Building on the Foundation

  B.O. What do you smell like to other people? Do you smell bad? We wear deodorant, perfume, cologne, and all kinds of other things to avoid the occurrence where someone might accidentally smell a bad odor emanating from our person. We want to smell good to others, especially in a world where the natural odor of the body is all but forgotten.  Just like animals, humans emit pheromones, and those natural odors contain information about us that other humans can interpret. Specific odors carry information about our physical health, our sexual readiness, and even about whether we are male or female.  We wear deodorant, perfume, and cologne to cover natural body odors—because in today’s world, even our God-designed scent is considered unpleasant.  But what if that effort to cover up applies not just physically, but spiritually?  What if, without realizing it, we are masking our spiritual scent in order to blend into the world? Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful fo...

  Last time, in part 1 of this series on reviling, we saw that our own tongues can keep us out of God’s Kingdom. As Jesus told us, “But I say to you that for every idle word men may speak, they will give account of it in the day of judgment” (Mat. 12:36). More specifically, we saw that reviling other people puts us in danger of the lake of fire if we do not stop. In the New Testament, the Greek word for reviling describes verbally abusing, railing a gainst, or cursing someone. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word describes making light of or diminishing someone. Speaking to or of that person with contempt. Who We Should NOT Revile So who, exactly, should we not revile? Yeshua/Jesus specifically forbade the reviling of brothers, that is, fellow believers: “And whoever says to his brother, ‘Raca!’ shall be in danger of the council. But whoever says, ‘You fool!’ shall be in danger of hell fire” (Mat. 5:22). The apostle Paul declared that revilers in general won’t be in God’s Kingdom...