If God is so loving why is there Evil and Suffering in the World

Why don’t we make the question more compelling, “since God is so loving why is there so much evil in the world?”

There are varying reasons why people ask this question. Some ask the question with an unthankful, irreverent, angry attitude toward God. They think they can demand an answer from God as if the Lord is obligated to answer them. I believe others ask the question out of sheer fear of God. They are genuinely disenchanted and confused about what the Lord is apparently not doing – why He allows all this suffering to continue.

Then there are others, those that are Christians who want to trust God but have no idea why He is delaying His judgment with all the wickedness going on everyday; and the Lord sees it all, at one time!

            

Most of the world see the ongoing wars, the poverty of people and especially young children, the disease, senseless murders, the rape of women and children, dope dealing, drug abuse, gangs, the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer, the good dying young, the evil living the good life and dying old, corrupt government and wonder, “what in the world is going on? Why doesn’t God put an end to it – like right away, right now?!”

            Does God care about what is going on? Where is the justice in all of this?

The question is valid. Does the Bible provide the answer regarding evil? I believe it does.

                                              Where does evil come from?

Skeptics and critics of God have said since we as Christians believe the Bible, and God created all things according to Genesis 1, then He MUST have created evil for evil is a created thing right?

Let’s think about that for a moment. In Genesis 1:31a it says, “and God saw everything He made and behold it was very good  (italics mine).

Verse 31 gives us an insight into what God thought about His creation. God said it was very good. Since evil is never good, God CAN NOT be the creator of it.

At this point the skeptic is going to object and say, “then the Bible can not be true if God created all things and evil is not a thing. What about Isaiah 45:7 where God says, “ I form the light and create darkness. I make peace and create evil. I the Lord do all these things.”

As an aside, a message I recently heard said that it is amazing how critics who DO NOT believe the Bible will search the Bible (they do not trust) for scriptures to discredit its veracity and prove their case.   

           

              

        Interesting.

The word evil in the Hebrew is the word Ra. It appears 663 times in the KJV. 431 it is translated as evil. The other 232 times It has a variety of meanings which some are: "wicked," "bad," "hurt," "harm," "ill," "sorrow," "mischief," "displeased," "adversity," "affliction,"  "calamity," "grievous," "misery," and "trouble”. Contextually the writer/prophet Isaiah is not talking about moral evil, but physical evil, disaster, or calamity upon man for the wickedness he has committed on the earth. Isaiah is contrasting ideas of natural phenomena in verse 7; light-darkness, well being-calamity. The Lord is the one that makes these things happen.

Isaiah in chapter 45 is also predicting the coming of Cyrus, a Persian king who God will use to release the Hebrews from captivity to return to the destroyed land of Jerusalem to rebuild it. Cyrus released the captives to go to their homeland in the year 538 B.C. (Ezra 1:1-10).

The only version that uses the word evil in this passage is the King James Version which originated in 1611. The translators did not use the best word in verse seven. Once again understanding the context is the key to arriving to the correct meaning of the verse. Poor hermeneutics by the critics and skeptics has caused many to believe that God created evil when He could not have. Moral evil is antithetical to God’s very nature. God does however cause physical disaster and calamity to befall man as a judgment due to his wickedness (e.g. the Flood of Noah, Genesis 7:1-24).

So since God is not the creator of evil for evil is not a thing, but a wicked disposition and rebellion towards God. Evil is the absence of good just like dark is the absence of light and as blindness is the absence of sight. Where does evil come from? As I mentioned  in my article “Is God a fatalist and where does evil come from?”  Some scholars would say evil originated with man when Adam and Eve disobeyed God in the garden. What I can say is that when evil invaded man’s soul, that evil nature passed down to every human being born afterward up until now. In other words, that is where human evil originated. We find in Ezekiel 28:15 and Isaiah 14 that evil was found in Lucifer (now the devil and Satan). So we see here that evil was cosmic-celestial before it was earthly. I believe we can be confident that evil existed before man because Satan rebelled before man was created. All the angels were created before the creation of the heavens and the earth (Job 38:7). This would include Satan who was a cherub (Ezekiel 28:14).

