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CR18Day_03 @ nkjv@Mark:2 @ RandyP comments: These are all facts that anyone remotely present to Capernaum at that time would know and be able to attest to. Word of these events undoubtedly spread through the entire region. Multitudes of readers later in 48AD or so when Marks gospel was widely issued would still know either personally or second hand that Mark was viciously cutting through all the false information about Jesus Christ being propagated by the establishment's defense. Many of those healed for instance would still be living at this point to give their testimony. Those close to or within the the Pharisee sect or disciples of John the Baptist would be unable to refute these evidences as well.

CR18Day_04 @ nkjv@Psalms:104 @ RandyP comments: "At Your rebuke they (waters) fled". Judgment leads to the deluge, rebuke hastens it's retreat. It is an odd way of saying that HE rebuked what HE brought to pass. The only way I can find of explaining this is that HIS ultimate intention is not to judge man, but to get man through this state of wicked unrighteousness. HE rebukes what HE has brought down upon man having judged man to be wrong as a secondary thought to HIS ultimate objective of making man right through the additional process herein. Complicated... isn't it?

CR18Day_05 @ nkjv@Genesis:10 @ RandyP comments: This is now the second re-population of Genesis, first being the more controversial from Adam and Eve. Critics often ask "where did Cain and Seth get their wives"? The answer most likely is that they were sisters, but it doesn't have to stop there. Genesis was written not as an overall history as much as it was of all redemptive history (the details that would be important to our understanding of God's redemption). Seth and Cain's brothers and sisters are unnamed and unnumbered. Over the course of nine hundred plus years Eve surely bore Adam many. Those children married and had children. Those children bore many children. It could be that Cain and Seth married nieces or even grand nieces. While Cain was the first child, neither Able nor Seth necessarily have to be second and third if we are to look at the narrative as a redemptive history. In this passage we are back down to eight persons starting all over again. In both passages we can see how quickly the multiplication of being fruitful adds up.

CR18Day_05 @ nkjv@Genesis:9 @ RandyP comments: Note now that while the world that then was was destroyed in the flood, wickedness has not been completely purged; there is a carry over. Righteous Noah is the first evidence of this getting unconsciously drunk. Ham is the second evidence of it by the manner that he looked upon his father's nakedness. It is Noah pronouncing a curse upon Ham's son Canaan which is important to note for two reasons. First, the fact that Ham is black skinned has been used by some bigots as proof that all black people are cursed or sub-human. The better interpretation is that one particular lineage of Ham's through Canaan is cursed by Noah. Ham you will recall had other black sons Cush and Mizrain and Phut that were not cursed (perhaps more) and lkely many daughters. Second, the lands best known that Canaan's descendants came to occupy are the very lands that later would become the promised land of Israel. What the actual effect of this "servant of servants unto his brethren" curse was meant to be and to what extent God would willingly honor it are other difficulties in the biggoted world view.

CR18Day_05 @ nkjv@Genesis:11 @ RandyP comments: There are two remarks to be made drawn out by the this and the last chapter regarding human choice whether it is free or not. We have the issue of a curse Noah placed on grandson Canaan in response to Ham's actions. Canaan is being directly effected by something his father was guilty of doing. This curse effects human will and self determination on a man to grandson level with God's own involvement unclear. Then there is the splintering of human language into several diverse languages having a direct/purposeful effect upon the will and ability of man as a whole; God seeking to keep human self determination from harming itself. Though human will and self determination apparently remains in both cases, it has thus become limited/restricted to some extent either by man in the first case or else by God in the second (perhaps in the first). Perhaps the will was never completely unrestricted from the Fall. Perhaps the will is free, but the options available for it to chose from are limited. From just the text of two chapters nothing can be said for certain except that there are early indications that man's will is somehow being imposed upon to some mysterious extent, perhaps from various sources.

CR18Day_11 @ nkjv@Mark:8 @ RandyP comments: Four thousand men, probably about that number again in women and kids conservatively. How many of those who saw this miracle of the loaves were still alive at the wider publication of Mark's gospel a decade and a half later? Quite a few of them; especially of the kids. How many others did each of these men women and children tell that would know of this event second hand or third hand and still be living? Conservatively hundreds of thousands, half or more still living. How many critics of that day refuted Mark's written account or questioned the numbers? We do not know of any. Again, how many witnesses at the feeding of the five thousand men plus women and children? How many other people did they tell? How many were living to later support Mark's gospel? How many critics refuted that additional multitudes' claims? Again the blind man in Bethsaida; what kind of numbers are we talking about there? Was the blind man still alive? What did he say about this? Were those all important surviving witnesses nearby? Could anyone in Bethsaida still confirm this? Unfortunately you see, this logical line of critical inquiry was not the line of attack that the critics then engaged in (leading us to believe that they knew it would be inaffective to their defence). Their means of countering Mark was to slander and persecute and physically compel believers to blaspheme the faith, else to argue against it on mere philosophical grounds. The history here says more than just Mark's written words.

CR18Day_19 @ nkjv@Genesis:35 @ RandyP comments: "Then God (Eloheem) went up from him in the place where He talked with him". The Apostle John quotes Jesus twice that "no man has seen God" and mentions it a third time in his first letter, yet there are multiple mentions of filter:OT LORD+AND+appeared in the Old Testament. Of interest we also have indication as here stated of the LORD going up afterwards, else coming down or just leaving. There seems to be no doubt nor unfamiliarity as to whom it is appearing in man's presence; no proof has to be given. Even when other angelic beings are beside Him His identity is obvious. There are a couple ways possible for us to interpret how this apparent contradiction can be resolved. The most prominent idea is that these are Christophanies (appearances of Christ before becoming human flesh); Christ is God but in viewable form. The second is what we see is as much of HIMSELF as God can show us without posing a danger to the lives of those HE is appearing to; a projection into our finite dimension or else avatar within a presentable form. Third HIS appearance is a vision HE plants within our mind. Fourth, we have the idea that an angel is making a substitutionary appearence for God. Some appearances are identified specifically as visions, others leave the impression that He is there (and is eating for instance), others are not as clear. These appearances are to be differentiated from the times when we are simply told that God or the LORD spoke saying... By all evidence God has been quite vocal and quite visable in these testaments.

CR18Day_19 @ nkjv@Genesis:37 @ RandyP comments: It seems to me that Reuben was willing to risk his brother's wrath by delivering Joseph back to his father Jacob. It would have made for big trouble in the household. Judah however saw it as an opportunity to turn a profit. Judah becomes the line of descendants that Christ is promised through. So it is not because of any exemplar behavior that the bloodline is chosen. The tribes of Judah and Benjamin later will become the only two tribes that remain of the divided nation Israel, the other tribes will split away. The Ishmaelites you'll recall take us back to Abraham and Hagar's son Ishmael. Midianites also descend from Abraham from his second wife Keturah. They would be the cause of plenty problems for Israel in years to come. Of interest is that Jacob's son are taking action with absolutely no thought even for their father Jacob who will be devastated by the sight of the bloodied tunic. No thought for Joseph, no thought for Jacob, no thought for Benjamin Rachel's other son, no thought for God righteousness, and one could even say no thought for themselves. This I believe to be a result of ungodly jealousy, consuming anger, murderous rage which is amplified in their hearts because of polygamy.

CR18Day_23 @ nkjv@Genesis:41 @ RandyP comments: "..the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass". We can remember back to Abraham where he was told by the LORD that his descendents will be brought into Egypt and that they would find favor, but the heart of the Egyptians would turn and they would be placed in bondage for many years. This storyline is part of that greater storyline and we are basically only into the first act. These men Joseph and Pharaoh for as much of a role as they play are only playing a part in a story much bigger than either of them written long before either were born. As much as we like to give preference in our theories to an individual's abilities and choices, very little in this chapter can be proved as being anything remotely concerned with that. God gives a dream to one man, HE gives the interpretation to another; HE gives it in such a way that the one man gives to the other (a complete stranger/a prisoner/a Hebrew) governorship over his vast empire. God gives seven years of plenty to fill the storehouses, gives seven years of severe famine, drives Joseph's brothers without their knowing to Joseph's feet to plead for wheat to survive the widespread famine. Yes, there is the individual's ability and choice involved to an extent but, it has only a secondary importance to God's choice and ability and some promises made three generations ago. And God is not yet finished. The story of Abraham's descendents in Egypt is only a part of an even larger story of the descendents being given the land of Canaan for their own, a story that will lead them all the way to a promised Messiah (going back to Adam and Eve) and the eternal salvation of their very souls.

CR18Day_23 @ nkjv@Mark:16 @ RandyP comments: Let us be clear as to why we believe in the death/resurrection/ascension of Jesus Christ the Son of God. It is not just because of these few testimonies from people that had seen Him in the flesh resurrected at the time (central and key as this evidence is). No we believe because of all that God has established prior to these testimonies even before Jesus Himself was born incarnate. We believe because of what was promised Adam and Eve of a seed to crush Satan, we believe because of what was promised Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, we believe because of what was promised to Moses and David and several verifiable prophets speaking to all Israel. We further believe because of the way God conducted HIMSELF even in man's utter disobedience, we believe because of the grace and mercy and longsuffering HE has shown successively to each generation, what HE has brought HIS people through, how HE has gathered HIS people, how lovingly HE has at times corrected them, how HE has stayed true to HIS word and not forsaken us even when we have not fully reciprocated. Much more do we believe because of the manner in which Jesus was born, the attention and resistance and tension from men His presence received even early on as an infant, later because of His teachings, because of His works (their size and scope and form). We believe because of the way He became despised and rejected for little or no tangible reason, sought after to kill, illegally tried and sentenced, brought before the Roman magistrate to execute because the Jews could not themselves do it. We believe because of the way people responded after His death, during the reports of His resurrection, the wild fire that immediately started throughout the region because of His gospel. We believe because of the effect this essential truth has proven to be in the everyday lives of everyday people throughout the ages ever since. In other words we believe because of all that God has established before and after to make this known, to confirm it as happening, to bless and favor those that this gospel has touched. In essence we have collected the best individual books relating to this evidence and establishment into one larger book of books. Each has it's own place in the chain of evidence. This Bible is why we believe what we do about that Jesus of Nazareth, His death/resurrection/ascension, that is why we believe even further in the revelation of His soon second coming and the day of final judgment. It is because of all that God has done throughout man's time on earth that brings us to these very same conclusions. Many will argue the resurrection and ascension singularly as if that were all it took to dispel all this other. I would say rather that it is all this other that proves the case for this one tremendously joyous thing: Christ indeed has Risen!

CR18Day_26 @ nkjv@Genesis:48 @ RandyP comments: "...truly his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his descendants shall become a multitude of nations." Of each of Jacobs sons, each became a single tribe of Israel except for Joseph who became two. The twelve tribes are really thirteen by count but twelve by vote, the two are often counted as half tribes else other times the priestly tribe of Levi is excluded. Manasseh settles east of the Jordan. Ephraim settles west of Jordan in a somewhat central parcel that one day becomes Samaria. For four hundred years it hosted the Ark and the Tabernacle until the time of David (of Judah). Joshua, Gideon and Saul were all leaders over Israel from this tribe. Early on Ephraim was pre-eminent among all the tribes under until the second Jewish period when that importance was given to Judah. It split with Judah along with nine other tribes during Solomon's son King Rehoboam's oppresive reign. Assyria latter took it over and the tribe was forced to intermingle marriages. The whole became the so called "bastard" nations of Samaria.