What’s Your Sign?

May 15, 2012 Leave a comment

As a woman was waiting in the checkout line of a grocery store, she noticed a young mother standing in line in front of her. The mother had her child strapped to her back in one of those baby-backpacks. Attached to the backpack was a large sign that read: “This child tends to shoplift. Please inform mother.”

Truth be told, each of us could have a sign attached to us. One sign would read: “This person tends to lie.” Another would read: “This person tends to use profane language.” Another would read: “This person tends to lust.” Another would read: “This person tends to covet.” Another would read: “This person tends to throw temper tantrums.” Another would read: “This person tends to not pay his bills.” Another would read: “This person tends to get drunk.” You get the idea.

In Isaiah 53:6, the Bible says:

All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way.

Notice please that each person has his or her own way of sin. My way isn’t your way and yours isn’t mine, but each of us is particularly susceptible to some specific sin. For this reason we shouldn’t be so quick to judge others or come down so harshly on their sin. You say, “But I would never be guilty of committing that person’s sin.” Perhaps you wouldn’t, but there is some other sin that you are guilty of committing. And I’m guessing that you know what your pet sin is.

The good news is that the Isaiah 53:6 verse ends by saying:

…And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.

The “Lord” spoken of there is God the Father, and the “Him” is God the Son, Jesus. Actually, the entire chapter of Isaiah 53 is a Messianic passage concerning Jesus. Writing prophetically under the inspiration of God, the prophet Isaiah speaks of how Jesus will be “wounded for our transgressions,” “led as a lamb to slaughter,” and “cut off from the land of the living.”

Of course, we Christians understand that Christ’s death on the cross pays the totality of our sin debt to God. We’re very quick to claim that truth, aren’t we? But, unfortunately, too many times we use the fact that we have been forgiven of all our sins as a license to sin. The apostle Paul addresses this problem in Romans 6:1-2 when he writes:

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?

In the verses that follow, Paul goes on to explain how a Christian’s baptism symbolizes that he has died to his old sinful way of living and is now walking in a newness of life. In this new life, the Christian will no longer be a slave of sin or let sin reign in his body. Rather than presenting the parts of his body as instruments of unrighteousness, he’ll present them as instruments of righteousness. Wow, Christian, when you got baptized you didn’t realize that you were committing to so much did you?

And so I’ll close out this post by simply asking, “How are you doing with your pet sin these days?” Are you keeping it in check? Or is some confession and repentance called for? You’ve probably heard that 1 John 1:9 is found within the context of John offering a word to Christians, not lost people. The verse says:

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Like you, I thank God for this verse, and I thank Him that it is written to Christians. However, my point today is that if you find yourself confessing one particular sin over and over again, day after day after day, you need to roll up your sleeves and work harder to STOP committing that sin. If God forced you to literally wear a sign like that baby, the embarrassment would motivate you to change your behavior so that you could lose that sign, wouldn’t it? Well, out of your love for the Lord and appreciation for Christ’s death on the cross, why don’t you go ahead and change your sinful behavior anyway? After all, the Lord doesn’t need a sign to know how you are living.

Filed under Addiction, Backsliding, Baptism, Change, Christ's Death, Christian Liberty, Confession, Drugs, Forgiveness, Gambling, Gluttony, Personal Holiness, Repentance, Sin Tagged with , , , , ,

Where Did Christ’s Soul Go After His Death? (part 5, last one)

April 14, 2012 Leave a comment

There are many instances where the time-honored King James translation uses the word “hell.” There is only one instance, however, where “hell” involves the Greek word tartaroo. That one instance is 2 Peter 2:4, which reads in the K.J.V.:

God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment.

In this verse, “cast…down to hell” translates the Greek verb tartaroo. It is from the noun version of tartaroo that we get the word Tartarus. But why am I mentioning all this? I’m doing it because the Bible teaches that Jesus visited Tartarus sometime after His death. In previous posts I’ve said a lot about how His soul went to Hades after His death. Now let me say some things about Him also visiting Tartarus.

For starters, you need to understand that Tartarus goes by two other names in the Bible. First, it is called “the bottomless pit.” This term occurs seven times in the K.J.V. (Revelation 9:1; 9:2; 9:11; 11:7; 17:8; 20:1; and 20:3). In these verses, the original Greek uses the word abussos, from which we get our English word “abyss.” Second, in two places (Luke 8:31 and Romans 10:7) the K.J.V. translates abussos as “the deep.” And so we see that Tartarus, the bottomless pit, and the deep all refer to the same place.

Now here’s the all-important thing about Tartarus: It is a place exclusively for the imprisonment of fallen angels. At no time does Tartarus ever hold the souls of any human beings. By the way, the K.J.V. refers to fallen angels as “demons,” “devils,” “unclean spirits,” or “spirits.” And mark it down, fallen angels know of Tartarus and fear the place (Luke 8:31).

