Talk of JESUS .com

Tag: evil

  • Protect Them from the Evil One

    Protect Them from the Evil One

    Keep Them

    I am not praying that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one.

    John 17:15 CSB

    JESUS prays fervently in an upper room in Jerusalem. He intercedes for disciples of every era, not for everyone but only for those the Father has given to Him for eternal life. Protect them.

    Are you one of these?

    For I have kept H8104 the ways of the LORD, and have not wickedly departed from my God.

    A Psalm of David 18:21 KJV

    The Lord confirms the praises and prophecy of scripture interceding as priest for His own.

    a Benediction

    “… You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.

    John 17:6b CSB – the prayer of Jesus

    This last formal prayer of Jesus feels like a benediction – a good-bye to His disciples ‘until we meet again.’

    Jesus prays, “They have kept Thy word [KJV].”

    He is leaving them unguarded in the flesh and asks our Father God, ‘please accept them into Your keeping and protect them.” Our sinless High Priest confirms to the Father that these are worthy of eternal life!

    Benediction:

    ben-e-dik’-shun: From the earliest times the records bear testimony that pronouncing the benediction or giving the blessing was a common practice. In the temple service, this duty was assigned to the Aaronites and was made an impressive part of the service. The form of the benediction used is given in Numbers 6:22-27. source: BlueLetterBible

    יְבָרֶכְךָ יְהוָה וְיִשְׁמְרֶֽךָ׃ ס

    יָאֵר יְהוָה פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ וִֽיחֻנֶּֽךָּ׃ ס

    יִשָּׂא יְהוָה פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ וְיָשֵׂם לְךָ שָׁלֹֽום׃ ס

    Numbers 6:24-26 Masoretic text – Command of the LORD to Moses for the benediction of the priests.

    How encouraging to know that the Lord will bless us, and keep us, to make His face to shine upon us, and give us peace.

    You, beloved believer, have likely heard priestly benedictions with some frequency. Jesus, no doubt, must certainly have blessed the multitudes many times as they returned to their homes from His preaching.

    After Christ’s resurrection and ascension the Apostles boldly preached the Gospel from town to town. They too would bless the church, often distant from their presence but near in their prayers:

    • The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all. – benediction of Paul’s letter 2 Corinthians 13:14
    • You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men and fall from your own steadfastness, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. Amen. – benediction of Peter’s letter 2 Peter 3:17-18
    • Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. – benediction of leter of Jude 24:24-25

    John 17:

    Jesus, now departing from His Disciples to His suffering prior to the Cross, prays for the earthly flock; these His beloved friends and soon-to-be anointed shepherds of His flocks and keepers of the New Covenant.

    11 I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, ..”

    Our Lord and priestly intercessor now prays:

    “… protect them by your name that you have given me, so that they may be one as we are one.

    12 While I was with them, I was protecting them by your name that you have given me.

    I guarded them and not one of them is lost, except the son of destruction…”

    He refers to Judas Iscariot, of course; who not only is absent from this worship before the Father, but who will very soon betray His Master and Lord Jesus to the evil rulers of this world.

    And Jesus continues by pointing to the purpose of His Sacrifice,

    “… so that the Scripture may be fulfilled.”

    Fulfillment of Scripture, a turning point between Covenants

    Genesis 3 excerpt:

    • Now the serpent … said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” – 3:1
      • The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! – v.4
      • For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” -v.5
    • The LORD God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this Cursed are you more than all… v.6
      • … And between your seed [offspring of the serpent]
      • and her seed [sons of adam]
      • He shall bruise you on the head,
      • And you shall bruise him on the heel.” – v.15

    By the sweat of your face
    You will eat bread,
    Till you return to the ground,
    Because from it you were taken;
    For you are dust,
    And to dust you shall return.”

    Genesis 3:19 NASB

    YES, Jesus the Son of Man will die and so will you and I.

    Yet why would our King and High Priest Redeemer pray that He will suffer for us?

    Romans 5: NASB

    • Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned— v.5
    • For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous. v.19
    • ..as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. –v.21

    The Enemy

    From before Jesus was born as a son of man, He turned back all opposition of man’s great enemy the serpent Satan, the spirit of evil opposing all righteousness.

    • The evil one could not kill the child born of the virgin in Bethlehem by the hand of Herod.
    • Satan could not tempt Jesus in the wilderness or from a vantage point above the whole world.
    • The great deceiver could not manage through corrupted Jewish leaders of false faith to push Jesus off a cliff.
    • The serpent and ruler of this world was about to have his day by the hand of Judas, the betrayer not present as Jesus prays to the Father.

    Yet by His Sacrifice for sin Jesus will crush the head of the evil one.

