The mind behind the system ....

[Joseph77]

Yeah this will be deemed a conspiracy theory even though the proof is everywhere. I’ve said this many times but it seems that koolaid is easier to swallow than truth. You can show someone actual footage of an event and they still believe whatever msm has spun it to be.

I like the topic / thread title..
- 'Don't be deceived'
It seems that Christians need more 'discernment'..nowadays.
---
There was a discussion thread on 'another site' - ( Christian Forum)..some time ago.
- It was about 'Total Depravity'.
I made a comment on that thread.
- " If you want to see 'total depravity' in action,
observe what is going on.. in political arena
..saying this with a sense of humor.. "

"1. The Mind Behind the System​

by Watchman Nee (CLC)​

"Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted from the earth, will draw all men unto myself" (John 12:31, 32).

"Our Lord Jesus utters these words at a key point in his ministry. He has entered Jerusalem thronged by enthusiastic crowds; but almost at once he has spoken in veiled terms of laying down his life, and to this heaven itself has given public approval. Now he comes out with this great twofold statement. What, we ask ourselves, can it have conveyed to those who have just acclaimed him, going out to meet him and accompanying him home on his ride? To most of them his words, if they had any meaning at all, must have signified a complete reversal of their hopes. Indeed the more discerning came to see in them a forecasting of the actual circumstances of his death as a criminal (verse 33).

Yet if his utterance destroyed one set of illusions, it offered in place of them a wonderful hope, solid and secure. For it announced a far more radical exchange of dominion"

 

[Joseph77]

"than even Jewish patriots looked for. "And I ..."-the expression contrasts sharply with what precedes it, even as the One it identifies stands in contrast with his antagonist, the prince of this world. Through the Cross, through the obedience to death of him who is God's seed of wheat, this world's rule of compulsion and fear is to end with the fall of its proud ruler. And with his springing up once more to life there will come into being in its place a new reign of righteousness and one that is marked by a free allegiance of men to him. With cords of love their hearts will be drawn away from a world under judgment to Jesus the Son of man, who though lifted up to die, is by that very act lifted up to reign.

"The earth" is the scene of this crisis and its tremendous outcome,"

 

[Joseph77]

"... ... cont.... ....
"The earth" is the scene of this crisis and its tremendous outcome, and "this world" is, we may say, its point of collision. That point we shall make the theme of our study, and we will begin by looking at the New Testament ideas associated with the important Greek word kosmos. In the English versions this word is, with a single exception shortly to be noticed, invariably translated "the world." (The other Greek word, aion, also so translated, embodies the idea of time and should more aptly be rendered "the age.")

It is worth sparing time for a look at a New Testament Greek Lexicon such as Grimm's. This will show how wide is the range of meaning that kosmos has in Scripture. But, first of all we glance back to its origins in classical Greek where we find it originally implied two things: first a harmonious order or arrangement, and secondly embellishment or adornment. This latter idea appears in the New Testament verb kosmeo, used with the meaning "to adorn," as of the temple with goodly stones or of a bride for her husband (Luke 21:5; Rev. 21:2). In 1 Peter 3:3, the exception just alluded to, kosmos is itself translated "adorning" in keeping with this same verb kosmeo in verse 5.

(1) When we turn from the classics to the New Testament writers we find that their uses of kosmos fall into three main groups. It is used first with the sense of the material universe, the round world, this earth. For example, Acts 17:14, "the God that made the world and all things therein"; Matt. 13:35 (and elsewhere), "the foundation of the world"; John 1:10, "he was in the world, and the world was made by him"; Mark 16:15, "Go ye into all the world."

(2) The second usage of kosmos is twofold."

 

[Joseph77]

"...cont....
"It is used (a) for the inhabitants of the world in such phrases as John 1:10, "the world knew him not"; 3:16, "God so loved the world"; 12:19, "the world is gone after him"; 17:21, "that the world may believe." (b) An extension of this usage leads to the idea of the whole race of men alienated from God and thus hostile to the cause of Christ. For instance, Heb. 11:38, "Of whom the world was not worthy"; John 14:17, "whom the world cannot receive"; 14:27, "not as the world giveth, give I unto you"; 15:18, "If the world hateth you ..."

(3) In the third place we find kosmos is used in Scripture for worldly affairs: the whole circle of worldly goods, endowments, riches, advantages, pleasures, which though hollow and fleeting, stir our desire and seduce us from God, so that they are obstacles to the cause of Christ. Examples are: 1 John 2:15, "the things that are in the world"; 3:17, "the world's goods"; Matt. 16:26, "if he shall gain the whole world, and forfeit his life"; 1 Cor. 7:31, "those that use the world, as not abusing it." This usage of kosmos applies not only to material but also to abstract things which have spiritual and moral (or immoral) values. E.g., 1 Cor. 2:12, "the spirit of the world"; 3:19, "the wisdom of this world"; 7:31, "the fashion of this world"; Titus 2:12, "worldly (adj., kosmikos) lusts"; 2 Pet. 1:4, "the corruption that is in the world"; 2:20, "the defilement's of the world"; 1 John 2:16, 17, "all that is in the world, the lust ... the vainglory ... passeth away." The Christian is "to keep himself unspotted from the world" (James 1:27)."

