Understanding the Bible

Transcript

GRM 1148
01/10/2016
Understanding the Bible
Selected Verses
Gil Rugh

As I mentioned this morning in our study I want to continue along the theme of what we were talking about, basically the focus that the God who in His very character is truth has chosen to reveal Himself, to make Himself known. He has done that in creation. We call that general revelation, revelation that is available to all people everywhere, all the time. “The heavens declare the glory of God and the earth shows His handiwork.” But we are focusing on what is called special revelation, revelation that God has given when He speaks and He has spoken and in His sovereignty He has ordained that this be recorded and preserved for generation after generation after generation. So we talked about the Bible being the record of God’s truth, His spoken Word recorded for us. He is the God who cannot lie so the sum of His Word is truth as Psalm 119, verse 160 says. “The sum of Your Word is truth.” So we are blessed to have the very Word of God in our possession.

Now we talked about inspiration. The Spirit of God moved men so that God selected the human instrument that would fit His purpose to use their personality, their characteristics to record the very words that He gave and you have the Word of God coming through a human instrument sovereignly controlled by the Spirit of God so that exactly the words of God were conveyed. The Spirit of God directed in the recording of this Word so that we come to the New Testament they refer to the Old Testament, they refer to it as God’s Word. We saw that like in Hebrews chapter 1, verse 1 and other passages. The Old Testament Scriptures are the very Word of God as are the New Testament Scriptures and we saw in John 14 and then to the Gospel of John chapter 16 where Christ assured His disciples that the Holy Spirit would bring to remembrance for them the things that He taught, the things that He did so that they would give an accurate record of that. He would also disclose to them things regarding the future and perhaps the outstanding example of that is the book of the Revelation, the Revelation of Jesus Christ given to the Apostle John that concludes the New Testament Scriptures and are valuable giving details of the future. So the Spirit of God is key in that. Holy men of old spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit the same as the New Testament writers controlled and moved by the Spirit of God.

Now just a word - the inspiration of Scripture refers to what we call the original autographs, various versions and translations aren’t inspired but they are an accurate record of what God spoke. We are assured of that. We know basically that the Old Testament that Christ was working with when He was on earth is basically the same as what we have. In my earlier class this morning I was sharing that before they found the Dead Sea Scrolls the earliest manuscripts we had of the Old Testament were 1,000 years approximately after Christ so some who did not believe in the authority of Scripture would say, well the apostles probably changed some of that Old Testament and their prophecy so it would fit more to look like it was a prophecy of Christ. Then we found the Dead Sea Scrolls that go back before Christ and we find they were exactly as they were 1,000 years after Christ. No significant changes had been made. For example, the manuscript of Isaiah; no changes in anything, any doctrine, anything like that. We have an accurate record assured. Of the New Testament, the debate is not over, the accuracy of what we have. We have so many manuscripts that we can compare.

One of the writers, a Greek New Testament scholar but an unbeliever, made the observation that those who say we are not sure we have an accurate record just do not have knowledge of the facts. That was William Barkley, a New Testament scholar but did not believe the truth of the New Testament but there is no debate whether we have an accurate record.

So you can expect that the God who gave it originally would preserve it. We want to be careful. Translations are translations. We have the King James only people who think the King James translation was inspired. That is just not so. It may be a beautiful translation. We use the New American Standard Version. We prefer to use a version that translates the Scripture from the original basically Hebrew and Greek, some Aramaic in the few passages in the Old Testament word for word as much as possible versus some translations that translate more by the thought because it wasn’t just the thoughts that were inspired it was words that were inspired. We move away from a translation of the words so King James was a word for word translation as is the New American Standard in contrast to some of the translations like the New International Version which would be more of a thought by thought translation. Just a little bit of background.

We have the Word of God. God has spoken. It was guided and directed by God the Spirit the One we call the third person of the triune God, God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. He moved and directed men. Now we have the Scripture. We have the Word of God. The question comes how do we interpret it, how do we understand it? Why are there so many interpretations and differences even among those who claim to be Bible believing Christians? Why don’t we all agree? It comes down to what we call hermeneutics which simply means your principles of interpretation.

