craigwbooth's Xanga

Are there ANY Bible prophecies that indisputably came true?

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:01:50 GMT

What presuppositions make every prophecy into a lie?

On a religion forum someone posted and asked, “Are there ANY Bible prophecies that indisputably came true?” Immediately rock solid prophecies leapt to mind and to keyboard: Abraham and Sarah having Isaac in their old age, God promising to grow a mighty nation of the Jews in Egypt, God telling Moses that he will lead the nation out of Egypt, Isaiah prophesying that God would release the Jews from Babylonian captivity to rebuild Jerusalem, Daniel naming the kings of coming empires, and that the Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.

Rock solid? As I soon learned, every prophecy in the Bible was rejected by the skeptics along with every secular source that supported the biblical accounts. It turned out the poster and the skeptics had ironclad rules they had hidden from view but followed rigidly. By the time the hidden rules of the presupposition game were slowly revealed in the words of the skeptics, the answer they had predetermined to obtain for themselves was, “No, there never was and never will be an indisputable biblical prophecy because our rules have guaranteed this answer for us.”

The hidden rules of the presupposition game are:

If a prophecy was made in one book of the Old Testament and fulfilled in another book of the Old Testament it must always be assumed that the prophecy was a recent scribal edit added after the fact (about 400 BC) and did not exist in the first writing of the book.
If a prophecy was made in the Old Testament regarding the future Messiah (e.g. virgin birth, born in Bethlehem, died via crucifixion, resurrected from the dead) then whenever the New Testament demonstrates that Jesus fulfilled that prophecy it must be assumed that the gospel writer invented those details about Jesus and that they never actually happened to Jesus.
If a prophecy was made by a New Testament person (e.g. Jesus predicted the destruction of the temple which occurred in 70 AD) then it must always be assumed that the prophecy was written down after the prophetic event was fulfilled and was not actually uttered at the time described in the writing.

What is the implication if every Bible prophecy is a lie?

In short, the hidden rules of the anti-supernatural presuppositionalists guarantee that no biblical prophecy can ever be accepted as valid prophecy. Worse, it automatically makes every Old Testament book of the Bible a fabrication filled with falsehoods and every New Testament apostle that wrote a letter or endorsed a gospel account to be a flagrant liar.

Virtually the entire Christian faith is dependent on the truths that Jesus was born of a virgin, was born in Bethlehem as a descendant of David, lived a perfect life, died a sacrificial death, and resurrected from death to life. Since all those events were first prophesied in the Old Testament about the Messiah, it means that either Jesus fulfilled them all and was the Messiah, or, every foundational aspect of Christianity is a brazen lie and never happened.

In other words, if one accepts that Jesus did live a perfect life, and/or died a sacrificial death via crucifixion, and/or resurrected from death to life, then you have “personal proof” that at least five Old Testament prophecies absolutely were fulfilled.

Opposite that, if one accepts that the gospel writers and the apostles all lied in their writings about such things as Jesus being born of a virgin, Jesus being born in Bethlehem in the line of David, His perfect life, His sacrificial death by crucifixion, and His resurrection to life, then EVERY aspect of Christianity is false and immoral; all of it having been based on falsehoods. There can be nothing good or wholesome in the Christian religion in such a case for it is all comprised of deceit, errors, and intentional mis-directions.

No revelation of God is possible?

Now, if every Bible prophecy is a fabrication and was never made in real human history, then God never revealed Himself in it or through it, ever. For example, Abraham could never have encountered God because God always prophesied the future (including a son and a nation) to Abraham on every encounter. Certainly Moses never encountered God because at the burning bush God supposedly prophesied that Moses would lead the nation out of Egypt into the promised land originally granted to Abraham (a prophecy later fulfilled by Joshua).

Kind David was given a future-telling prophecy that his lineage would rule Israel for eternity and would save all the world from their sins. That too had to have been a lie, a fake future-telling prophecy, a fabrication added to the scrolls by devious scribes in 400 BC.

Was every prophecy of the Messiah a future-telling prophecy?