But here’s a good question to ask: What angels have been cast down to Tartarus? Satan and the other now unholy angels continue to have access to this earth, don’t they? I mean, the pages of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Acts are filled with instances of demon-possession. Furthermore, Ephesians 6:12 says that we humans are always wrestling against fallen angels. And then there are those passage that tell us Satan is walking to and fro upon the earth (Job 1:7; 2:2; 1 Peter 5:8). So what’s this business about angels being cast down to Tartarus?

The answer is: The imprisoned angels are the “sons of God” who are mentioned in Genesis 6:1-4. That passage gives us the story of a certain group of fallen angels called “the sons of God.” In the Old Testament this term refers to angels (Job 1:6; Job 2:1). These particular fallen angels married human wives, had sexual relations with those wives, and produced children by those wives. It has been wrongly taught that these children became giants, but actually the passage says they became “the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.” (Think about it, there were giants such as Goliath on the earth long after the great flood.) It has also been wrongly taught that other interpretations, ones not involving fallen angels, might also fit the passage. However, if the Genesis 6:1-4 passage doesn’t involve fallen angels there is nowhere in the Bible that explains how some fallen angels ended up in Tartarus while others still get to roam the earth freely.

On the subject of those fallen angels producing children through those earthly women, the Bible doesn’t specify how a sexual union between a fallen angel and a human woman could take place. Neither does it elaborate on how such a sexual union could produce a child. Perhaps the best way to understand the passage is to think of these fallen angels as demon-possessing the bodies of human men. This would give them the male “seed” to impregnate a woman.

Jude verse 6 is a verse that also speaks of these “sons of God.” In the K.J.V. Jude 6 says they “kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation.” The New American Standard translation gives a more literal rendering of the verse’s original Greek. It says they “did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode.” For this sin God judged those angels once more by casting them down to Tartarus and delivered them into chains under darkness. So we might say that this group of angels “fell” twice.

Okay, now it’s time to bring Jesus into all this. The passage is Romans 10:6-7. These verses read:

But the righteousness of faith speaks in this way, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down from above) or, “‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).

The word translated here in the New King James Version as “the abyss” is abussos. And so what we have here is a passage that associates Jesus with Tartarus. This really helps us as we try to understand another passage, 1 Peter 3:18-20, which says:

For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, by whom also He went and preached to the spirits in prison, who formerly were disobedient, when once the Divine longsuffering waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water.

Now, the correct interpretation of these verses depends upon the correct answering of two questions. First, “Where did Jesus do this preaching?” Second, “Who were these spirits in prison to whom He preached?”

One possible interpretation is that the place was Hades and the spirits in prison were the souls in Hades. As we’ve learned in this series, Christ’s soul did go to Hades at the moment of His physical death (Acts 2:27). Is Hades then the prison he went to and were the spirits He preached to the souls in Hades?

The answer is no on both accounts. First, the interpretation doesn’t explain the Romans 10:6-7 passage, which associates Jesus with Tartarus. Second, even though the souls in the torment section of Hades could accurately be described as being in “prison” the same certainly can’t be said of the souls in the bliss section. Third, it is very awkward to describe human souls as “spirits.”

A second possible interpretation is that the prison was Gehenna and the spirits were fallen angels in Gehenna. This interpretation is easily dismissed. First, the Bible at no time puts Jesus in Gehenna. Second, at the time of Christ’s death Gehenna had no occupants to listen to preaching. Even now, Gehenna has no occupants.

A third possible interpretation is that these “spirits” in prison were actually the souls in the torment section of Hades, and Jesus had done His preaching to these people while they were alive on earth in the days of Noah. Under this interpretation, Jesus would have preached to them through Noah as Noah spoke in the power of the Holy Spirit. But this interpretation also has problems. First, it doesn’t account for Romans 10:7 using the specific Greek word abussos (Tartarus, the deep, the bottomless pit) in reference to Jesus. Second, the whole line of interpretation just doesn’t fit the way the passage reads. Again, it’s very awkward to refer to people as “spirits.” The idea of Jesus doing His preaching through Noah also seems pretty strained.

A fourth interpretation seems to be the one that best covers all aspects of the situation. For this one, the prison Jesus went to was Tartarus. This accounts perfectly for Romans 10:6-7. The “spirits” He preached to were the “sons of God” imprisoned in Tartarus. This fits perfectly with the fact that the most common New Testament use of the word “spirits” is for angels (Matthew 8:16; 12:45; Luke 10:20; 11:26).

So, putting the entire line of thought together, at Christ’s death His spirit went to God the Father (Luke 23:46; Ecclesiastes 3:21; 12:7; James 2:26), His body went to the grave, and His soul went to Hades (Acts 2:27). Then, at some point after that, Jesus, in soul, went to Tartarus. He went there for the purpose of preaching to “the sons of God” imprisoned there.

Of course, someone might ask, “But what purpose could Jesus have had for wanting to preach to a group of twice-fallen angels?” Well, this preaching was not the preaching of the gospel. It was, instead, Christ’s proclamation of victory over those fallen angels. It was preaching along the lines of what is described in Colossians 2:15, which says:

Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.

