Spirit of Truth/The Bible on Trial

Fear Factor~ I was talking with Rick Sterling after yesterday's program (Feb. 28, 2020) about the Covid-19 virus that is (by MSM news reports) spreading like wild fire around the world. The show notes for yesterday titled 'Panic'  garnered a bigger response than any other that I have published. People are either terrified of the possibility of getting the Covid-19 virus, or they are not. What is the difference?  Rick is a RN (Registered Nurse) who specializes in the operations in the cardiac catheterization lab environment, and has taken the training that applies to the use of medical face masks. Rick pointed out that most people have no idea about how to use the N-95 face masks that they are buying in a panic, and these masks actually don't help prevent any transmission of a virus. The people that try to use them for this purpose are fooling themselves into believing that they are 'safe' from getting a cold or the flu. He pointed out that the only way a face mask could prevent this kind of transfer would be if you have a 'soft seal' around both your nose and mouth, such as with a respirator type mask that has the proper filters. People are responding to this situation out of fear, because they don't understand how viral infections work, and how to prevent them. Humans have a tendency to fear that which they don't understand. So if you become fearful about something make an effort to understand it. Knowledge and Understanding eliminates the Fear Factor from any area of our lives. The reason Jesus came to earth was to take away the fear of the unknown. He came to reveal how God works in the salvation of mankind, and that if we are obedient to His Commandments and hold to His testimony we need not fear for our eternal lives.  Jesus said, "Take courage, it is I; do not be afraid." Matt. 14:27.

Panic~ The level of panic has risen this past week in relation of the Covid-19 virus outbreak in China. The hardware store where I work has almost run out of N-95 face masks, and our suppliers can't get any more. Yesterday we had a lady come to the store and buy $250 worth of masks, which basically cleaned us out. We do have a few single use masks, and we are selling them at our regular price, but with a limit of 10 per person ($7.99 each). Our stock will not last through the day.  Yesterday, a young family came in with their baby and asked me if we had masks that would fit their child. The young mother was almost in tears when I told her that we did not carry child sized masks. I tried to reassure her that if they were heathy and took care to wash their hands regularly that they should be OK, but this family has bought into the idea that there is a pandemic happening, and that they are facing iimmanent death.  The issus here is that the media is playing to the fears of the people when there is truly no need to panic. There is NEVER any need to panic. But what we are seeing is an uninformed populace taking the word of and uniformed media, and placing their trust in the words of people that don't know what they are talking about.  So let's move this situation over to the spiritual side of things. The 'peepul'  have been told by their pastors and teachers that salvation is the free gift of God, and that all you have to do to be saved is claim Jesus as their savior by FAITH through Grace. When this is shown to not be true, panic will set in, because these people will be forced to choose a path that they do not know, and cannot see. They won't know who to turn too for the truth, because they have learned to believe a lie as if it is the truth.  The world is drowning in lies. The 'lifesaver' is the truth, the gospel of the Kingdom.

Melting Pot~ There are a variety of uses for a melting pot, otherwise know as a crucible. In olden days when candles were the primary source for light in a house, used candles were put in a melting pot so that the left over wax could be melted down and reused to make new candles. A blacksmith would use a melting pot to melt left over iron for reuse. A jeweler would uses a melting pot to purify gold or other precious metals with which to make jewelery. This was termed  "gold refined by fire" in Revelation 3:18. In order to make hardened steel, iron ore is placed in a crucible (melting pot) and heated in a blast furnace that removes the impurities, poured into forms and cooled. Then this iron ingot is reheated, hammer forged into a useful form, water cooled, and repeated until the result is a form of steel that is much harder than the original iron taken from the ground. The result is a strong building material. The purpose of a melting pot is take 'like' elements and join them together, heat them to the melting point, and then use the result to accomplishe the purpose for which the result is to be used.  It does no good to put candle wax in a melting pot with iron ore or gold to try to make either better. It simply makes them worse, unusable for any purpose.  In John 17, the pastoral prayer of Jesus for His own disciples, Jesus prayed to His Father that His disciples with be unified in the truth. Jesus knew that they were not all in the same place, and that He would need to bring them to the place of unity in the truth through His words. This would make them strong and useful in building HIS Kingdom of the heavens.  The crucible of the fire of the Words of God are what makes the structure of the Kingdom of God strong enough to withstand the trials to come. Trying to join lies with truth only makes truth into a lie.

