As to the idea of "races." That is a concept created by people who wanted to believe that their group was better than the others. The Europeans of northwestern Europe were supposed to be the most evolved.
Science has shown that we all are descended from one man and one woman. If there were others; their descendants don't exist today.
Science now knows that the old concept of races is wrong. Trying to find where one people group ends and another begins doesn't happen. We are different in shapes, colors, nose shape and hair type. In India, the same parents can have children with dark and light colored skin and light and dark colored hair.
As to color; we are all some shade of brown. Take a white person to the beach and they will start turning brown. There are pinkish browns, reddish browns, yellowish browns, light browns, medium browns and dark browns, except for a few that have no color. We are all descended from a couple that was probably a medium brown.
Take the term "Caucasoid." While most think of this as being western European, we find that a small group of people in northern Japan have Caucasoid features.
In looking at Jesus' parables about the kingdom of heaven it is important to remember that these are not always about good. The best example is in Matt. 13:37-43 where Jesus explains the parable of the "Tares." Here an enemy has sown weeds among the wheat. At the end the weeds are taken and burned, but they get to live among the wheat plants until the harvest.
Here is Matt. 13:31-32:
MT 13:31 He told them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. 32 Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches."
Yes this looks great. Christianity started with Jesus, added 12 disciples and then other disciples and grew until what we have today. But is something hidden there?
Look at Matt. 6:26
26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?
The birds are along for the ride. They don't contribute, but they still receive.
I think that the mustard plant represents the church. Starting small it is now huge. People can wake up on Sunday, find their Bible (or not) and head over to church. They can sit there and listen to a sermon about some book that the pastor has just read. He may have a Bible verse to go along with it, but many times they forget to read it. You can slap a couple of bucks into the collection plate and whine about the pastor talking about money. After the service, you can meet with friends, line up some business or a game of golf and forget about the LORD for another week.
Like the birds, people can perch in a church, but provide nothing for is care and growth.
MT 6:19 "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
Remember what the people listening to Jesus would have heard. They knew that leaven was excluded from service to God. At Passover time, the wife clears the house of leaven except for a small bit of it. The husband goes through the house to see that all the leaven has been removed. He finds that last bit and removes it and declares that their home is free of leaven.
1. Judah was not with the family. He had moved elsewhere.
2. He was supposed to give Tamar to Shelah to raise up a child which was to represent his brother.
3. Judah put Tamar off saying that Shelah was not old enough to marry her.
4. Tamar was to live as a widow in her father's house until Shelah grew up.
5. Shelah grew up and Tamar was not given to him for a wife.
6. Judah was looking to sin and Tamar got pregnant.
7. Judah was with his father and brothers when they went to Egypt. The sons of Tamar went along too.
8. In the book of Ruth, Tamar is spoken highly of. So it looks like the boys weren't taken from her. Therefore, I believe that she lived with Judah. He says in verse 26 that Tamar was more righteous than himself. It adds that he didn't have relations with her again.
9. He realized that he had sinned and that sex with her had been wrong. He took her in and didn't have relations with her again.
10. In 1 Chron. 4:21 we find that Shelah has sons listed. Where they Tamar's? We don't know.
11. In Gen. 46 we read that Tamar's son Perez went to Egypt with two sons of his own.
I don't think that she was alone in raising the twins.:rocknroll:
In the parables of Jesus, he would speak of the kingdom of heaven. Many times we see that bad things happen. The parable of the sower is one example.
Let's look at Matt. 13:33
MT 13:33 He spoke another parable to them, "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took , and hid in three pecks of meal, until it was all leavened." NAS
Most of the time we are told that this is good happening in the kingdom of heaven. The growth of the Church is often talked about.
I think that something different is happening here. First we see that it is a woman that is acting in the parable. Who does she represent. The Father, Son and the Holy Spirit aren't presented as a woman. Also notice that she hids the leaven and the result is that all is leavened.
My explaination: The woman represents evil. This isn't the first time that he woman is used that way.(Zech. 5:7-11) Then we see that she is hiding the leaven. Jesus wants our light to shine and not be hidden. (Matt. 5:14-16) Now for the leaven. Leaven is not acceptable to God. It was not to be in any sacrifice to Him. In Matt. 16:6-12 Jesus tells the disciples to, "Watch out and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees." The disciples took a little while but learned that the leaven represented the teaching of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Here is 1 Corinthians 5:6-8
1CO 5:6 Your boasting is not good. Don't you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough? 7 Get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast--as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. 8 Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness, but with bread without yeast, the bread of sincerity and truth.NIV
So, I believe that Jesus is using this parable to tell us to watch out for evil getting into the kingdom of heaven. The leaven being wrong teaching. The three pecks of meal may represent the three kingdoms of heaven. The first is Moses giving the law to the Israelites. The people chose sin over God and the Babylonian captivity came. The second is Ezra and Nehemiah tried to get the people back on the path of the Lord. By the time of Jesus, it was corrupt. Jesus brought us the Gospel. Today, false teaching has gotten back in for the third time.
Note: I am not talking about disagreements that we have over verses in the Bible. I am refering to the all paths lead to God preaching. A Catholic leader saying that we should use the name Allah instead of God , The Father, etc. so that the followers of Islam will feel good about us. Sinning is okay if it doesn't hurt somebody and you feel good.
Right now I miss my wife so much.:angel: I love her most right now even though she is in Heaven.:purpleangel:
The Greeks had it made. They had more than one word for love. The love for my wife is different than the love for God, Jesus. Each day, I try to learn more about his awesomeness.:bow::bouncy:
Every good thing comes from God... and calamities?...
Posted : 13 Jan, 2010 07:34 PM
Yes, in Job we see that God says, "This far and no further."
The trouble in the world is cause by our ancesters deciding to bite the forbidden fruit. Later on their desendants went on a sin binge.
The world is still reeling from the great flood. Walt Brown Ph.D. has his doctorate from MIT. He shows in his book how the flood cause so much of what we see today. You can read his book online at www.creationscience.com. This guy is no kook. Predictions that he made on the basis of his theory are being found to be true. He explains why there is water on the moon and why there was water on Mars. Earthquakes and volcanoes are the result of the flood.:rocknroll:
Any Guys left that believe in Sex only within the Bounds of Marriage?
Posted : 13 Jan, 2010 05:00 PM
:waving:
Yes, men (women too) can be pigs.:angeldevil: I've heard guys tell me, "You wouldn't buy a car without test driving it first!" Of course if they could order a Ferrai 458 Italia, they wouldn't think twice about the test drive first. You know what you are getting before it arrives.
Same thing with marriage. Do you want to be with that person when you aren't having sex? Because the vast majority of life is stuff other than sex.:rolleyes: Once you are married, you can do the, "I like that, more please.":hearts:
Our culture is preaching all the wrong stuff and look where it has gotten us. People were freaked out about getting herpies. Now they are freaked out about getting AIDS.:devil: This stuff gets spread by spin the bottle sex.:stop:
