Don't Let the Chapter Heading Fool You

Kongsvinger Lutheran Church

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All right, let's pray and then we will get into our study. Lord Jesus, we recognize that we have nothing apart from you.

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And so we come to you humbly with empty hands, recognizing that apart from you and your spirit, we are blind.

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Our sin has plunged us into darkness, and as a result of it, when the light of your word shines, oftentimes it's glaring and we're not able to understand it.

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So we humbly pray that you would send your spirit, help us to rightly understand what you have revealed in your words so that we may believe, confess, and do all according to what you have revealed there.

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To the glory of your holy name, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Okay, so here's where we're going to go.

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And again, I cannot stress enough, ask questions. If there were any questions that came up as a result of the sermon, then do so.

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Sola said hi. Hi, Sola! We'll do a fist pump, there we go, right there.

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Okay, a little inside joke, sorry. Okay, so we're in John chapter 10 for our study, beginning of our study today.

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And I'm going to back up into the context because I want you to see what we were looking at in our sermon.

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So note, we were dealing with idolatry, and as expressed with the concept of blindness versus being able to see.

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And I want you to note that oftentimes we will miss the context of what the

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Bible is saying due to the fact that we let the chapter headings or the chapter numbers and the verses get in the way.

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And so always remember that when you see, like it says John 10 verse 1, that the next chapter is just a human apparatus put onto the biblical text for the purpose of being able to get to portions of Scripture easily.

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And so you'll note that there is no disconnect, there is no break in the thought between John 9 41 and John 10 1.

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It is a continuous thought, and so you've got to keep that in its context. So this is one of these stories where when somebody says, and I know many of you have heard sermons or pastors or whoever, prophetesses or prophets or whatever, preach and proclaim things like, oh

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Jesus said that He came to have life and that we might have it abundantly, John 10 10, right?

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And so are you experiencing lack? Are you suffering from illness or disease or poverty?

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Jesus said that He came to have that you might have life and have it abundantly, and they just rip this sentence out of its context.

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But when you go back in the context for this particular verse, John 10 10, the context begins at John 9 1, because it's this continuous story of the man who was born blind, whom

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Christ heals, who is then put on trial and excommunicated for confessing that Jesus is from God, whom

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Christ then seeks out, and He speaks to him, and the man's able to see

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Jesus, and then Jesus pronounces judgment. He pronounces judgment on those who claim that they can see but are in fact blind.

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Okay, let me do this real quick. There we go. Sometimes somebody gets out of the muting jail, so I have to put them back in mute.

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You know, that's interesting how that happens. All right, so all that being said, we're going to back up just in the context. We'll see the last part of the text we were dealing with in our sermon today, and then we're going to keep going, because it's all one continuous thought.

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So Jesus heard that they had cast him out, having found him, he said, do you believe in the

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Son of Man? He answered, who is he, sir, that I may believe in him? Jesus said to him, you have seen him, and it is he who is speaking to you.

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He said, Lord, I believe, and he worshipped Jesus. And by the way, if Jesus isn't

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God, then him receiving worship from a human being, that's forbidden. Remember when

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Jesus was being tempted by the devil in the wilderness, the final temptation is that the devil took

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Christ to a high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the earth and said, I will give you all of these if you will worship me.

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And Jesus responds, it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. So note here,

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Jesus receives from this man who was formerly blind full -on worship, and Jesus doesn't turn away, doesn't rebuke him, he worships

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Jesus, which strongly suggests that Jesus is God, more than strongly, because if he isn't, then he shouldn't be receiving worship from this fellow.

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So he worshipped Jesus, and Jesus said, for judgment I came into the world, that those who do not see may see, those who see may become blind.

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Some of the Pharisees near him heard these things and said to him, are we also blind?

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Jesus said to them, if you were blind, you would have no guilt, but now that you say we see, your guilt remains.

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And then without skipping a beat, next sentence, truly, truly. Now in the

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Gospel of John, it's worth noting here, in the Gospel of John, when you hear the words truly, truly, for real, the words are amen, amen.

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So Jesus says, amen, amen. Amen, amen. I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in by another way, that man, notice what it says, that man is a thief and a robber.

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Who is he talking about? He's talking about the Pharisees. They are people who did not come in through the door, they climbed into the sheepfold by another way.

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And always worth noting in this regard, the work of a Karaite Jew by the name of Nehemiah Gordon, Nehemiah Gordon, we mere

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Gentiles should be pronouncing it Nehemiah, but his name is actually Nehemiah, that's how you pronounce his name.

