Speaker: Justin Wheeler
Series: The Role of the Word of God
Speak, Seek, and Be Saved (Psalm 34)
Speaker: Mark Ritchie
The Word of God in the Church (2 Timothy 4:1-5)
Speaker: Justin Wheeler
Series: The Role of the Word of God
The Word of God in Our Home (Deuteronomy 6:1-10)
Speaker: Justin Wheeler
Series: The Role of the Word of God
The Word of God in the Life of the Believer (Psalm 19:7-11)
Speaker: Justin Wheeler
Series: The Role of the Word of God
Our Covenant Keeping God
Series: The Doctrine of Scripture
Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler
Scripture: Exodus 19:1-8
Stay in the Word
Series: The Doctrine of Scripture
Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler
Scripture: 2 Timothy 3:12-15
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2 Tim 3:12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, 13 while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it 15 and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
Most of us are familiar with the phrase, “The honeymoon is over.” This is really a discouraging thing to hear, but we know what it is intending to communicate. It means that the excitement and the emotional high of being newly married has worn off. It doesn’t mean the two people aren’t married any longer, it doesn’t mean that they don’t love each other anymore; it just means that life has settled in and the reality of living with another imperfect person has made its presence known.
We even use this phrase to describe aspects of our life that have nothing to do with marriage. “The honeymoon is over,” could refer to the fact that the excitement we felt about the new car we purchased 6 months ago has worn off. When you first brought it home you couldn’t quit thinking about it. You cleaned it regularly, drove it more than you really needed to, bought weird new accessories for it; but now it’s just a car, sitting in the driveway and costing you money.
Whether it is a new car, a new phone, a new job or even a new relationship; we all know what it feels like for the excitement to wear off and for the “honeymoon phase” to come to an end. This can happen in our walk with Christ as well. As a new believer everything about Christ is fresh and exciting. Reading the Bible is like a new adventure every day. Going to church is more meaningful than it has ever been and the desire to learn the Bible and share it with others is strong. But as the years go by the emotion that accompanied your conversion begins to fade.
The excitement about coming to church, singing to God, hearing the Bible taught, and spending time with other Christians is subject to the same, “the honeymoon is over” mentality that plagues the rest of our life. When that happens, or now that it has happened, the temptation is to move on to something else, something new, something different. But in our text this morning the Apostle Paul encourages us to do the opposite.
Transition…
Paul is warning Timothy that the pattern of this world is for people to move on, to advance from one thing to another, from bad to worse. They will get bored with one form of sin and move on to another and the temptation will be for us to do the same thing. The temptation will be for us to move on from the faith, to move on from a sincere devotion to the gospel and the Word of God that marked the early days of our faith. To this temptation, Paul says,
“But as for you, remain in what you have learned (v. 14)”
They will move on from one sin to another, but we must remain in the truth.
This summer we’ve been studying the doctrine of Scripture and we have learned amazing things about this book. It is the very word of God, inspired by God, free from error, sufficient, authoritative, clear, necessary and true in all its parts. In this final sermon of the series, my purpose in preaching is not to rehash all of the previous sermons, but to encourage you, to challenge you and to plead with you not to turn away from God’s Word but to continue in what you have learned.It would be a waste to learn all about the Bible and in the end not grow in our love for it, our appreciation of it, our consumption of it and our faithfulness to it. So this final sermon is a plea for all of us, all of you to Continue in the Word.
Sermon Focus…
I. Continue in what you have learned (V. 12-14)
2 Tim 3:12 Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, 13 while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. 14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it
If you want to live a godly life of trusting and following Jesus, then you will face persecution. That’s a pretty sober way to kick things off.If you want to live for Jesus it is not going to be easy, in fact, it is going to cost you. Jesus warned us about this... (John 15:18-21). He was persecuted for what He said and for how He lived; so, His followers can expect in some degree to face the same thing that He faced.
But, our natural human instinct is to avoid persecution and, in some cases, it might be the right thing to do. Fleeing political persecution and/or ethnic persecution is a fact of life for many people all over the world.But there is a type of persecution that most of us should not only expect but we should also refuse to abandon the way of life that brings it about. The persecution that Paul is talking about here is the direct result of our desire as believers to live like Jesus.
When a person comes to faith in Christ it is not simply the result of them changing their mind, it is more so a result of the Holy Spirit changing their heart. The Spirit of God changes our heart and opens our spiritual eyes so that we see the truth of our sin and long for the forgiveness of Jesus. The Bible calls this being born-again and it turns our whole life upside-down. It makes us want to turn from our sin. It causes us to want to put aside the life we once lived chasing sin and we grow in our desire to live a godly life that honors and obeys Jesus.
Now, there are other people who haven’t been changed the same way we have. The evil people and imposters, as Paul refers to them here, simply continue on in their sin. Their hearts haven’t been changed, their minds haven’t been changed and therefore their lives don’t change. They avoid the persecution that believers face, because they continue to live in the ways of the world, going from bad to worse.
But let’s notice the contrast between the Christian and the non-Christian in this passage by looking at the verbs. The non-Christians go on, this word means that they advance and make progress. In what? In sin and deception. They move on from where they are now but the end result is worse than where they started.
But the Christian is to continue or better yet, to remain.Paul tells Timothy, and us by the way, to stay right where you are. He doesn’t want us to abandon our gospel hope, nor the desire to live a godly life. He wants us to hold on to our trust in God’s Word and not let it go, even in the face of persecution.
Paul knows that Timothy’s life is anything but easy. He is a young pastor, surrounded by false teachers and enduring serious harassment from unbelievers. But so is Paul. Paul is in Rome about to die at Nero’s hand. Many of his friends have abandoned himand he is writing this letter to Timothy, urging him not to abandon the faith but to stay rooted in it.
But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it
In Timothy’s case, he learned the Scriptures from his grandmother and mother.
1:5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well.
Paul is pulling out the grandma card and that is not a bad thing at all. Did you know that it is God’s design for the faith to be handed down from one generation to the next? He even instructs us as Christian parents to raise our children to know and trust the Lord. In other words, we are to teach our children a Biblical view of the world, we teach them to trust the Bible and to believe the gospel. It is God’s plan and design for our natural family to play the major role in our faith.
Yes, I know that our cultural sensibilities mock such a thing. In the name of progress, our culture teaches us to question what we were taught as children and encourages us to abandon our upbringing in order to discover our true identity. Young people in our culture are taught to question every authority except their own, which is both inconsistent and foolish.
Even within the church, we have been led to believe that the most important thing is the most contemporary thing and anything remotely traditional is wrong. The church has become enamored with novelty and in the name of progress many have moved on from faithfulness to Scripture because it smacks of being too old-fashioned. But, God wants us to hold fast to the truth that we have been taught.
Maybe you didn’t learn the gospel from your parents because not everyone is blessed to grow up in a Christian family and healthy church. But somewhere along the way you were taught the Word of God. Maybe it was a Sunday school teacher, a youth minister, a pastor or a coach. Maybe you had a neighbor that invited you to church or a boss who encouraged you to take Sunday off and go to church.
None of those people were perfect but they were faithful. They didn’t know everything, but they weren’t morons either. They were kind, patient, knowledgeable and they were faithful to share the truth with you. Don’t abandon that truth. Continue in what you have learned and believed.
Don’t abandon the faith of your childhood simply because some professor told you the Bible wasn’t true. Don’t turn away from the gospel because some modern author made fun of you for believing it. Don’t move on from the Scriptures because you too are grasping for something new. Continue in what you have learned and believed.
John Piper was once asked, “Why did you conclude that inerrancy was true?” He surprised everyone when he responded, “Because my momma told me it was true.” What an amazingly Biblical answer. He believed the Bible was true and he continued to study it, believe it and follow it, in part, because his mother told him that it was true.
Now there are many more reasons for us to stay committed to the Word of God and we have been learning those reasons all summer, but I also want you to be encouraged to stay faithful to the good things your mother, father, grandmother and other imperfect but faithful teachers have taught you. Continue in what you have learned.
II. Consider where it will lead you (v. 15)
from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
The sacred writings, the Scriptures, which Timothy had been acquainted with since childhood, are able to make us wise leading us to salvation from our sins through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the outcome of our devotion to God’s Word; wisdom from God that leads us to eternal life with Jesus as Savior, Lord and King.
Being faithful to the Bible will not make us cool in the eyes of the world. Being faithful to the Scriptures will not make the world rush to our doors, at least not in a good way. But coolness and popularity have never been the goal of the Christian life. We want to know Christ and to be saved; the Bible leads us to this end.