    John 17:

    King James Version - an appropriate kingly honor and 
glory of Jesus, our High Priest 
as He stands before the LORD our Father
praying for us.

    Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee:

    As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.

    I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me; for they are thine.

    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.

    I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.

    They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.

    Believer, do you hear Jesus as He prays?

    Though we were not in the room where Jesus became the servant washing our feet as He did for the Disciples, the perfect High Priest now prays for not only the eleven, but for those the Father has given to Him from every era until these last days are completed.

    Are you one of these?

    For if you have by God’s grace come to the Lord Jesus you, like Him, are no longer of the world.

    Yet because the evil one opposes Christ Jesus, you have chosen Him over the world and Satan will seek your soul if you fall away.

    Jesus will continue praying for us as our High Priest before the Father. The Lord has yet more encouragement to keep you in the days ahead.

    To be continued...

  • The Tongue is a Fire! – Religion

    The Tongue is a Fire! – Religion

    The Fire of the Tongue, the Rhetoric of Politics and Religion

    In our previous look at public controversy in the media we began with the clash of politics, mentioning the trial of Socrates in 399 B.C. Today we begin coverage of the clashes of religion and the church with everyday culture.

    For, “THE ONE WHO DESIRES LIFE, TO LOVE AND SEE GOOD DAYS,
    MUST KEEP HIS TONGUE FROM EVIL AND HIS LIPS FROM SPEAKING DECEIT.

    First Letter of Peter to the Church 3:10 NASB

    Without digging a hole into some serious divisions of the church in our brief look at this opening quote of the Apostle Peter to the church, let me just remind us:

    Political parties and the church are all gatherings of disagreeable people more or less united in one thing.

    Roger Harned – talkofJesus.com

    Can you think of an application for followers of Christ in current election rhetoric for the (U.S.) election year to come?

    The church (saints or people) of this day and the past are all like you, like me and just like every candidate of every party in every country on earth. We are ALL SINNERS.

    Therefore, regardless of our politics of the moment or religion of the past, we all speak and do evil.

    The Tongue of the ‘Christian’

    But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell.

    Caution of Christ – Matthew 5:22 NASB

    Jesus Christ asks the crowds to examine our own hearts. So before we get to the controversy of Christ, let’s work back from Peter’s last point in this one verse [1 Peter 3:10] instructing “Christians.”

    Peter asks or suggests to followers of Jesus:

    1. If you desire LIFE, what is life?
    2. Do you desire LOVE, what kind of love?
    3. So you want to SEE GOOD DAYS, what path do you seek?
    4. Do you KEEP YOUR TONGUE FROM EVIL?
    5. Would others find you guilty of SPEAKING DECEIT because you have fooled yourself?

    Do you speak foolishness in angry answers to others – your loved ones, those you work or worship with, a politician inciting opposition?

    How can you judge their speech when you do not even judge your own?

    The root meaning of deceit here is to decoy. In other words, deceive another by your words. Of course no politician would do that!

    But Jesus speaks to those who want to speak truth. When we do not, like the politicians and leaders of cultural religion we also become hypocrites, as are our accusers.

    Hypocrites

    Their audience is US.

    ὑποκριτής, ὑποκριτου, ὁ (ὑποκρίνομαι, which see);

    1. one who answers, an interpreter (Plato, Lucian).
    2. an actor, stage-player (Aristophanes, Xenophon, Plato, Aelian, Herodian).
    3. in Biblical Greek, a dissembler, pretender, hypocrite:

    Followers of Christ must look in the mirror first.

    If you catch yourself speaking deceit you had best shut your mouth and seal your lips. (Nevermind the hypocrisy of your opponent, just find the beam in your own eye and fire of your own tongue.)

    The tongue of Evil

    The tongue of evil could be our own!

    Paul writes to church of the Romans:

    as it is written,
    “THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE;

    Romans 3:13

    He continues in speaking of Jews and Hellenistic culturists (Greeks):

    THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD,
    THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.

    “THEIR THROAT IS AN OPEN GRAVE,
    WITH THEIR TONGUES THEY KEEP DECEIVING,”
    “THE POISON OF ASPS IS UNDER THEIR LIPS”;

    “WHOSE MOUTH IS FULL OF CURSING AND BITTERNESS”…

    “THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.”

    Could this be a political treatise against Christians, Jews, Muslims, and ANY claiming God without love on their lips even in this day?

    Like Peter, Paul also shows why politics and religion mix in a murky cloud of hypocrisy.

    How do you seek GOOD DAYS?

    What is the platform of your faith? Your religion? Traditions? Good deeds?

    Your works of goodness certainly can not sway the politics of a fallen world or misled nation.

