How to Study the Bible III - Figures of Speech II
Vern Peterman · Apr 24, 2016
How to Study Bible (2016), No. 16
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/492653257451

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Continuing on with figures of speech, it's interesting. Back when Heidi and Helmut Naumann were here, some of you may recall when they were here. They were both from Germany. And so we talked about, in English, if somebody is joking with you, you might say, you're pulling my leg, right?

Which kind of doesn't make a whole lot of sense. In Spanish, in the Spanish-speaking cultures, the expression is, you're pulling my hair. And in German, the expression is, you're carrying me on your arm. Isn't that interesting? In other words, it doesn't make any sense. But they all mean, you're joking with me.

If we were coming up with different figures of speech from different cultures, we will say to somebody who is maybe a passenger and they're going to get out and go somewhere different, the driver might say something like, I'll drop you off at the corner. That would be a reasonable thing to say. And then maybe you're going to go shopping or whatever. Apparently in German, I'll drop you off at the corner means I'm going to shoot you and push you out the door. So he wouldn't dare say to a German person, I'll drop you off at the corner, apparently. This is the nature of figures of speech, they can be really cultural, and then sometimes they're more universal, like or as, the simile idea is more universal.

We have emphasis by repetition. Now, one of the things to look at as we're studying the Bible is in our writing, how do we emphasize things in our modern writing in print? Bold. We use bolded. OK. And what other ways do we emphasize? Exclamation marks. Exclamation marks would be another way. All right. Anything else? Underlining. Underlining. Right. So we have bold and underlining, is there anything else? You might use italics, bold italics, right? So you use different kinds of things in the writing to emphasize things. A bigger font, sometimes I'll see like all caps, especially in our electronic era, all caps is a way of shouting, right?

So we have different ways in our modern era to emphasize things, and the truth is, they didn't use any of those. They emphasize by different means than we do altogether. And so that's where learning about culture, and as you're reading things, what ways are they emphasizing that we're not even seeing because we don't see it culturally? Because we come from a different culture where when I say how do we emphasize things, you're all able to come up pretty quickly with how do we do it. They didn't do any of those, right? They didn't do any of those, they emphasized by different means.

And so that's one of the reasons we're going to take a look at that here and we'll continue to take a look at that actually as we go on here. So, emphasis by repetition is one of the ways they emphasize. So personal place names, as well as titles, and also actions, conditions, and adverbs are emphasized in the Hebrew culture by expressing them twice in a row.

So we got out of both the Old and the New Testament. Jesus quotes Psalm 22-1 on the cross in the afternoon. Eloi Eloi, which some people misunderstood and thought he was calling for Elijah. But it's my God, my God in Aramaic. Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sadaq Kani. And so it's emphasis by repetition there. Now just in the Old Testament, you have Genesis 22, 11, where Abraham, Abraham. And then the same thing with Jacob in Genesis 46, 2, Jacob, Jacob. And then Exodus 3, 4, Moses, Moses. And then Samuel, Samuel, Samuel. So this is a Hebrew pattern.

You say it twice, and that emphasizes it. By the way, how do you speak with italics? And that's one thing, is oftentimes both the written form and the spoken form maintain the emphasis with the Hebrew patterns of writing. Whereas our ways of emphasizing, where we underline, italicize, bold, don't have an exact equal when we speak.

So when David received the news that his son Absalom had been killed, he expressed his intense grief with a similar but more complex doubling pattern. This is one we brought up last year when we went to Israel, because we went to the exact fortress where David said this.

He was informed about his son Absalom. Second Samuel 1833, the king was deeply moved and went up to the chamber over the gate and wept. And thus he said as he walked, my son Absalom, my son, my son, Absalom. Would I have died instead of you, Absalom, my son, my son?

Lots of repetition as a way of emphasizing. So that was a part of the culture. In this case, it's a little more complex than just saying Absalom twice, but you get the idea. So repetition emphasizes it. In the New Testament, they carried on the same pattern. And you notice the pattern was carried on among those who were of Jewish background. So it's a particularly Jewish manner of speaking.

