Kingdom Perspective: Odds and Ends. Kenneth B. Alexander Alexander
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Название: Kingdom Perspective: Odds and Ends
Автор: Kenneth B. Alexander Alexander
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Религия: прочее
isbn: 9781456612160
isbn:
What Paul is saying here is that even though he knows the right thing to do he is unable to do it due to the condemned man within him which won’t allow it. He distinguishes between the two natures at war within him but finds no way out of the situation in himself. This is where many of us live. Although we may know the will of God, that is that we be perfect in all our ways, we find we cannot execute that perfection due our nature from which God separated Himself so long ago. However, Paul comes to the only solution possible for the self condemnation that dogs his life. We must walk completely in the new nature provided by Christ and very much alive in the believer.
“Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin” (Romans 7:25). When Christ died on the cross and was resurrected he accomplished two things with respect to sin. First of all He forgave sin, all the sin which had been committed by man and the sin he may commit in the future. The second thing He did was the most important: He removed all sin from man so that man never really had to sin again since the act of removal made him completely clean and unable to sin.
However Christ did one more thing on the cross which is important to this process. By removing the sin and guilt from mankind the only one left to carry the sin and guilt was Satan. Whereas the condemnation had been upon mankind, when it was removed, Satan retained the condemnation (guilty verdict and punishment). However what the Father did with Christ in actually removing or transferring the sin away from mankind was a miracle. Satan saw this miracle and realized that he could take the condemnation now upon him and transfer it back to mankind, if they were willing to accept it. Satan, even in his condemned state, remained the god of this world (2 Corinthians 4:4), giving him latitude to carry on spreading evil until his sentence was actually executed. So to this day mankind has been released from the curse or condemnation laid upon it by God in the Garden but Satan, the enemy, continually tries to convince man to reaccept what is not applicable to him anymore.
That is the dual nature that Paul was describing in Romans 7. However he came to the conclusion that Christ’s gift of grace resulting from His act on the cross really did release man from any condemnation. He saw the fulfillment of God’s promise in the Garden that the offspring of the woman (Christ) had crushed the serpent’s (Satan’s) head on the cross. Therefore he came to the conclusion that he expresses in Romans 8:1: “Therefore there is now NO CONDEMNATION for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). We can no longer be condemned or blamed for sin because Christ took care of the problem once and for all. This is significant because who are there among us who does not blame him/her self for mistakes we make? Who does not condemn themselves for saying or doing the wrong thing time after time? In God’s eyes all our sin is forgotten or made of no effect in our lives.
Does that mean then that we are free to commit sin now that we know it has been forgiven? Paul says a resounding NO: “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death? Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:1-4). The newness of life Paul is referring to is the perfection of God who knows no sin and walks only in love. When we walk in that newness of life we have become perfect (sinless) like the Father.
A perfect example of how this righteousness comes about is found in Zechariah chapter 3:1-7. That scripture says: “Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him”. Here Joshua, a high priest of the Lord, standing before the Lord. Joshua’s name in Hebrew is Yehotsadaq which means “the LORD is righteous,” His name is cross referenced in Hebrew to Strong’s number 3068 which defines it as “the proper name of the God of Israel”. The angel of the Lord is Malek in Hebrew meaning a direct messenger from God the Father (New American Standard Hebrew Dictionary). So here we have a righteous man standing before the Lord.
There was one problem: “Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments and standing before the angel”. Joshua was a righteous man but he was clothed with filthy garments of sin. And Satan was standing before him and the Lord accusing Joshua for appearing before the Lord in such a condition. But the Lord (messenger) said to Satan: “The LORD rebuke you, Satan! Indeed, the LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is this not a brand plucked from the fire?” The Lord saw Joshua for what he was- a righteous man who had gone through the fiery testings of the Lord. He saw that the filthy clothes were not his but the result of Satanic input by the accuser.
Joshua was standing before the Lord clothed in filthy garments [he was covered in sin] and Satan was standing with them accusing him of appearing before the Lord in filthy garments. Satan is known as the accuser, who accuses the righteous day and night. “Now the salvation, and the power, and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren has been thrown down, he who accuses them before our God day and night” (Revelation 12:10). The Lord did not accept what the accuser had to say here and ordered the filthy garments to be removed. These were not his filthy garments; they had been put upon him by Satan. The Lord simply rebuked Satan, who no longer had the power to effectively accuse, and clothed the man in festal robes and a clean turban.
It was as we have said. Satan, even after being a defeated foe due to Christ’s sacrifice, can still make the righteous look bad by transferring his filthiness on us. We simply need to have the filthiness removed, because it no longer belongs to us and thus be perfect (righteous) as is the Father.
The bottom line is that Christ’s sacrifice on the cross not only forgave our sin but gave us the ability to be made perfect like the Father by removing all our sin and sending it to whom it belonged-Satan. He remains the evil one, the condemned one, and will be for eternity. We must refuse his attempt to transfer his filthiness and unrighteous evil onto us. After Christ we have literally been made perfect, like the Father.
Catholicism and Mystery Babylon
The purpose of this article is not to disparage anyone or their beliefs. It is meant to expose the pagan history of Babylon which became the Roman Catholic Church after the fall of the Roman Empire. In Revelation there is a call to God’s people to “come out of her my people” (Revelation 18:2, 4). This passage describes the false Christian church and says: “I [John] heard another voice from heaven, saying, “Come out of her, my people, so that you will not participate in her sins and receive of her plagues; for her sins have piled up as high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. “And he cried out with a mighty voice, saying, “Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!... She has become a dwelling place of demons and a prison [haunt] of every unclean spirit, and a prison of every unclean and hateful bird”.
The information presented here is derived from the partial bibliography at the end of this article.
A.Origin of Babylonian Religion
The beginnings of Babylon go back to shortly after the flood when the great and renowned hunter Nimrod was born to Cush, son of Noah. “He was a mighty hunter before the LORD; therefore it is said, “Like Nimrod a mighty hunter before the LORD” (Genesis 10:8-10). The beginning of his kingdom was Babel [Babylon] and Erech and Accad and Calneh, in the land of Shinar” [now Mesopotamia including Iraq]. From that land he went forth into Assyria, and built Nineveh and Rehoboth-Ir and Calah, and Resen СКАЧАТЬ