Church Ages of Revelation 2-3

Is this possible? I only offer this as random speculation. There are various possible ways in which the seven churches of Revelation may be prophetic. My favorite suggestion is that they are representative of "church ages." But, I wonder if anyone has considered the idea presented above of the churches representing the condition of regions of the world near the "end times."

Here are the seven churches of Revelation:

1. Ephesus ("Permitted" or "Desirable")
2. Smyrna ("Myrrh")
3. Pergamum ("Height" or "Elevation")
4. Thyatira ("Odor of Affliction")
5. Sardis ("Red Ones")
6. Philadelphia ("Brotherly Love")
7. Laodicea ("Justice of the People")

Is It Okay to Question God's Timing?

When He opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth?”  —Revelation 6:9-10

So, here are the souls of the righteous ones made perfect before God in heaven, and they are asking God something very interesting. It sounds almost like they are impatient and complaining and vindictive on the surface. How long? Avenge our blood? These do not sound like the words of perfected individuals, right? Actually, there were good reasons for asking this question of God’s timing.

These martyrs were not impatient, but rather expectant and unsure of the timing of God’s judgment. They knew that God’s judgment was coming, but they did not know when. Notice the words “holy and true.” In that context, they sought an answer to the timing of God’s righteous judgment. The holiness of God demands justice, and justice is to the glory of His name. These martyrs desired, no doubt, the foreordained justice punishment of God to fall on the impenitent followers of the devil. Yes, it was personal to them, certainly, for they had been killed. But is it wrong to desire God’s judgment—which you know must sometime come—on those who have personally done great wrong to you and blasphemed God? Apparently, the answer is “no.” I would suggest that the key here is that they knew that there would be no mercy to these people, and so they looked forward to the just punishment of God that was to come, when His righteousness would be revealed. Then, we too can appreciate and look forward to God’s judgment on those who refuse to repent, even as did David (e.g. Ps 74:10; 94:1-5; 82:8). If God is glorified in judgment—though He takes no pleasure in it—we should and must learn to appreciate it. Perhaps this seems inappropriate in the church age where grace is emphasized, but perhaps rather our view of God needs some adjustment.

What we learn of the eternal state is that we will not know everything. We will not immediately be given all the answers in heaven. In fact, God may not give us the answers immediately, even as He did not give these ones a direct answer as to the exact timing. Then too it is not inappropriate to ask God questions now. An honest and open and God-glorifying prayer may include humble questions, as we see over and over again in the prayers of the Psalms.

(We also learn that those in heaven are aware of the passage of time. They are not so disconnected with time that they cannot wonder that so much time is passing. Lastly, we learn that they appear to be aware of what is happening on earth to some degree or another. They know that God’s judgment has not yet come to those on the earth.)

These martyrs were not complaining, but rather they were inquiring. They desired to know God’s timing and plans. It is not wrong to wonder at God’s plans and to inquire about them. Rather it might show a lack of interest in God and His glory (or else a lack of appreciation for His sovereign control). An inquiry becomes sin only when there is impatience, anger, or some such dissatisfaction with the plans of the Lord. Curiosity is not wrong but frustration is. Our lives will be richer, I think, when we inquire of the plans of the Lord and His counsels—just don’t always expect an obvious answer.

These martyrs were not vindictive, but rather passionate about the holiness of God. Why did these people not desire the salvation of the wicked? Why did they desire vengeance? This gets into the unpleasant question of the eternal punishment of God. Hell, and those who will go there, were made for the glory of God (cf. Prov 16:4). It’s not exactly something any of us humans really want to ponder every day. However, the punishment of hell serves a very important purpose: It more clearly than anything else demonstrates the justice and holiness of God. It’s there because God cannot permanently wink at sin. All sin must be dealt with severely, for all sin is offensive to the Lord and detracts from His infinite glory.

And, if we are believers, we acknowledge that we deserve such just punishment. Furthermore, we recognize that God’s glory is at stake and all sin must be dealt with severely one Way or another way. Should we not then desire God’s holiness to be demonstrated in His righteous indignation being poured out on the vessels of wrath (cf. Rom 9:21-23)? We should have no desire to see any one individual eternally lost, but we should expectantly wait for the justice of God to be revealed from heaven . . . for His own name’s sake! If we are passionate about the glory of God, I believe this will become reality for us.

The response of God to these martyrs is interesting. “Then a white robe was given to each of them; and it was said to them that they should rest a little while longer, until both the number of their fellow servants and their brethren, who would be killed as they were, was completed” (Rev 6:11). God was longsuffering to the wicked. Only God knows when to end that time of being longsuffering, but He does have a specific time in mind. Other examples of His longsuffering to those doomed to destruction include the Amorites, who were to be destroyed by the Israelites (cf. Gen 15:16). God’s mercy is perfectly optional, yet He chooses to be abundantly generous with His mercy. That is why we call it longsuffering. We see then that God is intentionally longsuffering up to a precise point in time when He will no longer constrain His anger against evil. For most individuals that time is no more than ninety years.

The martyrs understood. They accepted God’s answer without question. They understood that God is merciful even to the wicked and that He has a set time for judgment. So, we too must accept God’s timing and all that happens in our lives, trusting that He is in control and that He is wisely executing His plans to most emphasize His glory.

Why Are Miracles So Uncommon or Unobvious Today?

Agnostics will point out that there is no proof of miracles today, and hence no proof of God. If you are someone like me, you have to ponder this question a moment. Where are the great visions, fire falling from heaven, Red Sea partings, and crippled-men healings of the past? (I’m not going to even entertain the possibility that some televangelists are working miracles. I emphatically reject their sensational claims to miracles.) Don’t get me wrong, God does still work miracles today—or at least I have no reason to doubt that He does—and I have heard various credible testimonies of them (e.g. Faith Like Potatoes story). The question is why aren’t there more obvious, public miracles today for all to see in this country, perhaps caught on video? Why does it seem that God has gone covert in His miracles? I believe I have some good answers from the Bible.

1. God is not out to prove Himself, but wants people to seek Him and have faith.

The Bible says that the Creation testifies of God’s existence (Rom. 1:18-21). It also teaches that people have an innate awareness of God (Rom. 2:14-15). Then there is the Bible which claims in no uncertain words to be God’s direct revelation. There are three witnesses for man to receive. God thankfully has not left us without ample revelation of His existence and nature.

“If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead” (Luke 16:31). Jesus explained that miracles such as resurrection are not going to convert someone. If people will not listen to the Word of God, neither will they be persuaded of the Truth by miraculous signs. Furthermore, Jesus was disturbed by people’s desire to see “proof”: “This is an evil generation. It seeks a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah the prophet” (Luke 11:29). People’s nature has not changed. People are still demanding proof. But God has not changed, either, and He is not pleased with such demands, nor is He eager to prove Himself with signs.

Rather God wants us to have faith, which is belief in the unseen and unproven. “But without faith it is impossible to please Him . . .” (Heb. 11:6). We are justified by faith in Christ’s atoning work. Faith pleases God in a similar way that a wife’s faith in her husband pleases him. If you cannot have faith in someone’s character—their honesty, integrity, and graciousness—then you judge them untrustworthy and potentially of a bad character. Of certainty, God is displeased with those who pass bad judgment upon Him! Those who deny or seriously question God’s existence are usually motivated by a dislike of the God of the Bible (e.g. “He is too harsh,” or “He expects too much of me”). This too is passing bad judgment upon God. Since we all have a knowledge of God written in our hearts from the earliest years of our existence, no one is an ignorant and unbiased person just waiting for more evidence to make a solid assessment of what God is like (or that He exists at all).

2. God tests people by withdrawing Himself or by obscuring Truth.

The Bible further indicates that God goes to lengths to magnify His worth; this can mean that He puts His people through trials and lets them fall so that they learn to seek, trust, and depend upon Him more. The Word says of Hezekiah, “God withdrew from him, in order to test him, that he [i.e. Hezekiah] might know all that was in his heart” (2 Chr. 32:31). In the case of Hezekiah we may only guess all the reasons behind God’s “withdrawing from him,” but the Bible indicates that this was a test to show the depravity of Hezekiah’s heart. It would become manifest that Hezekiah was proud left to himself. This glorified the Lord by showing the complete dependence any of us have on the Lord to be holy as He is holy. In more general terms, I think we can say that God may withdraw the demonstrable presence of His Spirit in power in order to test society or His people—that the depravity of man and the need for God may become evident. Many Christians can testify of times of feeling far from God. These times can remind the Christian how much they need God and how valuable He is to them. (We’ll see soon how this can apply to a lack of obvious miracles today.)

