Honest Look at Catholicism - No.5 Infallible is anybody?

That day, when evening came, he said to his disciples, let us go over to the other side. Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was in the boat. There were also other boats with him.

A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him up and said to him, teacher, don't you care if we drown? He got up, rebuked the wind, and said to the waves, quiet, be still.

Then the wind died down, and it was completely calm. He said to his disciples, why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith? They were terrified, and asked each other, who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him. May the Lord add his blessing to that reading from his word.

Who is this? Or as the King James Version puts it, what manner of man is this? That even the wind and the waves obey him. Let's pray. Father, as we come around your word this evening, will you just speak to all our hearts and direct the truths of Scripture, so that not only our minds comprehend, but our emotions, our total being, respond to the claims of the Gospel upon our lives.

Grant to us an ability to concentrate, and we ask, O Lord, that you will pour into our hearts your Spirit, just quicken us, and we ask that you will cause those of us who know you through the Lord Jesus to be confirmed more in our faith, and those who are at the edge of spiritual things, may they be given an abundant entrance into your kingdom, as we consider the essentials this night of the Christian faith. For Jesus' sake. Amen.

When I was in Argentina, traveling through to Uruguay last year, I met up with quite a lot of lovely Christian folk on board an ocean-going liner known as the Dulos. And one of the directors of that ship, where I was to stay for some four weeks, had in his office a little motto, which I thought was so interesting, that I asked him if he'd photostat me a copy, so that I could put it in my office, so that when I had the same problems as he had, I would get some inspiration from it. Now, it's absolute nonsense.

It's nonsense doggerel. But listen. It says simply this.

And I've got it in my office, so you can't see it when you come in, because I'm too shy to let you all have a look at it. It's just behind my filing cabinet. We the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful.

We have done so much for so long, with so little, we are now qualified to do anything with nothing. Nonsense doggerel, which strains after an ability to do more than you possibly can, with absolutely inadequate resources, on behalf of folk who, even if you were, and I'm not referring to people in the tabernacle, were able to do all that they wished, you would never fully satisfy. We the willing, led by the unknowing, are doing the impossible for the ungrateful.

We have done so much for so long, with so little, we are now qualified to do anything with nothing. I don't know who put that together, but at the back of his mind, he was straining forward to a character, to a quality that nobody, really, no ordinary human being has, and it's the quality of infallibility. And that leads me into my subject matter for tonight.

Infallible? Who is? Is there anybody? The year 1870 was a very interesting year for a man by the name of Pius. Eight people had got in with that name before him, so he was known as Pius IX. And it was said of him, he was a clergyman, a bishop in Rome, it was said of him that he was infallible.

And those who followed in his office as Pope also would be infallible. Particularly, indeed exclusively, when they spoke in respect to faith, that is, doctrine and morals. Now the interesting thing about the Bishop of Rome, and I'm not going to be laboring on this this evening, just by way of introduction, is that only twice since that decree have two infallible pronouncements been made, by Pius IX and later on by one of his successors in 1950-odd.

And both of those pronouncements were wrong. They really were. Because they made pronouncements about the immaculate conception of Mary.

There's no biblical evidence for that. And as I tried to show you last week, that when she died, after a few days her body was taken into heaven physically, literally, to be with God. There's no biblical evidence for that either.

So the whole concept of infallibility as narrow and as restricted as perhaps it's put across these days in Catholic theology really doesn't add up, not even in that particular area. So I want to address this subject at a wider level. Indeed, what I want really to do is to bring it back to biblical concepts and biblical times.

Infallible? Who really is? And should we be looking for someone who's infallible? Well, I reckon to answer the latter question, yes we should because we want someone on whom we can rely, someone who can give us guidance, someone who can plot our course through this world. And there are many, many people who are looking for such a guide in the 20th century. Just a month or so ago, a man spent in excess of 100,000 pounds buying space in the major newspapers in the West heralding the fact that someone called the Christ had come back to this world.

