The Song of Solomon

The Journey

The Song of Songs, which is ‘Christ’s’ – Son 1:1

Study Aired January 17,  2026

Prelude

Why did Solomon conceptualise The Song of Solomon?

Solomon, like Adam, was not deceived, nonetheless semi-consciously bearing a cursed injury in his privy and “stones” (Deu 23:1), since Eden, referenced in all of his writings, culminating in Ecclesiastes 7, the primary reasons why he couldn’t find one woman in the entire known world, and proved by his 1,000 wives, one who could ravishingly complement his intellectual wisdom (the shadow of the holy spirit) as the primary criterion for wholehearted espoused unity, climaxing indivisibly coitally (Son 1:5-7) to be unified in the same mind as him. Through the holy spirit, he has revealed to the Bride of Christ that she is already engaged in singing her Lord and Husband’s song. At the same time, humanity conceals itself behind delusional notions of romance, morality, and virtue, singing its own song in an attempt to redeem itself. Eve, in representing all women to this day, and upon Adam’s sexual insecurity, was compelled to rescue herself to provide security. That saga set the pattern for humanity’s opposition to God.

Hidden behind the chaos of romance, self-styled morality and virtue, what the Eves of the world profoundly want is not only financial security, emotional security, psychological security and relational security, but, nonetheless influenced by those ideologies, she now wants Adam to understand her needs for him to minister to her, rather than being managed. She desires the security of being respected rather than tolerated. The assurance that loyalty will not be exploited; that affection will not fade into indifference; that commitment will not devolve into complacency; and the security derived from his selecting her will not falter under pressure, withdraw from responsibilities, or resent her strength.

The stability of security without stagnation, the passion without volatility, and the connection without possession exemplify an idealized approach. Security does not equate to safety from life’s challenges. Rather, it signifies safety and partnership. For the flesh, Christ designed such security to diminish and launch the Bride on a journey of evil experience to refine her, and for her to build His pattern of the Temple within herself (Pro 14:1).   

This study is not a condemnation of women. It is a recognition of her representing mankind’s ceaseless effort to save itself through the security of its wisdom because security makes love sustainable. Security fosters vulnerability, intimacy, trust, and enduring emotional commitment. It constitutes the foundation upon which other elements, such as desire, loyalty, and affection, are built. The sole factor that is overlooked when attempting to uphold these principles is lust. “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever” – 1Jn 2:16-17.

At the outset, it is essential to acknowledge that Adam, in not strongly dissuading his wife Eve from eating of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, unwittingly, to him, severely bruised his ability to wash her with God’s word and lead her as her God-ordained head. His now spiritually weakened headship, scripture describes for a priest of God as ‘wounded his stones and privy’,  directly and correspondingly wounded Eve’s spirit within her breasts, her heart to trust her husband’s leadership. The shocking covert result is that all women, particularly wives, now feel compelled to wrest the lead from men in all kinds of social and governmental authorities, and most critically, marital matters, essentially boudoir intimacies, to achieve their immense quest for security. 

Deu 23:1  He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD. 

Lev 19:29  Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a whore; lest the land fall to whoredom, and the land become full of wickedness.

Now, the everyday virtuously considered home-making wife’s connection of mind, spirit and body with her husband, we shall see, typifies whoredom. That chronicle constitutes the arresting theme that dominates this series until its conclusion, whereupon, in the end, the Shulamite Bride reverses that curse. The startling appreciation for the meanings of those topics will be examined in detail in the Introductory Studies. It will be recognized as a pivotal influence in understanding the Song of Solomon.

We shall observe (Mat 13:11) that the overarching, covert, and enigmatic theme of the Song of Solomon, which is exclusively sung by the 144,000, is the reversal of the curses afflicting Adam and Eve, as exemplified by the principal female figure, the Bride of Christ, in knowing that she has nothing to bring to the table, but her now wholehearted, enthusiastic intimate responsiveness to him, her Husband. She thus oxymoronically sings of the revealing of the brightness of His hidden coming.

Hab 3:4  And his brightness was as the light; he had horns coming out of his hand: and there was the hiding of his power. 

To Orthodox Christianity, The Song of Solomon presents a paradox, as it is alarmingly sensual and sexual for most women’s anxiety, thereby facilitating the empowerment of their husbands’ sexual pursuits. She knows that essentially, a husband’s principal need is for a unified mind in his wife’s, brightly applauded sexually, yet, something is dreadfully amiss. Applaudingly, that dynamic seems to be endorsed, as it is audaciously testified in hidden rectification by the proclamation of the Shulamite-Bride straight out of the gate with her first statement in the Song of Solomon, mirroring Christ’s Bride’s response every day, with Christ. Talk about a crisis!

Son 1:2  Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth: for thy love is better than wine. 

Rom 8:18  For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us. 
Rom 8:19  For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God. 
Rom 8:20  For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope, 
Rom 8:21  Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. 

It is widely recognized that husbands’ overwhelming method of connecting with their wives is sexually, and peeved wives, unconscious of wanting to rule their husbands, naturally, and logically reason why boudoir intimacies always appear to highlight their husband and his needs. Consequently, the internet has proliferated with, it seems, female primarily marriage assistants who eagerly acknowledge the significant disparity caused by wives emotionally distancing themselves. These assistants diligently employ a range of academically effective methodologies to address this issue. However, what they don’t know is what the Shulamite knows, that to correct that enduring and exceptionally reasonable aversion, is not just based on a wife attaining greater sensual satisfaction, but a supremely higher calling in understanding her purpose, to want to celebrate intimately, rather than advanced intimacy being the end in itself! Ironically, and subsequently, a Shulamite-like wife’s former fickle libido, and universal struggle for sexual satisfaction, is dramatically liberated; she ecstatically sees the purpose for her reason and increased emotional interest, and makes it her business to ravish her Husband!

Rom 8:28  And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. 

We shall see that Adam, in Eden, and by his hand, is first emblematically injured in his ‘privy’—effectively (unwittingly self) neutered to lead Eve. The primary dynamics of her curse are, barring a few spiritual ‘women’ since the cross, underwrite wives being “against” their husbands, and is signified in their equally ‘wounded’ breasts, her heart, ruling Adam’s most powerful compulsion for unity of mind, body and spirit, and is distinguished by the degradation of lively sexual intimacy. Her curse, representative of Adam’s curse, filling up behind in her of mankind’s curse against Christ and the Father, manifests in demanding endless romanticism that, historically and bitter anecdotal consensus, has never blessed a husband with consistent, authentic, lively, engaged sexual intimacy. That wretched disunity is signified by the 40,000 plus Orthodox Zionist Christian churches, representatives who are ‘harlots’ who never deny their “another Jesus” husband (2Co 11:4), actually Satan, his spiritual intimacies.

Thus, and always first ‘naturally’, it is Adam’s wounded privy that instigates the wound in Eve’s breasts that puts Eve perpetually in carnal marriages, against enthusiastically “ministering”, appreciably sexually, to her husband. As dreadful as a lot of negative biblical imagery is, that espoused disparity in every Babylonian marriage, covertly symbolizes the Whore riding the Beast, scattering her lewd doctrine among lustful men. It corresponds spiritually to Old Israel being against her Lord, her husband, that since the cross, the Bride, delightedly shocked and revulsed, swiftly reverses her Satan-gifted authority. 

Luk 11:23  He that is not with me is against me: and he that gathereth not with me scattereth. 

All 1,000 of Solomon’s wives, a veritable “companion of fools” (Pro 13:20), were only too aware of their lack of connective wisdom, and to procure the position of the most loved wife (Son 6:9), they are wired to default to their inherent sexual allure. That tactic is what The Great Whore, the mother of harlots, and to varying degrees of cunning accent, representative of all women, automatically engage to “ensnare” (Ecc 7:23-26) a prospective and all too compliant husband. Once she has captured her husband and her desire to bear children is fulfilled, she further enables her intrinsic lack of amorous ardour, a natural biological depreciation, to manage her husband’s tedious, never-ending amatory desires. (Indicative positively of the Father’s ravishment for Christ and Christ’s to the Bride’s elations). Ever since Eden, her fickle fervour, mysteriously eminating from the depths of her wounded breasts, her heart, sequentially represent all seven churches of Asia’s capriciousness (2 Ti 15), culminating in Laodicea’s apathy, and is the journey of the embryonic Bride of Christ, depicted before her representation as the Shulamite in The Song of Solomon, in which she undisguisedly ministers in assertive elegance (1Ki 1:1-4 representative transition to Song 8:1-3). Please do not be alarmed, as the utilisation of the profound theme of her bruised and wounded breasts, symbolising her heart in a manner analogous to Adam’s injured private parts, will be examined and substantiated in detail progressively.

Ominously, thereafter, Adam and Eve’s predetermined rejection of God’s word cursed them and humanity (except the Elect) for 7,000 years, forcing them to seek answers to their myriad physical and clouded spiritual confusions physically. Their life force energy, their vitality driving them, emanates from Adam’s center of emblematic authority in his privates, and Eve, unbridled feminine unity with Adam, embedded in her breasts, her heart, now both being severely wounded, not only creates conflict between them but also, worse, against their God. 

Eve’s “wounded breasts” precipitate the much later Aholah, the elder, and Aholibah, her younger sister, within, whereby their bruised breasts and teats, psychologically, Eve’s heart, and all women at odds to minister to their husbands rightly because of Adam’s self-afflicted, his treacherous/untrustworthy headship.

Eze 23:34  Thou shalt even drink it and suck it out, and thou shalt break the sherds [an itch to lust] thereof, and pluck off [H5423] thine own breasts: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.

Pluck off H5423 = 1. to pull or tear [off] or draw off or away or apart, draw out, pluck up, break, lift, root out.

Wound H6482 = 1. bruise, wound. From H6481 = 1. to bruise, wound, wound by bruising 
a. (Qal) to wound by crushing. [The same as “wounded stones” H6481 Deu 23:1]

Wounded H2490 = 1. to profane, defile, pollute, desecrate, begin a. (Niphal) 1. to profane oneself, defile oneself, pollute oneself 1a b. ritually 1a c. sexually 1. to be polluted, be defiled

Bruised H1792 1. to crush, be crushed, be contrite, be broken a. (Niphal) 1. to be crushed 2. to be contrite (fig.) b. (Piel) to crush c. (Pual) 1. to be crushed, be shattered

Isa 53:5  But he was wounded [H2490] for our transgressions, he was bruised [H1792] for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. 

Uniquely, their gender-specific innate sexual ravishments (allogorically spiritual), only their mate can satisfy, are now inherently selfish, reflecting the core difficulties of disunity their individual curses represent; with Adam’s heart unable to dynamically connect with his Lord’s word and walk in it, as is Eve’s opposition to Adam’s neutered counsel. It is profoundly emblematic of their disconnected espoused intimacies, directly representative of mankind’s rejection of God’s word. Essentially, these are the themes of the Introductory Studies Solomon’s Shulamite creation makes ‘new’.

