Vaclav's blog

Mark 15:33-39

And what did Adam and Eve do after they fell? "Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked. And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loincloths." (Genesis 3:7).

We are all fallen and falling short every day of what God originally made us for to be like him, holy and righteous in his character. As Romans 3:23, "for all have sinned and fall short [present continuous tense] of the glory of God".

Is it God's will, or men's will that is done in the end in the matter of our salvation? I believe it is God's will. But our will is done as well, in another sense. God does as he pleases, but so do the people.

If God has no choice as to our destiny, than we control God, which would make us stronger than God, which is not true.

Judges 12:1-7

The Gileadites came from Ephraim and Manasseh -- they were family. They were accused by their family with these words: "You Gileadites are renegades from Ephraim and Manasseh." Family politics never work out. Because of this accusation, Gilead killed all of Ephraim and took over the borders, so if there was any survivor from Ephraim he would also be killed.

Psalm 119:18, "Open my eyes that I may see wonderful things in your law."

When David wrote it, he probably had only the first 5 books of Moses, therefore he calls it "law", in Hebrew Torah. So law in this Psalm would simply mean "instruction".

For the believers in the New Covenant we not only have Torah, but also the Prophets, the Psalms and the New Testament. And it is God's word, his word, his special revelation inspired and breathed out by God's Spirit given to us, to instruct us in the way of salvation in his Son Jesus Christ.

Christ as Elohim in Acts 9:1-22

The life story of Saul is amazing! He was “circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless.” (Philippians 3:5-6). He was one of the greatest of all the Jews who ever lived.

Galatians 1:15-16a, "But when God, who had set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him..."

God did this in the case of Saul who was persecuting the early Christians, causing them to be put to prison, suffering and death, and who became Paul after he believed in Jesus Christ...

Have you ever thought that God did this in your life as well? -

1. Set you apart from your mother's womb, before you did anything good or bad.

"According to the will of our God and Father" (Galatians 1:4b)

It was God the Father's good will, it pleased him so to give up his only Son to death for our sins. He is God and he does as he pleases.

But it pleased God's Son as well to come and die, because it says, he, Jesus "gave himself for our sins..."! No one forced him or make him to come and die in our place, he did it of his own free will.

And so the will of God, of the Father and the Son is one, they both willed the death of God's unique Son, Jesus Christ.

Galatians 1:6
"I am amazed that you are so quickly turning away from Him who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel —"

What was it that made Paul astonished and amazed at the Galatian church?

It was that they were "deserting him [Jesus Christ]" who called them to himself by his grace, his marvelously undeserved favor.

And not only were they turning away from Christ, but also they were turning away from him "so quickly"! It would have been within the first three years of Paul's first visit to the Galatians!

Galatians 1:4a, "who gave himself for our sins to rescue us from the present evil age..."

What is that "present evil age"? When the apostle Paul wrote this letter the present age he lived in was evil. And presently we live in the evil age as well. Things have not changed much in two thousand years. Is the "evil age" something out there? Is it them who are evil and not us who are good?