And so you see Lord, Lord, We saw that twice in Luke, in our study in the past, and we went through Matthew a few years back here. We saw the same thing. Lord, Lord. Martha, Martha, Jesus says to Martha. And then Simon, Simon. We'll see that in Luke 22. Saul, Saul. and in the book of Acts there. So, and then Jerusalem, Jerusalem, and actually we saw it when we went through chapter 13 of Luke, and we're going to see it again, because that's not the only instance.

And then, and then in action, condition, or adverb, comfort, comfort my people, says your God, Isaiah 40 verse 1. Now here's one where it gets translated, and we've even sung it this way, the Hebrew is literally peace, peace, but we translate it perfect peace. Right? But it's literally peace, peace, and if we understood the Hebrew idiom, the Hebrew cultural expression, translating it peace, peace would make more sense to us.

Then it sounds like it's covered. So then, truly, truly. And it's interesting, in the Gospel of John, John writes where the other Gospel authors say truly, John repeatedly writes truly, truly. And so, why would that be used? John is using a Hebrew form of expression, as he's writing in Greek. He's using a Hebrew form of expression, which says, this is most certainly true. This is most certainly true.

So next, sarcasm. This is what really started Nancy and I off on the wrong foot. In her household, sarcasm was the humor of the day. In my household, that would get your mouth washed out with soap. But it is used in the Bible, both in the Old and New Testaments, as we'll see here.

And I won't read it all, but just point out in Judges 10, 10-14, It starts off, Then the sons of Israel cried out to the Lord, saying, We have sinned against you, for indeed we have forsaken our God and have served the Baals. And then he goes on there, and then in verse 14, Go and cry out to the gods which you have chosen. Let them deliver you in the time of your distress. You want to rely on those gods? Now you're in distress. See what good it does. Let them deliver you. Ah, but it's not working. Yeah, that's the point, right? So, sarcasm. Here's 1 Kings 18. 1 Kings 18 is what scenario?

Here's Elijah, and then there's 450 prophets of Baal, right? the altar? Yeah, you've got this altar to Baal and let Baal come and light this thing on fire and then now we've got this other one to the real God and let God light it on fire and so what the 450 prophets of Baal, what are they doing? They're screaming and hollering and cutting themselves and doing all sorts of things to try to get Baal to listen, right? And so what does Elijah do?

He taunts. In the midst of that, so in verse 27, 1 Kings 18, 27, it came about at noon that Elijah mocked them and said, call out with a loud voice, for he is a god, either he is occupied or gone aside, or is on a journey, or perhaps he is asleep and needs to be awakened. One of the characteristics of the pagan gods is they were often much more like people, much more human and having limited capacity. They're off on a trip or they're preoccupied with something.

Whereas the character of God, is God ever distracted? No, he is never distracted. And one of the points that we've been making is that you have God's undivided attention. God is an infinite God, and he's never at some point where he says, look, I'm busy, I've got two seconds for you. That never happens. You have God's undivided attention.

These pagan gods were not so. These pagan gods had much more human capacities, and they could be distracted, busy, putting their attention somewhere else, preoccupied, who knows what. And so he's mocking the limited character of these pagan gods, and specifically Baal here. And so he's using essentially sarcasm, right?

So we have another instance here, when the soldiers were about to crucify Jesus. So they used both verbal as well as symbolic sarcasm. So in verse 28, they stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him and after twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head and a reed in his right hand, and they knelt down before him and mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews. It was all sarcasm, both in what they said and in what they did.

By the way, once a person had been sentenced with crucifixion, there was no limit to the amount of mocking, torture. There was no legal limit at that point. They could torture a person to death, even before they got him crucified, if they wanted. So there was no legal limit once they've gotten a sentence of crucifixion.

And so that's just what they're doing. So in this case, because he has this King of the Jews you know, title in a mocking sort of way. And the Jews, by the way, really didn't like this. So they're playing out this thing as they begin to beat him and mistreat him. And the Apostle Paul used sarcasm with the believers at Corinth. So here we have that again.

1 Corinthians 4.8. You are already filled, and you have already become rich. You have become kings without us, and indeed I wish that you had become kings, so that we might also reign with you. So is he speaking literally? No, he's speaking sarcastically. So sarcasm is another form, again the examples are, it's used in both the Old and New Testaments.

And so you see that. Let's ask this question, is it a culturally unique pattern? Is it just for the Hebrews? Is it just... No, it is not. So sarcasm, you'll see it used, here we've got the Baals, the prophets of Baal. And you've got Elijah. And then you have here with the Roman soldiers, a lot of Roman and Greek influence. So you see it there. And you see the Apostle Paul, a Jew, writing to the believers in Korah and use sarcasm there.

So it's not culturally specific, whereas the repetition pattern that we looked at on the first page tended to be culturally specific. You find it used among Jews exclusively. So the next one, euphemism. Euphemism accepts one expression which is understood to mean another. Let's take it for instance.

In English, how many different words can you think of that people use for money? Moolah. Moolah, right? And everybody knows what moolah is, right? And can you think of something else? Greenbacks. Greenbacks, okay, all right. Bread, dough. Bread, dough, yeah. Lettuce. What's that? Lettuce. Lettuce is another one, yeah. Isn't that something?

So we have a lot of euphemism for money. Is that the only thing we have euphemism for? No, we've got other, you know, different things that we express with euphemism. And so anyway, we find that it tends to be one that is universal, not specific to culture. However, a culture may have a particular form of euphemism that is entrenched in that culture. And we'll take a look at that shortly. So here are examples.

Genesis 4.1, now the man, Adam, had relations with, literally knew his wife Eve. So to know, in the Hebrew manner of expression, is a euphemism for physical intimacy. And she conceived and gave birth to Cain, and she said, I have gotten a man-child with the help of the Lord.

So in Genesis 4.25, Adam had relations with, literally knew, his wife again, and she gave birth to a son and named him Seth, for she said, God has appointed me another offspring in place of Abel, for Cain killed him.

And then Genesis 31.33-35, So Laban went into Jacob's tent, and into Leah's tent, and into the tent of the two maids, and he did not find them. for he went out of Leah's tent and entered Rachel's tent. Now Rachel had taken the household idols and put them in the camel's saddle. And she sat on them and Laban felt through all the tent but did not find them. She said to her father, let not my Lord be angry that I cannot rise before you for the manner of women is upon me.

And what's that euphemism? Basically she's claiming that she's menstruating here. And he searched but did not find the household items. So here's another expression. So what we see is that the Jews would have, for personal and sexual things, they would tend to have a lot of euphemism in their expressions.

Alright, so here in the Gospel of Matthew, the Kingdom of God, by the way, the expression the Kingdom of God, which you find commonly in the New Testament, how many times does that occur in the Old Testament? None. Zip. Isn't that interesting? How is it that people, when Jesus would talk and he would say the Kingdom of God, how is it that everybody knew what he was talking about? I imagine it had become a euphemism for understanding of Old Testament. It's true in the Old Testament, and then they came up with a handle, a euphemism, and when people said, Kingdom of God, oh, we know what that means, and it's connected with all the Old Testament passages that talked about it, but it became a standard expression. Everybody knew what you meant if you said Kingdom of God, but it's not because it was used in the Old Testament.

We have one here at Holly Hills that we have to be careful with. Those of us who have been taught here use positional truths, which stand for this huge body of teaching and doctrines, but so that we don't have to list all of those out, it's sort of our handle for that. That's euphemism. You would think that Jesus would not be concerned about using God's name in vain.

By saying the Kingdom of Heaven, you would think that he would always refer to it as the Kingdom of God, right? And that's one of the things we point out here, is he would say the Kingdom of God. In Matthew, it's particularly brought across as Kingdom of Heaven, and sometimes just the Kingdom.

That's all you have to say and everything is understood Yes, and that's the thing within a culture and we have a church culture here right within a culture a Handle gets understood. Oh this set of words means all these other things Right and to someone who's not acculturated With that it's like wow what are you talking about?