The Past is Past~ One of my passions when I was a young(ish) man was golf. And though I no longer play the game (for a variety of reasons) I still loosely follow the game on TV when I can. I was reminded this morning of an old expression by one of the morning commentors on the Golf Channel that one of the things that makes a great golfer is that they can instantly put the past behind them when they make a bad shot; The Past is the Past. And as trite as this sounds it applies to nearly every aspect of our lives, and can benefit us in unlooked for ways, if we let it. When I was teaching band I used a modified version of this expression in dealing with 'clinkers', which are very loud and embarrasing wrong notes, usually played by inexperience student players at a time when the mistake is right out in the open where everyone can not only hear it, but everyone knows who did it. In preparation for these instances I conditioned my band players to be willing to instantly forgive themselves, and play on, not missing a beat. As with golf, and band, no one likes making mistakes, but EVERYONE makes them. It's not that you will not make mistakes, it how you behave when you do. There is a huge difference in making a mistake and moving on from it, or knowing about a mistake that you have made, acknowledging it, and  then deciding to make it anyway. Now you are doing is no longer a mistake, it is a deliberate activity where you tell yourself that doing wrong no longer matters to you, and you will do it anyway no matter the consequences. This is The Big Lie that has been placed on the Christian church by a false apostle that has clearly said in his writings that the Law of God no longer matters in dealing with salvation. The past is past. He says that "Where there is no Law, there is no violation" (Rom. 4:15). So don't worry about your mistakes, you are saved anyway.

Practice Makes Perfect~ Have you heard the expression "Practice makes perfect"? If you have taken music lessons in any instrument or voice, or lessons in any sport that requires finely tuned motor skills, then you have certainly heard this expression from your teacher or coach. There is just one problem with this aphorism - it is a complete and utter lie. It is a lie because it is missing one simple word to say, but one difficult word to accomplish. The word is PERFECT. Add this word to the front of this expression and you turn a lie into the truth. "Perfect practice makes perfect!" Teachers want their students to get better at what they need to learn in order enjoy the experience more thoroughly, and even be able to someday make a living at what they enjoy. When you practice a mistake it is VERY difficult, often impossible, to overcome the inertia of that mistake. How you practice dictates the result. If you practice something three times wrong then your brain automatically thinks that what you have practiced is correct, and it takes ten times practicing it perfectly to overcome that mistake, and change the way your brain makes your body react to what you have mistakenly learned. This is why when you hear a lie over and over, and believe it to be true, your brain rebells against trying to change that lie into truth. This is especially true in spiritual matters related to how salvation really works in moving a person toward eternal life. Learning HOW to practice is difficult but not impossible; which is why God sent His Son Jesus, to this earth to "testiy to the truth", and show His bondservants the WAY to practice TRUTH, in order to overcome and remove the lies that lead to death.  "But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God." (John 3:21)

Tsumani~ On coastal plains or islands tsunami's can occur after a strong earthquake. During an earthquake the sea bed is lifted, then it drops back down, and the resulting motion affects the water above it such than it creates a surge of water that if it reaches a coast or low laying inland area can bring devastation that is horrendous. We have all seen video of a wall of water moving inexorably through a village or town, and watch helplessly as it destroys all in it's path. It is safe to say that without an earthquake preceeding there would be no tsunami. This morning I was thinking as to how this would play out with repect to Truth. What causes Truth to be made known in the world. Is there a warning that comes before the Truth is known, that says "Something uncomfortable is about to happen, and I better get prepared." Is Truth easy to find, and does it come to us in a way that makes us cheerful and happy? Or does Truth slap us 'up side of the head', say 'here I am, now what are you going to do about it?" Recognizing Truth in anything is painful, if what you believe before that revelation is not true. When we "believe a lie as if it is the truth" that lie IS the truth for us; and it is very difficult to let go of it.  For most of us, to let go of 'our' truth, and to be able to recognize that what we now believe IS NOT Truth is one of the most difficult things that we have to do in life. And most of the time it takes a psychological or spiritual 'earthquake' to get us to realize that we have been fooled into 'believing that lie as if it was the truth', because we don't want to hold ourselves accountable for learning truth, we want to go along as before and believe what makes us comfortable. When Jesus came to this earth to "testify to the Truth."  He is the earthquake, Truth is the Tsunami.

Choose Life~ Daniel Daly, a double MOH (Medal of Honor) winner, was a Sergeant in the U.S. Army that fought in the battle of Belleau Wood in June 1918. Just before he and his men charged a German gun emplacement he is reported to have yelled one of the most iconic and memorable statements in the annals of military history; "Come on you sons of bitches, do you want to live forever?" I wonder how many of those young men that were behind the baracades getting ready to go 'over the top; wanted to yell back, "YES!"  True bravery has been described as 'being scared to death, but doing IT anyway'. All of those men that followed Sergeant Daly were brave. They had a choice to make. They made it, and stepped into history. God always gives us a choice. God gave Israel the same choice thousands of years ago, as illustrated in the following texts; "See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, and death and adversity; Ex. 30:15 "I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So choose life in order that you may live, you and your descendants. Ex. 30:19. In the case of the Kingdom of the Heavens the choice truly is between the LIFE ROAD or DEATH ROAD. Just as with Ancient Israel we today must choose either life or death, blessing or curse. A time is coming when no one will be able to sit on the fence and try to decide to make no choice. So WHAT is that choice, and HOW do you make it. The choice is between keeping what you BELIEVE to be true, or learning and deciding to search for truith so you KNOW what IS TRUE! This is a decision that is just as difficult and just as consequential as was the decision of those men to follow their Sergeant into battle. More so, because our choise is an ETERNAL decision.  Do you want to live forever? Choose well!