2Co 5:17  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 

Although Solomon’s Shulamite nativity is the perfect physical pattern of how a wife is to respond to her husband, and he to her spiritually, without the crucial holy spirit to understand and particularly live the concept, he, in desolate ‘blackness’, concluded that it, too, was vanity and chasing the wind. Like Job’s singular failing of pride in his own appointed righteousness, only God’s spirit could reveal, Solomon’s apparent infinite wisdom failed him in finding one gloriously beautiful wife who could deeply connect with his mind, body, and spirit, transcendentally celebrating their union sexually. Similarly, we, like Solomon, feel that God has let us down; there was nothing better to do than sullenly return to the pointless vanity of pleasures, nurtured in wealth, power, and unresolvable, disunited, espoused intimacies (Ecc 2:10).

Son 1:5  I am black, but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtains of Solomon. 
Son 1:6  Look not upon me, because I am black, because the sun hath looked upon me: my mother’s children were angry with me; they made me the keeper of the vineyards; but mine own vineyard have I not kept.

1Ki 11:4  For it came to pass, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned away his heart after other gods: and his heart was not perfect with the LORD his God, as was the heart of David his father. 

Isa 55:11  So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it. 

Consequently, the following “Contents” Introductory studies present a select few prime topics based on Eden’s curses, which were intended to help appreciate the Song of Solomon spiritually, and are wonderfully summarized by Proverbs 30:18-19. “…the way of a man with a maid”: we shall see that they are centered on the protagonist “maid” —the Bride’s journey that Solomon paradoxically found too confusing in Ecclesiastes 7 to understand. She moves mesmerizingly, like her first father, Satan. Serpentine-like, she lounges calmly, innately aware of her surroundings, and then, impulsively, as if upon ‘a rock’ (Christ), she becomes flighty, directionless, and uncertain of where she is going, like a ship seemingly without a rudder in turbulent seas, calling out to her carnal husband she had spurned, to save her, and suddenly, now directional, amazingly buoyant, in heaven-bound motion, like an eagle soaring without beating its wings upon unseen thermals. Such is the way of the carnal man juxtaposed here, in these studies, preceding the spiritual man, Christ, with a “Maid“, in the Song of Solomon.

Pro 30:18  There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: 
Pro 30:19  The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid.

Lord willing, we, the dying Beast-Whore will see, insisting that our Lord ravish us by our romantic sentimentalities signified spiritually (Joh 12:25), will not be included in the holy First Resurrection if we contend that our psychologically injured privy and breasts’ sensualities be selfishly satiated without eagerly reciprocating devoted ravishement of our Lord, our Husband’s espoused dues (1Co 7:3-6) above our own. 

2Co 5:16  Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh: yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more. 

 Contents 

The Order of Evil to Complete the Creation of God, the New Adam in the Bride.

   THE JOURNEY – Prelude and Introduction

1. Headship 

2. God’s Purpose for Taking the Woman out of the Man. 

3. The Male and Female Minds Are Designed Innately Lustful – Ruling Adam Coitally & Eve, Romantically 

4. The Male Privy: Signatory of Authority and Life 

5. Breasts: Signatory of The Mother of All Living, Nourishing Spiritually, Ruling Coitally 

6. A Husband’s Rejection of Christ’s Headship is Symptomatic of Whores, Exemplified by Women, an Alignment Scorned Contemptuously 

7. The Female Idol – Fastened with a Nail 

8. Romanticism Holds Husbands to Ransom, Escalating the Idolisation of Women—An Artifice of The Great Whore  

9. In Babylon, What Criterion Ravishes a Man or a Woman to Focus on a Prospective Mate? 

10. Irritated, Rejecting Christ, Favouring The Father of Lies, Necessitating an Occasion to Judge Mankind 

11. Moved by the Holy Spirit is Solomon’s Impulsion for Designing the Shulamite 

12. “She Hath Made Herself Ready” – Is The Bride’s Invariable State of Ravishment Equal to Her Husband’s for the Father

13. What Can Be Gleaned from The Song of Solomon’s KJV Headings 

14. The Song of Solomon 

The purpose of suffering in the body of Christ

[Study Aired January 25, 2024]

The purpose of suffering in the body of Christ is so that we may be nourished by our heavenly Father through a communion that has been purposed “before the foundation of the world” (Eph 1:4) for those who are being purified today and learning how we are to conduct ourselves in the house of God, “the pillar and foundation of the truth” (1Ti 3:15, 1Co 14:37). Through our many diverse trials and afflictions, the bride is being made ready to rule and reign under Christ today so that in the future the world will learn of His righteousness (1Co 10:16-18, Isa 26:9).

Eph 1:4  According as He has personally chosen us for Himself before the foundation of the world in order that we might be holy and blameless before Him in love;

1Ti 3:15  But if I should delay, you have these things in writing, so that you may know how one is obligated to conduct oneself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth.

This process of judgment upon the elect is hidden from those in the world who do suffer and bear a burden in this life as well as the sparks of life fly upward for all flesh (Job 5:7, Rom 9:22). However, in the body of Christ there is an intimate joining of our lives which God has predestined from the foundation of the world making us one in Christ through filling up what is behind of the afflictions of our Lord for His body’s sake, the church (Col 1:24). The church that suffers and rejoices together is kept together through a  process of cleansing that is sanctifying the body. It is the washing by the word that is accomplishing this sanctification, and that word is likened to fire (1Co 12:26, Eph 4:4, Col 1:27, Col 1:24, 1Co 10:17, Rev 19:7, Joh 17:17, Jer 23:29, Jer 5:14).

Rev 19:7  Let us be glad and shout with joy; and let us give glory to Him; for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready.

The judgment we are under in this life (1Pe 4:17, 1Pe 4:12) is what makes the elect a peculiar people who are zealously being prepared as God’s workmanship (Eph 2:10) to become the prepared, gone-onto-perfection bridegroom’s wife in that blessed and holy first resurrection. We are called to move with fear to the preparing of the spiritual ark, that is the body of Christ, the church. It is through our suffering that we will cease from sinning (1Pe 4:1-2, Tit 2:11-12) and learn of the liberty that comes with having God’s spirit in our lives, the faith of Christ that makes it possible for us to overcome and not fail (2Co 3:17, Luk 22:32). It is God’s spirit that helps us mortify the deeds of our flesh so we can die daily and live our lives out in zealous service toward one another (1Pe 2:9-11, Tit 2:14-15, Rev 19:7-9, Rev 20:6).

Tit 2:14  Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
Tit 2:15  These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee.

Tit 3:8  This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable unto men.

How we can continue to be zealous of good works, and be careful to maintain those works.

1Pe 4:1  Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin; 
1Pe 4:2  That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God.

Tit 2:11  For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, 
Tit 2:12  Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;

The body of Christ must go through a lifetime of overcoming and our flesh must be witnessed against as we fall seven symbolic times in this life (complete) (Pro 24:16, Act 14:22, Psa 119:164) but rise up each time stronger through Christ becoming more mature in Him. That is why Paul said, “I now rejoice” having gone through so much tribulation and suffering for the gospel’s sake and coming to deeply believe in God’s faithfulness that would see him endure to the end. That should be a tremendous reason to say, “Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the church” (2Pe 3:18, Col 1:24).

Pro 24:16  For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.

Act 14:22  Where they established the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith, and declaring that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God. 

2Pe 3:18  But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.

The symbolism of being saved by grace through faith (Eph 2:8) was given to us with the story of Peter’s denial of Christ where what Christ prophesied to Peter was for our sakes to remind us that boasting is excluded by the law of faith and that salvation is a gift of God given to those who come to see, by the grace of God, that their flesh has nothing to do with obtaining that salvation. It is solely by the witness of Christ’s life in us [cock crows twice] that we can endure through that process of putting off our flesh [Peter denies Christ thrice], as we learn through that gnashing-of-teeth experience of  having denied Christ that we are the chief of sinners, and that only by grace through faith, can any one of us be saved. The cock crowing twice and Peter denying Christ thrice adds up to five, which is the number for grace and reminds us of that free gift of God’s chastening in our lives that makes it possible for us to be received of Him in this age (Heb 12:6). That is the favour being shown to the body of Christ today that leads to our salvation in Him (Heb 12:6, Tit 2:11-12, Eph 2:8).

Eph 2:8  For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 
Eph 2:9  Not of works, lest any man should boast.

This study is meant to point us to the promises that explain how we will be more than conquerors through Christ who loved us, inseparable from the love of God, and promised that Christ won’t deny Himself this opportunity given Him by our Father to be the author and finisher of our faith (Heb 12:1-2). That faith must be tried through a life-long process to which we’ve been called (Act 14:22, 1Pe 1:7-9, 1Co 10:13), and it will be accomplished through our hope of glory within, Jesus Christ, who has apprehended those whom the Father has given him, and will lose none (Col 1:24, Col 1:27, Php 3:12, Joh 17:12). When we read that Christ won’t deny Himself, we are being told that He is faithful to finish what He has started as the author and finisher of our faith. This is He whom we desire to be found in when He returns (Php 1:6, Php 3:8-16).

Due to time constraints placed on me this week, I plan to read this FAQ of Mike and will start a new series after this, Lord willing.

The Purpose of Suffering

[Attached for convenience]

Hello Mike,

I hope this finds you well.

I am starting to understand the parable of the workers in the vineyard. Each day a tiny bit more of His truth seems to crystallise in me.

I hope you don’t mind me taking your time and emailing you directly. I don’t doubt it is something quite straight forward for you, but I am still grappling with it.

I understand and even see the beauty in what God does to His children through fiery trials and the chastening we receive. I don’t look back on what I’ve been through and grieve for a moment of it because I can see His purpose in it through the beautiful blessing of spiritual sight He, for whatever reason, has given me.

How do you make sense of or think about how such a great deal of people suffer extensively in often the most horrific ways since birth and them not given the privilege of understanding His greater purpose? I personally take great heart in knowing that they will all be saved, refined and transformed into His image, but that is of no comfort to them now as they cannot understand this.

I know we are all just vapor and dust, but I struggle to deal with helping these most tormented and afflicted people who don’t see any hope or point in their lives.

I am not at all questioning the potter, and I know it will just be a shortcoming in my understanding,​ but I guess I am curious as to what you think about all of this or, as would be better, what the Bible says about this.

Forgive me if it’s all quite straight forward, but alas it troubles me.

Many blessings to you and I am ever grateful for your fellowship and teachings,

M____

 

Hi M​____​,

Thank you for your question. It is one which I, too, have struggled to understand, but over the years I have come to see that it is my self-righteous carnal mind which simply cannot accept the fact that God’s love is superior to what my carnal mind calls love. My carnal mind tells me that suffering has nothing to do with ‘love’. However, as any parent knows, suffering has a lot to do both with being a good parent and with the true Biblical “love of God” as our own spiritual ‘parent’:

Heb 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Heb 12:7 If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?

