have done, you may have prayed everyday or have done good / charitable deeds or fasted or sacrificed an animal. You are forgiven because God loves you. This forgiveness in love makes sense ONLY when you consider the Jesus’ died for your sins. Unconditional Love my friends that is why we are saved. If our salvation were to depend on us it would not be called Unconditional Love. God’s love is unconditional and it is for this reason that we receive what we don’t deserve and this is what is known as His grace.

Ephesians 2:8

For it is by God’s grace that you have been saved through faith. It is not the result of your own efforts, but God’s gift, so that no one can boast about it.

To continue, I would like to clear a common misconception. Let me put a question to you, if you could change something in a person’s life in order to get that person closer to you then out of 2 people

1. A horrible sinner
2. A light sinner

Who do you think will yield a better result? Keep your thoughts with you & read the scripture below.

Luke 7:36-50 (Pharisee is like a Jewish Priest & the Pharisee thought of Jesus only as a prophet because he knew little of Jesus)

36 A Pharisee invited Jesus to have dinner with him, and Jesus went to his house and sat down to eat. 37 In that town was a woman who lived a sinful life. She heard that Jesus was eating in the Pharisee’s house, so she brought an alabaster jar full of perfume 38 and stood behind Jesus, by his feet, crying and wetting his feet with her tears. Then she dried his feet with her hair, kissed them, and poured the perfume on them. 39 When the Pharisee saw this, he said to himself, “If this man really were a prophet, he would know who this woman is who is touching him; he would know what kind of sinful life she lives!”

40 Jesus spoke up and said to him, “Simon, I have something to tell you.”

“Yes, Teacher,” he said, “tell me.”

41 “There were two men who owed money to a moneylender,” Jesus began. “One owed him five hundred silver coins, and the other owed him fifty. 42 Neither of them could pay him back, so he cancelled the debts of both. Which one, then, will love him more?”

43 “I suppose,” answered Simon, “that it would be the one who was forgiven more.”

“You are right,” said Jesus. 44 Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I came into your home, and you gave me no water for my feet, but she has washed my feet with her tears and dried them with her hair. 45 You did not welcome me with a kiss, but she has not stopped kissing my feet since I came. 46 You provided no olive oil for my head, but she has covered my feet with perfume. 47 I tell you, then, the great love she has shown proves that her many sins have been forgiven. But whoever has been forgiven little shows only a little love.”

48 Then Jesus said to the woman, “Your sins are forgiven.”

49 The others sitting at the table began to say to themselves, “Who is this, who even forgives sins?”

50 But Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”

From the above piece of scripture, I would like to talk of different love, a God given love/zeal from man for God. You see you may say “hey, I am the worst of sinners. I have been the ring leader in all the bad stuff that happens in my neighborhood”. Well the above scripture show that when Jesus walks into your life, His love will bring about the best of changes in you despite your human nature. Jesus is God and he will use his power to transform you, then you will gladly accept Jesus, because deep within, you will know that all your sins in the past, present and even in the future….have been forgiven. You have been set free. In fact as the above scripture says, you will love Him more than the others because, your sins were a lot but He loved you first (1 John 4:19) and forgave you of all your sins. Allow me to show you the unlikely people whom God has loved & used according to his purpose. So do not feel like God can’t use you, just remember.
Noah was a drunk (Genesis 9:21)
Jacob was a liar (Genesis 27:19)
Joseph was abused (Genesis 37:23)
Moses had a stuttering problem (Exodus 4:10)
Gideon was afraid (Judges 6:27)
Samson was a womanizer (Judges 14:1-2, Judges16:1, Judges16:4)
Rahab was a prostitute (Joshua 2:1)
David had an affair and was a murderer (2 Samuel 11)
Isaiah preached naked (Isaiah 20:2-3)
Jonah ran from God (Jonah 1:3)
Naomi was a widow (Ruth 1:3)
Job went bankrupt (Job1:13-22)
Peter denied Christ (3 times!) (Matthew 26:69-75)
Mary Magdalene was the Samaritan woman who was divorced, more than once. (John 4:15-19)
Zacchaeus was too small (Luke 19:1-3)
Paul was a persecutor of God’s people [Christians] (Acts 8:1-3, Acts 9:1)
Lazarus was dead! (John 1:1-16)

So you see, just as God loved these guys, despite who they were, God loves you for whom you are but it is this same love that makes you change into who He wants you to be. I would like to close this post the most popular of scripture on the love of God for the world.

John 3:16

16 For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life.

Hello people today was a great day with my Church, today’s word focused on the way we look at things. Let us consider 5 Biblical examples.

1. Abram and his nephew Lot (Genesis 13).

This is about the time before God named Abram, Abraham. The verse to focus on, needs some back ground information. Abram is very rich with sheep, goats, cattle, silver and gold. Lot also had sheep, goats, and cattle, as well as his own family and servants. And so there was not enough pasture land for the two of them to stay together, because they had too many animals. So quarrels broke out between the men who took care of Abram’s animals and those who took care of Lot’s animals. Abram one day approached Lot and told him of the situation and told him that since the land could not support the two of them, it would be better if they live seperately. Abram gave Lot the option of which land he would choose to live on, Lot was given the chance to choose first. Let’s check out what happened.

