79 Sermon Illustrations on Inspiration

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.

In “The Da Vinci Code,” one of the main characters, Sir Leigh Teabing says, “The Bible is a product of man, my dear. Not of God. The Bible did not fall magically from the clouds. Man created it as a historical record of tumultuous times, and it has evolved through countless translations, additions, and revisions. History has never had a more definitive version of the book.”

Teabing’s statement begs two questions: Is the Bible we have today what was originally written? And, how did the collection of authoritative Christian writings today we call the New Testament come to be chosen? Today, we will concern ourselves with the first question. Tomorrow, we will look at the other.

We have all played the game of telephone. In this game, the teacher whispers a statement in the ear of three people on the first row, who then whisper the same statement to the person behind them, who in turn whisper to the person behind them. By the time the person in the back of the room receives the message, it is quite different than what was originally communicated by the teacher. A skeptic could say, “If such a disparity can occur within five minutes in a room, how much more can occur in the alterations of biblical stories when continents are crossed and languages are changed over a span of 2,000 years?”

While this is an interesting question, it simply will not do. Let us suppose that the teacher asks the three students to whom she originally whispered her message to leave the room with her, having asked a fellow teacher to come and attempt to recover her statement to the three students. How would that fellow teacher proceed? Perhaps the first thing she would do would be to ask the people in the second row what was said to them. This, of course, is important because those closest to the original source are much more likely to have gotten it right. Her second action would be to compare the various statements of students further back and in different rows in order to try to ascertain where mistakes in communication were made. After a little work, there is a high likelihood that the second teacher will be able to reconstruct the first teacher's original statement with surprising accuracy.

Reconstructing the original writings of an ancient author works much in the same way. The closer we can get to the originals, the better. And greater numbers of manuscripts ensure greater accuracy. Historians feel fairly secure with the writings of Herodotus and Thucydides, both of whom wrote in the fifth-century B.C. and are regarded as two of our most prized ancient sources. This security is based on eight manuscripts for each of these authors. In either case, the earliest manuscript is dated at least 1,300 years after the original was written. In contrast, the New Testament has 5,745 Greek manuscripts (as of September 2005), more than 10,000 Latin manuscripts, thousands of manuscripts of early translations of the New Testament writings, and more than a million citations of the New Testament found in the writings of the church fathers. Moreover, the earliest manuscript is dated within only a few decades after the original was written. Indeed, we have no less than nine manus cripts of New Testament writings within 150 years of the originals. The writings of the New Testament, by far, enjoy the best manuscript evidence of any ancient writings.

Of course with many manuscripts come variations, especially when numerous church fathers paraphrased or attempted to recall a verse from memory. These variations fall into four categories. The first category includes spelling and nonsense readings probably due to circumstances such as a tired scribe writing by candlelight. Seventy percent or more of all manuscript variations fall in this category. The second largest category includes synonyms but where the meaning is unchanged. For example, “Jesus Christ” appears in the text instead of “Christ Jesus.” The third category includes variations in the text that affect meaning but are not found in manuscripts that carry much weight. The fourth category, and by far the smallest, includes variations that affect meaning and are found in decent manuscripts. This fourth category is at best only one percent and it does not impact any major Christian doctrine. However, scholars are still usually able to weigh that manuscript against other manuscripts that may be better. Other guidelines are likewise employed in order to arrive at what probably was written in the original. In some cases confidence is not very high. But remember that these instances are rare and they do not change major Christian doctrines.

In the end, even many of today’s skeptical scholars would agree that the text of the New Testament we have today is at least 99 percent exact to what originally was written. Only one percent remains in question and no major Christian doctrine is affected. Therefore, today’s Christian can have absolute confidence that the New Testament they read and revere can be relied on as much today as it was in the first century.

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Licona is director of apologetics and interfaith evangelism at the North American Mission Board.

A preacher worked hard on his sermon most of the week and retyped it all up on Saturday night. But during the night his dog chewed it all up. He didn’t notice until it was time to go to church. When he got in the pulpit, he said, “I had a nice sermon prepared for you this morning, but my dog chewed it up. I’m going to have to rely on the inspiration of the Lord today, but I promise to do better next Sunday.”

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[The original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #4886]

”Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the grave, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom” (Ecclesiastes 9:10).

“How could I ever write a book?” I once asked a friend. She replied, “One page at a time!”

Good answer. In all my years of writing there have been very few times when I felt so inspired that I couldn’t help but write and where words flowed freely … Those times have been rare. Mostly, writing is a challenge — including writing Daily Encounters … and trying to keep fresh and relevant.

Certainly I pray for God’s wisdom, guidance and help. But if I waited every day for some special inspiration, not many Daily Encounters would be written … if any! Yes, I keep notes and am forever looking for good illustrations and keep a file … and have taken courses in writing and communication. But my calling is still hard work.

Ernest Newman expressed this thought well: “The great composer does not set to work because he is inspired, but becomes inspired because he is working. Beethoven, Wagner, Bach, and Mozart settle down day after day to the job in hand with as much regularity as an accountant settles down each day in his figures. They didn’t waste time waiting for inspiration.”

And so it is with many, if not most, of life’s responsibilities. We need to be prepared and then work hard. As another has said, “The only place in the world where success comes before work is in the dictionary!” And as today’s Scripture indicates, when we put our hand to a task, we need to do it to the best of our ability and with all our might.

Suggested prayer: “Dear God, help me to sort out my priorities and take all of my responsibilities seriously and work diligently with all my might. And when each day’s work is done, help me to learn to relax, too — with all my might. Gratefully in Jesus’ name. Amen.”

Pastor Mark Becton’s skin cancer surgery five years ago continues to touch lives -- not medically, but spiritually. Becton, pastor of Grove Avenue Baptist Church in Richmond, Virginia, underwent surgery in August 2006 to remove the skin cancer and -- while unconscious from general anesthesia -- quoted Scripture and spoke words of encouragement heard by three medical professionals in the operating room.

