The Thanksgiving of Habakkuk

For 389 years the United States of America  has set aside one day to give thanks to God, creator of heaven and earth, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Giver of His Holy Spirit,  for His gracious sustaining of us all 364 days that preceded.

When the Pilgrims began this tradition it was not meant to be greater than their worship, (as it has become) but an outpouring of their worship a way to express the gratitude and love for our God and a celebration of Him, through our Lord Jesus Christ.  It included food, but much more it included praise and song and dance.  There was family and friends both old and new, but much more there was an  inward love and praise of our Father and through our Lord Jesus Christ that overflowed into the outward celebration. 

This was commanded of us in Ephesians 5:20 (KJV) Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ;

However sometimes we get it wrong we confuse things and circumstances with the blessing of our Father, and when this happens we don’t see the blessing, we miss the things we should give thanks for. we may even assume we have not been blessed, or have nothing to be thankful for

The trials of this world can weight us down but our Father has has given us instruction for those times. He says when this happens “Count it all joy when we fall into divers temptations”  (James 1:2) Our Father wants us to know that  “In everything ( that we go through we should )Give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus” (1Thess 5:13)   for the perfecting of our soul

One passage from the bible that radiates the mindset of gracious thanksgiving is  even though this man of God seen no way out of his situation he praise God and Gave thanks! The Amplified Bible puts it this way;  The Lord God is my Strength, my personal bravery, and my invincible army; He makes my feet like hinds’ feet and will make me to walk [not to stand still in terror, but to walk] and make [spiritual] progress upon my high places [of trouble, suffering, or responsibility]!Habakkuk 3:19

I imagine if he was here today He would praise his God, with power, saying

“I’m flat broke and been jobless for over a year, no money in my pocket, no food on my table, and I don’t know how these bills will get paid. I spend all day long at the free clinic, but the pain is only getting worst; my children are on drugs, gay, strung out and my spouse emptied the bank account and left me for a younger man. Yet will I rejoice, even though I’m going through all this, I will rejoice in the Lord, no matter what my circumstance are I will be joyful in God my Savior, regardless of what’s going on in my life. I will continually praise him.

This is the thanksgiving of Habakkuk

Soli Deo Gloria
Your Brother in Christ

Voting Kingdom Minded

So he brought the men down to the water, and the Lord said to Gideon, Everyone who laps up the water with his tongue as a dog laps it, you shall set by himself, likewise everyone who bows down on his knees to drink.  And the number of those who lapped, putting their hand to their mouth, was 300 men, but all the rest of the people bowed down upon their knees to drink water. Judges 4:5-6 _(KJV)

For entirely too long we as Christians and Evangelicals have pledged our allegiance to the republican party, or if African American or Latino the Democrat party. The Right to vote is a gift of God and we cannot sell it into whoredom to the first politician that says the word God in his speech.  We must be smart enough to know that they (the politicians) know at least enough about our beliefs to say just what we want to hear, and to get our vote, so they can ignore our faith, and their promises to us completely until the next 4 years comes.

For the last 24 years Christians have been voting their faith, yet no president has done anything for us whatsoever. Slowly they have eradicated God from our schools, and then from our courtrooms, and now even from our elections. No president has done anything to turn back the moral decay and the blatant animosity against our faith. Yet we foolishly support them.  Is there anything we can do about it? of course there is.

Gideon with 300 men change the direction of an entire nation. (Judges 7:4–7 )Yet because of our spiritual impotence we think we can flex our voting muscle in righteous indignation against one politician over another. Don’t be fooled election time is not a battle between and Christian and a Roman, nor an Israelite and a Midianites. Both of the candidates are Midianites! In the natural we have to see this election as a lose lose situation. There is not win without God and there is not God in politics. 

