Trying To Work This Out - Outer Darkness

[stunnedbygrace]

Accept the weak in faith but not to doubtful disputations.
How exactly is that done? Because there has to be a balance between not offending their weak faith and not putting a stumbling block of offense in front of them while also not allowing them to try to take away the freedom in Christ that the stronger in faith have and not allowing them to continue to make the whole house miserable.

So you have to find a balance between not offending their weak faith while also not permitting their flesh to rule over everyone...

 

[Zachariah]

When we speak of inner darkness we are referring to "the light within the darkness" such as hope. Hope is the very definition of light within the darkness. Within the darkness is the only place one could find hope hence being in the light we would not need it. Now we have an understanding on inner darkness we can know that outer darkness is related to complete despair, shame and trauma.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

Hmmm…

 

[Zachariah]

The more we look outside of ourself, the more detached we become. The answers come from within you. Know yourself and you shall know all.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

Been thinking a lot about the men who were sent back home and not allowed to fight because they kneeled down to drink as opposed to the men who took it in hand and brought their hands to their mouth to drink, who were used to fight.

It’s so odd. It’s not something men would DO to get on the ground to drink water. They just wouldn’t. Unless their hands were dirty, but then they would clean their hands in the water and THEN use their hands to gather water to bring to their mouth.

First the men who were afraid were sent home. Then God tested those who remained. I think the test was for laziness? They used the time to drink as an excuse to lay down? I know it says “kneeled down” but kneeling down would not get their face to the water to drink (and they didn’t use their hands). So they would literally have to lay down on their belly and put their face down to the water. It’s a lot more effort than is necessary if your goal is to slake your thirst. It takes less energy to bend down and scoop the water in hand and bring to mouth than it does to lay completely down and NOT use your hands.

As you can see, it has driven me crazy, lol!

So there has to be a meaning in spirit. (He trains my hands for war, they used their hands to drink, a lazy man puts his hand in the dish but doesn’t bring it to his mouth, the weapons of our warfare are not carnal…)

 

[Zachariah]

Been thinking a lot about the men who were sent back home and not allowed to fight because they kneeled down to drink as opposed to the men who took it in hand and brought their hands to their mouth to drink, who were used to fight.

It’s so odd. It’s not something men would DO to get on the ground to drink water. They just wouldn’t. Unless their hands were dirty, but then they would clean their hands in the water and THEN use their hands to gather water to bring to their mouth.

First the men who were afraid were sent home. Then God tested those who remained. I think the test was for laziness? They used the time to drink as an excuse to lay down? I know it says “kneeled down” but kneeling down would not get their face to the water to drink (and they didn’t use their hands). So they would literally have to lay down on their belly and put their face down to the water. It’s a lot more effort than is necessary if your goal is to slake your thirst. It takes less energy to bend down and scoop the water in hand and bring to mouth than it does to lay completely down and NOT use your hands.

As you can see, it has driven me crazy, lol!

So there has to be a meaning in spirit. (He trains my hands for war, they used their hands to drink, a lazy man puts his hand in the dish but doesn’t bring it to his mouth, the weapons of our warfare are not carnal…)

Send me what your reading. Or the chapter.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

Judges 7

 

[stunnedbygrace]

7 Then Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) and all the people who were with him got up early, and camped beside [a]the spring of Harod; and the camp of Midian was on the north side of [b]them by the hill of Moreh in the valley.

2 And the Lord said to Gideon, “The people who are with you are too many for Me to hand Midian over to them, otherwise Israel would [c]become boastful, saying, ‘My own [d]power has saved me.’ 3 Now therefore come, proclaim in the hearing of the people, saying, ‘Whoever is afraid and worried, is to return and leave Mount Gilead.’” So twenty-two thousand from the people returned, but ten thousand remained.

4 Then the Lord said to Gideon, “The people are still too many; bring them down to the water and I will test them for you there. So it shall be that he of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall go with you,’ he shall go with you; but everyone of whom I say to you, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ he shall not go.” 5 So he brought the people down to the water. Then the Lord said to Gideon, “You shall put everyone who laps the water with his tongue as a dog laps [e]in one group, and everyone who kneels down to drink in another.” 6 Now the number of those who lapped, [f]putting their hand to their mouth, was three hundred men; but all the rest of the people kneeled down to drink water. 7 And the Lord said to Gideon, “I will save you with the three hundred men who lapped, and will hand the Midianites over to you; so have all the otherpeople go, each man to his [g]home.” 8 So [h]the three hundred men took the people’s provisions and their trumpets in their hands. And [i]Gideon dismissed all the other men of Israel, each to his tent, but retained the three hundred men; and the camp of Midian was below him in the valley.

 

[Patrick1966]

The outer darkness is never said to be cast into the lake of fire. And it at least appears to me to be present during the thousand year reign and also AFTER death is done away with and he’ll is thrown to the lake of fire and when the new heaven and earth has come down.

Im trying to see if I can gain any more understanding, so I’m gathering the verses I think may talk about the outer darkness.

1 Samuel 2 - He watches over the feet of His godly ones, But the wicked ones are silenced in darkness; For not by might shall a person prevail.

Silenced in darkness. Not thrown into the fire. And who does the verse say the wicked are? Those who try to prevail by their own might. I see this as saying they don’t look for the strength and power of God to prevail but labor in their own strength and their confidence in their own ability to prevail with God. The verse is a bit difficult for me because I have always seemed to have the thought that the wicked go to the lake of fire rather than the outer darkness so…I’m working on getting it settled within me better. I guess I also think there’s a difference between having confidence in yourself silently or having that confidence and leading OTHERS to it. In other words, are you harming just yourself or are you also harming the destiny of others? Thinking you can see is one thing but telling others you can see and can help them is another thing.

Isaiah 8 - To the Law and to the testimony! If they do not speak in accordance with this word, it is because they have no dawn. They will pass through the land dejected and hungry, and it will turn out that when they are hungry, they will become enraged and curse their king and their God as they face upward. Then they will look to the earth, and behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish; and they will be driven away into darkness.

Mathew 8-Truly I say to you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel. And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; but the sons of the kingdom will be thrown out into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.


Mathew 22 - Then the king said to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.

I have some difficulty with this one too, because I don’t see the called but not chosen as wicked. I see them as the righteous. However, if you don’t ever get to chosen and IN Him, I think you can at least be clothed in humility and counted among the righteous. Don’t know, have some confusion here…but this parable seems to agree that the man was not clothed in humility - Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

2 Peter 2 - These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm, for whom the black darkness has been reserved.

Job 18 - He is driven from light into darkness, And chased from the inhabited world.


I also have in mind that the outer darkness is the prison spoken of that a man who doesn’t extend to another the forgiveness that he has been given is thrown into, which he won’t escape until he pays his own debt, which is reinstated because of what he did.
I’m not certain it’s the outer darkness but I have never found anything else I think this prison can be.
So next I’m going to gather the verses about prison.

 

[Zachariah]

Read this post. Its about faith but it has basic symboligy on water.

What is Faith

I thought I would take the time to share my perspective on Faith and what I know and understand to be true. Faith like all aspects and characteristics of god is of unseen nature. Like the wind itself, we can feel it and know its there, but we cannot see or comprehend what it is. Light is another...

www.christianityboard.com

 

[Michiah-Imla]

After this life there will be a good place, and a bad place.

Seek to enter that good place.

Don’t overthink unique words/phrases in scripture that may just be describing the same bad place in different terms.

 

[Lambano]

5 So he brought the people down to the water. Then the Lord said to Gideon, “You shall put everyone who laps the water with his tongue as a dog laps in one group, and everyone who kneels down to drink in another.” 6 Now the number of those who lapped, putting their hand to their mouth, was three hundred men; but all the rest of the people kneeled down to drink water. 7 And the Lord said to Gideon, “I will save you with the three hundred men who lapped, and will hand the Midianites over to you; so have all the other people go, each man to his home.”