How does it do this?The Bible doesn’t simply tell us what we want to hear, it tells us what we need to hear. The purpose of Scripture is not ultimately to make you smart, successful, powerful, or relevant. The purpose of the Scripture is not to make you feel good about yourself and help you to live your best life now. The purpose of Scripture is to reveal the truth about God and man, sin and judgment, grace and forgiveness.
The purpose of Scripture is to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ.
But why can it be trusted? 2 Tim 3:16, “All Scripture is breathed out by God…” This book is the Word of God. Our Creator has spoken to us and He still speaks to us. His word is without error, unchanging, complete, sufficient and final in its authority over every domain of knowledge to which it speaks. And the chief domain of knowledge to which it speaks is the salvation of men.
The Bible reveals to us the story of all things.It reveals that we are not the product of time and chance; but are the unique creation of the Triune God. We are creatures fashioned in time and space by our divine and eternal Creator. He gave us life, He sustains our life, and He watches over our lives as both a generous provider and a just judge.
Oh, and He is holy while we are rebellious and sinful. We have sinned against our Creator and we continue to sin against Him. We sin whenwe break the law of God. We sin whenwe fail to acknowledge the glory of God. We sin whenwe fail to cherish the love of God, fail to appreciate the goodness of God, when we failto obey the word of God. We sinin word and in deed. We sin in omission and in commission, and unless something changes we will be judged for our sin.
But God, because of the great love that He has for us, He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to be born of a virgin, to live a perfectly sinless life, to teach us the truth about our own hearts, and then to die in our place so that by His sacrifice our guilt would be washed away. He was raised from the dead appearing to His disciples and several hundred other people as well.
He calls us to embrace Him as the Savior we need. He calls us to turn from our lifestyle of sin to follow him. He calls us to live a godly life and not to turn from the Word that He has given us. He promises that if we trust in Him we will have eternal life. The word of God is able to make us wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ.
Continue in what you have learned and Understand where it will lead you.
Conclusion…
When we started this series on the doctrine of Scripture we kicked it off by looking at Psalm 119 and we have been reading that Psalm together ever since. It is a song of love about the Word of God and my goal in starting this series with a love poem about the Word of God was to try and stir our emotions about the Bible. We have God’s Word in our hands. We can trust every word on every page. We can read and hear Gods voice every time we open it.
We know these things to be true, because we know the doctrine of Scripture. But the reason most of us struggle to read the Word and apply it to our lives, is not the result of insufficient doctrine. It’s most likely the result of our hearts being cold to it. We don’t get excited about the Word the way we once did. We aren’t longing to know it and apply it the way we once were.
In this passage, Paul is urging Timothy to stand firm in the faith despite the persecution he is experiencing, but for many of us the temptation is not so much about persecution as it is about the way we feel. For some of us the honeymoon phase of our faith has been over for a long time. We just don’t get excited about reading and studying the Bible anymore. We haven’t stopped believing the gospel, but we aren’t allowing the Word of God to impact our daily lives the way it once did.
We need the doctrine in our head to warm the devotion of our hearts and fuel a renewed commitment to God’s Word. It’s not enough for us to say we are a people of the book, we need to be a people of the book.
Maybe you need some help. I have provided a reading plan that will take you through the entire New Testament in two months. You can pick that up on your way out.
Maybe you need to be challenged. Select a book you don’t understand that well (Isaiah, Ezekiel, Revelation) and spend the next month reading, studying, and journaling through that book.
Maybe you need some accountability. Find a friend, a sibling, a spouse, a co-worker, or some other acquaintance and commit to reading the Bible then meeting up in some way to discuss it.
Let’s strive to be Christians who know, love and are actively committed to the Word of God. Let the words of Psalm 119be our prayer as we close.
172 My tongue will sing of your word,
for all your commandments are right.
173 Let your hand be ready to help me,
for I have chosen your precepts.
174 I long for your salvation, O Lord,
and your law is my delight.
175 Let my soul live and praise you,
and let your rules help me.
Naturalism vs Christianity
The Canonicity of Scripture
The Authority of Scripture
Series: The Doctrine of Scripture
Speaker: Pastor Justin Wheeler
Scripture: Acts 17:10-22
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We are in week 7 of our series on the doctrine of Scripture. In this study we have learned about the inerrancy, inspiration, sufficiency, clarity, and necessity of Gods Word. A few weeks ago, Josh Wagner was here and he helped us understand the relationship between the Bible and Science, or the two books of God and how the book of revelation is what helps us interpret and understand the book of creation.
Today’s sermon is an application of all principles we have seen thus far; if the Bible is true in all of its parts and without error, if the Bible has been given to us by the inspiration of God, if it is clear, necessary and sufficient, if it stands as the infallible foundation for how we interpret the natural world; then this Bible stands in a place of unique authority in our lives as believers.
Why do we go to Haiti? Why do we, as a church and as individuals, engage in the mission of going to the nations to preach the gospel and make disciples? We are notsimplybeing driven by a human impulse of concern for the well-being of others. It is notbecause we believe that we are better than others and therefore we need to help them become more like ourselves, which is what one of our team members was accused of. We are not fueled by the religious belief that our going earns us some spiritual merit toward our entry into Heaven. We are not simplybeing guided by a burden for social justice.
We go because Christ commands us to go.We go because the one who commands us, the One who sends us, was Himself sent. Jesus obeyed the command of His Father. In obedience to His Father, Jesus came, lived, and died to set us free from our hopeless bondage to sin. We go because of our love for Jesus, our love for our neighbor, and we go in submission to the authority of God’s Word.
It is in Scripture and from the lips of Jesus that we see the command to go into the world, preaching the gospel, in order to make disciples of Christ. It is in the Word of God that we hear the command of God to go. It is in Scripture that we come to realize that just as God the Father sent His Son, so the Son has sent us. We go in obedience to the authority of God’s word.
The authority of Scripture means that all the words in Scripture are God’s words in such a way that to disbelieve or disobey any word of Scripture is to disbelieve or disobey God.[1]
Transition…
If you are a Christian, then you believe in the authority of Scripture; at least in some sense. But the question is how should we understand the Bible’s authority? What is the source of the Bible’s authority? Are their limits to the Bible’s authority? Why do many people reject the Bible’s authority? And then finally, how does the Bible’s authority impact our lives as believers?
Let’s look at some of these questions together.
Sermon Focus…
I. What is the Source of the Bible’s Authority?
The ultimate reason why the Scripture is authoritative is that it is God’s Word. Divine authorship gives the Bible it’s inherent authority and we see this truth born out in the historical statements of faith.
The 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, chapter 1 article 4 reads,
The authority of the Holy Scriptures obligates belief in them. This authority does not depend on the testimony of any person or church but on God the author alone, who is truth itself. Therefore, the Scriptures are to be received because they are the Word of God.[2]
The Scriptures have absolute authority because God has absolute authority, and scripture is His personal word to us.From the very beginning of the Bible we are told that it is God, our Creator, is speaking. He spoke to create the universe, to bring order and direction to His creation, and then He spoke to decisively establish His authority over mankind. He spoke to Adam, to Cain, to Noah, to Abraham and in each case the authority of His word is unquestionable.
As we move on in the Scriptures we see a recurring phrase letting us know that God is still speaking. “Thus says the Lord” appears hundreds of times and the cumulative force of these statements demonstrate that what we are reading is the written record of God’s own words. When this phrase occurs God is speaking.
But what about those times when we don’t see this phrase? What about those historical records, those poems and psalms, or those proverbs? How are we to understand the authority of the words that aren’t directly related to those, “Thus says the Lord” passages.
Well, as we move on to the NT the apostles help us answer this question definitively. The burden of the Apostles was to preach the Good News of the resurrection of Jesus, the messiah of God and Savior of the world. They declared that, “There is no other name under heaven by which men can be saved (Acts 4:12). They proclaimed Jesus as the Son of God and the final and supreme authority.
Furthermore, they rested this message upon the authority of the OT Scriptures. In other words, they weren’t simply declaring Christ as king on their own authority, they were declaring it based on the authority of the OT Scriptures. ANDthey understood their own apostolic writing/preaching to fall into the same category of being Spirit-Inspired Scripture (2 Pet 3:16).
The OT and the NT must be viewed as a whole and both of them together make up what the Bible calls Scripture.
2 Tim 3:16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
2 Pet 1:20No prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. 21 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.
The ultimate source of every word in the Bible is God himself. Yes, the Bible was written down by human authors, but every word is from God. Since this is God’s word from beginning to end, it carries His authority.
