It is so good to hear that people have been healed

This will be a little of a composite article although I will try not to have too many things in it. Overall, it would be an article about my little “ministry” and a little of my sensing or wondering.

Every few months I will reflect on what has been happening in my little “ministry”. By the little ministry, for the benefit of readers who are new to this site, I mean the tiny bit or two that I believe the Lord is using me in, or even would like to believe the Lord is using me in. Principally, there is a bit which I am a little more certain that the Lord is using me in a tiny way; and that is in the broad area of healing. Of course, for many who had embraced the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and the power thereof, such things that I do, may not, in their eyes, amount to a ministry at all, especially when what I do, I do not do it in a full-time manner. But I want to call it a ministry, if not for any other reasons, it is better for me to view the things I do, as important to the Lord because the sinful nature in me, naturally will not want me to do the things that I do. It is tiny, yet I must see it as capable of being made wider, deeper, and greater; not that I can but the Lord is able, and He can enlarge if He so desires. Is there any other bit? I like to dream with the Lord, and based on what I see as having happened or is happening to me, I like to picture myself as a “healer” with a slightly unique slant, a singing healer. We all have many dreams. How about a dream with the Lord? I find that dreaming with the Lord is one thing, not difficult at all, but to make an effort for that dream, is altogether a different thing, not a easy thing, because the sinful nature in us doesn’t like that. The tug of war of us trying to live according to the Spirit, and not, to the sinful nature is really tough, as like the Apostle Paul said it, in his epistles. But that is the reality of this life; there is no escaping it, we have to face it, and learn to win in that tug of war of choices of life, bearing in mind that Scriptures said that the Lord’s grace is sufficient for us, and that the Lord is faithful. I am still learning, and one recent thing that I am trying to internalize completely is that faith attracts grace.

What is faith? What is a faith entity or a unit of faith?
Because of my last statement above, I will explain a little of the understanding I learned. I will just be brief without quoting Bible references; perhaps when I feel I should write a separate article, I will go at length at this. Faith is not just a belief. Belief is only half the story, so to speak. The other half is action consistent with that belief. A unit of faith is belief coupled with an action consistent with that belief. If you just believe, that is not a complete faith unit or entity. Of course, action, by itself, is not faith at all. When a pre-believer believes that Jesus died for him but does not confess that fact with his mouth, that belief is just a belief, not a faith. It is only when that belief is followed by an action, like the confession with one’s mouth (or even putting up of hands), is the belief, a complete unit of faith, that can be counted as righteousness by God. Closely related is therefore, a definition of righteousness, but we will not go there, today. Some faith units are small, some are bigger, units can be joined together to form bigger units, bigger faith.

Therefore, in connection with the little ministry that I am referring to with regard to myself, i.e. in healing, if I believe but I do not pray for the sick person, I cannot claim the promise of God. I cannot say I have exercised faith, give me my grace. I have to believe (a belief) and pray (go into action consistent with that belief), and expect the grace of God to be poured out for healing. Of course, grace of God, by its very nature, depends on God, because when it is grace, anything asked for is unmerited. But I believe faith in God attracts God’s grace. When there is no unit of faith in God, there is no attraction of God’s grace. I am not saying that God cannot grant grace when no one put up any faith. Sugar attracts ants, but it does mean that ants cannot come by when there is no sugar. If we want to see God heals through you, move into action, do not just believe and do nothing.

Is expectation important?
I said we have to believe and pray, and EXPECT the grace of God to be poured out. Expectation in prayers for the sick tells of two things: One, strength of your belief. You do not expect because you do not believe or believed enough to expect. Two, your compassion for others; you do not expect because your heart did not go out for the sick person. Our God is a God of compassion, and when we move with his compassion, we are moving according to his heart-beat, and if it is His heart-beat, He is likely to move. So expectation is very important. If you pray without expectation, ask yourself, what is your motive? Again, do not get me wrong; I am not saying that healing cannot come without your expectation. Nothing can stop God from wanting to do something, except Himself. But if you want to see more healing, pray with expectation. But take note also that we cannot dictate how God should minister. We only expect God to act, how He acts is up to Him.

With these in mind, I will now share my joy of knowing that some people got healed when I prayed for them.

The last time I shared a testimony was in Jan 2010 – “Intercede for others, and you’ll be blessed too”. So, after 2 months or so, some 2 weeks ago, I wondered if God would do more in and through me. I long for God to break new ground, and I share my senior pastor’s desire of wanting to see more healings, and more significant healings, for his case, in the church, for myself, in the church, or elsewhere, wherever I minister. All of us, of course, know that healing is God’s work not ours, but remember what I just said about expectation.

At church
Some 2 weeks ago, in the church’s Sunday 8.30 am service, I again released words of knowledge and prayed for people in ministry time after praise and worship. I was encouraged that consecutively, one after another, 2 people got slain. The moment I finished giving my words of knowledge, a woman appeared in front of me. She was slain but there was not a catcher behind her; I was holding her hands, just like I normally would do when praying for people, at least at the beginning, before I usually would then lay my right hand on people’s forehead. When she felt like she was about to fall backwards, she grabbed my hands tightly, and in an effort to break her fall I also tried to hold onto her hands. This lady had rings on both her hands, the kind that hold diamonds, and those rings really gave me a nasty pain in my fingers (If any, from the church leadership is reading this, I got feedback, afterwards, from the woman and the husband, that they feared not having catchers around; maybe the church should regularly encourage members of congregation to step forward to be catchers).

Next was a man who 18 years ago, was miraculously healed by God of some weird muscle inflammation from certain death. This man is known to many in church. He walked up to me at the middle of the sanctuary front. Because the slain woman was still on the floor, there was no space to pray for this man, in case he also fell. I walked him to the extreme left side of the sanctuary and prayed for him there. Despite having walked some 30 feet to the left side of the sanctuary, when I prayed for him, I soon realized that he too was going to fall. I tried to break his fall, and he was slain to the floor. This gentleman had problem with his hip, and he told me that he had to be very careful when he put on his trousers because every time if the angle was not just right, he would experience extreme sharp pain on his hip. Afterwards, outside the church I passed by this brother, and he said he had experienced a tremendous release, which I took it to mean he had experienced the healing touch of the Lord.

TV program!
The above type of visible experiences excites me, and each time I would look forward to more. During the week, as I was watching a TV drama serial, 2 characters in the program talked about their experiencing a freshness going to work, just like the first days they started work. This set me meditating on the zeal that we must have concerning our work for the Lord – the first love. It got me thinking how much attention I gave to my “little ministry” when it first begun some 2 years ago. I began to remind myself how absorbed I was in the earlier days, although it is not to say I no longer did the things I used to do. The zeal and eager expectation sometimes eluded me. I reminded myself that many people, when they have not experienced God’s use of them in the supernatural, they long eagerly for such an occasion, but when they have tasted how it is like, they, soon, do not want to put themselves through “all the troubles” to be used by the Lord. I always keep in mind what a veteran itinerant preacher said about being used by God in the supernatural. These are his wise words: Anyone can be used by the Lord, but to be used consistently by the Lord one needs to get right with God, and stay right with God, even to grow. It is not difficult to understand, supernatural works are not works of men, and therefore clearly God is involved, consistent use of a person may imply a stamp of approval which God does not anyhow put on a person. God does look after His Name. So, you see, there are the “all the troubles” which, often times, people are not prepared to face.

FGBMF meetings
When I learnt from the Friday of 5th March 2010, that Michelle Hamilton (an Australian) would be sharing her testimony at the Jurong East FGBMFI(S) chapter (or now we called it gate) on the following Friday (12th March) , I was thinking to myself that I might want to be absent from the meeting. The reason was simple she had already shared the testimony in my church before, and I did not feel I want to hear her testimony again or would benefit from it. Do not get me wrong, Michelle Hamilton had a fantastic swept out to sea experience that completely changed her life. The experience happened some 20 years ago in Philippines, and today she was still sharing that testimony because it was that life-changing. Some of you, the FGBMFI(S) people know that I am part of the core Committee of the Jurong East Gate. I was supposed to provide the presence and support to the meetings, role of which I duly embraced for more than 1 year now (I am now on the 2nd term). I do not do very much at these meetings, although I have believed that my presences often helped. Still at this occasion, I just felt firstly I did not think that I would benefit from the coming to the meeting where Michelle Hamilton would be sharing, secondly, I was not really contributing much to make a difference; at least, that was what I thought sometimes. I had not been able to move much in the words of knowledge for healing in these lunch meetings as they are short, had its own liturgy, often attended by the same few persons. Often times, there was no room to pray for people, either no time left or I had better defer it to the invited speaker.

But because of the double slain in church, and the subsequent meditation of the first love, as a result of a prompting by the Spirit from the TV drama serial, I finally gave in to attend the Friday (12th March) FGBMFI(S) Jurong East Gate meeting where Michelle Hamilton was scheduled to give her testimony. I reminded myself that I was to serve, to give, and not to receive. On my way there to the lunch meeting, while driving, I told the Lord (I often did that) that alright I was to serve and to give, and asked the Lord to make my time at the meeting to count.

By the way, I just checked my blog entry on “A special Resurrection Sunday indeed (2009)”, and if my memory did not fail me, from my re-reading of that article, Michelle Hamilton spoke on that particular Sunday in my church (now confirmed from church online sermons site). I heard that testimony of hers 3 times that weekend, no wonder I did not feel like wanting to listen to it again. But this recollection, brought on a powerful connection that made me even more certain that I should pen this article down. When I re-read the 2009 article, I realized that what I did in that 10.30 am service in my church in April 2009 was exactly the same things I did on the Friday, 12th March 2010, both occasions of which Michelle Hamilton spoke.

At last Friday’s meeting, just like when I was in the April 2009 church service meeting, while I was seated, I received multiple sensations on my body, which by now I have learnt from “constant use”, to know these sensations were “words” of knowledge for healing. Those of you who were present at the meeting can compare what I said at the end of the meeting with the only recording that I had of my words of knowledge experiences in my church on this blog site, found at the end of the 2009 article. I gave out the words of knowledge in like manner. I am amazed at this similarity of the 2 occasions, many things were so similar, the words of knowledge were given at the end of meeting (in my church setting, that was uncommon, if you read, words were given outside the normal time slot), followed by many people responding to the words, I prayed for many people in this small meeting (maybe 8-10, and there was a proxy case even!), and I can recall that even when I was praying for people in this meeting, several persons were also being prayed for by Michelle Hamilton, like in 2009.

Back in the 2009 Resurrection Sunday session, I prayed like I was a great servant of God. For this FGBMFI(S) Friday session, although, I did not see anyone slain (in the 2009 session, also, no one was slain despite many were being prayed for), I remember I prayed with faith, just believing. For one of the women I prayed for in this FGBMFI session, I sensed heat on my hands when I prayed. I prayed with faith and expectation in that Friday afternoon.

All with early days’ vigor and zeal
So any healing took place from this Friday afternoon session, you are eager to know? After the meeting I realized it had been an extraordinary session, especially when it was such a small meeting of some 20+ people. While talking to the Lord before the weekend church services (both Saturday and Sunday services), I brought the occasion before the Lord, noted it was somewhat exceptional, but no people got slain. I entered the weekend church services with expectation. For those church services, I released words of knowledge, prayed for people, with great faith. I had hoped to see some tangible signs of God performing miracles in the church sessions. I was hoping I could at least see someone slain but I did not. Nevertheless, I was satisfied at the end of that weekend that I did my best for all the sessions, from Friday through to Sunday; I had gone into service for the Lord with the early days’ vigor and zeal.

Hello, so was there healing for the Friday FGBMF(S) lunch meeting at Jurong East Gate? I know some have feedback that my articles are too long-winded but please understand that these articles also served as a form of journaling for me of my journey with the Lord, and so I penned down things that I want to capture for my own record as well. The answer is affirmative. The news of the healing came on the Monday following, 15th March 2010, in the FGBMF(S) AGM. Before I go into the news, for the purposes of my own journaling, and also to encourage the brothers and sisters of FGBMF(S), please bear with me for a little recording of what I felt at the AGM.

For the benefit of those not knowing what FGBMFI(S) stands for, it is referring to the Full Gospel Businessmen Fellowship International, Singapore. I want to say that I could sense the Holy Spirit’s presence at that evening’s AGM. I usually sense the presence of the Holy Spirit physically. Not wanting to lengthen this article, I would only say that in this current season of my life I could sense the presence of the Holy Spirit by sensations in my ears, and on my forehead. The sensation was very strong when the central leadership was praying on the stage in the banquet hall. Also, when the people were asked to pray in the spirit (in tongues), I realized that when I did that, I prayed with a new tongue. Now, I have the gift of tongue for more than 20 years. I know I do pray in multiple tongues, and I am sensitive to the Lord’s doing of new things, like the giving of a new tongue (language) to me, in addition to those I already have. So, what I am saying is that I believed the Holy Spirit had given me a new tongue that evening. Because of the strong presence of the Holy Spirit, to which I usually would ask the Lord what he would want me to do; I prayed for the wife of the member who sat next to me. The member and the wife are new Christians, a year old. Both are old, over 70 years old. The lady was wheel-chair bound as a result of multiple strokes in the past, the last one happened some 8 years ago. May the Lord continue to grant her the peace and joy of the Spirit all the days of her life, just like I prayed for her that evening. Of course, I prayed for the Lord’s strengthening for her physical body to keep up with the long life the Lord has been granting to her.

At last, the 2 healing news from the Friday Jurong East Gate session. At that meeting, the words released included a condition of problem in the mouth, bad tooth, gums, or the jaw; pain in the knees; back pain; and breast disorder. The first thing that an Indian brother who had attended the Jurong East Gate session said to me, at the AGM dinner, was that he was healed. When I confirmed the details with him, he was indeed being healed of the first condition. This brother was having very bad glum and ulcers problem for over a week. He said it was so bad that he could hardly eat. I remember after that afternoon meeting, at the eating place (we always have lunch after each Gate session), this same brother thanked me for praying for him. This brother shared with me, on this Monday AGM evening that, that afternoon, after the prayer, his condition had already shown sign of improvement. He said by Sunday/Monday, he was healed. Many of us have experienced such nasty mouth ulcers or sores. Especially for those of us who are older, such ailments can really take a long, long time to go away if we leave it to our natural body immune system to heal the ailments. I thank God for He cared.

The next was a lady at the same table I sat. The Jurong East Gate members were spread over 3 tables in the AGM “banquet” meeting. She is the wife of another member of the gate. Both of them attended the gate meetings regularly. The husband goes out on mission trips from time to time, and the wife was relating to me on the Friday that I prayed for her, that each time the husband was to go out for mission trip, something would happen to her, she would get sick, pain in the eyes, mishap happened, etc. This time the husband is scheduled to leave for mission trip at the end of the month. She had a fall and injured her knee. Again, this couple is old; and old people when we fall, and injure ourselves, it can take quite long for physical injury to muscles, tendons and bones to heal; even bruises and blue-black marks take a long time to heal or go away. This sister said that by Sunday she was better already, and she had wanted to tell me and thank me on Sunday when she was at church (this couple attends the same church I attend), but somehow did not have the chance. To confirm her healing, she decided to wear high heels to the AGM. She even showed her shoes. Hallelujah.



Anthony Chia – Thank you Lord for the encouragement, and I must learn not to want to see people slain as a sign that you are working. But Lord, like my senior pastor, I want to see more significant healings, not that what you have done for the people were not important, you know that I know that, but more, Lord, more.

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The Fall of Man (Part I)

I have decided to do a series on this topic. The parts will be as follows:

Part I – The Need for understanding of the topic, background, and the fall
Part II – The Consequences of the Fall
Part III – Controversial Issues on the topic


Part I

The Need for understanding of this topic
Christianity is about God, Satan, and man, about man’s sinful nature, and sins, about the Gospel, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, about salvation, and born again, about the Way of Holiness, about the Kingdom of God, Heaven and Hell. As a Christian, as we mature in the faith, we must get to know enough about these things or are sure in our beliefs concerning these things.

To understand why we need to be saved, we need to understand what is wrong with us, and to understand what is wrong with us, we need to go back to the beginning, and in the talk about the beginning we necessarily need to cover topics such as The Creation, Nature of Man, Fall of Man. Those who have missed my article on the tripartite nature of man may want to read the article at “Man is body, soul and spirit”. For this series, we will look at The Fall of Man.

Particularly, we need an understanding of this topic to gain a fuller understanding of our need for the works of Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

As Christians, we must know that sin first got committed with this Fall of Man. The sinful nature of man was acquired with this fall. This sinful nature gets passed down the lineage of man. It is from here, that all men are born sinful. This Fall of Man captured the first disobedience of man towards God and so, the first sin commitment by man in God’s eyes. The stain of sin on man can only be washed clean by the Blood of Jesus Christ, hence the need for the Salvation Plan of God for Mankind.


Background to The Fall
The background of the story is in Genesis 2:8-25. In essence, the background is this:

God, having made man, also planted a Garden – the Garden of Eden (v8). God placed man in the garden to work it and to take care of it (v 15). Verses 16 & 17 are particularly important and I reproduced them here:

16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." (Gen 2:16-17)

Notice that God gave the commandment to the man directly, and not to the woman. The creation of woman is recorded in verses 21 & 22. According to my Bible, woman was created as a helper to man (v 18 & 20). I would not ignore this fact if I were a woman. As a man, I want to point out to the men that God gave the commandment directly to you, not your helper.

The other relevant and interesting verse is verse 25 - The man and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame.

The Fall
The Fall itself was recorded in Genesis 3. Before I go any further, I must say that because of the brief account and because the event is ancient, there are many schools of thought concerning various issues like the Garden of Eden (What and where is the Garden of Eden?), how come the Fall happened? Was there a purpose for the Fall? Was it predestined, etc? Some of these issues are not really important but there are some fundamental elements that are important as they would determine how we view God and what He was and is and will be doing. I will try not to dwell too much into those that are not fundamental and at the same time controversial, at least not here, in this part.

We read in Genesis 3:1 that the serpent was involved – the crafty serpent. But haven’t we all heard that the one who tempted Adam and Eve was Satan. Nowhere in Genesis 3 was there a mention of Satan. Oh, you are told that the serpent is Satan. How did people come to this conclusion? First, let’s look at the temptation:

4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." (Gen 3:4-5).

Genesis is the first book of the Bible, Revelation is the last book. It is from Rev 20:2, that we conclude that the serpent is Satan. Rev 20:2 –

2He [the angel with the key to the Abyss and a great chain] seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil, or Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.

Let us look at the two subsequent verses to verses 4 & 5 above:

6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves (Gen 3:6-7).

I feel some Christians have unfairly blamed the woman, Eve for seeing that the fruit was good for food and pleasing to the eye. Look, the trees were so, it was stated in Gen 2:9 –

9 And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. (Gen 2:9)

There are also those who speculated on why Adam ate the fruit when given to him by Eve. One speculation was that he did not want to be separated from Eve because he knew that she would be thrown out of the garden, so he joined her. I think we have to be careful and not find excuses for the man. Men like to do this, don’t we – make everything sounded like we are being loving, considerate and therefore should be forgiven even if we were wrong?

In addition, we read that the man, Adam tried to push the blame -

The man [Adam] said, "The woman you [God] put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it." (Gen 3:12)

In the first place, the commandment was given to the man; we saw this in Gen 2:16-17 earlier on. God gave the person in charge, the man, Adam, the commandment. Adam should know better, yet he did not stop his helper, the woman from disobeying God, on top of that he joined her to disobey God.