                                       

Since God created man and knew man would become evil does not that make God responsible for the evil men do?

This is another common question but the answer is no. Although God knew man would choose evil over good that does not mean we can lay the blame for man’s wickedness at God’s doorstep. For instance, if someone buys a knife and stabs and kills people who are you going to blame the knife company or the knife owner? You have to blame the knife owner because he misused the knife and did evil things with it. The knife company cannot be held responsible for how the killer used the knife. The knife is neither good or bad; its neutral. Just like he used the knife for evil, he can also choose to use it for good like cutting fruit or opening boxes.

Another example is when someone gets behind the wheel drunk and kills a family and smashes his car into a pole ruining the vehicle. Is this the manufacturer and dealership’s fault the car is destroyed or the driver’s? We all know it’s the driver’s fault the car is destroyed and the family is dead due to his drunkenness. Another case of  someone misusing an item for evil reasons. The offender has  to be held responsible for his actions.

In like manner God cannot be blamed or held responsible for man’s evil just because He created Him. Man chooses to do evil strictly of his own volition.  God does not make man sin.  God loves  man and gives him the opportunity to choose good or evil just like in the garden of Eden (Genesis 2:17).                                                                                                                                                                                         

Moses in Deuteronomy said these words, “See I have set before you today life and good, death and evil[1], in that I command you today to love the Lord your God, to walk in His ways, and to keep His commandments, His statues, and His judgments, that you may live and multiply, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you go to possess. But if your heart turns away so that you do not hear, and are drawn away, and worship other gods and serve them, I announce to you today that you shall surely perish; you shall not prolong your days in the land which you cross over the Jordan to go in and possess. I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that  I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live” (Deuteronomy 30:15-19).

Every human being on earth are faced with choosing either good or evil all the days of their lives. That is just the way it is.

                                      Will God ever rid the world of evil?

The answer to the question is yes. God will one day destroy evil. Most of the world is anxious and desire that evil be destroyed now. In response to that statement in getting rid of evil now would be cataclysmic. Here are a few reasons.

1. If God got rid of evil now we would no longer be human; for we would no longer have the ability to choose between good and evil.  We would only do good by default and not by a willing choice. We would be robots, and not free moral agents. Since when do we desire to have our freedom of choice taken away? Hear anyone march on capitol hill lately saying, “DOWN WITH FREEDOM!! WE DON’T WANT CHOICES ANYMORE!! No, the opposite is true. We fight for our freedoms, through demonstrations, the voting booths, and writing to our congressional leaders demanding the choices we desire.

So, removing evil now actually removes our ability to choose which takes away our freedom. Without the ability to choose, we can no longer love anyone willingly. A world devoid of love is a planet with six billion artificial intelligences.  A very cold and dark place.

2. A second and more somber reason God does not eradicate evil now is His love for mankind. Although man has long ago turned its back on God, God desires that man repents and comes to the knowledge of the truth (Ezekiel 18:32; 2 Tim 2:1-4). God actually believe it or not is showing extraordinary mercy by allowing evil to continue so that more people can repent of their sins and be saved. Evil in this sense is working according to God’s plan for all things (including evil) is working out for good (Rom 8:28).

2a. If God destroyed evil, this world be empty of all humanity. It would just be a world of trees, plants, water and land mammals, and insects. Why? It is our fault that evil exists in the world. Since Adam sinned evil has now persisted for over 6,000 years. If God destroyed evil now, He would have to wipe out every human being on the planet. Why? Because moral evil resides in every human being. We are the cause of evil, disease, poverty, wars and ultimately death are the effects.

Fortunately there is a happy ending to this morbid drama. I said in the beginning of this section of the article that evil will be destroyed. Listen to Revelation 21:4-5, “And God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain for the former things have passed away.” Then He who sat on the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.”

The period in which the apostle John is speaking is the eternal state . This is after the seven year tribulation, the second coming of Jesus Christ, the Millennium (i.e. 1,000 years of peace on earth), and the Great White Throne Judgment (Rev 20). At this point all the unsaved have been cast into the Lake of Fire with the Devil, the beast, and the false prophet, and the unholy angels. At this point in history time is no more.

