425 Sermon Illustrations on Bible

Ravi Zacharias in his book "Can Man live without God?" tells the following story. A young somewhat cocky cowboy was riding his horse one day when he spied a hunched-over old farmhand on a mule. Deciding to have a little fun the young cowboy drew his 6-shooter and told the old man to get down off his mule. He then asked the old man "if he had ever danced" and began to empty his revolver at his feet with great laughter. The old man slowly turned back to his mule (unamused) and put his hand into his pack and drew a shotgun and aimed it at the now bulletless young cowboy and asked, "Did you ever kiss a mule?" To which the young cowboy said with fear, "No, but I have always wanted to!"

TS -- There is nothing like a bullet for motivation. While the Lord does not put a gun to our heads he does give us the stories of the Bible for direction and motivation. Are you listening?

Through His Eyes

Read: Revelation 3:14-22

Anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see. --Revelation 3:18

When a woman from another country lived in our home for a few weeks, she kept asking questions I had never thought about. At a drive-in restaurant, she said, "Why would anyone want to eat in the car?" As she glanced at the church page in the Saturday newspaper, she asked, "Why do the ministers put their own photographs in the ads for their churches?" Through her eyes, we began to see aspects of our culture that were so familiar we had never noticed them before.

Christ warned the Christians at Laodicea that they were in great spiritual peril because they couldn't see themselves as they really were. He told them, "You say, 'I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing'--and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked" (Rev. 3:17). Jesus urged them to come to Him for what they needed, including salve to put on their spiritual eyes so they could see (v.18).

When we read the Bible, we see ourselves through God's eyes--not only our sinfulness but also the righteousness He has provided for us through faith in Christ.

Ask the Lord to help you see yourself and your world through His eyes today. --DCM

O send Thy Spirit, Lord, now unto me,

That He may touch my eyes and make me see;

Show me the truth concealed within Thy Word,

And in Thy Book revealed I see Thee, Lord. --Lathbury

To see yourself as you really are, look into the mirror of God's Word.

"Legendary coach Vince Lombardi began the first practice of each season by holding up a football and saying, 'This is a football .... Have we lost anybody?'" With that anecdote, Malcolm Yarnell, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary's academic affairs vice president, held a football up for all to see. Then he held up his Bible and said, "This is the Bible.... Have we lost anybody?"

Yarnell based his chapel address on Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians 2:2, "For I determined to know nothing among you except Christ and him crucified." Yarnell used three aids to deliver his message: a Bible, which he called "our standard for orthodoxy;" a passport, which he called "a symbol of our mission;" and a family album, which he called "a souvenir of our moral integrity."

He began by asking the students and faculty to stand, hold up their Bibles and verbally affirm the Bible using Psalm 19 as a guide: "This is my Bible. It is the testimony of God. It is perfect, sure and right. It is pure, clean and true. It restores the soul and makes wise the simple. It rejoices the heart and enlightens the eyes. It endures forever and is altogether righteous. I desire it more than the riches of the world. In keeping it, there is great reward. Today, may I hear it and receive it, meditate upon it and perform it to the glory of God alone. Amen!"

Yarnell noted that liberal theologians have leveled several criticisms at conservative theologians who hold to biblical orthodoxy, calling it "a false presupposition." To one such critic at a Baptist World Alliance session this summer, Yarnell responded, "Yes, the idea of biblical orthodoxy is a presupposition of mine."

Warning that liberal scholars will seek to cause the conservative to doubt his or her convictions as if presuppositions are somehow wrong and illogical, Yarnell stated, "What they will not tell you is that every human being, including them, operates with presuppositions. The liberal's presupposition is that his own personal opinion is the standard of truth." By contrast, Yarnell said the Bible is the standard of truth. "All human systems must measure up to it, and if any of those human opinions disagree with the Bible, then the Bible is not wrong, they are wrong."

While some fear the emphasis on the authority of a confession, Yarnell clarified, "We do not believe the Baptist Faith and Message is inerrant. It, however, is the authoritative document for employees of SBC agencies -- not because it is inerrant, but because it is the confession which Southern Baptists have adopted for our guidance. Our authority to teach comes from God's personal call to teach. Our authority to teach [at Midwestern] comes from the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention. We submit to that authority."

Yarnell then held up the passport of missions professor Ron Rogers, stating, "You would not believe the foreign nations to which Dr. Rogers has been to tell people about Jesus," citing Haiti, Brazil, Hong Kong, Thailand and five other countries he could not name because of their resistance to missionary endeavors. With Rogers committed to leading seminarians to participate in international missions, and church planting professor Carroll Fowler encouraging students in North American church planting, Yarnell said their efforts are enhanced by newly named evangelism professor Tom Johnston. "And Phil Roberts is the leading seminary president among all six when it comes to missions -- both North American and international," Yarnell said. As a result, he said students will be amazed "by how God will use the seminary in personal witnessing."

Just as an immunization given by a needle against a disease often hurts, Yarnell said the conviction of the Holy Spirit often brings pain to individuals with whom the gospel is shared. He encouraged students to be bold in their witness, stating, "If I do not offend people with the gospel here, they will go to hell there. I am afraid that in fearing for their sensitivities temporally, we will offend them eternally by not speaking Jesus to them."

Holding up the family album of theology professor Mark DeVine, Yarnell quoted from Scripture, "I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified." He turned to a picture showing the family at Christmas "celebrating our Lord's incarnation," a picture of DeVine's son being baptized by his father, and a picture of Jackie DeVine's grandmother with an obituary which read, "Mrs. Erisman was baptized as a little girl in the creek at route number 10." He called the album "a souvenir of moral integrity."

The sanctity of Christ likewise should be reflected in the church through corporate integrity, Yarnell said, challenging Southern Baptists to improve their treatment of ministers. "When the personal agenda of an ungodly person in the church dominates the agenda of the church, it has lost Christ's corporate integrity." By treating other Christians according to biblical principles, Yarnell said the practice of discipline would discourage the rumormongering and backbiting that characterize some churches and Christian institutions.

And through testimonial integrity, Yarnell said the sanctity of Christ is upheld as Christians exhibit morally responsible lives. "A corrupted witness to Christ comes from the moral failings of Christians in their personal lives and from the moral failings of Christians in their corporate lives. How are they going to see Jesus, if you do not look like Jesus?"

Yarnell concluded by inviting non-believers to accept Christ, chapel participants to make Jesus the single focus of their lives and for the seminary community to allow God to be glorified through the teaching of sound doctrine.

"Is your vision to let God glorify himself as right doctrine is proclaimed, as people live lives of integrity, and as the lost are saved?" Yarnell asked. "If it is not, then get out of the way." Holding up his Bible he restated, "This is the Bible. Have we lost anybody?"

*

THE MEANING OF INSPIRATION

There are teachers among us who seem too willing to surrender the time-honored Biblical meaning of inspiration. Their new attitude toward the Bible grew out of their demand for a new doctrine of inspiration. Neo-orthodoxy would have all Christians abandon the Scriptural teaching about inspiration and accept its new theology. But if we do this we will then be judging the Bible on the basis of what certain “scientists” and “scholars” have said concerning it. This I am not ready to do, and I am quite aware that my position is not a popular one among some religious leaders of our day.

