Galatians 3:27-28

"For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.  There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there  is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus."  Galatians 3:27-28

God initially installs the new man, and it is our responsibility to nourish him.  It is clear from various scriptures that he is manifested in our conduct, that he is reconciled to God and man, that he is circumcised of heart, that he is connected with the New Covenant, and finally, that adopting him is a matter of choice on our part.

But, what or who is the new man?

The best way to answer that is to answer yet another question: When does God create the new man in us?  Paul answers the question in Galatians 3:27: "For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ."  He uses the verb enduo, "to put on."  Its literal meaning is "to sink into."  We sink into Christ when we are baptized.  That is when we first clothe ourselves with the new man, or to put it a little bit more accurately, that is when God first establishes him within us.

Paul is clearly describing the new man in Galatians 3:27, and he connects the putting on of Christ with reconciliation.  The new man is, by definition, reconciled with God and with man.  Paul immediately follow his statement that the baptized person has put on Christ (verse 27) with a statement about reconciliation (verse 28): "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male or female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus."  Note the similarity of Paul's terminology and approach with Colossians 3:9-11, where he admonishes us "to put on the new man."    Paul also immediately follows this statement with a discussion of reconciliation: "There is neither Greek nor Jews ... slave nor free, but Christ is all and in all."

Now we can see how Galatians 3:27 answers these two questions:

-We put on -sink into - the new man when we are baptized.

-We put on Christ.

This means Jesus Christ is the new man.

The new man conducts himself according to God's Word, walking according to His law.  With this in mind, notice Romans 13:12-14, where Paul tells us how we should walk - we who have put on Christ, the new man:  "Therefore let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light.  Let us walk properly ... not in revelry and drunkenness, not in licentiousness and lewdness, not in strife and envy.  But put on the Lord Jesus Christ."


This only emphasizes our conclusion: The new man "is Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1:27).  "The second Man, ... the Lord from heaven" (I Corinthians 15:47) is the new man.

 

Hebrews 11:5-6

"By faith Enoch was taken away so that he did not see death, "and was not found, because God had taken him"; for before he was taken he had this testimony, that he pleased God.  But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him."  Hebrews 11:5-6

The world generally interprets the statements regarding Enoch being translated (as in KJV and other translations) to mean that Enoch was taken to heaven.  That is simply untrue, as it contradicts other scriptures.  For instance, Hebrews 9:27 states, "And it is appointed for men to die once."  In context, this is showing Christ's commonality with mankind:  Even as it is appointed for men to die once because of sin, so the perfect Christ died once as a sacrifice in mankind's behalf to pay for sin.  If what the world says about Enoch translation is true, Enoch did not die, creating a contradiction in Scripture.

Jesus makes an authoritative declaration regrading what happens after death in John 3:13, "No one has ascended to heaven but He that came down from heaven," meaning Himself.  Who would know better than Jesus?  "No one" certainly includes Enoch.  Peter declares in Acts 2:29-34 that one as great as David has not risen to heaven either, but is still in the grave.

Hebrews 11:32 lists several other significant people of faith who served god with zeal.  The section concludes, "And all these, having obtained a good testimony through faith, did not receive the promise, God having provided something better for us that they should not be made perfect apart from us" (verses 39-40).  These and many more unnamed saints are awaiting the resurrection of the dead and glorification in God's Kingdom.  This also applies to Enoch.

The term taken away (NKJV) or translated (KJV) in Hebrews 11:5 simply means "transferred."  Enoch was transferred or conveyed from one place on earth to another to escape violence aimed against him.  In this earthly place, he died like all men.

We experience a spiritual form of this, as Colossians 1:13 shows: "He has delivered us from the power of darkness, and conveyed (translated, KJV) us into the kingdom of the Son of His love."  Because we are justified and therefore reconciled to God through faith in blood of Jesus Christ, our true spiritual citizenship is now transferred to the Kingdom of God.  The implication of this is that with this transfer comes the obligation to live and walk representing the Kingdom of God's way of life.  Enoch's walk by faith tells us that he set aside his own carnal preferences and will, bowing in obedience before God's will and submitting his life to God's desires for him.  Enoch did so by faith, which is why he pleased God.

Jude 14-16 adds a factor that needs consideration:

"Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesies about these men also, saying, "Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment on all, to convert all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him."  These are murmurers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts; and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage."

