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Jezebel

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Elijah and Jezebel: Jesus and the Antichrist

by Francis Frangipane
written by Francis Frangipane

The ancient conflict between the spirits of Elijah and Jezebel is an incredibly powerful glimpse into spiritual warfare. In this age-old battle, Elijah represents the voice of Heaven: the call to repentance and the return to God. Jezebel, on the other hand, embodies that unique principality of Satan whose purpose is to hinder and defeat the work of repentance. The goal is to silence the work and Word of God. We can learn much about the war between Jesus and the Antichrist as we study the nature of Elijah, God’s prophet and Jezebel, God’s enemy.

 

To understand the conflict between Elijah and Jezebel, we must understand these two adversaries as they are seen in the Scriptures. Each is the spiritual counterpart of the other. Is Elijah bold? Jezebel is brazen. Is Elijah ruthless toward evil? Jezebel is vicious toward righteousness. Does Elijah speak of the ways and words of God? Jezebel is full of systems of witchcraft and words of deceit.

 

Elijah was the spiritual leader of Israel’s school of prophets. Under him were the sons of the prophets—literally hundreds of seers and prophetic minstrels, each of whom proclaimed the Word of the Lord. In this war, however, Jezebel had viciously and systematically murdered God’s servants until only Elijah remained (I Kings 18:22). Elijah, as the last of the prophets, then challenged the 450 prophets of Baal and the 400 prophets of the Asherah to a demonstration of power: their gods against the power of the Lord. These 850 men were the false prophets, satanic priests of Baal worship, who ate “at Jezebel’s table” (I Kings 18:19). They were the most powerful, demonized individuals that the hosts of darkness could produce.

 

King Ahab, Jezebel’s husband, sent a message out to all Israel, and the nation came to witness the conflict between the God of Elijah and the demons of Baal led by Jezebel. The terms of the challenge were simple: each was to place an ox upon an altar. Elijah then said, “…you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord, and the God who answers by fire, He is God’ (I Kings 18:24). Six hours later the cult priests still could produce no fire; twelve hours passed and Elijah began to mock them, “Call out with a loud voice, for he is a god; either he is occupied or gone aside…perhaps he is asleep and needs to be awakened” (vs 27). Then, just before evening, Elijah prayed over his sacrifice and, ‘The fire of the Lord fell, and consumed the burnt offering… And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces; and they said, ‘The Lord, He is God; the Lord, He is God’ (I Kings 18:38-39).

 

Immediately after this powerful witness of the Lord, Elijah instructed the Israelites to gather the prophets of Baal and all of them were put to death. We would suppose that, at this point, Elijah would have gone into Jezreel and, with the same confidence and power that just accompanied him, destroyed Jezebel, but he did not. In fact—and this may surprise you—Elijah came under spiritual warfare. Jezebel, in a fit of rage, released a flood of satanic oppression and curses against Elijah that overwhelmed him, swamping his soul with fear and discouragement, causing him to flee. How could such a mighty prophet turn and run?

 

The answer is not simple. In fact, the situation worsened. We next see Elijah sitting beneath a juniper tree, bewailing that he is no better than his fathers–actually praying that he might die! (I Kings 19:4) What pressure overwhelmed this great man of God that he would fall prey to such fear and discouragement? Satan’s work through Jezebel. Now listen, my beloved comrades, and understand. When you take a stand against forces of darkness like those who controlled Queen Jezebel, even though you resist such attacks, you must be aware that fear and discouragement as well as other devices of Satan will be sent against you to smother your prayer and silence your voice.

 

The Drama Continues… The war between Elijah and Jezebel reanimates at peak seasons in the history of man. Remember what the Scriptures speak concerning John the Baptist: he was to be a, “forerunner before [the Lord] in the spirit and power of Elijah” (Lk 1:17). Jesus said of John the Baptist, “…he himself is Elijah, who was to come” (Matt 11:14, 17:11-13). John even looked like Elijah. Like Elijah, John proclaimed the need for repentance wherever he saw sin. One such area was in the adulterous lives of King Herod and his wife, Herodias. When John confronted them, Herodias had him imprisoned (Mk 6:17-19). But who was this manipulating and controlling in the dark, spiritual side of Herodias? As Elijah’s spirit ministered through John, so Jezebel-like influences had surfaced into this world through Herodias! What Jezebel did to Elijah in the wilderness, Herodias now released against John: fear and discouragement blanketed the thought life of this mighty servant of God. John the Baptist, who had visibly seen the Spirit descend as a dove upon Christ, who heard the Father’s audible voice and beheld the living Son of God, was now asking if what he saw was real (Matt 11:3). The only man alive who had living contact with the Trinity, now doubted the vision. “And a strategic day came when Herod…gave a banquet” (Mk 6:21). “Strategic” is the perfect word to describe the timing of this event. For in this war between the spirits of Elijah and Jezebel, Herodias had her daughter dance before Herod, enticing from the king a promise to give whatever she asked. At her mother’s request—more truly, at a type of “Jezebel’s”  request—she demanded the head of the Baptist be brought to her. Why decapitation? Through John’s mouth came the Word of God. The audible proclamation of the Word of God is the greatest threat to Satan. To cut off John’s head was to silence his mouth and cut off his authority. Thus, temporarily, the confrontation between God and Satan (Elijah’s godly influence and Jezebel’s evil influence subsided.

 

Be encouraged. The Bible says that Elijah Is Coming! Two thousand years ago, Jesus stated that the ministry of Elijah was not over. He promised, “Elijah is coming and will restore all things…” (Matt 17:11). Malachi the prophet also wrote, “Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord” (Mal 4:5). The spirit or influence of Elijah, according to scripture, will return to the affairs of mankind before the great and terrible day of the Lord! His purpose will be to restore all things. Even as the Lord used the spirit of Elijah, through the Holy Spirit, to empower Elisha and then John the Baptist, so the Lord is raising up an “Elijah” company of Spirit-filled men and women sent to prepare the way for the return of Christ!

 

Let it also be known that, if Elijah is coming before Jesus returns, so also is Satan in the form of Antichrist (just like Jezebel opposed Elijah). Indeed, do you not see her in our land in the practice of witchcraft and false religions? Do you not hear her brazen voice rejecting God’s authority? Have you not beheld her causing even God’s spiritual leaders to “commit acts of immorality”? (Rev 2:20) Seeing “Jezebel” (the work of Satan) so blatantly attacking Christians only confirms that the spirit of Elijah, the Holy Spirit,  is also here to bring repentance and help prepare God’s people for the return of the Lord.

 

In the Old Testament we see how God destroyed Jezebel. Jehu, the newly crowned king of Israel, was sent by the word of the Lord through Elijah’s successor, Elisha, to fulfill God’s judgment. As Jehu and his men furiously drove their chariots toward Jezreel, the kings of Israel and Judah came out to meet him, ” ‘Is it peace, Jehu?’ And he answered, ‘What peace, so long as the harlotries of your mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts are so many?’ (II Kings 9:21-22) Jehu murdered the two kings-servants of Jezebel. Immediately afterward, he rode into Jezreel to confront Jezebel. The Word tells us that when she saw him, she painted her eyes and adorned her head, and looking out an upper window, she called to him, ‘Is it well, Zimri (Jehu), your master’s murderer?’ Then he lifted up his face to the window and said, ‘Who is on my side? Who?’ And two or three eunuchs looked down at him. And he said, ‘Throw her down.’ So they threw her down, and some of her blood was sprinkled on the wall and on the horses, and he trampled her under foot”” (II Kings 9:30-33 NAS/KJ).

 

There was something in Jehu’s courageous spirit that we must possess today in our war against Jezebel. While we must be compassionate toward those captured by Jezebel, Jehu had no mercy, no hope for reform, no compromise or sympathy whatsoever toward this Satan-controlled woman! Jehu ‘…trampled her under foot.’ While she lay bleeding and near death, he trampled her beneath the feet of his horse! While we are not called to so physical a demonstration of our resolve, spiritually, like Jehu’s heart, we must have no tolerance whatsoever to compromise our faith and our purity! There can be no peace, no relaxing under our “fig tree,” until the influence of Jezebel is slain!  We must refuse to settle for a false peace based on compromise and fear, especially when the Spirit of God is calling for “War”!

