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  •  Israel’s Temple Was a Church?

    Pastor John, 

    I listened to the Saturday fireside chat and you talked about making some changes to your Old Testament translation, in particular, using the word “church” instead of “house” and/or “temple” in certain cases. The example you brought up was Psalm 5:7: 

    “But as for me, in the abundance of your loving kindness will I enter your house. I will worship toward your holy temple in fear of you.” 

    You said that in this verse you suggest using the word “church” instead of “house” and leaving the word “temple” as it is. 

    I have heard you before talk about the origin of the English word “church”, and saying that it comes from the Greek word “kuriakon” (I have also translated the gospel tract titled “The Church?”* into Hungarian, where you say the same thing). You have also explained that kuriakon literally means “the house of a lord” or “a lord’s house” which, I assume, points to the pagan notion of there being “many gods and many lords”. 

    Now, here in Psalm 5:7, David is speaking/praying to Jehovah, so when he talks about entering “your house”, he must be referring to the holy temple (actually at this point it was still the Tabernacle, if I’m not mistaken) that God had chosen to put His presence into; the one place where the children of Israel could acceptably worship God, by keeping the ceremonies and rituals commanded to them through Moses. 

    So, my question is: Will it not communicate a wrong idea to the readers about what 

    David meant as Jehovah’s “house”, if you’re going to use the word “church” in this verse? Wasn’t God’s chosen place to worship (the Tabernacle and then later, the 

    Temple) indeed a unique, holy place in the Old Testament; and will not the word “church” (a house dedicated to ANY deity) actually question that idea of the Tabernacle/Temple being the ONLY place where God could be lawfully and acceptably worshipped? 

    I hope I was able to make my thoughts and my question clear.

    Zoli 

    =========

    Hi, Zoli.

    Yes, that was very clear, and understandable. Here is my reasoning for the change. 

    All earthly religion, whether in the ancient world or now, is church-based religion, except for the Faith revealed by Christ. His alone is a holy, Spirit-based religion. That was the wisdom revealed to the apostle Paul, and it set his gospel apart from even the gospel Peter preached, which included keeping the law.

    Israel’s religion, under the law of Moses, was as much church-based as were the religions of the heathen. Zeus’ temples were churches; Islam’s mosques are churches; Jewish and Buddhist temples are churches. What made Israel’s religion holy and unique is that God really did give that law; all others were man-made. In AD 325, when the emperor Constantine, with the apostate believers who joined him, devised the new religion of Christianity, that religion was church-based; it was not revealed to Constantine or those apostate believers by God. It became the religion of the empire (and the basis of Western society) because Rome had the muscle to enforce it, but it was, and is, a church-based faith; it was not from God.

    I don’t know a better way to communicate the uniqueness of Jesus’ blood-bought, Spirit-based Faith than to contrast it with all other religions, by calling them all, including Israel’s ancient religion, church-based. The church, which was central to Israel’s ancient religion, was the house of God in Jerusalem. To build it was commanded by God, but it was still a church, the only holy church that has ever been in the world.

    Paul’s way of saying “church-based” is “in the flesh”. All religions on earth, including ancient Israel’s, are “in the flesh”. Jesus delivered us from all fleshly, church-based religions, so that we may now worship God “in spirit and in truth” instead. I think that distinction is important enough to emphasize it by calling the house of God in the Old Testament what it really was: a church. To do so, I think, will help people understand Paul’s revelation from Jesus. That revelation was misunderstood and rejected in his time, even by most believers (cf. 2Tim. 1:15), and it remains misunderstood today.

    I hope that clarifies why we have decided to re-translate some biblical references to Israel’s temple as a church. 

    Pastor John 

    * Going to Jesus.com Tracts – The Church?

