79 Sermon Illustrations on Inspiration

The importance of believing in a trustworthy Scripture. A look at the "errors" and discrepancies of the Bible. Humanity vs. divinity of Scripture. Jesus' use of the Bible points to its complete trustworthiness. Definitions of terms used in the debate are used.

I. All branches of the church have generally agreed on inspiration.

A. In past, opposition came from outside the church.

B. Today it comes from liberals inside.

1) Infallibility is dangerous because one error destroys

Christian faith.

II. Errors in the Bible.

A. Hard to prove errors about science and history.

B. Most effort goes into discrepancies among texts.

1) Differences in Kings/Chronicles, and Gospels.

a) But these have been recognized for centuries.

b) Should be expected from variety of writers in different

ages.

2) (Example of a traffic accident)

C. Discrepancies should be examined.

III. Inspiration.

A. Paul says Scripture is "God-breathed."

1) Often taken to mean dictation, but doesn't deny human

authorship.

2) Humanity of writers shouts at us. It must be understood

as a human book.

B. Humanity of Bible.

1) Embedded in Bible's own view of itself.

2) But not merely human, because they were guided by God.

C. Tension.

1) How can God sovereignly control writing of Bible if it is

truly a human book?

2) Requires a bigger view of God.

a) Analogy of deity and humanity of Jesus.

IV. Critical study.

A. Bible should not be analyzed like any ancient document.

1) Historical criticism can have valid use.

2) Date, setting, customs, etc.

B. Criticism by liberals often becomes psychoanalysis of

Bible writers.

1) Wrong to eliminate the miraculous.

2) Pseudepigrapha and JEPD make a difference.

V. Bible bears witness to trustworthiness.

A. Jesus contrasts human tradition to Scripture. Mark 7:6-13

1) What Moses said is what God said.

2) OT quotes are used in same way.

3) Jesus defended the full integrity of the OT. Matt 5:17-19

B. No part of the OT can be set aside as useless. Luke 16:17

1) Scripture cannot be broken. John 10:35

VI. Infallibility is not essential to salvation.

A. Many godly Christians have denied infallibility.

1) C.S. Lewis.

B. But it is essential to consistent Christianity.

1) Guards against a pick-and-choose mentality.

2) Jesus accepted Scripture and leaders should do so today.

C. We believe Bible because of our obedience to Jesus, not because

it has advantages.

1) Is Jesus Christ Lord?

2) Question of Bible as authoritative guide for life and

thought comes next (not first).

VII. Inerrancy and infallibility. [sidebar article]

A. Infallibility stronger than inerrancy.

1) Infallibility says it CANNOT have error, inerrancy that it

does not (but could).

2) Covers all of Bible, not just parts.

B. Church Fathers used terms in their full sense.

1) Irenaeus.

2) Augustine.

3) Luther.

4) Calvin.

5) John Wesley: "If there be one error in Scripture, there

might as well be a thousand. It would not be the truth

of God."

C. Liberals acknowledge the teaching of infallibility in past.

1) Liberal professor at Harvard University, Kirsopp Lake:

"How many were there, for instance, in Christian churches

in the eighteenth century who doubted the infallible

inspiration of all Scripture? A few, perhaps, but very

few.... It is we [liberals] who have departed from the

tradition.... The Bible and the "corpus theologicum" of

the church are on the fundamentalist side."

#347

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In 1941 cartoonist Walter Lantz's honeymoon was rudely interrupted by a woodpecker that launched an assault on his lakeside cottage. The Lantzes dubbed the persistent pest Woody Woodpecker, and Walter developed the bird into the popular Universal Studios cartoon character. Grace Lantz has been the voice for Woody's five-note laugh for more than forty years.

In the late 1830s machinist Elias Howe hoped he could rise above his poverty by inventing a sewing machine. He developed one but it stitched unevenly. A nightmare became the answer to his dreams. One night he dreamt that a band of savages kidnapped him and threatened to kill him if he did not invent a sewing machine in 24 hours. He failed. But as the savages' spears descended on him, he noticed that they had holes near the tips. He awoke with an idea - put the eye of the needle near the tip instead of in the middle. The idea worked, and Howe patented his new sewing machine in 1846.

Andrew Carnegie held very decided views about the Old Testament, and once or twice, under provocation, expressed himself very bluntly. In fact, the point of view that Mr. Carnegie took toward the Bible has become very common in our day among the most eminent scholars in the churches. He did feel very strongly on the matter of teaching children certain portions of the Old Testament, which, to his mind, contradicted not only the finest human instincts but the whole spirit of Christ's teaching.

We were once walking together when he suddenly referred to a sensational heading in that day's paper about some preacher's utterances concerning the incident of Jonah: "What in the world has the question as to whether that book is fact or story got to do with the Christian religion?" he exclaimed. "It is this sort of thing that makes sensible people disgusted with the Churches. The first Christians followed Christ and that was all that was ever asked of them. Now we demand that they believe a lot of incidents said to have happened hundreds of years before Christ was born and which have absolutely no relation to him whatever, except that they happened to get bound up in a collection of books with the story of his life. It's just exactly as if I were told that I could not be a believer in Abraham Lincoln unless I believed some miraculous stories about the early settlers of America because the stories happened to be on the same library shelf. The Bible is a wonderful literature of a people who had a genius for religion, but I sometimes think it has been a misfortune that the life of Christ got bound up with the Old Testament. They don't always harmonize."