 

[Joseph77]

cont....
"The Bible student will soon discover that, as the above paragraph suggests, kosmos is a favorite word of the apostle John, and it is he, in the main, who helps us forward now to a further conclusion.

While it is true that these three definitions of "the world," as (1) the material earth or universe, (2) the people on the earth, and (3) the things of the earth, each contribute something to the whole picture, it will already be apparent that behind them all is something more. The classical idea of orderly arrangement or organization helps us to grasp what this is. Behind all that is tangible we meet something intangible, we meet a planned system; and in this system there is a harmonious functioning, a perfect order."

 

[Joseph77]

cont...
"Concerning this system there are two things to be emphasized. First, since the day when Adam opened the door for evil to enter God's creation, the world order has shown itself to be hostile to God. The world "knew not God" (1 Cor. 1:21), "hated" Christ (John 15:18) and "cannot receive" the Spirit of truth (14:17). "Its works are evil" (John 7:7) and "the friendship of the world is enmity with God" (James 4:4). Hence Jesus says, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36). He has "overcome the world" (16:33) and "the victory that hath overcome the world" is "our faith" in him (1 John 5:4). For, as the verse of John 12 that heads this study affirms, the world is under judgment. God's attitude to it is uncompromising.

This is because, secondly, as the same verse makes clear, there is a mind behind the system. John writes repeatedly of "the prince of this world" (12:31; 14:30; 16:11). In his Epistle he describes him as "he that is in the world" (1 John 4:4)and matches against him the Spirit of truth who indwells believers. "The whole world," John says, "lieth in the evil one" (5:19). He is the rebellious kosmokrator, world ruler-a word which, however, appears only once, used in the plural of his lieutenants, the "world rulers of this darkness" (Eph. 6:12)."

 

[Joseph77]

. .. ... ....
"There is, then, an ordered system, "the world," which is governed from behind the scenes by a ruler, Satan."
.....
...
..
.

 

[Joseph77]

. .. ... ....
"When in John 12:31 Jesus states that the sentence of judgment has been passed upon this world he does not mean that the material world or its inhabitants are judged. For them judgment is yet to come. What is there judged is that institution, that harmonious world order of which Satan himself is the originator and head. And ultimately, as Jesus' words make clear, it is he, "the prince of the world," who has been judged (16:11) and who is to be dethroned and "cast out" for ever.
Scripture thus gives depth to our understanding of the world around us. Indeed, unless we look at the unseen powers behind the material things we may readily be deceived.

This consideration may help us to understand better the passage in 1 Peter 3 alluded to above. There the apostle sets "the outward adorning (kosmos) of plaiting the hair, and of wearing jewels of gold, or of putting on apparel" in deliberate contrast with "the incorruptible apparel of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price." By inference, therefore, the former are corrupt and worthless to God. We may or may not be ready at once to accept Peter's evaluation, depending upon whether we see the true import of his words. Here is what he is implying.


In the background behind these matters of wearing apparel and jewelry and make-up, there is a power at work for its own ends. Do not let that power grip you."

 

[Joseph77]

. .. ... ....
"What, we have to ask ourselves, is the motive that activates us in relation to these things? It may be nothing sensuous but altogether innocent, aiming by the use of tone and harmony and perfect matching merely to gain an effect that is aesthetically pleasing. There may be nothing intrinsically wrong in doing this; but do you and I see what we are touching here? We are touching that harmonious system behind the things seen, a system that is controlled by God's enemy. So let us be wary."
....
...
..
.

 

[Joseph77]

. .. ... ....
"The Bible opens with God's creation of the heavens and the earth. It does not say that he created the world in the sense that we are discussing it now. Through the Bible the meaning of "the world" undergoes a development, and it is only in the New. Testament (though perhaps to a lesser extent already in the Psalms and some of the Prophets) that "the world" comes to have its full spiritual significance. We can readily see the reason for this development. Before the Fall of man, the world existed only in the sense of the earth, the people on the earth, and the things on the earth. As yet there was no kosmos, no "world," in the sense of a constituted order. With the Fall, however, Satan brought on to this earth the order which he himself had conceived, and with that began the world system of which we are speaking. Originally our physical earth had no connection with "the world" in this sense of a Satanic system"
....
...
..
.