Come over to the book of Corinthians, I Corinthians, Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, chapter 2. Paul has talked about the Gospel and that he came to Corinth preaching the truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He didn’t come to present them man’s wisdom. He didn’t come to wile them with the miraculous. He came to proclaim Christ crucified and he says this is the wisdom of God. The world doesn’t recognize it. The world doesn’t accept it but this is true wisdom. Verse 6, he doesn’t want verse 5: “Your faith to rest on the wisdom of men but on the power of God yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature. A wisdom however not of this age nor of the rulers of this age who are passing away.” Man in all of his wisdom, all of his brilliance does not know truthfully the wisdom of God. “We speak God’s wisdom in a mystery. The hidden wisdom which God predestined before the ages to our glory” and this wisdom is the wisdom of providing salvation. Man comes up with various ideas how man can be acceptable before God. None of it is worth anything. Only the wisdom of God could provide salvation for sinful human beings. That is what he is talking about.

Verse 8: “This is the wisdom which none of the rulers of this age understood for if they had understood it they would not have crucified the Lord of glory but just as it is written, things which eye has not seen, ear has not heard which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him.” The point of this verse is you don’t find it by just purely human means. It is a matter of revelation and apart from the revelation of God which we have in His Word you cannot know God’s purposes, God’s plan and God’s provision for salvation.

You will note the next verse: “For to us God revealed them through the Spirit.” It is a matter of revelation. Sometimes we hear verse 9 used at a funeral “that things which eye has not seen, ear has not heard which have not entered the heart of man all that God has prepared” now when we die we know them. Well of course. When we go into the presence of the Lord we are going to know with a fullness that we cannot know until that time. But Paul’s point is we know it right now. The things you can’t know by just purely human means with human wisdom God has revealed them through the Spirit. That is what we have been talking about. The Spirit is what? It’s the instrument of revelation. “The Spirit searches all things even the depths of God.” Now here is where it gets amazing. “Who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of a man which is in him?” In other words, you know what you are thinking. You are sitting here now but you may be thinking about what you are going to do at work tomorrow, what you are going to have for a snack when you get home tonight. I don’t want to turn your attention away from me but you know nobody knows what is going on within you but you. You know yourself better than anyone outside of yourself can know you. This is what he is saying. “Who among men knows the thoughts of a man except the spirit of man which is in him even though the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God.” Only God can know God. The Spirit of God knows the mind of God, the thoughts of God and He reveals them, amazing.

Now here is where he goes. “Now we have received not the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God.” The Holy Spirit of God who is the revealer of the mind of God, the thoughts of God have been given to us. Why? “So that we may know the things freely given to us by God.” In revelation God speaks not to confuse us but to enlighten us. The Spirit of God who is the revealer of God now comes and resides within us to enable us to know and understand God. “Which things we also speak not in words taught by human wisdom but as words taught by the Spirit combining spiritual with spiritual.” Now note this, “The natural man (the soulish man, the man apart from the Spirit of God) does not accept the things of the Spirit of God. They are foolishness to him. He cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned (examined, appraised) but he who is spiritual, who has the Holy Spirit is able to examine all things but is examined by no one for who has known the mind of the Lord that he will instruct him but we have the mind of Christ.” This is key. This is why it is futile to reason and argue with the unbeliever or as we were talking about earlier today to dialog with the unbeliever. He is in a world of darkness. He may be ten times more intelligent than you are but he has no ability to understand spiritual truth. Did I say we don’t talk to unbelievers? No, we present the truth of the Gospel to the unbeliever. How can he have the Spirit enlighten his mind? “Faith comes by hearing,” Romans 10 “and hearing by the message concerning Christ.” So as the truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is presented to him in God’s grace the Spirit may so work to open his blinded eyes, eyes that are blinded by his sin and by the devil are open by the Spirit to believe and now he can see. The Word of God becomes alive, open, understands it in a way that he did not understand it before. So you have to have the Spirit.

