Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that now there’s something in these, I’ve got one more. I’ll write it. But there’s something in this combination that’s a missing ingredient. Person. Too many times when we think of the potter’s house, whether it be in caricature, in a parable way we tend to think that all of this going around will produce – because I’ve said Romans 8, “To be conformed to the likeness, the image of His Son.” Ephesians 4. There are many places. “He begun a good work,” Philippians 1:6, He begun a good work, which He’ll bring to fruition, to completion. But too many times it’s looked over. I don’t have anything in the equation except faith and trusting Him. Once I am faithing – and that’s what all of this boils down to. We can sift all this away and ask the question, “Do you trust” – I’m sorry to say it like this and I don’t mean to be blasphemous. But do you trust the one being potter, the one who died for you enough to say, “I commit my life to you”? And quit trusting the flesh.

I got letters from people this week that my heart just melted. This woman who just loves the teaching, she said, “They kicked me out of the church because I smoked cigarettes.” They kicked her out of the church. And I thought how is this woman going – is she going to be turned off on God because of this, because she got kicked out of the church because of that? No. There’s more. How many letters I get from people that say, “I have an alcohol problem. And when my church found out, they kicked me out.” I’m sorry. Somewhere the message is lost for me because my Bible says Jesus came to save that which was lost.

But do you trust the one being potter, the one who died for you enough to say, “I commit my life to you”? And quit trusting the flesh.

Now I am somewhat reluctant to do this because I have so much respect for the Giants Of The Faith and God help me to convey this. I am not saying this by disrespect. If we’re all looking in the one place and this eye is fixed on Jesus, that’s our mark, then we can step to the side and this is where doctrinal issues take over and contention can come in. So I speak, I’ve taken the liberty to photocopy something out of his book, his commentary on Ephesians, which I want to read to you to make a point. And I say I preface all this by saying with all due respect, this is where we differ.

I’m just going to read you a small portion of this. It is James Boice from his commentary on Ephesians. We always give credit here to the people we quote. “Since the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century, those who follow in the steps of Martin Luther have been strong to assert that justification is by grace, through faith and not by human works. But does this mean that works no longer have any place in Christianity?

Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that does this doctrine of justification by grace, Luther’s doctrine, actually lead to bad conduct?” Now, I’m going to pause here. I must. Thank God for Dr. Scott laying out in the most simplistic way, explaining words that otherwise probably have left these seminarians and students of the Bible scratching their head for years to come had he not unfolded certain words like “justification.” We need to be careful when people talk about justification. It becomes some, like rocket science. But justification in its simplest definition: He puts on the spectacles of Christ and He looks at me as though I’m just like His Son. Just like Him. Justification. In its simplest meaning. So we have to be careful when we read these things.

Pastor Melissa Scott different times, different places, yet they all reference the clay, the potter. It’s an interesting thing to behold.

Now God’s not trying to say something in this – we looked at it – it’s not something that’s going to strike people as a popular message. In fact I think that’s maybe why I felt compelled to look at this through the eyes of Ephesians 2:10 because I know when people read, “For we are His workmanship,” it makes it sound like I might have made a contribution or I had something to do with it. But if we understand the principle of the potter’s house, yes it was a national picture. The people – He’s telling Jeremiah this is a national picture. I want to make an individual application today. Now of course there are elements at the potter’s house, most of you will have this in your Bible, I’m going to add two new elements. They’re not new by any means, but we’re going to add two elements.

Normally you have clay, a potter and the wheel. The clay, which is us, represented by us; the potter, God; the wheel our life circumstance on to which the potter is going to do His work on this crock of clay. But I’m going to add two things today.

But, God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ.” No missing Paul’s ability to weave in, in two verses, verses 2 and 3; his ability to tell you from verse 1, “This your condition, now let me tell you your condition. Your condition is verses 2 and 3: the world, the flesh and the devil.” “I’m not that bad.”

Man, I could tell you I rationalized. When I met Dr. Scott and before I met Dr. Scott, “Those people are bad. I’m not bad. I’m basically a good person.” That’s what we do. We rationalize our behavior. And I’ve been highly criticized for this, “Must you abase yourself?  Yes, because I want Him to elevate me. This is the problem that happens with; I hate to say it; it’s the problem with almost every single religious leader. Except for Dr. Scott, I have yet to hear a person on the platform of any pulpit say as the speaker, “I’m a sinner, being saved by grace.” I’ve yet to hear somebody step forward and say, “Hey, I’m just like you. The only difference is I’m standing up here having to do this work that God charged me to do. But I’m just like you. I’ve got blood in my veins and I can fall just as hard as you.”

Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that he’s pretty clever. You read and you can circle these words. They will stand out when you circle them. Circle in verse 2 “the world,” circle “the prince of the power of the air,” that’s the devil and verse 3 circle “the flesh.” Oh he’ll go on to elaborate it in verse 6, in chapter 6 rather. He’ll go on to elaborate about “the world, the flesh and the devil.” It says you first, you walked in times past you walked, you lived, you were in, you were a possession of the world.

Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that now this is A History of Christian Thought, by Justo L. Gonzales It is a great – for someone who is just going to get an introductory lesson, who just wants to get not too overwhelmed. It’s three volumes, a three-volume set. And let me tell you what he was up against, Augustine. I want to read this to show you sometimes we can have an erroneous idea. Somehow Augustine is painted as some demon. No. He did a lot of good, if you understand what he was counterbalancing.

Let me read this to you, against Palagious’ disciple wrote the following nine points. “That Adam was created mortal.” This by the way, because somebody will take me out of context, this is not my opinion. I’m reading from a book. “That Adam was created mortal, for he would have died no matter whether he had sinned or not.” That’s number one. “That Adam’s sin injured only him and not all of humankind,” number two. “That the law as well as the Gospels leads to the kingdom.” I swallow deeply every time I read this because, as I’m reading this and some of you are so well taught, you know this is a fallacy. But there are people out there that live in this realm “the law will save you” that “we’re not in Adam.” “That there were some before the time of Christ who lived without sin. That recently born infants are in the same state as was Adam before his fall. That the whole of humankind does not die in the death or fall of Adam, nor does it resurrect in the Resurrection of Christ. That if we will, we can live without sin. That unbaptized infants attain unto life eternal. “That rich who are baptized will have no merit, nor will they inherit the kingdom of God if they do not renounce their possessions.”

Beth “house” beth “house of dead” and really “of dead ones.” Now, too many things to do and too little time to do it. Often times we tend to focus on the resurrection and don’t realize the resurrection was the doorway for some other work to happen. We kind of – there are some that hold the belief that the cross was the end. No the cross was the stair up to that final act earthly. But the work had to continue. That was the doorway. If we understand it’s a lot more than just being raised from the dead. The Syriac tells us something. That passage, if you’ll turn there quickly in the fourth chapter, the fourth chapter. We’ll get there eventually but I’m just going to show you why sometimes we have problems interpreting what is being said.

Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that the fourth chapter the 8th verse where it says, “wherefore he saith, when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive, and gave gifts unto men. Now that he ascended, what is it but that he also descended first into the lower parts of the earth? He that descended is the same also that ascended up for above all heavens, that he might fill all things. Picture that. We’ll get to it. But picture that picture because a lot of you who’ve been around heard Dr. Scott teach on this particular passage. It wasn’t just we read so many times it says that his body wouldn’t see corruption but remember, I started off by saying “I’ll build my ekklesia and the gates of hades shall not prevail against it.” going down somewhere below the earth. Many interpret this and they say, “no, it’s not; it’s a misinterpretation.” well my other languages prove very well that he went to be; he went when he was, what was worked in Him, in Messiah.

Some have grown up in the church and they had a “promise box” in every room of their house; they would reach in and grab a promise out of the box, and that was their promise for the day. Others, like myself, only came to know God’s promises after a time of hearing and studying; it took some time for them to really sink in. We’re strange creatures: we can have God’s promises laid out for us, and we know that the Bible says “all the promises in him are yea, and in him amen,” but we reach for God’s promises like a thief grabbing for a morsel of bread somewhere and running off with it. Who said you have to claim promises like that? Who said that you can’t go and say all the promises are mine; every promise in this book is mine. It’s as much mine as it is yours or any person who is faithing. We are not to treat His riches as if we’re only entitled to a little. Now when I speak of His riches, I’m talking about His heavenly riches that He bestows on us through His Spirit. It is not a mere handout. I’m going to prove to you that Paul understood this, and I believe I’m beginning to understand. Paul is praying for something for these saints, and I hope you will share these things with me.

Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that Paul prays again in the third chapter, beginning at the fourteenth verse. This prayer in the Ephesian letter is like Mount Everest. You could pass by many times but unless you stop and really look at this whole laid out plan that he is speaking to the believers, you will probably not see the grandeur of it; it is very grand.

