Blizzards and Dragons

Okay, so real quick, we're going to pray and then we'll get started. We'll take a look at questions first and then, it's always my intention to get to Jeremiah and sometimes

I have to say, well, today we're actually going to do a normal Bible study and we'll throw a couple questions in.

But I understand that y 'all have a lot of questions and that is okay. So, let's pray, we will get started.

Lord Jesus, again, as we open up your Word, we humbly come to you recognizing we have nothing apart from you.

We don't have the ability to breathe, to stand, our existence comes from you.

And also, that because of our fall into sin, we are easily tempted and deceived by our own sinful flesh, by the world and by the devil.

And so, we ask that through your Holy Spirit, we may rightly understand what you have revealed there, so that we may be truly convicted of all the ways in which we have grieved you by our disobedience to your commands.

And also, may you grow in us a growing confidence in the forgiveness of sins that we have in Christ.

And also then through the Holy Spirit, give us strength to mortify our sinful flesh and not give in to the passions of this world and the things that tempt us in that way.

But instead, that we would bear fruit and love towards neighbor, we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.

Okay. Hang on a second here. I'm going to put this on. You've got announcements.

Oh yeah. I've got to do announcements real quick. Okay. Hold on a second here. I'll throw those in my wife. So, my wife keeps me on track.

I'm such a creature of habit. You get me out of my normal environment and you just change one thing up and then

I start forgetting everything. All right. So, a little bit of a note here on the announcements.

Normal week this week, blizzards or not, we're still having our online catechism classes.

I'm so thankful that we've become really good at this online stuff because when it starts snowing and blowing, they start closing schools and roads and things like that.

In North Dakota, we live in a winter desolate wasteland. And so, we know it's bad when they're closing roads up here.

But all that being said, youth catechism, this Monday night at 10 PM Central for our

Aussie human. Noon on Tuesday for the other parts of the other group of our youth.

And then Thursday, February 24th, online catechism classes at noon and 7 PM Central.

And then of course, this week also we have our men's and women's

Bible study on Saturday. Eight for the men, 9 .30 AM for the women. And then,

I feel like I have to explain this next one. So, a little bit of a note. March 11th,

Kongsvinger is holding our annual fundraiser charity event. So, Kongsvinger, since I've been here, has been very faithful in putting on charity events for the purpose of raising funds for worthy charities.

This year, we're raising money for a local crisis pregnancy center, as well as Lutherans for Life.

And here's the fun bit. We got Kyle Mann from the Babylon Bee to be our special speaker.

This is just nuts. I love it. So, but just a little bit of a note.

So, if you're coming in person, you need to RSVP. So, if you're local or if you want to fly in, you can do that.

But Kyle Mann is going to join us via Zoom, just so you know. But we're going to have a dinner and all this kind of stuff.

We also need those of you who attend Kongsvinger regularly, we need help.

We need volunteers, people to serve and donate food. So, sign up sheets are going to be in the fellowship hall, but good luck getting to it.

So, my wife said, that's next week, Chris. How is it that I reach into my bag and pull out the wrong words at just the right time?

It's a skill. It's a spiritual gift. So, you get the idea. But the sign up sheet will be there next week.

So, think about that if you get the idea. And then those of you who are joining us online, pay attention.

You guys are going to be able to join us for that event. So, you want to participate, you can.

But no, we're going to shake you down for money for other groups. So, you know, just so you know, you show up, you're going to be pitched to support the

Crisis Pregnancy Center and the Lutherans for Life. You get the idea. All right. Let's see here. Of course, if you'd like to be on our mailing list and things like that, you can do so.

Just email secretary at kongsvingerchurch .org. Oh, yeah. A little bit of a note, we're having an issue with Vimeo.

So, if you've been trying to access our catechism classes online, the weirdest thing has happened. And that is, is that the folder name shows up, but none of the contents are showing up.

So, that is a Vimeo issue. And so, yeah,

I'm going to be on. I hate calling tech support. So, I'm going to be calling tech support tomorrow to address this issue.

So, stay tuned. I'll let you know how it goes. Thank you for calling tech support. My name is Jim. How can

I help you? Anyway. You need more oil for your computer. Thanks. Yes. I totally agree.

I find that 1030, that weight is perfect for my computer. You sure you're not going to go to tractor supply?

Yeah. Oh, that's right. That mineral oil from that guy who claimed that his

Bible was pushing out oil. It turns out he was buying mineral oil from the local tractor supply company.

Aye yi yi. Okay. All right. So, let's dive into our text, shall we?

Let's see here. And I'm going to actually back up. I'm going to take a look at our questions real quick.

Okay. Let's see. Coffee is a must. Amen. I like the way you're thinking there. Okay. Question for Sunday School.

Did Job fall into this category? The testing and suffering really knocks me down. I was told

I should suffer well. I crumble under the suffering. So, you're going to note that the answer to your question,

Rachel, is that not initially, but eventually. Job kind of, he ended up kind of pushing things a little too far.