Able was a keeper of sheep and suffered a violent death.  Enoch, however, was a preacher and undoubtedly walked to the beat of a different drummer than those around him.  As a preacher, he probably gave message that made others feel ill at ease with him, and it appears that this put him in danger of a violent death, precipitating his miraculous transfer to a safer place.

Matthew 11:25-27

"At that time Jesus answered and said, "I thank You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden things from the wise and prudent and have revealed them to babes.  Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Your sight.  All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father.  Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him."  Matthew 11:25-27

Moses asked to see the visible glory of God, and He proclaimed His name verbally.  Jesus is saying, "If you want to see the mind and nature of God, if you want to see His attitudes, look at Me."  God reveals Himself and declares His glory to us through the life, works, and words of Jesus of Nazareth as He opens our minds by His Holy Spirit.

Jesus is "the way" because of all mankind, only He, unmarred by sin, has intimate knowledge of God.  Knowing God depends on our knowledge of the truth about Jesus.  He shows the way we must walk, the direction and manner of living and relating to others.  This is precisely the knowledge Jesus gives.  Many times when we ask directions in a strange city, the response confuses us because we are unfamiliar with the town.  But when we ask directions of Jesus, He says, "Come, follow Me, and I will take you there."

Some people may teach truth, but He embodies truth; He is "the truth."  A man may teach geometry, and his character may not affect his teaching.  But if one teaches moral truth, character is paramount.  Keeping the third commandment properly revolves around knowing the truth about God and His way.

Colossians 1:15; 2:9 are among the strongest statements in the Bible about the divine nature of Jesus: "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation .... For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily."  He not only is equal to and reflects God, but He also reveals God to us because He is God.  He is completely holy and has authority to judge the world.

We can have no clearer view of God than by looking at Christ.  He is the full revelation of God to man.  He is the complete expression of God in a human body.  He is unique:  God became a man, imposing upon Himself the same time-space limitations as other men.

He had every opportunity to waste time, get sick, eat gluttonously and become overweight, drink and experience a hangover, "fly off the handle" in anger, or attack others when someone pricked His vanity.  He could have become bitter from rejection or depressed when things did not go His way.  He could have worked or played with intense competitiveness to "win at all costs."  He had to face death, His own as well as of loved ones.  He could have felt "the deck was stacked" against Him.

The gospels show God coping with life on the same terms as men.  Now we can really see what kind of character God possesses.  Jesus' life gives us firsthand knowledge of what the true way of life is, allowing us to cooperate with Him in His purpose.  Among many other things, we see God teaching, healing, sacrificing His life, correcting in love, guarding His flock, and patiently counseling.

Leviticus 2:11

"No grain offering which you bring to the LORD shall be made with leaven, for you shall burn no leaven nor any honey in any offering to the LORD made by fire."  Leviticus 2:11

Jesus warns us in Luke 12:1 about leaven: "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy."  Throughout Matthew 23,  Jesus lists a multitude of Pharisaical sins that could be grouped as legalistic externalism.

In Matthew 16:6, Jesus warns of the leaven of the Sadducees.  The Sadducees' sins are not listed, but elsewhere we find they at least denied the supernatural and the resurrection of the dead (Acts 23:8).  Jesus also warns of the leaven of the Herod (Mark 8:15).  Herod was involved in the a great deal of lying in his political wheeling and dealing, abusing the power of his office, adultery, and general all-around worldliness.

Paul commands in I Corinthians 5:7-8:

"Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened.  For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us.  Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth."

Thus, in the New Testament leaven signifies wickedness and malice in contrast to sincerity and truth.

All of our offerings to God are mixed with some measure of sin.  Has He made allowance for this in His instructions for the offerings?  Yes.

"No grain offering which you bring to the Lord shall be made with leaven, for you shall burn no leaven nor any honey in any offering to the Lord made by fire.  As for the offering of the firstfruits, you shall offer them to the Lord, but they shall not be burned on the altar for a sweet aroma." Leviticus 2:11-12 

Leviticus 23:17, 20 clarifies this:

"You shall bring from your dwellings two wave loaves of two-tenths of an ephah.  They shall be of fine flour; they shall be baked with leaven.  They are the firstfruits to the Lord .... The priest shall wave them with the bread of the firstfruits as a wave offering before the Lord, with the two lambs.  They shall be holy to the Lord for the priest."

This Pentecost offering is a meal offering.  The loaves represent Christians accepted before God because of Jesus Christ.  However, because the loaves contained leaven, symbolizing the reality of sin in our lives, they are waved before God and accepted but not burned on the altar, recognizing the presence of that sin.

Romans 7:14-20 makes a powerful statement on this:

"For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin.  For what I am doing, I do not understand.  For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.  If, the, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good.  But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.  for I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells;  for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find.  For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.  Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me."

No matter how much oil - the Holy Spirit - is poured out on us, it cannot completely counteract the corrupting effect of the leaven.  We can control the flesh sufficiently so sin does not rule us, but sin is ever with us, and as long as we have human nature, that cannot be changed.

The only solution is that we must be changed - totally - and that is in our future, according to I Corinthians 15:50-52:

"Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does incorruption.  Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed - in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.  For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed."

Habakkuk 1:5-11

"Look among the nations and watch - be utterly astonished!  For I will work a work in your days which you would not believe, though it were told you.  For indeed I am raising up the Chaldeans, a bitter and hasty nation which marches through the breadth of the earth.  To possess dwelling places that are nor theirs.  They are terrible and dreadful; their judgment and their dignity proceed from themselves.  Their horses also are swifter than leopards, and more fierce than evening wolves.  Their chargers charge ahead; their cavalry comes from afar; they fly as the eagle that hastens to eat.  They all come for violence; their faces are set like the east wind.  They gather captives like sand.  They scoff at kings, and princes are scorned by them.  They deride every stronghold.  For they heap up earthen mounds and seize it.  Then his mind changes, and he transgresses; he commits offense, ascribing this power to his god."  Habakkuk 1:5-11

God says, "You are not going to believe what I am about to tell you, Habakkuk, but I am already at work to deliver you and punish the sinners around."  Then what does He do?  He tells the prophet that He is sending the ferocious, bloody, terrifying Chaldeans to conquer Judah.

The prophet must have been stunned.  This was not the answer he expected in the least.  What kind of deliverance is humiliating defeat at the hand of the utterly godless people who struck terror into the entire Middle East?  In addition, they were Gentiles, and God was taking their and cruelly punishing His own people.  It must have shaken his faith to hear God tell him, "I am coming to spank this nation with the worst of the heathen."

And just as God said, Habakkuk did not want to believe it.  In his eyes, the deliverance was worse than the original corruption - at least that is what he thought at first.  From what he understood of God, this made no sense.  How could a loving God punish His own special people with a club like the Chaldeans?

To understand God's answer we have to understand what God's work is.  Psalm 74:12 says, "God is ... working salvation in the midst of the earth." Genesis 1:26 says God is creating man in His won image, building character in us so that we can live eternally as He does.  What is astounding is how He chooses to do it because He does it far differently than we would.  As the old saying goes, "God works in mysterious ways His wonders to perform."  To a man's way of thinking, His works are truly mysterious; sometimes we do not have a clue how He works.

Isaiah 55:8-11 explains that God sometimes does things in a very round-about way, but it has a kind of boomerang effect.  At times, it seems God goes in one directions, off the beaten path, but that is merely our perspective of it.  We find out later - after we have grown in wisdom and understanding - that He has been following His plan all along.  We are the ones who have not kept up.  Habakkuk deals a great deal with perspective - man's perspective versus God's.  God always get His job done.  When He sends forth His word to accomplish a work, it always comes back to Him with the result He intends.  It may not make much sense to us at the time, but it surely works because God is behind it.  In the end, it is the best way.

Many have questioned why God has allowed the church to decline and scatter in the past.  What is happening here?  Why has God had to do this in order to bring us into His Kingdom? Why must He destroy to make well?  We have shaken our heads at the swiftness and brutality of it all.  That is how Habakkuk felt with the Chaldeans breathing down the Judeans' neck.  If God had told us a few decades ago that the church would lose, say, two-third of its members, would we have believed Him?  Would we have even considered that a work of God?  "look ... and watch - be utterly astounded!  For I will work in your days which you would not believe, though it were told you" (verse 5).  Now we can understand how Habakkuk felt.  He had prior warning, and it made him question God's very nature.

 

Matthew 15:9

"And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men."  Matthew 15:9

Two arguments are often used to justify Christmas observance.