And the worst part, there never was a promised Messiah. Every promise of a Savior/Messiah in the Old Testament was a future-telling prophecy. Every one. If all of those prophecies were recent edits by sneaky Jewish scribes in 400 BC and were not made by the original prophets who first wrote the books, or, if they were never fulfilled by anyone, including Jesus, then the world never did have a Messiah from the line of David. No Messiah means no sacrifice was made for sins. No sacrifice for sins means no forgiveness and no salvation. None.

Were the first manuscripts of the Bible written without any future-telling prophecies?

It is wrongly assumed by the skeptics that the Bible was originally a book that told a story about religious men and had no future-telling prophecies. They suppose that as time went on and the people described in the books died, the books were edited to describe past historical events as if they had been forecasted by the religious men.

Such a theory completely ignores the fact that the Bible is nothing but one continuous future-telling prophecy from one page to the next. There are no stories that do not contain future-telling prophecies. The prophecies were often the point, motivation, and plot behind each recorded event. There can be no story of Moses without all the future-telling prophecies by which God directed him and ultimately delivered the Law. Take away the future-telling prophecies because you assume they never happened in the manner described in the Bible, and there is no book of religious men.

What choice do I have but to believe the prophecies of the Bible are valid?

That about sums up the two choices:

Every patriarch in the Bible is a liar for having claimed an encounter with God and having claimed to have been given a future-telling prophecy regarding a promised land, a great nation, or a coming Messiah, thus, all of Judaism and all of Christianity are a giant conspiracy of uncounted liars covering a span of four thousand years.

-Or-

The prophecies were presented to the original patriarchs just as the Scriptures report them and Jesus is the fulfillment of every one of the prophecies just as the gospels, apostles, and eyewitnesses have reported.

Which choice is backed by the best evidence and is more plausible? If you have a presupposition that everything supernatural is impossible, you will choose option one. If you presuppose a living personal God who loves His creation and has communicated with it, option two may have some appeal for you.

As for me and my house, we have chosen to believe in the Lord.

Election, Predestination, Freewill, Choices, and Nonsense

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:55:29 GMT

C.S. Lewis once famously stated in his book, The Problem of Pain, that it was “nonsense” to assume that God chose who would be the elected saints and also those who would reject Him while He simultaneously held guilty those who turned away from Him. To Lewis God was incapable of choosing whom He would love and call to salvation while at the same time condemning to Hell those whom He chose not to give the gift of saving faith.

D.A. Carson more correctly noted that God can do all the choosing (He chooses both those who go to Heaven and those who go to Hell) while holding responsible those humans whom He did not choose to come to belief in Christ. Carson, in his book How Long O Lord?, does not find this concept to be nonsense but concurrent biblical truths.

The Apostle Paul, of course, presents the doctrine of predestination / election (“a choosing in advance”) in the terms understood by Carson. Paul notes that God chooses those humans He will honor with salvation and those who are destined for destruction in Hell (Romans 9:8-22). He did all this choosing “before the foundation of the world” was spoken into existence (Ephesians 1:4). Merely because Lewis could not personally do what God can do is not warrant to accuse God of being nonsensical.

But let us explore this idea of logic and apparent contradiction. Arminians are celebrated for following Lewis in accusing God of uttering nonsense in Romans 9. They say if God chooses those who will believe and those who will not believe then it is illogical to hold the unbelievers responsible for their unbelief for no one can resist the choosing of God; it is not the human’s fault so the person does not deserve Hell. Paul debunks this very accusation in Romans 9:13-21.

It seems to escape the Arminian’s notice that their position has an extraordinary and overwhelming illogical presupposition underlying their own framework. They argue that before creation God desired all the world to become saved and therefore He chose no one to be saved or unsaved, but relied upon the freewill of each person to decide their own fate. Then, before the world was yet created, He looked into the future and saw which person would accept Him and which would reject Him, then He only “elected” those who would use their freewill to accept Him.

Such a scenario is impossibly illogical. Before the world was created, IF God could see into the future to know what persons would choose to believe in Him and what persons would not, and IF God desired everyone in the world to be saved, then WHY did He allow the unsaved to be created or even born?