I remember the emphasis of John Whitcomb who has spoken here on different occasions. He said the only apologetic for the unbeliever is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I cannot use scientific arguments and the reasoning to convince the unbeliever of the truth of the Word of God. I must present the Gospel to him. If you have ever been with him he has always got the Gospel of John, the little Gospels of John in his pocket. You go to the hotel with him, he wants to stop and talk to the person at the counter. “I have something to give you that will change your life if you read it and believe it.” That is why we have to bring everything back in our conversation with the unbeliever. I don’t want to talk to them about the other things. I don’t want to debate creation with him and it is futile to talk to them about you know, homosexual marriage or morality or… you have to come back to the issue.

A professor from the university wanted to have lunch with me a number of years ago. When we went to lunch he said, “I want to talk to you about what you believe about the Biblical doctrine of creation.” I said, “I do believe the Bible’s account of creation but that is not the most important thing you and I could be talking about. There is something of much more importance. We have to talk about your soul” and on to the Gospel. We are going to waste our time trying to reason and argue. These things, they are in darkness.

So isn’t it amazing the Spirit of God who is the revealer of God who directed men in writing the Word of God now dwells in the life of the believer to enlighten him to understand what God has revealed, it is amazing. That is why we should not be timid with the Gospel. Well, those people are so intellectual. They know so much more than I know. They know nothing in comparison to what you know. You know God’s eternal plan of salvation. You know the mind of God in providing salvation for a sinful human being. You know the wisdom of God. Don’t try to compete with them on their level. It is futile. You might be more intelligent than them. That is still no reason to try to argue with them. They cannot grasp it. Verse 14: “The man without the Spirit (the soulish man, there is no work of the Spirit in the life) he cannot accept the things of the Spirit of God.” He doesn’t accept them. “They are foolishness to him. He cannot understand them.” That is hard for us to grasp. We think “Well when you are a believer it is clear.” Look, it’s not clear. Close your eyes tightly just for a moment. Look around. Isn’t everything clear? Well, I’ve got my eyes closed, nothing is clear. That is their state. “The god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbeliever lest the light of the glory of Gospel of Jesus Christ should shine in.” So that is foundational.

We have revelation from God. You believe it or you don’t believe it. The heart of this truth is you are a sinner. Christ, the Son of God died on the cross to pay the penalty for your sin. He is the One and only Savior. He is the only One needed. If you believe in Him you will be forgiven, cleansed, be born into God’s family. That is the Gospel.

Now there is much more than that in here. When you believe that now you are in a position to understand it. How do we approach the Word of God now that we have the Spirit of God? We follow a very simple approach. We call it a literal, historical, grammatical approach. This is why even Bible believing Christians differ on their interpreting of Scripture. It is all on what principles are we going to use to interpret the Bible. They go on the presupposition here in light of what we just read, verse 12 of I Corinthians 2, if you are still here, “Now we have received not the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God (now note this) so that we may know the things freely given to us by God.” God intends us to know these things. He reveals them so we know them. They are not muddy. They are not foggy. They are not unclear. But if we approach the Scripture interpreting it on the basis of faulty ideas, false principles of interpreting we are confused.

Come back to Deuteronomy chapter 6, Deuteronomy chapter 6 just for an example, one from the Old and one from the New Testament. I just pulled this out, I almost said out of the hat. That is not a good analogy; just one of so many examples, a simple one. Just before chapter 6 if you back up into the end of 5 which is in my Bible on the same page. Chapter 5 of Deuteronomy, verse 29: “Oh that they had such a heart in them that they would fear Me and keep My commandments always.” The commandments are given to be understood and obeyed. So you come down to chapter 6, verse 1: “Now this is the commandment, the statues, the judgments of the Lord your God which the Lord your God has commanded me to teach you.” Moses being the one to whom these were given, “That you might do them in the land where you are going to possess it.” Verse 2: “So that you and your son and your grandson (because these were given to be passed on and God would guarantee the preservation of His Word) might fear the Lord your God to keep all His statues, His commandments which I command you all the days of your life.” It is simple. God gave His Word to be understood. These are not language scholars. These are shepherd people. These are the people of Israel and they are going to go into the land that God has promised. They are not taking courses in linguistics. There is a simple clarity to the Word of God that comes out just repeatedly through the Word when God holds us accountable for doing what He said. I can’t do what He said if I am not sure what it means and so we come to the Word of God accepting its clarity, the perspicuity of Scripture. It is clear. That doesn’t mean that every passage is just simple. But as we study it, as we are diligent God intends us to understand it.