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Nehemiah Gordon, or Nehemiah Gordon. He is a fellow who grew up as an

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Orthodox Jew and has abandoned being an Orthodox Jew, and the Orthodox Jews are the people who are the direct theological descendants of the

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Pharisees. Best way to put it is that with the destruction of the Temple in 70

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AD, biblical Judaism ceased to exist on the planet, and rightly so, because the

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Temple was a type and shadow pointing to the sacrifice of Christ. And Christ's death and resurrection, you know,

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Christ's death was a once -for -all sacrifice for sins, and we learn from the book of Hebrews that the blood of animals and goats and things like that could never atone for sins at all.

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And so what Nehemiah noted is that with the destruction of the Temple, the

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Pharisees were the last guy standing, and they reinvented

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Judaism, the Judaism that exists today in Orthodox Judaism, a

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Judaism that doesn't have a Temple, doesn't have sacrifices. The Pharisees were the ones who invented that.

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And he noted that when they showed up, they showed up during the Intertestamental period, and it's always worth noting that scribes are mentioned in the

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Old Testament, but Pharisees are not. Pharisees are a group of people that they jumped the fence, they came up during the

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Intertestamental period, and they had this belief that when

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Moses went up on Mount Sinai, he didn't receive one Torah from God, he received two.

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The written Torah and the oral Torah, and according to them, God gave

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Moses the oral Torah so that the Gentiles could never know the full truth and therefore could never be saved.

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And that was their narrative. And they claimed to have a special authority from God to be able to interpret the written

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Torah as well as the oral Torah, and even boasted that God Himself could not correct their interpretations.

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It's a very fascinating thing. So when you read from Genesis 1 to the end of the

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Old Testament, the Tanakh, all the way up to Malachi, never once do you have the

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Pharisees mentioned as a group. They come up during the Intertestamental period. And in their time when they came up, they were opposed by a group of people who labeled themselves the

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Karaites. And it's not really the right translation, but you can roughly think of the Karaites as those who say that they are sola scriptura

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Jews. They only believe the written Torah, they do not believe in the oral Torah.

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And so the Pharisees, they were just, they were rank heretics.

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Now in this regard, it's always good to review what Mark chapter 7 says here, and this is a text that is always extremely helpful.

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Hang on a second here. Mark 7, and let me mute you.

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There we go. There we go. Mark 7. This is going to be helpful in this regard.

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A text that we're all familiar with as it relates to traditions, human traditions, and you don't want to do that.

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You don't want to make doctrines out of your own, out of your head. It's a form of idolatry.

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And so in Mark chapter 7, we read this account where the Pharisees sent from headquarters in Jerusalem some guys to kind of check out

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Jesus and see what he's all about. And it says, when the Pharisees gathered to Jesus with some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem, they saw that some of the disciples ate with hands that were defiled, that is, unwashed.

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For the Pharisees and all the Jews do not eat unless they wash their hands properly, holding to, and then here's our phrase, the tradition of the elders.

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And tradition of the elders is a body of work. This is the

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Oral Torah. I'm going to mute you. Hang on one second, we're having problems with one listener.

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Let me switch something real quick. That should solve it.

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There we go. Okay, so coming back to this. So the tradition of the elders is a body of work.

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This really should be capitalized. It's a body of work that the Pharisees say is the

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Oral Torah, and this is this extra -biblical body of work. So when you read the written

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Old Testament, the Tanakh, nowhere is there a command as it relates to washing your hands once you've gone out into the marketplace or something like that.

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The command to wash your hands is found in the elders. And so you'll note the Pharisees, our

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Gospel texts in John declares them to be idolaters, declares them to be blind, and how blind can you be except for that you claim that you believe in God, the

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God of the Bible, yet the God of the Bible is standing in front of you in human flesh, and you don't believe him. I mean, that's utter blindness.

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To say that God himself, God the Son in human flesh, is a sinner, how blind do you have to be?

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But again, this goes to the fact that they had this oral tradition that has these extra commands that they claim has

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God's authority behind them. And so when they go to check out Jesus, they don't find anything in his teaching or in his healing that day that they take issue with.

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What they took issue with is that when they had been out among the masses, when they came in for a meal,

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Jesus' disciples skipped the wash basin. And if you don't know what this wash basin is, the

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Orthodox still have it and still practice this today. It's usually a little silver pitcher with a wash basin, and the ceremony as it's taught in the tradition of the elders basically has you take your left hand and you put your left hand palm down over the wash basin.

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You take the pitcher of water, put a little bit of water on your left hand, switch hands, right hand palm down, and then you wash your hand.

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You just pour a little water on your hand with the palm down. You switch hands again, left hand palm up, water, switch, right hand palm up, water, and then you put the pitcher down and you kind of sprinkle to get the water off your hands, and then you're required to say this prayer,

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Lord God, Maker of heaven and earth, I thank you that you've given us the command to wash our hands. Yet God has not given anybody this command to wash their hands in this way.

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It is found only in the tradition of the elders, and Jesus refuses to allow his disciples to obey this man -made command.

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They are required by Jesus to disobey this command, and in so doing, what's happened here is by action of Jesus and his disciples,

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Jesus is saying that the tradition of the elders is not from God, and it has no authority to bind consciences of people at all.

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So holding to the tradition of the elders, then they say that they have to wash their hands. So when they come from the marketplace, they do not eat unless they wash, and there are many other traditions that they observe, such as the washing of cups, and pots, and copper vessels, and dining couches.

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By the way, the word for wash here is baptizmos, which means this is a baptism, and I always like to point out that those who claim that the word for baptism means full immersion, they don't know

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Greek, and nor do they understand, they really do not understand what the word means, because here you've got an example of the

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Pharisees who are baptizing dining couches, and I assure you that was not via full immersion, and nor was the tradition to baptize your hands, which is what that is, the tradition to baptize your hands, that was not by full immersion, it was by pouring.

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So important to note that. So the Pharisees and the scribes, they asked Jesus, why do your disciples not walk according to, and here's the phrase, the tradition of the elders?

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And walk here as a Hebraism means conducting your life in honoring and obeying the word of God, and so the

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Pharisees believed that the tradition of the elders was a word of God. Jesus did not.

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And Jesus forbade his disciples from walking according to it and obeying it, and so the

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Jews at this point, the Pharisees, are losing their minds. Why do your disciples not walk according to the tradition of the elders?

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But they eat with defiled hands. And he said to them, well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, this people honors me with their lips, their heart is far from me, and in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.

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So note here, not only did the Pharisees jump the fence, they did, and we're seeing that in John 10, but this tradition of the elders, this extra biblical stuff that they had, are the doctrines and the commandments of men, and Christ says that those who worship

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God in this way are worshiping God in vain. Jesus does not consider the

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Pharisees to be brother Jews, at least in the faith. Maybe genetically, but not in the faith.

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And then he says, you leave the commandment of God and you hold to the tradition of men.

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And so he said to them, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition.

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Now this one takes a little bit of explaining, but we're now really seeing what's going on here. I'm going to take a look at the cross -reference in a minute as well.

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So one of the commandments that the Pharisees had concocted in their tradition of the elders was a rank -breaking of the commandment, the commandment that says you will honor your father and mother.

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And the way they did it, think of it this way, in the days before big governments, any kind of socialized medicines or anything like that, if you lived to be elderly, who was responsible for taking care of you once you got to an age where you were incapable of caring for yourself?

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Answer. Your children. Your children would take care of you. And this was part of the understanding, the wider understanding of the commandment that you shall honor your father and mother.

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But the Pharisees, who loved money, came up with this really cool schema, and what they did is they created an amortization table, which basically came up with average life expectancy for your aging parents, and you would figure out how many years they have left to live based on this amortization table.

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And then what they would do is they would assign a value, a money value, of how much it would cost to care for your elderly parents.

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And what you could do is you could figure out what that amount would be, and rather than care for your elderly parent or mother -in -law, you could instead give it as a gift to God.

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It was called korban. And I can't think of anything more wicked than this.

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In the New Testament it's very clear that a person who doesn't take care of his own family member, his own family members, is not a

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Christian. This is a person who's abandoned the faith. And so the idea would be something like this, you know,

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I can't stand my Jewish mother -in -law, she drives me crazy! And so the idea of having to care for her until she dies,

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I'd rather gouge my eyes out. So I know what I'll do, and the Pharisees come along and say, have you heard of korban?

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And you go, no, what's korban? Yeah, the money that you would have spent caring for your elderly mother -in -law, you can give it to the temple as a gift to God.

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Really? Yeah, and then you don't have to help your mother -in -law at all. Really? Sounds really pious, right?

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This is wickedness. So Jesus says you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition.

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Moses said, honor your father and your mother, and whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.

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In the Greek it says must die the death. But you say, and note now watch how this works, and I'm going to show you that there's a perfect understanding here of the doctrine of inspiration as it relates to the

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Scripture. You have, this is what Jesus says, you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God.

