https://youtu.be/nswqU7yNVQ0
Heb 12:1-13; (NET)
1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, we must get rid of every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and run with endurance the race set out for us,
2 keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy set out for him he endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.
3 Think of him who endured such opposition against himself by sinners, so that you may not grow weary in your souls and give up.
4 You have not yet resisted to the point of bloodshed in your struggle against sin.
5 And have you forgotten the exhortation addressed to you as sons? "My son, do not scorn the Lord's discipline or give up when he corrects you.
6 "For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son he accepts."
7 Endure your suffering as discipline; God is treating you as sons. For what son is there that a father does not discipline?
8 But if you do not experience discipline, something all sons have shared in, then you are illegitimate and are not sons.
9 Besides, we have experienced discipline from our earthly fathers and we respected them; shall we not submit ourselves all the more to the Father of spirits and receive life?
10 For they disciplined us for a little while as seemed good to them, but he does so for our benefit, that we may share his holiness.
11 Now all discipline seems painful at the time, not joyful. But later it produces the fruit of peace and righteousness for those trained by it.
12 Therefore, strengthen your listless hands and your weak knees,
13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint but be healed.
1Pet 4:13-17; (NET) But rejoice in the degree that you have shared in the sufferings of Christ, so that when his glory is revealed you may also rejoice and be glad.
14 If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory, who is the Spirit of God, rests on you.
15 But let none of you suffer as a murderer or thief or criminal or as a busybody.
16 But if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but glorify God that you bear such a name. (17) For it is time for judgment to begin, starting with the house of God. And if it starts with us, what will be the fate of those who are disobedient to the gospel of God?
We are presently in a study of the doctrine of evil that is the product of believing the false narrative of the public lie aka darkness that satan, the god of this world, fabricates and asserts in his war against God's Word of truth aka light. Eph 6:12; 2Cor 10:5;
When we stopped last time we were noting 1Chron 21:1-17; where we saw that while sin can be confessed evil cannot be confessed.
David distinguished between sin and evil even though both were a part of his numbering of the people. His motivation for counting the people was evil because it was motivated by satan and the evil thinking caused him to commit the sin of doubting God and trusting in the size of his army. Jer 17:5;
Evil must also be distinguished from God's administration of the fifth cycle of discipline, Jonah 3:10.
When God sent Jonah to warn the Assyrians they were involved with evil, that made them culpable to the fifth cycle of discipline that is always administered through evil but because of their repentance God let them off from the fifth cycle of discipline and He did not permit whatever evil that was threatening them to attack . We see from this that there are two kinds of evil.
There is evil in a national entity when the citizens are negative to the laws of divine establishment or when believers reject Bible doctrine and go into reversionism.
The fifth cycle of discipline is described as "an evil to an evil nation." In other words, God matches the punishment to the crime. He uses "evil one" (active evil) to judge "evil two" (passive evil).
This is explained by the doctrine of holocaust where God uses evil one (active evil) to judge evil two (passive evil). Holocaust means devastation. It includes all persecution of the Jews or the violent expression of anti-Semitism.
Anti-Semitism is evil because is motivated by satan. One of satan's objectives is to destroy all Jews on the earth prior to the Second Advent of Jesus Christ so that he can accuse God of being a liar because He cannot fulfill His unconditional covenants to them.
Degeneracy is the decline from normal or superior standards to inferior or subnormal standards. Degeneracy is loss of integrity, resulting in a state of deterioration; it is the process of passing from the higher to the lower, therefore to decline progressively. Thus decline includes three stages.
Implosion is self-fragmentation, explosion is polarized fragmentation, and reversionism is the degeneracy of progressive decline.
Blackout of the soul plus scar tissue of the soul develops into religious degeneracy or historical degeneracy.
Historical degeneracy persecutes religious degeneracy, as seen when Hitler and Nazi Germany persecuted the Jews of Europe, or when Czar Nicholas II and Alexander III persecuted the Jews in Russia.
We see the potential for this developing in the USA at this time because the democrat socialist fascist mobs are anti-Semite just like they were in Germany and Russia.
During the Church Age under the restraining ministry of God the Holy Spirit doctrinal believers resist and oppose the trends of historical degeneracy but at some point during the Church Age doctrinal believers will be overrun and God will extract all believers from the earth via the exit resurrection leaving the Jews to suffer persecution during the last half or the Tribulation.
The religious degeneracy of the Jews is defined as going from the superior standards of the Mosaic Law to the inferior standards of the oral traditions of the Talmud and Mishna through fragmentation and reversionism.
Historical degeneracy is defined as going from the superior standards of establishment power and authority to the inferior and subnormal standards of mob rule that distorts authority into tyranny and uses power to persecute and murder those who disagree.
Historical degeneracy persecutes religious degeneracy except when religious degeneracy also has historical power, as occurred with the Catholic Church during the Middle Ages, Spain in the fifteenth century and England in the seventeenth century.
In reverse process reversionism, the superior standard is always rejected for the inferior standard as the decline in thought occurs. In Christianity, the superior standards of Divine establishment and the protocol plan of God are rejected by degenerate believers and exchanged for the inferior standards of legalism and ritualism or emotionalism and antinomianism.
To date the world's record for scar tissue of the soul from historical degeneracy was held BC 1441 by the Pharaoh of the Exodus generation,
The world's record for religious degeneracy occurred with the blindness of the Jews in Judea when they rejected Jesus Christ as their Messiah In the dispensation of the Hypostatic Union. it is likely that these records will be eclipsed during the Tribulation.
Whenever historical degeneracy occurs under satan's influence it always persecutes the Jews' religious degeneracy. In the Church Age this becomes a historical trend. During the Church Age If the Jewish people reach the point of religious degeneracy, then under satan's influence some Gentile nation will attempt to destroy them.
This is how God uses evil to destroy evil, arrogance to destroy arrogance and degeneracy to destroy degeneracy. Evil is always a function of the self-determination of free negative volition. Holocaust occurs in the last half of the Tribulation, when the beast (political or historical degeneracy) destroys the prostitute (religious degeneracy).
In this holocaust, no human volition is violated. Holocaust judgment dramatizes the fact that mankind is the product of his own free volition.
Evil is the product of human volition under the principle of sewing to the wind and reaping the whirlwind (Hosea 8:7;) and God using the wrath of man to praise Him, Psa 76:10;
Jesus Christ controls history and in the process of controlling history He sometimes uses the evil volition of one group to destroy the evil volition of another group.
Blackout of the soul is failure to recognize Jesus Christ as the God-man. Scar tissue of the soul is rejection of Christ as Savior. Together they equal religious degeneracy that is the consequence of reverse process reversionism.
By rejecting Jesus in each generation of the Church Age the Jews hold the record for scar tissue of the soul and the prosperity and blessing they receive from God on the basis of the Abrahamic covenant combines with their negative volition to create passive arrogance.
Passive arrogance demands the function of active arrogance against it. Passive arrogance is generally associated with freedom and prosperity that combines with negative volition for three or four generations. Exod 20:5;