Wednesday we talked about Temptations.

I ran across this in my own Bible reading…

In II Chronicles 25:5-10, we see a king who hires Israelites to go to war. He pays them a good deal of money to do so. (vs.5-6)

Then, a prophet comes and tells him that if they go to war, they will fail. He is told to dismiss the Israelites. (vs. 7-

The king basically then says, “hey, I paid them. What about my money?” (v. 9a)
To which the prophet responds, ” don’t worry about that, do what God says, He will provide.” (v. 9b)

The Lesson for us:
Often I hear people say that they cannot overcome a temptation or get out of a sin because of the money they invested in it. They view it as a waste of money if they do not indulge in that sin that they already paid for. (example, buying drugs that they may not have used yet. They feel that they need to or it was a waste of the money to buy the drugs).

Guess what? God wants us to obey Him, get rid of that stuff without using it…and let Him provide for our needs.

We got alittle confused on the explanation of the fact that Jesus was not able to sin while on the earth (or ever).

Hopefully this will help clarify that…

Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. (Hebrews 13:

Jesus has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. (Hebrews 4:15)

Combining these we see that Jesus is the same:
yesterday - without sin in eternity past and without sin while on the earth as a man
today - without sin in now as He is in Heaven with God the father
tomorrow - without sin in the future when He rules and reigns on the earth

Hope that helps.

Since we just read some genealogies, which included Methuselah, and the story of Noah’s Ark, I started thinking. We usually think of Methuselah as being righteous, since he lived the longest of anyone on earth. We also know that he died the year the flood came.

Now think with me…

Methuselah is not mentioned in Genesis chapter 8 in Noah’s story. The text seems to indicate that the only righteous ones on the earth were Noah, his wife, their 3 sons and their wives. Noah preached for 100 or so years as he built the ark, and no one believed.

Now…

Wouldn’t that indicate that Methuselah was not righteous…and that he died in the flood waters as punishment for unrighteousness along with all of the rest of the world (minus Noah’s 8-fold clan)?

Something to think about … something many commentators skip over.

But as I learned in seminary, some commentators are nothing more than “common taters.”