If you honestly knew
just how weird and crazy
it all really is?
Then you may not say
that you believe it.
Likewise?
If you honestly knew
just how weird and crazy
it all really is?
You might just
fall in love with it.
Either way?
The truth is the truth.
We are ancient Christians
over here.
Romans 8:29
For whom he did foreknow,
he also did predestinate
And we know it.
That is not arrogance.
That is the truth.
Yawl can have all your nonsense.
We got business to tend to.
It is not lost on either of us
that the starting of putting this together
happened
the very 1st day
of the mourning over
the death of MAGA.
11/04/26.
The old had to die
before we could begin.
It died on 11/03/26
The Unseen Realm:
Recovering the Supernatural Worldview of the Bible
(PDF Version)
Parts 1 and 2 in the book,
section ending at Chapter 9
Just tryin to hit the highlights
what I thought was worth noting etc...
p.16
"First, many Christians claim to believe in the supernatural but think (and live) like skeptics. We find talk of the supernatural world uncomfortable.
This is typical of denominations and evangelical congregations outside the
charismatic movement-in other words,
those from a background like the
one I grew up in.
There are two basic reasons why noncharismatics tend to close the door
on the supernatural world. One is their suspicion that charismatic practices
are detached from sound exegesis of Scripture. As a biblical scholar, it's easy
for me to agree with that suspicion-but over time it has widely degenerated
into a closed-minded overreaction that is itself detached from the worldview
of the biblical writers.
The other reason is less self-congratulatory.
The believing church is bending
under the weight of its own rationalism,
a modern worldview that would
be foreign to the biblical writers.
Traditional Christian teaching
has for centuries kept the unseen world
at arm's length.
We believe in the Godhead
because there's no point to Christianity without it.
The rest of the unseen
world is handled with a whisper or a chuckle."
p.18
"I've seen this sort of evasion more than once.
Usually it's not as dramatic.
Pastors don't typically tell their people
to skip part of the Bible.
The more common strategy for "handling" strange passages is more subtle: Strip the bizarre passage of anything that makes it bizarre. The goal is to provide the most ordinary, comfortable interpretation possible.
(Constantine and Genesis 6 anybody?
Come on now, you know its true...)
"This strategy is ironic to say the least. Why is it that Christians who would strenuously defend a belief in God or the virgin birth against charges that they are unscientific or irrational don't hesitate to call out academic SWAT teams to explain away "weird" biblical passages? The core doctrines of the faith are themselves neither ordinary nor a comfortable fit with empirical rationalism."
"The odds are very high that you've never heard that Psalm 82 plays a pivotal role in biblical theology (including New Testament theology). I've been a Christian for over thirty years and I've never heard a sermon on it. There are many other passages whose content is curious or "doesn't make sense" and so are abandoned or glossed over.
Here's a sampling of them:
p 19
Gen 1:26
· Gen 3:5, 22
· Gen 6:1-4
· Gen 10-11
· Gen 15:1
. Gen 48:15-16
. Exod 3:1-14
. Exod 23:20-23
. Num 13:32-33
. Deut 32:8-92
. Deut 32:17
. Judg 6
. 1 Sam 3
. 1 Sam 23:1-14
. 1 Kgs 22:1-23
. 2 Kgs 5:17-19
. Job 1-2
· Ps 82, 68, 89
. Isa 14:12-15
· Ez 28:11-19
. Dan 7
. Matt 16:13-23
. John 1:1-14
. John 10:34-35
. Rom 8:18-24
. Rom 15:24, 28
. 1 Cor 2:6-13
. 1 Cor 5:4-5
. 1 Cor 6:3
. 1 Cor 10:18-22
· Gal 3:19
. Eph 6:10-12
. Heb 1-2
. 1 Pet 3:18-22
. 2 Pet 1:3-4
. 2 Pet 2:4-5
. Jude 5-7
. Rev 2:26-28
· Rev 3:21
"Don't consider that a mere catalog.
The list is deliberate, and all of those
passages will be examined in this book.
All are conceptually interconnected,"
(Every last word of all of it
or you get spit out of his mouth.
(Revelation 3:16)
We haven't don't and wont ever
"buttercoat" anything.
Once you come to realize
we are supposed to be
"challenging"
it all starts to make a lil more sense.
p.24
"Morning stars are the stars one sees over the horizon just before the sun appears in the morning. They signal new life-a new day. The label works. It conveys the right thought. The original morning stars, the sons of God, saw the beginning of life as we know it-the creation of earth.
(Saw = Watched
File it away for a minute.
AND:
Revelation 2:26-28
26 And he that overcometh,
and keepeth my works unto the end,
to him will I give power over the nations:
27 And he shall rule them with a rod of iron;
as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers:
even as I received of my Father.
28 And I will give him the morning star.
Just sayin...)
p.27
"There's no need to camouflage what the Hebrew text says. People shouldn't be protected from the Bible. The biblical writers weren't polytheists. But since Psalm 82 generates questions and controversy, we need to spend some time on what it teaches and what it doesn't teach, along with other passages that inform us about the divine council. We'll do just that in the next chapter."
p.32
"This is not to say that an elohim
could not interact with the human world.