All right, now let me finish up this post and this series by sharing with you a few more facts about this place called Tartarus (the bottomless pit, the deep, the abyss):

Fact #1: The “sons of God” will one day be temporarily freed from Tartarus. Revelation 9:1-12 describes certain days that will occur in the coming tribulation period. The passage says that during these days Tartarus (the bottomless pit) will be opened. This will free the fallen angels (called “locusts” in the passage) that are imprisoned in there. These angels will then go out and torment people of the earth for five months.

Fact #2: I mentioned in my previous post that Satan will be chained up in Tartarus for the thousand years of Christ’s millennial reign upon this earth (Revelation 20:1-6). But now let me add to that by saying that Satan will have the company of all the other fallen angels in Tartarus for those thousand years. In Matthew 8:28-29 and Luke 8:26-31 a group of demons wonder if Jesus has come to torment them before “the time” (the coming time of their incarceration in Tartarus), and they beg Him not to cast them into Tartarus right then and there. The Old Testament also teaches that all the fallen angels will spend the years of Christ’s millennial reign imprisoned with Satan. The passage is Isaiah 24:21-22.

Fact #3: The Bible does finish out the thought on what will happen to all the fallen angels, including the “sons of God,” after their imprisonment with Satan in Tartarus during the one-thousand years of Christ’s reign. At the end of that reign Satan and all the other fallen angels will be released from Tartarus, engage in one final revolt against God (Revelation 20:7-10), and then all be cast into Gehenna (the lake of fire). There they will spend all eternity (Matthew 25:41).

Fact #4: Just as Hades has gates and keys to the gates (Matthew 16:18; Revelation 1:18 where “hell” translates Hades), Tartarus has a key to it. The proof text is Revelation 9:1. Some Greek scholars say that Revelation 9:1 conveys the idea of a shaft which leads down to Tartarus. This shaft isn’t Tartarus, but it does serve as the only way in and out of Tartarus.

Fact #5: Like Hades, Tartarus is located somewhere in the heart of planet earth. Revelation 9:1-3 makes this clear. It is believed that Tartarus is even lower down in the heart of the earth than Hades. Of course, it should be noted that the eternal prison for Satan and the other fallen angels, as well as all of history’s lost humans, will be Gehenna, and the Bible does not indicate that Gehenna is located in the heart of the earth.

Filed under Angels, Christ's Death, Demons, Prophecy, Satan, Spiritual Warfare, The Devil Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Where Did Christ’s Soul Go After His Death? (part 3)

April 12, 2012 Leave a comment

For centuries the dominant translation of the Bible was the King James Version. In answer to the question, “Where did Christ’s soul go after His death?” Acts 2:27 in the K.J.V. reads:

Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.

Not so surprisingly, people seized upon this verse to create a whole line of erroneous doctrinal thinking. It goes like this: “Christ’s soul went to hell when he died because He had to suffer our punishment in hell as a part of Him paying the penalty for our sins.” But think about it, if He really did have to endure the required amount of torment and suffering in hell to pay our sin debt, wouldn’t it have been eternal suffering? I mean, isn’t that the rule? When a sinner dies without Christ, his or her soul has to suffer a lot longer than three days worth of punishment in hell, right? Also, the whole idea of Christ’s soul suffering the torment of hell flatly goes against what He told the thief on the cross, “…today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43)

As I noted in my last post, whenever you read the word “hell” in the old King James translation you’ve got to dig a little deeper and find out the word used in the original language. Concerning the Old Testament, in 100% of the instances where the K.J.V. reads “hell” the Hebrew word is Sheol. But the interesting thing is that in the Old Testament the souls of both the saved and the lost go to Sheol. For example, Psalm 9:17 puts the lost souls of the wicked there, but 2 Samuel 22:6 puts the soul of David right on the brink of being there.

You see, this hints at the fact that Sheol has two sections to it. It has a bliss section for the souls of the saved, and it has a torment section for the souls of the lost. Really, the Hebrew word Sheol is simply an umbrella word that refers to the general afterlife realm of the dead. That afterlife could be spent in the bliss section or it might be spent in the torment section, depending upon one’s salvation or lack of it. As a matter of fact, just as the K.J.V. Old Testament translates Sheol as “hell” in thirty-one instances, it translates it as “the grave” in another thirty-one instances.

As for the New Testament, the equivalent of the Hebrew Sheol is the Greek Hades. And Luke 16:19-31, where the K.J.V. translates Hades as “hell,” leaves no doubt as to the place having two very different sections. The saved soul of the beggar Lazarus goes to the bliss section, while the lost soul of the rich man goes to the torment section.

And so Christ’s soul went to the bliss section of Hades when He died, the same place where the souls of the Old Testament believers went. You see, even though Lazarus the beggar, the thief on the cross, and Jesus lived in the days of the New Testament, they still lived and died in what we might call the Old Testament dispensation. What I mean is, the really big changes concerning afterlife abodes wouldn’t take place until Christ’s resurrection and ascension.

