Understanding Difficult Scriptures

Many of the Scriptures in the Bible are difficult to understand. The difficulty lies in man’s understanding or misinterpretation of the old English being used or not understanding the Greek and Aramaic words that belong in that Scripture. Many times, the Scribes did not know what a certain word meant and they added their own words so that the Scripture seemed to make some sense.

Difficult Scriptures can easily result in the misunderstanding and the wrongly dividing of God’s Word. This is a serious situation and it has prompted me to do this teaching. I believe that many of you will be very surprised to finally understand certain Scriptures that have given you no end of problems. We are going to begin with one of those Scriptures that causes great difficulty pertaining to the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. We will now get right into the teaching and go to the gospel of Matthew.

And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? -- Matthew 27: 46

How can this be possible? This verse of Scripture should have arrested your attention from the very beginning. First of all, why did the translators leave in the foreign words? This should have brought to our attention as to the translator’s deviation from the usual. We are probably going to put more time in this Scripture since it has caused no end of confusion among Christians.

We can understand and read this verse word by word except after the foreign words. And also the verse blatantly contradicts other verses in the Word of God. It appears that God has forsaken Jesus Christ because Christ became sin and God could not stand sin. Because of this nonsense, it clearly appears like God left Jesus to die by himself. How can this be true? Let us let the Word speak.

Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered [Jesus is talking to his apostles.], every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me. -- John 16: 32

Jesus was talking about the time of his crucifixion and of his death; He said, “. . . . the Father is with me.” Yet in Matthew 27: 46 it says, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Let’s check the rest of the Word in various books which will prepare you for what went wrong in Matthew 27: 46.

To wit [to know], that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them; and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation. – II Corinthians 5: 19

There is so much knowledge in this Scripture that I’m beginning to wonder if we are going to go into at least part two of this overall teaching. Let me show you what I mean.

God was in Christ. What does that mean? It means that God Almighty was working within Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ only did the Father’s Will. He never sinned even once in all of his days on this earth. Why? Because he always did God’s Will. If we were to be able to always do God’s Will, we would never sin. But this is not available at the present time because our bloodstream is corrupted. Jesus Christ had perfect blood and that is why he was able to go through his whole life without sin and always doing God’s Will.

I don’t want to get away from the reason we are studying Matthew but I should mention that people use this verse and various others to say that Jesus Christ was God. They are idiots and there are more and more of them lately than ever before. I recently had the police come up to my home and accused me of shining a light on my neighbor’s home. I did do this on purpose because for almost four years this neighbor, who is Satan himself incarnate has shined a high beam spotlight on my home. The police sided with my possessed neighbor and did nothing because they are also possessed and influenced by the power of the god of this world. Sounds harsh, doesn’t it, but self-defense is a Biblical concept. As of last night, the neighbor adjusted the light. Most people are afraid to go against the grain, but I am not so they find me to be a peculiar person as the Bible says all true believers are.

Also, look at the middle of this verse. Christ did not want people’ sins imputed or held against them. The adversary causes you to sin, but that’s no excuse to sin. LOOK AT THE LAST PHRASE: Jesus Christ committed unto us the word of reconciliation. This is a major concept. If we don’t move the Word, it does not move. We are God’s legs, hands, and mouth. Jesus Christ committed unto us the word of reconciliation – God’s Word. We have to move it by witnessing to it – what I am doing right now.

What specifically was God doing when He was working in Christ? He was reconciling the world unto himself – unto God, by his witness and works. God has an ability not to impute a person’s trespasses against them. Like the police officer who rang my doorbell almost 50 times for no reason at all. God doesn’t hold that against him. We have a hard time, don’t we? So how is God reconciling the world unto himself? By committing unto us the word of reconciliation. Now getting back to part of our original purpose of this teaching, how can God reconcile the world unto himself if Jesus Christ was the same entity? Do you see all of the confusion here? It is the adversary – Satan himself taking orders from the devil himself as to cause this confusion amongst the Scriptures and amongst people who do not study God’s Word and to believers. We better get off this Scripture soon because I can go on and on.

