Spiritual Ponderings

There were two trees in the Garden. One was called the Tree of Life. But what about the other one? We are told that it was labeled the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Quite a lengthy, complicated name wouldn't you think? But that is exactly what it was intended to be – complicated, confusing, even misleading. I've been thinking more about that tree lately and something occurred to me, something in the way that serpent who hung out in that tree talked about the God who didn't want our parents to participate or have anything to do with that tree or its serpent. Do you remember the very first thing that came out of his liberated tongue? Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God say, 'You shall not eat from any tree in the garden'?" (Genesis 3:1) Now before we get caught in the fast track of explaining what we think was going on here or how i...

As I was listening to the audio version of Servant God recently (very highly recommended), I came across a reference to the passage in Hebrews that had confronted me a few years ago as I was settling into my new awareness about God's goodness. I had recalled something about it saying that without blood there could be no remission of sins. Since the whole issue of blood appeasement was being seriously challenged, this statement seemed a bit troubling. As these words on the surface seemed to contradict everything else that I was learning about salvation, I decided I needed to go and face the question head on for myself because I knew full well that if I didn't resolve it to my own satisfaction that someone else would be sure to confront me with it sooner or later. The very first thing that jumped out at me when I located the verse in Hebrews 9 was the fact that the words I remembered were not the complete text. The verse begins with the very significant caveat of the ph...