Nancy and I Often, we'll find ourselves doing counseling with people who are out of state, even out of the country. And we've done both of that, both of those kinds of things, just this last week. Counseling with people who are, you know, not from Holly Hills, but some other state. And in fact, in one case we're doing right now, it's a Canadian and an American. and counseling them out of state.

So we get connected up with things like that. That's where we find, you know, you make reference to the, we have a handle, we're talking about, you know, positional truth or something of that sort. This couple that we're talking with had no idea what that was. So we're actually spending several counseling sessions going over and catching up with that. because it's relevant to the counseling we're doing, that they understand those things.

In other words, Jesus may have said kingdom of God, but Matthew may have put it down as kingdom of heaven. That could be because it would be an equivalent expression and it would be less likely for the Jews to get concerned or stunned by that expression. Mark would put it. And we actually have carried that kind of reluctance to say the name of God over into our culture, although I'd say it's getting lost.

But we give several examples. Instead of oh my God, we say oh my heavens. For God's sake, we say for heaven's sake. And instead of God forbid, we say heaven forbid. And instead of God knows, we say heaven knows. So we actually carry that prohibition over to some degree in our own culture, where we'll use heaven in place of God. Now, several quotations will show that the kingdom of heaven is a euphemism for the kingdom of God, that they were understood as the same.

So Matthew 5.3, blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

Luke 6.20, as we saw before, blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Further on, on page 4, so Matthew 10, 5, and 7, these twelve Jesus sent out after instructing them, and as you go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand. But in Luke 9, 1, and 2, he called the twelve together, and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God. In Matthew 19, 14, but Jesus said, Let the children alone, and do not hinder them, from coming to me, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.

In Mark 10.14, however, when Jesus saw this, he was indignant and said to them, Permit the children to come to me. Do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Why would Matthew be the only gospel that uses the term kingdom of heaven?

His audience were the Jews. Pardon? His audience were the Jews. Yes, he was writing to the Jews and so he uses kingdom of heaven frequently and very infrequently uses kingdom of God. And he himself was heavily conditioned Jewish. Right. And if you hear some things from the time like before you even have language, you just can't do it. Like I wonder if he himself Struggled with it. Struggled with it. So conditioned that you do not say Kingdom of God, you do say Kingdom of Heaven, that he just wouldn't flow.

Yeah. Yeah. So, now here's another one, and the Apostle Paul uses it, and it begins with 1 Corinthians 15, and it's verse 6, 20, and then 50 through 52. So, after he appeared to more than 500 brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep, and I actually should have bolded that, some have fallen asleep, so this is, what do you mean by fallen asleep? Died. Right, it doesn't mean they've been sleeping for several years, it means they've been dead for several years, right? Okay. But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep, so this expression, this euphemism again, Now I say this, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.

Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed. We use that in the nursery. They will not all sleep, but they will be changed. So in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. Now, how do we know that a sleep is a euphemism for being dead? Well, in 20th it says, but now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep. And we saw there in verse 52, the dead will be raised imperishable, right? And we will be changed. So he's not afraid to say dead. There isn't a prohibition against it.

But why would he use the euphemism asleep? To show that it's temporary? To show it's temporary, yeah. To me, that's kind of confusing, because when you think of, you know, when you die you're present with the Lord, so it's not necessarily soul sleep. Yeah, it's not really soul sleep. He's not talking about that. Yeah, it's, you know, if you die you're present with the Lord, so are you really asleep?

Well, let's put it this way. He would use asleep because dead sounds so final, right? And so he's using asleep as a figure of speech, because is sleep final? No. Hopefully not, anyway. So ordinarily, we don't think of being asleep as final. But this one here, where he uses it, he uses this several times, this euphemism.

But in the end, he said the dead will be raised. In answering Stan's question, The understanding, I've kind of thought this through as I look at all the different passages about resurrection and people dying in their sleep and all these things, the understanding that makes sense of all the New Testament passages about death and resurrection and going to be with the Lord is that those who have died in the past are brought forward in time to the time of the rapture. Let's take for instance someone like Paul who has been dead, asleep, from our perspective for a long time. He closes his eyes in death and the next thing he knows he's being raptured and he's meeting the Lord in the air. So brought forward in time. Now that also makes good sense We who are alive and remain won't precede those who have fallen asleep, 1 Thessalonians 4, which is our next passage.

