This sermon delves into the importance of understanding judgment in the context of God's righteousness and mercy. It emphasizes the distinction between using critical faculties to discern without condemning and the dangers of self-righteous judgment. The sermon highlights the need to rely on God's revelation for accurate discernment and the significance of not branding others with our own biases or self-love. It also explores the role of God's Word in piercing through soul and spirit to discern thoughts and intents of the heart.

Okay, we'll have a word of prayer and then we'll make a start. Lord, we want to come again to you, Lord, just acknowledging our need of you, our conscious need. We need your help, Lord, we need your enlightenment, we need the work of your Spirit in all of our hearts, Lord, to speak and to hear what you want to say to us tonight. We pray, Lord, that you will open our eyes and open our understanding, to understand the things that are on your heart for us tonight. Make this time a time of blessing and challenge and purpose, Lord, for each one of us and for us as a church. Amen. Amen. Amen. Okay, the chapters that we are kind of... really, again, are 1 Corinthians chapter 3 and chapter 4, but I'm not actually going to refer to them very much. It's just that when I mentioned these things last time we were together, there were a couple of questions that came up which, the more I thought about them, the more I thought were really such fundamental questions that we ought to give a bit more time. So, depending on what picture you like, we're going to drill down a little bit more deeply, or spread out a little bit more widely. This is a little bit like an appendix. If you're reading a book sometimes and there's something that's more detailed, they may say, well, look in the appendix, and this is a little bit like that. We're going to look at the question, really, of judgment and our work for God and the rewards that come as a result of that. So, those are the things I want to look at. We did touch on them last time, but I want to go down a little bit deeper. In fact, as I've been reading 1 Corinthians again this week, I was just amazed at how frequently the ideas of judgment come all the way through this book. One of the questions that I was asked, not in this language, but I guess this was always the verse behind the question. The Lord Jesus, of course, on one occasion said, don't judge, lest you be judged. But in 1 Corinthians, we're being told that there is a kind of judgment that's necessary, that there is judgment, and really what I want to do is try and look at that question. How do we understand these things when you've got what seems like a plain commandment, which is a don't judge, and then some other things which indicate that, for example, much of the trouble that the Corinthians were experiencing was actually because they weren't judging. They weren't actually assessing. They weren't appraising. They weren't examining what was happening. Consequently, they were making all kinds of wrong, they were having wrong concepts which were resulting in wrong ways of living. So I want to look at these things. Just to give you a bit of an example, I won't go through all these, because there's lots of them. I counted about, I think it was 38 verses, where there's some reference to judging or judgment in one way or another in this letter. And in fact, there are more than that, because if you think about it, every time you have a comparison, any time anything which says it's better or worse or less, or in fact, in a sense, every time you add an adjective to anything, you are automatically judging that thing. And if I say this is a bright red jersey, I've kind of added two things to it, and I've actually judged something. I've actually thought, well, yeah, this could have been a not such a red jersey, this could have been a green jersey. What I've done is I've appraised something. Now we do this automatically. This is how God has created us. And we can't pretend that we don't do this. Every time you see anything or anybody, it makes an impression on you. And that impression then becomes a kind of a benchmark. And then from that position, it either gets better or worse, depending on the new experiences that you have. It's like this old saying, you really only get one chance to make a first impression. Because as soon as you see somebody, you react, you have some idea of what this person is like. And then subsequently, that person will either prove to be better than you thought they were, or not as good as you thought they were. In other words, you will be pleasantly surprised or disappointed. And then we do this automatically all the time. And you can't switch this off. So when it says don't judge, we need to have a look at that and see exactly what's behind it. Let me just show you one or two of these examples. This is 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and verse 10. Now I plead with you brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and the same judgment. So right at the very beginning, you've got this reference to judgment or a way of thinking that you are to examine and compare to see if it's like somebody else's. That's the idea of it. And there's a whole list of these as you go through. In 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 14 and 15, you've got these verses that we referred to last time. And this is kind of one of mine. I was saying that you get one impression and then everything beyond that is either better than you thought it would be or worse than you thought it would be. And this is my constant experience with new versions of the Bible. I've got most versions of the Bible, I think, that are in English. And every time I get one, I find something about it that's really good and I like it. I think, oh yeah, this is really good. And then I read a little bit more and then I find something which disappoints me and then I get to the stage where I'm carrying two Bibles, that one and the other one, to compare it. And in the end, I just kind of abandon it and go back to my old King James Version. And the King James Version isn't much better at this particular point. But it's interesting. I don't know why they haven't bothered to change it. This is 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 14 and 15, where it says this. If you remember, the last time we were together, I used the word appraise here. And we can use the word discern, if you like. Verse 14. But the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to them. Nor can he know them because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual discerns all things. Yet he himself is discerned by no one. For who has known the mind of the Lord that we may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ. Those words discern, it's all the same word in the original. What it's saying here, then, is that the natural man doesn't receive the things of the Spirit of God because you can only perceive these things. You can only measure these things. You can only appraise, compare these things spiritually. And Paul actually speaks about combining spiritual things with spiritual. Then in verse 15 he says, But he who is spiritual discerns, judges, appraises, measures, values, all things. Yet he himself is measured, by nobody. This is all the way through what Corinthians, constant references to different kinds of judgment. It includes words like account, approve, decree, determine, differ, discern, examine, judge, judgment, law, question, report, try. There's a whole series of them. And they all have to do with assessing something mentally. We're looking at something and saying, now what is this? Is this this? Is this that? Is it better? Is it worse? This kind of thing. These are some of the things that the Corinthians weren't judging. And the consequence was that they were in part of the pickle that they were in. For example, in 1 Corinthians 5 they weren't judging a man who was in a relationship of fornication. They weren't judging that. And the church wasn't judging that. They weren't judging their brethren when they had legal issues between one another. In fact, they weren't judging them. What they were doing was that they were going outside to external judges. And Paul actually accuses them, he rebukes them, for not bringing this judgment inside the church, handling it on the inside. There's references to this theme which we'll get to ultimately, about head covering and head uncovering, where Paul at one point says, judge for yourselves. Is it cumbling? Is it fit that this and this and this? So there's a constant repetition of things where he's actually saying you should be judged. And of course one of the big important ones is in 1 Corinthians 11 where he says that part of the reason that they are in the state that they're in, part of the reason that there is sickness amongst them, part of the reason that people are dying in their midst, is actually because they're not discerning the Lord's body. They're not measuring, they're not recognising, they're not seeing what all this is about. OK, well wrong judgments result in wrong living. There are three words that I think will help us along this line. And really it's the question of right use, abuse and non-use. And our critical faculties, our ability to measure things and to decide whether it's good or better, lighter or darker, there's a right way of doing that. There's a wrong way of doing that. But when you have the wrong way of doing it, it's going to get a bit complicated now. But if you're doing something wrongly, the remedy for wrong use is not non-use, it's right use. I'll say that again. If something is being done wrongly, the remedy for wrong use is not non-use, it's right use. Now there are some people, in the world, who look at what happens concerning things to do with the gifts of the Spirit. And they see that it is so chaotic, it's such a mess, that what they've decided is that the best way of handling this is to ban it. That's to say, they see misuse and their remedy is non-use. That's never the Bible answer. The Bible, the answer is never to solve it by saying we won't use it. Do you remember when the Lord Jesus used this illustration? He used this phrase in Matthew 5 verse 30 where it says this, If your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you. For it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish than that your whole body be cast into hell. Now God doesn't want people to perish. He wants people with the right hands that are doing the right things. So the ultimate answer in this strong statement, we'll see how this fits in later on, I think, with the dangers, but the right thing is to use things properly. There's a little phrase of that where you've got things like this. If you look at 1 Corinthians chapter 7 verse 31, chapter 7 verse 31 and having this sense of owning them or possessing them and in verse 31 he says, For those and those who use this world as not misusing it for the form of this world is passing away. This is a challenge. Apparently we are to use the world. We are to use the world. Now some people say no you mustn't use it. You must not use it. You must avoid it. You must have nothing at all to do with it. But Paul actually, this isn't the only place here. If you remember a little bit earlier on in chapter 3, at the end of chapter 3, he says this in verse 21, Therefore let no one glory in men for all things are yours whether poor or a parse or a pifas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come or are yours. But you must go on to the next sentence. And this is what makes the whole difference. And you are Christ's. That's what changes everything. So we are to use things and we are to use them properly with a consciousness that they are not, that although we have rights we have those rights in a certain way so that Jesus always maintains his