Rightly Dividing
with Deductive Reasoning

Why This Teaching Exists

The Problem with Reading the Bible

There is a special problem that comes upon people who actually read the Bible — especially those who read it from cover to cover. When you get into the Old Testament, you encounter passages so shockingly evil that they rock your world. Baby killing. Genocide. The command to slaughter every living thing, spare only the virgin girls. Starvation so severe that parents ate their own children. And all of it done, according to the text, in the name of the LORD your God.

This is not an abstract theological problem. It happened to me personally. I came to God first as a healer. I was addicted to drugs and alcohol — I had a deeply sinful life — and when I finally turned to him, he instantly set me free. Instantly. Despite 40 years of rejection on my part. Because of that, I fell in love with him. God is good. God is merciful. God heals. I knew that from experience.

Then I got into Bible study that was focused heavily on the Old Testament. And I started reading. And the more I read, the more disgusted I became. I would literally get physically sick reading those passages. One day I threw the Bible down and cried out: "God — how could you do that? Did you do that? Is the devil the God of the Old Testament?"

That very night, he started giving me answers. And this teaching series is the result of years of those answers. Amen.

Here is the core tension that destroys faith for so many people. These two scriptures are in direct, absolute contradiction:

You cannot hold both of these positions at the same time. You have to choose. And the way you choose determines everything — your love for God, your faith in him, your ability to receive his goodwill. That is why we must learn to rightly divide. Amen.

What Is at Stake

Your love for God depends on your image of him. You cannot truly love someone you believe is a reformed baby killer, a warmonger, a torturer, a fire-burner. When you think that God does those things — or used to do those things — you go through psychological gymnastics trying to tuck it away and not think about it. But when you actually think about it, you cannot love someone with those things on their resume. We don't love evil. We love good. And so having a correct image of God — seeing him as purely, entirely, unchangeably good — is foundational to everything. It is foundational to love. It is foundational to faith. It is the starting line of the entire Christian life.

Second Corinthians 3–4

There Is a Veil Over the Old Testament

This is not Bobby's idea. This is not a theory. The Holy Spirit told us this directly, twice, in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. And once you grasp this, the confusion clears up immediately.

The Holy Spirit says — plainly, without qualification — that when you read the Old Testament, your mind is blinded. There is a veil that lies on your heart. You cannot see clearly. And notice what it says: until this day. That means right now. Today. When you pick up your Bible and read the Old Testament tonight, a veil is on your heart. Your understanding is obscured by design.

Here is who put that veil there: the god of this age — the devil. He did it intentionally and strategically to block people from believing, to block them from seeing the glory of Christ, to block salvation. When you read the Old Testament and come away thinking God is half evil, the devil has succeeded in exactly what he intended. He has blinded you to the goodness of God.

Two Reasons for the Veil

Look at every major religion that lacks Christ — Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism — and you will see the same pattern: every good thing and every evil thing comes from God. That is the natural man's view of the universe. There is no devil in their thinking, only one Supreme Being who does both. The Old Testament was written by natural men with exactly that worldview. That is why you find both the love of God and the terror of the devil attributed to the same name throughout it.

Proof of the Veil: Same Event, Two Authors

This is the single most undeniable proof that there is a veil over the Old Testament. The same event is recorded twice — once in 2 Samuel and once in 1 Chronicles, hundreds of years apart — and the two accounts do not agree on who did it:

One passage says the LORD did it. The other passage says Satan did it. Same event. This is not a theological argument — it is in your Bible. Take a screenshot, open your Bible, and look. The veil is right there in black and white. Your mind is blinded when you read the Old Testament, just as the Holy Spirit said. The only honest response is to rightly divide. Amen.

The Answer to Every Question

Jesus Is the True Image of the Father

If we cannot trust the Old Testament to give us an accurate picture of God, where do we look? The answer is simple and it is everywhere in the New Testament: you look at Jesus. Jesus came to earth specifically, in part, to reveal the Father to us. He is not a pointer to God — he is the picture of God. The portrait. The exact representation.

The phrase express image in the Greek is charaktēr — the same word used for a die that stamps a perfect impression into wax. Jesus is the exact character of the Father stamped into human form. He is not a rough approximation. He is not a representation with some differences. He is the carbon copy, the exact image, the perfect replica.

Philip asked to see the Father and Jesus was almost exasperated: Have I been with you so long and you still don't understand? If you've seen Me, you've seen the Father. This is Jesus's own declaration. It is not a metaphor. It is the definitive statement about how to know God. You want to know the Father? Open the Gospels. Watch Jesus. Read what he said, what he did, what he refused to do. That is your Father.

What Jesus Did — and Did Not Do

Make a list. On one side, everything Jesus did in the Gospels. On the other side, everything he did not do. The first list is long: he healed the sick, raised the dead, cast out demons, forgave sins, multiplied food, stilled storms, wept with the grieving, blessed children, showed mercy to sinners, and even healed the ear of the soldier who came to arrest him. The second list — things Jesus never did — is the important one:

Whatever those things are on the "never" list — the killing, the making sick, the cursing, the sending of plagues, the commanding of genocide — those things are not your Father. They have never been your Father. They will never be your Father. He has not changed. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And when you see Jesus, you see him. Amen.

The Tool We Use

Rightly Dividing with Deductive Reasoning

So how do we actually do this? How do we pick up the Old Testament, read an evil passage, and know what to do with it? The answer is deductive reasoning — a logical process that guarantees a true conclusion when the premises are true.

Deductive reasoning works like this: you start with a set of known truths, things you know without any shadow of doubt are true. Then you apply those truths to something you are questioning. If the thing in question agrees with all your truths, you accept it. If it contradicts your truths, you reject it — or reassign it to the devil where it actually belongs. The conclusion is logically guaranteed to be correct if the premises are true.

We are commanded to discern good from evil. That is not optional. And the only way to do that reliably when reading the Old Testament is to have your stack of truths — from the words of Jesus, the actions of Jesus in the Gospels, and the words of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament — and use those truths as your measuring stick. Amen.

Building Your Stack of Truths

These are the anchor truths — the non-negotiables — that we use to rightly divide everything else. Each of these is crystal clear in the New Testament. Multiple passages confirm each one. And they all agree with each other. This is your foundation:

Now you have your measuring stick. Whenever you encounter a troubling passage in the Old Testament, you apply these truths. If the LORD in that passage is killing, he is acting with the power of the devil. If the LORD is making people sick, he is doing what Acts 10:38 says the devil does. If the LORD is tempting someone to sin, James 1:13 tells you who is really doing that. And so on. The conclusion is guaranteed. Amen.

Putting It Into Practice

Rightly Dividing Specific Passages

Let us walk through some of the passages that trouble people most and apply deductive reasoning to them together. These are not hypothetical examples — these are the actual passages that caused me personally to throw down my Bible and cry out to God for answers. Let us rightly divide them, exactly as Jesus did in Matthew chapter 5. Amen.

Example 1 — The Curses of Deuteronomy 28

Deuteronomy 28 contains the most evil passages in the entire Bible. The LORD your God claims responsibility for every sickness and every plague. He says he will rejoice to destroy you. He will send enemies to take your children. He says he will curse you so severely that you will kill and eat your own children. Let us weigh that against our stack of truths.

Our truths tell us: the power of death and sickness belongs to the devil. Jesus went about healing all who were oppressed — not by Father but by the devil. The LORD in Deuteronomy 28 who claims responsibility for all disease and plague and who rejoices to destroy — that is not Father. That is the god of this world operating behind the veil. Amen.

Example 2 — The Plague on 70,000 Innocents (2 Samuel 24)

In 2 Samuel 24, the LORD moved David to number the people — inciting him to commit a sin. Then when David sinned, the LORD punished him by sending a plague that killed 70,000 innocent people who had nothing to do with David's sin at all. Let us apply the truths:

And then — the icing on the cake — the same event recorded in 1 Chronicles 21:1 says Satan stood up against Israel and moved David. The veil is right there. One passage says LORD. The other says Satan. Same event. That proves the conclusion we already reached through deductive reasoning. The LORD in this passage is the devil. Amen.

Example 3 — Snakes for Asking for Food (Numbers 21)

The children of Israel were wandering in the desert, eating manna day after day for forty years. They asked for food and water. The LORD got angry and sent fiery serpents to bite them and kill them. If they wanted to live, they had to worship an image of a serpent on a pole. Let us divide this:

What does Jesus say about people who ask for things? "Ask and it will be given to you... For everyone who asks receives." Matthew 7:7–8. And specifically on snakes: "What man is there among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent?" — Matthew 7:9–10. Jesus is directly addressing this passage. He is saying: even evil people would not give their child a snake if they asked for food. How much more will your Father — who is entirely good — give good things to those who ask? Someone far more evil than even an evil person sent those snakes. That was the devil. And God? He gives good things. Always.

And then the serpent on the pole: the devil in Revelation 12:9 is called the serpent of old, the dragon, the devil, Satan. When those people were beholding and showing regard toward a serpent on a pole, they were worshiping an image of the devil. And what does the devil want above all things? He wants to be worshiped. He made them an offer: worship my image and I'll call the snakes off. That is classic devil. That is not Father. Amen.

Example 4 — LORD vs. Leviathan

This one goes deep. There is a fire-from-heaven beast in the Bible. Revelation calls it Leviathan — described in Job 41 as a creature from whose mouth goes burning lights, sparks of fire, smoke from his nostrils, coals kindled from his breath, a flame going out of his mouth. He is king over all the children of pride.

Now read Psalm 18 — King David praying to the LORD, Yahweh, the Most High. Smoke went up from his nostrils, and devouring fire from his mouth, coals were kindled by it. He bowed the heavens and came down with darkness under his feet. He made darkness his secret place. His canopy around him was dark waters and thick clouds.

Those are the same being. Same attributes. Same imagery. The LORD that David is praying to in Psalm 18 is described with the exact same characteristics as Leviathan the fire-from-heaven beast in Job 41. And when Jesus's disciples wanted to call fire down from heaven and burn alive the Samaritans who rejected Jesus, what did Jesus say? "You do not know what manner of spirit you are of." He rebuked them. Fire from heaven is a sign of the beast — Revelation 13:13 confirms this. It is the beast's power and it is used to draw worship. And Jesus called it the wrong manner of spirit.

The veil over the Old Testament is not a metaphor. It is right there in the text. LORD and devil are written together as one. When you understand this, the confusion does not increase — it resolves. You see clearly. And you see God as good and only good. Amen.

The Takeaway

The Freedom of Rightly Dividing

Once you lay hold of these truths — really lay hold of them, in your heart and not just your head — everything changes. I know this from personal experience. When I was reading the Old Testament without rightly dividing, my faith was wrecked. My love for God evaporated. I was physically sick reading those passages. When God gave me the revelation of rightly dividing, everything changed. My love for God flourished. My faith flourished. My prayer life became rich and effective. And I want that for every person that hears this teaching. Amen.

Here is the summary of what we have proven across seven sessions: