July 22, 2025 • 8 mins
What is it that moves politics, economics, cultural changes and individuals? Is it a force, a spirit, or physical being? Is the Holy Spirit the One who is influencing and controlling history?
More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com
This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).
Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and
our series on the New TestamentFramework.
Today a smaller, bite-sizedpiece from the larger lesson.
We hope you enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
We see that from the second line of evidence, that
he's not a force, is from theinfluence of a spirit, okay.
So I just want to talk ingeneral about the influence of.
So I just want to talk ingeneral about the influence of
spirit, both in a wind sense aswell as in, like, demonic sense,
(00:33):
all these and, of course, theHoly Spirit and the sense of the
Holy Spirit himself.
So in John 3, we have the storyof Nicodemus, right, nicodemus
comes.
He comes when he comes at night, okay, well, he didn't want to
be seen, right.
And he has a specific question.
He's saying in verse 2, we knowthat you've come from God as a
(00:56):
teacher.
No one can do these signs thatyou do unless God is with him.
I mean, he recognized that thesigns that he was doing were
what we call messianic miracles,like they were not just
miracles on the order of thingsthat, like Moses was able to do.
Okay, this is something beyondthat.
(01:17):
Or, elijah, these are thingsbeyond that.
Okay, he recognized that.
And Jesus answered and said tohim truly, truly, I say to you,
unless one is born again, hecannot see the kingdom of God.
Okay, you know no entranceunless you're regenerated.
You have to be a regeneratedindividual to enter the kingdom
of God.
To see it, nicodemus said tohim how can a man be born when
(01:38):
he's old?
He can't enter a second timeinto his mother's womb and be
born.
Can he and Jesus?
Come on, guy?
Jesus answered, truly, truly, Isay to you, unless one is born
of water and the Spirit, hecannot enter into the kingdom of
God.
And we're not here to you know,reflect on that concept.
But that's not water, baptism,for whatever it's worth.
That which is born of the fleshis flesh and that which is born
(02:00):
of the Spirit is spirit.
Do not be amazed that I said toyou, you must be born again.
And then he gives thisillustration with wind.
See, regeneration is a work ofthe Holy Spirit, right, and he's
just mentioned the Spirit.
That which is born of theSpirit is Spirit.
He says the wind blows where itwishes and you hear the sound
of it, but you don't know whereit comes from and you don't know
(02:22):
where it's going.
So is everyone who's born ofthe Spirit.
In other words, the Spirit hasthis background work that is
illustrated by the work of wind.
Again, we don't know where windcomes from, we don't know where
it's going.
But we see the effects thereofright.
Especially as this fall comes.
We'll have some windy days andthe leaves will blow off the
(02:43):
trees, and then everybody willbe out in their yards picking up
leaves, right?
This is all due to thisbehind-the-scenes thing we call
wind, and so that's just anillustration.
Now let's go a little bitfurther and we'll turn to Daniel
, chapter 7.
Daniel, chapter 7.
(03:04):
In the Bible, nations are setup as, basically, water.
We are viewed as water.
Water is something that's veryunstable.
Of course, you know this fromyour own experience.
(03:26):
But in the New Testament you'dhave the Sea of Galilee, and if
you've ever been there, you'llsee the hills on the east side,
and the winds will sweep overthose hills and down onto this
lake and cause quite a tumult onthe water, big waves, and
that's the story.
You know, jesus is asleep inthe boat and they're like how
(03:47):
can he sleep, you know?
And he wakes up and he rebukesthe winds, the spirits, and it
becomes perfectly calm.
The waters become calm, but thenations are viewed in the Bible
as like bodies of water, whichare very unstable and are easily
tossed right and caused to turninto confusion, and here's a
(04:12):
section that discusses thatconcept.
Daniel 7, verse2.
Daniel said I was looking in myvision by night and behold, the
four winds of heaven werestirring up the great sea.
The four winds of heaven werestirring up the great sea.
See, the great sea is a well.
What's the great sea?
Well, now you have verse 3,.
Four great beasts are coming upfrom the sea and they're
(04:34):
different from one another.
We know these if you've studiedthis chapter.
We know these four great beastsare the four great Gentile
kingdoms or empires Babylon,medo-persia, greece and Rome
right that will rule during thetimes of the Gentiles and
they're viewed as coming up outof the sea, the seas themselves
being the nations of the world.
And so these are the four greatnations of the world rising up
(04:57):
and they're being stirred up bythe four winds of heaven.
And then he goes on to describethese four beasts.