And so, when you read Job, the best way to understand it is that Job has no clue why he's being made to suffer.

And he is suffering horrifically. Okay. He's lost all of his kids.

They're all dead. All of his animal assets, gone.

They're just gone. His house is burned down. He has boils on his skin. And when his comforters show up, the best thing that they did for Job is they said nothing for a week.

Okay. That's actually a good way to help somebody. But then they just opened their stupid mouths. Okay. And like, one of the guys is like super self -righteous.

The other guy is a prosperity preacher, you know, from like Ken Copeland and Rhema. And the other one's really kind of just all over the map.

All right. And so, his comforters are offering him theological advice as to how to overcome his issues.

And so, when you read Job in that way, you said, these people, their theology is whack.

That's the point. Okay. So, what I find fascinating as a pastor is that over and again, people who

I pastor who are made to suffer, Job's comforters are right there with those folks too.

Okay. So, may I suggest maybe a rereading of Job?

Now, there is this other guy who shows up, this fourth guy who shows up.

Listen to him. He's got some pretty good theology. He's actually on track. He's like the one who brings some sanity into this.

But at some point, Job is pretty much demanding of God an answer and maybe accusing

God of actually doing him wrong. And that's when the most terrifying part of Job occurs.

Hang on a second here. I'm going to pull over this way. Hang on a second here. Because when you see it, it's like, oh my.

Now, remember, Job is never told why. Never told what he's going through.

And so, let's see here. Let's see here. All right.

So, the Lord answers Job. Okay. Now, so earlier on,

Job legitimately, he kind of buckles under the load and is demanding something of God and is accusing

God of doing him wrong. So, the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind. All right.

So, let me see if I can find the, well, let's just think of this way. So, here in North Dakota, in the summer months, we get those big, tall supercell thunderstorms.

If you've ever seen these things, they're just impressive. So, God comes thundering down the highway in a supercell thunderstorm, drops a tornado, and has a little chat with Job.

And he says, who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man.

I'll question you and you make it known to me. Okay. Now, God knows full well why Job is suffering.

Job has never been told. Okay. And then God says this, where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?

Tell me if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements? Surely you know. Or who stretched out the line upon it?

On what were its bases sunk? Or who laid its cornerstone when the morning stars sang together and the sons of God shouted for joy?

Or who shut in the sea with the doors and when it burst out from the womb? When I made clouds its garment, thick darkness its swaddling band, then prescribed the limits for it and set bars for doors.

And he said, thus far shall you come and no farther. Here shall your proud ways be stayed.

Have you commanded the morning since your days began and caused the dawn to know its place? So that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth and the wicked be shaken out of it?

It is changed like clay under the seal and its features stand out like a garment from the wicked.

Their light is withheld and their uplifted arm is broken. You can kind of see that this particular line of questioning is basically designed to put poor

Job in his place, the guy who's been suffering horrifically, and basically say, you don't know what you're talking about, dude.

You have no clue. And so here's the thing, you know, over and again, the person who says,

I know the reason why you're suffering. You don't have enough faith. You haven't tithed enough or, you know, here's the thing.

It is above my pay grade to tell anybody why they're suffering. I can say it is in general, a result of humanity's fall into sin, but specifically, listen, okay, unlike the people who show up on Sid Roth's program,

I am unable to go to heaven and listen in, eavesdrop on the conversations that the Trinity is having.

Okay. So, all of that being said, the one thing I do know is that scripture is actually quite clear that God does discipline us and that in, you know, in the midst of our sufferings, we ought not to despair and they do come from his hand.

So, let me kind of show you what I mean by this. In Proverbs chapter 20,

Proverbs chapter 20, near the end, let's see here. Here we go.

Verse 30. This is not one I've ever heard preached at a Word of Faith church. Blows that wound, cleanse away evil.

Strokes make clean the innermost parts. It's a tough word to say, but the reality is this, is that I am actually shocked that I am not suffering more physically in my own body, because I can tell you right now, there is a lot of evil that needs to be cleansed out of me.

All right. And so, the idea then is, is that I can say with certainty that God will cause all things to work together for good for those who love him and that neither death nor life or suffering or persecution or any of these things separates us from the love of Christ.

And so, I know I can say, I can't say specifically what your lesson is if you're suffering in your body.

I don't know. I just legitimately don't know. I'm not God, but I do know that God will work that in you.

And that when our sufferings come, well, we keep our eyes on Christ.

And sometimes we have to ask for the ability to exist just for the next minute.

I remember a few years ago, I ended up in the hospital because I hurt my back of all things.

Really, really legitimately hurt my back. And back pain, I've been told by my wife is really bad, but it's not as bad as childbirth.

Okay. Whatever. Okay. She always reminds me. So, there I am. I'm in the hospital.