Anesthesiologist Gail Heppner heard Becton and thought he wasn’t completely sedated, so she upped his dosage. But Becton continued. When Heppner turned down the volume of monitors and the music playing in background, Becton’s words became clearer to her. “He is not only talking, he is completely articulate, clear as a bell,” Heppner said. “As I listened, I felt this is not a man preaching, this is not a man in prayer, this is the Holy Spirit.”

Heppner recounted what happened during the pastor’s surgery during both of Grove Avenue’s Sunday morning worship services on Sept. 10, 2006, which were televised locally and via satellite. More than 2,000 requests for DVD copies of the service have been requested from around the world.

“I know there are Christians in the room in pain. Some feel empty and used up, guilty because they feel they have nothing left to give God,” Heppner said, recalling Becton’s words five years ago.

Becton’s words shocked nurse Carol Miller, who also addressed the Grove Avenue congregation during the September 2006 service. A week before the surgery, Miller had voiced the same words to Heppner -- that she felt “empty, used up and guilty” because she had nothing left to give to God. Miller noted her suspicion at how Becton knew the words she had spoken to Heppner a week earlier. “Dr. Becton didn’t know me,” she told the Grove Avenue congregation. “Where did he hear that from?”

Equally stunned was Heppner, who had asked two others to pray for Miller. “At that point, the scientist in me was gone,” Heppner said, noting that she “nearly burst into tears” over what her patient had spoken.

Miller said her reaction in the operating room became, “Okay, I’m listening, I’m listening.”

“I was so filled with pain, this agonizing, grief-stricken pain, this weight of the world in my heart,” said Miller, whose husband died on Christmas night in 2001 and whose daughter died a year later. “My heart was dried up and empty. That’s the way I felt. ... I came to work every day and smiled. I went to church and prayed about it. But when Dr. Becton started speaking, you could feel the Holy Spirit in that room. Jesus came to work that day to take the burdens from my heart.”

“Carol, let me have it, all your hurt and pain, just give it up,” Becton said to her while completely sedated during the surgery.

“And that’s what I did,” Miller said.

“We put Dr. Becton to sleep, and everything went as normal,” said surgeon Burton Sundin, the third medical professional who was impacted by Becton’s words in the operating room five years ago. “We were waiting for the pathology to come back on his specimen, and the Holy Spirit spoke through him. He began to say things -- the Holy Spirit began to say things -- through Dr. Becton to me.”

Sundin recounted Becton’s words: “Dr. Sundin, you were delivered to me specifically to be my surgeon. And God has great plans for you and your life. And he has given you many gifts. They are His gifts, and He wants to use them through you, for Him. He has chosen you specifically to be His servant. ... God hears your prayers. He is near.”

Sundin had prayed before Becton’s surgery for relief from job-related feelings of burnout and despair. “Disease seemed to be winning its battle against me. Patients were unhappy and my life was in a total turmoil. I was dealing with the day-to-day toil and turmoil of being a young surgeon and trying to get my practice going,” Sundin said. “The day before Dr. Becton’s surgery, I left late with work on my desk piled to the ceiling. I was broken and I was seeking God even though I’ve always been a Christian.

“Some people will say it was the drugs talking or it just happened,” Sundin said. “But it lifted the heaviness from all of our hearts.”

Becton, in a telephone interview with Baptist Press this year, recounted that the former president of the International Mission Board, Jerry Rankin, attended Grove Avenue that September 2006 Sunday and later called to advise him.

“Dr. Rankin said he was ‘in awe in of what God had done,’” Becton recalled. “And he warned me of two things. One was that those of us who were involved in the event would go through spiritual attacks, and that Satan would try to discredit the story.

“The other was to make sure the experience didn’t become the only story of my life,” said Becton, who has spoken about the occurrence only twice publicly since.

Months afterward, Becton related the experience at a pastor’s request where he was preaching in a revival. A church member, who’d prayed for years regarding her husband’s salvation, saw her spouse give his life to Christ after hearing Becton’s account.

Other spiritual results were immediate, and others ongoing. More than 50 family members of the medical professionals involved in Becton’s surgery attended Grove Avenue to hear the account. After each service, about three-fourths of people in attendance came forward to pray and to recommit their lives to Christ, he added.

Becton said what God did spread through the medical community in neighboring cities as the account was a front-page story in the Richmond Times Dispatch five years ago.

Becton considers himself an unlikely candidate for what God did in the operating room, and that’s okay with the mild-mannered pastor. He also thinks “it’s unlikely that this would come from our church, which has a great reputation of proclaiming conservative biblical truth. For this to happen here would be unexpected.”

Not sure of all the reasons why God did what He did, Becton said members at Grove Avenue have a renewed passion for sharing the Gospel and the love of Christ at home and abroad. That’s due, in part, he said, to another message he got and enunciated during the surgery: “Time is short, and many must come,” Becton recounted.

In the ensuing five years, Grove Avenue members’ efforts in discipleship, missions and ministry have grown appreciably. A church missions program that already had seen 700 people come to Christ helped plant eight churches.

Local ministry is expanding as some schools now request Grove Avenue’s assistance with fall festivals, helping the church reach the world in Richmond as some 27 foreign languages are spoken in the various homes of local school children.

Becton added that some Grove Avenue members who are now prayerwalking in Richmond have met people from other churches on the street doing the same.

“We’re having a hard time keeping up with what God is doing in the lives of our members,” Becton said. “We have a sense that God is doing things deeper than I could see or records could show.”

Becton said every retelling of the story, whether public or private, elicits responses smiles and even tears of amazement. “For those who have a relationship with Christ, their faith is stirred. And for those who don’t, there’s a sense of awe.”

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This article includes excerpts from stories by Shawn Hendricks, a writer in Richmond, Va., and Alberta Lindsey, a writer for the Richmond Times Dispatch.

Evangelicals may disagree about many things, but we stand together on the non-negotiables that define the Christian faith: the Trinity, justification by faith, and the inspiration and authority of the Scriptures, to name a few.

Many belief systems, from Mormonism to Islam, profess a high regard for the Word of God. But, in fact, they deny its inspiration, inerrancy or preservation and thus reject the Bible as supremely authoritative.

Specifically, such religions employ four tactics to undermine the Scriptures:

1) They change it.

The most blatant of these is the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, whose members are known as Jehovah’s Witnesses.

In the late 1800s, Charles Taze Russell launched a Bible study to spread his denials of the Trinity, Jesus’ physical resurrection, and eternal punishment of the wicked in hell, cleverly twisting the Scriptures to buttress his false teachings. Not to be outdone, his successors produced their own version of the New Testament in 1950 and the completed New World Translation (NWT) in 1961.

Revised in 1984, and again in 2013, the NWT is a sanitized version of the Bible. Six translators -- only one of whom had any training in biblical languages -- essentially scrubbed the deity of Christ out of passages like John 1:1, John 8:58 and Colossians 1:15-17, and blurred other essential doctrines.

Jehovah’s Witnesses may regard the NWT as “an accurate, easy-to-read translation of the Bible” (jw.org), but distinguished Bible scholars disagree. British scholar H.H. Rowley calls it “a shining example of how the Bible should not be translated.”

Bruce Metzger, the late professor of New Testament language and literature at Princeton, called the NWT’s version of John 1:1 (“and the Word was a god”) “a frightful translation,” “pernicious” and “reprehensible.” He further stated, “If the Jehovah’s Witnesses take this translation seriously, they are polytheists.”

Even so, Witnesses are strongly encouraged to read only the NWT and to digest dozens of pages of Watch Tower literature every week. Sadly, as a result, Witnesses find it difficult to see the true Jesus in their Bibles, believing instead that He is a created being, Michael the Archangel.

2) They doubt it.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) claim to hold the Bible in high regard, but with a caveat. Among the LDS Articles of Faith is this statement: “We believe the Bible to be the word of God as far as it is translated correctly....”

In other words, Mormons doubt the reliability of the King James Bible they read and freely distribute because founder Joseph Smith taught that large portions of Scripture have been lost or corrupted. To Smith, this is a result of the church falling into complete apostasy after the death of the apostles -- a dire situation God sent him to remedy.

So, what are Mormons to do? Trust Joseph Smith’s “Inspired Version of the Bible,” essentially the King James Version, which Smith “corrected, revised, altered, added to, and deleted from,” according to LDS records.

Further, LDS members are encouraged to lean on other “standard works” such as the Book of Mormon.

3) They dilute it.

The LDS Church relies on the Bible, the Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants and Pearl of Great Price as their four written sources of authority. In addition, they may receive new revelations through their living prophet, seer and revelator -- the president of the LDS Church.

Meanwhile, Jehovah’s Witnesses are exhorted to interpret Scripture in light of the Watch Tower’s voluminous Bible studies and periodicals. Founder Charles Taze Russell once boasted of his Studies in the Scriptures, “They are not mere comments on the Bible, but they are practically the Bible itself.”

In a similar way, Christian Scientists rely on Mary Baker Eddy’s Science and Health With Key to the Scriptures for a proper understanding of the Bible.

4) They replace it.

Islam claims to be the restoration of true Abrahamic monotheism, and the Qur’an calls Jews and Christians “people of the book.” Muslims believe in the books of Moses, the psalms of David and the story of Jesus.

However, they also claim the Bible cannot be trusted because Jews and Christians have corrupted the texts. Therefore, one must read the Bible through the lens of the Qur’an to discern which parts are true. Essentially, the Bible is not necessary.

That’s because Allah delivered the “eternal Qur’an” to Muhammad by the angel Gabriel over a period of 23 years.

The Qur’an is said to be the final, perfect, eternal word of God, superseding and correcting everything that came before it. In a similar manner, Muhammad is the “seal of the prophets,” the last of 124,000 spokespersons for Allah, delivering the final chapter of Allah’s revealed will.

Whether changing, doubting, diluting or replacing the Bible, false belief systems fail to correctly teach the word of truth (2 Tim. 2:15).

How much better to receive Scripture for what it is: “inspired by God ... profitable for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, for training in the righteousness, so that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Tim. 3:16-17).

When Dwight McKissic asked the Baptist General Convention of Texas executive board to take a stand on the inerrancy of Scripture, he was surprised that numerous board members responded by shouting, “No!” McKissic, pastor of Cornerstone Baptist Church in Arlington, Texas, had hoped the board would give messengers to the Oct. 29-30 BGCT annual meeting in Dallas an opportunity to clarify their position on scriptural authority.

At the close of the Sept. 25 meeting, McKissic, a first-year BGCT board member, asked the board to affirm a statement which reads, “We believe in the divine inspiration of the whole Bible and the inerrancy of the original manuscripts.” He urged adoption of the statement as a means of unifying Texas Baptists and reconciling with the Southern Baptist Convention.

“Every time you pick up a newspaper or magazine [from BGCT] or go to the mailbox, they’re mailing you something trying to convince you about their position on Scripture,” McKissic told Baptist Press.

“But when they reject such a simple statement” that affirms the inerrancy and infallibility of Scripture “and mail you letters saying the Bible is true and trustworthy, that sounds Clintonesque,” McKissic said. “And with close to 1,000 churches affiliating with another state convention, these churches are apparently having some issues that they’re grappling with regarding the integrity of Scripture.” Either the affirmation of the original manuscripts as inerrant or support of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 would “help stop the hemorrhaging,” he insisted.

The board ultimately tabled McKissic’s motion as well as a substitute motion to affirm Texas Baptists’ “historic commitment” to the “complete trustworthiness” of the Bible. Instead, they asked BGCT Executive Director Charles Wade to guide them in affirming the convention’s dedication to Scripture.

In September, the 1,200-member Cornerstone Baptist Church voted to broaden its state convention affiliations to include both BGCT and the newer Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. After his attempt to clarify BGCT’s position on Scripture failed, McKissic resigned from the board and his church withdrew from BGCT membership, affiliating uniquely with SBTC.

During the board’s Sept. 25 meeting, Azle pastor Wesley Shotwell of Ash Creek Baptist Church responded to McKissic’s motion, objecting to any reference to inerrancy, believing the term to have multiple theological meanings and heavy political overtones. According to a report in the Texas Baptist Standard, he said the word can have six or seven meanings, some of which are “too liberal” for him.

BGCT communications reporter Ken Camp reported that Shotwell characterized inerrancy as “a very slippery term theologically” and as “politically divisive.” Camp noted Shotwell’s criticism that even the 2000 Baptist Faith and Message adopted by the Southern Baptist Convention did not use that word. “Why should churches make it an issue of fellowship when the SBC had the perfect opportunity to insert the word and did not do so?” Shotwell asked.

Other board members expressed concern that McKissic’s motion placed the BGCT in an awkward “lose/lose” situation. “In the interest of unity,” one board member asked both men to withdraw their motions. Shotwell agreed to do so if McKissic would also. However, McKissic declined, saying his conscience would not allow him to withdraw the motion.

Once board members approved the tabling of McKissic’s motion, they requested that BGCT Executive Director Charles Wade discuss the issue with him. According to the Standard, Wade spoke directly to McKissic while “fighting back tears.” Committing to work together with him on the matter, Wade told McKissic any further comments would do more harm than good.

Camp quoted BGCT President Clyde Glazener in his closing remarks as stating, “The BGCT is made up of people who believe the Bible to be the Word of God.” He further insisted that Texas Baptists are committed to living under the authority of “the Living Word of God ... Jesus Christ.”

Baptist Standard writer Mark Wingfield cited some board members as having speculated that “McKissic’s controversial motion had been originated by BGCT critics, namely leaders of the competing Southern Baptists of Texas Convention.” Editor Marv Knox asked McKissic whether SBTC leadership prompted his motion.

In the interview with Baptist Press, McKissic, an African American, said, “The roots of that question are racist. I don’t think they would have asked that question of Jack Graham, Mac Brunson or Ed Young,” referring to three Texas pastors of mega-churches, all of whom are white.

“It’s a question that asks, ‘Who’s thinking for you,’ as if I’m not capable of thinking for myself or that I can have an independent thought process. That gives me insight into the mindset of the writer” of the Standard article, he said.

“Unquestionably, those are my absolute convictions. My mother taught me as a kid that the Bible is the pure, unadulterated Word of God.” McKissic said he dealt with the issue in a book he prepared in 1990.

Of his appeal to the BGCT board, McKissic said, “That was first time in Baptist life that I’ve had an opportunity to express my convictions and try to clarify an issue that I think needs clarifying. The inerrancy of Scripture is a nonnegotiable for me,” he stated, allowing for the use of a “synonymous term.”

He viewed the phrase “truth without mixture of error” in the 1963 Baptist Faith and Message as a reference to “inerrant, infallible, original autographs that are inspired and profitable,” citing 2 Timothy 3:15-16. “But I discovered that for moderates ‘truth without any mixture of error’ means in matters of faith and redemption you can trust it, but they’re not willing to go on record that you can trust it on other matters.” Because of such varied definitions, McKissic said he returns to the term inerrancy.

Quoting Proverbs 30:5, McKissic said, “I just give one definition. ‘Every Word of God is pure.’ God breathed the Scripture, so how could a perfect God breathe imperfect Scripture?

“Words like true, trustworthy, inspired, high view of Scripture and even authority -- all of those are great words to use to describe the Bible and we all use them. But you have to have a word to describe the Bible that can’t describe the New England Journal of Medicine. Give me a word to describe the Bible that places it in a category beyond Time magazine. I’ve got a high view of Charles Wade’s Ph.D. dissertation, but I need a word to describe the Bible that cannot be said of his dissertation or any other.”

McKissic said this isn’t the first time he’s raised the issue with the BGCT’s executive director. “I’ve had private conversations with Wade across the years. And I consider him a dear friend. I’m well aware of where he stood and we maintain our friendship. But once you get on the board, to me it’s about the institution and not an individual,” McKissic said, referring to his responsibility as a part of the executive board. “This was the first time I had a chance to ask the question” before the full board, he said.

“I was shocked to know I was in a room with a hundred Baptists and was the only one who would stand up and say I believe in inerrancy,” McKissic told Baptist Press. “They have a problem with the term ‘guilt by association.’ I do, too. I don’t want to be associated with the guilty,” he said of his decision to resign from the BGCT board.

“If that group could not affirm that simple statement, then our church made a decision” to end its relationship with BGCT, McKissic said. The 45-year old pastor described the foundation of his church’s ministry as “an unshakable belief that the Bible is inerrant.” In 18 years of leading the church, he has emphasized expository preaching and evangelistic outreach, currently utilizing the FAITH program promoted by the Southern Baptist Convention. McKissic is among the workshop leaders at the early October Urban Alternative Church Development Conference hosted by Tony Evans in Dallas, speaking on church and community mobilization.

Among area pastors, McKissic has found inerrancy to be the first issue raised when the discussion deals with the BGCT. “There is a lack of confidence as to where they stand on inerrancy. And with them coming out opposing this motion, they’re making it clear that they leave room for doubt on that.” He charged other board members with “trying to cloud and confuse the issue by talking about seven different definitions of inerrancy. That’s a lawyer’s technique when facts and truth are not on their side.”

While applauding Wade and other BGCT churches for standing firm on the issue of homosexuality, McKissic said he objects to the appropriation of designated gifts to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship which he described as having a faction that promotes tolerance of homosexuality. “And with all the anti-SBC rhetoric that they articulate in CBF meetings, how can the leaders of BGCT have respect for people like me who gladly use the term inerrancy while they go off and listen to CBF leaders?

“If this convention [BGCT] does not go back to a strong, unquestionable view of the pure and unadulterated Word of God, we’re going to look like the CBF 20 years from now and that would be a tragedy.”

”Biblical authority dates back to Luther & Calvin, professor Says”: By David Roach

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (BP) — The Bible’s authority extends to all matters on which it speaks, including history and science, a Southern Baptist Theological Seminary professor said during the Give Me An Answer Collegiate Conference at the Louisville, Ky., campus.

Greg Wills, associate professor of church history, noted that liberal Christians have argued in recent decades that the Bible’s authority is limited to matters of faith and practice. Such a position, however, is inconsistent with historic Baptist beliefs and with the Protestant Reformers’ beliefs, Wills said.

Many liberal Christians teach that the Bible writers may be mistaken in matters of history, including how God created the world, the extent of the flood in Genesis 7 and whether Elisha really made an axe head float in 2 Kings 6, Wills said. Yet liberals maintain that the Bible’s historical errors do not damage its spiritual authority, he said.

To support their beliefs about Scripture, many liberals claim that the doctrine of inerrancy developed only during the last 150 years as a response to Darwinian evolution, Wills said.

Some liberals argue that “Luther and Calvin did not need an inerrant Bible, but only a Bible sufficient for saving sinners” and that inerrancy was “first suggested by Francis Turretin in the 17th century and fully developed by the Princeton theologians in the 19th century,” Wills said.

But such statements ignore the sizable mass of historical documentation that Martin Luther and John Calvin did, in fact, hold to the doctrine of inerrancy, Wills said.

“This theory is one of the more absurd myths promulgated in print,” he said. “… The Reformers held that God is the author of the Scriptures. As God makes no mistakes or errors, neither does the Bible. Even the least important and trivial statements must be true.”

Luther held that every word recorded in the Bible was spoken by the Holy Spirit and is therefore inerrant, Wills said, quoting Luther as saying, “It is impossible that Scripture should contradict itself; it only appears so to senseless and obstinate hypocrites.”

Wills recounted that “Luther said even ‘trifling’ matters in Scripture were profitable for life and morals, ‘since the Holy Spirit wanted to have it committed to writing.’”

“If that is not inerrancy,” Wills said, “I don’t know what is.”

Calvin argued that “the Bible is without error even in details, not merely in the truths that relate to faith and practice,” Wills continued, quoting Calvin’s commentary on 1 Peter: “The beginning of right knowledge is to give that credit to the holy prophets which is due to God … because they dared not to announce anything of themselves and only obediently followed the Spirit as their leader, who ruled in their mouth as in His own sanctuary.”

Early Baptists shared the Reformers’ sentiments regarding inerrancy, Will said, pointing out that Jesse Mercer, the first president of Southern Baptists’ Foreign Mission Board, wrote in 1834: “In writing the historical, biographical, and experimental parts of the Bible, … nothing more was needful than the inspiration of suggestion and direction, to excite in their minds what God would have recorded, and so to superintend and direct the whole work, that they should, though frail and imperfect in themselves, be preserved, even in the use of their own chosen language, free from error.”

Wills concluded, “The Bible is authoritative in all matters on which it speaks, for God inspired every word such that its statements are God’s words. Those who claim [that inerrancy] is a new invention know neither history nor the Scriptures.

“It’s hard to improve on our confessional formula: Scripture has God for its author, salvation for its end, and truth, without any mixture of error for its matter,” Wills said.

“Baptists did not come up with that statement after Darwin. They came up with it long before.”

[It is interesting to note the following sections from chapter 1, “The Holy Scriptures” of the Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689 (known also as ”The Old London Confession” and “The Philadelphia Confession of Faith”):

1. The Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith and obedience, {see 2 Ti 3:15-17; Isa 8:20; Lu 16:29,31; Eph 2:20} although the light of nature and the works of creation and providence do so far manifest the goodness, wisdom and power of God, as to leave men inexcusable; yet are they not sufficient to give that knowledge of God and His will which is necessary unto salvation {see Ro 1:19-21; 2:14-15; Ps 19:1-3}. Therefore it pleased the Lord at sundry times and in divers manners to reveal Himself, and to declare that His will unto His church; {see Heb 1:1} and afterwards for the better preserving and propagating of the truth, and for the more sure establishment and comfort of the church against the corruption of the flesh, and the malice of Satan, and of the world, to commit the same wholly unto writing; which maketh the Holy Scriptures to be most necessary, those former ways of God’s revealing His will unto His people being now ceased. {see Pr 22:19-21; Ro 15:4; 2 Pe 1:19-20}

4. The authority of the Holy Scripture, for which it ought to be believed, dependeth not upon the testimony of any man or church, but wholly upon God (who is truth itself), the author thereof; therefore it is to be received because it is the Word of God. {See 2 Pe 1:19-21; 2Ti 3:16; 2 Th 2:13; 1 Jn 5:9}

6. The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man’s salvation, faith and life, is either expressly set down or necessarily contained in the Holy Scripture: unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelation of the Spirit, or traditions of men {see 2 Ti 3:15-17; Ga 1:8-9}. Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word, {see Joh 6:45; 1 Co 2:9-12} and that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed {see 1 Co 11:13-14; 14:26,40}.

and

10. The supreme judge, by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Scripture delivered by the Spirit, into which Scripture so delivered, our faith is finally resolved {see Mt 22:29,31-32; Eph 2:20; Ac 28:23}.

Source: the Online Bible; see http://www.onlinebible.net

The emphasis on inspiration, of the reformers and the framers of this and the Westminster Confession, was not its general extent which was predicated to be universally true, but that Scripture, and it only, was the source of spiritual truth – RGH]

Sermon in 2 Timothy series. 2 Timothy 3:14-17

MORE THAN A BOOK

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

I. Are there dead bugs in there?

A. He got the right lesson from it.

B. Baptists are "people of the Book."

II. The Bible must be learned from someone. 3:14

A. It was a normal part of Jewish life.

B. No way around it, learning the Bible requires work.

III. The Bible is from God.

A. Christians have always believed the Bible was special.

B. The Bible is "God-breathed." 3:16

IV. The Bible is useful. 3:16

A. Ministry or life?

B. What the Bible can do for you.

V. The ultimate goal of the Bible. 3:15

On March 28, 1992, my journal entry reads, “My seminary notes, along with ten years of sermon tapes, are sitting in the dumpster at Glengary Elementary School.”

At the time, the decision seemed radical. All night I considered driving back to the dumpster and retrieving my deposit, but I never did.

What prompted such unusual behavior? Was I renouncing my ministry, my preaching, my seminary education? Not at all. I had struggled with the decision for several weeks. An imminent move from Nashville, Tennessee, to a pastorate in Honolulu, Hawaii, which pressured me to get rid of excess baggage, had brought me face to face with how in recent years my preaching had changed.

In my early years of ministry, my preaching was strong on principles, ideas, information. I encouraged listeners to take notes. But as the years passed, I concluded that effective preaching is not ultimately about points, outlines, and information as much as about helping people make contact with God.

Today I don’t care if people take notes during my sermons. Like my seminary notes, they won’t be looked at again. While outlines and information are important, they’re secondary. The experience of meeting God is primary.

THE POWER OF STORIES

I’ve been preaching for twenty years. I served as a youth speaker during high school, an associate pastor during college, a student pastor during seminary, and a senior pastor after seminary. For four years I served as editor of Proclaim, the Southern Baptist journal for biblical preaching. Now I’m back in the pastorate. And I’m convinced one of the best ways to impact people is to follow Jesus’ example in preaching.

Jesus’ primary style of preaching was storytelling. When Jesus wanted to teach people about the love and grace of God, he didn’t say, “Let me share three principles about God’s love.” Instead he said, “There was a man who had two sons....”

During my early years of preaching, I used stories to illustrate my point; today, stories often are my point. My favorite method of preaching is to take a biblical story, retell it as creatively as possible, develop one primary point from that story, and reinforce it with several contemporary stories.

Early in my ministry I preached an informational sermon during a Lord’s Supper service. The sermon was a rational, three - point message explaining the meaning of the Supper. Although theologically correct, it lacked passion and impact. After the service people shook my hand and politely said, “Nice service, Pastor.”

Three months later we again observed the Lord’s Supper. My sermon and its effect were dramatically different. A few weeks earlier, I had read a Lord’s Supper sermon by John Claypool in which he told the story of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and read one of his letters.

[see #3966 on Bonhoeffer and communion as a package from home.]

After the service people didn’t say, “Nice service, Pastor.” Several commented, “That was the most moving Lord’s Supper service I have ever experienced.”

SHEDDING LIGHT ON SCRIPTURE

A few months later, during a tragedy, I again experienced the power and impact of an appropriate story. Anthony, a beloved teenager from our youth group, was killed in an automobile accident. The following Sunday I preached from the book of Habakkuk, especially 1:1 - 4, 2:1 - 4, and 3:17 - 19. This text speaks of faith in the midst of struggle, anger, doubt, and despair.

I began by telling the congregation how much I loved Anthony and how bad it hurt to lose him. I told several stories from my experiences with Anthony. I was honest about my grief and anger over his premature death - - even my anger at God. I reminded them the prophet Habakkuk had similar feelings.

After looking closely at the text, I told the story of a young Jewish boy named Elie Wiesel, who at age 14 was taken from his home and placed in a German concentration camp.

[see #3967 for Wiesel on “God on trial.”]

THE POWER TO MOTIVATE CHANGE

I recently preached a sermon about our call to minister to the needs of others. Like many of Jesus’ sermons, my sermon consisted primarily of three stories.

[see #3968 for Red Cross class.]

[see #3969 for story on God’s bread in synagogue.]

Stories not only complement the teaching of Scripture by fleshing out the truth, stories change lives.

________

Copyright (c) 1995 Christianity Today, Inc./LEADERSHIP Journal lewin94mrw4L10385817

Sermon in series "We Are Gifted," #2. Romans 12:6

SPEAKING FOR GOD

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

I. Words have power.

A. Was it inspired?

B. Everyone wants to have an impact.

II. The gift of communication is one of the highest gifts.

A. Sometimes it is described in ways we are familiar with.

B. At other times the communication seems to be more supernatural.

1) Prophesying. Rom 12:6, 1 Cor 12:10

2) What makes prophecy different from teaching or preaching.

3) Giving a message of wisdom and knowledge. 1 Cor 12:8

III. What gifts of communication can - and cannot - do.

A. They are intended for the good of the hearers. 1 Cor 14:6

B. They cannot replace the Bible.

C. They are not always really from God.

IV. God has a message for today.

For some Christians, the Holy Spirit is something we experience intellectually through songs and hymns but not someone we consciously relate to on a daily basis. We know He exists, and we know that He is a part of the Trinity of God, but because we don’t know what Scripture teaches about Him, we tend to ignore Him.

There can be plenty of confusion, emotionalism and even misuse of Scripture when it comes to the doctrine, presence and work of the Holy Spirit. However, if we don’t desperately yield to and depend on the Holy Spirit in our daily lives, we can never expect to walk and live in the freedom and victory that only comes from the Spirit of our great God.

Consider these truths about the Holy Spirit that we simply can’t ignore:

1. The Holy Spirit authored the Scriptures.

Anything that we know about God and how to live with Him comes from the Bible, authored by the Holy Spirit through the pens of men. Key Scriptures include 2 Timothy 3:16 -- “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” -- and 2 Peter 1:20-21 -- “ ... no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” When we fail to engage Scripture on a daily basis, we starve our souls of knowing Him intimately.

2. The Holy Spirit exalts Jesus.

Any kind of work of assertion that puts more focus on “giftings,” “expressions” and “fillings” than on Jesus, you can be sure it is not the Holy Spirit. The primary work of the Holy Spirit is to exalt Jesus. The Spirit has come that we might be deeply impressed with the person of Jesus Christ and His work. As Jesus said in John 15:26: “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.” To the extent that we exalt Jesus, the presence of the Spirit becomes more palpably real in our lives.

3. The Holy Spirit makes us the church.

The church is a not a building, but rather the church is a people. When the Spirit of God makes His home inside of us as believers, we become the church. We are now the temple of the Holy Spirit sent to tell the world that Jesus is alive! “Do you not know that you are God’s temple,” the apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 3:16, “and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” As we seek out fellowship with other believers, the manifestation of the Spirit becomes more evident in our lives.

4. The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin.

The Spirit awakens us to the reality of sin and the need of a Savior. Then, as born-again children of God, the Spirit in us will awaken a heightened sense of sin. Where things may not have bothered us before, now there is a grieving that takes place when we sin. As Jesus said of the Spirit: “And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment” (John 16:8). The closer we draw to the Spirit, the more consciously aware we are of strongholds of sin in our lives.

5. The Holy Spirit guides us in everyday life.

We’re completely dependent on the work of the Spirit to help us understand His Scriptures, to guide us to live according to the Word and to direct us in the ways of righteousness and holiness. As Paul put it: “... the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Galatians 5:22–23). These qualities of the Holy Spirit are not character traits we work up; they are the natural expressions of the Spirit radiating from us.

6. The Holy Spirit seals believers until the day of redemption.

One of God’s great desires is for His people to feel secure in His love and power as they go into the world to be witnesses. Everything else in life may be unpredictable and unstable -- our health, job and relationships -- yet our identity in Christ and our eternal destination are completely sealed, and nothing can separate us from the love of Christ. Key Scriptures include Ephesians 4:30 -- “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” and Romans 8:38-39 -- “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The more we rest in the Spirit, the deeper is our assurance that this world is not our final home.

Lord, make us Spirit-filled Christians who faithfully proclaim the Spirit-authored Scriptures to a people who are being Spirit-awakened for the glory of God to be witnesses to a lost world that’s in desperate need of the Spirit’s work.

________

Shane Pruitt (@shane_pruitt78) is director of evangelism for the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. This column first appeared at his website, shanepruitt.com.

For some Christians, the Holy Spirit is something we experience intellectually through songs and hymns but not someone we consciously relate to on a daily basis. We know He exists, and we know that He is a part of the Trinity of God, but because we don’t know what Scripture teaches about Him, we tend to ignore Him.

There can be plenty of confusion, emotionalism and even misuse of Scripture when it comes to the doctrine, presence and work of the Holy Spirit. However, if we don’t desperately yield to and depend on the Holy Spirit in our daily lives, we can never expect to walk and live in the freedom and victory that only comes from the Spirit of our great God.

Consider these truths about the Holy Spirit that we simply can’t ignore:

1. The Holy Spirit authored the Scriptures.

Anything that we know about God and how to live with Him comes from the Bible, authored by the Holy Spirit through the pens of men. Key Scriptures include 2 Timothy 3:16 -- “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” -- and 2 Peter 1:20-21 -- “ ... no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” When we fail to engage Scripture on a daily basis, we starve our souls of knowing Him intimately.

2. The Holy Spirit exalts Jesus.

Any kind of work of assertion that puts more focus on “giftings,” “expressions” and “fillings” than on Jesus, you can be sure it is not the Holy Spirit. The primary work of the Holy Spirit is to exalt Jesus. The Spirit has come that we might be deeply impressed with the person of Jesus Christ and His work. As Jesus said in John 15:26: “But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me.” To the extent that we exalt Jesus, the presence of the Spirit becomes more palpably real in our lives.

3. The Holy Spirit makes us the church.

The church is a not a building, but rather the church is a people. When the Spirit of God makes His home inside of us as believers, we become the church. We are now the temple of the Holy Spirit sent to tell the world that Jesus is alive! “Do you not know that you are God’s temple,” the apostle Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 3:16, “and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?” As we seek out fellowship with other believers, the manifestation of the Spirit becomes more evident in our lives.

4. The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin.

The Spirit awakens us to the reality of sin and the need of a Savior. Then, as born-again children of God, the Spirit in us will awaken a heightened sense of sin. Where things may not have bothered us before, now there is a grieving that takes place when we sin. As Jesus said of the Spirit: “And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment” (John 16:8). The closer we draw to the Spirit, the more consciously aware we are of strongholds of sin in our lives.

5. The Holy Spirit guides us in everyday life.

We’re completely dependent on the work of the Spirit to help us understand His Scriptures, to guide us to live according to the Word and to direct us in the ways of righteousness and holiness. As Paul put it: “... the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Galatians 5:22–23). These qualities of the Holy Spirit are not character traits we work up; they are the natural expressions of the Spirit radiating from us.

6. The Holy Spirit seals believers until the day of redemption.

One of God’s great desires is for His people to feel secure in His love and power as they go into the world to be witnesses. Everything else in life may be unpredictable and unstable -- our health, job and relationships -- yet our identity in Christ and our eternal destination are completely sealed, and nothing can separate us from the love of Christ. Key Scriptures include Ephesians 4:30 -- “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” and Romans 8:38-39 -- “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” The more we rest in the Spirit, the deeper is our assurance that this world is not our final home.

Lord, make us Spirit-filled Christians who faithfully proclaim the Spirit-authored Scriptures to a people who are being Spirit-awakened for the glory of God to be witnesses to a lost world that’s in desperate need of the Spirit’s work.

________

Shane Pruitt (@shane_pruitt78) is director of evangelism for the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. This column first appeared at his website, shanepruitt.com.

Pastor Mark Becton’s skin cancer surgery five years ago continues to touch lives -- not medically, but spiritually. Becton, pastor of Grove Avenue Baptist Church in Richmond, Virginia, underwent surgery in August 2006 to remove the skin cancer and -- while unconscious from general anesthesia -- quoted Scripture and spoke words of encouragement heard by three medical professionals in the operating room.

Anesthesiologist Gail Heppner heard Becton and thought he wasn’t completely sedated, so she upped his dosage. But Becton continued. When Heppner turned down the volume of monitors and the music playing in background, Becton’s words became clearer to her. “He is not only talking, he is completely articulate, clear as a bell,” Heppner said. “As I listened, I felt this is not a man preaching, this is not a man in prayer, this is the Holy Spirit.”

Heppner recounted what happened during the pastor’s surgery during both of Grove Avenue’s Sunday morning worship services on Sept. 10, 2006, which were televised locally and via satellite. More than 2,000 requests for DVD copies of the service have been requested from around the world.

“I know there are Christians in the room in pain. Some feel empty and used up, guilty because they feel they have nothing left to give God,” Heppner said, recalling Becton’s words five years ago.

Becton’s words shocked nurse Carol Miller, who also addressed the Grove Avenue congregation during the September 2006 service. A week before the surgery, Miller had voiced the same words to Heppner -- that she felt “empty, used up and guilty” because she had nothing left to give to God. Miller noted her suspicion at how Becton knew the words she had spoken to Heppner a week earlier. “Dr. Becton didn’t know me,” she told the Grove Avenue congregation. “Where did he hear that from?”

Equally stunned was Heppner, who had asked two others to pray for Miller. “At that point, the scientist in me was gone,” Heppner said, noting that she “nearly burst into tears” over what her patient had spoken.

Miller said her reaction in the operating room became, “Okay, I’m listening, I’m listening.”

“I was so filled with pain, this agonizing, grief-stricken pain, this weight of the world in my heart,” said Miller, whose husband died on Christmas night in 2001 and whose daughter died a year later. “My heart was dried up and empty. That’s the way I felt. ... I came to work every day and smiled. I went to church and prayed about it. But when Dr. Becton started speaking, you could feel the Holy Spirit in that room. Jesus came to work that day to take the burdens from my heart.”

“Carol, let me have it, all your hurt and pain, just give it up,” Becton said to her while completely sedated during the surgery.

“And that’s what I did,” Miller said.

“We put Dr. Becton to sleep, and everything went as normal,” said surgeon Burton Sundin, the third medical professional who was impacted by Becton’s words in the operating room five years ago. “We were waiting for the pathology to come back on his specimen, and the Holy Spirit spoke through him. He began to say things -- the Holy Spirit began to say things -- through Dr. Becton to me.”

Sundin recounted Becton’s words: “Dr. Sundin, you were delivered to me specifically to be my surgeon. And God has great plans for you and your life. And he has given you many gifts. They are His gifts, and He wants to use them through you, for Him. He has chosen you specifically to be His servant. ... God hears your prayers. He is near.”

Sundin had prayed before Becton’s surgery for relief from job-related feelings of burnout and despair. “Disease seemed to be winning its battle against me. Patients were unhappy and my life was in a total turmoil. I was dealing with the day-to-day toil and turmoil of being a young surgeon and trying to get my practice going,” Sundin said. “The day before Dr. Becton’s surgery, I left late with work on my desk piled to the ceiling. I was broken and I was seeking God even though I’ve always been a Christian.

“Some people will say it was the drugs talking or it just happened,” Sundin said. “But it lifted the heaviness from all of our hearts.”

Becton, in a telephone interview with Baptist Press this year, recounted that the former president of the International Mission Board, Jerry Rankin, attended Grove Avenue that September 2006 Sunday and later called to advise him.

“Dr. Rankin said he was ‘in awe in of what God had done,’” Becton recalled. “And he warned me of two things. One was that those of us who were involved in the event would go through spiritual attacks, and that Satan would try to discredit the story.

“The other was to make sure the experience didn’t become the only story of my life,” said Becton, who has spoken about the occurrence only twice publicly since.

Months afterward, Becton related the experience at a pastor’s request where he was preaching in a revival. A church member, who’d prayed for years regarding her husband’s salvation, saw her spouse give his life to Christ after hearing Becton’s account.

Other spiritual results were immediate, and others ongoing. More than 50 family members of the medical professionals involved in Becton’s surgery attended Grove Avenue to hear the account. After each service, about three-fourths of people in attendance came forward to pray and to recommit their lives to Christ, he added.

Becton said what God did spread through the medical community in neighboring cities as the account was a front-page story in the Richmond Times Dispatch five years ago.

Becton considers himself an unlikely candidate for what God did in the operating room, and that’s okay with the mild-mannered pastor. He also thinks “it’s unlikely that this would come from our church, which has a great reputation of proclaiming conservative biblical truth. For this to happen here would be unexpected.”

Not sure of all the reasons why God did what He did, Becton said members at Grove Avenue have a renewed passion for sharing the Gospel and the love of Christ at home and abroad. That’s due, in part, he said, to another message he got and enunciated during the surgery: “Time is short, and many must come,” Becton recounted.

In the ensuing five years, Grove Avenue members’ efforts in discipleship, missions and ministry have grown appreciably. A church missions program that already had seen 700 people come to Christ helped plant eight churches.

Local ministry is expanding as some schools now request Grove Avenue’s assistance with fall festivals, helping the church reach the world in Richmond as some 27 foreign languages are spoken in the various homes of local school children.

Becton added that some Grove Avenue members who are now prayerwalking in Richmond have met people from other churches on the street doing the same.

“We’re having a hard time keeping up with what God is doing in the lives of our members,” Becton said. “We have a sense that God is doing things deeper than I could see or records could show.”

Becton said every retelling of the story, whether public or private, elicits responses smiles and even tears of amazement. “For those who have a relationship with Christ, their faith is stirred. And for those who don’t, there’s a sense of awe.”

________

This article includes excerpts from stories by Shawn Hendricks, a writer in Richmond, Va., and Alberta Lindsey, a writer for the Richmond Times Dispatch.

At 15 years of age, Arnold Schwarzenegger decided he wanted to be the best body builder in the world. And when he saw a massive bodybuilder named Reg Park in a movie, he knew he had found his hero. In Schwarzenegger’s own words, “From that point on I was utterly dominated by Reg Park. His image was my ideal. I found out everything I could about Reg Park. I bought all the magazines that published his programs. I learned how he started training, what he ate, how he lived, and how he did his workouts. I became obsessed with Reg Park; he was the image in front of me from the time I started training.... I pasted his pictures on all the walls of my bedroom. ... I studied every photograph of him I could get my hands on – noting the size of his chest, arms, thighs, back and abdominals. This inspired me to work even harder. When I felt my lungs burning as though they would burst and my veins bulging with blood, I loved it. I knew then that I was growing, making one more step toward becoming like Reg Park.”

__________

Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder, by Arnold Schwarzenegger and Douglas Kent Hall, A Fireside Book, New York, pp. 18-20.