4.  The Pattern of Gethsemane

I remember Gethsemane: all the disciples (priests) entered with Jesus the High Priest into that garden of Passover prayers, but none went with Him beyond their sleeping points to the “yonder” holiest place of sweat and blood, where the ‘covering cherub’ over the ark of that location appeared to Him “from heaven, strengthening him” for the coming day (Luke 22:43-46; Matthew 26:36).   While as High Priest Jesus groaned through the night in that holiest place of intense prayers, all the priests who had entered with Him, at their outer-court station, slept off.

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1.  Frequency and Value

Is value commensurate with frequency of use?  Can we determine the worth of something based on how often it is used?  Sometimes, in our minds, that is how it works. If a kitchen knife is used more often than a butcher’s knife, it must be more important; since the AK-47 is handier, more popular, and its voice is heard more often on the battlefield than the dumb atomic bomb, it must be superior to the less deployed.  In Paul’s letter to the Hebrews, I find a model that might suitably address this mystery of the relationship between service and value, between quantity and quality, between frequency of activities and divine significance.

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8.  Slay Them

The adversaries swore to “slay them.”  The deaths were going to be multiple – all the workers.  Can an agenda be so ruthless as not to mind how many it slays?  Can killers be so callous as not to care about the rivers of tears they force to flow and the streams of blood that turn the vegetation red?  Can they be so deaf to the wails of the maimed and the agony of orphans and widows multiplied?  What creed or malice blinds them to the graves of all sizes that have overtaken worksites and farmlands?  Will they eliminate entire populations to achieve one evil goal?

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4.  Our Adversaries

What is after your brother could be after you, too.  It may be only a matter of time before you know it.  In our text, the objects of concern were “OUR adversaries,” not “MY adversaries.”  Not only the speaker was under threat; everybody was.  If anyone supposed that Nehemiah alone was the target, because he was the leader, they were tragically mistaken.

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And our adversaries said, They shall not know, neither see, till we come in the midst among them, and slay them, and cause the work to cease.

Nehemiah 4:11

1.  Direct and Indirect Attacks

Let’s imagine that you were working at a construction site, and a gang of men came to take away your tools or to seal off the place; they would thus have halted or permanently stopped your work.  Sometimes, that is what the enemy of our souls does to stop what we do – by directly attacking the project or the project materials.

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1.  The Unpardonable Sin of Date-Setting

There is a new iniquity in the canons of contemporary Christianity, an abomination comparable to the unpardonable sin.  Some call it the sin of date-setting, others call it date-fixing.  It is the sin someone commits when they claim that by any stroke of divine prerogative, they were allowed a peep into the calendar of God.  The sin is more unforgivable if they should further claim that they have been privy to a mystical date that none is supposed to know, not even the angels in heaven.  That iniquity is unpardonable because, by claiming such forbidden knowledge, the prophet or dreamer or whatever they are called, make themselves equal with God and place themselves not only above the angels of God but also above the weary Jesus of Galilee who longingly sought food from a fig tree one hungry afternoon (Mark 11:12-14), who sat thirsty by an unlikely well, asking an afternoon drink from a very unlikely woman (John 4:6-7), who fell so deeply asleep during a boat ride that even the boat-rocking waves and storms could not wake Him out of His wearied slumber (Mark 4:37-38).

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RESPONSES … 

Dear Preacher,

This brings a critical balance to the very crucial topic of marriage, divorce, and remarriage.  It fills a gaping void in church doctrines on the subject.  Ignorance and inadequacy of church doctrines have caused men and women, as well as the Church, to pay a huge price.   Some of the casualties over the years could have been avoided.  This is one book that I wish I could personally put on the shelf of every church, in the hands of every pastor and marriage counsellor, on the curriculum of every Bible school, in every home, and in the hands of every intending couple. It is bold and audacious, daring to enter some hitherto uncharted territories to give uncommon illuminations. I salute the Author’s courage. It would, doubtless, be contended by the traditional and religious dogmatic camp, but be gladly embraced by every honest and humble seeker of truth in this sparsely navigated terrain where there isn’t much doctrine to give light to the Church. It would certainly SET CAPTIVES FREE.  I am glad and privileged to have been impacted/illuminated by this uncommon work. Thank you, dear Preacher.

Pastor O.I.

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1.  The Pathetic Five

In Matthew 25:1-13, Jesus gave the famous Parable of the Ten Virgins, five of whom were wise, and five of whom were foolish.  In the conclusion to that parable, He warned, “Watch therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh” (v.13).  In other words, that parable was a caring Master’s earnest caution against the possibility of tragic carelessness, on His return, by a worrisome percentage of followers otherwise considered to be saints.

In that parable, the distinction between the two categories of virgins was not between sinners and saints, or the holy and the unclean; it was between the wise and the foolish – or between wisdom and foolishness. That takes me to a very worrisome question: Can someone be a virgin, be in the proper company of virgins, yet be shut out of the coming Great Wedding?  The answer is a troubling Yes, according to the Parable.  Why?  We shall find out.

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34.  The Pre-Eminence of Grace over Law

 A woman was brought to the public court of Jesus one early morning.  She had allegedly been caught in the act of adultery.  By the extant law of Moses, she deserved to die by stoning.  What was Jesus going to say or do?  Respect for the law or deviation from it?  Mercy, or justice and judgment?  We know the story.  He sided with mercy, to the disappointment of the murderous morning crowd.  The woman was let go with another chance to live better (John 8:1-11).

That someone is guilty does not always mean that they must be condemned.  We may condemn an act while sparing the actor.  Rightness is not usually righteousness.  Even to an adulteress allegedly caught in the act, with a crowd of first-hand witnesses against her, God gave another chance.  Such enlightenment as this study offers is not a license to kill.  Paul warns that “Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies” (1 Corinthians 8:1, NKJV).  Love is what it takes to build.  Not everyone who jumped off with a licensed parachute landed safely.  No matter how right one might be, no matter how wrong the other, mercy still has a long rope, so long as it has not been dropped at the other end.  But mercy must also go with wisdom, or mercy can be fooled.

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1.  The Weakness of God

Sometimes, sadly, the merciful patience of God is counted as weakness.  Solomon addressed the same concern when he said, “Because God does not punish sinners instantly, people feel it is safe to do wrong” (1 Eccl 8:11-12, The Living Bible). In his opening prophecies and denunciations of sinful nations, Prophet Amos metaphorically focused on the same subject when he said, “For three transgressions of Damascus, and for four, I will NOT TURN AWAY the punishment thereof …” (Amos 1:3).  The same was said of Gaza, Tyrus, Ammon, about a climax of “transgressions” after which “punishment” becomes imperative and “will not turn away,” no matter who tries then and how to turn it back.  That refrain on the likely expiration of grace and the consequent inevitability of divine judgment occurs eight times in the first two chapters of his book.

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