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Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Daily Reminders #5

"Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them." John 7:38

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Keeping yourself Interested

When I read the bible, I don't always feel like it. Satan doesn't want Christians to read the bible, he wants us all to fail miserably in every way, and Satan is great at fooling us. I can easily think of things I could be doing or "need" to do when I sit down and read God's word. I'm always glad I afterwards when I read my bible, but there's an internal conflict when I try to read my bible. I think it's best to find I way to keep myself interested while I read my bible so that I can feel the benefits afterwards. For a while I would always find one verse that stuck out to me while I was reading the bible, but that's hard to do when your reading 1st and 2nd Samuel (which I recently finished) and 1st Kings (which I just started). Yesterday, I had the wonderful idea of making a modern bible, where I take I read and write down as if it where being said in modern times. It's really fun!
Here's the first 4 verses of 1 kings 2 (my version). What you are about to read is NOT God-breathed scripture.
  1. David’s death was coming around, so he gave his position to Solomon
  2. "I am going to follow through with the ways of the world," he said. "Make sure you are strong and show everyone that you're a man.
  3. Look at what God tell us to do: follow his ways, and listen to his laws and guideline, his  rules and requirements, like it’s been written in Moses' decrees, so y'all will be prosperous in every way possible.
  4. So that God will carry out what he said he'd do a bit back: 'If your kids are careful about how they act, and they’re faithful with everything they've got in them, you’ll always have a dude on the throne.'
And the same verse in the NIV bible
  1. When the time drew near for David to die, he gave a charge to Solomon his son.
  2. "I am about to go the way of all the earth," he said. "So be strong, show yourself a man,
  3. and observe what the LORD your God requires: Walk in his ways, and keep his decrees and commands, his laws and requirements, as written in the Law of Moses, so that you may prosper in all you do and wherever you go,
  4. and that the LORD may keep his promise to me: 'If your descendants watch how they live, and if they walk faithfully before me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.'
There's this one little kids songs that describes life. "read your bible and pray every day and you'll grow, grow, grow...don't read your bible, forget to pray and you'll shrink, shrink, shrink..."
You know yourself...maybe you find it easy to read your bible, or maybe your need a little thing that will help you read your bible. Whatever you do, make sure your reading your bible, so you can grow...and take a stand for Jesus.

Monday, October 15, 2012

The Lake of Fire: Worms

And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, where "'their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.' Everyone will be salted with fire.
Mark 9:47-49

I am I the only person who has wondered why Mark 9:48 mentions worms not dying? I did some research to see if I could uncover the meaning behind worms not dying.

Immediately, because Herod did not give praise to God, an angel of the Lord struck him down, and he was eaten by worms and died.
Acts 12:23

Here's something from "Antiquities of the Jews Book 17" (Chapter 6, verse 5) The following was NOT taken from the bible.

But the disease of Herod grew more severe, God inflicting punishment for his crimes. For a slow fire burned in him which was not so apparent to those who touched him, but augmented his internal distress; for he had a terrible desire for food which it was not possible to resist. He was affected also with ulceration of the intestines, and with especially severe pains in the colon, while a watery and transparent humor settled about his feet. 
He suffered also from a similar trouble in his abdomen. Nay more, his privy member was putrefied and produced worms. He found also excessive difficulty in breathing, and it was particularly disagreeable because of the offensiveness of the odor and the rapidity of respiration. He had convulsions also in every limb, which gave him uncontrollable strength. It was said, indeed, by those who possessed the power of divination and wisdom to explain such events, that God had inflicted this punishment upon the King on account of his great impiety


I don't know how reliable this source is, but it seems to match up with scripture, Herod was eaten by worms. Yes, it's nasty, but I think "their worm does not die" from Mark 9:48 is speaking of King Herod disease. Hell a pleasant subject, but it's an important one.

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.
Mathew 10:28

In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up. Their condemnation has long been hanging over them, and their destruction has not been sleeping. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for judgment; if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others; if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly; and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)--if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment.
2 Peter 2:3-9

The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
Revelation 20:13-15

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Sin...Songs and Some Scripture

Sin is something that makes everyone have something in common. I grew up hearing sin is bad, but the truth is we are sin. You must murder yourself if you want to live. Sin is a big deal, it's something that you will notice one day when your flesh is burning hell if you don't notice now.
And now on a lighter note, I like music, but what teen doesn't? Music is written by a band, but interpreted by the listener. What you have been through in life effects how you hear music. With that being said, I'm going to interpret two songs based on my life.
I'd recommend listening to this youtube video unless you've already heard "It's not me, it's you" by skillet.
First of all, there's defining this song. It could be taken for a song to someone whose hurt you, or to Satan, but I think it's a song to yourself...your sinful nature. A songs meaning can change based on what's happening to you at the moment. This song has for me.

For when we were controlled by the sinful nature, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in our bodies, so that we bore fruit for death.
Romans 7:5
Sin is a poison, once we drink it, it wears our body down and it finally drives us to insanity.

Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation--but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according to it. For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
Romans 8:12-14
WeAsHuman's message is more clear than Skillets in song. It's clearly says that when we stop sinning is when we feel the most alive. It says to let go of sin, so that you can be free. "Sitting here by my graveside, I've never been so alive" Because Jesus took me out of the picture.

Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. 
John 8:34-16

God pulls the dead man out of us.

For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin--because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Romans 6:6-11

This is a concept that is hard to understand, and that I don't fully get, but when we die to ourselves, that's when we feel most alive.  "Sitting here by my graveside, I've never been so alive. You pulled the dead man out of me."

But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead. Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death. For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death.
Romans 7:8-11

But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.
Romans 8:10

Friday, October 5, 2012

Daily Reminders #4

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The angel of the LORD encamps around those who fear him, and he delivers them. Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him lack nothing. The lions may grow weak and hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
Psalm 34:7-10

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Is it ok to lie?

I think this is an interesting topic. Of course I could state the obvious "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor." (Exodus 20:16) or "Do not lie." (Leviticus 19:11) or "Do not lie to each other" (Colossians 3:9) But I think there's more to it.

Then a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt. "Look," he said to his people, "the Israelites have become much too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country." So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh. But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread; so the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites
Exodus 1:8-12

The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah "When you help the Hebrew women in childbirth and observe them on the delivery stool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live." The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live. Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, "Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?" The midwives answered Pharaoh, "Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive." So God was kind to the midwives and the people increased and became even more numerous. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own.
Exodus 1:15-21

In this example of, God blessing the Hebrew midwives for lying.

After this, Jesus went around in Galilee, purposely staying away from Judea because the Jews there were waiting to take his life. But when the Jewish Feast of Tabernacles was near, Jesus' brothers said to him, "You ought to leave here and go to Judea, so that your disciples may see the miracles you do. No one who wants to become a public figure acts in secret. Since you are doing these things, show yourself to the world." For even his own brothers did not believe in him.
Therefore Jesus told them, "The right time for me has not yet come; for you any time is right. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify that what it does is evil. You go to the Feast. I am not yet going up to this Feast, because for me the right time has not yet come."
Having said this, he stayed in Galilee. However, after his brothers had left for the Feast, he went also, not publicly, but in secret.
John 7:1-10

In this example, Jesus lies. And Jesus is perfect...right?

Then Zedekiah said to Jeremiah, "Do not let anyone know about this conversation, or you may die. If the officials hear that I talked with you, and they come to you and say, 'Tell us what you said to the king and what the king said to you; do not hide it from us or we will kill you,' then tell them, 'I was pleading with the king not to send me back to Jonathan's house to die there.'"
All the officials did come to Jeremiah and question him, and he told them everything the king had ordered him to say. So they said no more to him, for no one had heard his conversation with the king.
Jeremiah 38:24-27

Jeremiah, God's prophet, lies.

But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them. She said, "Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they had come from. At dusk, when it was time to close the city gate, the men left. I don't know which way they went. Go after them quickly. You may catch up with them." (But she had taken them up to the roof and hidden them under the stalks of flax she had laid out on the roof.)

Joshua 2:4-6

In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction?
James 2:25

Rahab is honored for her lying. 

But then there is this:

...all liars--their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur.
Revelation 21:8

Does that mean Jesus has a place in hell? And the midwives that God blessed?
In the case of the midwives, it was lie or kill babies.
In the case of Rahab, it was lie or let the spies be killed.
In the case of Jeremiah, it was lie or maybe be killed.
In the case of Jesus it was lie or be...truthful

Jesus doesn't even have a life on the line. He could go like this:

I'm gonna go to the feast, but in secret. Just don't say anything."
Having said this, he stayed in Galilee. However, after his brothers had left for the Feast, he went also, not publicly, but in secret.

 I am not yet going up to this Feast, because for me the right time has not yet come.

I looked into things, and according to the footnotes in my bible, "Some early manuscripts do not have yet."
And removing the 'yet' makes it so that Jesus could be talking about how it's not time for his death yet. But,, at the same time, removing the yet means that Jesus says 'I'm not going.' instead of 'I'm not going right now.'

I think the lying is more of your motive. When Rahab was faced with lie or let the spies be killed, she chose lie. And that was a noble choice.
When the midwives were faced with lie or let the male babies be killed, they chose lie. And that was a noble choice.
The times when God blesses sin is when it's sin V.S. sin and the choice is the more honorable sin. So I don't want what you take away from this post to be lying is ok. Because most of the time, it isn't.
-Ruth
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