WHEN FAMILY OR LOVED ONES HOLD YOU BACK

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WHEN FAMILY OR LOVED ONES HOLD YOU BACK

July 14, 2022 • Pastor Robert R. McLaughlin • Genesis 11:25–26, Genesis 25:11, Genesis 26:11

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The beginning of the Abrahamic Covenant.
We must begin with a descendant of Shem, who for 99 years was an Arab and the Arab’s claim him as one of them, but then at age 99, God claimed Abraham for Himself and started a brand new race called the Jews.

Abraham was a Gentile who became a Jew when God started the Jewish race through him at age 99. He was born in the city of Ur about 2161 BC and this passage picks up Abraham around 2086 BC (where he had just entered Canaan or was about to).

The accounts about Abraham are found in GEN 11:26-25:11, with the focus on four important aspects of his life. First, his migration or his moving from one place to another. Abraham’s story begins with his migration with the rest of his family from UR of the Chaldeans in ancient southern Babylonia, GEN 11:31.

He and his family moved north along the trade routes of the ancient world and settled in the flourishing trade center of Haran, several hundred miles to the northwest. While living in Haran, at the age of 75 Abraham received a call from God to go to a strange, unknown land that God would show him.

The promise must have seemed unbelievable to Abraham because his wife Sarah (called Sarai in the early part of her life) was childless and he had no children, GEN 11:30-31; 17:15.

Terah was an Akkadian unbeliever, and in
JOS 24:2, he was an idolater.

His name Terah means “delayed,” and he is well named for he delayed Abraham from getting to the place where the Lord wanted him.

The city of Ur built the famous ziggurats, a system of terraced platforms on which temples were erected.

Ur of the Chaldees was a great powerful empire; however it was destroyed after Abraham left.

Abraham left Ur to go north and then south down to Canaan. On his way to Canaan Abraham passed the Amorites who were on their way to destroy his home area.

There were only three believers in Ur, Abraham, Sarah, and Lot, not enough to save Ur; the pivot was too small.

Abraham’s spiritual life was very limited in Ur, and he needed to get to a place where he could learn doctrine without being distracted.

You may find out that your spiritual life is limited because the place where you are or the people you are with become a stumbling block to your spiritual growth.

Geographical change is necessary for spiritual growth.

Abraham was one of the largest slave owners of the ancient world.

His father was also a priest of the moon-god who was called Ur, as well as one of the wealthiest men in this prosperous city.

Because TLJC controls history and since He knew what was going to happen to Ur, He got Abraham out. The only way to be sensitive to the leading and guidance of the Lord is to know Bible doctrine.

When Abraham left Ur, it was entering into the peak of its prosperity, and he appeared to be leaving a sure thing, a good thing, but it wasn’t.

This verse brings out the importance of resident doctrine in Abraham, positive volition and being motivated by doctrine before reaching spiritual maturity.

The change of geographical location was the basis for separating Abraham from his family and relatives. When family or relatives hold you back then family has to go and relatives have to go.

MAR 3:21 And when His own people [family] heard of this [He claimed to be the Son of God], they went out to take custody of him; for they were saying, “He has lost His senses.”
JOH 7:5 For not even his brothers were believing in Him.

Per-act-ind - hestekasin = they have been waiting outside for Him for a long time.

TLJC taught that His followers are even closer to Him than His natural family and closest relatives.

1TI 2:4 He wills all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

Relationship with God must have priority over relationship with people.
Emphasis on people over God must be set aside.
If we recognize that TLJC is our Lord, then we will put Bible Doctrine first in our scale of values.

The issue = Is Bible doctrine more important to you than the most intimate ties of life?
The greatest issue is always doctrine vs the details of life.

The glory road, which is saving grace, living grace, super-grace, dying grace, surpassing grace, was not open to Abraham in Ur of the Chaldea.

Abraham was uprooted in time so that he will be rooted forever in the eternal state.

To leave some environment where you’re appreciated, or in some cases, you think you’re appreciated, but your being appreciated is also keeping you from getting Bible doctrine.

Doctrine was available to him in Ur of the Chaldea, up to a point.

It ceased to be available when Abraham’s family and relatives and friends and social life and perhaps even his celebrityship - when these things got in the way of his advance down the glory road.

Wherever there is positive volition toward doctrine, God provides the spiritual food even if it means a change of residence.

The circumstances in Ur of Chaldea limited against Abraham from becoming a spiritual champion, invisible hero, and finally a visible one.

Abraham could only go so far in the environment of influence from family, friends, and social life.

When environment is not conducive to the persistent positive volition toward doctrine necessary to keep pressing on, then God uproots the believer who is positive.

God provided enough doctrine in Ur of Chaldea to give Abraham the inner doctrinal resources and strength to obey the command for a change of residence.

Separation “from” should be applied to both believers and unbelievers in the cosmic system.

It does not have to be physical separation.
1. Mental separation.

Your volition protects you from becoming antagonistic toward them by your use of impersonal unconditional love.

Mental separation emphasizes the integrity, honor, and doctrinal application of the believer residing inside the PPOG.

Impersonal love is not influenced by those loved ones who are residing in the cosmic system, who are apostate and antagonistic to doctrine.
Impersonal love functions on its own integrity and perpetuates its own priorities from the metabolization of doctrine.

Impersonal love emphasizes personal love for God while setting aside the functions of personal love for friends or loved ones.
Impersonal love does not compromise the believer’s status inside the PPOG.

Mental separation, in contrast to physical separation, avoids maligning, judging, hating, criticizing, seeking revenge, hurting those with whom you have been intimate in the past.

Mental separation not only emphasizes integrity and honor, but avoids destruction of the spiritual life.

2. Physical separation.
We will continue in our next study.

This lesson is from: Thursday, February 21, 2008

CANONICITY

April 15, 2008 • Pastor Robert R. McLaughlin

The History of the NT Greek Canon. Papyrus was mostly used for more ancient books. It survived in warm, dry climates such as the Middle East, but became frail after repeated use. Parchment or vellum, which became more used in the 4th century, was made from the skins of cattle, sheep, goats, antelopes, and was much more durable than papyrus, but more expensive. At the close of the first century A.D. the codex or leaf form of book, came into use in the Church. This is the form of book that we have today. Majuscules or Uncials were all capitol letters without spaces or punctuation. This was beautifully done in very old manuscripts and eliminated errors due to handwriting styles. Minuscule was a script type of writing using lower case letters. Since the minuscule handwriting made books cheaper, they were more available to people with limited means. Greek manuscripts fall into these two major groups (majuscule or minuscule), having subgroups of being written on either papyri or parchment. Either material was used interchangeably depending on cost. In English for example it would read: GODISNOWHERE. In the 4th century, when Rome received Christianity, scriptoria were established to produce copies of the NT. Therefore, just because a manuscript is older, that does not mean that it’s necessarily more accurate. God chose to preserve the NT by the very number of man’s mistakes. In other words, the mistakes preserve the original text. There are over 5700 manuscripts catalogued of parts of the NT alone. Each having small differences, then the number of variants becomes high, however, by comparison of them all, the variants become quite clear and a wonderful rendering of the original text is possible. Wescott and Hort indicated that about one eighth of the variants had any weight, the rest being trivial. Philip Schaff estimated that there were only 400 variants that affected the sense of the passage, and only 50 of these were important. Dr. A.T. Robertson, the greatest of Greek scholars, indicated that of real concern regarding textual variants amounted to but “a thousandth part of the entire text.” Four categories: Papyri………….116 Majuscules …….310 Minuscules……..2877 Lectionary………2432 5735 Codex Sinaiticus At the age of nineteen, young Count Koinstantin von Tischendorf amazed his professors with his fluent knowledge of the classical languages and his knowledge of history. This is how Tischendorf discovered the 129 pages of what is today known as the Codex sinaiticus, or the Codex Aleph. Codex Sinaiticus is still one of the finest and most accurate texts available to us today, and it became the basis of many revisions and corrections of earlier editions of the Bible. Actually, Codex Vaticanus, also known as Codex B was known to be some fifteen years older than Codex Sinaiticus (Codex Aleph). Vaticanus dated back to 325 or 350 A.D., and had probably been brought from the East by Pope Nicholas in 1448. In 1809, when Napoleon exiled the Pope, it took about fifty wagons to transport the Pope’s library. Tregelles, another great scholar and friend of Tischendorf’s, decided to investigate the Codex Vaticanus in the Vatican library. A third very interesting manuscript, which very few people knew about, is the Codex Alexandrinus. This Greek language manuscript had been written about 450 A.D. in Alexandria, Egypt. In 1621, when Cyril Lucar became the Patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, he transferred the manuscript to Constantinople. The beautiful document, Codex Alexandrinus, was presented at court in 1627, just fifteen years after the King James Version of the Bible had been completed. The first thing that was printed was Jerome’s Latin Vulgate as it was the most popular Bible translation at the time, although by then Bibles had been printed in several languages of Europe. No Greek NT had been “printed” until 1514 and was called the Complutensian Polygot. It was a magnificent edition of Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Latin texts. 