Last night, Paul Grady, one of the young men of God in our church, preached a powerful message from 1Samuel 28 on "Doing a Good Thing Instead of the Right Thing." He showed how King Saul had done a good thing by putting away the witches and wizards out of the land of Israel (1Samuel 28:3). However, he had not done the right thing in obeying the law by putting the witches and warlocks to death (Exodus 22:18). As a result, he eventually went to the witch of Endor himself (1Samuel 28:7-8). Using, the witch as a type of the flesh, Brother Grady showed how we will eventually be conquered by the flesh if we will not put it to death. We must do the right thing; not just a good thing.
The phrase, "God said," occurs exactly ten (10) times in Genesis One. These ten sayings of God might be called the first Ten Commandments. They are the original declarations of God's word. The first Ten Commandments are creative. The second Ten Commandments are given to guide the highest creation on earth - man. Therefore, the second group of commandments continue where the first ten left off. The first set begins with the command of Genesis 1:3, "And God said, Let there be light: and there was light." The second group began with this command, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me" (Exodus 20:3). The first set ends with the provision of food for man (Genesis 1:29). The second set ends with the command not to covet (Exodus 20:17).
Most Christians know that our spiritual opposition comes from three sources: the world, the flesh, and the devil. However, as in most things, we have them in the opposite order from scripture. The world refers to the evil world system. But the world would not be evil except it be filled with fallen men. Men are fallen because their fleshly nature is perverted. Yet, the fall began with the temptation of Eve in the Garden of Eden and it was the work of the devil. So, the devil rebelled against God and brought about the fall of man which resulted in the sinful flesh that is in all men. Then, fallen men with the help of the evil spirits of the devil created the evil world system. The true order is the devil, the flesh, and the world.
When my children were growing up, we kept a long-standing tradition from my wife's family of telling our children at bedtime: "Sleep tight, and don't let the bedbugs bite." We never had trouble with the bedbugs ourselves, but were assured that this used to be a major problem. However, according to an article in today's Knoxville News Sentinel, the bedbugs are back. They had been absent from the United States since about the time of World War II and many people thought they were just an old fable, but they are quickly making a comeback. These small insects feed exclusively on the blood of animals and humans causing itchy red welts with their bites and they are extremely difficult to exterminate.
The following is an excerpt from Soldiers in Training by Brother Daryl Coats.
One of the most interesting short verses in the Bible reads, "And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying." In seven simple words (seven being the number of perfection), The Bible identifies the source of what Moses wrote. It did not come from Moses, but directly from the Lord Himself. The words of the law are the words of God. This is an important doctrinal truth. However, I do not know what Bible reference to give you for this verse. It occurs with these exact seven words a total of 72 times in the Bible. 72 is 6 times 12 (6 being the number of man and 12 the number of Israel). Perhaps this indicates that God used Israel to bring His words to man.