 

Side with God, and remember that to have victory over satanic oppression requires that you stand strong in the “armor of God” (Ephesian 6) and you pray for spiritual protection! When God wants to use you the most, as He did with Elijah, Satan is not far behind to discourage and depress you. Let God give you the victory!

Taken from The Three Battlegrounds by Francis Frangipane, frangipane.org

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Sermons

Are You Passive or Controlling in Your Marriage?

by Craig Groeschel
written by Craig Groeschel

“Once Upon a Marriage, Part Two” is the story of a passive husband, King Ahab, and his controlling wife, Queen Jezebel. A truly bad romance, both partners were self-centered and godless. God designed husbands to provide, protect and pastor their wives. Abusive Jezebel took matters into her own hands and became a murderer in the process.

Uploaded by permission of LifeChurch.tv/Open.

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Articles

A Jewish Look at Smyrna’s Synagogue of Satan

by Eli Lyzorkin-Eyzenberg
written by Eli Lyzorkin-Eyzenberg

Revelation 2:8-9

8 “To the angel of the church in Smyrna write the following: “Thus says the one who is the first and the last, the one who was dead, but came to life: 9 ‘I know the distress you are suffering and your poverty (but you are rich).

 

The city of Smyrna was one of the three cities in Asia Minor who competed for the status of being the greatest city of the region along with Ephesus and Pergamum. The name of the city itself simply meant myrrh – expensive fragrance, because in the ancient times this was the chief expert of the city. Smyrna just like Ephesus was a coastal city perfectly positioned for accumulating enormous wealth because of its port and central location on trade route connecting all other cities of the Roman province of Asia Minor. Out of all seven cities mentioned in Revelation only Smyrna survives today as an inhabited city. It is called Izmir and it is located in the West of modern Turkey. The city was founded twice. Once it around as a Greek colony in Western Anatolia (around 1100 BCE) and after its total destruction was once again returned to life and habitation under the regional administration of Alexander the Great (4th century BCE). Perhaps, it is because of this known history of Smyrna as being dying and coming back to life that Jesus in his message to the messenger in Smyrna highlighted this particular aspect of his own life: He was also dead and came back to life.

 

In a series of statements regarding Jesus’ personal knowledge of the perilous situation of his followers believers in the city of Smyrna, the Heavenly Priest, who is able to sympathize assures the congregation in Smyrna that the suffering and financial difficulties of this community is known and understood by him well. Yet Jesus tells the people experiencing social and, therefore, economic sanctions/isolation from prosperous Jewish and Pagan communities of Smyrna that in all reality they are rich. This idea of “things are not what they seem” will reappear many times throughout the book of revelation.  

 

I also know the slander against you by those who call themselves Jews…

 

The second affirmation of Christ’s intimate acquaintance with the difficulties of Jewish and God-fearing followers of the Way had to do with a slander against them. Slander is a criminal action of making a false usually a spoken statement damaging to a person’s or group of persons’ reputation. This section is extremely important in order for us not to swerve from the road we are currently on – rereading the Letter of Revelation as a Jewish Christ-following document. Here too again the standard theory preconditions/forces the reader to think by the later categories while reading first century texts. The traditional theory goes something like this:

 

The Christian Church at Smyrna suffered at the hands of the Jews. The Jews thought they were the people of God but were actually they were self-deceived representatives of Satan. Christians were now the People of God just as Jews once were. Why are were these people said not to be the Jews then? It is simple, the traditional theory posits – They were Jews by race and religion only. But they were not spiritual children of Abraham. Paul made the point in his writings that: “A man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit” (Rom.2:29). The Christian Church now was the Israel of God, the “true circumcision” and “the true Jews”, who worshiped God through Christ Jesus.

 

But there are all kinds of misconceptions and anachronisms that are present in this common and usually unchallenged reconstruction of what took place in the City of Smyrna. This reconstruction that I sought to briefly present above is usually offered together with a story of martyrdom of great man of God Polycarp (bishop of Smyrna), disciple the Apostle John. When he was offered life in exchange for a public denial of Jesus and acceptance of Roman Emperor as Lord he uttered now his iconic words: “Eighty and six years have I served Him, and He has never done me wrong; how, then, can I blaspheme my King and my Saviour!”

