GENERATIONAL REVELATIONS (Part 3 of 4)

7. Delayed Insights

Sometimes, understanding might be delayed not because the dispensation or generation for that revelation has not come, but because those for whom it is meant have not matured enough to receive it.  Why?  Truth misunderstood can be abused, turning it into a dangerous error that is still ‘based on the word of God.’

Jesus told His disciples, “I have yet many things to say unto you, but YE cannot bear them now.”   The matter was not the message but the intended audience.  The reception of those truths was going to be pending for as long as they remained immature.  The ‘time’ for the unsealing, unlike the visions of Daniel, was not tied to a coming generation but to a mature dispensation of the intended receivers.  That explains why God would not give some people a direction until much later in life.  It explains why some prayers are kept in what appears to be the “Unanswered” file, until a mature future.  Sometimes, however, that season may be mercifully shortened by the coming of the Great Teacher who, “when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, … will guide you into ALL truth” (John 16:12-13).

Knowledge is power.  Some power can destroy those who are not mature enough to handle it.  That is why some parents keep cell phones from children or install programs to restrict what they do with them. In other words, sometimes a prophecy might be faintly understood or entirely misunderstood, not because it is sealed for a different dispensation but because of a weakness in the hearers.

8. Blinders

i) Satanic blinders: Satanic interventions are also responsible for some revelations not accessed even by those for whom the time has come to access them. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4:4 that this sometimes happens because “the god of this world hath blinded the MINDS” of the hearers. There is a blindness of the eyes, but worse is the blindness of the mind.

Jesus was also concerned about that category of hearers, whom Satan “hath blinded their EYES, and hardened their heart; that they should not see” (John 12:40), and the others from whose hearts the word is plucked off by the demonic “birds of the air” even when they seem to have caught some seed-word (Matthew 13:19; Luke 8:5, 12).  In other words, some blindness is induced by Satan (Daniel 10:12-14) just as, on the contrary, understandings can be ‘opened’ by the Master (Luke 24:31).

ii) Occult Blinders: Apart from blindness from demonic agencies, there can also be blindness supervised by the human agents of the demonic forces. At Paphos, Paul was preaching to a deputy governor who was unfortunate to have had a personal assistant who was a Satanist. (Mind whom you engage to work closely with you. Mind whom you share your space with.)  As Paul and Barnabas preached, that sorcerer and false prophet “withstood them, seeking to turn away the deputy from the faith.”  It ended up being force against force as Paul, “filled with the Holy Ghost,” rendered that satanic agent blind, and took him out of the way.  Only then could that ruler believe what he had been hearing (Acts 13:6-12).

For those whose understanding Satan blinds, he might not prevent them from hearing.  In fact, they would sometimes pride themselves in how much they hear, except that, as Isaiah prophesied, “hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive.”  The enemy worries not about the frequency of their hearing but about their understanding of what they hear (Matthew 13:14, 19; Luke 8:12).

iii) Ideological Blinders:  Not all blinders are Satanic forces or their human agencies.  Traditions, dogmas, and other human tools also cause that state.  Jesus often confronted the Pharisees and Sadducees for letting their religiosity prevent them from seeing the truth.  They were fanatics blinded ironically by the very knowledge that they thought they had, as well as by a sentimental attachment to doctrines that were a sandy foundation (Luke 6:5-11; John 4:20-24).  Often “laying aside the commandment of God,” they would usually “hold the tradition of men” (Mark 7:8).  They saw the truth but feared the consequences of breaking free from the strong “hold” of human traditions and vain philosophies.  In Colossians 2:8, Paul warns that someone can be spoiled, wrecked, made less effective, ruined “through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world.”  In other words, he not only tells of the possibility of being spoiled by other humans but also identifies some of the blinders by which that condition might come about in someone’s life: awry human philosophies, deceit, the traditions of men, the rudiments of the world.

iv) Volitional Blinders: Apart from those whose eyes are shut by Satan or his occult agents, and others blinded by human traditions, some are responsible for their state. Jesus said of them, “their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes THEY have closed.” Not Satan, but “they” are responsible for their limited access to truth. They fear the change that truth would bring.  They want to keep their old ways because of what it affords, so they close up, by personal choice, “lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them” (Mathew 13:15).  A thousand sermons are unlikely to change someone who has made up their mind not to be changed.  Probably, that was also why Jesus usually asked those He would heal, “Wilt thou be made whole?” even when the question seemed absurd, especially given the apparent wretchedness and helplessness of their condition (John 5:6). Personal choice is a strong force that sometimes even God does not overrule.

In summary, then, there are spiritual blinders, occult blinders through Satanic human agencies, cultural and ideological blinders (that work from the mind and the soul), and personal (sometimes sentimental) blinders to people who are what they are by choice.  Some blinders are external, others are internal; some are spiritual, others are human and cultural.  Some blindness might be unfortunate, but others are a choice.  Some can be helped, others cannot.  Strangely, many blame the Book for being hard to mine from, even when they have never seriously tried.

9.  Hidden Mysteries

Does God deliberately hide certain truths from some generations, but reveal them to others?  Or are certain revelations reserved for certain generations?  That point is repeatedly made in the scriptures.  In Colossians 2:7, 9-10, Paul speaks about the “mystery” of “deep things” never heard or seen or even conceived by mortals, “but” now “revealed … unto us”; he speaks of “hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto OUR glory” – intentionally “hidden” by Him from those of old, but revealed “unto us” of another generation according to His dispensational calendar.  Why?  It is part of the unquestionable “wisdom of God,” and none can call foolish what God calls wisdom.  It is God’s prerogative whom He reveals what to, and whom He hides it from.

In Romans 16:25, Paul speaks further about “the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began.”  Was that mystery never found until then because no one searched ‘properly’ for it?  No.  Many searched, but it was purposely “kept secret.”  By whom? Why?  Adam, Abraham, Moses, Elijah, Daniel, mighty as they were, could not discover it.  It was not meant for their age.  Furthermore, in Ephesians 3:3-9, Paul identifies his writings as a “mystery” – the “mystery of Christ” – “made known” unto him, but “Which in other ages was not made known” in the way it was “now revealed.”  In case someone is unsure of what he said, he repeats that there is “mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God.” Nobody can find what God has hidden – in apparent plain sight of an open Book.

In transmitting those mysteries, Paul brought the same Old Testament to such fresh light as we still admire in the New Testament.  It was hidden from the ancients even while they handled the items physically in the process of their regular worship.  They understood the items, but not to the depth revealed to Paul, the distant observer.  He never shared their privileged proximity to those objects of the mystery, but from afar he saw details that they never did.  That it is in your daily hands does not make you the best or sole interpreter of it.

Like Paul and John, it is given to some to reveal the mysteries by writing (Ephesians 3:3; Revelation 1:11); to others it is given to reveal them by mouth (Luke 4:22).  In all, the Holy Spirit is the Researcher and Revealer (Ephesians 3:5; 1 Corinthians 2:10).  To Peter, Jesus made that point: “flesh and blood hath NOT revealed it unto thee, BUT my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 16:17).  Paul called his fresh depth of insight a revelation; Jesus also did.  It was a revelation, not a discovery; it was a seeing, not a finding through the power of research or by the wisdom of the ‘researcher.’  Accordingly, no one may take credit for what the Spirit does.

From The Preacher’s diary,
March 26, 2025.