Month: October 2022

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Mid-week Manna

ABEL’S FAITH YIELDS OBEDIENCE UNTO RIGHTEOUSNESS (Part 5)

MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:

October 26

ABEL’S FAITH YIELDS OBEDIENCE UNTO RIGHTEOUSNESS; CAIN’S UNBELIEF BREEDS SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS (Part 5)

Bible righteousness—-Christ demonstrated righteousness in human flesh, in stark contrast to the righteousness of the Pharisees —-simply put, is “right doing,” the opposite of wrongdoing. All “unrighteousness is sin” and “sin is the transgression of the law” (Rom. 6:23).

In the primordial examples of Cain and Abel were immediately established down through the stream of time and generations two separate lines of brethren, faiths, religions, worshippers, and churches till the close of earth’s probation.

Not long after their transgression and consequent banishment from their Eden home, to Adam and Eve, the father and mother of mankind, was quickly revealed the true nature and substance of both the great controversy—enmity and war—-between Christ and Satan and their respective agencies and followers as well as the seed of the gospel’s plan of salvation/redemption for fallen mankind only. 

These two astounding, fundamental issues underlying all and every single thing, great and small, visible and invisible, blessings or curses concerning mankind and the earth itself since after the fall in Eden, is contained and revealed in their embryonic forms in the Creator’s grand declaration to Adam and Eve and Satan (disguised as a serpent then the most beautiful and attractive animal before it was cursed):

God declared to them: “I will put ENMITY between thee and and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: It [the woman’s Seed] shall bruise thy head, and thou [Satan the serpent] shall bruise His heel.” (Gen. 3: 15, KJV).  Thus was declared the first of all prophecies and promises in the Bible ending in Revelation, the last of the 66 books of the Bible! 

God’s messenger wrote: (emphasis mine) “Cain and Abel represents two classes that will exist in the world till the close of time.  One class avail themselves of the [divinely] appointed sacrifice for sin [the transgression of the Decalogue]; the other venture to depend on their OWN merits; theirs is the sacrifice without the VIRTUE of DIVINE MEDIATION, and is not able to bring man into FAVOR with God. 

It is only through the MERITS of Jesus that our transgressions can be PARDONED [justification by faith]. Those who feel no need of the BLOOD of Christ, who feel that WITHOUT DIVINE GRACE they can by their OWN WORKS secure the approval of God [the essence of heathen/pagan sacrifice and worship], are making the SAME MISTAKE AS DID CAIN. 

If they do not accept the cleansing blood, they are under CONDEMNATION. There is no other PROVISION made whereby they can be RELEASED from the THRALLDOM of sin.” (E. G. White, Patriarchs & Prophets, Pacific Press Publishing Asso., 1890, 1913, pp.72, 73. 

To be continued next MWM, God willing. Bless all, NMF.

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Mid-week Manna

THE FAITH OF EARTH’S FIRST MARTYR (Part 4)

MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:

October 19

THE FAITH OF EARTH’S FIRST MARTYR (Part 4)

“By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts [sacrifice]: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.” Heb. 11:4, KJV. 

Abel, translated from the Hebrew Hebel, meaning “breath,” “transitoriness,” would be appropriate as the shortness  of the recorded life of this second son of Adam and Eve (Gen. 4:2, etc.). 

The only incident of his brief life recorded by the Word of God  is his “offering a more excellent sacrifice” than that of Cain, his older brother and very first son of Adam and Eve, whom they initially thought was the “promised seed.” 

How mistaken they were for their first son (after their fall and banishment from their Eden home) turned out to be earth’s first human murderer by killing his younger brother when he should have been “his brother’s keeper!”  (Jesus said Satan, the fallen cherub Lucifer, is “the father of lies and murderer from the beginning.” John 8:44). 

Abel’s offering, in faithful compliance with God’s specification on how to worship Him, was “acceptable unto God” in that being a sacrificed lamb from the flock, it testified and witnessed to his OBEDIENT FAITH in the promised Mighty Deliverer “to come,” the true “Seed of the woman,” the “Lamb of God” who was “to bruise the serpent’s [Satan’s] head (Gen. 3: 15; John 1:29). 

God’s messenger wrote (emphasis mine): “So far as BIRTH and RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION were concerned, these brothers were equal. Both were sinners, and both acknowledged the claims of God to reverence and WORSHIP. To outwards appearance their RELIGION was the same UP TO A CERTAIN POINT; but beyond this the DIFFERENCE between the two was great! 

“By faith Abel offered unto God a MORE EXCELLENT sacrifice than Cain.” Abel grasped the great PRiNCIPLES of redemption. He saw himself a SINNER, and he saw SIN, and it’s penalty DEATH, standing between his soul and communion with God. He brought the slain victim, THE SACRIFICED LIFE, thus acknowledging the CLAIMS OF THE LAW that had been transgressed (by his parents first).

Through the shed blood he looked to the FUTURE sacrifice, Christ dying on the cross of Calvary, and trusting in the [sacrificial] ATONEMENT that was there to be made, he “had the witness that he was righteous,’ and his offering accepted. 

“Cain had the SAME opportunity of learning and accepting these truths as had Abel. He was not a victim of arbitrary purpose [as in the pernicious, fake doctrine of ‘predestination’]. One brother was not selected to be accepted of God, and the other to be rejected! Abel CHOSE FAITH AND OBEDIENCE; Cain CHOSE UNBELIEF AND REBELLION. Here the whole matter rested.

“Cain and Abel represent two classes of [worshippers] that will exist in the world till the close of time.” -E.G. White, Patriarchs and Prophets, p.72. 

To be continued next MWM, God willing. Bless all, NMF

Categories
Mid-week Manna

THE ‘SUBSTANCE’ OF THE FAITH OF JESUS AND THE BIBLE (Part 3)

MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:

October 12

THE ‘SUBSTANCE’ OF THE FAITH OF JESUS AND THE BIBLE (Part 3)

“Now faith is the SUBSTANCE of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”Heb. 11: 1, KJV.

In his scholarly treatise, “The Book of Hebrews” (Review & Herald Publishing Asso.,1948), which I heartily endorse to all serious Bible students, M. L. Andreasen says(all emphasis mine): 

“Faith is the substance of things hoped for.’ This verse is not so much a definition of faith as a statement of what faith will do. It presents faith SO STRONG AND VITAL that the person not only feels himself in possession of that which he HAS NOT AS YET RECEIVED, but is caused to EXPERIENCE the [1] strength [2] the courage, and the [3]confidence that ordinarily only actual possession would give.

“Faith thus ENABLES a Christian not only to claim promised blessings but to have and enjoy them NOW.

The powers of the world to come’ become a present possession: and the kingdom of heaven is not MERELY a future possibility: it is even now WITHIN.

“Faith gives the ‘good things to come’ a real SUBSISTENCE in the soul and mind. They are no longer DREAMS to be fulfilled in the future; they are LIVING REALITIES which the soul enjoys and appreciates. They cease to be far-off visions, and become SUBSTANCE. WE SEE THE INVISIBLE! The old Syriac Version of the Scriptures well translates: ‘Now faith is the PERSUASION that are in hope, as if they were in fact: and the MANIFESTATION of things not seen.’

The evidence of things not seen.’ ‘Evidence’ here is not merely an abstract belief that evidence EXISTS, but CONVINCING PROOF ALREADY DEMONSTRATED, and the soul, persuaded of its truth, rests SECURE in that belief.” pp. 472, 473.

Furthermore, on the word “substance,” Andreasen wrote: 

“The Greek word hupostasis, translated ‘person,’ is the same word rendered ‘substance’ in Hebrews 11:1, whereas in 2 Cor. 11:17 and Heb. 3:14 it is translated ‘confidence.’ 

Its root meaning is ‘that which stands under’ as an underplacing, a substructure, a support, a foundation; that which can be built upon; and hence denotes firmness, steadfastness, assurance, confidence. It stands for reality in contrast with imagination and fancy, and is used for the ESSENCE of things, the INMOST nature of a person; the real self.  Its meaning is well expressed by ‘standing’ in Ps. 69:2: ‘I sink in deep mire, when there is no STANDING.’ In Eze. 20:11 the same word is translated ‘ground.’”-Ibid, pp. 50, 51.

To be continued next MWM, God willing. Bless all, NMF.

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Mid-week Manna

THE FAITH AND RELIGION OF JESUS CHRIST WITNESSED TO BY THE SAINTS OF THE BIBLE’S HALL OF FAITH PART 2

MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:

THE FAITH AND RELIGION OF JESUS CHRIST WITNESSED TO BY THE SAINTS OF THE BIBLE’S HALL OF FAITH

(Part 2)

“By it (faith) the elders obtained a good report.” Hebrews 11: 2, KJV.

By carefully reading through this “Faith chapter” of 40 verses, stripped of preconceived opinion, it becomes self-evident that verse one (read it again) is less of a dictionary-like DEFINITION of faith and more a DESCRIPTION of what genuine Biblical faith and the faith of Jesus (cited in Rev. 14:12) has done, and will do for all the true followers of Christ from Abel down to the last saints of the final generation before earth’s probation closes. 

Verse 3 quickly reveals why atheists are more consistent in denying Creation because they don’t believe in God and the Bible than professed Christianity who profess “sola scriptura” as the basis of their faith yet openly deny the fourth commandment of the Decalogue (Exo. 20: 8-11; Deut. 5: 12-14;  Heb. 4:1-11, etc.) that alone definitively explains WHO God Creator is, WHEN and HOW “the earth and all that in them is” was created, and the one and only day of each week the Creator appointed, set apart, and sanctified by the same fiat He spoke the worlds and the earth into existence after His six-day work of “creating the heavens and the earth in the beginning,” as the weekly (never monthly or annual) MEMORIAL DAY of His creative power and authority and the creation origin of man and the earth. 

Hebrews 11:3 says, “Through FAITH we understand [not conjecture or surmise] that the WORLDS were framed by the word of God, so that things which are SEEN were NOT made of things which do appear.”  Another verse that assures all faithful believers and commandment-keeping saints (Rev. 14:12) of the existence of other worlds created by the only-begotten Son of God, who became the Son of man through the mystery of the incarnation (1 Tim. 3:16; John 1:1-14, etc.) and declared Himself as “the Lord of the Sabbath” (Matt. 12:6-8; Mark 2:27, 28; Luke 6: 5, 6) is also in the book of Hebrews that declares (emphasis mine):

“God. who at sundry times and diverse manners spoke in time past to the fathers [elders,patriarchs] by the prophets, hath in these last days [New Testament Christian dispensation] spoken unto us by His Son, whom He hath appointed Heir of all things, by whom also He made the WORLDS.” (Heb.. 1:1, 2).

Learn new truth every single day from the increasing and progressively “marvelous light,”of the “present, testing truths” of the last days from “the law and testimony” (Isa . 8:20), which is “the word” of the Bible and the “Spirit of prophecy which is the Testimony of Jesus” (Rev. 19: 10). 

To be continued, God willing.  Bless all, NMF.