Genesis 13:10-13

10 Lot looked round and saw that the whole Jordan Valley, all the way to Zoar, had plenty of water, like the Garden of the Lord or like the land of Egypt. (This was before the Lord had destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.) 11 So Lot chose the whole Jordan Valley for himself and moved away towards the east. That is how the two men parted. 12 Abram stayed in the land of Canaan, and Lot settled among the cities in the valley and camped near Sodom, 13 whose people were wicked and sinned against the Lord.

As you can see Lot trusted his own sight, what appealed to him is what he chose. Now let’s move a little further to see what happens about Abram.

Genesis 13:14-18

14 After Lot had left, the Lord said to Abram, “From where you are, look carefully in all directions. 15 I am going to give you and your descendants all the land that you see, and it will be yours for ever. 16 I am going to give you so many descendants that no one will be able to count them all; it would be as easy to count all the specks of dust on earth! 17 Now, go and look over the whole land, because I am going to give it all to you.” 18 So Abram moved his camp and settled near the sacred trees of Mamre at Hebron, and there he built an altar to the Lord.

As you may see that Abraham trusted in God more than in what things appeared to be to him. And incase you do not know as time passes, Abraham is blessed even more & Lot practically looses everything even his wife.

1. Peter walks on water with Jesus

Matthew 14:22-32

22 Then Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go on ahead to the other side of the lake, while he sent the people away. 23 After sending the people away, he went up a hill by himself to pray. When evening came, Jesus was there alone; 24 and by this time the boat was far out in the lake, tossed about by the waves, because the wind was blowing against it.

25 Between three and six o’clock in the morning Jesus came to the disciples, walking on the water. 26 When they saw him walking on the water, they were terrified. “It’s a ghost!” they said, and screamed with fear.

27 Jesus spoke to them at once. “Courage!” he said. “It is I. Don’t be afraid!”

28 Then Peter spoke up. “Lord, if it is really you, order me to come out on the water to you.”

29 “Come!” answered Jesus. So Peter got out of the boat and started walking on the water to Jesus. 30 But when he noticed the strong wind, he was afraid and started to sink down in the water. “Save me, Lord!” he cried.

31 At once Jesus reached out and grabbed hold of him and said, “How little faith you have! Why did you doubt?”

32 They both got into the boat, and the wind died down. 33 Then the disciples in the boat worshipped Jesus. “Truly you are the Son of God!” they exclaimed.

As you can see from the above, Peter seeks to believe and call out to Jesus as Lord (almighty and sovereign) and says that if it is Him (Jesus) then let him (Peter) come walking out of the boat to meet with Jesus. What does Jesus reply? COME! Apostle Peter was indeed rewarded for his faith in Jesus for he walked on water right till a strong wind caused him to doubt. You see Peter did not try to rationalize; his eyes were the eyes of faith. He sought faith in Jesus and even asked for a sign to justify his faith in Jesus. These miracles are always on role for those who seek and find Jesus.

1. The disobedience of the first man and woman against God.

As you may know the first man and woman God made was Adam and Eve. God made them and they were given the beautiful garden of Eden to stay in but God warned them not eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of what was right and wrong, for then they would fall under their own condemnation. However Satan succeeds in tempting the man and woman into eating the fruit.

Genesis 3:6

6 The woman saw how beautiful the tree was and how good its fruit would be to eat, and she thought how wonderful it would be to become wise. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, and he also ate it.

You can see that Eve like Lot looked and gets taken in by what is pleasing to her eyes. She puts her perspective before God’s warning & what does this lead to …getting kicked out of the Garden of Eden. Why? Because in the same garden was the tree of life, whose fruit would enable them to live forever. Can you imagine a person living under his own condemnation forever? What misery will that be? Suicide would seem like a blessing in such a dammed situation.

However the tree of life we now have is God’s free gift for the world, on this tree hung a solution for condemnation from all sin. The tree I am talking about is the cross on which hung the perfect sacrifice (Jesus) for all sin….salvation purely by grace….Amen.

1. Satan tries to tempt Jesus

Luke 4:1-13

1 Jesus returned from the Jordan full of the Holy Spirit and was led by the Spirit into the desert, 2 where he was tempted by the Devil for 40 days. In all that time he ate nothing, so that he was hungry when it was over.

3 The Devil said to him, “If you are God’s Son, order this stone to turn into bread.”

4 But Jesus answered, “The scripture says, ‘Human beings cannot live on bread alone.’ ”

5 Then the Devil took him up and showed him in a second all the kingdoms of the world. 6 “I will give you all this power and all this wealth,” the Devil told him. “It has all been handed over to me, and I can give it to anyone I choose. 7 All this will be yours, then, if you worship me.”

8 Jesus answered, “The scripture says, ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve only him!’ ”

9 Then the Devil took him to Jerusalem and set him on the highest point of the Temple, and said to him, “If you are God’s Son, throw yourself down from here. 10 For the scripture says, ‘God will order his angels to take good care of you.’

11 It also says, ‘They will hold you up with their hands so that not even your feet will be hurt on the stones.’ ”

12 But Jesus answered, “The scripture says, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ ”

13 When the Devil finished tempting Jesus in every way, he left him for a while.

You can see that Jesus does not act violently or try to show Satan that he can be worse. You can clearly see that Jesus is in full control and Satan is the person who appears to be worried. All his efforts to lure Jesus, fail. You may look at the above and see that even in the weakness of Jesus’ 40 day fast; Jesus not only puts up a really good fight but has Satan all worried. Getting Satan worried was as easy for Jesus as twiddling His thumbs. Jesus in the weakness of His 40 day fast handles the baddest dude in all creation and still comes out victorious.

The above verse also shows Jesus trusting His Father, please do not make this to be that Jesus was just a man/prophet. Jesus is fully man and fully God. In fact the control which Jesus showed against Satan, even in His weakness of His fasting, was something not even the strongest of men has ever Biblically shown.

However the Bible does say that while Jesus was on earth, He lowered Himself to something lower than even the angels because He accepted His Father’s plan for the Salvation of man, all out of humility, for He alone could steer through with this plan.

Hebrews 2:9,14

But we do see Jesus, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, so that through God’s grace he should die for everyone. We see him now crowned with glory and honour because of the death he suffered.

….

14 Since the children, as he calls them, are people of flesh and blood, Jesus himself became like them and shared their human nature. He did this so that through his death he might destroy the Devil, who has the power over death,

Philippians 2:8 (About Jesus)

He was humble and walked the path of obedience all the way to death — his death on the cross.

1. The thief with the eyes of faith.

Luke 23:32-43

32 Two other men, both of them criminals, were also led out to be put to death with Jesus. 33 When they came to the place called “The Skull”, they crucified Jesus there, and the two criminals, one on his right and the other on his left. 34 Jesus said, “Forgive them, Father! They don’t know what they are doing.” They divided his clothes among themselves by throwing dice. 35 The people stood there watching while the Jewish leaders jeered at him: “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah whom God has chosen!”

36 The soldiers also mocked him: they came up to him and offered him cheap wine, 37 and said, “Save yourself if you are the king of the Jews!”

38 Above him were written these words: “This is the King of the Jews.”

39 One of the criminals hanging there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”

40 The other one, however, rebuked him, saying, “Don’t you fear God? You received the same sentence he did. 41 Ours, however, is only right, because we are getting what we deserve for what we did; but he has done no wrong.” 42 And he said to Jesus, “Remember me, Jesus, when you come as King!”

43 Jesus said to him, “I promise you that today you will be in Paradise with me.”

You can see that the criminal with the eyes of faith gets the free gift of eternal life ….by grace through his faith in Jesus.

From all the above 5 points, it is important to note that when God speaks to you, it mostly will be something you cannot rationalize, because if you could have rationalized it then you would have done it, without Him speaking to you. I would like to close with 4 lovely pieces of scripture.

Hebrews 11:6

6 No one can please God without faith, for whoever comes to God must have faith that God exists and rewards those who seek him.

1 Corinthians 2:8-10 (from the letter of Apostle Paul to the Church of Corinth)

⁸None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. ⁹However, as it is written:
“No eye has seen,
no ear has heard,
no mind has conceived
what God has prepared for those who love him”— ¹⁰but God has revealed it to us by his Spirit.

2 Corinthians 4:18

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

2 Corinthians 5:7

7 For our life is a matter of faith, not of sight.

So people listen not to your own perception but listen to Jesus & Him alone in union with the Father and the Spirit, for He knows what is best for you.

Hi folks I write again, as almost always, this is from the Word brought brilliantly to our Church by one of the youth members, which was his first time. The topic is on forgiveness. I know that this is very easy to talk about and just as hard to practice.

There are many reasons as to why we need to forgive, the three main ones are.

1. Jesus teaches His people to forgive.

In Luke 6:37, Jesus teaches His people to forgive and be forgiven. Luke 6:27-30 even teaches to do good to those who wrong you.

1. God is the judge not us.

Many times we take it upon ourselves to repay wrong with wrong, that is to take revenge. The world considers revenge to be something what is right but is not so in the eyes of Jesus. How could we say that God is good if he allows wrong to repay wrong. If we are to avenge the wrong done to us then that sends a signal to God saying “I can neither wait for your course of action nor do I feel that You will repay the wrong to the extent of the hurt caused”. That is something like when someone murders a person close to you; you take it upon yourself to take revenge because you feel that the police or government will do nothing. So you see taking your own course of action for revenge speaks very little about your faith in God & it speaks of even lesser faith for those who terrorize people in the name of their god. So we must remember that the God that truly exist as God, will judge & punish the guilty (Deuteronomy 32:35) & just as when we go into restaurants, we leave the cooking to the cook, in the same when we come to Jesus, we need to leave the judging to Jesus (John 9:39).

1. To continue to live a blessed life.

I am sure you will understand that you can only enjoy and count your blessing if you stop counting the wrongs done unto you & brooding over them. I have not lived my full earthly life as yet but till now I have never come across anyone who is so good at multi-tasking that he is happy and sad at the same time. People who believe in Jesus cannot afford to be unforgiving because they are ambassadors of God in this world.

So here are the 3 very good reasons as to why we need to forgive but how do we go about it. The answer is love. The love that I am talking about is very different from what the world knows as love. You may read 1 Corinthians 13, to know the kind of love the Bible talks about. This is one thing I am unable to put in words. I feel infinitely further than couples who are unable express their love for each other in words. In John13: 34, Jesus gives us a new commandment, to love one another.

So why is Jesus making so much emphasis on love? How exactly does love work where forgiving is concerned? 1 Corinthians 13:5, stand out boldly saying that love keeps no records of wrongs. You may think very little against keeping records of the wrong done unto you. Many a times when someone would wrong me, I would say in my mind “I will remember this”. I have even heard many people say when they are angry & hurt “I will not forget this”. That is precisely what keeping records of wrongs is about. We do not remember the wrongs just to exercise our memory, we keep the records of the wrongs done so that we can pay the concerned people back the same way in good time & till that time comes to pass we will walk in His faith or live our lives with a pebble in our shoes. Wouldn’t you agree that marriages would be so much happier if husbands and wives did not keep records of the wrongs done by their partner? The only person who existed in the beginning, exist even now & will continue to exist forever, who ONLY can remember the wrongs done unto Him in order that his transgressors be forgiven, is Jesus & the reason He alone can do this is because He is God. The rules of science, nature & world do not apply to Him. When Jesus went to the cross, every cry of His from the torture, was a cry remembering that man needed to be saved from his sins. Jesus remembers his torture and death on the cross not to take revenge on man but to know that through faith in Him, man is saved.

According to the world, it is a good thing to forgive if the wrong doer sincerely apologizes for the wrong he has done. But for people who believe in Jesus, it is very important that we forgive even if the wrong doer is not at all sorry for what he has done. This is because as Luke 6:37 says it is not for us to judge and condemn even the wrongs that are done unto to us as mentioned in point 2.

If you have watched a few action movies, you will see how the bad guys attack or capture or kill the hero’s family or close friend & how the hero does some special training and returns the favour with generous interest. How good it is to see such instant action in just a 2 or 3 hour film. In real life that hero would be living with bitterness, with the hope of revenge. That bitterness will wear him out rather than driving him to achieve his goal over such a long period, God willing if the revenge worked out then our hero will find it hard to break the habit of living in bitterness and then he would not be a good guy or hero at all. That’s the movies for you, showing the world what they want to see because that is what they think is right.

Let us consider some stories in the Bible to show you God’s standard of forgiveness.

The prodigal (lost) son (Luke 15:11-32): There was a rich man with 2 sons. The younger one takes his share of wealth and squanders it & returns. The father not only accepts and forgives him but throws a big feast because of hi return. The elder son did not like this because even though he was a good son, his father did not throw him any feast. However his father explained that his son was lost but is now found. His love for his younger son helped him overlook what he did & forgive him.

The adulterous woman (John 8:1-11): An adulterous woman was brought to Jesus who was caught in the act of adultery. Now according to the Law, she was to be stoned to death but what does Jesus say? He says let he who has not sinned pick up the first stone. All the people throw their stones away and leave one by one. The only one then standing with the woman was Jesus. Allow me to quote some of it.

John 8:7-11

7 As they stood there asking him questions, he straightened himself up and said to them, “Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone at her.” 8 Then he bent over again and wrote on the ground. 9 When they heard this, they all left, one by one, the older ones first. Jesus was left alone, with the woman still standing there. 10 He straightened himself up and said to her, “Where are they? Is there no one left to condemn you?”

11 “No one, sir,” she answered.

“Well, then,” Jesus said, “I do not condemn you either. Go, but do not sin again.”]

In the above scripture, the reason the only one who remained with the woman was Jesus is because he is without sin, he has always been & will forever be. He is God and being God, he forgave the woman & when he did not condemn her no one could, because whoever comes or are brought in their despair to Jesus, are relieved by His judgment.

Isaiah 58:9

When you pray, I will answer you. When you call to me, I will respond.

“If you put an end to oppression, to every gesture of contempt, and to every evil word;

People, who have not accepted Jesus as their King, find it impossibly hard to forgive. Trying to forgive someone & rejecting the forgiveness of your sins by Jesus is like someone trying to lend money without having a steady income. To the world forgiveness is not harming that person in return & what goes along with this is that they will have nothing to do with that person, you know, the forgive and forget attitude which is a futile attempt to do away with the hurt feeling. Without Jesus, your attempt to forgive will hurt you and cause you even more grief when you see the wrong doer. With Jesus, you just need to take that first step of faith & not only forgive but accept that person with love (Luke 6:28). If that person rejects you then leave it to God while keeping him in prayer but if he accepts then leave to God’s Sovereign Spirit to take control of that situation. For starters forgiveness will hurt when you think about it because your conscience will try to talk you out of it. Jesus will make sure that the result is good & He will reward you for your faith in Him (Matthew 15:28). Jesus’ style of forgiveness is action oriented, to do with the heart, not just words (1 John 3:18). If you have trouble forgiving this way then pray (talk: talking to God is prayer) to Jesus, ask Him to send His Spirit upon you, so that you may have victory over all your hurt feeling. Jesus holds all authority over the past present and future & he will make changes in your life to help you be happy in due time even when you are in the company of the wrong doer, that is the power of my God.

Just one last thing, it is important that my God (Father Son & Spirit) being a God of love also pronounces judgment with punishment. All of creation are spiritual orphans. Just as man would call an orphan his son if that orphan were close to his own son, in the same way we are God’s children only if Jesus is King in our hearts. Just as a loving parent corrects but never severely punishes his son. In the same way God corrects his people, who are union with Him through His Son & for this same reason only we are saved, all because of Jesus.

Hi people I would like to share with you something beautiful about Jesus in the Old Testament.

I will be speaking of Psalm 49 from the Old Testament. I would first like to quote Psalm 49:7-9.

7 A person can never redeem himself;

he cannot pay God the price for his life,

8 because the payment for a human life is too great.