Concluding when we sin, we are reminded we are evil by nature. And each time we are not wiped out by God, we should praise Him for once again He is extending mercy toward us when we deserve punishment. 

Next time either you reading this article or someone you know asks the question if God is loving or real why does evil exists? Remember 1: evil and suffering is man’s fault not God’s. Number 2: If God decided to get rid of evil now, countless people would not have the opportunity to respond positively to the gospel message, repent of their sins, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved. God in His holy righteous justice (without any mercy), would send millions of soul straight to hell which they deserve.

In this sense evil for now has to exist for it when it is manifest in us and God withholds His judgment, it displays His transcendent mercy. Something we undeservedly receive everyday.

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[1] Here we see once again God giving the children of Israel a choice. In order for a choice to be present, there has to be  an opposing option(s). If only good existed, we would not have the ability to choose which means we would not have free will. To love God or hate him or anyone we encounter has to involve freewill choice.

Apparent Contradictions in the Bible - Part 2

Apparent Contradiction #3

A concern regarding the time of Jesus crucifixion:

In Mark 15:25 we read that Jesus was crucified at the third hour of the day. But in John 19:14 we read that Jesus was crucified around the sixth hour. There is an obvious contradiction isn’t there?

            

Let’s examine these two verses carefully.

First of all we need to determine the audience the writers were addressing. Mark was writing to a Jewish audience. For the Jews a day begins at 6:00 am. So, the third hour of the day would have been 9:00 am for them; the time when Jesus was crucified.               

When John wrote his gospel, he was not residing in Israel. He was in the city of Ephesus; a city in Asia Minor – a Roman province. The Romans are on a different time system than the Israelites. A Roman day begins at 12:00 midnight like our days here in America. So for those residing in Roman colonies, the sixth hour of the day would be 6:00 am when Jesus was crucified. But on the Hebrew time system, it was 9:00 am. There is no contradiction at all. All we are dealing with are different time zones between these two accounts. Mark is on Israeli time, and John being to the west of Israel was on Roman time which was six hours ahead.

Apparent Contradiction #4

Regarding Jesus Resurrection and the Angels at the tomb

We read in Matthew 28:2 that an angel of the Lord came from heaven and rolled away the stone and sat upon it.

However in John’s gospel we read that two angels were inside the tomb of Jesus asking Mary Magdalene “why are you weeping?” (John 19:12-13).

So in the first account one angel is mentioned, and in the second account there are two angels.

Critics and skeptics of the Bible would say that these accounts contradict one another but they do not.

Just because one author mentions something the other one does not is no reason to discredit the entire account.

For example, if I say to my wife I’m going to the store and afterward I say to my mother I’m going to buy milk, did I lie to either one of them? No. I simply gave one account to my wife and another account to my mother of what I was going to do. Obviously I went to the store to buy milk. This is the same thing the gospel writers did. Matthew focused on the one angel who rolled away the stone of the tomb and sat on it, whereas John omits the first angel and focuses on the two angels inside the tomb who spoke with Mary Magdalene. There were three angels total.

As I said on the first article these different accounts do not contradict one another, rather they complement one another.

Think about, if all four gospels were exactly the same word for word, the authors would be suspect, accused of collusion and plagiarism.

The Spirit of God knew exactly what He was doing when He inspired the gospel writers.

Apparent Contradictions in the Bible - Part 1

The statement is indeed true. There are ”apparent” contradictions in the Bible; but these apparent contradictions are “genuine” as far skeptics and critics are concerned. That is why they do not trust the 

Bible. If there are indeed contradictions in the Bible, then we have to conclude God is not the author and we as Christians are without hope; we have believed a lie because man would be its author and that would make the whole document flawed because man is flawed due to sin.

While the writer has not discovered every alleged contradictory scripture reference, we will examine a couple to see if the critics have a leg to stand on.                                                                    

           

Apparent contradiction #1 – The skeptic says, “In James 1:13 it says that God cannot be tempted with evil, but you Christians who claim Jesus is God was tempted in all points according to Hebrews 4:15.  These two verses contradict one another. For one says God cannot be tempted, and the other says He was.”

In Mark 1:12 the Bible says after Jesus was baptized the Spirit drove (italics mine) Him into the wilderness for forty days to be tempted by the devil. This verse does appear to contradict James 1:13 but it does not. Keep in mind when Jesus was attempted by the devil He was tempted in His humanity not in His deity for God cannot be tempted with evil, but Jesus the man can and was tempted; not just by the devil, but also by the religious leaders who wanted to have him killed (Matthew 22:17-18).

Hebrews 4:15 along with Mark 1:12 prove that Jesus was fully human for had He been only spirit He could not have been tempted at all.

These two verses do not contradict one another; rather they complement each other.

Apparent contradiction #2 – The critic says, “In Matthew 5:44 Jesus commands that we love our enemies, bless those that curse you, do good to those who hate you and spitefully use you and persecute you. But, in Luke 19:27 Jesus (the skeptic and critic say) is commanding that his enemies be brought before Him so that he can kill them. The skeptic says this is a clear contradiction which is why they cannot trust the Bible. Jesus in one verse is commanding us to love, and in another verse He is advocating murder.”

So, what is going on between these two verses?

In order to clear up this apparent problem, we have to go back to verse 11 in Luke 19. The whole account reads: ¹¹ Now as they heard these things, He spoke another parable, and because He was near Jerusalem and because they thought the kingdom of God would appear immediately. ¹² Therefore He said: “A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return. ¹³ So he called ten of his servants, delivered to them ten minas and said to them, ‘Do business till I come.’ ¹⁴ But his citizens hated him, and sent a delegation after him, saying, ‘We will not have this man to reign over us.’

¹⁵ “And so it was that when he returned, having received the kingdom, he then commanded these servants, to whom he had given the money, to be called to him, that he might know how much every man had gained by trading. ¹⁶ Then came the first, saying, ‘Master, your mina has earned ten minas.’¹⁷ And he said to him, ‘Well done, good servant; because you were faithful in a very little, have authority over ten cities.’ ¹⁸ And the second came, saying, ‘Master, your mina has earned five minas.’¹⁹ Likewise he said to him, ‘You also be over five cities.’

²⁰ “Then another came, saying, ‘Master, here is your mina, which I have kept put away in a handkerchief. ²¹ For I feared you, because you are an austere man. You collect what you did not deposit, and reap what you did not sow’ ²² And he said to him, ‘Out of your own mouth I will judge you, you wicked servant. You knew that I was an austere man, collecting what I did not deposit and reaping what I did not sow. ²³ Why then did you not put my money in the bank, that at my coming I might have collected it with interest?’

²⁴ “And he said to those who stood by, ‘Take the mina from him, and give it to him who has ten minas.’ ²⁵ (But they said to him, ‘Master, he has ten minas.’) ²⁶ ‘For I say to you, that to everyone who has will be given; and from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him. ²⁷ But bring here those enemies of mine, who did not want me to reign over them, and slay them before me.’”

Jesus was not commanding His disciples to gather His enemies together to kill them. Jesus was giving a parable of nobleman who gave money to his servants to conduct business while he went away on a journey. Jesus mentioning of slaughtering of enemies in the parable was in reference to the nobleman’s enemies who did not want him to rule over them because they hated him. Once the nobleman returned to settle accounts with his servants, he subsequently commanded his servants to kill those rebel citizens.

Those skeptics and critics who insist that Matthew 5:44 and Luke 19:27 contradict one another did a terrible job by isolating this verse in Luke instead of reading the entire context starting with verse 11. Jesus is teaching a parable of the TEN MINAS. He is not advocating murder or hate.

This display of poor scholarship, the mishandling of God’s word is what causes a lot of these mistakes to occur. Isolating one verse severing it from the verses preceding and succeeding it does violence to the text of scripture. When people mishandle God’s word by isolating verses, you can make the text say anything you want it to say. Twisting of scripture are for the ignorant and unstable who are headed for destruction according to the apostle Peter (2 Peter 3:16).

It amazes me the lengths that critics and skeptics will go to point out apparent contradictions in scripture. To me it shows their disdain for the word of God and God himself; to search so diligently to attempt to discredit the reliability of divine truth.

There are more apparent contradictions in scripture, but we will cover those in another article or two.

The Deceitfulness of Sin

                                                            By Delvin Arnold

Take care brothers lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart leading you away from the living God. But, exhort one another everyday as long as it is called today that none of you may be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin

                                                                                                                        -Hebrews 3:12-13

The writer of Hebrews is exhorting the believers to remain in faith and not to be unbelieving as their ancestors were during the time of Moses in the wilderness wanderings. Their unbelief led to their death, and them not entering into God’s rest (Psalm 95:7-11).

So, what sins are you engaged in, enjoying that have deceived your heart, led you astray? What vices have captured you to the point where you initially felt guilty about the sin, but now since you are practicing it, you are now enjoying your perversion, justifying and minimizing its wickedness? That is the deceitfulness of sin. 

Your sin is leading you astray.

My brothers and sisters our sins not only affect our lives negatively, it affects those around us. When we are deceived by our sins, we become a wrecking ball, a derailed train destroying everything in our path. Sometimes the collateral damage we cause is irreparable due to our unwise choices and deviant behavior. A person that does not care who they harm is dangerous to be around and should be avoided. A person without contrition is a person with an untamed spirit.

Another problem with the deceitfulness of sin is our attitude toward it. Do you laugh at sinful situations? Do you mock at sin instead of feeling sorry for the sin you commit or the sins of others?

Proverbs 14:9 says, “Fools make a mock at sin, but among the righteous there is favor.”

I understand the struggle we face fighting our sin (provided you are indeed fighting your sin) but, if we are endeavoring to please God by living holy, then we MUST engage in the struggle to conquer sin in our lives. If we do not, we will be continually deceived by our sin. Child of God, we can not abide in that terrible space. Jesus did not redeem us to live in our sins; he died and took away our sins. Remember the words of Paul in 

Romans 6:1-2, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! 

How can we who died to sin still live in it?”

The answer to that question is we can’t! We must confess it before God and forsake it (I John 1:9).

The deceitfulness of sin causes backwards thinking. How you may ask? When we allow our sin to drive our thoughts and deeds, God is an afterthought or dismissed from our lives altogether. For instance, when people are living in sin, and someone lovingly confronts about them about their wicked ways because they love them, and are concerned about their destructive behavior, the sinner gets offended, hostile, and curses that person out. They often will use God’s name in vain, and pile more sin in their lives yelling “DON’T JUDGE ME! ONLY GOD CAN JUDGE ME!” Instead of acknowledging their sin and repenting, they commit more sin and love it. Their sin in their eyes is right. Repenting is wrong.

Because after all, everyone sins right; so what’s the big deal? I’m not as bad as him or her…

The person in this condition does not see their sin as exceedingly sinful as Romans 7 declares. They have become desensitized by sin to the degree that their sin does not sting them with  shame. Sin’s deceit has morphed into a pleasure principle instead of the heinous cancerous spiritual disease that it is. They fall into the category of those described in Romans 1:18-32 and those in I Corinthians 6:9-10. Those described in those verses are non believers who will never see the kingdom of God. I pray you are not one of those.

Here are a couple tragic and sobering verses I have discovered in Isaiah 5:20-21: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitterness. Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes.”

As I segue off of those verses, the next thing regarding the deceitfulness of sin I need to mention is that it breeds ignorance and a lack of objectivity to scripture. What I mean is when a person is deceived by their sin, they do not want to accept the word of God because it contradicts their wayward lifestyle. The last thing someone wants to hear is that they need to examine their lives to see if they are abiding in the faith (II Corinthians 13:5). Our sin clouds our judgment, and magnifies our ignorance which clearly screams to our need for a savior and for deliverance. This happens to saint and the unbeliever alike.

Folks deceived by their sin are usually woefully biblically illiterate, and only have their own godless reasoning to lean on. When this occurs people usually respond this way when they hear the word of God, “Well, that is your opinion!” Sinfully deceived people will not accept objective truth. Why? Because they can not. The gospel truth is veiled to those who are perishing (II Corinthians 4:4).

Sin has enslaved you. Sin has become your master (Romans 6: 15-18).

