Tag: is the bible reliable

FAITH IN THE REAL WORLD

On By Pastor TomIn Bible, Bible Teaching, Christianity, Podcast, Religion, SermonLeave a comment

faith1

Faith isn’t a magic pill that gives us the power or right to accomplish whatever we want. But the faith of Jesus-followers is a wonderful means through which God wants to act in this world, and has acted in this world for two-thousand years. Having faith does not enable you to do whatever you want – it enables God to do whatever He wants, in and through you.

 

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Matthew Part 59

 

There is a persistent, widespread belief that the New Testament was written, or edited, by people who had an agenda, people who wanted to use it to manipulate others. Therefore, before we dive in to the main text today, I want to mention verse 21, because it is the kind of thing that more or less takes all the air out of that silly notion. When we see the actual facts, we know that we can have confidence that the New Testament we have today really is what the apostles – those who actually knew Jesus – wrote.

The Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB) puts brackets around verse 21, and makes a footnote about it, which reads: “other mss omit bracketed text.” The NIV has it only as a footnote. The English Standard Version (ESV) also has it as a footnote. Their footnotes read something like this: “some manuscripts insert verse 21: But this kind never comes out except by prayer and fasting.”

This is what we in the exciting business of Bible Teaching call “a major textual variant.” I have mentioned before that there are almost six thousand ancient manuscripts and partial manuscripts of the Greek New Testament. Scholars have been comparing them to one another for many years now, and have found very few variations between them. What this means is that long before Christianity was legal in the Roman Empire, all Christians were using the same New Testament we use today. It wasn’t changed to suit the purposes of people in power. It wasn’t shaped by various faith communities to suit their particular agendas. All Christians have been working from the same text for almost two-thousand years, from a time hundreds of years before following the words of Jesus provided anyone any sort of prestige or power.

But there are some variations. This is an example of what is considered a major variation. The earliest complete manuscript of the New Testament does not have the words “But this kind never comes out except by prayer and fasting,” in the book of Matthew. A large number of later manuscripts do have those words in Matthew.

Mark records the same incident in chapter nine of his gospel. Every text of Mark 9:29 has this:“This kind can come out by nothing but prayer.” Some variants of Mark 9:29 add “and fasting.”

So first, let’s look at the big picture. The use of prayer and fasting while performing exorcisms is not a major Christian doctrine. If we take this out altogether, we have not really changed Christianity in any significant way.

Second, it is clear that Jesus did actually say, “This kind can come out by nothing but prayer,” – it’s just that it is unlikely that Matthew recorded those words – probably only Mark did. So, actually, the only thing we aren’t sure Jesus said was “and fasting.”

Do you see what’s going on here? Nothing. This is considered a major textual variant and yet it doesn’t affect any significant Christian belief. The only real question we are left with is whether Matthew wrote it (we know Mark did) and whether Jesus says it is helpful, in addition to praying, to also fast while driving out demons.

All right, on to the main text today:

14 When they reached the crowd, a man approached and knelt down before Him. 15 “Lord,” he said, “have mercy on my son, because he has seizures and suffers severely. He often falls into the fire and often into the water. 16 I brought him to Your disciples, but they couldn’t heal him.”

17 Jesus replied, “You unbelieving and rebellious generation! How long will I be with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring him here to Me.” 18 Then Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and from that moment the boy was healed.

19 Then the disciples approached Jesus privately and said, “Why couldn’t we drive it out? ”

20 “Because of your little faith,” He told them. “For I assure you: If you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will tell this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.

Mark records that the failure of the disciples to drive out the demon led to a dispute between them and some of the religious leaders (Mark 9:14-16).

14 When they came to the disciples, they saw a large crowd around them and scribes disputing with them. 15 All of a sudden, when the whole crowd saw Him, they were amazed and ran to greet Him. 16 Then He asked them, “What are you arguing with them about? ”

Let’s use our imagination here, and I think we might find a familiar scenario. Imagine this: John Smith is a skeptic. He doesn’t know if he really believes in God, and is not sure at all that God will help when someone asks. John has a friend named Fred Jones, who gets very sick. John asks his Christian friends to pray for Fred, and then when Fred isn’t immediately healed in the way John wants, John gets mad at God for not doing anything. I’ve been involved in several scenarios like that, and I think there is a little bit of something I might call “perversity” in that. If you really don’t believe, why do you ask for, much less expect, any help? How can you seek help from a place of faithlessness, and then turn around and hold God responsible for not doing what you never trusted him to do in the first place? How can you blame him if you don’t believe in him?

I suspect that this is what was going on between the disciples and the religious leaders, and this is what Jesus ran into when he came down the mountain. I think it is this attitude that he called “unbelieving and rebellious.” The translation above (HCSB) translates the Greek word “rebellious,” while others use “perverse,” but the root word means “to distort.” That is exactly what is going on. The people were using the failure of the disciples as an occasion to distort the truth about Jesus.

I think the disciples provide an admirable example to us when they go to Jesus and humbly admit that they failed, and seek the reason why. The world is already generally inclined to reject Jesus and persecute his followers, but we don’t need to give them unnecessary reasons. A little humility, and some genuine honesty about our failures doesn’t hurt, and may help at least a few people to be more open to the message of the grace of God in Jesus Christ. At the very least, it is helpful to us spiritually both to admit that we have failed, and also to bring those failures to Jesus.

Jesus’ reply to them is one of the few places where I think the HCSB really misses the obvious meaning of the Greek. It says “Because of your little faith.” Little faith doesn’t capture it at all. This is not the same word Jesus used during the calming of the storm when he said “you of little faith, (Matt 8:26),” or when Peter started to sink after walking on water (Matt 14:31), or when the disciples were talking about the yeast of the Pharisees (Matt 16:8).

The Greek word for faith (or trust) is pistis. Here, Jesus uses a single word for the “little faith” of disciples: apistis. In Greek, an “a” in front of a word generally means “the opposite of” or “the absence of” or “the contradiction to.” In other words, Jesus is not saying the disciples had very little faith – he is saying they had none at all (at least in this situation). Everywhere else in the New Testament, the HCSB translates apistis as “unbelief.” I believe it should have been the same here, or maybe, “lack of faith.”