The Christ who would be recognized as the Jewish Messiah, as the greatest of Hindu gurus, as a prophet, a great prophet as far as the Muslims were concerned and as far as the Christians go, would be indeed Jesus Christ. Well, we've been waiting for the actual person to be recognized. He's supposed to live in one of the immigrant communities in South London.

But it's all a big mistake. I tell you that quite categorically. It's another attempt, and one does not doubt the sincerity of the people who are endeavoring to find a being with inerrancy, with infallibility in whom they can have utter trust.

It's just an attempt to find an anchorage in this world which is so full of change and difficulty with many people who've got fears. And when this immigrant to our country eventually reveals who he is, even though his disciples recognize him to be the Christ, you will discover him to be no more than another Sung Myung Moon, the founder of the Unification Church, one of the many claimed messiahs and gurus of the 20th century. It's a shame that people are getting taken in so much in these days, but I do understand how people want someone to rely on.

That's why, and though I've got sympathy for the young people, I question that they should have used that hymn in this context. They were singing in Cardiff Arms Park, was it, or wherever that mass Catholic open air was in the capital of Wales a few days ago of the Pope. He's got the whole world in his hands.

How wonderful it would be if physically we could see someone who was utterly, absolutely infallible, who could be a lead for us today in the complex areas that we have to negotiate as young people and as older people. It's good to look for infallibility, but you'll never find it in 20th century man. You'll not find it in 19th century man, nor 18th century man.

I want to try to show you this evening that there is only one being and one alone who has infallibility, who never makes a mistake, for that's what infallibility means, who is never found to be in error, who is absolutely trustworthy. When I was working out something of my address this afternoon, I tried logically to discover what are facets of infallibility so that you could recognize such a being. And it seemed to me that there were four or five.

Anyone who was to be infallible would first of all have to have a life without error. Secondly, speech without fault. Thirdly, prediction without mistake.

Fourthly, intuition without flaw. And fifthly, influence without parallel. Now you've got all those safely memorized, haven't you? Well, I'll try again.

First of all, life without error is basic to a claim for infallibility. Speech without fault. Prediction without mistake.

Intuition without flaw. Influence without parallel. Now in the Scriptures you had the question read to you already twice of our Lord Jesus Christ when the disciples said who is this? What manner of man is this? Let's test Jesus alongside these five facets which taken together seem to me to be a reasonable definition of what infallibility is.

And if our answer indicates that Jesus has indeed this quality then let's logically make some commitment to Him and work out the consequences ourselves. First of all, if someone is infallible they must have a life without error. Do you know on one occasion the Lord Jesus Christ said to a group of people who were standing by Him and they weren't His friends which one of you convicts me of sin? That was a tremendous challenge.

Could you say it to your teacher? Could you say it to your mum, your dad? Those of you who are married could you say it to your husband? Could you say it to your wife? Is there anyone here who can point out anything wrong in my life? Any error at all? Well, I guess you just wouldn't dare to put that challenge because you know so well that there are many, many things that you have done which are wrong, which are in error. But the Lord Jesus Christ said look, take a telescope and review even the infancy of my life. See it all in perspective.

Take a magnifying glass and scrutinize every particle of my activity and see if there's anything that I have done which is wrong, which is in error. And the interesting thing is this that those who lived most closely alongside Jesus they had to agree that there was nothing wrong in what He did. There was nothing wrong in any activity in which He engaged.

And it wasn't just those who lived closely to Him who were His disciples. It was other people who had some encounter with Him. There was the wife of Pontius Pilate when she knew that her husband had the responsibility of judging Jesus in our terminology she sent Pilate a telegram and she said have nothing to do with that just man.

And when Pilate eventually has Jesus in front of him he says to the Jewish accusers I find nothing amiss that he has done. And even Judas who was responsible for betraying Jesus as he rushes out into the night his last recorded words as he flings the money that he's been paid for his betrayal is this are these I have sinned inasmuch as I have shed innocent blood. Whether you accept what Jesus' friends say or just His mere acquaintances or Judas who you might take to be His enemy you get exactly the same conclusion His life is utterly absolutely without error.