My carnal mind tells me there is a big difference between a parent lovingly chastening his son and all the seemingly needless suffering of so many innocent children, the elderly, and so many victims of what appears to us to be needless violence. The hardest thing for me to accept is the torture and abuse of innocent children. The long drawn out suffering of adults who are simply standing on their Babylonian faith, and the suffering of the elderly, as well as the life-long suffering of so many afflicted people, just all seems so unnecessary to me as a natural man.

My flesh tells me in no uncertain terms that if I were God I would have come up with a much more humane and merciful way of saving all men. As ‘God’ I would just make every man alive and full of love and humility, and respect for his fellow man, and I would simply have perfected everyone in a spirit body to begin with. I would have just left off this messy, bloody thing called “the cross” with all of its unnecessary suffering.

With all of those thoughts, and without the Lord’s mercy, I would have been overwhelmed with resentment toward the Lord for not doing His work my way and not being more loving and more merciful toward His creatures. However, through His mercy, I have been made to see and to accept the absolute Truth that I am not God, and therefore I do not know better than God what is the best way for Him to work with His own creation.

When I was thirteen years old I remember my Father telling all six of his children that the Bible was the Word of God, and that the answers to all of our questions were in the Bible. God gave me at that tender age to believe what my father was teaching me. His father, my grandfather had told him the very same thing, and while neither of them were given eyes to see nor ears to hear the things of the spirit (Mat 13:9-15), they both were given great faith in the letter of the Lord’s words.

So all I have to offer anyone is what I have been given faith in the Word of God to believe and to understand about any question I am asked. I cannot bequeath to you faith in the Word of God. Faith in God and in His Word is a gift from Him to those to whom He chooses to give it in this age:

Eph 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Eph 2:9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
Eph 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Eph 1:4  According as He has personally chosen us for Himself before the foundation of the world in order that we might be holy and blameless before Him in love; (AFV)

Although I was given a deep regard for the Bible from my youth, like all of us, I “forsook [my] first love” (Rev 2:4) and had to be chastened and scourged and crushed to powder to be brought back to a much deeper respect for the Lord’s voice, and a much deeper understanding of who the Lord is, the necessity of all of my own suffering, and a much deeper understanding of what His love is. I am now very grateful for all the suffering I endured because it brought me to overcome ungodliness in my own life in this present age.

Tit 2:11 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,
Tit 2:12 Teaching [Greek: (G3811) paideuo, chastening] us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;

As an aside, the revelation that “the grace of God… chastens us” is just one more Biblical refutation of the two false doctrines of a ten-second sinner’s prayer and a substitutionary atonement in which Christ died for us so we don’t need to die. Both of those doctrines have robbed many people of the Truths of the Words of God which teach that “grace… chastens us” and that we must “die daily… be crucified with Christ… and suffer with Him” if we want to reign with Him:

1Co 15:31 I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.

Gal 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Rom 8:17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

2Ti 2:12 If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us:

I was granted the faith to discover that knowing the Lord was the very definition of eternal life:

Joh 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

My father was a very strict religious Pentecostal who required the whole family to listen to Him read a chapter of scripture every morning and every night. As a child I cannot tell you how much I resented coming in late at night after putting up hay all day long, eating dinner and then having to listen to my father read a chapter of scripture. I always went to sleep, but at the same time the Lord permitted my father to instill a deep respect for God’s word. He told us over and over with his little Babylonian faith, “Whenever it seems that the Bible is contradicting itself, the problem is your lack of understanding. There are no contradictions in the word of God.”

Those words stuck with me and were used by the Lord to get me past my struggles with all the suffering we see in the Lord’s creation.

The Lord has granted me to accept the fact that the suffering of this age, as painful as it is to experience and to contemplate all the pain felt by others of all ages and circumstances, is all a temporal experience which He has designed as an evil foil against which He is in the process of displaying His love for all men of all time.

1Co 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

This is a verse of scripture which tells us up front what the Lord is in the process of doing:

Ecc 1:13 I applied my heart to inquiring and exploring by wisdom concerning all that is done under the heavens: it is an experience of evil Elohim has given to the sons of humanity to humble them by it. (CLV)

“To humble them by it” tells us that we have been given over to pride by the Lord’s design. One of the functions of the very evils you and I are discussing is the suffering which the Lord has placed upon “the whole creation”.

Rom 8:22 For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now.

In the Lord’s own time, the Lord will drag all mankind to bow in desperation to the feet of His elect, who, typified by Joseph, will administer judgment upon all His brothers and will drag all men to Himself:

Joh 12:32 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw [G1670: helkuo, drag] all men unto me.

Rev 3:9 Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee.

The Greek word translated as “draw” in this verse in John 12 is helkuo, and here is how Strong’s correctly defines the meaning of this Greek word:

G1670
ἑλκύω, ἕλκω
helkuō helkō
hel-koo’-o, hel’-ko
Probably akin to G138; to drag (literally or figuratively): – draw. Compare G1667.

Going back to what the Lord tells us in Ecclesiastes 1:13, we must acknowledge that the way He is dragging us to Himself is through “an experience of evil to humble [us] by it”.

1Pe 5:6 Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time:
1Pe 5:7 Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.
1Pe 5:8 Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:
1Pe 5:9 Whom resist stedfast in the faith, knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren that are in the world.
1Pe 5:10 But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strengthen, settle you.
1Pe 5:11 To him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

Returning to your question concerning how you are to deal with “the same affliction of your brothers [who] are in this world”, the Lord Himself has left us the perfect example “that [we] should follow His steps”:

1Pe 2:21 For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow his steps.

After being beaten so severely that He died before the other two men who were being crucified with Him, Christ spoke these words of comfort to one of those men:

Luk 23:39 And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us.
Luk 23:40 But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation?
Luk 23:41 And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss.
Luk 23:42 And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.
Luk 23:43 And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, To day shalt thou be with me in paradise.

The fact is that both of the thieves with whom the Lord was crucified will be brought up in the great white throne judgment to be purified with the same fiery words which are purifying us in this age. However, these men were not being dragged to Christ even though one of them was granted to know who Christ was. He still had not been given the holy spirit because the spirit was not yet given.

Joh 7:37 In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.
Joh 7:38 He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.
Joh 7:39 (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.)

We are to count ourselves as being on the cross with Christ:

Rom 6:3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
Rom 6:4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
Rom 6:5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
Rom 6:6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.

“Is crucified” is in the Greek aorist tense, which means that this is not just a past event, but our dying is a “daily dying [and] being crucified with Christ” ongoing experience. In us Christ continues to be crucified daily. Here is how Paul put it:

1Co 15:31 I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.

Gal 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

The Lord is our example. As we interact with the whole creation with whom we are suffering in this age, we must follow Christ’s example and speak words of comfort to them. Christ did not attempt to explain to the thief that the thief would die and sleep in the dust of the earth for the thousands of years between his death and the great white throne judgment which follows the thousand-year reign. He simply spoke very comforting words: “you will be with me in paradise”.

Crucifixion is an excruciating way to die, but our Lord endured His own crucifixion to bring life to all men:

Joh 12:32 And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw [Greek: helkuō, drag] all men unto me.

Eternal torment in everlasting flames of literal fire has no basis in scripture. “As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive” is the doctrine of Jesus Christ concerning His plan for all of suffering mankind.

There is no truth to the false doctrine of a ten-second sinner’s prayer or the substitutionary atonement through the death of Christ. Rather, this is the Truth of how we must enter into the kingdom of God:

Mat 10:21 And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death.
Mat 10:22 And ye shall be hated of all men for my name’s sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.

Mat 24:12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.
Mat 24:13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

Mark repeats this straight-forward refutation of the false doctrine of a ten-second sinner’s prayer:

Mar 13:13 And ye shall be hated of all men for my name’s sake: but he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

The preceding verses in both Matthew and Mark warn us against believing the words of “many… false prophets… coming in Christ’s name” (Mat 24:11 and Mar 13:6). Those false prophets invariably tell you that God does not make men wicked, does not create evil, and certainly does not make us “to err from [His] ways”, and does not intend for us to suffer. However, what does God Himself say?

Pro 16:4 The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

Isa 63:17 O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

Act 14:22 Confirming the souls of the disciples, and exhorting them to continue in the faith, and that we must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God.

In that way they attempt to shift the responsibility for all the evil in this world from God’s very wise and sovereign will over onto the weak shoulders of His poor, marred, struggling creatures. If indeed Christ is beginning to grow within you, then you will know that is not the voice of the True Shepherd, and you will hear His voice in His own scriptures:

Joh 10:4 And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice.
Joh 10:5 And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers.

“His voice” teaches us that all the suffering in the world is the fruit, not of our free will choices to do evil, but rather it is all the result of the “dying… experience of evil [which] the Lord has given mankind to humble him by it”:

Gen 2:17 and of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, thou dost not eat of it, for in the day of thine eating of it–dying thou dost die.’ (YLT)

Ecc 1:13 I applied my heart to inquiring and exploring by wisdom concerning all that is done under the heavens: it is an experience of evil Elohim has given to the sons of humanity to humble them by it.

God is in the process of creating mankind in His own image. We must “enter into His rest” (Heb 4:1-4) on the seventh day before that plan will be completed.

In the meantime, He has given mankind an experience of evil to humble us and to make us to appreciate the fact that, although He has given us an experience of evil, He has also devised means that His banished be not expelled from Him:

2Sa 14:14 For we must needs die, and are as water spilt on the ground, which cannot be gathered up again; neither doth God respect any person: yet doth he devise means, that his banished be not expelled from him.

If indeed all the suffering God has placed upon mankind did not eventuate in the salvation of all mankind, then the Lord would indeed be the evil monster which the eternal hell-fire ministers of “historical Christianity” proclaim Him to be. God really has “devised means that His banished be not expelled from Him and “all in Adam… shall be made alive”:

1Co 15:22 For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

The wonderful news is that this will all be accomplished through you if you are given to believe on Him and suffer with Him:

Rom 11:30 For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief:
Rom 11:31 Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.
Rom 11:32 For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.

Paul summarized the purpose for all the suffering we see around us and all the suffering we endure in these words:

2Co 4:6 For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
2Co 4:7 But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.
2Co 4:8 We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;
2Co 4:9 Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;
2Co 4:10 Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.
2Co 4:11 For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.
2Co 4:12 So then death worketh in us, but life in you.
2Co 4:13 We having the same spirit of faith, according as it is written, I believed, and therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore speak;
2Co 4:14 Knowing that he which raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise up us also by Jesus, and shall present us with you.
2Co 4:15 For all things are for your sakes, that the abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory of God.
2Co 4:16 For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day.
2Co 4:17 For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
2Co 4:18 While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.

I pray these verses help you to cope with all the suffering you see which the Lord is working within us and all around us as the foil against which He is wisely in the process of displaying His great mercy upon all men of all time.