rights and that we summon all our rights to him. So we'll see how that works out in a little bit. So I'm going to look first of all at this whole question of judgment. Let's look first of all at the whole thing about God's judgment. Isaiah chapter 30, this is the passage where Isaiah is telling the people of Israel that God's plan for them was to depend upon him and not to rely on other foreign countries, particularly Egypt. And this is what you get. Chapter 30 and verse 18. He's actually told them to rest. Verse 18 says this. Therefore the Lord will wait that he may be gracious to you and therefore he will be exalted that he may have mercy on you for the Lord is a God of... Now the King James Version will say judgment and this here says justice. Blessed are all those who wait for him. God is a God of judgment. It's one of God's... It's one of God's titles. It's one of the ways in which God has revealed himself to the world that he is the God of judgment. He is not a God who ignores things. He's not a God who says well it doesn't matter too much that God is a God of judgment. This works out particularly with the people of Israel when God actually said to them in Amos if you remember this is a key verse in Amos and God says to them in Amos 3 chapter 3 and verse 3 he says you own me if I'm known of all the people of the earth therefore I will judge you for all your sins. So God would actually hold them accountable for what they had known therefore the Lord will wait that he may be gracious to you. That's a lovely phrase. Sometimes if you know the background of this what God was going to allow to happen he was actually going to allow actively not passively he was going to allow actively a train of events which would result in the punishment of Israel and it was an act of God's grace to them. Sometimes God allows us to live out the consequences of the choices we make and it's not punishment in the sense that this is God who has lost his patience with us it's part of God's grace. There are some things that we only will ever learn if God lets us face up to the implications of the choices that we make. It's part of God's grace sometimes that judgements work in our lives and things happen like this. Okay. So this is a kind of an absolute statement of fact that God will judge the world. If you look at Romans chapter 3 verse 6 you know in math they have things they call axioms and axioms are are absolute statements of facts there's no argument about it everybody accepts it so that's all there is to it. And there are some kind of Bible axioms as well there's absolutely no argument about it everybody accepts it it doesn't explain it it's beyond explanation it's just a simple fact of life. And here in Romans chapter 3 and verse 6 where he's explaining certain things I'll read from verse 5 But if our unrighteousness demonstrates the righteousness of God what shall we say? Is God unjust who inflicts wrath? I'm speaking as a man certainly not for how will God then judge the world? In other words it's an absolute spiritual fact of life that God will judge the world God is a judge and he will judge maybe you remember that this is one of the things that Paul actually said in Acts chapter 17 again this is a fundamental fact of life Acts 17 verse 31 he hasn't rebuked the Athenians for many things he's said very little but this is something which is to be known by every people upon the face of the whole earth again it is Acts chapter 17 verse 31 and I'll read verse 30 Truly these times of ignorance God has overlooked but now he commands all men everywhere to repent because he has appointed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by the man whom he has ordained he has given us assurance of this to all by raising him from the dead so this is a fact of life that God is going to judge the world and then it makes it clear that it's going to be through Christ who will judge the world now we sometimes say we often say, I've said this and lots of preachers will say this people out in the open air will say this that when Jesus was on the earth he wasn't here as the judge he was here as the saviour and that one day he would become the judge now there's a truth in that there is a truth and there's a very famous passage in John chapter 12 often with these things we're not arguing with truth it's just that we need the whole truth we need more truth we need more information to get the balance right so this is John chapter 12 and verse 47 if anyone hears my words and does not believe says Jesus I do not judge him for I did not come to judge the world now that's a statement of fact he did not come to judge the world but if you look at John chapter 5 and verse 30 you'll see he says this I can of myself do nothing as I hear I judge and my judgment is righteous because I seek not my own will but the will of the Father who sent me and in that verse this is really a pivotal verse because this is what makes judgment right or wrong why we are doing the judging if we are doing the judging to put ourselves in the right if we are doing the judging to put somebody else in the wrong so there's a winner and a loser if we are doing the judging so it makes me greater and him less then that is not permissible that kind of judging but if the judging that's taking place is in order that the will of God should be done if it's a result of revelation in this sense you see here where the Lord Jesus says I can of myself do nothing as I hear I judge and he isn't talking about the evidence of his ears and he isn't talking about the evidence of his eyes he's talking about the evidence of his spirit there's a verse in Isaiah I often look it up I can't tell you where it is maybe about 40 or something like that where it speaks of the Lord and there's a famous phrase where Isaiah asks the question and he says who is as blind as my servant or as deaf as my servant and it's a strange kind of a statement because he's speaking about Christ there was a sense in which Christ could be and we need to choose to be at times blind and deaf in order to listen to what God is saying in our hearts we do this actually all the time and we do this whenever we believe God rather than believing the evidence of our senses if we pray for someone and we believe that God gives us that face we believe that person is healed but we trust God in contrast to relying upon the evidence that comes from our senses we say well I have greater evidence of greater impact of greater importance of greater significance this is almost the definition of faith in Romans chapter 4 if you remember with the story of Abraham Romans chapter 4 verse 19 he talks about Abraham and he says being not weak in faith he did not consider his own body already dead since he was about 100 years old and the deadness of Sarah's womb now this is evidence this is genuine data he is dead his body will no longer function as a man's body needs to function if he's going to generate children his wife's body is dead her body no longer functions these are not illusions this is fact this is material fact but Abraham has another fact and the other fact he has is that God has said something and he believes that fact and he chooses to go with that fact so he's blind and deaf to the other facts in order to be alive awake, seeing and hearing the thing that God is saying so it goes on to say that he did not waver the promise of God through one belief but it was strengthened in faith giving glory to God and being fully persuaded of his righteousness ok really the thing that we are forbidden to do has to do with condemnation and we touched on this last week but I'm going to touch on it again because I really think this is such an important issue and it's something which Christians so often get wrong and it really gets us into a mess when we get this wrong the Acts of the Apostles there are it's about six chapters it's about a sixth of the Acts of the Apostles is actually given over to the story of a trial a court appearance of Paul now when you think of all the other things that are going on in the Acts of the Apostles this is really quite a hefty chunk now when God does that there's significance to it and I believe that part of the significance is the person of law of a court and the way that it worked it worked like this first of all in a Roman court you had an accuser someone would accuse one person of another thing they would accuse this person of stealing their land or killing their cow or something like this and that would start off this thing then usually there was an arrest the person that had been accused was arrested pending the trial then in the trial the evidence is brought forth and a process of judging begins a process of appraisal of measuring information measuring data begins to operate so you start off with the accusation then you move on to this question of assessment or appraisal then ultimately a decision is made they had a group like magistrates not really like our jury system but ultimately a decision would be made when the decision was made the verdict would actually be given and the verdict is like the sentence now once the sentence is passed this person is now a criminal a criminal is someone who has had a sentence passed against him that's to say someone who has had a verdict against him that's what a criminal is and up until that point he may have done it and it may be obvious that he'd done it but he is not a criminal until the verdict is issued do you follow this? this might seem really very pedantic but it's such an important background of so much of what the bible wants to teach us you start off with an accusation then there's the process of appraisal kind of sifting through the evidence then ultimately there's a decision and then there's the verdict which is guilty or not guilty of the accusation that was brought against them that's the way it kind of works if the person had not been proven guilty remember this is all to do with the court it might even have been that the person had stolen your cow or something like this but if the evidence could not be brought to prove it and the appraisal of the court was such that the person the verdict was no this guilt is not proven against this person the person would go from the court justified this is where this great word justification comes in that doesn't mean he hasn't done the crime it means the court has not found him guilty are you following this? it doesn't mean he isn't answerable to God it just means that in the law court the man is now a free man the law no longer has any claim on him nothing that can be done against him the man walked to the court absolutely a free man he is declared justified this is why I often quote to you this kind of pigeon English thing this definition of justification which is God, him saying, me all right and that really is a perfect demonstration of what this whole idea of justification means it means that the court has not upheld the charges against me and the reason for that is because the penalty has already been paid by somebody else now if I am found guilty following the verdict of guilty that is at the end of the process following the verdict of guilty there comes the sentencing and the carrying out of the sentence those next two are the condemnation condemnation is the pronouncing of the sentence and the carrying out of the sentence now for those who are in Christ and who are declared all right by God there is for them who are in Christ therefore no condemnation it does not go on to these next stages the whole process grinds to a halt because once the person has been justified the court no longer has any interest and the man just kind of walks away it is all over so there is literally no condemnation now the reason I am saying this is because we persistently use the language of condemnation and I have been kind of going on banging this drum for 20 years here now I have been here 20 years now to use the word condemnation is actually just to confuse ourselves you cannot condemn yourself because you are not the judge you cannot condemn anybody else because only the judge can do that you don't have the right to be the judge you don't have the right to pass the sentence you don't have the right to brand somebody as a criminal you can't do it and Satan can't do it he is the accuser of the brethren not the condemner of the brethren he will bring accusations against you and you can bring an accusation against somebody else and you can actually bring an accusation against yourself so you can put yourself back in the court if you are not careful but you can't actually condemn yourself because condemnation is God's work you see why Paul later on says who is he that condemns? God who is declared as righteous? it doesn't make any sense how can God condemn us when he declares us righteous? it is kind of turning the whole legal system upside down it doesn't make any kind of sense to me OK so there is a sense in which certain people can condemn and issue this statement of the sentence that follows the guilty verdict and actually the references I was using just the other Sunday morning when I was talking about the people of Nineveh they shall rise up in the judgment and condemn the people of Capernaum and Kharazam and Bethsaida and the Queen of the Sand, the Queen of Sheba will rise up in the judgment and condemn apparently they are going to carry out a sentence on people who did not believe we will talk a little bit more about judging things a little bit later on let me show you an example of this where hopefully it will make this clear John chapter 8 is this famous story of the woman who was actually being caught in the act of adultery and you know she is dragged before the Lord he is there he is in the temple John chapter 8 verse 3 Then the scribes and Pharisees brought to him a woman caught in adultery and when they had set her in the midst they said to him teacher this woman was caught in adultery in the very act now Moses in the law commanded us that such should be stoned what do you say this they said testing him that they might have that they might have something of which to accuse him but Jesus stood down and wrote on the ground with his finger as though he did not hear so when they continued asking him he raised himself up and said to them he who is without sin among you let him throw a stone at her first and again he stood down and wrote on the ground then those who heard it being convicted by their conscience went out one by one beginning with the oldest even to the last and Jesus was left alone the woman standing in the midst when Jesus had raised himself up and saw no one but the woman he said to her woman where are those accusers of yours you see where it starts off it starts off with the accusers where are the accusers he says in other words if this case is going to be handled by the court here you have to start off with an accuser where are the accusers and then he jumps to the end of the court case and he says has no one condemned you now this is the only time in John's gospel the word condemn is used now we have it in our authorised version in John chapter 3 and it really is very confusing where it should be there this is the only place it occurs and Jesus says to them where are the accusers has there been no condemnation and then he says this she says no one Lord and Jesus said to her neither do I condemn you go and sin no more now that does not mean that Jesus has ignored the fact that this woman is an adulteress it does not mean that what it means is he will not pass the verdict he will not pass the sentence he will not condemn her he will not condemn her to death by sculling he will not do it he will not do it and he will not do it to you either and those who come to him he will never pass the sentence there is always forgiveness for those who come to him there are accusers here but the accusers are now gone and Jesus certainly will not be an accuser but then there is this other thing so what we need to be sure that we are doing is that although we are using our faculties, our critical faculties our ability to decide one thing against another thing we are not using it in the sense of being an absolute judge who puts a brand upon this person and says this person is carnal or this person is an adulterer or any of these things we don't have the right to do that unless it comes directly via revelation that is to say we hear what God is saying and we have a word to speak let me go on a little bit really what Jesus is doing here is our model his whole judgement is not based on his own preferences it is not based on the things that irritate him or the things that offend him his whole judgement is based upon what he as his father is doing he doesn't judge according to his own will he doesn't judge according to his own preferences he doesn't do these things because he isn't the judge in that sense at this point so let's see if I can just make that even more simple for us sometimes when I am talking to people about sexual sin particularly with young people I make this point and I think it is a really important issue to make that sexuality is not sin sex is not sin verbally sex plus sin self is sin and judgement is not sin judgement plus self is sin are you following this? is that making sense? it is when I am doing something for my own benefit when I am getting something off my chest when I am doing something because I can't live with it any longer and it doesn't work the righteousness of God and there are some people they get fed up to their teeth with people and then they spill over in their anger but that is not what we are talking about here that is judgement which has become sin because it is judgement which has been added to self am I making this clear? ok so you can't pretend that you are not seeing what you are seeing and to do so you end up with a bad conscience that is what will happen in fact I know instances of this where this has happened I know an instance which is well known to some of us there was a certain man who knew that this man was in sin but everybody in the church was actually saying no he is fine this is actually a gift from God this man has exercised and it went on like this and this man who had a judgement knew actually that this man was actually clairvoyant let me tell you a famous story about bringing names in it there was a man in one of the fellowships very very early on a man who was still active in apparently kind of Christian circles and he was very powerful in effectively reading people's minds I know people who can listen to conversations that take place in the next house or a man who can have a conversation with his wife when she is not at home there are certain clairvoyant powers that certain people have but sometimes they can be dressed in such a way that people think that this is actually spiritual discernment and there was a certain brother who was constantly doing this he was constantly exposing people in meetings constantly exposing sins causing embarrassment and actually accusing them publicly all the time and to begin with the church thought that this was actually a gift of God but there was one man in the church who felt very uneasy in his conscience but because he wasn't supposed to judge these things he shut down this thing inside of him and he almost had a nervous breakdown until he actually came to the place where he said I'm going to have to say this whatever the implications are whatever the consequences are there was an absolute release of that thing the person was exposed and the person was ultimately put out of the church but it's important that we don't pretend we don't try to pretend that we are not seeing something if we are seeing something but we don't set ourselves up as the judge if God gives us revelation it's so that we can do something about it so that we can praise and those are kind of the patterns of it I've got a little quotation that I often put in my bible it isn't either of these bibles but I've written it down here it's from a man whose name was Anthony Norris Groves and he was a missionary he was a reverend missionary to Persia and India and a very very godly man and I think one of the things that happens to us at times is we see things we see things that are not we see things that happen in other circles and we are uncomfortable with them and we don't know whether we should be uncomfortable with them and we don't know quite how we should handle these things and there's no slick answer to this question I think you just have to take your uncertainties to the Lord and talk to him about it this is a little quotation here from Anthony Norris Groves he said this and I think whereas man withdraws because he sees some evil thing which is generally found to mean something that wounds his self-love in the little scheme he has set up as perfection often the reason that people do condemn other things the reason they do sentence other things and brand them with this or that is because something has happened which doesn't quite fit this little scheme of their self-love where everything is in perfect order and we need to be very careful that we don't get drawn into that and we need to be very careful that we don't get drawn into accusing people of not being spiritual because they see something differently to the way I see it this can happen very easily in some circles that people will brand this purpose as being carnal and what they really mean is let me show you that verse that was in Hebrews we looked at it before but it's such a key verse it's Hebrews I'm going to pause now for a minute it's this passage in Hebrews which speaks about the wood of God being sharp and I think, to me I think this is such a key phrase it's chapter 4 where is it? 4 verse 12 where it says this chapter 4 verse 12 for the wood of God is living and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword piercing and I think I've probably said last time revelation is always piercing revelation is never a blunt instrument it's never a felling axe or something you go charging in that way it's never a sledgehammer it's always, revelation is always something which is sharp and two-edged and which pierces that's to say it is pinpoint it's never vague I have known people in the past maybe you have as well I've known people in the past who've actually been in the company of people who've said to them well, I've got a discernment there's something wrong with you but I can't tell you what it is now that is wicked that is absolutely wicked God will never handle people like that God will always put his finger absolutely on this one he will always pierce it he will nail it he will prick them in their heart he will nail it to the spot so that you know what it is and that's how revelation works revelation is always absolutely pinpoint accurate and the person then knows that God is handling this thing and he goes on to say here and he mentions a couple of things that are difficult to divide between he says piercing even to the division of soul and spirit now again there are some people who judge others and they say well he's not very spiritual what he does is really very soul-rich he's singing is soul-rich he's preaching is soul-rich maybe you don't move in the circles that I'm walking in but you get this it's wrong it's only the word of God that can make these distinctions and it doesn't count as general generic rules and laws it doesn't count as rules of thumb it doesn't count as if it's like this it's probably this and this it always comes absolutely pinpoint so that you can divide between soul and spirit otherwise you can't only the word of God can divide between soul and spirit only the word of God can divide between joints and marrow and discern between thoughts and intents of the heart these are key things we're going to pause now for a minute