Hidden (Krypto) Treasures

To get pearls, one must dive deep!

Tag: Agnus Dei

There is wonder wonder …

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On August 24, 2010

In Become a Child, Christian, Reuben

Our beloved 4 year old son, Reuben was learning to sing the song, “There is power, power, wondering working power, in the blood of the Lamb (Jesus Christ)” but instead of singing it the way we are used to signing it, he switched the words “wonder” and “power” and sang it as “There is wonder wonder power working wonder in the blood of the Lamb”. At first thought, I thought that I had to correct him so that he could correctly learn the words, but soon it dawned on me that he was spot on and accurate about the blood of the Agnus Dei, the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ.

There is not only power in the blood of the Lamb so that you and I could be free for the bondage of the sin (that easily besets us), but there is wonder, power working wonder in the blood of the Lamb. The greatest power working wonder is that a sinner can be forgiven and made into a saint. Personally, I wonder and marvel at this blessed assurance, where I (the chief of sinners) am imputed righteousness and declared blameless before the throne of God above, because of the shed blood of the Jesus Christ, by which alone there is remission of sin. We can be forgiven from the burden of sin and free from the bondage of sin, for there is wonder wonder power working wonder in the blood of the Lamb.

Exodus 15:11 (KJV)
11 Who is like unto thee, O LORD, among the gods? who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?

Father forgive them for they know not what they do

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On March 25, 2010

In Christian, Seven Sayings

The first saying of Jesus as He hung on the Cross, living up to His Name, which was to save His people from their sins was “FATHER, FORGIVE THEM FOR THEY KNOW NOT WHAT THEY DO” (Luke 23:34). These are wonderful, wonderful words of Love.

Let’s break this saying down into its individual components as we try to understand the depth of what Jesus meant.

FATHER
The address was a direct and personal address to God as His Father. This was establishing the fact that He was the Son of God in whom God was well pleased. Jesus said He and the Father are one, in other words. If the Father was God, so was He. This is GOD asking GOD to forgive.

FORGIVE THEM
Whom was Jesus asking to forgive?

  • The men and women who shouted “Crucify Him”.
  • The religious leaders and their followers.
  • The indifferent Pilate, the inebriated Herod
  • In essence, transcending all barriers of time, all sinners, including You and Me

FOR THEY KNOW NOT WHAT THEY DO
I wish that Jesus had spelled out what the people did not know, for which they had to be forgiven.

WHAT was it that the people DID NOT KNOW?
The people did not know 

  1. THE WILL OF GOD
    In the Garden of Gethsemane we see Jesus, in agony praying and submitting to the will of God as he prayed “Not my Will, but thy (God’s) Will be done”. What was this will of God? Isaiah 53:10 states “Yet, It was the Lord’s will to crush Him (Jesus) and cause Him (Jesus) to suffer”. It was the Lord’s will that Jesus had to suffer and die and bring salvation to all. Luke 23:24, records that PILATE handed over Jesus to the People’s Will, but the people and Pilate were mere ACTORS in the grand design of God’s Will. There were merely doing without knowing what God wanted them to be doing.
  2. THE TRUTH (VERITAS) about the CROSS
    that it was indeed a fight of the ages, a battle that began in Genesis in the garden and now was being finished (Tetelastai) on the Cross, and its outcome.

