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The Feeding of the Five Thousand: How Old Were the Bread and the Fish the People Ate, That Jesus Gave Them?

July 27, 2021 / Leave a comment

When I go to the grocery store and I select my items, I don’t very often think of the process. I just push the cart and put into it what’s on my list. My wife was gone for quite awhile recently, so I grocery shopped. A few times I picked up one or two of those tubes of hamburger you’ve maybe seen. It didn’t occur to me when I did that a calf was born, it grazed in a field, grew to full grown size, was herded into a truck, shipped to a meat plant, driven into a building and was butchered, then parts of that full grown cow were ground into beef, which was squeezed into a tube and through various machinations of the supply chain, arrived in my store in Southern Oregon.

I didn’t look at that tube of hamburger and assume that it just sprung up there in the meat department of Walmart with the appearance of age. I know it didn’t. However, something different happened when the Lord Jesus Christ served the five thousand bread and fish in Matthew 14:13-21. I now know that just one cell of a fish exists according to a very complicated code of DNA, information from powerful and intelligent design antecedent to its emergence, let alone the origin of the matter from which it formed. Further along, there’s the fish eye, it’s gills, brain, internal organs, scales, and fins. Its musculature, that allowed for its under water propulsion, becomes the fleshly substance of a meal, also the subject of future digestion and incorporation into a human body.

Everything everyone ate at the feeding of the five thousand had the appearance of age. That was the miracle of it. Sure, it would have been a great miracle if everyone was able to stand or sit there that day and wait for a seed of wheat or corn to grow into the grain necessary to mill to flour, work into dough, and baked to yummy goodness. How long would that take? Perhaps the moment of the feeding was actually an age, once we’ve decided that we’re permitted to conform measurements of time to our preferred version of a scriptural narrative. We all know that a loaf of bread couldn’t have appeared in a moment according to known dating systems, so to help with the believability of Matthew 14:13-21, we allow for our own adaptation and maneuverability of the story.

No. Jesus created bread and fish, skipping the time and the process. He went straight from point A to B or A to Z, depending on how many steps you want to imagine were skipped. That’s the wonder of His power, wisdom, and love. God by nature is supernatural and He divinely intervenes in His creation however He wants. He is not bound by the very natural laws He originated. He’s more than the state highway police traveling as fast as He wants to enforce His own laws.

What’s harder? An instantaneous universe with an apparent appearance of fourteen billion years or thousands of separate bread loaves and fully grown fish? Think of even the milling process for flour. Where was the mill stone? There was none. Flour itself was skipped. What’s harder, the instantaneous creation of matter or the instantaneous formation of that matter to a mature appearing universe? Both are impossible, except with God. If you can believe the first, you can also believe the second.

Without faith, it is impossible to please God.

The Elimination of Practices and Activities Deemed Dispensable By the Truth About Real Gain

July 15, 2021 / Leave a comment

You can do certain things. They’re permissible, sure. They’re not wrong per se. Paul argue that’s not how we should choose to do things. We might like them. They might be fun.

Paul could have made money off of his preaching. According to him in 1 Corinthians 9, he even deserved it. Those who preach of the gospel, he said, should live of the gospel. However, he willingly gave up that support for the sake of the gospel. As an evangelist or missionary, taking monetary support for preaching the gospel could diminish the effects of his preaching.

The money Paul could have made was a type of gain. It’s still a well-known type of gain. Gain is an economics term, like “capital gains.” Adam Smith in his classic, Wealth of Nations, begins chapter ten by saying:

The five following are the principal circumstances which, so far as I have been able to observe, make up for a small pecuniary gain in some employments, and counterbalance a great one in others.

Then he names those five principles circumstances and elaborates on them. You see his use of the word “gain.” He uses it 17 times in that chapter. In the next paragraph, he writes:

Honour makes a great part of the reward of all honourable professions. In point of pecuniary gain, all things considered, they are generally under-recompensed, as I shall endeavour to show by and by. Disgrace has the contrary effect. The trade of a butcher is a brutal and an odious business; but it is in most places more profitable than the greater part of common trades. The most detestable of all employments, that of public executioner, is, in proportion to the quantity of work done, better paid than any common trade whatever.

He says that honor is the reward of certain honorouble professions, rather than “pecuniary gain.” “Pecuniary” is “related to or consisting of money.” He implies there are other types of gain, like honor. Honor is a kind of gain, not pecuniary, but one to be chosen over money apparently. The profession brings honor, if it doesn’t bring money.

The Apostle Paul refers to gain again and again in scripture, and this is seen in 1 Corinthians 9 in a section that most label as a section on Christian liberty. I respect that idea that 1 Corinthians 6-10 is about Christian liberty. I don’t mind it, but it is worth looking at it from the perspective of the definition of real gain.

God created man for a relationship with Him. The Lord Jesus said in Matthew 16:26,

For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?

There’s that word “gain.” The implication here is that someone profits nothing, even if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul. Luke 9:25 says,

For what is a man advantaged, if he gain the whole world, and lose himself, or be cast away?

In the King James Version, Paul uses the word “gain” five times. He writes first in 1 Corinthians 9:19,

For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more.

Instead of taking pecuniary gain, Paul wanted heavenly gain. He gave up the former for the latter. Pecuniary gain was dispensable. His own soul and the souls of the lost were not dispensable. He dispensed of one to gain the other. He goes on to use the word “gain.” Verse 22 is the last use:

To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.

Then Paul uses the example of athletes or competitors who discipline themselves for a prize. They dispense of personal comforts to win something temporal. They are an example. Paul says, decide and live and choose based upon real gain. Dispense of false gain. It isn’t gain.

When Paul gives his testimony, he credits this thought in his own salvation. Philippians 3:7 reads,

But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ.

Paul’s own salvation meant accessing real gain. What was once gain to him, to be saved, he must count as loss. Later in his ministry, for others to be saved, what was considered gain by many, he must count as loss.

1 Corinthians 6-10 is less about liberty, more about eliminating practices and activities that are dispensable. They are not gain. Paul could say that “to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). Real gain is what makes life worth living and death, not just tolerable, but favorable.

In 1 Corinthians 9 besides “gain,” Paul uses the words “reward” (vv. 17-18), “without charge” (v. 18), and “prize” (v. 24). Everyone is working or living for something. Where is the gain, the reward, and the prize?

At the end of Paul’s epistle (1 Corinthians 16:22), he writes:

If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha.

Anathema Maranatha means “cursed at His coming.”

Do we love the Lord Jesus Christ? That is, are we truly saved? If we do, we can and we will eliminate dispensable practices and activities. They are permissible, but they miss the purpose of God, why we’re here on earth as people and especially as believers.

Defining Pharisaism By Fleshing Out Its Confrontation by the Lord Jesus in His Sermon on the Mount

July 7, 2021 / Leave a comment

Terms like Pharisaism and legalism are often blunt instruments used today against churches and individual believers. They can be much like the word, racism. People weaponize terms to protect a belief or lifestyle through castigation. At the worst, they want to eliminate the objects of their scorn. Maybe they’re right about the ones they want to cancel and what they believe and practice. Is it true though? Are their targets really Pharisees and legalists?The Lord Jesus confronted Pharisaism and legalism with His Sermon on the on Mount in Matthew 5-7. The sermon explains salvation, but in a unique way to cast down the corrupt view of the Pharisees, the religion of the day. Their teaching was so prevalent everywhere, what Jesus then preached was also dealing with the thinking of everyone in His audience. Even if He wasn’t preaching to Pharisees, He was preaching to Pharisaism and legalism.

Pharisees didn’t recognize their spiritual poverty, so they didn’t mourn. Spiritually rich people don’t need to mourn because they’re already full of righteousness. As a result, they’re not submissive to God. They don’t need God to inherit the earth. They’ve got that one covered by themselves and through their own efforts.

Mercy is so weighty, so hard, that it’s nearly impossible for an impression of righteousness, not actual righteousness. Mercy also isn’t showy. It’s like what James talks about, visiting widows and the fatherless in their affliction. That doesn’t get the same publicity like Pharisaical religion, which depends on being noticed. Pharisees have a pure look, except when no one is looking. They’re not pure in heart.

Pharisees don’t have real peace, so they can’t be peacemakers. Peacemakers require peace with God themselves. Ignoring sin won’t bring peace. Peace doesn’t come from toleration of sin. Trying to be good and preaching that to others will leave them still an enemy of God’s.

Daniel prophesies the hardship brought on by the Roman government. It wouldn’t and it didn’t occur because of righteousness, but because of sin. Israel wasn’t suffering for righteousness. Individual Jews weren’t being persecuted by the Romans. Followers of God, who would be followers of His Son, Jesus Christ, will be persecuted for righteousness’ sake.

Pharisaism doesn’t retard corruption like salt. It hides its light to avoid persecution. The Pharisees reduced God’s law to something they could keep on their own. Like Jesus, they did not keep the least of God’s commandments, neither did they teach men to do so. Instead, they ranked the commandments and eliminated the ones that are hard to believe and obey. Because they abolished God’s instructions, they added their own as a replacement.

To do everything God wants, someone must trust God. In other words, his house must be built on the rock, who is Jesus Christ, and not the sand, which is their own efforts. The actual keeping of everything God says, in order to please Him, is what God wants. You won’t do that if you don’t believe in Jesus Christ.

Pharisees came to Jesus to find the greatest of God’s laws. It wasn’t so they could keep God’s laws, but to reduce them. Most of evangelicalism fits that description and most of evangelicalism labels Pharisees and legalists those who do not fit that description. They who do and teach the least of the commandments are called Pharisees. Those who break them and teach others to do so are the Pharisees.

Worth Your Salt

June 16, 2021 / 4 Comments on Worth Your Salt

When taking the opportunity to portray true Christian identity, Jesus used salt and light in Matthew 5:13-16. Through these two metaphors, He painted a picture of the expected nature of a genuine believer. In so doing, Jesus adhered to His original representation of salvation in the beatitudes (verses 3-12) and invoked the association with the Word of God (verses 17-20).

Salt can and will retard corruption and enhance taste if it retains its fundamental characteristic of saltiness. Salt without saltiness is worthless. Jesus said, “Ye are salt.” Specific people are salt, those who have saltiness. Very often scripture portrays unbelievers as worthless. They aren’t functioning according to the image of God in which He created man. They are like the branches of John 15, bearing no fruit and so thrown into the fire. They are worthless branches.

At the time Jesus spoke, salt was of great value. Roman soldiers were paid in salt, which pay meant they operated in a competent way. They were worth their salt.

The blessed man, one with the ultimate fulfillment of true salvation and receives the kingdom of heaven, is persecuted for righteousness’ sake. The righteousness stands up to and contrasts and conflicts with evil. This is being salt. A true believer’s righteousness will clash with false doctrine and practice. He’s not salt if he doesn’t.

The standard for the genuine believer’s conflict to retard corruption is scripture. The true believer lives according to and propagates the Word of God. Scripture manifests the nature of God. To take on the nature of God, the true believer retards decay by detecting and correcting false doctrine and practice according to the Word of God.

The nature of the world conflicts with the nature of God. This results in persecution. Rather than succumb to the pressure of that persecution, the true believer will continue as salt, retarding the corruption. This doesn’t occur by destroying the law, but by fulfilling it, every jot and tittle (verses 17-18). The genuine believe retains saltiness in the face of persecution. It’s his nature and that won’t change with opposition, a characteristic Jesus front loads in His description of salvation.

The opposition to darkness isn’t selective. It’s every jot and tittle. As Jesus continues, it is teaching not just the “essentials,” but even the least of God’s commandments. The righteousness of true Christianity supercedes the righteousness of the Pharisees. It doesn’t dumb down righteousness to a standard that can be kept by men. This is the salt losing its saltiness and becoming worthless.

Churches today are becoming worthless at retarding the unrighteousness of the world, because they are not standing up for righteousness. They stand up for selective or relative righteousness, not every jot or tittle. They are ashamed of many points of scripture and refuse to be salt where Christianity most clashes with the world. They are not worth their salt.

My Conversations with Numerous Exvangelicals

June 1, 2021 / 4 Comments on My Conversations with Numerous Exvangelicals

Exvangelical sounds like either a misspelling or a bit too much cleverness, I would agree, but for the sake of this post, I’m sticking with a word of which I’m reading its contemporary usage. Of all the words in the title, it gets your attention because it doesn’t sound like a word. Perhaps I’ll help you in future Scrabble endeavors.I regularly knock on doors of young, ex evangelicals, who grew up in church or a Christian home. Now they aren’t going to church and a large majority of the time, they don’t have the faith any longer. It is occurring and even as many of you readers know at an epidemic level. Churches are hemorrhaging their young people. Social media spreads the idea like a virus, and all the new forms of communication instantly create an interconnectedness in these exvangelicals that strengthens them against repentance or a return. They bind together and encourage one another in their apostasy. For those related, this is very, very sad, as sad an occurrence as they experience in their lives, putting new wrinkles on their faces and more grey in their hair.I’ve had many long conversations with some of these young exvangelicals. I haven’t gone out of my way to talk with them. It’s just happened. Even though they may come from varied backgrounds and situations and different types of evangelical churches, they are all very similar. For two reasons, I’m writing on this subject: the long talks with young exvangelicals in person and an article that was written by a Grayson Gilbert at Patheos, entitled, “I’m Not All That Impressed With Exvangelical Deconstruction Stories.” Gilbert is the polar opposite in that he started where exvangelicals have ended, so he was where they presently are, except seeing it from a unique perspective.I don’t write this post to critique Gilbert’s piece, although I may refer to it, but to write mainly what I have found myself, and then discuss my approach to these exvangelicals. When I meet one of them, I don’t know they’re there. I haven’t targeted them. They just appear without notice and the conversation starts like all the other ones I have. In the midst of it, they start telling me some of their backstory usually to explain why it is that they might not need to listen to what I have to say. They say they’ve already heard and thought about it a lot, and they turned away from it for various reasons. Almost always part of their narrative is some kind of injustice in the group they left, that justifies their having left it. In other words, something also happened that they didn’t like, so they can’t go back to it for personal reasons, which also serves to validate their decision. If they were to return, they now contend would support the evil of the former group.What I have to say to them doesn’t bring back exvangelicals, but it has resulted in longer conversations, where it seems to me that they’re giving my preaching at least a consideration. Like what we read in scripture, the real reason for their defection is why they are very difficult to persuade, so I see myself as just planting seed, giving them the best possible opportunity to come to the truth. That’s all we can do anyway.Why would exvangelicals eject from Christianity or biblical Christianity at least, if biblical Christianity is the truth?Assume that not every exvangelical will want to talk with you. They might be hostile. Many times they will talk though. I’ll ask, what happened that you left your group? Or, why aren’t you in the church any more? Many times they’ll give an answer. I sympathize with them. A lot of churches and groups have real problems. One of the reasons that we can say they’re wrong though is because we can know the truth about what’s wrong, which also means we can know the truth about what’s right. It would bother me though if the wrong thing was just normally or regularly allowed. I understand why someone would want to leave, it’s like you’re paddling out to an island that has little to do with the mainland. Why should you keep putting in that effort?However, just because your church or group went off or way off the rails, that doesn’t mean that the Bible or Christianity itself are not true. I am here to say that Jesus Christ is the best, really the only valid explanation for why we’re here and what we’re supposed to be doing.From here, I treat exvangelicals a bit like people who say they’re atheists. I ask, “So do you think all of this, all of this around us, got here by accident?” It is very, very rare that I have anyone answer, yes, to that question. I remind them that everything getting here by accident is the view taught in the state schools and it still can’t even be challenged there. The viewpoint that represents, naturalism, the more we know from science, the more it’s proven to be false. Darwin looked at a cell and it was just a blob. Now we can see it under a microscope, and even the cell is irreducibly complex, let alone the human eye or any of our bodily systems.Science now agrees everything must have a beginning. There can be no eternal regression of causes. Since the explanation for everything is supernatural, what is the true story? What is the first cause? When we look at what is caused, because we know it’s caused, it matches with the Bible.I talk to many, many religions, and I believe that every time I talk to one, I’m open to it being the truth. Nothing comes close to comparing to biblical Christianity. Christianity is different than everything else, because it is objective truth. It has proof. The Bible is historical, scholars agree with that. Then there is prophecy and fulfilled prophecy.Greater than every other evidence of Christianity is Jesus Christ Himself. How do you explain Him? More has been written about Him than about all other historical figures combined. There is more historical attestation of Jesus than Julius Caesar. We date our calendars based upon Him. In His writings, He speaks with absolute authority. Who could say, Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven? What He said could not have been said by someone who was just a man. Then He rose from the dead just like He said He would, and after walking around for forty days so thousands of people could see Him, who were alive when the New Testament was written, He ascended into heaven before over 500 of witnesses.Everything in the Bible fits together. It fits what we know to have happened. When people have based their lives upon the Bible, they have thrived. Its principles bring the success of a nation.You’ve finally got to bite down on something. You’ve got to make a choice and Christianity blows away the other choices. You could say that you don’t like the kind of proof of Christianity. I like to say that the knowledge of the existence of God and the truth of the Bible is not like the knowledge of the existence of your right foot. You don’t need to seek after your right foot. God wants you to seek after Him. You won’t find Him if you don’t want Him, and that’s how He’s designed it. But the proof is there.Faith according to the Bible is not a leap in the dark. It’s based on evidence. Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:6). God does want you to know Him. The Pharisees and Sadducees of Jesus’ day wanted an astronomical sign, and Jesus said He wasn’t providing any more (Matthew 16:1-4). He was saying, there’s enough. I like to say, for anyone who cares, there is enough.If the proof isn’t the reason for rejection, then what is the reason? Romans 1 says men have enough proof to justify God’s wrath. They are holding fast or suppressing the truth in their unrighteousness. 2 Peter 3 says it’s because of their lust. They want what they want to do more than what God wants them to do. They want to be in charge of their own lives.So exvangelical, just because you had a bad experience, you think, as a child or young adult, doesn’t mean Christianity is false. For there to be hypocrisy, there needs to be a belief in something. If there is no belief, no one can be a hypocrite. Don’t be upset at hypocrisy when you can’t even be a hypocrite.So why not bite down? You’re not open minded unless you are willing to believe something. If not, then you’re just closing your mind to everything. You can always say that you don’t have enough evidence, but you’re just rejecting what is by far the best explanation. Really, it’s the only explanation.Why take God’s free air, food, your circulatory system, your brain, all the good things, and be unthankful? Use them all up for yourself without any kind of gratefulness to God? That’s just rebellious. You’re not going to get away with it. You’ll get to the end and you’ll be separated from God and His goodness forever. It won’t be over for you. You’ll regret for all eternity.

PATAS, Philippine Atheism, Agnosticism, and Secularism (Society) Debate live: Does History Validate the Accuracy of the New Testament Gospels? Ross / Maisonet

May 28, 2021 / 2 Comments on PATAS, Philippine Atheism, Agnosticism, and Secularism (Society) Debate live: Does History Validate the Accuracy of the New Testament Gospels? Ross / Maisonet

I am pleased to inform What is Truth? readers that the Thomas Ross – Benjamin Maisonet debate, “Does History Validate the Accuracy of the New Testament Gospels?” is now live and can be watched on YouTube.

Click here to watch the Ross-Maisonet debate, “Does History Validate the Accuracy of the New Testament Gospels?”

The debate took place in Manila, Philippines, in 2019, where I was teaching a class on the preservation of Scripture and preaching for Bro Billy Hardecker of Mt. Zion Baptist Mission in Manila, but issues with the audio and video lining up kept the debate from going live until now. The quality is still not absolutely amazing, but considering the non-first-world setting and the equipment used, I am thankful for the quality that is present. Mr. Maisonet was (and I assume still is) the president of the Philippine Atheism, Agnosticism, and Secularism (Society), or PATAS. He told me that he replaced the previous president because that person had been stealing money from the organization. Atheism and agnosticism are much less common in the Philippines than they are in the United States, which may be one reason that the president of PATAS was born in the United States and moved to the Philippines. In any case, Mr. Maisonet, as the president of PATAS, was a good representative of atheism in the Philippines. He made the sort of popular-level arguments that one will run across in personal evangelism, rather than the more scholarly type of arguments against the accuracy of the New Testament made by Islamic apologists such as Shabir Ally. I confess that I did not find his argumentation particularly convincing, but he seems to have thought he made a good case, and I will allow those who watch the debate to evaluate what was said based on facts and logic in God’s world.

PATAS Philippine Atheist Agnostic Society

The PATAS debate was set up at short notice, so I employed a lot of the material from my debate with Dr. Ally on “The New Testament Picture of Jesus: Is It Accurate?” which is also in my study on evidence for the New Testament from archaeology, prophecy, and history. In my view, which is admittedly biased in favor of God and His Word, the arguments made for the historicity of the New Testament have now stood up well against both Muslim and atheist apologists.

Feel free to subscribe to my KJB1611 YouTube channel,”like” and comment on the debate, and share it with others, if you believe it deserves it. Also, if you would be interested in sponsoring a debate with a non-Christian philosophy or a pseudo-Christian cult, please contact my church.

–TDR

How Jesus Relates Persecution to the Gospel in the Sermon on the Mount and His Example to Us In Doing So

May 19, 2021 / Leave a comment

In what is called “the Sermon on the Mount” in Matthew 5-7, Jesus preaches salvation to a Jewish crowd of people and pulls down with supernatural wisdom and authority their unique strongholds. For instance, in the very first statement, one of the Beatitudes, He says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” The Jews didn’t see themselves as spiritually poor, but spiritually wealthy. They were by rights, God’s chosen people. Of course, they were already “blessed” through the Abrahamic covenant, and even in their own eyes, the Mosaic covenant, according to the Deuteronomic code. None of their thinking was true on this, so Jesus eviscerated it in the Sermon.

Another Jewish thought is “the kingdom.” They would have considered themselves already the beneficiaries of the kingdom through the Davidic covenant. “Heaven” is the abode of God and they saw themselves as the children of God, so wherever God was, they would be, even as God resided in the tabernacle through the wilderness. Jesus confronts their wrong thinking when he shows the rich man is in Hell, not in heaven in Luke 16. None of this, the kingdom or heaven, was theirs, however, unless they were poor in spirit, which meant that they acquiesced to their own spiritual poverty, that they really were lacking and in dire need. They needed to do what the Apostle Paul did and count their own spirituality as loss and as dung for them to win Christ or find themselves under the reign of the Messiah in His kingdom with all its promised blessings.

The Jews already saw themselves as sadly and badly not receiving their just desserts, their appropriate reward. According to their own assessment, they were persecuted by the Romans as they had been by many other various empires previously. This would fly in the face of being a blessed people and a kingdom people. It was an unacceptable circumstance that should be turned around and would be reversed by a true Messiah. That’s not what Jesus said though.

Just like the people in the kingdom of heaven would be first poor in spirit, they would also be persecuted for righteousness sake (Matthew 5:10). Persecution is the guaranteed cost of a truly saved person and Jesus frontloads this in His gospel presentation in Matthew 5:10-12. As people enter into true salvation through Jesus Christ, they need to expect persecution. They need to count the cost. Jesus said in Luke 9:23, that if any man will come after him, let him take up his cross daily. Jesus issues that understanding right up front to those who might receive the kingdom. It’s a narrow road with few on it.

Churches today do not give their targets for attendance or membership the impression that they will suffer or be persecuted by joining up. That’s a way to shrink the numbers. However, it is the method of Jesus. He included that in His gospel presentation and more than once. Do not expect to have it easy if you’re a Christian, and that’s not why you’re receiving Christ, for what you’ll receive in time, because that’s going to be persecution. Very likely why less are truly converted today is because they do not see the Christian life as worth suffering for. They would choose a Christianity full of pleasure, but not the one with guaranteed pain, so they reject genuine Christianity for the placebo. Churches offer the placebo, because that’s what people want. Then the entire program of the church revolves around various pleasures, especially for the young people.

The Jews thought they were persecuted already, but they were were persecuted for unrighteousness. Daniel prophecies why Israel would be dominated by the Romans. He was downhearted by the lack of enthusiasm for God among the captives in Babylon, comfortable to just stay and not return to the land for true worship of God. They would keep being chastised because of their faithlessness and then they took that as persecution. Actual persecution is for righteousness and not unrighteousness. Just because the Jews of Jesus’ day were suffering didn’t mean they were persecuted and neither did it mean they had a future kingdom for them. No, that kingdom was only for those persecuted for righteousness.

People in the future kingdom do not fit into the present one, the kingdom of this world. The people under the future reign of Jesus are those who want a present reign of Jesus. People who want Him to be king in the future have got to want Him to be king in the present. Those over whom Jesus reigns will be persecuted. They will not fit in. They will be despised, reviled, and accused falsely by men. That will be the norm for those following Jesus Christ into the kingdom and He wants them to know that right up front.

Jesus isn’t going to take away persecution in the short term. He offers the future kingdom as a motivation for present rejoicing. The basis for being exceeding glad now is the reward in heaven for all eternity. There is a lack of joy in churches and in professing Christian families because of something far less than persecution. The church and family members are not getting their way and they don’t like the discomfort now. They expect to be treated better and have their rights protected. When they get hard preaching from scripture they become easily offended. When they are required to live like a Christian, they are put off and threaten to quit, if not just to find another church where they’ll be treated like they want.

Professing Christians aren’t looking for a church where they will suffer. They are looking for a place of creature comforts with lots of friends. This is not what Jesus told true believers to expect. He told them just the opposite and He included it in His gospel presentation.

The Misuse of James 1:20 and the Wrath of Man

May 17, 2021 / Leave a comment

Does the wrath of man work not the righteousness of God? It would seem that this was true because of James 1:20 and it’s saying that explicitly: “For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.” How could anyone question that? It’s the entire verse.

You see someone get angry, this verse comes to mind, and you quote it to the angry person. Yet, what if I saw that you weren’t angry, and I quoted instead, Ephesians 4:26, “Be ye angry, and sin not”? This verse seems to require anger not to sin. James 1:20 seems to require no anger not to sin. Are they contradicting one another?

2 Corinthians 7:11, a classic passage on repentance, includes as part of repentance over sin, “indignation.” It’s obvious that the indignation is over someone’s personal sin, which is also what Ephesians 4:26 is about. Anger at one’s own sin is useful for not sinning.

John 2 doesn’t say that Jesus was angry when He cleansed the temple, but of his disciples, who were present and witnessing this occurrence, John 2:17 says, “And his disciples remembered that it was written, The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.” Jesus reached down, picked up strands of leather to form into a make-shift whip, and started whipping people, animals, and overturning tables. It looked like He was angry. The Greek word translated, “zeal,” which is a quotation of Psalm 69:9, BDAG calls “an intense negative feeling.” There was sin all over that temple, and Jesus was angry over it. He had an intense negative feeling about it.

Let’s return to James 1:20 and look more at the context, seeing verses 18-22:

18 Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures. 19 Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: 20 For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. 21 Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. 22 But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.

James lays out tests of faith so that someone can know that he’s been converted, that he has saving faith. Saving faith proceeds from the “word of truth.” See that in verse 18? God begat us “with the word of truth.” A test of faith is what someone does with the word of truth. The context is about hearing scripture and doing it. It is obvious that the hearing of scripture is the preaching of the Word of God.

In the context, when the Word of God is preached, since it is the agent of our regeneration, our conversion, turning us into a ‘firstfruits of God’s creatures,’ every man should “be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath” (v. 19). There is one positive and there are two negatives. If someone is receptive to the Word of God being preached in a positive way, he is “swift to hear,” and then in a negative way, he is “slow to speak” and “slow to wrath.” He is listening and not debating or getting angry with what he is hearing.

James directs his writing to “beloved brethren.” Are these saved people? I believe they are unsaved and saved Jews, a mixed multitude attending a church. “Brethren” in this case refers to Jewish brethren, people in the nation Israel. Some of them are saved and some of them are unsaved. If they are unsaved, listening to the preaching of God’s Word could result in their being saved, or in other words, ‘work the righteousness of God.” On the other hand, if they were to debate and get angry with the preaching of scripture, that would not work the saving righteousness of God.

If these are saved Jews hearing James’s epistle, they could acknowledge that they have a saving response to preaching. They are swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. Their response to scripture is a test of their faith, and they pass that test.

The “wrath” of verse 20, that “worketh not the righteousness of God,” is the wrath of verse 19, “slow to wrath.” It’s not just any wrath. It is anger at the preaching of scripture. That anger, that wrath, worketh not the righteousness of God. It results in a person not receiving imputed righteousness by faith. If this is a saved person, it results in his not receiving sanctifying righteousness.

A man, who is angry with the preaching of scripture, will not “lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness” (v. 21). As a result, he will not receive the saving of his soul. He’s not listening to scripture. He’s arguing with it and angry with it. As a result, he is not begotten by the Word of Truth.

James continues in verse 22 on the same theme. A true believer will not just hear but also do what the Bible says. He will hear it and practice it. This all connects to his relationship to God. God is the source of every good and perfect gift (v. 17a). He spoke the world into existence by His Word and He doesn’t change (v. 17b), so He is still giving good things through His Word, including His righteousness.

When someone uses James 1:20 in a general way to say that no wrath works the righteousness of God, that is false. We know that some wrath, righteous indignation, does work the righteousness of God. This is the wrath of man against the Word of God when it is preached. That is the wrath of James 1:20 and that is how James 1:20 should be used or applied. When it is isn’t used that way, it is being twisted or perverted. You could even say it isn’t working the righteousness of God.

The Command in Scripture and in the Real World

May 10, 2021 / 2 Comments on The Command in Scripture and in the Real World

The Bible is full of commands. A command is an order from authority. In a colloquial way, it is being told what to do. It is distinguished by telling, not asking. In the military, it is a statement that might be followed by “and that’s an order.” In a grammar, the command is an imperative mode of verb. When studying commands, it’s under the heading of imperatives. Out of all the imperatives in the Greek New Testament, there are 1357 commands, which include prohibitions or negative commands. A command is the language of superiors in authority to subordinates.

The fact that the Bible uses so many commands justifies commands or commanding. Commands need to be made. The first statement of God to mankind is from the Lord God and Genesis 2:16 says, “And the Lord God commanded the man.” With the command comes a consequence, disobedience to the command results in death.

With the above being said about just the New Testament, we live in an era, even when someone is superior in authority, he doesn’t tell, but he asks nicely. A command implies authority. It also calls for subordination and obedience. It says that someone can tell someone else what to do. It implies that someone might know more than someone else too. Someone should be listening to someone else and doing what he says to do.One of the greatest commands in the New Testament is the Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20. I start with verse 18, because Jesus says that “all power,” which is all authority, is given unto [Him] in heaven and in earth.” Therefore. Based upon that authority, verse 19, “Go ye, and teach all nations.” In the Greek, only “teach” is a command, and “go” is a participle. Jesus has all authority and He commands those that day, “Teach,” which is to “make disciples.” With all authority, Jesus commands, “Make disciples. “Have you “made a disciple”? Why not? Some professing Christians, who barely even try to make a disciple, put very little effort to obey that command, still judge themselves to be superior spiritually for other reasons. They are still not obeying that command.What are other New Testament commands? Follow me, Jesus commanded. Rejoice. Fear not. Bless them that curse you. Love God. Love thy neighbor.Jesus used commands all the time, because He has and had authority. He speaks with authority in part as seen in His commands. He also showed His authority by the consequences He guaranteed. In the Sermon on the Mount, He said, “The meek shall inherit the earth.” Who could make that statement except the Person who owns the earth? That is who we should listen to. He speaks with authority.We live in a world where people don’t want commands. They don’t want someone in command. They chafe at being commanded. This is not the atmosphere or environment well-suited to follow Jesus Christ, because He commands all the time in the New Testament, and then even those who call themselves Christians don’t obey what He commanded.I am not going to command you, but I ask you to think about your relationship to commands and, therefore, to authority. Can you be told what to do? When you are told what to do and by authority, do you obey it? Do you become angry with it?When people are children, parents and other adults need to start commanding. “Give me that.” “Stop it.” “Come here.” “Don’t touch.” “Eat.” “Pick that up.” “Make your bed.” “Go get me that.” “Mow the lawn.” “Pull those weeds.” “Finish your homework.” “Put that down.” As children, they need to start learning to obey commands.If someone, who says he is a Christian, is going to obey the New Testament, obey God’s Word, and obey Jesus Christ, he needs to be fine with commands. He needs to embrace them. God works through authority.

The Detection and Correction of Doctrinal and Practical Error

May 3, 2021

Not meant as an understatement, detection and correction of the coronavirus has become serious to the whole world and the nation. I don’t remember anything treated as importantly in my lifetime. Coronavirus kills the body. It doesn’t kill everybody or even necessarily a large percentage of those who get it, but the fear of it is that it destroys the body. The importance of detecting it and correcting the coronavirus relates to its killing people’s bodies. The Lord Jesus said the following in Matthew 10:28:

And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

With eternal knowledge, which includes eternity past all through eternity future, the Lord Jesus can judge with perfection what to fear. Jesus says that we should fear the one who can destroy body and soul more than the one who can destroy just body. The detection of that which can destroy both body and soul in hell forever is far more important than the one who can destroy just body. With this contrast Jesus reveals the truth about the priority of detecting and correcting doctrinal and practical error. Even though people do not treat it as such, there is so much more at stake with it.People stress personal protective equipment. When the virus first started its spread, there was a shortage on this, and it was a big deal to have it for obvious reasons. It was very important to protect people. The virus kills. But it only kills body. Doctrinal error specially, which is also practical, is more important to detect and stop or correct. Much doctrinal error and a diverse, large variety of it, is enough at least to destroy both body and soul in hell forever. Forever. This is very serious. If Jesus says it is this serious, it is this serious. Destruction of body and soul forever blows away mere destruction of body. Jesus said in Mark 9:47 it would be better to pluck out your eye and enter into the kingdom than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire.False teachers (Matthew 7:15) are the first reason people take the broad road to destruction. They aren’t pointing to the narrow road with their false teaching, but to the broad road that leads to destruction (Matthew 7:13-14). Jesus says they’re wolves in sheep’s clothing and they want to destroy sheep, obviously by destroying their souls with all sorts of what 2 Peter 2:1 calls, “damnable heresies.” Jude 1:11 calls this destruction of the soul, perishing in the gainsaying of Korah, which in the next chapter of 2 Peter (3:17), Peter speaks of those who will fall from their steadfastness, being led away with the error of the wicked.Those who save those from the damnable teaching of false teachers, James says convert from the error of their way and save their souls from death (5:20). Paul says in 1 Timothy 4:16 says that by taking heed unto true doctrine, they will save themselves and those who hear them. Those who abide not in the doctrine of Christ, John says they have not God (2 John 1:9). In some cases, believers are deceived through the false teaching of false prophets, which is enough to distract them from service or at least effective service (1 Cor 15:33, Col 2:9).The detection and correction of doctrinal and practical error has eternal ramifications for the souls of men. An error in need of detection and correction from the onset is one of proportion, when the fear of him who can destroy only body extinguishes or overshadows the fear of Him Who can destroy both body and soul in hell forever.

WHAT IS TRUTH

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INDEX FOR WHAT IS TRUTH

The Feeding of the Five Thousand: How Old Were the Bread and the Fish the People Ate, That Jesus Gave Them?

The Elimination of Practices and Activities Deemed Dispensable By the Truth About Real Gain

Defining Pharisaism By Fleshing Out Its Confrontation by the Lord Jesus in His Sermon on the Mount

Worth Your Salt

My Conversations with Numerous Exvangelicals

PATAS, Philippine Atheism, Agnosticism, and Secularism (Society) Debate live: Does History Validate the Accuracy of the New Testament Gospels? Ross / Maisonet

Click here to watch the Ross-Maisonet debate, “Does History Validate the Accuracy of the New Testament Gospels?”

How Jesus Relates Persecution to the Gospel in the Sermon on the Mount and His Example to Us In Doing So

The Misuse of James 1:20 and the Wrath of Man

The Command in Scripture and in the Real World

The Detection and Correction of Doctrinal and Practical Error

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