600 were printed, of which 97 are preserved today. However, the first Greek NT to be published (put on the market) was an edition prepared by the famous Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus in 1516. Erasmus could not find a Greek manuscript that contained the entire NT. He used about a half dozen different, incomplete copies of the Greek NT. For most of the text he relied on two rather inferior manuscripts from a monastic library at Basle, one of the Gospels and one of Acts and the Epistles, both dating from the 12th century. Said of this first edition, owing to the haste in production, the volume contains hundreds of typographical errors. Said of this first edition: “It is in that respect the most faulty book I know.” (Scrivener) Erasmus made a second edition which became the basis for Luther’s German translation. Corrections were made but the text was still only based on a half-dozen Greek manuscripts. Further editions were made for a total of five editions in all by 1535. The text of Erasmus’ Greek NT rests upon a half-dozen miniscule Greek manuscripts. The oldest and best of these (codex 1, a miniscule of the 10th century) he used the least because he was afraid of its supposedly erratic text. It is Erasmus’ text (Textus Receptus: Received Text) that is the basis of the 1611 King James Version. This is not to say that the KJV is a terrible translation, but it is flawed as any other translation and it is not as good as RSV, NIV, or NASB etc. ROM 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. KJV ROM 8:4 That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. KJV After Erasmus thousands of manuscripts of the Greek NT have been discovered as well as other ancient Greek texts that have aided in our understanding of the Koine Greek. In fact the 26th edition of the Nestle-Aland Greek NT was published separately from the United Bible Societies’ Greek NT. Without communicating and by using different critical methods the two editions are identical. 5735 Greek manuscripts discovered and criticized over hundreds of years have reproduced God’s original Word to the writers of Scripture within 99.999% accuracy. Grace Bible Church Basic Training in Doctrine April 8, 2008 Canonicity Definition, Origin, and the OT. Definiton: Canonicity is derived from the Greek word “kanon” which originally meant a rod or a ruler – hence a measuring stick or a norm. The canon of Scripture is the divine absolute standard of God’s revelation to mankind. Argument: We don’t have any of the originals and the originals have been copied over and over so there are bound to be mistakes. Answer: True Argument: The Bible was written by men and not God. Answer: True. But over 40 different writers who wrote over a period of 1,500 years are in exact agreement about types, antitypes, prophecies, fulfillment of prophecies, timelines, stories, and history, and all without a single glitch. God the Holy Spirit so directed the writers of Scripture that without changing their personality, their vocabulary, their frame of reference, God’s complete message to mankind was recorded in their own language and vernacular. This is the doctrine of inspiration. The Bible is not human viewpoint, but it is the Holy Spirit’s use of human agencies to record God’s complete revelation to mankind through mankind. The Origin of the Scriptures: The Bible was inspired by God and it is now complete. REV 22:18 I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book : if anyone adds to them, God shall add to him the plagues which are written in this book; 1 Cor 2:10 For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God 1 Cor 2:16 For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ. When we turn to the decree of Artaxerxes, made in his twentieth year, NEH 2:1-8, for the first time is permission granted to rebuild the city of Jerusalem. This prophecy fulfills the conditions of DAN 9:25 Therefore, 69 weeks of prophetic years of 360 days (69 x 7 x 360 = 173,880 days) = 173,880 days. After this many days, from March 14th B.C. 445, one would arrive at the 6th of April, A.D. 32. Luke 19:42 “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace-but now it is hidden from your eyes. (NIV) The Old Testament For instance the original Greek of John 1:1 is as follows: Now look at an OT verse in the Hebrew: à áÌÀøÅàùÑÄéú, áÌÈøÈà àÁìÉäÄéí, àÅú äÇùÌÑÈîÇéÄí, åÀàÅú äÈàÈøÆõ. In 280 B.C. 72 Alexandrian scholars got together and produced an amazingly accurate translation. This was called the Septuagint or “the Seventy” in honor of the translators. : The Bible was originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, although only a handful of chapters were written in Aramaic Unlike the NT, the OT scriptures were kept among one people, the Jews, for centuries. Outside of the Septuagint it remained in Hebrew, was kept among people who spoke the same language, and the Jews were well trained copyists and preservers of the OT Originally the OT was divided into 3 parts: The Torah, the Prophets, and the Writings The Torah or the Pentateuch consists of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy The second group, the Nabhim or Prophets which are split into two categories; the Former Prophets (before the Babylonian captivity) and the Latter prophets (after the Babylonian captivity). There are four books in each category. The three Major Prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel The Minor Prophets, which we divide into 12 separate books, are all one in the Hebrew Bible, called the Twelve. Apart from Daniel “The Twelve” includes everything from Hosea to Malachi The third section of the Hebrew OT is called the Kethubim or “The Writings.” This was divided into 3 sections, The Poetical Books, The Five Rolls (also called the Megilloth), and The Historical Books. Lastly there are the three Historical Books at the end of the Hebrew Canon: Daniel, Ezra and Nehemiah (one book), and Chronicles. Therefore, the Hebrew OT contains 24 books compared to our 39 This endorsement of Scripture takes us from GEN 4:10 (the first book) to 2CH 24:20-21 (the last book in the OT Canon) The Apocrypha are books written after the close of the OT Canon in 425 B.C. The word Apocrypha means hidden or secret. Their addition was an attempt by the devil to infiltrate God’s Truth. The Apocrypha teaches: Prayers and offerings for the dead (2 Macc 12:41-46). Suicide is justified (2 Macc 14:41-46). Salvation by giving money (Tobit 4:11). Cruelty to slaves (Ecclesiasticus 33:25-29). The soul is produced by parents (Wisdom 8:19-20).

