Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67

Greetings, dear ones.

We sure don’t have to look far to find an overwhelming amount of human need, evil, and suffering. But there is nothing new about that. The evidence is that it’s always been that way since the fall. Even a serious Bible-based Christian life is not easy within the context of a fallen world. But it’s still the absolutely best choice of all the options. The benefits are terrific. We are instructed, “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Romans 12:21). And the “goodest” thing we can do is to seek and love God passionately.

Blessings on your evening…along with a new week.

Love, Dad/Ray.

The full verse reads this way: “The high priest tore his clothes. ‘Why do WE NEED more WITNESSES?’ he asked.” (I did the capitals for emphasis.)

The wording that the high priest used here is clear evidence that Jesus was falsely condemned before this council ever tried Him. They only NEEDED some kind of substantial convincing WITNESS or accusation against Him that would support and confirm the sentence they had already passed. Since these enemies of Christ really wanted Him dead, they then struggled to gather sufficient reason to kill Him so they could make it look like a legal execution.

I’ve met a lot of people in my time who were absolutely delighted, for example, to point out all the hypocrites in Christian churches. They had already made a judgment that rejects God’s claim to their lives, so they are eager to use the nonsense exceptions in Christian churches to condemn the whole of the Christian faith. That way they think they can exempt themselves from any accountability to God and carry on living the way they want to live with some legitimate-sounding support.

Jeremiah 17:9 is certainly a revelation of God’s view of the deceitful and wicked leaning of the human heart apart from spirit conversion and rebirth. And it’s clear that natural human hearts will never ever be able to arrive at TRUE conclusions about Christ and God and His Word on their own. For, “The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned” (I Cor. 2:14). Like begets like, truth begets truth, and spiritual light begets spiritual understanding. That’s why David declares, “Surely you desire truth in the inner parts” (Ps. 51:6). That is the one and only basis for establishing truth in choices and decisions. The person with truth and honesty inside is absolutely free from the corrupt style of those who NEED WITNESSES to support what their dirty hearts desire.