And here now is where we bring things into our current era. So please take special note of what you’re about to read: When Jesus ascended back to heaven forty days after His resurrection, He emptied the bliss section of Hades and took those saved souls formally into heaven with Him. The passage on this is Ephesians 4:8-10, which reads in the New King James translation:

Therefore He says: “When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, And gave gifts to men.” (Now this, “He ascended – what does it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.)

What Paul is doing in this passage is playing off the scene of a Roman general leading a procession through the streets of Rome after a victorious military campaign. For such a procession the general would be at the front of the parade. Then behind him would be the “trophies” he had “won” through his military victories. Some of those “trophies” would be people who had been captured as prisoners of war by the general’s army.

And so, using this earthly illustration, Paul describes how Jesus “won” the souls out of the bliss section of Hades. First, Jesus descended into the lower parts of the earth. (Remember that in the previous post I explained that Hades is located somewhere deep in the heart of the earth.) Second, He ascended to heaven with those souls. Third, He marched victoriously into heaven with those souls behind Him. The N.I.V. translation does the best job of conveying Paul’s imagery. It renders Ephesians 4:8 as, “…he led captives in his train…”

You ask, “But why did those millions of saved souls have to wait until Christ’s resurrection before they could formally enter heaven?” It was because Jesus had to officially shed His blood in time and history before their sins could be eternally cleansed. Keep in mind that Hebrews 10:4 says that it wasn’t possible for the blood of the Old Testament sacrifices to take away sin. The best such blood could do was cover sin and stay the wrath of God. It is only Christ’s literal blood that can eternally cleanse sin. As I once heard a Bible teacher say, “Really, the Old Testament believers were saved on credit by looking ahead to Christ’s death on the cross just as we look back upon it.”

And so what does all this mean for the Christian today? It means that at the moment of death the Christian’s soul goes straight on up to heaven. There is now no longer a need for the bliss section of Hades. Surely that section still exists, but it’s empty. The same Paul who wrote about how the resurrected, ascended Jesus entered into heaven with those saved souls from Hades also taught in 2 Corinthians 5:1-8 that now when a Christian is absent from the body he is present with the Lord. He also said in Philippians 1:23 that he desired to depart this earth and be with Christ, which is far better. When he said that he knew full well that Jesus is now seated at the right hand of God the Father up in heaven. For that matter, just before Steven died his martyr’s death he saw Jesus in heaven standing to immediately receive his soul (Acts 7:54-60).

And right there is where I’ll stop for today. In my next post I’ll finish up the teaching on Hades by explaining what is going to eventually happen to the lost souls that are currently abiding in its torment section. You see, when all the dust has settled and everything is said and done before the dawn of eternity, there won’t be one soul left in either section of Hades. With this post I’ve explained how the bliss side got emptied, and I hope you’ll stay tuned for the explanation of how the torment side will eventually get emptied as well.

Filed under Christ's Death, Christ's Resurrection, Heaven, hell Tagged with , , , , , , , ,

Where Did Christ’s Soul Go After His Death? (part 2)

April 11, 2012 Leave a comment

For centuries the classic King James translation of the Bible was the favored one for the English-speaking world. Many of us grew up reading the K.J.V. and memorizing its verses, and undoubtedly it’s a generally solid translation. Unfortunately, the way it uses the word “hell” has been a longstanding problem.

In the K.J.V.’s New Testament three very different Greek words get translated as the one word “hell.” This has caused untold confusion among sincere students of the Bible. The three words are Tartarus, Gehenna, and Hades. I could devote an entire series of posts to explaining what the Bible teaches about each place, but I won’t do that because I’m already in a series. So, for my purposes here, let me just give you the barest of the bare basics.

First, Tartarus (2 Peter 2:4) is a place exclusively for the imprisonment of certain fallen angels. No human souls have ever been or ever will be incarcerated there. In the New Testament this place also goes by two other names. In the book of The Revelation it is “the bottomless pit” mentioned in chapters 9,11,17, and 20. In Luke 8:31 and Romans 10:7 it is “the deep.” The terms “the bottomless pit” and “the deep” both translate the Greek word abussos, from which we get our English word “abyss.”

Second, Gehenna is the eternal lake of fire of chapters 19-21 of The Revelation. Even though this place is in existence now it is completely empty as of yet. Its first occupants will be the Anti-Christ and the False Prophet from the coming tribulation period (Revelation 19:20).

This leaves us with Hades, which is where Acts 2:27 places Christ’s soul after His death. Perhaps it’s best to think of Hades as being a general realm of the dead. In the Old Testament Hebrew it goes by its Hebrew name Sheol. In the Old Testament the soul of every deceased person goes to Sheol (Hades). You ask, “Do you mean that in Old Testament days the souls of saved people went to the same afterlife abode as the souls of lost people?” Yes, that’s right. There is, however, more to it than that.

The thing about Hades (Sheol) is this: It has two sections. One section was for the souls of saved believers, and the other section was for the souls of lost unbelievers. While the Old Testament certainly hints at these two sections, the New Testament comes right out and describes each one. The passage is Luke 16:19-31, Christ’s story of the rich man and the beggar Lazarus. The souls of the rich man and the beggar both went to Hades upon death. The beggar’s soul went to the bliss section of Hades, where he was comforted by the soul of Abraham, an Old Testament believer. On the other hand, the rich man’s soul went to the torment section where there was no comfort. The rich man could engage in a brief conversation with Abraham and Lazarus, but a great gulf prevented him from passing over to that other section.

