Judging According to Appearance

Judging According to Appearance

Jesus commanded us to judge when He said, “Judge not according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgment” (John 7:24). When we judge according to appearance, we can easily miss the real truth.

God told Samuel to go to the house of Jesse to anoint the new king to replace evil King Saul, and he failed to understand this truth. When Samuel saw Eliab, Jesse’s firstborn, he said, “Surely the Lord’s anointed is before him” (1 Sam. 16:6). The Lord responded to Samuel, “Do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart” (16:7). God rejected seven sons of Jesse until David, the youngest was chosen as the next king.

Consider how easily hypocrites use this weakness of judging by appearance to deceive. Jesus described hypocrites in various ways to call attention to how they seek to hide their evil hearts by appearing to be holy. “Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence” (Matt 23:25). He also described them as being like beautifully adorned tombs, “…but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness” (Matt. 23:27-28). They prayed long prayers standing visibly on street corners. They gave great sums to help the needy but not until they had sounded the trumpet to call attention to themselves. Judge not according to appearances!

Some want to judge a church by how many notable people attend. Compare the ornate temples of the first centuries with the places Christians met, often in secrecy. “You see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of the world…” (1 Cor. 1:26-27). The Lord also said, “Listen my beloved brethren: Has not God chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him” (Jas. 2:5).

So, when you look at others remember what Samuel forgot—man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart. A person’s true nature is not determined solely by his outward appearance as a Christian. Remember that Jesus judges us by how we regard the least in the kingdom (Matt. 25:40). Righteousness is determined by the heart of a man, not by how he makes himself to appear.

As you make judgments about other’s worth, use righteous judgments—look on the inside!

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A Verse Few Understand… “Judge Not”

A Verse Few Understand… “Judge Not”

Our theme for July is looking at the judgment and seeing it as God sees it. There are many aspects of judging, for we make judgments every day. Let’s take time to look at one of the most misunderstood verses in the Bible about judging others. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, “Judge not that you be not judged” (Matt. 7:1).

The evidence that is so misunderstood is best seen when you are discussing the Bible with another and simply restating truths which are found in it. Far too many seek to negate what you have said by accusing you of violating Jesus’ words about not judging others. While the reality is that what you said is what Jesus said, they have felt the force of what you have shown them in the Bible. They hope to end the religious discussion with these words.

To see that these words of Jesus are being misunderstood, look on the same page where they are found and note that Jesus also said, “Beware of false teachers who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves” (Matt. 7:15). How could we beware of these false teachers without making a judgment against them? The fact that Jesus teaches us to beware of the “wolves” shows that not all judging is wrong.

On another occasion Jesus spoke about judging. “Do not judge according to appearance, but judge with righteous judgments” (John 7:24). The One who said do not judge also said judge! He commanded righteous judgment. His words about not judging concerns unrighteous judgment.

What kind of judging did He forbid? Look again at all that He said in the Sermon on the Mount. He describes the situation when one with many faults harshly condemns another. “Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank that is in your own eye” (Matt. 7:3)? This is unrighteous judging.

How will God treat this kind of judging? “For with what judgment you judge you shall be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you” (Matt. 7:2). If we use the standard of sinless perfection on others, God will use that standard on us! God is full of mercy and willingly treats us this way. “Blessed are the merciful, for they will obtain mercy” (Matt. 5:7). Read Psalm 18:24-26 to see David’s description of this. This man of God understood our God.

So do not hesitate to deal with ungodly behavior. Keep yourself out of the discussion and use the words of the Bible in talking to others. Speak the truths of God, using the words of God. They cannot accuse you of judging when the words of judgment are the words of God!

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Until the Harvest… Sowers, Laborers

Until the Harvest… Sowers, Laborers

Before Jesus died, He revealed to the apostles what lay in their future. They were to be sowers of the word of God into hearts that were like wayside, thorny, stony and good soils (Matt. 13:1-9, 18-23). He also told them that in the field they were planting seed which would produce the kingdom of God. He then told them they should expect Satan to come add seeds of evil among the seed the apostles had planted (Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43).

That kingdom began, and Satan began his work by “planting weeds” in the church. He tried to change the very nature of the church into one which demanded all men, especially Gentiles, be circumcised. For the next generation, the church of Jesus struggled with tares (weeds) of Judaism. Take a moment and look around you. The church of Christ is eternal and will always be on the earth, but Satan has never ceased trying to hide it among the tares of religious division.

When the Owner of the field was asked about removing the tares planted by Satan, He said, “Let both grow together until the harvest, and at the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, ‘First gather together the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barns’” (Matt. 13:30). Good seed and tares will be here “until the harvest.”

So, what are we to do until the harvest? Jesus said, “Pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest” (Matt. 9:38). The time of the harvest is not yet, but He wants us to pray that laborers may be in the fields. He even told the apostles that they were laborers in that field (John 4:38). We need to pray for laborers and to be laborers.

