Spirit of Truth/The Bible on Trial

~In the Line of Duty~ I awakened this morning to a live video on the news that a Pomona California police officer was killed in the line of duty. Police officers from all over California have come together to escort the dead officer from the hospital to the Coroners office, as a tribute to the Police Department and the officer's family. There will be a heart rending funeral and grave side service that will also be shown on the news, and we will hear not only about life of the fallen officer, but about how this officer sacrificed his future for the present of the citizens of the city he served. Unfortunately, this scene has been repeated time and time again over the years as we honor both civilian, military, paramilitary and fire personell who have made the ultimate sacrifice of their lives for their communities and countries.  Is this honor extended to those that have given their lives in death for the bringing about the Kingdom of the Heavens? Will the King of the Kingdom, Jesus, honor Antipas (Rev. 2:13),  the Two Witnesses (Rev.11:7), or members of the 144,000, or others with an elaborate funeral after they are killed in His service? No! God does not do funerals for those that die in His service. Who was more deserving of this honor more than Jesus Himself, after His death on the Cross? Yet there was nothing from His Father. Why? Because God is the God of the LIVING, not the God of the dead.  The reunion of God the Father and Jesus when He finally returned to Heaven from His mission on earth, must have been and amazing sight. And then Jesus is seen standing before the throne in honor and glory (Rev.5:6), just as do those that overcome as He overcame (Rev. 3:21). So those of us that die in the service of the King, both throughout the ages, and during the time of the end, willl not be honored in death, we will be honored with Life Eternal; and that will be worth everything we can give.

BANNING WORDS! America is going through a tough time right now because there is lots of back lash from many quarters about the need for 'common sense' gun control. Don't worry, this is NOT the subject of this piece. It does, however, bring up this issue, and that is that one solution that has been proferred as to how to solve the gun violence issue is to ban guns. This is not new. But what is new, in America at least, is that when a person uses words to disagree with any change in policy toward the 2nd Amendment they are regailed with all sorts of personal attack and invective (swearing), and accused of being all sorts of things with they are not. When we here at Spirit of Truth Ministry dare to question the verasity and validity of a certain New Testament 'apostle', we recieve the brunt of many of the same types of comments people are using to describe the character, personality, and mental competency of those that DO NOT want to ban guns in America. The WORDS we use in describing this beloved apostle infuriate people to such an extent that they have stated categorically the we are "servants of Satan", and what we say must be stopped at all cost. In both of these cases the idea that people should not be allowed to say that they believe and know to be the truth means that those words need to be banned.  Now you will say that this is impossible in a 'free' country, or in a 'free world', because no one is actually saying that. And yet prophecy in Revelation tells us that this is exactly what is to happen at the time of the end; so much so that people will be prevented from participating in commerse to the extent that they will be prevented from "buying and selling", and will pay for their words with their lives. Words mean things; and it is importnat for us to listen carefully to the words of people with which we disagree, simply because there may be truth in them.

"Your future hasn't been written yet, so make it a good one!" Doc Brown, from Back To The Future. The most important element that shrouds the past in mystery, that complicates the present with seemingly impossible decisions, and has the immense power to alter the future for good or evil, is the TRUTH. The expression "You can't change the past" is itself a lie. Of course you can change the past, as long as your view of the future is clear. Perspective is the key. When you look at today from the perspective of the future you desire, every decision point moves you toward that desired future. I hear Christians sing the old hymn "When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be"; but what I don't see from these lovely and sincere people is an effort to understand the dynamic that TRUTH plays in the reality of that song. If you believe a lie as if it is the truth, and you don't choose to accept the responsibility for your belief that THAT lie is NOT the truth, then the future depicted in that old hymn CANNOT ever come true for you. A future based upon lies is fiction; and yes, sometimes fiction seems more real than real life. R.A. Heinlein coined a phrase that became the foundation for much of his science fiction writing, "Future History". What we do today, the choices we make, the deeds that we do-or don't do, is the history of our future. This concept is what brings our need for knowing and understanding the truth into sharp relief. And it is for THIS reason that Jesus was sent by His Father to this earth, not simply to die for our sins, but to teach us how to know and LIVE the truth through the words of the Father in the Old Testament (Matt. 5:17), and through the words of Jesus that He gave to His eyewitness disciples in the New Testament (John 3:19-21).