It makes sense with that one because those who are dead in Christ will rise first, that is, they will be brought forward in time to that moment of the rapture, and then those who are alive and remain will be brought into that point as well. So in other words, you're saying, scientifically, But when a person dies, they actually leave the time-space-matter continuum, and they go into the eternal continuum. So, in a sense, right? You're changing dimensions when you die. Yeah, and think about this. Is God limited to doing things within our time tunnel? No. No, he's not at all. Think of this one.

I've been identified with Christ in His what? His death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and seeding. I've been identified with Christ in those five things. Does God do it to every person on the planet? Does He identify every person? No. He only identifies those who will come to believe. But that crucifixion and resurrection and all happened how long ago? almost 20 centuries ago, right?

So it happened a long time ago. How did he know that I'm going to be one who believes? He's looking, as we mentioned earlier, he's looking at all time as now. So it's no challenge to him. So he's looking at all time as now. So he, from our time tunnel perspective, knows ahead of time that we're going to believe, and then takes us spiritually back to the time of the cross, and the burial, and the resurrection, and the ascension, and the seeding. So spiritually speaking, we've been taken there, and then he then takes the effect of that, and makes it true, back into the present that we're living now. So I have been crucified with Christ, and it's effective right now.

So God knew ahead of time who was going to believe, But it gets even wilder than that. Ephesians 1, 3, and 4. The Father chose us in Him, when? Before the foundation of the world. So God had me in mind before He said, let there be light. And He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world. So in Him isn't just now. isn't just at the time when Christ was in ministry on the earth. In Him was before, let there be light. So is God limited by time?

Not at all. And so taking believers forward to that moment of the rapture means we in our time tunnel language will say, oh this person is with the Lord, this person is with the Lord. We'll say that in the present, but the reality is That person, all they experience is they close their eyes in death, and the next thing they see is they're meeting the Lord in the air. So in other words, I never really had expanded my thoughts at this point, but that's why it says the dead first in Thessalonians. Yes, in 1 Thessalonians 4. All believers who have died in Christ are brought forward in time.

We'll be brought to that point in time and we'll be raptured. So what you're saying then, when Paul opens his eyes, he's part of that rapture we were talking about a long, long time ago. Amazing. I think what is difficult for us to understand is that time is constructed for us to constrain us, to create that need.

It's not for God. Because He created other things and then He put the seasons in place. So it's a construct for us so that we will know God. It is not a construct for God so that he can manage anything. And that's a part of the problem with open theism. Open theism doesn't understand that correctly and instead has God being subject to the time that he created.

Right? Subject to the time where God doesn't know the future. But it's just a creative thing. And it doesn't work, especially if you think through identification. He chose us in Him, I believed, He knew who would believe, He identified with... God's not limited to time and He's not stuck in the time tunnel like we are. It doesn't make any sense.

Okay, so let's take a look at 1 Thessalonians 4, 13-18 with that in mind. So, we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep. By the way, this letter was written when the oldest Christians in the Church of Thessalonica were only a few weeks old. They were all baby Christians. So, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve, is do the rest who have no hope.

For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. By the way, what do you need to believe? Because notice that, if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, it's conditioned here. Jesus Christ died for your sins. Jesus Christ died for your sins and was buried and rose again.

Will not precede those who have fallen asleep for the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout. By the way, that's one single shout and it's a shout of command. It was a shout with the voice of the Archangel. We don't know which one. and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first, brought forward in time.

Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words." And where will we always be with the Lord? Where will we always be with the Lord?

Well, initially it's going to be his throne room, and then afterwards it will be raining. In other words, the throne room is the first place where we're going, right? And then here on earth, when he's here. When he's raining, we will rain with him here, right? And then there will be the new heavens and the new earth. Okay, so then we have 1 Thessalonians 5, 9-11.