Isn’t this familiar, today, men are still doing this. I cannot claim I have not been guilty before; men, we must be aware of this. Actually, in a larger context, we (men and women alike) are also prone to doing this - commands were given to us (in some sort of leadership positions) but when things go wrong, we push the blame to those in subordinate positions to us. The man, Adam, was in leadership position over the woman, Eve; yet he tried to push the blame down.

We saw what the man said when confronted by God. What did the woman say when confronted?

Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?"
The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate." (Gen 3:13)

It sounded like “I can’t help it; I was deceived or misled what!?”


To me, these are plain about the Fall:

1. The woman did not trust God enough. She chose to trust the serpent more than God. God said, “You will surely die” (Gen 2:17) but the serpent said, “You will not surely die” (Gen 3:4). It is not correct interpretation to say that the woman’s lack of trust is not in God but in the man. I tell you why. The woman told the serpent the words which were supposedly God’s words told to her by the man (verse 2 & 3). She did not say anything different. The serpent did not say anything implying that the man had misquoted God or that the woman should doubt the man. Instead the serpent said, “You will not surely die, for God knows ……. (Gen 3:4-5).

2. The woman chose not to obey God. Trust and obedience are different things. To be obedient means that you do the things you are instructed to do, or you do not do the things you are instructed not to do. God said that Adam and Eve were not to eat of the fruit; obedience meant no eating of the fruit, full-stop.

3. The man is guilty just the same, as the woman. In fact, he failed God in another count – He had been a poor steward, God gave him a helper, he did not look after the helper well. He should have stopped the woman from disobeying God. She was under his charge. Actually, the man was responsible and rightly so; and throughout the Bible, reference was rightly made to Adam and not to Eve, for that fall or sinful nature of mankind. Teaching that tries to absolve the blame from the man is suspect.

4. Man(kind) was with choice or free-will. Men chose to do what they did when tempted by Satan. They fell. I believe God did not plan it, and God did not predestine it.

5. I believe God was aware of the possibility that man could disobey and eat of the fruit but I also believe it was not the intention of God for that to happen. And when it happened God dealt with the situation, and planned accordingly. (If I go any further, it will go into full-blown controversial discussion, which is best left to the last part of this series).

Before I end this Part I, I just want to point you to a separate article on the modus operandi of Satan (The Modus Operandi of Satan). In this article, you will see how the same modus operandi was at work in relation to The Fall, The 3 Temptations of Jesus, and The Triple Sins of King David.



Anthony Chia – Right from the beginning man was with free-will, and in the exercise of that free-will, man fell.

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A recap of all points learnt from story of Gideon

{For full listing of all articles in this series, click here}

It was quite amazing the way God had dealt with Gideon – the favor He gave to Gideon, and His tolerance of Gideon’s antics. As such, it is good we try to learn the good points of Gideon that pleased God. I list again, by chapters, the points we have noted, albeit, in slightly more shortened form:

Chapter 6

1. A sincere heart of wanting to understand the ways of God. I believe the Word exhorts us to seek and hold onto the knowledge of God, the ways of God, wisdom or discernment. God looks at the heart of men. Men may not know the meditations of our hearts but God knows {through the Holy Spirit}. I believe when Gideon asked the questions in Judges 6:13, there was no bad insinuation in his heart.

2. Humility is a likeable trait to God. The opposite of being proud is being humble, not neutral. I leave my quote for you to ponder, “We need to be humble, if we were to be used positively by the Lord.” (The Pharaoh of Egypt, who was proud, was used by the Lord, but negatively.). Gideon was really humble (Judges 6:14-17).

3. Learn about our faith heritage. By this I do not mean just knowing the Word of God, as in, ok, I need to know what I must do and what I must not do, full-stop. I believe it pleases God if we try to know the “full works”. It takes time; nonetheless we need to be actively learning the full works. It is important that this learning include the past and present dealings of God with man. If we truly believe God is the same yesterday, today and forever, how can the past dealings of God be not relevant? There is much to learn in those dealings. There are 2 mistakes that we can make. First, is to ignore the Old Testament dealings of God with man, thinking that they are no longer relevant to us. Second, is to ignore God’s dealings with man outside the Bible. We should not ignore the dealings of God with man post-completion of Bible writing. A lot of Christians missed God’s blessing because they ignored what happened post-Bible completion. What was/is happening around the world with regard to God’s dealings with man is relevant to us.

4. Give pleasing offerings. Don’t be stingy with God. Yes, obedience is better than sacrifice. But it does not mean there is no need to sacrifice. If you truly love God, you embrace both. There are other motivations for both obedience and sacrifice, but I believe the correct motivation that pleases God is the love for God. Obedience can be motivated by fear of punishment but that is not what God is after. Jesus said if you love me, obey my commandments; he who obeys my commandments loves Me (John 14:15 & 21). What does the “famous” John 3:16 says? Yes, God so loved the world that He gave {sacrificed} His one and own begotten Son …… Pleasing sacrifice is not based on some code of honor of some secret society, or fear of embarrassment or grows out of a desire to stroke one’s ego, or so that we can leave a name for all posterity. Pleasing sacrifice flows from love. Sacrifice to God, therefore, to be pleasing to God, is one that flows from love for God.

5. Obey God. When we look at the burnt offering asked of, by the Lord, and Gideon’s doing as instructed, we find both obedience and sacrifice, the manifestations of love (of Gideon for God), at work. That seven years old bull was a prized possession (sacrifice). At the same time, the performing of the offering could bring a lot of problems for Gideon, could even cost him his life (obedience).

6. Trust God and be courageous. Without faith, it is impossible to please God. Obviously what Gideon did concerning the desecration of Baal altar and Asherah pole was expected to come to light. Gideon trusted God to take care of things, and it was courageous of him to go ahead to do as instructed by the Lord. To be courageous is not necessarily to be without fear. To be courageous is to do the right thing despite fear.

7. Inquire of the Lord before going to war. God and Satan are at war. When we accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior, we have chosen side; we are sided with God. We are at war (The Apostle Paul said in 2 Tim 2:3, endure with us like a good soldier of Christ Jesus). For whatever role that we have been assigned for the season, we are to be battle-ready (there are many battles in a gigantic war that stretched over time). We are also not to be a “stray soldier”, going to a battle without checking with our Commander, the Lord.

It appeared that a sign was not an uncommon way to ask for confirmation from the Lord in the olden days. I believe God still give signs to people as confirmation.

Chapter 7

1. In service for Lord, one must be attentive to God. This was the attitude of Gideon. Even after a double confirmation (with unmistakable signs of the fleece) from the Lord to fight the powerful Midianites and her alliances, with the promise of the Lord going with him, Gideon was still attentive to God, to what God wanted him to do to accomplish his mission. Gideon was working with God; he catered to God. That is what we must also do, cater to God. Many church liturgies leave no room for this, sad to say!

2. Victory is meant to glorify God, and God alone. Whether we meant it or not, it is best for us not to use the word, glory on ourselves. Glory, presently, belongs solely to the Lord. All must be ascribed to the Lord; no one is allowed to take any of it for himself. God reduced Gideon’s army strength to 1% so that all glory might be ascribed to Him and Him alone.

3. Without faith you cannot glorify God. The Scriptures directly said without faith it is impossible to please God. I believe without faith you cannot glorify God, too. The Scriptures does, in fact, talk about doing things without element of faith at all as sin; and if it is sin it obviously cannot glorify God. Going to battle with 1% army strength really required faith, in absolute numbers it was 300 men against 135,000!

4. It is ok to be afraid but we must be courageous. God knew Gideon was afraid, who wouldn’t be, at the thought of fighting a battle with only 1% of the original strength. Yet we can say that Gideon was courageous. I believe the courage, in the Bible, was about doing what was right despite being afraid.

5. Be humble and be humble. In the last Chapter we have already discovered that Gideon was humble, and that was a likeable trait by God. We see here again Gibeon was humble before the Lord; had he not being humble and admit that he was afraid, and had he put up a bold front before God, he would have missed the sign given by God through the dream of one of enemy’s men about the loaf of barley bread crashing the enemy at her camp.

6. Know our faith heritage to know what to do. This again is a repeat of one of the points in the previous chapter. It is just that I paraphrased it differently. Gideon knew what to do, to get to the enemy’s camp, to blow the trumpets, to shout, and to smash the jars to let the fires of the torches to come forth, all because he probably knew the significances of the available resources from his understanding of the faith heritage.

7. Faith must be followed by actions consistent with the faith. Faith without action is dead; the Book of James tells us that. Gideon acted consistent with his faith in God. God said to take only 1% of the army strength and to go into the enemy’s camp of 135,000, he acted on it! Do we really believe God is good, God is in control, and He has our interest at heart, too? If we do, there should not be lack of actions consistent with that faith in our lives.

Chapter 8

1. Love peace, and be gracious as the Lord has been to you
Many of us have a mindset of being very hard up for things, wealth, status, and even power and authority. Worse still, some of us are having this mindset despite already having and are being blessed with much by the grace of God. The relentless pursuit of these things, without the blessing of God inadvertently leads to strive, and peace taking a back seat; and enmity will arise, or made worse. We saw that Gideon was not like that. Very clearly God had raised Gideon, from the weakest clan in the Manasseh tribe, and the least in his family; yet we saw how he dealt with the sensitive issue between the sub-tribes of the house of Joseph. Some people grew up from poor and deprived families, and when they achieve successes in their lives, they are very grateful and thankful, and compassionate towards the poor and needy, and the marginalized and afflicted; while some of them, despite coming from such backgrounds, are not at all gracious to those who are struggling. It is sad to observe the latter.

Gideon was not hard up at all; he just concentrated on doing the things that God wanted him to do. I believe he knew what mattered was how God looked at him. In the Book of Romans, the Apostle Paul talked about serving, and he put it in this way: Serve righteously, and serve in the peace and joy of the Holy Spirit, in that way, our service will be pleasing to God, and our service will also gain the approval of men. Such had been the attitude of Gideon, and we read that at the end of the war, when finally the entire enemy had been subdued, the people still wanted Gideon, and his descendants, to be their king, despite that the war was over, and his letting the Ephraimites to take some of the choicest credits.

2. Can one sit on the fence? Apparently not
A man is never sitting on the fence. By The Fall of Man (an article is coming up), the unregenerate man is on Satan’s side. The only choice for man is either he remains on the side of Satan or he crosses over the line or the fence, into God’s side. Jesus Himself said that those not with Him is against Him (Matt 12:30a, Luke 11:23a). What is even more startling to know is what He said, for the second part, that those who do not gather with Him, scatter.

If you are not on God’s side you are on Satan’s side; Harsh it might seem, but that is the reality, although I believe in most cases, if not in all cases, God does provide a chance for one to choose. When it is the time to choose, and one does not choose, one is actually not sitting on the fence; he has made a decision, and that decision is that he has opted to ratify his existing position of being on Satan’s side.

In this Book of Judges, there are 3 examples of men or cities not taking side with God. These examples did not show that the parties went against God, but only that they were not with the Lord (just like Jesus said it in the New Testament), and they would not gather with the Lord. In all 3 examples, punishments were meted out.

3. Don’t play, play, the words from the mouths of favored men of God can be powerful
The declarations or prophetic words of favored men of God can, very well be honored by God, and be made to come to pass, just like what had happened to Succoth and Peniel in Judges 8.

4. Any form of idol worship is abominable to God
Gideon made a golden ephod with the gold melted down from the gold earrings from the spoil of war. This ephod was placed in his hometown and was being worshipped by the Israelites; and this was recorded for us as a snare to Gideon and his family.

This is not an isolated case, and I believe if we are not careful, we, men, tend to do these things – instead of worshipping God, we end up worshipping or giving the due reverence to a thing (making it an idol) rather than the Giver, who is God Himself.

5. Always be on your guard (be watchful) so that you may finish well
Few men of God, recorded for us in the Bible, finished well. The Apostle Paul had repeatedly called believers to be watchful, to keep our eyes focused on the finishing line, and to press on, and to run the race in such a way as to finish the race, wining the prizes. His motto for us is to run to win the prize God has in mind for each one of us, in Heaven.

Gideon, it looked to me, could not be absolved from blame for the worship of the golden ephod he made and installed, unless the worship was started only after his passing on.

6. Again, without a judge, after the death of Gideon, the Israelites went back to pagan worship
History repeated itself for the Israelites in this area - a consistent failure over the Judges period. Look at ourselves honestly, is there an area in our lives, we consistently fail the Lord?

7. Be kind to the family of the servants of God
Despite Gideon’s installing of the golden ephod leading to people worshipping the ephod, God still have it recorded that the Israelites ought to have been kind to the family of Gideon after he passed on. The point to be made is that we should be kind to the family of the late servants of God.


Anthony Chia - Lord, there is much to learn from Gideon’s life; help me to learn them well so that I may please you, always.

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Modus Operandi of Satan

There are other ways Satan acts against man; this article looks at the ancient modus operandi of Satan.

THE ANCIENT MODUS OPERANDI OF SATAN

John 10:10 - The thief [Satan] comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I [Jesus] have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

What does Satan come to do? To steal, kill and destroy. How does he do it? In other words, what is his modus operandi? This is how I look it:

1. To steal (the truths from the people) by contradiction with an outright lie/half-truth.

2. To kill by making one curious to try. You have heard it – Curiosity kills the cat. Interestingly, the thing that Satan uses to make one curious, is usually a truth or subtly distorted truth.

3. To destroy by promise of grandiose, appealing to pride and power.


In relation to The Fall, this is clearly seen in Gen 3:4-5 -

"You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." (Gen 3:4-5).

1. To steal (the truths) by contradiction with an outright lie/half-truth.
God said in Gen 2:17, “You will surely die” but Satan said, “You will not surely die”. Eve’s trust in God got shaken because of Satan’s lie.

2. To kill by making one curious to try.
Satan said, “……your eyes will be opened”. Eve probably thought in her heart, “Wow, what does he mean by my eyes will be opened. Was God hiding something? Let’s find out.” Of course, we know from Gen 3:7, “your eyes will be opened”, was a truth because verse 7 recorded that both Adam and Eve were opened and they saw that they were naked and felt ashamed (Earlier, In Gen 2:25, it was recorded that the man and his wife were both naked but they felt no shame).

3. To destroy by promise of grandiose, appealing to pride and power.
Satan said, “and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” Eve probably thought, “What can be better? Let’s eat it, man! What are we waiting for?”

{added: 18/08/2010 NB: In the New Testament it was said that it was Eve who was deceived by the Serpent; nevertheless, Adam was accountable to God, and was considered to have sinned along with Eve when he listened to Eve to take of the fruit from the tree of knowledge and evil.}

In relation to The 3 Temptations of Jesus (the second/last Adam) (Mat 4:1-11) –

After 40 days and 40 nights of fasting, Jesus was hungry, and Satan came up to Him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread." (v3). "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down. For it is written: " 'He will command his angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.'" (v6). "All this [the world with all its splendor] I will give you, if you will bow down and worship me." (v9).

The first Adam, fell when tempted by Satan but not the second/last Adam, Jesus; but the same modus operandi was used:

1. To steal (the truths) by contradiction with an outright lie/half-truth.Although these were not the exact words Satan used, I believe this was what Satan was implying to Jesus, “You did not eat for 40 days and 40 nights, you must eat to live, turn these stones into bread for food so that you will live.” "Eat (physically) and you will live" is only a half-truth. Jesus held on to the truth which was in Deu 8:3 and said it, "It is written: 'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"

2. To kill by making one curious to try.
Satan used a subtly distorted truth taken from Psalm 91:11&12 in an attempt to make Jesus curious enough to test God. If it were the first Adam, he probably might have thought, “Yah man, it would be interesting to see if God would send his angels to scoop me up before I hit the ground.” Jesus knew better and answered back with another truth, Deu 6:16, “It is also written: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'"

3. To destroy by promise of grandiose, appealing to pride and power.
Satan was saying, “I will give you the world!” But Jesus basically said, “World or no world, I will not disobey my God” when He said, “For it is written: 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.'”(Deu 6:13).


In relation to The Triple Sins of King David (2 Sam 11 – 2 Sam 12) –

King David, said to be the man after God’s heart, broke 3 commandments at one go (one after another). What are they? Thou shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, thou shall not commit adultery and finally thou shall not murder. The events recorded in the book of 2 Samuel chapter 11 and 12 do not have any mention of Satan. I am suggesting to you that Satan was at work (in fact Satan {and his team} is always at work). I believe the same modus operandi was at work:

1. To steal (the truths) by contradiction with an outright lie/half-truth.
In 2 Sam 11:2, we read that, from the roof of his palace, King David saw a very beautiful woman taking her bath. The King was subsequently told, the woman, Bathsheba, was the wife of Uriah, a soldier of the King, a loyal Hittite soldier (v3). The truth is that the Ten Commandment stated that one should not covet another’s wife. Playing the devil’s advocate, I would say at that point in time, Satan might have said to David, “But you are the King, what. A King can desire what he wants.” So, because David did not resist the temptation, he broke one commandment – thou shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.

2. To kill by making one curious to try.
Satan probably went on further and said something like, “See, even God was on your side – He gave Saul’s house to you, including his wives, didn’t he? So, what’s the problem? [In 2 Sam 12:8, Samuel spoke about the Saul’s house and his wives being given to King David by the Lord].” David sent for Bathsheba and committed the 2nd sin – thou shall not commit adultery.

3. To destroy by promise of grandiose, appealing to pride and power.
“Oops, Bathsheba got pregnant, what am I going to do?” maybe this thought crossed David’s mind. I imagine this would probably be what Satan said, “Good, now you have a son, isn’t that great, the King now has a son. You just need to get rid of Uriah and take Bathsheba as your wife and live happily ever after. Tell you what, you are the King, just set Uriah up to die at the battlefront, that should be easy for you. In fact, it is ok to let your general, Joab know so that people will know, as the King, you can do what you want, and whoever stands in the way will be destroyed. No sweat , no one would dare speak out against you.” David set Uriah up, and Uriah was killed as planned by David – David committed murder, the 3rd sin. We read in 2 Sam 11:26-27, David then took Bathsheba as his wife and she bore him a son, but the Lord was not pleased with what David did.



Anthony Chia – Lord, help me to be quick to recognize the ancient modus operandi of Satan in situations of my life.

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Seeking the face of God when one is afflicted by wicked people - Psalm 9

The way to read this article is that the orange underlined texts are the verses of the Bible (NIV, unless otherwise stated). The black texts following the Bible verses (and enclosed by square brackets) are my commentaries. At the end of these Bible texts and commentaries, I have inserted a section on "Points to take note".
{For full listing of all articles in this Psalms exposition series, click here}

[To me, this psalm is about seeking the face of God when one is afflicted by wicked people. This is a supplication by David to God when he was faced with wicked enemies (this was most probably not the first time he had faced wicked enemies). Because the heading of the psalm had in it, direction to the music director pointing to the tune of “The Death of the Son”, some commentators said that it got to do with the death of his, David’s, first son with Bathsheba (2 Sam 12); but I could see no apparent link with the death of David’s son (the son was from the adulterous affair with Bathsheba). The death of the child was pronounced by God as a punishment for David’s triple breaking of the Ten Commandments. David was guilty of covetousness, followed by adultery, and finally murder.

So, let us just treat this psalm as such, David’s psalm in a time of facing enemies who were wicked.]


1I will praise you, O LORD, with all my heart;
I will tell of all your wonders. [This is a psalm of King David. He opened this psalm with a reminder to himself, as well as to tell God that he would always do this one thing. And this one thing was to praise God. Praise is easy to understand – it implied singing, singing songs of praise, and worship, psalms, odes, etc. It can include other outward manifestations like clapping of hands and even dancing for the Lord. Another very important aspect of praise is to tell others how good and great God is, i.e. sing his praises, so to speak. Those were what David did – singing, and dancing and performing for the Lord, and he would do this with great exuberance (in fact with all his heart), as well as telling others of all of God’s wonders. David, ever since he was drafted into Saul service, from being a shepherd boy, was growing in influence. David used that which gave him influence, to spread the goodness and greatness of God.]
2 I will be glad and rejoice in you;
I will sing praise to your name, O Most High. [David said he will be glad and rejoice in God. It was not that there were no occasions at all that David had moments of sadness, and filled with frustrations. It could be, and can be for us all, too. Why? Because we are all living in a fallen world with Satan hard at work, and we are also subject to chastisement (which are not always to our liking) from God for our growth. Yet, just as David had and did, we must know that we have an underlying peace and fullness of joy that comes from the Holy Spirit that lives in us (for David, possibly not in him but was often with him because of the devotion and time David spent before the Lord, of course the Holy Spirit could come into David from time to time but unlikely the Spirit was dwelling in him like He is doing in us all); and we must choose to be glad and rejoice in God, in recognition to that belief. Faith must be acted out – in this case like David, we are to sing praises to God; when we do that, we are saying to God that we have faith in God to see us through all our life afflictions.]
3 My enemies turn back;
they stumble and perish before you.
4 For you have upheld my right and my cause;
you have sat on your throne, judging righteously.
5 You have rebuked the nations and destroyed the wicked;
you have blotted out their name forever and ever.
6 Endless ruin has overtaken the enemy,
you have uprooted their cities;
even the memory of them has perished. [How can we get ourselves to praise God despite our sad and frustrating circumstances? How can we act out our faith in belief that God is good, righteous, and great? Remember and recount, that was what David did here. David used a mix of past and present (present continuous) tense to declare to himself that not only God did, God would continue to do for him, the turning back of his enemies, the stumbling of enemies, and the perishing of enemies. David reminded himself that God was and is a righteous God; He had judged righteously and had upheld his right and cause. He was and is great; He had rebuked the nations and destroyed the wicked, even blotted the names of the wicked forever and ever. Endless ruin had overtaken God’s enemy, their cities God had uprooted; even the memory of them had perished – in the Book of Judges, there are recordings of such cities or places, one of them is Meroz (recorded in Judges 5 – Song of Deborah).]
7 The LORD reigns forever;
he has established his throne for judgment.
8 He will judge the world in righteousness;
he will govern the peoples with justice.
9 The LORD is a refuge for the oppressed,
a stronghold in times of trouble.
10 Those who know your name will trust in you,
for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.
11 Sing praises to the LORD, enthroned in Zion;
proclaim among the nations what he has done.
12 For he who avenges blood remembers;
he does not ignore the cry of the afflicted. [When faith had arisen, David started to magnify the Lord. He declared the Lord reigns forever; He had established His throne of judgment. He will judge the world in righteousness; he will govern the peoples with justice (there is always justice with the Lord, not necessarily equality – the two is not the same). For the depressed, the Lord will be a refuge, and for those afflicted, the Lord will be the stronghold. For all who know God, and therefore have their trust in Him, when they seek the Lord, the Lord will never forsake them. So David was saying, with one who reigns forever, and judges righteously; one who is a refuge for the oppressed, stronghold for the troubled; and one who never forsake those who know Him and have placed their trusts in Him, and are seeking Him, as our Lord, we are to rejoice and sing praise to our God who is enthroned in Zion, the Holy Mountain, and proclaim His name among the nations – give testimonies to glorify the Lord. God is our avenger, and the marvelous thing is that He remembers, and he does not ignore the cries of the afflicted (cries against wicked people of Sodom and Gomorrah, for e.g.; also the cries of Israelites in Book of Judges when oppressed wickedly by enemies in the Promised Land), Hallelujah.]
13 O LORD, see how my enemies persecute me!
Have mercy and lift me up from the gates of death, [Psalm is in fact, also a prayer. We see here, as typical of a prayer, now David present his request before the Lord. He said, “O lord, see how my enemies persecute me!” It was as if David said, “Help, Lord, help”. Have mercy and lift me up from the gates of death. We see here that actually at this moment David was in affliction, yet we saw in the earlier verses of the psalm how David still got himself to magnify the Lord despite his circumstances; that is the attitude of heart that we must assume, in whatever circumstances that we are struggling in, we must arouse our faith to rise up to praise and magnify God.]
14 that I may declare your praises
in the gates of the Daughter of Zion
and there rejoice in your salvation. [It was as if David was telling God to do it again for him, “so that I may declare (yet another time) your praises (sing God’s praise) in the gates of the Daughter of Zion {possibly referring to Jerusalem}, and there, greatly rejoice (celebrate) in your saving of me.”]
15 The nations have fallen into the pit they {referring to the enemies in v13} have dug;
their {referring to the nations} feet are caught in the net they {referring to the enemies in v13} have hidden. [David explained to the Lord that he was (again) up against wicked people. David knew the heart of God concerning wickedness; put it mildly, God does not like wicked people. I believe this is one of the reasons why David was said to a man after God’s heart. David went on to paint the picture of the wicked people and what they did: Wicked people are like people digging pit or setting net to snare others. David said that nations had fallen into the pit dug by these wicked people; they were caught in the net the wicked people set for them.

Quite a few Bible commentators viewed verse 15 as David stating that wicked nation {Strong number used was 1471 which can mean “heathen”, but not necessarily wicked, but if the parties were taken to be self-referring, then wicked nations were implied, which was not necessarily the case} had fallen into the pit they themselves had dug, or that they were caught in the every net they themselves had set. The verse by itself can be interpreted as such, and if such was the interpretation, the next verse, v16, was just to reaffirm the same position; although some scholars chose to explain verse 16 as God in executing his justice, ensnared the wicked with the works of his (God’s) own hands.

However, I personally feel that firstly, verse 15 was a description of the modus operandi of the wicked, and secondly, it was to be a clarification of the nature of David’s enemies mentioned by David in verse 13, i.e. it was meant to give a description of the kind of enemies that David were facing. In other words, the “they” in verse 15 were referring to the enemies in verse 13, not necessarily referring to the “nations” in verse 15 itself. If one was reading verse 15 in isolation or by itself, of course, “their” could only be referring the “nations” in the same verse itself. You can take either interpretation, but I believe whichever interpretation we use, clearly the NIV translation of the next verse, v16, is correct, i.e. the wicked are ensnared by the works of their hands, not God’s hands. That, I believe, was why the special musical notation “Higgaion” was used here (see next verse).]
16 The LORD is known by his justice;
the wicked are ensnared by the work of their {own} hands.
Higgaion {mediate on that}. Selah
17 The wicked return to the grave,
all the nations that forget God. [David knew how God would deal with wicked people. God would and will use the wicked people’s very snare to punish them, i.e. God would/will cause wicked people to be ensnared by the works of their own hands! {Of course, it does not mean that God cannot execute his own form of punishment}. David said this was God’s known justice. Even in our times, under the New Testament times which many regarded as an era of grace and mercy (of God’s preference to be long-suffering, to be deferring judgment until the End, and to be giving people time and chances to repent), I believe God still does let the stubbornly wicked people get a taste of their own medicine even presently (present life). Wickedness and holiness are directly opposite. God is holiness, and you need holiness to see God. Where God is enthroned it is holy because He is holy. So, heaven is a holy place. God is holy and heaven is a holy place, and we want to go to heaven; the Scriptures exhort us to be holy as God is holy. If holiness gets to do with God, wickedness, Satan. If holy people get to heaven, wicked ones, Hell (or temporary, Sheol). So, in a figure of speech, it is correct to say holy ones come from heaven, wicked ones from the grave or Sheol (or even Hell). David said here, let the wicked return to the grave. What David was imploring God to do was to act presently concerning wicked people, send them to the grave; including all the nations that had forgotten the Lord. But why, you might ask, that nations that had forgotten the Lord be included? I believe nations that had forgotten the Lord had in them great numbers of wicked people, because nations that had forgotten the Lord, many depravities went unchecked, there were no voices to speak up against any form of wickedness. On the other hand, for nations that had not forgotten the Lord completely there will always be some voices speaking for the Lord, and calling for repentance.]
18 But the needy will not always be forgotten,
nor the hope of the afflicted ever perish.
19 Arise, O LORD, let not man triumph;
let the nations be judged in your presence.
20 Strike them with terror, O LORD;
let the nations know they are but men.
Selah [While David was calling for action presently by God towards the wicked people, he was also imploring God to help those who need the help of God (the needy here are not necessarily limited to those in physical destitute, of lacking food and clothing, although these could be included), and fulfill the hope of the afflicted ones so that that hope would not die out.

David, knowing God’s heart concerning wickedness, also hated people setting themselves up against God or were proud, having no regard for God (and God opposes the proud, said the Scriptures), so he called on God to arise, not to let man triumph; he asked that God judge presently the nations (wicked nations or nations that had forgotten God), and display his wrath [a display of wrath like that on the wicked place of Sodom and Gomorrah would surely strike great terror) so that the nations would know they were but men.]


Points to note/learn:

This psalm gave us a good model to follow when we want God’s help when facing wicked people.

1. Despite our circumstances, (and I can tell from first-hand experience that it is very demoralizing, and depressing, and outright frustrating when you are up against wicked people), we must remind ourselves, and even tell it to God, that we will always praise God, with all our heart. Very difficult, at times, but we must, if we profess that our trust is in the Lord.

2. Remember that praises include both singing (and dancing ,etc) praises to God, and singing his praises (testifying His goodness and greatness)

3. We must choose to be glad and rejoice in God. We must firstly know and believe by faith that we do have an underlying peace and fullness of joy that can come from the Holy Spirit. We must choose to act out our faith by singing praises to the Lord. The Apostle Paul was imprisoned yet he chose to be glad and rejoice in the Lord by singing praises to God. What happened after that? The prison shook and prison doors opened.

4. Still find it difficult, use David’s approach – recount God’s goodness and greatness. In the past, how have God delivered you? If you did not have much to go by, hang onto those of others, testimonies you have heard of. If even that, was lacking, look to the Word, many had been afflicted in the Bible; what God did for them, God can do for you too; claim them for yourselves.

5. And when your faith has arisen, even magnify the Lord. Are singing praises (v2) to God and magnifying God the same? Not necessarily, just in matter of degree or shades, we go from singing praises to magnifying. From a choice, and recounting of the past, you push your faith into action, to sing, to sing praises, more of referring the past in giving of your exaltation to God. Magnifying calls for moving into declaration, into making things bigger so to speak (you can never over-stretch God), of attributing greater importance (to the role of God, for example), of injecting greater expectation and excitement into your circumstances, of letting your faith to call forth the reality of God into your future, as opposed to referring to the past when you started off in singing praises. It is not hyping; it is speaking of the true perspective – God is gigantic, and your problem or enemy is tiny, God can fix it.

6. Tell God your problem or enemies; in this case, the problem is with wicked people, the enemy is wicked. Tell God to judge for you because you cannot likewise be wicked, go tick for tack. If indeed, your enemy is wicked, God knows how to turn your enemy’s wicked scheme back on him, the enemy, and turn your situation around. Please understand that we cannot be wicked just because someone is wicked towards us. If you turn wicked as well, you may lose the hands of protection/blessing of the Lord.

7. And when you secured your victory, do not forget to sing God’s praises, and give thanksgiving unto God (v14).



Anthony Chia, high.expressions - Lord, deliver me from my wicked enemy.

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Judges series - Judges 8

The way to read this article is that the orange underlined texts are the verses of the Bible (NIV, unless otherwise stated). The black texts following the Bible verses (and enclosed by square brackets) are my commentaries. At the end of these Bible texts and commentaries, I have inserted a section on "Points to take note".
{For full listing of all articles in this series, click here}

Judges 8
[This chapter is the last of the 3 on Gideon. Indeed, Gideon was a major judge; 3 chapters were devoted to him, Judge Deborah had only 2 (only Judge Samson whom we will cover in the future, has more chapters devoted to him). In this chapter, we will read of the capturing of the 2 last kings (“the 2 Zs”, I called them), and the punishments of the 2 cities which refused to aid the Lord, finally a brief about Gideon’s life, including the creation of the Gideon’s Ephod, and his having a son called Abimelech, by a Shechem woman.]

Zebah and Zalmunna {2 remaining Midian Kings}
1 Now the Ephraimites asked Gideon, "Why have you treated us like this? Why didn't you call us when you went to fight Midian?" And they criticized him sharply. 2 But he answered them, "What have I accomplished compared to you? Aren't the gleanings of Ephraim's grapes better than the full grape harvest of Abiezer? 3 God gave Oreb and Zeeb, the Midianite leaders, into your hands. What was I able to do compared to you?" At this, their resentment against him subsided. [There is a little background to the Ephraimites’ remarks. Like I said in the last commentary in Judges 7, a little knowledge of the 12 tribes of Israel helps in understanding of some of the Bible stories. At the start, Manasseh and Ephraim are the 2 sons born to Joseph, one of the 12 sons of Israel (aka Jacob). Customarily, the firstborn will carry the family line down the generations; there are great privileges and rights to the firstborn families. What happened was, when it was time to bless Joseph’s children, Israel (Joseph’s father, and therefore the paternal grandfather of the 2 kids) placed his right hand on the Ephraim, and left on Manasseh (in the words of my daughter, Audrey, the crossing of hands), although Manasseh was the firstborn, and should have had Israel’s right hand on him. What resulted was that Ephraim was put ahead of Manasseh, and to cut the story short, the matter was resolved with 2 tribes being established in the house of Joseph. So, the tribes of Israel often got quoted with Ephraim and Manasseh in them. It is almost like there were 13 tribes because Ephraim and Manasseh were often quoted, and quoted separately.

Because Gideon was from the weakest clan in the Manasseh tribe, and in Judges 6:35, we read that he sent messengers out to some of the tribes of Israel but did not include the Ephraimites, and now there was victory, the Ephraimites were not happy. Gideon had God’s wisdom, and he answered them saying firstly, the Ephraimites had better privileges and rights (though they did not come from the firstborn, descendants of Manasseh were of the firstborn line), the mere gleanings of the Ephraimites were better than the full harvest of the Gideon’s clan, Abiezer; secondly, the Ephraimites got to slay the Midianite leaders, Oreb and Zeeb. Gideon did subsequently sent messengers to Ephraim to come and kill the Midianites (Judges 7:24). Basically, Gideon was saying to the Ephraimites, “You got the better end of the stick”. He made peace - no wonder God made him the Judge.]
4 Gideon and his three hundred men, exhausted yet keeping up the pursuit, came to the Jordan and crossed it. 5 He said to the men of Succoth, "Give my troops some bread; they are worn out, and I am still pursuing Zebah and Zalmunna, the kings of Midian." 6 But the officials of Succoth said, "Do you already have the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna in your possession? Why should we give bread to your troops?" 7 Then Gideon replied, "Just for that, when the LORD has given Zebah and Zalmunna into my hand, I will tear your flesh with desert thorns and briers." 8 From there he went up to Peniel and made the same request of them, but they answered as the men of Succoth had. 9 So he said to the men of Peniel, "When I return in triumph, I will tear down this tower." [There will always be people who will not aid the cause of God. We read of this also in Judge Deborah’s exploit, where she, together with Barak led the Israelites to fight at the Kishon River, and there was a village called Meroz whose inhabitants refused to help. The Lord cursed the village (Judges 5:23). Here we read of the peoples of two separate cities refusing to provide bread for Gideon’s 300 men troop, when the latter were pursuing the remaining 2 kings of Midian, Zebah and Zalmunna. Earlier on, in Judges 6, I suggested people like Abraham, Moses and Gideon have the favor of God. Indeed if you study a little more of their lives, you will know that they had the favor of God. I really hope I can grow in favor with God. Do you know why? It is because people with God’s favor will be able to do great exploits for God. If you want to read a little more about this favor and doing exploits for God, you can read the 3rd section of my article – Reserve glory and worship for God, practise honor, and grow in favor with God. I believe that the words of people with God’s favor can be powerful; God is likely to bring their words to pass, if they are not inconsistent with His ways. Gideon declared that he would come back to them, men of Succoth and Peniel, and teach them a lesson. That would surely come to pass.] 10 Now Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor with a force of about fifteen thousand men, all that were left of the armies of the eastern peoples; a hundred and twenty thousand swordsmen had fallen. 11 Gideon went up by the route of the nomads east of Nobah and Jogbehah and fell upon the unsuspecting army. 12 Zebah and Zalmunna, the two kings of Midian, fled, but he pursued them and captured them, routing their entire army. [Gideon finally managed to route the entire enemy army; even with reduced numbers, still it was 300 men versed 15,000. The 2 Midian kings were captured.] 13 Gideon son of Joash then returned from the battle by the Pass of Heres. 14 He caught a young man of Succoth and questioned him, and the young man wrote down for him the names of the seventy-seven officials of Succoth, the elders of the town. 15 Then Gideon came and said to the men of Succoth, "Here are Zebah and Zalmunna, about whom you taunted me by saying, 'Do you already have the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna in your possession? Why should we give bread to your exhausted men?' " 16 He took the elders of the town and taught the men of Succoth a lesson by punishing them with desert thorns and briers. 17 He also pulled down the tower of Peniel and killed the men of the town. [This is the record of Gideon’s declarations against Succoth and Peniel coming to pass. Don’t play, play with people with God’s favor, God is on their side. You can read of other examples of this from my separate article – Don’t play, play, the words from the mouths of favored men of God can be powerful]
18 Then he asked Zebah and Zalmunna, "What kind of men did you kill at Tabor?" "Men like you," they answered, "each one with the bearing of a prince." 19 Gideon replied, "Those were my brothers, the sons of my own mother. As surely as the LORD lives, if you had spared their lives, I would not kill you." 20 Turning to Jether, his oldest son, he said, "Kill them!" But Jether did not draw his sword, because he was only a boy and was afraid. 21 Zebah and Zalmunna said, "Come, do it yourself. 'As is the man, so is his strength.' "So Gideon stepped forward and killed them, and took the ornaments off their camels' necks. [I was wondering what these verses about the killings at Mount Tabor were about. Perhaps, Gideon was referring to the atrocities of Midianites against the Israelites in the seven years after Judge Deborah and before God’s appointment of Gideon, recorded for us in Judges 6:1. It was possible. Deborah, together with Barak fought Jabin in the area of Mount Tabor, in the valley below the mount and at the bank of the Kishon River. With victory, it was likely that the Israelites occupied and lived on those lands around Mount Tabor. In fact, in Judges 6:2-6, the Israelites were so oppressed by the Midianites that the Israelites had to run up the mountain and live in mountain clefts, caves and strongholds. I believe although many Israelites were killed, many of the Israelites were left alive for oppressions (including perpetually being robbed of the fruits of their labor, crops and livestock – free food for the Midianites); maybe the nobles and the royalties were mostly brought before the kings of the Midianites, to be dealt with. They ended up being killed. To avenge the deaths, Gideon decided that the 2 kings must die. Maybe Gideon thought of giving the honor to his firstborn, but the boy was too young and was afraid to kill; it ended up Gideon himself did the honor.]

Gideon's Ephod
22 The Israelites said to Gideon, "Rule over us—you, your son and your grandson—because you have saved us out of the hand of Midian." 23 But Gideon told them, "I will not rule over you, nor will my son rule over you. The LORD will rule over you." 24 And he said, "I do have one request, that each of you give me an earring from your share of the plunder." (It was the custom of the Ishmaelites to wear gold earrings.) 25 They answered, "We'll be glad to give them." So they spread out a garment, and each man threw a ring from his plunder onto it. 26 The weight of the gold rings he asked for came to seventeen hundred shekels, not counting the ornaments, the pendants and the purple garments worn by the kings of Midian or the chains that were on their camels' necks. [The Israelites wanted to make Gideon King over the Israelites but Gideon declined. Instead he asked that he be given an earring from each man from the share of the spoil of war. At first I was stumped by the sentence in the bracket in verse 24. On checking I learnt that the Midianites and Ishmaelites are the same (Gen37:25, 28), the descendants of Ishmael, the son Abraham had with Hagar, the Egyptian maidservant. Wearing gold earrings was the custom of Ishmaelites, and so that accounted for the great number of earrings collected as war spoils.] 27 Gideon made the gold into an ephod, which he placed in Ophrah, his town. All Israel prostituted themselves by worshiping it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and his family. [What a pity! What a pity! To me it was a pity, unless some references can be found to support that the worshipping was after Gideon’s time, I really have to take this verse plainly and say that it was a pity, Gideon did not end well. Such worship was and is an abomination to God.]

Gideon's Death
28 Thus Midian was subdued before the Israelites and did not raise its head again. During Gideon's lifetime, the land enjoyed peace forty years. [Israelites enjoyed 40 years of peace while Judge Gideon was alive] 29 Jerub-Baal son of Joash went back home to live. 30 He had seventy sons of his own, for he had many wives. 31 His concubine, who lived in Shechem, also bore him a son, whom he named Abimelech. 32 Gideon son of Joash died at a good old age and was buried in the tomb of his father Joash in Ophrah of the Abiezrites. [Gideon lived a long life, had 70 sons and many wives. Specifically recorded here is a concubine in Shechem who bored him a son, called Abimelech. Gideon died and was buried with his father, Joash in their hometown of Ophrah] 33 No sooner had Gideon died than the Israelites again prostituted themselves to the Baals. They set up Baal-Berith as their god and 34 did not remember the LORD their God, who had rescued them from the hands of all their enemies on every side. 35 They also failed to show kindness to the family of Jerub-Baal (that is, Gideon) for all the good things he had done for them. [History repeated itself, again after the death of a judge, the Israelites went back to the worship of pagan gods, and forgot about the Lord who rescued them from the hands of all their enemies. They also forgot what Gideon had done for them, and did not show kindness to the family of Gideon. The first bit, I can understand easily. Why the 2nd bit got recorded for us? Maybe the Lord would like us to not forget to be kind to the families of the servants of God after the servants had passed on. Many servants of God gave of themselves, even at the sacrifices of their loved ones, whom they then left behind when they (the servants) passed on. Shouldn’t we be kind to those they left behind?]


Points to take note/learnt:

1. Love peace, and be gracious as the Lord has been to you
Many of us have a mindset of being very hard up for things, wealth, status, and even power and authority. Worse still, some of us are having this mindset despite already having and are being blessed with much by the grace of God. The relentless pursuit of these things, without the blessing of God inadvertently leads to strive, and peace taking a back seat, and enmity will arise, or made worse. We saw that Gideon was not like that, but we will read later in Chapter 12 (you do not need to turn it now, as I will cover it in due course) that another judge raised by God, called Jephthah, although also from the Manasseh tribe, just like Gideon, was not like Gideon in this respect.

Very clearly God had raised Gideon, from the weakest clan in the Manasseh tribe, and the least in his family, above all; yet we saw how he dealt with the sensitive issue between the sub-tribes of the house of Joseph. Gideon was a man of war (we are all men of war; the Apostle Paul said we are all soldiers of Christ) and at the same time he was a peace-maker, and loved peace (blessed is the one who is a peace-maker). God is love yet God has to discipline and punish. God is peace yet God has to war. God is a giver yet God has to take away, too, at times. God knows when to do what, because God is Wisdom. For us, to juggle such ironies in life (sorry, we cannot avoid them all), we need the wisdom of God. We are being told, in life, to get into the company of the “wise”, learn from them, tap on their “brains”, etc, yet that is not good enough, and it can never be enough (the wisdom of men are just plain foolishness in the eyes of God), we need to get into the company of God, learn of His ways, and tap on the wisdom of God to correctly juggle such ironies.

Gideon was not hard up at all; he just concentrated on doing the things that God wanted him to do. I believe he knew what mattered was how God looked at him. In the Book of Romans, the Apostle Paul talked about serving, and he put it in this way: Serve righteously, and serve in the peace and joy of the Holy Spirit, in that way, our service will be pleasing to God, and our service will also gain the approval of men. Such had been the attitude of Gideon, and we read that at the end of the war when finally the entire Midan enemy had been subdued, the people still wanted Gideon, and his descendants, to be their king, despite the fact that the war was over, and his letting the Ephraimites taking some of the choicest credits. Jephthah, whom we will read about in chapter 12, was different; he demanded that the people promised him leadership even before going to battle for the people -such a contrast.

You do not need to shine all the time before men, let others shine too, and you will shine even brighter before the Lord.

2. Can one sit on the fence? Apparently not
We read here that apparently one cannot sit on the fence, and not choose side. Indeed the line dividing the kingdom of God and the domain of darkness can be a thin one. God is spirit, and Satan is spirit. God has powers and Satan has too (but much lesser, in reality, but is still a force to content with for the mortal men). There are “realities” on both sides of the fence, yet many of them, on Satan’s side are fakes. For example, there is real authority on one side but no real authority on the other, Satan’s side, over the children of God. Satan has no authority over us (Christians), the children of God, unless we choose to submit to his make-believe authority. I believe the real authority of Satan over the lives of the children of God had been effectively cancelled by Jesus’ victory on the cross.

Men need to choose side; he cannot sit on the fence. In fact, more correctly, in this matter, a man is never sitting on the fence. By The Fall of Man, unregenerate man is on Satan’s side. The only choice for man is either he remains on the side of Satan or he crosses over the line or the fence into God’s side. Jesus Himself said that those not with Him is against Him (Matt 12:30a, Luke 11:23a). What is even more startling to know is what He said, for the second part, that those who do not gather with Him, scatter. The KJV version used the phrase, “scattereth abroad”. Scattering has the meaning of “to separate and disperse. The KJV gives the connotation of being far away, from God.

If you are not on God’s side you are on Satan’s side; Harsh, it might seem, but that is the reality, although I believe in most cases, if not all, God does provide a chance for one to choose. When it is the time to choose, when one does not choose, one is actually not sitting on the fence; he has made a decision, and that decision is that he has opted to ratify his existing position of being on Satan’s side (As a side issue, those on God’s side, if you turn your back on God, you are a mutiny, you can be given over, and the enemy knows it, and you can be devoured, left, right, and centre, so to speak. Stay steadfast, please.).

In this Book of Judges, there are 3 examples of men or cities not taking side with God. In Judges 5:23, we saw how the place, Meroz, was cursed for her refusal to help the Lord who was fighting the enemy.

Here, we have the elders of Succoth not willing to feed the fighting men of God; also, the case of the men at Peniel. Gideon prophesied or declared judgments over these 2 cities, and God honored the declarations, and the punishments went ahead. These examples did not show that the parties went against God, but only that they were not with the Lord (just like Jesus said it in the New Testament), and they would not gather with the Lord.

Was the Lord being cruel? No, you must understand that in those days, for all the 3 cities or peoples involved in them, the God of the Israelites was clearly “known” to them; they heard of the mighty exploits and the works of the Lord all around them, yet they chose to reject the Lord. You can see for yourselves what Gideon and his 300 men were asking for, only bread, not anything that the people were not able to provide for them, yet they chose not to do so. I believe, although some of us, because of the remoteness of the events from us (and lack of detailed facts), cannot fully comprehend, but it must have been very clear in the hearts and minds of the peoples in those two towns that they were deciding not to be siding with God, the God of Israel.

Accept it, we all have to make choices; do not blame Adam and Eve for they had to make a choice when confronted by the Serpent (remember, not making a decision is still a choice made), they made their choice which affected you and I, but we have to make a choice of either staying in the condemned state or be set free from the curse of death, and cross over the fence to God’s side.

3. Don’t play, play, the words from the mouths of favored men of God can be powerful
For the exposition of this, please read my separate article – Don’t play, play, words from the mouths of favored men of God can be powerful. For those not reading the separate article, it suffices for me to say here that the declarations or prophetic words of favored men of God can very well be honored by God, and be made to come to pass, just like what had happened to Succoth and Peniel, here.

4. Any form of idol worship is abominable to God
Gideon made a golden ephod with the gold melted down from the gold earrings from the spoil of war. This ephod was placed in his hometown and was being worshipped by the Israelites; and this was recorded for us as a snare to Gideon and his family.

This is not an isolated case, and I believe if we are not careful, we, men, tend to do these things – instead of worshipping God, we end up worshipping or giving the due reverence to a thing (making it an idol) rather than the Giver, who is God Himself. Another example of this is the bronze snake or serpent Moses erected for the Israelites, under the instruction of God, but later became an idol, the worship of which (and it was worshipped, the Israelites burned incense to it) became an abomination to God (Numbers 21:9 & 2 Kings 18:4).

5. Always be on your guard (be watchful) so that you may finish well
Few men of God, recorded for us in the Bible, finished well. Moses finished with one thing against him (you can read of this in Why Moses did not enter the Promised Land), King Solomon strayed away from God with grave consequence to the kingdom of Israel (In 1 Kings 11:4-6 & 11-14, we read that as Solomon grew old, he was turned by his many wives to other gods, incurring the wraths of God, so much so, that God decided to tear away the kingdom from him, but for the sake of King David, Solomon’s father, who did finish well (you can tell, even from the reading of these verses concerning Solomon), deferred the tearing away until the reign of Solomon’s son; leaving only one tribe intact, again, for the sake of David, the man after God’s heart), John the Baptist, which in recent days, was being preached about as being doubtful of Jesus’ identity (sending messengers to question Jesus) when at the beginning of his ministry he was so emphatic that Jesus was the true Messiah, the shoe laces of whom he was not worthy even to tie, or that it was not in proper order that he should baptize Jesus; or even Judas Iscariot, one of the 12 Disciples of Jesus who ended up betraying Jesus, and hanging himself from a tree. Although how and when Paul, the God appointed Apostle of Jesus Christ, died, are not fully verified, it is generally accepted that Paul (and the Apostle Peter) died in persecution, or at least in general persecution, during the reign of Roman emperor Nero. I believe although Paul did not start well (he was an ardent persecutor of the Christians and the Christian faith until he was supernaturally blinded by the Lord on the road to Damascus), he finished well. He had repeatedly called believers to be watchful, to keep our eyes focused on the finishing line, and to press on, and to run the race in such a way as to finish the race, wining the prizes. His motto for us is to run to win the prize God has in mind for each one of us, in Heaven.

Moses obviously cannot be blamed for the bronze snake or serpent being worshipped by the Israelites, but Gideon, it looked to me, could not absolved from blame unless it can be proved that such worship was started only after his passing on.

6. Again, without a judge, after the death of Gideon, the Israelites went back to pagan worship
History repeated itself for the Israelites in this area - a consistent failure on the part of the Israelites over the judges period. Look at ourselves honestly, is there an area in our lives, we consistently fail the Lord?

7. Be kind to the family of the servants of God
Despite Gideon’s failing, of installing the golden ephod in his hometown leading to people worshipping the ephod, God still have it recorded here that the Israelites ought to have been kind to the family of Gideon after he passed on. To me, there is a point that the Lord wants to put through, that we should be kind to the family of the late servants of God. This, I am encouraged that in my church I saw at least 2 examples of kindness being extended by the church to the spouses and children of a pastor and a missionary who died.



Anthony Chia – This concludes my exposition of the 3 chapters in the Bible on the major Judge, Gideon. Lord, there is much to learn from Gideon’s life; help me to learn them well so that I may please you, always.

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Stars are stars, sand is sand

[Caveat: The views expressed here are solely those of the writer, and not necessarily represented those of the church(es) he attends or any fellowship(s) that he may be a part of.]

In the account of the battle at river Kishon, in Judges 5:20 (for the full Song of Deborah, see article – Judges series – Judges 5), it was mentioned, “From the heavens the stars fought, from their courses they fought against Sisera.”

A thought came back to me concerning a supposedly revelation received by a very admirable missionary preacher from a certain island (I praised God for how He had used him do the most fantastic work done (of building schools and churches, and reaching out to the lost ones) on the island. What is amazing is that this man was already old when he was first called. He was and is an inspiration to me, ah! you know now I am not so young). He spoke of Genesis 22:17, about the words of God to Abraham concerning the latter’s descendants being as numerous as the stars of the sky and as countless as the sand of the seashore. According to him, the revelation was that the stars referred to the descendants through the line of Isaac (son of faith mothered by Sarah), and the sand, the descendants through the line of Ishmael (the other son of Abraham, mothered by Hagar).

So when I looked at Judges 5:20 (again), I thought maybe he, the missionary preacher, was right, “the Isaac line” fighting here. But because this is my writing, I must make sure that indeed he was right, before I could pen it down, that such could be interpreted of Genesis 22:17 and Judges 5:20 here. When I checked other references to this “famous” stars and sand verse, I found that it was also used in Jeremiah 33:22 and Hebrews 11:12. The latter was a re-quote of Genesis 22:17 while the former, Jeremiah 33:22, was not; descendants of David and Levites {who themselves were ALL descendants of Isaac} were used in place of Abraham, and it was also spoken by the Lord. As such, in my humble view, I believe the stars and the sand did not represented in specific terms, the descendants from the lines of Isaac and Ishmael respectively. And so, the stars here in Judges 5:20, are not specific to “line of Isaac” at war. It remains as far as I can tell - a poetic description of the war.

This brings on 2 important points:

Firstly, when we are stating something we believe we got from God through personal revelation by God or through Holy Spirit’s inspiration, we should expressively say so. Of course, even to know this, i.e. “the piece of stuff is a revelation”, is in itself, not easy; depending on how much you already know of the Scriptures and how much teachings/preaching you have heard. Nonetheless, if it “sounded” to you as revelation, and it could not be clearly backed up by the Scriptures, you should qualify it with the words, “I believe….”. That is what I endeavor to do, in my writings. The idea is to give the reader or listener a flag that what is said/written is of personal belief, may not be widely held, and perhaps not completely/fully backed by the Scriptures. This is especially so, when it comes to an important issue/matter. The greater the importance and ramifications/implications, the greater must be the caution, and the greater is the need to expressly said that it is a personal belief or revelation, perhaps not backed completely/fully by Scriptures. Something that is not, or perhaps not, completely/fully backed up by the Scriptures is different from something that contradicts the Scriptures. The latter cannot be revelation by God or the Holy Spirit.
{Added 15/10/2010 - There is a 3rd category which I called speculation, and it can be more damaging than the "contradiction" category, for it is not capable of being "proved". An example, which I came across recently, is the equating of the tree of good and evil to "tithe" by a "famous" mega-church grace preacher. This is PURE speculation. Pure speculation designed to justify perversion of truths of God, must be avoided; and the truths of God need only be stated plainly, and obviously, not through deception.}

Secondly, what happens when we are wrong!? Before I say anything more, let me say that it is not my intention to attack the missionary preacher which I already said was both admirable and an inspiration to me. Only perhaps, he could have researched a little more before he publicly said what he said was a revelation. Nevertheless, I must say that he was addressing a smallish group of older people who were assumed to be mature Christians who would be quick to understand what revelation implied (including it could be wrong! Not that a revelation from God can be wrong but that such has not come from God but thought to have come from God), although such assumptions {concerning the audience} are not always correct. The preacher’s details were intentionally withheld so that easy identification is not possible, as I have said, the intention is not to attack the preacher.

To tell you the truth, I do not really know the answer to that question – what happens when we are wrong? Most definitely, we have to be careful with what we say or write. In the world, you can be sued for slander or libel, and in my country, this is world-famous! But we are not talking about or referring to the world, what I am more talking about is the implications with regards to God and in the Kingdom of Heaven/God.

Obviously, at times, it is really difficult to interpret Scriptures, but that should not stop us from wanting to understand Scriptures; and so it is at the least, the reason for exposition, of the words by pastors, preachers, speakers and even informed believers (who qualifies, as one, in itself, is again of course, subjective). We do not just, not do a thing because it is difficult. Of course, it is not easy, but the honors (by God, not men) also commensurate with the difficulty; the Scriptures said teachers or preachers of the Word get double honors. But the responsibility is also heavy; if we stumble others we are answerable to God, and stumbling others is a sin.

One brother in fact suggested to me that I should not be commenting on the Word of God. The brother, I believe, is aware that I am not a staff of a church, and I am not a full-time minister, but am only a long time Christian. Yes, that is not much of a qualification. In fact, I also do not have any formal diploma or degree in theology as of now. I only know that I must try to know the Word much, and with my knowledge, help some others to understand the Word, and maybe even point out some incorrect expositions of the Word, especially if they pertained to important issues that have significant ramifications/implications. Except for the "for my own knowledge" bit, which is a must for my own walk with God, all the rest are really none of my business. But if you think more deeply, much of faith work, is of the kind that is none of our own business, they are God’s business. But why do I do this writing, I wonder? People are doing it because it has been their job – they are preachers, pastors, speakers, etc. Why am I in this risky business anyway? Don’t I have enough areas where I could sin and incur the wrath of God? With writing on this blog, I created another “mine field” which I need not have to. If I claim it is God’s work, no one can say anything, but if that is so, any wrong I made here, I profane the name of God. I suppose I have no answer here, I will continue to write as long as I still have the desire {hopefully that, that is a sanctified desire, and of Him} to write, but I must continue to exercise care because I am handling the Word of God, and I pray that He may guide me in my writings.

Coming back to the question of what happens when we are wrong, I can only hope that, on matters that are not that serious, God will forgive us, and we all will end up in heaven, seeing each other and saying to each other, “I thought we have had different views on such and such a matter. Ah! Both of us are here, in heaven; and thank God for his grace and mercy despite our errors.” What about the very serious wrong/false teachings?

In relation to an important matter, circumcision, the Apostle Paul said in Galatians 5:12, as for those agitators {false teachers}, I {Paul} wish they would go the whole way and emasculate {castrate} themselves!

The Apostle John, in 2 John (a one chapter short epistle, I believe it to be written by the Apostle John), warned us that we may lose our eternal rewards if we subscribed to false teachings (that epistle was more particularly addressing antichrist teachings). If those deceived may lose their eternal rewards, those who perpetuate the false teachings must be facing more severe penalty. It also said that those who preach those deviated teachings (deviated from the teaching of Christ), are wicked. The Book of Proverbs, in Proverbs 3:33, gives us an idea of God’s position on the wicked – “The Lord's curse is on the house of the wicked, but he blesses the home of the righteous."

So God help us!



Anthony Chia - "Now the Bereans were of more noble character... for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true." (Acts 17:11 NIV)

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