 

The story of Polycarp’s Martyrdom, though being one of the greatest stories that inspired millions of Christians for the greater commitment to the Lord, may not be historical at some very important points. The earliest manuscripts of Polycarp’s Martyrdom are dated to the tenth century CE and come across as full of inspirational Christian interpellations. This becomes clear when the story in Martyrdom of Polycarp is compared to the account as told by Eusebius in his Church History written in the fifth century CE. The differences are considerable. There are other issues like literary parallels with the passion of Christ that are doubtfully coincidental. Moreover, by the fifth century CE the Christ-followers have already developed what can be called Historic Non-Jewish (and often-times anti-Jewish) Christianity and therefore it is doubtful that documents coming from under the feather of fifth century Christian historians such as Eusebius can be trusted completely, especially when they involve the Jews.

 

My point here is not that nothing in Eusebius’ account of the Martyrdom of Polycarp is true. But that simply we do not have ideologically independent and reliable sources to establish the details of Martyrdom, especially involving the Jews of the city of Smyrna, claiming that they led the way and encouraged the murder of St. Polycarp.

 

The accuracy of Eusebius’s account have often been called into question many times both today and in the ancient times. For example, in the 5th century, the Christian historian Socrates Scholasticus described Eusebius as writing for “rhetorical finish” and for the “praises of the Emperor” rather than the “accurate statement of facts.” (Socrates Scholasticus, Church History, Book 1.1)  The so-called historical methods of Eusebius were criticized by many modern scholars, which show that at least his chronology was something between an exact science and an instrument of propaganda.

 

My suggestion, therefore, is to leave the story of the dating and the authenticity of these materials to the scholars of later periods and not to allow those accounts of Polycarp (whether they are true, false or only partially so) to influence our reading of a much earlier text of Revelation. We need to be able to read the Letter of Revelation as a first century literary work without borrowed insights and inspiration from later often-times anti-Jewish theology.   

 

… and really are not, but are a synagogue of Satan.

 

The translation choice of the overwhelming majority of Christian translations of the Book of Revelation for the Greek is a synagogue of Satan. This a perfect example of inconsistent and clearly anti-Jewish (though most of the time without any malicious intent) translation. By inconsistency I mean that in the cases when the word synagogue is positive or neutral in meaning it is translated as a “congregation” or as “assembly” (James 2:2 “For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes…”), but in the cases that it is negative like in this case it is translated not as congregation or assembly of Satan – something that in modern minds evokes strictly Jewish (vs. non-Jewish) affiliation – “the synagogue”.

 

If we read this text as is normally done in the context of Christian Polycarp being practically murdered in the mid-second century by the Jews. We will not be able to see any other interpretive options here at all.

 

We would actually, as our interpretations of this normally do, have to disagree with what Jesus may be saying. Jesus says that those who slander his followers in Smyrna were dishonest about their Judean affiliation. They were actually not Jews. They only pretended doing so.

One way to look at it is as we discussed before. That is these people are Jews in ethnicity and religion only, but not really in their hearts. But what if Jesus was right literally?! What if these people slandering the Jewish believers in Jesus and those who joined them in following the Jewish Christ were not Judeans/Jews at all? What if they were recent converts to the Judean life-style package from the Romans – a well-known and problematic phenomena in the Roman Empire?  Incidentally, the utter religious zeal is very much characteristic of a religious convert.

 

A Greco-Roman writer Epictetus who was a Stoic Philosopher residing in Asia Minor at the time of the composition of the Book of Revelation wrote the following: “Why, then do you call yourself a Stoic, why do you deceive the multitude, why do you act the part of a Judean, when you are a Greek? Do you not how each person is called a Judean, a Syrian, or an Egyptian? And when we see someone vacillating, we are accustomed to say, “He is not a Judean, but he is just pretending.” But when he takes up the state of mind of one who has been baptized and made a choice, then he is a Judean in both reality and name. So also we are falsely baptized, Judeans in word, but indeed something else, not in harmony with reason, far from applying the principles we profess, yet priding ourselves for being people who know them (Dissertations 2.9.19-21 = Stern no. 254).”

www.eteacherbiblical.com.