For God has not destined us for wrath, This comes out in the Tribulation. But for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we will live together with Him. So awake is what? Those who are alive when the Rapture takes place, or asleep, those who have died when the Rapture takes place. We will live together with Him. And he focuses again on who died for us, right? This is a key part of the gospel. He ties that into the rapture. So it's not rapturing everybody, it's those who believe, right?

So then we have another one that shows up on page 5. Antithesis. The apostle Paul, by the way, likes to use this. And at the end of Romans chapter 5, verses 12 through 21, It's one place where antithesis and what I say is comparison and contrast. Comparison and contrast is a kind of a thought skill that has been underdeveloped in terms of people knowing how to compare and contrast. But it's one that the Apostle Paul uses, the author of Hebrews uses it. We're going to be looking at examples of comparison and contrast.

The lack of the ability to do this has been the basis for a great deal of theological diversity and conflict. The inability to compare and contrast. So for example, people read the Sermon on the Mount, and they'll try to apply it directly all to us, even though right in the middle of it, they'll have things like if you have your sacrifice on the altar and things that are very Jewish. The inability to compare and contrast has been at the root of a great deal of church conflicts, Christians arguing with each other. And it's what's the same and what's different. What's the same and what's different? It is a greatly underdeveloped skill, but it's necessary.

The Apostle Paul uses it. In Romans 5, 12-21, he talks about two men. And who are the two men? We have Adam and Christ. And then we have two acts. One trespass in the garden, and this he mentions five times. Five times. One righteous act on the crops, verse 18. One trespass in the garden, one righteous act on the crops. And then two outcomes. Condemnation, guilt, and death. He mentions that four times. And then justification, life, and reign, verses 17, 18, and 19.

So you have there, now let's look at this With the first one, two men, what's the same? Between Adam and Christ, what's the same? They're leaders. They're heads of... They're both heads. And what else is the same? Both human. They're both fully human. Morphology-wise. In terms of who they are, they're both fully human.

Why weren't the... Sacrifices, whether they're in the form of a ram, or a goat, or a bull, or a bird. Why weren't the sacrifices in the Old Testament sufficient? Because they weren't human. That's right. They weren't human. All they could do was point to God's sacrifice through Christ. But they could not get the job done. Yeah, they could cover some but they couldn't take it away.

Right. And so one of the things, when he says two men, that's significant because you didn't have the second man around until Christ was on the earth, right? You didn't have the second man. And then what we see is then the contrast is two acts and what's in common is we have two acts, right? But what is different is one is a trespass and one is a righteous act. a restorative act on the cross. Yeah? I had never thought about this before, but it's interesting. One act created all sin. One act created all justification for that sin. Yes. Isn't that something? Yeah, just one. Just one. And that's one, you know, it brings up...

Adam is a federal head, if you will, and Christ is a federal head of those that follow, right? And so two outcomes. And so what we have is what's in common is outcome, right? What is different is one is condemnation, guilt, and death. And what's contrasting to that is justification, life, and reign. So comparison and contrast is huge.

So what you'll have is people in the extreme, for example, in dispensationalism, who will say, oh, that was about the Jews, and it's all irrelevant. People in the extreme, oh I don't worry about that, that's Old Testament stuff. It's not for me. They just cast it aside. And then you'll have folks who come from a more of a reformed background where they don't see the difference. Oh, Israel just transitions into the church. What?

So in the extreme, not being able to look at this comparison and contrast has caused huge problems. Huge problems. Okay, so now let's look at this one. Two contrasting states. We have condemned people, slaves of the sin nature by Adam, and then in contrast to that, justified people reigning in life by Christ. Two differences. Differences in degree.

Sin abounds and grace super abounds. And then in operation. One sin by Adam resulting in condemnation and the reign of death for everyone. And then, in contrast to that, many sins on Christ resulting in justification and reigning in life for all who believe.

Then two effects of the law, and by the way, the effects of the law, how come you don't see them on this side? It's your debt to the law. Because we've died to the law, it doesn't apply to us here. All those who have been identified with Christ in His death have died to the law. Therefore, there's no two effects of the law on the right side, right? Because you're done with it.