GOD IS IN YOU, THE SHEKINAH GLORY REVEALED.

July 7, 2022 • Pastor Robert R. McLaughlin

We have the glory of God in writing. We have the grace of God in writing. We have the mercy of God in writing. We have the goodness of God in writing. See our MP3 Series for other parts of the "John Series" or visit us @ http://gbible.org Exodus 33:19 Moses had seen the face of God face to face. A theophany is an old testament appearance of Jesus Christ. In this situation a theophany is Jesus Christ in a literally human body. To behold the Glory of God is to behold His goodness, His mercy, and His grace. Bible Doctrine is the revelation of the glory of God. The Word of God in writing. John 1:14 The Lord Jesus Christ was full of grace. Luke 4:22 Full of Grace has to do with the person of Jesus Christ. There will never be a person who will stand before God and not have had an opportunity to behold His grace. Titus 2:11, 12. Grace is simply God’s unmerited favor toward the human race. Grace is God loving you when you don’t deserve a single thing. Grace is the way God treats you and I because of what His Son did on the Cross. There is nothing that you could ever do to make God love you or bless you. God loves you because of who He is and not what you are. God loves each and every one of us with a perfect and unconditional love. God’s glory is His graciousness, His mercy and His goodness. Luke 4:22 Our words usually reveal what we are thinking, unless one is a hypocrite. Jesus Christ constantly spoke gracious words, and He constantly thought gracious thoughts. Jeremiah 29:13 The reason why they are thoughts of peace is so that you can except reconciliation and come to God’s expected end. Many Christians struggle to live the Christian way of life. How can you please God? The first prerequisite to coming to a place of being a Christian that pleases God is that you have to know God’s thoughts towards who you are. Many people do not know what God’s glory is all about and they begin to feel condemned. God’s glory is His grace. God’s glory is His mercy. God’s glory is His goodness. Who wouldn’t want to draw near to a God who is filled with glory filled with Mercy, filled with grace and God that is good to us constantly? When Jesus Christ walked on this earth, He was filled with not just Truth, but Grace and Truth.¬¬¬¬ You can’t be filled with grace unless you’re filled with truth and truth is God doctrines. You can’t be filled with truth unless you’re filled with grace. You can’t have one without the other, the two go together. The more truth that I learn, the more grace that I’ll know about God and then the more gracious I’ll be to others. Jesus Christ, when He came down on earth, revealed His glory to the human race and His glory was revealed by grace and truth. That is so precious when you think about it. In fact Grace and doctrine, Grace and truth, doctrine is what sustained Him in His earthly ministry. You and I can go through any difficulty in life and have Bible doctrine, God’s word and God’s promises and the Holy Spirit to sustain us constantly. When Jesus Christ came, He was filled with grace and truth and when our sins were poured upon Him and judged, grace and truth is what carried Him. Grace and Doctrine carried Him through. The same thing that carried Him through you and I have the ability to carry us through right now, at any time because His grace, His truth, the Shekinah Glory, and God the Holy Spirit will never leave us or forsake us. God the Father will never forsake us because God the Son already paid that price for every single one of us… If you lived when Christ lived and if you followed Him all around and you sat and you learn with Him and you went everywhere with Him, you would still not have what you have today, you would still not have the Shekinah Glory inside of you. You could’ve seen Him all that you want but you couldn’t behold all of His glory, Psalm 85:10 Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other. In the person of Jesus Christ when he came down on the earth mercy and truth met, and then in the person of Jesus Christ righteousness and peace kissed. What does that mean? That means that righteousness, God‘s righteousness, God‘s holiness now has been totally at peace with mankind through Jesus Christ. This LESSON is from our John Series

WHY DID JESUS CHRIST COME TO DWELL AMONG US?