Spirit of Truth Ministry presents a unique method for discovering and understanding the truth. It is our desire that our listeners and readers know that we are not claiming infallibility in our understanding of the Truth; it is just that we understand from the words of Jesus that we WILL know the Truth. Join us as we search for the Truth of Jesus, that He brought to His disciples from the Father.

The Olympics are all but over, and the essence of the games are sportsmanship and winning. Note: this sentence does not end with the word 'whining'. Placing second instead of first in an Olympic event can be a matter of 0.01 seconds-one onethousands of a second. This was the difference between Gold and Silver in the Men's Snowboard Parallel Slalom. The person that placed second just could not believe the result; he was literally stunned. The winner of the Ladies Super-G (giant slalom) was not supposed to win. This woman was way back in the pack, and the woman that was holding first place at the time was being congradulated by those around her, until the woman at the start of the race left the gate. This lady was a snowboarder that was just skiing the Super-G to see how she would do. At the finish she was 0.07 seconds ahead of the woman that thought she had won. And the woman that won could not believe it. When she completed her run out and looked at the clock she did not realize that she had won. When the realization hit she could hardly believe it. Yet the woman that now had second place came over and congradulated her. We are in a race, and in this race there is no second place. If you don't win, you lose. You can lose by the barest of margins and yet still be out of the Kingdom of Heaven. If you don't run the race by the rules, and go through every gate perfectly it doesn't matter if you cross the finish line or not; it is identical to running off the course and not finishing, you lose.  The rules of our race have been made clear by the Son of God, and eveyone that observes those rules WILL WIN THE RACE. No one need not be able to do what our coach has already done.  'He who overcomes (comes in first), I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.' Rev.3:21.

"With Malice Toward None." On of the greatest Presidents of the United States was Abraham Lincoln. He lived at a time that 'tried men's souls' in a way that had not ever happened in the History of our nation. The rancor and vitriol over States Rights and slavery was so harsh and overbearing that is caused the Southern States to secede from the union, and was a primary cause of the great Civil War. Ovbedience to the Constitution became a millstone to those that wanted to keep men and women in slavery. We are seeing the same kind of thing in the world and in the church today. There are those that want to keep slavery to sin alive and well, and there are those that want to abolish it. And it all stems from the idea of obedience to the constitution of the Kingdom of Heaven, which is the Covenant of the Kingdom-the 10 Commandments. This fight is becoming bitter, and personal attacks abound. Malice and vitriol are becoming the order of the day when 'believers' are confronted with the idea that what they believe is a lie. And the fight is just beginning. Do you have the will to follow the words of Jesus, or will you give them up for the convenience of trying to keep the peace? Soon our backs will be against the wall, and we will not be able to retreat any further, at which point we will either have to give up, or fight for the LIGHT.

Big Screen~ My lovely and gracious wife and I have a few favorite television shows, that we watch together; drama, comedy, British, and American (no specific names). For the past 7 years we have been using a flat screen TV for this purpose. Seven years ago LCD flat screen TV's were very expensive, and all we could afford at that time was one that was 27 inch diagonal. Yes, that is a TINY screen, but it had an amazing picture, compared to our old RCA 32 inch square screen that weighed about 100 pounds. We were delighted with our joint Christmas present that year. Yet as the years went by it became more and more evident that what we were using to watch TV was just not very good. Our friends were getting BIG 40 inch LCD's that had 1080p resolution, while we were stuck with 720p resolution. Whenever there was writing on the screen we had to squint to see it, if we could see it at all. The only good thing about or watching experience was that I have a state of the art (at that time) 5.1 sound system, that brought theater sound into our living room. Yesterday, we went to Costco and bought an amazing 50 inch 4K, incredibly beautiful UHD LCD flat screen TV, and OH MY, what a difference! From across the living room we can see EVERYTHING. Looking back now, we literally did not know what we had been missing. This is the same for when you discover the Truth; when you realize you have been looking aT Truth on a tiny screen, when all along you had the opportunity to see it in a big screen in High Definition. All you have to do to see truth is be willing to pay for it. And how to you do that? With self-honesty, great desire, and persistence. If you overcome your fear of the unknown, and what you might find, you WILL find TRUTH!  'He who overcomes, I will grant to him to sit down with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne." Rev.3:21.

"The truth doesn’t matter, what I think matters." I just read a wonderful article that describes the way many people manipulate a conversation by assuming they know and understand the perspective of the other person simply because of a statement they said that disagrees with their own perspective. (https://brenebrown.com/blog/2017/11/08/gun-reform-speaking-truth-bullshit-practicing-civility-affecting-change/) Example: if you support the NRA then you must be in favor of mass murder shootings at schools. This is a false statement based on a false narrative, to which there is no acceptable response to the person that made the false statement. We have seen this in people that we have spoken too about putting the Bible on Trial. When we have made the statement that the Bible contains truth, but it also contains lies in the form of the words of the 'apostle' Paul, because Paul's teachings are completely opposite to those of Jesus, as He gave His words to His own disciples, people have made the response, "Well, if you throw Paul out of the Bible you might as well throw out the whole thing". This response sets up a 'no win' situation for both perspectives, in that nothing that we can say will change that person's mind, because they firmly believe that what they think about a subject supercedes the truth about that subject. We sincerely hope that what you hear on The Bible On Trial program will allow you to see that there is a 'false narrative' in religion that states that "you must belong to our religion in order to be saved'. We hope that you will see that it is only the words of Jesus that teach the truth, and that it is the Truth that will ultimately save you, not a religious belief.

The Anthem of the Kingdom of God! What do you suppose it will sound like when the "saved of the ages" sing together the Anthem of the Kingdom of the Heavens. I really think that it will be the most Awe inspiring events that anyone will have ever hear, including the angels and the other Heavenly Host. It is difficult to comprehend millions upon millions of people all gathered together around the New Jerusalem, standing before the Throne of God all singing in chorus. It send chills down my spine just thinking about it. There will also be a much smaller group of people, 144,000 in number that will also have their own song to sing: And they *sang a new song before the throne and before the four living creatures and the elders; and no one could learn the song except the one hundred and forty-four thousand who had been purchased from the earth. Rev.14:3. Even this relatively small number of people is a LOT of voices that must coordinate perfectly together to sing this 'New Song', this New Anthem to God and to the Lamb. Will it be a song of praise, a song of Joy, a song of relief, a song of blessing? And who will be the conductor? I will tell you truthfully, that of all of the choirs, bands and orchestras that I have conducted in my life it is THIS choir that I most want to lead, it is THIS choir that I most want to sing with. What an incredible event of which to be a part.  In order to be in this number, so sing with this choir, it will be necessary to learn this new song; and ONLY those of the 144,000 will have the privilage doing so. The reason that they will know this song and be able to sing it together, is because they will have learned it while they were on earth, serving their King as they fulfilled the assignments that Jesus gave them, in order to prepare the Bride for her Groom. I don't know the title, I don't yet know the words or the music, but I long to be there, don't you?

Scarcity: the shortness of supply, or and insufficiency.  The scarcity of anything drives up the cost of whatever is scarce. Rare metals such as gold, silver, platinum are costly because they are rare. The shortage of a commodity drives up the cost of that commodity. This is why the Chicago Mercantile Exchange exists, to buy and sell futures on commodites. The people that guess which commodites (corn, orange juice concentrate, pork bellies for example) will be scarce and buy us futures contracts for those commidities when they are cheap can make fortunes-buy low, sell high! There are Rare Earth metals that are even more valuable by weight than gold or silver; things such as U-235 in the form of 'yellow cake' which can be processed into U-238, and isotope that fuels nuclear reactors; it is by far worth more valuable than gold. Why? Because it is so rare. In the spiritual world (AKA-religion to most people) the single most rare and costly commodity is the pure, unfiltered, unprocessed TRUTH. When it comes to religion NO ONE has the truth, altough they practitioners of religion will tell you otherwise. If they told you the truth there would be no religion. They have made the truth a commodity that anyone can have, anytime, as long as you join with them What does it cost to acquire the truth? That answer is simple; everything you own, everything you are, and everthing you ever hope to be. If you are now willing to "sell all that you have, and follow me" (Jesus to the Rich, young ruler-Matt. 10:21) then you cannot follow Jesus. You must be willing to do this in order to be in the place where you can "Keep the Commandments, and hold to the testimony of Jesus" (Rev. 12:17).