Will the world have a unified religion under the antichrist? Revelation 13:8.

 I listen to several prophecy teachers as they talk in an effort to inform us all of what they deem to be the truth about what is to come. Since most of what we see coming lies within the period of what many call the tribulation, the bulk of the people this conversation applies to will be those who do not go up in the church's rapture. That means the remaining people on earth will endure at least some of the events occurring during that time. 

After the catching away of the church, life on earth will take some drastic turns. 

• A horrendous attack on Israel could occur before the church is removed, if not before, then shortly after that. 

• Whether it takes minutes or weeks is unimportant, but the man we have been expecting, called the antichrist, will step onto the world stage, set forth a peace treaty "with many," and proclaim that he has everything under control. An older quote repeated during the last couple of years is this. 

  "We do not need another committee. We have too many already. What we want is a man of sufficient stature to hold the allegiance of all people and to lift us out of the economic morass into which we are sinking. Send us such a man and be he god or devil, we will receive him."—Paul Henri Spaak, the first president of the UN General Assembly, first president of the European Parliament, and onetime secretary general of NATO.

  Note that I said that the antichrist makes a peace treaty "with many," this is because far too many claim he will make a peace treaty with Israel. I am not saying it can't happen, but there is nothing in scripture that says he makes peace with Israel. Does it make sense that Israel would take advantage of this ceasefire and possible withdrawal of troops? Of course, it does, so the presumption is that the peace treaty is with Israel.

  I do not know if you have been paying attention, but Israel has very few friends right now, and the United States, one of the last countries I would have expected, has, under the "leadership" of Joe Biden, thrown Israel under the bus.

  What you do see, in terms of peace, particularly if this man can address the Muslim world, is that this man will be able to get the attacking parties to back off under the guise of a peace treaty. Consider where the major players, in terms of endless bombing, are coming from. They are coming from Muslim nations, and surprise, even Russia has a large Muslim population, and many have been fighting under the title of Chechen(s).

The prophecy teachers and those who mindlessly replicate what they say will tell you that the antichrist will bring about a one-world religion. Many of them back their claim by quoting this passage. 

"All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain." (Revelation 13:8 NASB)

I prefer the NASB because scholars say this version is the closest to the original in meaning, and I chose to believe them. But there is an immediate problem because it says, "all who dwell on the earth will worship him,' and far too many will stop here and not gain the context of verse eight. The passage goes on to say that these worshipers are ONLY those whose names are NOT written in the Lamb's book of life. Sitting here at my desk, I cannot tell you whose names are NOT in the book. To do otherwise is to be judgmental, which is NOT even close to our job description.

Another translation, which is worded in a manner that makes it almost impossible to misunderstand what God is trying to say, is the Williams New Testament.

“All the inhabitants of the earth whose names, from the foundation of the world, have not been written in the slaughtered Lamb's book of life, will worship him.”
(Revelation 13:8 Williams)

With a translation like the NASB, there is a presumption that the church is standing there watching all this happen, which is NOT the case. I am not trying to convey that only the lost will be worshiping this man, but there will be those whose names are written in the book, and this will happen throughout the time of wrath, and they will also resist the beast in every way possible, up to and including their deaths.

Let's discuss the word WORSHIP for a moment.

Worship is the Greek word proskuneō. The meanings go like this: To kiss the hand in a token of reverence. To do obeisance, show respect, fall or prostrate before. 

"It is also a salutation between persons of equal ranks was to kiss each other on the lips; when the difference of rank was slight, they kissed each other on the cheek; when one was much inferior, he fell upon his knees and touched his forehead to the ground or prostrated himself, throwing kisses at the same time toward the superior. It is this latter mode of salutation that Gr. writers express by proskunéō." (Word Study Dictionary)

While obeisance can be associated with worship, the dictionary definition reads like this. It is a courtesy or an act of reverence made by an inclination of the body or the knee.

Sadly, even animals will do this. For example, don't, as a rule, live in wolf packs where there is a pack leader and the other wolves “bow” to the alpha, mainly because the alpha will potentially kill the offender.

How do you turn this obeisance, the transliteration of which is written as worship, around and say there will be a one-world religion?

Having spent my life in the church, I have heard every possible suggestion as to who will be the next antichrist. Russia held the record for world leaders. Still, then it started transitioning as our American Presidents began saying things, like points of light, a new world order, or we need to level the playing field – meaning that "they" were going to bring America down to third-world status, which kind of explains this opposition to a wall that would work to restrain those that choose not come into the country through legal means.

On that note, I suspect that someone like Barack Obama will step forward, and he is an admitted and dominant Muslim that seemed to be a big player on the world scene. So many different people are being suggested, but WE will never know because he will NOT be revealed until the church is revealed.

Should you be unfortunate enough to be here, the thing you should realize is that we were right. Jesus will come to you if you turn to Him, but you will probably have to die by the sword though.

It is appointed unto man once to die; is that true? Hebrews 9:27.

It was early in 2022 that I came to learn of Lee Brainard. He maintains a YouTube website called Soothkeep, where you can find many of his teachings should you want to check them out.