Take a look at the words of Psalm 89:46: “How long, Lord? Will You hide Yourself forever?” This man felt far from the Lord God. He felt as if God were hiding from him. God never claimed He would magically appear when we called on Him at a moment’s notice and that we would see glorious visions of Him. Oh, that it were true! Rather God rewards diligent searches for Him (Heb. 11:6; Jer. 29:13; Prov. 8:17). He wants us to depend upon and value Him so much that we keep crying to Him until He answers. This is the nature of God. And, I think, when He is found by the diligent seeker, He is all that much more precious.

On a similar note, Jesus spoke only in parables to the masses for a clearly stated reason: “. . . that seeing they [the hearers] may see and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand . . .” (Mark 4:12). Wow! It doesn’t sound like Jesus was trying to convince them all of the Truth. He knew as mentioned above that if they would not hear the words of the prophets they would not hear Him or truly believe just by being more obvious (cf. John 2:23-25). If people were unwilling to seek Him more earnestly, signs and obvious language apparently would not help them. (Aside: I do not suggest that we should similarly obscure the truth in such a way when talking to people, but that’s another topic for another time.) Again, those who were true seekers of God would not be turned off by the parables and would find answers, one way or another.

So it is today, God is not trying to convince people with obvious miracles; if people will not believe the Bible, they would not believe in their hearts when they saw fire falling from the sky. Intellectual belief in God’s existence is not what is important. Yes, obvious miracles might convince some people that logically God exists, but that changes no one’s heart. A changed heart is what God wants (Ps. 51:17). True faith is of the heart. It is not purely mental. (It is apparent that Christianity that only involves mental assent of God’s reality is powerless, lifeless, and worthless. Such Christianity God hates, and it is a disgrace to even have the name of “Christ” in the word.)

3. God has a bigger plan for allowing worldwide apostasy, coldness, and unbelief in Him.

Public miracles at the hands of men were for a time and for a specific purpose. New revelation was being given in the early Church period. This new revelation needed some clear validation that it was truly God’s Word, such that it would become established and received without endless doubts about its validity. Most of the miracles in the New Testament were done by the apostles (Acts 2:43; 5:12). The Church was built upon the apostles (Eph. 2:20). These miracles confirmed the Word preached by them (Mark 16:20). New revelation requires amazing verification. That is one reason among others that new claims of revelation from God should be rejected. Once the revelation is confirmed, it is settled and the public miracles are no longer necessary. We can look back at the New Testament revelation from God and know that it is God’s Word since there is ample testimony left to us that it was confirmed by many eyewitnesses. A foundation is only laid at the start of the building process, by the way. Since the Bible says that the miracles were to confirm the new revelation and that most of the miracles were from the apostles (a select group of men), and the new revelation is done and the apostles have died long ago, we can be quite certain that such miracles as were done in those days are no longer necessary in the same way. If miracles happen today, there is no need for them to be evident and public miracles. (1 Corinthians 13 seems to indicate that prophecy and tongues and other miraculous signs would fade out, but we do not have time to exegete this passage.)

This leads us to examine some of the prophecy of the Bible about the end times and what God’s plans might be. Jesus said that He would go away on a long journey and be gone for a long time (Luke 20:9; 19:13; Mark 12:1). This was a prophecy of His going away after the resurrection and of Him being gone for many years. He told His disciples to carry on without Him (Luke 19:13). He said further that during His days away times would get rough. People would grow tired of waiting for Him (2 Pet. 3:4). People would wax more degenerate (2 Tim. 3:1-5). Apostasy would come (1 Tim. 4:1), a “falling away” from the faith would happen (cf. 2 Thes. 2:3), unbelief would be widespread (cf. Luke 18:8), and the love of many would grow cold (Mat. 24:12-14). Couldn’t God prevent all this apostasy? Absolutely. But God has a bigger plan in this darkness when He is “away.”

If obvious miracles were commonplace, I think that the result would be greater belief in the Bible. There would be more fear of God. There would be much less proliferation of agnosticism, atheism, or variant religions. People would not have a hard time believing logically that Jesus was returning. Israel as a nation might actually start to believe in Jesus Christ, also. In short, such miraculous confirmation of the Word today would likely prevent some of the prophecy declared in the Bible. These prophecies are indicative of the plans of God.

Now I delve into the speculation. I tend to relate most everything to Israel. God still has a redemptive plan for the nation of Israel. The Bible indicates that Israel would continue to live in unbelief until the end (cf. Rom. 11:25-27; Zech. 12:2-3,9-10), and be completely abandoned in the last days and left dangling at the end of their rope, I think (cf. Dan. 12:1,7; Deut. 28:15,20-21,25,29). For this unbelief and abandonment to be fully realized, perhaps God has had to conceal Himself from the world. There are no more obvious signs today, but they will come just before the end. In a dramatic show, the world will see the arm of the Lord descend and deliver Israel at the very end. The darkest darkness magnifies the Light that will return to Israel. God has left His people in the flesh (Israel) in order to test them and to show all that is in their hearts. In this His name will be most magnified and His beauty most glorified.

Final Words

“‘Behold, the days are coming,’ says the Lord God, ‘That I will send a famine on the land, Not a famine of bread, Nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the Lord’” (Amos 8:11). There are periods where God intentionally sends famines of new revelation, visions, prophecy, or even dramatic miracles as mentioned at the start of this article (cf. 1 Sam. 3:1). Jesus said that people who still believe without “seeing” (a form of proof) would be blessed (John 20:29). We are likely in those days of famine. Nevertheless, be believing.

“We do not see our signs; There is no longer any prophet; Nor is there any among us who knows how long” (Ps. 74:9).

Tactics of Deception Used by Satan

"the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field" (Gen 3:1)

The first tactic that Satan used against Adam and Eve was to use a simple and innocent animal as his messenger. Satan has always done this. He tries to appear as something innocent or beautiful or familiar (cf. 2 Cor 11:14). He disguises himself in such a way as to not be discovered for what he really is, so that people may listen to his poisonous words.

APPLICATION: The Bible offers this phrase probably to alert us to what is about to be said. God wants us to be guarded against the deception of the devil, even before he speaks. The devil has been from the beginning seeking to devour and corrupt humanity (1Pet 5:8), since God seeks to glorify Himself through those who bear His image. Satan undoubtedly hates humans because of their image and likeness with God. So, here in the beginning of man's existence, Satan was quickly seeking to deceive and destroy humanity.

The devil and his legions are very cunning in their deceptions. We should always be on guard and ready with our feet solidly on the Truth. There is great wisdom in being familiar with the Word. All of us are in a spiritual battle against hosts of wickedness (Eph 6:12).

"And [the serpent] said to the woman" (Gen 3:1)

This was perhaps the second tactic that Satan used against mankind. He chose the woman as his target. The woman is said to be the weaker vessel in the New Testament (1 Pet 3:7) and the one who was deceived rather than Adam (1 Tim 2:14), though those are very unpopular teachings today. I believe that Satan had been watching them and had already determined that Eve was the weaker one who would more easily be deceived by him. For that reason, I think that this was a specific strategy of the devil's. He will target our particular weaknesses. (I know this is controversial. Obviously, not all women are more prone to deception, and I have no statistics to back up a generalization, but I do believe that the Bible teaches women in general are weaker both physically and emotionally. If that offends you, then I apologize. I may be wrong.)

"Has God indeed said" (Gen 3:1)

The devil here gets Eve to question the wisdom and validity of what God said. The inference that the devil seems to make using the word "indeed" is that the Lord was being unreasonable or unfair. It was something similar to saying, "He said what?!" perhaps. It was meant to be a mental challenge to the fairness of God's command. This is the third tactic Satan seems to use: he uses an unspoken inference that God is unreasonable or ridiculous.

We see that Satan is one who knows God's words. He is not ignorant. It seems from other passages that Satan is very familiar with the Word and that he often quotes it (or misquotes it). Beware of those who quote Scripture vainly or rashly. Satan is one who misuses the Bible in an attempt to deceive people.

Also, another possible tactic is that the serpent drops the word "Lord" (Jehovah), which speaks of the personal covenant relationship of God. Both here and in vv.4-5, Satan only says, "God," rather than "Lord God" as in v.1 and elsewhere. This tactic is about de-personalizing God and getting a person to think of God as an impersonal force or being who has no love or feelings of kindness. Some religions believe in such a false god. Satan likely wanted Eve to think of God in more logical terms rather than personal terms.

APPLICATION: We must be exceedingly careful not to ever assume that our wisdom or intelligence can be better than God's. We should never question God's commands in a skeptical way. God is worthy of our absolute trust. He only commands what is best, because He is love. He is never unreasonable or unfair. Satan, however, wants us to question everything He says and be unbelieving. There are two ways to deal with God's commands and Word: either endlessly question everything in doubt, or simply trust His wisdom without seeking proof of it being wise.

"You shall not eat of every tree of the garden?" (Gen 3:1)

The fourth tactic the devil uses is focusing on the negative. God had started with the great positive that all the trees would be available to them for food, except for the one. The devil flips this around and puts all the attention on this one excluded tree. The implication that the serpent was making was that Eve was entitled to every tree and that God was unreasonable to place a restriction on them. He wanted Eve to question God's motives for keeping Eve from eating from this particular forbidden tree. He wanted Eve to think that God was somehow purely selfish in His command -- that Eve was hurt by this restriction and not helped.

APPLICATION: Our flesh and the devil will both attempt to get us to obsess about those things that we are not morally allowed to have. The end result of such obsessing is that we begin to lust for those things, and the rest is history (cf. Jam 1:14-15).

"You will not surely die." (Gen 3:4)

Here is the direct and blatant denial of God's Word. Apparently when the serpent had detected that Eve was not so much in love with God any longer so as to take offense at the serpent's derision, he attacked the Lord God's veracity directly and head on. This is a possible fifth tactic that Satan may use against those who are open to this attack: a direct denial of God's truthfulness. Satan was trying --and succeeding-- to get Eve to directly consider that God could be absolutely wrong.

APPLICATION: The devil is called a liar (Jn 8:44) and the "father of lies." He was apparently the first creature to lie. We are to be on guard against lies. To be armed against the lies of the devil we need the shield of faith and our waists girded with the Truth (Eph 6:13-16). We should reject the lies of Satan by confident faith that God is true and right and everyone else who contradicts is wrong and a liar (Rom 3:4). We are not called to systematically tear down every lie and false argument that the devil makes, but to outright reject his lies without needing proof that he is wrong. In fact, perpetually facing his lies can be devastating to one's faith, I believe, since the effort is great and sometimes too much for us feeble humans.

However, literally speaking, everything that the serpent said was technically true. Adam and Eve were not going to immediately physically die. Their eyes were opened, etc. The serpent was cunningly trying to deceive Eve by confusing Eve using technically true statements that he knew Eve would apply as contradictory to the Lord's word. He intended that Eve take his words as contrary to God's words, thus he was as good as lying.

(Beware lest we lie to other people by speaking technically true words that we know they will misunderstand leading to their deception. This is wrong. A lie, then, you could say is anything that is spoken with the intent to deceive someone to their harm.)

"For God knows that in the day you eat of it" (Gen 3:5)

The devil uses his sixth tactic with Eve, which is to provide a logical rationale for why God should be considered wrong. He uses God's name here in vain, it seems. Notice how he tries to redefine God by suggesting that God was opposed to Eve eating for His own "selfish" reasons.

This perhaps could be considered a so-called "begging the question" fallacy, also called Petitio Principii. The devil tries to use some of God's words to try to establish that Eve could not die, even though that directly contradicted God's statement. Basically, the serpent says something like, "God said it Himself, so it must be true!"

"your eyes will be opened" (Gen 3:5)

The seventh tactic the devil uses is that he tries to put the most positive spin upon the results of sinning. He claimed that Eve's eyes would be opened, as if they were currently darkened and she were blind to reality. Some truth is here spoken, since later it says that Adam and Eve's eyes were opened (Gen 3:7), but this was a very negative thing rather than a positive thing as Satan wanted Eve to think.

I suspect that the serpent also wanted Eve to think in terms of her physical eyes and what she was seeing. He probably used the word "eyes" so as to subtly get her to pay more attention to the appearance of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. Supporting this is the next verse that says that Eve considered that the fruit was pleasant to her eyes. This could be the eighth tactic he uses: appealing to the fleshly senses and appetites. (Compare this with Satan's temptation of Jesus, also appealing to appetite: Mt 4.)