Was God not powerful enough to change the future before it happened and demand that His desires be implemented? Was God not powerful enough to decree, “Johnny is not going to choose Christ, but since I want all people to be saved I will simply not have Johnny be born”? Was Johnny more powerful than God so as to thwart His good intentions?

Or maybe God is not all knowing and cannot really see into the future? Perhaps God did His best to foreknow what each person would do, but since the future is always in motion it is blurry and hard to read, so He most often got it wrong since most people go to Hell?

The notion that God is either lacking in power or lacking in knowledge (or foreknowledge) is heresy, illogical, and nonsense. Yet, this is the underlying assumption that must be made by all Arminians when they promote freewill. Lewis boasted that he believed God defers the use of His power to allow humanity to exercise his freewill. That comment is self-contradictory when Lewis also claims that God desires all people to be saved. If God desired all men to be saved, He would not have intentionally limited His power and thus condemned untold multitudes to Hell. Remember, there is no good reason why God allowed Hell-bound unbelievers to ever be born when He could easily have stopped each one from coming into existence while still allowing to be born all those who would choose to believe in Him.

Arminianism is logically flawed. Worse, it is biblically flawed. It makes God to be less than God in both knowledge and power. Given the choice between accepting the mystery of biblical election / predestination and the logical contradictions and heresies introduced by Arminianism, I must side with the Apostle Paul.

Just as it is written, "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated." What shall we say then? There is no injustice with God, is there? May it never be! For He says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." So then it does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy. (Romans 9:13-16)

Sorry Harry Potter Fans, but It’s Not Magic: A Blog of Miracles, Science, and Magic

Fri, 09 Oct 2009 15:47:40 GMT

When God created the universe He did not use magic. He planned in advance the rules that would govern energy, atomic cohesion, biology, entropy, matter, physics, and quantum physics. Then Christ, who lived in the realm of spirit, created a corporeal reality--from the absoluteness of the infinite void that lacked energy, time, space, and matter. He willed into existence the energy and the particles of matter that now comprise the massive cosmos that surrounds our little planet. Then, applying the laws of physics and biology He manipulated the very molecules of His cosmos and He created life itself.

God did not use magic. He created physical laws, and the energy and matter that obey those laws. He manipulates this physical realm by ordering the energy and matter particles that He brought into existence.

When God performs miracles, He commands the very atomic and molecular elements to reorder themselves so that the result is compatible with His physical laws even though there were no physical means or abilities to have achieved that result. For example, water is hydrogen and oxygen. When Jesus changed water to wine, He had the knowledge and power to reorder every molecule to be reassembled into wine, the resulting substance of which obeys and is compatible with the physical laws of this universe even though there was no physical means to have instantly reordered the molecular structure of the water. That is a miracle.

Magic is an imitation of the miraculous. By magic I am not referring to the slight-of-hand misdirection-trickery of illusions by David Copperfield. I am referring to actions and results that cannot be accomplished by ordinary persons. Nor am I referring to the use of science and machinery by which one can convert coal to electricity. I am referring to only the use of will and knowledge. No human has the knowledge or the power to reorder matter or energy by mere use of their will.

Yet, the Bible speaks of Egyptian magicians having performed acts that mimicked genuine miracles. Today we hear about impossible things that happen when children play with Ouija boards. How can such things be if humans do not have the power of will or the knowledge to reorder molecules and energy?

Satan is the prince of the power of the air. This is a limited authority he has for a limited time to be sure. Yet, at his disposal are legions of angels (one third that followed him from heaven) called demons. Scripture is replete with comments about the angels of God and the demons of Satan being able to do what man cannot: reorder matter and energy.

When a human “magician” (not an illusionist doing slight-of-hand) appears to perform acts of true power, or a Ouija board answers a question on its own, the power is that of a demon taking action. Humans can do no such thing. There is no magic, only the operations of demons.

Some will argue that controlling or commanding a demon to get things done is magic. After all, what are spells and incantations except verbal petitions to demons to make something happen? Such persons who offer supplications to demons do not understand that men cannot control or command demons. The demons are controlling and manipulating them. Satan is the prince of the power of the air, not the other way around. Demons appear to “obey” the human so as to deceive them and bring them more and more under demonic influence and more and more into the chaotic thinking of evil. This leads the human to becoming open to being possessed, the slave of the demon, not its master.