 If we vote against gay marriage and abortion, then we are voting for a false religion, and against the deity of Jesus Christ?  Juxtapositionally,  if we vote against Mormonism, we vote for abortion. Which of these has God put his stamp of approval on? Which one of these two men should the Body of Christ look to to execute God’s will? Do you not know that a vote for one is a vote against another, and a vote against the other is a vote for the first? (Matthew 12:30)

We Christians and evangelicals, must know that God is not a republican nor is He democrat nor will any of God commandments ever be filled in the office of the president.  Those in the presidential race care nothing about God,  their auxiliary compliance to God’s law is at most coincidental. To insinuate that through voting we can restraint sin is both foolish and disrespectful to my intelligence. Restraint of sin is God’s duty not our. moreover, saying that we hate the sin of gay marriage, but love the sin of idolatry. and denying the deity of Jesus Christ is not a better way they, are both evil in God’s eye. (Ephesians 5:11)

However, we cannot blame them, we have created them. We have created them because we have failed to proselyte the gospel to every creature We have created these presidential candidates because we have allow of faith to be an incidental issue in the eyes of the world. 300 men of God are worth the accumulation of 300 votes to both President Obama and Governor Romney, 300 votes are nothing in a country of of nearly 240 million registered voters, but if we voted with spiritual power! 300 men of God would be more than enough.

See to it that no one carries you off as spoil or makes you yourselves captive by his so-called philosophy and intellectualism and vain deceit (idle fancies and plain nonsense), following human tradition (men’s ideas of the material rather than the spiritual world), just crude notions following the rudimentary and elemental teachings of the universe and disregarding [the teachings of] Christ - Colossians 2:8 _(AMP)

Voting is a privilege that many men, in many nations desire, but God has been given us this privilege to vote graciously (by God not man). Yet even as the offer of salvation is rejected by the reprobate mind, so is the right to vote rejected by the ignorant. I would suggest that it is sinful not to vote ( though this is just my opinion) so that we may see the mercy and graciousness of  this most privilege gift of God.  Our vote is the spiritual power which can shape our world. But if we vote our of righteous indignation thinking that we know God’s will or that one man is the devil and the other is not, we make our vote impotent unable to impregnate the will of God in this country. 

Conversely if  we vote out of allegiance to a party, or because our parents or friends said they would vote for one party over the other. Like lemmings we are blind followers of parties allowing one candidate to take for granted our vote knowing that he can fail us, or completed ignore us in his promises (Luke 6:39)

This is man's kingdom where power makes the king. Each presidential candidate seeks the power that comes with this kingship.  Each one offers us materialist promises to sway us under his banner. And once we are under his banner, it is only by what we have of value that we can trade for anything in his world.  The quality of our citizenship is measured by what we have to offer the kingdom. Those that have nothing to trade, are the lesser in this kingdom. The rich have much in this kingdom and the poor have nothing. It makes no difference if it is President Obama or Governor Romney that presides over the kingdom of these United States, the system will remain the same (Matthew 26:11, Mark 14:7, John 12:8)

If then you have died with Christ to material ways of looking at things and have escaped from the world’s crude and elemental notions and teachings of externalism, why do you live as if you still belong to the world? [Why do you submit to rules and regulations?—such as] - Colossians 2:20_(AMP)

But in God’s Kingdom we have a King who is in complete opposition to the the very ways of this world. He became King not by the strength of His might but by being weak and dying on the cross. It is not by what we have to offer, but by complete and contrite declaration of the fact that we are totally bankrupt, having nothing worthy, that we are given citizenship in His kingdom.

So my brother and sister don’t  take your vote lightly, let us vote kingdom minded. Be in prayer about whom God wants you to vote for. Taking into consideration nothing of this world, putting your faith in the promises of God not the promises of man. So that when you leave the ballot booth you know that no matter what the outcome, and who becomes the president that he would have no power if it were not given him  from above. (John 19:11 )

Soli Deo Gloria
Your Brother in Christ

Where Did Cain Get His Wife?

And God blessed them, and God said  unto them, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea and the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.  (Genesis 1:28)

A few days ago someone asked me did Cain marry his sister? Originally this was a conversation developed out of simple text message, but later I realized much more was needed.  In order to give a clear answer I was forced to send a lengthy letter. From that letter I am publishing this brief excerpt.

Discerning What's Really Being Asked

1. First  I could hear the truth of what was being asked,  I could hear its contempt of the word of God. and therefore I perceived the question as “If God is so righteous then why does he condone incest in the bible?”.  I prepared myself to defend  the Word of God as we should.  Please don’t listen to those that would teach that God can defend Himself ( of course He can) However, the Bible requires us to defend the word of God.  In 1 Peter 3:15,  we read "..be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you ( with meekness and fear)"
2. Secondly, in knowledge of the will of God which is again a Biblical requirement to those that are in the faith that we study to show ourselves approved [before God] (2Timothy 2:15). It is in this studying that we are able to defend the word of God, (for he that has no knowledge can neither have a defense of or any faith in God). I’m going to say that once more, so that there is no mistaking what I’m saying. “He that has no knowledge ( of scripture) can neither have a defense of scripture , or any faith in God.”  (Romans 10:14)  

So I added this to my newsletter because it’s about defense of the word, I hope for both mine and your sake.

Answering not a Fool (Proverbs 26:4)

I start this letter with a warning, “Never let anyone put  your faith against the wall." The enemy will try to get you to think in the natural, (like the rest of the world) so that he can persuade you to address his attacks without scripture.  They will ask you things like "can you explain God without the bible?"  Don't be foolish, that  is like explaining  the theory of relativity without using  a science book, or going to a gun fight with no weapon at all!  It just cannot, and should not be done.  Even Jesus when he was tempted by the devil kept reverting back to the Bible for his answer, time after time Jesus answered Satan with, "It is written, or Again it is written" Because His answers were grounded in scripture, He was able to quickly shut the enemy's mouth. There is a lesson in this for us in this event.

Please understand that questions about God formed in such a way that cause you to remove the Bible from your answer have the purpose of disarming you and make your gospel impotent.

For instance in this question it would appear that the devil’s intent was to receive a biblical answer, but in truth he wanted you to reason according to the modern worldview, not with Godly wisdom. Be not deceived this is a tool the enemy uses to turn you away from God, to cause you to doubt God, and to cause you to fail to walk as a Christian. Now please understand, I am in no way calling the person that asked the question a devil, nor am I saying that he/she had in any way evil intents. However, all of us can and will on occasions be used by the devil, sometimes knowingly, sometimes unwittingly. No one is above the devil's schemes.  Unwittingly he employs even men and women of God as his minions to fill our heads with doubt; through science, and intellect, logic and reasoning even the most innocent sounding questions of the enemy has a hidden motive.(Mark 12:13, Luke 11:54) With that said let us address the nature of the question.

The question says in the natural “If God is so righteous than why does he condone incest in the Bible?”  This question sets you up to accept unintelligible logic and cause you to come against scripture because it is written with the intent of forcing you to cling to a non-christian worldview as correct.  The non-christian worldview says incest is bad, and if God is good, than God would not allow incest, if God allowed incest than God cannot be good. Which of us really realized that the question was an attack on our faith in God?

 Let us intelligently reason the truth. By virtue of numbers alone and God’s commandment it was necessary that there would be  inter-family marriage (notice I did not say incest?).   (Genesis 1:28) Since we believe creation to mean only Adam and Eve then we can be sure that their sons intermarried with their daughters, and the second generation had to marry their cousins and with each generation they would be removed from closeness of that family member exponentially.

Because the bible teaches that in the beginning God created only Adam and Eve, though there are those that teach God created others the Bible never speaks of such a second creation and such teaching is purely in error. Instead we find this answer in Genesis 5:4 “ And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:” it is these sons and daughter that make up the first generation of all the people in the world.

Now let us remember God's command to Adam and Eve was to be fruitful and in the 130 years of before Seth was born, Adam and Eve may have continued to have children after Cain and Able. Cain therefor taking a wife from his his sisters, or nieces, or some other relative. If we further consider that the death of Abel and the birth of Seth is 30 years difference than its even possible that neither Cain nor Abel where the first two children of Adam and Eve. In fact the Bible only teaches that they were the children of Adam and Eve. It  never specifies a chronological placing in the many children of Adam and Eve. Consider that Nor does is give any information on the 60 to 100 years of children that could have been born, during the time prior to the killing of Abel.

Now the Issue of Incest:
However, it is important to distinguish between inter-family relationships prior to God commanding against them (Leviticus 18:6-18), and incest that occurred after God’s commands had been revealed. Until God commanded against these types of marriages it was not incest. It was just marrying a close relative.

The reason we are against incest today is because our genetic chain is so impure that the child born of an inter-family marriage may have birth defects.  However at the time of Adam and Eve it (the genetic chain or DNA) was pure. And no genetic defects were present.  In Adam and Eve was the DNA of every type of person there is today.    We see this truth foreshadowed in the story of Cain and Able where God says to Cain “The Voice of Your Brother's Blood Cries to Me From the Ground.” (Genesis 4:10) and more specifically When the Bible speaks of the decedents as being in the loins of their ancestors (Hebrews 7:9-10) “Levi pays tithe to Melchizedek while still in the loins of his father Abraham.”

Genesis 10 tells us that Noah, his wife and his 3 sons and their wives were the only survivors of the flood. Therefore we can say that the entire world is the descendants of the three sons of Noah. Consider how the Bible tells us this;

1. The first son Shem was the Father of the northern people, Europe and north those whose skin was pale in color, finally, the Bible identifies these people as Shemitic Eurasia.
2. We know Ham to be the father of the darker people, south Egypt and all of Africa and South America, the Bible identifies these people as Hamitic;
3. And the third son Japheth  was the Father of the middle people, Arabic, Middle East and Asia, the Bible identifies these people as Japhetic

Now even though these people are three different races that came from one family of Noah.  And in order for mankind to survive they would have had to intermarry among their cousins as well. This is why until God had commanded man not to intermarry, intermarrying was (needed to fulfill the first command of God to mankind  (Genesis 1:28)

By the time of Moses, the human genetic code had become so polluted that close family intermarriage was no longer safe. So, God commanded against sexual relations with siblings, half-siblings, parents, and aunts/uncles. It was not until many centuries later that humanity discovered the genetic reason that incest is unsafe and unwise. However, on some occasions even before God commanded against it inter-family copulation was sinful if one party was not in agreement. (Rape)  Take the case of Lot and his daughters (Genesis 19:31-39) though it happened before the law  because one of the parties involved was an unwilling participant in the copulation  it was called rape. Because  with the personage of mankind is the moral knowledge of rape being wrong (no one has to explain why rape is wrong you just know it) rape has always been a sin against God.

When we think of incest today it can bring up feelings of anger, or disgust which is perfectly good, but unlike the world which does not see why God makes things so, we who are in the faith see the will and love of God works itself in the action of men even today.  In the days of early creation,  man was made with the fullness of perfect DNA.  And therefore  inter-family marriage was not an  issue for humanity; in fact had there been no  inter-family marriages there would have been no you or me. What occurred between Adam and Eve’s children, Abraham and Sarah, and Amram and Jochebed, (Exodus 6:20) should not be viewed as incest, but the love and knowledge of God which worked in the very loins of man, in the beginning that we could multiply, and now that same love and knowledge of God working in us which restrict inter-family marriage that we may remain strong.

Soli Deo Gloria 
Your Brother in Christ

You Must Contend for the Faith

Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints.  For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ.(Jude 1:3-4)

Not twenty years after the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, while there were still people alive that had seen Him and spoken with Him, some had even eaten with Him, false teachers were already forming within the local bodies denying the resurrection and the deity of Jesus Christ.

Just as the Apostle Peter had to deal with false teachers in his second epistle (2Peter 2:1-3), Jude who identifies himself as the brother of James was  inspired to write to a church in an unknown location not concerning salvation but how to deal with False Teachers. So false teachers, and anti-Christian teaching is nothing new, it has been here a long time, and it will always be an issue that we as christian must face head on.

The Apostle Paul tells us that philosophy and deep thinking enticing arguments and logical thinking where the tools that they would use to strip Christians of their faith and hope in Jesus Christ. Just as an invading army would rob a country of all that was valuable. (Col 2:4[1], 8 [2]) so does the enemy seek to rob us of our riches (Mat 6:20)

Now Jude tells us just like the Apostle Peter that these men are not found among the non-believers but have crept in unaware into fellowship with other Christians. This simple statement gives us our first step in dealing with false teachers.
     
Identify Them; ( Because they creep in unaware) 
In part One (Doctrine of Devils) on False Teachers I listed 7 characteristics of false teachers  they are;

a.      False teachers advocate a different doctrine besides what Christ advocates.

b.     False teachers do not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ.

c.      False teachers promote a lifestyle of ungodliness due to the errors in their teaching

d.     False teachers are conceited and yet they understand nothing

e.      False teachers have a morbid interest in controversial questions and disputes about words

f.      False teachers create within the body of Christ envy, strife, abusive language, evil suspicions, and constant friction between men of depraved mind and destitute of the truth.

g.     False teachers use a form of godliness to advance some selfish agenda for their own advantage.

     Test Them;  
Test everything you hear from the pulpit, read on a Christian site or even sent to you in a newsletter. It makes no difference who sends it to you. I am honored when someone comment on my blogs correcting my use or identifying my misuse of scripture. Never assume I’m right because if I am wrong I go to hell and take you with me. One way to show your love for me and appreciation for what I do is to test (verify against scripture) everything I write. (1John 4:1)

  Require Sound Doctrine of Them
Insist that the doctrine of Repentance of Sin, ,the virgin birth, death on the cross and ressutectionand the full Gospel of Jesus Christ be preached or taught continually. Because it holds Christ up as the Savior and emphasizes the need for sinners to be changed.  However when you say to some  there is a need for correction they argue, “But God love me just the way I am”

a.     my answer is that may be true but, I’m sure God loves you too much to leave you the way you are.

b.      Or the more aggressive  version, God does not love you just the way you are, that’s why he sent Christ to show us how we should be.( Romans 6:1-4)

Flee From Them;
When all else fails flee! For many Christians leaving a church is very difficult but this is not a matter of friendship or allegiance its a matter of your salvation.  Churches headed by false teachers often teach you should never leave your home church.  This is a control method used to keep their followers; they attach the lie that if you leave the church, you will leave your faith. And even though I don’t agree with this association I can understand it if your faith was not built on sound doctrine.

a.      However, scripture shows that just because a person leaves a church does not mean he leaves God. Consider John Mark who traveled with Paul and Barnabas. In Acts 15:38 he was considered a "deserter" for going back to Jerusalem (Acts 13:13) and his desertion causes conflict between Paul and Barnabas. However, later in life we find Paul in his letter to Timothy saying that Mark was profitable for the ministry (2Timothy 4:11).  Here is some scripture passages from the Apostle Paul on this matter.

                                                    i.     Paul commanded Timothy to not have anything to do with it false teachers (2 Timothy 3:1-5).

                                                  ii.     Paul gave a similar command to the Ephesians to have nothing to do with deeds of darkness, but rather to expose them (Ephesians 5:11).

                                                iii.     Paul told Titus to have nothing to do with divisive individuals who persist in false teachings or advancing foolish controversies after attempts to bring about a correction (Titus 3:9-10).

Conclusion;

When you have identified a false teacher and you cannot bring their heterodoxies to an end through intelligent conversation and concern then flee. Save your soul, and the soul of your family, you will be amazed how an entire congregation will turn on you if you go public with your concern. Only go public (to the entire congregation) if;

1.          The teacher has broken man’s law, you must never be a part of any illegal action that another does.  
2.       You have physical evidence that he is deceiving the congregation. This is the most difficult you better be right when you say he is false or you will surly suffer.  
3.       And you are willing to be labeled, a trouble maker, false believer, the devil and much more. 

The establishment will do all they can to hurt you, socially, emotionally, economically, and even possibly physically. This is a very hard uphill battle. therefore my suggestion for most people is simple to leave

Soli Deo Gloria

Your Brother in Christ

Other post that may interest you;

1. Offenses will Come 
2. Dealing with Betrayal  
3. Unwilling Sacrifice    
4. Fixing the Broken wheel of flawed teaching
5. Should we accept what comes from the pulpit?

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[1] Col 2:4 And this I say, lest any man should beguile you with enticing words.

[2] Col 2:8 Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