Biblical characters given as example

To build up a good relation with the Divine Creator, the Divine Master Maker Himself provided several people who should be an example for mankind to come closer to God.

The temptation of Adam and Eve

Because of the rebellion against their Maker, the first human beings where cast out of the Garden of Eden, but had their offspring also with the blemish of the consequences of their going wrong. From those two people, Adam and Eve, came forth several people and several nations. They were the beginning of all nations and therefore those the Bible refers to as “one flesh”, Eve coming from the same flesh (Adam’s) and being joined together again in marital/sexual union are really inseparable. They were told to multiply in such a way that the whole world would be populated. That is part of the Plan of God.
Their act of defiance, called “The Fall” by many theologians, is a real bummer because from it comes painful childbirth, weeds in our gardens, many problems, lots of pain and, ultimately, death. Moreover, Adam and Eve’s disobedience introduce fear and alienation into humankind’s formerly perfect relationships with God and one another. As evidence of this alienation, Adam and Eve’s son, Cain, murders his brother, Abel.

Building the Ark (Noah’s Preaching Scorned), by Harry Anderson

After that horrible drama it still not went right and even went so bad that God found it more than enough, and therefore would give man a possibility to return to the right path. But they did not; and therefore God brought a great flood over the whole earth.
Noah and his family where chosen to survive the deluge because Noah was

“the most righteous in his generation.”

and as such should be one of the many good examples to follow. Can you imagine what a faith in that God he could not see, he must have had, to build a giant three-decked wooden box in which he, his family, and a whole bunch of animals would have to come to live when there was going to be a massive flood that God was going to send to destroy humankind for its disobedience. For years he worked on that ark in the desert where so many passed and laughed with him, finding him a big idiot.

From the family of Noah the world of man could start again from anew. Once again God could see people not willing to follow Him but preferring to make themselves other gods and believing in them more.

Abraham Taking Isaac to Be Sacrificed – by Del Parson

In those early times of mankind, early 2nd millennium bce, we can find again a man with incredible faith in his God. Though not perfect, Avram, how he was called first, was called by God to leave his homeland in Mesopotamia to venture to an unknown Promised Land Canaan. The tales of Abraham and his wife Sarah are a roller coaster of dramatic events that repeatedly jeopardize God’s promise. The couple its faith was really tested many times. Ironically, the biggest threat to God’s promise was when God Himself commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac. Abraham did not hesitate to do what God asked from him, but right before Abraham was going to deliver the fatal blow to his own child, God stopped the sacrifice. As a reward for Abraham’s faith, God fulfils His promise to make Abraham’s descendants a great nation, as Isaac’s son Jacob eventually has 12 sons, whose descendants become the nation of Israel.

In Judaism the promised offspring is understood to be the Jewish people descended from Abraham’s son, Isaac, born of his wife Sarah. Similarly, in Christianity the genealogy of Jesus is traced to Isaac, and Abraham’s near-sacrifice of Isaac is seen as a foreshadowing of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. In Islam it is Ishmael, Abraham’s firstborn son, born of Hagar, who is viewed as the fulfillment of God’s promise, and the Prophet Muhammad is his descendant. {Abraham Hebrew patriarch; André Parrot, Encyclopaedia Britannica}

Moses and the Burning Bushes – by Jerry Thompson

To bring over His messages Jehovah God uses human people who live according His wishes. One of them could see how people where not nicely treated and had to be brought out of the yoke of Egyptian slavery. Raised in the royal palace by Pharaoh’s daughter and her servant, the real mother of Moses, he had to flee Egypt for killing an Egyptian who was beating an Israelite slave. God knowing the heart of man, also knew very well what went on in Moses head and why that murder happened. Though no man can see God and live, Jehovah ‘appeared’ before Moses in a burning bush and told him to return to Egypt to deliver the Israelites from their slavery. Lots of faith in God was demanded from Moses, to meet every time the pharaoh bringing over the message of God, Who would bring a plague to the country. With God’s help, Moses succeeded in his mission, bringing the Israelites to Mount Sinai, where God gave him the Law, including the Ten Commandments.

Moses wrote down also the Words of God on the scrolls or manuscripts which we know today as the Pentateuch or the Torah. It are those books which bring us the history of man, but also bring us a picture how we can build up a good relation with God or how we can destroy such a relation.

That God not only wants to have a relation with us when we are totally good, we can see in many other characters, who also did not have a faultless life. In David, for example, we may  find a character who perpetrates one of the Bible’s most heinous crimes: he committed adultery with a woman named Bathsheba, who was the wife of one of David’s most loyal soldiers, Uriah. Though to cover up the crime, David had the Hittite killed. It was after the prophet Samuel confronted David with his sin, that he came to repent. We may see that God is a forgiving One when people repent, but we should know that sometimes we shall have to bear the punishment like it was for David.
Beyond David’s royal exploits (and indiscretions), he’s credited with writing many of ancient Israel’s worship songs, which you can read in the Book of Psalms.
He was is Israel’s second and greatest king and it is out of his lineage an other prophet and king would be born and would bring salvation to the world.