No, there is no magic, only demons. Satan is prince (not king) of the power of the air of this planet. And Christ is the King over all He created. Pray to the Creator, the King of Kings, for a new heart, a living spirit, and for the forgiveness of sins, and He will save you, sending His Holy Spirit to live inside you as a guarantee of ultimate salvation and a protection against the powers of this world. Who needs magic when God offers you a personal miracle like that?

Plan Now to Make a Halloween Impact

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 14:13:51 GMT

There are a candy dish full of children who are about to visit your home this month. They will simply be begging to hear the gospel. This is your chance to make an impact on them for Christ.

Here ( http://thefaithfulword.org/redeeminghalloween.html ) is an article that provides a free printable tract (4 tracts per one sheet of printer paper) along with instructions and suggestions on how to use it. There is sufficient time to read the article, print the tract, and make copies to share with the children who will be coming to your house. It is a tiny investment on your part that could yield huge results in the heart of a child.

Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. (Ephesians 5:15-16)

What will be Your Job during the Millennium?

Fri, 25 Sep 2009 18:41:41 GMT

In the last few chapters of Revelation we are told that a coming Great Tribulation will transpire. During that judgment time (between 3 to 7 years in duration) many, many people will come to faith in Christ. So numerous will be the numbers of Jews that become saved that they are called “an uncountable multitude.”

After the Great Tribulation, Christ will return, and the 1000 years of His bodily rule as king over the earth will begin. Revelation says He brings the resurrected saints back with Him. These resurrected saints will have first been given their glorified bodies which cannot sin, which are genderless, which cannot age, sicken, or die. These resurrected saints are us.

We come back with Christ when He begins the 1000 years of His absolute rule over those who will have survived the Great Tribulation; He will rule over them and the children they will bear. People will live to be over one hundred years of age during that time period. Jesus’ throne will be housed on Mount Zion, the temple mountain in Jerusalem that is presently hosting the Dome of the Rock.

Why does Jesus bring us back to this planet in glorified bodies? Two reasons. First, we have been promised to never be absent from the presence of Christ after we die--and His presence will be on earth during His Millennial monarchy. The Millennial reign is for the benefit of the Jews. God will grant every unfulfilled blessing that Israel was given in the Old Testament Law. They will live in peace. The nation will worship Christ as king and Savior. The world will honor Israel as the favored nation of God.

So what is the second reason why are we there? We will serve Christ in His administration. He rules, we do His bidding for the purpose of serving Israel. Some of us will likely be sanitation directors, while others will possibly be city planners (there will be a population explosion going on), others will probably be lawyers and judges, while some may be mayors and governors. Whatever jobs we are given to do in Christ’s administration we will be working for Christ and to serve Israel that all the blessings they were promised will be fulfilled.

I have no idea how assignments will be given. Is it possible that what we learn and experience on this earth in this life will be the basis for what God chooses to have us do later? Will those who have dedicated themselves to the study of the Word in this life be pressed into service as teachers, counselors, or judges in the Millennium? I have no idea. But if our future is connected with our present (and I do not know that it is), that is but one more reason to learn the Word well now, “Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more matters of this life?” (1 Corinthians 6:3)

If you have a choice, what job will you choose to volunteer for during the Millennium?

What does expositional mean?

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 01:53:43 GMT

Over the past few days I have been following a debate on a religion forum. On one side of the debate are some preachers from a not-quite-mainstream Christian denomination. They have been arguing that everything that a patriarch did in the Old Testament is meant to be a model of moral conduct for us to emulate today, UNLESS the story narrative explicitly says, “and he sinned by doing this.”

On the other side of the debate are some laity who have been quoting hermeneutic books and Old Testament exegesis materials. These quotes all show that often the Old Testament narratives did not explicitly call attention to evil behavior by the patriarchs. The authors of the stories expected the hearers and readers to know the Old Testament Law and to know that lying, stealing, adultery, and murder were evil without having to be told. The authors of the Bible never expected that people would assume that everything a patriarch did was always good enough to be copied without further thought.

