SATAN HATES THE SCRIPTURE (Continued)
We�ve begun discussing the fact that Satan hates the Scripture which God has inspired and preserved. God gave His Word to us so that we could find our way back to fellowship with Him. Satan ain�t all that happy with this prospect! He fights against it by trying to disarm the Christian and the Words of God.
Burton (Let�s Weigh the Evidence) sees this. �NOW ... The Christian is in a battle with the devil ... AND, the devil is out to destroy the Christian�s sword.�
Sword? What sword? �...the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.� (Ephesians 6:17b)
We generally consider the sword to be an offensive weapon. It is. But, the sword can also be used for defense. As the adversary gives thrust with his sword, we can use our�s to parry the blow.
Not only do we use the Scripture to move forward with the message that Jesus Christ died in time so that others could live in eternity, we must use the Scripture to defend ourselves from the wiles of Satan. If you recall the temptations of Jesus on the mount, you will recall that He answered each temptation by appealing to Scripture. Satan was defeated by the Words of God.
Barnhouse (The Bible Under Attack) says that one of Satan�s earliest strategies was to put the Words of God into question. �The first question mark in the punctuation of the Bible is after the question put by Satan when he tempted Eve to doubt the Word of God. �Indeed, has God said...?��
I find it amazing that the writer of this sentence used the NASV. Still, his observation is valid. Satan does try to introduce doubt in the Words of God.
Satan has done this in our time by claiming that we can not really know if we have the words of the �original autographs� of the Scripture. We can not really know if the Bible version in our hands is a true representation of the Words of God. Most of the newer texts, the NASV among them, seem to argue that we can not know. After all, they are based on the argument that the pure Words of God were lost in history for about a thousand years. It is only the great intellect of man which has rescued God from this position.
But, in this case above, notice the subtlety of Satan. Satan allows truth to shine forth from a dusty and �dinged up� mirror. He will let enough truth to shine forth that we will be deceived into trusting error.
Our only sure safety lies in a reliance upon the preserved Words of God. Without this preservation the entire argument of inspiration is called into question. With this preservation we have a solid sword which the adversary cannot overcome.
Burton, again, argues for a preserved, and therefore trustworthy Word of God. �We are saved by FAITH, BUT ... The OPPOSITE OF faith is DOUBT! Satan is using DOUBT and CONFUSION to try to destroy the Word of God!?
Often a fighter will hurl insult against his opponent in the boxing ring. The reason he is doing so is that the opponent will forget his training and make mistakes. Satan ain�t stupid! He knows that if he can get us to doubt the power and preservation of the Scripture he can cause us to trust in our own argument.
That isn�t a fair fight. None of us, not the most brilliant, can ever devise an argument which will deter Satan. We are fighting from our understanding of time and physicality. That is a very week position in which to place ourselves when we are fighting a battle of spirit and eternity. We are not only overmatched; we don�t even understand the rules!
But, when we approach Satan with the Words of God we will be victorious. All of us, even the most seemingly ignorant, can stand behind the Words of God�s inspired and preserved Words and say, �Thus saith the Lord!� Satan is defeated every time by the Word of God.
God, and His Words, will defeat Satan. We, and our own words, are no match for Satan. We need the true and powerful Words of God.
Fuller (Which Bible?) sees this battle. �The �god of this world� direct his attack on the character and Person of the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word, and on the integrity and accuracy of the written Word of God - the Bible.�
Satan does not attack God. Neither, really, does he attack the Scripture. He is powerless against both. But, he can and does attack our faith in God and the Scripture. Satan knows that every time we flee to the Lord, or hide His Words in our hearts, we can be victorious in the spiritual theater of combat. Every time.
One time, during his service in World War II, my father - along with two other men - was cut off from his unit. The German army had these three men in their gunsights. It was a terrible place to be, cut off from their own unit. One of the men said, �You two are married and have children. I am single. If I draw the attention of the German�s, you guys might be able to get back to our group.�
With that this man stood up and charged, by himself, the German line. He was killed. But, his plan worked. My father and the other man were able to get back to their own lines in the confusion of the moment.
We are away from our lines when we strike out on our own, without a relationship with God or a confidence in His Words. Satan knows this. That is why he attacks us in these areas. He knows that if he can convince us to doubt the Words which God has given, our battle will be lost. We will cease to be victorious combatants in Spiritual Warfare. Humanly speaking, souls will be lost for eternity.
Burton sees Satan as trying to destroy our faith in the Words of God. �Satan came to tempt Eve. HOW DID HE DO IT????????? By casting doubt on God�s Word!!!!!�
Burton uses a whole lot of capital letters and punctuation marks. It�s O. K. He also uses a whole lot of truth. Fifty years ago everyone brought their Bible to church. Now? No so many. One of the reasons is that there are so many competing versions that no one really knows what is what. Do I trust this, or do I trust that?
What did God really say? Even, did God really say?
Fuller sees the same point. �From the very outset, when he cast doubt upon God�s Word in the garden with the question, �Yea, hath God said...?� He [Satan] has sought to corrupt or destroy that which God has caused to be written.�
If Satan can get us to doubt the preservation of the Scripture with arguments like, �The recent archeological finds have cast doubt on what we�ve once believed the Bible said,� how long before we jettison the entire concept of a �Holy� Bible and gravitate to a �religious tradition,� or a �god story?�
Folks, it has already begun - and you know it!
One of the �dirty little secrets� of the crowd that argues against the preservation of Scripture because of all the �archeological finds,� is that in the four hundred years since the King James Bible was first published there have been no (NO!!!!!!!!!!! Burton might say!) new �readings� found. The arguments against the textual base of the King James Bible still amount to no more than 15% of the available evidence.
One of the most hated passages of Scripture, among those who argue against preservation, is the last few verses of Mark�s Gospel. Do you know that there are only two manuscript areas where these verse are cast into doubt? Both of these are associated with the same man.
The simple fact is, we do have a Scripture we can trust because God has both inspired and preserved His Words for us!
In our next session we will look at how some of the religious �professional�s� actually do the work of Satan. It�s not intentionally done. I don�t believe that! But, it is done.
14 March 2008
SATAN HATES SCRIPTURE (Continued)
Satan hates the Scripture because contained therein is the message of God to humanity. Mankind is bound in sin and unable to communicate with the Creator. Therefore, God has condescended to take the initiative of speaking to us. More than this!, He has given us a Savior, Jesus Christ, the Lord. Within the pages of His Book is the story of Jesus and the means of meeting Him at the Cross explained. In this manner mankind is allowed to, once again, have free access to the Throne of Grace.
Is it any wonder that the deceiver would stop at nothing to hide the message of this Book from the eyes of men?
We would consider that the agnostic, the atheist, the avowed enemy of God would be used of Satan in the attempted quenching of the Holy fires of the Holy Words of God. This is not necessarily the case.
Former President Richard Nixon was known for a lifetime of fighting communism. He was an avowed and avid opponent of the communist regimes of the world. Then, during his presidency, Richard Nixon opened dialogue between China and the United States. His efforts opened trade between the two powers.
Political analysts argued, �Only Nixon could have gone to China.� The meaning was that anyone without the staunch anti-communist background of Nixon would have been suspect if he had tried to open trade between the two nations. Perhaps no other president had the personal reputation to undertake the task. He would not be second guessed.
Such is the case, quite often, with Satan�s choice of agency for fighting against the Words of God. Fuller (Which Bible?) sees this fact. �The greatest enemies of the infant Christian church ... were not found in the ... Heathenism which filled the world, but in the rising flood of heresy which, under the name of Christianity, engulfed the truth for many years. This is what brought on the Dark Ages.�
What Fuller is speaking of in this case was the church tradition which was birthed by Constantine. Constantine first offered the churches an official act of toleration. From this point on they would be able to look to Rome for safety. Although this sounds like a very good proposal, it shifted, however slightly, the perceived protector of these churches from the Living God to the government of man.
Constantine�s purpose, of course, was not so much his personal conversion to Christianity, something which I question. According to Constantine he saw a vision of a �cross� in the sky with the words, �In this sign conquer.� There are two problems associated with this. The first is that the early Christian churches were disposed to conquer sin in the Name of Christ. The second problem is that the �cross� described by Constantine as being in his vision was not the simple cross upon which Jesus died; it much more closely resembled the Egyptian Ankh. This was a pagan sign.
Later, after Constantine had made Christianity a state religion, he decided to procure fifty copies of Bibles to be placed in these newly minted state churches. Eusebius, commissioned by Constantine to produce these Bibles, used the Scriptorium from Alexandra, Egypt, as his template for the copies. Many consider that Aleph and B are two surviving copies of the efforts of Eusebius. Although the base text for most of the modern day English translations, these two are very corrupt and flawed.
Egypt was an area heavily influenced by both the Arian and the Gnostic heresies. Most of the literature available from those early Gnostic sources comes from this same general area. This was not the best area, then or now, to search for authentic early Christian manuscripts.
The churches influenced by Constantine began to merge into a Church. Rome became the seat of ecclesiastical power with the several churches under her authority becoming subservient. The church which grew from this unholy alliance of church and state began to resemble, more and more, the state.