    Do you seek an honest path to righteousness? It would be a religion of works and false morality, a religion of philanthropic leading in your own ideals.

    … and I’m NOT going to take it anymore!

    Do any recall our ‘must elect my candidate’ arguments of religion for the 2016 election?

    How will you, being evil, do good for anyone?

    My fellow Christians, is your witness for the Gospel of Christ?

    Or is your shout to the crowds that you’re mad as hell as if Christ would be swayed by the fire of your tongue?

    Perhaps your opponents think that you feign madness before the media.

    What good is your shouting into the whirlwind? For the fire of your words fails to witness the compassion of our Lord Christ Jesus.

    Mere religion and righteousness never equate.

    Love of words or love of the Word?

    Here’s a question for so-called ‘christians’ embroiled in the politics of the day: Do you have a love of words or love of the Word?

    Surely the politician loves the stage of the world. Certainly the media twists words meant to incite supporters into indictments of political opponents.

    Satan works no differently than the internet in spreading false accusation of the believer; for Christ is the only Word of love who can save the sinner.

    The Apostle John instructs the church:

    Do not love G25 the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves G25 the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

    1 John 2:15 NASB – Strong’s G25 ἀγαπάω agapaō

    Life – ζωή – zōē

    Life’s meaning described by Peter is:

    1. life
      1. the state of one who is possessed of vitality or is animate
      2. every living soul
    2. life
      1. of the absolute fullness of life, both essential and ethical, which belongs to God, and through him both to the hypostatic “logos” and to Christ in whom the “logos” put on human nature
      2. life real and genuine, a life active and vigorous, devoted to God, blessed, in the portion even in this world of those who put their trust in Christ, but after the resurrection to be consummated by new accessions (among them a more perfect body), and to last for ever.

    Peter points not only forward to Christ, but by scripture back to David, a man after God’s own heart.

    Religion questions God.

    May I add that the politics of the world deny God’s saving grace. By our knowledge of good and evil we lost the fruit of the tree of life in Eden. Mankind spoiled God’s paradise by disobedient sin.

    Psalm 34: A Psalm of David

    when he feigned madness before Abimelech, who drove him away and he departed.

    David looks back at these dark days and praises the LORD.

    I will bless the LORD at all times;
    His praise shall continually be in my mouth.

    Psalm 34:1

    9 O fear the LORD, you His saints;
    For to those who fear Him there is no want.

    13 Keep your tongue from evil
    And your lips from speaking deceit.

    14 Depart from evil and do good;
    Seek peace and pursue it.

    From advice for the saints of the Lord, David proceeds to the justice and redemption of the faithful.

    21 Evil shall slay the wicked,
    And those who hate the righteous will be condemned.

    22 The LORD redeems the soul of His servants,
    And none of those who take refuge in Him will be condemned.

    The Fire of the Tongue, the Politics of Jesus

    Now it was Caiaphas who advised the Jews that it was expedient that one man should die for the people.

    John 18:14 NKJV

    Jesus against religion

    John 2:

    14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!”

    John 8:

    42 Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. 43 Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. 44 You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me!

    54 Jesus replied, “If I glorify myself, my glory means nothing. My Father, whom you claim as your God, is the one who glorifies me. 55 Though you do not know him, I know him.

    58 “Very truly I tell you,” Jesus answered, “before Abraham was born, I am!” 59 At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds.

    a Word of witness to followers of false religion

    Jesus answered him,

    “I have spoken openly to the world; I always taught in synagogues and in the temple, where all the Jews come together; and I spoke nothing in secret.

    John 18:20 NASB

    Jesus continues:

    “Why do you question Me? Question those who have heard what I spoke to them; they know what I said.”

    Truth has witnesses; yet how do unrighteous leaders of religion react?

    When He had said this, one of the officers standing nearby struck Jesus, saying, “Is that the way You answer the high priest?”

    Jesus answered him, “If I have spoken wrongly, testify of the wrong; but if rightly, why do you strike Me?”

    So Annas sent Him bound to Caiaphas the high priest.

    Political reaction to Righteousness

    Pilate said to Him, “What is truth?” And when he had said this, he went out again to the Jews and said to them, “I find no guilt in Him.

    Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?”

    The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar.”

    John 18:38; 19:15b NASB

    Righteous reaction to the Political

    Mark 12:

    Is it lawful to pay a poll-tax to Caesar, or not? 15 Shall we pay or shall we not pay?”

    coin head of Antiochus IV Epiphanes

    But He, knowing their hypocrisy, said to them,

    “Why are you testing Me? Bring Me a denarius to look at.”

    17 And Jesus said to them, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” 

    Is Politics your Religion OR Religion your Politics?