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Articles

Crickets, Joseph and Anger

by Max Lucado
written by Max Lucado

FORGIVE ME if this chapter is disjointed. As I write, I am angry. I am angered by a cricket. He’s loud. He’s obnoxious. He’s hidden. And he’s in big trouble if I ever find him.  I arrived at my office early. Two hours before my alarm sounded, I was here. Sleeves rolled back and computer humming. Beat the phones, I thought. Get a jump on the morning, I planned. Get a leg up on the day. But get your hands on that cricket is what I keep mumbling.

 

Now, I have nothing against nature. The melody of a canary, I love. The pleasant hum of the wind in the leaves, I relish. But the predawn raack-raack-raack of a cricket bugs me. So I get on my knees and follow the sound through the office. I peek under boxes. I pull books off the shelves. I get on my belly and look under my desk. Humbling. I’ve been sabotaged by a one-inch bug.

 

‘What is this insolent irritant that reduces a man to bug-stalker?

 

Finally, I isolate the culprit.  Rats, he’s behind a shelf. Out of my reach. Hidden in a haven of plywood. I can’t get to him. All I can do is throw pens at the base of the shelf. So I do. Pop. Pop. Pop. One after another. A barrage of Bics. He finally shuts up.

 

But the silence lasts only a minute.

 

So forgive me if my thoughts are fragmented, but I’m launching artillery every other paragraph. This is no way to work. This is no way to start the day. My floor is cluttered. My pants are dirty. My train of thought is derailed. I mean, how can you write about anger with a stupid bug in your office?

 

Oooops. Guess I’m in the right frame of mind after all.

 

Anger. This morning it’s easy to define: the noise of the soul. Anger. The unseen irritant of the heart. Anger. The relentless invader of silence.

 

Just like the cricket, anger irritates.
Just like the cricket, anger isn’t easily silenced.
Just like the cricket, anger has a way of increasing in volume until it’s the only sound we hear. The louder it gets the more desperate we become.

 

When we are mistreated, our animalistic response is to go on the hunt. Instinctively, we double up our fists. Getting even is only natural. ‘Which, incidentally, is precisely the problem. Revenge is natural, not spiritual. Getting even is the rule of the jungle. Giving grace is the rule of the kingdom.  Some of you are thinking, “Easy for you to say, Max, sitting there in your office with a cricket as your chief irritant. You ought to try living with my wife” or, “You ought to have to cope with my past.” Or, “You ought to raise my kids.”  “You don’t know how my ex has mistreated me. You don’t have any idea how hard my life has been.”  And you’re right, I don’t. But I have a very clear idea how miserable your future will be unless you deal with your anger.

 

X-ray the soul of the vengeful and behold the tumor of bitterness: black, menacing, malignant. Carcinoma of the spirit. Its fatal fibers creep around the edge of the heart and ravage it. Yesterday you can’t alter, but your reaction to yesterday you can. The past you cannot change, but your response to your past you can.  Impossible, you say? Let me try to show you otherwise.

 

Imagine you are from a large family—a dozen or so kids. A family more blended than the Brady bunch. All the children are from the same dad, but they have four or five different moms. Imagine also that your dad is a sneak and has been one for a long time. Everybody knows it. Everybody knows he cheated your uncle out of the estate. Everybody knows he ran like a coward to avoid getting caught. Let’s also imagine that your great-uncle tricked your dad into marrying your mother’s sister. He got your dad drunk before the wedding and had his ugly daughter go to the altar instead of the pretty one your dad thought he was marrying. That didn’t slow down your father, though. He just married them both. The one he loved couldn’t have kids, so he slept with her maid. In fact, he had a habit of sleeping with most of the kitchen help; as a result, most of your siblings resemble the cooks. Finally the bride your dad wanted to marry in the first place gets pregnant. . . and you are born.

 

You’re the favored son.. . and your brothers know it. You get a car. They don’t. You get Armani; they get K-Mart. You get summer camp; they get summer jobs. You get educated; they get angry~ And they get even. They sell you to some foreign service project, put you on a plane for Egypt, and tell your dad you got shot by a sniper. You find yourself surrounded by people you don’t know, learning a language you don’t understand, and living in a culture you’ve never seen.