Your brother in the Christ, Mike

Psa 117:1 O praise the LORD, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people.
Psa 117:2 For his merciful kindness is great toward us: and the truth of the LORD endureth for ever. Praise ye the LORD.
Psa 118:1 O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good: because his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:2 Let Israel now say, that his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:3 Let the house of Aaron now say, that his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:4 Let them now that fear the LORD say, that his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:5 I called upon the LORD in distress: the LORD answered me, and set me in a large place.
Psa 118:6 The LORD is on my side; I will not fear: what can man do unto me?
Psa 118:7 The LORD taketh my part with them that help me: therefore shall I see my desire upon them that hate me.
Psa 118:8 It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man.
Psa 118:9 It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes.
Psa 118:10 All nations compassed me about: but in the name of the LORD will I destroy them.
Psa 118:11 They compassed me about; yea, they compassed me about: but in the name of the LORD I will destroy them.
Psa 118:12 They compassed me about like bees; they are quenched as the fire of thorns: for in the name of the LORD I will destroy them.

God’s “merciful kindness” is great toward us and understood through the eternal words of truth which He speaks to us through His son. In verses 10 through 12 we are reminded of the process of spiritual completion through judgment (3) that God’s word will bring upon the enemy within us and how it is only “in the name of the LORD I will destroy them“, mentioned three times, that this will happen. This study of the spiritual meaning of numbers is a helpful review of the number three.

That enemy is destroyed within us by our labouring for the meat which does not perish and by being granted to fight a good fight of faith in this life (Joh 6:27, 1Ti 6:12, Heb 11:6).

Joh 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Joh 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

Joh 6:28 Then said they unto him, What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?
Joh 6:29 Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.

Being given the faith to believe in Christ prevents us from perishing spiritually as we abide in the earnest of this relationship today [Eph 1:14] which God has granted us, a relationship that will lead to “everlasting life” in the fullness of that blessed and holy first resurrection [Rev 20:6].

Joh 6:68 Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life.

Those words of God are promised to be sanctified within God’s elect throughout our life time (Joh 17:17). That is our washing of the word which we must experience that brings about ‘spiritual completion through judgement’.

Notice the context surrounding the following verses that speak of the impossibility for our flesh to be able to “enter into the kingdom of God” and yet Peter is being encouraged by Christ after Peter states “we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore?” Forsaking all and following Christ is the path that we are on, also described in Revelation 2:10 in this regard.

Rev 2:10 Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.

Where did Christ overcome? It was in His flesh, and if we are granted to be as He is in this life, we will overcome in our flesh and be given outward “power over the nations…[where]..ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (1Jn 4:17).

Rev 2:26 And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations:

Mat 19:24 And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.
Mat 19:25 When his disciples heard it, they were exceedingly amazed, saying, Who then can be saved?
Mat 19:26 But Jesus beheld them, and said unto them, With men this is impossible; but with God all things are possible.
Mat 19:27 Then answered Peter and said unto him, Behold, we have forsaken all, and followed thee; what shall we have therefore?
Mat 19:28 And Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, That ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.

Joh 6:27 Labour not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of man shall give unto you: for him hath God the Father sealed.

This statement in Romans we will look at typifies how we are to look at works and how it is in believing in Christ the true vine, that spiritual works will manifest that are likened unto treasure laid up in heaven. Without Christ as the vine those works can never manifest (Rom 4:1-3, Jas 2:17, Tit 3:8, Joh 15:5-6)

1Ti 6:12 Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses.

Rev 20:6 Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.

Joh 15:5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
Joh 15:6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

Heb 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

Like the apostle Peter we are blessed to hear our Father in heaven reveal to us who Christ is, as we come to understand “At that day” that Christ is in us as our hope of glory. It is when we truly come to know in our own selves that “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” within us that we can become convinced that nothing can separate us from the love of God.

Mat 16:17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

Joh 14:20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.

Col 1:27 To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:

Rom 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation [labour in the word so you can be strengthened to endure the tribulation Act 14:22], or distress [2Co 4:8], or persecution [2Co 4:9, Heb 13:5], or famine [Psa 9:9-10, Php 4:19, 3Jn 1:2], or nakedness [Heb 13:5, 2Co 11:27-33, these trials of Paul we just read represent what it takes for us to not be found spiritually naked – Rev 3:18], or peril^G2794 [eight times mentioned in 2Co 11:26], or sword?^G3162
Rom 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter. [1Co 15:31]
Rom 8:37 Nay, in all these things [all these trials] we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
Rom 8:38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Rom 8:39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Eight perils G2794 mentioned in 2Co 11:26

• waters (Isa 43:2)
• robbers (Rev 3:11)
• countrymen (1Th 2:14)
• heathen (Mat 16:6)
• in the city (2Pe 2:7)
• in the wilderness (Rev 18:10)
• in the sea (Isa 43:16)
• among false brethren (Mat 10:16)

G3162 sword machaira Total KJV Occurrences: 29

sword, 23 Mat_10:34, Mat_26:51-52 (4), Mar_14:47, Luk_21:24, Luk_22:36, Luk_22:49, Joh_18:10-11 (2), Act_12:2, Act_16:27, Rom_8:35, Rom_13:4, Eph_6:17, Heb_4:12, Heb_11:34, Heb_11:37, Rev_6:4, Rev_13:10 (2), Rev_13:14

swords, 6 Mat_26:47, Mat_26:55, Mar_14:43, Mar_14:48, Luk_22:38, Luk_22:52

“In the name of the LORD I will destroy them” in verses 10, 11 and 12 of Psalm 118 is just another way of saying “Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us” (Rom 8:37) and that conquering is accomplished by the sword^G3162.

Rom 13:4 For he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword^G3162 in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil.

Eph 6:17 And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword^G3162 of the Spirit, which is the word of God:

Heb 4:12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword^G3162, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.

Heb 11:34 Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword^G3162, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.

Heb 11:37 They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword^G3162: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;

Luk 22:38 And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords^G3162. And he said unto them, It is enough [Heb 4:12].

If “The LORD is my [our] strength and song, and is become my salvation” it will be because we are blessed in this age to be judged by His word which is the sword which we pray will never depart from our house. If it does not depart from our house, Christ has told us “It is enough” to get the job done [2Sa 12:10].

2Sa 12:10 Now therefore the sword shall never depart from thine house; because thou hast despised me, and hast taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be thy wife.

That judgment which comes via the word of God is “quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword^G3162, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” and is the reason we “praise the LORD, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people.

Psa 117:2 For his merciful kindness is great toward us: and the truth of the LORD endureth for ever. Praise ye the LORD”.

We praise God for showing mercy to us in this age by piercing our hearts through the judgment that His word brings in our land so we can learn of His righteousness first and one day be blessed to reveal the thoughts of many hearts; another way of saying “when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness”.

Isa 26:9 With my soul have I desired thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek thee early [Heb 11:6]: for when thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.

Luk 2:35 (Yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also,) that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.

Psa 117:1 O praise the LORD, all ye nations: praise him, all ye people. Psa 117:2 For his merciful kindness is great toward us: and the truth of the LORD endureth for ever. Praise ye the LORD.

We praise the LORD for the reasons mentioned in the first and only two verses of Psalm 117,”For his merciful kindness is great toward us: and the truth of the LORD endureth for ever.” That is the theme which the Psalmist continues to speak to in Psalm 118, and as we will see, the LORD has given us this Psalm to reassure His children that we can put our confidence in the LORD and know that His merciful hand is going to destroy all the enemies within us as He brings us unto perfection on the third day through that judgment.

Luk 13:32 And he said unto them, Go ye, and tell that fox, Behold, I cast out devils, and I do cures to day and to morrow, and the third day I shall be perfected.

It is “all ye nations” and “all ye people” who are to praise the LORD, and who will praise the LORD one day, but for today it is all the nations within us which are being brought into subjection to Christ as we learn through our trials to no longer trust our flesh, being blessed to no longer put our confidence in man or princes, but rather in our LORD whose plans for us are so great that we cannot fully appreciate what has been set before us.

Jer 29:11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.
Jer 29:12 Then shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you.
Jer 29:13 And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.
Jer 29:14 And I will be found of you, saith the LORD: and I will turn away your captivity, and I will gather you from all the nations, and from all the places whither I have driven you, saith the LORD; and I will bring you again into the place whence I caused you to be carried away captive.
Jer 29:15 Because ye have said, The LORD hath raised us up prophets in Babylon; [Mat 24:11].

1Co 2:8 Which none of the princes of this world knew[Psa 118:9]: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
1Co 2:9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
1Co 2:10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
1Co 2:11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. [boasting is therefore excluded by the law of faith Rom 3:27]

Psa 118:1 O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good: because his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:2 Let Israel now say, that his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:3 Let the house of Aaron now say, that his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:4 Let them now that fear the LORD say, that his mercy endureth for ever.
Psa 118:5 I called upon the LORD in distress: the LORD answered me, and set me in a large place.

O give thanks unto the LORD; for his goodness, let Israel, the house of Aaron, and those who fear the LORD say, his mercy for ever! The way this is outlined for us we are being witnessed to that all the world typified by “Israel, the many called “the house of Aaron” and the elect “Let them now that fear the LORD” in time are all being brought to understand the mercy of God that never fails.

We can only learn of that mercy by being put into situations where we need to be delivered, as David wrote, and it is the elect who truly “fear the LORD” and who are being dragged to call “upon the LORD in distress” so we can learn that “the LORD answered me, and set me in a large place.

That “large place” is the peace that passes all understanding which is formed through the trials, when we are brought to our safe haven Jesus Christ (Psa 107:30) who is that “large place” of refuge for us in this life.

Php 4:4 Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice.
Php 4:5 Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand.
Php 4:6 Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.
Php 4:7 And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
Php 4:8 Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,
whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

Isa 25:4 For thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall.

Mat 5:3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Gen 24:63 And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at the eventide: and [1st Rom 5:8] he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and, behold, the camels were coming. Gen 24:64 And [2nd] Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac, she lighted off the camel.

Psa 118:6 The LORD is on my side; I will not fear: what can man do unto me?
Psa 118:7 The LORD taketh my part with them that help me: therefore shall I see my desire upon them that hate me.

Verse 6 and 7 demonstrate just how greatly God’s power can be working within us to make us more than conquerors through Him.

Act 7:59 And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
Act 7:60 And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

Dan 3:16 Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.
Dan 3:17 If it be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king.
Dan 3:18 But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up.

Mat 10:19 But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.

Rom 8:31 What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?
Rom 8:32 He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?
Rom 8:33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.
Rom 8:34 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.
Rom 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
Rom 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
Rom 8:37 Nay, in all these things [Rom 8:28] we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

These verses we’ve looked at demonstrate that we have no reason to fear what man can do unto us if “The LORD is on my side“. He will make our situations work together for the good because of His love that is being shed abroad in our hearts making our hope that “The LORD taketh my part with them that help me” very real.

Rom 8:28 And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

Rom 5:5 And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.