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So who gave the commandment? God did, in order to establish your tradition.

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Moses said. So note here, Jesus has a perfect understanding of the inspiration of Scripture.

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Although it was written by the man Moses, it is the inspired

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Word of God, and God is speaking to us through it. And so note that what

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Jesus does is he takes the commandments, he takes the Torah and Moses and smooshes them together and says this is

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God speaking, and then he in contradistinction says you over here, you

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Pharisees in your tradition of the elders in your oral tradition, you're not, God isn't speaking through you, okay?

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So you have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition.

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Moses said, honor your father and mother, and who said that by the way? God did through Moses, and whoever reviles father or mother must surely die, but you say, so note the distinction, but you say, if a man tells his father or mother whatever you would have gained from me is korban, that is a gift given to God, then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the

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Word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And here tradition is being used as man -made doctrines that make void the

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Word of God, and many such things then you do. All right, let me see questions that are coming in here.

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Jack says, korban, similar to churches that teach or enforce the tithe. You know, Jack, that's not a stretch.

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So in the New Covenant, which we're in, in the New Covenant there is no command to tithe.

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In fact, if you pay attention to the Mosaic Covenant as it relates to the tithe, the tithe was not what you brought to the temple for the purpose of upkeeping the temple or anything like that.

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If you brought a tithe, it was basically Thanksgiving, okay? You would bring the first fruits of your animals and your field and all this kind of stuff, and a portion of it would go to feed the priests and the

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Levites, the rest of it you had as a meal in the presence of God.

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If you read the Mosaic Covenant, a tithe is like Thanksgiving, it's like a Thanksgiving meal. So today's,

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I'm going to say scallywags and scoundrels like Kenneth Copeland, when they are demanding you have to tithe, and in fact, important to note, just a few days ago,

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Kenneth Copeland, on his Victory Network, let everybody know that even if you lose your job and you have no money, you have to continue to tithe during this time.

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And in the New Testament, there is no command to tithe. God loves a cheerful giver, and you set apart to give to God what you, that's between you and Him.

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And so it's very clear that in the New Covenant, God's will is that pastors make their living from preaching the gospel, this is true, but there is no command to tithe.

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You can give 10 percent, 5 percent, 2 percent, 1 percent, you can give a penny if you want, that's between you and God, and I don't have the authority to tell you otherwise, because the tithe command is part of the

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Mosaic Covenant, and those who try to bring the tithe into some kind of a thing that is the same as an offering in a church, they don't know their old covenant, and they're twisting.

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So I would say that. Gary says, faith preacher imply if your parents have enough faith,

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God will so abundantly bless them that you will never need to help them. Send the money to my ministry so that you can get blessed as well.

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Gary, I haven't quite seen it said that way, but it wouldn't surprise me, today's prosperity preacher saying something like that.

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So you're going to note here, send the money to me, don't take care of your parents. And this is deplorable.

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I'm telling you, today's prosperity preachers are the Pharisees. It's almost a one -to -one correlation.

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And all they care about is money, money, money, money. It's just deplorable.

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Okay, coming back then to our text, and I'm going to point something out as well here.

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So Jesus, note, He had no problem hitting these false doctrines straight on, and in so doing,

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Jesus didn't pull any punches. So these Pharisees, by their man -made doctrines, have made void the

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Word of God, and He says, many such things you do. And so then He called the people to Him again, and watch where Jesus goes with this, because He's just going to keep hammering on this.

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Hear me, all of you, and understand there's nothing outside a person that by going into Him can defile

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Him, but the thing that comes out of a person, those are the things that defile Him. And so you'll note here,

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Jesus is going straight at them, straight at them. I mean, even though the horse is down,

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He's still beating it, all right? And when He'd entered the house and left the people, His disciples asked

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Him about the parable, and He said to them, Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not into his heart, but into his stomach, and is expelled?

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What's really funny here is the ekparouamai in the Greek, to say it's expelled is a polite thing.

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It's expelled. It goes into the latrine is what the Greek says. So thus

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He declared all foods clean. He said, What comes out of a person is what defiles him, for within, out of the heart of a man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness.

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All these things come from within, and they are what defile a person. So you'll note that He then goes after even the main doctrine of the

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Pharisees here, that what defiles you is the goyim, it's the Gentiles. But Jesus says,

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No, what defiles you is inside of you. And then when you look at the cross -reference on this, I want to say, hang on a second here, offended.

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I gotta do a quick word search in the Gospels. Give me a second here. I gotta change my parameter.

