Topical Studies
Competitiveness
(From Forerunner Commentary)
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Genesis 3:1-5 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Satan made a seemingly gentle suggestion against God's word and work, first by presenting them in a negative light. God had spoken to Adam and Eve, giving them His word. They had gathered much about the mind and personality of God because of what He said. In addition, they could see with their own eyes a great deal about God's person, personality, and mind by what He had made. They were in a beautiful garden, which reflected the mind of God. They could see the beauty of His mind, and how His mind provided things beautiful and delightful to enjoy. They knew a great deal about the mind of God simply from what they were able to observe. By making the challenge the way Satan did, he first made them mildly skeptical about God's love, asking them, “Does God really love you?” Second, he made it seem as though obedience to God was, in reality, servility. He made them begin to feel as though God's way was restrictive; that He was holding back good things from them. This thought naturally lead them to think much more could be obtained from life if they just followed their body's and mind's natural inclinations. Third, he played his trump card: Not only would they not die, but they would be in control, free to determine right and wrong. In short, they would be equal to God! Satan successfully brought them into a spirit of competition against God, resulting in the enmity described in Romans 8:7. He indirectly lied about God Himself, and he directly lied about the penalty, giving them misinformation about the reward. He did tell them the truth, that their eyes would be opened and that they would not immediately die. Their eyes were opened, and they now looked at things through the twisted perspective, seeing evil in everything. From innocence, they became ashamed of their nakedness. The effect began immediately. This is important because right thoughts precede right actions; right thoughts determine the release of proper emotions. Our thoughts express themselves even in our most casual relationships, in daily work, and most importantly, in our intimate relationships in our home and family. Most of all, they express themselves in our relationship with God. False beliefs about God and His purpose for man are far more destructive than alcohol and drugs. They confuse, divide, and bring on warfare. Satan's lies, his counterfeits, and his devices are usually so subtle that only a trained mind can discern them. God teaches us to be able to see. He trains us to be able to spot the ploys, contrivances, and stratagems of our enemy so that we can overcome and defeat him.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Satan (Part 2)
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Proverbs 13:10 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Only through pride does contention last. We primarily see the effects of pride because pride is frequently difficult to detect. God has shown in His Word how to detect it: by looking at the fruits. How do we know false prophets? By their fruits, by what they produce. A quarrel that could be easily settled if both parties were humble continues indefinitely when parties are arrogant. Why? Because pride plows the way for contempt for the others opinion. Pride inflames passion and wounds feelings. Because of competitiveness, also an aspect of pride, a person feels he has to fight back. And so the argument goes back and forth. If we are ever involved in a quarrel that seemingly will not end, we should be well-advised from God's Word that the problem is pride. It is somewhere in the picture in one or both who are participating in the conflict. The quarrel will never end until one person makes up his mind to stop it by refusing to argue back, suppressing the feeling that they have to win. One of the greatest spiritual advances that I ever made in my life was when it suddenly dawned on me one day that I did not have to win. God is on His throne, and because He loves me and the other person, God will make available to both of us what the right decision is. If we ask patiently, persevering without anger, and if we continue to meditate and search and counsel with Him, the answer will come. So, arguments stop.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Faith (Part 6)
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Ezekiel 28:16 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
"By the abundance of your trading you became filled with violence within" is difficult to understand in terms of angelic beings, but it shows a measure of competition. He certainly began to be in competition with God. Not being content with his position, he began to compete with God, and it filled him with violence and sin. The attitude of competition, once it is taken too far, becomes violent. The only way a person can win is by beating down his adversary.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Countering Presumptuousness
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Ezekiel 28:16-17 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
God had made him perfect in wisdom, had He not? But Lucifer, or Hillel, corrupted that wisdom. In biblical terms, wisdom is the actual doing of righteousness. What happened in this situation was that Lucifer's doings, actions, behaviors, became corrupted. He should have known better because God had given him that wisdom. Early on, he had acted in wisdom, but his competitive attitude, his discontent, his pride, caused him to pervert his way of life.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Countering Presumptuousness
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Matthew 20:20-28 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Here, the disciples show they understood what Christ was doing, but they immediately let the idea of such awesome power go to their heads by vying for the very top positions. Christ explains that His disciples must use authority in a godly fashion, not for self-aggrandizement as the Gentiles had used it.
Staff
Who Are the 'Guests at the Wedding'?
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John 13:34-35 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
God is showing through the church that all the prejudices against God and man can be dissolved and overcome through Christ. "New" here implies freshness, rather than from the point of time. It is part of the different perspective one receives upon conversion. Doing what He says to do is new for a convert because it means operating from the perspective of cooperation rather than competition. It is a new thing for a convert to show love, which is the exercising or the application of God's Word.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Reconciliation and the Day of Atonement
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Acts 20:29 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
He calls these future apostates, these future false teachers, "savage wolves." Jude later calls them "brute beasts" (Jude 1:20). This conjures in our minds the idea that man's animalistic nature—what one could call the physical side of man's nature, what he shares with the beasts—is driving these false teachers. It is not necessarily their minds and their ideas that are driving them but their bodies, their desires, their lusts, and they want these lusts satiated in some way. It is not just eating, drinking, sex, and similar carnal needs, but also the base desires that men have for gain, for standing atop the pack, for glory and prestige. These false teachers are letting their "animal nature" get the best of them.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Jude
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Revelation 17:16 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
The woman and the beast represent political power with somewhat diverse and competing application of the same Babylonish system. The competition, according to this principle in Mark 3:24-26, will eventually escalate into war between them. Each is competing for world domination, and just as surely as Satan's house cannot stand, the Babylonish system cannot stand. We see where the competition will go between these two. At the beginning of Revelation 17, the woman is sitting on the beast, but by the end, the woman has been gobbled up by the super-powerful beast. It does not happen until God puts it into the heart of the kings, who make up the beast, to do so. We can begin to see that up until that point, God is intervening on the behalf of the woman who would seem to be weaker than this wild beast, but she is actually controlling it much of the time. Competition may appear on the surface to be good, producing better quality and better value, but it ultimately destroys. That is God's point. It ultimately destroys.
John W. Ritenbaugh
Where Is the Beast? (Part 4)
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Revelation 17:16-17 (Go to this verse :: Verse pop-up)
Within the practical realities of international political, economic, and military affairs, the Beast may be resentful and unwilling to do as the Woman directs. As a wild animal would, it will undoubtedly buck and resist, but until God is ready, it ends up most of the time doing what the Woman wants. The Beast submits to the Woman because she possesses power greater in certain areas than the Beast, a power the Beast resents, envies, and plots to have for itself.
John W. Ritenbaugh
The Beast and Babylon (Part Eight): God, Israel, and the Bible
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