ONE HEARTBEAT AWAY -PART 58

                                       ONE HEARTBEAT AWAY

  PART 58

(Mark Cahill's Book)

Sixth Commandment

Thou shalt not kill
(Exodus 20:13)


Traditionally this commandment is presented 
as "Thou shalt not kill,"  but the Hebrew 
words for "kill" and "murder"  are different. 
In this commandment the word used is 
"murder."

Why is that difference important?  Because the Bible says we have the right to defend our lives, our families, our homes, and our nations. Even 
if we have to kill the people attacking us.

It is not murder to kill someone who is trying to kill you. You are actually preventing a murder, 
by stopping the murderer.

The first murder recorded  in history occurred  when one of Adam's sons killed his brother 
Abel.

That was the first murder, but it certainly 
wasn't the last. There are an average of 44 murders a day in America. Up to 4,000  unborn babies are murdered by being torn apart (aborted) in America each day. Columbine High School, 
Hitler, Saddem Hussein. It is amazing the 
murder we see around us.

We see tens of thousands of unjust killings during our lifetime, portrayed on T.V.  in movies, and on video games. We see so many  "acted out"  murders in the media, that it doesn't seem to 
have much effect on us. We seem to have become desensitized to it all. 

The bar section of any town always draws interesting people. I was hanging out one night 
in the bar area of Denver, talking to people about God, and I walked up to three folks to get into a conversation. One of the guys wanted me to go into a liquor store, to buy some alcohol for the group. That wasn't going to happen, so he and 
the girl went looking for someone else to help them.

But one guy stayed behind because he wanted to talk with me. During the conversation, I asked 
him if he had ever sinned. He told me "yes,"  but then he asked me "what do you mean by sin?"

I said, " well like the Ten Commandments."

"Oh, I've broken all of those. "

"Have you ever killed anyone?"  I asked.

Very nonchalantly he answered "Yah."

"Ten people?"

He replied, "I don't know how many!"

He told me that he had grown up in a gang, in Long Beach, California, and he truly didn't 
know how many people he had killed.

When he was fourteen years old, he was 
shooting baskets in his driveway, when some gang members drove by and shot his girlfriend. She bled to death in his arms. " She was the one that I knew I was going to marry, and have kids with, and she died in my arms." 

Can you imagine having to go through that at fourteen years of age?  Can you imagine not knowing how many people you have killed?  
Well that's something you won't have to worry about, right?
Well let's see.

Jesus said:

"Ye have heard that it was said by them of 
old time,  Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: 

But I say unto you, that whosoever is angry 
with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment, and whosoever shall 
say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hellfire. 
(Matthew 5 :21-22)

And John writes of this :

Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: 
and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.
(1st John: 3-15) 

Therefore if you have been angry or hateful  toward someone, it is the same as murder in 
the eyes of Almighty God. Why is that?  God checks our insides as well as our outsides.  
He sees our thoughts as well as our actions. 
That is why all of us are in trouble by this standard.

Ask yourself this question, have I broken this commandment, by God's standard, by being 
angry or hateful toward someone, even once in 
my lifetime?

Next post 21st November.