8 Responses to “April 27, 2009”

1. Michael
   April 28th, 2009 @ 11:22 am

   Dr. Brown,
   I was curious your interpretation of this passage:

   1 Corinthians 13:8-10. The ESV translation says “8Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.” Then it goes on to say in verse 13 that “There are three things that will endure – faith, hope, and love – and the greatest of these is love”.

   Another translation had verse 10 saying “But when the end comes, these special gifts will all disappear.”

   I bring this up because I’ve heard some ceasationalists say since we are living in the end, these gifts have ceased, so until Christ comes, we live by the things that endure – faith, hope, and love. They say the Bible has already told all the prophecies relating to Jesus (Revelation being the last) so the gift of prophecy is not necessary anymore. I’ve also read where they try to use this rationale for 1 Corinthians 13:8-10 to explain to some atheists why God won’t perform certain healings like causing an amputee’s limbs to grow back. The atheist says if God is real then John 14:13-14 should work to cause an amputees lost limb to grow back. The ceasationalist says John 14:13-14 was Jesus giving full power of healing to his apostles at that time, but gifts of that magnitude have dwindled as we reach the end of the age and have now ceased since we’re at the end.

   I was wondering what you thought of all this.

2. Erika
   April 29th, 2009 @ 8:14 am

   Hey Dr. Brown,

   I just came running up to my room and began to listen to this show. I left the kitchen because I couldn’t stand it any longer to listen to slogans very similar to “God hates fags”, coming out of my brother’s mouth. I really don’t want to get into the details. I really don’t support homosexuality, but I’m talking of an atmosphere of pure hatred towards everything. When my brother is visiting here, he seems to die when he sees me happy in the LORD and thus begins to spill venom and hatred without end. I really don’t know how I should react to this. It just seems to me that he occasionally is loosing his mind, just when he sees me!!???!!???? What is your advice in this situation?

3. Anthony
   April 29th, 2009 @ 12:20 pm

   Michael,

   I might be able to help you with your inquiry. Notice in 1 Corinthians 13:8 that knowledge is included. This comes from the Greek word gnosis. We know that we are to add to our faith goodness (or virtue) and goodness with gnosis or knowledge (2nd Peter 1:5-6). The implication we receive from the word gnosis is the act of knowing something. In Romans 15:14 Paul wishes the believers to be filled with “all knowledge” or gnosis.

   Therefore knowledge has not passed away. If the other gifts have passed knowledge should also be gone but the Bible continues to tell us to have certain knowledge.

   We also know that Peter quoted Joel in Acts 2:16-18 saying that such signs will be in the last days. We know we are closer to the last days than Peter was at that time.

   There is far more. The Lord’s prayer itself asks for God’s will done on earth as is it is in heaven. The Lord’s prayer also asks God for his kingdom to come. Jesus showed signs of the future eschatological kingdom in the works in which he did, the same works in which he said would follow those who believe in Mark 16. Those who are in Christ partake of some of the blessings that are to be offered in the “age to come.” The Lord’s prayer is asking for God’s kingdom signs and will done here on earth as a sign of his glory.

   Time would fail me for all the other things I could share on this subject but I think I have provided enough detail. God still works in that way, if anyone says different it is just their excuse that he has not used them yet.

4. Anthony
   April 29th, 2009 @ 12:22 pm

   One last thing. Amputees limbs do still grow back and people are still raised from the dead. I know people who have seen it first hand.

5. Michael
   April 29th, 2009 @ 2:10 pm

   Thanks Anthony! If you have any references/resources to amputee’s limbs growing back, I would love for you to direct me to that. I have never heard of someone with no hands or feet having them naturally grow back. That would be awesome! I have no doubt God can do this, but would love to know about more of these instances to share with atheists if you can help me out.

6. Brandon
   May 4th, 2009 @ 3:23 pm

   Dr. Brown,
   I have a question on a scripture that was used during your show: John 10:10, regarding the “thief”. Doesn’t this parable refer to the “thief” as a hireling or a false shepherd? Correct me if I’m wrong but this parable does not refer to the devil. The devil is a thief and he does do all these things, but this parable refers to the false teachers of that time and today.
   Now about the show. I absolutely believe there is devine healing today. If a believer is not healed, there could be hidden sin or unrepented sin that is holding a believer back, only the believer and God knows. I wonder what John G. Lake, David Hogan, Smith Wigglesworth, and many other great teachers that dealt with healing would say to somebody who doesn’t believe in God’s healing power.

7. Jabez H.
   May 4th, 2009 @ 6:55 pm

   Dr. Brown is a busy servant, who may get to our questions, but, I venture an answer here to Michael. First, it seems that we must identify what is the “perfect” spoken of by the smae New Testament letter writer that instructed not to “forbid prophecy” elsewhere (fit can be sought concordance as appearing in a list). Here, the writer is writing to a church on various matters after Jesus has ascended, so, he does not seem to be saying that the perfect has indeed yet come. That is not to say Jesus is not perfect, but that something is yet to be established which is perfect. Certainly this would apply to a reigning and ruling Jesus, as Messiah Ben David, to his kind of love, and that coming to be perfected in, among, and between believers, as well as “the end” you cite. These are some possibilities. In reading what the letter to the Hebrews establishes one could find other catagories of what Jesus established as to the perfect. In one such passage the perfecting of the saints, who are “being made holy, or , perfect” is mentioned as a result of the believer’s new life.

   Because we still die, and the world is still corrupt, and the mainifested Kingdom is not yet established according to what constitutes “the end” or the coming down from heaven of the New Jerusalem as an end status of reality, in the Revelation of John, it is likely the perfect has been modeled and experienced in part–but not in total! Do we now see the unity of the faith spoken of in Ephesians as resident totally on earth? Do we find a lack of confusion and frustration of our energies and intentions–when and where they prove abidingly righteous and godly?

   What then is yet to be established in redemptive history and, according to what Jesus said on the Mt. of Olives over Jerusalem and his family group or nation? The Kingdom come is in a present so-called mystery state, awaiting the adoption of our bodies, and the completion of the full number of the Gentiles, and those of the chosen nation. The perfect is the same yesterday, todeay, and in the future–and it is not yet what it or we shall be_ in Him!

8. Jabez H.
   May 5th, 2009 @ 3:44 am

   I apologize for all the typos, above, and hope you catch the drift of thought.

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