The Bible makes it clear that divine beings can (and did) assume physical
human form, and even corporeal flesh, for interaction with people, but that is
not their normal estate. Spiritual beings are "spirits" (1 Kgs 22:19-22; John
4:24; Heb 1:14; Rev 1:4). In like manner, humans can be transported to the
divine realm (e.g., Isa 6), but that is not our normal plane of existence. As I
explained earlier in this chapter,
the word elohim is a "place of residence" term.
It has nothing to do with a specific set of attributes.
Let's take a look at some other questions Psalm 82 raises."
(This is the part where all you
Anunnaki enthusiast
ready need to sit up
and pay attention:
p.33
"They [the Israelites] sacrificed to demons [shedim],
not God [eloah], to stone.
to gods [elohim] whom they had not known.
The verse explicitly calls the elohim
that the Israelites perversely worshiped
demons (shedim).
This rarely used term
(Deut 32:17; Psa 106:37)
comes from the Akkadian shedu.6
In the ancient Near East,
the term shedu was neutral;
it could speak of a good or malevolent spirit being.
These Akkadian figures were often cast
as guardians or protective entities,
(Its called
"The Book of Watchers"
for a reason yo.
A picture of the table of contents
of our Ethiopian bible.
Thursday, March 27, 2025
The Book of Genesis - Session 8 of 24 -
A Remastered Commentary by Chuck Missler
"The dismissive attitude
routinely exhibited
(Unger in his book Biblical Demonology
in the chapter on Eschatology and the Jews
made not one mention of them either.)
on the role of Ethiopic peoples
in both Judaism and Christianity
by white protestant evangelicals
(particularly in the US)
is simply appalling.
Seriously, its disgusting.)
'though the term was also used
to describe the life force of a person.7
In the context of
Deuteronomy 32:17,
shedim were elohim-spirit beings
guarding foreign territory-who must not be worshiped.
8 Israel was supposed to worship her
own God (here, eloah; cf. Deut 29:25).9
One cannot deny the reality of the elohim/shedim
in Deuteronomy 32:17 without denying the reality of demons.10
Scholars disagree over what kind of entity the shedim were.
But whatever
the correct understanding
of shedim might be,
they are not pieces of wood or stone."
(And they were not aliens
nor were they ancient astronauts either.
Higher level lifeform than humans
but not "Gods".
"The divine council"
The creator created them.
They are not on his level.
And it just amazes me how people
will believe in any and all
kinds of higher lifeforms than humans,
but the minute it comes from this book?
They will just completely
snub their noses at
even the idea of it.)
p.34
"No. These "denial statements"
do not deny that other elohim exist.
Rather, they deny that any elohim compares to Yahweh.
They are statements of incomparability.
This point is easily illustrated by noticing where else the
same denial language shows up in the Bible.
Isaiah 47:8 and Zephaniah 2:15
have, respectively,
Babylon and Nineveh saying
"there is none besides me."
(Interesting it had to be those two right?
"Babylon and Nineveh")
"Are we to believe that the point of the phrase is to declare that no other cities
exist except Babylon or Nineveh? That would be absurd.
The point of the
statement is that Babylon and Nineveh
considered themselves incomparable,
as though no other city
could measure up to them.
(Oh you mean like we do
with our own selves in this country?
Interesting)
"This is precisely the point when these same phrases are used of other gods-they cannot measure up to Yahweh. The Bible does not contradict itself on this point. Those who want to argue that the other elohim do not exist are at odds with the supernatural worldview of the biblical writers.
p.36
"an old misunderstanding of the root of the Greek word. For years monogenes
was thought to have derived from two Greek terms, monos ("only") and
gennao ("to beget, bear"). Greek scholars later discovered that the second
part of the word monogenes does not come from the Greek verb gennao, but
rather from the noun genos ("class, kind").
The term literally means
"one of a kind"
or "unique"
without connotation
of created origin.
Consequently, since
Jesus is indeed identified with Yahweh
and is therefore, with Yahweh, unique
among the elohim that serve God,
the term monogenes does not contradict the
Old Testament language.
The validity of this understanding is borne out by the New Testament
itself. In Hebrews 11:17, Isaac is called Abraham's monogenes. If you know
your Old Testament you know that Isaac was not the "only begotten" son of
Abraham. Abraham had earlier fathered Ishmael (cf. Gen 16:15; 21:3).
The term must mean that Isaac was Abraham's unique son, for he was the son of
the covenant promises. Isaac's genealogical line would be the one through
which Messiah would come.
Just as Yahweh is an elohim, and no other
elohim are Yahweh,
so Jesus is the unique Son,
and no other sons of God are
like him."
p.37
"The term imager may be unfamiliar.
Later in this chapter I'll explain what it means to be one.
The part of the story we know most about is the one we're in-the
visible, terrestrial world. Naturally, that's the one that gets the most attention from pastors and theologians.
The invisible realm is regularly overlooked,
or talked about only in relation to God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. The two realms are not mutually exclusive or peripheral to each other; they are integrally connected-by design. That point is telegraphed very early in the biblical story.
p.37
Many Bible readers note the plural pronouns (us; our) with curiosity.
They might suggest that the plurals refer to the Trinity,
but technical research in
Hebrew grammar and exegesis
has shown that the Trinity is not a coherent
explanation.1
(That is what I always thought.
Not so any more.
See what an open mind I have?
I just need to be convinced
and this here did just that.)
"The solution is much more straightforward, one that an ancient
Israelite would have readily discerned. What we have is a single person
(God) addressing a group-the members of his divine council.
It's like me going into a room of friends and saying, "Hey, let's go get
some pizza!" I'm the one speaking. A group is hearing what I say. Similarly,
God comes to the divine council with an exciting announcement:
"Let's create humankind!"
But if God is speaking to his divine council here, does that suggest that
humankind was created by more than one elohim?
Was the creation of
humankind a group project?
Not at all.
Back to my pizza illustration:
If I am the one paying for the pizza
-making the plan happen after announcing it-
then I retain both the inspiration a
nd the initiative for the entire project.
That's how Genesis 1:26 works.
Genesis 1:27 tells us clearly that only God
himself does the creating. In
the Hebrew, all the verbs of creation in the passage are singular in form: "So
God created humankind in his image, in the likeness of God he created him."
The other members of the council do not participate in the creation of humankind. They watch, just as they did when God laid the foundations of the earth (Job 38:7).
(Interesting...
( Agian:
The dismissive attitude
routinely exhibited
(Unger in his book Biblical Demonology
in the chapter on Eschatology and the Jews
made not one mention of them either.)
on the role of Ethiopic peoples
in both Judaism and Christianity
by white protestant evangelicals
(particularly in the US)
is simply appalling.
Seriously, its disgusting.)
p.44
CHAPTER 6
Gardens and Mountains
W E'VE LEARNED THAT
THE OLD TESTAMENT DESCRIBES
TWO HOUSEHOLD-FAMILIES of God,
one human and the other nonhuman.
Those two families
were created as God's representatives
to serve him in different realms.
In this chapter we'll explore how
descriptions of Eden reinforce these concepts.
We usually think of Eden as it's described in Genesis 2:8, the place the
first humans called home:
"Yahweh God planted a garden in Eden in the east,
and there he put the man whom he had formed."
But the description of Eden
as the home of humankind deflects our attention
away from Eden's primary status.
Eden was God's home on earth.
It was his residence.
And where the King lives,
his council meets.
As modern readers,
we don't see how that thinking is
telegraphed in the biblical text.
Ancient readers couldn't miss it.
p.46
"El and Baal were, to say the least, markedly different in behavior from
Yahweh of Israel. But the literature of Ugarit proved very illuminating in
other respects, especially as to where El, Baal, and the Ugaritic divine council
lived and held court. At Ugarit the divine council had three levels: the highest
authority (El, who did most of his ruling through a co-ruling vizier, Baal), the
"sons of El," and messenger gods (mal'akim).
The council of El met on a mountain or lush garden. These were not
different places. Rather, the same place was described in two different ways.
The abode of El had an abundant water supply, as it was situated at the
"source of the two rivers" in the "midst of the fountains of the double-deep."
The divine council met in a place called Tsapanu,
the remote heights of the north
(tsapanu means "north").
Council meetings were held in
"the tents of El" or El's "tent shrine,"
whence divine decrees were issued.
At times Baal's palace was in view,
with its "paved bricks"
that gave his house
"the clearness of lapis lazuli."
(WOW...so much...
"the remote heights of the north"
Tuesday, August 25, 2026
Mount Hermon, Golan, Watchers, Enoch,
Bulls of Bashan, Syria, "The Assyrian" etc. etc. etc...
Thats Mount Hermon
and thats in the northern reaches
of Israel...
Black Triangle top right.
And thats where Enoch says the Watchers came down from
"It is the place
that according to 1 Enoch
the watchers
descended from.
1 Enoch 6:6
"And they were in all two hundred; who descended in the days of Jared (Enoch's father) on the summit of Mount Hermon, and they called it Mount Hermon, because they had sworn and bound themselves by mutual imprecations upon it."
(Entire Enoch Chapter 6)
"At times Baal's palace was in view,"
Tuesday, August 25, 2026
Mount Hermon, Golan, Watchers, Enoch,
Bulls of Bashan, Syria, "The Assyrian" etc. etc. etc...
"finish at verse 45
last time I believe chapter 11 speaking of
this final world leader
he shall plant his
Tabernacles of his Palace
between the seas
and the Glorious mountain."
Nobody is really sure where that is
Almost all commentators have that as being
thought to be Mount Zion in Jerusalem.
Go here if you want to read a bunch of them
Daniel 11:45.
Remember now this is where the Anti-Christ
"pitches his tent".
So why would he do it there?
So close to the prize?
Jerusalem?
if he had the resources to pitch his tent there?
On either side of Jerusalem?
Seems like he would had had enough momentum
to just keep going on and take it over...