I've taken some self-defense courses. The instructors talk about being "situationally aware", paying attention to your world, being aware of what's going on around you. I'm told it's the same with military and police training.

The ones who squatted down and scooped up the water were staying on their feet, demonstrating "situational awareness", and would have been better able to engage the Midianite army if they came swarming over the hill with swords flashing in the sunlight. The ones on their knees with their faces in the water would have been less aware and less prepared.

(Gosh, see what I remember from a Baptist Sunday School initiative titled "Lap Water Like a Dog" from half a century ago?)

We can come up with some applicable spiritual metaphors, I suppose.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

I've taken some self-defense courses. The instructors talk about being "situationally aware", paying attention to your world, being aware of what's going on around you. I'm told it's the same with military and police training.

The ones who squatted down and scooped up the water were staying on their feet, demonstrating "situational awareness", and would have been better able to engage the Midianite army if they came swarming over the hill with swords flashing in the sunlight. The ones on their knees with their faces in the water would have been less aware and less prepared.

(Gosh, see what I remember from a Baptist Sunday School initiative titled "Lap Water Like a Dog" from half a century ago?)

We can come up with some applicable spiritual metaphors, I suppose.

Hah! I’ve never taken any self defense courses but I came to that same human reasoning with my mind.
But God wasNT testing the men to make sure they wouldn’t lose. He was culling their number for a much different reason.

 

[dev553344]

You might have a look at near death experiences. People usually emerge into darkness and there is a presence there that is evil. Then in the happy ones a lighted being appears and brings them into heaven. The being of light being Jesus perhaps?

 

[Lambano]

In any case, there is no night there. (Revelation 22:5.) No darkness anymore.

Isn’t this in reference too within the city?

No, I think it means there is no darkness anywhere. Why do I think that?

23 And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illuminated it, and its lamp is the Lamb. 24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it. 25 In the daytime (for there will be no night there) its gates will never be closed; 26 and they will bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it; 27 and nothing unclean, and no one who practices abomination and lying, shall ever come into it, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life. (Revelation 21:23-27)

I was wondering about why the gates never close. The nations (those on the outside) come in and they go out; they walk by the Lamb's light on both sides of the gates of holiness that separated them from God.

This is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5)

 

[Davy]

The outer darkness is never said to be cast into the lake of fire. And it at least appears to me to be present during the thousand year reign and also AFTER death is done away with and he’ll is thrown to the lake of fire and when the new heaven and earth has come down.

Im trying to see if I can gain any more understanding, so I’m gathering the verses I think may talk about the outer darkness.

1 Samuel 2 - He watches over the feet of His godly ones, But the wicked ones are silenced in darkness; For not by might shall a person prevail.

Silenced in darkness. Not thrown into the fire. And who does the verse say the wicked are? Those who try to prevail by their own might. I see this as saying they don’t look for the strength and power of God to prevail but labor in their own strength and their confidence in their own ability to prevail with God. The verse is a bit difficult for me because I have always seemed to have the thought that the wicked go to the lake of fire rather than the outer darkness so…I’m working on getting it settled within me better. I guess I also think there’s a difference between having confidence in yourself silently or having that confidence and leading OTHERS to it. In other words, are you harming just yourself or are you also harming the destiny of others? Thinking you can see is one thing but telling others you can see and can help them is another thing.

Isaiah 8 - To the Law and to the testimony! If they do not speak in accordance with this word, it is because they have no dawn. They will pass through the land dejected and hungry, and it will turn out that when they are hungry, they will become enraged and curse their king and their God as they face upward. Then they will look to the earth, and behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish; and they will be driven away into darkness.

Mathew 8-Truly I say to you, I have not found such great faith with anyone in Israel. And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and recline at the table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven; but the sons of the kingdom will be thrown out into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.


Mathew 22 - Then the king said to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.