Mr. Brainard comes across as intelligent and worthy of a listen, but here it is November of 2022, several months later, and I tried to listen to him try to explain who the two witnesses would be (Just as a side note, because the two witnesses, like a few other things in scripture, are not so cleanly detailed I will use words like might be instead of “will be”, as Lee Brainard conveyed.)

He opened the talk by saying it could be Elijah and Enoch, and he explained how many people feel strongly about that choice; however, Mr. Brainard noted that he did not think it would be them and that he chose Moses and Elijah.

He proceeded to explain why it would not be Enoch because we never saw Enoch perform any signs, nor did he call down fire from heaven as Elijah did. 

Let's be honest; we know little about Enoch. Fortunately, scripture in the New Testament books of Hebrews and Jude references Enoch as a man who did something no nobody else has done - he worshiped God on a regular basis, and one day, he was transported off the earth, and not by death. That alone moves Enoch into an untouchable category, but I digress.

In Hebrews 11:5, we are told that

“By faith, Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.”

Translated? Now there's a familiar word. Philip, the evangelist, was translated, and so was Elijah.

Jude, a disciple who introduced himself as “a bondservant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James.” A logical assumption is that James is the half-brother of Jesus, an author of a book by the same name, and, therefore, a half-brother of Jesus as well. Both of these “brothers” rejected Jesus during His life on earth but eventually came around. Jude wrote to alert us to false teachers, a bit of information that will play into this piece of writing shortly.

Jude, in verses 14-16, tells us

“...Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, "Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints,  15  to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him."  16  These are grumblers, complainers, walking according to their own lusts; and they mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage.”

Things of note in this short paragraph.

• He has pointed out Enoch's lineage and that he, too, was untainted by the fallen angels having their way with the women folk.

• When he says, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints,” he projected, prophetically, well over 2,000 years into the future, how Jesus will come as the warring messiah and the saints will be alongside.

• While we seem to delight in the possibility that Jesus/God will kill and eliminate all those who are not Christians, nothing could be more wrong or distorted. Verse 15, in the ESV, states that He comes “to execute judgment on all...” Jude's own words speak of “their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way...” So many of these marked for judgment seem to be religious, and many commentaries define them as false teachers.

I will tell you that one of those two cannot be Moses and here is why.

Deuteronomy 34:5-6 NKJV  So Moses the servant of the LORD died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the LORD.  6  And He buried him in a valley in the land of Moab, opposite Beth Peor; but no one knows his grave to this day.

Moses died. It would be cruel and unusual punishment to bring him back and kill him again.

Mr. Brainard apparently refused to use the commonsense approach that Enoch and Elijah did not die but interjected how death was NOT necessary to fulfill this prophetic word.

Until Revelation tells us that the two witnesses are placed upon the earth, there is nothing that defines how and why they will arrive here. Sure, there are scriptures such as Numbers 35:30, and Deuteronomy 19:15, that tell us that there must be at least two witnesses to uphold a criminal complaint, but we do not see these two as those being judged but the ones bringing judgment and the testimony against Israel. In our introduction, we are merely told that they will prophesy.

If these two witnesses were to be deemed competent based on previous demonstrations of God's power, then where did Moses obtain the experience to do what he did?

He learned on the job. So I do not understand the logic of Lee Brainard's assertion that Enoch is any less qualified.

Within a few minutes, Mr. Brainard had us looking at Hebrews 9:27, which says, "it is appointed unto men to once die." Although not to my satisfaction, he attempted to explain that this was not a literal death and, therefore, allows us to bypass Enoch.

Allow me a moment to express myself here. 

These two witnesses are not given identities for a reason, which means the reason God has picked them is either NOT for us to know, or it does not apply to the church and is irrelevant. It is, however, relevant to those still left in Israel when that time comes. So these two are meant to be highly significant evangelists to the Jewish community, and what is vitally important is what they say and what they do, but we never focus on that because, again, it is something that we can only speculate about.

Most of my Bible study ideas come from conversations where someone, like a Bible teacher, has made an assertion, attempted to defend their position, and would not back down even when shown from the Word of God how improper their teaching is. I doubt this rebuttal to Lee Brainard's teaching would ever make it to him, so I do it here for you to see.

This, by the way, is not meant to promote the bashing of a particular brother in Christ but to learn to be sensible, like the Bereans that Paul spoke of, who, after hearing what Paul said, went, studied, and validated his words against the only scrolls available – the Torah. This is what I have done with Mr. Brainard's comments. But, remember, no one is above the law, even me. So I urge you to search the scriptures to see if what I say is true.

Another noticeable thing is happening here; while the passage that conveys that every one of us must be subject to death is found in Hebrews 9:27, I have initiated this "study" with Hebrews 9:11 as I wanted you to get a feel for the context. Mr. Brainard apparently sees the context differently.

So then, Christ had to be subject to death. The reasons for this had to do with Lucifer's rebellion and expulsion and Adam's eating of the fruit. The timing and beginnings of God's plan to rid the world of sin and Satan were put together before the world began and the creation of mankind. It is all these things put together that evoked the need for Christ to enter into the holy tabernacle in heaven.