So, we have sin is imputed, charged to the account, and next, sin increased, verse 20. So, if you really want to keep things under control, you apply the Law of Moses, right? You go and you post it all over the place and that keeps things more under control?

No, that increases. Yeah, isn't that something? Yeah. It actually stirs it up. It's gasoline on the fire, right? It stirs it up. You know, it's like this cartoon and I have this pair of people at the one side of the street and there's a sign there. No machete juggling. This guy says, suddenly I have this desire to juggle machetes. That's the characteristic of the law.

Two abundances. Notice again, we've got lopsided here. There's nothing under Adam for abundances, but there is only under Christ two abundances. One of grace, the other the gift of righteousness. And then two reigning principles. When we say a principle, what do we mean? Here's another thing where we've got to handle, but we need to make sure we understand it. A principle is either the way things work, or a fundamental truth, or both. The way things work, fundamental truth, or both.

So when we say principles, so sin, imputed and increased by law, reigning through death, that is that fundamental truth. It is also the way things work under the Adam category. Now we have grace reigning through righteousness to eternal life under the column with Christ. That is the reigning principle, the way things work in the fundamental truth, grace reigning through righteousness to eternal life.

So here's this comparison and contrast principle. We're going to be looking at that quite a bit more The Apostle Paul used it here. There's another one in Hebrews chapter 3, 1-6. We'll also be taking a look at it. Yes? I think it is valuable that this is a comparison and contrast, but it does not assume equality. Assume what? Equality.

So between Adam and Christ they are not equal principles or equal you know, reigns, because where Adam, he just brought about an influence and slavery that grows, when Christ, in his work, in his person, he doesn't have an influential power, he owns it. So like, he owns the entirety and has all power. So it's not, you know, Adam had limited power, and so nature has limited power. But when the Christ is, it's total and all.

Yes, and I think that's one of the things for us to observe is there are places in scripture where we've got opposite but not equal. Is Satan opposed to God? Yes. Is Satan equal to God? No. So opposite and equal is something that comes into our head easily, but there's a number of places when we do the compare and contrast. where we say, OK, what's the same? Well, you've got a spiritual entity. Are they equal? No, they're not. And so we see Satan as a created being. God is not. God is infinite. Satan is not. So we see the contrast. So this comparison and contrast is a very important skill. And the failure to develop that in our thinking, in our writing, in our speaking, the failure to develop that can actually be the source of unnecessary conflict.

Could you say this column under Adam, would it be appropriate to put something like stewardship of condition where Christ is the stewardship of position? I'm trying to think that through, make sure I've got that. Are you saying Adam is a stewardship of condition? Well, that seems to be all condition. Our condition or Adam's condition and everything. And this column is talking about the conditionness in nature and how it's interacting, whereas with Christ it's more, well it's totally positional and has nothing to do with the condition aspect. OK, the reason we have condition is simply because we have a dichotomy between our position and where we can be in our condition, right?

The reality is, though, that those who are in the left column are in atom, right? So there's a position issue. The word stewardship actually means a task or job or responsibility. It's an assignment. And Adam can't really give himself, per se, stewardships, but God owns it. And God did give him a stewardship.

He did. How did he do with it? Not so good. How did he do it? Not so good. So now, then we say, okay, Adam had a stewardship and he did not so good with it. Christ, did he have a stewardship? Yes, there was an assignment, right? How did he do with that? Perfectly, right? He did perfectly with it. And so that's again, they both had a stewardship. That's in common, right? How'd they do with it? That's a contrast, right?

Yes. Christ being God, He was the one who entrusted himself with the stewardship. Adam was entrusted with the stewardship by God. So I mean there's a power dynamic. So we're going to see this comparison and contrast. in a number of different passages as we go along. It is a powerful tool for interpreting the Word of God and having true insight into what the Bible is saying. And the failure to carry out that tool has been the source of all sorts of misunderstanding and conflict and difficulty. So it's something we will continue to revisit again and again. Other thoughts, questions, comments?

Yes. I just wanted to clarify this. Is there a difference between the Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of God? There are some who would say that there is, as we look at these passages, and I gave the short version because I actually went through, there's about two pages of quotes and different things. The answer is I don't believe that there's any difference. Okay. Because you can find...

What's your answer? Is there a difference between the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven in terms of what it means? I don't believe that there is any difference. And there's so many passages where it's exactly the same or very similar, and it's kingdom of God, kingdom of heaven. They appear to be synonyms.

It is also only Matthew that uses it. So you have to say, well, why would only Matthew use it? It's because of his Jewish audience. Whereas none of the other gospel authors even mention it once. So he had a particular reason. in having to do with the Jewish audience, and it's because of that reluctance to say the name of God, that the other authors didn't have that limitation.

Craig, you had your hand up? I didn't, I was waving it. Oh, okay. Alright, good deal. Just one thing, one small comment for those who may care. Sarcasm is under the heading of irony, but it's a particular kind of irony, and it actually means it's from Sark's flesh. and it means to tear the flesh. It's like a very particular form of irony. Some people think of it as a humor thing, but technically it is not. It is definitely for mocking and more cutting purposes.

Yeah, and this is this is key the truth is we're touching on figures of speech that the book that I made reference to By Bollinger is a great reference because he's he's he has and it's and it's free. It's a PDF file And you can also buy it in print, but he it's almost a thousand pages on figures of speech in the Bible He's just done a great job And so we're touching on it the reality is that you can dig you know really deep with all these things and And we could keep going on the rest of the year on figures of speech, but we won't because we've got other things to move on to. Thank you.

Just real quick clarification, what is the Kingdom of God and or the Kingdom of Heaven referring to? Okay, let's talk about it and it's going to be something that we're going to talk about in the main service as well. No, and essentially what it is, is the Bible describes this.

The Bible describes a picking up of the church, those from Acts 2 until the day of the rapture, right? A taking up of the church. followed by which, not started by which, but followed by which is the beginning of the seven-year tribulation period of hell on earth, and then at the end of which Christ comes again, comes again for a second time with the angels and with us, resurrects Old Testament and tribulation saints at that point in time, and then reigns on earth from the Jews over Israel, and King of Kings and Lord of Lords over the Gentile nations, during a period of time which is a substantial restoration of the planet Earth, and in which our enemies now are the world, the flesh, and the devil, right? And what's going to happen is that the world and the devil will be taken out for that period of time.

And so you'll have a significant period of restoration of the Earth. Someone who dies at 100 years will be said to have died young. So it isn't that people won't die. There will be death there. But substantial restoration of Earth, at the end of which is the creation of a new heavens, a new Earth, And there we will all be with the Lord. So in that sense, the reign will continue forever. Yes? It's probably a dumb question, but... Probably not.

The Jews that go into the Millennial Kingdom, is that only of the 144,000 or are there other Jews? No, there are other Jews. So you will have only believing Jews and you will have only believing Gentiles with these kinds of bodies entering into the monumental kingdom. The reason I ask is because 144,000 have the mark and are protected so they can make it through.

They have a seal. Right. They can make it through that period of time. That's correct. But you're saying there are other Jews as well who are not? Yeah, let's hope so because that's 144,000 single Jewish males. Yeah, you've got to have females in the mix. Right, but they could have been. Can you imagine being married to one of those 144,000 that went through the tribulation period? Nope. That would just be amazing.

Anyway, so here's a quick definition of the kingdom. We're going to go into it some more in the main service here. However, the passage itself will focus on the tribulation period and the second coming. It's going to focus on that and only talk briefly about what we call the kingdom. But still, that's the picture. So sometimes it's called the kingdom. That's it. Sometimes it's called the kingdom of God. Sometimes it's called the kingdom of heaven. But those are all synonyms. And they're all synonyms that were developed after the time of the Old Testament.

So anyway, other questions, comments, thoughts? The location of our mansion. The location of our mansion. With the Lord, right? Thank you Lord for the things you revealed here and thank you for the insights and understandings that we can have and as we see these things and understand these things we can understand more clearly what you intended to communicate. And so we just thank you that you've revealed what you have because you love us and you care for us so very much. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen.