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Be Strong & Courageous

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  A test was once conducted where 10 high school students were placed in one room and shown three lines of varying lengths. The students were told to raise their hands when the instructor pointed to the longest line. In reality, only one student was being tested. Nine of the students had been instructed beforehand to raise their hands when the instructor pointed to the second longest line. Seventy-five percent of the time, the students being tested retracted the right answer when they saw that no one else agreed with them. The researchers concluded that most people would rather be popular than be right. This condition is a symptom of today’s society and caused by a lack of convictions for the truth. When peer pressure supersedes doing the right thing, we become part of the herd and subject to all kinds of variant influences, many being very destructive. The Apostle Paul tells us, But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention t
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The Corruption of Mankind

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For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now.   Romans 8:20-22 When God created the garden of Eden, He made it a perfect place to live. After creating man, he empowered him with ability to exercise dominion over the garden and everything in it. The Lord gave Adam great freedom in fulfilling his responsibilities, with one exception, “ From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die ” (Genesis 2:16-17) . As we know, this one prohibition created an opportunity for sin (Romans 7:7-12) and Satan used it as a means of deception and mankind still lives in the consequences of Adam
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A Tale of Two Tamars

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  1 It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father's wife. 2 You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst. 3 For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. 4 In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, 5 I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. 6 Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough?      1 Corinthians 5:1-6 In his first address to the church at Corinth, Paul thought it of great importance to address the principle of sin (leaven) and its effect on the spiritual health
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Seasons of Testing

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It is interesting to observe that in Scripture there are a number of times when there is a period of forty days attached to major events. The two most prominent of these might be the time Moses spent on Mount Sinai receiving the Law and the time Jesus spent in the wilderness while being tempted by the devil. In fact, we find nine different times when forty days are assigned to a Biblical event. This is significant when you consider that 9 x 40 = 360 days; Jewish calendars in the past are represented by a 360-day year. We can conclude that these forty-day periods represent seasons of testing in the believer’s life.   The First Season The first of these “seasons” is found in Genesis 7:4-5 in reference to the predicted flood:   " For after seven more days, I will send rain on the earth forty days and forty nights ; and I will blot out from the face of the land every living thing that I have made ." Noah did according to all that the Lord had commanded him . God is instructi
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The Order of Melchizedek

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This essay is the result of a review of Ken Johnson’s book, “The Ancient Mysteries of the  Essenes,”  section 3, “Ancient Order of Melchizedek.” And this is clearer still, if another priest arises according to the likeness of Melchizedek, who has become such not on the basis of a law of physical requirement, but according to the power of an indestructible life. For it is attested of Him, "YOU ARE A PRIEST FOREVER ACCORDING TO THE ORDER OF MELCHIZEDEK."         Hebrews 7:15-17   This passage quotes from Psalm 110:4 that the Messiah would not be a priest from the lineage of Levi and Aaron, but from the order of Melchizedek. Is this a reference to a particular person or to a particular group of priests? The Hebrew word combines two words, melek meaning “king” and zedek translated “righteousness” (see Hebrews 7:2). The priests who lived in Qumran where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found were direct descendants of the Jewish high priest Zadok from King David’s time.  They saw th
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