Enter the Tower that Truly Reaches Heaven“The whole earth was of one language and of one speech. As they traveled east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar, and they lived there. They said to one another, “Come, let’s make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.” They had brick for stone, and they used tar for mortar. They said, “Come, let’s build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top reaches to the sky, and let’s make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad on the surface of the whole earth.”” (Genesis 11:1-4 WEB) There was a time that the whole earth under the sky spoke one language. The Bible teaches that the sky is a solid structure shaped like a dome: “God said, “Let there be an expanse in the middle of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.” God made the expanse, and divided the waters which were under the expanse from the waters which were above the expanse; and it was so. God called the expanse “sky”. There was evening and there was morning, a second day.” (Genesis 1:6-8 WEB) The word “expanse” in the passage above is “rakia” in Hebrew which means a solid structure that stretches out like a dome. Mankind wanted to built a tower that reached the dome of the sky (to try entering Heaven), to make a name for themselves—based on their own strength and ability, apart from God. The pre-incarnate Jesus came down from Heaven to see the tower that man was building, and He made an interesting statement: “Yahweh came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men built. Yahweh said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is what they begin to do. Now nothing will be withheld from them, which they intend to do. Come, let’s go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.” So Yahweh scattered them abroad from there on the surface of all the earth. They stopped building the city. Therefore its name was called Babel, because there Yahweh confused the language of all the earth. From there, Yahweh scattered them abroad on the surface of all the earth.” (Genesis 11:5-9 WEB) God said that the people were united, and that in their oneness, nothing would be withheld from them—there is greatness in unity. God is not against man ascending to Heaven, but He doesn’t want them to try and do it by their own strength. God had a plan to restore mankind and bring them to Heaven through faith and not by works—it would be by God’s goodness and not by man’s strength. That plan is the cross, and we know that no one is saved by their works. “yet knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, even we believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law, because no flesh will be justified by the works of the law.” (Galatians 2:16 WEB) The word Babel comes from the Hebrew word “balal” which means “to confuse”. God confused mankind’s language and from then on, they lost the power they had in their unity.
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Why It Was Wrong to Change the Lord's Prayer - Refiner's Fire Explained““But who can endure the day of his coming? And who will stand when he appears? For he is like a refiner’s fire, and like launderer’s soap; and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer to Yahweh offerings in righteousness.” (Malachi 3:2-3 WEB) I was just meditating on the passage above, about how Jesus is a Refiner and how He purifies is to become useful to God. To understand the illustration that Yahweh (the pre-incarnate Jesus) uses, we must first understand how gold and silver are refined. Here is how it works, based on a good article by Precious Metal Technologies (PMT): "Gold is processed into it’s purest form through smelting and refining. High heat, pressure and chemicals are used to remove impurities from the gold. A gold refinery receives the raw material such as rock, gold nuggets, scrap gold and re-liquefies the metal in a hot furnace, then adds various chemicals to the molten substance to separate the gold from the other metals. A sample of the gold is used in an assay to measure the purity of the gold content, usually found to be 99.9% pure. The gold can now be used in many applications, including in electronics and jewellery making." When you first believed in Jesus, you were like a gold nugget trapped encased in rock. Your spirit was reborn and perfectly holy, righteous and perfect, but your mind and body were still carnal—wanting to obey the desires of the sinful flesh. The high heat and pressure in Jesus’ illustration represents the trials, persecutions and sufferings that we experience in life—they are sent by the devil, not by God. Sometimes, God protects us from them, such that we don’t even know they were planned against us in the first place. However at other times, when God allows us to go through them, He is with us through His Spirit, leading the way. “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” (Matthew 4:1 WEB) The Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to experience this high heat and pressure from the devil’s temptations as well as the inhospitable heat and dryness of the environment In this case, Jesus didn’t need to be purified because He was already sinless and perfect in all His ways. He was allowed to be tested by the devil to show us that He is really pure gold. I just read an article recently about how Pope Francis just officially approved the change of a verse in the Lord’s Prayer. He changed “lead us not into temptation” to “do not let us fall into temptation”—this change only affects the Catholic religion. “Bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the Kingdom, the power, and the glory forever. Amen.’” (Matthew 6:13 WEB) This is a big mistake—an example of man trying to make sense of God’s word according to his own understanding. “Trust in Yahweh with all your heart, and don’t lean on your own understanding.” (Proverbs 3:5 WEB)
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AuthorHi I’m Milton Goh, I'm 30 years old and i'm a blogger who writes about Christianity, Parenting, Life Lessons that I learn from Movies/Shows, and Lifestyle. |