It goes down through the passage. Jump down to verse 17 of chapter 6 of Deuteronomy. “You should diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God and His testimonies and His statues which He has commanded you.” Verse 20: “When your son asks you in time to come saying, ‘what do the testimonies, the statues, the judgments which the Lord has commanded you’” you shall say and you explain it to him, this is the process.

Come over to the New Testament, John chapter 14 where we were in an earlier study, John chapter 14. Here is the promise that the Spirit would be given but note verse 15 as Jesus speaks on this last night with His disciples: “If you love Me you will keep My commandments.” What does that imply? They are understandable. The Spirit of truth will come and now He is with but He will be in you and has been since the day of Pentecost.

Verse 21: “He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me.” God expects that we study His Word and we understand it and thus we obey it. If it wasn’t understandable we couldn’t obey it.

Down in verse 23: “If anyone loves Me he will keep My Word.” Keep His Word, obey it, to live it light of it. “He who does not love Me does not keep My Words.” And My Word is the Father’s. So there is no conflict or disagreement within the Godhead of course. Christ came to reveal His Father, reveal God. And the Holy Spirit when He comes He is the One who will teach, to guide and give further revelation to those to those apostles.

So that is the process. We come and we understand with clarity so now we approach the Word of God. This is the dividing line and it makes a bigger difference than people are willing to acknowledge. We like to say, “Well as long as we believe on the Gospel.” We have a group and I appreciate what they are emphasizing when they say, “We are together for the Gospel.” But there is more to the Bible than just the Gospel. The Gospel of course is crucial and foundational but our hermeneutics, the same hermeneutics that give us clarity on the Gospel must be applied to the rest of Scripture. When you move away from that clarity and consistency you open the door to all kind of confusion. Now anyone who is, how should I put it, truly saved, truly born again, a true Christian interprets the Gospel literally. If you don’t you can’t be saved. If you do not believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God you can’t be saved. That doesn’t mean that you understand everything when you come to that. I just cast myself upon Him in faith.

The facts of the Gospel are – who is Jesus Christ? He is God’s Son, God in the flesh. If you don’t believe in His substitutionary death on the cross you can’t be saved. There are some who are claiming to be Christians who deny the substitutionary death. That is an oxymoron. You claim you are Christian and you don’t believe in the substitutionary death then how are you saved if He didn’t take your place, pay your penalty? “He bore our sins in His body on the tree that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.”

We have been identified with Him in Romans 6 in His death, burial and resurrection. If you deny the resurrection of Christ you can’t be saved. Well in I Corinthians 15 Paul made that point. If you deny the resurrection and Christ was never raised bodily from the dead there is no salvation in Him. Your faith is worthless and your condition is hopeless.

So everyone who is truly saved believes in interpreting the facts of the Gospel literally. That is why they are Christians in a Biblical New Testament sense. The problem comes we don’t do that moving out from the Gospel. Now we have confusion. We believe in literal, historical, grammatical interpretation. We take it at face value; historical, in its historical context. We understand it. When we read the Old Testament we read about David, about Goliath, we are reading about an historical king in an historical point in time with a literal physical Philistine enemy. We take it in its context, historically.

There is a setting, the Pharisees. So sometimes we talk about it today, use it in application today, they are like a Pharisee but really we have to understand what were the Pharisees in the New Testament in that historical context and so on? We take it in its historical context, we take it grammatically according to the rules in grammar. That is literal interpretation.

The Bible says, “All have sinned.” I was in a university here in town a number of years ago speaking to a theology class. I forget why they invited me but we were talking about the Gospel and at the end there was a question and answer and the theology professor said, “Well you know there are many ways to interpret the Bible.” I said well I don’t think it is that complicated. Let me ask you, “The Bible says ‘all have sinned.’ You go through the Gospel. I mean how would you interpret that?” He said, “Oh, I could interpret that in many different ways.” Well, I said, “I would interpret it just at face value. All means all. That’s all all means. It’s all.