Eph 1:11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:

God has purposed for His people to overcome, and it is His good pleasure to give us the kingdom! Knowing it is God’s good pleasure and purpose to give us the kingdom will drive all fear from His people, and it is through the judgment which is upon the body of Christ today that this will be accomplished as we grow in obedience to God’s word through the things which we suffer.

Luk 12:32 Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

1Jn 4:17 Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world.
1Jn 4:18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.

Heb 5:8 Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered;
Heb 5:9 And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey him;

Psa 118:8 It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man.
Psa 118:9 It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes.

The last two verses will look at in our study entitled “The LORD is my strength and song, and is become my salvation” and they speak of trusting in the LORD and not putting our confidence in man or in princes.

When we are subject to the wisdom of man and not being ruled and reigned over in our hearts by Jesus Christ, then we are demonstrating confidence in man and in princes. We naturally do this all our life until God sends His spirit to us and we become those Jews who are Jews inwardly who no longer have confidence in the flesh of men, especially our own flesh that must completely fall seven times (Pro 24:16). We will learn obedience through this life as we are shepherded down the strait gate to which we have been called (Mat 22:14, Mat 7:14).

Rom 6:16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?

Mat 20:26 But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister;
Mat 20:27 And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant:
Mat 20:28 Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.

God’s elect are called out of this worldly trust that we war against day after day as we die daily and live the rest of our lives fulfilling the will of God. When we are chastened and scourged of the LORD through storms which God allows to rise and bring us to our wits’ end, it is always for the same express purpose of bringing us to be of the generation who have no confidence in our flesh. It is only through that grace and accompanying faith that God provides that “The LORD is [can be] my strength and song, and is become my salvation”.

1Co 15:31 I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.

1Pe 4:2 That he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God.

Php 3:3 For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.

Next week, Lord willing, we will look at the next nine verses (Part 2 Psa 118:10-18) where we will see more examples of how God allows our enemy to compass us about so that He can be glorified when those enemies are destroyed at His hand. Of course the primary enemy is within our own flesh which wars against the spirit of God, but also the outward enemies that God sends our way are used by the Lord to strengthen us and remind us of His great power, the hand of the Lord that does valiantly.

Psa 118:10 All nations compassed me about: but in the name of the LORD will I destroy them.
Psa 118:11 They compassed me about; yea, they compassed me about: but in the name of the LORD I will destroy them.
Psa 118:12 They compassed me about like bees; they are quenched as the fire of thorns: for in the name of the LORD I will destroy them.
Psa 118:13 Thou hast thrust sore at me that I might fall: but the LORD helped me.
Psa 118:14 The LORD is my strength and song, and is become my salvation.
Psa 118:15 The voice of rejoicing and salvation is in the tabernacles of the righteous: the right hand of the LORD doeth valiantly.
Psa 118:16 The right hand of the LORD is exalted: the right hand of the LORD doeth valiantly.
Psa 118:17 I shall not die, but live, and declare the works of the LORD.
Psa 118:18 The LORD hath chastened me sore: but he hath not given me over unto death.

Could you please answer this question for me?

Joh 19:11 Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore HE THAT DELIVERED ME UNTO THEE HATH THE GREATER SIN.

We know that there is no power but Of God (ROM 13:1), So it was God that delivered Jesus over to pilot in the above verse

Is it God that has the ‘greater sin’?

Thanks, K____

Dear K____,

I thought about this very question a few years ago, and because everything that God creates is good, and God Himself cannot sin, Jesus is speaking to our old man, who is responsible by the determinate hand of God to use us to crucify Christ.

Act 2:23  Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:

We are the ones with the greater sin. Our religious self-righteous man of sin is the one with the greater sin. God used the evil that is within our vessels of dishonor to crucify our LORD so that in His death we would be recreated into vessels of Honor.

The religious man in us, our second beast with two horns, brings Christ before our first beast’s image, the law of the flesh, and it is our religious beast which has the greater sin, because Christ in us does not submit to the worship of flesh and blood, and therefore must be put to death so that we can justify ourselves as righteous by the law, Pilate, the image of the first beast. James explains it this way;

Jas 1:13  Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:
Jas 1:14  But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
Jas 1:15  Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.

I am not tempted by God to crucify The LORD, I am drawn away of my second beast to kill him so that I can justify myself, by the first beast. My second beast has the GREATER sin because he dresses himself up as religious and then uses the law to kill Christ.

Hi K____,

No, God Himself tempts no man.

Jas 1:13  Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.

He is working all things after the counsel of His own will, and to accomplish His plan of salvation, He sent Satan to have Judas betray his Master to the Jews:

Joh 13:27  And after the sop Satan entered into him. Then said Jesus unto him, That thou doest, do quickly.

Sin is scripturally defined as missing the mark, and all the Father does is right on the mark, including everything He sends Satan to do for Him.

He does not deny that He creates evil, but He, and He alone as God, is capable of calling light out of darkness and of making good come of evil, as he did with Joseph’s brothers whom God, through an evil spirit, had to sell him into Egypt so Joseph could come out of Egyptian slavery to being the ruler of Egypt and to bring salvation to his own sinful brothers.

Gen 45:4  And Joseph said to his brothers, “Please come near to me.” So they came near. Then he said: “I am Joseph your brother, whom you sold into Egypt.
Gen 45:5  But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life.
Gen 45:6  For these two years the famine has been in the land, and there are still five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvesting.
Gen 45:7  And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance.
Gen 45:8  So now it was not you who sent me here, but God; and He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.

Joseph is not accusing God of sinning. He is simply acknowledging that God is sovereign over both good and evil, and is doing exactly what He has planned from the beginning. And part of that plan was for Joseph’s brothers to sell him into Egyptian slavery, as a type of our own slavery to sin.

Then, out of that slavery Joseph was delivered to rule over those who had been his masters, and it is all a type of God working Christ’s death just as the Father had planned before He ever created Christ:

Act 4:26  The kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against his Christ.
Act 4:27  For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together,
Act 4:28  For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.

Paul deals with this matter of God’s sovereignty over evil with these facts:

Rom 9:18  Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth.
Rom 9:19  Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will?
Rom 9:20  Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?
Rom 9:21  Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?
Rom 9:22  What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction:

So number one: God is in the process of showing His mercy to the new man of every man, and in  order to do that, He has determined to “endure with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction”, meaning our sinful flesh. Secondly: as the Creator He has the right to do with His creatures as He desires, and is not capable of sinning inasmuch as all He does is exactly “what His hand and His counsel determined before to be done”. He never misses the mark, so He never sins, even when those who betray Him do so “after the counsel of His own will”:

Eph 1:11  In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.

I think you already know all this, but there are the scriptures which demonstrate that God does not sin.

Mike Vinson

The Prophecy of Isaiah - Part 54 Discussion

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Isa 12:1-6  Your Anger Is Turned Away, and You Comfort Me

Isa 12:1  And in that day thou shalt say, O LORD, I will praise thee: though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me.
Isa 12:2  Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid: for the LORD JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation.
Isa 12:3  Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.
Isa 12:4  And in that day shall ye say, Praise the LORD, call upon his name, declare his doings among the people, make mention that his name is exalted.
Isa 12:5  Sing unto the LORD; for he hath done excellent things: this is known in all the earth.
Isa 12:6  Cry out and shout, thou inhabitant of Zion: for great is the Holy One of Israel in the midst of thee.

These words go right along with the thoughts contained in the previous chapter where we are told the Lord is gathering His elect out of Assyria (Babylon), and is setting them up as a sign to the nations of those upon whom He is now showing His favor.

Isa 11:10 And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious.

Isa 11:12 And he shall set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.

And here are those in Christ who are that ensign..."in that day":

Eph 1:3  Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ:
Eph 1:4  According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before him in love:
Eph 1:5  Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,
Eph 1:6  To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved.
Eph 1:7  In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;
Eph 1:8  Wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence;
Eph 1:9  Having made known unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure which he hath purposed in himself:
Eph 1:10  That in the dispensation of the fulness of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in him:
Eph 1:11  In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:
Eph 1:12  That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.

These verses speaking of "that day" refer to the first verse of our study:

Isa 12:1  And in that day thou shalt say, O LORD, I will praise thee: though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me.

God himself, at first, has us all blinded to the Truth that He is first "angry with" His own elect, and because of the sin which He Himself placed within us to give Himself the occasion He is seeking to destroy our old man and his kingdom. God's elect, along with the whole creation, live in sin for many years not knowing they are His elect, not knowing their old man must die and that the kingdom of their old man must be destroyed. That destruction is accomplished through the fiery trials of our "predestinated" lives.

This is how the holy spirit tells us this is accomplished:

1Co 3:11  For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
1Co 3:12  Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble;
1Co 3:13  Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day ["that day"] shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.
1Co 3:14  If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward.
1Co 3:15  If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.
1Co 3:16  Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?
1Co 3:17  If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.
1Co 3:18  Let no man deceive himself. If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, that he may be wise.
1Co 3:19  For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.

 Is there any human who has never "defile[d] the temple of God"? Of course there is not!

Rom 3:23  For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;

What does the Lord do to all who have sinned?

Exo 32:33  And the LORD said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.

What this means is that "the first man Adam" in all of us is blotted out of God's book of life, blotted out of Christ, and Christ in us must replace that rebellious old "first man Adam".

But this is a process and Christ sums this process up in these words:

Joh 12:24  Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.
Joh 12:25  He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.

Then Christ used the apostle Paul to reveal to us that our 'dying' is a daily process:

1Co 15:31  I protest by your rejoicing which I have in Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily.

Gal 2:20  I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Who is working this entire process? It certainly is not any of us simply because our old man just naturally does not want to die, and will do anything to preserve himself. If we do seek to "Hate [our] life in the age", this is who makes that all happen:

Isa 12:2  Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid: for the LORD JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation.

When we are in time given the faith to simply believe the Truth of the Lord's words in the following verses, then the trust, courage, strength and joy of Isaiah 12:2 becomes ours. These verses are the Truth. Any spirit which attempts to tell us otherwise is a lying, false spirit:

Psa 136:1  O give thanks unto the LORD; for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

Rom 8:28  And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
Rom 8:29  For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

1Co 1:26  For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:
1Co 1:27  But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;
1Co 1:28  And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:
1Co 1:29  That no flesh should glory in his presence.
1Co 1:30  But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:

Eph 1:11  In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:
Eph 1:12  That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ.

When we realize and believe that we are the foolish, the weak and the base of this world, it humbles us and causes us to see just how hopeless and how helpless we are of ourselves, and only in that humble state we can and we will be exalted "to the praise of His glory", and only then we can be given the faith to "rejoice in His salvation", simply because we know our Lord "cares for [us]".

Isa 25:9  And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him, we will be glad and rejoice in his salvation.

1Pe 5:5  Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility: for God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.
1Pe 5:6  Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time:
1Pe 5:7  Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.
1Pe 5:8  Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:

Isa 12:3  Therefore with joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.

That word "Therefore" refers back to verse 2:

Isa 12:2  Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid: for the LORD JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation.