I cannot even, I'm like in the most awkward position because I can't lay down. I can't sit down.

I kind of have to lean over in order to kind of ease the pain a little bit. And she gets right in my face and she goes, and this isn't as bad as childbirth.

You just keep that in mind. Okay. But, I mean,

I, and here's the thing. It felt like from the time

I got into the examination room until they finally gave me something to ease my pain, it felt like a week.

Okay. Every second was an hour. And I literally didn't know how

I was going to get to the next minute because the one that I was in was so excruciating.

And here's the thing. In the midst of all of that, Christ hasn't abandoned me.

And he doesn't abandon us in the midst of our suffering. And yeah. And here's the thing.

It's an absolute lie that Christ will never give you more than you can bear. That's not true. That's absolutely patently false.

I'm pretty sure Christ gives us a lot of stuff that's way over our heads. Okay. And what do you do in the midst of it?

You cry out to him and you just keep your eyes focused on Christ.

And here's the fun thing. Suffering has this amazing ability to kind of like cause everything else to fall away where like the only thing you have left is

Jesus. That's kind of the interesting bit of it. So, all that being said, blows and wounds cleanse away evil strokes and make clean the innermost parts.

So, I can say that these are some of the biblical ways of framing all of this.

And Job eventually, after he's been chastised by God, could you imagine God coming at you with a tornado and talking to you out of the tornado?

You stand there and I'm going to question you like a man. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Right? You know, what does

Job do? He repents. Okay. He eventually repents. So, yeah, that's the thing.

I don't run the universe and I gave up trying a long time ago. I was terrible at it.

I could, you know, just, uh, you know, anyway, you get the idea. So, all right.

So, let's see. Sunday school request. Please explain Lucifer's fall, how he tempted Eve, the serpent, and where he is now, along with the difference between seraphim and cherubim.

I remember something about the serpent. Serpent in the garden being something like a dragon. Wow. Okay. That's a special topic.

Cool. All right. Hang on a second here. So, yeah. We're not getting to Jeremiah today. Yeah, I get that feeling,

Josh. I, you know, yes, I'm getting a download. It has something to do with the devil.

Okay. Okay. So, Chuck, let's kind of start,

I need a Hebrew text to pull this off, okay. So, we're going to start in Isaiah chapter six.

Oh, by the way, you know, when you think about people who've received sicknesses from God, Uzziah was one of them.

You know the story of Uzziah? This is a guy who started off well, king of Judah, and he got a little full of himself and he wanted to offer incense in the temple and that's not for him to do.

And so, he brought an censer into the temple in order to offer an incense offering to God.

And the priest actually confronted him and told him, no, you can't do this. And he didn't listen to them.

And God struck him with leprosy. He spent the rest of his life a leper and he lived a long time.

Okay. Kind of a fascinating bit. So, it says this, in the year that King Uzziah died,

I saw the Lord. So, this one's actually Adonai. I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high, lifted up, and the train of his robe filled the temple.

Above him stood the seraphim. Okay. That's an interesting word.

It really is an interesting word. And I'll explain why in a minute. Each had six wings.

With two, he covered his face. With two, he covered his feet. With two, he flew. One called to another and they said, this is your triple holy, kadosh, kadosh, kadosh,

Yahweh, Sabaoth. And then you got the whole earth is full of your glory, right?

So, kadosh, kadosh, kadosh. Holy, holy, holy. Why three holies? Because there's Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

You kind of get the idea. But here, you've got this weird thing. And by the way, the word seraphim appears in other contexts in the scriptures.

Okay. Let me explain. Okay. So, let me, I'm going to do this from memory. I think it's Numbers 20. All right.

Let me do this. Duplicate tab and Numbers chapter 20.

No, that's the waters of Meribah, death of Miriam, strike the rock. Let me think. Let me think about this.

It might be 13. Hold on. Spice and Indicanin. No, I need

Bronze Serpent and Serpent.

All right. Numbers 21. All right. There it is. Okay. Numbers 21. Okay. So, here's where we see this, we see seraphim again.

All right. So, Bronze Serpent. So, from Mount Hor, they set out, by the way, to the Red Sea, go around the land of Edom, and people became impatient on the way.

The people spoke against God and against Moses. Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no food.

There's no water. We loathe this worthless food. So, then Yahweh sent, and listen to the, listen to the, to the, the, how do

I explain this? The Nechashim Seraphim. He sent fiery serpents among the people.

Nechashim Seraphim. So, that's spelled N -A phlegm, you know, and then you get the, and then you get the seraphim.

Sorry. Stole that one from, from that, the guy who does the ventriloquism.

All right. But so, so Nechashim Seraphim. So, the idea here is, just a literal translation of seraphim would be burning ones.

But the implication is, is that the seraphim themselves, that's an actual serpentine description.