 

Imaginary tale? No. It’s the story of Joseph. A favored son in a bizarre family, he had every reason to be angry. He tried to make the best of it. He became the chief servant of the head of the Secret Service. His boss’s wife tried to seduce him, and when he refused, she pouted and he ended up in prison. Pharaoh got wind of the fact that Joseph could interpret dreams and let him take a shot at some of Pharaoh’s own. When Joseph interpreted them he got promoted out of the prison into the palace as prime minister. The second highest position in all of Egypt. The only person Joseph bowed before was the king.

 

Meanwhile a famine hits and Jacob, Joseph’s father, sends his Sons to Egypt for a foreign loan. The brothers don’t know it, but they are standing in front of the same brother they sold to the Gypsies some twenty-two years earlier. They don’t recognize Joseph, but Joseph recognizes them. A bit balder and paunchier, but they are the same brothers. Imagine Joseph’s thoughts. The last time he saw these faces, he was looking up at them from the bottom of a pit. The last time he heard these voices, they were laughing at him. The last time they called his name, they called him every name in the book.

Now is his chance to get even. He has complete control. One snap of his fingers and these brothers are dead. Better yet, slap some manacles on their hands and feet and let them see what an Egyptian dungeon is like. Let them sleep in the mud. Let them mop floors. Let them learn Egyptian.

Revenge is within Joseph’s power. And there is power in revenge. Intoxicating power.

 

Haven’t we tasted it? Haven’t we been tempted to get even?  As we escort the offender into the court¬room, we announce, “He hurt me!” The jurors shake their heads in disgust. “He abandoned me!” we explain, and the chambers echo with our accusation. “Guilty!” the judge snarls as he slams the gavel. “Guilty!” the jury agrees. “Guilty!” the audience proclaims. We delight in this moment of justice. We relish this pound of flesh. So we prolong the event. We tell the story again and again and again.

Now let’s freeze-frame that scene. I have a question. Not for all of you, but for a few of you. Some of you are in the courtroom. The courtroom of complaint. Some of you are rehashing the same hurt every chance you get with anyone who will listen. For you, I have this question: Who made you God? I don’t mean to be cocky, but why are you doing his work for Him?

 

“Vengeance is Mine,” God declared. “I will repay” (Heb. 10:30 NKJV)

.

“Don’t say, ‘I’ll pay you back for the wrong you did.’ Wait for the Lord, and he will make things right” (Prov. 20:22).

 

Judgment is God’s job. To assume otherwise is to assume God can’t do it. Revenge is irreverent. When we strike back we are saying, “I know vengeance is Yours, God, but I just didn’t think You’d punish enough. I thought I’d better take this situation into my own hands. You have a tendency to be a little soft.”
Joseph understands that. Rather than get even, he reveals his identity and has his father and the rest of the family brought to Egypt. He grants them safety and provides them a place to live. They live in harmony for seventeen years. But then Jacob dies and the moment of truth comes. The brothers have a hunch that with Jacob gone they’ll be lucky to get out of Egypt with their heads on their shoulders. So they go to Joseph and plead for mercy. “Your father gave this command before he died. . . . ‘Tell Joseph to forgive you” (Gen. 50:16—17). (I have to smile at the thought of grown men talking like this. Don’t they sound like kids, whining, “Daddy said to be nice to us”?)

 

Joseph’s response? “When Joseph received the message, he cried” (Gen. 50:17). “What more do I have to do?” his tears implore. “I’ve given you a home. I’ve provided for your families. Why do you still mistrust my grace?”  Please read carefully the two statements he makes to his brothers. First he asks, “Can I do what only God can do?” (v. 19).  May I restate the obvious? Revenge belongs to God! If vengeance is God’s, then it is not ours. God has not asked us to settle the score or get even. Ever. Why? The answer is found in the second part of Joseph’s statement: “You meant to hurt me, but God turned your evil into good to save the lives of many people, which is being done” (v. 20). Forgiveness comes easier with a wide-angle lens. Joseph uses one to get the whole picture. He refuses to focus on the betrayal of his brothers without also seeing the loyalty of his God. It always helps to see the big picture.