1) Many will reason this way: "But, even though the exact date of Jesus' birth is unknown, should we not select some date to celebrate as His birthday?"  The answer is positively no.  Notice the statement quoted from the Catholic Encyclopedia:  "Sinners alone, not saints, celebrate their birthdays."  The celebration of birthdays is not a Christian, but a pagan custom, observed by sinners.

2) But, many still reason, "Even so - even though Christmas was a pagan custom, honoring the false sun-god, we don't observe it to honor the false god, we observe it to honor Christ."

But how does God answer in His Word?  "Take heed to thyself that thous be not snared by following them [the pagans in their customs]... that thou inquire not after their gods, saying, How did these nations serve their gods? even so will I do likewise.  Thous shalt not do so unto the Lord thy God: for every abomination to the Eternal, which he hateth, have they done unto their gods?" (Deuteronomy 12:30-31).

God says plainly in His Instruction Book to us, that He will not accept that kind of worship, even though intended in His honor.  To Him, He says, it is offering what is abominable to Him, and therefore it honors, not Him, but false pagan gods.  God says we must not worship Him according to the "dictates of our own conscience" - a term we often hear.  But Jesus says plainly, "God is a spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and truth" (John 4:24).  And what is truth?  God's Word - the Holy Bible - said Jesus, is truth (John 17:17); and the Bible says god will not accept worship when people take a pagan custom or manner of worship and try to honor Christ with it.

Again, Jesus said: "In vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men" (Matthew 15:9).  Christmas observance is a tradition of men, and the commandments of God, as quoted, forbid it.  Jesus said, further, "full well ye reject the commandment of God, that ye may keep your own tradition."

That is precisely what the millions are doing today:  They ignore the commandment of God.  He commands, regarding taking the customs of pagans and using them to honor or worship God: "Thou shalt not do so unto the Lord thy God."  Still, most people today take that command of God lightly, or as having no validity whatsoever, and follow the tradition of men in observing Christmas.

Make no mistake.  God will allow you to defy and disobey Him.  He will allow you to follow the crowd and the traditions of men.  He will allow you to sin.  But He also says there is a day of reckoning coming.  As you sow, so shall you reap.  Jesus was the living Word of God in Person, and the Bible is the written Word of God.  And we shall be judged, for eternity, by these words.  They should not be taken lightly or ignored.

Mark 7:24-30

"From there He arose and went to the region of Tyre and Sidon.  And He entered a house and wanted no one to know it, but He could not be hidden.  For a woman whose young daughter had an unclean spirit heard about Him, and she came and fell at His feet.  The woman was a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician by birth, and she kept asking Him to cast the demon out of her daughter.  But Jesus said to her, 'Let the children be filled first, for it is not good to the children's bread and throw it to the little dogs.'  And she answered and said to Him, 'Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs under the table eat from the children's crumbs.'  Then He said to her, 'For this saying go your way; the demon has gone out of your daughter.'  And when she had come to her house, she found the demon gone out, and her daughter lying on the bed."  Mark 7:24-30

In this miracle (Matthew 15:21-28; Mark 7:24-30), Jesus uses His meeting with a pagan woman from beyond the borders of Judea to illustrate the future potential of the Gentiles.  While Christ spent most of His time ministering to Israelites (Matthew 15:24), on a few occasions He did mercifully intervene on behalf of Gentiles.

The Gentile identity of the woman who sought exorcism for her daughter is emphasized three times in the account: in Matthew 15:22, she is "of Canaan"; and in Mark 7:26, she is called both "a Greek" and "a Syro-Phoenician," a person from Phoenicia, then regarded as part of Syria.  Jesus performs this miracle in the coastal are of Tyre and Sidon, the same area where Elijah performed the miracles of providing meal in the barrel and raising the Gentile widow's son from the dead (I Kings 17:8-24).

Later, the apostle Paul stopped at Tyre and met with some Christians there (Acts 21:3-4), showing some of the influence Christ had on these Gentiles.  Not only was this miracle part of that influence, but Luke 6:17-20 also tells us that many from that area came to Judea, bringing their sick and demon-possessed to Christ for healing.

