I admit it – This is a question I have asked myself. 

How much freedom do we have as believers in the application of Scripture in our daily lives?  The key issue in this post is the freedom aspect.  Can I take a verse that contextually speaks of topic “A”, and apply it nowadays to a completely different topic, let say topic “B”.

Let me give you some background as to why this has cropped up in my mind lately.  I belong to a great Sunday School class and they have a group text system to inform us of prayer needs and reports of praise as we go about our days.  

This past week, a fellow believer had to undergo a serious, life threatening operation, and as we all prayed, we were excited to see that after the operation, our brother’s wife informed us of the success of the operation.  Of course this brother is an elderly man, and the operation was a serious threat to his immediate health.  

Upon informing the group of our brothers success in the operating room, many of us spoke praises to God for the success of the operation, and spoke of our continued prayers for him and his family.  He is not out of the dark yet!

One brother, bless his heart, spoke boastfully (I fear) of his continued recovery, stating…

He will complete the good work of recovery and restoration that he has started.

I am sure my brother is seeking to simply encourage the wife, and I assign absolutely no bad motivation or malice to him in this statement, but I wonder if this is a wise message to offer a believer in this circumstance.

First, it sounds like it is a free interpretation of Phil 1:6, which, as some may know, I believe is speaking of monetary gifts given to Paul by the local church of Philippi (See Conditional Security – Philippians 1:3-11), and not of a unilateral promise of God in continually restoring one’s health. 

This is an impossible interpretation, in that we all eventually die!

Now of course if my brother is a prophet, that is another ball of wax that may be considered at a later date, but from all the discussions I have had with him, he has never claimed to be apostolic or prophetic.  

As I have ruminated previously, providing a promise to a fellow believer (or a non-believer) as if directly from God but taking liberties in applying a promise, brings potential shame on the name of the Faithful One. (Truth is invincible, only if applied truthfully)

In an earlier post I have recounted a story of when I discussed the word of faith teaching with a preacher of the same persuasion and of some of the unintended fall out of this teaching.  (See Story Time in  Ezekiel 34 – Shepherds & The Sick – 5)  This fallout, not only of putting words in God’s mouth, and of the potential shame as mentioned above, but also includes the weakening (or decimation) of a believers faith, if the promise is not fulfilled.   I am convinced this is a totally unintended action but if considered in the light of Scripture, may have incredibly serious implications. 

In this culture that is completely free of all moral bonds, as believers, we need to cling to the truth, and yet not overextend it’s application.  Truth has boundaries (an essential characteristic of truth), and at the risk of sounding faithless, only God knows the immediate future of our brother in the hospital.  We all seek his wellness, and I believe we all know his future depends on the the wisdom of God and His tender mercies. 

Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.

The Lord has instructed us to be gracious in our communication, and informed us that in this gracious attitude, we would know how to answer each other. To encourage a brother is to include truth, not to simply make us feel better in the immediate context. That may be the reason (at least one reason) Paul included the mention of salt. Salt sometimes stings. Gracious words are not to avoid truth, which may sting.

I look forward to comments and questions, especially passages of Scripture that may help in understanding this topic better.

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Thanks again for coming to visit. I hope you found something of interest in this post and would appreciate a comment, to begin a discussion.

Let’s continue in our second post based on the “Questions I’ve Been Asked”, regarding the binding of Satan, and more specifically, the term “a thousand years” in the book of Revelation.

You see, a brother asked me about the thousand year teaching in the Book of Revelation and if Satan is bound at the present time.

I hope I can address these concerns properly.

Let’s read the passage one more time.

Rev 20:2

And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years,

As I mentioned at the end of our last post, this next question has been the most influential in my understanding of the passage.

2.) Does the literalness of a passage increase due to the use of a precise number?

When John is writing this passage, he uses a specific number, and because of this, must mean what he writes, right?

(And isn’t that a cool gif? —->)

We must take his description of the thousand years literally since he specifically uses that specific term and did not modify it by using terms like “approximately” or “about” or “more than”. I must have heard this argument a million times! – Literally a million times!!!

But is that how a Jewish man would communicate 2000 years ago (not exactly 2000 years ago, but again, you know what I mean, right)?

John was a man steeped in the Old Testament, and surely knew of the instances the prophets used the very same term. Granted, sometimes the prophets would be defining a population, the result of a census, or a sum of money, and that seems to be an obvious use of the term in a literal sense. But sometimes the prophets used the term “thousand” to define an indefinite time, or an extended time.

Consider the following passages

Deuteronomy 1:11
May the LORD, the God of your fathers, make you a thousand times as many as you are and bless you, as he has promised you!

Was the LORD going to implement a birth control system once the population grew to a certain point? (Don’t be so sarcastic Carl!)

Deuteronomy 7:9
Know therefore that the LORD your God is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments, to a thousand generations,

Ok, follow me on this – let’s assume that one generation is 40 years (just for giggles!)

OK, lets make one more assumption, and that is that Moses recieved this promise aproximately 2,000 years before the birth of our Lord. I know it was less, but let me make the math easy!

A thousand generations would be forty thousand years. 40,000 years! That means that this promise ceases to be valid in the year 38,000.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m glad my great great great …. grandchildren have a chance, but honestly, what about my lineage in the year 38,001? (Ok Carl now you are being ridiculous!)

