One of the frequent discussions I hear centers on this phrase, “as it was in the days of Noah.”

 One of the frequent discussions I hear centers on this phrase,

“as it was in the days of Noah.”

This comes from Luke 17:26, where it says, “And [just] as it was in the days of Noah, so will it be in the time of the Son of Man. (AMP)” 

Those that speak on this subject talk about how people just went about their business, getting married and having birthday parties, as though everything was good for their level of advancement (instead of merely banging two rocks together.)

What I just brought up doesn't even come close to assessing how bad the world was at this time. So let's start in Genesis 6:1-2 and see where this takes us.

“When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them, the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose.” (Genesis 6:1-2 ESV)

• “When man began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them,”

  It is not the multiplying part that creates the problem; there was plenty of land. It was this next aspect that God was paying close attention to.

• “the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose.”

Who were the sons of God?

They were angelic beings, and though there are both righteous and fallen angels our focus is on the fallen ones. Jesus in trying to explain a twisted and unusual question to some Jews, spoke of the angels that did not fall, when He said,

"... For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels of God in heaven." Matthew 22:29-30 NKJV)

What can I make of this? 

That the angels, that remained subject to God and heavens laws, do not participate in sexual activity.

One of our primary pieces of evidence that these were fallen angels comes from an interaction between God and Satan, found in the book of Job.

“Now there was a day when the sons of God (the righteous ones) came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them. The LORD said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan answered the LORD and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” And the LORD said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?” Then Satan answered the LORD and said, “Does Job fear God for no reason?”
(Job 1:6-9 ESV)

Some obvious things you might have picked up on, as Satan - who the Revelation describes as being thrown out of heaven, is meandering about in the heavenlies with the angels that did not fall, is that he is there and nothing no one is doing much to challenge him. 

Satan doesn't seem to care if he is welcome or not, and so what do we see? 

Satan shoves himself right up near the throne to get God's attention.

God asks Satan a question.

Does God ask questions because He is lacking answers?

Never, and so we can think of these inquiries as forensic – as He is studying the words you say and the manner in which you respond. You cannot lie to God.

How did Satan respond to God's question, Have you considered my servant Job?

Well, of course, he had, and it was probably the basis for his being there in heaven, among the sons of God, of which he was still considered to be one. Consider the response of the disciples after being sent out. (This sending happened on two occasions: In Mark 6:7, it was only the twelve, but in Luke 10, the number being sent out was seventy. On both occasions, they were sent in pairs.)

“The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.”
(Luke 10:17-18 ESV)

Satan didn't just trip and fall out of heaven, he was thrown out.

“A war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels were fighting against the dragon and its angels. But the dragon lost the battle. It and its angels were forced out of their places in heaven and were thrown down to the earth. Yes, that old snake and his angels were thrown out of heaven! That snake, who fools everyone on earth, is known as the devil and Satan. Then I heard a voice from heaven shout, "Our God has shown his saving power, and his kingdom has come! God's own Chosen One has shown his authority. Satan accused our people in the presence of God day and night. Now he has been thrown out! Our people defeated Satan because of the blood of the Lamb and the message of God. They were willing to give up their lives. The heavens should rejoice, together with everyone who lives there. But pity the earth and the sea because the devil was thrown down to the earth. He knows his time is short, and he is very angry." When the dragon realized that it had been thrown down to the earth, it tried to make trouble for the woman who had given birth to a son. But the woman was given two wings like those of a huge eagle, so that she could fly into the desert. There she would escape from the snake and be taken care of for a time, two times, and half a time. The snake then spewed out water like a river to sweep the woman away. But the earth helped her and swallowed the water that had come from the dragon's mouth. This made the dragon terribly angry with the woman. So it started a war against the rest of her children. They are the people who obey God and are faithful to what Jesus did and taught. The dragon stood on the beach beside the sea.” (Revelation 12:7-18 CEV)

So the life-changing question that people ask is, When did Satan get thrown out of heaven?