Needless to say, I side most emphatically with the laity on that forum. The only way to be certain that an historical figure in the Bible did a good deed or did a bad deed is to compare the deed to biblical standards of conduct, like the 10 Commandments or the morality teachings of Christ as reflected in the New Testament gospels and epistles.

I took a break from following this debate and went to the local Protestant Christian bookstore. I asked the clerk if she could point me to the books on developing expositional sermons from the Old Testament. She looked blankly at me, then turned around a few times to see if there was any escape, then asked, “What does expositional mean?” I smiled and said, “Well, how about just books on writing sermons?” She smiled back and said, “We might have some over here.” A single volume was on the shelf dedicated to sermon development aids. It dealt with the New Testament only.

So I asked, “Where do you keep the books on hermeneutics?” and immediately regretted asking. “What does that word mean?” Again, I smiled and said, “Oh, it just means studying and interpreting the Bible.” “Oh, we don’t have anything like that, but we do have commentaries and Bible dictionaries.”

After thanking her for her assistance, I walked out of the store very sad. I realized that the online booksellers were putting the smaller Christian bookstores out of business, and that accounted for some of the lack. But I also realized that we are truly turning into an unchurched country, even in Christian circles. There are no books on expositional preaching and hermeneutics because there is no demand for them. Increasingly, there is no knowledge of what these skills are. And that is why we see Christian pastors attempting to emulate the sins of the Old Testament patriarchs all the while thinking they are conducting themselves in a biblical manner.

If this country’s pastors do not begin recovering their expositional and hermeneutical skills sets and begin teaching the Bible in a deeper way that will stretch and grow their congregations we are in danger of seeing the next generation of Christians grow up to be entirely illiterate with regard to the Bible, morality, faith, and the person of God. As we learn from the Old Testament story of the divided nations of Israel and Judah, there is a limit to the amount of willful ignorance and disobedience that God will permit from His own people.

But that is the catch, isn’t it? To learn that lesson from Israel and Judah, one must know how to read the Old Testament and interpret it correctly. I wonder, is it already too late?

Health Insurance and an Appeal for Common Sense

Tue, 11 Aug 2009 06:45:19 GMT

When Obama was elected, I was unhappy because my political views tend toward the conservative. Yet, I did harbor some hope that maybe, just maybe, healthcare would get some attention and some reform would be accomplished.

What I have seen leaves me just as unhappy as I was on election eve.

When I think healthcare reform, I mean simply:

make it illegal for insurance companies to refuse applicants or to refuse coverage because of “preexisting conditions”
make it illegal for healthcare providers (doctors and hospitals) to bill different prices to those without insurance “coverage” as those with (those without insurance are billed considerably more for the same medical procedure as those who have insurance--how is that fair?)
the only government involvement in healthcare (aside from Medicare and Medicaid) would be to provide a spending cap for all citizens--that is, once a citizen spent $10,000 or $15,000 of their own cash for health expenses in any year then the government would pay any additional expenses--any expenses before the cap amount is met would be paid by the citizen or by his insurance company. No one will find themselves in a million dollar hole for having decided to treat their cancer.

But our current president has just gone beyond common sense with overspending and his penchant for taking over everything. I wanted reform of some aspects of the healthcare payer system, not a total tear down and rebuild of the healthcare system. We have the most competent, efficient, and easy to access healthcare in the world. The payer system was broken, yes, but not healthcare itself.

I fear that just as the president threw good money after bad in the auto industry, and ended up literally buying a private company, GM, nationalizing it, and then firing its CEO, he will attempt to take over and control all elements of healthcare. He is not qualified to run GM and he is certainly not qualified to run the healthcare business.

Mr. Obama, keep it simple. Clean up some of the abuses of the payer system, but leave the rest alone. For once in your administration, think practically and prudently. Pass a few sensible reforms that will make the payer system more equitable and stop trying to reengineer all of society after your own personal and socialistic vision.

Christian Possums

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 20:00:15 GMT

My neighbor went away for the weekend. She has been having chipmunk problems (very costly foundation undermining type chipmunk problems), so she set a live-trap and asked me to tend it in her absence. And she asked me to care for her dog at the same time. Last night while I tended to the dog I checked the live-trap. Nothing there. I went to bed.

