200 – COHERENCE 4
Any observer visiting the greater part of the Evangelical churches will notice that the topic chosen from the New Testament is Jesus Christ, because Jesus Christ saves; and the Holy Spirit, because of the gifts (healing, miracles, prophecies, revelations, tongues, etc.). The rest of the arguments, stories, examples and everything else, are taken from the Old Testament. The Old Testament occupies today 90% of the content of the preaching. They are all about wars.
It is interesting to note that the kingdom of God, which is the kingdom of heaven, does not belong to the Old Testament. “The Law and the prophets were proclaimed until John; since then the gospel of the kingdom of God is preached” (Luke 16:16). Luke makes it clear that the kingdom of God was not announced in the Old Testament. The evangelist Mathew tells us “For all the prophets and the Law prophesied until John (Matt. 11:13). Regarding the kingdom of God, the prophets and the law are over. Jesus Christ spoke, “From that time Jesus began to preach and say, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matt. 4:17). Which was the greatest sign done by Jesus in order to reveal the coming of the kingdom of God? We read in the same gospel of Matthew that the kingdom came only when the demons began to be cast away, and this happened only through Jesus (Matt. 12:28). Let us read the complete text: “Then there was brought to Him a demon-possessed man who was blind and dumb, and He healed him, so that the dumb man spoke and saw. And all the multitudes were amazed, and began to say, ‘This man cannot be the Son of David, can he?’ But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, ‘This man casts out demons only by Beelzebub the ruler of the demons.’ And knowing their thoughts He said to them, ‘any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and any city or house divided against itself shall not stand. And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself, how then shall his kingdom stand? And if I Beelzebub cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? Consequently they shall be your judges. But if I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you” (Matt. 12:22-28). The first point is that, before Jesus, no one had cast away demons by the Spirit of God. The second is that, wherever demons dominated, there was not the kingdom of God. Third point: the kingdom of God came only where the demons were removed. There were so many demons in Israel, that Mary Magdalene had seven of them cast away from her (Luke 8:2). Two thousand, that is, a legion, came out from the Gadarene (Mark 5:9-13).
In the Old Testament, the demons dominated the kingdom of Israel, for Jeroboham, when he received the ten tribes from the hands of Jehovah, for fear that the people, going to Jerusalem to worship, might abandon him, made two golden calves and turned the heart of the people away from God (1 Kings 12:26-30). In 2 Chr. 11:14-15 we read, “For the Levites left their pasture lands and their property and came to Judah and Jerusalem, for Jeroboam and his sons had excluded them from serving as priests to Jehovah. And he set up priests of his own for the high places, for the satyrs, and for the calves which he had made.” In the kingdom of Jeroboam there was the worship and service to demons. In consequence of this, the people of Israel began to sacrifice their children to the demons (Ps. 106:37).
If the kingdom of Israel was undermined by demons, why did not Jehovah, the Almighty El Shaddai, did not deliver them? This work only Jesus had the power to accomplish. The answer is the following: the very Jehovah sent the demons. Now, the demons are evil spirits. Jehovah rejected King Saul, who had been chosen by the very Jehovah. He placed in him a malignant spirit, that is, a demon (1 Sam. 16:14-15). This demon made Saul to be angry, cruel and murderous. Each time the demon manifested in him, Saul had a desire to kill his faithful servant David (1 Sam. 18:10-12; 19:8-11). Jehovah sent a spirit of lies to deceive the prophets of Israel, because he wanted to kill King Ahab. The text says this,“Therefore hear the word of Jehovah. I saw Jehovah sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him, on His right and on His left. And Jehovah said, ‘Who will entice Ahab to go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?’ And one said this while another said that. Then the spirit came forward and stood before Jehovah and said, ‘I will entice him.’ And Jehovah said to him, ‘How?’ And he said, ‘I will go out and be a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.’ Then He said, ‘You are to entice him and also prevail. Go and do so.’ Now therefore, behold, Jehovah has put a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; and Jehovah has proclaimed disaster against you” (1 Kings 22:19-23). The demons of deceit that plague this world where we live do not come from Satan, but from Jehovah.
An evil person thinks only of doing terrible evils. Well, Jehovah is the king of those spirits. “Well, then, where are your wise men? Please let them tell you. And let them understand what Jehovah of hosts has purposed against Egypt. The princes of Zoan have acted foolishly, the princes of Memphis are deluded; those who are the cornerstone of her tribes have led Egypt astray. Jehovah has mixed within her a spirit of distortion; they have led Egypt astray in all that it does, as a drunken man staggers in his vomit” (Is. 19:12-14). All the perverse spirits that cause men to revolve in their vomit come from Jehovah.
Jehovah is the father of the spirits of all flesh (Num. 16:22; 27:16). We read in the book of Job: “Who among all these does not know that the hand of Jehovah has done this, in whose hand is the life of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind?” (Job. 12:9-10). Therefore, the demon of lust comes from Jehovah (Hos. 4:12). The demon of prostitution also does (Hos. 5:4). Jehovah is responsible for the contamination of his own people. “And I pronounced them unclean because of their gifts, in that they caused all their first-born to pass through the fire so that I might make them desolate, in order that they might know that I am Jehovah” (Ezek. 20:26). “Jehovah reigns, let the peoples tremble” (Ps. 99:1) “Say among the nations, ‘Jehovah reigns; indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved” (Ps. 96:10). “Who would not fear Thee, O King of the nations?” (Jer. 10:7). “For the kingdom is Jehovah’s, and He rules over the nations” (Ps. 22:28). Jehovah is king over all the earth, which is filled with demons. And Jesus, in order to introduce the kingdom of God, first cleans it from the demons, as we see above. To believe that Jehovah is the Father, or even Jesus, is to remove the consistency of the Gospels and of the New Testament.
What aggravates the situation of Jehovah as the king of all the earth (Ps. 47:2) is that the devil is the king of this world, too—a thing that Jesus did not deny in Luke 4:5-8, when Satan tried him by offering him the kingdoms of this world and their glory.
By Pastor Olavo Silveira Pereira