    Tell us what you think:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1891606496288383289

  • A Happy Slave

    Hey there! I’m pressing along with proofreading the Father and Son, Book 2,* and am in the chapter about the Temptation.  It is one of my favorites!
    I love the feelings and encouragement in that chapter, and Jesus especially touched me while reading it last week.   Many things touched me, but when I got to the section on “A new kind of warfare”, I got so saturated with the feelings of the Spirit that I had to stop reading and let it soak in!
    I got to this part, and I was done…saturated!   You said, “Our enemy is the appeal of unseen spirits to the desires of our flesh….yet, as with Jesus, if we choose God’s will over our own, we will win the battle against our fleshly nature and overcome the only world that matters.”  It reminded me of a time years ago when I was struggling with the feelings of that warfare.  I was very burdened to be feeling the struggle, and I felt like Jesus spoke to me and said, “I’m not tempted.”  (Of course not!) In other words, His Spirit, that is in me, is not tempted by anything of this world, and my way to win that struggle was getting myself more full of the Spirit.  It touched me to remember that and to have an “amen” inside to what you wrote.  It just added to the wonderful feelings I was feeling.
     (Then, not even realizing for a while they were talking about the same thing, a Sandy song came to mind and I listened to it for a while, “Make the World Go Away”!)
    Not over yet!  After all that, I was driving and praying, and those wonderful feelings continued to flood my soul!  I was being so blessed with the feelings, and tears were flowing down my face.  I was sure I looked like Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer by the time I got home,  and I didn’t want James to see me like that, but I couldn’t help it, so I told him when I came in the door that nothing was wrong and that I was tearing up because I felt so good! 🙌 Whew!  The feelings kept going!
    I had heard you say that same morning during coffee time that the attitude of a servant solves a lot of things. I guess that was influencing my prayers and thoughts.  So true!  As I was unloading the car, I was feeling so good and thanking God for it and told Jesus, “I’m your happy slave!” (I felt my new creature coming to the surface!)  I started singing “I’m a prisoner of love, a slave to the Master” and “my soul doesn’t want to be free!”  He is a wonderful Master!
    These feelings overcome the world!
    I love that I get to proofread for you…I get so much out of it.  It is an opportunity for me to be thorough, like Gary says, and take in the messages.
    And I’m thankful for the encouragement recently to testify.  It’s important to the body.  This may be a “rope” someone else needs.  It is embarrassing to admit that I’ve ever felt weak and struggled with the flesh, but the flesh is something we all have to overcome, and knowing the truth about that warfare helps us be better able to overcome it…Thank you for sharing your life experiences with us!
    You have taught us that the strength to overcome the world (our fleshly nature) is to be full of the Spirit and walk in it – be led by it.  The old man has been given the death blow and will die if we don’t nurture him back to health.  We need to feed the new man and starve the old man, die DAILY and keep our gift stirred.  And we need to know who we are in Jesus so wrong spirits can’t convince us otherwise!  (I loved what was said in morning coffee yesterday…that wrong thing is not us anymore!) Influences are real!  Be careful who you spend your time with!  I am so thankful for this understanding and growing in it! This is strength!
    Well, I just wanted to tell about it!  😊❤️🙌
    Thank you, Jesus!!!
    Still feeling this!
    Lyn
    Happy and content to be a slave!❤️

  • Rejoice & Be Glad!

    Good morning, John. 

    I read the print-out from this morning’s fireside chat, “The Reproach of His Glory”.* The scriptures there reminded me of an encouraging experience from Jesus that I cherish. 

    These are some of the scriptures from Luke 6: “Blessed are you when men hate you and when they exclude you, and revile and cast out your name as evil for the sake of the Son of man.  Rejoice in that day, and dance! Behold, your reward is great in heaven!”

    Here is the testimony.  It was October, 2012.  Tom & I were on our way to a get-together at your house.  We had just moved here.  A loved one of ours, who had the holy Ghost and had a place in the hearts of God’s people, had gone out into the world to marry a man who cared nothing for Jesus. This day was their wedding day.  I felt the heaviness that often comes along with feeling the pain of a wayward soul, and I said to Tom; “I just can’t get a hold of that scripture about ‘rejoice and be glad.’  I wish I could feel that, but I just can’t grasp it.”