And I don't think in fact I'm dead sure that there's not one person in the tab there's not one world leader on the international stage there's not one politician in Westminster who would dare to say this there's not one clergyman there's not one bishop nobody who is absolutely living a life without error. But the second thing that I suggested to you was part of in the concept of infallibility not just a life without error but speech without fault. Jesus said heaven and earth will pass away but my words will never pass away.

You ever known anyone who's had the cheek to say that? Always felt sorry for Mr. Nixon the president of the US a couple of presidencies ago. Sorry for him because I believed him to have been an able man. But I became even more sorry and so did he but for different reasons when I heard that every conversation he ever had in the White House was taped.

Several years he was president a double office he did. And on one occasion Kissinger who was really his nearest confidant said to Nixon my, they've got to live seven years just to listen to all those tapes. And who'd spend that amount of time? And when those tapes have rotted in the archives of some museum or library in the states in a hundred or two hundred years if the world continues that time everything that Nixon said will more or less be forgotten.

And a lot of what he said needed to be forgotten instantly. Indeed. But not Jesus.

Heaven and earth will pass away but my words will never never never pass away. Now he wasn't a sort of equivalent to Nixon in the White House. He didn't even get a position in the Senate in Rome.

Jesus was just a carpenter just a carpenter if you please. Never went to college never to university never had a big sponsorship of businessmen never got into the public media never controlled the equivalent to the press in these days and yet this man from such an obscure origin as Nazareth can anything good come out of Nazareth? He says, my words have got so much import built into them that when heaven and earth pass away the universe will still know the words which have fallen from my lips. And you know people began to realize even in the days when Jesus was alive that his eloquence was something spectacular.

No man ever spoke like this man. And that was Roman soldiers who made that particular comment. You can read it through and through again in the Gospels the magnificent words of Jesus and the response that these words bring statistically it can be demonstrated that the Gospels are the greatest literature that was ever written read by more people quoted by more authorities translated into more languages represented in more art set to more music than any other book or books written.

But the words of Jesus are not just remarkable because of those statistics which I quoted. They become remarkable because when Jesus spoke he addressed his remarks to questions that people were asking. What's life all about? What happens when I die? How can I deal with the sin that's in my life? I've got a guilty conscience.

I feel utterly inadequate. I've been a prostitute. I've sold myself, Jesus Christ.

And I feel as dirty within as what I sometimes look without. Can you help me? And Jesus addresses his remarks to those questions. No wonder that these Gospels have been grabbed by nations around the world and down the centuries.

No wonder that men and women have risked their lives to have them translated into hundreds of different vernaculars. Because Jesus is inspired, you see. Never man acted like this man.

His life is completely without flaw. His life is completely without error. No man ever spoke like this man.

His speech is without fault. But then, it seems to me, there's another aspect of infallibility that needs to be examined. Prediction without mistake.

Now, it's no discredit to the Admiral who's leading the British task force down there in the southern Atlantic to say that his prediction about it being a walkover to regain the Falkland Islands was a little untimely and he swallowed his own words after saying them and a day or two later you might remember two weeks back he said we're in for a difficult time. Jesus never had to swallow his words because when he made a prediction that prediction was without mistake. He made minor predictions and also major predictions.

As for minor, well, on one occasion he sets up a a place where he's going to have a meal with his disciples. They don't quite know what room to book and so Jesus says look, when you go down that road and into that village you'll find a colt that's tethered by an ass and you're to ask the owner for the use of that so that I can ride into Jerusalem and what's more you'll find a man doing a very unusual thing. He'll be carrying a jar of water.

Follow that man and book a room in his household because it's there that I want to hold a Passover meal with you. When Jesus predicts even minor events they come through to the very letter. But major events why, they are equally magnificent.

He speaks in terms of his own death. Lord, you're not going to go to Jerusalem. Yes, I am.

Why are you going? Well, I'm going to Jerusalem to die. And that didn't turn the disciples on at all. They thought it was a terrible business.

