The Origin of True Preaching — Art Katz

Isaiah’s Prophetic Word to a Deaf Nation

Remember where Isaiah begins his whole prophecy with, hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord hath spoken? The greatest prophetic book begins not by an address to men, but by an address to nature itself, dumb, inanimate nature.

Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth, for the Lord hath spoken. Why is he addressing the elements? Because the nation itself is deaf to God. But nevertheless, he doesn't say, well, it's vain for me to speak if people are not hearing.

He still brings the word. The word still goes forth and will not return to God void. Talk about the efficacy of the word, the mystery of the word and its power, even to go forth into nature, let alone into men, and that the prophet is not discouraged.

And in fact, you'll find in your experience that there'll be more than one occasion when you might just as well be speaking to nature when men are not hearing. But you're not at liberty to shut up. The word still has to go forth, even though it seems completely pointless and somehow affects something in the purposes of God.

So Lord, we just thank you for inducting us and bringing us into an Hebraic perception of the word, its reality, its mystery, its creative power, for it has not changed. We have. We have become modern, skeptical, secular, narrow, utilitarian.

We look at all things only as it affects something and does something, and we don't understand the proportions behind it. So to be enlarged in this way, my God, is to catch a glimpse of you and the glory of God, who is the creator through the word.

And it gives us invitation to be also at a lesser level co-creative with you. So we bless you, Lord. Oh, precious God, change us, stun us, shape us by the very word that we're hearing, that we will come into a new relationship with the word and be instruments for the word that have their origin in God.

That is so desperate for this hour. Bless us now as we continue, Lord. Give us a fresh second wind to go on and bring the line upon line, precept upon precept of your intention. And we thank you, Lord, and give you praise in Jesus' name.

Amen. Well, let's look at Jeremiah chapter 23. It begins with a condemnation of the shepherds, and then it goes on to a condemnation of the false prophets. In verse 9, I'm reading from this version that I have, if yours expresses it a little differently, where it would be a benefit to hear that, pipe in, and we'll compare even these versions.

The Prophet’s Grief Under the Weight of God’s Word

Concerning the prophets, my heart is crushed within me. All my bones shake. I have become like a drunkard, like one overcome by wine, because of the Lord and because of his holy words. That deserves some pause and reflection right there to show that the man for whom the word comes is not some disembodied spirit of some mechanical instrumentality.

He's flesh and blood. He has nerves and emotions. He's affected. How could a word be God's word and not ravage and have its effect on that one for whom it is coursing, even to the feeling like a drunken and one overcome?

My bones shake. And then, by contrast, for the land is full of adulterers. Because of the curse, the land mourns. Notice the prophetic way of understanding reality. The whole name of the game, the issue, is what is reality?

What is, in fact, real? How is it to be understood? Is this man off on some far-fetched tangent that he's seeing the land as stricken because of the false prophet and the false words that issue from them and the social, religious, political conditions of Israel that makes the false prophets popular, that even the land itself will be affected and the land will mourn?

What a mentality this is. What a way of perceiving. But if he's correct and that is reality, we are the ones who are off base. We're the ones who are completely unrelated to things as God sees them. And no wonder we're like walking into walls.

For the land is full of adulterers. That's not only just the sexual sin that transgresses the parameters of right sexual behavior, but also the word of adultery as adulterating. You know what that means, to adulterate something?

To disfigure it by mixing. To lose its purity by adding, changing, mixing is to adulterate. And in the prophecy of Isaiah, he says your wine is turned to water and your silver is turned to dross. And that is what was once original, was once pure, was once holy, was once invigorating and powerful has now become adulterated.

Your wine has become like water. You could spit it out. It has no value to bring scintillation or renewal or joy. Wine is a symbol of joy. And your silver, which is the symbol of righteousness and redemption, has become dross.

The thing that was once skimmed off has now become the substance of it. So the two most precious things have become debased through mixing. And it's the prophet who's aware of this and speaks it to the nation that has no consciousness that that has taken place at all.

And it was through a progressive deterioration, a process over a course of time, that this adulteration and debasing has taken place. So gradual is something like that frog that is put into a pot and the temperature increases.

It doesn't know until it's cooked. But the prophet knows. He's aware from the very beginning. He's sensitive. So that what is otherwise just a commercial campaign of merchandising is already, for him, the beginning of the end.

See what I mean? To allow this is the beginning of the end. The Star Wars thing is not a passing phenomenon because Star Wars Roman numeral II or numeral numeral III is already in the works. He sees the beginning of the end.

Something has already had its inception that is devious and destructive. It needs to cry out from its inception. When the prophet Isaiah cried out those things, there was no consciousness of them to the people who were being addressed.

That's why he says, hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth. And then he predicts the judgment that will come long before there's any evidence that it's even on the way. So he sees this. Look at the acuteness of the scene, what has passed the observation of his own contemporaries.

And he sees what the consequence will be as judgment. And he speaks it with such a reality as if it's already present and already taking place. No wonder such men are dismissed as mad. It's either that they are mad or they are intensely sane and that those who are going along with the present debacle, D-E-B-A-C-L-E, the corruption of the ones who are insane and don't know it, that insanity passes for sanity, darkness passes for light, lies for truth.

And there's only one voice raised against it. It's the prophetic voice. It's standing in identification with God for what is true. It's the plumb line of God. But it's painful to bear this. It eats you up.

False Prophets and Religious Complicity

The land is full of adulterers. Because of the curse, the land mourns. And the pastures of the wilderness are dried up. Their course has been evil. And their might is not right. Both prophet and priest are ungodly.

There's such a conjunction between prophet and priest, the religious functionary and the false prophet. I don't know where he says this. The prophets prophesy falsely. And the priests bear rule by their means.

They advantage one another. They compliment one another. They slap each other's back and confirm one another in what is religiously and spiritually false. And so they confirm one another as if they're true.

But only the prophet sees through it. When one of the most celebrated prophets of today was beginning to become publicly known, and someone came into the locality who was also considered prophetic and began to celebrate him, I wrote a little note.

And I passed it to the pastor who was sitting alongside me at whose church this was taking place. And the note that I wrote to him was, the prophets prophesy falsely. And the priests bear rule by their means.

There's always going to be a conjunction between the false prophets and the religious functionaries who benefit from that relationship. They reinforce one another. They compliment one another. They establish one another.

They become a fraternity. The true prophet is outside and looked upon with scorn and condemnation because these guys believe that what they are in is reality and that this other guy is mad or he's false or he's all the rest.

So here is Jeremiah addressing the condition of these men. Both prophet and priest are ungodly. Even in my house, I have found a wickedness, saith the Lord. He goes from his own statement to God's own interjection.

He's probably so close to the heart of God that the Lord could not miss the opportunity to slip in his own statement. Isn't that remarkable? So much so you can almost say, where does the prophet end and where does God begin?

So it's so much so that we can come to an hour where the prophet can speak for God as God and Elijah can say, as the Lord my God liveth, it shall not rain nor dew, but according to my word. That's either outstanding and unbelievable presumption and arrogance, or it's a man who has become so subsumed in God, you can't tell where he ends and where the Lord begins.

That's the kind of prophet that is prophet. Therefore, their way shall be to them like slippery paths in the darkness in which they shall be driven in full. For I will bring disaster upon them in the year of their punishment, says the Lord.

In the prophets of Samaria, I saw a disgusting thing. They prophesied by Baal and led my people Israel astray. Where was Israel's discernment? What about the false prophets in Elijah's time who were absolutely persuaded that they were not false?

And when Elijah attested them that Mount Carmel, you build your altar and I'll build mine, and let that God be God who answers by fire, these men believed that the God that they were celebrating was God.

And they leaped on their sacrifice and cut themselves and yelled and screamed and went through all kinds of whirling dervishes to invoke God. But there was no answer. Because they were, themselves, not only deceivers, they were themselves deceived.

And now it was being found out. There was no answer. But Israel was celebrating them and celebrating Baal through them. Where was the nation's discernment that they could not recognize the falsity of this?

Because the false prophets were speaking man-pleasing things, syrupy, benevolent. God is not angry with you. This is the best of all possible worlds. This will be corrected. God is not going to judge.

But there will be a year of punishment, says the Lord. And the disgusting thing, they prophesied by Baal. They must have had some kind of unction, some kind of an anointing, some kind of quickening. But it was not from God.

Isn't that remarkable? We can come to a state where we're, let me say this, this is so critically important, where we are so tuned to the benefit and to the result and to the effect that we give little pause as to the source.

If the thing will work, if it will have an effect, if it will do something that seems to affect something to be desired, we don't question its source. And that's the whole experience-oriented condition of the church today.

They'll run to the most distant places, whether it's Toronto or Oshkosh, if they can receive something that appears to be of benefit, but will not give a serious consideration to what is the source of that which they are receiving.

I've heard terrible tales of the woeful after-effects of what has been received. A woman left that place shrieking. Her husband had to pull off the car to the side of the road. His wife had gone berserk because she had lost all sense of herself when they told her not to think, not even to pray, just to open herself for the experience.

That is the outflow of a man celebrated, whose name I don't even want to mention, who said, we're so hungry for something to happen, we don't even care if it comes from Satan. Yes. And belly up to the bar and get drunk on it.

We're so starved for something to happen. Our Christianity is so gray, so dull, so uninspiring, so without consequence. Let it even come from Satan, but let something for God. Well, if that's our mentality, you'll get something, but it will not be from God.

And you'll rue the day that you ever got it. Isn't it remarkable that nothing has changed? There's such a timelessness about these evils and the alternative to the truth and the true and false prophets, and that's why it's so valuable for our time.

That's why when we advertised these days, we said the school, the title of the school was Jeremiah, prophet of the end days. There's nothing more appropriate for ourselves than the issues to which he himself had to struggle.

They led my people astray. But in the prophets of Jerusalem, I've seen a more shocking thing. It's one thing to take place in Samaria, but Jerusalem itself, the holy city, they commit adultery and walk in lies.

They strengthen the hands of evildoers so that no one turns from wickedness. The very opposite of what should be the effect of God's word is men turning from wickedness to repentance unto God. But a word comes that does not require a turning, but rather confirms them in the evil so that they continue in it has got to be a false word.

A true word will always require of God's people change or leave off what they're doing or turn again to God. The false prophets will reinforce men in their error and in their evil as if it has the approval and the sanction of God.

But the God is Baal and not the God of Israel. And if that happens in Jerusalem, woe for the nation itself. If this is what's happening in the principal city in the capital, what can we hope for in the nation?

And if it's happening in the nation, what can we hope for in the world? For this is a nation to be a priest and a lighter to the world. And if their own light has turned to darkness, what could be hoped for elsewhere?

And that's why the prophet is so jealous. That's why he's so intense, even to the verge of insanity, because he knows how consequential this deviation is. And the whole nation has gone running after it.

All of them have become like Sodom to me and its inhabitants like Gomorrah. Therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts concerning the prophets, here is no longer Jeremiah expressing his heart that is chafed.

It's now God taking over and now making his own statement. And I'm just by that inclined to say, how often when we are intensely in something close to the heart of God, we leave that point where it's no longer ourselves and God then comes in.

And maybe we don't see God enough and enough of his speaking because we don't give him that opportunity. Our conversation is not the vehicle through which he can then enter because it's not a godly conversation.

It's gossipy or chatty or shallow. It's not where his heart and thought is. We haven't begun the day with God in the place of communion. And therefore we're askew, we're out of sorts, we're out of place.

We're not where his mind and heart is. So what I'm saying is we would be hearing much more from God if men were in the place of God and that he could just, as it were, shift gears and move right out of that into himself and we would hear the oracles of God.

Therefore, thus says the Lord of hosts concerning the prophets, I'm going to make them eat wormwood to give them poisoned water to drink. For from the prophets of Jerusalem, ungodliness has spread throughout the land.

Notice the irony of God's judgment that he makes men to suffer the consequence of their own evil, that they spread false things and it's not the water of life. Therefore, this is the water that they themselves will drink.

It'll be poisoned. That the judgment of God will be an exact proportion to their sin, all the more because they are purveyors of the word. That's why Paul says, let not many men be teachers for the consequence for them is double.

It's a high responsibility. Now, were these men always false? Because God is addressing the prophets. It's as if we can well consider that they may have been authentically called to truth and to true prophets, but over a course of time, as the silver has turned to dross and the wine to water, they themselves have turned from true to false and not overnight, but by a process of erosion and disfigurement of which they themselves are not conscious until they don't even realize that what is animating them is not the spirit of God, but the spirit of Baal.

And that what they're speaking is not God's word, but the word of that one who is anti-God and they don't even know the difference. They have not only lost their own discernment, they are the deceivers of others and are themselves deceived.

And it didn't happen overnight. It happened over a process of time together with the nation. As the priests, so also the people, as the prophet, so also the nation. So what is the message for us who are accused now of being false, but a vigilance?

I mean, I shouldn't answer my own question. How do we safeguard ourselves from the possibility of becoming false, even if our calling was initially true? And I would say one of the greatest provisions is Ben-Israel.

Community as Protection for Prophetic Integrity

Absolutely. Slapdash, silly, weak, and defective collage of souls that the world would not even look up to take notice is the very salvation of the prophetic man. If indeed it's a community and not a trailer court, if indeed he can hear from them and they have the heart and the vision and the courage and the love to speak to him and to say, you know, I've noticed the last time in a few times now, that somehow when you say this, I don't quite get the witness or you're becoming professional or there's something, you've lost your naturalness.

Your voice is becoming affected. There's something that doesn't sit well. Really, I haven't been aware. Thank you. I need to be aware. Something is slipping. I need to be conscious and be repentful before the Lord that I'm slipping from the authentic thing into some kind of professional thing.

I once sent out a letter, I don't know if I can find a copy of it, to 50 men who either purport to be prophets or connected with the prophetic phenomenon in America. And I gave 12 statements of what would distinguish the true prophets from the false, asking their feedback.

And one of them was that the false prophet is never going to allow himself to be in this kind of a context in which he can find correction with brothers. What will be a kind of holiday in phenomenon who has an establishment or a ministry and surrounded by those whose salaries are paid by him and will not bite the hand that feeds them, but will confirm him even in his error.

He will not want correction and will see to it that the conditions of his life do not permit it. That man is on the way to being false. And the one letter I got back was from one of today's most prominent prophets indignant at that reference.

That's the one thing that gouged him and that with which he took issue. But I believe it profoundly. And very little is said about the old Testament phenomenon of the school of the prophets. In the time of Elijah and Elisha, there was schools of prophets, but the word school is not school as we presently understand it.

It wasn't a place of instruction. It was a collegium. The word college is another synonym for community. It was a life together of people who either had that call, were sympathetic to that call, were intercessors for that call, or were being groomed in that call who related to the man who was in that call.

And were in that kind of relationship by which he himself could be a beneficiary as well as a teacher. So God from the beginning gave prophets a protection to keep their integrity by being in a kind of authentic relationship with others who were jealous for the prophetic integrity.

And that was the beginning. And that I think will be descriptive of the end. The false prophets will be found in isolation, living in their own petty kingdoms with their staffs of paid workers who confirm and applaud them even in their error.

But in the end, they'll be eating wormwood and drinking poisoned water. And serving it. I'm sorry? And serving it. Yeah. Providing it to others. And so thus says the Lord of hosts, do not listen to the words of the prophets in verse 16 who prophesy to you.

They are deluding you. They speak visions of their own minds, not from the mouth of the Lord. And I had to correct a brother, a Jewish brother in Florida who sent me page after page of his faxed prophecies.

And they were full of good things and true things. And I got no witness. And I finally had to answer back and say, dear brother, for all of your well-meaning intention, this is not the word of the Lord.

And it was like inflicting a grievous wound. He truly believed that it was because what he was saying was true. But it was clear it had not that source. It came out of his own spirit, his own understanding of things that need to be expressed.

But that does not give us leave to express them, let alone to say, thus sayeth the Lord. It's already on the road to becoming false through the misuse of truth. Wow, thank you, Lord. That leaped out of my mouth.

Woo, talk about the anatomy of deception begins with the misuse of truth and not immediately with error. Don't think that because it's true that you have the right to pronounce it, let alone to append the label, thus sayeth the Lord.

Hmm. Wait for God to say it in his own time. You can offer it as an opinion and as a statement that needs to be made, but don't address it and give it the appellation, thus sayeth the Lord, if the Lord has not said it.

You're already on the path to deception and to error through the misuse of truth. And this young brother didn't know better and was doing it, thinking he was doing God's service. The question for him is, will he receive my word of correction or be offended?

And at that juncture is the issue of his whole future. Well, how is it that I have to, from Minnesota, send him a word to Florida? Wasn't there anybody in his messianic congregation who had heard his prophecies, who did not witness them as coming from God to tell him so?

No, not one had ever mentioned what I'm speaking to him from this great distance. Because what they were hearing sounds true. You can find biblical support for it. And the man says, thus sayeth the Lord, he believed he got it from God.

So, you know, let's not make an issue out of it. They didn't love him enough to critique him and to correct him. And the lack of love was proportionate to the lack of discernment, so that they themselves are complicit with him in the deception and will themselves suffer loss.

Because to receive that as the word of the Lord when it's not, is to yourself become dulled and less capable the next time of exercising any kind of right discernment. See what I mean? Our life is charged daily and hourly with such issues that if we miss it, we make ourselves candidates to miss it yet the more for the dullness that comes into us by allowing something to get by as being God's word when it in fact is not.

Because we have not the courage or the discernment or the love to speak up in the moment that we first heard it and say, no. And what's happening in the whole charismatic, sleazy setting where prophecies come forth and tongues and interpret and thus say as though, and no one, either the minister, the pastor or anyone finds fault or says, well, maybe I understand your heart, but I don't have a witness that that was the Lord.

Testing Prophecy and Recognizing the Source of the Word

This is so critical that in the history of Israel in Second Chronicles 20, I think it is, when they were faced with the greatest threat, Judah, from the three uncircumcised nations on their borders, a word came to them, the king called the fast and called the people together.

And when they were assembled, a word came to them through the prophet Jehoshiel saying, the battle is mine, saith the Lord, but not yours. But nevertheless, go out against them tomorrow. What a prescription for disaster if that was a man speaking out of his own soul or his own flesh.

And they went out tomorrow and got demolished. But the priest, it was a priest who prophesied. And when they heard that word from the Lord, they went down on their faces. They knew it was the word of God because they knew the man and the vessel for whom the word came.

He had already established credibility. He was a priest. He walked before them. They were in relationship. They knew his heart. They knew his spirit. They knew that this is not some amateur taking a shot at it and wanting some attention to be dramatic.

It was a tested vessel who had an authenticity whose character and life was tested and known. And therefore they received it as the word of the Lord and went the next day. What would have been their disaster, three armies overwhelmingly against them that would have done them in.

They not only went forth, but they went forth with the sweet singers of Israel in the forefront of their army. And the king, I forgot which one he was, had to ask among the people who are the sweet singers of Israel.

And the people knew and identified them. And he set them in the advance of the army. And when the enemy heard their praise, they were confounded and slew one another so that when the army came, they were done in and they were three days in taking the spoil.

What a triumph. Can you imagine coming back with rejoicing? They had not to lift their arms to win their victory. The praise of God by the sweet singers of Israel had already won it. And the word, the prophetic word was true when they went forth the next day.

Go ye out against them tomorrow. Don't go right now when you're all fired up. And you're gung-ho, hey, the Lord has spoken, let's go get him, tiger. Tomorrow, rest on this. Take this into your spirit, sit on it.

Put it under your pillow, sleep it. See how you feel tomorrow morning in the cold gray dawn with the excitement and the flush is gone. And the whole issue was, was that God's word or not? Now you, then you go.

We're going to face issues as epical as that in the last days, where if it's a false word out of the flesh or soul of a man, however well-intending, it will be disaster rather than detriment. And a critical issue is the man himself and our knowledge of him, which we will never obtain as employees whose salary is paid by him, but as those who are living with him, not as a prophet, but as a brother.

That's right. Got the picture? And the prophet has got to be willing for the humiliation of being only a brother. And though he might experience honor elsewhere, he's not going to find it in his own home, in his own country.

There he's just a brother whose defects and humanity is very evident to all. And yet he's open for their correction. And he's corrected even when they're not correcting. He's corrected just in the matrix of community itself, in the outworking and conversation and things that take place in the life together is itself a correction.

I can't think of a greater provision from God to keep a prophet a prophet and keep him from being forced in this, if he's willing for the humiliation of it. So I knew 25 years ago, when the Lord called us to this property, this was not going to be a picnic.

I knew it was going to be an exercise in humiliation. And I knew that what I could have safely kept privately away from the attention of men would necessarily become public very quickly. The condition of my marriage, the condition of my children, my own condition.

And however much Inger has bucked against the same community, she herself has been the beneficiary. Whatever our condition that she's alive and that we're still together is the honor due to the reality to which God had brought us and that he's not finished yet.

See what I mean? So talk about celebration of community. And may well be if we knew the situation here that these prophets have become a clique and a professional guild apart from the people and honoring one another, celebrating.

Yes, brother, you're the word of the Lord. Oh boy, I really witnessed that. And they believe that, they confirm each other and deepen themselves in their own error and their own deception.

Or would you say this is where the community is where you take out the precious from the vial?

Yeah, it's a continual process. So they speak visions of their own minds and not from the mouth of the Lord and don't even know the difference. Could you know the difference? Could you know when the Lord is saying something or you're saying it?

Do you know the origin of something that comes up in your own spirit? That's a sensitive thing, especially if what comes up is true. They keep saying to those who despise the word of the Lord. Isn't that interesting?

Their audience and the condition of Israel and Jerusalem is of a people who have come to such a place that they despise the word of the Lord. Because look at their reaction against Jeremiah, they're ready to kill him.

It shall be well with you. And to all who stubbornly follow their own stubborn hearts, they say, no calamity shall come upon you. So the distinguishing feature of false prophets is false security, false comfort, false assurance.

Exactly the antithesis of what the true prophet is saying, whose words are full of warning of the devastating calamity to come. His words are not assuring, his words are threatening. People want to be assured.

They want to be comforted, particularly in an hour of insecurity. The prospect of a Y2K crisis or a crashing economy or shootings in high schools or bombings in Jewish community centers, people want assurance.

They want to hear something positive. They want to be confident. They want to believe that this is passing away and this is only a trivial phenomenon that need not alarm them. That this is characteristic of the hour, but our kids will grow up.

They're not gonna become monsters and heartless and without natural affection, though the word of God says so. In the last days, perilous times shall come and men shall become lovers of pleasure and lovers of self, more than lovers of God, without pity, without natural affection, without regard for father and mother.

That's what the word says. But what are the false prophets saying? Oh, it's a passing phenomenon. They're kids, they're growing up. This is only adolescence. Are you guys marking your Bibles? Are you putting in parentheses or in brackets?

It shall be well with you and to all who stubbornly follow their own stubborn hearts, they say, no calamity shall come upon you. The false prophets speak the pleasing thing. The thing that condones evil, error, the thing that placates flesh and gratifies men.

It has more the fear of man than the fear of God. It's calculated to serve men rather than God. And that's where men are. Men need that acknowledgement. They want to be respected, honored, but to speak the word of God that is disagreeable to the flesh is to lose the prospect of acceptance, of honoring, of a slap on the back of people celebrating you.

So the true prophet has got to be dead to anything in himself that demands or requires acknowledgement, confirmation, celebration or honoring for men. He's alive to one thing only, well done, good and faithful servant.

And he's not necessarily even going to hear that in the moment of his obedience. He's more likely to hear silence from God. And maybe in the day of his reward, he'll hear well done as in the day in which they received their judgment, he will receive his honoring.

But until then, he has to serve in the tension of God's silence, believing that he's speaking the true thing, even though every voice is raised against him from men who prefer what is false. So where do you get the real word?

Standing in the Counsel of the Lord

The next verse, the next stanza tells us, for who has stood in the counsel of the Lord so as to see and hear his word? Who has given heed to his word so as to proclaim it? If you don't put that in brackets, you're fired.

Mark your Bible, put that, you ready? That should go on like a neon sign. This is the heart of the matter. What is the nexus, the anatomy, the origin of that word, which is God's word? And the answer is in the counsel of God, wherever that is.

This young man from a missionary fellowship in Florida, not only had never stood in the counsel of God, he didn't know that there was such a place. And just assume that what rose up in his own mind was the Lord, because their goal is true and needs to be expressed.

So we shouldn't go any further today. Let's end with this and burrow into this. What does this mean to stand in the counsel of God? Well, if that is the only place where God's word is to be obtained, we had best have some understanding of what that place is and how to enter it and to find the word of the Lord in it, or we ourselves will be added to the false.

What is it? How do you understand that? There's no explanation. Wouldn't it be wonderful if there were an asterisk and there's a footnote at the bottom of the page that tells you what the counsel of God is?

As a matter of fact, there is, from the commentators that I'll share with you. But what do you think it is before you look at anybody else's explanation? Not C-O-U-N-S-E-L, C-O-U-N-C-I-L. The S-E-L is the counsel of God, like the advice of God.

The kind of counsel that we can receive from one another, advice, instruction. But this is another word entirely, don't miss it. C-I-L, a counsel. What is that? The King James says S-E-L. The King James says S-E-L.