 

[Joseph77]

.... ... .. .
"In many parts of the world it has long been easy to trace an intimate relationship between idolatry and the arts of painting, sculpture, and music.

No doubt the day is coming when the nature of antichrist will be disclosed more openly than ever through song and dance and the visual and dramatic arts.

As for commerce, its connections are perhaps even more suspect. Satan was the first merchant, trading ideas with Eve for his own advantage, and in the figurative language of Ezekiel 28,which seems to reveal something of his original character, we read:

"By thy traffic thou has increased thy riches, and thine heart is lifted up" (verse 5). Perhaps this does not have to be argued, for most of us will readily admit from experience the Satanic origin and nature of commerce. We shall say more of this later."

... ... ...

 

[Jay Ross]

. .. ... ....
"What, we have to ask ourselves, is the motive that activates us in relation to these things? It may be nothing sensuous but altogether innocent, aiming by the use of tone and harmony and perfect matching merely to gain an effect that is aesthetically pleasing. There may be nothing intrinsically wrong in doing this; but do you and I see what we are touching here? We are touching that harmonious system behind the things seen, a system that is controlled by God's enemy. So let us be wary."
....
...
..
.

I hope that you are understanding what you are publishing here on this forum, but I fear that my hope is already lost in your hollow words to yourself.

 

[Joseph77]

Do you have any valid point at all ?

I hope that you are understanding what you are publishing here on this forum, but I fear that my hope is already lost in your hollow words to yourself.

 

[Jay Ross]

Do you have any valid point at all ?

Is this the pot calling the kettle black?

 

[Joseph77]

No, it is more like trying to shine the Light of Jesus where there is darkness.... but when the Light came into the world, and was rejected, that happens too, as here.

 

[Jay Ross]

@Joseph77 let us do a post count at this point of time in this thread.

Until I posted in this thread at #12 in the post count no one else had posted.

I hope that you are understanding what you are publishing here on this forum, but I fear that my hope is already lost in your hollow words to yourself.

You responded with: -

Do you have any valid point at all ?

To which I responder with

Is this the pot calling the kettle black?

To which you then responded with

No, it is more like trying to shine the Light of Jesus where there is darkness.... but when the Light came into the world, and was rejected, that happens too, as here.

Including this post, there are only three posts out of 16 posts by someone else, that being me, in this thread.

It seems that no one is really interested in your posts in this thread, and my post was made to point out that you were really only talking to yourself and even then you were not listening to what you were posting. No wonder people have a hard time getting through.

I wonder if God has the same difficulty with you?

 

[Joseph77]

You really have no idea (anyone's purpose, motives, reality, God's Word, God's Purpose) do you ?

Including this post, there are only three posts out of 16 posts by someone else, that being me, in this thread.
It seems that no one is really interested in your posts in this thread, and my post was made to point out that you were really only talking to yourself and even then you were not listening to what you were posting. No wonder people have a hard time getting through. I wonder if God has the same difficulty with you?

 

[Jay Ross]

You really have no idea (anyone's purpose, motives, reality, God's Word, God's Purpose) do you ?

Joseph your own self righteousness is getting in your way of hearing what others are posting for you to hear/read.

 

[Joseph77]

Go by God's Word, instead of what someone taught you, apparently in much error.

Joseph your own self righteousness is getting in your way of hearing what others are posting for you to hear/read.

 

[Joseph77]

======================
Pisteuo said: ↑
Yeah this will be deemed a conspiracy theory even though the proof is everywhere. I’ve said this many times but it seems that koolaid is easier to swallow than truth. You can show someone actual footage of an event and they still believe whatever msm has spun it to be.
=======================
Pathfinder7 said: ↑
I like the topic / thread title..
- 'Don't be deceived'
It seems that Christians need more 'discernment'..nowadays.
---
There was a discussion thread on 'another site' - ( Christian Forum)..some time ago.
- It was about 'Total Depravity'.
I made a comment on that thread.
- " If you want to see 'total depravity' in action,
observe what is going on.. in political arena
..saying this with a sense of humor.. "
===================================






.....
Yet if his utterance destroyed one set of illusions, it offered in place of them a wonderful hope, solid and secure. For it announced a far more radical exchange of dominion"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
.....
the mind behind
Some COVID-19 vs. Malaria Numbers: Countries with Malaria ...
www.drroyspencer.com/2020/03/some-covid-19-vs-malaria-numbers-countries-with-malaria-have-virtually-no-coronavirus-cases-reported/
If I sort all 234 countries by incidence of malaria, and compute the average incidence of malaria and the average incidence of COVID-19, the results are simply amazing: those countries with malaria have virtually no COVID-19 cases, and those countries with many COVID-19 cases have little to no malaria.