Regarding the exorcism of the daughter, we see that Christ declares the girl to be healed, and it is so.  Clearly, the woman believes that distance does not matter regarding Christ's power to heal, for when Jesus tells her to go home and that her daughter is healed, she leaves Him with complete confidence that His word is true and omnipotent.  She is another of Jesus' "other sheep" (John 10:16), a Gentile, not a Israelite to whom He had primarily come.  She undoubtedly made this miracle known to other Gentiles, opening the door for the apostle to proclaim Christ's purpose for coming into the world: to bring salvation one day to all humanity.

   

Genesis3:16

"To the woman He said:  "I will great multiply your sorrow and your conception; in pain you shall bring forth children; your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."  Genesis 3:16

The second of Eve's curses deals with her relationship with her husband.  It explains why many marriages fail and why many of the rest are unhappy.  As mentioned before, human relationships are just as likely to succeed when men and women rely on human knowledge rather than revealed, godly wisdom.

The NKJV's rendering of the latter half of Genesis 3:16 is typical of many translations:  "Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."  From this we can see that the two clauses cannot be parallels.  Instead, they form a statement of action and reaction.  Because the woman "desires" her husband, he will "rule over" her.

Yet this does not make much sense as a curse.  Why should a woman's desire for her husband cause him to dominate her?  Most men would gladly accept his wife's desires for him, causing him to treat her more gently rather roughly, as i implied in this verse.  How are we to understand this?

The key is in the word "desire," translated from the Hebrew tesuqah, which the Brown, River and Briggs lexicon calls "unusual and striking" (p. 1003).  It occurs only three times in the Old Testament here, Genesis 4:7, and Song 7:10.  It can carry the sense of sexual longing (as in the Song of Songs), but its usage in Genesis 4:7 shows another side, that of a desire to overcome or defeat one another" "[Sin's] desire is for you, but you should rule over it."  This latter meaning fits Genesis 3:16 better than the former.

Thus, God is saying that a woman's desire will be to gain the upper hand over her husband, but because she is the weaker vessel, her husband will put her down by force, if need be.  The curse is that, in the main, women will lose the battle of the sexes.  History bears this out.  Until the advent of women's rights movements, women were virtually husband's property, treated as heir-producing machines, given little freedom, and forced to serve their husband's every whim.  In many cultures, men bought and sold women like cattle.  Some cultures maintain this custom even today.

Only where true Christianity flourishes is there any real easing of this curse.  Ephesians 5:22-23 teaches how we can decrease it effects within our marriages - by emulating the virtues of Christ's relationship with the church.  Thus, wives are told to submit rather than contend, and husbands are commanded to love rather dominate.  It takes conscious effort to overcome the evil, ingrained habits of 6,000 years of misguided practice.

Ephesians 4:28

"Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need."  Ephesians 4:28

God's intention is clear.  We are to gain property and possessions by honest work and /or inheritance from those who have the right to give them.  WE must come into possession of things in a way God approves.

The verb "labor" indicates exertion to the point of exhaustion.  In addition, Paul admonished us not merely to work to satisfy our personal needs and desires, but also to be able to give freely any excess to others in need.  The admonition implies distributing the excess personally rather than indirectly through an agency.  He adds in Acts 20:35, "I have shown you in every way, by laboring like this, that you must support the weak.  And remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He said, 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"

Stealing is totally against the grain of God's way of life.  Our God is a working, creating God (John 5:17), and we cannot be in His imagine if we are gaining possessions through stealing.  In the spirit of God's law, a person not only steals by taking another's possessions, but also by refusing to work in order to share and give to others in need.

This commandment does not reach its fullest expression until the ninth and tenth and added to it.  Stealing frequently has its genesis in a desire to have something one has no money to purchase, or the unwillingness to work patiently until one does.  Deception then enters.  A person will try to acquire a desired possession in such a way that others will think he procured it honorably.  We can stop this sin at any point in the process, but few make any effort to restrain their lust, deceit, and itching fingers.

Robert Kahn was correct in saying, "There are a hundred ways to steal but only one way to be honest."  In order not to steal, we must be scrupulously honest. What good is it if we are one-half or three-quarters honest?  What if God was honest with us only part of the time?  Could we trust Him?  Can others really trust us if we are only partially honest?  Do we lock our doors because we trust everybody?  Thievery creates distrust, fear, and suspicion, destablizing intituitons and communities.

