By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS
Paul’s declaration of being poured out as a drink offering points believers to Christ, the Chief Cornerstone. From Bethel to New Jerusalem, God builds His dwelling with living stones who steadily give themselves in faith, emptied in joyful response to His finished work.
Continue reading “Built on Christ, Poured Out in Faith”By Elizabeth Prata
When we discuss other words representing the fruit of the Spirit, such as love, peace, and joy, we think we know what they mean, but often times these culturally embedded words have a totally different flavor when used from a biblical context. It is true of the words pertaining to the Fruit of the Spirit. Even these ‘simpler’ biblical words are misunderstood.
Let’s look at Peace
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:22-23)
What does ‘peace’ mean? I hear people saying in their decision-making, “I have a peace about it.” Is Galatians talking about that kind of peace? Or, is it the peace that comes after a war or a struggle with someone?
The Greek word as it’s used in the verse is (they think) from eiro. It means in this verse, a harmony and an accord.
Once we possess the Spirit, we are no longer at enmity against the Lord. (Ephesians 2:16). We have peace with Him since we are no longer rebelling against Him. We have relational peace. Strong’s defines it partly as:
According to a conception distinctly peculiar to Christianity, “the tranquil state of a soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and content with its earthly lot, of whatsoerer sort that is”: Romans 8:6; namely, is used of those who, assured of salvation, tranquilly await the return of Christ and the transformation of all things which will accompany that event,
John Gill Comments on the two kinds of peace, peace with God and peace with each other, on the Gal 5:22 verse,
which is another fruit of the Spirit: and designs peace with God in a man’s own conscience, produced there by the Spirit of God, in consequence of peace being made by the blood of Christ; and that through the application of the blood of Christ for pardon, and of his righteousness for justification to the soul of a sensible sinner by the blessed Spirit, the effect of which is peace, quietness, and tranquillity of mind; also peace with men, with the saints, and with all others; for such who are under a work of the Spirit of God, and are influenced and led by him, seek after the things which make for peace and edification among the brethren, and are desirous if possible to live peaceably with all men: hence appears another grace in them,
But beyond that, as the verse in John 13:34-35 says,
A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.
We cannot have peace with one another if we are feeling less than loving.
What was “new” about this commandment? Love wasn’t new, it is in the Ten Commandments. What was new was the depth and the extent of the love Jesus commanded His people to do. Jesus loved His own to the end, fully and consistently and completely. He gave the sop to Judas. Giving the morsel to someone at a dinner was a manner and custom in Israelite banquets. The host showed utmost respect and love to a person, by personally handing him a morsel, sometimes even placing it in the recipient’s mouth himself. Judas was to betray Jesus in mere hours, but Jesus still loved Judas to the end. He gave him the sop. THAT is the new kind of love.
The fruit of the Spirit is all one fruit. It isn’t that we work on peace one week and then patience the next… The first fruit mentioned is love. ALL other fruit stems from this one fruit. If we are loving we will be patient, we will be joyful, we will be gentle, we will employ self-control, and so on. Jesus was at peace relationally with Judas the Betrayer and demonstrated that peace through His loving act of giving the morsel.
Peace with one another is to be sought because we love.
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Here is a wonderful 45 minute sermon by Harry Walls at Grace Community Church about the kind of love Jesus expects from us.
Connecting with Quality Love by Harry Walls
Here is an article about Peace from Compelling Truth:
In What Way is Peace a Fruit of the Spirit?
By Elizabeth Prata
Angels are innumerable, powerful, nonhuman beings created by God to serve His ordered purposes. Scripture portrays them as named, hierarchical spirits who worship, judge, minister, and wage warfare. Some rebelled and became demons. Angelology, the study of angels, is legitimate but requires biblical caution and careful discernment of sources.
Continue reading “Are you curious about angels?”By Elizabeth Prata
Last August 2025, about 6 months ago as of this writing, Ben Kayser started a website and Youtube channel called “Reformed and Dangerous.” From his ‘About’ he stated, “AI-powered songs and rap battles where Scripture meets swagger. Watch pastors, theologians, and historical figures face off in lyrical showdowns on Calvinism, theonomy, church history, and the gospel.”
Recently Kayser put up a ‘rap battle’ between John MacArthur and RC Sproul. He creates AI (artificial intelligence) videos of the theologians saying the lines. These ‘rap battles’ never happened in real life. They are all virtual, thanks to AI.
John MacArthur was a well known and widely loved pastor of Grace Community Church for 56 years. He passed into glory 7 months ago. RC Sproul was pastor of St. Andrews Chapel and founder and chairman of Ligonier Ministries. He passed into glory 9 years ago. The two men were good friends, despite their different theological interpretations of eschatology and baptism.
After MacArthur’s passing a few months ago, almost immediately there was an influx of AI generated videos of a virtually created MacArthur preaching. Some of the videos stuck close to his years-long stated doctrinal interpretations. Others took liberties and put words in the artificial MacArthur’s mouth he never said or believed.
This was a problem. MacArthur’s close friend and manager of MacArthur’s digital recordings at GTY.org, Phil Johnson, put out a warning to the public regarding these AI videos, writing at ,
“YouTube is overrun with videos purporting to be John MacArthur—but produced by AI. These do not reliably represent John MacArthur’s opinion. The only way to be certain any recording is legitimately John MacArthur’s is to get it from http://gty.org. “
So enter in ‘Reformed and Dangerous’ rap battle AI generated video. In the Youtuber’s mind, I’m sure there was no malicious intent. It was just another of his hugely popular videos, and instead of creating videos of long passed theologians John Calvin or Charles Spurgeon, this time Sproul and the newly passed MacArthur were featured.
His video caught the attention of GTY Director Phil Johnson. Apparently in the background, Phil had asked the Reformed and Dangerous publisher to remove the video. R&D did so. Kayser put out an explanation for the public as to why he took it down, right-click on the link in the embed to go to Twitter/X. You can also read the read his explanation on Facebook here.
Phil wrote an essay about the issue. He said that prior to MacArthur’s death, the elders and he had a discussion about AI. Johnson said,
“John was never a fan of Siri or Alexa, and he certainly did not want to lend his face, voice, or personality to an AI-generated cyber-pastor or digital rabbi.” … Johnson is not in favor of AI generated rap battles “because doing something in John MacArthur’s name that we know with absolute certainty he would disapprove is no way to honor him.“
Phil’s essay is here at his Pyromaniacs blog.
VIrtual reality is interesting to me. First, as Christians we need to be as Matthew 10:16 says, “Behold, I am sending you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be as wary as serpents, and as innocent as doves.” We cannot be gullible. We must determine what is real and what is virtual. Scam phone calls, fake videos (and Youtube is overrun with them), fake news, and more plague our lives these days. This is one of the downsides of technology, which otherwise has many great advantages.
Second, virtual reality on earth is like earth’s life being virtual as heaven’s life is real. We Christians are sort of living in a virtual reality while the actual reality is heaven. Earthly life is not meaningless, to be sure. It is preparation for heaven. But earth’s life is as virtual as AI compared to heaven. A pale copy! Dear reader, always remember our citizenship is in heaven. Our real life begins the moment we are translated to heaven and we see Jesus face to face.
Meanwhile on earth, as sin grows, fakery grows. Liars, cheaters, deceivers abound. Watch where you step.
By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS
Reflecting on travel documentaries like Pole to Pole, I admire exploration yet feel sadness when the explorer expresses awe of nature but fails to glorify God for it. In many of these docs, I watch seekers yearn for meaning but misattribute the meaning of life to creation.
By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS
The church is one body, formed by the Spirit, who places each believer intentionally. Like a pointillist painting, individual lives lived further afield may seem indistinct, yet from God’s perspective every placement contributes to a unified, beautiful masterpiece completed in heaven according to His sovereign design.
Continue reading “Seen from Heaven’s Distance”By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS
My personal divorce reflects sin’s violent fracture of marital, cosmic, and divine peace. I urge fidelity, repentance, and fleeing temptation always.
Continue reading “From One Flesh to Fracture”By Elizabeth Prata
I was in a secular setting with some 7-year-olds. They were drawing a picture to go along with the story about pizza they had just read. When one boy finished his drawing he still had room on the page. He asked if he could draw a cross. I said sure.
Of course then the others wanted to draw a cross too. Most or all of them have been exposed to Jesus. As they drew their crosses they began to talk about Jesus. The original boy said, ‘Jesus died on the cross’. Another said, ‘Isn’t He living now’? I chimed in and said His is living now, that He walked around on earth for 40 days after His death and resurrection and talked with His friends.
By Elizabeth Prata
What is a miracle? GotQuestions answers,
The Bible uses three main words to refer to a miracle: sign, wonder, and power. From a human perspective, a miracle of God is an extraordinary or unnatural event (a wonder) that reveals or confirms a specific message (a sign) through a mighty work (power). From the God of miracle’s vantage point, a miracle is nothing extraordinary or unnatural. It is simply a divine display of His might (power) that attracts the attention of humans (a wonder) to His Word or His purposes (a sign).
Miracle-mongers are the people who clamor to see or experience a miracle but do not know the first thing about the other attributes of God. Like the ‘crowds’ in the Bible. These are the people who come to church only in hopes to see a sign. The pray for glory dust to fall down so they can say Jesus showed up. They pray for healed legs so they can run toward sin. People like that existed in Jesus’ day and in our day too. (John 6:2, John 12:18).
Be warned, miracle-mongers, “most of the miraculous events in the Old Testament killed people,” explained John MacArthur. They simply, flatly, killed people, as a demonstration of God’s justice and holiness.
His justice is demonstrated at the cross. It is God who said the soul that sends it must die. It is God who says the wages of sin is death, and death there will be. Death there must be. And justice prevails at the cross. God is so just, so just, that He will even take the life of His own beloved Son. If the sins of the world are to be laid on His Son, then His Son must take the death that they deserve. You will never see a greater illustration of the justice of God. You can look in the past. You can look in the Old Testament. You can see most of the miracles in the Old Testament killed people. If you’re looking for miracles in the Old Testament, most of the miraculous events in the Old Testament killed people, drowned entire armies, drowned the entire world, burned up people, holes opened in the ground and swallowed them up. People were literally killed by angelic beings. Most of the Old Testament miracles were miracles of divine judgment.
“So Jesus said to him, “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe.” (John 4:48).
You know, we have a tendency to read the Bible as if miracles were occurring behind every bush and every other day by everybody in history. But actually, if you look at the appearance of miracles in the Bible, they’re clustered. There’s all these miracles that attend Moses in his mediatorial office, and then very little miraculous activity takes place for centuries until when? Elijah. That’s the next redemptive historical period that has a cluster of miracles. Isn’t that interesting? That God verifies the law, and then the prophets, through the giving of miraculous powers. And then you don’t hear about miracles from Jonah or Habakkuk that they performed, or Ezekiel, or the other prophets of the Old Testament until again, the world becomes a blaze of miracles with the appearance of Jesus. Notice that there is a special focal point for the clustering of miracles in biblical history—all surrounding the issue of the word of God.
Do you love Jesus for who He is? Or for what He can do for you? A warning to those who seek and cling to and desire miracle after miracle, be careful what you wish for–
For false Christs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders that would deceive even the elect, if that were possible. (Matthew 24:24).
By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS
I show that Proverbs 31 does not endorse feminist careerism. While acknowledging limited work outside the home, I look at the Proverb closely to show that God ordains that most wives’/mothers’ primary vocation is household management and sacrifice. The woman’s worth lies not in productivity, but fearing the Lord and serving family within God-ordained roles.
Continue reading “More Than Productivity: The Heart of Proverbs 31”
the-end-time.org 