Scriptural Thoughts: Uncovering the Codes to God's Plan

By Raymond G Cross

Do creation days reveal God’s future plans? Was the flood universal or localized? When God said, “Let there be light,” did he foretell the incarnation? 
Is there a connection between Noah’s sons and the Middle East today?
It turns out the Bible is one of the most misunderstood and mysterious books ever wr

• Language: English
• Publisher: Global Summit House
• Release date: Aug 21, 2019
• ISBN: 9781646699834

Raymond G Cross

REV. RAYMOND G. CROSS was a design engineer for IBM during the sixties and seventies. He was involved with advanced technology pointing to new products, printers, copiers, imaging, and ways of placing information on paper. In 1965, he was transferred to the new Boulder plant, located in Niwot, Colorado. Niwot was named for an Indian chief and translates to 'left handed.' It was here that his life changed forever. One cold January morning, a minister of the Gospel visited. Pastor James Maxwell introduced him, his wife, and son into receiving Jesus as Lord and Savior. They were born again. He was thirtyeight years old and his so called intellectual, engineering background made him very skeptical. Diligent study soon convinced him the Bible was the inerrant truth. Continued workstudy lead him to understand God's wonderful word more, and he took early retirement from IBM to attend Reformed Seminary in Clinton, MS. In 1987 he graduated with a Master of Divinity from the Reformed Seminary. He went on to minister in the Presbyterian Church in America for over twenty-seven years in Sardis, Mississippi.

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Scriptural Thoughts

What does the Bible say to you?

Rev. Raymond G. Cross

Copyright © Rev. Raymond G. Cross.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by reviewers, who may quote brief passages in a review.

ISBN: 978-1-64669-984-1 (Paperback Edition)

ISBN: 978-1-64669-985-8 (Hardcover Edition)

ISBN: 978-1-64669-983-4 (E-book Edition)

Some characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Book Ordering Information

Phone Number: 347-901-4929 or 347-901-4920

Email: [e-mail]

Global Summit House

www.globalsummithouse.com

Printed in the United States of America

Dedication

This book is dedicated to The Lord Jesus Christ,

Who is God The Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

My prayer is that He will use this work to glorify Himself.

My heartfelt thanks to the Reverend James D. Maxwell and his wife Helen for introducing me, my late wife Ann, and my son, Randy, to the Lord of creation and Salvation.

I also thank my beloved late wife Jo, for understanding, help and patience with me as this book was written.

Last, but not least by any means,

I thank Jack Phillips and Mary Ellen Joslin,

for tireless work in checking this manuscript for errors, correcting grammar and English.

Contents

Dedication

A Note from the Author

Preface

Overview

Chapter 1: Day One

Chapter 2: Day Two

Chapter 3: Day Three

Chapter 4: Day Four

Chapter 5: Day Five

Chapter 6: Day Six

Chapter 7: Day Seven

Chapter 8: Expulsion from the Garden of Eden

Chapter 9: Fifteen Cubits

Chapter 10: The Confusion of Tongues

Chapter 11: Supernatural Faith

Chapter 12: The Bride

Chapter 13: Jehovah-jireh (The Lord’s Provision)

Chapter 14: Whom do you choose?

Chapter 15: Born - Two Distinct Natures

Chapter 16: The Cryptogram Scriptures

Scripture Thoughts

A Note from the Author

From Engineer-Scientist to Minister

My life story is most average and uneventful until 1966, when my life changed dramatically. But allow me to provide some background.

After schooling at the University of California, I started work at IBM in 1959. I was a design engineer and chosen to work in a newly formed department called advanced Technology in San Jose, California.

Our work was at the forefront of the electronic technology business in computers, printers, copiers, photo-optic devices and many new ideas involving most high tech machines in use at that time. It was very satisfying work, but in 1965 I transferred to Niwot, Colorado, where IBM was building the Boulder, Colorado plant. Our job was to help set up new laboratories for this new site and to develop special machines for the business.

One reason we left California was that my son was about to start school and there was evidence of drug use at his school; even at the elementary level. I’m sure it is an even greater problem today.

My work in Colorado was interesting and rewarding, so we bought an acre of ground and built a house on Gun Barrel Hill, just outside of Niwot, with a beautiful view of the mountains and valley. Niwot translates as ‘Left Hand’ and is named after an Indian chief who was left handed. We moved in our new home on December 30, 1965.

On January first, 1966, at about 10:00 o’clock in the morning my life made a dramatic change. A man came knocking on our door. It was a cold, blustery morning, so we invited our visitor to come inside. All our lives changed forever on that morning. Pastor James Maxwell of the General Association of Regular Baptists introduced my wife, my son, and me to Jesus.

Understand that I was 38 years old with a scientific engineering background and skeptical of much of what he told us about God and salvation. Despite my personal intellectual skepticism, we received Jesus as Lord. Pastor Maxwell would visit once or twice a week to talk about the Bible.

Our son attended after school classes that Pastor Maxwell and his wife held at their home. Our families became friends and the pastor built a small church in our area.

Although I had made a spiritual commitment, my scientific background forced me to question some things about the Bible. I decided to see for myself if all of this was true.

I read the Bible and everything I could learn about it. I absorbed many archeological facts and findings, read many commentaries, and I studied diligently. I was reluctant to give up my knowledge, my thoughts and many half-truths that lingered tenaciously.

When my mind caught up with the spiritual commitment I had made, I was fully committed, spiritually and intellectually. I became a Sunday school teacher and actually filled in preaching for Pastor Maxwell on occasion.

IBM transferred me to Florida in 1970, with the same type of work, but because we could not find a General Association of Baptist Church, we attended a Southern Baptist Church for awhile. This church did not suit us.

We found a small independent church where we became involved, preached, and taught with the possibility of being ordained by this pastor to take over his church when he retired.

This didn’t work out either, so we started going to a Christian and Missionary Alliance church in Lake Worth, Florida. I became a Sunday school teacher, youth minister and radio announcer and preached occasionally for this church.

In December of 1981, my wife died of an aneurism. After a period of time, I remarried a Jewish Christian lady, Doba Mendelson, who was Presbyterian. We attended the Lake Worth Presbyterian Church where I again became very involved and more interested in ordination.

In 1984 I took early retirement from IBM, having accomplished an Outstanding Contribution Award for work on printers and a First and Second Invention Certificate due to 25 patent publications and one patent for the card reader. This card reader is the one used for credit cards today.

I attended the Presbyterian Reformed Seminary in Jackson, Mississippi, graduated with my Masters Degree in 1987 and was called to the Sardis Presbyterian Church, Sardis, Mississippi.

In 1991, my Jewish wife and I went to Japan as missionaries and church planter. My wife died in 1994 in Japan of an aneurism, so I returned home. Losing my second wife due to the same cause of death as my first wife was very difficult for me.

My missionary wife Doba and I had said that we would try to visit all of our prayer and support partners, so I tried to do that alone, but it became difficult traveling from Florida.

I went to Sardis, Mississippi and stayed with a male widower parishioner from the Sardis church. It was during this time that I met and married Jo Eddie Adams from Sardis. We had 18 very happy years, the majority of them in semi-retirement, preaching and teaching God’s word. The last five years I have been the interim pastor to the Sardis Presbyterian Church until Jo died December 31st of 2011.

My life has had its challenges, but I have to say that God has been very good to me and I praise His name.

* * * * *

Preface

The Bible is an amazing book! It is a book which will not be totally understood until we get to heaven. It is a book which tells us where we came from, where we are going and who we will eventually be with, in eternity.

This wonderful book also tells us about God, our creator. Without Him telling us about Himself, we would never know anything about Him, because man can only conjecture what and who He is. Many false images and projections have been made concerning Him, but they are inconceivably small ideas of how wonderful and majestic He really is, so He remains somewhat of a mystery.

To gain wisdom and know more about all things, man must seek the truth, to learn more about the only God, the creator of all things. Man desperately needs God to survive, not only in normal life, but even more so in spiritual life.

This book is written for students of the Bible and it is hopeful that new enlightenment will come from some of these thoughts. My wish is that readers will be stimulated to go further with God’s knowledge, and may God receive all the glory. Non-believers could very well benefit from this work also, if they were to read it with open mind and my hope is that some do.

It is an interesting phenomenon that Gentiles, accepting Jesus as Messiah, become more Jewish as they are grafted into the Family of God. Contra wise, the Hebrew person who receives Jesus as Messiah becomes more Jewish also.

Paul explains this happening:

"I am talking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I take pride in my ministry in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them. For if their rejection brought reconciliation to the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?

"If the part of the dough offered as first fruits is holy, then the whole batch is holy; if the root is holy, so are the branches. If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches.

If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. You will say then, ‘Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.’ Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but tremble. For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.¹

This book is a collection of sermons the writer has given at various times, with enlargement of various individual thoughts concerning some Scriptures. Someone has said, Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, but because we adopt for ourselves a better mannerism, characteristic or idea from someone does not imply a form of plagiarism. This is done to improve ourselves and is a learning process to enlarge our thinking and actions.

Consequently, most all educational progress is derived, based on past experience of individuals who have, in our eyes, excelled in their respective fields. Thus, by using others learning and experiences, we can progress in all ways, because someone else’s experience and wisdom shows us how to go forward and what not to do! It is my hope that some of these concept ideas will be of use to further your life in gaining more understanding of God and His Word to work for your behalf.

May God receive all of the glory and honor due Him. God bless!

* * * * *

Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION, copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, International Bible Society, used by permission of Zondervan Bible Publishers. The Holy Bible: New International Version, 1995, Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc. (Romans 11:13-21)

* * * * *

Overview

The First Seven Days

~ An Outline of Man’s History ~

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. ¹

* * * * *

God usually gives man a fore-view, a pre-type or foreshadow of what is to come in the Scriptures. This Biblical information is usually then elaborated on and completed only by a thorough study