    Psalm 2:

    The Messiah’s Triumph and Kingdom

    Why do the nations rage,
    And the people plot a vain thing?
    2 The kings of the earth set themselves,
    And the rulers take counsel together,
    Against the Lord and against His Anointed saying,
    3 “Let us break Their bonds in pieces
    And cast away Their cords from us.”

    Christ Jesus, the Messiah of the Lord God, warned of our anger against God.

    7 אֲסַפְּרָ֗ה אֶֽ֫ל חֹ֥ק יְֽהוָ֗ה אָמַ֘ר אֵלַ֥י בְּנִ֥י אַ֑תָּה אֲ֝נִ֗י הַיּ֥וֹם יְלִדְתִּֽיךָ׃

    8 שְׁאַ֤ל מִמֶּ֗נִּי וְאֶתְּנָ֣ה ג֭וֹיִם נַחֲלָתֶ֑ךָ וַ֝אֲחֻזָּתְךָ֗ אַפְסֵי־אָֽרֶץ׃

    10 Now therefore, be wise, O kings;
    Be instructed, you judges of the earth.
    11 Serve the Lord with fear,
    And rejoice with trembling.
    12 Kiss the Son, lest He be angry,
    And you perish in the way,
    When His wrath is kindled but a little.
    Blessed are all those who put their trust in Him.

    To be continued...

  • Because the days are evil – 5 – a Perilous Dark Path to Perdition

    Because the days are evil – 5 – a Perilous Dark Path to Perdition

    But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.

    1 Timothy 6:9 KJV

    Destruction and Perdition

    Perdition. Now there’s a word rarely heard in these last days. Do you know what it is?

    Of course we can imagine several paths to destruction and doubtless destruction of the body is inevitable. Yet what of perdition?

    ἀπώλεια – apōleia

    Destroy, Destroyer, Destruction, Destructive:

    … indicating “loss of well-being, not of being,” is used
    (a) of things, signifying their waste, or ruin; of ointment, Mat 26:8; Mar 14:4; of money, Act 8:20 (“perish”);

    (b) of persons, signifying their spiritual and eternal perdition, Mat 7:13; John 17:12; 2Th 2:3, where “son of perdition” signifies the proper destiny of the person mentioned; metaphorically of men persistent in evil, Rom 9:22, where “fitted” is in the Middle Voice, indicating that the vessels of wrath fitted themselves for “destruction;” of the adversaries of the Lord’s people, Phl 1:28 (“perdition”); of professing Christians, really enemies of the Cross of Christ, Phl 3:19 (RV, “perdition”); of those who are subjects of foolish and hurtful lusts, 1Ti 6:9 (for the preceding word “destruction” see No. 3, below); of professing Hebrew adherents who shrink back into unbelief, Hbr 10:39; of false teachers, 2Pe 2:1, 3; of ungodly men, 2Pe 3:7; of those who wrest the Scriptures, 2Pe 3:16; of the Beast, the final head of the revived Roman Empire, Rev 17:8, 11;

    (c) of impersonal subjects, as heresies, 2Pe 2:1, where “destructive heresies” (RV; AV, “damnable“) is, lit., “heresies of destruction” (marg., “sects of perdition”); in ver. 2 the most authentic mss. have aselgeiais, “lascivious,” instead of apoleiais.
    See PERDITION, PERNICIOUS, WASTE.

    I include source detail due to our unfamiliarity.

    1 Noun Strong’s Number: g684 Greek: apoleia
    Waste (Noun and Verb):

    “destruction,” is translated “waste” in Mat 26:8; Mar 14:4.
    See DESTRUCTION, B, II, No. 1.

    You never gave this sin a thought, not even for a moment.

    It was harmless. And you just did it (this one time).

    But then your path of doing right becomes shrouded in darkness.

    Once again, and then twice (and more) your path toward the deeper darkness quickens your heart.

    I hear the cries of perdition in the near distance! But from which cluttered maze of sin have they come?

    Works of the Flesh

    Now the works of the flesh are obvious:

    sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar.

    I am warning you about these things—as I warned you before—that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. –

    Galatians 5:19-21

    Paul brings light to these dark sins with great clarity. Need I say more?

    Where do you stand during these last days which are evil?

    With those revelers standing in the shadows of darkness? Trying to hide your sins luring you into the mire of a slippery path near the entrance of destruction?

    Lord, help you.

    Call upon the only One who can save your soul from perdition and destruction, the One who loved the world so much that He suffered for you one the Cross — died — rose from the grave…

    Christ Jesus will judge the living and the dead.

    Which are you?

    Because the Days are Evil,
to be continued... God-willing