The following lesson from J. Vernon McGee teaches about the inspiration of
God in the Bible.
May God bless,
Carl
my website -- http://www.nettally.com/saints/
my blog -- http://www.anniemayhem.com/cgi-bin/wordpress/
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INSPIRATION
by J. Vernon McGee
All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for
doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness.
(2
Timothy 3:16)
There are four words that we have emphasized in the chapter on Bible
Doctrine that require more explanation to understand their meanings. We
need
to distinguish among them and not be confused by them. They are:
revelation,
inspiration, illumination, and preservation. These four words are
all-im****tant. We will focus on inspiration in this chapter, but first
we'll
review all four.
Revelation means that God has spoken. We've already talked about that. And
we have actually two sources of revelation, the natural and supernatural.
The supernatural is sometimes called natural and special revelation.
In natural revelation, God has spoken in the heavens and on the earth:
The heavens declare the glory of God;
And the firmament shows His handiwork.
(Psalm 19:1)
It is a limited knowledge of God that is given in creation, of course. God
has revealed His person and He has revealed His power in creation, but
nothing else. You will never find the love of God revealed in creation.
Then you have the supernatural or special revelation, which is the Bible.
The Bible is God's Word to man. Over 2,500 times the Old Testament says,
"?Thus saith the Lord,?" or a cognate expression such as "?God says?" or
"?God has spoken.?" And the New Testament confirms this. The New Testament
speaks of the Old Testament as being God's Word.
The second word, inspiration, guarantees the revelation of God, guarantees
that we do have the Word of God. Illumination means that the Holy Spirit
takes the Word of God and makes it real to the believer, and only to the
believer. Then the fourth is preservation. That is actually the history of
the Bible from the very beginning down to the present hour.
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What Inspiration Means
The Bible claims to be the Word of God, and we want to look at the
validity
of that claim. First of all, let's look at our key verse, 2 Timothy 3:16,
in
the Amplified New Testament.
Every Scripture is God-breathed-given by His inspiration-and profitable
for
instruction, for reproof and conviction of sin, for correction of error
and
discipline in obedience, and for training in righteousness [that is, in
holy
living in conformity to God's will in thought, purpose and action].
"?Every Scripture is God-breathed.?" The word there is theopneustos. Theos
means "?God.?" Pneuo means "?breathe?" (we get our word "?pneumonia?" from
that word). Every Scripture is God-breathed. The New King James
translation
reads, "?All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.?" This means that
God
breathed in the sense that these men, as Peter says, "?were carried along
by
the Holy Spirit?" (2 Peter 1:21 niv). He pictures it as a sailing vessel
that is carried out to sea by the wind blowing into the sails, pu****ng it
along. And these men who were chosen to write the Scriptures were carried
along by the Holy Spirit.
That does not mean that these men were perfect in everything they said.
Actually, they were very imperfect men. The five books of the Bible
written
by Moses we believe to be inspired, and we have them today as the Word of
God. Doesn't this mean that Moses was holy in the sense that he never made
a
mistake? Oh, no, for this very record tells us of several mistakes that he
himself made. But when it came to writing the Word that God had given him,
he made no error there because the Holy Spirit was the One who was using
him, moving him along as he wrote. That is the claim of the Word of God.
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Theories of Inspiration
First of all, we'll look at some of the theories of inspiration, and there
are all sorts. We're living in a day which is so complicated that when
someone says that he believes the Bible is inspired, you cannot let it
rest
there. You have to find out what he means, because there are so many
theories abroad.
The first theory that we will look at is, in my opinion, the weakest. It
is
the one that has no life in it whatsoever. It is called the natural theory
of inspiration. That simply means that the Bible is inspired like
Shakespeare was inspired to write Romeo and Juliet and that there's no
more
inspiration in the Bible than there is in Romeo and Juliet. As they see
it,
Shakespeare was sort of a genius in what he wrote, and these men who wrote
the Bible were religious geniuses. Or they may say that Karl Marx was
inspired to write Das Kapital, the bible of Communism today. That theory
is
called natural inspiration, and that is what some people understand
inspiration to be-yet it is the weakest argument of all.
The second theory is universal inspiration, which means that anyone who
professes to be a Christian is inspired. In other words, you could write
something that would be just as worthy and worthwhile and be of as great a
value as anything Paul wrote or David wrote. In fact, some proponents of
this theory think you can do better than they did! A professor at Columbia
University said some years ago that he thought he could. One of his
students, apparently a pretty smart egghead in the class, suggested to the
professor that if he would turn out something that would survive like
Psalm
23, he would accept that theory. But so far neither that professor nor
anyone else has written anything that's been the blessing that the
Twenty-third Psalm has been.
Among these folks who believe in the natural theory of inspiration or that
of universal inspiration, of course, are the ones who believe that Mary
Baker Eddy's book, Science and Health, was inspired. Her book has been
corrected a great deal, by the way. In the original copy, she said that
when
a lobster lost its claw it would grow another. Well, since it doesn't,
they've
deleted that from her book. And they have relieved it of several other
embarrassing statements that were made in the original copies.
Nevertheless,
they believe that Science and Health is inspired.
The Mormons believe in what Joseph Smith supposedly wrote, which he didn't
write, by the way. Joseph Smith was an ignorant man, totally incapable of
writing anything that would compare with The Book of Mormon. It is well
authenticated today that The Book of Mormon was written by a Presbyterian
preacher, a fellow who did a great deal of traveling on horseback through
Ohio, and he compared the hills of Ohio to the hills of Judah. If you read
The Book of Mormon, bear that in mind, and the comparison is beautiful
from
that viewpoint. But Joe Smith happened to go into a print shop where this
manuscript was, and after he was gone, the manuscript was missing. The
strange thing is that, when Joseph Smith published the manuscript, he
claimed to have gotten it from the angel Maroni on top of a mountain. He
had
quite a story about how the devil tried to take the golden plates away
from
him.1 It is interesting that many intelligent people accept that as truth
today, because they believe in universal inspiration. They think anyone
could write something that would compare to the Bible.
Now there's another theory of inspiration which holds that the thoughts
and
the concepts of the Bible are inspired. For instance, these people accept
the Sermon on the Mount as being inspired, but they don't like to say that
all of it is inspired. They do not believe the words are inspired. They
don't
mind a new translation that uses the idiom of the day. Well, when you take
the Word of God and rewrite it like that, it simply means that you believe
its concepts are inspired, but you do not attach too much value to the
actual words that are in the Bible.
Oh, my friend, the words are all-im****tant. You cannot have thoughts and
concepts without words. You cannot have confidence in a
thought-and-concept
version of Scripture, because there are shades of meaning that can be
distorted. Let me illustrate with a story about a young lady who had taken
singing lessons. Because her father had plenty of money, she had taken
voice
lessons from the best teacher. And the best teacher had taught her because
the father paid well. The time came for her to give a concert. After the
concert she was all excited, and when her friend came in she said, "?You
sat
next to my teacher, what did he say??"
"?Well..?" The friend hesitated a moment, then said, "?He said that you
sang
in a heavenly manner.?"
"?He did? That is wonderful!?" Then she got to thinking about it-the
teacher
had never said anything like that before. So she insisted, "?Now is that
exactly what he said??"
"?Well,?" this friend said, "?that's what he meant.?"
"?But I want to know the exact words he used. What did he say??"
"?Well if you must know, he said, '?That was an unearthly noise.?'?"
May I say, thoughts and concepts are not what we base inspiration on.
That's
as farfetched as anything can possibly be.
Another theory of inspiration is known as the theory of partial
inspiration.
That means that the Bible contains the Word of God. You have to watch some
of these fellows today, especially some of these preachers. They'll say,
"?I
believe the Bible contains the Word of God.?" When you pin them down, this
is what they'll say: "?I believe that the Golden Rule is inspired. It just
thrills me when I read it. But I want you to know, where it says God told
the people of Israel to destroy all the Amalekites, I don't like it.
That's
not inspired.?" They say the Bible contains the Word of God and then pick
out what they consider to be the Word of God. Well, that's putting
yourself
in the position of God the Holy Spirit, as if you were able to tell what
is
the Word of God and what is not the Word of God.
I used to sit in a ministerial meeting with a preacher like that. I had my
New Testament with me one day, and I asked him if he would mind
underlining
what he thought was the Word of God in the Epistle to the Romans, but he
wouldn't do it. I said, "?Go ahead. You keep saying that the Bible
contains
the Word of God, and I'm in doubt about that because it's hard for me to
tell which is and which is not. If I could have the benefit of knowing
what
is the Word of God, you could help me a great deal.?" It's mighty hard to
pin them down, but they will always say that Psalm 23 is inspired, and
then
go on from there.
The theory that p***** as "?Bartonism?" in this country holds that the
Bible
is the Word of God-if it is the Word of God to you. Now if you read Psalm
23
and it's the Word of God to you, then it's the inspired Word of God. But
if
you read another psalm that you don't like, then it is not the Word of God
to you, you see. There are many Americans and especially many American
preachers (quite a few of them are young preachers) who take that
viewpoint.
It all comes back to this theory of partial inspiration. The partial
inspiration theory means that not all of the Bible is the Word of God.
Now may I take up another theory that, instead of being liberal, is based
on
extreme fundamentalism. It is known as the mechanical or dictation theory
of
inspiration. These men hold that the Holy Spirit took up the penmen of the
Scriptures, like you would pick up your pen, and He wrote with them. The
Holy Spirit wrote with Moses at first, then He wrote with Joshua. And so
on
down through David and all the way to Paul and John. They believe that
these
men were nothing in the world but pens in the hand of the Holy Spirit.
May I say, that theory is wrong, and it can be proven so from this
viewpoint: If it had been true, we would have the same style of writing
all
the way through the Bible. But we do not have the same style. Actually,
Dr.
Luke writes classical Greek. He is the only one who uses what is known as
a
periodic sentence, which is the hardest sentence in the Greek to
translate.
Paul does come through with a periodic sentence every now and then, but
it's
Dr. Luke who uses it consistently. In contrast, Simon Peter butchered the
Greek language in his two epistles. But don't call him ignorant! I heard a
Greek professor do that once. It was during a meeting of teachers who
taught
Greek. I went to him afterward and said, "?Doctor, let's be very frank one
with another. I'm teaching first-year Greek, but the Greek that I write is
atrocious. How is yours??" He had a Ph.D.in Greek, but he was very honest
about it. He said, "?If you really want to know the truth, I wouldn't do
any
better than Simon Peter did.?" I said, "?Then do you want somebody to call
you ignorant? You ought not to call Simon Peter ignorant. He's not writing
in his own language.?"
Actually, I think Peter did pretty well, considering his native language
was
Aramaic. But, you see, the differences in writing style prove that God did
not use the dictation method. God is no dictator. He did not destroy the
personality of these men whom He chose to write Scripture! When Paul
wrote,
he expressed his heart. When Peter wrote, he expressed his heart and wrote
in his natural style. The thing that makes it God's Book is that through
these various writers God communicated to mankind exactly what He wanted
to
say, and He wouldn't change a sentence of it today! Neither has He
anything
to add to it. He hasn't come out with a new volume of things He didn't
know
two thousand years ago. He gave it all at that particular time.
Now this leads me to the viewpoint which we who are Bible teachers hold
today: plenary, verbal inspiration. Verbal means "?the words.?" Plenary
means "?full.?" When you eat too much, you are plenary, meaning full.
Plenary, verbal inspiration means that the words are inspired and that God
spoke all these words. Some folks speak about our verse-by-verse study of
the Scriptures. And I tell them, "?I'm not conducting a verse-by-verse
study
of the New Testament. The verses are manmade. They were added years later
by
men. I'm conducting a word-by-word study of the Word of God.?" Since the
words are inspired, and God spoke all these words, I think every word
should
be examined, every word should be considered.
Let me clarify an im****tant point: I am talking about the autographs, the
original manuscripts of the Greek text. Those are what the Bible claims to
be the inspired Word of God. I want you to notice several passages,
because
it is im****tant to see that the Bible makes this claim. We'll start near
the
beginning of the Old Testament:
Then Moses said to the Lord, "?O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither
before
nor since You have spoken to Your servant; but I am slow of speech and
slow
of tongue.?" (Exodus 4:10)
It may be that Moses had some sort of impediment of speech. But when you
hear him talking to the nation Israel, you don't get that impression, do
you? He was able to talk to them. Now will you notice this:
So the Lord said to him, "?Who has made man's mouth? Or who makes the
mute,
the deaf, the seeing, or the blind? Have not I, the Lord? Now therefore,
go,
and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall say.?" But he
said, "?O my Lord, please send by the hand of whomever else You may
send.?"
So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses, and He said: "?Is not
Aaron the Levite your brother? I know that he can speak well. And look, he
is also coming out to meet you. When he sees you, he will be glad in his
heart. Now you shall speak to him and put the words in his mouth. And I
will
be with your mouth and with his mouth, and I will teach you what you shall
do.?" (Exodus 4:11-15)
Notice that He said "?words?" and "?your mouth?"-not concepts. God did not
leave it to these men. He didn't give them a thought and then let them put
it into words. God gave them the words. That's all-im****tant. This
business
today of saying, "?Well, I believe the Bible contains the Word of God,?"
or,
"?I believe that the concepts and the thoughts are inspired,?" is
nonsense,
my friend. Let's boil this down. How are you going to communicate a
thought
or a concept? You have to use words to do it. And if you don't use the
right
words, you'll be misunderstood.
The words are inspired. That's the reason I keep saying, "?Let's get back
to
the actual words of Scripture and find out what really was said. What did
John really say in the Book of Revelation? What did Paul really say in the
Epistle to the Romans? What is the actual word he used??" I attach a great
deal of im****tance to the words.
Let's keep reading God's instructions to Moses:
You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor take from it, that
you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.
(Deuteronomy 4:2)
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Prophets' Dilemma
Now let's go to the New Testament. Oh, my friend, we can multiply these
examples by the hundreds! Peter says that the Old Testament prophets wrote
of things they did not understand.
Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who
prophesied of the grace that would come to you, searching what, or what
manner of time, the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when
He
testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would
follow. (1 Peter 1:10-11)
As we see in this passage, all the prophets prophesied diligently
concerning
this grace, this salvation that was coming. They spoke of the sufferings
of
Christ and the grace of God. We find this in Isaiah 53 and in Psalm 22 as
well as in many other Scriptures.
"?And the glories that would follow?" can be found, for example, in Isaiah
11 and Psalm 45. The prophets all spoke of Christ's suffering and His
sovereignty and of the glory that is to come when Christ returns as King
to
the earth to establish His Kingdom.
"?The Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating?" tells us
specifically that the prophets of the Old Testament wrote by the Spirit of
Christ. This is one of the many statements contained in the Word of God
declaring that the Old Testament was inspired of God. These men wrote by
the
"?Spirit of Christ.?"
The prophets wrote some things which they themselves did not grasp. They
searched for the meaning diligently, "?searching what, or what manner of
time, the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when He
testified
beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow.?"
There are many places in the Old Testament that speak of the suffering of
Christ, and there are many other places that speak of the sovereignty of
Christ, of the Kingdom Age. Grace and glory are combined, and it was
difficult for them to understand this. For example, Isaiah wrote in the
fifty-third chapter of the sufferings of Christ; then in the eleventh
chapter he wrote of the Messiah coming in power and glory to the earth to
establish His Kingdom. This seeming contradiction was very puzzling to the
prophets, and they tried to find out how both could be true.
You and I are in the unique position of living in that interval of time
between the suffering of Christ, which is in the past, and the glory of
Christ, which is yet in the future.
It will help you to understand the prophecies of the suffering and
sovereignty of Christ if you picture the two events as great mountain
peaks.
Here in Pasadena we have a backdrop of the San Gabriel Mountains. As the
crow flies they are about five miles away, but driving the winding road to
get there makes them about twenty-five miles away. Mount Wilson is in the
foreground and is approximately six thousand feet high. Behind that peak
we
can see another peak, Mount Waterman, which looks as if it is the same
height as Mount Wilson. Actually, Mount Waterman is over eight thousand
feet
high. However, it looks as if they are the same height and that they are
right together. In actual fact, they are not together at all. A tremendous
valley between twenty-five and thirty-five miles across separates them.
And
I estimate that it is probably fifty miles from one mountain peak to the
other. Yet, seeing them from a distance, you would think they were right
together.
In just such a way, the prophets looking into the future saw the suffering
of Christ and the glory of Christ as two mountain peaks which appeared to
be
right together. I believe that there were skeptics and higher critics in
those days who argued, "?This is a conflict; the Scriptures are in
contradiction. You cannot have it both ways. Either He comes to suffer or
He
comes to reign.?" Of course, we know now that both are true. And the
valley
between them is the church age, which already is around two thousand years
in length.
They saw the Cross of Christ; they saw the Crown. They saw them as two
mountain peaks, but they did not see the valley between where you and I
are.
And Peter says that they wanted to look into these things.
Now let's see the accuracy of the Old Testament in Paul's experience when
he
was in Rome, awaiting trial by Caesar. Though he was in chains, he was
permitted to speak to his fellow Jews as they came with questions about
Christ. Some believed, though others refused to believe:
So when they did not agree among themselves, they departed after Paul had
said one word: "?The Holy Spirit spoke rightly through Isaiah the prophet
to
our fathers.?" (Acts 28:25)
In other words, Paul said to these Jews, "?The Holy Spirit was speaking
through Isaiah, and here is exactly what he said.?"
Go to this people and say:
"?Hearing you will hear, and shall not understand;
And seeing you will see, and not perceive;
For the hearts of this people have grown dull.
Their ears are hard of hearing,
And their eyes they have closed,
Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears.?" (Acts
28:26-27)
That's a tremendous thing!
Notice our Lord's assurance to His apostles when they faced persecution:
For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in
you. (Matthew 10:20)
Now let's look at God's directions to David in the building of the temple:
All this, said David, have I been made to understand in writing from the
hand of Jehovah, even all the works of this pattern. (1 Chronicles 28:19
asv)
And when God was giving a message to the pagan king of Babylon, He wrote
it
in words: "?The fingers of a man's hand appeared and wrote?" (Daniel 5:5).
All the way through, the Word of God makes it clear that it is the words
that are inspired. And that, my friend, is one of the most im****tant
truths
to keep before us.
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Testing the Word
Somebody says to me, "?How do you know, then, that the Bible is the Word
of
God? Have you any tests that you can make??" Yes, we can make tests. I
have
already mentioned fulfilled prophecy, which is one of the greatest proofs.
Remember the great, fearsome image seen by Nebuchadnezzar in a vision
representing three kingdoms which would seize world domination in the
future-Babylon, Media-Persia, and Greco-Macedonia. The prophecies of the
three kingdoms as seen by this man and interpreted by Daniel the prophet
have been literally fulfilled. And God gave to Daniel (as recorded in
chapter 8) all the details concerning the transfer of power from the East
to
the West. So clear is it that the critics launched an onslaught against
the
sixth century b.c. dating of the Book of Daniel. ****phyry, a heretic in
the
third century a.d., declared that the Book of Daniel was a forgery,
written
during the time of Antiochus Epiphanes and the Maccabees (170 b.c.),
almost
four hundred years after Daniel had lived. However, the Septuagint, the
Greek version of the Old Testament, was written prior to that time, and it
contains the Book of Daniel. And, of course, the greatest proof that the
man
Daniel was not a deceiver and his book was not a forgery is the
endorsement
by the Lord Jesus Christ who called Daniel "?the prophet?" and cited a
prophetic truth from his book (Matthew 24:15). And believe me, friend,
it's
amazing. If that were the only prophecy, we might seriously question it,
but
we can't when there are literally hundreds of fulfilled prophecies.
This is another example: Tyre was the capital of the great Phoenician
nation
which was famous for its seagoing traders. They plied the Mediterranean
and
even went beyond that. We know today that they went around the Pillars of
Hercules and the Rock of Gibraltar and into Great Britain, where they
obtained tin. They established a colony in North Africa. Tar****sh in Spain
was founded by these people. They were great colonizers and went a lot
farther in their explorations than we used to think they did.
Tyre was a great and proud city. Hiram, king of Tyre, had been a good
friend
of David and supplied him with building materials. Solomon and Hiram did
not
get along as well as David and Hiram had. Apparently Hiram was a great
king,
but the center of Baal wor****p was there in Tyre and Sidon. A few
generations later, Jezebel, the daughter of a king and former priest,
married Ahab king of Israel and introduced Baal wor****p into the northern
kingdom. Tyre was destroyed by the Babylonians at the same time Jerusalem
was destroyed. Nebuchadnezzar took Tyre.
Therefore thus says the Lord God: "?Behold, I am against you, O Tyre, and
will cause many nations to come up against you, as the sea causes its
waves
to come up.?" (Ezekiel 26:3)
When God says, "?Behold, I am against you,?" you can be sure He is against
that place. Just as the waves break on the shore, God said, nations would
come against Tyre, that great commercial center that had been invincible.
The ruins of Tyre stand today as a witness to the accuracy of the Word of
God. And if you want to disprove the Word of God, the thing to do is go
over
there and build a city on that site. God says you won't.
Also, there is the red-rock city of Petra, a ready-made city. You can get
an
apartment down there with running water out in front of the apartment. All
you have to do is go get it, and you can have that apartment rent-free!
Petra is a city which God said would be without inhabitants, and it's been
vacant all these years!
Let me give another example of fulfilled Scriptures, a very im****tant one,
by the way. One evening one of our friends was showing us pictures of his
trip around the world. He showed pictures of Israel, and I was interested
in
a statement he made. When he showed the country around Jericho and
Jerusalem, he said, "?They call that the land of milk and honey, but I
don't
see how they can call it that!?" Well, here is something interesting. God
said that judgment would come on the land and, friend, that judgment is
still on it today. But that wouldn't end it all.
So that the coming generation of your children who rise up after you, and
the foreigner who comes from a far land, would say, when they see the
plagues of that land and the sicknesses which the Lord has laid on it:
"?The
whole land is brimstone, salt, and burning; it is not sown, nor does it
bear, nor does any grass grow there, like the overthrow of Sodom and
Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, which the Lord overthrew in His anger and
His
wrath.?" All nations would say, "?Why has the Lord done so to this land?
What does the heat of this great anger mean??" (Deuteronomy 29:22-24)
How did the land flowing with milk and honey get that way? This is amazing
to us! It was foretold! That's what the stranger says when he goes to that
land.
Then people would say [and I'm going to say it too!]: "?Because they have
forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers, which He made with
them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt; for they went and
served
other gods.?" (Deuteronomy 29:25-26)
You probably have seen the pictures of the Isaiah scrolls, and the only
value I can see in these Dead Sea scrolls is that they have called
attention
to the terrain around those caves-oh, it is desolate! If you think Death
Valley is bad, you ought to have just a glimpse of the Dead Sea area. My
beloved, God says, "?Look at it!?" And when you see it you will say,
"?This
is not a land of milk and honey!?" Of course it's not. God has judged it.
And He judged it because of the idolatry of these people. He said you
would
ask that question. The Bible tells you the reason: It's because they
disobeyed God, and it is His judgment upon the land. May I say to you, we
observe today many prophecies like that which have been fulfilled. To me
that is unanswerable proof.
There is also a pragmatic test proving that the Bible is the Word of God,
and I think this is a good one. The Scripture itself extends an
invitation:
Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. (Psalm 34:8)
God invites you to come, to taste and see. The Lord Jesus Christ said to
the
critics in His day:
If anyone wills to do His will, he shall know concerning the doctrine,
whether it is from God or whether I speak on My own authority. (John 7:17)
Now, my friend, you cannot be a theoretician sitting on the sidelines and
know this Book is true. You've got to test it. God says so. The proof of
the
pudding is in the eating. In other words, God says, "?I've given you a
Book.
If you want to know whether it's true or not, then you test it for
yourself.
It will stand the test.?"
The trouble with these soapbox artists and these agnostic professors today
is that most of them have never even read the Bible, and yet they reject
it
outright. Oh, my friend, how unfair that is! Why not accept God's
invitation?
There have been a number of prominent men who have repudiated the Bible.
Do
you know why Lew Wallace wrote Ben Hur? He was an agnostic riding on a
train
one day with a friend, and he was spouting off about how he disbelieved
the
Bible. His friend said to him, "?Lew, you're a writer. Why don't you write
a
book to disprove the Bible since you so sincerely hate it??"
Lew answered, "?That's what I'm going to do,?" and he began to study the
Old
Testament. He said, "?I'll find it full of flaws and contradictions.?" He
tested it. Do you know what happened? Lew Wallace came to faith in
Christ-he
became a Christian. And he did write a book, not to disprove the Bible,
but
to try to get other people interested in it. The book he wrote was Ben
Hur.
But, my friend, if you want to test the Bible as he did, you don't need to
read Ben Hur. Read the Book Lew Wallace read. The Bible is the Book he
read.
God says, "?Taste of the Lord, and see.?"
Why don't you be honest? Why don't you try Him out? Why don't you see
whether this Book will work or not?
Another way in which we can know the Bible is the Word of God is through
archaeology. At one time I was very much interested in archaeology;
however,
I've given to my daughter most of my books on it. And although I actually
wanted to specialize in that field, I no longer preach apologetic sermons.
Many young preachers and theological professors stay in that field, and as
long as they are immature they will stay there. But we ought to grow up
sometime and get away from apologetic sermons-that is, an argumentative
defense, trying to prove the Bible is true.
I hadn't kept up with it too much until I read a certain article, and I'm
very much interested in several statements that are here. For instance, it
states that back in the Pentateuch, in three different places, it says,
"?You shall not boil a young goat in its mother's milk?" (see Exodus
23:19;
34:26; and Deuteronomy 14:21). Have you ever wondered about that
statement?
Archaeology has thrown a lot of light on it. The Ras Shamra letters and
tablets that were found have shown that it was a pagan practice to offer
to
a heathen god an animal in the milk of its mother. Now we know why God
said
to His people, "?Don't you do that.?" It was a pagan practice. And I have
heard unbelievers argue about that-"?What's wrong with cooking an animal
in
its mother's milk??" There is nothing wrong in it, unless it's an act of
pagan wor****p, which is the reason it's prohibited in the Word of God.
Now you find many other things in the Bible that the critics questioned
but
archaeologists have confirmed. For instance, a few years ago Sargon
(mentioned in Isaiah 20) was not known in secular history as a king, but
archaeologists found that he was a king. Sargon's son Sennacherib made his
attack on Jerusalem in 701 b.c. and for years the doubters said, "?Look,
there's no mention of that in profane history, so it must not be true.?"
Now
they have found a well-preserved prism in Assyrian script that confirms
the
Word of God. Sennacherib, in describing the siege of Jerusalem says,
"?Hezekiah himself I shut up like a caged bird in Jerusalem.?" Like most
kings, he boasted of every other thing he did, but for some reason he did
not boast of the outcome of the siege. He just said, "?I shut him up in
Jerusalem.?" But the Bible records the outcome three times. It's recorded
in
Isaiah 36 and 37, it's recorded in 2 Chronicles 32, and it's recorded in 2
Kings 18 and 19. For years a great many rejected the Bible because they
said
this event is not in profane history. Well, now it's also in profane
history
but, my friend, it was accurate before it was found in profane history.
What
the Word of God says three times just happens to be accurate.
I have come to the place where I no longer require confirmation by
archaeology. I'm not depending on a spadeful of dirt being turned up to
satisfy my faith. However, I rejoice in the many spadefuls of dirt. I had
the privilege of studying under Dr. Melvin Grove Kyle, who was the
greatest
Egyptologist at the time of his death. I heard him say once in a lecture
in
class, "?There has never been turned up one spadeful of dirt that has
disproved one fact in the Bible.?" That's remarkable, isn't it? You can't
say that of any other book. That ought to make some people begin to think.
I have another reason for knowing that the Bible is the Word of God, and
for
me it is the final authority. That is the endorsement of the Lord Jesus
Christ Himself. Now the Pharisees believed that the Old Testament was the
Word of God. When our Lord was here, He upbraided the Pharisees on
everything under the sun except one thing-He never upbraided them for
believing the Bible was the Word of God. Isn't that interesting? Don't you
know that since He went after the Pharisees regarding so many things that
were wrong, if they'd been wrong on the Bible, He would have corrected
them?
But He didn't. He agreed with them. This is the one place He was in
agreement with the Pharisees, and by not correcting them on it He
confirmed
the Scriptures.
When Jesus came into His temptation from Satan, how did He meet that? By
answering him with the Word of God. And when the devil was talking to Him,
the devil never raised any question about the validity of the Word of God.
That's interesting! Why didn't he say, "?You just wait until the great
minds
of Europe and America come along, and Doctors So and So of Yale. Wait till
those fellows come along. They're going to show that the Bible is not
true.?" Well, the devil didn't say that, and the reason he didn't say it
is
because these fellows could not, and they have not, and no one else has
been
able to disprove the accuracy of the Word of God.
May I say to you, again and again our Lord Jesus quoted from the Old
Testament. For instance, "?When you see the '?abomination of desolation,?'
spoken of by Daniel the prophet .,?" Christ did not finish the sentence by
saying, "?Well, you know that Daniel was not really written by Daniel, it
was written much later.?" He didn't say that. He said "?Daniel the
prophet.?" May I say to you, the Lord Jesus Christ is my final authority.
He put His seal of approval upon it, and that's good enough for me.
My beloved, this which I have presented to you is probably the most
controversial subject that there is today: the inspiration of the
Scriptures. And may I say that this subject is all-im****tant. Especially
would I say this to young preachers. Now I was young once, and I, like
you,
felt it was im****tant to spend a lot of time proving that the Bible is
true.
I remember hearing a great preacher a few years ago say that nothing will
kill a church like a series of messages proving the Bible is the Word of
God. It doesn't need proving, it needs preaching today!
The new book I purchased on archaeology is only a human book. It may or
may
not be true. It can be questioned. I myself question two or three of the
contributing authors. It is a human book, written by fallible humans. But
the Bible is a Book that not only has the facts but examines them. And not
only will it appeal to the intellect, but the Holy Spirit has confirmed
these things and given to my heart an assurance that this is the Word of
God. I like it that way, my beloved.
A young theology professor whom I bumped into at Winona Lake this summer
said to me that he was giving a series of messages on proving the Bible is
the Word of God. I said, "?Are you still doing that? You know that the
professor whom you are studying under has been doing it for fifty years!
Aren't you fellows convinced yet??" Then I told him this, "?You know, I
went
through the same machine that you are going through and the same little
ordeal. It's nice to go through it, but I do hope that someday you come to
the place where the Holy Spirit is going to give your heart an assurance
that it is the Word of God.?"
God's Word will stand all of the acid tests you put to it. Oh, my friend,
here is a Book that will still appeal to your intellect. It will appeal to
all the mental a***en you've got. But it's also going to appeal to
something
else. If you examine the facts and examine its truths, then the Holy
Spirit
is going to make this thing real to you. Then, honestly, you will be
surprised how unim****tant the shovel of the archaeologist really is to
your
faith.
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