Faithful Writers

Before the fall, God walked with His creation in perfect harmony. To understand the promise of Heaven, we must first understand what was lost—and what God plans to restore.

Although it is generally assumed that it was Abraham who first received the call from God… according to this passage, it seems like it was Terah who first got the call… How many of us have been called by God… but due to the pressing cares and circumstances… we let ourselves become sidetracked?

They (the Jews), are a kind of barometer of the spiritual condition of the Gentile people.” – Art Katz. This piercing truth reminds us that how we view Israel reveals much about our relationship with God.

Christians often confuse covenants with wills or testaments, but that’s not Biblical truth. God’s covenants are eternal laws woven into the very fabric of creation.

One theory is that since the human population was very small at this time, rather than other human beings, Cain was in danger from wild animals. However, this is unlikely. When Adam and Eve came into being, they were created as fully mature adults capable of procreating from day one and most likely did.

In the ancient Middle East, covenants were sealed with blood, salt, and sacrifice. These practices reveal powerful insights into the Bible’s covenant language.

Connected to this point is the huge misunderstanding that God made a separate covenant for the salvation of the Gentiles. I’m sorry to say this, but NO SUCH covenant exists

Genesis 13 shows the quiet but powerful moment when Abram and Lot part ways. One chooses worldly wealth; the other, God’s promise. This passage invites us to consider which direction we choose when faith and comfort collide.

Thinking that just walking down an aisle and mouthing some canned salvation prayer is the be all and end all of your faith walk is I believe a gross error. It is just the beginning. God has great plans for your life but YOU HAVE TO TAKE ACTION in order to translate those plans into reality.

We’ve built entire sermons around words Jesus never spoke. It’s time we stop preaching a misquote and start living the truth.

The underlying theme of Genesis is about the overcoming of all odds to achieve ultimate victory through faith in God. Think about it. God chooses one childless and elderly couple way beyond their ability to bear children. And God says to the husband Abraham that not only is he going to have a child but He is going to make him into a great nation, bless him abundantly and grant his descendants the Land of Canaan.

We can see throughout the book of Genesis that God’s interventions are at their most intense during the early stages of mankind’s history and gradually take a backseat as His creation matures.

Here is something a lot of people don’t know. Jesus Himself quoted from the Septuagint. This translation was done in the third century B.C. by Jewish scribes who were experts in Hebrew and Greek.

So have you ever heard this argument? “How could God have created the universe in just six days?” “The Hebrews claim that by counting the generations we find the earth to be approximately six thousand years old.”

There is a logical symmetry behind His actions clearly reflected in His creation. He is a God who draws up boundaries that are NOT to be broken. Let’s take a look at the creation story in Genesis Chapter One.

Since we are talking about the one true God of Israel, why is the plural form of God being used, instead of the singular form, which is EL? The answer is that the IM ending in Hebrew also has another usage. Adding IM to the end of a word can also indicate greatness.

God achieves His purposes through division and separation. This is a fundamental God principle and can be seen in the very first Chapter of Genesis. “God saw that the light was good, and God divided the light from the darkness.”-GENESIS 1:4

The important point that I want you to get from all of this is to keep in mind that there is an underlying spiritual reality and message behind not only physical objects in Scripture but also, many of the events depicted in Scripture that are not evident when first read but become clearer through prayer and as God gives us a deeper understanding.

The problem with this explanation is that it still does not explain how the market days happened to cluster around every “seventh” day, instead of every fifteenth day or nineteenth day or something else.

In some mysterious way, this number has left an indelible impression on the world and mankind. Our planet has seven continents and seven seas. The rainbow only has seven colors. The entire musical scale consists of only 7 notes. In popular culture, we have Snow White and the 7 Dwarves, The 7 Samurai, and James Bond 007.

The word Adam is also the root word for the color “red” and for the word “soil” or “earth." This makes perfect sense since the Scriptures tell us that God created a human (remember not a “man” but a “human”) from the dust of the ground.

But imagine watching a historical piece or a detective movie from the halfway point. Contextually speaking, you would be completely lost. This is the exact problem one encounters when reading the Bible starting from the New Testament.

The middle of the week of 30 A.D. was a Wednesday Passover. Jesus was to be “cut off” in the middle of the week! He was to be cut off in the middle of Daniel’s 70th week, in the middle of God’s 7000 year week and in the middle of the simple seven day week.

Of course God doesn’t have to rest. But He knew we would need one Holy Temple in time where we would need to get away from it all. That is why he rested on the seventh day and separated this day from all other days.