Mat 16:1-4 When Pharisees and Sadducees asked for a sign in the sky, Christ said, "If you know how to interpret the look of the sky, can you not read the signs of the times? An evil, faithless age is eager for a sign..." First, Christ challenged them to use their own judgment. It's extremely important to notice this, because corrupters of Christianity (and maybe everything else) promote mindlessness as a superior standard. In Christianity, the mindlessness is often called faith. They don't have a clue as to what faith is. Since it is so mysterious to them, they use it to justify nihilism (which means willful ignorance).

Christ was saying moral responsibilities are not separated from the evidence of life and application of knowledge. Throughout the Bible, knowledge is built up as extremely important, while corrupters of religion ridicule it as being inferior to something mysterious which they can never describe, such as faith.

Christ said they were evil and faithless, because they wanted a sign. It was evil and faithless to ignore the important truth and knowledge which he was producing and place greater importance in some worthless show.

Peter the Rock

Mat 16:13-23 Christ told Peter that he is the rock upon which he will build his church. He told Peter that whatever he declared bound on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever he declared loosed on earth will be loosed in heaven.

Then when Christ described his crucifixion, Peter began to argue with him. Christ called Peter a satan trying to make him trip and fall—judging by man's standards instead of God's (Mat 16:23).

The important thing to notice here is that God did not purify Peter, even after Christ put him in charge of his church. It shows that God does not purify anything humans do. There is no reason to assume Paul or Moses would be any less fallible than Peter. Yet fundamentalists claim Paul was producing the infallible word of God. If Peter arguing with Christ was not the infallible word of God, then nothing Paul or Moses said was the infallible word of God.

Of course, what the world is concerned with here is the question of binding and loosing. What sort of authority did Christ give Peter? Christ was somewhat facetious with this statement. Worldly authorities are obsessed with authority, and little else. Church authorities would be giving themselves the authority to bind and loose. All power mongers do. So Christ was reversing the rationale and putting it under God's domain and saying, "Do your binding and loosing in a virtuous way under God's authority." Of course, they would be a disgrace, but this would create a need for measuring their corruptions by a higher standard. Later, Christ described the same power for others.

Elijah Returning

Mat 17:1-13 After the transfiguration, a discussion developed concerning future events. The disciples asked Christ why the scribes claim that Elijah must come before his return. Christ made contradictory statements. He said Elijah is coming, but that he already came, and he suffered at the hands of the authorities. So the disciples concluded that John the Baptist must have been Elijah.

The reason for the contradictory statement is that Christ could not get into a trivial argument with the scribes, so he agreed with the premise. But he needed to dampen speculation, so he said the event already occurred.

The whole point of this story is that there are endless claims and speculations about the future. They could mean anything, and they always generate false assumptions. So they need to be diminished in their significance.

True prophets describe the future in veiled language to protect the questionable facts from attack and corruption. This provides some clue of future events for persons who have some judgment. But they are far outnumbered by speculators and gossipers who claim they can pin down the specifics. Of course, they are always wrong. So their claims need to be put down. Christ was trying to put down such nonconstructive speculation.

For example, If Christ would have allowed people to assume Elijah would be appearing and correcting everything before his return, the speculation would never end, and the conclusions would always be wrong. When Constantine accepted Christianity into the Roman government, he would have been said to be Elijah restoring everything, and supposedly Christ would be returning at that time.

Expelling by Faith

Mat 17:14-21 The disciples tried to expel a demon, but couldn't. After Christ cured the person, they asked him why they couldn't. He said it was because of their lack of faith. He said with sufficient faith they could move a mountain.

It's important to know what faith is, because there is so much emphasis on it in Christianity. Often, faith and religion are used as synonyms. Paul's theology says people are saved by faith, not works (Rom 3:27, 11:6)(Gal 2:16)(Eph 2:8,9).

Sin destroys faith, because it destroys relationships to realities and other persons. How then can religion start with faith or be limited to faith, as claimed by Paul? Sin has to be overcome to produce faith.

Christ often pointed out the deficiencies of faith in others. His purpose was to show that there is something wrong. This is supposed to raise the question of what is wrong and what to do about it. The whole purpose of Christ's teaching was to show what is wrong and what needs to be done about it. Yet other theologies including Paul's claim there is nothing wrong that is not so trivial that it can be corrected on a whim.

One of the main reason why Christ kept pointing out the deficiency of faith in his disciples was to show that producing faith is no whim. So how can it be the only requirement for getting saved, as Paul's followers claim? If people can't produce enough faith for Christ, they aren't producing real faith for the phony preachers who have them signing on the dotted line to be holier than thou.

Christ said the path to life is hard to find and follow (Mat 7:14). All of his teaching had the purpose of describing that path. But it is discarded in favor of other theologies, in Christianity and out. That's why Christ had to keep showing that there is a problem which is not fixed on a whim.

