Category Archives: Bible

March 28, 2012 · 6:36 pm

Speak the WORD

The world system has conditioned us Christians to not talk about God.  I remember when I taught public school, the teachers rarely spoke of God, and that was in a conservative small school in the middle of the Biblebelt!  Maybe once or twice in fifteen years did I hear a fellow teacher openly talk of Christ.  The secular setting had done its browbeating.

But I was fortunate, for I taught English and American Literature all those years.  The writers in our culture spoke and wrote about God and the Bible until the 20th Century began .  Scriptural allusions and metaphors ran constantly through Shakespeare, Milton, Chaucer, our Puritan writers. Even our Founding Fathers spoke and wrote openly of the Supreme Being, mixing freely religious and political ideas.

So I was able to talk about God in the secular classroom all the time using the literature books that they provided me. But Satan has done a thorough job in squelching God’s voice coming through His children.  We have almost quenched the Spirit in our reluctance to speak.

But Christ and His early apostles did not play that game.

They had a very important job to do, and they were not about to let another spirit dominate them and what they had to do–which was to lay the foundation for the building of the LORD’s temple (us).  It was also, to use another of His metaphors, to let the early rain of His Spirit fall freely on the thirsty gr0und, the hearts of men.  And this was the former rain; now is the time for the latter rain, His Spirit now falling in our era.

So, Jesus (Yahshua) and His apostles labored mightily.  They spoke the Word, the Logos, which is the eternal purpose and plan of God.  And they wrote His vision for this earth down for us to be able to study and prepare ourselves for the end times.

Now we, the sons and daughters of the latter rain must follow our example–Christ.  “For herein He has left us an example that we should follow His steps, who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth” (I Pet 2: 21-22).  We are to follow our Example. 

We are to be like Him.  “For we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him…” (I John 3: 2).  Don’t let any gainsayer try to tell you differently–not your mom or dad, brother or sister, wife or husband, best friend or feared enemy.  We should be like Christ, and with His Spirit within us, we can and will be like Him.  In fact we are to live “godly in this present world”! (Titus 2: 12).

This is our hope–and His hope.  This is our vision–and His vision.  This is our destiny–and His destiny for us (1).

There–I’ve said it.  Now that the cat’s out of the bag, we are free to speak this vision of manifested sonship throughout the entire planet earth–wherever you are.

Speak the word.  Speak the truth.  For when you speak this truth, you are speaking the WORD.  You are speaking Him, for He is the WORD, and the WORD is thereby becoming flesh one more time–in you and in me and now through us! Speak the Word.        KWH

1.  I John 3: 3; Rom. 8: 18-30

1 Comment

Filed under Bible, Christ, end time prophecy, eternal purpose, manifestation of the sons of God, sons and daughters of God, truth, Word

Tagged as , ,

December 12, 2009 · 5:54 pm

The Greatest Hit of the Ages–The Called According to His Purpose*

(Formerly in Israel, if a man went to inquire of God, he would say, “Come, let us go to the seer,” because the prophet of today used to be called a Seer.”  I Samuel 9: 9)

One time I asked the Seer, “What is life all about?  What’s really going on?  Why are we here?”

And then the Seer answered in a sweeping monologue.

First of all, there is a Creator, a Supreme Being with a plan and purpose.  Modern man will just have to get over it and accept that there is Someone higher in the food chain.  Just look around.  Things that are alive come from living things.  If anything ever lived, it owes its existence to something else that was living–of its own kind.  Every living thing reproduces itself.  Since every living thing gets its life from another living being, then an Initial living being, a Supreme Being, had to have given life to all the living.

It is only logical.  Two pieces of granite cannot reproduce.  Only the living things of creation are reproducing, and their pro-creating drive has been ignited by the Creator, the Life Giver. 

But the kicker, though, is that the Creator has put in motion all this reproduction as a type or metaphor of what He is doing with Himself.  The Creator’s plan and purpose is written into the quintessential  action of every living thing–procreation.  His plan and purpose is written into nature, and it is just waiting there to be deciphered.

So what does the secret writing of both nature and the scriptures reveal as to what God is saying?  Answer:  Hey, creation, I’m reproducing Myself, too!  You didn’t think I was going to let you have all the fun of raising a family, did you?  I have a family, too.

And this is how I am going to do it.  My essence is Love.  And I desire to magnify and reproduce Love.  So, in order to reproduce the real Spirit of Love, which is Me, I will create a special being that can contain Me. 

I’ll create this special creature, the human being, male and female.  And I will place within them both a desire to procreate.  I will make them capable of loving with a heart that longs for love.  And their lives will be like a play, lived out on the stage of this earth.

But this play will seem like a tragedy in the first few acts, for the human beings will have tragic flaws.   As my crowning creation, humans will be extremely complex characters.  In their inner being, they will want to do good, but their innate selfishness will thwart their intents to do that good and right thing.

Some humans will eventually come to their wit’s end.  They will do craven acts of unkindness, driven by the first nature I have given them.  Their foolish and selfish heart will drive them to cheat on their spouses, steal from their fellow humans, and tell falsehoods to further their own selfish desires.  And other sins they will do.

But some will feel horrible about their actions.  Their consciences will torture them.  They will long to do good, despite succumbing to the temptations of the old nature.  It is from these who feel the need to repent that I will choose to reproduce Myself in.  They will know that they have done wrong and will search for a place of repentance and redemption as desperately as a lost man in the desert seeks water. 

And they will find forgiveness of all their past evil deeds and thoughts.  Then I will give them of My Spirit, which is their new seed beginning in the garden of their hearts.  And through this new spirit within, they will blossom in love.  And this love will be shed abroad, by them forgiving their fellow human beings–especially those who are still using them for their own selfish desires. 

They will learn to bless those who hurt them and persecute them.  They will love their enemies and do good to all unenlightened human beings.  They will forgive everyone in their old Adamic past, and they will reach out and love any and all.  And they will love Me who gave them a new chance–an opportunity to become one of My children, one of My princes or princesses.

And they will walk on this earth, shining forth this spiritual light of My own reproductive perfectness.  For I will multiply Love, which is my nature, through their realization of the great deliverance I have brought them through.  They will be fountains of forgiveness, shedding forth the refreshing water of life to all so called.

And in due time, I will change these redeemed ones into my immortal offspring.  For they will be those human beings who have believed My word.  In the face of all the gainsayers, they will have persevered despite the doubts of those who persisted in pernicious ways.

And then I said, “So this is what the Bible is all about.”

“Exactly.  It is not about sanctimonious ceremonies in “castles midst the poverty” once or twice a week.  It is about Life, an abundant Life, a life that will last forever.  It is all about God sharing Himself with His creation.  And this Life is the play foreseen and written by God and revealed to a few.  It is a real play produced and directed by God.  He wrote it eons ago, and we as the principal players in this drama should submit to the Director.  The sooner we do, the sooner we will be a part of the Greatest Hit of the Ages.”     Kenneth Wayne Hancock

*Romans 8: 28-30; Ephesians 3: 11-19

1 Comment

Filed under Bible, children of God, eternal life, immortality, princes and princesses of God, repentance

Tagged as , , ,

November 15, 2009 · 12:22 pm

Conversations With the Seer–Becoming the Temple of God

(Beforetime in Israel, when a man went to enquire of God, thus he spake, Come, and let us go to the seer: for he that is now called a Prophet was beforetime called a Seer.  I Samuel 9: 9)

“I’m trying to comprehend God’s plan and purpose about making us His sons and daughters, but it boggles my mind.  I can’t seem to take it in.”

The Seer looked at me and told me the truth, even though he knew that  it would sting.  “It is because your heart, your spiritual core, is small and unable to contain at present what the Creator wants to do with you.”

“How do I make my heart bigger?”

“You cannot make it bigger.  It is so typical of natural man, to think that it all depends on  his actions.  You can’t enlarge it to contain more of Him.  Even though you sincerely desire to please God, you cannot just will it so.  You cannot run the race according to your own specifications, win the prize, and then trade the prize for a bigger heart to receive more of Him.  It doesn’t work that way.  He is the One who draws you to Him. He shows mercy to whomsoever He desires to reveal Himself to.  He is sovereign; we are not.  He is the Potter; we are the clay.  We have to remember that it is His ballgame, His rules, His ball park, and His ball.”

“I really do want to play,” I said.

“I know you do.  He has led you here.  He has placed a thirst for the truth in you.  It is Him drawing you.  He has His hands on you.  But you must first meet Him in that special place.”

“Where is it?”

It Is Not a Church Building

“It is not in a building with colored glass windows depicting events that were written down thousands of years ago.  That special place I speak of is not inside the walls of a physical building.”

“You are talking about churches.”

“Yes.  The true church is not a building where people go twice a week to worship.  Nor is the church those people necessarily.  The church is His body, which is the temple of God.  And this only occurs when humans have His Spirit inside them, leading them in their daily walk.  The Holy Bible tells of this.  It is a letter to us from our Father.  Its thoughts are inspired by His Spirit.  But without His Spirit breathing life into its words today, it is only black ink and white paper. Without God’s Spirit breathing truth afresh as to what it means, then it sits alone and mute, gathering dust in the houses of America and the world.

“Don’t get me wrong.  It is God’s written word to us, and in those pages are spelled out how to get to where we need to go.  But the world needs someone with God’s Spirit to bring it to life so that it can bring its light to others.  It speaks of God’s glorious plan, but without a human picking it up and believing it, its greatest power rests in being a witness against those who do not study their copy of it.”

“The Bible tells us how to get to that special spiritual place.”

“Indeed.  But our perspective must change.  It is not a place that we go to, to meet Him.  But rather, you become that special place.  Or better put, the lack of you becomes that special place.”