This morning the live-trap had a possum in it. Thinking it had only been a few hours, I thought to raise the trap lid and let the animal go. However, as I approached the trap and studied the critter, it was already dead, curled up, eyes open. I rattled the trap to ensure the critter was deceased. Since the animal had died during the night, I left it where it was, took care of the dog, and went to church.

When I got home from church, I went to take care of the dog, and I passed the trap as I did so. Something was wrong. The possum was lying in a different position. I guessed I had been wrong about it having died in the night. So I set about releasing the critter. As I approached the cage I detected the unmistakable stench of a dead animal. It dawned on me that the critter had died while I was at church. I poked it with a stick to be sure, and left the deceased carcass where it was in the cage and returned home for lunch.

Only then did an old idiom come to mind, “he’s just playing possum.” Since I had only seen possums in pictures, I had no frame of reference for how well possums did or did not play dead, or if the saying was even true to any degree at all. One more time I walked over to the neighbor’s house. I studied the cage, no movement. My wife walked up offering impeccably pragmatic and helpful suggestions: “Watch out, don’t let it bite you, it might have rabies, if it’s dead let it alone, get some gloves on, it might attack you, I hear those things are vicious, why don’t you leave it alone…”

I picked up the cage and balanced it between two trash cans. No movement. I tried opening the cage but the mechanism was thoroughly jammed. My wife walked up and began offering a second set of string of faultlessly practical and beneficial ideas. I left the cage precariously balanced on the trash cans as I returned to fetch some tools from my garage as my wife continued to deliver her suggestions to the obviously dead rodent.

When I returned, the cage was still dangerously perched, and by now it seemed very certain the creature was quite expired. As I worked the tools on the cage door, I noticed the eyes of the animal…did they half blink?…slowly…I think, maybe. Finally the cage door popped open and I set the cage in the grass with the door off. I then poked the unresponsive creature with a stick to encourage it to leave, assuming it was only almost dead. It did not move. I left it alone, checking up on it ever half hour or so. Nothing but flies were moving there. My wife stopped by the neighbor’s house after an hour and a half, and when she came back home she declared to me the thing was definitely not alive.

Several hours later I went back. The creature was gone. It left a trail through the uncut grass where it had walked away from the cage into thick weeds. The smelly thing was gone, alive, but very much gone. I now understood the expression, “playing possum.”

As I walked back to my house, bemused that the thing had so successfully fooled me, I considered the fact that Christians are not to be possums. God does not want us playing dead so well that the world can poke us, toss us around, and never think twice that we are alive or in any way different than than they. The neighbors should not wonder if anything alive lives over in that house.

Christians are a living body. Our dead spirits were made alive by Christ. Why would we pretend to be dead again? We were called out of the world to change the world, to shout back to it, “Wake up and live!”

For this reason it says, "Awake, sleeper, And arise from the dead, And Christ will shine on you." Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men but as wise, making the most of your time, because the days are evil. (Ephesians 5:14-16)

God did not call us to be possums, but to release the possums from their self-imposed slumbers.

Only One Gospel: From Cain and Abel to the Apostle Paul

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 12:37:49 GMT

Below is an email sent to some students summarizing a set of classes in Romans 3 which I recently concluded. Since the email was originally only meant to summarize the contents of the classes for those who attended, the language and grammar are a bit irregular, and I am not going to take the time here needed to smooth them out. Nonetheless, I hope the summary conveys the gist of the global, timeless, and unchanging aspects of the gospel message.

We discovered that the gospel, the good news, is "God's promise of salvation to humankind to those who have faith." We learned the staggering truth that the gospel delivered to Cain and Abel (remember our Hebrews 11 study?) was the same gospel delivered to King David, which was the same gospel delivered to John the Baptist, which was the same gospel delivered by Jesus, which was the same gospel delivered by Paul, and is the same gospel we deliver to the world today!