Now where should one begin in his quest for the meaning of inspiration? I do not hesitate in insisting that the first place where one must go to learn the meaning of the inspiration of the Bible is to the Bible itself. We cannot accept merely what is acceptable to modern man. Our generation has witnessed the growing exaltation of man and his intellectual powers to the degree that some men are looked upon as knowing more than God. Let us come back to the Bible and accept the concept of inspiration which is based solely upon the teaching of the Bible. When the Biblical meaning of inspiration is accepted, there can be no mistaken identity.

Someone might raise the objection that it is “circular” to appeal to the Bible for its own authentication and vindication, meaning that to appeal to Scripture in support of Scripture is to argue in a circle. Any court will recognize that a man has a right to testify in his own behalf. Now we know that it is possible for every man to lie, or to deceive, or to be prejudiced. But because the Bible is the Word of God, and God, because of Who He is, cannot lie (Titus 1:2), most certainly the Bible’s witness to its inspiration ought, therefore, to be accepted as trustworthy.

One of the great doctrinal passages in the Bible is the well-known word from Paul to Timothy. The King James Version reads as follows: “All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16). Take notice of that word “inspiration.” I believe there are only two appearances of this word in the English Bible, one in the Old Testament (Job 32:8) and one in the New. The passage which for our purpose is of supreme importance is the one in the New Testament.

The five words, “given by inspiration of God,” are the translation of the one Greek word THEOPNEUSTOS. It is a compound, consisting of THEO (God) and PNEUSTOR (breathed). The true meaning is “that which is breathed out by God.” It is a strange figure, but a strong one. Used only here in the entire New Testament, it is designed to make the reader aware of the fact that all Scripture, every writing to which the name Scripture could be given, was actually breathed out by God, and consequently bears the stamp of Divine origin and authority. When man speaks, his words might be said to be man-breathed; when God spoke, His words were God-breathed. It can be said metaphorically that the Scriptures are God’s breath. How much of the Scriptures have gone out of the mouth of God? ALL Scripture! The Scriptures came into being because they were breathed out by God Himself. Modern theories of inspiration would have us give the larger role to man and the lesser to God, as though God is not necessary to inspiration. But be certain that the Scriptures are the product of the Divine breath because they have their origin in God. And since the inspiration of the Bible is the focal point of conflict, we assert with firmness and finality that this greatest Book of all books owes its very existence to the direct creative work of God Himself.

The Lord Jesus said, “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4, cf. Deuteronomy 8:3). He is merely stating that God had spoken, and that the words came from His mouth, they had been breathed out by God. On another occasion He said to the Jews, “...the Scripture cannot be broken” (John 10:35). The precise point of our Lord’s statement here is that the Scripture cannot be fragmentized, the Scripture as a whole cannot be annulled or set aside. He was attributing to all the Scriptures an authoritative character. His was an appeal to the unity and totality of Scripture, namely, all of Scripture must be inspired or none of it can be. The Bible claims for itself total inspiration. All Scripture is the product of the breathing of God Who is the first and final cause of Scripture and of all things. “By the word of the LORD were the heavens made; and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth” (Psalm 33:6). “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul” (Genesis 2:7). “The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life” (Job 33:4). This graphic figure of speech tells us that God employed the same movement in the creation of the universe, man and the Scriptures, namely, the activity of His Spirit or Breath. When the three American astronauts were circling the moon, the first humans ever to do so, they alternated reading aloud the divinely inspired record of creation as found in Genesis, chapter one. In so doing they were paying the same reverence and respect to the Scriptures that they attributed to God and His vast creation. And rightly so, because both the universe and the Scriptures proceeded from Him.

THE MAGNITUDE OF INSPIRATION

How high a view of inspiration can we hold? Is the inspiration of the Bible plenary, that is, is it totally, fully inspired? Is it verbally inspired, or merely thought-inspired? We believe that the inspiration of the Bible extends to the very words because the Bible itself teaches this. The neo-orthodox position, in its quest for a new approach to the doctrine of inspiration, rejects the plenary and verbal inspiration of the Bible. When one reads what some modern “scholars” have written on the subject he sees in some instances a mind that is hostile toward the idea of verbal inspiration. Some opponents of verbal inspiration go so far as to misrepresent us by falsely claiming that verbal inspiration is synonymous with mechanical dictation. We will leave the mode of inspiration for later discussion. The late Dr. W.H. Griffith Thomas wrote, “In Scripture we do not have mechanical dictation, but inspiration; and whether we call it verbal or plenary, the phrase is not intended to say HOW God does it, but HOW FAR it has gone.”

The magnitude of inspiration reaches the WORDS of Scripture as well as the THOUGHTS. How can we know God’s thoughts if we do not have God’s words? It is illogical reasoning for a person to expect to find inspiration in one’s thoughts without the words of the person who thinks those thoughts. Surely inspiration cannot mean a collection of uninspired words supposed to convey inspired thoughts. For myself, I am forced to the conclusion that it would be just as impossible to divorce the thoughts of the Bible from its words as it would be to divorce my thoughts from my words. Why would any professing Christian consider it an incredible thing that God should speak in words? The Bible itself claims to be THE WORD OF GOD, and must therefore be written in the words of God. I am not suggesting that there is no disclosure from God apart from the Bible. It is not necessary to use words to impart revelation. We know that “the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge. There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard” (Psalm 19:1-3). But this first or primary disclosure of God in His works falls far short of the knowledge we receive through the fuller revelation in His words. The former discloses His power, while the latter reaches beyond to the revelation of His purpose and future plans. The Bible is not merely a work of God, it is the record of His words.

The writers whom God raised up recorded His words, not their own. When we say that God revealed His WORD to the prophets, we are saying that He revealed His words to them. Since the Bible is God’s word, it consists of God’s words. In this way the writers were inspired of God, for He said, “I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my WORDS in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him” (Deuteronomy 18:18). Moses said, “And God spake all these WORDS” (Exodus 20:1), and “These are the words which the LORD hath commanded” (Exodus 35:1). David said, “The Spirit of the LORD spake by me, and His WORD (not his thought) was in my tongue” (2 Samuel 23:2). When God called Jeremiah, He assured His servant, “Behold, I have put my words (not thoughts) in thy mouth” (Jeremiah 1:9). Perish the thought that the sovereign, almighty God, Who created the universe and man, was indifferent about the details of His written revelation! David prayed, “...Thou hast magnified Thy word above Thy name” (Psalm 138:2).

In 1940 the editor of THE CHALLENGER magazine asked this writer to send him a statement of his belief about inspiration. As a young pastor in my first church, I prepared and submitted the following, quoted here only in part:

“Inspiration extends to the very words of Scripture, so that by

inspiration is meant verbal inspiration. By this I am not

suggesting that God dictated every word, but rather that He

guided the writers in the choice of their words. The Bible is

fully inspired, in all parts and respects. I believe in the

plenary inspiration of every word of the original text of Holy

Scripture. The writers were infallibly guided by God in their

choice of subject matter and the words used to record their

subjects. Words are necessary to express thoughts, therefore

inspiration includes words as well as thoughts and concepts.

Such guidance of the Holy Spirit over the human penmen does not

extend to other writings, but rather excludes all other writings

as uninspired. Of the Bible it must be said that ‘all’ is thus

inspired (2 Timothy 3:16), including ‘the WORDS which were

spoken before by the holy prophets’ (2 Peter 3:2), the LETTERS

(Galatians 3:16 - notice the absence of the letter’s’), the ‘JOT’

(the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet) and the ‘TITTLE’

(the small ornamental mark in that alphabet distinguishing one

letter from another) (Matthew 5:18). The Bible is the only God-

given, authoritative revelation which gives to man an infallible

rule of faith and practice.”

