Automatic Transcript Generated:
Why did Jesus tell the good thief “today you’ll be with me in paradise”?
Speaker 1
Farron is asking. In another segment, it was stated that we would not go to heaven until the Raptor or the second coming of Christ when the dead in Christ would rise. If this is true, why then did Jesus tell the thief on the cross that on that day he’s a thief, would be with Jesus in heaven?
Speaker 2
That is a really good question, and I want to go to the verse that you’re talking about because I want to make something really clear. And it’s a question because obviously I’ve had the same question myself. I remember when I read this and I was like, wait, is the Bible inconsistent? Why is it saying that? So I want to go with me to the Book of Luke and chapter 23 and verse 43. And I don’t know if we can have it on the screen. If not, I’ll just kind of share it myself. There it is. And Jesus said to him, assuredly, I say to you today you will be with me in paradise. Now, something I want you to be really clear about is I know that in English we have all of this what is it called? Commas, periods, things like that. I can’t remember the name of it. All of a sudden, your uppercase, your lowercase, your complications Grammar.
Speaker 2
Grammar. Thank you, director. Punctuation. And so in Hebrew, there is no punctuation, there are no periods, there’s no commas, there’s no semicolons, any of that. So when you’re reading the text, it’s literally just like a straight sentence. It’s hard to kind of tell where sentence is beginner, end. So that’s why the people who wrote, who translated the Bible into English, they did the best they could with what they felt. Now, at the time that the Bible was translated into English with the King James Bible, mainly the belief was that when you die, you went straight to heaven. So of course then, because of that, when they see Jesus said, assuredly, I say to you today you will be with me in paradise. Where they put the comma was basically, I tell you, comma, today you will be with me in paradise. But the thing is, Jesus saying, I’m telling you today, you will be with me in paradise one day. But he’s assuring him that day was his day of salvation, that he had salvation that day, that he believed in Jesus Christ on the cross, which honestly, I think is the most powerful story as far as the gift of salvation, because how many people are like, okay, well, I sinned, but now that I’ve asked God to forgive me, now I need to go get myself right.
Speaker 2
I don’t have salvation until I earn my way back into God’s favor by making up for the things I did. And Jesus is saying, no, when you come to me by faith believing you have salvation that day, that is your day of salvation. When you come to Christ and you don’t have to come to Him. Perfect. You don’t have to come to Him or you have to fix yourself before you come to God. God accepts you as you are and all he asks is for your sins to soul to come and be in a relationship with Him. Now, had Jesus said assuredly you will be with me in paradise eventually, he would have been like, when will that be? I’m going to die today, I’m on the cross. Jesus had to specify that it was that day that hey, your assurance of salvation is right. Now don’t worry about what’s going to happen. They all knew they were going to die in a few hours, but Jesus assured Him that day that he had salvation. So yes, the punctuation might seem like it’s saying, hey, Jesus is saying one thing, but I really believe that the people who translated the Bible added that comma when it didn’t need to be there.
Speaker 2
And because of that it’s very confusing and honestly it hurts me because it’s so incongruent with the rest of the Bible. And you have to be really careful that when you decide on a belief from the Bible, like Jesus talks about being established by two or three witnesses. So there needs to be at least two or three Bible verses that go along with your belief. And I really don’t see any other Bible or any other Bible verse that share that Jesus, anybody goes straight to heaven unless they have a special resurrection like Moses, or if they were translated straight to heaven like Enoch or Elijah. But just like and my doctor is sharing with me another note which I appreciate so much, which is that even Jesus, he can’t be going back on his own word because if you think about this story, when Jesus is dying on the cross, he told the thief that today you have salvation. You will be with me in paradise in the last day when he comes in his kingdom. But the thing is, Jesus could not have been with Him that day in paradise. And we know that because just a little bit later in the story of the Crucifixion, after Jesus is resurrected on that first day, mary comes to him and Jesus says, don’t touch me because I have not yet ascended to my Father.
Speaker 2
And so there is no way that Jesus saw Him in paradise that day, because Jesus wasn’t there. Jesus was dead. He was in the grave. And that was very clear that it says that he will be in the grave for three days and that’s exactly what happened. So there was no way that Jesus could have promised Him that day that they would both be up in heaven, in paradise, because he wasn’t even there himself. So it has to be based on all the surrounding evidence and every other verse where it talks about people who are safe. It says that in the book of Daniel, chapter twelve. It says Daniel was practically a perfect person or model of what it means to follow God. And it says that you will stand in your lot in the last day. So again, there’s so many other examples where people knew that at the resurrection in the last day they would be resurrected. Like when you think of the story of Lazarus, martha and Mary come up to him and Lazarus’s sisters come up to him and they’re like, if you would have been here, he wouldn’t have died.
Speaker 2
And Jesus says he will rise again. And his sister was yes, in the last day. And she’s like, I know we will see him again one day. And Jesus is like, wait, I just want you to know I am powerful enough to raise somebody today. Like that can happen. Don’t get me like so just know that you can have trust in me, that in Jesus Christ we will have a resurrection. But again, going back to every other verse in the Bible, first thessalonians chapter four, verses 13 through 17, it’s very clear that Christ coming, the dead in Christ rise first, and we that are alive remain, are caught up with him and so shall we ever be with the Lord. That’s when we are resurrected. We see that in one Corinthians 15. We see that in the book of Revelation throughout the book, chapters 20 through 22. Anyways, I hope that answers your question. There is a manifold amount of evidence pointing towards Jesus coming and his second coming, and that being the Rapture, where Jesus resurrects his people who are asleep in the dirt and all people that are alive and remaining on the earth are translated into heaven, and so shall they ever be with the Lord.
Speaker 2
So again, I hope that answers to your question and you can see all those verses coming into play. When we look at the Bible, we really have to remember that this is a book that was originally written in Hebrew as well as Aramaic and Greek. And we need to go back to those original sources, which obviously this is always our plug for blue letter Bible. We love that website because if you ever have a question like why is this word being used, go back to the original Hebrew, go back and think about how the word was originally written and you kind of can get a better picture of maybe what God is trying to convey to you as his message of truth. Jared and Wendy, any other thoughts on that?
Speaker 3
I want to share one verse where to me this sort of confirms also that Jesus didn’t like when he died. He didn’t just send up to heaven as a spirit float up there and it’s John 20 verse 17. And the context of this is Jesus just resurrected and he’s speaking with Mary. And so the verse reads John 20 verse 17. Jesus said to her, do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to my Father, but go to my brethren and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father and to my God and your God. So Jesus saying that, yeah, I haven’t got back yet. Don’t keep me here. I’m going to have to take off. I got things to do. So, yeah, there’s no evidence when you actually study the verses, as Tina said, that people actually do go. And really, I do like that. To me, it is so much more meaningful when Jesus says, I tell you today, I’m telling you right now, when you’re suffering here on the cross, you’re going to have a brighter future ahead of you. It’s going to be paradise to come.
Speaker 2
Amen. Yeah. Other things that Jesus said, I was mentioning earlier, like Matthew 1240, jesus said, just as Jonah was three days and nights in the whale’s belly, so shall the sudden be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. So Jesus was not in paradise for sure. He was in the earth, he was in the grave, not with the Father, not in paradise. But yeah. Amen. Thank God that when we come to Jesus, he accepts us as you are. And we have that actually. Check it out.
Speaker 3
To love the Lord your God. So he’s not saying commanding you today to love your Lord, he’s saying, I’m commanding you today to love the Lord. I mean, this is sort of the same context of how Jesus is speaking when he’s on the cross. I tell you today, I command you today. So I’m sure you can read the Bible and see a lot more verses that are like this. So we’re not making it up. It’s just someone shows when translating and put the comma on the other side of today to fit their theology that comes from, I would say, a corruption that entered Christianity during the Great Apocalypse plunge into.
Speaker 2
And I think it’s a good point you make with the Duterte 19 nine, because obviously they weren’t supposed to love God just that day. It’s supposed to be starting today, going forward. Yeah, definitely. And I think there’s so many other I think of so many verses where it’s just like it’s so clear that Jesus are the rectus people at the end of time. When you look at like I was kind of saying one Corinthians 15, but.
Speaker 3
Just the whole concept of resurrection, what is the point of that? If you would already be in ultimate spirit form in heaven or even if was it the ultimate form? It just doesn’t make sense to go up there, change, come back down, put on your bodily suit, go back up.
Speaker 2
Exactly. So again, there’s so many things that point towards this truth and I’m so grateful because I would hate to think and honestly, the doctor I know so many people will say, well, to be absent from the body is to be present from the Lord. I’m like, first of all, that’s not how the verse reads. And second of all, that’s not what the verse means. It’s that as soon as you die, you’re with the Lord. That’s not what the verse is saying. It’s saying that when you die, you’re asleep. Like the rest of the Bible says, the dead know nothing, go to ecclesiastic design. Everywhere in the Bible, death is like asleep. Jesus called death asleep when he talks about Lazarus being dead all over again. First, those are asleep in Christ shall awake. And so it’s like absence in the body. So as soon as you die, you’re asleep. The next thing that you know is like, yeah, you’re going to be present with the Lord facing whatever is going to happen to you next, whether it’s the resurrection of life into salvation or the resurrection of damnation.
Speaker 3
Yeah. And they just view this current body we have this broken mortal body as a temporary thing, like second, Peter one four, Peter says, knowing that shortly I must put off my tent, just as our Lord Jesus showed me. He just viewed it. The body is like a tent, this temporary thing, and then eventually you’re going to move into your house, your permanent body that God will give later on. Yeah. Not a unique concept.
Speaker 1
That’s an interesting segue that I had never really thought of in that way, moving from moving into our house.
Speaker 2
Kind of like the sanctuary.
Speaker 3
Yeah. I think the word there Peter used for tent is actually the word tabernacle. I’m looking up. Yeah, it is the word tabernacle, or the Greek word for tabernacle and echo.
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