"But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things to come, He entered through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation;" (Hebrews 9:11 NASB)

My Thursday morning men's group has watched several weeks of Dr. Derwin Gray on Right Now Videos. He is the Lead Pastor at Transformation Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. What is unique about his teaching style is that as he reads a passage that speaks to the topic, he frequently says, "now let's pause here a moment." I want to do that now.

When Christ appeared after his death, where did he appear? 

As I think about what I just asked, it is a trick question, although that was not my intent, as few of you will acknowledge that He went into the heavenly tabernacle, and fewer even realize that this act of forgiveness actually happened. Still, if you read your Bible, you will know that Jesus appeared to over 400 between his resurrection and ascension into heaven. However, the most important thing He did after subjecting Himself to the cross and death was that He appeared in the heavenlies, a more perfect tabernacle. This is the heavenly tabernacle and the pattern for the one on earth.

“and not through the blood of goats and calves, but through His own blood, He entered the holy place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling those who have been defiled sanctify for the cleansing of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (Hebrews 9:12-14 NASB)

Once again, let's pause here. 

Jesus entered the heavenly tabernacle and obtained eternal redemption for us, with and through His own blood. Christ, we are told, offered Himself and subjected Himself to death.

"For this reason He is the mediator of a new covenant, so that, since a death has taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. For where a covenant is, there must of necessity be the death of the one who made it. For a covenant is valid only when men are dead, for it is never in force while the one who made it lives."
(Hebrews 9:15-17 NASB)

Pause!

Because He died, subjected Himself to the cross, and poured His blood out, just as they did with the animal sacrifices, for His benefit and ours, this makes Him the mediator of a new covenant.

Under no circumstance is the covenant valid until the death of the mediator. Jesus' death fulfilled the first and the last covenant, and yet, He was raised from the dead and now lives as our mediator, making Him a greater mediator.

"Therefore even the first covenant was not inaugurated without blood. For when every commandment had been spoken by Moses to all the people according to the Law, he took the blood of the calves and the goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people, saying, "THIS IS THE BLOOD OF THE COVENANT WHICH GOD COMMANDED YOU." And in the same way he sprinkled both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry with the blood. And according to the Law, one may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness." (Hebrews 9:18-22 NASB)

Again a pause.

Every covenant is inaugurated with blood.

The first covenant was fulfilled with blood, and so was the second.

We are told that without blood, there is no forgiveness; thank God, blood was shed for our forgiveness. 

"Therefore it was necessary for the copies of the things in the heavens to be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;"
(Hebrews 9:23-24 NASB)

Another pause.

Why did Jesus have to cleanse the heavenly things? 

Because Satan tore the place up and brought abomination to the heavenly tabernacle. Jesus did this for us.

“nor was it that He would offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.”
(Hebrews 9:25-26 NASB)

Will the pauses ever end?

He is NEVER to offer Himself again. Why?

Because His sacrifice, as the unblemished lamb, was enough. He did not use any other blood: He used His own. He sacrificed Himself, and you don't do this without dying and rising again.

“And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him.”
(Hebrews 9:27-28 NASB)

Let's focus on verse 27 for a moment.

Appointed - apokeimai - to be reserved; figuratively to await: - be appointed, (be) laid up.

Men are the Greek word anthrōpos = human beings.

Once, the Greek word is hapax and means one (or a single) time, once.

Die is the Greek word apothnēskō and carries meanings of to die off (literally or figuratively): - be dead, death, die, lie a-dying, be slain (X with).

Judgment, this is the Greek word krisis and means (Subjectively or objectively, for or against); by extension, a tribunal; by implication, justice (specifically divine law): - accusation, condemnation, damnation, judgment.

I have led you into Hebrews 9:27, where it says it is appointed for human beings to die once. The manner in which you die varies from old age, disease, or some form of violence. Hebrews 9:11-27 speaks to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Yes, Christ died.

We, on the other hand, do not have to die merely because sin demanded it, as Jesus became the sacrifice for us. But there is still a problem as we are born into the world physically damaged in a way that propels us to sin, and God will not tolerate that impairment in the Holy City or Heaven if you rather, and that is why we will be changed.

“In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality. But when this perishable will have put on the imperishable, and this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, "DEATH IS SWALLOWED UP in victory.”
(1 Corinthians 15:52-54 NASB)

So what do I see here?

The dead in Christ will be raised, but the perishable will now be imperishable because they have already physically died, and God has been able to purge that drive for lust that was a part of their bodies.

But the passage goes on to say, "and we will be changed."

What changes?

One our location, as we will lift off from this earth and meet Jesus in the air. The other thing that changes seems to be this body. The body carries the drive to sin, and it appears as though our bodies must die. This transition may be part of the Bema seat, and as I think about it, I see freedom.

“in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.”
(1 Corinthians 15:52 NASB)

Changed is the Greek word allássō, and though the Bible translators simply used the word changed, it implies that you are changed into another form or the nature of the thing is changed.