Now, it is the torment section of Hades (Sheol) that people have in mind when they talk about someone dying and going to hell. And this notion is factual because this is exactly the place where every lost soul now goes. This section is a place of torment and flame (Luke 16:24). It is a place of painful remembrance of the events of your earthly life (Luke 16:25). It is a place where all your requests are denied (Luke 16:24, 27-28, 30-31).

And would you believe that Hades (both sides) is literally located in the heart of the earth? The Old Testament always speaks of the place in terms of being “down.” Read the story of how God allowed a medium to conjure up the soul of the deceased Samuel so that Samuel could pronounce a word of doom on King Saul (1 Samuel 27:3-25). According to the story, Samuel’s soul ascended up out of the earth, not down from heaven. Furthermore, not only is Hades located somewhere in the heart of the earth, the Bible also teaches that the place has gates (Job 17:16, Matthew 16:18).

And so now the question becomes, “Which section of Hades did Christ’s soul go to at His death?” We find the answer in Luke 23:43. There, just before He dies, Jesus promises the believing thief on the cross beside Him, “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.” Make no mistake, there is no correlation whatsoever between the torment section of Hades and “Paradise.” And since Jesus said, “you will be with me,” He obviously went to the bliss section of Hades.

I should point out that the word “Paradise” is used in two other places in the New Testament. First, in 2 Corinthians 12:4 the apostle Paul uses it in reference to “the third heaven,” which is God’s heaven, the place we think of when we use the word “heaven.” Then second, in Revelation 2:7 (when interpreted through the lens of Revelation 22:2) the word is used in reference to the future city of New Jerusalem, the city where the saved of all history will spend eternity. You see, in the New Testament the specific “Paradise” being mentioned is determined by the context and time-frame of the passage in question. Before Christ’s death and resurrection, “Paradise” was the bliss section of Hades. After Christ’s death and resurrection, “Paradise” became the third heaven, God’s heaven. In the prophetic future, after Christ’s thousand-year-reign upon this earth, “Paradise” will become the heavenly city called the New Jerusalem.

Okay, I’m going to put a period here for now, but it’s not because I don’t have more to say about Hades. I just feel like I’ve given you plenty of scriptural meat to chew on for one post. Let me encourage you to study all these references for yourself. I think you’ll find them interesting reads. Then, in my next post, I’ll say the rest of what I need to say about Hades and Christ’s soul going there after His death.

Filed under Bible Study, Christ's Death, Christ's Resurrection, Easter, God's Word, Heaven, hell, King James only, Prophecy Tagged with , , , , , , , , ,

Where Did Christ’s Soul Go After His Death? (part 1)

April 10, 2012 Leave a comment

In the days leading up to Easter Sunday, I had two different people ask me the same question: “Where did Christ’s soul go after His death?” So I felt led of the Lord to build my Easter sermon around that question. What I’d like to do with my next few posts is share that information with you.

Let me begin by saying that every human being consists of a body, a soul, and a spirit. This applied to Jesus as well because He was God in human flesh. I could use individual passages that specifically mention the body, other passages that mention the spirit, and other passages that mention the soul, but I’ll just go with 1 Thessalonians 5:23, which brings all three into play:

Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely; and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Several months ago I devoted a series of posts to the body, the soul, and the spirit, and I’ll not repeat all that information. Let me just say that each human being is a soul who lives in a body and possesses a spirit. The soul is the eternal you. The body is that which houses the soul. The spirit is the life-giving spark of God that makes the body alive. As James 2:26 says, “…the body without the spirit is dead.”

Now, we know what happened to Christ’s body after His death, don’t we? Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus removed the body from the cross, bound it in strips of linen, and buried it in Joseph of Arimathea’s personal tomb (John 19:38-42). Furthermore, we also know what happened to Christ’s spirit. His last words on the cross weren’t, “It is finished,” as some people wrongly believe (John 19:30). Not long after He uttered those words He said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My spirit” (Luke 23:46). This chimes in perfectly with Ecclesiastes 12:7, which teaches that at death the spirit returns to God. And so all this leaves only the matter of what happened to Christ’s soul after His death.

Thankfully, the Bible hasn’t left us in the dark as to the answer. As a part of the famous sermon that Peter preached on the Day of Pentecost following Christ’s resurrection and ascension, he loosely quoted Psalm 16:8-11, which is an Old Testament Messianic passage that speaks of Jesus. In Acts 2:27, we read these words from that passage:

For You will not leave my soul in Hades, nor will you allow Your Holy One to see corruption.

Frankly, these words really aren’t hard to understand. First, the part about God the Father not allowing Christ to see corruption refers to Christ’s body not experiencing the normal process of decay in the tomb. Second, the part about not leaving Christ’s soul in Hades refers to His soul going there after His death but not remaining there. The point is, Christ’s soul obviously went to Hades immediately following His death.