Where are these "wells of salvation" which are also called "rivers of living waters":

Jer 2:13  For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.

Jer 17:13  O LORD, the hope of Israel, all that forsake thee shall be ashamed, and they that depart from me shall be written in the earth, because they have forsaken the LORD, the fountain of living waters.

Joh 4:10  Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water.

Christ is the source of the fountains, rivers and wells of living waters. But as with all things except headship and the power of the throne, Christ has given us all His Father gave to Him:

Joh 4:14  But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.

Joh 7:38  He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.

The message of the "sum of [His] word", at which we arrive when we add John 7:38 to Isa 12:2-3, is the truth contained in these verses:

Rom 8:11  But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

2Co 4:5  For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake.
2Co 4:6  For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
2Co 4:7  But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.

Gal 2:20  I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.

Col 1:26  Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints:
Col 1:27  To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:

When we are granted to realize that "the life which [we] now live in the flesh [we] live by the faith of the Son of God... which is Christ in you the hope of glory... that the excellency of the power is of God and not of us, because Christ lives in us by the faith of the Son of God, then:

Isa 12:4  And in that day shall ye say, Praise the LORD, call upon his name, declare his doings among the people, make mention that his name is exalted.

We are instructed by our Creator to praise Him, call upon His name, declare His doings, and make mention that His name is exalted. The Lord obviously considers it very important that we acknowledge Him for who He is and that we acknowledge "His doings among the people". So what exactly are "His doings"? What are "His doings" of which we are instructed to make mention?

Here are "His doings" which He has done and over which He wants us to know and "make mention" that He is sovereign:

Gen 1:31  And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

Gen 45:8  So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and he hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.

Exo 20:11  For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

Pro 16:1  The preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the LORD.

Pro 16:4  The LORD hath made all things for himself: yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

Isa 45:5  I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me:
Isa 45:6  That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else.
Isa 45:7  I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

Isa 63:17  O LORD, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants' sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

Amo 3:6  Shall a trumpet be blown in the city, and the people not be afraid? shall there be evil in a city, and the LORD hath not done it?

The point of 'making mention that His name is exalted' is to exalt His name in all things. This acknowledgement includes the fact that it was God who made Joseph's brothers to sell him as a slave into Egypt. In Exodus we are reminded that it was the Lord who created heaven and earth and all that in them is. Here in Isaiah we are told that there is no other God, and we are informed in the clearest manner that our God creates both good and evil to the extent that He actually "makes us to err from His ways and hardens our hearts from His fear just as He hardened Pharaoh's heart. In Amos we are even told that if there is evil in the city, and we all know there is plenty of "evil in the city", yet we are reminded "the Lord hath done it".

The doctrine of the New Testament is the same message. Christ tells us clearly that he came to blind the masses from knowing who He is:

Mat 13:10  And the disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables?
Mat 13:11  He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given.
Mat 13:12  For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath.
Mat 13:13  Therefore speak I to them in parables: because they seeing see not; and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand.

Joh 9:39  And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind.
Joh 9:40  And some of the Pharisees which were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind also?
Joh 9:41  Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth.

Christ tells us in no uncertain terms that "it is not given to [the multitudes] to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God". He tells us plainly that He came to blind the masses and to take away their ability to hear His words:

Joh 8:43  Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word.

However He has a purpose in all He is doing, and he tells us what that purpose is:

1Co 15:22  For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
1Co 15:23  But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming.
1Co 15:24  Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.
1Co 15:25  For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.
1Co 15:26  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.
1Co 15:27  For he hath put all things under his feet. But when he saith all things are put under him, it is manifest that he is excepted, which did put all things under him.
1Co 15:28  And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.

Christ and His Father determined "before the world began", 'before chronos aionios' that it would be through "Christ the firstfruits; [and] afterward they that are Christ's at his coming", that all men of all time would be brought back from death and given immortaity:

Rom 2:7  To them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life:

1Co 15:53  For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
1Co 15:54  So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.

2Ti 1:9  Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began,

Tit 1:2  In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began;

Immortality is the gift that awaits all men of all time, and all men have already been given an order in which we will each receive immortality. When all flesh and death are destroyed, then "God will be all in all". God being "all in all" will be accomplished through "the church which is His body":

Eph 1:17  That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him:
Eph 1:18  The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints,
Eph 1:19  And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power,
Eph 1:20  Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places,
Eph 1:21  Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come:
Eph 1:22  And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church,
Eph 1:23  Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.

When we learn and are brought to understand fully that we are "the church which is His body, [and that we are] the fulness of Him that fills all in all" we are provoked to:

Isa 12:5  Sing unto the LORD; for he hath done excellent things: this is known in all the earth.
Isa 12:6  Cry out and shout, thou inhabitant of Zion: for great is the Holy One of Israel in the midst of thee.

"He hath done excellent things" is in the 'Qal stem', which is the Hebrew equivalent of the aorist tense in the Greek. What that means is that "The Lord [is] do[ing] excellent things", and according to verse 6 He is doing so "in the midst of [us]" because to this very day He is doing excellent things like revealing:

Col 1:26  Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints:
Col 1:27  To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory:
Col 1:28  Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus:

Truly "the eyes of our understanding [is] being enlightened; that we may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints" (Eph 1:18).

Psa 94:19  In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul.

We will close with our opening verse:

Isa 12:1  And in that day thou shalt say, O LORD, I will praise thee: though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me.

Next week, if the Lord wills, we will discover that "the day of the Lord" within us is the judgment of Babylon within us.

Here are our verses for our next study:

Isa 13:1  The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amoz did see.
Isa 13:2  Lift ye up a banner upon the high mountain, exalt the voice unto them, shake the hand, that they may go into the gates of the nobles.
Isa 13:3  I have commanded my sanctified ones, I have also called my mighty ones for mine anger, even them that rejoice in my highness.
Isa 13:4  The noise of a multitude in the mountains, like as of a great people; a tumultuous noise of the kingdoms of nations gathered together: the LORD of hosts mustereth the host of the battle.
Isa 13:5  They come from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the LORD, and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the whole land.
Isa 13:6  Howl ye; for the day of the LORD is at hand; it shall come as a destruction from the Almighty.
Isa 13:7  Therefore shall all hands be faint, and every man's heart shall melt:
Isa 13:8  And they shall be afraid: pangs and sorrows shall take hold of them; they shall be in pain as a woman that travaileth: they shall be amazed one at another; their faces shall be as flames.
Isa 13:9  Behold, the day of the LORD cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
Isa 13:10  For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine.
Isa 13:11  And I will punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; and I will cause the arrogancy of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.

“Marriage in Scripture” Series

What Is the Purpose For The Institution of Marriage?

This is the first study of what will be a series of studies on marriage – its purpose, selecting a mate, problems faced in marriage, etc. We will be asking and answering with the scriptures, many questions you may have had, and maybe many questions you have never had, but should have asked before you ever got married. We will first establish with the scriptures the purpose for the institution of marriage. Then we will be discussing the stresses upon the marriage union, and what the Creator of this institution of marriage has given us to keep our marriages strong and unified in the one mind of Him who created and instituted the marriage union.

So what is the purpose for the institution of marriage? Why do we need marriage? Is there a spiritual lesson for us in this institution? Why did God give Adam a woman instead of another man? Why are women called “the weaker vessel”?

1Pe 3:7 Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.

Here is the history of how the Lord gave us the institution of marriage. Let’s read this story and see what lessons we can learn from what we are told:

Gen 2:20 And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him.
Gen 2:21 And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
Gen 2:22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
Gen 2:23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
Gen 2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

There is a huge spiritual revelation in this true story of how the Lord gave us the institution of marriage, and the scriptures reveal that this union has many very edifying spiritual revelations for us.

After giving us many wonderful admonitions that will, if obeyed, keep our marriages healthy, Paul tells us this:

Eph 5:32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

In 1 Corinthians 2 Paul also tells us this:

1Co 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
1Co 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

When Paul tells us in Ephesians 5 that the institution of marriage, when “comparing spiritual things with spiritual” is actually speaking “concerning Christ and the church”, then we know that our physical marriages are really just a type and shadow of “Christ and the church”.

Accepting that as the Truth, let’s look the institution of marriage “comparing spiritual things with spiritual, and see what we can learn. Let’s ask ourselves what is the spiritual meaning of “she was taken out of the man.” What is the spiritual meaning of “sleep”? What is the spiritual meaning of “flesh… and bone”? And what is the spiritual meaning of “they shall be one flesh”?

The spiritual meaning of “she was taken out of the man”

The spiritual lesson behind this statement is of utmost significance. Without knowing what this statement means we cannot “know God and Jesus Christ who He has sent”. And if we do not “know God and Jesus Christ” we do not have life eternal.

Joh 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

Knowing just how important a matter this is Christ Himself reveals to us the meaning of this statement. This is what that part of the history of the institution of marriage is teaching us:

Joh 16:27 For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God.

Joh 17:8 For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.

This is not speaking of Christ as the firstborn from the dead, as Babylon teaches us. This certainly includes that meaning, but it is specifically teaching us that God the Father created Christ and in that sense Christ came out from His Head, for the specific purpose of creating the physical universe and for the specific purpose of creating all men of all time, and becoming the savior of all men.

Here are two places in scripture where this is plainly stated for all who have eyes to see and ears to hear:

Col 1:15 Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:
Col 1:16 For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:

The word ‘for’ in verse 16 is translated from the Greek word ‘hoti’ and it means ‘because’. Christ was “the firstborn of every creature BECAUSE by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth…”

Then we also have this verse of scripture:

Rev 3:14 And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God;

That is the spiritual meaning of “she was taken out of the man”.

The spiritual meaning of ‘sleep’

To understand the spiritual meaning of ‘sleep’, we need to go to the New Testament story of the death of Christ’s good friend, Lazarus, the brother of Mary and Martha. When Christ was told of the sickness of Lazarus, He waited until Lazarus had been dead four days before he got there to pray for Lazarus. Lazarus had already died, and after his death Christ told his disciples:

Joh 11:11 These things said he: and after that he saith unto them, Our friend Lazarus sleepeth; but I go, that I may awake him out of sleep.
Joh 11:12 Then said his disciples, Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well.
Joh 11:13 Howbeit Jesus spake of his death: but they thought that he had spoken of taking of rest in sleep.
Joh 11:14 Then said Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead.

So being in “a deep sleep”, as Adam was when God took a rib from him to make him a wife, is a symbol of being dead. If we are given the understanding that the first Adam is a type of the last Adam, then we will know that the first Adam had to, “in a figure”, die before he could be given a wife who would, just like the last Adam, be given a wife who also must come “out of [himself]:

Rom 5:14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come.

If we are so blessed, spiritually we are the espoused “chaste virgin”, who is the bride of our husband, Christ:

2Co 11:2 For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.