Since I am, as you are, a spirit that cannot die, then death is merely a painless transition. The oddity is that we all have an unwarranted fear of death.

The next question is why?

As a child, we were made to say a prayer before bed. Where this prayer came from, I am not sure, but the theme was one that continued in the church. The prayer goes like this Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take. There was no confidence, no understanding, and fear was laced throughout the prayer.' That, along with the things I was told continually in the church, filled my life with fear about God and death. Church merely backed up these prayers by implying that every little sin (like the paper clip I took) would send a person to hell if they did not repent of those sins. I reckon they forgot that Jesus covered all sins and made atonement for them through the cross, pouring His own blood upon the altar in heaven.

I now realize that all this imposed guilt was meant to control the body of Christ because we are all representative of that sheep that has a tendency to stray and must be stopped. But, since breaking our legs would be illegal, and it does little to stop the thoughts that come into your head, all that is left for church leadership is manipulation. No, it does not show up in every leader or every church, but it is there, and Satan saw to it that we were all taught deathly thoughts and fear.
Consider Adam and Eve; in the garden, God spelled out that their sin of eating that fruit initiated the two of them and all their offspring, of which I am one, into warfare. Satan is a master at psychological warfare.

In case you haven't figured it out, I am an unswerving believer in Hebrews 9:27, which says it is appointed unto humanity, once to die, and after this comes the judgment.

For the believers, this judgment is the Bema seat of Christ, where you will be rewarded according to the acts that made you look like Jesus to someone, and most of those acts you were probably unaware of. So judgment, for us, is nothing to fear. I am being sarcastic as I say if you idolize your Gucci underwear, then perhaps you should switch to Fruit of the Loom or Hanes, as it appears that all human idolatry and adultery will get burned up at the Bema seat right before you get that sparkling white robe.

This is, for the most part, not a life-changing argument, but when a notable speaker says that God did NOT mean what He said has the potential for huge problems, especially if you do not spend any time in God's Word. If that is true - God did NOT mean what He said, then God is a liar. If you have read the Word for yourself, then you know that God cannot lie and that He is incapable of lying, and you would know that what Lee Brainard is NOT true, making him a false teacher.

Scriptural proof to substantiate that God cannot lie can be found in 1 Samuel 15:29.

“He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind." (1 Samuel 15:29 NIV)

Since we are to make our judgments based upon two witnesses, try this.

“I, the LORD, have spoken! The time has come, and I won’t hold back. I will not change my mind, and I will have no pity on you. You will be judged on the basis of all your wicked actions, says the Sovereign LORD.” Ezekiel 24:14 NLT

The context of Ezekiel 24 is a judgment upon the Jews. Many, still to this day, refuse to see Yeshua as the Messiah, and yet, they, too, were covered by Jesus' blood shed on that cross. So, here in verse 14, they, along with the nations and anyone else who pushed Jesus aside, will be judged on the basis of all their actions.

Are their actions all wicked?

Matthew 25:31-46 speaks of the judgment of the sheep and the goats. If you pay attention, you can see that this is a parallel to the great white throne that most fear. Here though, the goats are separated from the sheep, and the sheep gain entrance into the eternal kingdom. Shocked, they ask, what did we do to deserve such favor? The answer has everything to do with their actions. These actions are the very things that God commanded us to do when He gave us the Ten Commandments – simply put, Love on People. You cannot do that unless there is a moral fiber from God running through your body.

So if you were to challenge me about the nature and character of God, I would have to say, Nope, sorry, I believe God and His Word, and I will not change my thinking on this one.

Genesis Chapter Six, The Nephilim.

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Genesis Chapter Six

The Nephilim

When you make the decision to look intently at Genesis chapter six, you begin to see

• a strange people,

• odd terminology,

• and an angry God.

The definitions and reasons behind those oddities do not jump out so readily, and so it takes dedication and a heart that chooses to understand to grasp what I am going to tell you.

The objective in talking about the Nephilim is not to make some new doctrine out of the unusual things buried within the Word but to open your eyes to the God that lives outside the time and space dimensions we do. Perhaps another way of putting this is to say that God does not live inside our religious box. 

Here is where we will begin this dive into the Nephilim.

“And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives, whomsoever they chose.”
(Genesis 6:1-2 JPS)

Where did those “the sons of God” come from?

An assumption would be Cain's and Shem's descendants. But you have a problem because you cannot answer where Cain or Shem's wife came from. To assume that these two stood around waiting for mom and dad to crank out some sisters is laughable. Assumptions are rarely productive or educational.

I cannot define who the sons of God were without understanding that this book we are looking at is a Jewish book, and the majority is written in Hebrew. But, of course, we also need to grasp the writer's mentality; that tends to mean paying attention to the context. And I can use some logic to help comprehend this. Since we only know of two people, at this point, Adam and Eve, and God made them in his image.

“Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” (Genesis 2:7 NASB)

Sometime later, He makes the woman.