Indoctrination~ In 1959 a very controvercial book was published that was titled "The Manchurian Candidate, by Rickhard Condon. It is a political thriller about the soldier son of a prominent U.S. political family that is captured by the Chinese in during the Korean war, and it 'brainwashed' into becoming an assassin for a Communist conspiracy. It became a best seller, and eventually made into a movie in 1962, and a remake in 2004. Another word for 'brainwashing' is indoctrination. In the brainwashing process, the agent systematically breaks down the target's identity to the point that it competely removes the target's current social, political or religious paradigms, and replaces them with new paradigms that work to the agent's advantage. This type of indoctrination is very insidious, because the victim does not realize that their congnitive and emotional processes have been altered to the extent that they can no longer recognize truth from lies. There are those in today's world that through a deliberate and subtle long term process have been forced by indoctrination to believe lies as if they are the truth. It is easy to see that this has and is still occurring in many aspects of life, especially in politics and religion. If this is NOT apparent to you, then you HAVE BEEN brainwashed. The Devil has had over 2000 years to perfect the deception in making it look like the lies that he has had propogated through the words of the 'aposlte' Paul are the truth. This subtle and insidious propganda has 'converted' the very words of God from an asset to the Christian church to a liability in the knowing a practicing the Truth. If you claim that you are a Christian today you simply MUST believe the words of Paul above and beyond the words that Jesus gave to His own disciples. "See to it that no one deceives you."

"Style"~ A friend of mine posted an interesting video today on Face Book, that showed BB King explaining where his 'style' came from. He cited 3 players that he thought had a unique sound, and tried to incorporate their sound into his playing in order to create a 'unique' playing style. In Back to the Future #1 Marty McFly (Michael J.. Fox) was playing guitar at the 'Enchantment Under the Sea' dance as a fill in for Marivin Berry, the injured lead guitarist, who heard Marty's riffs, and liked them so much he called his cousin, Chuck Berry, so he could hear the 'style'. When a musician tries to copy 'style' it never turns out exactly like the sound of the original, because the two players are do not have the same physiology, or musical identity. Musical style is unique to the player. This idea of 'style' does not cross over into the study and finding of truth.  Truth is not unique to an individual, because "Truth is singular and absolute". Truth is not beholden to individual identities or personalities. You have heard (in one form or another) the expression that "Truth is in the eye of the beholder", that "Truth is what you believe to be true", and that "Your truth is just as good as My truth". The idea that is expressed in philosophy is that everyone defines their own idea of truth, and no one should force anyone else to subscribe to a truth outside of themselves. This is the reason that after Jesus spoke with Pilate (recorded in John 18) that Pilate (who was a trained philosopher) said, "What is Truth?" Jesus declared to Pilate that He came to earth to "Testify to the Truth; everyone that is (already) of the truth hears MY voice." (John 18:37). This shows that Truth IS a Universal Constant, and is not a personal perogative.

Treason~ In case you missed it, January 28, 2020, FBI Agents arrested Dr. Charles Lieber, chairman of Harvard University's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, wio was accused by the Department of Defense of taking secret monthly payments of $50,000.00 from China, and receiving millions of dollars more to help set up a chemical/biological “Research” laboratory in China. 'Coincidentally', this lab was set up at the Wuhan University of Technology which is in the city that has been called 'gtound zero' for the world wide outbreak of the 'Coronavirus'. Also arrested were two Chinese “Students” working as research assistants, one of whom was actually a lieutenant in the Chinese Army, the other captured at Logan Airport as he tried to catch a flight to China - smuggling 21 vials of “Sensitive Biological Samples” according to the FBI. This person is a TRAITOR to his country. This is horrendous, but nothing new as a human activity. This happens all the time, often to a lesser but still significant degree. There are also traitors to the Kingdom of the Heavens; people that 'say' they are 'of God', but are not', but lie. These are people that 'lead many astray' by claiming that what they are teaching is from God, but in reality is from the Father of Lies. There words can be found in the Bible. Jesus specifically warned us of these people: And Jesus answered and said to them, "See to it that no one misleads you. For many will come in My name, saying, 'I am the Christ,' and will mislead many. Matt. 24:4-5. How can we possibly be mislead? By WORDS that 'sound' good, but are poison to the intellect.  We are protected ONLY by the words of Jesus that HE gave to His eyewitness disciples. Think on this.