The authority of Scripture means that all the words in Scripture are God’s words in such a way that to disbelieve or disobey any word of Scripture is to disbelieve or disobey God (Grudem).
II. Are There Limits to the Bible’s Authority?
There are a lot of voices in this world each claiming to be the final word on any number of subjects. Sometimes the focus is history and the claim is made that Biblical history is inaccurate. Sometimes the focus is scienceand the claim is made that Biblical teaching has been disproved by modern science. Sometimes the focus is traditionor human reason and from this standpoint people make the claim that the Bible cannot be trusted.
All of this brings up the question, “What is our ultimate authority?” Are there limits to the Bible’s trustworthiness and therefore it’s authority?
Roman Catholic author, theologian and apologist, Peter Kreeft answers this question from the RC position.
The Church gives us her tradition like a mother giving a child hand-me-down clothing that has already been worn by many older brothers and sisters. But unlike any earthly clothing, this clothing is indestructible because it is made of…truth. It was invented by God, not man. Sacred Tradition must be distinguished from all human traditions…as part of “the deposit of faith”, which also includes sacred Scripture.
Did you catch his answer? Scripture has authority in Roman Catholic life but not sole authority. Tradition reigns at its side. For the RC, the authority of Scripture is limited by Sacred Tradition.
Liberal theology has elevated human reason and experience over the Scriptures in terms of final authority. LT already undermines the accuracy, inerrancy and trustworthiness of Scripture; and in the realm of authority it simply continues that trend.
Gary Dorrien writes,
The essential idea of liberal theology is that all claims to truth must be made on the basis of reason and experience, not by appeal to external authority (ie. The bible). Christian Scripture may be recognized as spiritually authoritative within Christian experience, but its word does not settle or establish truth claims about matters of fact.
What this means is that the Scriptures can speak with authority on matters of faith, so long as we want them to; but in their system there is a difference between faith and truth.For the liberal theologian, who has supplanted God and replaced Him with man, final authority comes down to man’s reason and experience, not Scripture.
As your pastor and an elder in this church, we absolutely reject both of these views. We believe that Bible is the final and only authority. It stands in judgment of human reason. It reigns over all tradition. We learned a few weeks ago from Psalm 19 that God has given us two books; the book of nature and the book of Scripture. Nature reveals much but Scripture reigns as the authoritative book of God.
From the Cornerstone Statement of Faith…
God has graciously disclosed his existence and power in the created order, and has supremely revealed himself to fallen human beings in the person of his Son, the incarnate Word, Jesus Christ. God has also inspired the words of the Scriptures, the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments. These writings alone constitute the Word of God, which is authoritative and without error in the original writings, and is complete, sufficient, and final in its authority over every domain of knowledge to which it speaks.
This paragraph makes clear our position on the authority of God’s Word.
III. Why Do So Many People Reject the Bible’s Authority?
We really have to answer this question in a couple of ways: biblically and then practically. Biblically, men and women suppress the truth and authority of God’s Word because of their sin (Rom 1:18). All of mankind has some innate knowledge of the truth of God because God has written it on our hearts, but we suppress that truth. We know it is true, but we choose to believe the lie of sin rather than the truth of God.
But practically there are several reasons why people reject the authority of Scripture. Some reject it because they have legitimate intellectual concerns. Some reject it because they prefer the wisdom of man to that of God. Atheists reject it for obvious reasons; if there is no God then the Bible has no authority for them. Some reject it because they don’t fully understand it, but others reject it because it gets in the way of their sinful desires, and on the rare occasion you can find people who are willing to admit it.
Aldous Huxley, the author of Brave New World,once wrote,
“For myself, as for most of my contemporaries, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation. The liberation we desired was simultaneously from a certain political and economic system and liberation from a certain system of morality. We objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom…”[3]
Huxley, like so many, rejected the truth and authority of Scripture because it interfered with his sexual freedom. He, like so many, rejected the Words of eternal life for the fleeting pleasures of a few years of sexual sin. He didn’t reject it because he studied it and found it to be untrue in some empirical way. He didn’t reject it because of deep intellectual convictions. He rejected it because it confronted him over his immorality.
This notion is alive and thriving in our culture today. Many people aren’t interested in a reasonable consideration of Christian faith because they have already made up their mind that their chosen lifestyle, which the Bible addresses as sinful, is more valuable than anything the Bible might teach them. They haven’t studied the Scriptures for themselves, they’ve simply decided that the Bible is antiscience, antipleasure, anti (fill in the blank) without ever bothering to investigate the Bible with an open mind.
Christians have long been accused of being closed-minded and in some cases that may be true, but the same is also true of many unbelievers only they aren’t willing to acknowledge their own inconsistency.
This is nothing new, in fact this has been happening since the time of the early church. Jesus was rejected becausethe authority of His word threatened the authority of the Pharisees and Scribes. The apostles and the Word they preached were rejectedbecause they threatened to undermine the status quo in Jerusalem. Paul and His band of early missionarieswent throughout the Roman Empire preaching the Word of God. The authority of his message was rejected in many towns because the Jews were filled with jealousy(Acts 5, 13, 17).
The gospel was rejected in Philippi and Ephesus because it interrupted the revenue stream of idolatrous men. In these cases and many others, the authority of God’s word was rejected simply on the basis of sin. But we do have a Biblical example where the authority of the Word was not rejected but nobly considered.
Acts 17:10 The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived they went into the Jewish synagogue. 11 Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so. 12 Many of them therefore believed, with not a few Greek women of high standing as well as men.
IV. How Does the Bible’s Authority Impact our Lives?
These men and women were eager to examine the Scriptures in order to check the accuracy of Paul’s message. They didn’t simply take Paul’s word for it nor did they reject it based on their own sinful presuppositions; instead they relied upon the authority of Scripture to help them decide if the good news was true. This passage demonstrates what it means to affirm the authority of Scripture.
If Paul’s message could be supported from Scripture they wanted to accept it. They were willing to hear the gospel and believe the gospel so long as it was consistent with the Scriptures. Their submission to the authority of God’s Word led to them embracing Jesus as Messiah and following Him as Lord. If the Bible said it, they would believe it and obey it.
Conclusion…
The Scriptures have the last word, the final word and our posture is to understand it, believe it and submit to it. So, let me ask the obvious question, how are we doing in our application of the Authority of Scripture? Fox News does not have the final say in how we are to live our lives. Nor does CNN. Hollywood is not our final authority. The current moral (or amoral) climate of our culture does not have the final word in our lives as Christians. That position belongs to God’s Word.
Is your life continually being shaped by God’s Word? Are you growing in your understanding and application of it? Are you progressing in your struggle against sin by repenting, confessing and battling according to Scripture?
Are you growing in your love for Jesus and in your love for your neighbors? Are you serving in ways that are consistent with the Word? Are you praying, giving, and going? Are you allowing the Scriptures to be the final authority in your life or are you simply giving lip-service to this doctrine?
These are tough questions, hard hitting questions, but they must be asked. Theology must not simply remain in the pages of our books, it must jump from those pages and impact our lives.
When the Word of God tells us who God is we believe it. When the Word of God tells us who we are we accept it. When the Word of God tells us of our need we trust it and when the Word of God tells us of the Savior we need, we receive Him. When He commands us to repent we repent, when He commands us to love we love, when He commands us to go we go.
Scripture’s authority functions in our lives to guide, sustain, convict, compel, save and sustain us until Christ comes again.
[1]Grudem, Wayne A.; Grudem, Wayne A.. Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine (p. 73). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.
[2]https://founders.org/library/1689-confession/chapter-1-the-holy-scriptures/(2 Peter 1:19–21; 2 Timothy 3:16; 1 Thessalonians 2:13; 1 John 5:9.)
[3]Aldous Huxley, in Robert S. Baker and James Sexton, eds., Aldous Huxley: Complete Essays Volume 4 (Pg 369).
The Necessity of Scripture
From Creation to the Cross: The Harmony of Science and Scripture
The Clarity of Scripture
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Deut 6:4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
This passage is among the most well-known in all of Scripture. It contains profound statements about the nature of God; He is The Lord, He is Our God, and He is One. It also contains a list of commands laying before us our appropriate response to this knowledge of God; because He is our Lord and God we ought to love Him with all of our being. We ought to teach His word to our children and allow His word to shape every aspect of our lives.
Now, as we read this passage there are any number of things that we might choose to focus on. We could focus on the theological side of things. We could spend weeks studying and meditating on what this passage teaches us about the nature of God.