Rome (Imperial) became Rome (Church) with control over the provinces (parishes, etc.) down to the level of the local cities (churches). The emperor (pope) was elected to a lifetime governance by the Roman Senate (College of Cardinals). The importance of Roman citizenship (see Acts 16:36-40) was even transferred to the ecclesiastical considerations of these churches as salvation was now to be vested in church membership rather than in Christ alone.
The new Church became jealous of her power. She would not allow churches which still held to Biblical principles to exist in her domain. Like the Roman armies, her priests and others set about to remove these obstacle�s at her borders.
The new Church was also jealous of her power over the Scripture. As Fuller alluded to above, she forbade the Scripture to be published in the tongue of her subjects. For all spiritual guidance these people were forced to travel to the Roman magistrates (Priests) much as the Jewish leaders had to seek the approval of Pilate to crucify Jesus.
This continued until the Protestant Reformation flooded the market with Scriptures which were based on a pure text, preserved by God. Rome then began to allow her people to see a Bible in their own tongue. But, it was a Bible approved and sanctioned only by Rome.
Today we have Bible Colleges and Universities going back to the texts of Eusebius. These Bible are not from the pure and preserved Textual tradition. They are the Bible texts which spawned the Roman Church. One need only to consider that many of these new editions have begun to restore the Apocryphal Books to the text of their translations to understand the concern.
The underlying rational for the mad dash to �revise� the Scripture is based in the new doctrine of Biblical fallibility. We no longer are told that the Bible is secure from error. We are only advised that the Bible was free from error in the �original manuscripts.� We are also assured that these original manuscripts are gone. We can only try to �reconstruct� what it is that they might have said.
Hills (Believing Bible Study) notes the problem of this new �faith tradition.�
�How can we be sure that Jesus really said what these New Testament writers represent Him as saying? How can we be sure that Jesus really was the Son of God? Such is the logic of unbelief which begins with the use of these modern-speech New Testament versions and ends in complete uncertainty about everything.�
This is a real problem because it takes our basis for authority from the Book and places it squarely upon those who �edit� the Book. We can only trust, we are told, our Bible�s so far as they have been �authenticated� by the religious elite.
God, in the final analysis of this mindset, is not in control of our faith except as He is filtered through the learned pronouncements of the experts.
Do you see Satan completing his circle of deception in our day, via the use of modern editions which are based in unbelief? Satan has taken the Words of God and placed, through soiled and impure manuscript base, the question of the Garden within the covers of the Book, �Yea, hath God said?� The answer we are getting from the professional is often, �I think He might have. I am pretty sure we have a close approximation of what He might have said. Maybe our next edition will be even closer to His original manuscripts.�
You can not build faith on the possibility that we might, or might not!, have the message from God. Satan has figured that out long ago. He is using willing participants, who are caught up in their own importance and intellect, to argue his lie!
Burton (Let�s Weigh the Evidence) argues that, �The new versions are one more push down the road to a one world church. The New International Version advertises ... �The work is interdenominational ... Also thoroughly transdenominational. This new translation will be accepted widely.��
There is a truth in Burton�s words. We see this more every day on the religious scene. The problem with this ideal is that the pure Words of God are not the binding glue of the move. The binding glue is the argument that we can not be certain what God has said. The Fundamentalist who does not see this has his head in the sand and his eyes on the deceiver. The emergent, ecumenical church will not be Biblically based because it can not have a trustworthy Bible.
This is probably a good closing place for this session. We will return to this subject in our next session.
21 March 2008
SATAN HATES SCRIPTURE (Continued)
When we consider the present state of Biblical criticism we are struck by the fact that critics are become more critical toward the Scripture. The concept of Biblical criticism is to critique the Words. This carries a connotation of evaluating the text. Unfortunately, this criticism has become more of a critical mode, with the �criticism� carrying the general meaning of the word �to criticize.�
Rather than simply offering a �critique� of the preserved Words of God, modern scholarship has taken an adversarial position toward the very concept of preservation. Rather than considering that God might just have preserved His Own Words, the general construct of the day is that God either could not, or would not, preserve His message to man. It has become, in these person�s minds, necessary to use their own best human judgement and skill to reconstruct that which they have already decided God did not preserved. Gipp (An Understandable History of the Bible) has opined that, �Unbelieving scholarship is its own authority. It does not need any competition from a book!�
Unfortunately this religious mindset has untethered Christian discourse from faith in the Book and the Author of the Book. The only words we are allowed to consider are those which have been filtered through the �skill and intellect� of the �expert.� Those experts are become Aaron to speak the words which God had given to Moses. Except that these �Aaron�s� are the arbitrator of what Moses might have been told.
Criswell (Why I Preach that the Bible is Literally True), not - in my view - a strong proponent of Biblical preservation, has argued against the idea of trusting the �expert� rather than trusting the Lord.
�Much of the learning and theological activity of the present hour is dedicated to the attempt to discredit and destroy the authenticity and authority of God�s Word. The result of this is that thousands of nominal Christians are plunged into seas of doubt. Many of those who are paid to stand in our pulpits and defend the truth of God are now the very ones who are engaged in sowing the seeds of unbelief and destroying the faith of those to whom they minister.�
Criswell was arguing against the modernist and liberal who deny the core doctrine�s of historic Christianity. These men have moved from a reliance upon the God of the Bible and have substituted all too often a moralistic creed which preaches that man is an evolving being in his religious experience. The Bible is relegated to a collection of stories which point out the way in which man has sought to identify his place in the universe.
How trivializing this is of the great sweep of Bible history. The Bible is the record of God teaching men about Himself. The Bible is not a collection of �sacred fables� in which man has sought to understand God.
The current crop of religious teaching, even from all too many Fundamentalist groups and schools, has taken this same argument. They have only moved it slightly. The Bible is not the secure Word of God to them either. We can not even be certain that we have the exact record as God placed it in those lost �original manuscripts.�
But, we are told not to worry. The �best scholarship� of �pious men and women� has reconstructed the general concept of those lost originals. We are no longer allowed, the �experts� tell us, to speak of �The Word of God� except in the general sense. We no longer have the �words;� but we do have the �general concepts.�
How weak a Bible is thus presented to modern man. It is no longer the truly inspired and preserved Words of God. It is now simple the general �God story.� In politics we have been fed the concept of the �expanding Constitution� in the United States. This means an evolving constitution which may mean one thing today and quite another thing in another day.
This is the �Bible� we are offered by the �concept� theory. We do not have a secure Word from God. We have a �general outline.� Folks, that ain�t near enough! That means we have a Bible that is completely time centric and culturally based. What we need, and what we have in the inspired and preserved Traditional Text, is an Eternal Word from the Eternal God. Within the covers of The Book we have an Eternal set of values and teachings.
God is not tied to our �evolving culture.� Neither are His Words to us. We do not interpret His message to fit our day. We need to fit our day, as Christians, to His Words!
Fuller (True or False) speaks about the harm done to the world at large and the Christian world especially, by those theories which have sought to explain away the Truth that God�s Words are settled in Heaven - and on earth!
�The �mischief� has been incalculable. The Hort theory and text have been perhaps the most effective weapons used by those who have made it their concern to defend and propagate their unbelief in the infallibility and authority of Scripture. ...[Those who] have propagated Hort�s theory and text (Nestle is essentially Hortian) bear a heavy responsibility for the growing doubt and disbelief throughout the Church.�
And Satan laughs at the Fundamentalist who does his bidding in teaching a lack of faith in the revealed Words of God.
Gipp (An Understandable History of the Bible) sees that man�s pride is much in the same manner as was the pride of Satan. �Jeremiah concludes in chapter 17, verse 9, �The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?� Even a saved man has bad flesh. Give this flesh the authority to change God�s Word, and he will soon plant himself on God�s throne.�
Satan was an angel; he was a servant of God. His pride took control of his ambition. He wanted to be �like the most high.� Consider the Fundamentalist. He has considered himself a servant of God. But, now he wants to be the one who is in charge of the message of God. He does not allow God to speak for Himself. In a very real manner, the Fundamentalist - or anyone else - who refuses to accept that God is the Final Arbitrator of His Own Words, who argues that God has lost control of - or refused to protect, the Scriptural message, has set up humans as the possessors of the Words of Life. This is usurping the place of God. This is usurping the Throne of God in the faith life of the Christian.
James (The Corruption of the Word) has hit the nail upon the head with his analysis of the situation of Biblical scholarship. He was speaking of the revisers of 1881 when he said, �Perhaps nineteenth century scholars needed something �new� to compete with the �new� theory of evolution to show that the church was not behind the times.�
There is an inferiority complex among to many Christians. They feel that they are not �up to par� with the world. Maybe they look at the Amish, and others, and think that we have neglected to keep up with the world. So they �update� the Scripture and try to �redefine� the message so that it is consistent with the modern culture.
If the Christian message ever catches up with the current culture, not only will it be as corrupt as the culture, it will also be outdated in a few short years. Our �religion� is not of this world or this culture. Our Christianity is of Eternity. Those values need to be held and cherished. Those are the values and teachings which we take out into all the world in all the times.