"The man gave names to all the cattle, and to the birds of the sky, and to every beast of the field, but for Adam there was not found a helper suitable for him. So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; then He took one of his ribs and closed up the flesh at that place. The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man." 
(Genesis 2:20-22 NASB)

Operating on the premise that there are only two people on the earth, there could only be a handful of possibilities for ancestral sons on the planet. But, for argument's sake, there are supposedly only two people on earth when sin infiltrates humanity. 

• Descendants of Adam and Eve.

  Keep in mind that from the garden forward, all their descendants carry a damaged chromosome that promotes an inclination to sin. In a way, humanity was already damaged by Adam's treasonous act, making any further demonic efforts pointless; and yet the onslaught from Satan's cohorts continues proactively. What gives this more credence lies in Genesis 3:15.

  "And I will cause hostility between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring. He will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.” (Genesis 3:15 NLT)

  Well, this demonic onslaught could certainly be perceived as hostility or warfare. And though I will not pursue it here, the fact that it speaks of offspring from Satan should alarm you. Her offspring speaks to the birth of Jesus, but keep in mind that Jesus was the product of God being carried by this young virgin Mary. There was no human procreation involved, making Jesus sinless from birth and, therefore, the only one who could pay the price of our redemption.

  However, because God spoke a prophetic word that indicated that an offspring from Eve would strike Satan's heel, Satan had every reason to disrupt that plan. So no, an attempt to pollute and stop the human lineage through demonic intervention simply because they were descendants of Adam and Eve falls short.

• Both Cain and Seth found a woman to "marry." 

  Where did these women come from?

  I happen to think that it is a logical question that deserves an answer.

  I can logically assume that children were produced prior to eating from the tree of knowledge in the garden, as it is not practical to think that their bodies suddenly matured and they discovered sex after sinning.

  Since we have little that defines Adam and Eve prior to sin, one might say that the children were Godlike (Consider that Adam was made in the image of God, and Eve is a clone of Adam.) This seems logical as Adam had dominion over the earth, and we rarely stop to think what that means.

  And we have NO idea how long those two walked this earth prior to Adam's treason. Then the potential number of children, who only know how to act based on what they saw and heard from Adam and Eve, could have been uncountable. (If you pay attention when you read about the creation of Adam and Eve, you will never see God giving any instructions to Eve or the sons, and yet we make the assumption that they are supposed to know the rules. Since we do see God giving those instructions to Adam, then the only logical recourse is to assume that it was Adam's responsibility to pass the restrictions about the tree of knowledge along to Eve. This understanding is the basis of Satan's argument, “did God really say that?” Because the pretense is that Adam played her, lied to her, and that would make God a liar as well.

What happened as sin suddenly traveled through the earth like a shock wave?

Scripture tells us that the sons of god looked on the daughters of men.

They would suddenly have looked upon the women differently, as sin was now affecting them to the point that they saw women as something to lust upon. (This train of thought is conjecture as there is little to back such statements.)

The Young's Literal Translation tells us that the sons of god saw "the daughters of men that they are fair, and they take to themselves women of all whom they have chosen."

The phrase "the sons of god" is the usage of two Hebrew words, ben 'ĕlôhı̂ym. Elohim means rulers, judges, divine ones, and angels, while ben means sons.

Now, why would I use the terminology supposedly in relation to people on earth? 

Because it seems intuitive for the man, Adam, to mate with the woman, and, whether you intended to make a baby or not, babies happen; and our "two" humans are not even in the garden as yet, at least that is the way we get this narrative depicted to us. 

Stepping away from babies for a moment, you need to realize that God placed Adam in the garden and pointed out that the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was in the middle of the garden.

"And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground made the LORD God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil." (Genesis 2:7-9 KJV)

Sometime later.

“The LORD God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die." (Genesis 2:16-17 NASB)

Is that clear enough?

When you eat from that tree, you will die.

Ah, but how many ways are there to die?

Physically, spiritually, and perhaps the hardest to understand, complete separation from God. Unfortunately, to many, this separation means nothing until it is experienced.

Another reason for using the term supposedly is because God has to say to Eve, now your pain will be increased in childbirth.

The Complete Jewish Bible puts it this way.

To the woman, he said, "I will greatly increase your pain in childbirth. You will bring forth children in pain. Your desire will be toward your husband, but he will rule over you." (Genesis 3:16 CJB)

That is a bizarre disclosure unless she has already been producing children with minimal discomfort, and you have NOTHING that restricts Adam and Eve's time or actions together to the garden environment.

The third argument in support of Adam producing offspring outside the garden is the fact that Cain, the first of two children since the fall of humanity, says, people will kill me. Quite an odd statement when we prefer to believe that there are only three people on earth, and we see nothing to explain how or why Cain would have this concept.

Cain, understandably, leaves the family unit and goes to the land of Nod.

"Now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother's blood from your hand. "When you cultivate the ground, it will no longer yield its strength to you; you will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth." Cain said to the LORD, "My punishment is too great to bear! "Behold, You have driven me this day from the face of the ground, and from Your face, I will be hidden, and I will be a vagrant and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me." So the LORD said to him, "Therefore whoever kills Cain, vengeance will be taken on him seven-fold." And the LORD appointed a sign for Cain so that no one finding him would slay him. Then Cain went out from the presence of the LORD and settled in the land of Nod, east of Eden." (Genesis 4:11-16 NASB)

I looked at the word land to see if I could find some clue as to where Cain went, but no, it just means the vastness of the land. Nod, on the other hand, gives us a clue that I did not expect. In Hebrew, it means vagrancy, or, as the Brown-Driver-Briggs definition puts it, wandering.