The reason we should refrain from stealing is not just to avoid sinning.  This in itself is very good, but scrupulous honesty produces integrity, wholeness. Such integrity enables us to live confidently before God and man.  The apostle John writes in I John 3:18-19: "My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.  And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him."  Personal integrity is a major source of positive, confident living.

A conscience can be either a good or bad guide because it is educated by an individual's experience.  Practicing  scrupulous honesty builds character and educates the conscience in the right direction so that it will send the right prompting at the right time.  We cannot allow ourselves room to rationalize stealing.  We must be scrupulously honest always, or our character will descend on a path of degeneracy.

There are hundreds of ways to steal, and dozens of excuses for stealing, but only one way and one reason and one law of integrity. That way is honor, that reason is a clear conscience, and that law is God's.  He says, "You shall not steal."  Never.  In any way. From any one.

I Timmothy 2:12-15

"And I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence.  For Adam was formed first, then Eve.  And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived, fell into transgression.  Nevertheless she will be saved in childbearing if they continue if faith, love, and holiness, with self-control." I Timothy 2:12-15

Paul comments on the woman's curse in this passage, a section of Scripture that has come under a great deal of scrutiny in recent years.  What is immediately striking about Paul's reasoning and conclusion on Genesis 3:16 regarding the church is that he upholds it.  Modern theological thought would reason that the effects of "the Fall" are nullified under Christ's blood, but Paul says, "Not so."  They my be diminished, but not eradicated.

Paul cites the fact that God created Adam before Eve as his proof that God intended the man to lead.  He backs this up by showing that while Eve proved subject to deception - thus, she was the "weaker" of the two - Adam, whose sin was sheer disobedience, did not.  Thus, Eve's sin established that woman should not take the lead from man; that route, by the biblical example of our first parents, generally leads to problems.  The apostle concludes that a woman, formed by God as a helper to Adam and more inclined to being deceived, should not teach or lead men in the church.

On the hand, as Ephesians 5:25-29, 33 plainly shows, a Christian men must no longer "rule over" their wives.  Loving authority is not domineering or despotic, but humble, caring, gentle, kind, and patient.  In the same vein, Christian women should submit to and respect their husbands (verses 23-24, 33).  Submission is not manipulative or grudging, but done in faith, respect, and humility.

How, though, is a woman "saved in childbearing"?  The word uses for "saved" (sozo) can be used for both physical deliverance from danger and spiritual salvation.  How does faith, love, holiness and self-control prevent or nullify the physical dangers of pregnancy?  Conversely, is not salvation by grace?  Which salvation does the apostle mean here?

Neither.  A third explanation fits the context best.  Paul's main concern in this section is proper order within the church.  Men, he writes, should pray and teach.  Women should adorn themselves modestly and do good works, but they should not be teaching publicly or leading men.  Verse 15 explains what their primary concern should be: "childbearing."  Thus, it means that much of God's judgment of women will be based on how well they perform their God-given role in bearing children.

To us, this sounds quite misogynistic, but to the Greek speaker "childbearing" (teknogonia) covers a great deal more ground than just "popping out babies."  The Strong's Concordance definition shows that the extended meaning is "maternity (the performance of maternal duties)."  W.E Vine, in his Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, agrees, writing that it 'impl[ies] the duties of motherhood" (p. 190).  The Twentieth Century New Testament translates this clause, "But women will find their salvation in motherhood."

Paul's exhortation aims to brings marriage and family back to what God intended of men and women before Adam and Eve's sin.  Just as God will judge men according to how well they fulfill their roles as husbands (leaders) and teachers, so He will judge women by their performance as wives and mothers.  Since salvation, particularly the period of sanctification, is a process that covers our entire converted lifetimes, how well we fulfill our God-given responsibilities within our families will make a difference in God's judgment.  Paul says we must perform these duties in faith, love, holiness, and self-control - just as we must do everything else in our Christian lives.

To summarize, then, the apostle simply states that God will judge and reward a woman according to her growth as a Christian within her appointed sphere of influence:  her family.  God Himself has drawn the lines between the sexes, and we should do our best to fulfill our roles with excellence, not rebellion or compliant.  In this way, we will make progress in reversing the effects of the curses in the Garden of Eden.

Hebrews 5:12-14

"For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God; and you have come to need milk and not solid food.  For everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.  But solid food belongs to those who are of full age, that is, those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil."  Hebrew 5:12-14.


