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I’ve often told the joke “Hey, who was the first person to break the commandments”, and I get various responses such as “Adam” or “Lucifer”. Then I told the punchline “No, Moses was the first person - he walked off Mt. Sinai and broke ALL TEN at once!”Ok, so it isn’t the funniest joke in the world but most of mine aren’t. The point is, Moses did break those tablets and had to go back to the mountain and get a second set. But did you ever notice… that God carved the first tablets out of Mt. Sinai with his own hand, and wrote on them with his own finger? I’m sure you did.

Exodus 32:16-19 And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables. [and Moses walked down the mountain] … And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses’ anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount.

But did you notice that God commanded MOSES to carve out (but not write upon) the second tablets? And if you did, did you ever ask WHY? These things happened to Moses and the Israelites for SYMBOLS; pictures of the plan of God so that we could understand them and learn from them TODAY. WHY did Moses cut the second tablets?

Exodus 34:1 (NKJV) And the LORD said to Moses, “Cut two tablets of stone like the first ones, and I will write on these tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke.

The Bible goes way out of it’s way to EXPLICITLY say that God cut the stones for the first tablets out of the mountain, and then just as explicitly says that Moses made the second tablets. Now that wasn’t an accident. The words were the same on both tablets, and God personally wrote the ten commandments on both tablets… but the tablets themselves were different…. Read the rest of this entry »

Anyone who has ever kept the passover has asked “what does footwashing represent?”. We drink the wine and eat the bread, and those symbols are well defined. But footwashing? It isn’t mentioned in Matthew, Mark or Luke, and John doesn’t tell us a lot about it, just the command to do it; so true Christians everywhere wash each other’s feet and either don’t know what it means, or make up something. And if you must obey God in ignorance of why you’re doing what you’re doing, then by all means obey Him in ignorance; but if we can KNOW what it symbolizes, why we go through this ritual year by year, then we certainly should.

John 13:2 And supper being ended, the devil having now put into the heart of Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, to betray him;

First let’s set the stage; this happened after the “supper”. We know from harmonizing this with the other gospels that the old testament lamb had already been prepared and eaten this night to fulfill the old testament passover first. The old testament passover was to be killed and eaten between the two evenings, the period of twilight between sundown and complete darkness. So since supper was finished the sun’s light was probably about completely gone; most likely the footwashing took place about an hour and a half after sundown when supper was finished.

After that ceremony Jesus set into place the new symbols which would, from now on, be the new passover service. But before He did that, in the space between the old and new testament passovers that night, Jesus washed the disciples feet.

Before going into that further, let’s make a few facts clear:

1. No one washed Jesus’ feet that night
2. The disciples did not wash one another’s feet that night
3. Peter was not the first one washed
4. Jesus specifically changed his clothes for this ceremony, then changed back when it was finished before going on with the passover service

Those facts tend to challenge what we’ve always believed, but read through John 13 and no mention is made of anyone washing anyone except Jesus washing the disciples. This is important, so remember it… Read the rest of this entry »

Few people realize it, but Jesus made two sacrifices; and it’s hard to say which is greater. Sadly, no one even knows about the first sacrifice. So let’s correct that shameful oversight.

John 1:1-2 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.

We can infer from this and a few other scriptures that, in the immemorial recesses of antiquity there were two Gods; equally perfect and equally God. Distinct of course, but of the same rank - since rank is merely a measure of perfection. But they wanted to build a family, billions of people with whom to share the joys of a perfect universe.

Unfortunately, there was a snag. See, in creating beings who can sin, it is inevitable that some of them will sin. In fact, given time, it is inevitable that ALL will sin. Since it is a given that every being WILL sin at some point in the future, however perfectly they are created (Satan, for instance), it is equally a given that all beings must die at the moment of that sin.

But this would ruin everything, for what’s the point of creating a family, just to destroy them as punishment for their sin? Read the rest of this entry »

“Why are unclean meats unclean?”

“God said so.”

“Well why did He say so?”

“Because He knows something we don’t.”

“DUH! Is that the best you can do?”

“Well … maybe it’s because they’re unhealthy…”

*****

You know, that’s the best answer I’ve ever heard on this subject. And yet this is one of the major things that sets a true Christian apart from the rest of the world. Didn’t you ever want a better answer? I did. So… why are unclean meats unclean?

Genesis 1:29-30 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so.

Back in the garden of Eden, just after creating man God laid down dietary laws for him. God instructed him that he could eat all plants and all fruits freely. God told Man, in effect, that these were “clean” for him. (Of course, the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was excepted from that. It by inference was unclean).

At this time God also set down dietary laws for animals as well; just how He enforced them is at the moment beyond me, but He clearly said that EVERY beast of the earth, and EVERY bird was to eat every green herb. We can back this up in a rather unusual way because we know that in the future God will restore the Earth to the paradise-like state it was in then, and in that time…

Isaiah 65:25 The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent’s meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.

When this day comes the wolf will be eating the same thing as the lamb - grass and herbs - and the lion will be eating the same thing as the ox - grass and herbs. So however God makes this possible, it seems that the entire Earth both was and will be again, vegetarians. So God told man that every green herb was clean, and we can infer from that that every animal was unclean, and not to be eaten! Read the rest of this entry »

This is another one of those questions that explains the inner workings of reality and salvation on a level that is quite astounding. We tend to take the things we see in scripture at face value, and assign anything we don’t understand to “the awesome power of God”. But the more you study the Bible and get to know the mind of God, you see that each of these things functions according to a set of laws; and each of them follows a pattern, and an exact scientific process.

Matthew 10:29 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.

Have you ever wondered… HOW does God know how many hairs on are your head? Does He have a contingent of angels following you around, with nothing better to do than keep a running count on your hairs? And HOW does He know when a sparrow dies - does He just “KNOW” (wimpy, cop-out answer) or does He have angels with titles like “Vice president of the bird kingdom in charge of sparrow-counting”?

I have asked many far-out and wild questions in my time, and I’ve yet to find one that the Bible doesn’t tell us the answer, or at least give us enough implications to reason it out for ourselves, if we know God and the laws He lives by well enough. So let’s talk about the Book of Life. Read the rest of this entry »