Logic would tell you that this happened somewhere between Genesis 1:1 and the serpent showing up in the garden.

Genesis 2:2 indicates that God felt everything was done and good, but it was good once before and then not. The prophet Isaiah tells us that God made it perfect, to begin with.

“For thus says the LORD, who created the heavens (he is God!), who formed the earth and made it (he established it; he did not create it empty, he formed it to be inhabited!): “I am the LORD, and there is no other.”
(Isaiah 45:18 ESV)

So when I read a verse like Genesis 1:2, I can see that something cataclysmic happened.

“The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.”
(Genesis 1:2 ESV)

Well, Genesis 1:2 may have been the result of Satan's being tossed to earth.

Were there any people other than Adam and Eve on earth?

The answer is a strong maybe. Look, you put a young, naked man and woman in the most spectacular of settings, and they will find a multitude of things to explore ( if you get my hint.) Didn't you ever notice that God said to Eve, after the fall, now you will have pain in childbirth?

Why would He say that if she had never had children?

Give me a break; they had many. And, if all they knew was what Adam, their papa, said and acted like, then they, too, were Godlike. I know this opens a large “can-o-worms,” but try not to let your mind melt over this.

Then why didn't the serpent – Satan go after one of the others?

Because, in the long run, Satan was going specifically after “God's” creation,  those who had been given dominion over the earth, Adam and subordinately, Eve.

“And God said, "Let Us make man in Our image, after Our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of heaven and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that crawls upon the earth."”
(Genesis 1:26 AFV)

Dominion is the Hebrew word râdâh and means to tread down, subjugate, have dominion over, prevail against, and most importantly, have rule over.

Adam had been given command over this planet, and just like Jesus, he only did what the Father told him, except for that moment in the garden.

In that brief moment of time, he handed the entirety of the planet over to Satan by following his wife's lead.

Now, if you read Genesis 1:26 attentively, you noticed that there is a plurality inferred, and you would be right, but God does not put a body on the man until Genesis 2:7, and then He only formed one of the two; so conversations about making humanity was all in the spiritual mode until He put flesh on them. All the instructions pertaining to this dominion were given specifically to the man, who, in time, informed Eve once she had been made.

If you can understand what I have just told you, then you will better understand what took place when the Serpent said to Eve, did God really say that?

Satan was trying to put a rift between God and Adam, Adam and Eve, and eventually all humanity that could never be repaired. In that masterful move, Satan sowed seeds of doubt, deceit, lying, and an unending heap of trust issues.

Oh, about that rift that could never be repaired. 

The laws that make this universe run are moral laws created and put in place by God himself. Therefore, the only one who could pay the price that justice demanded was God himself, and He did so by sending His Son, Jesus. He also bypassed an inherent problem we have had since the garden, and that is our built-in sin mode. Jesus did not have that, as He was not a creation of either man or woman and was, therefore, sinless. Jesus, being sinless, is the thing that Satan did not count on. So this irreparable rift was not too big of a problem as long as you have a sinless God-man to take your place, and Jesus did just that.

Back to this paragraph,

“the sons of God saw that the daughters of man were attractive. And they took as their wives any they chose.”

Having established that these “sons of God” were fallen angels that fell when they followed Satan in his folly, then they were taking the daughters of men, anybody at any time, as they chose. And I don't think they cared about looks (even though the passage, as though the writer had interviewed them, says they noted the attractiveness of women) as they were trying to manipulate the human genome even further. Hold that thought for a moment. 

We live in a day when science is consistently modifying or attempting to modify the human genome. The American Department Of Defense (under the guise of DARPA) has been doing it for years as they try to create super soldiers. 

Since the ingesting of that fruit changed the human genome and instilled a propensity within us to sin, it permanently damaged the DNA strain that was the base origin of humanity. Every human from that moment forward has that same damaged marker. If that be the case, then when science began looking at DNA, they saw a commonality in every human strand compared. This damaged marker, for which they cannot find a purpose, becomes an expected marker in all of humanity.