 

Some time ago I was in an airport lobby when I saw an acquaintance enter. He was a man I hadn’t seen in a while but had thought about often. He’d been through a divorce, and I was close enough to it to know that he deserved some of the blame. I noticed he was not alone. Beside him was a woman. Why, that scoundrel! Just a few months out and here he has another lady?  Any thought of greeting him disappeared as I passed judgment on his character. But then he saw me. He waved at me. He motioned me over. I was caught. I was trapped. I’d have to go visit with the reprobate. So I did.

 

“Max, meet my aunt and her husband.”

 

I gulped. I hadn’t noticed the man.

 

“We’re on our way to a family reunion. I know they would really like to meet you.”

 

“We use your books in our home Bible study,” my friend’s uncle spoke up. “You’ve got some great insights.”

 

“If only you knew,” I said to myself. I had committed a common sin of the unforgiving. I had cast a vote without knowing the story.

 

To forgive someone is to admit our limitations. We’ve been given only one piece of life’s jigsaw puzzle. Only God has the cover of the box.  To forgive someone is to display reverence. Forgiveness is not saying the one who hurt you was right. Forgiveness is stating that God is fair and He will do what is right.
After all, don’t we have enough things to do without trying to do God’s work too?

 

Guess what. I just noticed something. The cricket is quiet. I got so wrapped up in this chapter I forgot him. I haven’t thrown a pen for an hour. Guess he fell asleep. Could be that’s what he wanted to do all along, but I kept waking him up with my Bics.

He ended up getting some rest. I ended up finishing this chapter. Remarkable what gets accomplished when we let go of our anger.

Published by Word Publishing
© 1994 by Max Lucado

 

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Articles

Victory Over Sexual Sin

by demo
written by demo

If you are a guy, you have been tempted with sexual sin. If you deny it, you are a liar or are you are dead. But there are some powerful principles for gaining victory over sexual sin and some great Scripture passages regarding the subject. Here are Perry Noble’s wise, succinct words.

#1 – Who or what you pursue will ultimately determine what you do and who you become.  It is a spiritual impossibility to pursue Jesus AND sexual sin at the same time.  (Psalm 25:15)

#2 – As a friend of mine has often said, “God is not after our begrudging submission but rather our joy!”  And long term joy, peace and fulfillment are never the result of pursuing sexual sin.  (Please read Proverbs 5, Proverbs 6 & Proverbs 7 for further confirmation in regards to this point.)

#3 – Sexual sin is not something that can be “prayed away,” nor can we simply read Bible verses about grace after committing it in order to feel better.  NOR can we simply promise God over and over that we won’t do it again (how’s that working for you?)  We CAN be set free from it…but it will not be pretty.  It must be confessed (James 5:16) and repented of (Revelation 2:21-23!)  (I did not overcome my nearly 20 year battle with pornography until I confessed it and asked for help!)

YES, it may “cost you” when it comes to your reputation…but remember, the costs of concealment are far greater than the costs of confession…and repentance is WAY more important than our reputation.

#4 – Sexual sin costs us our spiritual esteem…people who are involved in sexual sin feel disconnected from God, guilty and spiritually dead.

#5 – For those who want to STOP sinning sexually…a decision MUST be made to renew your mind (Romans 12:1-12,) to FIGHT the battles in your mind (II Corinthians 10:5) and to ask GODLY men and women to come along side of you and both encourage and spur you when necessary (Hebrews 10:24-25).

(PS…this means you have to stop saying, “I messed up sexually.”  OR, “I made a mistake!”  Call it what it is…sin.  AND stop meeting with people who are doing the same things that you are doing and so when you get together to “hold one another accountable” you are actually hoping that the other person “messed up” so that you don’t feel bad about doing so!)

#6 – Understand that IN CHRIST you CAN have victory over sexual sin!!!  (See Romans 8:37, I Corinthians 15:57, Philippians 4:13!)  IN CHRIST you are NOT a victim but rather a receiver of VICTORY!  If Jesus overcame DEATH then Christ in you can help you breakthrough the stronghold of sexual sin!!!  (Luke 1:37!!!)

#7 – For those who belong to Christ and are trying their best to pursue Him on a daily basis but are still haunted by a sexual past…remember that is who you WERE, it is not WHO YOU ARE IN CHRIST!!!  (II Corinthians 5:17!)  Do not allow what used to defeat you to define you!  You are no longer defined by what you did but rather by what CHRIST did for you on the cross!!!

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