God of Old and New Covenants the Same

One of the most misunderstood ideas concerning the Bible is that which assumes the God of the old covenant has somehow changed when revealed in the new covenant. This is totally wrong. There are some differences between the old and new covenants, but those differences are not found in God.

Moses wasn't presenting one God under the old covenant, and then Jesus reveal a different God to us in the new. He is the same God who never changes. It's impossible for Him to be other than He is; and He was like that from before creation, and remains unchanged.

What does that mean? It means His very nature has always been and always be the same, and the standards He has as revealed in the law also remain the same. There were of course changes made after the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, but those changes weren't in what most would identify as the moral law. The changes were primarily in relationship to ceremonial law and the law of the priesthood. There were some other changes in the law, but we won't get into them in this article.

Let's put it another way; in language many so-called teachers us today. I'm talking about cheap grace. To assert, as many do, that grace somehow lowers who He is or His standards, is a great deception.

After all, what does grace have to do with the holiness of God? What does it have to do with His righteousness. These are who God is. Grace can never change that reality, and in the thought and person of God was never expected to. That's why the difference between the old and new covenants should never be taken as a change in the nature of God as a result of the shedding of the blood of Jesus for the forgiveness of sins.

So what is one of the key differences between the covenants then? It's the mediators themselves. Moses, as great as a man as he was, still had to offer sacrifices for his own sin. Jesus, on the other hand, was the perfection of God revealed in His humanity. He totally embodied who God was and met all His standards as a man. The importance of that is under the new covenant, we start from a different position in God than those did under Moses.

Jesus, as the perfect representation and representative of God, fully realized the entire standard of God, answering it in full obedience. In Him was the Godhead revealed, expressing exactly who He was and what He wanted by living it out before those He came in contact with while on the earth, and further revealing it after He ascended into heaven and sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in His people.

This perfect man is now the Mediator of a new covenant, a covenant that starts from a position of perfection in the man Jesus Christ, but includes the same God who revealed Himself under both covenants.

In other words, when we place our faith in Jesus Christ, we start from a position of His perfection, not Moses' imperfections, or our own. This is the position we start from when we repent from our sins and believe in Jesus Christ.

All of this is to say while we are saved from God's wrath because of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, and by grace we are saved and not by works, the requirements of God are still in place, and He has given us the Holy Spirit to help us to walk in obedience to His moral laws and commands.

The God of the old covenant is the God of the new covenant, and e doesn't change.

Christians Have Dominion: It's Part of the Image of God

Many times when reading Genesis 1:26-28, and reading or listening to commentary on it, a major part of the teaching is missed because people tend to focus on verses 26 and 28, forgetting verse 27.

Why that's extremely important is verse 27 affirms what God is saying in that part of the image of God is to take dominion. So when verse 26 says "let them have dominion...," verse 27 is reinforcing the fact that dominion is a characteristic of God that man is to bear. Verse 26 starts with God saying to one another that they'll make man in His image, and then immediately goes into dominion.

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Longing for Jerusalem

As the world continues to fray and is not able to hold itself together, there are a small but growing number of real Christians who are praying for and longing for Jerusalem. Not the physical city in modern Israel, but the one that John saw coming down out of heaven.

It's a mistake to think of this city as some type of reality that won't happen or come to earth until after the ressurrection. What John saw was an answer to the prayer Jesus taught us to pray concerning the kingdom of God and His will being done on earth as it was in heaven. New Jerusalem was the perfect will of God in its essence, and it is coming to earth now.

I'm not talking about the silliness and nonsense I heard years ago when some people actually said there was a square, large object hurtling toward the earth in space, declaring it to be New Jerusalem.

The truth is, all that New Jerusalem is and will be has been revealed in the person of Jesus Christ. He was the first building block of the city, and He is the one that came down out of heaven. The fact it is described in Revelation 21:2 as being "prepared as a bride adorned for her husband," simply means we have taken on His characteristics which are not of this earth, and are a testimony of who Jesus Christ is; being adorned with His likeness.

When the city is described in Revelation 21, it's a reference to the characteristics God is building in His people, which are from Him who dwells in heaven, yet is above heaven in greatness and grandeur. What makes heaven what it is, is the fact the kingdom of God is perfectly expressed there, and His will totally done.

This is why we can, with confidence, pray for His kingdom to come and will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. Not only is it reflection of heaven, but of His character and will in completeness in a people. That is what He wants to see happen on the earth.

In verse 24 it says the nations of those that are saved will walk in the light of it, meaning to reflect who He is. A people will walk on this earth that walk in obedience to His commands and in accordance with His character.

The faraway land of heaven will become near to us as we respond in obedience to the revealed word of God, bringing a taste of heaven to the earth. We'll never have it perfectly here because evil people will remain, as Jesus described as tares, which were a plant that looked similar to wheat, but was completely different than it.

What is key to understanding New Jerusalem is the throne of God and the Lamb which is in the center of it. That's just another way of saying God ruling from heaven and working that rule into the people living on the earth. It is done through His people.