What do we do until the harvest? We need to realize that all of us can be laborers in many ways. Paul spoke of those who planted and those who watered. He then reminded us that it does not make any difference who does any of this work. He said he who sows and he who waters are to do their work realizing it is God who gives the increase (1 Cor. 3:7).

What are we to do until the harvest? Ask God to use you. Lift up your eyes unto the field. Plant, water and ask God to put you in situations where you can be used as one who goes into the world sowing the seed. The fact that others might be better “sowers” or “waterers” than you makes no difference. Remember every seed sown and every drop of water added to the seed together makes for a great harvest.

There is so much that is happening in our world which can only be changed by those who are sowers and waterers, lights in the darkness and salt seasoning the earth. Pray, ask, sow, water, light and salt—let God use you!

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They Got It Wrong… Coelacanth

They Got It Wrong… Coelacanth

The “story” played out so well and it “seemed” plausible—and also, it plugged a major hole in their theory. So, they went with it…big time. For years the coelacanth, a lobed-finned fish, was touted as the creature that took us out of the water onto the land, eventually giving rise to the dinosaurs. It was allegedly the ancestor of all modern land-dwelling tertrapods (four-footed animals).

Coelacanth

Another evolution fairy tail.

Prior to 1938, the coelacanth was known only from fossils, which afforded scientists a great deal of speculation when they tried to extrapolate a physiology from the record of the rocks. Certain structures, such as fins, were determined to be the forerunners of legs for all amphibians. With joy abounding, evolutionists designated this as the animal that allowed fish to crawl out of the muck and mire in order to live on dry land.

Textbooks were quick to point out this “missing link” as a transitional animal between water-dwelling and land-dwelling creatures. For instance, one book explains “The coelacanth is the only surviving member of the ancient group of fishes from which modern four-footed land animals are thought to have evolved” (Maton, et al., 1997, p. 105). Another biology textbook has a beautiful picture of this amazing creation with the following caption:

“The living coelacanth, Latimeria chalumnae. Discovered in the western Indian Ocean in 1938, this coelacanth represents a group of fishes that had been thought to be extinct for about 70 million years. Scientists who studied living individuals in their natural habitat at depths of 100 to 200 meters observed them drifting in the current and hunting other fishes at night. Some individuals are nearly 3 meters long; they have a slender, fat-filled swim bladder. Although Latimeria is a very strange animal, its features mark it as a member of the evolutionary line that gave rise to the terrestrial tetrapods” (Raven and Johnson, 1989, p. 857).

It seemed a good fit at the time. The funny looking creature with lobed front fins appeared to be the perfect candidate for evolutionists’ transitional creature. Yet, the truth has shown this to be completely wrong.

In December 1938, a living coelacanth was caught off the coast of Africa, and soon thereafter the evolutionists’ joy turned to consternation when it was determined that the soft anatomy of the coelacanth was nothing like that of an amphibian. A 1999 book review in Nature provided the following commentary regarding the anatomy of coelacanths:

“…it shares very few advanced characteristics with the tetrapods, and this puts it somewhere near the base of the sarcopterygian [vertebrates in which the fin/limbs portion of the skeleton articulates to the girdles by means of a single bone—BH] tree. In a sense, the coelacanth tells us more about the primitive condition of all bony fishes than about the origin of tetrapods” (Janvier, p. 856).

Fast-forward to 2021, when the demand for shark fins prompted fishermen to take their nets deeper. Tony Carnie reported, “a new commercial market in China for shark fins and oil prompted fishers off the southwest coast of Madagascar to set large-mesh gill-nets known as jarifa in deeper waters: a startling number of coelacanths have been landed as by-catch.” Carnie pointed out that this new discovery had recently been published in the South African Journal of Science. In that journal article researchers Andrew Cooke, Michael Bruton and Minosoa Ravololoharinjara reported that many Coelacanths have also been captured off the coast of Madagascar.

Bob Yirka, writing for Phys.Org noted, “The work involved studying catch records made by fishermen, most of whom were using a type of gillnet known as jarifa—they are used to capture sharks in deep water. The nets are placed vertically in the water down to depths of 300 meters in underwater canyons—the same places where coelacanths live. The researchers found far more recorded captures than they were expecting—34 between the years 1987 and 2019, enough to suggest that as many of 100 of them may have actually been captured over the past several decades.”

These and other studies have made it quite apparent that these fish did not live in shallow areas “ready to crawl out onto land.” All the way back in 1998, Peter Forey observed, “Comoran coelacanths live at about 180 meters, below the 18° C isotherm, and inhabit submarine caves formed through recent volcanic activity” (1998, 395:319). These animals, that allegedly were suppose to have crawled out on land, are extremely deep-water fish. Evolutionists got it wrong—these are not fish that lived millions of years ago that walked out on land, and gave rise to the dinosaurs. No, these are fish that live in tremendously deep waters, and they are very much alive today.


