Category Archives: Story of Sin 11-20

Theology of sin

The Story of Sin: Part XVI: Ancient Jewish Eschatology’s View of Salvation from Sin!

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© 2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
The Story of Sin…
Part XVI:
Two Paths Greatly Diverging on the Meaning of the Messiah’s Deliverance from Sin.
By Joseph M. Cross
4/2/14
 
Introduction: A Line Drawn in the Sand…
 
So beginning with one of his very early miracles, Yah-Saves draws an unmistakable line in the sand: I am not just here to make a man walk again! That’s easy! I am here to do something vitally much more Spiritually and universally significant. As my name, Yah-Saves, states, I am here to save humans from their flawed natures! I AM Daniel 7:13’s “one like the son of man,” or the “one like a man,” whom the Ancient of Days (or God the Creator in his heaven’s eternal now) has given all authority over all things for all time. I AM THE SON OF MAN! I AM GOD IN THE FLESH! I have the divine right, authority and power to release a man, or a people, from their spiritual offenses…their sins against…their Creator and Redeemer, as well as, as a result of their sins, flaws or mistakes, their corresponding guilt, legal-righteous condemnation, eternal shame and endless judgment! I can make it ALL…ALL… go away! I can SAVE! I can save a man from SIN! I AM GOD! I AM ETERNAL GOD!
 
Now, do the religious leaders whom Yah-Saves directs his comments towards really get what Yah-Saves is saying–that he is declaring himself God? God in the flesh? God “like a man”?–I am not sure. They get something. Something is up because beginning here, and only escalating as his prophetic ministry continues, their reactions to him, his message and his miracles only intensifies…until the point that they seek his death and by any means possible! (John 5:16-18).
 
But why is Yah-Saves such a threat to his contemporaries? Why the disconnect? After all, if Yah-Saves is offering deliverance from man’s imperfection, why are they, or for that matter, all of mankind, NOT at least considering what Yah-Saves has to offer with an open mind? Is it that Yah-Saves claims to be God, which, if NOT true, would obviously be enough to raise concerns or cause problems? But if miracles really are occurring…if blind people are being given sight, the lame made to walk, the deaf to hear, the dead raised to life, the sick made well, the hungry fed, storms stilled and demons cast out…then why not listen to what Yah-Saves has to say, or at least open-mindedly investigate his miracles to begin with? And if they prove to be true, then listen to what he has to say? Check it out with the Scriptures? Does it match up? Could he be telling the truth? Bottom line: Seek the truth! Or is there something else also going on here? The answer is both. And in the end, both are crucial to our understanding of how the Story of Sin is still impacting billions more two thousand years later.
 
The Cause of the Great Disconnect…
 
To understand the immense disconnect between the incredible truth or deliverance from sin that first Yah-Saves’ Elijah–John the Baptist–and now Yah-Saves himself were both laying the groundwork for and the deliverance that the religious leaders, as well as, the people themselves perhaps, had in mind and were expecting, we must attempt to go back in time and recreate what was being taught and promulgated within the ancient Jewish synagogues during Yah-Saves’ day. For even if the religious leaders, or Rabbis (religious teachers) were willing to consider Yah-Saves’ claims to be Messiah, what does this mean to them? In other words, WHAT were they looking for in God’s promised Messiah (anointed one or Christ) and WHAT did they think that his deliverance (from Man’s sin) would look like?  
 
The answer is, from the very beginning, what the religious leaders where looking for in a Messiah and the Messiah’s deliverance was NOT what they were necessarily getting in Yah-Saves. In fact, when one attempts to reconstruct what the Jewish people were taught at that time, the role of Yah-Saves’ Elijah or Isaiah 40’s Comforter, John the Baptist, becomes CRYSTAL clear! John’s role as 1) Isaiah 40’s Comforter, 2) Malachi 3’s Messenger and 3) Malachi’s 4’s Elijah was to reprogram, or rather deprogram, the people, as well as, the religious establishment of hundreds of years of flawed prophetical misunderstanding and misapplication concerning Yahweh God’s soon-to-come offer of forgiveness and deliverance from sin or imperfection. What had started out as truth…OT scriptural prophecy…by John and Yah-Saves’ Day…had become a massive entangled knot of confusing and contradictory interpretations concerning Yahweh God’s ultimate deliverance of God’s people. Continue reading

The Story of Sin: Part XV: The Authority to All Erase Imperfection!

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© 2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
The Story of Sin…
Part XV:
The Authority to Erase All Imperfection!
By Joseph M. Cross
3/19/14
 
Essentially, via the story of “Yah-Saves’ Elijah” or “John the Baptist,” we have been making the case that what the Lord’s angel meant when he instructed Joseph “to name the child (to be born to his betrothed, Mary) ‘Yah-Saves‘ (that is ‘Jesus’ in Greek) because he will save the people from their sins” and what others, including Joseph himself, would have understood the angel’s words to mean, particularly his last words, “because he will save the people from their sins,” may have been light years apart!
 
The angels’ s meaning is still unfolding within our New Testament “Story of Sin”; how the people thought Yah-Saves would save them from their sins, well that is another matter and leads us to two critical questions: 1) What is at the heart of this huge interpretative disconnect between Jesus and the religious leaders and 2) how was Yah-Saves’ Elijah or John the Baptist attempting to correct this critical misunderstanding?
 
Below is a story from early in the life of Yah-Saves that brings this interpretative disconnect into a much sharper focus. Continue reading

The Story of Sin: 
Part XIV: Regaining the Story’s Big Picture…

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© 2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
The Story of Sin…
Part XIV:
Regaining the Story of Sin’s Big Picture…
By Joseph M. Cross
2/22/14
 
For just a moment, since we seemingly have covered a lot of ground through the first thirteen parts of our “Story of Sin,” let’s take a look back…
 
Here’s the chapter by chapter overview…
 
Part I: It Started with a Christmas Curiosity: What did the angel truly mean when he instructed Joseph to “…name the child Yah-Saves (Jesus) because he will save the people from their sins” Matt. 1:21?
 