    We then turned on the latest meeting music CD, dated September, 2012, and the first song began: “Do you have your wedding invitation….to that marriage supper in the sky!?” Quite suddenly, I laughed & said, “I got it!!”   I was thrilled to have that special, outstanding feeling that I did not cause to happen.  I could not cause that joy to come upon me! Jesus did it in his mercy & kindness.  It was thrilling & quite memorable, even to this day.  It is one more reminder of what Jesus can do.  He rescues us from our own thoughts & feelings & gives us joy.  Woohoo!
    Suzi

    ===

    The Reproach of His Glory

    O sons of man, how long will my glory be a reproach?  You love strife; you seek after a lie!  Selah.

    Psalm 4:2

       When Israel’s prophet and king David, and “all the house of Israel”, brought the ark of God into Jerusalem, trumpets sounded and everyone was happy.  David was so full of joy that he danced before all the people as the ark proceeded toward the tent he had prepared for it.  David’s soul was absolutely thrilled at the prospect of having God’s ark with him in Jerusalem.  With his whole body and soul, David was saying to all the people, “Praise Him with a blast of a shofar!  Praise Him with harp and lyre!  Praise Him with timbrel and dance!  Praise Him with strings and flute!  Praise Him with clashing cymbals!  Praise Him with crashing cymbals!  Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!  Hallelujah!”

       Unfortunately, there was one that day who did not join the king in his joy, for David’s wife, “Michal, the daughter of Saul, looked down through the window and saw King David leaping and whirling before Jehovah, and she despised him in her heart.”  The glory of God that David was feeling was contemptible to her, and she reproached him for it: “How the king of Israel was glorified today, who exposed himself today in the eyes of the handmaids of his slaves, like one of the worthless men who shamelessly expose themselves!”

       When those who do not love God see the glory of God on His people, they despise it as if it is something shameful, and they will speak evil of both it and the people on whom that glory rests.  But David’s response to his wife’s reproach is an example for us all.  He did not back up an inch.  He said to her, “Yes, I played before the Lord!  And I will be more contemptible than this!”   

       Among the many riches of the kingdom of God is one which we often try to avoid, though we are exhorted to gladly receive it: the reproach of Christ.  Are we rich in that?  Moses “esteemed the reproach of Christ to be greater riches than the treasures of Egypt, for he looked ahead to the reward.”

       Consider the value of the reproach of Christ, and do not flinch when God uses the world to heap it upon you.  Be like David, and tell those who despise the glory of God, “I will be more contemptible than that!”  In other words, “I will rejoice in the glory of God more than that!”

    Luke 6

    1. “Blessed are you when men hate you and when they exclude you, and revile and cast out your name as evil for the sake of the Son of man.
    2. Rejoice in that day, and dance!  Behold, your reward is great in heaven!  For their fathers used to do such things to the prophets.”

    Hebrews 13

    1. Wherefore, Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate.
    2. So then, let us go to him outside the camp, bearing his reproach.

    1Peter 4

    1. If you are being reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you.  On their part, he is blasphemed, but on your part, he is glorified.

    jdc

    Tell Us what you think:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1891566263542903224

  • False Prophets

    Pastor John,

    Is a false apostle in the same kind of condition as a false prophet?  Meaning, just as a false prophet in the Old Testament once had to be a real prophet to qualify to be a false one, were false apostles once true apostles who had rejected the truth for another way?

    Jerry

    ==========

    Hi, Jerry.

    I don’t think that false prophets in the Old Testament had to be true prophets first, though that was the case with some of them.  What I have tried to convey, and perhaps poorly, is that false prophets were always men who belonged to God.  The Old Testament never calls the prophets of heathen nations false prophets because those prophets did not belong to God.

    Likewise, the “false apostles” of the New Testament were men who believed  in Jesus and truly belonged to God.  They were not unbelievers.  After all, Paul said they claimed to be apostles of Christ.  An apostle is one who has been sent  (that’s what the word means), and even though those false apostles were not sent by God to teach what they were teaching, they had been born again.

    ==========

    I was thinking about how you described Paul’s opinion of men in his day who taught lies about Jesus, versus the kindness God spoke to your father when he instructed him how to treat similar men.

    The apostle Paul was disgusted with the men that he described as speaking lies about Jesus.  I wondered if those men once had the truth but preferred a lie for whatever gain or reason.  While the man whom preacher Clark saw on television (that day when God told him not to speak evil of anyone who was speaking well of His Son) was perhaps giving his all out of a zeal for Jesus, but was teaching wrongly because God didn’t send him to teach and he had never really known the right way of the Lord.

    They sure are two different kinds of hearts.  God is very kind to those who ignorantly do the wrong thing, but do it with their whole heart.  I know that no one can know what God is thinking unless he makes it known, but that sounds like his goodness.

    Jerry D.

    ==========

    Yes, Jerry, that is true.  And that may have been the case when the Lord spoke to my father.

    It is certainly true that the false apostles of Paul’s day had heard the truth which Paul preached, and had rejected it, claiming instead that God sent them with a contrary gospel.  That is very different from those who have never heard it, and God is very patient and merciful with such.  We know that is true because we all have been in that boat.

    Pastor John

    Tell us what you think:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1891561902615969930

     

  • Responses to: Zoli’s thoughts from Leviticus 26

    I loved these verses from Leviticus because I thought that these verses in Leviticus were prophetic regarding the holy Ghost entering our bodies.  The Father and Son take up their abode IN us, in our midst.  He writes these laws that we can now obey, in our hearts.  And not only does it make US happy, but that makes the Father and Son VERY happy…. because the Son is the happiest of all.  And the thing that will make Him SUPER happy, is when His children are ONE, and can walk in unity.

    Gary

    ==========

    Amen, Gary.  Jesus said it is the Father’s GOOD PLEASURE to give us the kingdom!

    jdc

    ==========

    This is so good, Zoli!

    I had a similar feeling when I woke up today. It was like a thought that went with a new feeling of how God sees giving us His kind of knowledge and feelings to grow. It felt like the happiness/satisfaction when you’re teaching someone a new thing and they really absorb it. If we’re feeling happy, thankful, a deeper feeling from God, etc… it’s because He already had it. He already felt what you’re feeling now in the spirit. He understands what we’re feeling completely! He created these feelings for us to have and was waiting for us to be in a place to receive it. Let us be ready to receive whatever God wants for us to experience! 

    Hahhaahhhaa. That makes us happy to even think about God making ‘happy’ to give it to us! He could have just left us here to die, but we’re alive because He cares about us. He created these feelings for us!  Be happy with God! 

    Wendy 

    ==========

    Pastor John,

    I was reading Leviticus 26 this morning, where God lays out for the children of Israel what He will do to them if they will obey him and keep His statutes (verses 3-12), and what He will do if the opposite happens and they refuse to follow His commandments (verses 14-39). 

    Verses 11-12 stuck out to me: 

    “And I will put my tabernacle in your midst, and my soul will not abhor you. And I will walk about in your midst, and I will be your God, and you will be my people.”

    God’s promise that He will “walk about in your midst” reminded me of the kind of relationship He had with Adam and Eve before the fall. Well, at least Genesis 3:8 seems to suggest that it was not unusual for God, back then, to walk about “in the garden in the evening breeze”, that is, in the very place where Adam and Eve lived.  And then I thought, Wow, this has been God’s heart from the beginning; for Him to be able to walk in the midst of His people, to have communion with them, that the whole point of choosing Israel, bringing them out of Egypt, and then giving them all the commandments through Moses was to restore the kind of relationship with men that He used to have with them in the garden, before Adam and Eve sinned. 

    And then I had a thought I had never had before.  When God promised Israel that if they obey Him, He will “walk about in their midst” and that He will be their God, and they will be His people, it was something God desired, something He really wanted from the depth of His heart.  When He made this promise, I think He was more excited about fulfilling it (even the word “giddy” came to mind), than the children of Israel were, then or any time later in their history. 

    In the past, when I read verses like this, I always imagined God’s mindset to be something like this: “If you, my lowly creatures, do what I require, and I will be satisfied with your conduct, I will have pity on you, and will allow you to enjoy my company a little bit.”  The thought that having fellowship with us is something God actually loves and enjoys, that He is literally HAPPY to “walk in our midst” is a kind of thought that had never entered my mind.  I surely didn’t attribute such thoughts and feelings to God while reading the Old Testament, but I’m pretty sure that has had an effect on how I imagined Him thinking about me or feeling towards me here and now.

    Wow, this is something I didn’t even think of, when I started writing this e-mail! 

    I pray that God will keep cleansing my heart and my mind of wrong thoughts and ideas about who He is and what He is like and that my thoughts and my feelings (about everything and everyone, including myself) would become His thoughts and His feelings.  I pray that I won’t allow superstitious fear to stop me from learning, embracing and loving new thoughts about God and His Son; thoughts I probably would have never dared to think before. 

    Zoli

    Comments welcome:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1888992343996428716

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • Some thoughts from Leviticus 26

    Pastor John,

    I was reading Leviticus 26 this morning, where God lays out for the children of Israel what He will do to them if they will obey him and keep His statutes (verses 3-12), and what He will do if the opposite happens and they refuse to follow His commandments (verses 14-39). 

    Verses 11-12 stuck out to me: 

    “And I will put my tabernacle in your midst, and my soul will not abhor you. And I will walk about in your midst, and I will be your God, and you will be my people.”

    God’s promise that He will “walk about in your midst” reminded me of the kind of relationship He had with Adam and Eve before the fall. Well, at least Genesis 3:8 seems to suggest that it was not unusual for God, back then, to walk about “in the garden in the evening breeze”, that is, in the very place where Adam and Eve lived.  And then I thought, Wow, this has been God’s heart from the beginning; for Him to be able to walk in the midst of His people, to have communion with them, that the whole point of choosing Israel, bringing them out of Egypt, and then giving them all the commandments through Moses was to restore the kind of relationship with men that He used to have with them in the garden, before Adam and Eve sinned. 

    And then I had a thought I had never had before.  When God promised Israel that if they obey Him, He will “walk about in their midst” and that He will be their God, and they will be His people, it was something God desired, something He really wanted from the depth of His heart.  When He made this promise, I think He was more excited about fulfilling it (even the word “giddy” came to mind), than the children of Israel were, then or any time later in their history. 

    In the past, when I read verses like this, I always imagined God’s mindset to be something like this: “If you, my lowly creatures, do what I require, and I will be satisfied with your conduct, I will have pity on you, and will allow you to enjoy my company a little bit.”  The thought that having fellowship with us is something God actually loves and enjoys, that He is literally HAPPY to “walk in our midst” is a kind of thought that had never entered my mind.  I surely didn’t attribute such thoughts and feelings to God while reading the Old Testament, but I’m pretty sure that has had an effect on how I imagined Him thinking about me or feeling towards me here and now.

    Wow, this is something I didn’t even think of, when I started writing this e-mail! 

    I pray that God will keep cleansing my heart and my mind of wrong thoughts and ideas about who He is and what He is like and that my thoughts and my feelings (about everything and everyone, including myself) would become His thoughts and His feelings.  I pray that I won’t allow superstitious fear to stop me from learning, embracing and loving new thoughts about God and His Son; thoughts I probably would have never dared to think before. 

    Zoli

    Tell us what you think:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1888960319755547115

     

  • Saving Noah before the Flood

    I had a thought last night while watching the video on the Flood that I have never had before.

    (Bing Videos)

    If people had believed that there was something to Noah building the Ark, they would have torn it apart or tried to take it over, maybe even killed him for it.  That ark was huge, and surely they noticed Noah building this ark, and yet, I cannot find anything said about their reactions to him.  God destroyed the earth because He saw that every thought and every intention of man’s heart was evil.  It made me think that God surely shielded Noah from the evil of those around him so he could build the ark.  Today you cannot leave a nice vehicle running in your driveway for fear of thieves.  In Noah’s days, a big sturdy boat or strong cut lumber would have been at risk. 

    There is no telling how much God has saved us from by hiding the truth from evil hearts. 

    Just thinking out loud. 

    Genesis 6:

    1. And Jehovah saw that man’s wickedness was great on the earth and that every thought and intention of his heart was altogether evil every day.
    2. And Jehovah regretted that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved to His heart.
    3. And Jehovah said, “I will wipe man, whom I have created, from off the face of the earth, as well as the beasts, the creeping things, and the flying creatures of the sky. For it grieves me that I have made them.”
    4. But Noah found favor in the eyes of Jehovah.

    Beth

    Comments welcome:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1886590295464091766

  • The Flood

    John,

    This morning around the fire, we all were talking about the Flood video we watched last night at your house. (Bing Videos)  We got onto the subject of fish fossils in different layers of sediment, some being fresh water and some being saltwater species, and not being found at the same level with each other.  I was thinking about that some and I was thinking “what different does that make?”

    I got curious about salt water in the bible.  There is not one mention of the sea being salt water anywhere in the bible, before the flood or after, that I could find anyway.  The only place that it is mentioned is in James 3:12: “A fig tree cannot bear olives, can it, my brothers? Or a grapevine, figs? Just so, no fountain yields salt water and fresh.”

    I started thinking about what you said about how some men take the present and think it represents what happened in the past, and the way we see it now is the way it has always been.  But that is not true.  What we have now is the result of what happened in the past. What if all the water was fresh water until after the Flood?  Or later?  We know that the seas were gathered in one place just as the land mass was one land at creation, then God put the firmament in the midst of the waters, and it divided the waters from the waters (Gen: 1:7).  Was the rainwater salt water when it was divided?  What if God tearing apart the earth created salt water from all the minerals being poured into the waters that covered the whole earth?  We are not told, I know, but it was interesting just looking it up today in the bible and not seeing the sea being called salt water anywhere that I could find.  Maybe you know some place I missed.

    Stuart

    =========

    What an interesting thought!  Was the sea before the Flood salt water?   Maybe someone knows how to tell from the bone structure of fossils whether a fish is a fresh water or salt water fish.  But the pre-Flood world was so different from the world that exists now, we would have to ask how can anyone know for sure that the differing bone structure in fish before the Flood signified a difference between fresh and salt water fish.  Everything in the world, even the physics in nature, changed with the Flood.

    Thank you for the thought.  When we see Jesus, we can ask him all about it.

    Pastor John

    Tell us what you think:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1886587477453889779

     

     

  • 1Corinthians 11

    Hey,

    I had another thought about 1Corinthians 11:17 to the end of the chapter, and I wanted to throw it out there.   I wonder if the Corinthians were starting to participate in a Christian-like eating ceremony and calling it the Lord’s supper, and Paul was having to set that straight.  Seems reasonable that he would be talking about both earthly food at same time as explaining the Lord’s supper to them.  Just a thought.
    Lyn
    ==========
    Hi Lyn.
    That may have been the case, Lyn, but if they were turning from Paul’s gospel and adding ceremonies to their faith, it seems odd they would have inventing a new ceremony instead of performing the ceremonies God gave to Israel, as other Gentile believers were doing (e.g. the Galatians).  Still, it is possible.  We know that Christians invented many ceremonies for themselves after Jerusalem was destroyed in AD 70 and that they have continued practicing them to this day.
    Thanks for the comment.
    Pastor John
    Tell us what you think:

  • Confessing Christ

    Pastor John,

    RE: Matthew 21:43–44:

    1. Therefore, I tell you that the kingdom of God shall be taken from you and be given to a nation that will yield its fruit.
    2.  And the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but whoever it falls on, it will crush him.”

    Confessing Christ now is “falling on the rock.”  Confessing Him in the end is the rock falling on you!

    Amen!

    Jerry

    Tell us what you think:

    https://x.com/WitnessofSpirit/status/1886582274063225003

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