Several other prophets warned people about their lifestyle and how they had to prepare for great days to come. Because many people liked worshipping multiple gods many prophets tried to have them to worship Only One True God.
In order to prove to the Israelites that the Elohim Hashem Jehovah God is the Only True God, the prophet Elijah gathered the prophets of Baal at Mount Carmel, where for the main event each deity was given a pile of wood with a bull on it. The god who could produce fire and consume the sacrifice would be called the greatest and win. Baal went first, and for half the day his prophets danced, shouted, sang, and even cut themselves in order to convince their god to answer Elijah’s challenge. When their efforts failed, Elijah prayed to Jehovah God, who immediately brought fire down from the sky to consume the sacrifice. The Israelites rededicated themselves to This Incredible God who listens to people and gives answers to people, and they killed the prophets who deceived them into worshipping Baal.

Isaiah Writes of Christ’s Birth (The Prophet Isaiah Foretells Christ’s Birth), by Harry Anderson

A later figure of importance is the man who with many of his prophecies inspired hope for eventual peace and righteousness on earth. Several of these prophecies were later understood by Christians to be predictions of Jesus, including the birth of Immanuel; the coming of the Prince of Peace, as quoted in Handel’s Messiah; and the suffering of God’s “Servant” for the sins of his people.
That prophet (Isaiah) spoke about a servant and sent one from God, the son of man, coming from the lineage or seed of king David, who can be considered as the most important prophet. It was the Nazarene Jew Jeshua, the ben haElohim or son of God, better known today as Jesus Christ.
He is the one who told many stories and parables so that people could come to know how to live and how to prepare themselves for the Great Day of Judgement that is going to come.
He is also the best example to follow, him being the way to God and the one showing and opening the door to the Kingdom of God.

All the above mentioned characters are only a few of the many presented in the Bible. In that Book of books we may find many men and women who can be brought forward as people of God, having done things we can learn from. Many of them were obedient to God’s commands throughout their life, some even risking their life, like Esther. Other’s their family story, like Hosea‘s, was a metaphor for God’s relationship with Israel.

In stories like the one of Jonah we can see how much better it is to listen to God. And that listening can be done by reading the most precious Book of books, the Bible.
With over 66 books of Scripture, 39 in the Old Testament and 27 in the New Testament, covering thousands of years of history, the Bible makes mention of hundreds of people either in great detail and gives others just a passing mention. From all those spoken off we can learn, the same as we can learn by looking around us and by comparing what is written, in the Bible, about such occasions we encounter in our daily life.

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Preceding

When there is a relationship with God there is a possibility to grow

How do people want to grow and come closer to the Real God

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Additional reading

  1. The real God
  2. Creation of the earth and man #1 Planet for living beings in a pre-Adamic world
  3. The 1st Adam in the Hebrew Scriptures #4 The Fall
  4. No man is capable of self-improvement on his own
  5. Disobedient man and God’s promises
  6. Old language to confirm the promises
  7. A voice and a Word given for wisdom
  8. Necessity of a revelation of creation 5 Getting understanding by Word of God 3
  9. Necessity of a revelation of creation 6 Getting understanding by Word of God 4
  10. Jehovah God Maker of the entire universe served by a well-trained army
  11. Men who believed and had faith in a Higher Power they could not see
  12. Today’s thought “As wax melts before the fire” (February 5)
  13. Today’s thought “The Land promised and fear of man” (April 18)
  14. Today’s Thought “The whole earth is full of his glory” (May 16)
  15. Today’s Thought “The earth shall be full of …” (May 21)
  16. Today’s thought “Being made prosperous and numerous on conditions” (May 13)
  17. When believing in God’s existence and His son, possessing a divine legislation
  18. On the Edge of Believing
  19. The Exodus Story: History or Myth?
  20. Bamidbar (In the Wilderness)
  21. Adar 6, Matan Torah remembering the giving of Torah
  22. Looking at the time when the Torah was given
  23. The Abrahamic Covenant and Seed of Abraham
  24. Keturah concubine of patriarch Abraham
  25. Ishmael not merely “laughing” but “Issac-ing”
  26. The Son can do nothing of his own accord
  27. Redemption #7 Christ alive in the faithful
  28. Souls and Religions with Nirvana and light
  29. Memorizing wonderfully 2 Biblical Reasons to Memorize Scripture
  30. A Living Faith #1 Substance of things hoped for
  31. When having taken a new direction in life, having become a Christian

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Further related reading

  1. By the Grace of God I am
  2. Makeda, Queen of Sheba
  3. The Mother of Moses: Preaching my essay to myself this morning
  4. More Like Martha: 4 Lessons I Never Heard in Sunday School
  5. What are the Lessons You Can Learn from the Life of Jabez?
  6. 5 Amazing Lessons You can Learn from the Life of the Apostle Philip

When there is a God is it possible to relate to Him

When wondered about a godhead and having come to the conclusion that there must be a Divine Creator or Supreme Being that surpasses all human and animal beings, we may question if it is possible for us to have a relationship with that Higher Being.

What does it take to begin a relationship with God?

With people around us we may have an idea how we can start a relationship with them, but what about God?

Do we have to wait until something serious happens in our life? Many do that, but is that the right way? Do they not miss a lot because they too late became in a relationship with their God?

Is it necessary to enjoy yourself a lot or to get in trance to come closer to that god or the God?

Or should we spend more time to ourselves or to taking part in religious activities? Or is it necessary to devote yourself to unselfish religious deeds?

Do we first have to become a better person, whatever that might entail, so that God will accept us?

The bible used by Abraham Lincoln for his oath...
The bible used by Abraham Lincoln for his oath of office during his first inauguration in 1861, turned to the page signed by the clerk of the Supreme Court, William Thomas Carroll, attesting that the book was used for Lincoln’s oath of office, and impressed with the seal of the Supreme Court. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We can ask a thousand questions and look for many answers. We might go looking in lots of books and places to find answers. Though we should know we do not have to go far. God has made it very clear in the Bible how we can know Him. In God His Word, the Bible, is explained what happened to mankind, how the relationship was broken and how the relationship was and can be restored.

Does that God hide or is it our pride which makes that we do not want to see and know Him?

Should we have to ask Him first a proof of His identity? do we not need some certification or a security that we do have to do with God? Do we need His sign and his reassurance first before we can come to Him? Should we not know first of all that we are speaking with the right person?

Is it in response to a power displayed, that we should start looking for a relationship with God?

In the following articles you might find why it is necessary to build a relationship with God and how you can personally begin such a relationship with God, right now…

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Dutch version / Nederlandse versie:  Als er een God bestaat is het mogelijk om een relatie met Hem op te bouwen

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Some interesting articles to read

  1. Do You Know Him?
  2. Why does God hide
  3. God’s Attribute of Invisibility
  4. Is That You, God? Can I See Some Identification, Please?
  5. It’s Not Them, It’s You
  6. Too Proud To Follow God
  7. Chavakuk: Relationship with God
  8. Guard Your Relationship With God
  9. God Is Your Home
  10. Nooks and crannies
  11. Proverbs 15:2 ” The tongue of the wise commends knowledge, but the mouth of the fool gushes folly. “
  12. Let Us Not Take For Granted..
  13. Rise and fall
  14. Being True to God
  15. Are You In The Habit of Daily Bible Reading?
  16. Hungry
  17. My House Will. Will Yours?
  18. Does God Make You Suffer?
  19. Who you calling “meek”?
  20. Did You Need The Reminder: Be Strong And Courageous!
  21. Heart Call
  22. Come and See: Sermon by Keith, 1.22.17
  23. #JustThinking | Why worship?
  24. The Goodness of God
  25. He Loved Us First: The Difference That Makes
  26. Where does eternity begin?

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Save

Save

Revolt against the Authority of the Bible

Concerning the authority of the Holy Scriptures there has bean much debate. Let us have a look on what is written about the Power of God’s Word and its authority in a well-known encyclopedia of the Bible.

The Power of God’s Word.

The Gutenberg Bible displayed by the United St...
The Gutenberg Bible displayed by the United States Library of Congress, demonstrating printed pages as a storage medium. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Bible remains the most extensively printed, widely translated, and frequently read book in the world. Its words have been treasured in the hearts of multitudes like none other. All who have received its gifts of wisdom and promises of new life and power were at first strangers to its redemptive message, and many were hostile to its teaching and spiritual demands. In every generation its power to challenge persons of all races and lands has been demonstrated. Those who cherish the Book because it sustains future hope, brings meaning and power to the present, and correlates a misused past with the forgiving grace of God, would not long experience such inner rewards if Scripture were not known to them as the authoritative, divinely revealed truth. To the evangelical Christian, Scripture is the Word of God, given in the objective form of propositional truths through divinely inspired prophets and apostles, and the Holy Spirit is the giver of faith through that Word.

Carl F. H. Henry

Elwell, W. A., & Beitzel, B. J. (1988). In Baker encyclopedia of the Bible (p. 300). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House.

Bible, Authority of the.

View that the Bible is the Word of God and as such should be believed and obeyed.

Image from the Book of Kells, a 1200 year old ...
Image from the Book of Kells, a 1200 year old book. Category:Illuminated manuscript images (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Western civilization is in a severe “authority crisis” which is not confined solely to the realm of religious faith, nor is it specially or uniquely threatening to Bible believers. Parental authority, marital authority, political authority, academic authority, and ecclesiastical authority are all being deeply questioned. Not only particular authorities — the Scripture, the pope, political rulers, and so on — but the concept of authority itself is vigorously challenged. Today’s crisis of biblical authority thus reflects the uncertainties of civilizational consensus:

Who has the power and the right to receive and to require submission?

Revolt Against Biblical Authority.

As the sovereign Creator of all, the God of the Bible wills and has the right to be obeyed. Judge of men and nations, the self-revealed God wields unlimited authority and power. All creaturely authority and power is derived from that of God. The power God bestows is a divine trust, a stewardship. God’s creatures are morally accountable for their use or misuse of it. In fallen human society God wills civil government for the promotion of justice and order. He approves an ordering of authoritative and creative relationships in the home by stipulating certain responsibilities of husbands, wives, and children. He wills a pattern of priorities for the church as well: Jesus Christ the head, prophets and apostles through whom redemptive revelation came, and so on.

The inspired Scriptures, revealing God’s transcendent will in objective written form, are the rule of faith and conduct through which Christ exercises his divine authority in the lives of Christians.

Revolt against particular authorities has in our time widened into a revolt against all transcendent and external authority. The widespread questioning of authority is condoned and promoted in many academic circles.
Philosophers with a radically secular outlook have affirmed that God and the supernatural are mythical conceptions, that natural processes and events comprise the only ultimate reality. All existence is said to be temporal and changing, all beliefs and ideals are declared to be relative to the age and culture in which they appear. Biblical religion, therefore, like all other, is asserted to be merely a cultural phenomenon. The Bible’s claim to divine authority is dismissed by such thinkers; transcendent revelation, fixed truths, and unchanging commandments are set aside as pious fiction.

In the name of humanity’s supposed “coming of age,” radical secularism champions human autonomy and creative individuality. Human beings are lords of their own destiny and inventors of their own ideals and values, it is said. They live in a supposedly purposeless universe that has itself presumably been engendered by a cosmic accident. Therefore human beings are declared to be wholly free to impose upon nature and history whatever moral criteria they prefer. In such a view, to insist on divinely given truths and values, on transcendent principles, would be to repress self-fulfillment and retard creative personal development. Hence the radically secular view goes beyond opposing particular external authorities whose claims are considered arbitrary or immoral; radical secularism is aggressively hostile to all external authority, viewing it as intrinsically restrictive of the autonomous human spirit.

Any reader of the Bible will recognize rejection of divine authority and definitive revelation of what is right and good as an age-old phenomenon. It is not at all peculiar to the contemporary person “come of age”; it was found already in Eden. Adam and Eve revolted against the will of God in pursuit of individual preference and supposed self-interest. But their revolt was recognized to be sin, not rationalized as philosophical “gnosis” at the frontiers of evolutionary advance.

If one takes a strictly developmental view, which considers all reality contingent and changing, where is the basis for humanity’s decisively creative role in the universe? How could a purposeless cosmos cater to individual self-fulfillment?

Only the biblical alternative of the Creator-Redeemer God, who fashioned human beings for moral obedience and a high spiritual destiny, truly preserves the permanent, universal dignity of the human species. The Bible does so, however, by a demanding call for personal spiritual decision.
The Bible sets forth the superiority of humans to the animals, their high dignity (“little less than God”—Ps 8:5) because of the divine rational and moral image that all bear by reason of creation.

English: Print 3330 in volume 27 of the Bowyer...
Print 3330 in volume 27 of the Bowyer Bible in Bolton Museum, England. From page 12 of Volume 1 of “A-Z of Artists in the Bowyer Bible” by Phillip Medhurst. Photo 4 of 117. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the context of universal human involvement in Adamic sin, the Bible utters a merciful divine call to redemptive renewal through the mediatorial person and work of Christ. Fallen humanity is invited to experience the Holy Spirit’s renewing work, to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, and to anticipate a final destiny in the eternal presence of the God of justice and justification.

Contemporary rejection of biblical tenets does not rest on any logical demonstration that the case for biblical theism is false; it turns rather on a subjective preference for alternative views of “the good life.”
The Bible is not the only significant reminder that human beings stand daily in responsible relationship to the sovereign God. He reveals his authority in the cosmos, in history, and in inner conscience, a disclosure of the living God that penetrates into the mind of every person (Rom 1:18–20; 2:12–15). Rebellious suppression of that “general divine revelation” does not wholly succeed in suspending a fearsome sense of final divine accountability (Rom 1:32).
Yet it is the Bible as “special revelation” that most clearly confronts our spiritually rebellious race with the reality and authority of God.

Title page from the Great Bible published by G...
Title page from the Great Bible published by Grafton and Whitchurch in 1539. It depicts an enthroned Henry VIII receiving the Word of God and bestowing it upon his bishops and archbishops (top third), who in turn deliver it to the priests (middle third). Finally, the laity hear the Word and loyally recite, “Vivat Rex” and “God save the kynge” (bottom third). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the Scriptures, the character and will of God, the meaning of human existence, the nature of the spiritual realm, and the purposes of God for humankind in all ages are stated in propositionally intelligible form that all can understand. The Bible publishes in objective form the criteria by which God judges individuals and nations, and the means of moral recovery and restoration to personal fellowship with him.

Regard for the Bible is therefore decisive for the course of Western culture and in the long run for human civilization generally. Intelligible divine revelation, the basis for belief in the sovereign authority of the Creator-Redeemer God over all human life, rests on the reliability of what Scripture says about God and his purposes. Modern naturalism impugns the authority of the Bible and assails the claim that the Bible is the Word of God written, that is, a transcendently given revelation of the mind and will of God. Attack upon scriptural authority is the storm center both in the controversy over revealed religion and in the modern conflict over civilizational values.

Elwell, W. A., & Beitzel, B. J. (1988). In Baker encyclopedia of the Bible (pp. 296–298). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House.

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Preceding:

Are there certain books essential to come to faith

Life and an assembly of books

Reliability of message appears from honesty writers

The Bible a book of books

Continued with: The Bible’s View of Itself

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Additional reading

  1. God does not change
  2. God wants to be gracious to you
  3. God receives us on the basis of our faith
  4. Doctrine and Conduct Cause and Effect
  5. Mishmash of a legal code but importance of mitzvah or commandments
  6. Cosmos creator and human destiny
  7. Christian values, traditions, real or false stories, pure and upright belief
  8. Cognizance at the doorstep or at the internet socket
  9. I can’t believe that … (4) God’s word would be so violent
  10. The business of this life
  11. Importance of parents 2
  12. Control your destiny or somebody else will

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Further reading

  1. Why study prophecy? And what does apocalypse really mean, anyway?
  2. Church Shopping: Engraved
  3. Spiritual Sucide
  4. Church Shopping: Renovation
  5. A Simple Case for Postmillennium
  6. Warnings to 7 churches are so relevant today
  7. How to Destroy the Faith in Five Easy Steps
  8. The Baptist Confession of Faith
  9. They All Point To Him
  10. Sovereignty
  11. The Authority
  12. Delegating authority: a two-way traffic
  13. Positioned to Reign
  14. Rant: Debating People that have Authority Over You
  15. Aphorism of the Day: Ideas + Force = Force
  16. The Power of Words
  17. Life essentials: bite my tongue
  18. Book Review: “All Authority”
  19. Article: Authority in Spiritual Direction Conversations: Dialogic Perspectives, by David Crawley
  20. Governor of the Jews
  21. Hannah Arendt: The Solution to Conscience
  22. Light Up The World
  23. Lines of Flight: For Another World of Possibilities
  24. You Are a Ruler
  25. The Authority of Jesus
  26. Society…what happened?
  27. We sit ignorant of the authority given
  28. God’s Will > Your Will
  29. Digging Deeper Into Worship: Jude’s Doxology
  30. Kingdom Life and the 21st Century

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Are there certain books essential to come to faith

When we are looking for God and want to find Him are there certain books in which we should belief and follow?

Parinirvana Buddha
Parinirvana Buddha (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Many people create themselves gods. We can see that in how people have idols and sometimes go so far to worship those human beings. There are also people who take elements from nature as their god and they speak or pray to trees, sun, stars or look for a god behind everything that happens in nature, and as such have a god for the rain, wind, thunder, sky, or even for each day of the week.

But when we look how those gods respond or what they can do we see that something is lacking. It is always questionable what those gods can do and what they really provide.

Though there is One God Who is superior to all those gods and can do much more than they. About Him is a lot written down throughout the years. But one particular library is very trustworthy and should be best referred to. When we consult that library of Books of books we can find the Word of that God of gods, Who is most reliable.

White-collar criminal defense lawyer Joel Cohen questions if the Bible’s factuality is essential to faith.

Many people wonder if one can trust what religious people say about the Bible. Is there reason to believe in the factuality of the Bible’s contents, and that the Almighty God Himself was its Author?

Cohen writes:

Indeed, to worship God as religion demands, must one believe that God actually performed the acts attributed to Him; must we accept as authentic His purported interactions – His Creation of the universe and mankind, the plagues that He visited on Egypt, His splitting of the Red Sea and His conversations with mankind, Moses, Abraham and David.  More to the point, must we obdurately accept them in the particular and peculiar ways described in the Bible? {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

A bible from 1859.
A bible from 1859. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It all depends how you want to look at that Book of books. In which way do we have to look at those different writings, and take them as stories or real reviews of what happened at the earlier times? Several people do find that we have to take those Biblical accounts as morality plays or anecdotal narratives, created by human beings without God’s help or involvement.

When you take a closer look at them, you will find strange things, which would shed a light on those writers, they normally would hide for others.

We may choose to believe that God dictated nothing whatsoever to Moses, and merely instructed a spiritually inspired Moses to write of the Creation.

writes Cohen and continues

We may choose to believe that all that God really wants from mankind is for it to live a conventionally moral life based on civility, charity and love of one’s fellow man.  That a moral life is not only the sine qua non to a life of faith, but is also its sole prerequisite.  We may believe that all of the meticulous laws of animal sacrifice (morphed, upon the Temple’s destruction, into communal prayer), the Sabbath’s sanctity and kashrut were fashioned by man himself in order to nationalistically (if you will) create a “culture.”  Perhaps even, a culture that designated this particular Society as having been chosen, while others were not. {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

Today we have different media and we always can pick up what is written or filmed before. At the old times there were no sources people could consult and not all where so literate they could read the stones or scrolls. For that reason passing the word form one generation to the next mostly was done in the aural way and history had to be so compressed or said in such manner people could easily remember it.

Orality, epic singer [Credit: Courtesy of John Miles Foley]the first and still most widespread mode of human communication. Far more than “just talking,” oral tradition refers to a dynamic and highly diverse oral-aural medium for evolving, storing, and transmitting knowledge, art, and ideas. It is typically contrasted with literacy, with which it can and does interact in myriad ways, and also with literature, which it dwarfs in size, diversity, and social function. {Encyclopaedia Britannica}

What is so special about that aural tradition, that not likewise other aural stories, these stories kept the same over centuries.

Nicolas de Largillière, François-Marie Arouet dit Voltaire (vers 1724-1725) -001.jpg
François-Marie Arouet (1694 – 1778), known by his nom de plume Voltaire, a French Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher famous for his wit, his attacks on the established Catholic Church, and his advocacy of freedom of religion, freedom of expression, and separation of church and state. – Portrait by Nicolas de Largillière, c. 1724

Even Voltaire, who wanted to destroy the Bible and distributed pamphlets against that book, had to confess that he could not imagine that when there would be a watch that there would not be a watchmaker. Looking at mankind and the plants and animals around us, and when you get to know how wonderfully they are made it would be very strange to believe there would be not a Master Inventor or Maker behind them, providing this life. When those people grew up and multiplied from one generation to an other, they carried with them the stories of their families. To their next of kin they brought stories from kings (Solomon) herdsman (David), man who could tell about things which happened many years later and as such were visionaries (Isaiah, Zacharia), fisherman (John) doctor (Luke), publican (Matthew), scholar (Paul) etc..
That collection of stories written on 3 continents: Africa, Asia and Europe, under different circumstances: in desserts, humble homes, palaces, prisons, etc., written in three languages, Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek, became the first translated Great Book, and became the most translated and reprinted book in the world, a best-seller of all times.

Voltaire is death. His house and the printing machines became again used, this time to print bibles.

Interesting to note is that those writers also told not such nice things about themselves. Proud being inherited by man you would expect their visions would be contributed to themselves. But more than 3800 times the writers do say that their words do not come form them but from the Higher Power God, the Adonai Elohim Hashem Jehovah.
Every time we read:

Jehovah, god, said to me

or

The word of the Most High, Jehovah God, came to me

Naturally you could assume they were telling lies; But how could they tell about things which had not happened yet and could use names which did not mean anything yet at the time they lived?

Would such liars than be able to produce such special writings which can inspire so many people and can bring forth so much goodness? Bitter sources cannot bring forth sweet waters.

The 40 different writers of the assembly of books, written over a period of more than 1500 years, also never contradict each other. This whilst they wrote about one of the most sensitive subjects on earth: God.

Though many rabbis as well as priests and ministers say it does not matter if the Bible is written under the guidance of God or if their congregants want to read the Bible with skepticism, or see it as somewhat of a work of historical/Biblical fiction.

In the monotheist religions we have seen several groups which started to put more accent on human writings and gave preference to keep to human doctrines instead of holding to the clarity of the simple words written in the books of the Bible. This created many schisms in those religious groups and even made it possible that certain people came to consider themselves still monotheist though they started worshipping what they call a tri-une god, three gods in one.

The man of justice correctly looks at the real question

what do the rabbis themselves believe? Do they say aloud “it doesn’t matter” because they recognize that defending the Bible’s stories to moderns simply won’t (or can’t) be effective, leaving congregants to turn elsewhere or pay less attention to what observant Jews tend to believe?  Or is it because they, themselves don’t believe in their authenticity? {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

In the Catholic Church we can find many examples of people who call themselves “theologian” and do not believe in God. For them being part of an institution which pays for their living is very handy. Also for the other priests we can ask the same question as for the Jewish rabbe or the Muslim imam when they utter either in their sermon or tete a tete that a Holy Scripture account’s authenticity “doesn’t matter,”

do they immediately then mutter to themselves: “But yet it happened”?  And, really, does it and should it matter if an observant rabbi/teacher doesn’t himself believe in exacting fashion that the Bible is God’s literal Word transmitted by God to Moses at Sinai? {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

If you want to get to know the only real God, in a way it does not matter if you believe it or not that the Bible is God’s Word. But it is essential to come to see and understand what happened to mankind and to get to know Who is behind it all.

Do you want to take it as an allegory or metaphor, that is your good right, but then also dare to take the words written in it to take for what they (literally) say. For example when there is written “the son of God“, do not think in your head “god the son” because that is not at all what is written there. Only by accepting the words like they are written down, saying what they are saying and not what some theologians may want you to believe what should be implemented by that saying.

God is a god of order and clarity who does not tell lies. When those writers claim to have written down what God ordered them to write down, we may expect that they did not write down lies but wrote what was meant to be said. Then we also should not fix our eyes on one phrase but look at all the phases being connected with each other and in unison with each other. As such we should always look at the text in contexts with the sayings at other places in that Holy or put or set apart Book of books.

Joel Cohen asks

Can we, ourselves, determine what the Bible truly means to us?  While it may be controversial or provocative to articulate it that way, that’s exactly what’s at stake. And, lest it go unsaid, this decision, dilemma if you will, is not limited to Judaism.  How different is it that the Fathers of the Church, years after Jesus’s time, dictated that Jesus is actually part of the Holy Trinity (part of God Himself) , even though the Christian Bible never said that.  Yet, would a modern Christian remain in good standing, if he doesn’t believe (or, at least state he believes) in a Triune God? {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

Real lovers of God should come to see how certain people prefer to be off this world, instead of being of God, following God His advice and wise Words.

When you shall take the historical books and the Bible, you shall come to see that the idea of a three-headed god does not come from Jesus, nor from somewhere in the bible but from those people who wanted to live in peace with the Roman leaders and came to an agreement with emperor Constantine the Great.

You also than come to understand what it means to be from the world or of the world, to belong to the world and what it is to be living in this world being of God or to belong to God.

Those people whose lives are steeped in faith – split so that approximately 50% said they accepted the Bible’s account; the other 50% did not, will have it more difficult to see the light and come to the truth.

Then, after everyone had opened their eyes, the moment of truth arrived:  I asked those who had only  “confidentially” acknowledged that they didn’t believe the Bible’s account to raise their hands in full view of the now eyes-wide-open congregation.  Only a handful raised their hands.  How does one explain this?  For me at least, the overwhelming majority of those “non-believers” of the Red Sea story who sat on their hands were comfortable in their belief, but only privately.  They apparently didn’t want their community to know; essentially, they didn’t want their neighbors to think “less” of them. {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

Lots of people are afraid to talk openly about what they really believe. Lots are convinced that one’s faith is a very personal thing, and should remain so.

People might believe in only certain things their religion places before them, irrespective of whether the Author is divine. But even if they don’t believe in all of it, they remain believers in God, as well as believers in the importance of faith in their lives. {Is the Bible’s factuality essential to faith?}

says Joel Cohen.

We do believe that in case you are wiling to read and study the Bible as a book to come to enlightenment and to learn about the Most High Divine Creator of all things, it shall offer you enough insight to come to understand that it is really the Word of God, and that there is really only One True God of gods, Who is One, and that we do have a sent one from God who is one mediator between God and man.

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Preceding article: All about love, not needing disasters

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Please find additional reading:

  1. Looking for Answers
  2. Words to inspire and to give wisdom
  3. Wisdom not hard to find nor hiding in remote places
  4. Coming to understanding from sayings written long ago
  5. From the very early beginning of the universe
  6. Possibility to live
  7. People Seeking for God 1 Looking for answers
  8. People Seeking for God 3 Laws and directions
  9. Did the Inspirator exist
  10. Necessary to be known all over the earth
  11. Do you believe in One god
  12. God is one
  13. God of gods
  14. Only one God
  15. A God between many gods
  16. Seeing or not seeing and willingness to find God
  17. The Trinity – the Truth
  18. Christianity without the Trinity
  19. For those who believe Jesus is God
  20. Believing what Jesus says
  21. Jesus Christ Waiting For An Invitation
  22. Bible, sword of the Spirit to come into the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man
  23. The Almighty Lord God of gods King above all gods
  24. God giving signs and producing wonders
  25. Jewish and Christian traditions of elders
  26. An uncovering book to explore
  27. The Need to Understand Genre
  28. Genre – Playing by the Rules
  29. Why think that (4) … God would reveal himself in words
  30. Why think that (5) … the Bible is the word of God
  31. The Word of God in print
  32. A way to look for Christ, the Bible, Word of God
  33. An unbridgeable gap
  34. Inspired Word
  35. Book of books and great masterpiece
  36. Bible, God speaking words profitable for doctrine, for reproof and for correction
  37. Challenging claim
  38. Challenging claim 1 Whose word
  39. Challenging claim 2 Inspired by God 1 Simple words
  40. Challenging claim 3 Inspired by God 2 Inerrant Word of God
  41. Challenging claim 4 Inspired by God 3 Self-consistent Word of God
  42. the Bible – God’s guide for life #1 Introduction
  43. the Bible – God’s guide for life #2 Needs in life
  44. the Bible – God’s guide for life #3 Fast food or staple diet
  45. the Bible – God’s guide for life #4 Not to get the best from our diet– or from ourselves
  46. the Bible – God’s guide for life #5 What is God like
  47. the Bible – God’s guide for life #6 Case example – King Josiah #1
  48. the Bible – God’s guide for life #7 Case example – King Josiah #2 Lessons from Josiah’s experience
  49. the Bible – God’s guide for life #8 Looking to Jesus #1 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus
  50. Authority of the Bible
  51. No other god besides Jehovah who gives all explanation
  52. Creator and Blogger God 8 A Blog of a Book 2 Holy One making Scriptures Holy
  53. Unread bestseller
  54. Written down in God’s Name
  55. Bible, God’s Word to edify (ERV)
  56. Absolute Basics to Reading the Bible
  57. Colour-blindness and road code
  58. Who Gets to Say What the Bible Says?
  59. Vision And Mission By The Word Of God
  60. Theologians and a promised Spirit to enlighten us
  61. Background to look at things
  62. Gone astray, away from God
  63. The very very beginning 2 The Word and words
  64. Necessity of a revelation of creation 3 Getting understanding by Word of God 1
  65. Necessity of a revelation of creation 6 Getting understanding by Word of God 4
  66. Necessity of a revelation of creation 7 Getting understanding by Word of God 5
  67. Necessity of a revelation of creation 8 By no means unintelligible or mysterious to people
  68. Necessity of a revelation of creation 9 Searching the Scriptures
  69. Necessity of a revelation of creation 10 Instructions for insight and wisdom
  70. Necessity of a revelation of creation 11 Believing and obeying the gospel of the Kingdom of God
  71. Necessity of a revelation of creation 12 Words assembled for wisdom and instruction
  72. Necessity of a revelation of creation 13 Getting wisdom
  73. Necessity of a revelation of creation 14 Searching the scriptures
  74. God’s forgotten Word 2 Lost Lawbook 1 Who has still interest
  75. God’s forgotten Word 3 Lost Lawbook 2 Modern scepticism
  76. God’s forgotten Word 4 Lost Lawbook 3 Early digressions and Constantinic revolution
  77. God’s forgotten Word 5 Lost Lawbook 4 The ‘Catholic’ church
  78. Looking on what is going on and not being of it
  79. Trusting, Faith, calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #3 Voice of God #4 Words in Scripture
  80. I can’t believe that … (4) God’s word would be so violent
  81. To find ways of Godly understanding
  82. Engagement in an actual two-way conversation with your deities
  83. Luther on Being a Theologian: Oratio, Meditatio and Tentatio
  84. Are Science and the Bible Compatible?
  85. Bible containing scientific information

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Relating to God is it possible

Relating to God Weebly site Relation page
Relating to God Weebly site Relation page

Some people do find it ridiculous to hear others saying to “relate to God”. There are those who say there does not exist a god and others who say God is so Divine it is impossible for man to have a relationship with Him. Others say it is only the son of God who is related to God because he is the incarnation of God himself, God having coming to earth. For them God became personified. Some two thousand years ago, according to them, there took place an act of embodying in flesh. Those believers who call themselves also Christians are convinced that Christ Jesus is an incarnate yatsar or form of God. For them he is the manifestation of God and the visible embodiment of the Most High. They think it was God who took an the form of a slave.
At this site we shall show that God may be manifested in Christ Jesus but that the Bible teaches that Jesus is the son of God and that nowhere in the Holy Scriptures is written he would be the “god the son” (a big difference).