This is followed by the vav conjunction, “and,” and the preposition el: “and to,” followed by the familiar word kappor from which we get kapporeth meaning “to cover.”  So it is saying, ““and to atone, atone for,” and the King James Version says “wickedness,” but it could also mean guilt or iniquity. This is followed by another vav conjunction. What’s fascinating is that this whole passage is what in Hebrew grammar is called a “construct.” This is followed by “and to bring righteousness,” sedek. The next word, olam, means “eternity,” but here the word is olamim, which makes it intensified. It means “forever and ever and ever and ever and ever, worlds beyond and unknown.” So “to bring in righteousness never to be ended and,” another vav conjunction followed by el again, meaning “and to,” and the next part is a little strange: the King James Version says, “and to seal up the vision and the prophecy.” But the Hebrew reads, “To seal up the vision and the prophet.”

Now that’s very significant. You can seal up a vision yet the prophet can still be walking around and talking.  I had to make sure, so I checked every source and this word being used clearly means “spokesman, speaker, prophet.”  It does not mean “prophecy” or “to prophesy,” to speak forth, but it refers to the actual speaker himself. So this verse should read, “everlasting righteousness, seal up the vision and the prophet.” And this is going to be important for understanding why this book of Daniel has had so much ridicule put on it. It’s been belittled by scholars. The book of Revelation suffered the same thing, because it’s easier to say, “Oh, that’s just too complicated.” When there is a clear path, the devil wants to get in there and say, “Hey, listen. Don’t read that stuff. That’s crazy stuff,” when the fact of the matter is it’s God’s floor plan, if we don’t mess it up, of what He wants to see and have happen for all of His people.

Pastor Melissa Scott tells us that the last one part of Daniel 9:24 reads, “and to anoint the most Holy.” Again it has the same “and to” conjunction and preposition, followed by the familiar word masach, meaning, “to anoint,” “and to anoint.” This is the same word in the Hebrew from which we get Mashuah, or Messiah.  The next work is kodesh, meaning “holy.” And this is interesting: it says literally “to anoint the Holy of Holies,” in the plural.  The King James Version says “most Holy,’ but some of your Bibles will have this alternate translation. Unless someone tells you this, it could sound like the passage refers to the anointing of the most Holy as a person. Now why is this important? Let’s read on in Daniel and we will see.

I keep my prayer, “More of you God, and less of me until I reach over there.” But if you’re like me swinging across those monkey bars and plummeting to the ground with your shoes of iron and brass, this message is for you.

Turn with me if you will to Deuteronomy 33:27. That was all background to get to here. Now I have to tell you while you’re turning and spinning, I am the most blessed person because those messages, what we’ve called Nitro Pill messages, I read them, I listen to them and it’s daily food for me. What I love about the Bible, the Bible is like a spring or well. If your soul’s thirsty it never runs dry; it’s always there to replenish and refresh.

I’ve put the King James text on the board. Let’s read what it says: “The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms: and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee; and shall say, Destroy them. Israel then shall dwell in safety alone.” The French translation reads C’est une retraite que Le Dieu qui est de tout tem(p)s, it’s ‘a retreat that the God who is of all times,’ et que d’être sous les bras, ‘and to be underneath His arms,’ eternel car il a chassé de devant toi, ‘He’s chased away from before you your enemies,’ tes ennemis, et il a dit extermine, I’m sure everybody can read that. You don’t have to read French to know what that says, ‘exterminate,’ ‘exterminator,’ like terminator; extermine. Israel donc habitera seul surement, ‘Israel will live alone surely.’

In this case the foreign word was the Latin perdonare: forgive. But not really, because per- “through” or “by,” and donare, “to give”; so it’s really not “forgiving.” You’ll see why in a minute. The compound, the underlying sense of it, was “to give wholeheartedly.” “To forgive in its roots at the beginning from where it came from: to give wholeheartedly. These two elements were translated in prehistoric Germanic times and assembled to give forgeban, which came to the German vergeben, Dutch vergeven and English forgiven.” So it is not even an English word.

And the better picture I can paint for you is this word here. I looked up the words forgiven and forgiveness in the Strong’s Concordance; you will find this word is very seldom being used. But if you start to reference and see how it’s being used, it is “to be released.” Now I hope I can do this properly, because it will kind of summarize for today what I want to say. Remember I said a couple of minutes ago, “the blood, His blood.” I said, “What would propitiate God?” As human beings, we need to feel expiated. We need to feel like we’ve been cleansed, that expiation is like all of what I walked through in my life that made me “dirty,” I want to feel now, because I believe I want to be expiated. I want to feel cleansed. And there’s a twofold, maybe threefold, action that goes on with this blood, which is the cleansing power. What good is it to say your sins are forgiven if you can’t say, “I’m made clean by the blood of the Lamb”? What good is it to say, like two people who have an argument, “I forgive you”?