Taxes

Mat 17:24-27 Collectors for the temple tax asked Peter if Christ paid the temple tax. Peter said he does. Then Christ entered and contradicted Peter, indicating that kings collect taxes from foreigners, not their sons.

The purpose in contradicting Peter again was to show how fallible he was, since he was to be the head of the religion. It's extremely important to show this, because corrupters of religion are always claiming that corruptions are fact, because their official god says so. Christ had to take measures to show that there are no gods incapable of being wrong. And still, the corrupters of Christianity claim Paul cannot be in error.

Child-like

Mat 18:1-14 This lesson starts with a lead-in concerning who is the most important. Then Christ used a child for emphasis and lectured against striving to be important saying that being like a child is necessary for getting save. He went on to admonish against harming or scandalizing children.

It is apparent that Christ is trying to correct a force in the world which pushes everyone for higher and higher status. Status seeking relies upon a lot of fraud, because it attempts to defy what people are objectively worth. Then to counter the truth, the opposite of status has to be ridiculed; and this attack falls on moral persons including Christ's followers for being child-like.

At this level of instruction, the point might look simple and trivial. But extending the analysis to it's worldly applications shows that elitism is a major driving force of corruption in society, particularly with modern tools for manipulating realities. Professionalism is largely obfuscation used to wall off those with a license from accountability to the rest of society. Kant was a philosopher who taught scientists how to separate words from objective reality through the use of meaningless drivel. Out of it society got relativity which has no relationship to objective reality, and now prions in biology which contradict all principles of biology and evolution.
(See Science Home Page)

Conflicts

Mat 18:15-20 Christ said that if someone wrongs you, take it up with him first, but keep it between the two of you. If he doesn't listen, summon another as a witness.

There is a gradient approach to conflicts. Start by assuming it is a correctable mistake, and don't broadcast it and create a scandal over it. If that doesn't work, getting a second person involved increases accountability allowing the power of truth to have much more of an effect. If nothing works, deal with the trouble maker as you would a gentile or tax collector.

Christ is describing the responsibility people have to avoid scandalizing each other. It's important to notice how this differs from the way scandalizers do things. They contrive and imagine things that are not true and take them up with persons who promote the scandal, so the victim cannot establish the truth.

Then Christ said what he said to Peter: "...whatever you declare bound on earth shall be held bound in heaven, and whatever you declare loosed on earth shall be held loosed in heaven" (Mat 18:18). It seemed like Christ was giving some god-like power to Peter, and here he gives the same power to everyone.

How can this apply to lowly persons? Because the victims of injustice represent the truth. Even though no one can arbitrate truth, the victims have the right to say what the consequences of injustices are. Therefore, there is a lot of inherent weight in their words, and consequences follow.

Divorce

Mat 19:3-12 In regard to divorce, Christ referred to Genesis saying, "...at the beginning the Creator made them male and female...Therefore, let no man separate what God has joined." Therefore, he was asked why Moses allowed a decree of divorce. Christ said it was because of their stubbornness that Moses allowed divorce. But now, he said, divorce is adultery. But he also said lewd conduct is a separate case. And he said not everyone can accept this teaching...let him accept it who can.

There is an important perspective here that does not get properly considered. Christ describes the exact morality knowing full well that it is not going to be followed in most cases; and when he says, "Let him accept this teaching who can" he is advising not to get overly obsessed by it. It's not possible to live perfectly in a world controlled by satan. People have to try to minimize the corruptions, but they cannot entirely eliminate them from their lives.

A point that needs to be made here is that too many persons never admit that there are imperfections in their lives, and two consequences are that they corrupt the meaning of religion trying to justify their corruptions, and they try to impose a corrupt version of perfection onto others. No one does more destroying than the purifiers. Wasn't Nazism based on purifying society? Nazis were cleaning up the gene pool, getting rid of worthless eaters, and exterminating Jews and anyone who was too much like them, such as Ukrainians. This is why Christ said not to get too obsessed by a moral rule which is not easy to adhere to. The same is true of abortions, homosexuality and all forms of bigotry. Purifying a world which cannot be purified is nothing but Nazism. But this is not the same thing as saying sin is not sin—anything goes. Christ defined the morality and then said that it is a goal, not something to be imposed.

An example of attempting to impose morality was prohibition of alcohol. It didn't work. What this means is that moral standards can be set in place as criminal codes, when a large part of society accepts them willingly and lives by them. But morality cannot be imposed in a constructive way. Morality has to come from inside people, it cannot by forced onto people. Teaching, learning and following the difficult path are required to create morality; it can't be done through force.

Getting Saved

Mat 19:16-26 When a person asked Christ what he must do to posses "everlasting life," Christ said to keep the Ten Commandments. When the person said that he did that, Christ said that seeking perfection would require selling his possessions and giving to the poor.

The most basic message here is that getting saved requires responsibility for being moral, which means "works," contrary to Paul's claim that people are not saved by works but by faith (Rom 3:27, 11:6)(Gal 2:16)(Eph 2:8,9). And then if a person wants to go farther, perfecting oneself requires poverty.

Humane poverty with moral concerns is the path to life which is hard to find and follow (Mat 7:14). This is because poverty strips away power which corrupts and forces people to solve problems. It also creates proper interactions with other persons reversing the reactions of corruption in the subconscious mind. Elsewhere, Christ said that on judgment day each person would be repaid according to his conduct (Mat 16:27).

Then Christ said that only with difficulty will a rich man enter heaven (Mat 19:23). When this statement overwhelmed the disciples, Christ said, "For man it is impossible; but for God all things are possible" (Mat 19:26). This means that people don't accomplish everything in one life-time, and some of their moral progress is made in future life-times. This is because there is so much that needs to be accomplished that it cannot all be done in one life-time. The requirements are different for each person, because humans have varied histories in the ancient spirit world, where sin was developed, and they have varied histories in the human society.

It's important to compare Christ's statements with Paul's version of getting saved, where Christ's crucifixion supposedly fixed everything through atonement (Rom 5:9,10)(Gal 2:21). Paul describes the problem as a dispute, which is fixed the way a dispute would be fixed (Rom 4:15, 7:7-9). God and humans simply learn to get along by agreeing to get along. Supposedly, it's just a way of thinking, with nothing for humans to do, because sin is something God created by imposing laws which were not constructive (Rom 7:7-9), and the main thing making them not constructive was that he also created flesh which causes people to contradict God's wishes (Rom 7:5,6). So sin results from God's blunders rather than human deficiencies, and fixing God is what Christ's crucifixion did.

The Last and First

Mat 20:1-16 The process of getting saved being varied and involving several life-times was demonstrated by a parable of laborers in a vineyard. The owner went out and hired people several times during the day. Each time when he hired new persons he gave them a whole days pay. At the end of the day, they all got paid the same. So the ones who worked the longest objected. But the owner said he was free to do as he pleased. Christ then summarized the parable saying, "Thus the last shall be first and the first shall be last."

The persons who worked the longest in the vineyard were those who were involved in material life the longest, which goes back four billion years. Many of them had spirit powers, and they got involved in evolution, which was a lot of work. Evil spirits were right on their heals, getting involved in material life and evolution, being driven to take over all sources of power and get their hands on vulnerable persons and their enemies, which they acquired over some time before material life began.

Satan's involvement in evolution is demonstrated by a segment in the Book of Revelation which says, "Then the fifth angel blew his trumpet, and I saw a star fall from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the abyss; he opened it and smoke poured out of the shaft...Out of the smoke, onto the land, came locusts as powerful as scorpions in their sting...Acting as their king was the angel in charge of the abyss, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon and in Greek Apollyon" (Rev 9:1-11).

The star falling from the sky was of course satan. He fell from the sky when Christ took away the spirit substance which he had stolen as a source of power (see History of the Universe). Satan then let other evil spirits out of hell by evolving insect bodies for them to occupy. Evil spirits need to occupy bodies to stay out of hell, as indicated when Christ was expelling a group of demons who wanted to enter some swine, so they would not have to go back to the abyss (Luke 8:31,32). In Wisdom, evil spirits say that when they die, their spirits will be poured out like unresisting air (Wis 2:3). So the evolution of insects gave evil spirits a way to escape from hell. Satan held the key by evolving insect bodies.

The Money Changers

Mat 21:12-17 Christ entered the temple area and drove out those who were buying and selling and overturned their tables. He said, "Scripture has it, 'My house shall be called a house of prayer,' but you are turning it into a den of thieves."

By present moral standards, you would think Christ would approach them quietly and whisper in their ear. If they objected, he would agree to disagree and leave.

The moral lesson is that corrupt persons cannot be told through words, because they only see forces. Sin separates corrupt persons from the reality medium and immerses them in a force medium. They learn to hate reality, because truth condemns them of sin. So they don't listen to anything others say. This means that to communicate with them, force is needed. A person needs to make a statement through force.

This principle is sometimes applied in modern times through actions which are called "civil disobedience." Demonstrators will chain themselves to property or damage property to make a statement. They try to draw public attention to a problem a tell people that something is wrong. The self-righteous prosecute them for the motion of molecules and suppress any indication of the purpose. This thwarts the effort and discourages such activities.

Christ was showing that sin extracts too high of a price in death, misery and destruction to not pay some price to at least define the truth which makes life possible.

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