And now thirty-two years later (1972), 1 am prepared to say that my convictions about inspiration, as expressed above, are stronger than when they were first written.

THE MEDIA OF INSPIRATION

At this point it is necessary to make the distinction between INSPIRATION and REVELATION. INSPIRATION is that activity of God whereby He imparted certain information to certain men of His own choosing for the express purpose of committing that information to writing. He superintended each writer of the Scriptures in order that those Scriptures would possess Divine authority and be free from error. REVELATION, while closely related to inspiration, is essentially the communication of that information and has to do more with the mode or method of presenting and preserving the imparted knowledge. Revelation is the act or process of imparting knowledge; inspiration guarantees its veracity.

Most appropriate for our purpose is an examination of 2 Peter 1:20-21: “Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For 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 1:20-21). These words make it clear that the Scriptures are not the result of any man’s personal and private investigation. Peter is stating here that the knowledge contained in the Scriptures is not to be found in man. The Scriptures are not the product of human search and reason, not of human origin. This is how the Bible did not come to us, and on this point there can be no misunderstanding. The teaching in these verses is both negative and positive.

NEGATIVELY, the Scriptures do not owe their origin to human initiative, investigation or imagination. How wonderfully the Holy Spirit anticipated the scoffers and critics in their claims that men concocted the Bible! He first disposes of such a notion. Never, at any time, did any part of Scripture come through the will of man.

POSITIVELY, human instrumentality is fully recognized, for “holy (set-apart) men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” First, observe the kind of men God selected for the task of writing the Scriptures. They were “holy men,” meaning men set apart by God Himself. The human penmen did not choose writing as a career. As a matter of fact, Peter, who penned the passage we are presently considering, was an unlettered fisherman. Yet, for reasons known only to Himself, God set apart Peter to pen two Epistles. Jeremiah was a writing prophet, and God said to him, “Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5). Jeremiah was a HOLY (set-apart) man, selected by God to receive the inspired word from God. Paul testified, “...It pleased God, who separated me (set me apart) from my mother’s womb, and called me by His grace, to REVEAL His Son in me...” (Galatians 1:15-16). For this reason the Apostle could say, concerning the gospel he preached, “For I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ” (Galatians 1:12). All of the writers of Scripture were men set-apart by God to be the media of inspiration, the human penmen to whom God could reveal His thoughts.

Upon a closer examination of Peter’s words, we learn how God controlled their minds as they received and wrote the message. They are said to have been “moved by the Holy Ghost,” meaning that they were controlled and carried along by the Spirit. Without this special work of the Holy Spirit, the revelation from God could never be known by the natural man. When Moses wrote, for example, of the creation of the heavens and the earth, what he wrote would have to be an inspired writing. He was not present at the time of creation, nor was any other man. No human eye saw it and no human mind could have conceived it. The case of Moses and his account of creation illustrates the idea of revelation, the fact that God set apart a man to reveal a truth that only God knew. Inspiration has to do with the keeping of the writings from error and mistakes in the process of transmission.

Human writers were the media of inspiration, penning not their thoughts and words, but the utterances of God as they were lifted up and carried along by the Holy Spirit. The writers were not mere passive automata whose own gifts and abilities lay dormant. Man, unaided by God, could not have written the Bible, yet God did call certain men and control them by His Spirit to do His writing. There is definitely the human side of the Scriptures, but the Scriptures themselves are from God. Paul knew this great fact when he wrote, “Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual” (1 Corinthians 2:13). Paul could not take credit for the “words” which he spoke because he knew that the Holy Spirit gave them to him.

The Divine-human combination in the matter of inspiration may be illustrated from a statement made by our Lord. We must look at it in the parallel passages as recorded by Mark and Luke:

“For David himself said by the “And David himself saith in the

Holy Ghost, the LORD said to my book of Psalms, the LORD said

Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, unto my Lord, Sit thou on my

till I make thine enemies thy right hand, till I make thine

footstool.” enemies thy footstool”

(Mark 12:36) (Luke 20:42-43)

Look carefully at these two verses, and what do you see? In Luke’s account the quotation is attributed to David, but Mark’s account includes the fact that David spoke “by the Holy Ghost.” Both are correct. The words that David spoke were God’s words because they originated with God and He alone is their Author. On the other hand, God spoke them by the mouth of His servant David. When Peter and John quoted the Second Psalm in their prayer, they said to God, “Who by the mouth of thy servant David hast said...” (Acts 4:25, cf. Psalm 2:1). In like manner Zacharias said, “He (God) spake by the mouth of His holy prophets...” (Luke 1:70). Jeremiah said, “Then the LORD put forth his hand, and touched my mouth. And the LORD said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth” (Jeremiah 1:9). The Bible is not a record of the thoughts and experiences of the human writers, but it is itself the very Word of God as God revealed Himself to those men. Jesus said to Peter, “Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 16:17).

There are doubtless many questions about inspiration which arise in our minds and which we cannot answer now. All that God requires of us is that we accept humbly the truth He has given. The media of inspiration have not in any way robbed the Word of God of its perfection.

*

[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #9053]

Last eve, someone passed beside a blacksmith's door, and heard the anvil ring the vesper chime.

Then looking in, he saw upon the floor old hammers, worn with beating years of time.

"How many anvils have you had," he asked, "to wear and batter all these hammers so?"

"Just one," said the blacksmith, and then added with twinkling eye, "The anvil wears the hammers out, you know."

Just so, the anvil of God's Word, for ages skeptic blows have beat upon.

Yet though the noise of falling blows was heard, the anvil is unharmed-the hammer's gone!

A ship's mate once challenged a chaplain with the question, "How is it that you are always talking to my men about Jesus Christ? Did you ever see Him?" "No, I never did." "Then how can you tell a man to trust in someone you have never seen? I can't see any sense in that." "Well," replied the chaplain, "when you head for a place of refuge in a storm, what sense is there in telling your men to let go the anchor when they cannot see the ground? On what principle do you trust your ship and your life to ground you have never seen and never can see?" "Oh," said the mate, "we go by our chart." "Exactly," replied the chaplain, holding up his Bible, "and I, too, go by a chart, and it is an infallible one, while yours is not. It tells me of the only sure ground of my salvation-the atoning work of Christ upon the cross. My faith, like your anchor, takes hold of this unseen but real ground, and so rides out the storm of life in peace and safety."

A young farmer in North Dakota brought home a fancy barometer for which he paid $24.65. In the following days he watched it avidly as it predicted the weather. On one of the walls of his home it hung in an honored place. But the day came when for three days it predicted "storm" while the sky was turquoise and clear. So he took it off the wall and back to town where he demanded his money back. Returning home, he and his wife became alarmed when they saw evidence of a storm ten miles out. When they turned in their yard, their home had blown away. The furniture was up in the apple trees, and the bathtub three blocks away in a pasture. But the grandmother had believed the barometer, and when a dark cloud appeared she took the two small children and went to the shelter in the old storm cellar, long unused, and they were saved.

There is no city in the world, perhaps, where the treasures of art are more appreciated than Florence, Italy. It is told that an American visitor to the Pitti Palace, after viewing some of the paintings there, said to his guide: "Are these the great masterpieces that everyone tells me about? I don't see much in them to arouse such enthusiasm."

"It is not these paintings that are on trial sir," the guide answered, "but it is you who view them."

So it is with the Word of God. Sometimes we run across scoffers, men who sneer at divine revelation, who say that they cannot feel much enthusiasm about the Bible. But the Bible is not on trial. Whether men believe it or not, it is the Word of God, "which liveth and abideth forever" (1 Peter 1:23).

1. Sing them over again to me,

Wonderful words of life;

Let me more of their beauty see,

Wonderful words of life;

Words of life and beauty

Teach me faith and duty.

Chorus

Beautiful words, wonderful words,

Wonderful words of life.

Beautiful words, wonderful words,

Wonderful words of life.

2. Christ, the blessed one, gives to all

Wonderful words of life;

Sinner, list to the loving call,

Wonderful words of life;

All so freely given,

Wooing us to heaven.

3. Sweetly echo the gospel call,

Wonderful words of life;

Offer pardon and peace to all,

Wonderful words of life;

Jesus, only Saviour,

Sanctify forever.

*

“What advantage then has the Jew, or what [is] the profit of circumcision? Much in every way! Chiefly because to them were committed the oracles of God.” (Romans 3:1-2 NKJV)

The apostle now replies to some supposed objections.

• What…Jew? — a very natural question of the Jew is here anticipated

• Much…way — see Rom 9:4-5, Deut 4:7-8, Ps 147:19-20, Rom 11:28

• Chiefly — as relating to this present discussion

• Committed — as a sacred trust, to obey and teach

• Oracles — ture utterances, sayings, words — see Acts 7:38

• God — the prime Teacher of the spirit and letter of religion

Christians' advantages above heathen — C. Simeon, M.A.

I. What advantages we, as Christians, have above the heathen

1. A guide for our faith

2. A warrant for our hope

3. A rule for our conduct

II. The improvement we should make of them

1. Study the Scriptures

2. Conform ourselves to them

3. Promote the knowledge of them in the world

The hope of the ancient believer may be said to have been always in a state of pilgrimage, traveling onward through the successive periods of revelation, and finding no rest till they had crossed the barrier flood which divided the Law and the Gospel, the first dispensation and the second. — Davison

We should read the Bible with all diligence, that, as being good exchangers we may know the true coin from that which is counterfeit. — Jerome

Beauties of the Sacred Oracles — The rhetorical and poetical beauties of Scripture are not merely incidental. Its authors wrote, not for glory or display, not to astonish nor amaze their brethren, but to instruct them, and make them better. They wrote for God's glory, not their own; they wrote for the worlds advantage, not to aggrandize themselves. Demosthenes composed his most splendid oration in order to win the crown of eloquence; and the most elaborate effort of ancient oratory — the panegyric to which Isocrates devoted fifteen years — was just an essay written for a prize. How different the circumstances in which the speech on Mars' Hill was spoken, and the farewell sermon in the upper chamber at Troas. Herodotus and Thucydides composed their histories with a view to popular applause; and Pindar's fiery pulse beat faster in prospect of the great Olympic gathering, and the praises of assembled Greece. How opposite the circumstances in which the seer of Horeb penned his faithful story, and Isaiah and Jeremiah poured forth their fearless denunciations of popular sins. The most superb of modern historians confesses the flutter which he felt when the last line of his task was written, and he thought that perhaps his fame was established. A more important history concludes: "These things are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing, ye might have life through His name." — Dr J. Hamilton

A small group of businessmen met in New York City in 1940 to talk about faith in the face of an impending crisis. World War II was raging in Europe, and it appeared to be only a matter of time before America would be involved. These businessmen believed they had to do something to help strengthen the nation spiritually.

“What can we do?” they asked. Well, after much deliberation, they agreed that Bible-reading was crucially important. After all, the Bible had proven to be a source of hope and encouragement to countless millions over the centuries.

So they announced the first National Bible Week, to be observed December 8-15, 1941, and their first nationwide broadcast was scheduled on NBC Radio for December 7.

The timing was providential, for just before that broadcast, news of the bombing of Pearl Harbor flashed around the world. There were few details, but America was glued to their radios as the National Bible Week broadcast began. Initially scheduled for one hour, with a comedy to follow, NBC scrubbed the comedy and allowed the National Bible Week broadcast to continue. I still remember as a kid listening intently to my radio that day.

Later, President Franklin Roosevelt captured the spirit of the event in his message to our enlisted personnel. He said, “As Commander in Chief, I take pleasure in commending the reading of the Bible to all who serve in the Armed Forces of the United States. Throughout the centuries,” he continued, “men of many faiths and diverse origins have found in the Sacred Book, words of wisdom, counsel, and inspiration. It is a foundation of strength, and now, as always, an aid in attaining the highest aspirations of the human soul.”

The tradition that began so dramatically fifty-nine years ago continues today, with National Bible Week observed from the Sunday before Thanksgiving to the Sunday after Thanksgiving.

It is a time to pause and reflect on the magnificence of what God has given us, and the great contributions of the Bible to this nation. The Pilgrims who celebrated the first Thanksgiving were filled with gratitude for their safe arrival in a land where they could worship freely. They gave thanks to God for their blessings. And they built their new government based on God’s promises in the Bible.

John Winthrop, the first governor of Massachusetts, spoke of this spirit in a talk in 1630 entitled, “A Model of Christian Charity.” He concluded with a parallel to Moses’ final words to Israel, in Deuteronomy 30: “There is now set before us life and good, death and evil … But if our hearts shall turn away so that we will not obey, but shall be seduced and worship other gods … we shall surely perish.”

Each year some thirty governors and 500 mayors recognize the Bible’s contributions to this nation in their National Bible Week proclamations. A Gallup survey reported that 8 million people begin reading the Bible each year as a result of this annual campaign.

You and I should be doing the same thing. Why not start by reading Psalm 23, 100, or 145? Or the gospel of John. Read it this week, to your family, and give thanks for this incredible gift — of God’s holy Word that we can read in this free nation.

Years after returning from exile in Babylon, the people of Israel, in 445 B. C., asked the prophet Ezra to bring out the Holy Scriptures and read them aloud. Ezra did this, reading to those who gathered in the public square, from daybreak to noon.

They listened attentively. The Levites taught the people, expounding on what was being read. And the people wept as they heard God’s Word. Then they were told to spread the Word through their towns and in Jerusalem. And their joy was great!

Many would say that the American people have been in exile for the last forty years, dangerously out of contact with the Word of God. But it wasn’t always this way.

Reading the Bible at the dinner table or reciting Bible verses was once a regular activity at the evening meal. Sadly, that’s no longer the case in most homes. Reading Bible stories to children at bedtime is also less common. Parents today say they’re “too busy.”

Many churches have fallen away from teaching the Scripture. The outstanding Sunday School programs that were so common back in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, were decimated in the 1960s. Denominational programs dried up, Christian education budgets were reduced by as much as 90 percent in some places, and Sunday school programs — like everything else — were watered down.

But there is a way back from this forty-year exile, just as there was for the Israelites of old. We can reclaim our biblical heritage in our homes and our churches. We do it when we begin to read and learn from the Bible, just as they did in Ezra’s time, rejoicing in its wisdom.

Now I realize that most of you listening are regular Bible readers, but maybe your neighbors are not. And you’re wondering how to get them involved. Well, here are some practical ways. The National Bible Association has prepared an excellent daily planner, with six different lesson plans for daily Bible reading. It has a plan for individuals and groups, and includes liturgical readings as well as daily readings from the Psalms and Proverbs.

For those on the Internet, you can access the daily Bible e-mail, containing from four to twenty Bible verses in several different translations. And you can begin each day with an inspirational reading.

To order the daily planner or the daily Bible e-mail, write to the National Bible Association at: 1865 Broadway, New York, New York 10023; or visit their website: . This is a great way to send a love note to your children and grandchildren, or other family members, every day of the year.

And there’s more that you can do. You can ask your pastor to talk about National Bible Week and to highlight Bible reading not just in his sermons but in classes throughout the church. And you can speak to the principal or teachers in your local school — because reading the Bible is constitutional.

As America observes National Bible Week during this week of Thanksgiving, let’s remember to give thanks to God for all our blessings and, most particularly, for the special blessing of God’s Word revealed to us in the Bible.

Just think what could happen if the American people got into the habit of reading God’s Word every day. It would transform lives, certainly; and, in turn, it could change this world.

How long did it take to print the first Bibles?

It took three years of constant printing to complete Johann Gutenberg's famous Bible, which appeared in 1455 in two volumes, and had 1,284 pages. He reportedly printed 200 Bibles, of which 47 still exist.

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For more on the Gutenberg Bible visit: http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/permanent/gutenberg/

Source: ArcaMax Trivia, http://www.arcamax.com

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At a recent conference in Washington, D.C., the questions were asked: “Why Genesis? Why Now?” The event, sponsored by the Ethics and Public Policy Center, was a discussion of the new book The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis by Professor Leon Kass.

Both Kass's book and the conference it inspired raise a question that Christians ought to welcome: What is the role of the Bible, in particular, Genesis, in twenty-first century American life? Do words written more than three millennia ago have anything to tell us about how we ought to live our lives today? The answer, according to Kass, a great scholar and the chairman of the President's Council on Bioethics, is “absolutely.”

Kass's book is the product of twenty-five years of studying Genesis and teaching it to his students at the University of Chicago. Those experiences led Kass to appreciate the “moral sensibilities and demands of the Torah,” although he confesses that his practice is still “wanting.” But he is no longer confident in the sufficiency of “unaided human reason” to answer life's most important questions.

Genesis's impact isn't limited to the personal. What Kass, who is Jewish, calls the “crisis in modern thought,” especially in the moral and ethical realms, stems from our culture's disregard for the lessons taught in Genesis. We have a “need for wisdom” in this area, one that requires a “serious examination” of the Bible, starting with Genesis.

And what better place to start than at the beginning? Even a reader who doesn't believe in the inspiration of Scripture has to admit that Genesis chapters 1 through 11 are without peer in their accurate depiction of the “human predicament”: our strengths and our weaknesses, our nobility and our folly.

As Kass puts it, the stories in chapters 1 through 11, tell “what always happens” — whether the subject is the relationship between spouses, between siblings, or between man and God.

For instance, Kass's chapter on the story of Cain and Abel, “Fratricide and Founding,” is a powerful antidote to our culture's sentimental and even utopian view of human nature. Genesis's account of how pride, jealousy, and anger cause us to prey upon one another is much more true to life than what we hear from contemporary “experts.”

Given Genesis's insight and accuracy regarding the human condition, it's reasonable to think that its insights on what it means to be human are likewise worth examining. Its account of what makes man unique and the dignity that flows from that status, like its portrayal of our faults, rings far truer to human experience than secular alternatives.

Genesis's understanding of human nature and human dignity has implications for nearly every aspect of our culture: bioethics, human rights, religious freedom, war, and peace. That answers the question: “Why Genesis?” And the answer to the second — “Why Now?” — is that the alternatives to the biblical worldview have all failed. They have left us with the “crisis” Kass mentions, unable to find answers because we no longer remember the real questions: Who are we? How are we supposed to live?

To remember those, we, like Kass, need to start at the beginning — in this case, “The Beginning of Wisdom.”

FOR FURTHER READING:

• Leon Kass, The Beginning of Wisdom: Reading Genesis (Free Press, 2003).

• Roberto Rivera, “Patriarchy,” BreakPoint Online, 7 July 2003.

• David Novak, “Ideals and Idols,” The New Republic, 12 May 2003. (You must be a subscriber to access this article; there is a 4-week free trial subscription available.)

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Copyright (c) 2003 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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After Acts: Early Church series #5 Revelation 22:18-19

MARCION - CAN YOU SLICE THE BIBLE?

==================================

I. Where did the Bible come from?

II. It begins with the Jews.

A. God revealed himself to the Jews, and they began writing.

B. Later Jews in Bible (Ezra) credited earlier ones as inspired.

C. The Old Testament apocrypha.

III. History of Marcion.

A. The origin of a world-class heretic.

B. What kind of God do we worship?

C. Proving his point by slashing the Book.

IV. The crisis of the canon.

A. Christians knew the New Testament was inspired.

B. Early Bibles were fluid.

C. Crisis led to action.

D. The Church did not produce the canon, but recognized it.

V. Modern threats.

A. Rejection of any canon by liberalism.

B. Those who add to the Bible.

C. Subtracting from the Bible.

VI. We need the whole Bible.

A. The whole Bible is our standard of faith and life.

B. The whole Bible testifies to Jesus.

*

Version adapted by Rev. David Holwick:

In 1995, Robert Harlan kidnapped a waitress and assaulted her. She escaped and flagged down a female motorist. Mr. Harlan caught up with the two women, shot the driver, leaving her paralyzed, then beat and killed the waitress. He was arrested, put on trial and found guilty. Then the penalty phase began.

Mr. Harlan's lawyers urged the jurors to consider biblical wisdom and find mercy in their hearts “as God ultimately took mercy on Abraham.” They also made several references to Mr. Harlan's soul and his habit of reading the Bible with his father.

The judge told the jury to go beyond the narrow confines of the law in thinking about the death penalty. They were told to make an “individual moral assessment.”

The jury went into their room and began deliberating. Several of them took out their Bibles to see what it said about the death penalty. Then the jury voted unanimously for death.

Because they used their Bibles, the Colorado Supreme Court reversed their decision and gave Mr. Harlan life in prison. They said the jury was not allowed to bring a “higher authority” into the jury room beyond the evidence in the trial. Even though the witnesses were sworn in on Bibles - and the defense attorneys quoted the Bible - and the judge told them to go beyond the law on the issue.

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Original article:

In a sharply divided ruling, Colorado's highest court on Monday upheld a lower court's decision throwing out the sentence of a man who was given the death penalty after jurors consulted the Bible in reaching a verdict. The Bible, the court said, constituted an improper outside influence and a reliance on what the court called a “higher authority.”

“The judicial system works very hard to emphasize the rarified, solemn and sequestered nature of jury deliberations,” the majority said in a 3-to-2 decision by a panel of the Colorado Supreme Court. “Jurors must deliberate in that atmosphere without the aid or distraction of extraneous texts.”

The ruling involved the conviction of Robert Harlan, who was found guilty in 1995 of raping and murdering a cocktail waitress near Denver. After Mr. Harlan's conviction, the judge in the case - as Colorado law requires - sent the jury off to deliberate about the death penalty with an instruction to think beyond the narrow confines of the law. Each juror, the judge told the panel, must make an “individual moral assessment,” in deciding whether Mr. Harlan should live.

The jurors voted unanimously for death. The State Supreme Court's decision changes that sentence to life in prison without parole.

In the decision on Monday, the dissenting judges said the majority had confused the internal codes of right and wrong that juries are expected to possess in such weighty moral matters with the outside influences that are always to be avoided, like newspaper articles or television programs about the case. The jurors consulted Bibles, the minority said, not to look for facts or alternative legal interpretations, but for wisdom.

“The biblical passages the jurors discussed constituted either a part of the jurors' moral and religious precepts or their general knowledge, and thus were relevant to their court-sanctioned moral assessment,” the minority wrote.

Legal experts said that Colorado was unusual in its language requiring jurors in capital felony cases to explicitly consult a moral compass. Most states that have restored the death penalty weave in a discussion of moral factors, lawyers said, along with the burden that jurors must decide whether aggravating factors outweigh mitigating factors in voting on execution.

“In Colorado it's a more distinct instruction,” said Bob Grant, who was the prosecutor in the Harlan case. Mr. Grant said no decision had been made yet on whether to appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

Legal scholars say the connection between hard legal logic and the softer, deeper world of values is always present in jury rooms, whether acknowledged or not.

“The court says we're asking you to be moral men and women, to make a moral judgment of the right thing to do,” said Thane Rosenbaum, a professor of law at Fordham University School of Law in New York City, and author of the book “The Myth of Moral Justice: Why Our Legal System Fails to Do What's Right” (HarperCollins, 2004). “But then we say the juror cheated because he brought in a book that forms the basis of his moral universe,” Professor Rosenbaum said. “The thing is, he would have done it anyway, in his head.”

Other legal experts say the Colorado decision touches on an issue that courts do not like to talk about: that jurors, under traditions dating to the days of English common law, can consider higher authority all they want, and can convict or acquit using whatever internal thoughts and discussions they consider appropriate.

In this instance, lawyers said, there was simply a clearer trail of evidence, with admissions by the jurors during Mr. Harlan's appeal that Bibles had been used in their discussion. One juror testified she studied Romans and Leviticus, including Leviticus 24, which includes the famous articulation of Old Testament justice: “eye for eye, tooth for tooth.”

Professor Howard J. Vogel, who teaches ethics at Hamline University School of Law in St. Paul and has a master's degree in theology as well as a law degree, said, “I don't think it's a religious text that's the problem here, but rather whether something is being used that trumps the law of the state.”

The Bible is hardly monolithic about what constitutes justice. Some legal experts say the jurors might just as easily have found guidance that led them to vote to spare Mr. Harlan's life. Lawyers for Mr. Harlan also specifically urged the jurors to consider biblical wisdom, according to the Supreme Court's decision, with a request that they find mercy in their hearts “as God ultimately took mercy on Abraham.”

The lawyers also made several references to Mr. Harlan's soul and his habit of reading the Bible with his father, the court said.

Mr. Harlan was convicted of kidnapping a waitress, Rhonda Maloney, and raping her. She escaped and flagged down a motorist, Jaquie Creazzo. Mr. Harlan caught up with the two women, shot Ms. Creazzo, leaving her paralyzed, then beat and killed Ms. Maloney.

*

At first glace, the Bible simply looks like a book. But it is immeasurably more.

A glass of water may not be a marvelous sight, unless you are desperately thirsty; then it becomes invaluable.

Coins or paper currency are passive objects, but when they are taken into the marketplace they provide food, clothing or other personal needs. Money can fulfill a person’s wishes and, unfortunately, fuel a person’s self-centeredness and eventual ruin.

It is entirely plausible, then, that “the Word of God is living and active,” as the Bible is described in the Book of Hebrews, chapter 4, verse 12, and thus a vital part of our times in prayer.

“Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow,” the passage continues with a metaphoric touch; “it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”

This stark transparency before our Creator’s eyes might leave us undone and hopeless, but instead, God intends for it to deepen our intimacy with Him.

“Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess,” the Scripture counsels, reminding us that God’s intense knowledge of our thoughts and actions should stir us to “approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (verses 12-16).

Our time of need isn’t just when a crisis has erupted; it encompasses every moment of awareness of our dependence on God to draw another breath, to experience life at its fullest, and to preserve our souls into eternity.

Through God’s love, we will have “confidence on the day of judgment,” we are told in 1 John, chapter four, verse 17, “because in this world we are like him.”

Knowing that the “living and active” Word of God is a key dynamic by which we become “like him,” the practice of memorizing and internalizing Scripture provides momentous opportunities to take hold of an ever-deepening faith.

More and more, we become the kind of people Scripture envisions and we experience the kinds of things that occur in God’s supernatural realm.

Increasingly, we are attuned to the inward transformation and outward flow of the “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control” noted in the Galatians 5 passage that describes the fruit of the Spirit.

Frequently, we contemplate what’s on God’s heart as conveyed in Scripture and by the Holy Spirit. We begin to ponder His wisdom, seeking in prayer to apply the intriguing qualities set forth in James 3:17: that the “wisdom that comes from above is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”

And when we lovingly speak forth God’s Word, it has a way of enriching us as well as those who hear it.

In listening to music, we often become absorbed by it, allowing it to infuse and reverberate in our souls. Scripture, though its impact may be more subtle, is far more crucial to our well-being than any melody or set of lyrics.

Internalizing various life-changing Scripture passages is as important spiritually as an elementary school student learning the basics of addition and subtraction, or a worker attaining the skills necessary to do his or her job, or a driver knowing the various road signs that assure safe travel.

When we are rooted in Jesus and open to his Holy Spirit, Scripture is far more likely than any other resource known to man to help us pray in tune with God. Each Scripture passage that we internalize is like a new path toward God’s love and wisdom and His eternal riches.

________

Art Toalston is editor of Baptist Press. This article was adapted from an unpublished manuscript on prayer.

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“This book contains the mind of God, the state of man, the way of salvation, the doom of sinners and the happiness of believers. Its doctrines are holy, its precepts are binding, its histories are true, and its decisions are immutable. Read it to be wise, believe it to be safe, and practice it to be holy. It contains light to direct you, food to support you and comfort to cheer you. It is the traveler’s map, the pil- grim’s staff, the pilot’s compass, the soldier’s sword, and the Christian’s character. Here Paradise is restored, heaven opened, and the gates of hell disclosed. Christ is its grand Object, our good its design, and the glory of God its end. It should fill the memory, rule the heart and guide the feet. Read it slowly, frequently and prayerfully. It is a mine of wealth, a Paradise of glory and a river of pleasure. It is given you in life, will be opened in the judgment, and will be remembered forever. It involves the highest responsibility, will reward the greatest labor and will condemn all who trifle with its sacred contents”

-- found on the inside cover of my gradfather's Bible, a well-worn, 1909 Scofield Bible. Steve Worden, Tulsa, OK

In a book written in the early 1900's titled THE PSALMS IN HUMAN LIFE AND EXPERIENCE, author Rowland Prothero gives evidence of the widespread use and influence of the Psalms in public and private lives throughout history. His work carefully traces together some of the countless instances in which the Psalms have guided and sustained lives and nations. While looking back on history, Prothero notes of his day, that the very language of the Psalms “has become part of the daily life of nations, passing into their proverbs, mingling with their conversation, and used at every critical stage of existence.”(1)

Doubtless, much has changed since the writing of these words. As a nation we seem to be guided more by feelings and appetites, than the Word of God, more in tune with what we want, than what is written in the pages of Scripture. We have become so bombarded with information, and so comfortable with listening to the experts, that we have largely abandoned the wealth of personally delving into God's Word daily. Sadly, even as Christians we often spend our time gazing at the pennies we have found along the journey, instead of receiving unto ourselves all of the wealth of heaven God offers us in his Word.

Sad indeed, for the stories describing Scriptures that have changed history are abundant. And occasionally, one finds an old soul who scatters throughout his conversations the vocabulary of old hymns, speaking readily with the language and imagery of God's Word. An old man in a church I once served was very much like this. At 100 years old, he had been blind for years and had grown nearly deaf as he came through his nineties, and yet I have never known a more contented Christian or a more robust and fervent man of God. He recited daily entire chapters of Scripture by memory. When I would come to visit, he would take my hand and ask if I could fathom a more beautiful hymn than “How Great Thou Art,” or conjure up more truthful words than “Great is Thy Faithfulness.” Singing completely by memory, unable to read the words in the bulletin that read, “1,2, and 3 verses only,” he once bellowed out the words of the last verse alone and a cappella. I have wondered if heaven ever heard so grand a sound and verse:

When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation

And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart!

Then I shall bow in humble adoration

And there proclaim, my God how great Thou art!

Then sings my soul, my Savior God to Thee;

How great Thou art, how great Thou art!

His life, among countless others, is a testimony to the power of God's Word when we allow it to seep deeply into our soul. Even so, the words of a popular song clash loudly, “Follow your heart, your intuition; it will lead you in the right direction.” And this we declare the postmodern anthem, even as our hearts testify against us. For in the words of the prophet Jeremiah, “The heart is deceitful above all things” (17:9).

As one truth-seeker of old has said, “The nature of water is soft, that of stone is hard; but if a bottle is hung above the stone, allowing the water to fall drop by drop, it wears away the stone. So it is with the Word of God; it is soft and our heart is hard, but the man who hears the Word of God often, opens his heart to the fear of God.”(2)

Will you allow your heart to be changed? Let us not forget that by God's Word the heavens existed and the earth was formed. What would happen if his were the words sung from the depths of our soul? The Word of God is infinitely practical, living and active, sharp enough to penetrate the hardest of hearts, careful to shape and able to transform the lives of all who will receive Him. Let us return again to the wealth and splendor of Scripture, for the promises of God vouchsafed to us in Christ are ours in abundance.

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1. (New York: E.P. Dutton and Co., 1903), 2.

2. The Sayings of the Desert Fathers, (Cistercian Publications, 1987).

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Copyright © 2005 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

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Wot ye not what the Scripture saith? — Romans 11:2.

My only safeguard against licentiousness on the one hand and monasticism and all foolish notions of human piety on the other, is “What saith the Scripture?” for it forms the only infallible test wherewith to prove the spirits whether they be of God (1 John 4:6). I cannot trust the voice of the church, she has so many voices. I cannot trust the voice of my brethren — it changes too often. I cannot trust the voice of my own heart, it is so often fanciful and false. But when I open the Bible I hear a voice which I can trust. It is my Father’s voice, the Good Shepherd’s voice, and I reverently bow to it as the voice of God and believe and confess what it says as the Word of God.

God’s Word unfolds Jehovah’s mind;

This Voice unfolds in accents kind.

This sun renews and warms the soul;

This sword both wounds and makes us whole.

This letter shows our sins forgiven;

This guide conducts us safe to Heaven.

This charter has been sealed with blood;

This volume is the Word of God.

The most contentious debates among Christians are arguments over biblical authority. While Christians who accept the full authority of Scripture -- even the inerrancy and infallibility of the biblical text -- may debate issues ranging from baptism and church government to eschatology and spiritual gifts, the issues of greatest debate in our time fall along the fault line of biblical authority.

This is especially true when dealing with the issue of sexuality, and the question of homosexuality in particular. Those who argue for the acceptance of homosexual behavior and the blessing of homosexual relationships have to deal with the fact that the Bible straightforwardly condemns homosexual behavior. In light of this, some attempt to subvert the text by arguing that these texts have actually been horribly misunderstood for over two thousand years. Increasingly, however, some now concede that the Bible condemns homosexuality in every relevant text, but that Christians are no longer bound by the authority of these texts as we deal with the present moral crisis.

One scholar who takes this approach is Brian K. Blount, Richard J. Dearborn Professor of New Testament Interpretation at Princeton Theological Seminary. Professor Blount specializes in “cultural hermeneutics,” and he applies this approach to the issue of homosexuality and biblical authority in an essay entitled, “The Last Word in Biblical Authority.”

Blount's essay is published in STRUGGLING WITH SCRIPTURE, which Blount authored along with coauthors Walter Brueggemann and William C. Placher. The book emerged out of a symposium on the theological interpretation of Scripture in which the three were participants.

Blount begins his essay by suggesting that some persons simply must have THE LAST WORD on any subject. “Many people treat the biblical words that way, believing that those words, all of them, must always be the last words standing. Now in matters of faith -- in matters of understanding our human relationship before God and God's moves to nurture, develop, restructure, and refine that relationship through the prophetic and incarnate Word -- most of Christendom, I think, agrees that those inspired words are lasting words. But in matters of the proper way to appropriate those words of faith ETHICALLY, there is and has always been considerable discussion and debate.”

Well, give Professor Blount credit for honesty. When he looks to the Bible, he does not see eternal words that are to be received as fixed and determinate, but as a text that is to be divided between “matters of faith” and other, presumably negotiable issues.

In making his case, Blount points to the issues of slavery, gender, and sexuality as evidence that “even the inspired biblical authors, when they applied God's prophetic and incarnate Word to their very human situations, allowed those situations to influence how they heard God and therefore how they talked to each other.”

Several clarifications must be inserted here. First, the Bible does not sanction race-based chattel slavery as practiced in many parts of the world, America included, throughout history. The Bible does seek to REGULATE slavery, but there is no way that slavery, gender, and sexuality can be linked as equal issues in terms of biblical interpretation.

Nevertheless, Professor Blount argues that when confronting biblical texts that deal with these issues, the contemporary church must not allow these words to be the last word on the subject. Instead, he argues that “ethical biblical authority is CONTEXTUAL biblical authority.”

The interpretive key, according to Blount, is the human spirit. “The role of the spirit is a constant,” he explains. “Laced into the fabric of human beings is that part of us that reaches beyond the boundaries of our flesh and blood and touches the essential voice of God's own Holy Spirit. Did you ever hear someone say a room is wired for sound? We're wired for God, wired by God with a human spirit that despite its limitations can be touched by God's Holy Spirit. In every time, in every place, in every moment of history, the spirit plays this interlocutory role.”

He argues that the church should hear God's voice “like an inaudible whisper -- sometimes gentle, sometimes fierce -- that jangles the nerves of the human spirit until, tensed and alert, it attends to what it is that God wants to 'say.'“

Nevertheless, what God says “will be different according to the variable conditions in which the human spirits who encounter it find themselves.”

Note his argument carefully. He is suggesting that human experience is the key to interpreting scripture, and that the words of Scripture may take on different meanings in different contexts. The ethical teachings of the Bible, he asserts, are limited to specific times and specific places, where the prejudices and realities of any given time may shape the biblical text in unethical ways. When such texts are encountered, they “ought to be challenged when we find that they were influenced by their contexts in such a way that they are damaging, and not life affirming, in a contemporary circumstance.”

Professor Blount understands that he has set himself up for some difficult questions. Which words of the Bible are to be seen as living and authoritative and which are to be seen as ethically substandard? He accuses the contemporary church of wanting to remain in an infantile state, unwilling to acknowledge the reality of these issues and instead desiring a stable and authoritative text. “We're too often not ready for the meat of mature considerations about the words of texts that were often right for their own times twenty centuries ago but may well be wrong for our time.”

This raises a most interesting question. Is Professor Blount arguing that, assuming his interpretive scheme, slavery was at one time ethically right, but is now to be seen as ethically wrong? When did this transition in the morality of slavery take place? Similar questions could be addressed to the other controversial cases he raises.

Sometimes, he argues that the Bible simply has to be put in its place. He cites Carlos Mesters to the effect that the poor and oppressed in Latin America have had to learn to put the Bible “in its proper place, the place where God intended it to be.” As Mesters affirmed, “They are putting it in second place. Life takes first place!”

“We've often made the biblical words the last word in the sense that none of them can ever change,” Blount argues. “Even if the words were on the mark for a first-century community but are no longer on target for ours, even when they have become like rickety, arthritic knees that don't bend and twist so well in the new race we're running for God, we treat them as if they just started competing yesterday. A last word can't breathe; it can't endure this marathon of living with the people of God who run in the presence of God's ever-living, ever-sustaining Holy Spirit.”

Beyond this, Blount argues that treating the biblical words as fixed and enduring transforms them into literary artifacts. Over time, these words become fossilized and the faith becomes more like an exercise in archaeology than a living faith “that celebrates seeing God say and do new things in new times.”

To be clear about this, what Blount argues is that God is now doing and saying something different than he did and said in the past. Responding to new realities, new people, and new contexts, God is presented as leading His people in new directions, often in contradiction to where he presumably led His people previously.

For most mainline Protestant denominations, the issue of homosexuality is now where the question of biblical authority is most clearly encountered. When he gets to this issue, Blount makes some rather surprising concessions. “The New Testament's words on homosexual behavior are also clear. They are words of condemnation; I don't try to deny that. I don't think anyone should,” he asserts.

Nevertheless, these words are to be seen as coming out of a “particular context” that is significantly different than our own. Thus, “I don't think the words are any longer living, but are, rather, dead words if we try to read them without contextually understanding them today.”

This is where “cultural hermeneutics” serves as a license to liberate the church from the undeniably clear words of Scripture. Applying his tools of cultural hermeneutics, Professor Blount argues that the Apostle Paul “was inspired by God's Word in a world where sexuality was understood in a radically different way from how it is understood today.” For Paul, homosexual activity was tied to idolatry and the “unnatural” dimension of homosexual acts related to the fact that they were not related to procreation. Blount argues that the Apostle Paul derived his understanding of sexuality from the larger secular culture of the Greco-Roman civilization. “He tied his understanding of sexuality to an understanding of sex acts that were properly condoned only when done according to the natural order designed for procreation or as a remedy for the burning passions of lust that apparently threatened the eruption of human bonfires all over the ancient world.”

Pushing further, Blount argues that Paul's thoughts should be divided between his creation theology and his Christ theology, and the two theological strains should be seen as competing with one another in the text of Paul's letters.

Brian K. Blount attempts to offer a hermeneutical rationale for denying the authority of biblical texts that condemn homosexual behavior. In the name of liberating humanity, he would liberate the church from the actual words of Scripture and look instead for an “inner dynamic within the biblical text that transcends the actual words.” This is why a doctrine of verbal inspiration is indispensable to biblical authority. If the very words of Scripture, in the original languages, are not inspired of God, and thus precisely the right words for the church throughout all time, then we are left in a constant battle to negotiate the meaning of the biblical text. Its meaning in one generation might be very different from its meaning in another, and generations to come might actually reverse the interpretation settled upon by Christians living in our times. In other words, God seems to be leading His people in many different directions over time, and the biblical text becomes a fabric that can be stretched in any number of different directions, all claiming to be led by the Spirit of God.

Professor Blount's approach should be understood to be more honest than the arguments made by many others, who would seek to subvert the text by denying that the words actually mean what they appear to mean. Blount accepts that the Bible clearly condemns homosexual behavior, and he advises his colleagues that it is unwise for them to argue otherwise. Nevertheless, he then makes an astounding jump of theological imagination to suggest that the church should simply liberate itself from these words, and should do so in the name of God's own Spirit.

We are reminded all over again that debates over these contentious issues are, at their very base, debates over the nature of biblical authority. Professor Blount wants to affirm some understanding of biblical authority, but his methodology actually places the human spirit and the interpretive community in the roles of greater authority. The biblical text simply has to give way to the “living Word” that the church now experiences.

How long will it be before similar arguments begin to emerge within circles that think themselves solidly committed to biblical authority? We can only wonder -- and watch with great care.

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I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains ,of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed. — Ezekiel 34:14.

The Word of God may be compared to green pastures. There is nourishment there for all hungry hearts “enough and to spare.” Nor do these pastures ever become barren or sear. They are as green and fresh today as when they were first issued by the Holy Spirit. Though multitudes of commentators have considered them, and myriads of Christians have studied and conned them, they cannot be pondered by a loving and obedient heart without yielding nutriment and strength.

There is a storehouse of rich fare,

Supplied with plenty and to spare:

‘Tis God’s own Word! It spreads a feast

For every hungering, thirsting guest.

As diligent bees fill their cells with honey unseen and unknown to others, so may we search the Word of God, which is sweeter than honey in the honeycomb, for hidden delights. As men seek riches, laboring through days and nights, so may we search for that precious truth which shall give to us a new manhood, a nobler aspiration, a nearer alliance to God and more blessed joy.

One day Luther's wife seems to have been a little out of temper. She got tired of his prolonged reading in the Psalms, said she had heard enough, and added impatiently that she "read a great deal for herself every day, and knew very well how to talk about it, too." "Ah, Kate," replied her husband, with a sigh, "this is the way weariness of God's word begins; beware lest new books come and take its place, and the Scriptures be driven into the corner."

The Rev. Charles Vince, of Birmingham, told the following incident at a meeting of the Bible Society, in 1863- The Hill-top Auxiliary, in "the Black Country," determined to send around two or three Christian men every Saturday evening, with packages of Bibles, to visit the public houses, and persuade the miners of the district, while they had their money, to spend some part of it in buying the word of God. While they were carrying out this plan, a miner said: "Wouldn't it be a good thing for us to have a copy to read down in the pit at dinner-time?" The proposition met with general approval, and they agreed to buy a copy for this purpose. Of the first copy handed to them, the landlord said the print was too small to read down in the pit, and offered to give a shilling towards the cost of a better type. This was bought, and one of the men said with great simplicity: "If we have the Bible at dinnertime, we mustn't have no swearing." This, too, was carried, and a fine imposed upon the man that should break the rule. Is there any other book in the world that you could carry into the company of men and make them say, "If we open this, and begin to look at it, we must begin to put away some of our sins"?