How was this accomplished? It was accomplished only as Adam’s “deep sleep” typified, “through death”:

Col 1:22 In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight:

Heb 2:14 Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;

The Spiritual Meaning of “Brought Her Unto the Man”

We were told that Christ brought Adam’s wife to him:

Gen 2:22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.

Who then gave Christ His wife?

Joh 17:6 I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.

Joh 17:12 While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.

The type carries through to the point that the first Adam, and Christ, the last Adam, both willingly died for their respective errant, sinful wives:

1Ti 2:14 And Adam was not deceived, but the woman [as the type of Christ’s called out ones] being deceived was in the transgression.

Joh 10:17 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again.

Joh 10:18 No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

Very few know or understand just how integral Christ’s espoused wife is to His own purpose. Very few understand just how integral she is to His death, His resurrection, and His own inheritance.

Look at this verse:

Rom 4:25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

The word ‘for’, which appears twice in this verse, should actually read “through”, because it is both times, translated from the Greek word ‘dia’, which means ‘through’ and from which we get our English word ‘diameter’, which is the distance ‘through’ a circle to the other side. What this verse reveals is that Christ was delivered up to be crucified ‘through’ our offenses, and was raised from the dead ‘through’ our justification. That is just how integral His own wife is to His inheritance. She is given to him “through death”, and this is all typified by God causing a symbolic “deep sleep” to fall upon Adam, and taking a rib from him and making of that rib a wife which He then brings to Adam. That is the spiritual significance of the word ‘sleep’ in the story of the institution of marriage.

The spiritual meaning of “flesh and bone”

Let’s notice carefully what we are being told about Eve’s origins:

Gen 2:23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

Eve coming “out of Adam”, for those with eyes to see, reveals that Christ Himself is the one out of whom Adam came. Christ is the Word who said “Let us make man in our image…”, and that is exactly from whence we are told Adam came:

Col 1:16 For by him [Christ] were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:

The scriptures teach that when God creates another, a second for that which He created first, under those circumstances, that which is first, becomes the stronger, and becomes the head of that which was created for the first and preeminent creation.

Here are the scriptures which make this spiritual lesson so clear:

1Co 11:3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

Christ was created before the man, Adam was created before the woman, and the Father is He “of whom are all things” (1Co 8:6). This is the lesson of the institution of marriage. “Through death, “a deep sleep”, the wife of the first Adam came out of Adam, just as the wife of the last Adam “through death”, comes out of Christ” to be “bone of [His] bones, and flesh of [His] flesh”. All of this is done for the purpose of showing us that a married couple are to be “one flesh”, spiritually typifying the one spiritual mind of the one body of Christ and His bride.

Gen 2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.

While the earthy type is created in a “marred… made to be destroyed” condition and composition, the spiritual anti-type is being made to be of an “immortal” condition and composition, “a spiritual body”. The first Adam is of this earth, earthy. Nevertheless he is a figure of the last man Adam:

Ecc 3:18 I said in mine heart concerning the estate of the sons of men, that God might manifest them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts.

Jer 18:4 And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

Rom 5:14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression, who is the figure [Greek, tupos, type] of him that was to come.

Rom 8:20 For the creature was made [‘”marred… in the Potter’s hand”] subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope,

1Co 15:44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
1Co 15:45 And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
1Co 15:46 Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual.
1Co 15:47 The first man is of the earth, earthy: the second man is the Lord from heaven.
1Co 15:48 As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly.
1Co 15:49 And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.

Why Did God give Adam a woman instead of another man?

Why are women called “the weaker vessel”?

“Adam called his wife’s name Eve because she was the mother of all living.”

Gen 3:20 And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all living.

Here is the meaning of the Hebrew word ‘Eve’ the name Adam gave his wife.

H2332
חוּה

chavvâh
khav-vaw’
Causative from H2331; lifegiver; Chavvah (or Eve), the first woman: – Eve.

The wife was made for the husband for the purpose of giving life to others by her husband. Witness the billions and billions who have come “through the woman”.

As unpopular as it is to just read it out of the Bible, the apostle Paul, under the inspiration of the holy spirit, tells us that this headship of God over Christ, and Christ being the head of the man, and the man being the head of the woman, is all ordained to be symbolized by a man having short hair and thereby having an “uncovered… head”. The very same symbol of submission to God’s ways is also symbolized by a woman having her head covered by her long hair:

1Co 11:4 Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head [Christ].
1Co 11:5 But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head [her husband]: for that is even all one as if she were shaven.
1Co 11:6 For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered.
1Co 11:7 For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.

And what is the point being made by the holy spirit?

1Co 11:8 For the man is not of the woman; but the woman of the man. [and Christ for His Head]
1Co 11:9 Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man. [As the man was created for Christ]
1Co 11:10 For this cause ought the woman to have power on her head because of the angels [the messengers of Christ].

1Co 11:11 Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.
1Co 11:12 For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God.

1Co 11:13 Judge in yourselves: is it comely that a woman pray unto God uncovered?

So exactly what does “uncovered” mean?:

1Co 11:14 Doth not even nature itself teach you, that, if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him?
1Co 11:15 But if a woman have long hair, it is a glory to her: for her hair is given her for a covering.

1Co 11:16 But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom [of long haired men and short haired women], neither the churches of God.

Just like outward adultery and outward fornication demonstrate our infidelity to the spiritual laws of God, so does a man having long hair, and a woman having short hair, demonstrate that we are not very worried about our Lord’s spiritual commandments.

Please do not think that we should begin measuring the hair of our brothers and start setting limits on exactly what is to be considered as long hair, and what is to be considered as short hair. We do not want to think above what is written, but we do want to be faithful to what is written, and let the holy spirit do its own convicting work within each man and woman.

What all of this reveals is that this is the exact same submissive, fruitful function that Christ fulfills for His head, His God the Father:

Let’s put these two sections of scripture together and see if we can see what the institution of marriage reveals to us:

1Co 11:3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

Col 1:15 Who [Christ, whose “head… is God”] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature:

Why must Christ be “the firstborn of every creature”? Here is why:

Col 1:16 For [Greek, ‘hoti’, because] by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:
Col 1:17 And he is before all things, and by him all things consist.
Col 1:18 And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence.
Col 1:19 For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell;

Nowhere in the New Testament is there any mention of anyone in “the Godhead” other than Christ and His Head, “the Father of whom are all things” (1Co 8:6). It is the lesson we are taught by the institution of marriage which delivers us from the yoke of the false doctrine of a trinitarian Godhead. We are told that the invisible things are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even the Godhead:

Rom 1:20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

We are not left to speculate which “things that are made” make the “Godhead” to be clearly seen. We are told throughout the New Testament that “the head of Christ is God”, and we are told that “the Father” Himself is the “one God”, and that besides that “one God, the Father of whom are all things, [there is also] one Lord Jesus Christ by whom [like Eve, “the mother of all living”] are all things.” There is no mention of “third person” in the Godhead.

1Co 8:6 But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.

1Co 11:3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.

Just a few verses later we are made to know just how integral Christ is to His Head and just how integral Christ’s wife is to Him:

1Co 11:12 For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God.

“The man is by the woman” tells us that Christ is a woman to His head, His “one God, the Father, of whom are all things…” (1Co 8:6). “The man” came by Christ, as Col 1:16 make so clear:

Col 1:16 For [Greek, ‘hoti’, because] by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:

There certainly is not room in the institution for a third “coequal” head, and it is the institution of marriage which teaches us that “the head of Christ is God”.

Just as a marred creature, such as these Adamic vessels of clay, is a very accurate “figure” of “the last man Adam”, so too, is the physical institution of marriage an accurate type of the relationship between Christ and His Creator and His head, His “one God the Father. The institution of marriage also teaches us that we are the weaker vessel, the called-out bride of our husband and our head and our Creator, Christ. But the institution of marriage also reveals to us that Christ is “the weaker vessel”, in His relationship with His head and His Creator the “one God, the Father, of whom are all things”, including Christ, by whom the Father has chosen to give life to all men.

Conclusion

The institution of marriage shows us “clearly” what is the Godhead (Rom 1:20). It shows us that the Father was, is and always will be the head of Christ (1Co 11:3). It shows us that Christ is “subject unto the Father” (1Co 15:28), just as the church is “subject unto Christ in all things” (Eph 522-24). These are spiritual lessons which the institution of marriage impart to us. This is why God gave Adam a wife instead of another man. This wife, He tells us, came “out of the man”. It is through the institution of marriage that we are taught that the wife is “the weaker vessel” (1Pe 3:7), by whom “all living” came into this world (1Co 11:12). It is the institution of marriage between male and female which shows us we are to ‘bear fruit’ (Gen 1:28). It is the institution of marriage which the scriptures use to demonstrate for us that Christ’s relationship to His Father is as “the weaker vessel” (Joh 14:28), His “life giver” (Col 1:16) who, in the end will be “subject to Him who put all things under Him” (1Co 15:28).

1Co 15:28 And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God [“the Father of whom are all things”] may be all in all.

There is nothing about the institution of marriage which so much as hints at Christ being “co-substantial, coequal, and co-eternal” with His Father. There is nothing about the institution of marriage which even hints at a trinitarian Godhead. Instead what we are clearly told many years after Christ had returned to His Father, is that “the head of Christ is [still] God” (1Co 11:3), that “it pleased the Father that in Him should all the fulness of the Godhead dwell”, and that the Father is “but one God, of whom are all things, [and besides this “one God of whom are all things” there is also] one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom [like Eve] are all things”. What we are told that Christ, the anti-type of the first Adam, “is the first born of every creature, For by him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by him, and for him:” We are even told in very clear language, which confirms the witness and lessons of the institution of marriage, that “the holy spirit” is “the holy spirit of God [the] one God, of whom are all things”:

Eph 4:30 And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.

Then finally we are told is that Christ will subject every man who has ever lived, along with every creature and every power in heaven and in earth to Himself, and that He will then, “be subject unto [His]… Head” just as “wives [are to be] subject unto their husbands in all things”.

All of this demonstrates scripturally how the institution of marriage helps us to ‘clearly see the invisible things of the Godhead’ (Rom 1:20). All of these scriptures demonstrate how the institution of marriage teaches us that all men come through Christ who is “the weaker vessel” in His relationship to His Head, His Father. All these scriptural witnesses teach us that Christ is also His Father’s Eve, His Father’s “life giver” and that through Christ, our “life-giver”, the very definition of the name ‘Eve,’ we will all “in [our] own order” be imparted an “immortal… spiritual body”.

Through the institution of marriage we learn that while we are the sons of Christ, we are at the same time also His bride, and He is our husband. In the same way, the institution of marriage teaches us that “the things that are made” (Rom 1:20), teach us that while Christ is the son of God and He too, is at the same time, the Father’s “life giver”, the Father’s ‘Eve’, the Father’s wife. “The head of Christ is God” (1Co 11:3).

Also ref: http://iswasandwillbe.com/The_Head_Of_Christ_Is_God.php

Gen 1:31 (a) And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.

