06 1 Regular and Utility Scriptures
1 Regular and Utility Scriptures
1. Regular and Utility Scriptures
INTRODUCTION
2 Timothy 2:15 says: "Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." This text has been used for many sermons on the proper division of the word. Let us use this text, an old text, in somewhat of a new way. This is a day of athletics, and it is in order to use some of our games just as Paul did in (1 Corinthians 9:24-27), illustrative of the lesson before us. In the baseball game, the one with which many are familiar, we have two kinds of players—viz., (1) the regular players; (2) the utility men. The regular players are the ones we expect to see in every game—first baseman, second baseman, third baseman, shortstop, right field, center field, and left field. But we have some men sitting off yonder on the bench whom we call utility men. They are there for emergencies that may come up that call for special men to drop in due to these emergencies.
Now, do you have it all visualized? If so, under this imagery, let us study this old text in a new way.
1. The Regular Scriptures. By this is meant those Scriptures that teach us how to be saved and stay saved. There is the alien sinner out there. What must he do to be saved? Is it possible for any question to be answered more clearly and unmistakably than this question is answered. The apostles were commanded to go and teach all nations and baptize the ones they taught into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (Matthew 28:16-20). And you will note this instruction is backed by all the power and authority God has in heaven and on earth. Mark 16:15-16 says: "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned." In Luke 24:45-53 it is stated, as plain as day, that this preaching must begin in Jerusalem, and not to begin until the Spirit came to guide these teachers. For this reason, after being so commanded, they returned to Jerusalem and waited for the promised Spirit. Now turn to Acts 2 and you have a full account of the Spirit’s coming and the first preaching done by Peter who had the "keys of the kingdom" (Matthew 16:18-19) with authority to bind on earth the conditions of pardon that our Lord had bound in heaven. Study that chapter carefully, and you learn that when souls were convinced that Christ had emptied the sepulcher by his resurrection, had returned to heaven and had been made both Lord and Christ, they asked what they must do and were commanded to repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of their sins. This about three thousand souls did, and on that day the Lord added them to his church because they had become such as should be saved. Could anything be made plainer than this? Then you follow these apostles and other preachers sent out by them, and in every case of the conversion of aliens, you find them first taught, and this teaching resulting in faith, repentance, and baptism, no one rejoicing and being recognized as saved until these things had been done. Here there is no room for doubt.
These are regular Scriptures. They come in every conversion without an exception. But do we know these baptized believers were taught to live and conduct themselves as individuals in their homes, at their business, and as citizens? Most certainly we do. Do we know how they must conduct themselves when bound together in a local church? Do we know how to meet and work and worship as local congregations, that the gospel by us must be sounded out, the hungry fed and the naked clothed? Certainly all of this is made as plain as day. This is what is meant by regular Scriptures. They teach us how to become Christians and how to live the Christian’s life. They are so plain that "the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein." (Isaiah 35:8).
2. The Utility Scriptures. By "utility Scriptures" is meant all the other Scriptures in the Bible. There are lots of Scriptures in our Bible that you may never know and yet go to heaven. By this I simply mean that you can learn what to do to be saved and do it, then how to live the Christian’s life and live it, and your eyes closed in the sleep of death and you pass on to be with your Lord without knowing a great many things in the Bible. Who is it that does not know this is true? This thing that you call salvation requires but few things, and they are the most simple things as conditions on which it is bestowed on us. Get it: (1) The gospel, God’s power to save,: for every creature, and every creature that believes it not shall be damned. (Mark 16:15-16). Some of the creatures on earth are slow to learn, uneducated, and have just sense enough to be accountable. But the gospel is for them, and they will be damned if they do not believe it. Could God be just in damning a human soul for not believing something that is not simple, easily seen, as facts to be believed or commands to be obeyed? You answer the question. Some of us are making the gospel hard and difficult by adding to it things to be believed that are not essential. We had better go slow here. (See Deuteronomy 4:2; Revelation 22:18-19). (2) Could God be a just God and damn those of us who add to his conditions of salvation and take from them, if just what is essential were not so plain that we are wholly without excuse for such adding and subtracting? (3) Could he be a just God and damn both men and angels for preaching another gospel, which simply means the good news of how we are saved and can stay saved, if the limits and bounds of this gospel, its real content, were not outstanding and as plain as the noonday sun? To ask such questions answers them. (See Galatians 1:6-9).
Here let us read again 2 Timothy 3:16-17 : "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works." If every Scripture inspired of God is profitable, then there are none that are unprofitable. Do you get this? Every Scripture by inspiration given has its own utility. The purpose of the regular Scriptures, we have already stated—viz., to teach us how to be saved and stay saved. But what about all the rest of the Bible’ They must have a utility, for every one of them is profitable. Well, we shall see what their utility is.
3. God Foreseeing. The Bible speaks of "the scripture, foreseeing." (See Galatians 3:8). This can only mean that the God who gave us the Scriptures could foresee our needs and put certain things in the Bible because of this foreknowledge. And may I say that, in this "foreseeing," he foresaw every error that would arise after the Bible was finished by John on the Isle of Patmos in A. D. 96. Yes, thousands of false ideas, false doctrines, have come before man since the church was established and since the Scriptures were fully revealed. And God foresaw each error and intentionally placed a statement in the Bible to keep us from believing the error when it arises. Here is the most undoubting evidence that the Bible came from one above and beyond man. The mind that superintended it being written foresaw every need of man, as new needs would arise through the centuries, and placed a statement in his good book to meet each need. Who is it that but knows that no man nor set of men, with only finite minds, could produce a book like this. All the brains on earth compacted into one gigantic brain could not foretell all of our needs for one year ahead of us, or even one day ahead. But the mind that wrote the Bible foresaw every need, so far as the welfare of our souls is concerned, and met that need by placing what I am pleased to call a utility Scripture in the Bible, comparable to the utility men on the ball team, to meet these needs. And just as a game can be well played and a glorious victory won without using a single utility man, just so thousands, doubtless, have gone home to glory without needing any of these utility Scriptures. But not so with others.
4. Some Exemplifications. Let us now study a few of these utility Scriptures, that you may see the goodness of our God in placing them in the Bible, and look for others as needs arise in our lives as we journey onward and upward to glory. Who is it that does not know you can live and die and be saved forever without ever thinking of whether the earth is round or flat? Millions have been saved without this knowledge. Some say that the writer of the Bible speaks like he thinks the earth is flat; for this reason he is accused of being an ignoramus. And since God could not be this ignorant, if he is what we claim him to be, they conclude the Bible was written by ignorant men, and there is no God such as we claim for the Bible.
Well, the Bible claims only to be a book of science on how best to live while here on the earth. It was written for the masses of humanity and Paul declares that God in writing it "calleth those things which be not as though they were." (Romans 4:17). It would have been most unscientific if our God had gone aside into explaining every little thing that appears in this old world as it really is not. Hence, he speaks of things as they appear and not as they are in fact. The Bible is a book of the science on right living, and where is the man or set of men who can produce another just as good and use not its own thoughts and doctrine on right living? Here is a book of science on how best to live that cannot be improved upon. The best man in the world is that one who comes most nearly living as the Bible teaches us to live. This you know. But let us look into the rotundity of the earth. It was Copernicus, in 1543, who first advanced in a definite way the idea that the earth is round and rotates on its axis. Galileo, years later, championed the theory, and for so doing was considered by the church as a heretic and was persecuted. This shows how deep in the darkness of ignorance man was as to the physical facts about the heavens and the earth. But the question arises:
(1) He inspired Job to write, more than three thousand years before Copernicus was born, these words:"He stretcheth out the north over empty space, and hangeth the earth upon nothing." (Job 26:7). Here Job is telling us what God did. But Job knew not the meaning of these words. This proves beyond doubt that "the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." (2 Peter 1:21). And let it be said, the book declares that much they said they themselves could not understand. Study 1 Peter 1:8-12. Certainly none of the writers could see the exact fitness and importance of these statements the Holy Spirit guided them into making, for their need did not then exist. There is not a scientist on earth who can frame a sentence that more exactly fits in with the physical facts of the heavens and the earth than this sentence found here in Job. And not until a few years hack did man discover that, out beyond the north live there are no planets—just empty space.” With this one statement, the Davids of today, who have undoubting trust in the living. God, can pick this smooth stone from the brook of God’s truth and bury it between the eyes of any modern Goliath that comes out to challenge the God of Israel today.
(2) He inspired Isaiah to write:"It is he that sitteth upon the circle of the earth." (Isaiah 40:22). (3) And note how shrewdly our Lord left it on record that he knew the physical facts about the earth, night on one side while it is slay on the other, by stating to his disciples that when he comes the second time it will beat night and also day. "In that day" two will be in the field at work, one taken and the other left. "In that night" two will be in the bed, one taken and the other left. These words provoked no discussion among the disciples. Jesus so made these statements that his disciples would not raise the question as to the condition of the earth. (Luke 17:30-31; Luke 17:34; Luke 17:36). But we all very well know now that, so far as the physical facts are concerned, it will be both day and night when Christ comes—day on one side of the earth and night on the other side.
(3)The mode of baptism. Of what does the act, sometimes spoken of as mode, consist?You know it is claimed by some that sprinkling, pouring or immersion, any one constitutes a scriptural act of baptism. Loose talk gets us far removed from the Bible. Sprinkling and pouring are spoken of, as a rule, as modes of baptism. Nothing could be more unscriptural than such thoughts, and, besides this, further removed from the meaning of the words. Baptism, without any kind of doubt, is an immersion in water and a resurrection therefrom. In it the subject is buried, planted, and resurrected. Study Romans 6:3-5; Colossians 2:12. For this reason it took place where there was much water (John 3:23); there was a coming unto the water (Acts 8:36); going down into the water (Acts 8:38); and a coming up out of the water following the act of baptism while in the water (Mark 1:9-10; Acts 8:39). Now as to the mode of this burial and planting in the water, you could do it face foremost, or lay the candidate backwards, as it is usually done, or lay the party down sidewise. More than once, I have immersed crippled people by having them seated in a chair, lower the chair into the water, and when resting on the bottom of the baptistry, and after the proper words are said, lean the chair backwards until the body was buried or covered with water, then bring the chair back to its proper position. All of these are modes of immersion, but never could be thought of as a mode of sprinkling. Now, would it not be unthinkable to so speak of them? Then why speak of sprinkling as a mode of immersion? You may have different modes or manners of sprinkling. For instance, pour a little water on the fingers or dip the fingers in water and sprinkling the water on from the tips of the fingers, or pour the water on the end of a piece of a bushy shrub or dip the end of it in water and sprinkle the water from it on the one to be sprinkled. These would be different modes or manners of sprinkling, but never of immersion. But a utility Scripture is in order here. Turn to Acts 8:36-39. In this brief account of the act of baptism, given by the Holy Spirit, it says five times that the baptismal act took place while both the one who was baptized and the one doing the baptizing were in the water. You say you do not quite see this? Well, you shall see it. Is not the pronoun they used twice, stating that "they both went down into the water" before the baptism, and then "they came up out of the water" after the baptism? If it merely read, "They went down into the water and he baptized him," this would put the baptism in the water. But if it said nothing about going down into the water, but simply read that "he baptized him. And as they were coming up out of the water, the Spirit caught Philip away," this would put the act of baptism in the water. But it not only uses they twice, saying "they went down into the water" and "they came up out of the water," but the word "both" is used twice, and the parties renamed—"both Philip and the eunuch." There you have it. That simple statement of this baptism says five times that this baptism took place in the water.
One who was highly esteemed in his own eyes approached me once and was pitying me for my ignorance of simple prepositions. He said that "into the water," in the account of the eunuch’s baptism did not mean they got into the water, but at or near by the water. I quickly replied that he had me in trouble. Said I unto him: "If, when it says they both went down into the water, it means they stayed out of the water and never got in. then we would have to take the position that when it says they came up out of the water, they stayed in and never got out. If not, why not?" He failed to tell me why not, and the soul does not live who could tell. It is too plain to be misunderstood. Certainly "The wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein." (Isaiah 35:8).
Now words are signs of ideas, and each time the Spirit speaks, it has an idea to drive home to our hearts. Babbling is condemned in the Bible in the strongest way. To babble is to talk without some thoughtful, definite purpose in view. Are you ready to accuse the Holy Spirit of being a babbler? Well, the Holy Spirit certainly babbled if we do not have to go down into the water to be baptized, and then come up out of the water.
"Every scripture inspired oft. God is profitable." What is the profit of this Scripture? This was driven home to a mother once who had been sprinkled and had had her two daughterssprinkled. It was insisted that she tell exactly what the Spirit had in mind when this Scripture was placed in our Bible. She finally admitted that it could not have been put there for any other purpose than to offset the teaching that sprinkling will do for baptism, and she was immersed and so were her daughters. But there is another interesting part of the above story. Her husband was skeptical, made so by the divided state of the religions in his community. After she saw this utility Scripture, turning to the husband he was asked if he knew that the author of the Bible foreknew all of the false doctrines that would be advanced and put something in the book to keep us from believing these errors when advanced. He said he had never thought of the Bible this way. Soon he was convinced and he too was baptized into Christ. The Bible, as we have it, is without doubt, "Jehovah’s greatest wonder and the miracle of the ages." In 2 Corinthians 12:1-9 you learn that Paul was caught up into the third heaven, into paradise, and that he saw things, heard things, learned things; but that when he came back to the earth it was not "lawful for a man to utter" what he saw, heard, and learned. There it is. Certainly you can learn what to do to be saved and how to live the Christian’s life and die and go to heaven without knowing that Paul was caught up into the third heaven. But if you were confronted with the Adventist and knew that the whole Adventist hope rests on the claim that Mrs. Ellen G. White, their prophetess, went to heaven, right into paradise, and that she came back to this world and began to do lots of talking and writing about learning the Sabbath commend belongs to the New Covenant, and that the Adventist Church is built on her teaching, then you would need this statement of Paul’s. All you have to do is to ask them if Paul was caught up into the third heaven. Of course, they have to say yes. Then ask if it were lawful for him to tell what he saw and heard while there after returning to the earth and they will tell you no. Then ask, how it comes about that it is lawful for Mrs. White to tell about what she learned when unlawful for Paul. The fact of the business is Mrs. White was not caught up there. But God foreknew her claim and put this in the book to spike it when it was made. All that man needs to know has been revealed and is found in the gospel, God’s power to save. (Romans 1:16-17). It matters not how many people go to heaven and come back or how many angels come from heaven to earth, they dare not preach or teach anything that tints gospel does not contain. Read it in Galatians 1:6-9. And when people come making such claims, just know here is the Scripture God placed in the good book to enable you to do exactly what you are commanded to do in 1 John 4:1 : "Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world." But enough for utility Scriptures in this chapter. Others will be named as we study other subjects.