Talk to someone lately who simply refuses to hear the gospel? The reason why is that they are perishing and they are walking in darkness. Tragic thing about it is that they love their darkness (John 3:19). We can only pray that they have a change of heart.

Another problem with the deceitfulness of sin is that it causes a person to minimize their sins and maximize everyone else’s. This person is the hypocrite described in Matthew 7:1-5. Take careful examination of your life. Are you this way?

Are you so jaded by your sins that you dismiss your obvious issues to point the finger at your neighbor’s smaller ones? As the scriptures command, deal with your own problems then you can see clearly to help someone with their problem.

The deceitfulness of sin causes a person to be pretentious toward God. What I mean is when someone is caught in serious trouble because of their sin, they will call on God with impure motives for deliverance knowing within their hearts that they have no desire to repent. They in effect mock God as if God does not know the evil motives of their heart. Their sin has so clouded their judgment, they think their false sincerity in approaching God is honorable. They have no desire for change, they only want to escape the present pain they righteously deserve for their wickedness. Jesus repeats Isaiah’s oracle in Matthew 15:8, “These people draw near me with their mouths and honor me with their lips, but their hearts hold off and are far away from me.”[1] Galatians 6:7 in the amplified Bible reads this way, “Do not be deceived and deluded and misled. God will not allow Himself to be  sneered at (disdained, or mocked by mere pretensions or professions, or by His precepts being set aside). [He inevitably deludes himself who attempts to delude God.] For whatever a man sows, that and that only is what he will reap.”

            

Summation: You try to play God, you play yourself; stop the madness![2]

The last area I will mention regarding deceitfulness of sin is that it prevents godly sorrow.  When we are deceived by sin, godly humility and sorrow is far from us. Are you the type of person that unashamedly sins and says, “Well God knows my heart!”  As if that statement is going to get you off the hook from the consequences of your sinful behavior? Since we know God knows our hearts, that should prevent us from committing the evil we do, but sadly it often does not.

We know we are going to sin, but we should not just give in to temptation without a fight. When we do sin, we must be quick to confess it to God and forsake it; being mindful that sin breaks God’s heart and incurs His wrath.

No one in their right mind desires the wrath of God or desires to break the Lord’s heart.

As I wrap up, I see the sum of the matter like this, the more we spend time with God and His word, the more we love Him and desire to serve Him. We must develop an insatiable appetite for the things of God. This reality will determine the success or failure in a Christian’s life. The decision is ultimately ours. If we vigorously pursue this path, our sin goes from being something we love at first, to something that should make us uncomfortable, and guilty when we commit it.[3] Hopefully to something we are afraid to commit and love to hate. You see the progression in the decrease of the level of sin in our lives? We should all desire this pursuit! We have to look at sin through the lens of God’s word. And how does God view sin? He hates it to the degree that He sent His Son Jesus to die for it and judicially remove it forever.  When we hate the sin in our own lives, we will hate the sin in others which should drive us to pray and share the love of God with them in Jesus Christ. This is thinking with a God consciousness. That type of person is no longer deceived and blinded by sin. Their view of the Lord is high.

On the unfortunate flip side, those who decrease their fellowship with God along with prayer and study of the word will have no desire for the things of God. For they are a spiritual desert. For them corruption comes easy. They will ruin their witness for truth, and will live like the devil. Deceit will prevail over them to the degree they will forget the goodness of God and will lose the assurance[4] of their salvation (if they ever had it). Sin will become their lover and bedfellow. God will give their body over to Satan so that hopefully their soul will be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus (I Corinthians 5:5). This person is hastening to a quick death. Why? Because sin prevailed in deceiving them. Remember, sin always writes death checks (Romans 6:23). 

This person view of God is way too low!

I heard it said to me this way, “Sin keeps you away from the Bible. The Bible keeps you away from sin.”

C
hild of God, let’s allow the word of God to dwell in us richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed (italics mine), do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him (Colossians 3:16-17).

Let those who name the name of Christ depart from iniquity (2 Timothy 2:19b).

The apostle John said those who are of God listened to his words (I John 4:6).

Those that love God will not practice sin as a way of life. For Jesus said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” Notice Jesus said commandments, not suggestions.