And what's more they began to believe him by now because everything else he predicted had come true and they got that unusual feeling of his uncanny accuracy when he stilled the winds and the waves and they by this time surely had logically come to the conclusion that if he could handle that situation then it could be right that at Jerusalem he was in for a nasty time. And they weren't exactly looking forward to sharing it with him. And he was dead right accurate.

The Sanhedrin they got it all together the arrest in Jerusalem the treachery of Judas. But all these things Jesus predicts and they're fulfilled to the last letter. Then later on he told his disciples after his death he'd come back.

He reminded them of Old Testament history. You know that fellow Jonah? Three days. The belly of a big fish.

So as he was there incarcerated in that submarine fish so I will be in the heart of the earth for three days and on the third day I'll be brought back again. And that is one of the most remarkable events of history with so much positive evidence. Jesus predicted the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70.

Jesus had some idea of the armies of Rome coming around Jerusalem in 140. Jesus said that his gospel would circumnavigate the globe. And everything that he said to the minutest detail came true.

That's what you would expect if you postulate infallibility. This is where it's a bit of a laugh what happened in 1870 in Rome. You can't conceivably imagine a man ever being infallible.

Not to this degree when you take the word infallibility and squeeze it work out all its meaning. Who on earth is infallible? Is anyone like Jesus here today? You take your trade union leaders when Arthur Scargill comes on the television set does he fill you with inspiration or perspiration? And you could say the complimentary thing about the management of British affairs. All our leaders do you find anything like the Lord Jesus Christ and ability to predict and to deliver the goods? I've yet to find in my relatively short life a political party that's kept its manifesto promises.

They mean well and they predict what they're going to do and then when they get into office they tell you well it's a different ball game because now they've seen the books and they can't give you just what they've promised because they're not infallible. But Jesus delivers the goods and when you test his life the minor areas the major areas of his predictive ability there's truth that rings through. This is no hoax this gospel it's not like the piltdown man that forgery you remember that was skillfully put together to try and deceive others that we'd found the missing link.

Jesus and what he had to say and his predictions were accurate to the last letter. Well you would expect that of infallibility. So what points have I given you that infallibility demands a life without error speech without fault prediction without mistakes and intuition without flaw.

You know what intuition is? If I say I can read you right now and I really can do it then that's intuition. If I know what you're thinking just now and again I pick up the vibes if you're yawning but by and large I do not have the ability to be intuitive. But Jesus he's completely different he spots a man by the name of Nicodemus and he ministers to Nicodemus you can read it in John's gospel and the first chapter and this man is so amazed you know me and yet we've never even been introduced.

Says Jesus yes I know I know all about you. And even for Judas Jesus wasn't caught by surprise when this man engaged in the greatest treachery that history has ever known. Jesus knows what is in men.

He knows what is in their heart. Look at Peter I'm not going to deny you oh yes you are Peter I've seen it all I can see right through you. Peter you're a transparent book as far as I'm concerned I can turn the pages over one by one and I can read it all.

Matthew or rather John's gospel has a remarkable comment it says of the Lord Jesus Christ that he never entrusted himself into the care of man because he knew what was in a man. Have you ever thought that if Jesus is utterly infallible he knows all about you. You see you can fool me that's relatively easy.