What he could pay would never be enough

9 to keep him from the grave,

to let him live for ever.

The above shows that there is nothing a man can do to earn eternal life, whether it be doing good works, donating a lot to charity, praying, fasting, visiting holy places & he certainly cannot bribe his way into heaven.

Now I would quote verse 15 of the same Psalm.

15 But God will rescue me;

he will save me from the power of death.

You see from the above verse. It is only God who can save you & this God is Jesus. He has paid the price of your sins on that cross. You were to earn death for your sins but it is Jesus who took the death penalty for you. So you see God has offered you eternal life through Christ and all you need to do is believe in what Jesus has done for you.

Now I would like to quote verses 18 to 20 again from the same Psalm.

18 Even if he is satisfied with this life

and is praised because he is successful,

19 he will join all his ancestors in death,

where the darkness lasts for ever.

20 His greatness cannot save him from death;

he will still die like the animals.

The above verses show no mater how much a man is satisfied with his life and no matter how successful he becomes he will still reap the wages of his sin, which is death, unless as from verse 15 he accepts Jesus.

Hi folks, here are some amazing videos of proof of the things that written in the Bible. Check it out, it is not only eye opening but shows the Bible to be true word for word. The Ark of the Covenant video is a master blaster because it shows Jesus as the Savior of the Jews and the world, the Son of God.

Mt. Sinai

Red Sea Crossing

Ark of the Covenant

Noah’s Ark

The Destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG3QsisQrkc

Aleph Tav

Hi people today I would like to share something and clear a common misconception people have about God. I feel this post is more to do with unburdening people of tiresome rituals, which people have been taught with the aim of being put right with their god. This is taken partly from last Sunday’s word at Church.

Allow me to quote

Luke 18:9-14

9 Jesus also told this parable to people who were sure of their own goodness and despised everybody else. 10 “Once there were two men who went up to the Temple to pray: one was a Pharisee, the other a tax collector.

11 “The Pharisee stood apart by himself and prayed,‘I thank you, God, that I am not greedy, dishonest, or an adulterer, like everybody else. I thank you that I am not like that tax collector over there. 12 I fast two days a week, and I give you a tenth of all my income.’

13 “But the tax collector stood at a distance and would not even raise his face to heaven, but beat on his breast and said, ‘God, have pity on me, a sinner!’ 14 I tell you,” said Jesus, “the tax collector, and not the Pharisee, was in the right with God when he went home. For all who make themselves great will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be made great.”

Note:

1. A tax collector was a person who collected unpaid taxes from people. The tax collector of Jesus’ time had the full backing of ruling empire and so they did everything to squeeze the money out of the people no matter what was the person’s circumstance. We don’t have tax collectors today but we have something similar and those are loan sharks. Tax collectors like loan sharks were greedy and took more money than they were supposed to.
2. The Pharisees were like Jewish priest.

Incase you would like to know, the Bible consist of the Old and New Testament. The Testament consists mostly of History and God’s message to His people, which came through the prophets. It is important to note that the time difference between the last record of the Old Testament till the time Jesus arrived was roughly 4 centuries, 400 years.

So knowing this, I would like to add that in these 4 centuries many traditions sprang up and got associated with the Jewish religious belief. When Jesus came there were 3 major religious Jewish societies the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Essenes, the Pharisees were often the most vocal and influential.

God never intended for his worship to be ritualistic because when something becomes ritualistic it looses its significance. Let me give you a real life example, when someone answers the phone, what is the first thing he says? “HELLO”…isn’t it.  However when this same someone comes across someone he knows on the road, what is it that he “sometimes” uses to greet that known person? “Hello”. Now tell me which “Hello” signifies a “real Hello”. The “Hello” which came out proactively to greet another right! Not the “Hello” over the phone because that has been said so many times that it has almost lost its meaning and significance. Saying “Hello” over the phone started of with the idea of greeting the caller, in the same way in the above mentioned 400 years the Jewish leaders started maintaining traditions for a purpose which they thought would honour God. Allow me to quote from Mark 7:3-4.

Mark 7:3-4

For the Pharisees, as well as the rest of the Jews, follow the teaching they received from their ancestors: they do not eat unless they wash their hands in the proper way; 4 nor do they eat anything that comes from the market unless they wash it first. And they follow many other rules which they have received, such as the proper way to wash cups, pots, copper bowls, and beds.

When Jesus came, he warned His disciples against religious leaders who forced empty rituals upon people in the name of God. Let me quote to you about this from

Matthew 16:6 (Jesus to His disciples)

Jesus said to them, “Take care; be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”

Luke 12:1

As thousands of people crowded together, so that they were stepping on each other, Jesus said first to his disciples, “Be on guard against the yeast of the Pharisees — I mean their hypocrisy.

Note: The Sadducees recognized only the written letter of the Tanakh or Torah (laws) and rejecting life after death, while the Pharisees held to their own interpretations additional to the written texts (Old Testament).

To keep you in the loop, Yeast are specie of fungi. They are used often in the baking of bread. When the dough of the bread is ready a small amount of yeast is mixed in and the dough is left for some time, the dough then raises (become bigger) without increasing in matter.

This is what Jesus warned His disciples about, about the Pharisees and Sadducees.  The teachings of Pharisees and Sadducees were like that little yeast added to God’s Word in order to burden people. They were like people who liked to be in control of common men. This yeast was to puff up their pride as religious leaders without adding any substance to it. Earlier in the Old Testament God (Jesus) spoke ahead to Moses [much before He (Jesus) arrived here on earth] & asked for unleavened (without yeast) bread offerings.