Mediterranean on the left
Jerusalem in the center
Dead Sea on the right.
When he knows he is going to take over
The Holy City?
Why pitch a temporary dwelling
so close to what you know
you are going to take over?
So like always lol,
I got a different idea.
This is one of those rare instances
where I go with the NIV and it's footnote.
Daniel 11:45
He will pitch his royal tents
between the seas at[c](and) the beautiful holy mountain.
Yet he will come to his end, and no one will help him.
c. Daniel 11:45 Or the sea and.
So why wouldn't it be between
the Mediterranean and Mt. Hermon?
Given that is where Christ said
he would build his church?
And a bunch of other events
that have happened there?
Watchers came down, transfiguration
gates of hell pan/pagan worship etc
See: Tuesday, August 25, 2026
Mount Hermon, Golan, Watchers, Enoch,
Bulls of Bashan, Syria, "The Assyrian" etc. etc. etc...
(Mt. Hermon is the green triangle in the center.)
Southern Lebanon
(The area pictured above)
is straight up
Hezbollah territory.
Wednesday, July 1, 2026
"They work in Tandem" pt 2
or "The False Prophet and
The Assyrian Anti-Christ saga continues..."
Trump presses Syria to take on Hezbollah,
raising alarm in Lebanon and Israel
AP 06/28/26
“I suggested to Israel
to let Syria take care of Hezbollah.
‘Cause to be honest with you,
I think they’d do a better job.”
(Donald J. Trump)
So make your own decision about it...
But know that me and honey
have already made ours...
p.47
"The Tabernacle tent structure and the Tent of Meeting, both of which are
mentioned throughout the books of Exodus through Judges, are clear parallels
to places where God dwells and hands down his decrees.
Yahweh could also be found on mountains (Sinai or Zion).
(Christ was transfigured on Mt. Hermon
=
God was on Mt Hermon as well.)
AND:
Why are The Watchers and Mt Hermon
getting left out of everything
all the time?
I like this bible
I really do.
Great notes.
One of my "go-to's"
So close to
two pages of notes
All around:
Matthew 16:18
And I say also unto thee,
That thou art Peter,
and upon this rock
I will build my church;
and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it.
And absolutely no mention of this:
being the backdrop?
Really?
I never heard not one person
ever say anything about it ever
(In that context)
But boy have I sure heard
all about:
Matthew 16:18
And I say also unto thee,
That thou art Peter,
and upon this rock
I will build my church;
and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it.
And nothing about the transfiguration,
Or Watchers, or Bulls of Bashan,
or the Antichrist pitching his tent there
etc., etc., etc.,
Its a catholic Bible BTW.
Ill just leave it at that...)
"In Psalm 48:1-2,
Jerusalem,
the city of God,
is said to be located
in the
"heights of the north"
(tsaphon in Hebrew).3
Mount Zion is the
"mountain of assembly,"
again located in the
"heights of the north"
Isaiah 14:13
For thou hast said in thine heart,
I will ascend into heaven,
I will exalt my throne above the stars of God:
I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation,
in the sides of the north:
Mount Hermon
is to the north
and off to the side.
"At Sinai, Moses and others saw the seated
God of Israel,
under whose feet was a pavement
"like sapphire tile work and
like the very heavens for clearness"
(Exod 24:9-10).
The garden of Eden, of course, is a lush,
well-watered habitation
(Gen 2:5-14).
Ezekiel 28:13 mentions the garden of Eden
("garden of God"),
but then adds the description
that the garden of God is
"God's holy mountain"
(Ezek 28:14).4"
"We naturally think of God's mountain
as Mount Sinai or Mount Zion.
When it comes to garden imagery,
the latter is spoken of in Edenic terms.
Like Eden, Mount Zion is also described as a watery habitation
(Isa 33:20-22; Ezek 47:1-12; Zech 14:8; Joel 3:18).
Whether Sinai or Zion,
the mountain of God is, in effect, his temple.
(So how's about we make it where God in the flesh said
he was gonna build his church huh?
How about we go with that?
"Whether Sinai or Zion"
I hate black and white thinking and it occurs when only
certain options are presented and leaves out other
every bit just as viable, and logical solutions.
It is stinking thinkin that subliminally says
"Other options don't exist."
When in fact they do and may even be
better solutions than what was offered
as the only available choices.)
p.47
This is not speculation. In the last chapter we saw the beginning of the theological idea that humans are the children of God. It was God's originalintent to make them part of his family.
The failure in Eden would alienate God from man, but God would make a way of salvation to bring believers back into that family (John 1:12; 1 John 3:1-3).
We also saw that humanity's presence showed that God's original desire was for his human children to participate in his rule. Both of these theological threads wind through the Old Testament and create the context from which New Testament writers will talk about the kingdom and the glorification of believers.
These are ideas we'll
return to in future chapters.)"
p.48
"One more verse about Eden-one that will vault us into the next chapter:
Eden is described in Ezekiel 28:2
as the "seat of the gods."