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I'll go New Testament, there we go. Yeah, so Matthew chapter 15, here's the cross -reference on this.

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And watch this, because this is very fascinating. So Jesus called the people to Him and said to them,

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Matthew 15 10, hear and understand, it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth.

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This is what defiles a person. Then the disciples came to Him and said, Do you not know that the

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Pharisees were offended when they heard this saying? So this is very fast. So Jesus stepped on people's toes.

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He called out the false doctrine, said it was straight -up false, did it in the presence of the false teachers, the

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Pharisees, and they were offended. And does Jesus go, Oh, oh, oh,

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I'm so sorry I offended them. Oh, what was I thinking? I heard their fee -fees. No, listen to what he says,

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Every plant that my Heavenly Father has not planted will be rooted up. Let them alone. They're blind guides, and if the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.

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And so here you've got this connection, then, with the Gospel of John chapters 9 and 10, which connects the

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Pharisees with blindness. Again, they are blind guides, and yeah, Jesus spoke the truth, he did it bluntly, uncompromisingly, and he offended the false teachers.

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So I would note that if Jesus offended them by speaking the truth, then we must risk offending others by speaking the truth as well.

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Okay, Kate says, If our parents are not in the faith, is it better to have our money go towards members within our own church body who are in need?

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No. And Kate, the idea here is that whether or not your parents are in the faith does not change the fact.

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The commandment is, Honor your father and mother. And so the idea here is that you are commanded by God to care for the members of your family, including your parents, even if they are not

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Christians, even if they are not in the faith. You honor them by virtue of the office that they hold as your mother and father.

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Gary says, I pray for wisdom and courage to know when and how to say truths that cause offense. Gary, I've been around that track more than once, kind of an occupational hazard, and I will say this.

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I have learned the hard way that trying to say the truth in a way that doesn't offend doesn't work.

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The truth itself is the offense, and so you must speak it. And you'll note that even if you say things like,

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I'm saying this because I love you, I'm saying this because I care for you, even if you couch it in the most loving language, the truth itself is the offense, and they won't hear it.

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They will not hear it. So is light in Scripture meaning truth? In this particular case, you can talk about it in that sense, but that's the idea, yes.

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So all right, now coming back then to the Gospel of John.

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We've all done, now we've done a little bit of work, you know, taking a look at the Pharisees. I want to come back to John 10 and keep going on in the context, because this is really important.

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So note then, Jesus talking about the Pharisees. These are the ones who are blind, and how blind do you have to be except for the

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God you claim to worship is standing right in front of you, is talking to you, performing miracles in front of you, and you won't listen to him, right?

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So truly I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber.

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And oftentimes I ask the question, where did these Pentecostal faith healers and so called prophets, who commissioned them, who authorized them, who called them into ministry, where did they study and show themselves approved, where did they come from?

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Oftentimes they come out of nowhere, and it's just sheer, it's based upon their ability to scratch ears that they are able to build a following for themselves, but they came out of nowhere.

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They were not commissioned, they were not called, they were not ordained. These are people who, you know, just kind of show up like vagabonds.

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So, but he who enters the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the gatekeeper opens the sheep, hear his voice.

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He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, for they know his voice.

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A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.

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So this figure of speech Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. So Jesus again said to them,

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Amen, Amen. I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me, talking about the

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Pharisees, they are thieves and robbers. So you'll note, the thief and the robber is a man.

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That man is a thief and a robber, talking about the Pharisees. They are thieves and robbers.

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So are today's TBN prosperity preachers. But the sheep, they did not listen to them.

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I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.

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And now here's a famous text taken out of context. The thief comes only to steal, to kill, and to destroy.

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And you get Cindy Jacobs screeching on March 4th, at her big coronavirus event.

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The devil, it says in John 10, comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy, and that's the devil.

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He's the one who's coming to kill, steal, and destroy. So we've got to bind the devil, because the devil's the one putting coronavirus on us.

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No, the devil's not the one being referred to in John 10, 10. The one being referred to in John 10, 10 is the heretic, is the false teacher.

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It's the Pharisee. It's the one who's added to the Scripture. It's the one who's made void the

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Word of God by their human commandments. You know, that's what's going on here.

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They are the thieves. They're the ones who've come to steal, to kill, and to destroy.

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And Jesus is making a distinction between himself and the false teachers, the

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Pharisees. But Jesus says, I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

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And so you'll note here, this isn't talking about prosperity, this is talking about true forgiveness, reconciliation with God, peace, eternal life.

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Whereas the false teacher cannot lead you to eternal life. Wide is the road that leads to destruction.

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Narrow is the path that leads to eternal life. I came that they may have life and life abundantly.

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I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd, who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming, leaves the sheep, and flees.

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And the wolf snatches them and scatters them. He flees because he's a hired hand, and he cares nothing for the sheep.

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He cares nothing. And neither do today's heretics. They care nothing for the sheep. They only care about themselves.

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I am the good shepherd. I know my own, and my own know me, just as the Father knows me, and I know the

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Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. And I have other sheep that are not of this fold, and I must bring them also.

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They will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. For this reason, the

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Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.

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I have authority to lay it down. I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my

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Father." So hopefully you kind of see the idea. Other sheep. Please elaborate. Okay, so Jack, here are the other sheep.

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Now this is really funny. I'll give you the wrong answer first. So this is the text from the

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Gospel of John talking about he has other sheep, where the Mormons will say, see, here

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Jesus says he has other sheep. Jesus is talking about the Jews who are living in South America from the tribe of Lehi.

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No, the other sheep are the Gentiles. Okay, so Jesus is preaching and teaching to an exclusively

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Jewish audience, and the other sheep that he has are those who are not genetically

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Jewish, who the Gospel is going to go out to, because Jesus has laid down his life for his sheep.

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So that's going to be you and me. Jack, you in Oklahoma, you're part of that other sheep group.

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Me here in North Dakota, Minnesota, I'm part of that other sheep group. So if you don't have a drop of Jewish blood in you, you're part of that other sheep group.

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This is talking about the So one shepherd, one flock, no longer distinguished between Jew and Gentile, for we're all one in Christ.

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That's the idea here. Now I think in this regard, I think it would be useful to take a quick look at the fact that Jesus dealt with stuff like this, but also in the time of the

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Apostle Paul. The Apostle Paul had to deal with the so -called super apostles, and this is an interesting thing.

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When you read 2 Corinthians 11 and 12, a very fascinating thing happens here, and that is that the

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Apostle Paul always was being dogged. An example would be the

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Judaizers would come in and say, that Apostle Paul, he didn't tell you Gentile Christians the whole truth.

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Nope, he forgot to tell you about the snip -snip procedure that you guys have to go through, because you've got to get circumcised.

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And so they would always undermine the Apostle Paul. Well, in Corinth there was another group of guys who came up, and they for real called themselves the super apostles.

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And I remember, it was maybe five or six years ago, maybe seven, Stephen Furtick made reference to this thing about the super apostles, and in one of the boneheaded moves

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I've seen exegetically, actually thought that super apostles was a positive title. I think you could still find it on the internet, but I noted it at the time.

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But the super apostles, what they did is, these are guys who are really good at oration.

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And you've got to remember, this is the days before television. This is the days before YouTube and the internet. So if somebody was a skilled orator, that could be a

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Friday night's entertainment. I mean, so anybody who was really skilled at oration could command a high speaking fee and stuff like this.

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And so there was a group of guys who called themselves the super apostles, and they judged their value based upon how much they can charge for their services as a super apostle, and they dogged the

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Apostle Paul because the Apostle Paul never charged money for his apostolic services.

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And they would say, see, the reason why he doesn't charge money is because he's no good, he's just an apostle. But we super apostles, we can command a higher salary.

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And I'm not joking, this is all part of the story. And so Paul here is trying to get the church at Corinth to wake up.

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It's like, these guys are false teachers. And so he's going to do something really funny, and he's going to play the part of a fool.

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He's going to speak foolishly on purpose to show the foolishness of the doctrines of the super apostles.

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So here's what he says to the church at Corinth, and he does this lovingly. Hopefully, their hope is that they're going to have their eyes open.

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He says, I wish you would bear with me a little foolishness. Do bear with me, for I feel a divine jealousy for you since I betrothed you to one husband to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.

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But I'm afraid that as the serpent deceived Eve by his cunning, your thoughts will be led astray from a sincere and pure devotion to Christ.

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And so, note, note, this is great seriousness. This is as dire of a situation, as dangerous spiritually as what the serpent did to Adam and Eve, that the church at Corinth is going to be led away from a pure and sincere devotion to Christ by whom?

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Well, listen to what he says. So if someone comes and proclaims to you another

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Jesus, notice this is idolatry. And so a great example of this is

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Mormonism. Mormonism teaches that Jesus is the spirit brother of Lucifer, okay, and he's one

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God of many, all right? That's a different Jesus altogether. So if someone comes to you and proclaims to you another

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Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you received a different spirit—notice they're using the same words, spirit,

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Jesus, gospel, but they mean different things. So if someone comes and proclaims to you another

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Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you received a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel, and heteros here, heteros, this is a heteros, an other gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough.