Do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey it’s lusts (Romans 6:12).

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[1] Amplified Version

[2]These delinquent attitudes described here are indicative of Christians behaving

Carnally instead of spiritually

[3] When we feel guilty and confess and forsake sin, godly sorrow has prevailed. Godly sorrow

leads to true repentance of sin.

[4] Losing one’s assurance of their salvation does not mean they have lost salvation in the eternal sense.

What the writer means is that for that sinning believer their confidence in salvation’s assurance has temporarily

Departed from them due to the evil they are currently engaged in. A truly born again believer will never lose salvation for it is eternal, but based on  current behavior assurance for that person becomes lost. Sin will always

Erase any confidence we have in Christ until we repent.

Everything written in the Bible is not true

Shocking statement? To most it definitely is. Why would I make what seems like a most blasphemous phrase? Well, before anyone brands me a heretic let me defend my position. There are indeed statements in the Bible that are simply not true. In fact, the Bible records lies.

            

          Let me explain.

In John 8:41 the religious leaders said to Jesus that they were not born of fornication. In the 48^th verse they said Jesus had a demon.

Neither one of these statements are true of Jesus, but it is true that the statements were made. Although I’m sure this is obvious to most readers, but to perhaps some, this may not be obvious. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this account, they may be led to believe that these remarks regarding Jesus are true because they are recorded in scripture.

We know that Jesus was virgin born. The religious leaders underlying thinking was very insulting. By saying they were not born of fornication, they were implying that Jesus was a bastard, and his mother was a whore.

In Matthew 11:18-19 we read, “For John came neither eating or drinking and they say, “He has a demon!” The Son of Man came eating and drinking and they say, “Behold a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners”…

Here we see again the true recording of the account, but the accusations being untrue. John the Baptist was not demon possessed, and neither was Jesus a glutton and a drunk.

In Matthew 12:22 Jesus heals a demon possessed man who was also blind and mute. In verse 24 the Pharisees said that Jesus casts out demons by Beelzebub the prince of demons. Jesus himself refutes the remark as being untrue. In verse 26 He said, “If Satan casts out Satan he is divided against himself; how then will his kingdom stand?”

For so in review, we see that the religious leaders said that Jesus was:

1       Born illegitimately

2        Was demon possessed

3     Was a glutton and drunk

4     Casting out demons by the power of Satan instead of the Holy Spirit

Everyone of these statements was truly made, but none of these statements were true of our Lord.

    Unrecorded accounts and statements that are true and are counted as scripture

There are a few instances where a statement was made or event occurred that was not previously mentioned or recorded in scripture.

For instance in Luke 13:4-5 Jesus says, “Or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse culprits than all the men that live in Jerusalem? I tell you, no but unless you repent, you will likewise perish.”

This account Jesus mentioned is not recorded anywhere in the Old Testament, yet it is a true account by virtue of the fact that He makes reference to it. The issue Jesus is preaching to His audience is repentance. He used this tragic situation of death to say that death is sudden and does happen to all. We do not know when death will occur so repent now or you will perish; that is eternally perish!

In Acts 20:35 Paul says remember the words of the Lord Jesus, “It is more blessed to give than to receive.”

These words are not recorded anywhere in the gospels which tells us not all of Jesus words are recorded in scripture, yet the words are true by virtue of the fact that Paul by inspiration of the Holy Spirit recites them to the Ephesian elders.       

We read in Jude 14 that Enoch the seventh from Adam prophesied that the Lord will come with many of His holy ones to execute judgment upon the ungodly.

The book of Enoch is a non biblical or a pseudepigraphal book (false writings). However, the prophecy of the biblical Enoch is true. We only know of this prophecy through Jude.

The Spirit of God inspired Jude to quote the writer (most likely not Enoch) of this non biblical source regarding God’s coming judgment on the wicked. The quote from the book of Enoch fits perfectly with Jude’s theme of righteous judgment on God’s enemies.

Concluding, we have statements recorded in scripture that aren’t true, and also we have events and statements that are true not recorded in scripture until mentioned by the writer who was divinely inspired by the Holy Spirit.