The phrase shouldbe familiar to modern readers. It speaks of governing authority ("countyseat"; "Congressional seat"). Ezekiel's words draw attention to Eden as a seat of authority and action. There was work to be done. God had plans for the whole planet, not just Eden.
("seat of the gods."
Its where The Watchers came down from....
Its where Christ said
he was gonna build his Church.)
p.49
CHAPTER 7
Eden-Like No Place on Earth
GOD DOES NOT ACT
WITHOUT PURPOSE.
(And here is a great recent example:
Iran unveils ‘We will kill Trump’ banner – but
US president may now be tempted to resume bombing
Guardian Wed 4 Nov 2026
"Trump’s reverse is all the more piquant because it comes on the day Iran’s leadership celebrates the anniversary of the seizure of the US embassy in Tehran in 1979,...
(God is tidy...Just sayin...)
"HE CREATED THE HEAVENLY HOST,
intending that they carry out his will. Did he create them to meet some need
in him? No. A complete, perfect being has no deficiencies. God has no need
of a council, but he uses one. Similarly, God did not need humans to steward his creation or, later on, to reveal that Messiah had come. But those were his choices as well.
God delighted in creating proxies to represent him and carry
out his wishes. His decisions in that regard have ramifications.
p.49
"EARTH WAS NOT EDEN
The first observation is one that is transparent from the biblical text, but somehow missed by many:
Not all the world was Eden.
It's important to
establish that Eden was,
rather than the entire earthly creation,
only a tiny part of it.
This distinction will become important in future chapters.
The text tells us this in several ways.
Eden was actually a tiny plot on Earth.
Its location is circumscribed by
geographical markers (Gen 2:8-14). In the last chapter we saw that the
Ugaritic council met in a garden where two rivers intersected ("in the midst
of the fountains of the double deep"). Eden is described with four water sources:
10 Now a river flowed out from Eden that watered the garden, and from
there it diverged and became four branches.
11 The name of the first is the
Pishon. It went around all the land of Havilah,
where there is gold.
12 (The gold of that land is good;
bdellium and onyx stones are there.)
13 And the name of the second is Gihon.
It went around all the land of Cush. 14 And
the name of the third is Tigris.
It flows east of Assyria. And the fourth
river is the Euphrates (Gen 2:10-14).
Verses 11-12
Probably where Zecharia Sitchin got the idea from for his 1976 book The 12th Planet, which claimed that ancient Sumerian texts described an extraterrestrial race from a hypothetical planet called Nibiru that came to Earth for gold and genetically engineered humans as laborers.
And people will willingly believe that ?
But reject the truth of the entire matter?
p.50
"In Genesis 1:26-27 God made
humankind as his imagers, his
representatives in this new domain.
This functional view of the image
becomes clear in the commands of verse 28:
And God blessed them, and God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply,
and fill the earth and subdue it, and rule over the fish of the sea and the
birds of heaven, and over every animal that moves upon the earth."
Notice that verse 28 says that the earth needed filling. This does not refer to
Eden. Eden has not even appeared yet in the Genesis story. Its first mention
comes in Genesis 2:8:
And Yahweh God planted a garden in Eden
in the east, and there he put
the man whom he had formed."
p.51
"PROCLAMATION AND PARTNERSHIP
The working relationship between God and humankind, before and after the fall, involves genuine, meaningful participation on the part of God's human imagers. This is most transparently seen as God works through figures like Moses, Joshua, David, Solomon, the prophets, and the apostles.
But the pattern extends to us, to all believers.
There is nothing we do that God could
not accomplish himself.
But he has not chosen that method.
Rather, he tells us what his will is
and commands his loyal children
to get the job done.
("Be yourself, just go tell em.")
p.51
"We saw in an earlier chapter that imaging status is something shared by human and nonhuman, divine beings. This fact is reflected in the plural language of Genesis 1:26, when God said, "Let us make humankind." The ensuing singular forms guided us to conclude that the passage has humankind created by a single creator, the God of Israel, who creates humans as his imagers. The prior plural language was a clue that God's other family, the divine sons of God created sometime earlier, were also imagers of their creator.
(Took a break and came back
and got the page numbers all screwed up lol...
"Micaiah, the prophet of Yahweh,
always told Ahab things he didn't
want to hear-like the truth."
(Its kinda what we do lol.)
p.53
"19 And he [Micaiah] said, "Therefore, hear the word of Yahweh. I saw
Yahweh sitting on his throne with all the hosts of heaven standing beside
him from his right hand and from his left hand. 20 And Yahweh said,
'Who will entice Ahab so that he will go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead?'
Then this one was saying one thing and the other one was saying another.
21 Then a spirit came out and stood before Yahweh and said, 'I will entice
him,' and Yahweh said to him, 'How?' 22 He said, 'I will go out and I will
be a false spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.' And he said, 'You shall
entice and succeed, go out and do so.' 23 So then, see that Yahweh has
placed a false spirit in the mouth of all of these your prophets, and
Yahweh has spoken disaster concerning you" (1 Kgs 22:16-23).