I�ve said it before, but it needs restating: I have several books in my library which were written to be �relevant� to the �Jesus People� of the late 1960's. These books are nearly laughable in their outdated vocabulary and considerations. Meanwhile, I have books written hundreds of years ago (reprints!) which are still valuable and relevant!
Criswell (Why I Believe that the Bible is Literally True) also spoke of this same situation. �The reason evolution is believed and taught as fact is not due to the evidence for it but rather to the need for it. Any natural miracle according to the atheist, the agnostic, and the secularist is preferable to a supernatural miracle that has God as its author.�
I would only add that any theory which holds, at the very foundation of it, that God has lost control of His Message for any length of time makes that Message, as well as it�s preservation, a natural miracle rather than a miracle of God! It we can accept Him we can accept His inspired and preserved Words.
Hills (Believing Bible Study) has argued that, �The Bible is true because it is true for me. The Holy Spirit bears witness with my spirit that I am a child of God and that therefore all the promises of Holy Scripture are true in my case.�
I would take issue with Dr. Hills statement. The Bible is true because it is of God. The only reason that the Holy Spirit bears witness to us is because God has energized His Words with His Own authority. The promises are ours only because God said that they were.
Satan hates these facts!
In our next session we will begin to look at the idea of Respect the Word.
28 March 2008
RESPECT THE WORD
This section of our study is titled �Respect the Word.� What a simple and logical response to the great love of God as He gave us His message. In the Words of His message He has given us the Words of Life. He has taught us things that mere nature could never have even suggested to our minds. Respect the Word? No kidding. Can we do anything else!
Unfortunately, there are those who do something else. They argue that God could not, or would not, preserve His message to us. In doing so they demean both the message and the Messenger. How can any mere human, especially one who has tasted and seen that the Lord is good, treat the Creator with such utter disrespect as to impinge the love of God, or the goodness of God, or the power of God? Such is the position assumed by those who argue that God was pleased to inspire His Words but not able, or willing, to preserve those same Words so that the people of His churches, the Bride of Christ, would have access to them throughout the ages of time.
One of our responses to the message of God is that we accept His power and desire to preserve that same message. We nearly call Him foolish to suggest He inspired what He did not preserve.
Gipp (An Understandable History of the Bible) saw that �[God�s] obligation was to communication our obligation is...� fourfold as seen by Gipp.
First, Gipp argues that our obligation is �...to accept that communication...�
One of the reasons why God has denounced the occult in His Words is that this is an argument that God has not told us everything we need to understand of the Spiritual. This is a lack of faith on our part. Worse, this is an acceptance of another spirit than the Spirit of God as a spiritual leader.
From all such, turn away.
Gipp also sees that our obligation is �...to read that communication...�
Actually God says to do more than simply read His Words. �Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.� (II Timothy 2:15)
In another place God says to meditate on His Words. �The book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.� (Joshua 1:8)
In another place God said to hide His Words in our hearts. �Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.� Psalm 119:11) The meaning here is primarily the concept of memorization of the Word.
I hope you noticed that each of these commands came with a promise. God never asks us to do something that He does not also reward us. What a wonderful Lord we serve. We are the servants of the Creator and Lord of the Universe. Yet, when He asks us to do something, He also rewards our faithfulness!
How far beyond our wildest hopes and dreams is His mercy and love toward us!
God is not obligated to reward our service. He does so because of His Own desire to give us the best gifts. Even, as Gipp acknowledges, we are obligated �...to obey that communication...� of His Words, God honors our response toward Him.
There are those who would say that the concept of our service is demeaning. Far from that canard!, God love toward is a an ennobling act for us, the created beings.
Gipp, finally, says that we are obligated to God because of the fact of this communication as given us in the Words of the Scripture. �Without that communication we have no connection to this God Who is the Creator of the universe.�
How true is that observation. It is only through this inspired and preserved Word, the Living Words of God, that truth about our spiritual condition and God�s gracious remedies for the sin problem, are communicated to us. It though these Words, which are quickened within our spirits, that the Spirit of God makes real to us the precepts and purposes of God.
Even our very salvation is predicated on a response to these Words in that they tell us of the great sacrifice of the Savior. It is within the pages of His Book that we find the Living Words of Life about the Living God of Live.
�If,� Gipp continues, �those are not His words, we have no hope.�
We cannot find the love of God in a tree. We can find the fact of God in nature. But, to understand His Love we need to know of Jesus. It is within the preserved pages of His inspired Book that we are able to learn of the Savior.
Respect the Bible? How can we not simply love the Bible and the One Who has given it to us!
We will continue with this same theme in our next session.