Somewhere in the world there are others who believe what the Bible says, that God is the sent one from God, the one who came to “let it be known” that the God of gods is the Divine Creator Who wants His creatures to have a good relationship with Him and His creatures.

The Nazarene rabbi Jeshua (Jesus Christ) declared his intentions and got followers who listened to his words, followed his teachings and unleashed a worldwide movement. That what was stirred up in the first century of this common era (CE) still continues these days with new followers of Christ (Christians) who also want to keep to Jesus his teachings and to the same books Jesus followed and preached from (the Hebrew and Aramaic writings or 39 Judaic Books = the Old Testament). Additionally those followers to day use also the books written by Jeshua’s disciples and the called apostle Paul, 27 writings compiled in the Messianic Writings or New Testament).

Those followers of Jeshua from all over the world join forces to have people come to know the Way to God, who is this sent one from God, rabbi Jeshua, son of man and son of God. They do agree that the Divine Creator has distinguishing features and that not all human beings do have the required qualities to have mutual relations. What’s more, most people are living on strained relations with each other and with the Creator.

Being created in the image of God every human from whatever race is in the likeness of God. Being of the old world descendants of the 1° Adam or of descendants of the 2° Adam, who are in the likeness of Christ Jesus, the first born of the New World, like Jesus was in the image of God.

Genesis 1:1 (RNKJV)
Genesis 1
1 In the beginning Elohim created the heaven and the earth.

Genesis 1:26-27 (RNKJV)
26 And Elohim said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. 27 So Elohim created man in his own image, in the image of Elohim created he him; male and female created he them.

Psalms 100:3  (RNKJV)
Know ye that יהוה he is Elohim: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

Isaiah 64:8  (RNKJV)
But now, O יהוה, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.

Colossians 1:15 (RNKJV)
15 Who is the image of the invisible Elohim, the firstborn of every creature:

When a Maker would make something in His image, do you not think He would like to relate to it.?

First of all it is something He created. He made it Himself. He also liked what He made. After He created something every time we are told He looked at it and saw that it was good.

Genesis 1:31 (RNKJV)
31 And Elohim saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

Also later when Jesus was born and had done everything according God’s Will, God was pleased with that creation.

Colossians 1:19-20 (RNKJV)
19 For it pleased the Father that in him should all fulness dwell; 20 And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.

We are also told that the heavens were sanctified with what the Elohim Hashem Jehovah had done.

Psalms 19:1  (RNKJV)
The heavens declare the glory of El; and the firmameint sheweth his handywork.

Psalms 104:24  (RNKJV)
O יהוה, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches.

Psalms 104:31  (RNKJV)
The glory of יהוה shall endure for ever: יהוה shall rejoice in his works.

Ephesians 3:21  (RNKJV)
Unto him be glory in the assembly by the Messiah Yahushua throughout all ages, world without end. amein.

When God’s glory has to stay for ever it means also when He has to heave pleasure in His works, and others should glorify His works, than it means that there must be a relationship with that what He created.

Throughout history we also can see how God kept contact with those who came after Adam and Eve. Although they had doubted God’s right to have dominion over man, God was forgiving and loving His creatures, wanting them to give an other chance. Those who were willing to come to Him He was willing to receive.

From the many Bible stories we can clearly see that the Elohim Hashem Jehovah, the Divine Creator really wants to make an alley with His creatures.

At this and our sibling website we want to show the world that God wants to connect with the living creatures. We also want to show how we can be involved in God’s demand for an ally.

By going through the coming articles you might come to see how you can have a bearing on the creation and can empathize with the Divine Creator and other living creatures.

 

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Additional reading:

  1. No other god besides Jehovah who gives all explanation
  2. Necessary to be known all over the earth
  3. Something from nothing
  4. Means of creations
  5. The very very beginning 1 Creating Gods
  6. The very very beginning 2 The Word and words
  7. Genesis – Story of creation 2 Genesis 1:26-31 Creation of man
  8. Coming to the creation of human beings in the image of God
  9. Creator and Blogger God 2 Image and likeness
  10. Creator and Blogger God 3 Lesson and solution
  11. Creator and Blogger God 5 Things to tell
  12. Necessity of a revelation of creation 2 Organisation of a system of things
  13. Necessity of a revelation of creation 7 Getting understanding by Word of God 5
  14. Creation of the earth and man #2 Evil Angels and moments of creation
  15. Creation of the earth and man #17 Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #1 In the image and after the likeness
  16. Creation of the earth and man #18 Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #2 Assimilation of character
  17. Creation of the earth and man #19 Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #3 Beholding image and likeness of the invisible God
  18. Man in the image and likeness of the Elohim #8 The Formation of woman #1
  19. Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 1
  20. Forbidden Fruit in the Midst of the Garden 4
  21. Philippians 1 – 2
  22. Yatsar
  23. What is life?
  24. Entrance of a king to question our position #2 Who do we want to see and to be
  25. Looking at three “I am” s
  26. Getting out of the dark corners of this world
  27. Self-development, self-control, meditation, beliefs and spirituality
  28. Faith antithesis of rationality
  29. Trusting, Faith, calling and Ascribing to Jehovah #3 Voice of God #1 Creator and His Prophets
  30. Not trying to make the heathen live like Jews #1
  31. Not bounded by labels but liberated in Christ

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