This passage, specifically verses 19-22, describes a meeting between God and his divine council. Verse 20 tells us plainly that God had decided it was time for Ahab to die. God then asked the host of heaven standing in attendance how Ahab's death should be accomplished.
God had decreed Ahab was going to die at Ramoth-Gilead, but the means of his death was not decreed. The council debated the matter until one of the spiritual beings came forward with a proposition (vv. 21-22):
"I will go out and I will be a false
spirit in the mouth of all his prophets." Upon hearing this, God said
(paraphrasing), "Good. I know that will work-go get it done."
p.53
"In Daniel 4 Nebuchadnezzar
relates a dream wherein he saw an enormous
tree that reached into the heavens.
Nebuchadnezzar tells Daniel that in the dream
he saw a watcher-a term for a divine being
(a "holy one") in this
chapter of Daniel (Dan 4:13, 17, 23).
The watcher proclaims
that the tree will
be chopped down, leaving only its stump. The tree and the stump are symbols
for Nebuchadnezzar, who, the watcher announces, will lose his mind and
become like an animal (Dan 4:13-16).
In verse 17 readers discover who decreed this fate for Nebuchadnezzar:
The sentence is by the decree of the watchers,
and the decision by the command of the holy ones,
in order that the living will know that
the Most High is sovereign
over the kingdom of humankind,
and to whomever he wills he gives it
(Dan 4:17).
The sentence is by the decree of the watchers,
and the decision by the command of the holy ones,
(Mirrors Revelation 2:26-28
26 And he that overcometh,
and keepeth my works unto the end,
to him will I give power over the nations:
27 And he shall rule them with a rod of iron;
as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers:
even as I received of my Father.
28 And I will give him the morning star.
As well as:
Daniel 2:21, 5:21, 4:25,32
Daniel 2:21
And he changeth the times and the seasons: he removeth kings, and setteth up kings: he giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding:
Daniel 5:21
And he was driven from the sons of men; and his heart was made like the beasts, and his dwelling was with the wild asses: they fed him with grass like oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven; till he knew that the most high God ruled in the kingdom of men, and that he appointeth over it whomsoever he will.
Daniel 4:25
That they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field, and they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and they shall wet thee with the dew of heaven, and seven times shall pass over thee, till thou know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
Daniel 4:32
32 And they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field: they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall pass over thee, until thou know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
p.54
"Here we see that the ultimate authority behind the decree is God, the Most High, and yet the watcher who delivered the decree in verse 17 said "the sentence is by decree of the watchers."
Both God and his divine agents were involved in the decision.
Daniel adds a few details as he continues.
Note the emphasis in bold carefully:
25 you [Nebuchadnezzar] will be driven away from human society and
you will dwell with the animals of the field, and you will be caused to
graze grass like the oxen yourself, and you will be watered with the dew
of heaven, and seven periods of time will pass over you until that you
have acknowledged that the Most High is sovereign over the kingdom of
humankind, and to whom he wills he gives it. 26 And in that they said to
leave alone the stump of the tree's root, so your kingdom will be restored
for you when you acknowledge that heaven is sovereign (Dan 4:25-26).
Verse 25 says very plainly that the Most High is sovereign. It is clearly
singular. The phrase "heaven is sovereign" is interesting because the Aramaic
word translated heaven (shemayin) is plural and is accompanied by a plural
verb. The plurality of shemayin can point to either the members of the
council or the council as a collective.
In any event, the wording is suggestive
of the interchange between
council and Most High
earlier in Daniel 4.
(So "Watchers" aren't just in the book of Enoch
they are in your bible.
And it's kinda hard to have a
"Most High"
if you don't have a lower
"created" council below.
WHERE DID IT ALL
GET SO DIFFICULT?
THIS IS HOW FAR
WE HAVE STRAYED.
What sounds so strange to us now?
BECAUSE NOBODY EVER
BRINGS IT UP
Was very easily accepted
by the writers of the biblical text.
p.55
"The takeaway is that God rules over the heavenly realm and the earthly realm with the genuine assistance of his imager-representatives.
He decrees and they carry out his commands.
These points are clear.
What is perhaps less
clear is that the way God's will is carried out
and accomplished is open-
imagers can make free decisions
to accomplish God's will.
God decrees the ends, but the means can
(and apparently are at times) left up to the imagers.
This balance of sovereignty and free will is essential for understanding what happened in Eden.
The choices made by human and nonhuman beings described in Genesis 3 were neither coerced nor needed by Yahweh for sake of his greater plan. The risk of creating image bearers who might freely choose rebellion was something God foresaw but did not decree. We'll examine all that in more detail in the next chapter.
(See:
Open Theology
"God's omniscience
necessitates God's foreknowing
what free choices are made"
He already has multiple options
for whatever course we chose.
You will not defeat
infinite wisdom.
IMPOSSIBLE.
p.58
"The beginning of Job is of interest to us because of two statements later in
the book. In Job 4, one of Job's friends, Eliphaz, responds to Job's lament
and wish for death (Job 3:11). He's not much of a comfort. He questions
Job's belief that he has done nothing deserving of suffering (Job 4:6),
something the reader knows is actually true (Job 1:8).