Or we could focus on the practical side of things and lock in on the commands we see. There is a pattern of application. What begins in the heart as individual/personal love for God, moves to consume our entire being (heart, soul, strength). Then it flows from us into those nearest to us, our family and our children. The word of God affects the way we talk, the way we walk and the way we sleep. His commands guide our hands and influence how we interact with the world.
Or maybe, like me, you have a tendency to focus on the historical side of things. This passage was written near the end of Moses’ life and when I think about Moses, my mind gets carried all the way back to the Exodus and what God did to deliver Israel from slavery. I think about the plagues, the Passover, the Exodus itself and God’s presence leading the people through the sea and into the wilderness. I want to follow that history all the way through to this particular moment, when Moses is recounting the mercy of God, the grace of God, the love of God, the law of God and this passage is being established as the theological foundation for Israel as a nation.
Now, we would be right to focus on any of these or all of these things when we read this passage, but that is not what we are going to focus on this morning. This morning I want us to focus on the underlying assumption inherent, not simply to this passage, but to all of Scripture. I want to focus on the things that almost all of us take for granted when we read this passage, assuming that you have not been hopelessly corrupted by the postmodern theory of indeterminate meanings. I want to focus on the fact that the central message of the Bible is clear and understandable.
Transition…
The Word of God has been revealed to us in a way that its message and meaning are clear and because of its clarity all men are fully accountable to its message. The Bible assumes not only that God can communicate with words, but that He has communicated with words that are unchangeable and knowable.
In this passage from Deuteronomy 6there is no mystery concerning what God has said about himself and what He has commanded of us. And in case you missed it, His word is so clear and understandable that it can be taught to children. We don’t have to solve complex riddles and engage in impossible interpretive paradigms; the Word of God is right in front of us in plain language that is easy to understand and easy to obey.
This morning I want to talk about a characteristic of Scripture known as the Clarity of God’s Word or you may be more familiar with the older term Perspicuity. The Clarity of Scripture affirms that the Bible is written in such a way that all things necessary for salvation and for our Christian life and growth are very clearly set forth in Scripture.[1]
There are three things I want us to look at this morning: 1. Define Biblical Clarity, 2. Look at some Objections to Biblical Clarity, 3. Talk about why this matters.
Sermon Focus…
I. Defining Biblical Clarity
The Clarity of Scripture, as a protestant doctrine, has been carefully defined by the Westminster Confession of Faith as well as the 1689 Second London Confession. Here is the article on clarity in a modern English version of the 1689.
1.7. Some things in Scripture are clearer than others, and some people understand the teachings more clearly than others.12 However, the things that must be known, believed, and obeyed for salvation are so clearly set forth and explained in one part of Scripture or another that both the educated and uneducated may achieve a sufficient understanding of them by properly using ordinary measures.13(122 Peter 3:16. 13Psalm 19:7; Psalm 119:130.)[2]
Some of you might prefer the older language, but I think this one is a bit clearer, and after all that is the point. But what does this statement tell us?
First, it tells us that some passages in the Bible are clearer and easier to understand than others. Not every passage has a simple or obvious meaning. When you read the parables of Jesus, the prophecy of Ezekiel or Daniel, and the Revelation; you find that it is more challenging to understand than the historical narrative of the book of Acts. But the point is that the Bible was written in order to be understood. God hasn’t revealed himself in riddles nor as a paradox.
God actually wants us to know Him. The Bible was given to us by God as a revelation of Himself and His redemptive plan for us. Those things which we need to know, believe and obey for salvation are incredibly clear. Even if those things are not abundantly clear in one part of Scripture, they are made clear in other parts of Scripture, so that the essential message can be properly understood.
Some people understand the Bible more clearly than others, but you don’t have to be a scholar to read and grasp the message of the Scriptures. It might be of benefit to you to get a degree in theology, Biblical languages, and ministry; but these things are not necessary for disciples to understand and obey the word of God. After all, if we are supposed to teach the Bible to children it must be understandable to them.
Ordinary people, using ordinary measuresmay achieve sufficient understanding of what must be known, believed and observed for them to be faithful Christians. What does it mean to use ordinary measures? It means that we are to interpret the Bible as it is written; we read it and apply basic principles of language and interpretation in order to understand it.
A noun is treated as a noun and a verb as a verb. Poetry is to be treated as poetry. Historical accounts are to be treated as history. Parables as parables, hyperbole as hyperbole…In other words, the Bible is to be interpreted according to the rules that govern the interpretation of any book.[3]
Now for most of us, this is not earth-shattering news. We instinctively accept that the Bible is clear and understandable, but this was not always the case.Let me give you some examples of what I’m talking about.
In Jesus’ day, the Pharisees and Scribes were widely considered to be experts in the law of God. They were revered for their knowledge of God’s Word, but in the interactions between the Pharisees and Jesus it becomes clear that their knowledge was flawed. In Matthew 12, they argued with Jesus about what the Bible taught concerning the Sabbath. In Matthew 19, they argued with Him over what the Bible taught on divorce. In Matthew 22, it was His view of the resurrection.
In each case, they had a position on these issues that they claimed was faithful and orthodox, Jesus however, told them that they were wrong. But the question is, why were they wrong? At no point in these arguments did Jesus say, “Oh, I understand your confusion – the scriptures are not very clear on that subject.”
Instead, He tells them that their problem is that they haven’t read and understood the Scriptures. “Have you not read?” Is His ready reply and in one case He flat out tells them that they “know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God.”
The problem was not that the Scriptures were unclear, but that they had not relied upon the clear teaching of Scripture. Jesus’ underlying assumption when dealing with the Pharisees was that the Bible was sufficiently clear and understandable, they just weren’t relying on it.
The Pharisees and Scribes had developed a method of interpreting the Bible that led them into serious error. They weren’t satisfied with the plain meaning of the text, so they added to and expanded on the law such that the 10 commandments became 248 man-made commandments and 365 man-made prohibitions. But they weren’t the only religious group to make this type of error.
During the Medieval period, church leaders developed a very complex method of interpreting the Bible. That method was known as the quadrigaand it claimed that every passage had a fourfold meaning – a literal sense, a moral sense, an allegorical sense, and an anagogical sense.
R.C. Sproul commented on this method by saying,
To know the literal or most obvious meaning of a passage was a good thing, but to know the higher moral, allegorical, and anagogical meanings was even better. Precious few, however, could attain to these other, more hidden meanings of Scripture. This tended to obscure the meaning and significance of the Bible…Only the most “advanced” thinkers, for example, could see that the census recorded in Numbers was not really about the number of Israelite soldiers but rather the several steps it takes for the soul to ascend to God.
Nowhere in Scripture will you find support for such a view, for such a method of interpretation. In fact, the Bible teaches that the most basic meaning of the text is clear enough for anyone to understand.
Psalm 19:7 The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple;
Deut 30:11–14 For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that you should say, “Who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?” Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, “Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?” But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart, so that you can do it.
It is clear enough to give instruction to the wise, prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion even to youth (Prov 1:3-4).
This doctrine of Biblical clarity may seem clear to many of us, but I must let you know that not everyone agrees with this position. Let’s talk about some of the historical objections to Biblical Clarity.
II. Some Objections to Biblical Clarity[4]
The Mystical Objectionsounds very spiritual and sincere because it claims that God is so complex and transcendent that he cannot be described meaningfully with mere words. The idea is that God is beyond the ability of human language and often those who make this claim believe that they need to rescue God from our man-made theologizing. They want to keep us from putting God in a box and they argue that truth cannot be captured in words or propositions.
The truth is that, yes, God is a complex and incomprehensible being. There are aspects of God’s character and nature that remain a mystery to us; but that doesn’t mean that we cannot understand what He has communicated about Himself in the Word. The doctrine of Biblical clarity does not assume that everything about God is clear and understandable to us, but that the things which God has revealed to us are clear and understandable. This objection falls apart when you consider the fact that the Scriptures have been given to us by God himself and He gave them to us in order to reveal Himself and His plan with clarity and for the purpose of understanding.
The Catholic Objection is one that the Protestant Reformers had to deal with. Catholic theologians argue that the Bible as a whole is not sufficiently clear and therefore it needs the aid of tradition and papal interpretation in order to be made clear and understandable. The Catholic church has long claimed that the average person is more apt to misunderstand and misapply the scriptures on their own and therefore they need the help of the Magisterium, the Popes and bishops to help them get it right.
The reformers disagreed and encouraged every Christian to study and interpret God’s Word on their own. The reformers argued that Scripture Aloneis sufficient to clearly teach us all truth that is necessary for salvation and spiritual life.
Martin Luther wrote,
But, if many things still remain unclear to many, this does not arise from obscurity in the Scriptures, but from [our] own blindness or [lack] of understanding… Let, therefore, wretched men cease to impute, with blasphemous perverseness, the darkness and obscurity of their own heart to the all-clear Scriptures of God… nothing whatever is left obscure or ambiguous; but all things that are in the Scriptures, are by the Word brought forth into the clearest light, and proclaimed to the whole world.[5]
Now, this doesn’t mean that we always interpret and understand the Bible with perfect accuracy. We, like the reformers, understand that we can and do make mistakes when interpreting the Bible. But those mistakes aren’t the result of the Bible itself being unclear. When mistakes are made they are the result of our own blindness, our own lack of understanding, our own suppressing the truth in unrighteousness; but the Scriptures themselves remain perfectly clear in presentation of the Truth.
The Pluralism Objection is probably one that you have heard or even used before. This objection questions how can we say that the Bible is clear and understandable if there is so much disagreement about what it means?Why are there so many denominations, and four views books?
The objection is not that one interpretation is greater than another, but that no one has any sufficient grounds to know whether any interpretation is right or wrong. This is a staple of post modernism. At best, they will only accept that everyone is entitled to their own opinions and personal interpretations; but they will reject that the Bible can be understood to clearly communicate any objective truth.
So, if you met this person at a coffee shop to talk about Scripture and you presented to them the meaning of Ephesians 2:1-4 they would look you in the eyes and say, “Well, that’s just your interpretation.” You might respond by pointing out the meaning of Greek terms and explaining the sentence structure and grammatical syntax. To which they might reply, “but human language is inadequate to accurately represent the reality of God.”
At the end of the day you can’t get anywhere because they have rejected the base assumption of the Bible itself, which is that it can be understood to communicate timeless truths from God with sufficiency and clarity.
Throughout the Bible we see that God communicates to men and He expects them not only to understand what He has said but also to obey what He has said.Throughout the Old Testament, the prophets speak the Word of God and they call on the people to read, understand and apply the Word of God to their lives. God even expected the Kings of Israel to write out their own copy of the Law of God and to meditate on it day and night, so that they would know how to lead the nation and please God.
In the NT, Jesus approached the written word of God as a book that could be clearly read, understood, and obeyed. He used the Word of God to teach, to correct, to rebuke and to train His own disciples. To Jesus, the OT was the word of God (period).
This doctrine of Clarity is the underlying assumption of the entire Bible. It is the ground level of how we interact with the Word of God. And if we lose this doctrine of clarity, then we lose our ability to understand anything with certainty.
Conclusion…
III. Why does this matter? 5 reasons…
1. It matters because human language is a gift from God.When you read the Bible, from the beginning you see that God speaks. In fact, He was the first being to ever speak. He spoke the universe into existence and then He spoke to His creation. He taught Adam and Eve how to communicate and He taught them the consequences of failing to heed His words carefully.
Human language, human communication has its foundation in God and He has chosen to use everyday human speech as the way to spread the knowledge of Him and His plan of redemption to the very ends of the earth. If we can’t trust the Word of God then we have nothing to stand on, nothing to rest our heart on, nothing to hope in, and nothing to drive us in life. But if we can open our Bibles, read its pages and understand what it says; then all of life comes into beautiful, God-glorifying focus.
2. It matters because it tells us what God is like.Every couple of years a new book comes out and in a culturally relevant sort of way this new book claims to show us a picture of God that is more accurate than what we see in the Bible. Many of these books become bestsellers, which shows that people really are curious about God, some of these books are even made into movies. But what these books do is they try to humanize God in ways that make Him more acceptable to our cultural sensitivities.
But the clarity of Scripture means that you don’t have to wait on the next best-seller to come out in order for you to know what God is like. There is an old poem about the 6 blind men of Hindostanwhere 6 blind men all come across an elephant but they each approach it and touch it from in a different angle. One touches the side of the elephant and immediately declares that the elephant is like a wall. One touches the elephants tusk and declares that it is like a spear. Another touches the tail and declares that the elephant is like a rope.
These men then begin to argue, all asserting that their opinion about the elephant is the right one, but in the end, they are all right and wrong at the same time. Religious people will often use this to illustrate that it is arrogant to claim that we know what God is truly like when all the other people of the world and the various religions of the world claim something else.
Now, there are a couple of problems with claiming the moral and religious high-ground using this poem; but the point that I want to make is that the whole story falls apart the moment the elephant speaks. If humanity is groping around blindly seeking to discover who God is and what He is like, then all of our groping ceases when God opens His mouth and reveals Himself to us.
In the Bible that is exactly what we have. God has spoken, and He has spoken clearly so that we can know Him and know how to be His people. If we close our ears and keep groping around thinking that we know more about God than what He has revealed, we aren’t just blind, we are hard of hearing and hard-hearted.
3. It matters because our eternity is at stake. This doctrine of clarity insists that even the simplest disciple can pick up the Bible, read and understand the gospel, and be saved. You don’t need a scholar to explain it to you because God has made His Word clear. Children, you can and should pick up and read the Bible. When you find something that you don’t understand get help but you can read it for yourself to learn the truth about God, the truth about your sin, the truth about Jesus and be saved from your sin.
4. It matters because God has called each of us to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. To love God we must know Him and to know Him we must know what He has revealed to us in His Word. Mysticism is not the answer to how we can know God. Theological liberalism is the not the path that leads us to true knowledge of God. The Emergent conversation, is pretty much finished, but it wasn’t the path leading to a true knowledge of God.
Jesus prayed, “Sanctify them in the truth, your word is truth.” We will grow in our love for God as we grow in our knowledge of and obedience to His Word.
5. It matters because Christ has called each of His disciples to engage in the ministry of the gospel. It is not just for scholars and professionals to know and share God’s Word. It is a right and responsibility given to all believers. Because the Bible is clear and understandable, everyone one of us can read it, study it, think deeply about it, and then teach it or share it with others. Moms and dads, you can teach the Bible to your children. Sunday school teachers can faithfully teach the next generation what God has said and done.
The Sufficiency of Scripture
Can We Trust the Bible?
Manuscript
2 Pet 1:16 For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 17 For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” 18 we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.
19 And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, 20 knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. 21 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.
The Bible that you hold in your hand is trustworthy and reliable because it was not produced by the will of man, it is the very word of God.
Holy Scripture, being God's own Word, written by men prepared and superintended by His Spirit, is of infallible divine authority in all matters upon which it touches: it is to be believed, as God's instruction, in all that it affirms; obeyed, as God's command, in all that it requires; embraced, as God's pledge, in all that it promises.[1]
For the Biblical authors, there were myths on one side and truth on the other, and the Bible clearly belongs on the side of truth. No one had a more settled trust in the reliability of the Scriptures than Jesus and He requires no less from His followers. The Christian faith requires trust in the truthfulness and reliability of the Bible.
Many have tried to deny this and create a form of Christian religion that is very selective about what it will accept from the Bible. They don’t think we should take the Bible so seriously, but one thing the Bible can’t be is moderately important. It is either of no consequence whatsoever or it is the most important book in the history of humanity; I’m going with the latter.
Both the OT Jewish faith and the NT Christian faith are intricately tied to history. The events that took place and are recorded for us are events that took place in space and time and under the guise of eyewitnesses. The most important claims of Christianity are historical claims. Jesus was born of a virgin in a stable in Bethlehem. Thousands of people saw him, heard him and witnessed the countless miracles that he performed. He was crucified by Roman authorities in Jerusalem. Then three days later He was raised from the dead and was seen by more than 500 eye-witnesses.
These facts and thousands more make up the historical evidence that fueled the Biblical authors. They wrote what they saw, they wrote what they heard, they wrote what they experienced first-hand; but beneath all of the seeing, hearing and experience, the Holy Spirit was also present.
Question: Who wrote the Bible?
Answer: Holy men who were taught by the Holy Spirit.
Transition…
This morning we are going to look together at 2 Peter 1:16-21 and we are going to ask the question, can we trust the Bible? Is the Bible trustworthy and reliable? Is the message of Christ true?
Sermon Focus…
I. The Message of Christ is no Myth (16)
2 Pet 1:16 For we did not follow cleverly devised myths (cleverly invented fables) when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.
The problem that Peter is addressing in this letter is that a group of people in the church are dismissing the claims of the gospel as mere myth. They are denying certain aspects of Christian teaching, especially the second coming of Christ, as nothing more than a cleverly concocted story, and Peter is responding to their attack on the reliability of his teaching as well the reliability of all of Scriptures.
We face a very similar problem today. Many of you are familiar with the words of C.S. Lewis where he outlines the options available to us when trying to make sense of Jesus. Lewis writes,
A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic – on a level with a man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.
You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon; or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.[2]
Liar, Lunatic, or Lord; those are the options that Lewis presents us with. But in our day, we can add a new option to the list; legend.
Tim Keller in his book The Reason for God recounts his collegiate experience during the late 60’s where he was confronted with the prevailing wisdom of the time.
My professors taught that the New Testament Gospels originated as the oral traditions of various church communities around the Mediterranean. These stories about Jesus were shaped by those communities to address the questions and needs peculiar to each church. Leaders made certain that the Jesus in these stories supported the policies and beliefs of the community. The oral traditions were then passed down over the years, evolving through the addition of various legendary materials.[3]
This was taking place at Bucknell University, a private liberal arts college in Pennsylvania. It was also taking place in Baptist seminaries during that time. In 1961, Ralph Elliott, who was a seminary professor at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, wrote a commentary on the book of Genesis that was published by Broadman Press. Elliott’s method of interpreting the Bible was to look for the symbolic and spiritual meaning to the text, because in his view the Bible couldn’t be trusted as historically reliable.
In other words, their view is that the Bible is simply a collection of legends or myths made up by men in order to further their own religious cause. If this is true, then the Bible can’t be trusted as reliable and taken seriously. But these views simply are not true. Over the last 50+ years we have seen the evidence for these claims crumble. There is no serious scholarship to back up what these men and women have said.
The Biblical documents that we have are historically reliable. When you look at manuscript evidence, archaeological evidence, prophetic evidence and statistical evidence; the Bible is the most historically credible book ever written in human history.[4]
Norman Geisler writes,
“By comparison with the New Testament, most other books from the ancient world are not nearly so well authenticated. The well-known New Testament scholar Bruce Metzger estimated that the Mahabharata of Hinduism is copied with only about 90 percent accuracy and Homer’s Iliad with about 95 percent. By comparison, he estimated the New Testament is about 99.5 percent accurate. So the New Testament text can be reconstructed with over 99 percent accuracy. And, what is more, 100 percent of the message of the New Testament has been preserved in its manuscripts!”[5]
There was once a biblical skeptic named Sir William Ramsay, trained as an archaeologist, who set out to disprove the historical reliability of the books of Luke and Acts. He set out on an archaeological journey to prove his theory. However, after several trips through the Mediterranean, all the while comparing the archaeological evidence with the biblical record, he discovered that every fact that Luke, the author of Acts, recorded was spot on, and he became a Christian.[6]
Here is Ramsay’s conclusion to his work:
Luke’s history is unsurpassed in respect of its trustworthiness” … “Luke is a historian of the first rank; not merely are his statements of fact trustworthy...this author should be placed along with the very greatest of historians.”4[7]
You see, we aren’t the only generation of people to face these attacks on the reliability of Scripture. Even in Peter’s day, it is clear that a very early form of this same thing was taking place. There was a group of people in the church and they were rejecting the message of Christ as nothing more than mere mythology, legends created by men to gain credibility and influence. And Peter responds to their attacks by saying nothing could be further from the truth.
The NT gospels, Acts of the apostles and letters to the churches don’t fall into the category of myth or legend – they fall in the category of historical, verifiable fact. Kevin DeYoung writes,
The Greeks and Romans had lots of myths. They didn’t care whether the stories were literally true. No one was interested in the historical evidence for the claim that Hercules was the illegitimate son of Zeus. It was a myth, a fable, a tall tale, a story to entertain and make sense of the world. Paganism was built on the power of mythology, but Christianity…is intimately tied to history.
But how? How does the message of the NT tie itself to actual historical events? For starters, the authors were eyewitnesses.
II. The Trustworthiness of the Gospel is corroborated by eyewitness accounts (17-18)
V. 16 - but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. 17 For when he received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was borne to him by the Majestic Glory, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased,” 18 we ourselves heard this very voice borne from heaven, for we were with him on the holy mountain.
In other words, Peter isn’t making anything up. There is not the slightest hint of mythology or legend in Peter’s mind. This actually happened, and Peter, James and John saw it with their own eyes. What did they see? The transfiguration of Jesus.
They were present on the mountain when Jesus was changed right in front of their eyes. All three of them saw the same thing, they heard the same voice, they were all together with Jesus when the majestic glory of Christ was revealed. The mountain where this took place exists. The event itself took place in space and time. All three of the Apostles were present. This wasn’t a vision in their souls or an experience within their hearts. If you and I had been on the mountain with them, we would have seen it too because it truly happened.
This is the posture of the entirety of Scripture. The events recorded actually took place and they were written down for our instruction and edification. The events were verified by those eyewitnesses but also by the countless number of people who were also present when the miracles of Jesus took place.
All four canonical gospels were written no more than 40-60 years after Jesus’ death and most of the epistles were written between 15 and 25 years after Jesus’ death. What this means is that the Biblical accounts of Jesus’ life were all in public circulation well within the lifetime of hundreds of people who were eyewitnesses to His amazing ministry. If legends were to creep into the New Testament accounts, they would have to be written much later so that no eyewitness could point out the errors.
This means that all of the supernatural events that occur in the gospels could easily be confirmed by living eyewitnesses and that is exactly what we find in the NT.
Luke 1:1-4, Luke claims that his written account of the life and ministry of Jesus was taken from eyewitnesses who were still alive when he wrote and began to circulate it.
Mark 15:21, Mark mentions specific names of people, and there is no other reason for him to do so except to give them the opportunity to confirm what he has written.
I Corinthians 15:1-6, Paul not only refers to an eyewitness but to more than five hundred who saw the resurrected Christ at the same time…almost to say, “Go ask them if you don’t believe me.”
On top of these, there is also the fact that the ministry of Jesus did not occur in a bubble, it was clearly visible to thousands of people in the first century world, especially important people. In Acts 26:26, Paul stood before King Agrippa and declared to him the gospel in Jerusalem, the very city where Christ had been arrested, tried, crucified and buried…but those present didn’t laugh off Paul’s words, they took them to heart and pondered them as an explanation for what they knew had already taken place.
What you find in the early days of the church is overwhelming continuity between the gospel writers, which is why we refer to them as the synoptics. The four gospels that we have in our Bible today were recognized from the start as authoritative eye witness accounts and this is evidenced by the fact that one of the church fathers, Irenaeus, declared in 160 AD that there were only four gospels.
It wasn’t until the late 2nd century (175 BC) that the first of the so-called Gnostic gospels was written and that volume contained the type of legendary material you would expect to find, which is why the orthodox church rejected them. They were rejected because by that time the 4 canonical gospels that we have in our bibles were trusted as reliable and true.
When the Apostle John wrote a letter to the church in Ephesus, he led out with…
1 John 1:1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands, concerning the word of life…3 that which we have seen and heard we proclaim to you.
Peter, James and John were eyewitnesses to the glory of Christ and their burden is to pass on to us what they saw and heard. Their eyewitness testimony is powerful evidence of the trustworthiness of the Scriptures but there is something even more convincing than eyewitness testimony.
III. The Reliability of the Prophetic Word rests on God (19-21)
19 And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts,
More fully confirmed is an amazing statement that we simply cannot miss. Peter wants us to trust in his own first-hand account of Jesus transfiguration glory. He wants us to take his word for it as historically reliable truth. But Peter knows that there is something with even greater credibility, this Word came to us by the Holy Spirit.
It is not that Peter’s eyewitness account of the transfiguration is less reliable than the prophetic word; but that the prophetic word should be accompanied with the utmost certainty and reliability as it comes directly from God. The Word of God is as true as true can be. There is no firmer foundation upon which to rest your faith, your life and your eternity.
The Word of God is true, and the Scripture is the Word of God. Neoorthodoxy wants us to affirm that the Bible contains the word of God or that it becomes the word of God. But Peter’s point is that Scripture is the Word of God. The Greek term graphe means writing, or that which has been written down. The Bible is God’s speech, God’s communication to man, written down and preserved for us and this means that God’s authority resides with His Word.
That’s why the writer of Hebrews can say,
Heb 4:12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
God’s Word is not just something that we read, it is something that reads us. It brings the power of God to bear on our hearts when it convicts us of sin, convinces us of the truth of the Gospel, and motivates us to obedience and faith.
Yes, the word of God was given to us through human instrumentality but that doesn’t make it any less true, authoritative or divine.
V. 20 no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. 21 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.
God chose to use the “intellect, skills and personality of fallible men to write down what was divine and infallible…but this in no way implies any fallibility in the Scriptures (DeYoung 37).”
B.B. Warfield writes,
The men who spoke from God are here declared to have been taken up by the Holy Spirit and brought by His power to the foal of His choosing. The things which they spoke under this operation of the Spirit were therefore His things, not theirs. And that is the reason which is assigned why “the prophetic word” is so sure.
The Bible that you hold in your hands was written down by the hands of men but every word, in the original autographs, was inspired by the Holy Spirit of God. And because God is the author of Scripture we must also say that Bible is without error. Scripture did not come from the will of man but from God and if it is God’s Word then it must all be true.
Ultimately, we believe the Bible to be inerrant because it comes from God Himself. It is unthinkable to contemplate that God might be capable of error. Therefore, His Word cannot possibly contain errors. This is our faith-we can trust the Bible because we can trust God (RC Sproul).[8]
Conclusion…
Some people falsely believe that they can have a relationship with God apart from His Word. They want to be able to pick and choose what to believe about Him. They like certain aspects of Scripture but not others, so they form their opinion of God based on their own likes and dislikes. In the end, what they have is not God but a deified version of themselves. They have constructed an idol that will never save them and probably doesn’t even need to.
But, this is not Christianity it is a delusion. A real relationship to God, the God who has revealed Himself in Scripture, is one where He changes us day by day from one degree of glory to another. “An infallible Bible is not an enemy to our relationship with God; it is the precondition for it.”[9]
You can completely immerse yourself in the Word of God and trust with certainty that it is true. Trust it, rely on it, and be shaped by it. When you read it you are hearing the voice of God and the words of eternal life. The Word of God is true. The good news of Jesus Christ is that He is the way, the truth and the life. He lived, died, rose again and appeared to more than 500 eyewitnesses. He calls us to repent and believe in Him so that we can be pardoned of sin and enjoy eternal life with God.
Preparation for the Lord’s Supper…
Invite helpers to come forward and ask the people to prepare themselves.
As we prepare to take the bread and the wine into our hands and then to taste them with our mouths, let us remember with our minds what these things represent. The sacrifice has already been made and accepted. Christ has been raised victorious over death and this bread is but a reminder, albeit a powerful one. This bread is a tangible reminder of the body of Christ that was broken for us. The wine is a tangible reminder of the blood of Christ that was poured out for our sin.
As we eat this bread and drink this cup we remember the Lord’s death and all that it accomplished for God’s people.
If you are a believer in Christ, meaning that you trust that Jesus is the Son of God who died to take away your sin and was raised to secure your salvation. If you are trusting in Christ alone as your Savior and Lord then we welcome you to join us in observing the Lord’s Supper this morning. As the plates pass you will see clear cups filled with grape juice and purple cups filled with wine.
If you are not a believer and have not come to trust in Christ then we ask that you simply let these plates pass by you. But I would urge you to think deeply about the state of your soul. I would urge you to consider your sin and its offense to God. I would urge you to look to Jesus as your only hope of rescue and to put your trust in Him alone for salvation.
[1] R. C. Sproul. Can I Trust the Bible? (Crucial Questions Series Book 2) (Kindle Locations 68-70). Kindle Edition.
[2] C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity pg. 52
[3] Keller, pg. 97
[4] Josh Wagner, Can We Trust the Bible (personal notes from Falls Creek Apologetics Forum)
[5] Norman L. Geisler and Abdul Saleeb, Answering Islam: The Crescent in Light of the Cross, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2002), 239–241.
[6] You can read his story in his own book, St. Paul the Traveler and Roman Citizen by William M. Ramsay.
[7] Josh McDowell, Josh McDowell’s Handbook on Apologetics, electronic ed. (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 1997), Chapter 7.
[8] R. C. Sproul. Can I Trust the Bible? (Crucial Questions Series Book 2) (Kindle Locations 49-50). Kindle Edition.
[9] Ibid.
Delighting in God's Word
Manuscript
Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord!
2 Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart,
3 who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways!
4 You have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently.
5 Oh that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes!
6 Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments.
7 I will praise you with an upright heart, when I learn your righteous rules.
8 I will keep your statutes; do not utterly forsake me!
This morning we are kicking off a new summer sermon series on the Word of God: The Doctrine of Scripture. We will be exploring what we believe about the Bible or better yet, what the Bible teaches about itself.
Now, I am sure that as soon as you heard me say that you were thinking in your mind, “Wow, this is going to be incredible!” Does the thought of studying the Doctrine of Scripture excite you, comfort you, fill you with joy? Does it make you want to shout and praise God? Does it make you want to jump up and run to tell others, “We are studying the Doctrine of God’s Word?” Probably, not.
I’m being a bit silly, but I want to make a specific point and it is that when we come to this subject we know that it will engage our minds. This is a “thinking cap” topic, for sure; but as we read Psalm 119 we also see that this is a subject that should move our hearts.
Listen to how the Psalmist describes his feelings about God’s Word:
1. Delight (10 times)– v. 14 In the way of your testimonies I delight as much as in all riches. V.174 I long for your salvation, O Lord, and your law is my delight. (Duck Tales and Uncle Scrooge swimming in money…)
2. Sweet Like Honey – V. 103 How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth! (God’s Word is more satisfying than the best dessert in the world)
3. Love (18 times) – V.97 Oh how I love your law! It is my meditation all the day; V.127 Therefore I love your commandments above gold, above fine gold. (He would rather read and obey the commands of God than to have fine gold in his hands)
4. Joy – V. 111 Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart.
As he meditates on God’s Word the psalmist does more than think deep thoughts, he also feels deeply in his heart and out of his Spirit-inspired pen comes poetry. Psalm 119is a poem, the longest love poem in the Bible and the object of its love is the Word of the Living God. It is a poem of praise to the Word of God and it is masterfully constructed.
The first letter in each line in each section starts with a specific letter of the Hebrew alphabet. So that verses 1-8 all begin with Aleph and verses 9-16 all begin with the letter Beth, and so on through all 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet.
How many of you have ever tried your hand at writing poetry? If you have then you know this is no small feat. The author of this poem took His time and worked extremely hard to write in such a way that this Psalm would instruct our mind, challenge our soul, and awaken our heart to the wonder of God’s Word.
He uses a handful of terms over and over: law, commandments, statues, rules, testimonies, promises or simply word. Out of 176 verses, 169 of them contain at least one of these terms and sometimes we find more than one. These words represent various shades of meaning but they are all pointing to one idea, this Psalm is about God’s verbal revelation that has been written down for us.As the Psalmist meditates on what God has said, His mind, soul and body are overwhelmed at the beauty, truth and power of God’s Word and that is what I want for myself, for you, for us.
Transition…
Now, I understand that some of you think the Bible is great and all, but it’s a bit odd for people to get too excited about it. After all, isn’t the Bible a combination of God’s Word mixed with human thinking? Didn’t these ancient authors simply put words in God’s mouth? The short answer is, no! In the weeks to come we are going to show you why that’s not true and why you can trust that the Bible is God’s Word and that you should delight in it like the Psalmist.
Some of you may have a different reaction. You may not have any particular problem with the Bible being God’s Word, but it just seems so old and dull. It’s hard to read at times and you would much rather watch a movie or play a video game. I hope that in the weeks to come you will begin to see that in the most serious possible way, your life and your eternity depends upon this Word.
This morning’s sermon is an introduction to our summer study and we are going to look at the first section of Psalm 119 where we learn the Importance of Scripture, the Imperativeof Scripture, the Impactof Scripture, and the Necessity of God’s grace.
Sermon Focus…
I. The Importance of Scripture for Everyone (Vv. 1-1-3)
Ps 119 Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord!
2 Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart,
3 who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways!
We have seen this word Blessed before and it means Happy or Fortunate. You could almost substitute the term happy each time you see the word blessed and if you did, it would read like this, “Happy are those whose way is blameless…Happy are those who walk in the law of the Lord…Happy are those who keep His testimonies…Happy are those who seek Him with their whole heart.” This sounds great because we all want to be happy.
Blaise Pascal wrote,
All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. [159] The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.[1]
Everyone wants to be happy and we have an incredible number of options available to us all promising to secure us that happiness. I did a search online and found over 1 billion search results for the phrase, “How to be happy.” Some of the options include: Happiness through better mental health, happiness through better physical health, happiness through better spiritual health, happiness through better sex, better food, better parties, better jobs, better friends, better lifestyle, better entertainment, a better house, better car, better spouse…
It’s interesting to me that the common idea is that happiness will be achieved by having more of what we already have. Or maybe just a bigger, better or newer one. The pursuit of happiness in our culture is being fueled by the consumerism and materialism of our culture. In other words, the marketers have won in that they have made us think that happiness is just a credit card swipe away.