This gets us onto the subject of Hades, and since that is something of a complex subject I’ll wait until my next post to tackle it. I’m not trying to needlessly draw this out. Nor is this a ploy to keep you coming back. It just takes a little bit of time to get everything explained. So please stay tuned.

Filed under Christ's Death, Christ's Resurrection, Easter, hell Tagged with , , , , ,

Praying In Jesus’ Name (part 6, last one)

March 22, 2012 Leave a comment

For the past several posts, I’ve been explaining what all is involved with praying “in Jesus’ name” (John 14:12-14). Thus far we’ve covered the following ground:

1. Praying in Jesus’ name can only be done by a Christian.

2. To pray in Jesus’ name is to pray in submission to God’s will.

3. To pray in Jesus’ name is to pray in the authority of Jesus.

4. To pray in Jesus’ name is to pray with an understanding of the limitless power such praying offers.

5. Praying in Jesus’ name means praying the kind of prayer that Jesus would pray.

Okay, now let me move on to the sixth and last thing I want to say on this subject. It is this: To pray in Jesus’ name is to pray with an awareness of the work of redemption that Jesus completed.

Christian, when you pray you should be keenly aware of the fact that your privilege of prayer rests upon the foundation of Christ’s divinity, virgin birth, sinless life, substitutionary death, miraculous resurrection, and victorious ascension back to heaven. Hebrews is the Bible’s great book here. Allow me to string together some of the relevant passages:

But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone (2:9)…Therefore, in all things He had to be made like His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High Priest in things, pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.(2:17)…Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.(4:14-16).

You see, the teaching of these passages is this: The only reason we Christians can bow our heads anytime, anyplace and have our prayers heard by God the Father is because Jesus did the work that we might be redeemed. If you take that work out of the equation, our prayers take a deadly hit. That’s why, Christian, when you pray you should always have Christ’s work of redemption in the back of your mind. You should remember not only that Jesus is your High Priest but what it took for Him to earn that title. The redemptive work He did is of infinite importance, and without it your prayers would carry little if any weight with God the Father.

Filed under Christ's birth, Christ's Death, Christ's Resurrection, prayer, salvation Tagged with , , , , , ,

How To Handle A Bad Inning

March 5, 2012 Leave a comment

My son Ryan has now officially begun his high-school baseball career. He had his first j.v. game last Friday. It’s put me in the mood to share one of my favorite “baseball” illustrations.

At a Little League game the visiting team had already scored 21 runs and was still batting in the top of the first inning. The mother of the kid in right-field began to worry that such a staggeringly lopsided loss would demoralize her child and destroy his confidence. So she left her seat in the stands and made her way out to the right-field fence. She stood there on her side of it and yelled out to him, “Son, this has to be an awful experience for you, and I just want you to know that you don’t have to keep playing if you don’t want to. I’ll take you home right now and explain things to your coach.” The boy, however, seemed shocked by the suggestion. He simply smiled back at her and said, “But mom, we can still win this game. We haven’t come to bat yet!”

You have a choice to make as to how you approach life. You can operate with an optimistic attitude or a defeatist one. You can believe that God is up to something good in your life or that He is leading you off a cliff. The choice is yours.

As for the optimistic approach, I’m not talking about some pie-in-the-sky, “hope so” kind of thing. I’m talking about you putting your faith in a Savior who loves you enough to die on the cross for your sins and stands ready to give your life ideal meaning and purpose. I’m talking about heeding Him when He says, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes” (Mark 9:23). I’m talking about relating to the apostle Paul when he says, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).

Does following Jesus mean that you will never experience any blowout defeats? Hardly. But it does mean at least two things. First, if you stay submitted to Christ’s will for your life He will keep you out of a lot of those situations that would end badly for you. Second, even when those difficult times do come along, Jesus will not only give you what you need to get through them but also use them to increase your strength and wisdom.

I don’t know where this post finds you today, but perhaps you are right now guilty of bringing a defeatist attitude to the playing field. I suppose this is understandable for a person who doesn’t know Christ as Savior. After all, if I didn’t have the hope provided by Him, the state of this world would have me down in the dumps too. But it should be different for the Christian. Our Savior wasn’t a quitter, even as battered, bloodied, and bruised He carried the cross up Calvary’s hill. None of us will ever have a worse day than that one, and yet the eternal good He accomplished through it is far too deep for our human minds to grasp. That should teach us that the hardest things we have to endure in life can produce the greatest good. And that’s why we shouldn’t quit playing even in the midst of a bad inning.

Filed under Attitude, Belief, Choices, Christ's Death, Disappointment, Encouragement, God's Love, God's Provision, God's Will, perseverance, Personal, trials, Trusting In God Tagged with , , , , , , ,

What Does the Bible Teach About Drinking Alcohol? (5)

October 17, 2011 Leave a comment

Did Jesus drink alcoholic wine? Needless to say, it’s a touchy subject. To answer the question, all I know to do is go to the Bible.