The very next verse says,

"And Cain knew his wife, and she conceived and bore Enoch, and he built a city and called the name of the city after the name of his son Enoch." (Genesis 4:17 JPS)

And we are left to assume that in this land of Nod that Cain immediately found himself a woman and started a family. So think about this, Cain finds his woman in the land of wandering also. What a treasure she must have been.

For life to go on and people to expand their families is not unusual; however, we have no well-defined evidence to tell us what life was like before sin entered the human stream, but when Adam saw Eve, he said, "At last! This is bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh." (CJB).

All the soft furry animals may have talked, but they were NOT human, and Eve was like him in more ways than one. So it only makes sense that after the introductions, the exploratory interactions began.

Having been raised in the church, where everything associated with the world was evil and would send you to hell, I asked the question, what makes the sexual act a sin? 

What makes it a sin is the intent and the self-serving idolatry that goes along with that intent. That intent can turn into idolatry, where you are setting up something as having more importance than God, and that is what makes it a sin. But remember, as yet, corruption was NOT integrated into the lives of Adam and Eve and, therefore, had NO impact on them. It was all good.

This is a naively simple translation of Genesis 6:2.

"the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose." Genesis 6:2 NIV

Who were the sons of God? 

Or did God actually have sons at this point?

Since I should know that we are not talking about the sons of Adam, then it has to be someone else.

The Hebrew word for sons is 'ben,' pronounced bane, and means a son (as a builder of the family name), in the broadest sense (of literal and figurative relationship, including grandson, subject, nation, quality or condition, etc... Word Study Dictionary.

So I know that I am dealing with a figurative relationship when I read “the sons of God.”

BDB Definition: 1) son, grandson, child, member of a group, 1f) sons (as characterization, i.e., sons of injustice [for unrighteous men] or sons of God [for angels]), 1g) people (of a nation) (plural), 1h) of lifeless things, 1i) a member of a guild, order, or class.

Since I know that the relationship is figurative, then it becomes easier to understand that these are fallen angels. Young's Literal Translation also identifies them as fallen angels.

“The fallen ones were in the earth in those days, and even afterwards when sons of God come in unto daughters of men, and they have borne to them—they are the heroes, who, from of old, are the men of name.” (Genesis 6:4 YLT)

Do not read this and say, look, only moments later, the verse calls them sons of God, so it is two different groups. The Holy Spirit is telling you that the fallen ones came back after the flood to try a variety of approaches by which they could pollute and nullify God's people.

Let's see if there is any corroborating evidence for some of my theories.

1. These sons of God are (any) descendants of Adam.

   The problem with that is genetics. You will get black cats if you breed two pure strains of black cats. God created Adam; therefore, the possibility of the couple's first offspring looking extraordinarily different than the originals would be insurmountable, that is, unless something extraordinary happened, and it did - they ate the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil. So any sexual activity prior to the entry of sin would have produced offspring exactly like the Godlike creations they were.

   Sin, through the eating of the forbidden fruit, corrupted the human DNA, and that caused mutations within the offspring that no one could see. While that is certainly a possibility, it is not addressing where the sons of god came into play. Not everything in scripture is black and white, but there is usually some underlying evidence to support or reject some theory.

   Why, then, would God choose to send his son Jesus as a man when there was the possibility of that form having a genetic malfunction that would make him unqualified to pay the debt necessary?

   In case you missed this in your Bible reading, God circumvented the human reproductive method and had a young virgin, Mary, carry a fertilized egg made without human intervention. That fertilized egg had NO malfunction or sin attached to it at all, as God bypassed humanity to produce that egg. Don't lose sleep over this concept; just remember that He created Eve, and all her intricate body functions from a rib. He can create a fertilized ovum.

2. These sons of God are not humans, leaving only angels.

   Your mind cannot wrap around that as yet. Hang on.

   The Hebrew gives us some leeway in looking at the word 'ben' as It carries the connotation of a figurative relationship with God. Based on this information, we still have no clear definition of who the sons of God are.

   What does it mean when it calls them the sons of God?

   The word God is one we have become familiar with as church leaders try to integrate us into the Jewish heritage. In this case, it is the word 'elohiym.

   Brown-Driver-Briggs' Hebrew Definitions - Transliteration: 'elohiym - Definition: 1. (plural) a. rulers, judges b. divine ones c. angels d. gods.

   It is becoming more evident that the 'sons' is taking on a figurative or conditional relationship and could easily have been angels, and that is why I want you to look at Job's life for a moment. This journey into Job may seem long, but the important takeaway is that Satan is included among the “sons of God.”

   In the opening narrative about Job, we see Job's sons.

   “His sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one on his day, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them.”
   (Job 1:4 NASB)

   Now this narrative alone may mean nothing, but Job is troubled by their actions and repeatedly offers sacrifices to God, presuming that the boys have sinned and cursed God.

   “When the days of feasting had completed their cycle, Job would send and consecrate them, rising up early in the morning and offering burnt offerings according to the number of them all; for Job said, "Perhaps my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts." Thus Job did continually.”
   (Job 1:5 NASB)

   The religious, who feel they have the right to be critical of Job, will point out that "without faith, it is impossible to please God," which may have been Job's failure. Admittedly, the passage tells  that Job continually offered "sacrifices to God," which would seem to be a problem. 

   “Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them.” (Job 1:6 NASB)

A straightforward observation is that this is the same Satan Jesus saw fall to earth.

“And He said to them, I saw Satan falling like a lightning [flash] from heaven.” (Luke 10:18 AMP)

Our assumption upon reading that is that Satan was permanently ejected from heaven, yet there he is. It feels more like he lost his seat at the United Nations assembly, but not his right to attend the meetings and voice his protests. Satan was well aware that God had protected Job, but he was not aware that Job had somehow made himself vulnerable.

"Have You not made a hedge about him and his house and all that he has, on every side? ...” (Job 1:10 NASB)

So no, Satan does not know everything, and we see him challenging God to test him yourself.

“All right, you may test him,” the LORD said to Satan. “Do whatever you want with everything he possesses, but don’t harm him physically.” So Satan left the LORD’s presence. (Job 1:12 NLT)

Truth is, beyond God telling Satan that he is in your hands, we don't know what happened to Job to make him vulnerable to Satan. What we do know is that God trusts the man to not submit to Satan's tests.

The following is an excerpt from the 'Through the Bible' commentary by Dr. J. Vernon McGee. 

"The term "sons of God" in the Old Testament is used elsewhere but only of angels, never of man. In the book of Job, the sons of God were presenting themselves to God and Satan also came with them, angels. It would appear that these are angels here in Genesis, that they actually began to intermingle and intermarry. You say but wait a minute. Jesus said the angels neither marry nor are given in marriage in heaven. That is true. But Jesus did not say that they were sexless; He just said there was no marriage nor given in marriage. And it is interesting that always angels are referred to in a masculine form." (emphasis mine)

I will lend my agreement to the late Dr. McGee, although he does not need it, in saying that I am unwaveringly convinced that angels were involved in the business of men.

Who were the Nephilim or giants?

I will give you two translations for comparison.

Genesis 6:4 (KJV) states that: "There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that,"

Genesis 6:4 (NIV) The Nephilim were on the earth in those days--and also afterward--

And one more verse for understanding.

“In those days, and for some time after, giant Nephilites lived on the earth, for whenever the sons of God had intercourse with women, they gave birth to children who became the heroes and famous warriors of ancient times.” (Genesis 6:4 NLT)

If the sons of God were angels, they were NOT living on the earth as the heavens are, or were their realm; but ask yourself, how does this statement apply to the fallen ones. From what we saw in Job, it is apparent that they move back and forth between heaven and earth with ease.

How odd; if we start with the pure strain called Adam, made by the hand of God, and Eve was a clone of Adam, there should have been no expectation of oddities, and yet here they are in the form of Nephilim. There are so many translations of Genesis 6:4, and many, probably because the era in which this was published was attempting to show sophistication, used words like “came” into, or took in marriage. Give me a break.

The “God's Word” translation tells us that the “sons of God slept with the daughters of other humans,” as though they were all humans. In almost every interaction with humans, these beings looked like humans, although a few had wings.

The “ISV” translation says it straightforward “those divine beings were having sexual relations with those human women.”

A common religious argument that Dr. McGee mentioned in the previous quote is that “ Jesus said the angels neither marry nor are given in marriage in heaven. That is true. But Jesus did not say that they were sexless; He just said there was no marriage nor given in marriage.”

Since many translators stated this interaction as "came unto," which sounds like they met at a local dance, let's tear this apart for a moment. 

"Came in unto" is the Hebrew phrase bô' el. The word bô' carries meanings to enter, fall, or light upon (which quickly moves this thought into the category of spoils of warfare.) The Word Study Dictionary states that "It is used with the preposition el meaning to have intercourse," and that is precisely what we see in (Genesis 6:4). In Genesis16:2, these are the words that Sarai spoke to Abram when she told him to go have sex with Hagar. 

We cannot deny that there were giants because we have some bones, pictorial evidence, and historical records of these giants. Young David, before he assumed his kingship, slew Goliath - the giant, and mythology tries to explain the existence of such people. 

How else would normal humans have described such persons? 

Perhaps mythology was closer than we choose to believe.

H5303 n^ephı̂yl. Transliteration Nephilim. It is from H5307 nâphal. It is possible that the differences were pre-flood and post-flood.

Interesting that the Strong's concordance indicates that they were bullies or tyrants.

The Word Study Dictionary tells us that Nephilim is a masculine noun and is only used in the plural sense to mean giants. That means that there were many of them. Having cohabited with women, the Nephilim - the mighty men or warriors of great fame, were the offspring.

The 'WSD' also indicates that H5307 is the Hebrew word napal: A verb meaning to fall, to lie, to prostrate oneself, to be overthrown.

I cannot help but think about a teaching that Dr. Chuck Missler did on the Nephilim. He asked the question, who is being overthrown here? Although the attempt was made on God, it failed, and it was Satan/Lucifer and those that followed him in this mutinous attempt that got overthrown. A wise observation is to pick up on the fact that these fallen ones are still viable but will meet their fate someday soon.

Brown-Driver-Briggs Definition of H5307 shows it spelled in this manner na^phal, and conveys the idea of being cast down or they failed. You could say they are fallen.

There is no denying that angels, fallen or not, have been involved in the affairs of humanity since time began, and you see their influence throughout the scriptures. Lot had some dealings with them, as two of them eventually had to grab Lot, his wife, and his daughters and remove them from the town that was to be destroyed. Daniel had angels appear to him on multiple occasions to give and explain dreams, and Jacob wrestled with one, although we believe this to have been a Christophany, a pre-incarnate interaction with Jesus.

An alarming statement in Genesis 6:4 tells us that they (the giants) were in the earth then and after. 

After what? 

For those that get hung up on the word impossible, consider that the Nephilim were here before the flood. All humans outside Noah's extended family get destroyed, yet the giants return again. 

I don't know about you, but I have to wonder, how did the destructive nature of sin get so reinvested in the earth?

We were told that Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. I always assumed that Noah was a good man, like Joseph, who was engaged to Mary. We have nothing that tells us what would have made Noah a good man. I did a little investigation a few years ago and found that Adam was around 600+ years when Enoch was born. Who better train a curious young man when he comes to ask what it was like walking in the garden with God. Methuselah's name, which many say, means "when he dies, it will come," may well have had an influence from Adam and Enoch, and we do see Methuselah dying before the flood. Otherwise, I suspect he, too, would have been on that boat.

The Hebrew word for grace is chên and means that Noah found favor and kindness from the Lord. If you take this narrative back to the garden, you will discover Abel offering a proper sacrifice of a lamb, while Cain did not. I challenge you to find the time when God gave those instructions to Abel; you won't find them. And neither will you find God giving Eve the warning to NOT eat from the tree of knowledge in the middle of the garden, as that was entirely Adam's job, as he had been given dominion over the planet. This dominion included his lovely "wife" and, after the fall, his offspring – Cain and Abel. 

Did you catch what I did there?

I put their names in birth order. This is significant because, whether Adam told them individually or in a group session, he told them both, and he was the representative of God here on earth. So I can prove that with this statement from God. 

If you had done the right thing, you would be smiling; but because you have done evil, sin is crouching at your door. It wants to rule you, but you must overcome it."
(Genesis 4:7 GNB)

[The translations of this verse are split down the middle. The NASB, which I prefer, says, “If you do well.” Killing your brother should be considered, by most, to be the polar opposite of doing well.]

You can't punish your child for something that you have NOT explained to them unless you are just a tyrant. So we have evidence that God had explained the rules to Cain as well as Abel, but He did it through Adam.

Among these men on earth, one man stood out. The question is, why?

Noah -  and why he stands out, requires more than a casual look. 

“But Noah found grace in the eyes of Jehovah”. (Genesis 6:8 MKJV)

Jehovah y^ehôvâh - (the) self Existent or eternal; Jehovah,

“... Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. (Genesis 6:9 KJV)

Just is the same word translated as righteous. It is tsaddı̂yq.

The word perfect is the Hebrew word tâmı̂ym. Some of its meanings include: complete, whole, entire, sound, and unimpaired.

The word for perfect in relationship to Noah's generations implies purity within his generational lineage. That would mean that there has never been a time, since Adam, without the destructive interaction of fallen angels.  

What, then, would they have been impaired by, and doesn't that mean that the entirety of the world had been damaged? 

Just a couple of names stand out as I think about the genealogy of Adam; Enoch and Methuselah.

“And Enoch walked with God, and then he was not, for God took him.”
(Genesis 5:24 MKJV)

But if you recall, the sons of god were only going after the daughters of men. In so doing, they were attempting to corrupt the human genome through the creation of giants, titans, and monsters.

“the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were good. And they took wives for themselves from all whom they chose.” (Genesis 6:2 MKJV)

Took is the Hebrew word lâqach means to take, seize, and carry away. This was not civilized nor romantic but a forceful act on the part of these fallen angels.

Now, why would that be important? 

Because God had a plan to recover his creation, humanity, and it involved bringing a son into the world, which had to be done through a pure line from Adam. Recall how I talked about a pure strain that would have been initiated with Adam and Eve. Satan picked up on this idea and gave orders to impact and pervert the lineage of humanity in an effort to thwart God's plan of redemption. It almost worked, and that is why we have this cautionary message about Noah being perfect or pure.

"As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man." 
Matthew 24:37 (NIV)

There is already an onslaught of demonic influence greater than anything Noah might have witnessed, and much of it will be hidden under the guise of alien invasions.