For in him [Jesus Christ] dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead [head God] bodily. – Colossians 2: 9

How in the world are we going to separate the fullness of the Godhead which dwelt in Jesus Christ’s presence on this earth? So again, we go back to our beginning Scripture and I say to you how could Jesus say, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”

There are very many examples in the Word which blatantly contradict Matthew 27: 46. The gospel of Matthew cannot do this if this is the Word of God. Listen to what Christ said at the time he was taken captive as recorded in the following Scripture.

Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? -- Matthew 26: 53

Man, you’ve got to be on talking terms with God to get that kind of assistance. Jesus Christ could have walked off that cross, but, as usual, he did the Father’s Will. By the man Adam we lost it – by the man Jesus Christ we got it back.

Now let’s get back to Matthew 27: 46:

And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? -- Matthew 27: 46

This verse contradicts the rest of the Word of God. What is the problem? In the first place, the foreign words that are inserted in that verse are Aramaic words. Jesus spoke Aramaic. (Aramaic is called Hebrew in the King James Version.) These Aramaic words are in this particular Scripture because the translators really did not know what to do with them. They let the verse set and added the English translation. There are only a few other examples in the New Testament where the translators have allowed the Aramaic words to remain in the text. Now let’s break down those Aramaic words and we will begin to see the problem and how it came about.

The word eli means “my God,” but there is no Aramaic word like the word lama. However, there is a word lmna. Lmna is always a cry of victory, a declaration of “for this purpose,” or “for this reason.” Now, I am sure you are beginning to see that this verse has been seriously misinterpreted and misunderstood throughout the centuries. Let’s examine the verse even farther and we can see that the verse contains a word called sabachthani. The root of this word is shbk. Shbk means “to reserve,” “to leave,” “to spare” or “to keep.”

Here was Jesus Christ hanging on the cross at about the ninth hour which is 3 o’clock in the afternoon and he spoke from the cross. He came forth with this utterance from the depth of his very soul and here it is:

My God, my God, for this purpose was I reserved, for this purpose was I spared.

That is the accurate translation of Matthew 27: 46. Now if this is the first time you ever heard this, I’m sure you’re almost jumping up and down with joy. You can see how man can misinterpret the Bible and make the whole thing fall to pieces. Well it’s not going to happen on this Bible site – glory to God, not to me.

To conclude this section, I want to go over the last words that Jesus Christ uttered. He said “It is finished.” What was finished? Your redemption and mine. Jesus Christ had given his own life for us and he was one who knew no sin but he had become sin that you and I might become the righteousness of God in him. It’s beautiful, isn’t it? Your redemption and mine was then finished. Then a verse of Scripture in John 19: 30 says “and he… gave up the ghost.” This means that he died by his own free will. Nobody took his life. It was not the nails driven through his hands that held him to the cross nor the rope tied around his midriff nor the nails driven through his feet. He kept hanging on that cross because Jesus Christ loves us. Do you remember my last teaching? Maybe it’s hard for you to find some of my teachings but at least that I have them categorized and in alphabetical order. But my last teaching said “At the Exact Right Moment in Time”. That’s when Jesus Christ gave up his life and we were redeemed or bought back from the clutches of the adversary. We do not belong to him anymore. We are set apart or sanctified. He has no legal rights over us whatsoever, but we must know this and we’re only going to know it by studying God’s Word. When Jesus Christ walked the face of this earth he did mainly one thing and that was to destroy the works of the devil. When he returns for the second time, he is going to completely destroy the devil. In the meantime, we are to follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ and continue to destroy the works of the devil. That can only be done with a right knowledge and application of the Word of God.

We spent loads of time on this Scripture but it is that important. Now we are going to move on to other difficult Scriptures that are in the Word of God.

I and my Father are one. -- John 10: 30

The Trinity boys just love this Scripture because it appears to say that Jesus Christ and God are one person. What Jesus Christ is stressing here is a figure of speech that can be referred to as Unity of Purpose or simply an analogy. Let’s make this real simple. If you were a good welder and your father was just as good or probably better and someone approached you and said. I would like to see your father as pertaining to a welding job that I have for him. Your father is not available at the present time so you say to this person: “Who had seen me had seen my Father.” What you are saying in essence to this person is that both you and your father have great skills when it comes to welding. You are trying to tell this man that if you deal with him, it is the same thing as dealing with his Father. Is this hard for you to understand? There are at least 40 verses in the Bible that specifically state that Jesus Christ was not God, but he the Son of God. I always stress the following point that in the Gospels even a devil spirit call Jesus Christ the Son of God. And we today want to insist that Jesus Christ is God. This throws the whole Bible to pieces and it is one of the Devil’s strongest methods used today. All of the Catholic Church believes that Jesus Christ was God. And these people are adamant about their beliefs. If you tell them the opposite, they will get seriously angry with you. These are people who do not study or rightly divide the Word of God. They guess at what it says and they incorporate private interpretation which is “one’s own”. Again, Jesus Christ was saying that he and his Father have one purpose and one purpose alone. That’s what he means when he says that I and my father are one.

Now we are going to go on to two different Scriptures that are in Galatians chapter 6. These Scriptures cause no end of confusion for many Christians because they do not understand that there are Greek words that mean different things, but the English translations are spelled the same way. We also have this in the English language. Let’s take a look at these two Scriptures and this is going to clear up a lot of confusion that you may have had. Both Scriptures appear to contradict one another, but as we will clearly see when we understand the Greek language, that they are both accurate in their interpretation and meaning.

Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. – Galatians 6: 2

This seems quite simple, doesn’t it? The verse is saying that in most cases we are to bear one another’s burdens. This means we are to help people when they are in need of help and when we do so we fulfill the law of Christ. Again, it means that we can help one another with any problems that they may be having. It’s that simple. But now take a look at verse five and it seems like we have nothing but confusion because verse five seems to contradict verse two, but it does not in any way. Notice that I am using the word ‘seems’ because what appears to be is not necessarily so when we understand the Greek words that are used for burdens.

For every man shall bear his own burden. -- Galatians 6: 5

Now how does this make any sense? In verse two, it says we are to bear each other’s burdens or to help one another at a time of need. But in verse five it says that every man shall bear his own burden. Something is obviously wrong and I’m going to tell you what it is.

Now in verse two the word for burdens is BAROS in Greek. This is the type of burden where we can receive help from others.

Now in verse five the word for burden is PHORTION in Greek. This different Greek word means that in verse five a person must bear whatever burden they are experiencing by themselves. They cannot accept help from anyone and they will not get it.

This is quite simple, isn’t it? When I first learned this, it was a great blessing to me because I too was confused. But you never have to be confused again when you read these two verses. That’s what it means by rightly divided the Word of God. You get blessed and your mind clears up. It’s refreshing.

I am now going to take a Scripture that the scribes interpreted in a most confusing manner. I am simply going to rearrange the Scripture so that you can clearly understand what is being said. Here is the Scripture and the way the scribes have interpreted it.

For it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell; -- Colossians 1: 19

Notice that the words ‘the Father’ are in italics. That means that they were added by the translators. Those two words do not belong in that verse. Now take notice of the pronoun ‘him’. We are not really sure if this pronoun belongs to the Father. It does belong to someone else and I am going to give you the literal translation of this verse according to usage.

Because in him [Jesus Christ] all the fulness was pleased to dwell; -- Colossians 1: 19

Now isn’t this a much clearer interpretation of the verse when all of the errors in translation are removed and the Scripture is now grammatically correct? Many people read this Scripture and do not really understand it, so in their minds they skip over it. You do not have to skip over this Scripture any longer. Just remember the literal translation and write it in your Bible. That’s what I did so that I never forget it as I read the book of Colossians.

Now we are going to stay in the book of Colossians and go over a Scripture that can cause a lot of difficulty. Let’s get right to it.

Let no man beguile [cheat] you of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshiping [religion] of angels [devil spirits], intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind, -- Colossians 2: 18

This Scripture also can be very difficult for most believers. I am going to give you another literal according to usage. This verse was examined and researched by the ministry that I studied with. It is truly my heart’s desire that you do your best to understand the following translation.

Let no one deprive [cheat] you of your prize, having pleasure in a religious humility of angels [devil spirits], taking his stand upon the things which he had seen, vainly puffed up by the mind of his flesh. -- Colossians 2: 18 literal translation according to usage

There are so many ways to look at this verse but believe me, devil spirits can act very humble and they can trick you with this humbleness. Then what happens is they will deprive you of your reward or rewards in this life. Your mind could be vainly puffed up by the mind of the flesh which is the five senses. For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. The adversary has been known to transform himself into an angel of light. Unless you are studying and learning God’s Word and thinking about God during the day, you can be tricked by this power which is second to God. That is the best I can do with this verse because it was taught to me in this manner. Remember, you cannot go beyond what you are taught. We are never to guess at what the Word means. That is private interpretation and it transgresses the Word of God. If you run across a verse similar to this and you do not know what it means, just skip over that verse for now. Someday God will reveal its meaning to you. And as I said again in my last teaching, it will happen at the exact right moment in time.

This next verse of Scripture can cause problems regarding interpretation. It was a woman of God that finally shared this verse with me rightly divided and I was amazed at the great deliverance I felt when I finally understood.

Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord. -- Romans 12: 19

This Scripture is truly a mind blower if you do not understand mainly one pronoun. The first part of the verse seems so straightforward and says that we are not to avenge ourselves, but rather to give place unto wrath. Who’s wrath?! I should have mentioned that this one noun ‘wrath’ is not the wrath of the person who may be causing you problems. This is the first great Revelation of the Scripture. The wrath that is mentioned here is referring to THE WRATH OF GOD. It seems to be saying that we are to give place to our wrath or the wrath of people and to let them do whatever they want to do to us and we are not to avenge ourselves. Well this can be very difficult for a believer to do, but that’s not what the verse is saying. It is saying to get out of the way because God will render wrath upon whatever is inflicting you. Then the verse goes on to say that vengeance is mine – vengeance is God’s. Do not misunderstand the Scripture and what is being said here. It is not referring to your vengeance – it is referring to the vengeance of God Almighty. And then at the last part of the verse God says, I will repay, saith the Lord.

For many years I misunderstood the word wrath. I thought it was my wrath, but all the while it was the wrath of God Almighty and let me tell you something, you’re going to want to get out of the way. It is God that protects us. It is God that allows vengeance upon your enemies. You are never ever to seek vengeance upon a person. It is God’s job. And God says to give place unto His wrath. In other words, get out of the way because when God starts to work, there is nothing in this world or universe that he cannot accomplish. You need to do one thing and that is to stay in fellowship with God Almighty.

Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. – John 14: 10

Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works' sake. – John 14: 11

By taking the Word of God out of context, you can make it say whatever you want it to say. What is said in both of these verses is similar to a figure of speech or an analogy. Here is a very good example of what I’m trying to say.

When you use the term “Christ in you”, this is referring to being born again of God’s spirit. Christ in you means that you are born again and that you have the faith of Jesus Christ and you cannot get any more. Each person has the same amount of the faith of Jesus Christ when they are born again of God’s spirit. What you do with that power is up to you. That is why we are all equal and we all have the same potential. Now let’s back up for a minute. If we use the term “you in Christ” we are referring to the renewed mind. This is a totally different concept. Because you have Christ in you, you must put on the mind of Christ. This means that you emulate what Jesus Christ did in his life and what the Scriptures say that you should do. Do we have that correct? Romans 12: 1, 2 goes over the subject of the renewed mind. We must put on the mind of Christ because Christ always did the Father’s Will. Now let’s go to the Scriptures.

In verse 10 Jesus Christ says “do you not believe I am in the Father?” To be in the Father means to have the same thoughts that God Almighty has. He was not only in the Father, but the Father was in Jesus Christ. This simply means that it was a two-way street. Jesus Christ did the Father’s Will because the Father spoke to Jesus Christ by Revelation. The Trinity boys try to use this Scripture to prove that Jesus Christ was God. The Scripture makes no such remark. The Word of God needs to be rightly divided to be understood and then applied. This may seem like a difficult set of verses, but they are not when the Word is rightly divided.

When Jesus Christ said “the words that I speak are not of myself”, He simply meant that he was getting Revelation as to what to say from God Almighty. He says so in the next verse or phrase that the words that he was speaking were coming from God and that is from the God that dwelt in him. In other words, God was working closely with Jesus Christ and simply giving him the words that he should speak and this is noted as word of knowledge and word of wisdom. The first part is what we should say and the second part is how we should say it or carry it out.

Jesus Christ said in the latter part of verse 10 that God was doing the works. God worked through Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ carried out God’s Will.

In verse 11 Jesus Christ was trying to convince others by saying to the people that he was in God Almighty. Remember our example? This means that he had renewed his mind greatly to the Scriptures to the point where he never sinned and always did God’s will, he was in God Almighty. This is a type of analogy as I mentioned before. He wanted people to know that he was in God and God was in him. They were working together as one, but they were two separate entities. They always have been and they always will be. If the people still did not believe him, he said to them at least believe me for the work’s sake. He was saying at least look at the miracles that have taken place and let that be an indicator for you to believe.

These two verses are very often misunderstood because people do not know how to rightly divide the Word of God. That is why I sit here and do these teachings. Because I am in God and God is in me. We work together because I know what I do is the most important thing I can do for God Almighty. Again, the adversary has hidden himself. He is in hiding and he does not want you to know that he exists, but he is manipulating almost everything that’s going on in this present world.

In conclusion of these two verses, I strongly suggest that you go over this section at least twice. It may take a while for you to renew your mind to these concepts, but they are truth and not nonsense like the religions of the world propound.

Matthew 27: 52, 53 These two verses are so ridiculous that I am not even going to quote them. You should take a look at these two verses before you continue reading. They are pathetic and are the epitome of stupidity. Some scribe must have decided to play some type of joke to more intensify the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This nonsense about graves being opened and the bodies of Saints coming back to life has no biblical proof whatsoever. To tell you the truth, I do not know how these two verses were placed in the King James Version. I have both verses scratched out and you should do the same. Now to help you with the logic of this situation, the context should read from verse 51 to verse 54. You can easily see the logic with the connection of these two verses. And again, for the last time, please scratch out versus 52 and 53. They are not part of the Word of God and are some type of private interpretation.

But ye beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost. – Jude 1: 20

This Scripture will help you to understand just how plain and stupid certain preachers can be. To build yourself up in your spirit, you must pray in the in the Holy Ghost or spirit. You should remember that this is the only way to strengthen the spirit of Christ in you. By studying Scriptures, we strengthen the mind. These are two facts that you should never forget since they are misunderstood by most Christians.

Now I think that the story I’m about to tell you will probably make you laugh to a certain extent. This is a true story about a minister who was obviously wrongly dividing the Word of God. There are many preachers and teachers especially on television that know nothing about the rightly divided Word of God. But you can bet one thing – they pass out the basket for an offering on every show.

This minister told another believer who was well-versed in the Scriptures that they had such a hot prayer meeting that they prayed IN the Holy Ghost. Now understand this – this minister was saying that they prayed God into the meeting. What he must’ve been saying and implying is that God was not there until they prayed so hard that they prayed in the Holy Spirit. Now let’s take a look back at Jude 1: 20. The verse is not saying this by any means. It is saying that believers were building up themselves on their most holy faith. Where were they building themselves up? In the spirit because they were praying in the Holy Ghost which means they were speaking in tongues.

Now here’s a minister that’s teaching God’s people and is totally wrongly dividing this verse of Scripture by saying they prayed the Holy Ghost into the meeting. Do you remember what I said about making the Bible say whatever you want it to say? You cannot pray the Holy Spirit into a meeting because God is everywhere at all times. He took simple English grammar and made the last part of the verse sound like something that it was absolutely not. If you are getting a laugh out of this, it’s okay.

We have gone into eight pages of teaching on the subject of Understanding Difficult Scriptures. We have only covered 12 Scriptures so you can imagine how many more there are in the Bible. I have tried to cover some of the more obvious erroneous translations and I believe it will bless you overall to clear up some confusion that you may have had pertaining to some of these verses. I found it interesting myself to review some of these problem areas and it is my heart that this teaching has helped you to understand more of God’s Word. God bless. You’re the best.

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