Leviticus 8:26 (Moses’ offering to the Lord during the ordination of Aaron and his sons)

Then he took one loaf of bread from the basket of unleavened bread dedicated to the Lord, one loaf made with oil, and one biscuit, and he put them on top of the fat and the right hind leg.

Leviticus 10:12

Moses said to Aaron and his two remaining sons, Eleazar and Ithamar, “Take the grain offering that is left over from the food offered to the Lord, make unleavened bread with it and eat it beside the altar, because this offering is very holy.

Jesus (God) never wanted bread with yeast as an offering because He (Jesus) foresaw and knew that the yeast symbolized what would be added to His word (Old Testament) and the end product would be something that was not His. Allow me to support this with some more scripture; this is Jesus’ reply to the Pharisees in regards to the same topic.

Mark 7:6-9

6 Jesus answered them, “How right Isaiah was when he prophesied about you! You are hypocrites, just as he wrote:

‘These people, says God, honour me with their words,

but their heart is really far away from me.

7 It is no use for them to worship me,

because they teach human rules

as though they were God’s laws!’

8 “You put aside God’s command and obey human teachings.”

9 And Jesus continued, “You have a clever way of rejecting God’s law in order to uphold your own teaching.

Note: Isaiah is a prophet of the Old Testament.

Reading all this, you might now not have a very good opinion about such religious leaders but all through time there have been people like these, before & after Jesus coming, people who have enslaved people in the name of their god & with the idea of maintaining ritual cleanliness. The rules that such religious leaders; have burdened their people with, range right from eating, drinking, dressing, worship, washing, praying and even using the toilet. These may sound ridiculous from a secular point of view but this is real life stuff. Would you like to know as to what Jesus says about spiritual cleanliness?

Mark 7:14-23

14 Then Jesus called the crowd to him once more and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand. 15 There is nothing that goes into a person from the outside which can make him ritually unclean. Rather, it is what comes out of a person that makes him unclean.”

17 When he left the crowd and went into the house, his disciples asked him to explain this saying. 18 “You are no more intelligent than the others,” Jesus said to them. “Don’t you understand? Nothing that goes into a person from the outside can really make him unclean, 19 because it does not go into his heart but into his stomach and then goes on out of the body.” (In saying this, Jesus declared that all foods are fit to be eaten.)

20 And he went on to say, “It is what comes out of a person that makes him unclean. 21 For from the inside, from a person’s heart, come the evil ideas which lead him to do immoral things, to rob, kill, 22 commit adultery, be greedy, and do all sorts of evil things; deceit, indecency, jealousy, slander, pride, and folly — 23 all these evil things come from inside a person and make him unclean.”

What I would like you to gather from all this is that, there is freedom in Jesus freedom not only from empty rituals but also freedom from sin.

Colossians 2:6-8….20-23 (Apostle Paul to the Church of Colossae)

6 Since you have accepted Christ Jesus as Lord, live in union with him. 7 Keep your roots deep in him, build your lives on him, and become stronger in your faith, as you were taught. And be filled with thanksgiving.

8 See to it, then, that no one enslaves you by means of the worthless deceit of human wisdom, which comes from the teachings handed down by human beings and from the ruling spirits of the universe, and not from Christ.

……

20 You have died with Christ and are set free from the ruling spirits of the universe. Why, then, do you live as though you belonged to this world? Why do you obey such rules as 21 “Don’t handle this,” “Don’t taste that,” “Don’t touch the other”? 22 All these refer to things which become useless once they are used; they are only human rules and teachings. 23 Of course such rules appear to be based on wisdom in their forced worship of angels, and false humility, and severe treatment of the body; but they have no real value in controlling physical passions.

Hebrews 9:14

Since this is true, how much more is accomplished by the blood of Christ! Through the eternal Spirit he offered himself as a perfect sacrifice to God. His blood will purify our consciences from useless rituals, so that we may serve the living God.

Romans 6:23

For sin pays its wage — death; but God’s free gift is eternal life in union with Christ Jesus our Lord.

So this message like all the other messages comes to the same conclusion; come to Jesus and know Him for who is, in doing so have freedom and a healthy relationship with Almighty God (Father Son and Holy Spirit). This is something infinitely more than rituals as empty as a telephone “Hello”.

Psalms 146:7 (Old Testament)

he judges in favour of the oppressed and gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets prisoners free

Romans 3:24 (New Testament)

But by the free gift of God’s grace all are put right with him through Christ Jesus, who sets them free.

Hi folks today, I write and share after a very long time. There is something which I know many unbelievers question. The question is that if God is good and just then why do the wicked prosper?

Yeah I have heard and seen many making a good living by cheating people. If any of you are not even interested in this article then it would most probably mean that you to believe that cheating is a sure shot way to success. May be you are even practicing this idea. Yeah I’ve seen cheaters & what I’ve noticed is that their idea of right and wrong is all knotted up. To them trusting or listening to God is either secondary or God is only to be involved during their ritualistic prayer.

From a Biblical point of view, we are all sinners, right from the most religious of people to the worst of sinners. Allow me to give you 3 Biblical examples of people who have changed drastically just by encountering Jesus.