    In John 8:32 we read “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free”
    WHAT WAS THIS TRUTH?
    To know THE Truth, we need to go back to the very beginning; to Genesis. To the time of  
    ADAM and EVE     in the garden. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God (The fall of Man), God prophesied against Satan who had caused Adam and Eve to disobey Him.
    The prophesy was “I will put enmity between the seed of the woman (Jesus) and the serpent (Satan), you shall strike His heel and He will crush it’s head.”
    So, Satan knew that his doom was foretold and he could do nothing but wait.
    CAIN is BORN.
    Satan acts, thinking he is the one who has come to deliver (the seed of the woman). Satan gets Cain to kill Abel.
    God tells Cain “Sin is crouching at your door, you must master it” (Genesis 4:7)
    Adam and Eve proliferate, the earth gets filled. Satan entices people to sin until the time of
    NOAH’s FLOOD    . God in his wrath almost destroys ALL of mankind by a flood.
    From Noah and his Son’s and their wives, the world is repopulated. Satan goes back into slumber until one day when
    MOSES IS BORN.     Could this be the seed of the woman, the deliverer?  Satan entices Pharoah and in the birth of Moses, “BABY BOYS are KILLED”.
    Though Moses is miraculously saved, He could not be the one, since he himself sinned. Satan must be now at a little ease. Then came the
    TIME OF THE KINGS.     Satan continues to live in the LUXURY of DECEIT for a while until one
    BETHLEHEM     NIGHT when  he is AWAKENED from his sleep, as he hears
    FOOTSTEPS of the wise men (MAGI)     in Herod’s court. He hurries to Herod’s palace and find’s the magi asking, “Where is he who is born the king of the Jews?”
    Satan hears the heavenly angelic choir sing and the shepherds talk about this baby boy called Jesus as the one who has come to Save and deliver God’s people.
    Knowing that the deliverer was born, he gets back to his ways of trying to kill the seed of the woman; and pulls out from his bag of evil tricks, the same plan as in the time of Moses (the mistaken deliverer) which he puts into action. There is another Slaughter of the INNOCENTS;
    ANOTHER BLOODSHED OF BABIES.     But by divine intervention, Joseph and Mary escape with Jesus to Nazareth and hence the fulfillment of the prophecy, “He shall be called a Nazarene” (Matthew 2:23)
    30 years pass by and we see Jesus walking along the banks of a river and his harbinger John the Baptist, proclaiming
    BEHOLD THE AGNUS DEI    , the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world and at the
    BAPTISM OF JESUS,     Satan hears along with everyone else, the very voice of God, saying
    “BEHOLD”, THIS IS MY SON, WITH WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED.”
    Immediately after that proclamation, Satan knew who his target was and so goes to tempt Jesus when Jesus is physically weak (yet spiritually fortified) after 40 DAYS AND 40 NIGHTS of fasting.
    Jesus engages in the the fight of the ages as he fences with Satan using the Word of God to defend himself and deal offensive blows. In all of this Jesus did not sin nor knew no sin, and He could not be touched. This only vexed Satan even more and so he devises an evil plan and entices the religious leaders, poisoning their hearts.“The religious leaders plotted to kill Jesus” (John 11:45-53)
    Fearing this was insufficient, he wants to make sure that his plan to kill the seed of the woman wont fail again. So he poison’s a friend and disciple of Jesus, Judas Iscariot who betrays Jesus. After the
    BETRAYAL OF A FRIEND    , Jesus is handed over to be crucified. THE FIGHT IS ON FULL SWING . JESUS IS CRUCIFIED and Satan thinks – “hah, now it is finished. I have won”.

    What Satan failed to have realized is that in all his calculations, he had not considered a critical fact into his equation. He was suddenly GUILTY OF MURDER.
    God had said. “The soul that sins shall die” (Ezekiel 18) and that “ the wages of sin is death” (Romans 3:23)
    But Jesus had never sinned.  Satan had no right whatsoever to kill Jesus.

    THIS TICKED GOD BEYOND BELIEF and his emotions and actions is recorded in Habakkuk 3: 11-14
    Vs. 11: Sun and the Moon stood still in the heavens, At the glint of your flying arrows, At the lightning of your flashing spear. When Jesus died, darkness came over the land.
    Vs 12: In wrath, You strode the earth, And in your anger, you threshed the nations.
    Vs. 13: You went out to deliver your people (Jesus’ birth) To save your anointed One (Jesus on the Cross) You crushed the leader of the land of wickedness (Satan crushed) You stripped him from head to toe.
    Vs. 14: With his own weapon, you pierced his head. The cross, looks like an inverted sword, wielded into a head (skull). Interesting, isn’t it that the hill on which Jesus was crucified was shaped as a head, a skull and hence called Golgotha.
    From verse 13 of this scripture, we see that God was INFURIATED, STRIDING THE EARTH in his WRATH and ANGER and as in the time of Noah, He could have destroyed it all, if Jesus had not stepped in and INTERCEDED, saying “Father, Forgive them for they know not what they do.”

    This is the truth that Satan does not want you to know, that at the end of the faded storm, as the mist cleared, there was one hero, one champion, one victor standing , and that was the Lord Jesus Christ.

NOW YOU KNOW THE TRUTH – There is no excuse “Captivity has been set, Salvation bought for you and me. Cause Satan is defeated and Jesus is the Champion” and this TRUTH SHALL MAKE YOU AND ME FREE.

“FATHER, FORGIVE US FOR WE DID NOT KNOW”, but now we do.

Guides of God

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On March 17, 2010

In Christian

On our visit to the Taj Mahal the November of 2009, we were approached by many at the entrance who kept asking us if we wanted to hire them as guides. The Taj Mahal is a testament of a man’s love for his bride. We did not feel the need to, but observed that there were others who had hired these guides. The guides functioned in explaining the history and details of the beautiful Taj Mahal and those who used these guides got a deeper and more personal understanding of the monument.

The Bible also talks about guides and in one particular instance has a person asking as to how he can understand the Scripture (what he read) unless some man guided him. This is recorded in the encounter of Philip with the Ethiopian Treasurer. As the Ethiopian man of authority was returning from Jerusalem, where he had come to worship, sat in his chariot, reading the Scripture prophesied by prophet Isaiah, Philip led by the Spirit of God ran toward him and on hearing the Ethiopian, asked him, as to whether the man understood what he was reading. The Ethiopian’s response was not only straightforward, but profound as well. He merely questioned “How can I, except some man should guide me?” (Acts 8:31). Philip subsequently preached to the man that led to his salvation as he believed in Jesus Christ, the Agnus Dei (lamb of God who took away the sins of the world) and was baptized.

We ought to be guides of God as well. We ought to be guides of God for his people. The world around is asking us, how can I understand what the Scripture says about God? Except you and I function as a guide how can they  understand?

Just as the guides at the Taj Mahal functioned to make the experience of those who hired them personal and testified on the extent of a man’s monumental love for his bride, we must function as guides of a God who so greatly loved His bride (the world that believes in Him) that His monumental Love stands today in the symbol of the Cross on which the very personification of God’s great Love, His Only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, willingly demonstrated His love for us by being judged by God, in our stead.

Acts 8:26-35 (KJV)
26 And the angel of the Lord spake unto Philip, saying, Arise, and go toward the south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.
27 And he arose and went: and, behold, a man of Ethiopia, an eunuch of great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians, who had the charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for to worship,
28 Was returning, and sitting in his chariot read Esaias the prophet.
29 Then the Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thyself to this chariot.
30 And Philip ran thither to him, and heard him read the prophet Esaias, and said, Understandest thou what thou readest?
31 And he said, How can I, except some man should guide me? And he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him.
32 The place of the scripture which he read was this, He was led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his shearer, so opened he not his mouth:
33 In his humiliation his judgment was taken away: and who shall declare his generation? for his life is taken from the earth.
34 And the eunuch answered Philip, and said, I pray thee, of whom speaketh the prophet this? of himself, or of some other man?
35 Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus.

Jesus in the OT :: Isaiah

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On December 16, 2009

In Christian, Jesus in the O.T.

The book of Isaiah gives us a glimpse of who Jesus is in the Old Testament (O.T).

The book of Isaiah can be likened to an miniature Bible. Like the entire Bible has 66 books, Isaiah has 66 chapters. In the first 39 chapters, Isaiah stresses the RIGHTEOUSNESS, HOLINESS and JUSTICE of God, a theme similar to the 39 books of the Old Testament. In the next 27 chapters of Isaiah portrays the Lord’s GLORY, COMPASSION and GRACE, a theme similar to the 27 books of the New Testament. In the 40+ years it records, it spans 4 kings of Judah. The Book starts with the Judgment of Judah and the nations and in the middle moves into Redemption, closing with Redemption and Future Glory.

Isaiah, the Latin form of Yesha’yahu (shortened as Yeshaiah) means Yahweh is Salvation and the well known passages in Isaiah that we are familiar with are from Isaiah 9:6 and Isaiah 53.

Isaiah 9:6 which is the prophecy of the ANOINTED ONE reads
For unto us a child is born (expressing the humanity of Jesus),
unto us a Son is given (expressing the divinity of Jesus).

And Isaiah 53 which is a prophecy of the ANOINTED ONE’s ATONING WORK states the Jesus was wounded for our transgressions, Bruised for our Iniquities and The chastisement of our peace was upon him and by His stripes, we are healed and like a Lamb to slaughter, He (Jesus) came.

Now when we fast forward many years, we saw John the Baptist, a man dressed brutishly, alongside a river making a promulgation as recorded in John 1:29 (29 The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God (Agnus Dei), which taketh away the sin of the world.)

The Lamb that Isaiah saw being led to the slaughter, is the Lamb of God that John the Baptist sees, and it will be this same Lamb that we will all see, seated on the throne, of whom it will be sung –  Blessing and honor, and glory and power be unto him who sits on the throne and unto the Lamb, forever and forever and ever and ever … (Revelation 5:13) and  Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb. (Revelation 7:10)

In Isaiah, Jesus is the Agnus Dei, The Lamb of God

Isaiah 53: 5-7
5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.
6 All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
7 He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.

Broken for you and me

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On September 18, 2009

In Broken, Christian

As I pondered over the word ‘broken’, I wondered as to what are some of the things that were broken in order to crucify, or in the crucifixion of Jesus. Some that surfaced are given below,

  1. The Law was broken
    The 9th commandment (law) which said that you shall not bear any false witness (Exodus 20:16) was broken, for when those who tried Jesus found no fault in Him (Luke 23:4, Mark 14:55), many bore false witnesses with contradictory accounts against Jesus (Mark 14:56-59).
  2. Jesus’ body was broken
    In describing His manner of death (by crucifixion), Jesus informed His disciples, in the event that we familiarly know as the Lord’s supper, that His body will be broken, by symbolically breaking the bread and presenting it to His disciples with the following words “Take, eat: this is my body, which is broken for you: this do in remembrance of me” (1 Corinthians 11:24). Though this may seem contradictory to the verse that states that none of His bones were broken (John 19:36), we must recognize that the breaking of one’s body need not necessarily mean that one’s bones need to be broken as well. There is absolutely no doubt however that his body was scourged, beaten, pierced and marred (literally broken) in the events preceding his crucifixion.
  3. Jesus’ heavenly relationship with God the Father was broken
    When Jesus the sinless became sin (2 Corinthians 5:21), a Holy God (the Father) who could have nothing to do with sin, had to severe the Unitarian relationship that He had with with His Son, Jesus, which leads to Jesus crying in agony, “My God, My God, why have YOU forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34).
  4. Jesus’ earthly relationship with his mother was broken
    From the Cross, Jesus refers to Mary, his earthly mother, not as mother but as woman, when he hands over responsibility to his beloved disciple John to care for Mary (John 19:26-27). When the penalty for sin was paid by Jesus, the Lamb of God (Agnus Dei), Mary’s boy child demonstrated and vocally expressed that He was indeed the foretold seed of the woman (Genesis 3:15), the Son of God (Isaiah 9:6).

What are some of the other things that you can think off that were broken in the redeeming and saving act of Jesus, in the events that led to and in the crucifixion of Jesus Christ?

Earthly laws against God, heavenly and earthy relationship of Jesus, including His body was broken. Why? Jesus was broken, so that the broken relationship of God with man could be restored.
He would rather be broken for you and me, than be broken without you and me.

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