The ‘Lack of You’

“Wait a minute.  I don’t get it.  What do you mean, ‘the lack of you becomes that special place'”?

The Seer became energized.  He was conducting a symphony of knowledge that was now reaching a crescendo.  “The ‘lack of you’ means that you must cease and desist.  Your old life along with its vestiges must decrease to a point that ‘you are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.’

“How does that work?”

“I told you before that it is His ballgame and His rules.  And rule number one is ‘Obey His rules.’  He calls us while ‘we are yet in our sins.’  He commands us to repent of our sins.  We can’t clean up our mess by ourselves, no matter how hard we try in our own strength.  But He has provided a way.  The Great God of heaven, that great Spirit that created all things, came down and walked with us here on earth for a few short years.  He provided for us His own earthly body as a sacrifice that will cleanse us from sin, which is the breaking of the Ten Commandments.

“It is not just acknowledging that He died for us that cleanses us from all sin.  No. That is not enough.  We must rather die with Him.  For ‘He was made to be sin for us’ [1].  At the moment of Christ’s physical death, your old sinful heart and mine was placed upon Him, so that when He died, our sin died with Him.  When He was buried, our old sinful heart was buried.  And when He arose–this is the crux of our belief–when He arose from the dead, we, too, arise from the sinful dead, and become alive unto God [2].

“And as we grow spiritually in this truth, we begin to sense that it is no longer the original sinful human staring back at us in the mirror, but an entity quite changed.  We begin to see that we are that special spiritual place where God will dwell.  We become that special peaceful location–a place free from a demanding ego that tries to enslave other humans to worship its whims.

“At the end of this seemingly long spiritual growth cycle, we will have the distinct sensation that we are no longer in control or trying to be in control of everything around us.  The monkey chatter drowning our ear will have quieted, and then, we become that special abode for God’s Spirit.”   Kenneth Wayne Hancock

  1. 2 Cor. 5: 21
  2. Romans 6: 1-11

5 Comments

Filed under Bible, crucified with Christ, death of self, resurrection, sin, Spiritual Life Cycle

July 6, 2009 · 6:16 pm

Abraham Lincoln’s School Book–The Holy Bible

I thought of President Lincoln this morning over coffee and scriptures.  I pondered about how much the Bible played a role in shaping him, both during childhood and his final difficult years.

He was self-taught, and his primer was the Holy Bible.  It is easy to see its influence in his writings.  Practically every thing he wrote exudes the wisdom found in the scriptures of truth.  That is why his words still move us, still inspire us, still cause us to stop and shake our heads and say, “That’s the stuff of greatness.”

His words are great, for their truths are mined from the Rock of Ages.  He quotes Christ’s very own words in the “house divided against its self” speech.  He alludes to the themes of forgiveness and reconciliation and mercy—universal concepts that the Great Teacher taught.

Style and Themes

His literary style was simple, yet elegant.  His word choice often was plucked from the pool of Elizabethan English the King James translators provided, illuminating a clear path of expression.

Themes of brotherly love, unity, fairness, faithfulness, and hope that President Lincoln employed came straight from the “Good Book”—words he read from childhood, words contained between black leather covers, words inspired by God and carefully preserved for all to study and spiritually prosper thereby.  To get to the heart of Lincoln, one must go through the mind of God contained in the Bible.

Reading his speeches and letters, one’s heart soars.  Yet he himself would tell us that this phenomenon is not because of any craft or genius that he possessed, but rather because of all those lonely hours by candle and fireplace light, reading the words of the patriarchs, prophets and the apostles.

But Some Have Turned Away

But now in this modern age, many powerful and influential people in government and the media have turned away from the scriptures Lincoln read.  The same Book sits there on their shelves collecting dust, gilded pages never turned.  They have shied away from it, tossing it into the pile of other “politically incorrect” positions.  And for this, they rarely quote it, nor allude to its glorious stories of mortal man triumphing against all odds through the mercy of its God.

I dare say that if Lincoln were raised from the grave, he would shake his head in disgust at our leaders’ lack in taking “the counsel of the LORD.”  I’d like to think that he would upbraid them as Christ did the hypocrites, who paraded in their pharisaical robes, while inwardly clothed in the filthy garments of deceit and greed.  I believe that Lincoln would be heartbroken and grieved that we, the descendants of a once thankful and humble people, inhabiting the choicest lands on earth, had become “fat and had forgotten God.”

So let us not be ashamed to read and savor the same inspired words that guided President Abraham Lincoln.  If those precepts were good enough and fine enough to steer him through our nation’s roughest seas, surely we of a less noble intellect can harvest from the Bible’s fruited fields, spiritual food able to sustain us during “the perilous times”  that lie ahead–the “time of the end,” spoken of in President Lincoln’s school book, the Holy Bible.         Kenneth Wayne Hancock

5 Comments

Filed under Bible, great tribulation period, Law of Harvest

Tagged as , , , ,