1. Mathew: Before Jesus called Matthew (Mat 9:9) to join Him in His ministry. Mathew was a tax collector. Allow me to tell you, what the job of a tax collector was. A tax collector was a person who collected unpaid taxes from people. The tax collectors of Jesus’ time had the full backing of ruling empire and so they did everything to squeeze the money out of the people no matter what the person’s circumstance was. We don’t have tax collectors today but we have something similar and those are loan sharks. Tax collectors like loan sharks were greedy and took more money than they were supposed to. The advantage that tax collectors had was the ruling empire backing in all that they did. Mathew meets with Jesus and his life is transformed. He goes from “tax collector” to “man of God”. He travels and preaches the good news of free eternal life in Jesus, in places including Jerusalem and Persia & died as a Martyr proclaiming Jesus in Ethiopia.

1. Zacchaeus: Zacchaeus too was a tax collector. Allow me to quote from the Bible about Zacchaeus.

Luke 19:1-10

1 Jesus went on into Jericho and was passing through. 2 There was a chief tax collector there named Zacchaeus, who was rich. 3 He was trying to see who Jesus was, but he was a little man and could not see Jesus because of the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead of the crowd and climbed a sycomore tree to see Jesus, who was going to pass that way. 5 When Jesus came to that place, he looked up and said to Zacchaeus, “Hurry down, Zacchaeus, because I must stay in your house today.”

6 Zacchaeus hurried down and welcomed him with great joy. 7 All the people who saw it started grumbling, “This man has gone as a guest to the home of a sinner!”

8 Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Listen, sir! I will give half my belongings to the poor, and if I have cheated anyone, I will pay back four times as much.”

9 Jesus said to him, “Salvation has come to this house today, for this man, also, is a descendant of Abraham. 10 The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

1. Saul: Saul was hater of Christians. He used to go seeking underground Churches and putting Christians to death. At the time of the early Church, Christians could not practice their faith in the open. A person believing and worshiping Jesus was put to death. This exist even today in a few countries but the Bible says (Mat 16:18) that the gates of hell will never be able to withstand the power by which the Church moves forward. So the Church prevails. So coming back to Saul, one day while he was on his was to Damascus to attack the Church there, on the way a bright light from the sky struck him and turned him blind and from that light Jesus spoke. Allow me to quote once more from my Bible.

Acts 9:3-5

3 As Saul was coming near the city of Damascus, suddenly a light from the sky flashed round him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul! Why do you persecute me?”

5 “Who are you, Lord?” he asked.

“I am Jesus, whom you persecute,” the voice said.

Saul is then prayed for by a Christian and his vision returns and he now becomes a changed man. He then goes about many places preaching the free gift of eternal life ready for those willing to believe in Jesus. He is finally beheaded and so dies a martyr for God’s people.

So you these were 3 wicked people are transformed by the person Jesus. I would like to quote some scripture where wicked people and the love of God are concerned.

Luke 6:35

No! Love your enemies and do good to them; lend and expect nothing back. You will then have a great reward, and you will be children of the Most High God. For he is good to the ungrateful and the wicked.

Romans 5:6

For when we were still helpless, Christ died for the wicked at the time that God chose.

Being wicked is one thing but not believing in Jesus is something very different. Being wicked is sometime because of how a person is naturally wired or maybe because of the upbringing. Being wicked is something of a helpless situation like that mentioned above in Romans 5:6.

Ephesians 6:12

For we are not fighting against human beings but against the wicked spiritual forces in the heavenly world, the rulers, authorities, and cosmic powers of this dark age.

However rejecting Jesus is something that God will not tolerate. Will you invite someone home and alow him to stay forever, if that someone rejects what your have done and may be even despises you.

Matthew 10:14-15 (Jesus words to His disciples who go about preaching His word)

14 And if some home or town will not welcome you or listen to you, then leave that place and shake the dust off your feet.15 I assure you that on the Judgement Day God will show more mercy to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah than to the people of that town!

Luke 10:16

16 Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever listens to you listens to me; whoever rejects you rejects me; and whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.”

So coming back to how to deal with wicked people, the only solution to deal with such people is “a change of heart”. If you believe in Jesus then invite that person to Biblically sound Church so that he may powerfully witness God during worship & come to know of the abounding love and grace that is in store for him in the sacrifice of Jesus. However, if you don’t believe in Jesus then you may put your trust in that unknown God, the God of all gods and Lord of all lords, that Supreme Being. That unknown God has revealed Himself to me in the person that is Jesus Christ. But for now you may trust in that unknown all powerful God. Ask Him to reveal Himself so that you may know Him. Tell him of your frustration seeing wicked people prosper by unfair means. If you are frustrated it is a good sign because it is means you are putting up a fight against falling into their wicked ways. Be patient but seek this unknown almighty God diligently. You will know that you are in the right direction when a fire starts burning in you to know more. When you pray do not stick to a script, speak your heart out. Let it be you praying and not somebody else using your mouth. Your prayers will be answered.

What I have noticed about people with wicked ways is that in their idle time they are never happy. There is a guilt in them which they cannot hide when they are alone. Among other people they hide their guilt by acting even more wicked, like trying to cover a lie with lie. They would often have a look of disgust, disgust that comes from the way they go about life. For a non believer who complains about wickedness, there is only one way out, he needs to come to Jesus.

John 10:9 (Jesus words)

I am the gate. Whoever comes in by me will be saved; they will come in and go out and find pasture.