I have some difficulty with this one too, because I don’t see the called but not chosen as wicked. I see them as the righteous. However, if you don’t ever get to chosen and IN Him, I think you can at least be clothed in humility and counted among the righteous. Don’t know, have some confusion here…but this parable seems to agree that the man was not clothed in humility - Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

2 Peter 2 - These are springs without water and mists driven by a storm, for whom the black darkness has been reserved.

Job 18 - He is driven from light into darkness, And chased from the inhabited world.


I also have in mind that the outer darkness is the prison spoken of that a man who doesn’t extend to another the forgiveness that he has been given is thrown into, which he won’t escape until he pays his own debt, which is reinstated because of what he did.
I’m not certain it’s the outer darkness but I have never found anything else I think this prison can be.
So next I’m going to gather the verses about prison.

Don't forget this one...

Matt 25:30
30 And cast ye the unprofitable servant into outer darkness: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
KJV

The 'unprofitable servant' represents a servant in the 'kingdom' that was given one talent, but did nothing with it and instead buried it and gave it back without increase. It goes back to Christ's parable of the sower, those who fall away and are not willing to bear their cross with Christ.

And this...

Matt 24:48-51
48 But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, "My lord delayeth his coming";
49 And shall begin to smite his fellowservants, and to eat and drink with the drunken;
50 The lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of,
51 And shall cut him asunder, and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
KJV

I believe the "outer darkness" is this for the day of Christ's future return...

Rev 22:14-15
14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
15 For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.
KJV

Most Churches don't teach about Christ's future Millennial temple and the return of God's River to earth, and the Tree of Life that will return to earth for Christ's "thousand years" reign, even though the detail of it is written in Ezekiel 40 through 47.

The "outer darkness" appears to be a place of separation outside the gates of the holy city on earth in that future time.

In one place in Ezekiel 44, it is written that Christ's elect who are allowed to serve Him (the Zadok, meaning the 'Just'), will be able to cross to a dead relative outside the gates of the city in that time. The 'dead' in that time mean the 'spiritually dead', those without Christ. Apostle Paul showed that the type body of the world to come will be a "spiritual body", even for the wicked "resurrection of damnation". And that change will happen for all on the "last trump". So anyone called 'dead' after Christ's return means their spirit-soul is still subject to the "second death" of being cast into the "lake of fire" after Christ's "thousand years" reign.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

Most Churches don't teach about Christ's future Millennial temple and the return of God's River to earth, and the Tree of Life that will return to earth for Christ's "thousand years" reign

Until recently I saw it that way too. I had some things mixed up between the thousand years and after the thousand years. Not really desiring a conversation on it though. Keep examining it.

 

[Davy]

Until recently I saw it that way too. I had some things mixed up between the thousand years and after the thousand years. Not really desiring a conversation on it though. Keep examining it.

That's about the kind of lame response I would expect from someone who barely has studied not much more than The Gospel Books.

FOR BRETHREN IN CHRIST:
Don't listen to these types that can't understand enough Bible Scripture to even be able to converse intelligently about it, but instead must try to belittle and patronize in a vain attempt to show their ascendancy in Bible knowledge when most of them don't know enough Bible Scripture to debate their way out of a wet paper bag.

When Lord Jesus returns, the wicked, whoremongers, thieves, etc., will be cast to the "outer darkness", along with all unbelievers and those who fell away from Lord Jesus Christ. This will include those deceived brethren on man's FALSE Pre-trib Rapture theory which is to serve as a SETUP for those to fall away and worship the coming pseudo-Messiah instead of waiting on Jesus to return! Those will be like the blind Pharisee Jesus rebuked and said like them fall in a ditch.

 

[stunnedbygrace]

Alrighty then.

By the way, not a pretribber here.

 

[Davy]

Alrighty then.

By the way, not a pretribber here.

Doesn't matter, many will fall away in the coming trib because of not staying with God's Word as written, but instead trying to create their own word by doctrines of men.