I’ll begin by saying that the gospels make a point of not using oinos, the Greek word for alcoholic wine, in regards to the famous “last supper” that Jesus had with His apostles. We see this in Matthew 26:27-29, Mark 14:22-25, and Luke 22:14-22. I’ll quote the Matthew passage here:

Then He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you. For this is My blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. But I say to you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it new with you in My Father’s kingdom.”

You see, the original Greek of the New Testament is perfectly capable of differentiating between alcoholic wine and mere grape juice when the facts of the case call for it. And that’s exactly what Matthew, Mark, and Luke did concerning what Jesus served His apostles at the “last supper,” which was of course His formal instituting of what we now call the “Lord’s supper.” (By the way, whenever we come to the word “wine” in the New Testament we should remember that if the beverage in question had been grape juice, the writer of the passage could easily have gone with the Greek for “the fruit of the vine.”)

Okay, so the Bible teaches that Jesus didn’t serve alcoholic wine at His “last supper,” which might imply that He didn’t drink it at that meal either. But are there any other passages relevant to our question? Yes, there are. Mark 15:23 is one. In the context of describing Christ’s crucifixion, that verse says:

Then they gave Him wine mingled with myrrh to drink, but He did not take it.

The verse’s Greek word for “wine” is the familiar oinos, which means alcoholic wine. The Romans offered such a drink as a painkiller to men being crucified. Jesus, however, refused it. Some will say that He refused it because He was thoroughly opposed to anyone drinking alcoholic beverages under any circumstances. As for me, I line up with those who believe that He refused it because He wanted to experience the fullness of the cross. He didn’t want His senses dulled in any way. If He was going to die to pay the world’s sin debt, He would do so without any aid from anything that would dull the pain and thus lessen the suffering.

And so we’ve seen that Jesus didn’t serve alcoholic wine at the “last supper” and He refused the same as He hung on the cross. So does that finish out the answer to our question? No, it doesn’t. We also need to consider the teaching of Matthew 11:18-19 and Luke 7:33-34, two passages which tell the same story. I’ll quote the one from Luke. It records Jesus saying to the Jewish religious leaders:

“For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a winebibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’”

Basically, those Jewish religious leaders couldn’t be appeased. On the one hand, they criticized John the Baptist for his isolationist lifestyle and minimalistic diet (Luke 1:13-15; Matthew 2:4). On the other hand, they criticized Jesus for the fact that, socially speaking, He was the polar opposite of John the Baptist (Luke 5:27-32). But what we want to focus on is the fact that those leaders called Jesus a “winebibber,” which means “a person who drinks excessive amounts of wine.”

Now we need to be careful here because we can’t assume that Jesus drank alcoholic wine just because those Jews said that He did. With that noted, however, I don’t feel totally comfortable believing that they just pulled the accusation out of thin air. After all, they didn’t call John the Baptist a “winebibber,” did they?

I suppose the accusation could have simply grown out of Jesus attending feasts like the one in the home of Matthew (Levi) (Luke 5:29-32). Surely alcoholic wine was served at that feast. But, admittedly, Jesus being at such a feast doesn’t necessarily mean that He drank wine there.

Let’s understand, though, that some of those Jewish leaders were either in attendance at Matthew’s feast or had direct knowledge about it (Luke 5:30). So was it a boldfaced lie when they called Jesus a “winebibber” or did they know for certainty that He drank wine and simply exaggerated His drinking? That’s a good question. I wish we could nail down the answer with a high degree of certainty.

There are some who contend that Jesus would never have drunk wine because that would have violated Old Testament law concerning the priesthood. Certainly Jesus did live His earthly life as a Jew who kept that body of law that God had given to Moses and the Israelites. He even made a point of saying, “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.” (Matthew 5:17) And what did that law command concerning priests as they ministered in the tabernacle (temple)? Leviticus 10:8-11 tell us:

Then the Lord spoke to Aaron (Israel’s first high priest), saying: “Do not drink wine or intoxicating drink, you, nor your sons with you, when you go into the tabernacle of meeting, lest you die. It shall be a statue forever throughout your generations, that you may distinguish between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean, and that you may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the Lord has spoken to them by the hand of Moses.”

You say, “Ah, at last, that settles it! Jesus would never have drunk alcoholic wine because He was a priest, like Aaron.” Well, unfortunately, things aren’t so cut and dried as that. Consider the following facts:

#1: That law specifically dealt with ministering in the Jewish tabernacle or (later on) the Jewish temple. But Jesus never ministered as a priest at the temple of His day. He visited there, but He certainly never performed any priestly duties there. Israel had its own priests.

#2: The New Testament book of Hebrews emphatically teaches that even though Jesus is a High Priest, He isn’t of the priestly order of Aaron. He is, instead, of the priestly order of Melchizedek. (Hebrews 5:1-6; 7:1-27) Interestingly, Melchizedek ministered in a time before the building of the Jewish tabernacle or the temple.

#3: In Genesis 14:18-20, the only Old Testament passage that speaks of Melchizedek, he brings two particular items to Abraham. Guess what they are: bread and (you got it) wine.