What disturbed Mr. Carnegie most of all was hinted at in that last sentence. He thought it was a great mistake to teach certain of the narratives of the Old Testament to children for the sake of the ethical lessons. The ethics of parts of the historical books not only did not harmonize with the teachings of the New Testament but they were contrary to them. He used to grow quite indignant on this point and I think the fact that the Sunday Schools were teaching these portions of the Bible somewhat colored his views of the entire Old Testament and perhaps made him unappreciative of its really spiritual revelations. Once he exclaimed to me, as we were discussing this whole question of the worth of the Old Testament (we were walking in Central Park):

"I picked up the Bible just the other day and was reading the

story of the times of Samuel. One king after another comes along

and they are all engaged from year to year in killing -- it is

really slaughter. All sorts of ghastly incidents are related,

and some passages are simply revolting to a mind accustomed to

feel toward humanity as Christ felt, and the thing is that God is

pictured as directing and helping it all. It is God who leads in

the slaughter and He even inspires His children to the most

unmerciful acts. Now, if you want to teach these things to

students in the universities as you familiarize them with the

legends and myths and wars of ancient Rome and Greece, all right,

but do not teach them to boys and girls as heroic deeds, to be

admired and copied, and, for heaven's sake, do not tell them that

the God pictured in some parts of these stories is the God Jesus

Christ shows us in the Sermon on the Mount."

I think I have recorded rather accurately what Mr. Carnegie said, for I was greatly interested in getting his point of view, and he said these things very emphatically. Professor Samuel T. Dutton, who used often to drop into the house at Ninety-first Street Sunday afternoons, for a chat with him, told me that he once said practically these same words to him. When I told Mr. Carnegie that he would find the view which he was expressing even more forcibly put than he was putting it, in the pulpits of many churches, he said:

"I know that; but still they go on teaching it just the same, and

I have heard passages from the Old Testament read in church which

made me blush, so contrary were they to the spirit of

Christianity. I think General Armstrong and David Livingstone

are much better Christians than Joshua or Gideon, and I would

teach their lives in the Sunday Schools. And there ought to be

an edition of the Old Testament prepared for use in church and

home, which would leave out those parts that are not Christian."

As a matter of fact, Mr. Carnegie had a great admiration for those portions of the Bible which deal with pure religion, and was continually quoting it, and had carved upon the walls of his library, over the fireplace, one of its great words: "Let there be light!"

Billy Graham said "Early in my ministry some intellectual theologians challenged me because they felt I was naive when it came to understanding the Scriptures. As I listened to them, I began to question what I believed.

One moonlit night I walked into the woods and spread my Bible over the stump of a tree. 'Lord,' I said, 'I don't understand everything in this book. But I accept it by faith as your divine Word.' From that moment on, I've not had a doubt that the Bible is God's inspired Word. The Scriptures have remained my constant guide."

I [Rev. Bruce Fraser] had a similar experience when I was at seminary. The professor who taught first year Old Testament studies was John Hardie, a scholarly man who had studied the Bible all his life - in Hebrew! Near the beginning of our course, he told us that the first five books of the Bible were not written by Moses (as the Bible itself says they were), but were actually the result of many different people writing and re-writing these stories during the thousand years after Moses. Since they were writing about things long after they had happened, none of it can be taken as trustworthy; most of it is just legends and myths. (This is the theory taught in most liberal seminaries today.)

I asked Doctor Hardie to provide some evidence to back up the claims of this theory, since it had sweeping implications for our faith. He looked at me over his glasses and said, "My boy, I've been working on this all my life. Just take my word for it."

I replied, "Doctor Hardie, with all due respect, I can go to other seminaries and find other professors with even more degrees behind their name than yours, who will tell me the very opposite of what you are saying. If I am going to accept what you are teaching, you will need to provide some evidence."

Dr. Hardie: "Bruce, I don't have time to go into detail on that in this course. Don't worry about it." I was not impressed!

Before entering the ministry, my background was heavily in the sciences, where we have to test everything. I'm as much a skeptic as anyone else. I want evidence if I'm going to believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God... but I also want evidence if someone's going to tell me that the gospel of Jesus Christ is just a legend, and that he has no power to save people today!

I'm still waiting for evidence that Jesus is not real. But I have examined the evidence in favour of Jesus Christ, and it's very impressive. There is historical evidence. There is the evidence of the Scriptures themselves, particularly how the life of Jesus fulfills the prophecies of the Old Testament. There is also the evidence of people's lives changed when they have met Christ.

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A sobbing little girl stood near a small church from which she had been turned away because it 'was too crowded'. "I can't go to Sunday School," she sobbed to the pastor as he walked by. Seeing her shabby, unkempt appearance, the pastor guessed the reason and, taking her by the hand, took her inside and found a place for her in the Sunday School class. The child was so touched that she went to bed that night thinking of the children who have no place to worship Jesus.

Some two years later, this child lay dead in one of the poor tenement buildings and the parents called for the kind-hearted pastor, who had befriended their daughter, to handle the final arrangements. As her poor little body was being moved, a worn and crumpled purse was found which seemed to have been rummaged from some trash dump. Inside was found 57 cents and a note scribbled in childish handwriting which read, "This is to help build the little church bigger so more children can go to Sunday school." For two years she had saved for this offering of love. When the pastor tearfully read that note, he knew instantly what he would do. Carrying this note and the cracked, red pocketbook to the pulpit, he told the story of her unselfish love and devotion. He challenged his deacons to get busy and raise enough money for the larger building.

But the story does not end there! A newspaper learned of the story and published it. It was read by a realtor who offered them a parcel of land worth many thousands. When told that the church could not pay so much, he offered it for 57 cents.

Church members made large subscriptions. Checks came from far and wide. Within five years the little girl's gift had increased to $250,000.00 - a huge sum for that time (near the turn of the century). Her unselfish love had paid large dividends.

When you are in the city of Philadelphia, look up Temple Baptist Church, with a seating capacity of 3,300, and Temple University, where hundreds of students are trained. Have a look, too, at the Good Samaritan Hospital and at a Sunday School building which houses hundreds of Sunday scholars, so that no child in the area will ever need to be left outside during Sunday school time. In one of the rooms of this building may be seen the picture of the sweet face of the little girl whose 57 cents, so sacrificially saved, made such remarkable history. Alongside of it is a portrait of her kind pastor, Dr. Russel H. Conwell, author of the book, "Acres of Diamonds." - a true story.

Goes to show WHAT GOD CAN DO WITH 57 cents.

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Analysis by TruthorFiction.com at http://truthorfiction.com/rumors/hattiemaywiatt.htm -

This story is true. A first-hand account of it is in a sermon delivered December 1, 1912 by Russell H. Conwell, pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Philadelphia. Rev. Conwell said the little girl's name was Hattie May Wiatt. She lived near a church where the Sunday School was very crowded and he told her that one day they would have buildings big enough to allow every one to attend who wanted to. Later, Hattie May Wiatt became sick and died. Rev. Conwell was asked to do the funeral and the girl's mother told him that Hattie May had been saving money to help build a bigger church and gave him the little purse in which she had saved 57 cents. Rev. Conwell had the 57 cents turned into 57 pennies, told the congregation the story of little Hattie May and sold the pennies for a return of about $250. In addition, 54 of the original 57 pennies were returned to Rev. Conwell and he later put them up on display. This was in 1886 when 57 cents was no small savings account for a little girl from a poor family. Some of the members of the church formed what they called the Wiatt Mite Society which was dedicated to making Hattie May's 57 cents grow as much as possible and to buy the property for the Primary Department of the Sunday school. A house nearby was purchased with the $250 that Hattie May's 57 cents had produced and the rest is history. The first classes of Temple College, later Temple University, were held in that house. It was later sold to allow Temple College to move and the growth of Temple, along with the founding of the Good Samaritan Hospital (now the Temple University Hospital) have been powerful testimonies to Hattie May Wiatt's dream.

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Barbara and David P. Mikkelson of Snopes.com put this story on their "Glurge" page, saying it is a nice story but too embellished:

It seems these days that no true story is deemed sufficiently inspirational but that it can't be made even more so by the addition of exaggerated and fabricated details. If a story about a sad little orphan makes you misty-eyed, the thinking goes, then transforming it into a tale about a whole busload of abandoned, homeless orphans will make you cry your heart out.

Here we have such a tale, one that contains a kernel of truth wrapped in a layer of exaggeration.

If there's anyone who knows the truth behind this story, it would be Russell H. Conwell, the kindly pastor described in this anecdote. He set down his version of these events in a chapter of his book Acres of Diamonds, and the details he relates are significantly different than the ones presented above.

For starters, he does tell of a little girl who was turned away from Sunday school because there was no room for her:

One afternoon a little girl, who had eagerly wished to go, turned

back from the Sunday-school door, crying bitterly because there

was no more room ... [I] asked her why it was that she was

crying, and she sobbingly replied that it was because they could

not let her into the Sunday-school ... I said to her that I would

take her in, and I did so, and I said to her that we should some

day have a room big enough for all who should come.

So far, so good. But what happened next? Unbeknownst to Dr. Conwell, the little girl went home and told her parents that she wanted to save money to build a larger church, and they indulged her by letting her run errands for pennies that she saved in a little bank. And then:

She was a lovable little thing -- but in only a few weeks after

that she was taken suddenly ill and died; and at the funeral her

father told me, quietly, of how his little girl had been saving

money for a building-fund. And there, at the funeral, he handed

me what she had saved -- just fifty-seven cents in pennies.

Dr. Conwell says nothing about being asked to handle the little girl's “final arrangements,” makes no mention of a worn and crumpled purse with a note explaining the purpose of the girl's savings, and explains that the girl passed away a “few weeks” -- not two years -- after he encountered her outside the church. In fact, there was no note nor any “cracked, red pocketbook” for him to “carry to the pulpit” and use to “challenge his deacons.” What occurred next was somewhat more prosaic:

At a meeting of the church trustees I told of this gift of fifty-

seven cents -- the first gift toward the proposed building-fund

of the new church that was some time to exist. For until then

the matter had barely been spoken of, as a new church building

had been simply a possibility for the future.

The trustees seemed much impressed, and it turned out that they

were far more impressed than I could possibly have hoped, for in

a few days one of them came to me and said that he thought it

would be an excellent idea to buy a lot on Broad Street -- the

very lot on which the building now stands.

The immediate result of Dr. Conwell's tale of the little girl and her fifty-seven cents? Advice on a piece of property. Hardly the industrious fund-raising efforts this telling leads us to believe took place in short order. Dr. Conwell followed up on the advice:

I talked the matter over with the owner of the property, and told

him of the beginning of the fund, the story of the little girl.

The man was not one of our church, nor, in fact, was he a church-

goer at all, but he listened attentively to the tale of the

fifty-seven cents and simply said he was quite ready to go ahead

and sell us that piece of land for ten thousand dollars, taking -

- and the unexpectedness of this deeply touched me -- taking a

first payment of just fifty-seven cents and letting the entire

balance stand on a five-per-cent mortgage!

No mention of a newspaper article that publicized the story, or of a generous realtor who offered a “parcel of land worth many thousands” and dropped the price to fifty-seven cents when told “the church could not pay so much.” Just a direct deal between Dr. Conwell and a property owner to buy a piece of land for $10,000 under some rather generous terms: no down payment and a low interest rate.

As things turned out, the church soon came to own the land free and clear, not because “church members made large subscriptions,” but because the church received “a single large subscription -- one of ten thousand dollars.”

This anecdote has all the elements an inspirational tale needs: a little girl who saved her pennies after being turned away from a church that had no room for her, a stranger who was inspired by her story to offer his land to the church at some very favorable terms, and a benefactor who contributed $10,000 so that the church could buy the property outright instead of carrying a mortgage. So why cheapen it by making up details that simply aren't true? “Truth is stranger than fiction” is not merely an aphorism -- sometimes it's advice that should be heeded.

[ http://www.snopes.com/glurge/57cents.htm ]

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(Continuation of article on criticism and interpretation of Bible...)

But when we say this about eccentric revisionists, we should not imagine that Bible-believing Christians come to the Scriptures with unbiased blank minds, unaffected by their own context and presuppositions. To be faithful biblical interpreters, we must all become both self-conscious and self-critical about our prior commitments, subjecting them both to the searching light of Scripture itself and to the wider witness of the Christian family to which we belong.

Thomas Oden's clarion call for contemporary theology to return to the rich exegetical tradition of ancient Christian orthodoxy is one of the most encouraging developments of our time. It will not suffice merely to have our New Testament in one hand and the latest word from current biblical scholarship (even if it comes from our favorite evangelical press!) in the other. We must also learn to "read alongside" the church fathers, reformers, and theologians of ages past. None of their interpretations is inerrant, and we must subject them all -- along with our own -- to the divine touchstone of Holy Scripture itself. Still, the Holy Spirit did not abandon the church with the death of the apostles. As we prayerfully listen for what the Spirit is saying to us today, we will do well to heed what he has been saying to the people of God throughout the history of the church. The massive consensus of thoughtful Christian interpretation of the Word down the ages (and on most matters of importance there is such a thing) is not likely to be wrong.

The role of the community is crucial both in understanding how the Bible came to be recognized as canon and in appropriating its message today. The Enlightenment model of the Bible student as a Lone Ranger, out on his own away from the church as he seeks truth, inevitably leads to distorted, if not heretical, conclusions. A renewed appreciation of the Bible as the book of the church should make us more aware of our need to explore it in and with, rather than without and apart from, the larger Christian fellowship.

Those who seek wisdom in the Bible will not find it as long as they sidestep the Bible's declarations of fact and ignore what Scripture tells us about the world and its history as such. The Scriptures do not present themselves in a cultural-linguistic cocoon or as a self-contained aesthetic object to be studied and admired as one religious book among many. The narrative structure of the Bible itself, from Creation to the world's forthcoming end, makes the imperious claim to be the one true story in the light of which all other stories -- and indeed, the reality of the universe itself -- must be understood. The postmodern flight from the cognitive content of biblical truth, and the revamping of it as a system of symbols with subjective significance only, is a form of theological suicide that leaves the believer with nothing but a warm-tub feeling to present as "good news" to a lost world.

The reality of Jesus, in particular, cannot be reduced to a language game or a literary construct. The Word did not become "a text" but sarx, flesh, something unmistakably, historically concrete. Because this is true, the "story of Jesus," when canonically understood as including everything from Genesis to Revelation, is dissimilar from all other stories and cannot be explained as anything less than the last word about this world and God's plan for it.

Evangelicals have always insisted that the historicity of biblical events be taken seriously because the soteriological essence of Christianity demands this. As Geerhardus Vos, among others, has argued, if Christianity were a philosophical system aimed at the spiritual enlightenment of humankind, or a code of ethics to be used as an instrument of moral suasion, then it would make little difference whether its founder were born of a virgin, walked on the water, healed the sick, or rose from the dead.

AN OFFENSIVE MESSAGE

But the Christian message declares something altogether different. We confess, in the words of the Creed of Nicaea, that the Lord of eternity, "God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God...for our salvation came down...and was incarnate..." A space-time crucifixion of the incarnate Lord was followed by a space-time resurrection, a space-time outpouring of the Holy Spirit, and a space-time spread of the gospel and the church, which still goes on. Christianity must be seen as a historically continuous fellowship in which all enjoy a salvation that was won for them in Palestine on a certain date nearly two millennia ago. The historical claims of the Christian primary documents must therefore be acknowledged as true, and true not just "for me," but true for all persons everywhere.

Admittedly, this is an offensive message for a culture that magnifies local consensus above any notion of objective public truth and that prizes pluralism and relativism as the reigning orthodoxy of the day. But we should not imagine that the scandal of biblical particularism is a greater burden for us than it was for Elijah at Mount Carmel, Paul on Mars Hill, or William Carey in Calcutta. Because of who God is and what he has done, we can only say, on the basis of the commission we have received, "If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him."

What is the ultimate alternative to a reverent, if also discerning and even properly critical, engagement with Holy Scripture as the message of divine achievement, promise, and command? It is the kind of intellectual nihilism that reduces the Christian faith to the sum total of our dreams, fantasies, and self-projections, "a God who looks like me," to quote the title of a recent book. Following the lead of Feuerbach and Nietzsche, Sigmund Freud described this outcome with glaring precision at the beginning of the present century:

Fundamentally, we only find what we need and only see what we want to see. We have no other possibility. Since the criterion for truth -- correspondence with the external world -- is absent, it is entirely a matter of indifference what opinions we adopt. All of them are equally true and equally false. And no one has the right to accuse anyone else of error.

Contrary to this outcome, evangelicals affirm that the Bible can be trusted to be totally reliable on its own terms: its history is historical and its miracles are miraculous, and its theology is God's own truth. But what is the source of such confidence in the truth-telling character of Holy Scripture? How do we know that the Bible is the Word of God? The Reformers of the sixteenth century faced this question. They could accept neither the magisterial authority of the Church of Rome, which made knowledge of the divinity of the Scriptures depend on ecclesiastical tradition, nor the radical individualism of certain mystics who were so enamored of the Spirit that they saw little need for the written Word. Luther and Calvin pursued a different path. They stressed the coinherence of Word and Spirit -- that is, the objectivity of God's revelation in Holy Scripture and the confirming, illuminating witness of the Holy Spirit in the believer.

The Belgic Confession declares that the Scriptures carry within themselves the evidence of their own divinity and authority (article 5). The self- authenticating nature of the Bible is an important principle for Christians to remember both in our witness to unbelievers and in our dialogue with skeptical critics. There is no neutral ground, no independent epistemological platform, on which we can stand and decide for or against the Bible. Skepticism about it is natural to our hearts, and only as God opens our eyes to discern divinity in Scripture do we ever come to trust it. Our assurance of its veracity comes only as the same Spirit who inspired the prophets and apostles enlightens our minds and confirms the truths that have been revealed in these sacred texts.