You can fool your parents you can fool your loved ones but if Jesus has the ingredient so to speak the characteristic of infallibility then he sees through you just like he saw through Peter and that's quite an embarrassing business if you've done things that you are as most of us if not all of us have ashamed of. Jesus' infallibility was an intuition without flaw it was a prediction without mistake there was speech without fault there was life without error but the last thing and I promised last week that I wouldn't speak too long so I'm keeping my promise the last thing about the Lord Jesus Christ if he is infallible is this he will have influence without parallel influence without parallel the infallible life will be an influential life and it's interesting is it not that when you read the Bible today it's got relevance to the lives that we live when you study Jesus and his sayings you know full well that he's got something that's very important to share with you and to share with me you look down the centuries and you discover that Jesus bisects history A.D. B.C. you find that most of the vanguard of improvement that there has been here in Europe can trace its inspiration back to the Lord Jesus where did we get our hospitals from where did we get our schools from where did most of the philanthropic organizations come from and by and large you find that the majority are traced back to the ethical teaching and the way that that has influenced men and women down the down the centuries his influence is incomparable listen he was born in an obscure village the child of a peasant woman he grew up in still another village where he worked in a carpenter shop till he was thirty then for three years he was an itinerant preacher he never wrote a book he never held an office he never had a family or owned a house he didn't go to college he never visited a big city he never traveled two hundred miles from the place where he was born he did none of the things one usually associates with greatness he had no credentials but himself he was only thirty three when the tide of public opinion turned against him his friends ran away he was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial he was nailed to a cross between two thieves while he was dying his execution a gamble for his clothing the only property he had on earth when he was dead he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend nineteen centuries have come and gone and today he is the central figure of the human race and the leader of mankind's progress it might be said of all the armies that ever marched of all the navies that ever sailed of all the governments that ever reigned all these compressed together have not affected the history of mankind like the life of that peasant from Nazareth a man who is infallible will have an influence without parallel and that's exactly the case with Jesus now I ask you once again take my points lay them alongside any philosopher that you might know or any great person here in Worthing lay them alongside any politician any charismatic figure that comes across the television screen that you hear of in radio that you read about in the newspapers and see if they have these qualities a life without error speech without fault prediction without mistake intuition without flaw influence without parallel but I'll tell you right now that your quest would be in vain because there's only one person like that there's only one who's infallible and that is Jesus Christ do you know him? has his influence taken hold of your life to the extent that you have placed yourself under his control there's a question in the Old Testament that says this you'll not understand it when I quote it but you will when I explain it what will you do in the swelling of the Jordan tomorrow I have to conduct the memorial service for a deaconess of this church she died just a few days ago I saw her hours before she died and she was full of faith in the Lord Jesus knowing that the surgeon was gambling with her life with the best intents in the world as far as he was concerned and she wasn't afraid to die what will you do in the swelling of the Jordan can you say as the psalmist says in the 23rd Psalm yea when I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear no evil why? because I've come under the influence of the infallible Christ who died to save my soul and promises me life eternal now and ultimately reception into his father's house what will you do when you stand in front of almighty God this life that you live was given you it's on loan it's on trust God if you like is the bank manager one day you have to give an account you've messed it up we've all messed it up so what do you do when you stand before God embarrassed? nothing to say for the sins that you have committed no excuses to proffer that will hold any water at all listen having come under the influence of the infallible Christ I can sing from the depths of my heart bold shall I stand on that great day and who ought to my charge shall lay why? because Jesus influenced me by his great love and example he took my sin he bore it on the cross and he pronounced me whole he absolved me from my guilt do you need someone who is infallible you definitely do because only such a being can minister to your need but such a being will have to be God what manner of man is this? man truly but not all man only he is the son of man and he is the son of God let's bow our hearts in prayer and let's just make that commitment total commitment again perhaps by all this congregation and certainly on the part of those who are not sure whether they are Christians let's pray quietly in our hearts something like this Lord God we come to you we have a quest to find someone who is infallible who can help us someone whose life was without error speech was without flaw predictions absolutely accurate influence without parallel we find your son fulfilling all this and he tells us to come and so we ask that you will because of what he has done forgive our sins you know who we are and what we are like and through Jesus we are beginning to discover who you are and what you are like take us into your family accept us as we confess our sin and fill us with your spirit and enable us to go through life trusting in you through our Lord Jesus Christ Amen Holy, Holy, Holy The infallible Christ was in very nature God not considering equality with God something to be grasped made himself nothing taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness and being found in appearance as a man he humbled himself and became obedient to death even death on a cross therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father Lord we thank you for your infallible Son we praise you for his inerrant word help us to respond to all that you make available to us through him and by the Bible for Jesus sake Amen