From the scriptural record, the Hebrews and the Corinthians were not equipped to feed themselves - to discern sacred or spiritual from profane or carnal.  If we are in a dependent state, it would be to our advantage to learn how we can wean ourselves from the bottle.  Some lose an appetite for solid, spiritual food and need to be fed intravenously.

All of us need to become less dependent on spiritual milk and instead become more capable of profiting from solid food.  For those who are losing the capacity to enjoy solid food, there is a way to revitalize our spiritual appetite for weightier matters.

Most of us would agree that the state of spiritual dependency described by the apostle Paul in Hebrews and Corinthians seemed lamentable and disgusting.  Yet, how many are conditioned to wait for a minster to prepare a weekly baby formula rather than ravenously devour God's Word every day?

Perhaps we have developed "baby-bird syndrome" in which we, in a helpless "take care of me" posture, open our beaks to get our weekly, bi-weekly, etc.. worm.  If church services were the only times we were spiritually fed, we would eventually starve to death.

Sometime late in life, after leading a full life, people for no apparent reason lose their will to live and must be fed intravenously.  Actually, when we all think about it, without and overriding purpose of our existence, we have no reason to eat or sustain our life.  If people indeed start to lose the vision of their purpose for existence they eventually lose their capacity to endure solid food.  Hopefully, we have passed the stage of the milk bottle.  I know this is a question I have dwelt on extensively over the past few years and still do at times.

Luke 7:41-50

"There was a certain creditor who had two debtors.  One owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty.  And when they had nothing with which to repay, he freely forgave them both.  Tell Me, therefore, which of them will love him more?  Simon answered and said, "I suppose the one whom he forgave more."  And He said to him, "You have rightly judged."  Then He turned to the woman and said to Simon, "Do you see this woman?  I entered your house; you have Me no water for My feet, but she has washed My feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head.  You gave Me no kiss, but this woman has not ceased to kiss My feet since the time I came in.  You did not anoint My head with oil, but this woman anointed My feet with fragrant oil.  Therefore I say to you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much.  But to whom little is forgiven, the same love little." Then He said to her, "Your sins are forgiven."  And those who sat the table with Him began to say to themselves, "Who is this who even forgives sins?"  Then He said to the woman, "Your faith has saved you.  Go in peace."  Luke 7:41-50

Interestingly, in the model prayer (Matthew 6:12), sin is expressed as a debt.  It is a true metaphor because duly neglected in relation to God is a debt owed to Him, one that must be discharged by paying a penalty.  All have sinned (Romans 3:23), and the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23).  We are all under a peculiar form of indebtedness that we cannot pay and still have hope.

Simon and the woman each portray a class of sinners.  Though all are sinners, some have incurred more debt through the way of life each has lived.  Some are outwardly respectable, decent, and clean living, while others have fallen into gross, sensual, and open transgression.  In this regard, Simon was a great deal "better" than the woman, who was coarse and unclean.  She had been wallowing in filth while he attained civic respectability through rigid morality and punctilious observance of civility.  He had far less to answer for than she, but he had also received a great deal more from his morality and righteousness than she had.  God is not so unfair as to withhold blessings from people for the right they have done.  Yet, regardless of the relative size of each one's debt, neither was able to pay it!

We all are sinful and stand in the same relation to God as these two debtors.  One's sins may be blacker and more numerous than another's, but upon considering degrees of guilt and complex motivations behind each one's sins, we may not be so quick to judge the woman's sins worse than Simons'.  From this perspective, they were equal.  His sins were clothed with respectability, but he still could not meet his debt.  Jesus says, "They had nothing to pay."  That also precisely describes our position in relation to each other.

What does this mean practically in regards to Jesus Christ and our sins?  No depth of guilt, no amount of tears, self-flagellation, or discipline, no amount of repentance can work this into a payable debt.  Some of these are certainly required of God and are good to do, but forgiveness, the payment of our debt incurred through our personal sins, is by grace through faith (Ephesians 2:8),  It comes by God's mercy through the blood of Jesus Christ (I John 1:7).  We absolutely cannot pay it ourselves and still have hope of eternal life.  If it could, God would owe us something - He would be indebted to us.  That will never, never be.