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Indeed, I consider that I am not in the least inferior to these super apostles, even if I am unskilled in speaking,

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I'm not so in knowledge. Indeed, in every way we have made this plain to you in all things.

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So Paul notes he was not a skilled orator, he's very open about this.

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The so -called super apostles, their big claim to fame was their great skill in oration.

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And then he says this, or did I commit a sin in humbling myself so that you might be exalted because I preach

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God's gospel to you free of charge? So the super apostles impugned the apostle

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Paul as somehow being inferior as an apostle, because he preached the gospel free of charge, whereas they commanded the highest amount of money that you can command.

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So he says this, listen, I robbed other churches by accepting support from them in order to serve you, and when

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I was with you and was in need, I did not burden anyone, for the brothers who came from Macedonia supplied my need, so I refrained and will refrain from burdening you in any way.

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As the truth of Christ is in me, this boasting of mine will not be silenced in the regions of Achaia.

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And why? Because I don't love you? Well, God knows that I love you. And what I am doing I will continue to do in order to undermine the claim of those who would like to claim that in their boasted mission they work on the same terms we do.

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So note, Paul makes it very clear, his goal here is to completely undermine the claims of the so -called super apostles, which we as Christians all have a responsibility to do, by the way, for today's false teachers and today's so -called super apostles and, you know, all that kind of stuff.

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Such men, he says this, for such men are false apostles. They are deceitful workmen, and they disguise themselves as apostles of Christ.

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And that's the dangerous part here. So note that the Pharisees disguised themselves as Jews, but they weren't.

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They were rank idolaters. In the same way, a great threat that has existed in the

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Church from the time of Christ to this day are people who are deceitful workmen who disguise themselves as apostles of Christ, disguise themselves as Christians.

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And then he says, and no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. So it's no surprise if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness.

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Their end will correspond to their deeds. And he's talking about eternal damnation. So then he goes on,

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I repeat, so let no one think me foolish, but even if you do, accept me as a fool, so that I too may boast a little.

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So what I'm saying is in this boastful confidence, I say not as the Lord would, but I'm going to say this as a fool.

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And so Paul's going to say this a few times in order to make the point. Listen, what I'm about to do, I'm speaking as a fool to make a point.

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This is foolishness. I know it is. So note, I'm speaking as a fool. Since many boast according to the flesh, he says, okay,

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I too am going to boast foolishly. For you will gladly hear fools being wise yourselves.

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For you bear it if someone makes slaves of you, or devours you, or takes advantage of you, or puts on airs, or strikes you in the face.

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To my shame, I must say, we were too weak for that. So one of the things about false prophets, false apostles, false teachers, those who disguise themselves as Christians, who are ravenous wolves and workers of deceit of the devil, they always take advantage of other people, devour them.

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They're after their money. They're after controlling them and all this kind of stuff. But Paul says, to my shame,

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I was too weak to do that. But whatever anyone else dares to boast of, I'll speak as a fool.

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And he's speaking as a fool here. I will boast of that also. Are they Hebrews? Well, so am

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I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they offspring of Abraham?

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So am I. Are they servants of Christ? And watch here, now he's going to ramp this up.

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Now he says, I'm not only talking as a fool now, I'm talking like a crazy guy. I'm a madman now. He says, are they servants of Christ?

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I am a better one with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, often near death.

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Five times I received at the hands of the Jews, the forty lashes less one. Three times

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I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked. A night and a day I was adrift at sea, on frequent journeys in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers, in toil, in hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food and cold and exposure.

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And apart from other things, there's the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches. Who's weak and I'm not weak?

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Who's made to fall and I'm not indignant? So if I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness.

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The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, He who is blessed forever, knows that I'm not lying.

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At Damascus, the governor under King Aretas was guarding the city of Damascus in order to seize me, and I was let down in a basket through a window in the wall and escaped his hands.

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So if I must go on boasting, I'll stop there, but you get the idea.

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So Paul's point here is that the super apostles, they're always about devouring people, they live in luxury, they command the highest prices, whereas real apostles, they are despised, beaten, always in danger, and really getting to suffer, and that's the thing he's going to boast in.

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So Corey says, okay, question about the blind man healing. Uncleanness is transferred via spit and touch, among other things, but would it be true to say that here, cleanse is transferred by the spit and touch from Jesus to the blind man?

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Yeah, so there is definitely an interplay there, going back to the

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Mosaic Covenant. Let's take a look at that text real quick, because I want to make sure that I don't miss anything that I should.

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Leviticus 15 is what you're invoking, verse 8, and all right, let's see here, so these are talking about discharges and stuff like that.

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All right, so I'll start in verse 1 for our context. Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, speak to the people of Israel, say to them, when a man has a discharge from his body, his discharge is unclean, and this is the law of uncleanness, for a discharge, whether his body runs with his discharge or his body is blocked by his discharge, it is uncleanness.

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Every bed in which one has the discharge lies shall be unclean, and everything on everything on which he sits shall be unclean.

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Anyone who touches his bed shall wash his clothes, bathe himself in water, and be unclean until the morning.

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Whoever sits on anything on which the one has the discharge has sat shall wash the clothes himself in water and be unclean until morning.

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Whoever touches the body of one with the discharge shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water, be unclean, and if the one with the discharge spits on someone who is clean, then he shall wash his clothes and bathe himself in water.

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Okay, so we're going to note here, this is an important distinction here, Corey, is that this is talking about somebody who is unclean, then spits on somebody who is clean, the person who is clean definitely becomes unclean by virtue of that fact.

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So let me make sure I got your question right then. So uncleanness is transferred via spit and touch, among other things, but would it be true to say here cleanness is transferred by spit and touch from Jesus to the blind man?

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Not a bad way of putting it. You know, I will say this, is that there is a lot of ink spilled on why did

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Jesus use spit here? Why did he just not send him to the pool of Siloam?

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Answer, we don't know. And you're going to note here that Jesus heals the blind man via means, and so for real,

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Jesus, who is holy and who is the epitome of what it means to be clean, he makes mud, and in some ways it kind of invokes a couple of things to me.

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If you're thinking biblical typology, it's going to invoke Genesis 2, where God made the man from the dust.

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It's kind of along those lines. It's as if Jesus taking the dirt and making mud, it goes back to Genesis.

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It's a miracle where he's creating within this fellow the eyes that he's going to need to be able to see.

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So I would go the direction of Genesis 2. You can pull

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Leviticus 15 into it as maybe a touchpoint that Jesus is clean and clearly he's making clean, but then you're going to note then that the mud which has

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Jesus' spittle then is then mixed with water, and what it's invoking is a washing that makes one clean and restores and gives sight.

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And so you'll note that Jesus' spittle then mixes with the water, and the guy is made perfectly clean.

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It harkens back to baptism. It clearly is some kind of a picture that goes with baptism, so you get the idea.

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So what is baptism according to Ephesians 5? Baptism is a washing of water in the Word. This fellow, the blind man, was healed via a baptism which was a washing of water with the spittle of Jesus.

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So the two ingredients come together along with the mud. The mud invokes kind of Genesis 2, and then you get the idea.

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So it's a picture of... it does invoke baptism, but it also invokes Genesis 2. That's the direction

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I would go with these things. But Leviticus 15 .8 just gives us the ability to work in the opposite and show how, you know, if somebody's made unclean by the spittle from somebody who's unclean, then how much more are they made clean by Christ?

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So you get the idea. So that's how I would pull it all together. All right. Very good questions.

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Very good questions. All right. We've run a little long, and that is okay.

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And let me say this. It was a pleasure to see so many people joining us online for our services.

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As long as the United States is in lockdown, we're going to continue to have our services online.

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And y 'all are welcome to attend, and bring your questions, bring an open Bible, and things like that.

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But I want to thank you all for attending. And you get the idea.

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Quick announcements, by the way, and that is that my catechism class for my youth that I'm catechizing, that'll still be taking place on Wednesday, but we're going to do that online.

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We have a Lenten service midweek on Wednesday night at 7 p .m. Central, if you guys would like to join us for that.

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We've been working our way through the opening chapters of the book of Exodus, and y 'all are welcome to attend.

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But you get the idea. And then people who are local to Oslo, Minnesota, or Grand Forks, North Dakota, in this area, if you have any physical needs and you're not able to get out, or you know somebody who does, contact my wife, her secretary at kongsvingerchurch .org,

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email, for the purpose of letting her know, and we will do what we can to offer mercy and assistance to anybody in need locally.

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So, okay, let's see here. Thank you very much. Good. Okay.

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Air hugs. Be careful with the air handshakes, everybody. Make sure you use proper hand sanitizer before you do that.

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All right. Peace to you, brothers and sisters. Lord willing, we will see you next time, and continue to pray for our nations as we work our way through this pandemic.