In Genesis the foundations are laid for the two main generational lines within the first Adam which God is using to work the process of the eventual salvation of all in Christ (Eph 1:10, 1Co 15:22). God placed a clear distinction between the darkness and the light right in the beginning which is further expounded by the “enmity” between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman (Gen 1:1-5, Gal 5:17):

Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity [Hebrew: wə·’ê·ḇāh = hatred/ hostility] between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

The very first child of Adam and Eve, Cain, manifested this hatred and hostility first which represents the darkness and the evil in all flesh through which God generates the spiritual offspring of the serpent (Gen 3:14). From the natural perspective, the flesh will always be the first on the scene, so to speak, and in that way exposes its own carnal eagerness “but not according to knowledge” (1Co 15:46, Act 26:9-11, Mat 19:30, Mat 10:17, Rom 10:2). Cain and his generation typify the seed of the wicked one in our own flesh (with its carnal mind) which hate, persecute and even kill the righteous seed of the woman (Gen 4:17-24).

1Jn 3:12 Not as Cain, who was of that wicked one, and slew his brother [Abel]. And wherefore slew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother’s righteous.
1Jn 3:13 Marvel not, my brethren, if the world hate you.

God appointed Seth ‘instead of’ Abel to typify the true spiritually resurrected sons of God, the elect in Christ, who call on the name of the Lord and are led by the spirit of God (Gen 4:26, Rom 8:14,19, Php 2:15). The elect in Christ knows that “now we are the sons of God”, and they do not marvel “suffer[ing] reproach, because [they] trust in the living God” (1Jn 3:1-2, 1Ti 4:10, Heb 13:13). In scripture God always repeats His warning about being complacent and ignorant to think that the deceitfulness of sin can be underestimated at any stage (1Co 10:1-12).

Heb 3:12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.
Heb 3:13 But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
Heb 3:14 For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end;

The deceitfulness of sin also affects the sons of God. This is typified for us in the days of Seth’s generation when they were seduced by the daughters of men, those in the line of the hostile murderer Cain. Cain’s name means ‘a man from the Lord’ which is referring to the deceitful carnal heart of the natural man in all of us which will always try to entice us into the philosophies and vain deceits of the world (Gen 4:1-2, Jer 17:9, 1Co 3:3, Gal 4:10, Mat 21:25, Col 2:8, Jas 4:4, 1Jn 2:16).

Gen 6:1 And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
Gen 6:2 That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.

The “sons of God” in Seth’s generation were to be the messengers of God in the sense that they, like the true sons of God, were sent as God’s sheep and lambs “in the midst of a crooked and perverse [generation], among whom [they had to] shine as lights in the world” (Mat 10:16, Luk 10:3, Act 20:29, Php 2:15). This also links with physical Israel who was also commanded to keep themselves separate from the morals and customs of the other nations as God’s spiritual elect also is admonished to do (Rom 12:2, Rom 13:14, 1Co 6;19, 2Co 6:17, Col 4:5).

Deu 7:2 And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them:
Deu 7:3 Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son.

Seth’s generation had to keep their calling or ‘estate’ separate from the line of Cain. Just as physical Israel failed in this commission, so also the generation of Seth in their earthly conversation or walk, for our learning, also “left their own habitation” of being the house or city of light to those around them (Mat 5:14).

Jud 1:6 And the angels [Greek: aggello = one who is sent (commissioned), or a messenger from God] which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

2Pe 2:4 For if God spared not the angels [Greek: aggellos = messengers] that sinned, but cast them down to hell [Greek: tartaroo = imprisonment in spiritual darkness], and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment.
2Pe 2:5 And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly;

This section in Jude and Peter links to the same period of when the generation of Seth intermarried with the generation of Cain as explained here in Genesis 6. It also points to our own times of fornication with the false doctrines and the “weak and beggarly elements…of the world” (Gal 4:1-10). The ‘old world’ is our first Adam and our first “corrupt… conversation” in the deceitful natural lusts and pride which all in the first Adam will “put off” at the appointed time (1Jn 2:16).

Eph 4:22 That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts.

The time in the first Adam is our time in ‘the night’ or spiritual darkness when these spiritual chains of lust and pride are placed on us by God. These chains of darkness can only be taken off in the day of judgment when those in the first Adam will be taught and given the Light of His righteousness (Luk 4:17-21, Isa 26:9):

Psa 9:16 The LORD is known by the judgment which he executeth: the wicked is snared in the work of his own hands. Higgaion. Selah.

God is bringing this all-important judgment first to His church or elect, and that is the reason for bringing one man into focus at this early stage in the book of Genesis (1Pe 4:17). Within this time of darkness and interaction between the lines of Seth and Cain, God kept one man, Noah, faithful in that whole generation of Seth. Noah and his household are types of Christ and His elected ones in this respect:

Gen 6:7 And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.
Gen 6:8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.
Gen 6:9 These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

“I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth” is again emphasizing the truth that all physical things have a temporary existence and function in God’s plan, and that includes mankind. The sum of God’s Word witnesses over and over that God never changed His mind on this. No action of any creature, good or evil, can make God repent of His one original plan (Jer 18:4, Rom 8:20, 1Co 15:50).

1Sa 15:29 And also the Strength of Israel will not lie nor repent: for he is not a man, that he should repent.

Noah received favor or grace from God as it was not Noah’s works that brought on him this favor. It was God’s works in Noah that kept him faithful in his generation (Php 2:12-13, Rom 9:16, Jer 10:23). This is how all in the first Adam will receive favor or salvation from God:

Eph 2:8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:
Eph 2:9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.
Eph 2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Faith in God is not to be found on the earth if God does not give it to a person. Without God’s shield of faith, the natural man is an open target for the ‘fiery darts’ of the wicked (Eph 6:16). Noah is shown as the type of those who are given this shield to be faithful until the end and who can work and labour with diligence amid scorn and reproach (Pro 11:27, 2Ti 2:15, 2Pe 3:14).

Heb 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.
Heb 11:7 By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.

Noah is the type of the worker whose faith did not waver as he was warned by God of “things not seen” yet. This is what faith is also defined as:

Heb 11:1 (ASV) Now faith is assurance of things hoped for, a conviction of things not seen.

God is indeed a rewarder of them who serve Him in all diligence and fear (Pro 12:24, Pro 22:29, 1Co 15:58). This reminds us of Nehemiah and his faithful workers who were of one mind to rebuild the wall and the temple of God amid the subtle detractors who tried every trick in the book to subvert them from their task:

Neh 4:6 So built we the wall; and all the wall was joined together unto the half thereof: for the people had a mind to work.
Neh 4:7 But it came to pass, that when Sanballat, and Tobiah, and the Arabians, and the Ammonites, and the Ashdodites, heard that the walls of Jerusalem were made up, and that the breaches began to be stopped, then they were very wroth,

The Apostle Paul was diligent to work amid extreme trials and tribulations, even when several who were close to him left him, and others opposed him openly (2Ti 4:9-17, 2Co 11:23-33):

2Ti 4:17 Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me; that by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might hear: and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion.

When God’s Word is revealed and received in a heart which God prepares, that word produces faith, faithfulness and diligence, among other godly attributes (Gal 5:22-23).

Rom 10:17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

Faith instills and activates the ‘doing’ part after one hears the word, as it also brings about the fear of God to do what He commands:

Jas 2:14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?

Noah diligently prepared the ark, and in so doing he was preaching by his actions also. He displayed his faith by his works. Christ’s spirit in Noah preached for a hundred and twenty years with the darkness of man of his days, even as the spirit of God “moved upon the face of the [dark] waters” and “the four winds of the heaven strove upon the great sea” (Gen 1:2, Dan 7:2):

Gen 6:3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.

1Pe 3:18 For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:
1Pe 3:19 By which also he [Christ] went and preached unto the spirits in prison;
1Pe 3:20 Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.

As already alluded to, a spirit ‘in prison’ is referring to the spirit of the first man Adam. This spirit of fleshly man is in spiritual darkness and in spiritual chains from its creation, as per God’s design (Psa 51:5, Psa 142:7, Isa 24:21-22, Isa 61:1, Gen 1:2, Gen 6:3). The ‘hundred and twenty years’ mentioned here is not referring to the life span of human beings who lived during Noah’s time, as many lived either shorter or longer than one hundred twenty years before and after the flood. The ‘hundred and twenty years’ has a spiritual meaning as the number twelve (the number of spiritual foundations) combining with the number ten (the completion of flesh). This is telling us that man has a foundation in temporary dust or sand as this foundation, and the house built on it will be destroyed. Earthy man cannot do the Word of God even if his natural ear can hear it and his mouth can speak or quote it numerous times:

Mat 7:26 And every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand:
Mat 7:27 And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell: and great was the fall of it.

This is the very position in which fleshly man was made by God, and when the house on this earthy sandy foundation ‘falls’, it actually just exposes what it was the whole time. The exposing of the old foundations of flesh brings the new foundations of the new man into focus:

1Co 15:42 So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption:
1Co 15:43 It is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power:
1Co 15:44 It is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body.
1Co 15:45 And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.

Joh 3:30 He must increase, but I must decrease.

All the time that God has to deal with mankind (spiritually referring to one hundred twenty years) is also called “the longsuffering of God” to have evil in His creation (1Pe 3:20). Flesh and carnality is the very evil and darkness He first created to bring the first Adam through a humbling evil experience to become the true spiritual sons of God:

Isa 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.

Ecc 1:13 (CLV) I applied my heart to inquiring and exploring by wisdom concerning all that is done under the heavens: it is an experience of evil Elohim has given to the sons of humanity to humble them by it.

No one on earth before Noah’s generation ever experienced rain from the heaven, which spiritually means that earthy men’s ways are according to their own wicked thoughts (Isa 55:8-11, Pro 16:25). Those on the earth generally are very immature and ‘weak in the faith’ in the sense a soft mist is needed to water everything on the earth:

Gen 2:4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,
Gen 2:5 And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground.
Gen 2:6 But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

All creatures, including mankind, only eat green plants or herbs before judgment comes, and this judgment was foreshadowed by the global flood in Noah’s day (Gen 1:29-30):

Rom 14:1 Him that is weak in the faith receive ye, but not to doubtful disputations.
Rom 14:2 For one believeth that he may eat all things: another, who is weak, eateth herbs.

“Noah walked with God” is emphasizing that Noah stood out in his generation, as he typifies the true sons of God who also are the salt and the light to the world:

Mat 5:13 Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.
Mat 5:14 Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid.
Mat 5:15 Neither do men light a candle, and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in the house.
Mat 5:16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

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[Questions and comments for the writer can be directed to: glgroenewald@gmail.com]

[Detailed studies and emails written relating to these foundational themes in Scripture are available on the www.iswasandwillbe.com website, including these topics and links:]

The Fallen Angels
What are Angels?
Tartaroo and the Bottomless Pit
Number Ten – Completeness of the Flesh
Number Twelve – Foundations