There is a kind of evidentialist apologetic that overrates the receptive capacity of fallen human reason and plays down the inner witness of the Holy Spirit. Calvin's words to those who demanded "rational proof" that Moses and the prophets were inspired are still relevant today:

The testimony of the Spirit is more excellent than all reason. For

as God alone is a fit witness of himself in his Word, so also the

Word will not find acceptance in men's heart before it is sealed by

the inward testimony of the Spirit. The same Spirit, therefore, who

has spoken through the mouths of the prophets must penetrate into

our hearts to persuade us that they faithfully proclaimed what had

been divinely commanded. (Institutes 1.7.4)

Thus the Holy Spirit, the divine author of Scripture, authenticates the prophetic and apostolic word to our consciences. Through the Spirit's illumination earnest believers find that the Scriptures are marked by what Huldrych Zwingli called "prevenient clarity" or perspicuity. Each day Zwingli began his Bible lectures in Zurich with the following prayer, which became a model for other ministers in the Reformed tradition: "Almighty, eternal, and merciful God, whose Word is a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path, open and illuminate our minds, that we may purely and perfectly understand thy Word and that our lives may be conformed to what we have rightly understood, that in nothing we may be displeasing to thy majesty, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen."

THE LUCID WORD

The doctrine of the Bible's perspicuity is one of the historic hallmarks of the evangelical understanding of Scripture. Fundamentally it means that, as was shown above, the Bible is not an obscure conundrum or cryptogram that must be decoded by a team of specialists before it can be understood and applied. On the contrary, in all matters that are necessary for salvation, the Bible is so lucid that laypersons as well as theologians, mechanics as well as academics, can sufficiently understand and appropriate its teachings. The acceptance of this principle underlies the widespread use of the so- called inductive method of Bible study and the high regard for the Scriptures from the church's earliest days as the communal treasure of the entire body of believers.

But the perspicuity of Scripture can itself be misunderstood in a number of ways. It does not mean, for example, that there are no difficult passages or "hard sayings" that continue to baffle the best and most spiritually alert students of the Bible. Not everything in Scripture is equally plain or evidently clear to all. Neither should this principle be equated with the "right of private judgment," where that motto is used to justify the kind of individualism that reduces biblical meaning to a matter of personal taste.

We should also guard against using the clarity of the Bible as an excuse to undermine rigorous and reverent scholarly work on the text. To be sure, vast numbers of evangelicals can relate to the question asked a hundred years ago by the English Congregationalist pastor Joseph Parker: "Have we to await a comment from Tubingen or a telegram from Oxford before we can understand the Bible?" No doubt there are many tributaries that spill into the reservoir of resentment against technical biblical scholarship. Anti-intellectualism and unreflective piety (substituting emotional fervor for disciplined thought) are two examples. And an even greater problem during the past 150 years has been the gaping chasm that opened in so many centers of learning between the academic study of the Bible on the one hand, and the life and mission of the church on the other. It is hard to overstate the destructive impact of "unbelieving criticism," that is, scholarship shaped by the ethos and presuppositions of the secular academy. To scholars of this bent we might well apply Jesus' description of the "experts in the law" of his day: "You have taken away the key of knowledge. You did not go in yourselves, and those who were on their way in, you stopped" (Luke 11:52, NEB). Such scholarship, unhappily, is with us still.

But it would be tragic if evangelicals spent so much time lamenting destructive criticism that they ignored the impressive achievement during the past half-century of Bible-believing scholars who are deeply committed to Jesus Christ and his church and who seek to be faithful ministers of the divine Word. Such men and women of learning and faith stand in worthy succession to the great English biblical scholar J. B. Lightfoot, who once said: "I cannot pretend to be indifferent about the veracity of the records which profess to reveal him whom I believe to be not only the very Truth but the very Life." The learning of exegetes and theologians such as this can only contribute to the building up of God's people.

A MEANS OF GRACE

Evangelicals today have a rich legacy of cherishing the Bible as the Word of God, defining its authority and defending its veracity against both secular critics outside the church and religious modernists of various types within. Over the past two generations, evangelical Bible scholars have moved beyond a defensive posture to engage the wider world of thought. Their careful research and interaction with current trends in biblical scholarship have made them a vital resource for the church as well as a significant presence in the academic world. At the same time, we must also confess that evangelicals have often worked in isolation from the wider community of faith, the body of Christ extended throughout time as well as space. We have frequently been bound more to the biases of our culture than to the unadulterated Word of God. And we have sometimes used the Bible as a hammer in our fractious conflicts with one another, forgetting, as Francis Schaeffer reminded us, that harshness does not equal holiness, and that we are always to speak the truth in love.

After his appreciative survey of the recent evangelical renaissance in biblical scholarship, Mark Noll wisely urged that Bible-believing Christians "move beyond the external examination of Scripture to an internal appropriation of its message." Committed as we are to the truth of God's Word, we should never for a moment imagine that the Bible is a mere compendium of neutral, albeit accurate, information about God and his dealings with humankind. The Bible, as vivified by the Spirit, is a divinely appointed means of grace, a medium of encounter with the living God. John Bunyan had this in mind when he asked, "Have you never a hill Mizar to remember? Have you forgot the close, the milk house, the stable, the barn, and the like, where God did visit your soul? Remember also the Word -- the Word, I say, upon which the Lord hath caused you to hope."

The true measure of evangelical identity is that we delight in the Bible as fully as we believe in it. Where this is so, our congregations will be characterized by an atmosphere of hospitality to scriptural truth. Our pulpit work will be marked by faithful expository proclamation. The public reading of the Scriptures will again assume a place of honor in our corporate worship. And our personal devotional life will also be transformed. The standard fare of sound-byte spirituality will be replaced by what the Cistercians called "divine reading" (lectio divina), that is, the sustained reading of the Word of God leading to meditation, contemplation, and prayer. In each of these activities we shall approach the Bible, as the late Merrill Tenney put it, in a spirit of eagerness seeking the mind of God, in a spirit of humility listening to the voice of God, in a spirit of adventure pursuing the will of God, and in a spirit of adoration resting in the presence of God.

Thus, with all persons who love and cherish the Holy Scriptures as God's gift of revelation about himself, with all who recognize and adore Jesus Christ as the center and sum of the Bible, and with all who study the inspired words of Holy Writ seeking the illumination of the Spirit, we shall ever pray in the words of this Advent collect:

Blessed Lord, who hast caused all Holy Scriptures to be written for our learning; Grant that we may in such wise hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that by patience, and comfort of Thy Holy Word, we may embrace, and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which Thou has given us in our Savior Jesus Christ.

****************

Timothy George is a senior adviser for CHRISTIANITY TODAY and dean of Beeson Divinity School, Samford University, in Birmingham, Alabama.

Copyright (c) 1995 Christianity Today, Inc./CHRISTIANITY TODAY Magazine ctcurrmrj5TC0165A10

[for part A see #3478]

#3479

*

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

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

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

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

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

THE POWER OF STORIES

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

SHEDDING LIGHT ON SCRIPTURE

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

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

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

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

THE POWER TO MOTIVATE CHANGE

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

[see #3968 for Red Cross class.]

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

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

________

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

Sermon in Job series. Wisdom must come by revelation. Job 28

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

DIGGING DEEPER

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

I. Searching with all your worth.

II. Where people look for wisdom.

A. Personal experience.

B. Human history, anthropology.

C. Science.

D. Religion.

III. The nature of God's revelation.

A. God reveals truth through nature and revelation.

B. Can we trust the Bible?

C. Smart people can believe.

IV. Seeking God with all your heart.

A. When we value something, we put effort into finding it.

B. Typical cycle for Godly wisdom.

V. A lifestyle of discovery.

A. Growth of "full time" students.

B. Seek God daily.

C. Explore deeper issues with friends.

D. Challenge self with quality books, magazines.

E. Reveal commitment.

F. Remain humble.

VI. Are you prepared to receive God's wisdom today?

#4380

*

Nelson Glueck, former president of Jewish Theological Seminary in the Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati and one of the greatest archaeologists ever:

"I have been accused of teaching the verbal inspiration of the

Scripture. I want it to be understood that I have never taught this.

All I have ever said is that in all of my archeological investigation

I have never found one artifact of antiquity that contradicts any

statement of the Word of God."

*

[Used in sermon found at Holw-serm-ID #4682]

Out on the road we have the wonderful opportunity, especially in the autograph lines, to sit and talk to everybody and get the feedback on songs like my song, "Living in a Moment You Would Die For."

As an artist, it tells me we are doing our job when we're touching people's hearts. That's the whole purpose of music. It's what it's all about when we can make just a little difference in people's lives.

I had this seven-year-old boy and his father come up to me. The boy stuck his hand out and said, "Mr. Ty, I really love your song, 'Living in a Moment You Would Die For.'" And I said, "Well, that's great, son."

And as he turned to walk away, his father looked over and said, "No, he's really got a story to tell you. He lost his mom. She died during childbirth." And the boy turned and said, "To me, she was that person - she died for me. 'I am living in the moment that she died for.'"

-----------------

By Ty Herndon, from Chicken Soup for the Country Soul, Copyright 1998 by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen and Ron Camacho

*

Rev. David Holwick 1 Thessalonians 2:13-16

WORDS WHICH WOW

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

I. What does the future hold?

II. How God speaks to us.

A. Does God really communicate in words?

B. The Word of God comes through ordinary people.

C. Danger - revelation can be faked.

III. Clear evidence of the Word of God.

A. Bible is absolutely accurate.

B. The Bible changes people. 2:13b

C. Word often arouses violent opposition.

IV. Jews and the Word of God.

A. Harsh passage.

B. God isn't done with the Jewish people.

C. Signs of softening are happening even now.

V. God will take severe measures to awaken people to reality.

A. Wrath at last.

B. Christians are not immune to judgment. 1 Peter 4:17

C. God sends disasters to get our attention.

In a court case the trustworthiness of a witness in even minor details is crucial. A good attorney will go to great lengths to discredit the witness of the opposing side. The lawyer will try his best to trap the witness by making him/her say things that contradict each other. Why? To show that his/her testimony is not reliable. The same is true for the Bible. Either it is all true or it is not reliable at all.

There is a camera aboard the Tiros XII satellite that takes pictures of ships drilling for oil in the North Atlantic. If the ships move more than 10 feet from their pre-programmed positions, the satellite will send a signal back to a computer that automatically activates the ship's propellers to correct the drift and keep the ship over the oil-drilling hole. The Bible functions the same way for those who believe it is true.

Is there a perfect original? Some say it doesn't matter. Does it matter whether or not there is a perfect measure for a "pound" or "foot?" Try taking your own interpretation of those units of measure with you when you go to the grocery store or to buy a piece of property! But we've never seen a precise measurement--always off to some degree. In the Bureau of Standards in Washington D.C. there are models of the standard weights and measures used by U.S. citizens. They are as accurate as humanly possible. The vast majority of us have never seen them, but they govern our lives and give meaning to everyday exchanges. One doesn't need to see the inerrant original manuscripts to affirm that there is such a thing as an inerrant Bible!

Ancient people longed to hear a word from heaven.

Outside of the town of Delphi there were cracks in the earth that gave off fumes. A goat herder discovered that when he entered one of the chasms, he sensed a spiritual euphoria and could see into the past and the future.

A shrine was erected at the site and a young virgin was chosen to live there and communicate her visions to the people. However, the men began flirting with the virgins so they were replaced by 50-year-old women. Keep that focus on the message, guys!

Overcome by the fumes, the priestesses would speak the word of God in low voices. And usually what was spoken could be taken two ways, so you couldn’t blame them for what happened.

In 2001, archaeologists investigated the faults that run near the temple and found they emitted noxious gases. These gases could induce hallucinations.

