MID-WEEK MANNA FROM PASTOR NAT’S DESK:
June 22, 2022
THE SCRIBES SAID HE WAS ‘BEELZEBUB,’ WHILE DEMONS ADDRESSED HIM, ‘JESUS, THOU SON OF GOD’
Indeed, “truth is stranger than fiction,” i.e., Bible truth, specifically, “the truth AS IT IS in Jesus” (Eph. 4:21). This alone satisfies the demands of “THE truth, the WHOLE truth, and NOTHING BUT the truth,” for, Christ alone is “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6).
It is only His truth and enabling grace that can “free us” from slavery to the natural propensities and inherited weaknesses to sin, and deliverance from Satan’s power to seduce, tempt, deceive, confuse, vex, and annoy with his numberless schemes. See Matt. 8: 28-34; Mark 1:21-28.
In a jaw-dropping contradiction of role-reversals, as recorded in the New Testament, the SCRIBES ascribed the title, Beelzebub, “the Lord of dung,” a name given to Satan, the chief of the demonic world, to Jesus! See Matt. 10: 25; Mark 3:22; Luke 11: 15.
Who were the scribes in Christ’s day? “After Ezra’s time [Ezra 7] scribes assumed influential positions among the Jews as TEACHERS of God’s Word. By the time of the Maccabees (2nd cent. BC.) they were recognized as constituting an honored profession (1 Macc 7:12).
Some of the most famous scribes of Jewry, such as Hillel, Shammai, and Gamaliel I, lived at the time of Christ’s birth and shortly thereafter. They were PHARISEES and attempted to adapt the Law of Moses [the Ceremonial law] to the times in which they lived, but could not always agree, so different schools of thought developed.
The SUBTLE interpretations of the Pharisees were considered by many to be of EQUAL value with the Law of Moses, and Jesus BITTERLY DENOUNCED the sect’s HYPOCRISY and MISINTERPRETATION of Scriptures which LED THE PEOPLE [the Jewish nation] ASTRAY (Matt. 15:1, 3; 23:15, 23, 25, 27, 29, 33).
Some of the scribes in Christ’s day were influential members of the SANHEDRIN and shared in the responsibility for His death (Matt. 26: 57-59; cf. chs 16:21: 27:41). Later some of these men also turned against the APOSTLES and had a hand in their persecution (Acts 4:5; 6:12).”-SDA Bible Dictionary, Commentary Ref. Series, Vol. 8, 1960, art. “Scribe,”p. 966.
Indeed, Jesus Christ, the promised “Seed of a woman”(Gen. 3:15; Gal. 4:4, 5) “came to His own, and His own received Him not. But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His name.” John 1:1-3, 10-12
To be continued in the next MWM, God willing. NMF
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THE SCRIBES SAID HE WAS ‘BEELZEBUB,’ WHILE DEMONS ADDRESSED HIM, ‘JESUS, THOU SON OF GOD’
