Reach and Teach

So then, those who had received his word were baptized; and that day there were added about three thousand souls. They were continually devoting themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.  Everyone kept feeling a sense of awe; and many wonders and signs were taking place through the apostles. And all those who had believed were together and had all things in common; and they began selling their property and possessions and were sharing them with all, as anyone might have need. Day by day continuing with one mind in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart,
Acts 2:41-46

being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
Ephesians 4:3

I have to admit that I've struggled with this blog for some time.  Studying the Bible is straight forward enough, but trying to express the study can be intimidating.  After reflection and prayer, I've decided that I'll just start typing and see what the Holy Spirit says.

This blog is the last one for the acrostic F.L.O.C.K.  where "Kindred Spirit" represents "K."  The dictionary defines "Kindred Spirit" as "an individual with the same beliefs, attitudes or feelings as oneself."  A kindred spirit is someone who feels and thinks the way you do. In both Scripture verses cited above, the word "kindred" does not appear in the translation.  Why would we use these verses to express "Kindred Spirit?"

In most Bibles along with the chapters and verses, they may provide headings for certain paragraphs.  Our Scripture in Acts falls under the headings of "The Believers Form a Community" (NLT), "The Fellowship of Believers" (NIV, ESV), and "Life Among Believers" (ISV).  Our Scripture in Ephesians falls under the headings of "Unity in the Body" (NLT), "Unity and Maturity in the Body of Christ" (NIV), "Unity in the Body of Christ" (ESV), and "To Be Mature" (ISV).  These headings speak of community, fellowship, unity and maturity.  Except for maturity, these words are defined similar to Kindred in the respect of joined sharing in same common beliefs, attitudes, interests and feelings.  Let's look for these themes as we examine our text.

Focusing on the latter verses in Acts, we see the believers were "together," "common," "sharing", and having "one mind." Homothumadon is the Greek word used for "one mind."  Delving deeper into the word, it speaks of one accord with the same passion, with the same faith.  In Ephesians, unity in the Greek is henotes which means oneness, unanimity, and harmony.  The believers have agreed on their path, direction, and goals in life.  This is not a compromise between the people.  This oneness is a consensus, group solidarity in sentiment and belief.

Therefore, pray for your church to be unified in its goals for Christ.  That the church will have a "Kindred Spirit." Specifically, that the church focuses on our Savior's last command.


And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Amen.
Matthew 28:18-20

How Narrow is Narrow?

“Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.

Matthew 7:13-14

Tonight's passage comes right after "Ask, Seek, Knock" during the Sermon on the Mount.  It comes right before Jesus talks about "True and False Witnesses."  The passage is the transition from teaching to warning.  Let's examine the original Greek to uncover deeper meaning to this Scripture.

In English, "narrow" and "wide" are consider antonyms of each other.  An antonym is a word opposite in meaning to another (e.g., bad and good).  "Narrow" is diametrically, contradictory different to "Wide."  The Greek word is stenos which means narrow or figuratively the closely-defined path God ordains to travel on to gain His approval.  Wide is platus in the Greek or broad.  To emphasize how wide and broad, the author restates with the Greek word, euruchóros, or spacious, wide.  The next time narrow is used in the text, the word is thlibó, I make narrow, persecute.

 The Greek word for destruction here is apóleia which means destruction, loss, perishing, eternal ruin.  It has as its root word of apollumi which we have discussed means the "lost," unbeliever.  This leads us to another pair of antonyms, destruction and life.  As a contrast to apoleia, the Greek word here is zóé which means life, both of physical (present) and of spiritual (particularly future) existence.

The Scripture has one last pair of antonyms, many and few.  In English, a few has been numerated as three to five.  In the Greek, oligos means small, brief, few, slight, little.  Many is polus which means many (high in number), multitudinous, plenteous, "great" in amount (extent), numerous.  Multitudinous gives us even further insight.  Many is populous, crowded, containing many people or inhabitants, having a large population, containing many inhabitants, abundantly populated.

In this warning, Jesus tells us that an abundant amount of people walk the copiously large road to unbelief and death.  Rarely can a person be found that walks the closely defined, persecuted road to belief in Christ and eternal life.  So, how rare is a true redeemed person in Christ?  How many of us are truly saved?

Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.
Luke 17:28-30

Perhaps examining Lot's story we may discover the rarity of Christians.  Sodom and Gomorrah population has been estimated anywhere from 600 to 1200 to almost 5000 people.  According to the Bible, only three people were spared.  Let's be generous and define "few" as 3 out of 600.  The population of the plant Earth today is roughly seven billion.  Using a Lot definition of "few," 35 million true redeemed believing Christians are alive today. 

Millions of people doesn't seem rare or few, but let's consider a few more statistics.  The United States of America (USA) has a population of almost 300 million people which three quarters profess to be Christian.  129 million people in the USA identify themselves as Evangelical, born again Christians.  Using the Lot definition of "few," all the Christian alive today would have to be living in the USA.  Even with that, the 35 million doesn't even come close to the 129 million Evangelicals.  35 million doesn't even compare to the 60 to 80 million people estimated to be killed in World War II.

After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”

Revelation 7:9-10

This great multitude of believers uses the same Greek word as our previous text, polus.  Therefore, at the end, there will be plenty of believers, right?  But exactly what is a number "no one could number?"  The life expectancy during the time John wrote this was 40 years.  If someone counted from one the second they were born and increased the number a second until they died at 40, that person would count to over 1.2 billion.  To count to 35 million would take a little over a year.  We need to also consider that only over 110 million people were estimated living at this time.  I conclude counting a million would seem to be a lot to them.

This study arrives to this question: How do we know if someone is truly saved?  Yes, we will know them by their fruit, but we don't know their heart.  Only you know your own heart.  Only you know whether you have a relationship with Christ.  Only you know if your fruit is from the Holy Spirit.  We will only know who truly believes in Christ when we get to heaven.  In the grand scheme of things, by tonight's Scripture, there's not going to be a lot of us.  Nearly 107 billion people have walked the planet Earth. Using the Lot definition of "few," only 535 million will believe.  That's only 0.5%, five people out of every 1000.  Even if the Lot definition is wrong, it can't be far off.  Few and many are antonyms, direct opposites.  If many is the world's population, than few would be in the millions not billions.

Five people out of every 1000.  Are you one of the five?

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. “John3:16

March Madness!

I'm very fond of statistics and mathematical models.  If you take my favorite sports time of the year, NCAA men's basket ball tournament time, and statistics, you have an opportunity for me to spend hours developing different brackets based on past performances.  I've developed a Six Step process influenced by statistics.  I've developed a Excel randomization model based on the steps to remove my biases.  Over the years, several of my brackets were in the top 5% of ESPN, CBS, NCAA, etc.  One bracket was in the top 0.09%.  I've listed the steps below.

STEP One:

• Declare victories for Number 1 and 2 seeds in the first round.  2012 was a figment of your imagination.

STEP Two:

• Pick your final four.  The bracket will be won and lost on these four teams.
• Do NOT pick these seeds:  7, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14 (15 and 16 go without saying).
• Do NOT Pick all Number 1 seeds (It only happened once)
• Pick two number one seeds.
• For the remaining seeds, pick either 1, 2, 3, 4.  If you like disappointment, venture out on the wild side and pick a 5,6 or 8 seed.
• Note: You can have a bracket with zero or one number 1 seed.  It's riskier though.

STEP Three:

• You want to make at least 26 points in the First Round.  There can be plenty of upsets, but to minimize point loss, just pick three solid upsets.
• 9 and 10 seeds win 40% of the time.  11 and 12 seeds win 30% of the time.  13 and 14 seeds win 20% of the time.
• If you want some fun during the first couple of days, you can pick up to seven upsets, but you will increase your chances of being below 26 points.

STEP Four:

• Pick three solid upsets in Round 2.
• Never pick a 9 seed to win.  13 and 14 seeds hardly ever win.
• 5, 6, 10, 11, and 12 seeds have a 50/50 shot at winning.   7 and 8 seeds only have a 30% chance.

STEP Five:

• Pick 3 to 4 upsets from Round of Sweet Sixteen.
• Never pick a 12, 13, or 14 seed.
• Number 3 seeds have a 50/50 shot.  4, 6, 10, and 11 seeds have a 30% chance.
• Remember to pick your final four teams that you selected in Step Two!

STEP Six:

• Pick the Final Two Teams and your winner.

There you go. You now have selected a tournament bracket based on statistics.  Remember, this is just for fun.  The technique may help you and it may not.  Let the basketball begin!