When Lamech Starts Bragging
In church this morning, the pastors sermon was about the Biblical concept of forgiveness. One of the supplemental texts he used to emphasize a point within his sermon was this text found in Genesis 4:23-24 (New King James Version listed below):
Then Lamech said to his wives:
“Adah and Zillah, hear my voice;
Wives of Lamech, listen to my speech!
For I have killed a man for wounding me,
Even a young man for hurting me.If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold,
Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.â€
Where my pastor was using this Scripture to make a point about the subject of vengeance as it relates to the overall scope of forgiveness, another thought immediately crossed into my mind that I wrote down on a scrap piece of paper to ponder later on (Because my pastor’s sermon was something I needed to hear):
Lamech comes across like most modern-day televangelists.
As I pondered this thought on the way home and after reading Genesis 4:23-24 again, I deeply felt and started to see more and more parallels between many of the cocky televangelists on television today and the cockiness displayed in Lamech’s words.
(1): Look at the number of wives: When you look further back in Genesis 4 at verse nineteen we see something of significance mentioned here.
Then Lamech took for himself two wives…..
In fact, this was the first ever mention of polygamy. Adam and his descendants to this point only had one wife and now we see Lamech having two at the same time. Look at many of the televangelists and research them and see how many spouses they have had. Even though they were not married to two spouses simultaneously, in most cases there was already ‘something going on’ with the ‘other woman’ during marriage number one that caused divorce and the other woman became the new wife. It was two emotional, and some cases physical relationships going on simultaneously.
(2): Their bragging for seeing people die because they attacked them: In verse twenty-three, we see these statements made:
For I have killed a man for wounding me,
Even a young man for hurting me.
See how many televangelists brag about the people who have died physically and/spiritually for ‘disagreeing with them’, for ‘exposing them’, for coming against the ‘annoying’ and doing the ‘profit$’ harm. I used to hear it all the time in pentecostalism how many families that ‘God broke up’ all because these parents came against them.
Worse was the fact that it was propagated that if you one day reached ‘the next level’ (send them money, pray harder, etc…), you can one day earn the same right to have God do the same atrocities / vengeances / murders, etc. on your enemies because of what ‘your enemies’ did against you.
(3): Their bragging for seeing worse punishments done to their enemies than seen by the enemies of their predecessor preachers (aka: fathers of their faith): In verse twenty-three, we see these statements made:
If Cain shall be avenged sevenfold,
Then Lamech seventy-sevenfold.
The reference to Cain and ‘sevenfold’ is found mentioned in verse fifteen of Chapter 4 after God cursed him and declaired Cain a ‘fugitive and a vagabond’ and that God would punish the man who would succeed in killing Cain sevenfold. Lamech’s words of “seventy-sevenfold” is in a spirit of bragging but implied that there would be a worse vengeance against anyone who attacked him.
Doesn’t this sound like the same concept of Lamech and the same spirit of vengeance / murder that spews out of many televangelists mouths when people come out and call them out?
There is a huge problem here. Where the televangelists justify this same spirit of vengeance / murder by using the oft-repeated ‘…touch not mine anointed and do not the prophets harm…’ as coming from God, the problem here is that the spirit of vengeance / murder propagated from the mouth of a televangelist comes from the root of a murderer that stemmed from a spirit of jealousy traceable back to Cain who murdered Abel for providing the acceptable sacrifice pleasing to God.
It comes from a televangelist who emotionally and spiritually murders a true worshipper, prophet, evangelist, apostle, etc. for proclaiming the real truth and bringing forth real correction, for seeking and saving the lost, for setting the captives free, and for manifesting the true signs that follow them (in my name they shall cast out devils….)
It comes from a brother killing their own brother….
It manifests when the ‘cursed of the ground’ is offered up to God as the sacrifice and the problem is that the wrong blood is being wrongly shed to try to ‘atone’ for someone else’s sin.
It comes from the small church very few people attend that looks for and publicizes the flaws in the church down the street that grew because of obedience to the Lord.
It manifests in a ‘third wave revivalist’ mindset as these self-appointed mega apostles resent the sacrifices brought forth by the church leaders of the past claiming that their ‘dead spirit of religion’ is ‘holding up’ God from moving on earth to reestablish God’s Government, end abortion, marketplace ministries, and seven mountain mentalities.
It manifests when the ones who are ‘attacking them’ are deemed as ‘resenters’ when in reality, the spirit of vengeance / murder is the driving force that causes them to ‘resent’ any true worshipper, prophet, evangelist, apostle, etc. for proclaiming the real truth and bringing forth real correction.
It manifests in a theo-political mindset that believes they are going to be able to ‘take dominion’ over the earth and re set back up the justice of God to where God can come back again and get rid of their perceived enemies and set up the official state religion.
In this environment, we do not see the Lion and the Lamb. We see instead lust, lasciviousness, and the mentality of Lamech. We do not see repentance nor do we see a contrite heart. We instead see an arrogance that really believes that these leaders are more anointed and more powerful than the men of the Bible to the point where they really believe that God will punish their detractors using worse methods because they see themselves as being more important to God and even worse, God can not do anything on Earth without them.
The Lakeland Revival tried to bring the mentality of Lamech forth via an covert and deceptive manner via the now famous Todd Bentley commissioning service. Lakeland in many ways was the re-enactment of the mentality of Cain (Bob Jones, Paul Cain, C. Peter Wagner, Kansas City Prophets, etc.) who despised the true Abel blood sacrifices passed down to the younger generation possessing the mentality of Lamech (Todd Bentley, Patricia King, Bill Johnson, Che Ahn, etc.) who despises everyone who gets in their way. What we saw during the now famous Todd Bentley commissioning service (along with ‘Stacey Shakems’ bobbing her head like Linda Blair in the Exorcist), was the ‘coming out’ of the new self-appointed leaders announcing to us to get out of their way, they were going to take control of the church, reestablish God’s government, and that they would be viewed as being the ‘real church’ of the ‘real God’.
The mentality of Lamech resents someone else being called ‘the true people of God’. The mentality of Lamech resents the toil that the martyrs died for to promote the Christianity as portrayed in the book of Acts because the martyrs are seen as the ‘fathers of old religion’ while they want to be seen as ‘the new thing, the new way, and ‘the new and improved’ way we do church.
The mentality of Lamech to this day still wants to offer up something that was built upon the foundations of the cursed and the ground instead of accepting the ultimate blood sacrifice that Jesus gave us via his death on Calvary. The mentality of Lamech believes ‘vengeance is theirs’ when the Lord states that ‘vengeance is mine’.
The mentality of Lamech wants to offer up their ‘tentmaking’, their livestock, their flutes and harps, and their craftsman / metalworking industries (Lamech’s children’s trades) calling it ‘marketplace ministries’ when God wants us to just obey and go out and fulfill the Great Commission and seek and save the lost bring them until salvation and repentance.
It is of interest to see that after Genesis 4:24, we see no further mention of Cain’s descendants and Lamech (the Lamech mentioned in Genesis 5:25-31 is not the same person). It is not really known if they died out at this point of if they multiplied (and never documented) and were ultimately destroyed in the great flood as told in Genesis 6-8. But we can clearly see the point here.
As Cain, Lamech, and the rest of Cain’s vengeful descendants eventually dies. God wants the jealousy, resentment, bragging, vengeance, taunting, and murder that may still exist inside of us dead and inoperative.
God wants us to be free from being the tracker of what happens to those who have wronged us. God wants us to be free from thinking that we must be the ‘Holy Hitman’ and get rid of God’s enemies for him. God wants us to be free, period and one of the many ways of obtaining the fullness of life in Christ is to let those hurts, wrongs, and desires for ‘God to get them’ loose to where you can go onward, forward, and toward a productive life. Instead of the wrath and vengeance manifested in Lamech. God wants us to act in love, freedom, and compassion towards those we may disagree with or who may have wronged us.
All we can do is be forgiving at last, and let it go….
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- Christian Thought of The Day
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Ask yourself this question. Abraham committed adultery and left the poor girl to fend for herself. Lamech had many wives! (Smacks of a cult to me) pilate sold Jesus down the river when he thought he was out numbered! Jesus was hung! mary stood and watched her son die. Why then do we revere the bible as the answer to our sins? Its full of them. SO WHAT IS IT SAYING. Beware hell hath no fury like a woman scorned (Jezebel) and so on and so on. Learn from the social statement it gives us, exactly what your dealing with
[to the comment above]
Huh???