The Bible is more complicated than this. Some of it is visions people had. Other parts are poetry, or sermons, or historical accounts. But Christians believe all of it originated with God.

*

[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #1366]

A computer program was recently used to prove that St. Paul is the author of only 4 of the 13 epistles attributed to him in the New Testament. Two researchers fed the computer a quarter of a million words of Greek prose to reach this conclusion. They said the method could be used to determine the authorship of any part of the Bible. Truly amazing, isn't it, that a mindless machine questions the Word of God?! If its findings were correct, they would make Paul a liar, for he claims the authorship of all 13 epistles. Just think, a lifeless mechanism "proving" that the Bible is not true! The computer is now a disputer. Now for the clincher. The same computer program was used to do an analysis of the book in which these conclusions were written. It was proven that the man who wrote the book couldn't have been its author.

Those who oppose the Today's NIV version of the Bible will be remembered and spoken of in the same breath with those who burned William Tyndale at the stake, according to a professor at Bethel Theological Seminary.

Mark Strauss, professor of New Testament at Bethel Theological Seminary in San Diego, Calif., made the comment during an Internet webcast debate about the TNIV with conservative scholar Wayne Grudem May 21.

"I guess we should be grateful -- as Bruce Metzger points out -- that at least today they only burn the translations and not the translators. I'd be afraid if I saw them building a bonfire outside tonight," Strauss said.

Grudem, research professor of theology and Bible at Phoenix Seminary, who has opposed the TNIV, responded to Strauss' comment, saying that those who opposed Tyndale and his translation did not want the Bible in the hands of the laity.

"They thought lay people could not understand Scripture. That was a wrong motive," Grudem said. "It really troubled me when Dr. Strauss said that I and those who oppose the TNIV will be remembered along with those who opposed William Tyndale. Those were terrible motives to keep the Word of God from people and terrible moves -- burning people at the stake. It troubles me that he could say that about those of us who are opposed."

Strauss, who holds a Ph.D. from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland, said that he was deeply concerned about the precedent being set by those who were attacking the TNIV. Critics, he said, "are, after all, attacking a highly accurate expression of God's inspired and authoritative word."

Worse than that, Strauss said, was that criticism of the TNIV was unfounded and based on misperceptions. Most critics, he believed, had never even seen the TNIV. Strauss has seen the translation and referred to it as "intentionally gender accurate and not gender neutral."

"Much of what I have read about the TNIV is often unfair, unwarranted and simply untrue," Strauss said. "Gender accurate translations like the TNIV seek to accurately convey the sense of the Hebrew or Greek original while utilizing the language people use today. That is the best possible goal for Bible translation."

Strauss said that such a goal was what the translators of the King James Version had in mind when they wrote the preface to their 1611 edition.

"Keeping the Bible current was critically important to the King James Version translators. It was critically important to William Tyndale, whose magnificent translation captured the hearts of the English people in their own words, and it is critically important to the TNIV translators."

Strauss emphasized that a number of New Testament scholars had endorsed the TNIV, among them Darrell Bock and Don Carson. Bock is professor of New Testament Studies at Dallas Theological Seminary and Carson is professor of New Testament Studies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.

But Grudem countered Strauss' assertion, saying that he had spoken with Bock and that he had refused to endorse the TNIV. Carson also was said to have rejected the translation.

"I don't think you should use them if they haven't made a public statement," Grudem said.

Grudem, who holds a Ph.D. from Cambridge University, provided a list of over 20 conservative evangelical scholars who had rejected the TNIV, among them Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Paige Patterson, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary; and R.C. Sproul and Verne Poythress.

Grudem noted that changes in gender language made by TNIV translators revealed a systematic agenda with the goal of "muting the masculinity of Christ" and attributing traditional male roles in Scripture to women.

"1 Timothy 3:11 (TNIV) says, 'In the same way, women who are deacons are to be worthy of respect.' That's a debatable question exegetically, and doubtful, but the TNIV puts it there and we have women deacons required and no longer debatable," Grudem said. "These are big changes revealing a systematic agenda."

The changes, Grudem said, were evidence that the translators had succumbed to political correctness and a feminist agenda.

Strauss, however, said that the application of "gender accurate" phrasing was neither politically motivated nor representative of any agenda. "The TNIV is not trying to make God into a woman," he said. The translation, according to Strauss, was only an attempt to bring the sense of Scripture into the modern vernacular.

"Why are we fighting about this?" Strauss asked. "Let's not let an issue like this divide and breakup the body of Christ."

Grudem answered that he, too, was for promoting the full equality of male and female in the sight of God, but the risk of altering meanings by applying "gender neutral language" to the Bible was to change the words of God. "I want to be remembered with William Tyndale, who would not alter one syllable of Scripture contrary to the meaning of God's Word. ... I stand before God with a clear conscience. I struggled long and hard before speaking out publicly against this, but I thought it was necessary because the purity of the Word of God was at stake," Grudem said.

--30--

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

He is the First and Last,

the Beginning and the End!

He is the keeper of Creation

and the Creator of all!

He keeps the Architect of the universe

and the Manager of all times.

He always was, He always is,

and He always will be…

Unmoved, Unchanged,

Undefeated, and never Undone!

He was bruised and brought healing!

He was pierced and eased pain!

He was persecuted and brought freedom!

He was dead and brought life!

He is risen and brings power!

He reigns and brings Peace!

The world can’t understand him,

The armies can’t defeat Him,

The schools can’t explain Him,

and the leaders can’t ignore Him.

Herod couldn’t kill Him,

The Pharisees couldn’t confuse Him,

and The people couldn’t hold Him!

Nero couldn’t crush Him,

Hitler couldn’t silence Him,

The New Age can’t replace Him,

and Donahue can’t explain Him away!

He is light, love, longevity, and Lord.

He is Goodness, Kindness, Gentleness, and God.

He is Holy, Righteous, mighty, powerful, and pure.