As Revelation 22:14 says, "Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates of the city." Keeping His commandments is the way through the gates, although not the means of salvation. That can't come by works.

What it's declaring is only the obedient people of God enter the gates of this city, meaning they are what makes the city what it is. You can't just live any sloppy, disobedient life and be part of New Jerusalem. It takes obedience to the commandments of God.

In the end, those walking as Christ walked is what is being revealed here. That is what the city coming down of heaven is.

This is the longing Christians have who want to see what is being done in heaven concerning the kingdom of God and His will.

Our prayer should be for this city to come down out of heaven, taking up residence in His people, as it did in the person of Jesus Christ, who was the Lord from heaven.

His eternal purpose is to have a people conformed to His image, which is another way of understanding New Jerusalem coming down out of heaven.

Whether we understand or identify this or not, this is the deep longing we have when we look at the world as it is at this time. We long for the person of Jesus Christ to take practical residence in a people. Not in a general sense of dwelling within them, but in helping to obey the laws of God that are now placed in our hearts.

Old things have passed away and all things have become new. That is the heritage of God's people, and it is more than a position, it's a practical reality being worked in us. That's the longing for Jerusalem we all have in us. Let us pray that it comes down out of heaven into our lives.

Christian Men Arise

It is far past time for Christian men to remove the yoke of feminism and gender blending off of them; rejecting the lie of egalitarianism while embracing their masculinity.

Since men and women are totally different, the idea of saying there is no difference between the sexes has resulted in the freakish culture we have in the world today, where people insanely believe they can be a man or women by simply asserting it.

This goes back to what the Bible teaches, where it states men and women are not to wear the clothes of one another. Men were required to dress like men, and women like women. Disobedience to that command comes from the attempt to blur all differences between men and women in order to force an unattainable "equality" upon them that is impossible to produce.

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Building Wealth Without Losing Your Soul

Building Wealth and Financing the Kingdom Without Losing Your Soul

Preface

Success, money, business and economics, among other related areas of life, have been given a bad name by many confused and deceived people using bits and pieces of the Bible to suggest God isn't interested in, or opposes these types of things, because they represent the pursuit of riches and love of money, which can in fact lead to all sorts of evils.

While it's true the love of money is the root of all sorts of evil, money in and of itself isn't, as it's nothing more or less than a medium of exchange, which is used to buy goods or services. Christians can be tempted to pursue money in an extreme way, as they get caught up in craving more for themselves in this life than may be good for their spiritual walk. That doesn't make money evil, it simply identifies the heart of man as having the potential to be corrupt, and forsaking everything in order to get more.

People like this never are satisfied, and their wants and needs can be insatiable. We could say the same about any area of life, which if we focus on it to the exclusion of other areas, we can suffer loss. For example, someone could be an obsessive eater, abuse alcohol, or neglect their family and training of their children in the pursuit of wealth or their own individual goals. That doesn't mean what is being pursued is wrong, only that there are other areas of life that must be paid attention to. That's the reason God told Israel before they entered the promised land that He had tested them over the period of 40 years so they would learn that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God, i.e., the Bible or Holy Scriptures. It was also the first temptation experienced by Jesus after He had fasted for forty days, when the devil attempted to get Him to change the stones into bread. His response was that man does not live by bread alone.

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Christians Can and Should Defend Themselves

It's a strange and unbiblical assertion to make when people declare there is no justification for guns and self defense for Christians or others.

Not only is it not true, it conflicts with numerous parts of the Bible, including the Old and New Testaments.

The first listed above in Exodus 22:2, is a law that is still relevant for modern times, and all times until Jesus returns and resurrects us. There is to be no guilt placed upon anyone that defends themselves from someone breaking into their home. Not only does it say that, but it identifies the one breaking in as a thief, a relative low-level criminal when compared to rapists or murderers. But even at that level to violate the boundaries of a home can be punishable by death by those threatened by the thief or anyone else.

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Negative Effects of False End-time Prophecies

The term paralysis is an interesting one in that it refers to the loss of muscle function in the muscles of the body. It's instructive for our purpose of looking at whether or not Jesus is going to return soon, because the seemingly endless number of so-called end-time prophecies, one after another, end in failure as time proves them all wrong.

Eventually we must come to the place where we legitimately question those throwing out these false prognostications, drawing the inevitable conclusion they are creating them out of their own imaginations, from self-deception, or maybe there is a more nefarious reason for their predictions.

Having said that, the reason it's important to honestly look at these false prophecies (and they are false prophecies) is because the result of believing Jesus is going to return any moment and snatch His church away to heaven, brings about paralysis to the body of Christ. After all, if Jesus is returning soon, why should we try to improve ourselves or attempt to apply the word of God to the circumstances of life if we're not going to be here for very long? The answer of course is there is no reason, which is why these false prophecies can't be taken lightly. It's serious business to speak in the name of God, and when one does, they have to be questioned if their words fail to come to pass.

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