Eliphaz says at one point:
17 Can a human being be more righteous than God,
or can a man be more pure than his Maker?
18 Look, he does not trust in his servants
and he charges his angels with error.
19 How much more dwellers in clay houses,
whose foundation is in the dust?
They are crushed like a moth (Job 4:17-19).
(So having "celestial rebels"
is not just something
that is in Genesis 6.)
"Who do you think you are, Job!
A man isn't more righteous than his Maker!
Why would God consider you blameless
when he doesn't even look at his
heavenly messengers that way?
Eliphaz repeats the thought in Job 15:14-15:
p.59
"FREE IMAGERS
God knows that none of his imagers, divine or human, can be completely trusted. The reason is straightforward. Though imagers are like God, they aren't God. That's a truth we know all too well from our own struggles and experiences in a fallen world."
p.59
"like God. They are attributes we share with God, such as intelligence and
creativity. The attributes God shared with us are the means to imaging, not
the image status itself.
Imaging status and our attributes are related but not
identical concepts.
One of these attributes is freedom-free will that reveals itself in decision making. If humanity had not been created with genuine freedom, representation of God would have been impossible. Humans would not mirror their Maker. They could not accurately image him.
God is no robot.
We are reflections of a free Being,
not a cosmic automaton.
p.60
Since the lesser elohim were also created
as God's imagers, they too must have free will.
Both human and nonhuman imagers are less than their Maker.
Only God is perfect in the possession and exercise of his attributes. Every lesser being is imperfect. The only perfect Being is God. This is why things could, and did, go wrong in Eden.
If that was true even in Eden-the place on earth
where the council was present-
then being in the presence of God
is no guarantee that free-will beings
will never stray or act out of self-will.
Only God is perfect. Beings that are lesser than God, whether human or divine, are not perfect. The potential for error and disobedience is by definition possible.2 Trouble could happen in paradise, and of course it did. God's decision to create free imagers involved that risk."
p.60
What we've learned leaves us with important questions. Even though freewill is necessitated by imaging and representation, is risk the right word touse of God's decision? If God foreknew all the things that would happen as aresult of his decision, didn't he also predestine those things? But if he did,how can we even talk about free will? How are Adam and Eve truly responsible? What about the notion that they would "know good and evil"(Gen 3:5) and be like God-does that mean God has an evil streak in him?These questions have long been debated. It may therefore surprise you when I say they all have straightforward answers.
What we've seen in this
and earlier chapters about Eden,
God, and his divine council prepares us for the answers.
God does not delight in evil and suffering.
Nor does he need it for his sovereign plan.
The conundrums evaporate
if we just allow the text to say what it says.
We need to lay our theological systems aside,
answer these questions
like an ANCIENT Israelite would have,
and embrace the results.
("Were ancient Christians over here."
John 1:47
Jesus saw Nathanael coming to him,
and saith of him,
Behold an Israelite indeed,
in whom is no guile!
(Cunning Deceit)
'It is essential that we stand back from our presumptions and prejudices and listen carefully to what the Biblical text is telling us. We are living in exciting times, but we need to be diligent in our study of God’s Word. The only certain barrier to truth is the presumption that we already have it."
~
Chuck Missler 2009"
If you dont have:
"The whole truth"
Then you aint preaching
"The whole truth."
EVERY WORD
OR SPIT OUT.
YOUR CHOICE.
p.62
"GOD'S GIFT
We might wonder why God doesn't do away with
evil and suffering on earth.
The answer sounds paradoxical:
He can't-because that would require
elimination of all his imagers.
But he will at the last day.
For evil to be eliminated,
Earth and humanity
as we know it
would have to end.
God has a chronology, a plan,
for this ultimate development.
It could be no other way,"
"There is no other way.
We don't see no other way."
RNM"
"given his decision to create
time-bound humans
as the vehicles for his rule.
But in the meantime, we experience
the positive wonders of life as well.
Though God knew the risk of Eden,
he deemed the existence of humankind
preferable to our eternal absence.
Despite the risk of evil,
free will is a wonderful gift.
God's decision was a loving one.
Understanding that requires
only a consideration of the two
alternatives:
(1) not having life at all,
and
(2) being a mindless robot, capable
only of obeying commands
and responding to programming.
If our decisions were all coerced,
how authentic would those "decisions"
actually be? If love is coerced or programmed, is it really love?
Is any such decision really a genuine decision at all? It isn't.
For a decision to be real, it
must be made against
an alternative that could be chosen.
p.63
"KNOWING GOOD AND EVIL
Several phrases in Genesis 3:5, 22 that have puzzled interpreters become more understandable in light of what we've been discussing.
In Genesis 3:5 the serpent (Hebrew: nachash) says to Eve:
"For God (elohim) knows that on the day you both eat from it,
then your eyes will be
opened and you both shall be like gods (elohim),
knowing good and evil."
This verse is like Psalm 82:1.
The word elohim occurs two times in the same verse.
The first instance is singular because of grammar (the verbal "knows"
is singular in form). While most English translations render the second
instance as "God," it should be plural because of the context supplied by
Genesis 3:22. That verse reads: "And Yahweh God said, "Look-the man has
become as one of us, to know good and evil." The phrase "one of us"
informs us that, as in Genesis 1:26, God is speaking to his council members
-the elohim. This tells us clearly that the second instance of elohim in
Genesis 3:5 should be plural.
This fits well with Psalm 8:5, where the psalmist notes that humankind
was created "a little lower than elohim." We aren't a "little" lower than God
-we're light years lower. Relatively speaking, the gap is narrower if we
assume the reference in the psalm is plural ("a little lower than the elohim").
This is the way the writer of Hebrews takes the phrase.
p.67
Things we discussed earlier in this book allow us to take the discussion
further. God may foreknow an event and predestine that event, but such
predestination does not necessarily include decisions that lead up to that
event. In other words,
God may know and predestine the end
that something is ultimately going to happen
without predestining the means to
that end.
We saw this precise relationship when we looked at decision making in
God's divine council. The passages in 1 Kings 22:13-23 and Daniel 4
informed us that God can decree something and then leave the means up to
the decisions of other free-will agents.
The end is sovereignly ordained;
the means to that end may or may not be.
p.67
"IMPLICATIONS
An ancient Israelite would have embraced this parsing of foreknowledge, predestination, sovereignty, and free will.
He would not have been
encumbered by a theological tradition.
(Ringing a bell yet?
Anybody(s) in particular come to mind?
Who? and Why so?
Hum?)
"She would have understood that this is
the way God himself has decided
his rule over human affairs will work.
These are Yahweh's decisions,
and we accept them."
This has significant implications for not only the fall, but the presence ofevil in our world in general. God is not evil. There is no biblical reason toargue that God predestined the fall, though he foreknew it. There is nobiblical reason to assert that God predestined all the evil events throughouthuman history simply because he foreknew them.There is also no biblical coherence to the idea that God factored all evilacts into his grand plan for the ages. This is a common, but flawed, softer perspective, adopted to avoid the previous notion that God directly predestines evil events. It unknowingly implies that God's "perfect" plan needed to incorporate evil acts because-well, because we see them every day, and surely they can't just happen, since God foreknows everything. Therefore (says this flawed perspective) they must just be part of how God decided best to direct history.
p.68
"All of this means that what we choose to do is an important part of how things will turn out. What we do matters. God has decreed the ends to which all things will come. As believers, we are prompted by his Spirit to be the good means to those decreed ends.
But the Spirit is not the only influence. The experiences of our lives involve other imagers, both good and evil, including divine imagers wecannot see. The worldview of the biblical author was an animate one, where the members of the unseen world interact with humans. Loyal members of God's "congregation" (council), sent to minister to us (Heb 1:14), have embraced God's Edenic vision-we are brothers and sisters (Heb 2:10-18).Other divine beings would oppose God's plan. The original dissident takes center stage in the next chapter.
P.69
'Section Summary
We're just at the beginning of our journey. But we've learned somekey concepts already-concepts that will emerge elsewhere in theBible to form patterns. Other ideas will accrue to these concepts, andthe mosaic will start to take form.
There are several takeaways from this first section of the book
that will take on more shape and definition as we proceed.
First, God has a divine family-a heavenly assembly, or council, of elohim. These elohim are not a replacement for the Trinity, nor do they add to it. Yahweh is among the elohim, but he is superior to all other elohim. He is their creator and sovereign master. He is unique. Since Jesus is Yahweh in flesh, he too is distinct from, and superior to, all elohim. While God has no need of a council, Scripture makes it clear that he uses one. His divine family is his divine administration.
The elohim serve him to carry out his decrees.
God also has a human family and administration. Their status and function mirror the divine family-administration. Just as with the members of the divine council who represent God in what they are tasked to do, so humans are God's imaging representatives. Just as God doesn't need a divine council, he doesn't need humans, either-but he has chosen to use them to further his intentions for Earth.
Heaven and Earth are separate but connected realms. God's households operate in tandem toward a mutual destiny. Their points of intersection along the way inform many other threads of biblical theology.
With Eden the divine had come to earth, and earth would be brought into conformity. Humans were created to enjoy everlasting access to God's presence, working side by side with God's loyal elohim. But this yearning of God's came with risk, a risk that was fully known by him and accepted. Free will in the hearts and hands of imperfect beings, whether human or divine, means imagers can opt for their own authority in place of God's.
Sadly, that will also become a pattern.
Both of God's households
will experience rebellion.
The result will be the commencement of a
long war against God's original intention.
The good news is that there will be an equally committed effort on God's part to preserve what he began."
Only Six more sections.
and an epilogue to go.
Goodness only knows
when i'll get through em all lol.
Hope you learned something.
I know I sure did.
You know...
be all open minded and everything...
ps
How many preachers
do you think have quoted scripture
that said:
"The Most High God"
(its recurs a lot)
And never once even knew
what they were referencing?
My answer would be:
PLENTY OF THEM.
Were gonna change that.
It just started...