It is important to note that it is not a person by himself who decides to come to Jesus; it is the Father in heaven who alone draws people to His Son, so that they may be saved.

John 6:44 (Jesus words)

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him to me; and I will raise him to life on the last day.

There is one thing we must know and understand, the wicked were always destined for hell

Psalms 92:7

the wicked may grow like weeds, those who do wrong may prosper; yet they will be totally destroyed,

1Corinthians 6:9 (Apostle Paul (also know as Saul) to the Church of Corinth)

9 Surely you know that the wicked will not possess God’s Kingdom. Do not fool yourselves; people who are immoral or who worship idols or are adulterers or homosexual perverts 10 or who steal or are greedy or are drunkards or who slander others or are thieves — none of these will possess God’s Kingdom.

But whoever comes to Jesus, wicked or not, are saved (will live forever in heaven in union with Jesus), all their sins past, present & future are all forgiven. Jesus is God & the King of all life changing experiences and when people come to Jesus the Holy Spirit starts to work within them so that on that last of judgment they will stand faultless before God like the 3 examples above.

1 Corinthians 1:8

He will also keep you firm to the end, so that you will be faultless on the Day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Colossians 1:22

But now, by means of the physical death of his Son, God has made you his friends, in order to bring you, holy, pure, and faultless, into his presence.

So if you want to be rescued from the wickedness of this world then seek and come to Jesus.

Acts 2:40 (Apostle Peter talking to general public on the day of the Holy Spirit Anointing)

40 Peter made his appeal to them and with many other words he urged them, saying, “Save yourselves from the punishment coming on this wicked people!” 41 Many of them believed his message and were baptized, and about 3,000 people were added to the group that day.

2Thessalonians 3:2 (Apostle Paul’s letter preaching the Gospel of Jesus to the Thessalonians)

Pray also that God will rescue us from wicked and evil people; for not everyone believes the message.

Hi people, how are you doing? Hope all is well. Sometime back I was listening to my Audio Bible and this piece of scripture struck me.

John 9:40-41

40 Some Pharisees who were there with him heard him say this and asked him, “Surely you don’t mean that we are blind, too?”

41 Jesus answered, “If you were blind, then you would not be guilty; but since you claim that you can see, this means that you are still guilty.”

Note: The blind in verse 41 refers to spiritual blindness of not being able the truth in Jesus. The Pharisees were members of an ancient Jewish sect that emphasized strict interpretation and observance of the Law of Moses.

Do you know what scripture came to my mind when I read this? Check this out.

Genesis 2:15-17

15 Then the Lord God placed the man in the Garden of Eden to cultivate it and guard it. 16 He said to him, “You may eat the fruit of any tree in the garden, 17 except the tree that gives knowledge of what is good and what is bad

You must not eat the fruit of that tree; if you do, you will die the same day.”

Genesis 3:6-7

6 The woman saw how beautiful the tree was and how good its fruit would be to eat, and she thought how wonderful it would be to become wise. So she took some of the fruit and ate it. Then she gave some to her husband, and he also ate it. 7 As soon as they had eaten it, they were given understanding and realized that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and covered themselves.

It is important to note that the reason God told Adam that he would die if he ate the fruit of knowledge of what is bad and good is because he would then stand condemned under his own judgment because of disobedience. This is the reason why Adam and Eve hid themselves after eating the fruit.

There is something very similar in Genesis 3:7 & John 9:41. When Adam and Eve were blind to knowledge of right and wrong they were not guilty. The Pharisees being a people who emphasized the Law upon the common people, claimed to know right from wrong, they were a people who were still guilty because they claimed to be able to see.

Romans 5:13

There was sin in the world before the Law was given; but where there is no law, no account is kept of sins.

In a similar way the Pharisees were hiding from God by rejecting Jesus, seeking always to trap Him.

Matthew 16:1

Some Pharisees and Sadducees who came to Jesus wanted to trap him, so they asked him to perform a miracle for them, to show that God approved of him.

Mark 10:2

Some Pharisees came to him and tried to trap him. “Tell us,” they asked, “does our Law allow a man to divorce his wife?”

There is something I’ve learned in my life and that is don’t only learn a lesson when you come across something bitter, rather learn a lesson even when others taste the bitterness of life’s experiences. Learn also from other people’s experiences. The Pharisees were sprinting towards death by rejecting Jesus. It is important for you to know that it is by grace and not merit that people are saved (going to heaven).

Ephesians 2:4-5

4 But God’s mercy is so abundant, and his love for us is so great, 5 that while we were spiritually dead in our disobedience he brought us to life with Christ. It is by God’s grace that you have been saved.

If you are going to heaven it is only because of the trust you have in Jesus. The Law of Moses opened the eyes of what was sin, so came condemnation & death but the grace that God showed us in Jesus increased much more as sin increased.

Romans 7:7

Shall we say, then, that the Law itself is sinful? Of course not! But it was the Law that made me know what sin is. If the Law had not said, “Do not desire what belongs to someone else,” I would not have known such a desire.

1 Corinthians 15:56

Death gets its power to hurt from sin, and sin gets its power from the Law.

To conclude,

Romans 5:20-21

20 Law was introduced in order to increase wrongdoing; but where sin increased, God’s grace increased much more. 21 So then, just as sin ruled by means of death, so also God’s grace rules by means of righteousness, leading us to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.