Parts II-IV: What does biblical scholarship say about “sin”?
Part V: The Overview of my Exhaustive NT studies concerning Sin…
 
(Here we go…The fruits of my labors…)
 
Part VI: The Priest Zacharias’ Prophesies that His Son John will Give the People the “Knowledge of Salvation by the Forgiveness of Sins” (Luke 1).
Parts VII-XI: John’s Preaching Fulfills Isaiah and Malachi’s Ancient Prophecies Concerning the Preparing of God’s People for the LORD’s Coming Deliverance and Forgiveness (the Gospels).
Parts VIII-X: The Reason for the People’s Powerful Response to John’s Preaching: Yah’s Original Covenant’s Blessings, Judgment and Forgiveness (Deut. 28-30).
Part XII: Elijah’s Voice, John, Blazes a Trail for God’s People and God’s Deliverance to Meet (the Gospels).
Part XIII: John’s Great Declaration: God’s Slaughtered Lamb—the One Who Stands Before Us–Will Take Away the Sins of the World! (Is. 53; John 1.)
 
Now here are the summaries for the first thirteen parts or chapters… Continue reading

The Story of Sin: Part XIII God’s Slaughtered Lamb Takes Away Man’s Imperfection…

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© 2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
The Story of Sin…
Part XIII: God’s Slaughtered Lamb Takes Away Man’s Imperfection…
By Joseph M. Cross
2/14/14

Last time… It was clear from the synoptic gospels–Matthew, Mark, Luke–that Isaiah 40’s Crying Voice or Malachi 4’s figurative Elijah was indeed the priest Zacharias’ son, John the Baptist. His role or purpose…to cut a path or road through the world’s harshest, hottest, most desolate, brutal desert wilderness…the wilderness of man’s imperfection–misunderstanding, ignorance, foolishness, thoughtlessness, immaturity, hurt, crime, poverty, injustice, immorality, fear, worry and rebellion…just to name a few… or everything that is less than perfect, which is… EVERYTHINGSIN and the effects of man’s deadly fall from the Creator’s supernatural protective grace, love, mercy, kindness, peace and presence …IMPERFECTION!

And how is Isaiah’s Crying Voice doing this? 1) By preparing the people to NOT miss out on the LORD’s appearing and his deliverance from their imperfection or sin, as well as, 2) identifying the LORD’s actual appearing. In other words, the Voice, much as a mediator attempts to reconcile two unreconciled parties, is cutting a path both ways through the wilderness of  man’s sins or imperfection…one way, which leads from man to God via man’s repentance from, confession of and symbolic cleansing of sin, and the other, leading from God to man, via John’s divinely-inspired identifying of Yah-Saves as God’s Son (as one who is the Son of God, or a the very least, represents the Father).

So now…what does the son of Zebedee, Yah-Saves’ beloved disciple and gospel writer, John, now add to the Voice’s song? Everything–the gospel in a nutshell…the good news in one sentence…one dramatic metaphor that says it all. Will John’s audience fully get it? Probably not, but with this one profound declaration by the Voice, the reader gains a huge, curious insight as to just how Yah-Saves will save or deliver the people from their sins.

Finally, the Fourth Gospel declares… Continue reading

The Story of Sin: Part XII Elijah’s Voice Prepares a Path…

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© 2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
The Story of Sin…
Part XII: Elijah’s Voice Prepares a Path for both Sinner and Savior to Meet…
By Joseph M. Cross
2/8/14

So if the son of a late first-century B.C.E. Jewish priest named Zacharias—that is, John the Baptist–was prophetically destined to become Isaiah 40’s Crying Voice, Malachi 3’s Messenger and Malachi 4’s figurative Elijah, then just how did John specifically clear the way for the LORD’s promised appearing and deliverance?

Remember John the Baptist’s father, Zacharias, and his prophecy at John’s birth?

“And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will go on before the Lord to prepare His ways…

(And how will Zacharias’ son prepare the Lord’s ways or the Lord’s way? By…)

“…giving his people knowledge (or understanding) of salvation by the forgiveness of sins” (Luke 1:76-77).

And how did John the Baptist give God’s people the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of sins? Well, lets’ look at how the Four Gospels (the stories of Yah-Save’s life…Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) described John’s prophetic ministry.

First, Mark’s account… Continue reading

The Story of Sin: Part XI A Voice Arises in the Wilderness

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© 2014
Fellowship at Cross Creek
The Story of Sin…
Part XI: A Voice Arises in the Wilderness
By Joseph M. Cross
2/7/14

“And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will go on before the Lord to prepare His ways…to give people the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of sins” (Luke 1:76-77).

In addition to prophesying Judah’s national forgiveness and salvation (as explained in “The Story of Sin: Parts IX and X), a late first century B.C.E Jewish priest named Zacharias was prophesying that his new-born son, John (who would later come to be known as John the Baptist) was in some manner, a fulfillment of the last words of the Old Covenant or Testament, found in Malachi 4:5-6 and spoken over four hundred years earlier:

“Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse.” Malachi 4:5-6.

Zacharias, inspired by God, was now prophesying that his son, John the Baptist, was indeed Malachi’s prophetic and “figurative” Elijah.

I say Malachi’s figurative “Elijah” because when some Jewish priests and Levites were sent to John later as he was preaching and baptizing at the River Jordan and asked him if was Elijah, he answered that he was NOT…meaning I am NOT THE Elijah, the 9th century Old Testament prophet (John 1:21), and John wasn’t.  Continue reading