Just one gospel. God saves sinners on the basis of the faith they place in Him as Savior. Before the Law, Abraham was saved by faith in God. During the Law, the Law saved no one--it was not the gospel. During the Law, people were saved only by faith; they had their hearts renewed, their spirits revitalized, and their sins forgiven on the basis of faith. After the Law, now, people are saved only by faith, and their hearts are renewed, their spirits made alive again, and their sins forgiven.

The only difference between then (during the Law) and now is that we know now that Christ is the begotten God, the God Who became a man, to save His creatures. Before He came, during the Law, they knew only that God saves. How did God save before Jesus became the sacrifice? The animal sacrifices did not save, but God did "pass over" sins confessed with an animal sacrifice, but He only passed over them until the final sacrifice. That final sacrifice brings forgiveness of all past sins, present sins, and all confessed future sins. The animal sacrifices were symbols of the faith that the people had placed in God, as Savior, and God promised them He would forgive them. God always honors His promises.

Salvation is always a promise of ultimate final redemption. Salvation is both "now" but "not yet." We have the renewed hearts and spirits now, the promise of ultimate salvation now, and the Holy Spirit as the guarantee of that ultimate salvation now. But what need do we have of a promise if we have salvation now? Because there is a final redemption coming, a final change from this corruptible body (which will be resurrected) into an incorruptible body for eternal life with God--He has promised and God never lies. We have salvation now, but the final form of it yet to come.

The gospel, the promise of God's salvation on the basis of faith, has not changed age to age. The exact nature of the fulfillment of that promise, that is that Jesus is the fulfillment of the promise via His life, death, and resurrection, was not given until 2000 years ago, but the gospel itself, the promise of God's salvation on the basis of faith, is still the same as it always was. The Law never saved anyone, faith in the Law never saved anyone, and faith in sacrifices did not save anyone. Faith in God saved all who believed, all who believe, and all who will believe.

As Paul said, a Jew could be a Jew via his blood line, and keep the Law (as best he could), but not be a Jew in heart, and so not be a spiritual son of Abraham, but merely a son of Adam. A gentile may ignore the Law of Moses but embrace Christ by faith and so become a spiritual son of Abraham in spite of having once been a son of Adam. So it is our goal to be known as sons and daughters of Abraham, spiritual Jews, adopted by God our Father, joint heirs with Christ.

Scripture Passages on the continuity of the gospel message:

There only ever was one Savior of humanity

Isaiah 45:21, 49:26, John 4:42

Messiah (the coming Savior) foretold (not a contradiction of Isaiah 45:21, but the fulfillment of it)

Daniel 9:25-26, Isaiah 9:6-7, Jeremiah 31:6-13

There never was a distinction between Jews and Gentiles

Romans 3:22, Jeremiah 3:17

All humanity sinned - Jews and Gentiles

Romans 3:23, Isaiah 53:6-7, Psalm 14:1-3

One gospel for all humanity for all time

Hebrews 10:38-12:3, Matthew 4:23, 9:35, 11:5, 24:14, 26:3, Mark 1:1, 1:14, 8:35, 10:29, 13:10, 14:9, 16:15, Luke 3:18, 4:18, 7:22, 9:6, 16:16, 20:1, Acts (seamless transition from the gospel of faith and repentance that Jesus taught to the gospel of faith and repentance that Paul ended up teaching)

Old Testament View of What Happens to a Man of Faith

New Heart: Ezekiel 36:25-26, 18:30-31, Psalm 51:9-13, Jeremiah 32:40

Spirit Made Alive: Nehemiah 9:30-31, Psalm 104:29-30, 139:4-10, Isaiah 57:15, 63:10, Lamentations 5:21, Titus 3:5

Yes, the gospel was always the same, as was the means of salvation: God saves by His mercy and grace those who have faith in Him, and He gives them a new spirit and a renewed heart--that's a promise!

Is It a Blessing or a Sign?

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 13:34:14 GMT

My teenaged son returned from summer camp this past week. I never know what to expect when that happens. Last year it was an appeal to be allowed to pursue attending college (in a couple years) at Cedarville. His camp counselor was a Cedarville attendee and he wanted to emulate him (as much esteem as I hold for Cedarville, it is far too expensive for me and my son, yet, a year later he is still dropping hints that he wants to attend there).

This year he sat on the couch reading a book that the camp speaker had given out. I could not pry it from his hands to see what the content was about. A day later he looked up and said, “Dad, do you believe you can know the will of God?” That was followed by several hours of questions, including, “Do you believe that God does miracles today?” and “Do you believe that God gives you signs?” I just love summer camp (for those who do not know me, I am not joking or being sarcastic in the least--I just love Christian summer camp because little else floats my boat than to have my own child ask me penetrating theological questions).

Even my wife was surprised at my response that I do not look for, or expect, supernatural signs from God to make decisions or confirm decisions already made. She asked, “But we just got those tax refunds in exactly the amount we spent on his summer camp--surely that was a sign that we were supposed to have sent him to Christian summer camp--otherwise, what would you call it?” I replied, “I would call it a blessing.”

Looking for signs is an indication of disbelief. Gideon lacked faith to believe the prophetic word of God, so he invented a sign by which he demanded that God affirm that He was not lying when He prophesied Gideon would be victorious. Similarly, when the scribes and Pharisees could not believe that Jesus was from God, they demanded Jesus prove Himself by giving them a supernatural sign. Jesus declined and told them that those who demand a sign so as to believe God are perverse and evil because they lack faith.

God has given us the faculties to make godly decisions, the Holy Spirit within guides our thinking toward the scriptural principles of wisdom, and He continuously makes our hearts and minds to desire to do the work of holiness (just as He hardens the hearts of those who hate Him). Those three things, logical minds, scriptural wisdom, and a desire to be holy in His service, are sufficient to make “good” decisions.

Signs in the Scriptures were not often used by God to affirm the decision making process, but mostly to give evidence that His messenger spoke for Him: Jesus used signs to make it evident that He was the Messiah (but declined to give signs when it was demanded that he do so), Moses used signs to demonstrate he was a prophet to Pharaoh, Paul used signs to show he was an apostle. Signs, supernatural miracles, were used to give evidence that the speaker was true, but not to indicate what choices to make in the decision making process, and never “on demand” by the unfaithful.

For that reason I view the unexpected tax refunds as blessings, gifts, from the Lord and not signs. In fact, the sign would have been too late anyway. We had already made the decision to send our son to camp without knowing about the tax refund money. We made the decision based on what we thought would be best for our son and best for God’s kingdom. The decision was already made. Could the refunds be seen as confirmation that the right decision had been made? No. My son’s response to the spiritual instruction he received was already sufficient confirmation that it was a wise decision. Would lack of a refund have been a counter-sign? No, for it never was expected and would never have been missed. The refund was a blessing. It was unexpected and had played no part in our decision making or in our son’s response to camp.

But, without signs, how will we know how to make the right decision? We don’t, not always. Just as Paul continually wanted to get to Rome (he eventually did, but not in the way he had wanted), or just as Paul desired to go to Bithynia and the Holy Spirit prevented him, our decisions are subject to “the will of the Lord” which means He institutes unexpected redirection (James 4:13-17). Was not the entire point of Job’s story to demonstrate that God does everything for His own hidden purposes, He redirects or undoes our best plans, and He owes us no explanation? Does not Ecclesiastes tell us that God hides from man the outcomes of his decisions (Ecclesiastes 6:12, 10:14) and that neither days of adversity nor wealth can reveal God’s true purposes or even what the next day will bring to a man (Ecclesiastes 7:14)? Does this not all teach us to NOT rely on circumstances as “signs”?

Paul did not rely on signs, but rather looked for opportunities to evangelize and teach. He called these opportunities open doors (Colossians 4:3 1 Corinthians 16:9), and the lack of them, closed doors. And all such times are of the Lord. Paul did not see circumstances as signs of God’s favor on his decision making, but that all circumstances were good for one thing, “is this a chance to preach and teach?”

No, I do not believe in looking for signs to make my decisions. I try to ask with sincerity, “Is this the right thing to do for the kingdom, for my family, and as a steward of what God has entrusted to me?” There are no signs, only opportunities, so that “man will not discover anything that will be after him.” The decisions are ours, but only as the Lord wills, because the outcomes are entirely up to Him for His own good purposes and reasons which He need not share with anyone.