REFERENCES

Carnie, Tony (2021), “Ghost fish: after 420 million years in the deeps, modern gillnets from shark fin trade drag coelacanths into the light,” Mongabay News, Online https://news.mongabay.com/2021/05/ghost-fish-after-420-million-years-in-the-deeps-modern-gillnets-from-shark-fin-trade-drag-coelacanths-into-the-light/

Forey, Peter (1998), “A Home From Home for Coelacanths,” Nature, 395:319-320, September 24.

Janvier, Philippe (1999), “Coleacanth a’ la Marseillaise,” Nature, 401:854-856, October 28.

Maton, Anthea, Jean Hopkins, Susan Johnson, David LaHart, Maryanna Quon Warner, and Jill D. Wright (1997), Exploring Life Science (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall), second edition.

Raven, Peter H. and George B. Johnson (1989), Biology (St. Louis, MO: Times Mirror/Mosby College Publishing), second edition.

Yirka, Bob (2021), Advent of gillnets has led to significant numbers of coelacanth captures, May 24th, https://phys.org/news/2021-05-advent-gillnets-significant-coelacanth-captures.html.

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RESPUESTA A CUESTIONAMIENTO DE 1 CORINTIOS 14:34

RESPUESTA A CUESTIONAMIENTO DE 1 CORINTIOS 14:34 POR PARTE DE ALGUNOS FILÓSOFOS

Recientemente leí en un grupo de filosofía y “exégesis” un cuestionamiento bastante serio a 1 Corintios 14:34 y la prohibición de Pablo a las mujeres en las asambleas públicas de la Iglesia. El texto era categorizado como “inexistente” con una imagen del manuscrito vaticano (Uno de los principales unciales) donde se asume de forma rápida y poco objetiva que quienes utilizaban ese texto simplemente ignoraban por completo el griego y eran culpables de ignorancia.

            Ciertamente no soy experto en Griego ni mucho menos pero considero con vehemencia que esta crítica necesita una respuesta forjada con respeto y adornada con la verdad. Cito textualmente las palabras del señor Juan Hernández (que son públicas en Facebook) de su artículo pertinente a esta cuestión, él escribe:

¿Que son los Obelos en los manuscritos antiguos griegos, en este caso, del Nuevo Testamento?

El obelismo es la práctica de anotar con marcas en los márgenes de los manuscritos antiguos. Los editores colocaron un obelo en los márgenes de los manuscritos, especialmente en documentos atribuidos a Homero, para indicar ciertas líneas que pueden no haber sido escritas por el mismo Homero. El sistema fue desarrollado por Aristarchus y se usó notablemente más tarde por Orígenes en su Hexapla. Orígenes marcó palabras espurias entre obelos y metobelos. Originalmente, este signo (o una línea simple) se usaba en manuscritos antiguos para marcar pasajes que se sospechaba que estaban corrompidos o falsos; La práctica de agregar tales notas marginales se conoció como se mencionó al principio (Obelismos)”

Mientras estamos completamente de acuerdo en referencia al obelismo, desentonamos por completo con el uso de los mismo en algunos pasajes del Nuevo Testamento. Es importante recalcar que en este caso al tener frente a nosotros el Manuscrito Vaticano la característica principal del mismo y su relevancia es que es un Uncial; por lo que no posee notas en los márgenes, como otros manuscritos lo harían inclusive el mismo texto masorético. Debe de entenderse entonces que el uso del Obelismo en este manuscrito, en este pasaje de Corintios particularmente NO ES de ninguna forma una nota explicativa  y no puede ni debe ser comparado con la Ilíada de Homero, pues es un documento formal, santo, con el más alto estándar.

¿Qué significa el uso de Obelos en el texto Griego de 1 Cor.14:34?

Bien, la duda que ha existido no es sobre la autenticidad de los versículos 34-35, sino más bien la correspondencia de los mismos. Varios Testigos Occidentales de fuerza trasponen los versículos para que aparezcan después del V.40 (D, F, G, 88, entre otros), Estas modificaciones de los escriban reflejan los intentos de los escribas por hallar un lugar más adecuado contextualmente hablando. Personalmente considero que ambos versículos están muy bien ubicados en la manera tradicional que ha leído la R.V. 1960, la razón que me convence a tener tal apreciación son los testigos que inclinan la balanza para la inclusión de ambos versos aquí y no después del v.40.  A favor de la inclusión tal como la  tenemos figuran los testigos (manuscritos de importancia) tales como: Alejandrino, A, B, K, 0243, 33, 81, 104, 181, 326, 330, 436, 451, 614, 629, 630, 1241, 1739, 1877, 1881, 1962, 1984, Byz… entre otros testigos más. También en la escala de dificultad de crítica de Textos (Disciplina que estudia estos asuntos), el pasaje alcanza “ (B) ” indicando así que no existe mayor dificultad alrededor de los dos versículos de 1 Corintios 14:34.

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