And they're all kingdoms thatsuppress man and oppress man and
hurt man.
They're not good for man welive in.
So spirit influences or windinfluences, causing humanity to
(05:22):
go through all sorts offluctuations.
We see these forces in theeconomy, in politics, in
military.
We just saw yesterday inmilitary.
You know, if you ask the realquestions, what I call the
metaphysical questions, that's,the questions about what's
behind reality, that is,structuring the reality.
That we see, the physics, themetaphysics behind the physics
(05:46):
that we can see.
What are the forces behind?
You know, the militaryengagement against Israel, for
example, which is, in Muslims'mind, war since 1948.
Not a bunch of separate wars,but they view it as war from
1948.
What's behind all that, thismilitary maneuvers?
(06:11):
Is it just humanity?
Is it just what we see?
Or there are spiritual forcesof darkness behind the military
machine?
What about politics?
I think somebody almost laughed.
(06:31):
Is this just humans or is theresomething more?
Are there spiritual forces ofdarkness behind this as well?
Daniel 10 seems to indicatethere are spiritual.
There's spiritual warfaretaking place between good angels
and bad angels over politicalrulers and nations.
(06:56):
Daniel chapter 10, over Iran,what we call ancient Persia.
Right, it's not just human.
These forces, these spirits areacting upon them, but they're
unseen like the wind.
But you see the effects thereof.
I mean, who can predict theeconomy?
(07:17):
It's behind the economy.
Who can predict?
If all the people in financeand the market really knew what
they were talking about,wouldn't they all be
billionaires?
Which means what they don'tknow, what they're talking about
, they can't predict the market.
(07:38):
Why not?
Is it because there are unseenspiritual forces that are behind
all the things that we see inthis world?
So there are these influences,what you might call metaphors,
but spirits okay and the humanrace is viewed like this
(08:00):
unstable body of water that'sbeing tossed to and fro.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with
Jeremy Thomas.
If you would like to see thevisuals that went along with
today's sermon, you can findthose on Rumble and on YouTube
under Spokane Bible Church.
That is where Jeremy is thepastor and teacher.
We hope you found today'slesson productive and useful in
(08:23):
growing closer to God andwalking more obediently with Him
.
If you found this podcast to beuseful and helpful, then please
consider rating us in yourfavorite podcast app, and until
next time, we hope you have ablessed and wonderful day.
Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and
our series on the New TestamentFramework.
Today a smaller, bite-sizedpiece from the larger lesson.
We hope you enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
We see that from the second line of evidence, that
he's not a force, is from theinfluence of a spirit, okay.
So I just want to talk ingeneral about the influence of.
So I just want to talk ingeneral about the influence of
spirit, both in a wind sense aswell as in, like, demonic sense,
(00:33):
all these and, of course, theHoly Spirit and the sense of the
Holy Spirit himself.
So in John 3, we have the storyof Nicodemus, right, nicodemus
comes.
He comes when he comes at night, okay, well, he didn't want to
be seen, right.
And he has a specific question.
He's saying in verse 2, we knowthat you've come from God as a
(00:56):
teacher.
No one can do these signs thatyou do unless God is with him.
I mean, he recognized that thesigns that he was doing were
what we call messianic miracles,like they were not just
miracles on the order of thingsthat, like Moses was able to do.
Okay, this is something beyondthat.
(01:17):
Or, elijah, these are thingsbeyond that.
Okay, he recognized that.
And Jesus answered and said tohim truly, truly, I say to you,
unless one is born again, hecannot see the kingdom of God.
Okay, you know no entranceunless you're regenerated.
You have to be a regeneratedindividual to enter the kingdom
of God.
To see it, nicodemus said tohim how can a man be born when
(01:38):
he's old?
He can't enter a second timeinto his mother's womb and be
born.
Can he and Jesus?
Come on, guy?
Jesus answered, truly, truly, Isay to you, unless one is born
of water and the Spirit, hecannot enter into the kingdom of
God.
And we're not here to you know,reflect on that concept.
But that's not water, baptism,for whatever it's worth.
That which is born of the fleshis flesh and that which is born
(02:00):
of the Spirit is spirit.
Do not be amazed that I said toyou, you must be born again.
And then he gives thisillustration with wind.
See, regeneration is a work ofthe Holy Spirit, right, and he's
just mentioned the Spirit.
That which is born of theSpirit is Spirit.
He says the wind blows where itwishes and you hear the sound
of it, but you don't know whereit comes from and you don't know
(02:22):
where it's going.
So is everyone who's born ofthe Spirit.
In other words, the Spirit hasthis background work that is
illustrated by the work of wind.
Again, we don't know where windcomes from, we don't know where
it's going.
But we see the effects thereofright.
Especially as this fall comes.
We'll have some windy days andthe leaves will blow off the
(02:43):
trees, and then everybody willbe out in their yards picking up
leaves, right?
This is all due to thisbehind-the-scenes thing we call
wind, and so that's just anillustration.
Now let's go a little bitfurther and we'll turn to Daniel
, chapter 7.
Daniel, chapter 7.
(03:04):
In the Bible, nations are setup as, basically, water.
We are viewed as water.
Water is something that's veryunstable.
Of course, you know this fromyour own experience.
(03:26):
But in the New Testament you'dhave the Sea of Galilee, and if
you've ever been there, you'llsee the hills on the east side,
and the winds will sweep overthose hills and down onto this
lake and cause quite a tumult onthe water, big waves, and
that's the story.
You know, jesus is asleep inthe boat and they're like how
(03:47):
can he sleep, you know?
And he wakes up and he rebukesthe winds, the spirits, and it
becomes perfectly calm.
The waters become calm, but thenations are viewed in the Bible
as like bodies of water, whichare very unstable and are easily
tossed right and caused to turninto confusion, and here's a
(04:12):
section that discusses thatconcept.
Daniel 7, verse2.
Daniel said I was looking in myvision by night and behold, the
four winds of heaven werestirring up the great sea.
The four winds of heaven werestirring up the great sea.
See, the great sea is a well.
What's the great sea?
Well, now you have verse 3,.
Four great beasts are coming upfrom the sea and they're
(04:34):
different from one another.
We know these if you've studiedthis chapter.
We know these four great beastsare the four great Gentile
kingdoms or empires Babylon,medo-persia, greece and Rome
right that will rule during thetimes of the Gentiles and
they're viewed as coming up outof the sea, the seas themselves
being the nations of the world.
And so these are the four greatnations of the world rising up
(04:57):
and they're being stirred up bythe four winds of heaven.
And then he goes on to describethese four beasts.
And they're all kingdoms thatsuppress man and oppress man and
hurt man.
They're not good for man welive in.
So spirit influences or windinfluences, causing humanity to
(05:22):
go through all sorts offluctuations.
We see these forces in theeconomy, in politics, in
military.
We just saw yesterday inmilitary.
You know, if you ask the realquestions, what I call the
metaphysical questions, that's,the questions about what's
behind reality, that is,structuring the reality.
That we see, the physics, themetaphysics behind the physics
(05:46):
that we can see.
What are the forces behind?
You know, the militaryengagement against Israel, for
example, which is, in Muslims'mind, war since 1948.
Not a bunch of separate wars,but they view it as war from
1948.
What's behind all that, thismilitary maneuvers?
(06:11):
Is it just humanity?
Is it just what we see?
Or there are spiritual forcesof darkness behind the military
machine?
What about politics?
I think somebody almost laughed.
(06:31):
Is this just humans or is theresomething more?
Are there spiritual forces ofdarkness behind this as well?
Daniel 10 seems to indicatethere are spiritual.
There's spiritual warfaretaking place between good angels
and bad angels over politicalrulers and nations.
(06:56):
Daniel chapter 10, over Iran,what we call ancient Persia.
Right, it's not just human.
These forces, these spirits areacting upon them, but they're
unseen like the wind.
But you see the effects thereof.
I mean, who can predict theeconomy?
(07:17):
It's behind the economy.
Who can predict?
If all the people in financeand the market really knew what
they were talking about,wouldn't they all be
billionaires?
Which means what they don'tknow, what they're talking about
, they can't predict the market.
(07:38):
Why not?
Is it because there are unseenspiritual forces that are behind
all the things that we see inthis world?
So there are these influences,what you might call metaphors,
but spirits okay and the humanrace is viewed like this
(08:00):
unstable body of water that'sbeing tossed to and fro.
Speaker 1 (08:03):
Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with
Jeremy Thomas.
If you would like to see thevisuals that went along with
today's sermon, you can findthose on Rumble and on YouTube
under Spokane Bible Church.
That is where Jeremy is thepastor and teacher.
We hope you found today'slesson productive and useful in
(08:23):
growing closer to God andwalking more obediently with Him
.
If you found this podcast to beuseful and helpful, then please
consider rating us in yourfavorite podcast app, and until
next time, we hope you have ablessed and wonderful day.
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