 

Matthew 5:21:22

"You have heard that it was said to those of old, 'You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.'  But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment.  And whoever says to his brother, 'Raca!' shall be in danger of the council.  But whoever says, 'You fool!' shall be in danger of hell fire."  Matthew 5:21-22

Matthew 5:21-22 advises each individual to make efforts to cover his responsibility to ensure that his thoughts, words, and conduct do not lead to his needing the court's services.  Indeed, Jesus' approach, if done perfectly, will ensure that he does not sin in any manner.

Our Savior's remedy for combating crime shifts matter from retaliation by civil authorities to stopping it at its source.  When each person is responsible for dealing with anger and hatred internally, keeping them from ever manifesting themselves as external acts, it also eliminates the fear of being caught by police and punished by the courts.

The central thought Jesus expresses is that such thoughts are tantamount to murder in God's eye.  If a person never had an evil thought, no murder would exist.  I John 3:15 reveals how important Christians should consider controlling our thoughts to be:  "Whoever hates his brother is a murder, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him."  The hostility present in a wrongly motivated person's mind already contains the ingredients necessary to persuade him to kill another who, he feels, stands in the way of his progress.  The hostility connects directly to the act of murder because they are actually one process.

At first, Matthew 5:38-39 appears to say that one should simply offer himself as a sacrificial lamb; "You have heard that it was said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.'  But I tell you not to resist an evil person.  But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also."  However, Jesus does not rule out self-defense in a life-threatening situation, as His illustration in the wider context of Matthew 5 show.

Taken together, His illustration reveal that He is not considering anything more than rather minor, but irritating and perhaps considerably inconvenient, interruptions in our daily routine.  The general thought is that we must not set ourselves up as the angry enemy of the person perpetrating evil against us.  He advises us to remove the bitterness in our own hearts by doing good rather than retaliating and doing evil.  It is a warning against letting our thoughts build a hatred-based case against others.

This involves a great deal of humility and patience on our part, but it often diffuses what could build to murderous thoughts in our mind.  We have all probably felt like not working at one time or another, but because we had to do it, we set our will, threw ourselves into accomplishing the work, and before we know it, we were likely enjoying the accomplishment.  This is a simple illustration, but the same general process is involved in Jesus' counsel.

Jesus followed His own teaching, as Luke 23:34 illustrates: "Then Jesus said, 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.'  The they divided His garments and cast lots."  Earlier He said, "Or do you think that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He will provide Me with more than twelve legions of angels?"  (Matthew 26;53).  Yet, retaliation was not on His mind. Fulfilling His work from His Father and in behalf of mankind overrode His personal feelings, even in this severe dilemma.

Galatians 5:4-6

"You have become estranged from Christ, you who attempt to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace.  For we through the Spirit eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.  For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love."  Galatians 5:4-6

Paul makes another contrast.  What avails a person is faith working through love.  These three verses are important because they introduce "Spirit" and that "faith works through love."  Faith works.  It works through - meaning "by means of" - love.  In other words, if a person really has faith in the right things and the right Person, he will produce what?  Love.

What is the Bible definition of love?  "For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments" (I John 5:3).  That is beautiful.  Similarly, Paul is saying that, if we really believe in the right things and the right Person (that is, have faith), then it will produce the keeping of the commandments.

The evidence of our faith, then, is in whether or not we keep His commandments.  John tells us that the basis of love is commandment-keeping.  It is not the whole picture, because emotion, feeling, is also tied to it, but we have to begin somewhere, and the bottom line is keeping the commandments.

Another statement that proves that Paul was not doing away with law keeping comes right from this context.  The word "Spirit" reflects on a subject he dealt with earlier.  The enemy - Judaistic Gnostics - believed that their calling and election by God came because they had the law and kept it.  But Paul is saying, "No.  We are drawn to God by His Spirit," which is what Jesus says in John 6:44.

Also, truth is revealed by God's Spirit (I Corinthians 2:10-16; John 14:17; 15:26; 16:13), so our calling has nothing to do with our works.  Romans 9:16 tells us that it is not of him who wills or of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy.  Thus, we are in this position because God, by His Spirit, has drawn us.  He, by His Spirit, has revealed Himself, His Word, and the purpose of life to us.  Our calling and election are completely a work of grace.  At the point of our calling, law-keeping has noting to do with it, but comes into play later when our faith works through love.