APPLICATION: Satan will often try to tempt people by their physical senses, since people are sensual creatures often guided by their physical appetites. Many of our fleshly desires are not inherently evil, if controlled properly and confined to the limits God set. But, we should never be ruled by our fleshly desires.

The literal meaning here is that supposedly Eve's understanding would be opened and she would break free from a limitation that God had put her under, resulting in a new-found awareness of reality. The lying supposition was that Eve was limiting her potential by virtue of her innocence. She needed, the serpent told her, to be given the "truth" and set free by it. This might be wisdom if she would find greater truth (as opposed to a lie) by eating, but instead she found death and embraced a lie in her sinning against God.

"and you will be like God" (Gen 3:5)

Wow. Here was a massive appeal to Eve's pride and self-interests, which is the ninth tactic (compare with Mt 4:8-9). Eve knew full well that God was incredible and intelligent and full of knowledge. The serpent use suggesting that Eve could become more God-like by sinning. No doubt she had understood that being made in God's image was good, and certainly she wanted to imitate God in the ways that she could. Christians understand that being "godly" involves being more like God in our behavior and attitudes and actions. Therefore, Satan appealed to Eve's good and natural desire to be more like God -- the Perfect Being.

Actually, again, the devil was using an element of truth to deceive Eve. Consider that the Bible does say that Adam and Eve became "like God" in Gen 3:22 by "knowing good and evil," similar to what the devil says in this verse. However, the devil was painting this as a good thing, by getting Eve to think that her knowledge would be similar to God's holy knowledge of good and evil, when in fact our knowledge is not entirely like His knowledge. We have experiential knowledge of evil, but God has intellectual and observational knowledge of sin. We are intimately aware of sin, since it is a part of our fallen nature, but God is holy and does not have this intimate knowledge of sin in the same experiential way. Eve, though, had no knowledge of sin before the Fall.

Perhaps this idea of being like God was partly that Eve would get to determine for herself what was good and what was evil, even as God determines what is right and what is wrong. It seems that the serpent was saying that if Eve defied God, she could set her own rules of right and wrong and become a self-made 'god'. This is a common lie of modern society.

APPLICATION: Satan is often appealing to people's pride and self-interest. He makes claims to people that they can become powerful, if only they do things in various ungodly ways. He suggests that sin leads to all kinds of satisfaction that cannot be obtained by following God's ridged standards of holiness.

"knowing good and evil." (Gen 3:5)

Lastly, the devil uses a tenth tactic of appealing to the natural desire for knowledge. All people desire knowledge, to some degree or other, and this desire is not inherently wrong. God designed us to be learning and wishing to learn (i.e., to gain knowledge). In this particular case, God did not wish for Adam and Eve to gain this knowledge, since it was harmful for them.

Satan here directly uses God's own words to deceive Eve, for God Himself had called the tree "the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil" (Gen 2:9,17). And, the devil may have possibly been arguing that Eve could not die and obtain knowledge, simultaneously. One could argue that if she died (depending on the nature of death), she could not gain the knowledge. Again, we see that Satan twists God's words in order to deceive.

It seems that the devil was arguing that God was somehow afraid of what Adam and Eve could become if they gained fuller knowledge. He was suggesting that God was unlovingly holding them back due to fear of them, or simply because He selfishly wanted their "slavish" service. Either way, Satan was asking Eve to doubt the goodness of God and seek her own interests above all. In short, she would become her own god, determining truth for herself and seeking her own good above all else, rather than submitting and serving the True God.

The problem with Satan's temptation is that Adam and Eve already knew about good. The part that they did not know about at all was evil, and evil was harmful for them. Why should Eve want to know of evil and all of its miseries? It seems the only reason for wanting to know about good and evil was because she was beginning to doubt that God really knew best and what was truly good or truly evil. Her faith in God was waning. However, if we cannot trust God, and we seek to determine truth on our own, everything becomes relative, since we are so finite and cannot adequately and wisely determine absolute truth and absolute good and evil. Only an infinitely wise and knowledgeable God can perfectly discern between good and evil, perfection and imperfection, and wisdom and foolishness.