I think this puts things in a different light. It is not that the disciples had some faith, but not quite enough for the healing of the demon-possessed boy. In fact, they had no faith at all. That is why Jesus uses the analogy of the mustard seed. A mustard seed is about one-third the size of a grain of rice. Not much bigger, really, than a grain of sand. In those days before microscopes or magnifying glasses, the mustard seed would be one of the smallest visible objects in the world. Jesus doesn’t mean their faith was even smaller than that – he means they had none.

I don’t know about you, but telling them “it is because you have no faith,” seems a little harsh. Remember, they had left homes and careers to follow Jesus. They had seen some incredible miracles. None of the others objected when Peter said Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God, and it seems likely that many, if not all, agreed with him. We know that Andrew (Peter’s brother) thought Jesus was the Messiah from the very first day (John 1:41). Also, Philip told Nathaniel that he believed Jesus was the one predicted by the Old Testament. So how can Jesus say they had no faith?

I think Jesus probably means something like this: “You may believe that I can do miracles when I am present. You may believe that I am the Messiah, the Son of the Living God. But you still do not have faith that this means anything real and practical for you right now, in the situations you face. When it comes to your real life and the problems you face, you have no faith that I am available to you, that I will make an actual difference for you.”

RT France writes about this text:

“It is a striking illustration of the fact that faith is, for Jesus, not a matter of intellectual assent, but of a practical reliance on a living God.”

The disciples were probably willing to give their intellectual assent to the idea that Jesus is the Messiah. But they had not yet learned to practically rely on the Lord in real life situations. Their doctrine is correct, but it doesn’t yet make a difference in how they live or deal with life.

So Jesus tells them, “if you have even a tiny amount of faith (any faith at all) you could move mountains.” By the way, the moving of a mountain is a proverbial saying. It’s like saying, “if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a million times.” When you say that, you don’t mean that you have literally repeated yourself 1,000,000 times. It’s a common saying that uses exaggeration to make a point. In the same way, in those days in Israel there was a common saying, or proverb, about moving mountain, and that is what Jesus is using here. I do not believe it is meant to be taken at face value. I think the point Jesus is making is that any amount of faith allows us to access the unlimited power of God.

I want to make sure we understand what Jesus is communicating here. Some people take all this as if faith is a means to harness the power of God to do whatever we want done (as long as it isn’t overtly sinful). You hear people say things like “I’m just standing in faith that the Lord will provide a new car for you,” or “I will not receive this diagnosis of cancer.” You may even hear people say “You have to stand in faith. Don’t doubt! Don’t speak doubt. God will act if you just stand in faith.” God may indeed want to give someone a new car, or heal someone of cancer. However, I think these sorts of statements often represent a misunderstanding of faith. Having faith does not enable you to do whatever you want – it enables God to do whatever He wants, in and through you. Through faith, you give God permission (and therefore power) to act as He pleases. Faith begins with the understanding that it isn’t up to you, it’s up to God.

Perhaps you want to move a mountain. Faith doesn’t give you power do that. You will never have that sort of power. That power is God’s. Also, faith doesn’t give you the right to go around re-arranging the landscape. They aren’t your mountains – they are God’s. The mountain is only moved by God’s power, and only if it is God’s desire to move it. Faith is simply opening the door to him. Faith isn’t a means to control God or “harness” his power – it is simply asking him and trusting him to act as he pleases in and through us.

This is one of those things in the Christian life that calls for balance. We don’t control God. We don’t control our circumstances through faith. The Lord never promised us freedom from all trouble, hardship or sickness in this mortal life. And yet, he does want us to rely upon him in practical ways in this mortal life. Though we should not lose our eternal perspective, we should also realize he does often want to act in us and through us while we are alive on earth. He wants to heal people through us. He wants to deliver people from demonic oppression through us. He wants to communicate his grace and love to others through us. He wants to comfort others through us. He also sometimes want to do these same things for us. Sometimes, he wants even to provide for our physical needs. All of these things happen when by faith we open the door for him to act. Faith isn’t a magic pill that gives us the power or right to accomplish whatever we want. But the faith of Jesus-followers is a wonderful means through which God wants to act in this world, and has acted in this world for two-thousand years.

Our faith should make a difference in real life. Jesus wants us to learn to rely upon him practically in all things. I don’t know about you, but sometimes I feel alone in attempting to really rely upon Jesus. It seems like people either think faith is a way to personally control the power of God, or faith has no practical value here on earth. But there are people who take a balanced approach. Their hope and goal is heaven. And yet, here and now, they live in daily dependence upon the Lord. One group of people who live like this are the missionaries of the World Mission Prayer League. They have been relying on Jesus in practical and balanced ways for almost ninety years. Here are some excerpts from World Mission Prayer League Documents:

We want to communicate our dependence upon God, as well. We want our prayers and communications to demonstrate that we have no hope but heaven, no resource but God, and no guarantee but his faithful promises…

We choose to depend upon Jesus, for all things at all times. Jesus secures our redemption and has become our eternal hope. We may count on him to provide as well everything necessary for life and service (2 Peter 1:3)…

The dependable grace of Jesus frees us from the anxious need to supply ourselves from the limited store of our own abilities….

Dependence upon “the dependable grace of Jesus” is a choice. It is a practice and a lifestyle.

It is something that we learn… And it is, of course, a kind of mystery, too. It is the mystery of faith itself, in a way. It is one of the irreducibly untidy things that I love about the Prayer League…

Dependence on Christ as gracious Lord sustains us in our calling when other ties may fail. Christ makes us heirs of the kingdom of heaven! Now we may face hardship with joy, endure privation with contentment, and suffer loneliness and adversity with the courage of faith. Funds might run short and fail. The Mission may disappoint us, or even cease to exist. Yet the Lord will never fail us (Deuteronomy 31:8). We may put our trust in him above all…

This fundamental relationship of faith will challenge our attitudes and shape our behaviors at every turn.

World Mission Prayer League lives and does business by these principles every day, even now in 2015. To support their work around the world, they need about $70,000 per month. Over more than eight decades, the only person they have ever asked for money is God. If they need more missionaries, they pray. If they need money to support a new missionary, they pray. If they need a new computer system, they ask Jesus for it.

Now, I don’t share this because I think the people of the World Mission Prayer League are perfect. They are flawed human beings like everyone else. But they are human beings whom I know, who really do live their lives in the flesh by faith in Jesus Christ. People really do live in practical dependence upon Jesus. It can be done in a biblical, balanced way. By the grace of God, many people even today are living that way. By the grace of God YOU can live the life of faith well. As the Prayer League said, this approach to faith should challenge our attitudes and shape our behaviors at every turn.

Let the Holy Spirit Speak to you now.

~

Thanks again for making use of Clear Bible.

I want to remind you again that we are a listener-supported ministry, and that means, first and foremost, that we are supported by your prayers. We need and value your prayers for us.

Please pray that this ministry will continue to be a blessing to those who hear it. Ask God, if it is his will, to touch even more lives with these messages. Ask him to use this ministry in making disciples of Jesus Christ.

Please also pray for our finances. Pray for us to receive what we need. Please pray for us in this way before you give anything. And then, as you pray, if the Lord leads you to give us a gift, please go ahead and do that. But if he doesn’t want you to give to us, that is absolutely fine. We don’t want you to feel bad about it. We want you to follow Jesus in this matter. But do continue to pray for our finances.

If the Lord does lead you to give, just use the Paypal Donate button on the right hand side of the page. You don’t have to have a Paypal account – you can use a credit card, if you prefer. You can also set up a recurring donation through Paypal. We can make this tax-deductible if you just mention that it want it to be so in the “note” part of the transaction.

You could also send a check to:

New Joy Fellowship

917 Canyon Creek Drive

Lebanon, TN 37087

Just put “Clear Bible” in the memo. Your check will be tax-deductible.

Thank for your prayers, and your support!

The Main Point of The Bible: Jesus

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Jesus, Old Testament, UncategorizedLeave a comment

jesus-smiling-bobby-shaw

Jesus is the main point of the entire bible. Reading the bible should help us get to know Jesus better. It should encourage us in our faith in Jesus. Reading the bible should strengthen us spiritually, from the inside out. That is what is for. So read it with that in mind.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Understanding the Bible Part 4

Understanding the Bible #4.

Last time, we talked about the documentary history of the New Testament. In other words, we learned that it is, without doubt, the accurately preserved teachings of those who knew Jesus Christ when he walked on the earth.

One question I did not address is about the historical accuracy of the New Testament. I’ll talk about it briefly here, and then we’ll move on.

Last time we learned that no ancient document has been as verifiably well preserved as the New Testament. Since we get a lot of our knowledge about history from ancient documents, that, in and of itself, should give us confidence that the New Testament is historically reliable. If the writings of Tacitus, or Julius Caesar are to be accepted as reliable sources of ancient history, then the New Testament should be accepted in the same way; even more so.

However, many skeptical people, including scholars, insist upon a position of assuming that the New Testament is wrong until proved right. No doubt, this is because they do not want to believe what it says about Jesus. Even so, time and time again, the New Testament has been proven right, while the skeptics have been proved wrong. Let me give you a few instances.

Luke Chapter 2 talks about a census taken by Caesar Augustus. He said that it happened while Quirnius was governor of Syria. This is a historical event. Roman records (not as well preserved as the New Testament) do indicate a census during the time of Emperor Augustus. But there has been no Roman record uncovered that mentions a governor of Syria named Quirinius. Skeptics long held out that this proved that the New Testament is unreliable. First, let’s consider the logic of that claim. Those skeptics did not have actual evidence that contradicted the New Testament. What they had was a lack of evidence to confirm it. Of course, they had an equal lack of evidence to contradict it. However, eventually, some coins were excavated in the ancient Roman province of Syria. In those days, provincial coins were stamped with the name and likeness of the governor who ruled at the time the coin was made. The coins discovered in Syria were from the reign of Caesar Augustus, right at the beginning of the “common era” and they were stamped with the name “Quirinius.” In other words, we now have positive proof that Luke wrote accurately. The skeptics were wrong.

Another place where skeptics held there was a “lack of evidence” was for the existence of a high priest named Caiaphas. Caiaphas was involved in the trial of Jesus. Archaeologists had not found any record of him outside the New Testament. Then, in the mid-1990s, excavations were made to build a water park in Jerusalem. The excavators discovered an ossuary – a “bone box.” It was labeled as holding the bones of Caiaphas, who was identified as a high priest in Jerusalem.

There are many more areas where skeptics never even had a chance. The New Testament names dozens of Roman officials, and makes references to hundreds of little cultural details that have all been affirmed by archaeology and other ancient documents. There can be no question that the New Testament is entirely historically reliable.

Let’s use the rest of our time right now to consider how the New Testament can help us understand and interpret the Old Testament. Last time, we looked at the idea that the New Testament was the unveiling of a mystery that began with the record of the Old Testament. Jesus himself, and his apostles, affirm this. The mystery, the key to the entire Bible, is Jesus himself. Jesus said to the Jews who believed the Old Testament:

The Father who sent Me has Himself testified about Me. You have not heard His voice at any time, and you haven’t seen His form. You don’t have His word living in you, because you don’t believe the One He sent. You pore over the Scriptures because you think you have eternal life in them, yet they testify about Me. (John 5:37-39, HCSB)

Both before and after his resurrection, Jesus pointed out to his disciples how the scriptures (that is, the Old Testament) looked ahead to the Messiah, to Him:

He said to them, “How unwise and slow you are to believe in your hearts all that the prophets have spoken! Didn’t the Messiah have to suffer these things and enter into His glory? ” Then beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, He interpreted for them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures. (Luke 24:25-27, HCSB)

Then He told them, “These are My words that I spoke to you while I was still with you — that everything written about Me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures. (Luke 24:44-45, HCSB)

Paul also used the Old Testament to share the good news about Jesus:

For he vigorously refuted the Jews in public, demonstrating through the Scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah. (Acts 18:28, HCSB)

The specifics of how Paul did that are all throughout his letters. That is one reason why it is helpful to understand the New Testament first – it gives us a guide for understanding what came before. The key is Jesus. Therefore, one very helpful trick in reading the Old Testament is to ask this question of every passage: “Where is Jesus in this passage? What part of the message about the Messiah is this? How does it teach me something about Jesus? Does one of the people in this story act in a way that reminds me what Jesus is like? Is it a prophecy about his life on earth, or what he will do at the end of time? What does it tell me about my need for a Messiah?”

Jesus is the main point of the entire bible. Reading the bible should help us get to know Jesus better. It should encourage us in our faith in Jesus. Reading the bible should strengthen us spiritually, from the inside out. That is what is for. So read it with that in mind.

There are also some secondary things. When we put our trust in Jesus, and let him lead our lives, it has enormous implications for everything in life. So the main point of the Bible is Jesus. In addition, there are many “secondary” points that flesh out what trust in Jesus means for us in hundreds of practical, emotional and spiritual ways. So Paul writes:

But as for you, continue in what you have learned and firmly believed. You know those who taught you, and you know that from childhood you have known the sacred Scriptures, which are able to give you wisdom for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. (2Tim 3:14-17, HCSB)

Of course, Paul didn’t know that his own letter to Timothy would be included in the bible. But Christians today believe that the Holy Spirit had Paul write this, and that it is intended for both the Old and New Testaments. Jesus spoke prophetically about this:

“Therefore,” He said to them, “every student of Scripture instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who brings out of his storeroom what is new and what is old.” (Matt 13:52, HCSB)

The “old treasure” in the storehouse are the writings of the Law and the Prophets – that, is, the Old Testament. The New Treasure is the mystery, now revealed, of Jesus Christ. Peter wrote about the scripture:

First of all, you should know this: No prophecy of Scripture comes from one’s own interpretation, because no prophecy ever came by the will of man; instead, men spoke from God as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. (2Pet 1:20-21, HCSB)

Christians have believed for almost two-thousand years that this is as true of the New Testament, as well as the Old.

So, all scripture (both Old and New Testaments) is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, training in righteousness and equipping. So, first we read in order to get to know Jesus better. And as we do, the Bible teaches, trains, corrects and so on. It gives us instruction.

Paul said it a different way in his letter to the Romans:

For whatever was written in the past was written for our instruction, so that we may have hope through endurance and through the encouragement from the Scriptures. (Rom 15:4, HCSB)

I want to look at two examples today of how all scripture is to help us get to know Jesus, and how it is for our instruction.

First, consider these words from Isaiah:

Yet He Himself bore our sicknesses, and He carried our pains; but we in turn regarded Him stricken, struck down by God, and afflicted. But He was pierced because of our transgressions, crushed because of our iniquities; punishment for our peace was on Him, and we are healed by His wounds. We all went astray like sheep; we all have turned to our own way; and the LORD has punished Him for the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet He did not open His mouth. Like a lamb led to the slaughter and like a sheep silent before her shearers, He did not open His mouth. (Isa 53:4-7, HCSB)

…My righteous servant will justify many, and he will carry their iniquities (Isa 53:11)

This was written hundreds of years before Jesus was born. There is not a scholar in the world who disputes that. And yet, it is clearly the message that someone (Isaiah doesn’t know whom) would take the sins of others upon himself, and through his suffering, bring us peace with God. That someone would not object to the suffering imposed upon him, but engage in it willingly.

This passage is in the Old Testament. But clearly, it points to Jesus. It is about Jesus, and what he did for us, though it was written long before he came into the world. So we read the Bible, even the Old Testament, and find Jesus.

Now, let me give you an example of instruction.

Deuteronomy 25:4 says “Do not Muzzle an ox while it treads out grain.” Now, not too many people who read these sermon notes own oxen. I bet none of you even own a muzzle for an ox. So what is the point of this verse for you today? Remember, it was written for your instruction. All scripture is given by God and is useful for teaching, training, correcting and encouraging. So we should not read a verse like this and say “Well, I don’t have an ox, so never mind about that one.” Instead, we should read a verse like this and pray something like this: “Holy Spirit, I’m not getting much out of this one. Please show me something about Jesus here. Or give me some instruction or teaching. Speak to me through this verse.” I have added, sometimes, “I dare you,” because, like you, I find many bible passages hard to understand at first.

In the case of the non-muzzled ox, we have it easy, because the apostle Paul showed us the way.

For it is written in the law of Moses, Do not muzzle an ox while it treads out grain. Is God really concerned with oxen? Or isn’t He really saying it for us? Yes, this is written for us, because he who plows ought to plow in hope, and he who threshes should do so in hope of sharing the crop. If we have sown spiritual things for you, is it too much if we reap material benefits from you? If others have this right to receive benefits from you, don’t we even more?

However, we have not made use of this right; instead we endure everything so that we will not hinder the gospel of Christ. Don’t you know that those who perform the temple services eat the food from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in the offerings of the altar? In the same way, the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should earn their living by the gospel. (1Cor 9:9-14, HCSB)

It was written originally about oxen. It taught the people of Israel to be kind and even generous with the animals that worked for them. It taught them that the harvest was to be shared – even with the animals. Paul sees an enduring principle here that applies to preachers of the gospel. Paul writes, “Is God really concerned with oxen?” Asking questions is always a good way to begin to understand the underlying principle. I’m sure God is concerned about oxen, but if we treat our oxen well, shouldn’t we also treat people well? If we are generous with the animals who make the physical harvest possible, what should we do with the people who make the spiritual harvest possible? Paul concludes: “Those who preach the gospel should earn their living by the gospel.”

This is not directly about Jesus. But it is instruction for those of us who are trying to follow Jesus. It tells us that we should financially support those who are called to teach the bible. You may not have oxen, but you probably have a pastor, or at least some leader or ministry from where you get spiritual leadership and solid biblical teaching. This passage about oxen doesn’t apply to oxen any more (unless you still own them, and use them to tread out grain). But it still applies to our lives as Jesus-followers. We are still supposed to share generously with those who help us spiritually.

By the way, of course I am one of those that preaches the gospel, and I know this passage applies to me and to my ministry. But I don’t share it here as a covert way of asking for money. I have no problem doing that directly: If the Lord leads you, then give. Use the donate button on the blog site, or send a check the address I used this passage because the New Testament serves it up for us on a platter. It’s a clear example of how we can use even what appear to be silly ancient laws to hear what the Lord wants to teach us.

We will look at some of these principles of bible interpretation later on in the series. For now, we need to know that that the entire bible, even the Old Testament is to help us get to know Jesus better, and to provide us with instruction, training and teaching in how to be his disciples.

WHERE DOES THE OLD TESTAMENT COME FROM?

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Old Testament, Religion, science, UncategorizedLeave a comment

coins2_1211697c

This is fact: the bible is, without question, the best documentary record of life and history in the ancient middle east.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Understanding the Bible Part 2

Understanding the Bible #2 . How We Got the Bible & Can we trust it? (Old Testament)

Psalm 119

Last week we considered the Bible from a non-spiritual standpoint, evaluating it as if it were merely a system that was developed to guide human behavior (that is, a “moral” system). We found that objectively, the Bible offers a superior guide to human behavior than other “holy books” and one that is much superior to any “individual morality” that individuals choose for themselves. The next few weeks I want to dig more deeply into the origins of the Bible. This will help us to evaluate spurious claims like those of the “DaVinci Code” and the “Judas gospels” and other part-truth/mostly lies stories that have been floated about the bible for years. For now, we’ll just consider the Old Testament. We will tackle the New Testament later in the series.

Several early portions of the Old Testament were originally recited orally and passed down from generation to generation through memorization and repetition. Most of Genesis, as well as probably Ruth and Judges were all originally spoken, rather than written. How do we know this? Well, the first portions of Genesis, if accurate at all, took place before reading and writing was widespread. But even more than that, examining the Bible texts in Hebrew (which was the original language) shows several easily recognized mnemonic devices (that is, verbal cues used to help people memorize a recitation). One way to picture it this: those texts which were originally recited orally, look (at least in Hebrew) more like a play than a novel. Usually, these little memory points are lost in translation to English, but one passage in which the NIV has preserved them fairly well is Genesis 5:1-31. There are seven small sections in these verses. Each section begins with “When [somebody’s name] had lived [a number] of years…” and then some details about that person and his descendants. The section closes with “and then he died.”

If this is the first time you have heard of that, this may make you a bit uncertain about how reliable those portions of scripture could be. This is because our culture has mostly lost the art and practice of memorization. But the fact is, there used to be professional oral historians. These were people who were responsible to memorize the oral histories, word for word and teach them to the next generation. Not only that, but in the case of the Hebrew people and the Old Testament, every father had a duty to teach the spiritual history to his children. People are capable of remembering a great deal. The philosopher Socrates, who lived almost a thousand years after the time of Moses, lamented the fact that during his lifetime the Greeks started writing things down in books. He felt that if books came into widespread use, people would stop remembering things, because they would be able to simply look them up in a book. He felt memorization was a much superior way to preserve knowledge for future generations.

Even in the twentieth century, Michail Gorbachev memorized the entire text of all four gospels when he was a child. We remember more, and better, than we realize. If you have seen the movie “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” I bet you can fill in this blank. Patsy, the trusty squire is shot by an arrow. He says: “I’m not quite ______ yet.” If you have seen the movie “The Princess Bride” I bet you know the word that the Sicilian kidnapper, Vicini, says all the time. These are things we memorize – word for word – without even trying. How much more are people capable of in a culture where oral history is valued and practiced!

Aside from the oral histories, other parts of the Old Testament were written down, more or less at the time the events occurred or the words were spoken. The first five books of the Old Testament are called the Pentateuch; they are also known by Jews as the “Torah,” or “Law.” Over time the Torah, and the writings of the scribes and prophets were compiled into what today we call the Old Testament. We don’t know the exact date at which the Old Testament was considered to be “closed,” but it is probably around 250 B.C., which is the approximate date most scholars agree that the Old Testament was first translated into Greek (the ancient Greek version of the Old Testament is called the Septuagint). We don’t have any original copies of the Old Testament. Professional scribes carefully copied the originals when they became worn, and then destroyed the originals. When the copies became worn, new copies were made and the older copies destroyed. For many years, the oldest copy that had been found was made in the 800s A.D. — much newer, in fact, than many New Testament manuscripts. Because of this, many scholars assumed that if the Old Testament manuscript copies were compared to the originals, there would be many errors. However, it should be noted that later manuscripts agree very closely with these earliest texts, which shows that the scribes took great care when making copies. In 1947, the “Dead Sea Scrolls” were discovered. These are not all Biblical writings, but among them are parts of the Old Testament. The Dead Sea Scrolls date back to 1000 years before those previous Old Testament manuscripts. As it turns out, at least in the texts that are available for comparison, during those thousand years very few copying errors were made, and none were significant. Again it is an example of how carefully the Old Testament was preserved by the scribes. I have personally seen a scroll of Isaiah that was made in about 1400 AD and used in a synagogue in Germany for 400 years — until the mid-1800s, when it was taken out of use because it was “worn.” It looked cleaner, clearer and more pristine than these sermon notes. In other words, new copies were long before manuscripts became difficult to read. Taken all in all, it has been demonstrated thoroughly that the contents of the Old Testament have been preserved, largely unchanged, from when they originated.

Now, in spite of these well-preserved texts, there is a prevalent and long-standing tendency to discount the Old Testament as “religious writing” and therefore inaccurate. For many decades the trendy thing was to doubt everything the Bible said – even the “normal, historical” parts of it – unless it could be confirmed by some sort of archaeological discovery. For instance, until very recently, Skeptical scholars claimed that king David of Israel was a mythical figure who had been made up by the writers of the Bible. Unfortunately for them, archaeologists discovered a reference to David in the writings of another culture in the middle east. The reference to David matched the approximate time period that the Bible puts him in. Since that time, architecture with inscriptions referring to David has also been found.

In the Old Testament, Isaiah writes about the invasion of the Assyrian army. He describes how they laid siege to the town of Lacish, and then how they came and surrounded Jerusalem. He mentioned Sennacherib, the Assyrian emperor at the time. Over where Assyria used to be, they have uncovered some of the records and court-commissioned art from the time of Sennacherib. We shouldn’t be surprised to learn that the Assyrians recorded some of the same events, and even mentioned the name of Hezekiah, King of Judah at the time, according to the Bible.

According to the Old Testament, the Israelites destroyed the town of Jericho in about 1400 BC. According to archaeologists, Jericho was indeed destroyed about 1400 BC. There is not enough time and space to describe all of the archaeological discoveries which have, over and over, proven that the Bible is a reliable historical source. The people it talks about were real people; the situations it describes were real. The history it records really happened. The texts were truly written or memorized when the events they record were actually happening.

Millar Burrows, a PhD graduate of Yale University, and one of the leading authorities on the Dead Sea Scrolls, said this:

The Bible is supported by archaeological evidence again and again. On the whole, there can be no question that the results of excavation have increased the respect of scholars for the Bible as a collection of historical documents. The confirmation is both general and specific. The fact that the record can be soften explained or illustrated by archaeological data shows that it fits into the framework of history as only a genuine product of ancient life could do. In addition to this general authentication, however, we find the record verified repeatedly as specific points. Name of places and persons turn up at the right places and in the right periods.

What is strange is that some people persist in doubting the Bible until is proven by some non-Biblical source. The truth is, there is no non-biblical source that has been so thoroughly verified as the Bible itself. It is, without question, the best documentary record of life and history in the ancient middle east.

But the bible isn’t just a history book. There are many kinds of literature in the bible: family histories, genealogies, laws, national histories, biographies, poetry, prophecy, letters and songs. All those different books, written in different times and places by people in widely varied life situations, carry message. The message is easier to understand in some places; in other parts, it takes time and patience to hear it. But it is there throughout the entire bible.

Imagine the song “Silent Night.” Like many Christmas songs it has been arranged in many different ways, and played by many different groups and performing artists. Think of it being played instrumentally, by an orchestra. You’ve probably heard it that way. Now, imagine how it sounds sung by a full choir, with no instruments at all. It’s the same song. The same music is being conveyed, and yet, it sounds very different. Now, picture Willie Nelson (a country-western singer) singing Silent Night. Now, try to imagine Barbara Streisand singing the same song. Picture it done to swing-rhythm, crooned by Harry Connick Jr. Now imagine it as “muzak” or “elevator music,” played at the mall. Think of a rendition of the song by Frank Sinatra. Hear it done by Reggae artists.

All of these are the same song, conveying the same “musical message.” And yet each style and performance conveys that same “musical message” in a very different way. We can appreciate some of those ways better than others, but it all goes back to the same composer, the same basic set of notes, the same lyrics.

This is kind of how the bible is. Sometimes, God conveyed his message through the life of an old man, or a young princess. Sometimes, he sent it through laws that helped people at that time understand him better. At other times, God’s message came through prophets, or teachers, or letter writers, kings or musicians. Sometimes, it is hard to recognize as the same message, because three-thousand year-old laws require more work to understand than clearly written letters from more than a thousand years later. But the messages about God, human beings and relationships are consistent throughout the bible. Like with Silent Night, though the “performances” are widely varied, the basic underlying message is the same. Different musicians may play the music, different instruments may create it, but at the same time, the music is, and always was, the product of the original composer.

Paul puts it this way:

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. (2Tim 3:16-17, ESV2011)

The bible comes to us through various human writers and poets and kings. But it is all the work of the Holy Spirit. Another way to look at it, is like an amazing building, say a cathedral. One architect designs the cathedral. He plans it. Many builders of different types are involved in actually building the cathedral, but it all comes together under the plan and direction of the one architect. If someone asks, “who built this cathedral?” we would probably say the name of the architect, not the many and various laborers who put it together. So, many people contributed to the bible, but it was God who planned it and put it together.

The best way that I know to start understanding the bible is to start reading it. It is very difficult to understand in little bits and pieces, especially if you get those bits and pieces from other people, or the internet. I would recommend, if you have never done this, to start reading one of the books of the New Testament, say, Matthew. Read a chapter a day (or more, if you are so inclined), until you’ve read the whole book of Matthew. Then find another New Testament book (any one of them, except Revelation. Leave that until you have more understanding), and read it the same way. After you’ve read the New Testament, go back, and pick an Old Testament book, and try a few of those. I would return and read a book in the New Testament after every second or third Old Testament book. Some people, in addition to this kind of reading, also read one of the psalms every day. That’s a great reading plan. Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it!

Psalm 119 talks about “the law.” It really means “the scripture” in general. Verses 97-103 says this:

97 Oh, how I love your law!

I meditate on it all day long.

98 Your commands make me wiser than my enemies,

for they are ever with me.

99 I have more insight than all my teachers,

for I meditate on your statutes.

100 I have more understanding than the elders,

for I obey your precepts.

101 I have kept my feet from every evil path

so that I might obey your word.

102 I have not departed from your laws,

for you yourself have taught me.

103 How sweet are your words to my taste,

sweeter than honey to my mouth!

Have you tasted the “sweetness” of God’s message to you through the Bible? I encourage you to start reading it, and experience that for yourself!

~

I want to briefly make you aware of our situation. This ministry (Clear Bible) until recently was supported by our local church. However, we have had some changes there, and we are now a house church. Today, we have about 8 families. Our church cannot fully support me financially any longer.

 In contrast, about 430 people subscribe to this blog, and an additional 300 or so each week come and visit the site. In other words, by far, most of the people who benefit from this ministry are not part of our little church.

 I’m asking you internet readers/listeners to pray for us. Seriously, before you give any financial support, please give us some prayer support. I value that more than anything else. Pray for this ministry to touch lives. Pray also for financial provision for my family and me.

But then, as you pray, do ask the Lord if he wants you to give financially as well. Be assured, after a small fee to Paypal, 100% of your donations will go to help support my family and me in ministry. In turn, supporting this blog means that you are helping to bless more than 15,000 people each year who visit this blog.

 Some of you may have noticed that I am also a novelist. Often, people have misconceptions about authors. Most of us, including me, make a part-time income through writing, and no more. In other words, we aren’t “raking it in” somewhere else. Now, we trust the Lord to provide, and I don’t want you to give out of guilt or fear. I just don’t want you to get the idea that your donations will only be an “extra” for us somehow.

 If most of our subscribers gave just five or ten dollars each month, (or even less, if everyone pitched in) we would be in good shape. It’s easy to set up a recurring donation when you click the Paypal donate button that is located on the right hand side of this page, down just a little ways.

 You could also send a check to:

New Joy Fellowship

625 Spring Creek Road

Lebanon, TN 37087

 Your check will be tax-deductible. Unfortunately, we cannot do the tax deductible option with the paypal donate button, however the money does go directly to support my family and me.

 Thank for your prayers, and your support!

WHERE DOES THE OLD TESTAMENT COME FROM?

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Old Testament, Religion, Uncategorized2 Comments

hebrew-Scroll-Torah

If you’ve ever wondered where the bible came from and why it is considered reliable, here’s a good place to start. Since we recently talked about the New Testament, this is a mid-week re-post about the origins of the Jewish/Christian Old Testament.

Last week we considered the Bible from a non-spiritual standpoint, evaluating it as if it were merely a system that was developed to guide human behavior (that is, a “moral” system). We found that objectively, the Bible offers a superior guide to human behavior than other “holy books” and one that is much superior to any “individual morality” that individuals choose for themselves. This week I want to dig more deeply into the origins of the Bible. This will help us to evaluate spurious claims like those of the “DaVinci Code” and the “Judas gospels” (which were touted by National Geographic last year). For now, we’ll just consider the Old Testament. We will tackle the New Testament later in the series.

Several early portions of the Old Testament were originally recited orally and passed down from generation to generation through memorization and repetition. Most of Genesis, as well as probably Ruth and Judges were all originally spoken, rather than written. How do we know this? Well, the first portions of Genesis, if accurate at all, took place before reading and writing was widespread. But even more than that, examining the Bible texts in Hebrew (which was the original language) shows several easily recognized mnemonic devices (that is, verbal cues used to help people memorize a recitation). One way to picture it this: those texts which were originally recited orally, look (at least in Hebrew) more like a play than a novel. Usually, these little memory points are lost in translation to English, but one passage in which the NIV has preserved them fairly well is Genesis 5:1-31. There are seven small sections in these verses. Each section begins with “When [somebody’s name] had lived [a number] of years…” and then some details about that person and his descendants. The section closes with “and then he died.”

If this is the first time you have heard of that, this may make you a bit uncertain about how reliable those portions of scripture could be. This is because our culture has mostly lost the art and practice of memorization. But the fact is, there used to be professional oral historians. These were people who were responsible to memorize the oral histories, word for word and teach them to the next generation. Not only that, but in the case of the Hebrew people and the Old Testament, every father had a duty to teach the spiritual history to his children. People are capable of remembering a great deal. The philosopher Socrates, who lived almost a thousand years after the time of Moses, lamented the fact that during his lifetime the Greeks started writing things down in books. He felt that if books came into widespread use, people would stop remembering things, because they would be able to simply look them up in a book. He felt memorization was a much superior way to preserve knowledge for future generations.

Even in the twentieth century, Michail Gorbachev memorized the entire text of all four gospels when he was a child. We remember more, and better, than we realize. If you have seen the movie “Monty Python and the Holy Grail” I bet you can fill in this blank: “I’m not quite ______ yet.” If you have seen the movie “The Princess Bride” I bet you know the special phrase that Wesley says to Princess Buttercup. It has three words. These are things we memorize – word for word – without even trying. How much more are people capable of in a culture where oral history is valued and practiced!

Aside from the oral histories, other parts of the Old Testament were written down, more or less at the time the events occurred or the words were spoken. The first five books of the Old Testament are called the Pentateuch; they are also known by Jews as the “Torah,” or “Law.” Over time the Torah, and the writings of the scribes and prophets were compiled into what today we call the Old Testament. We don’t know the exact date at which the Old Testament was considered to be “closed,” but it is probably around 250 B.C.E, which is the approximate date most scholars agree that the Old Testament was first translated into Greek (the ancient Greek version of the Old Testament is called the Septuagint). We don’t have any original copies of the Old Testament. Professional scribes carefully copied the originals when they became worn, and then destroyed the originals. When the copies became worn, new copies were made and the older copies destroyed. For many years, the oldest copy that had been found was made in the 800s A.D. — much newer, in fact, than many New Testament manuscripts. Because of this, many scholars assumed that if the Old Testament manuscript copies were compared to the originals, there would be many errors. However, it should be noted that later manuscripts agree very closely with these earliest texts, which shows that the scribes took great care when making copies. In 1947, the “Dead Sea Scrolls” were discovered. These are not all Biblical writings, but among them are parts of the Old Testament. The Dead Sea Scrolls date back to 1000 years before those previous Old Testament manuscripts. As it turns out, at least in the texts that are available for comparison, during those thousand years very few copying errors were made, and none were significant. Again it is an example of how carefully the Old Testament was preserved by the scribes. I have personally seen a scroll of Isaiah that was made in about 1400 AD and used in a synagogue in Germany for 400 years — until the mid-1800s, when it was taken out of use. It looked cleaner, clearer and more pristine than these sermon notes. Taken all in all, it has been demonstrated thoroughly that the contents of the Old Testament have been preserved, largely unchanged, from when they originated.

Now, in spite of these well-preserved texts, there is a prevalent and long-standing tendency to discount the Old Testament as “religious writing” and therefore inaccurate. For many decades the trendy thing was to doubt everything the Bible said – even the “normal, historical” parts of it – unless it could be confirmed by some sort of archaeological discovery. For instance, until very recently, Skeptical scholars claimed that king David of Israel was a mythical figure who had been made up by the writers of the Bible. Unfortunately for them, archaeologists discovered a reference to David in the writings of another culture in the middle east. The reference to David matched the approximate time period that the Bible puts him in.

In the Old Testament, Isaiah writes about the invasion of the Assyrian army. He describes how they laid siege to the town of Lacish, and then how they came and surrounded Jerusalem. He mentioned Sennacherib, the Assyrian emperor at the time. Over where Assyria used to be, they have uncovered some of the records and court commissioned art from the time of Sennacherib. We shouldn’t be surprised to learn that the Assyrians recorded some of the same events, and even mentioned the name of Hezekiah, King of Judah at the time, according to the Bible.

According to the Old Testament, the Israelites destroyed the town of Jericho in about 1400 BCE. According to archaeologists, Jericho was indeed destroyed about 1400 BCE. There is not enough time and space to describe all of the archaeological discoveries which have, over and over, proven that the Bible is a reliable historical source. The people it talks about were real people; the situations it describes were real. The history it records really happened. The texts were truly written or memorized when the events they record were actually happening.

Millar Burrows, a PhD graduate of Yale University, and one of the leading authorities on the Dead Sea Scrolls, said this:

The Bible is supported by archaeological evidence again and again. On the whole, there can be no question that the results of excavation have increased the respect of scholars for the Bible as a collection of historical documents. The confirmation is both general and specific. The fact that the record can be soften explained or illustrated by archaeological data shows that if fits into the framework of history as only a genuine product of ancient life could do. In addition to this general authentication, however, we find the record verified repeatedly as specific points. Name of places and persons turn up at the right places and in the right periods.

What is strange is that some people persist in doubting the Bible until is proven by some non-Biblical source. The truth is, there is no non-biblical source that has been so thoroughly verified as the Bible itself. It is, without question, the best documentary record of life and history in the ancient middle east.

It seems to me that people are inclined to doubt the Bible because, in addition to history, the bible contains records of supernatural activity. It doesn’t just talk about kings and wars – it also talks about miracles, healings and God’s standards. It’s commonly thought that people who believe in miracles do so because their faith-system requires them to, while people who don’t believe in miracles are merely looking at the evidence. But in fact, the opposite is true. Everyone believes the Bible when it talks about a war. Why don’t some people believe it when it talks about a miracle? Because some people are inclined to disbelieve in miracles, whatever the evidence may say.

Let’s consider it from another angle. Do you believe in murders? I would guess that 100% of adults reading this, believe that murders happen. Have you ever seen a murder personally? I would guess most of us have not. Have you ever known anyone, personally, who was murdered? Again, I would guess that most of us have not. Why then, do we believe in murders? Because of the testimony of other people. Some murder testimony is written – we might see it in the newspaper. Other testimony is spoken – someone tells us about it. People write stories and TV shows about murder.

There is nearly as much written and spoken testimony throughout history about miracles as there is about murder. If a man tells us of a murder, we tend to believe it. If he tells us about a miracle, many people tend to not believe it. Why not? Because they already have a belief against miracles. They may say, “Ah, but the people telling us about miracles are unreliable. We can’t trust them, because they are biased.” The problem with that is, they would trust them if they were telling about a murder. In other words they believe in murder, so they accept what people say about it. If you don’t believe in miracles, it really doesn’t matter what anyone says – you won’t believe it. In fact, the only reason you think someone telling you about miracle is unreliable, is because you start off by not believing in miracles.

To put it simply: the reason to believe in miracles is because there is so much evidence for them. The reason not to believe in them, is because you are already starting with a belief that they don’t happen.

So it is with the Bible. We know that the texts and contents have been preserved accurately, reliably and authentically. It has been proven reliable in how it records history. We we know we can believe it when it tells us that King Sennacherib invaded Judah. The natural, objective approach would be to believe it also when it tells us of God and the supernatural.

Psalm 119:97-103 says this:

97 Oh, how I love your law!

I meditate on it all day long.

98 Your commands make me wiser than my enemies,

for they are ever with me.

99 I have more insight than all my teachers,

for I meditate on your statutes.

100 I have more understanding than the elders,

for I obey your precepts.

101 I have kept my feet from every evil path

so that I might obey your word.

102 I have not departed from your laws,

for you yourself have taught me.

103 How sweet are your words to my taste,

sweeter than honey to my mouth!

~

I want to briefly make you aware of our situation. This ministry (Clear Bible) until recently was supported by our local church. However, we have had some changes there, and we are now a house church. Today, we have about 8 families. Our church cannot fully support me financially any longer.

 In contrast, about 430 people subscribe to this blog, and an additional 300 or so each week come and visit the site. In other words, by far, most of the people who benefit from this ministry are not part of our little church.

 I’m asking you internet readers/listeners to pray for us. Seriously, before you give any financial support, please give us some prayer support. I value that more than anything else. Pray for this ministry to touch lives. Pray also for financial provision for my family and me.

But then, as you pray, do ask the Lord if he wants you to give financially as well. Be assured, after a small fee to Paypal, 100% of your donations will go to help support my family and me in ministry. In turn, supporting this blog means that you are helping to bless more than 15,000 people each year who visit this blog.

 Some of you may have noticed that I am also a novelist. Often, people have misconceptions about authors. Most of us, including me, make a part-time income through writing, and no more. In other words, we aren’t “raking it in” somewhere else. Now, we trust the Lord to provide, and I don’t want you to give out of guilt or fear. I just don’t want you to get the idea that your donations will only be an “extra” for us somehow.

 If most of our subscribers gave just five or ten dollars each month, (or even less, if everyone pitched in) we would be in good shape. It’s easy to set up a recurring donation when you click the Paypal donate button that is located on the right hand side of this page, down just a little ways.

 You could also send a check to:

New Joy Fellowship

625 Spring Creek Road

Lebanon, TN 37087

 Your check will be tax-deductible. Unfortunately, we cannot do the tax deductible option with the paypal donate button, however the money does go directly to support my family and me.

 Thank for your prayers, and your support!