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God's Word - Do You Really Believe Series
66 Plays1 year ago
In this sermon, pastor Ridley Barron preached about the absolute truth and reliability of God's word. He emphasized the authority of Scripture, underpinned by archaeological evidence, the consistency of biblical manuscripts such as those found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the overwhelming manuscript support for the New Testament texts. Through personal experiences and historical examples, Barron argues for the inspirational nature of the Bible, its role as the final measure of truth, and the importance of interpreting it within the context it was written. He encourages listeners to find nourishment and growth within the word and the community of believers, and upholds the significance of the teachings and resurrection of Jesus, urging open dialogue and accountability in faith discussions.
Timestamps:
00:00 Deuteronomy 29:29, digging into word, self-investigation.
04:51 Archaeology confirms historical details doubted by many.
10:16 Professor's presence saved struggling student's faith.
12:56 Comparison of ancient texts shows strong preservation.
17:40 Different perspectives enhance the essence of storytelling.
19:31 God conveyed message through interviews, research, and testimony. Mark and Luke's firsthand accounts important.
23:38 Importance of faith in the reliability of scripture.
28:11 Prioritize God's word in your life.
30:39 Choosing the right woman affects everyone's fate.
35:42 Powerful church experiences lead to deeper understanding.
36:42 Encouragement to pray and seek God's goodness.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Series
00:00:00
Speaker
Over the last couple of weeks, we've been digging into this series. I hope that we've begun to bring some clarity for you in some areas to give you some answers to some things. Last week, after the first service, I think it was, we had a lady come up to me as we got through talking about God is, and she said, I just wanted to say something. She said, this morning brought me tremendous freedom because you let me know I don't have to have all the answers about God to still believe he is God.
00:00:30
Speaker
The goal of this series is not to answer all of your questions, we can't possibly do that. Again, go back to Deuteronomy 29, 29, and read it and understand why. I'm not God, you're not God, he is God, there's only one of those, okay? Your wife's gonna nudge you right now, see? See, I told you.
00:00:48
Speaker
Deuteronomy 29, 29 says there are some secrets that will remain God's forever because he is God. But we have the ability as students to dig into the word, to come face to face with the word so that we can understand a little bit more about God and his plans
The Role of the Bible in Faith
00:01:01
Speaker
for us. So first week we talked about absolute truth and necessity for it and how absolute truth is what keeps us from just falling completely into chaos. We also established that the basis of that truth, the standard for that truth is God himself because he is all truth.
00:01:16
Speaker
Last week we came back to God and we talked about God's character and how He not only is the standard for truth, but He also is the source of everything good that we have. The Bible tells us that every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father above. And so whatever you have that's good in your life has been sourced to you by the Holy God. Today we're adding what I would call the third leg of the tripod here in our faith.
00:01:41
Speaker
We're talking about God's Word itself, and why and how we know it to be reliable. The reason I call it the third leg of the tripod, because in my mind, if you establish the three, absolute truth, a holy God, and a reliable Word, then you have something to build the rest of your faith off of it. Everything else emanates out of those realities, those truths.
00:02:02
Speaker
So my goal this morning is hopefully if you walk out of here, you have a little bit more confidence in what you know to be true about this thing we call the Bible. As I grew up in a Southern Baptist Church all my life, I believed the Bible almost from the minute I first started reading the Bible, not because I believed it, but because my mom and dad said you can trust it.
00:02:21
Speaker
and then my Sunday school teachers and my preachers who I looked up to, they all said you can trust it. The problem was nowhere in that process did I do investigation for myself so that I could adopt that thinking for myself. Again, all the way up to college, I did it because people told me to. So I walked into a college classroom at a private Baptist institution and instantly had Old Testament and New Testament professors question and challenge everything about the Bible.
Evidence Supporting Biblical Reliability
00:02:50
Speaker
You might be shocked and surprised because you're going, wait, my child's at a private Christian school. What's going on there? And sadly, it's not always what you think it is. There are some good ones out there, but some of them do exactly what happened to me. My first Old Testament professor immediately began to question all the miracles of the Bible. He said there were natural explanations for every bit of it. I had a New Testament professor who said, man, these are some great stories, but we don't believe that all of them are true.
00:03:15
Speaker
But I hope by the time you emerge from here today, you understand not only that everything in this book is true, but everything in this book is reliable and you can accept it for what it is at its face value, okay?
00:03:29
Speaker
So I want to start off going to take you into a classroom for just a second to establish some things that help, if you will, affirm the trustworthiness of the Scriptures. Then we're going to talk about what that means for us as those who receive the Word of God. We are a people of the book, okay? We build our lives around this book.
00:03:49
Speaker
In order to establish historical verification, there's two things that are really, really important. One of them is just that history itself verifies everything in the book. The second one is that those truths back then have been transmitted to us without error to where we are today. That we have a complete confidence that what they gave us originally is now what we received today, that we read today, and we can know that to be a fact.
00:04:16
Speaker
Not only have many of the Bible's historical details been confirmed, but certain portions that were once in doubt by many people even within the church have now been verified specifically by archaeology that's going on today. Archaeology is doing fantastic things to confirm the truths of the Bible.
00:04:32
Speaker
Back in the 1920s, archaeologists confirmed the presence of the city of Ur. You might recognize the name of the city of Ur, Genesis chapter 11. It's where Abraham began his journey and following God. The reason that was so important is because many skeptics at the time doubted that there was ever civilizations of that size going all the way back to the story of Genesis. But they found the city, they dug it up, and there was the name of Ur, surprise, surprise.
00:04:59
Speaker
engravings from an Egyptian tomb that archaeologists uncovered and did their work on, revealed that there was an installation of a viceroy, or basically like a vice president or whatever, or assistant to the king, and it had a ceremony in it that was exactly describing exactly what Joseph went through and being established as the second in command of Egypt during history in Genesis.
00:05:24
Speaker
Skeptics also doubted the existence of the people we call the Hittites. If you remember reading through the journey of the people of Israel as they conquered the Promised Land, the Hittites were one of the people that they had to remove from the land. Skeptics didn't think they really exist, that they had just been made up. And then archaeologists uncovered a Hittite city in Turkey complete with city records and all kinds of history that verified that scripture was true.
00:05:49
Speaker
At one point, skeptics even doubted there was such a thing as King David. King David was believed to be a fable, something on the order of like Paul Bunyan and his blue ox for us, you know? Remember those stories. But they came across an inscription from another nationality, another civilization that mentioned the king of Israel being King David. And today, if you go to Jerusalem, to the southern part of Jerusalem, there's an entire excavation process going on because now they have uncovered the city of David.
00:06:18
Speaker
And it's absolutely amazing all the things they're finding there as they continue to uncover those things. There are dozens of Old Testament things that have been uncovered by archaeology in recent years. You're not going to hear about this on CNN or ABC because they don't want to talk about this. But here's the more important thing.
00:06:36
Speaker
There never once has been an archaeological discovery that contradicted anything in the Bible. Not once has one piece of archaeology ever disproved anything that has been stated in the Bible as truth.
00:06:51
Speaker
ancient Babylonian records that have been uncovered describe a period in Babylonian history where a confusion of language happened in their history. If you go back to the story of Bible, you're reminded that in Genesis chapter 11 that God confused the language of the people as they tried to build a tower to the heavens.
00:07:09
Speaker
These same records described a worldwide flood, which by the way, worldwide floods have been covered in hundreds of civilizations all over the world. Hence the name, worldwide flood, right? And it's amazing that those civilizations are confirming everything that the scripture tells us about this because many skeptics again believe it was just a local regional flood that they described as something bigger than that.
00:07:32
Speaker
But history and archaeology are confirming this. The city of Sodom and Gomorrah, the sites where it existed have been uncovered. That's a story in Genesis chapter 9. They found out where the cities existed, but here's what's even more amazing. Everything in the evidence they're uncovering display the evidence that there was a fiery and violent destruction to the city. Surprised, the Bible was right yet again.
00:07:57
Speaker
even the plagues of Egypt. I remember reading just, I guess, about a year ago in a book, a study of some kind that historians are now, as they begin to question what happened to the great Egyptian empire. Most empires, you can track the record of how they rose and eventually came to an end. But the question of how did the Egyptian empire come to an end? Well, it points back to a time and period when their army was wiped out and there was vast destruction all over the nation of Egypt.
00:08:25
Speaker
And if you know anything about the Exodus story, you know that Tim Plagues is what brought an end to that empire, not only killing many of the people who are part of that nation, but wiping out livestock, wiping out crops, and eventually wiping out the entire army.
Challenges to Biblical Miracles
00:08:40
Speaker
When I was in that Old Testament class I was referencing earlier, my professor started the first day almost, but it was probably a couple weeks. The first day of the study of Exodus, he said,
00:08:52
Speaker
It really wasn't the Red Sea that they went through, it was the Reed Sea. And the Reed Sea is a marsh that's over near the Mediterranean and it's not very deep and that's how the winds were able to dry it out briefly for the people to walk across. And the army didn't get wiped out, their chariots just got stuck in the mud.
00:09:09
Speaker
I wasn't brave and confident enough in my faith, but I had a friend there who was, and he spoke up that moment, said, wait a minute. He said, first of all, my Bible says that they drowned. I don't know very many grown men that can drown in two feet of water.
00:09:23
Speaker
Second of all, my Bible says that the entire Egyptian army, including their horses and chariots, was wiped out, that there was not one left existing. I'm pretty sure if they got stuck in the mud that smart Egyptians could have figured out how to get them out of the mud at some point. And that became the most interesting class to me because all year long it was debates between this guy and my professor over and over again. And I will tell you to this day, his presence in that class probably saved my faith.
00:09:47
Speaker
as a guy who was struggling with a lot of questions because I had not been prepared to defend my faith and to believe even in many of the things I had been taught as a young Christian growing up. So we talked about the reliability through history, but the next part of this, the reliability of the actual copying of scripture coming forward. How do we know that what we've got is exactly what God inspired for us thousands of years ago in putting together the book?
00:10:14
Speaker
Well, the New Testament books were composed within a few decades of the life of Jesus Christ. So that means Jesus died somewhere around 33 AD, that within probably 20 to 30 years, many of the books we call the New Testament were already being written and passed around. The reason that's important is because those who were part of those stories were still alive.
00:10:37
Speaker
So if I wrote a story about John Ballard and it was a complete falsehood, a tale that I made up, John Ballard, if he was still alive, would come around and go, hey, that's not how that happened. That's absolutely not true.
00:10:49
Speaker
especially when it came to the point where men and women were literally being put to death for the stories they were professing. John might have covered for me because he loves me to death, right? He might have said, eh, it could have been that way. But if John's life was put on the line knowing his head was on the block for what he believed, don't you think he would have eventually said, no, this story's got to be true. I can't let him get by with a fable.
00:11:13
Speaker
So because of that, we can know that the New Testament stories were true. In fact, before most of the people who participated in Jesus' life, before most of them died, there were already songs and poetry and creeds that were being passed around among the early churches.
The Historical Reliability of New Testament
00:11:28
Speaker
If you look at 1 Corinthians 15, verses three through eight, there is an example of some of those early creeds that taught some of the doctrine and some of the theology of those early churches.
00:11:39
Speaker
When the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in the 1940s, y'all remember hearing about that? Not that you were around in the 1940s, but you heard about the Dead Sea Scrolls being uncovered. I believe God led that little shepherd boy into that cave that day because he opened up some incredible information for us.
00:11:56
Speaker
Those manuscripts, when we talk about manuscripts, we're talking about the copies of the originals. Those manuscripts were 800 years older than any other text that we had at that point of the Old Testament. But here's what's fascinating, as they began to compare the oldest with the most modern versions of those texts,
00:12:16
Speaker
there were no differences between what had been conveyed 800 years sooner versus the 800 years that had passed, which committed ourselves to the affirmation that there was an absolute diligence in the passing along of this word and doing it very, very well.
00:12:32
Speaker
The Bible has more empirical support. It has a shorter time between original writings and surviving copies and a greater number of source manuscripts than any other ancient work. If some of you are history majors or went into college and did a lot of study in history, you know that three of the most important basic works when you're studying ancient history are the works of Julius Caesar, the works of the historian Herodotus,
00:13:01
Speaker
and the works of Homer. And some of you have read Homer's Iliad and some of those great stories of the past. At most we have about 1800 manuscripts of any one of those. And the closest they exist to the actual writing is 950 years after the original writing.
00:13:21
Speaker
But when you come to the New Testament, we have over 5,000 manuscripts, and some of them date back as recently as 30 and 40 years just past the life of Jesus Christ.
Authority and Interpretation of Scripture
00:13:34
Speaker
So again, we know for certain this book is real, that it is not only true and verifiable, but also that it has been protected as it's been transmitted to us over the ages. So what does that mean for us? Okay, so let's dive into it. Some of you are anxious to get to your fill in the blank guides there. Number one, the authority of God's word cannot be questioned. What do we mean by the authority of scripture? That means all words in the Bible are God's words.
00:14:02
Speaker
Therefore, to disobey or to not believe the Bible is to disobey God Himself.
00:14:09
Speaker
When you question the Bible, you're questioning God and his authority. So we have to move beyond asking the question, what do you think the Bible says? And instead, start praying the prayer, God, show me what the Bible says. Teach me what the Bible says. If you're in a setting ever in a church, in a Bible study, in a classroom where somebody says, this is what I think he means here, red lights should go off in your head saying, be prepared for what's about to follow.
00:14:39
Speaker
It doesn't mean that they're wrong, necessarily. It just means that somebody has leaned into their own interpretation instead of relying on the interpreter to take care of this free hymn. And who do we mean when we say the interpreter? The Holy Spirit.
00:14:54
Speaker
So when you approach the Scriptures, one of the most important things you do is you go, okay, God, soften my heart, make me ready to hear what you're about to show me, to teach me, so that I may fully comprehend it by the power of your Holy Spirit. Hebrews chapter 1.1 tells us this, long ago, God spoke to our ancestors by the prophets at different times and in different ways.
00:15:17
Speaker
So when we talk about the inspiration of scripture, what we're literally talking about is the fact that God breathed this word to the ones who wrote it, to the guys who wrote it. It does not mean that they were robots, okay? The guy did not come over them and they began to write going, I can't control the
00:15:35
Speaker
Pin I can't control what I'm writing with that's not the way it worked What it means is that God inspired them and allowed them to use their skills their talents and their Personalities to speak the word or write the word so that we could have it from their viewpoint It's really really important that we understand that because it explains some of what appears to be variables in the stories Let me give you an example what I'm talking about
00:16:00
Speaker
Matthew, who wrote the book of Matthew, was one of the apostles. Does anybody know who he wrote the book of Matthew to?
00:16:08
Speaker
the Jews. He wrote it to fellow Jews. So if you follow Matthew, what you get is a lot of references to the Old Testament, a lot of references to rituals and teachings of the traditional Jewish faith, and most importantly, a lot of ties back to the fact that Jesus fulfills prophecies. And so he's constantly making those connections for his people. He's training the Jews to get it that this is your Messiah you have been waiting on.
00:16:34
Speaker
You fast forward to Luke. Luke is a physician. So if you read Luke's book, what you're going to get a lot of, Luke's fascination with how God's miracles contradicted the laws of nature. How he was able to take bodies and give them healing. How he was able to raise the dead. There's a lot of that kind of stuff in there.
00:16:53
Speaker
In the book of Mark, you get the writings of John Mark, who we believe is the one who traveled with Peter in a lot of his gospel travels as he was sharing the message of Jesus Christ with the people of the Mideast. One of the things you'll pick up on with Mark is that Mark's a man of action.
00:17:08
Speaker
Because in the book of Mark, it says over and over again, in a short time, in a little while. I mean, it's like it's a fast-moving book. It's a short book, and it just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Mark's moving through the story. He's capturing it for us. When you get over into the epistles, you get the testimony of a man named Paul, the greatest missionary ever to live. Paul was telling his story from his perspective.
00:17:29
Speaker
Now here's what's so amazing, if you know somebody who was an investigator, somebody who did criminal investigation, he would tell you that if he came up on the scene of a crime and he had four different witnesses who all told him the same exact thing, he would immediately question whether or not their story was true.
00:17:46
Speaker
Why? Because four different people would see it from four different perspectives, four different experiences, four different backgrounds, so their stories would be expected to be a little bit different in the way they tell it, although the essence of the story would remain the same. That's exactly what you get with the books of the four Gospels.
00:18:03
Speaker
All four of them telling the same stories, but telling them from different perspectives.
Testimonies and Teachings in the Bible
00:18:08
Speaker
A lot of skeptics will go, well, Mark's telling the same story that Matthew told over here, and it seems a little bit different. Again, criminal investigators would tell you in a court of law, that's absolutely a good sign that they didn't sit together and corroborate their story and make up a fairy tale. So we have affirmation over and over again. Let me give you some examples of how the Bible came together. Number one, God spoke directly to people.
00:18:30
Speaker
God spoke directly. Revelation 2, verse 1, we have an instance where God spoke specifically to John, the apostle. He says, write to the angel of the church in Ephesus, and God immediately tells him, this is what I want you to write. This is what I want you to tell those people.
00:18:46
Speaker
If you go back to the Old Testament prophets, over and over again you hear this phrase repeated, this is what the Lord God says, this is what the Lord God of Heaven said, this is what the God Almighty says. God was speaking directly to these guys so we know with confidence that that was a place where we got exactly what God wanted us to have.
00:19:05
Speaker
Another way that we got information from people was through interviews, research, and personal testimony. I've already mentioned to you that Mark traveled with Peter, so he got the first-hand testimony of Peter who was doing what he did with Jesus, but also Luke.
00:19:21
Speaker
book of Luke, it was written by Luke the physician, so was the book of Acts. Today, modern historians say that Luke was one of the best history writers in the history of the world because of the detail he put into those stories and the way he accurately described the things that Jesus and the apostles were up to. Lastly,
00:19:40
Speaker
we have the teachings of Jesus and others. In other words, it came straight, if you will, from the horse's mouth. And so as those people sat and listened to the teachings of Jesus, they were faithful to write those things down. And if it came from Jesus, you and I know and believe that it came straight from God because Jesus was God.
00:19:59
Speaker
So the words of Scripture are more than simply truth. They are actually the final measure by which all truth is mattered. So here's the simple understanding, what I'm trying to say here. Whatever conforms to Scripture you know is true. Whatever contradicts Scripture you know is not true. It's that simple. Whatever is in the Scriptures, we can accept and know and trust and base our life on that reality. If it's not in Scripture, then it's not truth.
00:20:26
Speaker
The Bible never affirms anything that's contrary or contradictory in its nature.
The Necessity of Biblical Truth for Faith
00:20:32
Speaker
If it does, it cannot be trusted. I'm going to make this statement to you. I hope you get this and understand what I'm about to say. If at any point any part of the Bible can be proven untrue, then you can burn your Bibles, stay at home on Sunday morning and enjoy the Sunday cartoons. That's how confident I am that this book is reliable.
00:20:53
Speaker
If tomorrow, somebody in the Middle East digs up some sepulchre that has a body with bones in it, and it can be verifiably traced that those are Jesus Christ's bones, and that he did indeed not rise from the dead, this is all over, this is pointless, and we can go do whatever we want to. We don't need to be hanging out here.
00:21:14
Speaker
But the Word of God tells us not only that the Word is true, but in 1 Corinthians 15, which is one of my favorite chapters in the entire Bible, Paul says unreservedly, if Jesus did not rise from the dead, our faith is worthless.
00:21:28
Speaker
And he goes on to say as part of that chapter, Jesus ascended from the, resurrected from the grave, went back into Jerusalem and appeared to more than 500 witnesses who saw them with their own eyes and touched them. Some of them had dinner with him. Some of them hugged him. Thomas put his fingers in the side of Jesus. And in that moment, what Paul was affirming for us is this.
00:21:52
Speaker
Every single one of those witnesses for the most part was still alive. And so Paul was saying, if you don't believe me, go find them. They'll tell you this whole thing is real. So we have the authority of scripture.
00:22:07
Speaker
You know, at one point when I was in seminary, I told you about how my experience went going through college. When I got to seminary out in Fort Worth, Texas, I still was young, still crusty, if you will, and trying to put my faith together, connect all the dots. And I remember one Friday night sitting in the hallway with a bunch of guys in the dorm. We were just sitting out there talking, talking sports and all kinds of things. And eventually the conversation made its way around to scripture. And I'll never forget one of my friends looking at me across from where I was sitting. He said, oh, I don't believe that part of the Bible is true.
00:22:38
Speaker
And I looked at my friend, sit next to me, I said, did he just say what I think he said? My friend said, well, yeah, why? I said, you don't believe that's true? He said, oh no, he said, there's parts of the Bible I know are true, but there are other parts, it's obvious it's not true. It's too fanciful to believe. And I immediately thought, how in the world can you not believe that part of the Bible and then believe any of the Bible? Because if one part of the Bible is untrustworthy, I would argue that none of it's worth putting your faith in.
00:23:08
Speaker
And so we had that conversation that turned into, he went his way and I went my way because he refused to understand the importance of accepting the scripture as a full and total reliable book for us. Number two.
00:23:24
Speaker
Not only do we have the authority of God's Word, we have the clarity of God's Word. The Bible's written such a way that all things that we have to have to become a Christian, to grow as a Christian, to live as a Christian, are very clearly put in Scripture. God made it simple for us. We're the ones that make it complex.
00:23:40
Speaker
We're the ones that make it so hard. God said, if you will simply believe that my son has done what he's done on your behalf, if you will simply accept that Jesus had to die for you and that he has resurrected and will someday come again for you, if you'll just take that into your heart and believe it and base your life on it, all that's next is just following me.
00:24:01
Speaker
But man, we try to make it rules and regulations and breaking down doctrines and we split into denominations and we create all this controversy around this simple truth that changes our lives. So because of its clarity, I would make this statement to you. When someone disagrees about the proper interpretation of a passage of scripture, the problem doesn't lie with the scriptures because God has put it together for us. Rather, the problem lies with us. When we try to approach the scriptures with unconfessed sin in our heart,
00:24:31
Speaker
When we try to approach the scriptures with biases that we have or agendas to try to rearrange the scripture to meet our lives, that's when we run into problems.
Engagement with the Bible for Spiritual Growth
00:24:42
Speaker
And that's what we're running into today, people who are trying to take the scriptures and use it for their purposes. This may shock you, but every single one of you, regardless of how much you know about the Bible, can take this book, can pick it up, begin to read it, and you can take any verse in this scripture and change it to say what you want it to say if you don't read it in its context.
00:24:59
Speaker
if you don't understand the totality of the word. There's an old joke, and I'm not going to get it right, so I apologize. The punchline would be much better if I remembered it right. But there's an old preacher story about a man who called the pastor one night and said, I need some help. He said, I've been thinking about taking my own life. He said, well, what did you do? He said, well, I flipped the scriptures open, and the first verse I read said that Judas went and hung himself.
00:25:21
Speaker
And he says, well, I'm glad you didn't follow that. He said, but why are you calling me? He said, because the second one I flipped to said, go down likewise and do likewise. And I was like, okay. The reality is that's one of the most unbiblical ways to approach scripture.
00:25:36
Speaker
It may work from time to time if it does praise God, but don't just flip the Bible open and think that God's going to show you some answer because he wants you to know Genesis 1-1 all the way through Revelation 22. He wants you to know the totality of his word because every bit of it has the potential to impact your life. The book of Leviticus is just as good for you, shocking, is just as good for you as the book of John is.
00:25:59
Speaker
Every bit of it contains power for our lives. So number three means that the necessity of God's word is important for us. This means it's necessary for you to read and know the Bible. You've gotta read and know the Bible, or at least have someone teach you the Bible so that you can understand its truths. If you wanna grow personally in your relationship with God, if you wanna have your sins forgiven, if you wanna know with certainty that God has certain things he desires for you, you gotta know the word.
00:26:28
Speaker
In Romans chapter 10, we won't go read there, but it's in your study guide. Romans 10, Paul asked the question, how can they believe if they haven't heard? And how can they hear if there's not a preacher? By the way, that's my job security right there. It's gotta be a preacher, right?
00:26:45
Speaker
But that's the truth. How will people know if we aren't willing to go share this message with them? How will people know the life-saving power that we've seen displayed here this morning unless we go and take the gospel to them and teach them the things that are in scripture? And just as we are physically maintained by the things we eat and drink, spiritually we have to be maintained. I know in my life I have uttered these words, many of you have done the same. You get to that place in your life where you go, I just feel a little dry right now spiritually. Any of you ever said that?
00:27:15
Speaker
Thank you for the two people who've honest. Yeah, there's this point where you go, man, I just feel like my faith is weak. I feel like something's not going right, whatever. The first question I'm gonna ask you when you come to me and say that is, how deep are you in the word right now? Are you studying God's word? Are you putting that lamp up against your life and looking at the mirror that reflects who you are so that you can grow and learn and become more like Christ? Also, I'm gonna ask you, who are you in the company of?
00:27:45
Speaker
If you're spending more time with your golfing buddies at the golf course, or if you're spending more time just drinking coffee at the coffee house with your girls, but you're not in the company of other believers who are affirming the word in your life, then you're probably gonna run out of the nutrition you need because you are distracted from the thing that should be the priority of your life. Lastly, there is the sufficiency of God's word.
00:28:06
Speaker
the sufficiency of God's word. This means that the Bible contains all the words we need to know to have a relationship with Christ, to live a righteous life, all the things we need to do to continue to grow as a follower for him. In Psalm 119.1, the Psalmist writes this, he says, how happy are those whose way is blameless, who walk according to the Lord's instruction. If you're sitting around waiting for a special revelation from God, you're not gonna get it.
00:28:33
Speaker
Okay,
Aligning Life Decisions with Biblical Principles
00:28:34
Speaker
there's no need for a special revelation because 95% of what you need to know about life with Jesus is right here. It's right here in this word. Now, I'm gonna take a lot of pressure off of y'all and I'm also going to give you a little introduction to a sermon that's coming probably the second or third week in our study in Acts that's coming up next. The will of God is not a dot on a map for you.
00:28:59
Speaker
It's not just one specific thing for you. The will of God is contained inside the moral boundaries that are given to us by the word of God. So what does that mean for you? That means if you're out there praying, God, lead me to the college that I'm supposed to go to, young person. Should I be going to this specific school? God is probably not gonna say to you anything except for I don't care where you go, just live like Jesus when you get there.
00:29:26
Speaker
Some of you spent endless hours lying awake going, should I take that job tomorrow? Should I take that job tomorrow? Here's what the Bible teaches us. Within the commands of Scripture, if it doesn't go against the commands of Scripture, you have the freedom and the responsibility to make your choice based off the wisdom the Word has already given you.
00:29:45
Speaker
You don't need to look for some specific thing there. There are some few exceptions, but they are very, very rare. Let me give you the best reason why I believe that. Let's say that John Ballard, in his search to find the right woman, married Becca and she was not THE woman that God had picked out for her. Okay?
00:30:05
Speaker
Well, what suddenly happens is that John has set off a reaction that affects everybody on the planet. How? Because he took somebody else's right woman and that person had to go marry somebody that wasn't their right woman. And so suddenly we've got a chain reaction going on. That happens every time somebody makes a decision. If we're looking for a dot on the map, it's not a dot on the map. It is things that are done within the moral boundaries of what God has already aligned out for us in scripture.
00:30:31
Speaker
So if you wanna have an easier process in making decisions that follow God and are obedient to God, just learn this word and it will give you the guidelines you need to make the right decisions for your life.
The Infallibility and Authority of the Bible
00:30:43
Speaker
All right, so let me wrap up with four quick things. Number one, all of scripture is God's word and it's inspired by him for our use. All of scripture, Genesis 1-1, Genesis 12-1, Exodus 42-1,
00:30:58
Speaker
There's not 42 in Exodus. Psalm 23.1, you pick the scripture, and yes, even the commands of Leviticus regarding the 10 commandments. Yes, everybody has some meaning for us, okay? Those of you who panic and break into a hives when history is read, read it anyway. It connects the dots for us, God's hand moving throughout history, working in mankind. Second thing, there is nothing about scripture, sorry, there is nothing about scripture
00:31:29
Speaker
that is not true, nothing, not one thing. Now some of you are going, well, when I read my new living translation, that word is different than the NIV. That's not what we're talking about when we're talking about truth, okay? There are two words that we talk about when we hear scripture, when we talk about scripture. One of them is infallibility, the other one is inerrancy. Infallibility is just a fancy word that says the Bible will never be not true. Inerrancy means the Bible has always been true.
00:31:57
Speaker
Okay, so what we're talking about is the teachings of scripture at the original time that they were inspired. Now those teachings are still the same today, but changing the wording doesn't change the meaning. So the original inspiration of God taught us some things that we believe are infallible and are inerrant. And that's how we can trust the word and base our life on it. Number three, we should neither add nor take away from his word.
00:32:27
Speaker
In fact, this word shouldn't be compared to any other book in the world at any point in any place. It has been the best seller of all time for all time and will always be that way. Why? Because it contains life-changing truth for you and I. Life-changing truth. Do you know what the Bible says about those who add to or take away from the word? There's a special little curse for them.
00:32:55
Speaker
And let me tell you something guys, there are people who are adding and taking away right here, right now in this country, who are teaching some bizarre things.
Accountability and Encouragement in Bible Teaching
00:33:02
Speaker
I went back and watched a video a friend sent me the other day, Church in Cincinnati on Super Bowl Sunday, had a halftime show in the middle of the sermon. The pastor came swinging in on a chain, a ball, wrecking ball, singing Miley Cyrus' song, Wrecking Ball. I don't know what interpretation he's reading.
00:33:23
Speaker
I don't know what book he's in, but what I think is in that moment, there was an angel in heaven watching and put a little check mark by his name that said when he gets to heaven, we're gonna have a special conversation with him about, and by the way, I will never come swinging in on a wrecking ball, ever. Lastly, to disbelieve or disobey any word of scripture is to disbelieve or disobey God. So hear this for me, this is where we'll close.
00:33:52
Speaker
I have been given the authority to teach this word by this word, okay? So that means several things. Number one, if you ever catch me or anybody on this stage teaching anything outside of the word, you have a moral responsibility to come and challenge me, to hold me accountable. If I'm not teaching the truth of this word, then I am out of the boundaries of where God has given me.
00:34:16
Speaker
Number two, you should be praying for me because that word, that authority of that word says very specifically, I should be real careful in how I approach this. Because I have a responsibility as a shepherd to teach nothing but truth. My opinion should not matter to you. The latest opinion polls should not matter to you. What matters to you is the word that has been given to us by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and delivered by the hands of men for 2,000 years so that we know with confidence this is truth.
00:34:45
Speaker
So I'm gonna ask the band to come this morning. This is how I want you to think and pray and respond this morning. There may be some of you who out here this morning are going, you know what, I just came to check this thing out. It's been a while since I've been in church and I have seen some amazing things. I felt some powerful things this morning. What you said about the word has answered some questions for me and I wanna come have a conversation with somebody about this.
00:35:05
Speaker
Maybe there's somebody in here today who goes, you know what? I've been a Christian, a follower for a long time, and right now my biggest challenge is just getting into the Word. I don't know how to read it, don't know how to study it, don't know how to understand it. If you want to come forward, John, Kyle, myself, Lisa, there's plenty of people on our staff and in our leadership who would be happy to meet you for coffee, sit down and talk with you about what that looks like. How do I get into the Word so I can let the Word get into me?
00:35:32
Speaker
And then thirdly, there may be some of you who are here this morning who are going, you know what? I have experienced something from the minute I walk through the door sitting here in this moment that's different about this church. And I need this in my life. And you're saying, you know what? I just need to come talk with somebody. I need to just come pray with somebody because God has been doing some stuff in my life and it didn't make sense until I walked in here this morning and I think I need what's going on in this place.
00:35:58
Speaker
So if God is speaking to you in any way, this altar you've seen already, our people love to pray. You don't have to pray by yourself if you want to, you can. But if you wanna come up here and have somebody pray with you, pray over you, we're happy to welcome that. But if God is speaking to your heart, the most important thing you can do right now is to obey the nudging of the Holy Spirit in this moment.
00:36:19
Speaker
Let me pray for us. Father God, we are so thankful for this word that challenges our lives, that awakens our spirits, that gives us hope, gives us truth, gives us your goodness revealed to us in a powerful way. So right now in this moment, help us to respond in a way that honors Christ, a way that changes our lives, the way that rearranges us according to your leadership. Lord, thank you for the power of who you are and the power of this unchanging word
00:36:49
Speaker
I thank you for victories that have been won in this place today. And we ask that you continue to use your spirit to work in our midst. It's in Jesus' name I pray, amen.