I know most translations are using delicate wording so that you cannot easily pick up on the offense of the word "took." Perhaps we could say they were merely grabbing these women, or shall I say abducting, whomever, whenever, they wanted. These fallen angels may not have copulated with their victims in the manner to which we are accustomed, but the scriptures tell us that they did it.

Do we have anything bizarre like this happening today?

Unfortunately, yes, we do. If you are into the paranormal, a Christian brother named LA. Marzulli writes books and speaks at conferences about demonic abductions. By the way, those that have withstood these encounters have only done so because they possessed ownership of the name of Jesus Christ because they had accepted Christ into their lives at some point, and they used it against what was happening to them.

LA Marzulli, along with others, like Brian Forester, have pursued unexplainable oddities, such as elongated skulls – that have had their DNA tested, and, though in this case found in Paracas, Peru, had parentage leading the researchers back to the Middle East and NO known earthly being.

Let's assume that you don't believe me at this point. Let me ask you a question;

Can you accept the Bible as non-challengeable?

I am not talking about known errors or translation disputations, of which there are many, but I know that God's unchanging moral authority runs through the entirety of scripture. I also know that there is nothing of note in the New Testament that cannot be validated by prophetic words in the Old Testament. Our standard for proving this comes from the Law.

“One witness shall not rise against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin which he sins. At the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses a thing shall be raised up to judgment.”
(Deuteronomy 19:15 LITV)

So, no matter whether it is a law matter or the validation of God's Word, it can and should be validated by scriptural witnesses.

I brought up the possibility that Adam and Eve had other children. How do you explain that?

1. Time, as we understand it, began that day in the garden. If you wish to say the earth is only ten thousand years old, basing the presumption of time from the garden event makes all the sense in the world. Sin, death, and rebellion in the lives of humans all came out of the garden and the eating of that fruit.

2. What else happened that day? If you foolishly said that the plan of redemption began that day. To a degree, you would be right, but do you seriously think that God was caught off guard and had to come up with a plan now that the two people you have been close to for an untold amount of time will come to an end. Knowing that Satan would rebel and, in a way, take out God's man, Adam, the plan to recover His creation and entirely eliminate Satan came into being long before we were a thought – and based upon what King David said, you knew me before time began.

3. So children born outside of the garden do not fall under the category of sin, as sin, it would seem, became a genetic issue. The logical course would follow the change that began as the parents damaged their genetics and then passed that along to any children that followed.

   If they were outside of sin through genetics, then why would they have to be “judged” alongside everybody else?

   Good question, and maybe they are not. Consider that the fallen angels are given no recourse for their mutiny; perhaps those children which were not affected by tainted genetics sustained damage, just as the creation did and cries out for the day of their redemption.

   “All of creation waits with eager longing for God to reveal his children. For creation was condemned to lose its purpose, not of its own will, but because God willed it to be so. Yet there was the hope that creation itself would one day be set free from its slavery to decay and would share the glorious freedom of the children of God. For we know that up to the present time all of creation groans with pain, like the pain of childbirth. But it is not just creation alone which groans; we who have the Spirit as the first of God's gifts also groan within ourselves as we wait for God to make us his children and set our whole being free.” (Romans 8:19-23 GNB)

So, anyone born outside of the garden was still affected by what happened there, just as the entirety of the earth was. 

Some would say, how would those born outside of the garden know about salvation? 

Well, first off, who was their daddy? Yep, Adam. Adam told Eve, and he also told them as well.

I told you that the garden and its sin were the basis of the world we live in. That moment in the garden initiated the prophetic insertion of Jesus into humanity and the plan of redemption's calendar.

Did you, as you read, pick up on the fact that the method of momentary relief from sin came through appropriate sacrifice?

God, on the same day as the conversation in which He told Eve that one of her seed would crush the serpent's head, killed animals - adequate enough to make appropriate coverings, and He showed Adam how to make sacrifice using those same animals. Do not assume that Adam had been stripped of his title; therefore, he was still meant to take dominion.

“for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” (Romans 11:29 NASB)

Testimony from the Old Testament.

“God is not a man who lies, or a son of man who changes his mind! Does He speak and then not do it, or promise and not fulfill it?” (Numbers 23:19 TLV)

That meant he was still in the chain of command for the redistribution of information. Since we DO NOT see any mention of those born outside of the garden, the most logical assumption is that they fell and went out of fellowship with God, as Cain did. 

If you can't handle the idea that there were others born outside the garden and wish to hold to a chronological reading of the scriptures, then where did Cain get the idea that there were others, as violent as he, waiting to kill him?

“Since You expelled me today from the face of the ground and I must be hidden from Your presence, then I will be a restless wanderer on the earth—anyone who finds me will kill me!”” (Genesis 4:14 TLV)

Another bizarre anomaly also follows Cain as he went to a city (?) and found a wife (?). Keep in mind that we are trying to follow a chronological pattern. So, Cain, then, would have to wait for Mom and Dad to produce a daughter that he could have. 

But who was next to be born? 

Seth, a “righteous” son. Try to imagine how long you might have to wait before a sister was born that you could have for a wife. A bizarre train of thought, but so is the logic.

Then Cain left Adonai’s presence and dwelled in the Land of Wandering, east of Eden. Cain was intimate with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. And he was building a city, and he named the city after the name of his son, Enoch.
(Genesis 4:16-17 TLV)

Assuming that we have eliminated the possibility that children born outside of the garden could have been called the sons of God, then the only beings left, as we have pointed out when we looked at Job, are the fallen angels.

One of the boisterous arguments against the angels procreating with humans is that angels have no male organs and, therefore, have no sex. This is based on this passage, where the Pharisees, who were always trying to trap Jesus, brought up a scenario in which a woman is passed through the family members, much like a sex slave, to produce children with the family name.

“In the resurrection, when they (these family members who each had her) rise again, whose wife will she be? For the seven had her as wife.” Jesus said to them, “Is this not the reason you are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God? For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.”
(Mark 12:23-25 ESV)

Luke's gospel conveys this theme.

“In the resurrection, therefore, whose wife will the woman be? For the seven had her as wife.” And Jesus said to them, “The sons of this age marry and are given in marriage, but those who are considered worthy to attain to that age and to the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage, for they cannot die anymore, because they are equal to angels and are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection.”
(Luke 20:33-36 ESV)

At the moment, we live in the age of grace; this age will come to an end with the removal of the church. At that point in time, those of us in heaven become a part of a term that I have come to despise, that “new age,” where we will be married to Christ, the groom. We will be like the angels in that they are eternal. We will be the Sons and Daughters of God that we were designed to be. Stop here. Our spirits are already eternal as we have been made in the image of God – an eternal spirit, and as such, we will merely go on living with our Father. Our relationship with Jesus moves us into what we call the body of Christ. So, in a sense, we are already married to the Lamb. The angels, who also have free will, for the most part, know their duties and place – and it does not include sex. Satan, his name was Lucifer, decided to supplant God, an act that exceeded the limits of his position. He managed to convince a third of the uncountable number of angels to follow him in this rebellion.

Did their spirits die?

No. Many of them were locked up in chains, as they, in their rebellion, became very dangerous. They will be cast into outer darkness, along with Satan and those who choose to follow him, to the place where there is gnashing of teeth, fire, and perpetual anguish.

The scripture leaves no one out, and the flooding killed everything that walked on land and breathed air, that includes half-breed angels, referred to as Nephilim. The giants died, but scripture tells us that they came back after the flood. 

"The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown." (Genesis 6:4 NASB)

This can be attested to by Joshua and Caleb's testimony upon their foray into Canaan and David's killing of Goliath. Because we have very few records of Titans upon the earth, anymore, then I would suggest that the fallen angels changed their techniques and game plan.

So, the question is, who will you willingly be married to?

There are only two options, Jesus or Satan.

Gathering all the chief priests and elders he inquired about this king of the Jews. Matthew 2: 1-12.

 If you were hoping for a continued foray into the book of Romans, I must apologize because I am an obsessive multitasker. I had been feeling like I needed to do as I started almost twenty years ago, to read through the New Testament slowly while writing down my thoughts and questions as I went. I really did not want to disrupt your lives if you should be meticulously following me, but since everything in scripture is connected, just as the “New Testament” could NOT exist without the supporting words found in the Old. To my Jewish friends (I wish,) the Torah and Tenach. So it should all be good.

I also know that what I write includes so much of my heart and a strong disgust for religious zealots who add to the law, distort it, and impose their traditional teachings, merely because that is the way we have always taught some portion of scripture. Sadly, this is how I was taught and why I write, so that you and I can hopefully see the truth. 

On a humorous note, there is an old story where on a particular family holiday, one of the younger daughters, helping in the kitchen, asked the great-grandmother why they cut the ends off the roast before putting it in the oven? The reply changed everything that day as great-grandmother replied, I did it because my oven was too small. I will leave you to think about that.

 The next thing we encounter in Matthew’s gospel is,

The Visit of the Wise Men

“Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”
(Matthew 2:1-2 NASB)

Magi, what did they want and why were they demanding answers from Herod?

One brother in Christ, who is very skillful in the Word of God, explained that one of the roles of the Magi was to be kingdom changers, (Consider that this knowledgeable man had to look at other information, not contained within the pages of the Bible to make his valid assertion. I only point this out because a “brother in Christ” verbally lashed out at me, saying I do not believe that we should use extra-biblical texts and information to form our thoughts about God and scripture.) The Magi were the group of men that Daniel, as a young man, had been assigned to and eventually became the head of, while remaining a captive in Babylon.

Seeing the size of the entourage and perceiving a threat to his power, Herod went into panic mode and called the chief priests and elders before him to tell him what they knew about this situation.

“When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Gathering together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born.”
(Matthew 2:3-4 NASB)

“When Herod the king heard this.”

What did he hear?

“Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him.”

Since when has the Middle East changed so that you can merely gather up a large, armed crowd and go rolling up to another kingdom’s gates unannounced and immediately expect an audience with a king known to live in fear? It hasn’t, and so I don’t expect that was the case here, but the word was received and taken to the king. 

Now, what does the fearful man, Herod, do? 

He consults the people who most likely know the answer, the Jews, as they should know the prophecy.

All prophecy, like a criminal court case, must have two or three witnesses, one of those witnesses is found in the Book of Daniel. It is not likely that Herod, being a half-Jew, would have studied Daniel chapter seven, as it plays a significant role in testifying to what the angel declared to Mary as he explained the function of the child that she carried.

"He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David, and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have” no end.”
(Luke 1:32-33 NASB)

So, no, Herod would not know these words that we see in Luke’s gospel, as they were written long after Herod’s death, and that makes his fear and the lack of reaction by the elders even more peculiar.

The Magi, on the other hand, may have read Daniel's words with intensity.

“I kept looking in the night visions, And behold, with the clouds of heaven One like a Son of Man was coming, And He came up to the Ancient of Days And was presented before Him. "And to Him was given dominion, Glory and a kingdom, That all the peoples, nations and men of every language Might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion Which will not pass away, And His kingdom is one Which will not be” destroyed.”
(Daniel 7:13-14 NASB)

The reply of the elders is alarming to me.

“So they, “told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it has been written by the prophet: ‘And you, Bethlehem, land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; For out of you shall come a ruler who will shepherd My people Israel.’”
(Matthew 2:5-6 TLV)

They knew the answer to the question, but do we have any record that they went there and bowed before this new king?

Not at all. Herod responds to this by double-checking. Perhaps because even Herod could see that these magi are taking this king being born seriously and he calls them in to speak with them.

“Then Herod secretly called the magi and determined from them the exact time the star had appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem “and said, “Go and search carefully for the Child. And when you have found Him, bring word back to me so that I may come and worship Him” as well.”
(Matthew 2:7-8 TLV)

With terminology such as “determined from them the exact time,” Herod now has a ballpark idea of how old this new king is; and nothing will happen until they come back to Herod and give him the word of exactly where to find the child. Watch what the magi do.

“After listening to the king, they went their way. And behold, the star they had seen in the east went on before them, until it came to rest over the place where the Child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with” great gladness.”
(Matthew 2:9-10 TLV)

These magi had not yet found the child but they will. They will not go back for the child's protection. Notice where the family is now living.

“And when they came into the house, they saw the Child with His mother Miriam; and they fell down and worshiped Him. Then, opening their treasures, they presented to Him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their own country by another way.”
(Matthew 2:11-12 TLV)

Never once do you see the number three, what you do see are three specific names: gold, frankincense, and myrrh. A key word here is treasures, as the quantity may have been great and enough to sustain the family for several years. We, because of the age bracket that Herod ordered killed, would logically assume the age of Yeshua to be about two as they take off to the safety of Egypt.

“Now when they had gone (the magi), behold, an angel of Adonai appears to Joseph in a dream (so he has had a couple of these over the last few years), saying, “Get up! Take the Child and His mother and flee to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the Child, to kill Him.” So he got up, took the Child and His mother during the night, and went to Egypt. Now when they had gone, behold, an angel of Adonai appears to Joseph in“a dream, saying, “Get up! Take the Child and His mother and flee to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the Child, to kill Him.” So he got up, took the Child and His mother during the night, and went to Egypt. He stayed there until Herod’s death. This was to fulfill what was spoken by Adonai through the“prophet, saying, “Out of Egypt I called My son.” Then when Herod saw that he had been tricked by the magi, he became furious. And he sent and killed all boys in Bethlehem and in all its surrounding area, from two years old and under, according to the time he had determined from the magi.”

(Matthew 2:13-16 TLV)

Astronomy.com tells us that “On the morning of August 12 in 3 B.C ., Jupiter and Venus would’ve sat just 1/10th a degree apart in the dawn sky. That’s one-fifth the diameter of the Full Moon. (The December 2020 conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn will have an identical separation, albeit in the evening sky.) That wasn’t the end of the show, either. Venus and Jupiter continued their dance over most of the next year before finally appearing to merge into a single star in June.”

So approximately August of C.5 Christ was born.? (I am still not clear. If time is based on this dramatic change called Jesus birth, all I wanted or needed was a solid time frame that I could start with. If this is based upon Christ, it would seem that this timeline information puts the starting point at five months. An obvious fact is that He was NOT born at six months old, we also know that the shepherds were with their flocks, and that tends to put His birth far enough into the season for shepherds to be working the flocks comfortably in the hillsides.) At the age of two, his family takes him to Egypt to protect him. History, (and I must admit this is rather sketchy), records that Herod died around April 4 B.C., therefore it would seem that the family was only in Egypt for slightly over a year. The presumption then is that Jesus was brought back to Nazareth when He was four or five.

Why is this information important?

First, this has never been clear in my head, and that may be because no one ever talked about it. Secondly, questions occasionally arise about Jesus from toddler to maturity, which in the Jewish culture seems to be about age 13, a time when the sons are required to step up and learn their father's trade. Three, I made the mistake of reading Kahlil Gibran's book Jesus the son of Man. The title alone should tell you something about the lack of understanding and possible disrespect the man had for Jesus. A point that Mr. Gibran tried to make was that Jesus may have been a malicious brat, as he allegedly injured animals and then healed them. Sorry, but that did not sound right then nor does it sound right now. 

After the incident where the family, while in Jerusalem, had to go looking for Jesus, a 12-year-old child, they found Him in the temple where He had been for two days discussing with the Jewish leaders the scriptures. Remember, all they had were the law and the prophets, and they were precious and expensive scrolls, that only the richest of synagogues had copies. So learning the scriptures was almost exclusively through repetitious hearing.

A problem with this entire process. If your child had a disability would you focus on that, merely enabling that they lean upon that disability, or would you focus on their ability? In Jesus' case, He, by those who knew about His birth, would have been called a mumzer – an illegitimate child; and those same people had a long history, based on the law, that allowed them to treat a child like this poorly. As far as I can see, Jesus, had He been known, would have been violently expelled from the temple. An answer to this lies in the outer courts of the temple, as these were accessible to even the gentiles.

The final thought on this tells us that after His parents found Him, and I am sure expressed their displeasure at Him being lost, is that Jesus submitted Himself wholly to their wishes until He was old enough, able to take care of Himself and act on His own accord. I am thinking now of Mary. As the eldest son Jesus would have probably been the one to care for her after Joseph died. Keep in mind that Mary continued to have other children and several of them, including sisters, may have taken that role.

We, don't see support from the other family members, nor do we hear anything about siblings until the day that they came to restrain Him – so to speak.

“When His family heard about this, they went out to take hold of Him; for they were saying, “He’s out of His mind!” 

(Mark 3:21 TLV)

He conflicted with the 600+, additional Jewish laws, but He was amazingly kind to the down and out while excoriating the scribes and the“Pharisees.

“Then His mother and brothers come. Standing outside, they sent word to Him, summoning Him. A crowd was sitting around Him, and they tell Him, “Look, Your mother and Your brothers are outside looking for You.” Answering them, He said, “Who are My mother and My brothers?” Looking at those sitting in a circle around Him, He said, “Here are My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of God, he is My brother and sister and mother.” 

(Mark 3:31-35 TLV)

If Mary (Miriam) had not been the surrogate mother of Jesus we would probably never hear of her either.

I decided to post this, even though it is not, in my mind, done. 

I do not elaborate like this merely to convince you to think negatively about Jesus, just the opposite is true. If you happen to be one that thinks that every God aspect was little more than some high-speed download, I think that is illogical and works in opposition to His mission here on earth. Remember, He came as man and defeated Satan, as a human.

We have learned that Joseph, "his father," was a righteous man, some translations refer to Joseph as a good man. To be deemed a righteous man indicates that he was known among the synagogue crowd, as one that took notes (just kidding) and paid attention. Because of this he fastidiously practiced the scriptures with Jesus. 

So, how did Jesus become so knowledgeable? 

Joseph, his foster father. Let that sink in. 

If you do not know my Jesus He is as close as your breath. Merely submit yourself to the greater power and ask Him into your life, then watch the changes begin to happen because the Holy Spirit has now entered, permanently, and will begin teaching you all things and showing you things to come. 

If the rapture has come, there is no denying when that happened. (Yes, I know that the government has put it off on aliens taking the "bad" Christians off the earth.) 

If the church is gone all hell will begin to break loose. 

Constant rioting in the streets and death will come from multiple directions. Those you thought would be on your side and protect you, will be trying to kill you. Injections will be mandated that are intended to kill you. Efforts to monitor your every move will be demanded. The earth and the water supplies will be poisoned. The oceans will be filled with death. Commerce will come to a halt. The economies will become digital and tightly controlled, but will all, in a matter of time, will collapse. This time on earth, as seen in Revelation six and beyond, will include God's anger against unbelieving humanity and the Jews who rejected God. 

Within days of the Church being removed the antichrist persona will come to the forefront. If you have access to a Bible (it will be a forbidden book,) you can read about the emergence of the antichrist.

"Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a departing first, and (then) that that man of sin be disclosed, even the son of perdition,"                     (2 Thessalonians 2:3 Geneva)

Yes, I Americanized the old 15th-century wording, and yes, most translations use the phrase falling away. Just this morning, 3/11/23, I saw that the Church of England is now teaching four-year-old children, in their Sunday school class, about transitioning and perverted sex education. Try to convince me that we, the church, have not fallen over the cliff already. 

There is only one hope; it is Jesus, and if nothing else, make your life with Him personal. 

Trust me, once He touches your heart you will want to tell someone about Him.