But something even more interesting is the fact that the pursuit of happiness is universal. We all want to be happy and at present, most of us are convinced that true happiness is not something we have but something we must find. And yet, the Bible tells us that we are looking in the wrong places.
The Bible tells us that the happiness we are seeking is actually something deeper. It is the longing of our soul. Our hearts are seeking a happiness that goes beyond circumstances, beyond the simple feelings of the 5 senses.
A steak might make a man happy for a couple of hours, but it doesn’t bring joy to his soul. The epicureans tried that and they ended up morbidly obese, alcoholics with heart problems and type 2 diabetes. They didn’t end up with lasting joy.
The human longing for joy is something that rests beyond the flesh at the soul level of man, and therefore cannot be satisfied with the temporal things of this world. Money, success, pleasure, recognition and power are only the opiates that numbs our deep longing for joy that cries out from the soul of man.
In the Scriptures, God is going to tell us over and over that the deep satisfying happiness that we are seeking is not best understood in relation to things but in relation to Him.In Ecclesiastes, Solomon tells us that, ‘God has placed eternity into man’s heart…”A longing for God has been planted in our hearts and we seek to fill it with things that simply cannot satisfy.
(Illus.No one illustrates the vanity of this quest better than Solomon who sets out to find joy and pleasure by testing everything under the sun. In Ecclesiastes 2:1-11
He sought for joy in happiness and laughter…(v. 2)
He sought to find joy in wine…(v. 3)
He sought to find joy in achievement, building the temple of God, homes for himself and his wives…(v. 4)
He sought joy by being green and planting vineyards, national parks, forests, all kinds of fruit trees. (v. 5-6)
He sought joy in stuff/possessions hoarding gold and silver, horses farms and cattle ranches…(v. 7-8)
He sought joy in entertainment (v. 8)
He sought joy in women and sexual pleasure…(v. 8)
And just in case he left something out in verse 10 he says that whatever he saw he took it. If it looked like it could satisfy the longing of his soul he tried it. But at the end of his quest Solomon said, “I tried it all and it was good but it couldn’t satisfy my soul’s longing.” It was like chasing the wind. It was vanity. It left him empty and still longing to be filled.
That longing for happiness, that pursuit of joy in the human experience will always feel like chasing the wind if we try to satisfy it with the things of this world. But notice that the Psalmist doesn’t offer us happiness based on worldly things, He talks about happiness that comes to those who walk with God according to His Word.
God has given us His Word to show us that the way to happiness is actually the way to Him.True happiness, lasting joy comes when we are reunited with our creator to have relationship with Him. That is where the Word is guiding us. To walk in the way or in the law of the Lord is to have your heart and mind aligned with God. It is to believe, feel and live in relationship to God.
The phrase His Testimoniesis a reference to what God has said and revealed about Himself. To keep His testimonies is to believe and live affirming the truth about God that He has revealed to us in His Word.
Happy are those who seek Him with our whole heart, walking in His ways. One of the most comforting promises in Scripture is that those who seek Him will find Him. Those who cry out to Him, He will hear.
Jesus says, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”We read in Romans 10:11“Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. 13 For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
Why is the Word of God so important for everyone? Because in the Word, God has made it clear to us that the universal human longing for happiness, which we all feel, can only be satisfied by the One who gave us that longing in the first place.
II. The Imperative of Scripture (V. 4)
4 You have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently.
Notice the shift from verses 1-3 that spoke of the blessings that God’s Word holds out for everyone and verse 4 where the Psalmist addresses God directly. “Youhave commanded…” God has brought the full weight of His authority into being by declaring what He requires of us. In His Word, God has made it clear that we are the creature and He is the Creator. He is the lawgiver and we are subject to His commands.
This poses a problem for us because we have all fallen short. We have all sinned and failed to keep His law diligently. That pursuit of happiness has taken us out of God’s will. Our sinful desires have caused us to transgress the law of God. Our rebellious nature has driven us to deny God’s authority and rule. You could say that this is the bad news and it is in the Scriptures that we come to understand that this bad news applies to us.
You see, that pursuit of happiness that marks the human experience is fueled by the fact that we are separated from God because of our sin. We know that something is wrong, and we are trying to make it right on our own. The deep longing in our soul is a constant reminder that things aren’t as they should be, that we aren’t as we should be. In order to help us understand what is wrong and what went wrong, God has chosen to tell us the story.
Our story began in the garden where God and man were at peace. Then rebellion entered the Garden. Through Adam and Eve that rebellion has spread throughout the world resulting in a separation between God and man. We can’t come into His presence anymore because the peace we once had with Him is gone. He cast Adam and Eve out of the Garden and barred the way back in. But that is not where the story ends.
As the story continues to unfold God tells us, in His Word, that He is the one who is going to make things right between us. He is going to send His Messiah who will take our sin away and bring us back to God. That’s where Jesus comes into the story.
Jesus came and lived the life we couldn’t live, He died the death we deserved to die, He paid the price to set us free and rose from death to show that His work was finished. Then, when He was on the road talking with two of His disciples He pointed out to them that all of the Scriptures, from Moses all the way through the prophets, were about Him.
One of the most beautiful and incredible things that you will learn as you read and study the Bible is that it is not a loose collection of religious stories and tales aimed to teach us how to be moral people. Instead, it is one massive story about the relationship between God and His creation. The Bible is one book written by 40 authors on three different continents over a period of 2000 years and it is all telling One Story of how God would redeem His people from their sin by the loving sacrifice of His only begotten Son.
God could have simply left us to our fate. He could have locked us out in the cold, but He chose to reach out to us. In His mercy He called out to us, He spoke so that we could hear, and in His Word His voice can still be heard. God has preserved His Word for us so that we can read it and be changed by it.
Let’s look next at the impact of the Scriptures…
III. The Impact of the Scriptures (V. 5-7)
5 Oh that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes!
6 Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments.
7 I will praise you with an upright heart, when I learn your righteous rules.
Once again, the focus shifts. Verse 4 directly addressed God as the giver of commands but here in verse 5 the focus is on our individual response to God’s Word. “Oh, that myways be steadfast…then Ishall not be put to shame…my eyes are fixed…Iwill praise…Ilearn.”
It is not enough that we affirm the Bible to be the Word of God, we must read, study and apply it in our lives. The Bible is not a prop. It is not a decoration for the mantle. It is not a space-filler that fits on the bookcase just right. God has given us His Word so that it will impact our lives. He wants His Word to guide our way, to comfort us and keep us from shame, to teach us, to grow us, and to elicit praise from our heart.
There is such a thing as true piety. It comes when the law of God has done it’s work of showing us our need of God’s grace. It comes when the Word of God reveals that Christ alone can reconcile us to God and satisfy our souls longing for peace and happiness. It flows out of a life that sees the Scriptures as sweeter than honey and the joy of our hearts. Then we can walk with God in faithfulness, guided by His Spirit and His Word.
But notice verse 8,
8 I will keep your statutes; do not utterly forsake me!
One of the lessons that the Scriptures make very clear to us is that we are never beyond our need of God’s grace. “I will keep your statues, but don’t turn away from me, don’t stop guiding me, don’t stop loving me, don’t stop forgiving me, cleansing me and helping me.”
Conclusion…
Don’t you see that the Word of God reveals all of this to us. It reveals that the universal human pursuit of happiness is actually our soul’s longing to be made right with our Creator. It reveals that the reason we aren’t right with God is because we have sinned against Him. It reveals that in order to be made right we need to follow where the Scriptures lead us and that is to put our hope in Christ alone for salvation. It teaches that we will never outgrow our need of God’s sustaining grace.
So here is the million-dollar question, are you still seeking to fill the longing of your soul with the things of this world only to find yourself empty and still seeking?
Each of us has a longing in our soul which only Christ can fill and until we rest in him our souls will never find satisfaction. So my hope for us all this morning is the hope of Augustine which is this
Almighty God,
you have made us for yourself,
and our hearts are restless
till they find their rest in you;
so lead us by your Spirit
that in this life we may live to your glory
and in the life to come enjoy you for ever;
through Jesus Christ our Lord
[1]Pascal, Blaise. Pascal's Pensées (p. 97). Kindle Edition.