Pastor Robert R. McLaughlin

Who is this one that said to be raised from the dead? These are the questions you must ask yourself: Do you believe in God? Do you believe that there is a God somewhere somehow? And if so do you have a responsibility to listen to Him? Do you owe Him a hearing? If there really is a God, what does God want from your life? No one can go through life saying I believe in God, yet ignore Him. Many people that say they believe in God, really do not. To really believe in God you would have to realize that God wants something from you. God expect something from you. The Gospel of John deals with who Jesus Christ is. The Gospel of John One of the most unique. Matthew, Mark and Luke are very repetitious. The Gospel of John is much different than the Gospel of Matthew, Mark and Luke. John 1. John wrote his book after the other Gospels were already written. The Holy Spirit wanted him to bring something out about Jesus Christ more than what any of the other gospels did even combined. The deity of Jesus Christ, who Jesus Christ is. Many people will come up with excuses to not face who Jesus Christ is. John 20:31 This book was not written to condemn you. Jesus Christ has already paid the price for every sin you would ever commit. This book is written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God and that believing you might have life through His name. A lot of people believe that Jesus Christ is the Son but a lot of people don’t keep on believing. If you keep on believing then you’ll have life through His name. The Gospel of John is a book that is written to unbelievers to cause them to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and then this book is also written to Christians to cause them to keep on believing that He is Lord and Savior so that they can have a life through His name. Many people never learn to love themselves through Jesus Christ our Lord. Why was the Gospel of John written? So that we might believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that by believing we might have life through His name. The life that God wants us to have does not begin when we die and go to heaven. We are not talking about eternal life in heaven we are talking about life right now on earth, this is why this gospel was written. This book is considered by many scholars to be the deepest and the most spiritual book in the Bible. The main purpose for this book is to inspire you and I to have faith in Jesus. The only thing that matters now is what ye think of Jesus Christ? It doesn’t matter who you are or what you have done, if you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ you will have eternal life. There is only one reason and one reason only why people go to hell and that is because they refuse to believe in the Son of God, nothing else. Why did Jesus Christ who is God dwell among us? 2 Corinthians 8:9 For you are recognizing [more clearly] the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ [His astonishing kindness, His generosity, His gracious favor], that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that by His poverty you might become rich (abundantly blessed). Jesus Christ came to make poor people rich. The word of God says in Philippians 2:8 After He was found in [terms of His] outward appearance as a man [for a divinely-appointed time], He humbled Himself [still further] by becoming obedient [to the Father] to the point of death, even death on a cross. Christ is the Son of God and to keep having that face so that He’s not only Savior of your soul but He’s also Lord of your life. What good is it if Jesus Christ is your savior but He’s not your Lord? A lot of people use phrases so that Jesus Christ will not have to be Lord of their life. Consider making Jesus Christ Savior of your soul and if you’re already saved make Him Lord of your life. This gospel is designed for us to recognize the Celebrity ship, the Kingship, and the Lordship of our Lord. Jesus Christ is God! You must realize that Jesus Christ is not just the Son of God but He is God Himself. Jesus Christ is King, Jesus Christ is Lord and Jesus Christ is the only celebrity in the Christian life. The fact that Jesus Christ is God demands your attention. You will have to stand before God someday to answer to God. John 1:1 In the beginning [before all time] was the Word ([a]Christ), and the Word was with God, and [b]the Word was God Himself. The Word was in the beginning, and the Word was with God and the Word was God. The Word was God. The Word was God. The Word “beginning” means a beginning that has no beginning, it means eternity password for the Word. As much as you know about the Bible is as much as you know about God. God is omnipresent. God’s entire mind is in the Bible. John 1:14 The same One who is equal to the Father and the same One that was equal to the Holy Spirit and Who occupied the highest place of deity, He decided to come down on earth and take upon Him the form of a man. The same form of humanity as you and I.