His ways are right,

His word is eternal,

His will is unchanging,

and His mind is on me!

He is my Redeemer,

He is my Savior,

He is my Guide,

and He is my Peace!

He is my Joy,

He is my comfort,

He is my Lord,

and He rules my life!

I serve Him because His bond is love,

His burden is light,

and His goal for me is abundant life.

I follow Him because He is the wisdom of the wise,

the power of the powerful,

the ancient of days,

the ruler of rulers,

the leader of leaders,

the overseer of the overcomers,

and the sovereign Lord of all

that was and is and is to come.

And if that seems impressive to you,

try this for size.

His goal is a relationship with ME!

He will never leave me, never forsake me,

never mislead me, never forget me,

never overlook me,

and never cancel my appointment in His appointment book!

When I fall, He lifts me up!

When I fail, He forgives!

When I am weak, He is strong!

When I am lost, He is the way!

When I am afraid, He is my courage!

When I stumble, He steadies me!

When I am hurt, He heals me!

When I am broken, He mends me!

When I am blind, He leads me!

When I am hungry, He feeds me!

When I face trials, He is with me!

When I face persecution, He shields me!

When I face problems, He comforts me!

When I face loss, He provides for me!

When I face Death, He carries me Home!

He is everything for everybody, everywhere,

every time, and every way.

He is God,

He is faithful.

I am His, and He is mine!

My Father in heaven can whip the father of this world. So, if

you’re wondering why I feel so secure, understand this…

He said it and that settles it.

God is in control,

I am on His side,

and that means all is well with my soul.

Everyday is a blessing — for GOD IS!

• If you never felt pain, then how would you know that I’m a Healer?

• If you never went through difficulties, How would you know that I’m a Deliverer?

• If you never had a trial, How could you call yourself an overcomer?

• If you never felt sadness, How would you know that I’m a Comforter?

• If you never made a mistake, How would you know that I’m forgiving?

• If you knew all, How would you know that I will answer your questions?

• If you never were in trouble, How would you know that I will come to your rescue?

• If you never were broken, Then how would you know that I can make you whole?

• If you never had a problem, How would you know that I can solve them?

• If you never had any suffering, Then how would you know what Jesus went through?

• If you never went through the fire, Then how would you become pure?

• If I gave you all things, How would you appreciate them?

• If I never corrected you, How would you know that I love you?

• If you had all power, Then how would you learn to depend on me?

• If your life was perfect, Then what would you need Me for?

THANK YOU GOD!

“For ever, O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven.” (v.89, NKJ)

– For reading & meditation: Psalm 119:89-96

Yet another issue in today’s Church which makes the need for revival urgent is a growing loss of confidence in the Scriptures. Not all churches have moved away from the authority of the Scriptures, but we must face the fact that many have. “We are slowly reaching the position,” says one writer, “where the Christian who is orthodox in his beliefs and convictions, who stands on the Bible and in the central tradition of the Christian faith is considered to be a dogmatic reactionary, a stubborn anti-intellectualist, an obscurantist to be pitied and derided. The gospel which brings men to a personal knowledge of Christ and to the joyful experience of the new birth has to be fought for in the very inner councils of the historic denominations. In conditions such as these it would be a glib and shallow mind that dared to say a revival is not our greatest need.”

Revival brings with it a new confidence in the Bible. People who are moved upon by the Holy Spirit in times of great spiritual awakening invariably find their faith and understanding of the Bible being greatly quickened. An Irishman who was involved in the revival in Ireland in the mid 1800s said: “I used to read the Bible before revival came, but after I came in touch with the Holy Spirit the Bible became a new and different book. It was as if God had taken it up to heaven, rewritten it and handed it back to me. I now know it is inspired because it inspires me.” That is not the only reason, of course, why we know it is inspired but it is a good reason nevertheless.

PRAYER:

Father, it is difficult to see how the battle for the Bible can be won apart from a mighty deluge of Your Holy Spirit. Your people need to be revived, refreshed and enlightened. Let it happen, dear Lord — soon. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.

FURTHER STUDY:

2 Tim. 2:1-15; Psa. 119:1-16; Acts 2:42

1. What was Paul’s exhortation to Timothy?

2. What did the early Church continue to do?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

and

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

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

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

Olympic champion Charlie Paddock loved to speak to young people in high schools. At East Tech High School in Cleveland, Ohio, he challenged those young people: “If you think you can, you can! If you believe something strongly enough, it will come to pass in your life.” Afterward he lifted his hand and said, “Who knows? Maybe there's an Olympic champion in this auditorium this afternoon.”

Later a scrawny little black boy approached him and said, “Gee, Mr. Paddock, I'd give anything if I could be an Olympic champion just like you.”

It was that young boy's moment of inspiration. From that moment on his life was changed! In 1936 he went to Berlin, Germany, and won four gold medals. His name is Jesse Owens. When he returned home he was driven through the streets of Cleveland and greeted by a cheering crowd. The car stopped for him to sign autographs. That day a skinny little boy pressed himself against the car and said, “Gee, Mr. Owens, I'd give anything to be an Olympic champion just like you.”

Jesse reached out to this little fellow (who was nicknamed “Bones”) and said, “You know that's what I wanted when I was about your age. If you will work hard and train hard, and if you will believe, then you can become an Olympic champion.”

The little boy was so inspired that he ran all the way home where he told his grandmother, “I'm going to become an Olympic champion.” In Wembley Stadium in London, England, in 1948, six young men waited to hear the starting gun. The man in the outside lane burst out ahead; drove down to hit the tape, and won the race. His name was Harrison “Bones” Dillard. He tied Jesse Owens's Olympic record that day and went on to break many more records.

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From Robert Schuller's “Move Ahead With Possibility Thinking,” (New York: Jove Books, 1967); secondary source: Weekend Encounter, by Dick Innes, Copyright (c) ACTS International, 2004, http://www.actsweb.org/subscribe.htm