Deuteronomy 32:30
How could one have chased a thousand,
and two have put ten thousand to flight,
unless their Rock had sold them,
and the LORD had given them up?

Although there are many instances of small contingencies of Israeli men taking on multitudes (I am thinking of Gideon and Jonathon for instance), I don’t know if the exact thousand to one or five thousand to one ratios ever exactly occurred.

The Psalms are very descriptive and poetic and often use terms in a very symbolic fashion – not very much unlike the book of Revelation.

Psalm 50:10
For every beast of the forest is mine,
the cattle on a thousand hills.

I am sure God owns all the cattle. I guess I need to google the actual number of hills on earth – I am sure it is one thousand exactly!

Again Carl – too sarcastic – tune it down a smidge!

Psalm 68:17
The chariots of God are twice ten thousand,
thousands upon thousands;
the Lord is among them; Sinai is now in the sanctuary.

Twenty thousand chariots are a lot of chariots!

Psalm 84:10
For a day in your courts is better
than a thousand elsewhere.
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God
than dwell in the tents of wickedness.

Could the psalmist be using “thousand” days as an expression extending beyond two years and 9 months? Why is he so short sigted? I would have used a million instead of a thousand – At least then I would have over 2700 years of being in His courts!

Psalm 90:4
For a thousand years in your sight
are but as yesterday when it is past,
or as a watch in the night.

Yesterday and a watch at night are two different spans of time, so if we are goings to be ‘literalists” regarding the use of the term thousand, we need to consider the literalness of some of the other time descriptions being used.

Psalm 91:7
A thousand may fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.

The psalmist seems to use thousand and ten thousand interchangeably. Interesting.

Psalm 105:8
He remembers his covenant forever,
the word that he commanded, for a thousand generations,

The covenant is referred to as being forever and the generations are numbered at a thousand. Is there a hint here that thousand means more than a thousand?

It seems that when the writers of Scripture wanted to define an extended number or time , they used the term thousand.

When they wanted to really blow your mind Scripture writers would use the term “murias”, which comes down into the English language as the word myriad. This term seems to give the impression of an innumerable number.

Although this is a short study, it is rooted in the Old Testament. As I grow as a Christian, I am increasingly impressed with the importance of comparing Scripture with Scripture. especially in the book of Revelation.

I look forward to comments and questions, especially passages of Scripture that may help in understanding this topic better.

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On to the next verse we find in the book of Revelation, and trying to find some answers to the Bottomless Pit question a brother set me on to research. It seems I still have four verses to consider.

I will address the last two in the next post.

Lets consider our first verse.

Rev 11 :7
And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that rises from the bottomless pit will make war on them and conquer them and kill them,

Nagging questions…..

Who is the beast?

• He fights against the two witnesses (whoever they represent I don’t know, but at the very least they are on God’s side).
• He is coming out of the pit so he probably smells of death (2 Cor 2:16)

Is his ascension a present activity or is it describing the beasts origin?

In other words, does the beast ascend to make war, or has he ascended previously and John is simply describing the origin/source of the Beast?

The word ascendeth in the Greek is the Strong # G305,

• verb – present active participle – nominative singular neuter
• anabaino an-ab-ah’-ee-no: to go up
• arise, ascend (up), climb (go, grow, rise, spring) up, come (up).

Notice that Johns verb choice is a present active participle. I do not know greek, but from what I can find out, the use of a present tense signifies continuity, or continuously coming out of the abyss.

One website that tries to explain greek grammar states that the present tense signifies “a continuous action, habitual action, often reflects a lifestyle”

(Now I don’t know about you, but I have a hard time considering the continual ascending of the beast as a lifestyle, but the point is taken, that this does not seem to be a one time event.)

Other than defining where the beast is rising from, this verse doesn’t shed much light on the pit.

Rev 17 :8
The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to rise from the bottomless pit and go to destruction. And the dwellers on earth whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world will marvel to see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come.

What is going on here?

Dang – I am glad the only thing I have to consider is the portion describing the bottomless pit, cause this thing about “the beast that was, and is not, and yet is” is simply beyond me. Also, the book of life thing is confusing for me, so I am glad I don’t have to address that topic!

What I do have to address is the pit.

What does this passage teach me concerning the pit?

• Well – the beast comes out of it – but we saw that in an earlier passage (Rev 11:7).
• Could this be the same time, same ascendancy as in Rev 11:7?
• I think John is describing a different time, this being the time(s) the beast goes into damnation/perdition.
• Rev 11:7 speak of the beasts ascendancy and seeming success over the two witnesses.
• This passage speaks of the downfall of the beast.

I am tempted to think that the mention of the bottomless pit is more of a description of this beasts origin, as opposed to defining a physical location. I don’t have much to base that on other than this is a highly symbolic book and trying to identify a location for the pit may be a fools errand.

Also, whatever John is trying to describe escapes me since his verb tenses are confusing to me. The beast shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and yet is not, and yet is.

I guess the one thing that I know is that the pit is a real bad place – real bad! Other than that, I am not seeing much more that this verse is telling me of the bottomless pit.

If you have some input, I would welcome it! Hope to see you again for our final post in this series.

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Thanks again for coming to visit. I hope you found something of interest in this post and would appreciate a comment, to begin a discussion.