And so, in conclusion, what answer are we left with at the end of this post? Did Jesus drink alcoholic wine or not? The truth is, there is simply no way to take the Bible and build a 100% case for either a yes or a no answer. But if you pin me up against a wall and force me to state my opinion, I’ll say that I believe that, on occasion, He did. I just don’t think those Jewish religious leaders completely fabricated that charge about Him being a “winebibber.” Obviously, He never drank wine to excess because that would have been a sin. But I lean toward thinking that those guys had at least seen him drink some wine. And as for the argument that Old Testament law concerning the priesthood kept Him from drinking, as I’ve shown you that argument can be refuted pretty easily.

Filed under alcohol, Christ's Death, Crucifixion, The Lord's Supper Tagged with , , , , , , , ,

How You Get In

August 23, 2011 Leave a comment

Dr. Thomas John Barnardo was revered in London for his work with orphans. One day a dirty, destitute little boy came to him and asked for admission to the London orphanage. Somewhat surprised, Barnardo said, “But, my boy, I don’t know you. Who are you? What do you have to recommend you?” The little boy held up his tattered coat and said, “If you please, sir, I thought these here rags would be all I needed to recommend me.” Barnardo swept the child up into his arms and said, “You are right, little fellow! Welcome to our orphanage!”

Just as that little boy’s ragged attire was all he needed to receive help from Dr. Barnardo, our sins are all we need to receive help from Jesus. But, like that boy, we must see our need for help. It is only when we stop attempting to justify ourselves and cleanse our own sins that Christ can step in and provide the forgiveness we need.

One writer has described it this way:

God has no message and no blessing for men who are trying to justify themselves. As long as you try to make a good name for yourself, God can only condemn you; but when you come into His presence and confess yourself a lost, guilty sinner, God has a message and a blessing for you. “God so loved the world” – a wicked, corrupt and ungodly world, and you and I belong to it.

Going back to the illustration of the little boy and the orphanage, yes, his rags got him inside the doors. But it wasn’t just his rags; it was also the love, grace, and authority of Dr. Barnardo. Okay, think of heaven as the orphanage and God the Father as Dr. Barnardo. How does the lost sinner get in? He gets in by way of his sins (rags). But, you see, those sins must stand as forgiven, and God the Father only forgives the sins of those who have believed in God the Son (Jesus) as Savior.

You ask, “But didn’t Christ’s death on the cross pay the sin debt for the whole world?” Yes, it did, but that doesn’t mean that the whole world is saved. Only those who stop trying to work out their own salvation and believe in Christ exclusively for the forgiveness of sins are saved. While it’s true that Christ’s death on the cross is sufficient for God to forgive all sins, that death is only efficient for those who place their belief in Christ. So, when everything is said and done, the question that each of us must ask ourselves is, “Am I in?”

Filed under Belief, Christ's Death, Forgiveness, God's Holiness, Heaven, salvation Tagged with , , , , , ,

Why The Christian Will Be In Heaven

August 8, 2011 Leave a comment

Evangelist Dr. A.J. Fristoe tells the story of something that happened to him when he accepted an invitation to preach a revival in London, England. He said that upon his arrival he was met by those who had invited him. They told him that he would be staying in one of the finest palaces in England. It had all been arranged by the couple who owned the home. They had put in a special request that Dr. Fristoe be allowed to stay with them.

Even as Fristoe traveled to the home, he had to question why the wealthy couple would be so gracious to him. The mystery only deepened when he met them and realized that they were strangers to him. It wasn’t until all three were comfortably seated in an exquisite living room that he got his explanation.

The couple’s son, an officer in the Royal navy, was stationed on the other side of the world, but he had heard that Dr. Fristoe was to be in London. It was the young man who had sent instructions for his parents to be so hospitable to Dr. Fristoe. As the couple described their son, Dr. Fristoe did indeed remember him. The officer had been on a ship that had put into Norfolk, Virginia for repairs years earlier when Fristoe was serving as the pastor of a church there. The officer had attended Fristoe’s church and gotten to know the preacher quite well. Fristoe had invited the young man into his home for dinner on multiple occasions. There the two had enjoyed long discussions on the subject of religion, and those discussions had led the young man to believe in Christ as Savior. Dr. Fristoe had even baptized him.

After the officer’s ship had pulled out of Norfolk, he had kept in touch with Fristoe. Upon hearing that Fristoe would be preaching a revival in London, the officer had cabled his parents and instructed them to extend the invitation to the evangelist. After the explanation was all given, the couple ended it by saying, “Dr. Fristoe, you are here because of our son.”

The spiritual parallel isn’t hard to spot. Christian, when you journey to heaven and arrive at that indescribably beautiful place, God the Father could rightly look at you and say, “You are here because of My Son.” Take some time today to thank Jesus for the awesome fact that heaven awaits you when you leave this world.

Filed under Christ's Death, church, Church attendance, God's Work, Heaven, Influence, salvation Tagged with , , , , , ,

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