APPLICATION: God often places meaningful and helpful restrictions on us, even our knowledge. God does not tell us everything. He has His secrets (Deu 29:29) that we do not need to know immediately, or perhaps ever. Some things are better not known immediately. We are finite, and there will always be things we will not know. God knows all things and He knows what is good for us to know and what is unhelpful for us to know. We must trust His wisdom and be content, in many cases, to be ignorant. This can be especially hard when we really want to know why He is doing something to us that we find painful. Sometimes we will not get a solid answer from Him, however.

A Reprise of Science, Prophecies, and the Bible

Here is a kind of reprise of my two earlier posts about science, prophecies, and the Bible. I've included a few extra things, marked in green.

Scientifically-Validated Teachings

Archeology

- Snakes (or serpents) once had functional, rear legs, the fossil record shows [Gen 3:14]

- The Philistines are now known by archeology to have sometimes strangely made buildings supported by two pillars close together [Judg 16:29]

Astronomy

- The universe was expanded from the beginning and is still expanding [Is 40:22]

- There is a circular terminator line that marks the twilight zone where the darkness and the daylight meet [Job 26:10]

- Pleiades gravitationally bound to each other (it's a star cluster), whereas belt of Orion stars are not gravitationally bound [Job 38:31]

Engineering

- Dimensions of Noah's Ark were excellent for preventing capsizing [Gen 6:15]

Geology/Oceanography

- There are springs in the seas (hydrothermal vents) [Job 38:16]— not scientifically discovered until more recently

Atmospherics

- There is a weight for air [Job 28:24-25]— not scientifically discovered until more recently

Biology/Genetics

- According to research in epigenetics, additions and other tendencies are able to be passed on for about four generations [Num 14:18]

Medicine/Physiology

- 8th day of circumcision was necessary for blood clotting to happen [Gen. 17:12; 21:4; Lev 12:3]— not scientifically discovered until more recently

- Wine is good for medicinal purposes, like helping with digestion, studies show [1Tim 5:23; see notes on verse]

- For the sake of preventing the spread of germs and bacteria: (1) it is helpful to use running water [Lev. 15:13, 17, 21, 22], (2) to use quarantining and a covering for the mouth [Lev 13:43-46], (3) to avoid clothing/houses that are contaminated with toxic molds [Lev. 14:36-53], and (4) to properly dispose of human waste [Deu 23:12-13]

- There are two critical components to seeing: (1) the physical eyes, and (2) the brain's interpretation of the signals coming from the eyes [Mark 8:22-26]

Physics

- Time was created and is relative to an observer [2 Pt 3:8; 2Tim 1:9]

Validated Prophecies (Apparently)

General Society

- The Gospel has been spread across the world [Matt. 24:14] and "Christianity" has become a massive religion [Matt 13:30,38; 24:31; 13:47-50; Mk 4:26-28; 13:27]

Gentile Nations

- Edom (viz. Petra) has remained unoccupied since long ago [Jer. 49:17-18; Ezek. 25:13; 35:3-9]

- The original city of Tyre (which was an island) was destroyed and eventually became a place for fisherman [Ezek. 26:3-14]

- Egypt was prophesied to become a minor "kingdom" that would never again dominate as an empire over other nations [Ezek 29:14-15]

Israel

- Israel was prophesied to go into exile into all nations (~70 AD), and Jerusalem would be perpetually dominated by Gentile nations until the end [Luke 21:24]

- The return of Jewish exiles happened basically in the order: East, West, South [Is. 43:5-6]

- Israel became a nation in a single day in 1948 [Is. 66:8]

- The Dead Sea is prophesied to split into two parts, one side given to salt and other side with fresh water; this is already coming to pass (in 1960 it was a single sea, but the water level has been dropping & it's now split in two parts with the south being overrun w/salt) [Ezek 47:1-12]

Unusually Amazing Prophecies of Jesus

- The timing of Jesus' coming was prophesied to the year [Dan 9:24-26]

Technology and Architecture

- There is a pillar at the border of Egypt [Is 19:19]

- The Eastern Gate of Jerusalem was closed [Ezek. 44:1-2]

- The ability to create an image that seems to live and breathe could never have been done before; but, now, there are many ways this could be fulfilled by technology [Rev 13:15]