So, I always like to show my catechumens this and sit there and go, all right, so there's, there's, you know,

Isaiah, he's in the, he's in the temple, he's a priest, he's serving, and all of a sudden he can see what's really going on. And he sees the seraphim, and they each have six wings, with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew.

Okay. So, what do you call a serpent that has wings and feet?

I saw that, Lily. It's a dragon. Yeah. You call it a dragon. Okay. So, so when you, when you see this little bit of information in Isaiah, and that's the thing, when it comes to demonology in scripture, you got about this much, including the chief of the demons himself,

Lucifer. So, so data point number one, in the throne room of God, in his actual presence are seraphim, plural.

These are basically winged serpents with feet. I'm going to go dragon here.

I think that's not a bad way to describe them. So, when we take a look then at Genesis chapter three, hang on a second here,

I got a little too clicky, Genesis chapter three. Okay. It begins with, now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the

Lord God had made. And when you, watch the details here. Okay. So, here we have a talking serpent, but when we get to the curses, okay, after, after the sin is committed to the serpent, because you have done this curse, are you above all livestock, above all the feasts of the field, on your belly you shall go.

So, this serpent could talk and it has feet that were taken away from it.

That's weird. I'm just saying that's weird. Okay. And then when you consider the imagery of the bronze serpent itself, let me come back to Numbers 21.

So, here we got this wonderful story. So, all right. So, from Mount Hor, the people set out by the way to go around the land of Edom.

The people became impatient on the way. The people spoke against God, against Moses. Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness?

Are we there yet? My brother keeps touching me. There's no food. There's no water. We loathe this worthless manna.

So, then Yahweh sent fiery serpents among the people. They bit the people so that many people of Israel died.

And then the people came to Moses and said, we have sinned. We have spoken against Yahweh and against you.

Pray to Yahweh that he may take away the serpents from us. So, Moses prayed for the people and Yahweh said to Moses, make a fiery serpent.

Make? Okay. And then set it on a pole and everyone who's bitten when he sees it shall live.

And so, Moses made a bronze serpent, set it on a pole, and if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.

Now, here's the best bit. Okay. Bronze serpent. So, years ago,

I actually, I preached a sermon at a Higher Things conference and I think the name of it was

Snakebit. And in there, I make this connection, basically saying, now, if you think about this in the types and shadows, are we not all snakebit?

Yeah. Okay. But the venom was put into the ears of our parents. All right.

You know, you will not surely die. God knows that you eat of it on the day you like gods, knowing good and evil.

Right? So, we're all snakebit. But here's kind of the fun part about all of this.

So, again, we're kind of working the serpentine themes of scripture. When you look at the

Gospel of John chapter three, and in fact, I know I can do this. If I were to ask

Louise, drop of a hat, John 3 .16. Okay. She'd be able to tell me what John 3 .16 is.

All right. Remember that crazy guy with a rainbow afro who would sit behind the uprights at the football games, the

Super Bowl and stuff like that. He would have John 3 .16. All right. So, Louise, you turn your microphone on.

You want to tell us just from memory real quick, on the spot, John 3 .16. Oh, I was telling you about Rainbow Man.

He was, when I worked for ESPN, he used to send us letters all the time. He just wanted publicity. Of course he did.

Okay. All right. So, you're going to tell us about Rainbow Man. All right. He's now in jail, but that's... Rainbow Man's in jail?

Okay. He threatened someone, and he's threatened people, and he came to a stadium armed.

Yeah, that's a career limiting move. Okay. All right. God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten

Son, that whosoever believed in him would not perish, but had everlasting life. Right on. John 3 .16.

You know what? By heart. Most people know it. Okay. But if I asked you, would you please recite for me the three verses before it?

Put me on the spot, William. That's nice. From memory? No. Okay. We don't normally memorize.

Okay. So, let's take a look then. So, for God so loved the world, we're going to just fact check you,

Louise. Trust but verify. It's a good thing I learned from Reagan, right? So, God so loved the world that he gave his only

Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. Wonderful. But let me scroll back up.

Okay. All right. All right. So, here we go. Verse 13. No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the

Son of Man. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the

Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

So, here's the best bit. The serpent, the bronze serpent on the pole is a type and shadow of Christ.

And how is it a type and shadow of Christ? Well, Christ takes the venom of the serpent into himself, bleeds and dies for it.

And I always like to point out, how is anti -venom made? People who've actually been envenomated, their blood can be used for anti -venom.

Have you ever thought about that? So, Christ has the anti -venom of sin running through him. And it's just fun when you start kind of working out the themes.

But all of that being said then, is it any wonder that we see the devil depicted as a dragon, as a serpent?

That's kind of the point. And you get hints at it from Isaiah 6. But here's the other part then.

If you want to talk about the devil's fall, there's two passages that hint at it, or at least describe it in part.

And Isaiah 14 is your first text. And this is an interesting one.

How you are fallen from heaven, O day star, son of the dawn. Okay.

Now, in Jerome's Latin Vulgate, he translates son of the dawn as Lucifer.

And that may not be the, that's where we actually get the name Lucifer from. Let me see if that shows up in the King James real quick.

Hold on a second here. Yeah, here it is.

So, and this tradition then starting with Jerome, kind of gets plugged into the

King James. How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning.

I think the ESV is actually right in its translation, son of the dawn, you know, because, you know,

Ben, excuse me a second here. Ben Shachar, Ben Shachar, that literally means son of the dawn.

But it gets translated as Lucifer by Jerome, and then the King James translates it Lucifer. So, that's where we actually get the name from.

I think it may have been something that Jerome kind of plugged into the biblical text. It may not have rightly belong there.

But that being said, we see in these, in this language, something that really, it begins to peel back and we understand what's going on here.

So, how you are fallen from heaven, O day star, son of the dawn, how you are cut down to the ground, you who laid low the nations.

You said in your heart, I will ascend to heaven above the stars of God. What? Huh?

Okay. I will set my throne on high. I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north.

I will ascend above the heights of the clouds and I will make myself like the most high.

Really? Okay. Yeah. So, you'll note Satan's the original narcissist here, and he is so full of himself, he wants to dethrone

God. All right? That's really the thing. But you are brought down to Sheol, to the far reaches of the pit.

Those who see you will stare at you and ponder over you. Is this the one who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms, who made the world like a desert and overthrew its cities?

You get the idea. So, this, in Isaiah 14, we get this picture then of Lucifer, of the devil and what led to his fall, which by the way, that is consistent then with what we see when

Jesus is tempted in the wilderness, when the devil says, so the devil took

Jesus to a high mountain, showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and said to him, all these

I will give you if you'll fall down and worship me. And Jesus said, be gone, Satan, for it is written you will worship the

Lord your God and him only shall you serve. Seriously, I mean, what kind of a sick puppy are we dealing with here?

Okay? You know, it's almost like B -movie level kind of stuff.

Okay? It's hard to believe that this is really what we're up against. Okay? You know, this is the ultimate narcissist.

But then a little bit more about the fall of the devil is seen in, let me see,

I might have to go to 12. Hang on a second here. Yeah. So, here's the other bit.

So, a great sign appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet and on her head, a crown of 12 stars.

She was pregnant, crying out in birth pains and the agony of giving birth. Another sign appeared in heaven, behold, a great red dragon.

Okay? Again, what do you call a serpentine creature with feet and wings? It's a dragon.

Seven heads, 10 horns, and on his head were seven diadems. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven and cast them to earth.

And this sentence right here, the church has always understood that, that when you kind of combine this with Isaiah 14, the implication is, is that when the devil led his revolt, he convinced a third of the angels of heaven that he's the one who should be in charge and that they, you know, and they should worship him.

And so, this tail of his sweeps down a third of the stars of heaven and, you know, and this is where the demons come from.

All right? They started out as angelic beings. Now, just so you know, in Roman Catholic tradition, one of the stories, the narratives that is told as to what motivated the devil to go this route is that when the devil, it was revealed to the angels that the

Son of God was going to become incarnate and become a human being, humans who were created a little lower than the angels, that Lucifer used that as the impetus to basically say, this is just ridiculous.

I mean, he, you know, we're greater than those mud creatures. And God's going to, you know, to basically, you know, sanctify them and bless them by becoming one of them, that this, that became the impetus or the motivation then for the rebellion.

But that's not biblical. All right? Instead, what we see in scripture is not some kind of narrative that somehow makes

God guilty of something that's unbecoming of God. The issue was, is that the devil from, you know, something went screwy in him and he wanted to be

God and receive that glory and worship and things like that. And he convinced a third of the angels to go along with this.

So that's the idea behind it. So, but all right.

So does that help? We talked about the dragon. We talked about the serpents.

We talked about the seraphim. Yeah. Okay. All right. So there we go. Okay. All right. So, all right.

So, Aislinn, it seems like I have more questions now than when I repented and started following Jesus.

I wonder if anyone else's experience to date is similar. So Aislinn, I would note this here. That's, that I, as a pastor,

I would sit there and go, that's a good thing. Okay. Let me explain why. Okay.

So you'll note that one of the themes of our sermon today, using Christ's parable and his interpretation of it, you know, so I didn't offer my own interpretation.

His interpretation is talking about how the devil swoops in and takes away the word of God. The idea here is that as God is working in you, okay, now you're no longer taking his word and it's not ricocheting off of your forehead like a, you know, like a

Nerf dart. You know, y 'all ever have Nerf wars? Those are fun. Anyway, raised my kids with Nerf guns.

You know, but the idea here is, is that, you know, now the Bible isn't like a Nerf dart and doesn't bounce off your forehead.

No, when you hear the word of God, it's like you want to know what that means. You want to actually interact with it.

You want, you see, you have parts of it you don't understand. And now you're like wrestling with the text.

You're going to have a ton more questions. And that's what's supposed to happen, which you'll note that when you attend a church where the vision casting leader is one of the untouchables, right?

You're not allowed to ask questions. Asking questions is a sign that you don't have faith. Touch not

God's anointed. He's like, yeah, well, I ain't one of those. So you can ask him a question. So, yeah, so it's, you'll note then that for penitent

Christians were disciples and disciples have questions, you know, that's how that works.

So that's a good thing. All right. So piggybacking off Chuck, why didn't God do away with Satan immediately?

Why is he allowed to keep deceiving the whole world? Well, Rachel, I don't have biblical text gives you the answer to that question.

So I can't say with authority. Yeah. All I can say is that if you want to save this up, you know, email jesuschristatheaven .com

and he might answer your question when you get there. Okay. You know, but I legitimately don't know.

I have no clue why. Okay. You know, because it really would have saved us all a lot of pain and suffering and misery.

That is for sure. So Barb, you had your hand up. I have a class of one here.

She's allowed to raise her hand. Yes. Yeah. That is the issue.

Yeah. Okay. So hang on a second here. Okay. So my wife says, can you talk about then how, before the foundations of the earth,

I'm going to Google this because I always like to point out to people, Google's not a bad place to do a Bible searches.

So Bible, Christ died before the foundation of the world.

There we go. All right. Let's see what this is. Okay. Revelation 13, eight, the lamb slain from the foundation of first Peter one, but with the precious blood of Christ is the lamb of God.

He did was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifested in these last times for you.

All right. So Revelation 13, eight, let me show this text real quick here. So here's kind of the interesting bit about all this is that what we're going through isn't plan

B. That's the kind of the tough bit.

Yeah. So let's see. So, and the beast was given a mouth uttering haughty and blasphemous words.

By the way, the beast will eventually end up being thrown into the lake of fire. And when you read the book of Revelation, when that finally happens, we're all pretty much going to be, you know, losing our minds.

I am so looking forward to seeing this. Okay. When it's finally tossed into the lake of fire.

But anyway, so the mouth was given, the beast was given a mouth uttering haughty and blasphemous words. Isn't that how that goes nowadays?

You know, all of his agents end up in an episode of fighting for the faith. So it was allowed to exercise authority for 42 months.

It opened its mouth to utter blasphemies against God, blaspheming his name and his dwelling that that is those who dwell in heaven.

Also, it was allowed to make war on the saints and to conquer them. Pay attention to that little bit here.

I always remind people, our job is to lose. Okay. Right on.

Okay. Put our hands into the huddle. Okay. Here's the play. Are you ready? We're all going to lose. Okay.

Yeah. Jesus is going to win when he shows up, but our job is to die and be persecuted and suffer and stuff.

Okay. Okay. All right. So an authority was given over it, over every tribe, people, language, and nation and all who dwell on the earth will worship it.

Everyone whose name has not been written, watch this, before the foundation of the world in the book of life, in the book of life of the

Lamb, who was slain, if anyone has ears to hear, let them hear. Now, wait a second. What?

So before the foundations of the earth were laid, your name was written in the

Lamb's book of life. So was mine. This isn't plan B. Okay. This is the plan.

Okay. And just like Job wasn't given an answer to why am I suffering so badly? He was never told why.

At least this side of Christ's return, we're not told why either. Okay.

We have just a little bit of a hint as to an understanding of what's going on here. Why God decided to cast the devil and his angels to earth and allow us to be tempted the way we were and for us to fall into sin?

I don't know the answer to it. I don't know why, but I'm going to go with God knows what he's doing.

And this will all really work out really well.

In the meantime, it just is. Yeah. Loads of fun.

Okay. So you get the idea. All right. So pick Kung Fu Fighting. Great.

Now I've got that song stuck in your head. That's a good song to have stuck in your head, though. Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting.

Only to be topped by it.

And the man in the back said, everyone attack. And they went into a ballroom blitz, right?

Anyway, sorry. You get glimpses of what the music

I was raised on. All right. So let's see here. Keep going. Such a blessing.

Thank you. If you moved to North Dakota, Jen, could you meet? Okay. Oh, man.

So are you guys talking about that dog? Was that what they were chatting about? That thing is so cute,

Jen. I'm serious. I think that dog should be illegal. Okay. It's too cute.

It's beyond the normal limit for I know. I'm sorry. You're gonna have to return it,

Jeff. If you need me to take it off your hands, let me know. But it's illegal. So it's too cute.

It's such a sweet little thing. All right, Oscar, I see that hand up. Let's get you unmuted, sir.

Let's see if we can get Oscar unmuted. Yes. Can you hear me?

I can hear you. Yes. I started following your channel about two years ago.

I come from a Pentecostal background. And when I heard what you were talking about,

I was like, this guy is making a lot of sense. He's answering a lot of the questions that I've had for years.

And so I stayed on. I started following you. I have left the whole Pentecostal movement.

My question is that now I'm having a hard time finding a good Bible -based church because I've been visiting about three or four churches in my area, and they're all seeker -friendly, pretty much.

Yeah. Where do you live, Oscar? I live in San Antonio, Texas. There is a

Lutheran church about two miles away from my house that just opened.

So I'm hoping, you know, I don't know if they're professional

Lutherans. I don't know. But what advice would you give them?

Okay. So practical advice, practical advice. Number one, you're not alone.

In fact, have you noticed how many people we have joining us online today? And a lot of these folks are don't, they're not affected by the blizzard.

So if you go to issuesetc .org, they have a feature on there called

Find a Church. And that's, did my face just come up? Yeah, it did.

Okay. So if you go to the Find a Church section, these are generally really good confessional

Lutheran churches. Here's the thing. You don't know what you're going to get nowadays. So if you go to a

Lutheran church, you're rolling the dice. You might actually get somebody who wants to be seeker friendly, is mildly charismatic.

You might get somebody who's, you know, who's gay affirming or, you know, and all this kind of weird stuff.

You just don't know because there is no denomination, and I mean this, there is not a single denomination that is perfectly faithful.

Some are a little more faithful than others, but other denominations have completely gone into apostasy.

So the Missouri Synod generally is a good synod and there are some really good churches there.

I would start there. Now, if you are unable to find a good confessional church in San Antonio, which

I think would be actually, I think it'd be hard not to find one. You might end up driving, in a worst case scenario, you might end up driving a half an hour or an hour.

But my wife and I, a couple of stints in our life, we ended up driving an hour to go to a good church.

That may be the thing that you might have to do, but there are good churches in Texas. There's actually some very notably good ones.

But I would start here as a place to begin. And then, you know, in the off chance that you can't find a good church, keep joining us here online at Kongsvinger.

We're not going away. That's what I've been doing for the past two years. I have learned so much these two years.

Like I said, I dropped out of church and everything was just emotionally based.

Everything was just manipulation. You couldn't ask questions because he was questioning all his spirit and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And there was always something that told me, this ain't right. There's something off right here.

I just couldn't tell what it was. Right. Yeah. And I understand that. And, you know, having done a tour of duty in the

Pentecostal church, you know, I actually understand what, you know, the confusion that you experience.

And I don't know if you notice, I just teach the Bible, but I help you through the scriptures to answer the questions that you're having.

So, that's really kind of the goal. But, you know, thank you. Yes. Yes.

So, they are recorded. Oscar, email secretary at Kongsvingerchurch .org.

You have to pronounce it this way, Kongsvinger. Secretary at Kongsvingerchurch .org.

You bet you don't know. And email her and she'll send you the link. At the moment, it's not working.

We have a problem with Vimeo and that is that it has the folder where we're putting the catechism videos, but the videos are not available at the moment.

We don't know why. Yeah. And, you know,

I know Vati and I know Justin really well. And it's always fun when we when we have meals together and we end up talking about baptism.

Those guys like run away from the battlefield so quick. It's not even funny. But, yeah, we do have differences with them on the sacraments for sure.

So, but, you know, we always, always read these with open text. So, thank you for your comments and questions, sir.

All right. Nancy, I see your hand up. I think we need to unmute you.

So. So this doesn't actually go along with the lessons for today, but I am a little bit annoyed with someone that he's of the

Baptist faith, and he keeps telling me that an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth was the law back in the

Old Testament. Now, I've always been taught people took that out of context, that you're not supposed to have an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

And he swears, no, that was the law back in the Old Testament. And in the New Testament, Jesus changed that.

Okay. Now that's a great question, by the way. All right. So the question has to do with how do we understand the phrase eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth?

Now, let's, let's, let's take a look at it. And Josh, didn't I do a video where we talked about that with against some liberal guy?

I think we did. I think, hang on a second. Give me an idea how little that narrows it down.

You know, Josh, I know I'm the absent minded professor, but you make me feel more like that every time you say things like that.

Okay, hold on a second here. Okay, so the fellow

I have in mind, let's see, because I know I talked about this. And it's got to be within the last year or so.

It's that guy from the UK. Remember him, Josh? Are you talking?

Oh, goodness. Why can't I remember his name? Steve Chalk? Chalk. Yeah, that's right. It's Stephen Chalk.

Let's see here. Okay. Let's see. Because I actually covered this topic. That's C -H -A -L.

Is it chalk like that? K -E. Oh, yeah. Hang on. No, maybe

K -E. No, Steve. C -H -A -L -K -E.

Okay, hang on a second. Say that again. C -H -A -L -K -E.

That guy. Okay, here we go. Hang on a second. No, no, those are the older videos.

But we did a Stephen Chalk one recently, like in the last two years.

Hang on. Work with me for a second. Yeah, hang on. I know that we did something specifically on this because in fact, it was like, let's see here.

Yeah, I'm going to end up totally biffing this, I can tell.

But it was legitimately on the topic of the eye for an eye, tooth for tooth.

There's an actual phrase for that. Let's see. So Whedon was a year ago. Pavlets contradicts

Jesus. Let's see here. Anyway, I'll have Josh keep hunting while I do this because of my wife.

Here it is. How progressive misuse. This is this. This is it. Found it. Found it. Okay. All right.

So I'm going to put a link to this. So this is the extended teaching on it. And it's 55 minutes long.

Okay. Sorry for that bit. But okay, so the name of it is called the

Lex Talionis. Okay, and I'm not pronouncing it correctly. I you know, okay. But let me do this.

I'm going to grab my chat now, and I'll put the link here.

And so basically, the Lex Talionis is the concept of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

But here's the thing. It is true that the Lex Talionis, eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth was part of the

Mosaic Covenant. And it was not a bad thing. It was a good thing, because prior to that, there were no limits when it came to when people, you know, executed justice.

So what happened is, is that it became the foundation for the concept that the punishment needs to fit the crime.

Okay. So that's the basic idea. So, you know, if you steal one of my bananas, you know, and I decide that I'm going to go all

Ahmed the terrorist on you, I kill you, you steal my banana, you dead. Okay. Okay. Killing you for taking a banana, that doesn't work.

Okay. So the original concept of the Lex Talionis, and this is something very interesting, you know, it shows up for the, you know, so Hammurabi comes up with a version of it, and then

Moses, God reveals a real limit to it. The basic concept is, is that this is the punishment needs to fit the crime.

But the Jews in Jesus's day had totally twisted it. Let's take a look at what they did.

Hang on a second here. Matthew chapter, I think I want to go with five, but hang on.

Mm hmm. You are the salt of the earth. Okay. You know, to abolish the prophets. Okay. Okay.

You have heard that it's said, you shall not murder. Whoever murders will be liable to judgment. I say to you, everyone who's angry with his brother will be liable to judgment.

Okay. So come to terms quickly with your accuser, divorce, oaths, retaliation.

You've heard that it's said an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, but I say to you, do not resist the one who is evil. Okay. So this, what happens in Jesus's day, eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth gets put into the hands of private citizens rather than courts.

And that's a problem. Okay. So eye for an eye, tooth for tooth is the idea of the punishment has to fit the crime, but there has to be due process.

So when people take this into their own hands and there's no due process, and now it's about retaliation,

Jesus changes this altogether. So Jesus is basically, you know, this belongs in the realm of courts and due process and judges and witnesses and evidence, and he's going to take it out of the private realm where basically people are doing like the three stooges thing, you know, you poke me in the eye and I'm going to do the thing back at you and it looks ridiculous.

So he says, do not resist the one who is evil, but if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

So in the private realm, when somebody slaps you, retaliation off the table, if anyone sues you to take your tunic, let them have your cloak also, you know, and if anyone forces you to go one mile with them, go two.

All right. Give to the one who begs from you, do not refuse the one who would borrow from you.

So the idea then is that the lex talionis from the

Mosaic covenant is being misused and is now being abused by private citizens in retaliation against their neighbor, rather than where it's supposed to be.

And that's taking place in the courts. So does that answer your question, Nancy? Okay.

Nancy Thank you so much. Matthew All right, good. Yeah, because that's a great question. And there are people who you generally do not know how to kind of sort all of that out.

And it takes a little bit of teasing to do this. Okay. All right. Hang on. So speaking of revelation, could you ask pastor if he finished the

Sunday school series, my notes go to chapter 20. I think we did. Yeah, we did. We did finish the

Sunday school series, but they should be on the on the website.

So yeah, the Kongsvinger website. Okay. All right, here's let me let me do something really one more thing here.

I like bananas. Okay. Okay. Does issues etc .org

apply to Canada as well? I don't know. You might want to look. Okay. All right.

Okay. This is where we're going to end off. All right. Now here's the thing. I'm going to I'm going to put my foot down next week.

Okay. And we're going to actually do Jeremiah chapter nine next week. And we'll save up questions for the end.

So but you get the idea. So this is where we're going to end the Bible study today. And Stephen, I'm going to make you the host and because y 'all have always had the ability to have fellowship time.

And I don't want to take that away, even though, you know, I'm sitting in my office today and you know, not at Kongsvinger.

So Stephen, I'm going to turn everything over to you. And if you guys would like to sit and chat, you can if you'd like to log off and do other things you can.

And you're not you're not required to fellowship with anybody. But you know, but that is something you have the freedom to do.

So but it was great to see you all and pray for us that God would have mercy and send us warmer weather, please.

So be sure to get me those files quickly. What files? I don't know what you're talking about.

So yeah. Love that look.