Sin, what does the Bible say sin is? A failure to do what God requires. We are doing something contrary to what God requires. I understand what sin is. It is a failure to be and do what God says we must do. Afterwards, interestingly going through the Gospel walking back to his office he said, “You know Gil, I understand everything you were saying. I was raised in a fundamental Christian home. I just don’t believe it.” Well, I can’t do anything more for him but encourage him to reconsider again but the Gospel literal, historical, grammatical interpretation.

This literal interpretation is what divides Covenant Theology, Reformed Theology and Dispensational Theology. True Reformed Theology they would believe in interpreting the Gospel literally but they do not believe in interpreting the prophetic portions of the Bible literally. Now we are going to go totally different places. If you interpret the Bible literally and I am just going to summarize that word ‘literally’ you will understand that Israel is Israel for the example and the church is the church. The church doesn’t replace Israel, replacement theology. The church is the church and Israel is Israel but if you don’t interpret it literally you say “Well, spiritually, non-literally the church has become Israel. We have the spiritual Israel of God.”

Wait a minute, why would we do that? That is why I say when you abandon consistent literal hermeneutics you have opened the door that will carry you what we call liberalism, and unbelief. Because once you say we are not going to interpret the Bible literally where does that stop? And it is an erosion. I was taught that when I started Bible College many, many years ago. Covenant Theology is the road to liberalism. They wouldn’t like that. I am not saying that everyone who is a covenant theologian is going to deny the truths of Scripture tomorrow but not taking the Bible literally opens the door.

You know what is an erosion of the foundation, improper hermeneutics so now we see the church as Israel and we are in the kingdom and we are building the kingdom and the kingdom ought to be characterized by social action, by social justice and so now we are involved in these kinds of things and as soon as you bring those things in you erode the foundations and pretty soon you have replaced the Gospel with social action. Some of the comments made in the article I mentioned this morning that a reformed theologian, a reformed pastor who was covenantal fits that. We are going to make our community a nice place, a safe place. Well if you are going to make the church Israel what are you going to be doing? Israel was a place God required of them social justice, taking care of the poor. They were an earthly nation. People think well it’s not a big deal we agree on the Gospel. It is a big deal because you have laid the foundation by not interpreting the Bible literally in its given context.

I am not saying again these things are just easy. You know we read Peter, in 2 Peter where he said “Paul has written some things that are hard to understand” but none the less they were intended to be understood and you know how it is. You have been a believer for a number of years and you have studied the Bible. Much more of it is clear and understandable than when you started. That is the process of growing. It doesn’t amaze me we don’t have complete understanding of everything because this is the revelation of God. I am continually growing in my understanding and appreciation.

So we come, we look at it. We take it in its historical setting; interpret it grammatically, at face value if I can put it that way. Then as I study this passage and I have to be careful I compare it with other passages to be sure I have not put Scripture against Scripture. Now you have to be careful here. Reformed theologians talk about the analogy of faith and we would too but I don’t use the term very much because it is being corrupted by their use of it. That is just comparing Scripture with Scripture but be careful you don’t use one passage of Scripture to change another passage of Scripture. That is an improper use of the analogy of faith. Comparing Scripture with Scripture is good but first I want to study this passage of Scripture, understand it and it seems clear to me here. Then I want to compare it with another passage. If they seem to conflict with one another then I want to examine that passage and this passage and see. There may be that this passage, well I can see it could be understood one of two ways but when I compare it with another passage I say well that rules out the other option. So there is the comparison of Scripture.

Then there is the application of Scripture. We want to put it to practice. We are to do the Scriptures. The problem with most churches, evangelical, Bible believing churches is this is where they start. They just want the application, make it practical. Give me four points that will help me deal with two year old tantrums. Then give me 25 points on dealing with 14 year old rebellion and help me with life. Well you know what the Spirit of God does? As we study the truth, as we take it in, as we are nurtured, that’s why we studied Peter “As new born babies long, desire for the pure milk of the Word that you may grow” in respect to your salvation. What happens? As you raise your children to maturity the goal is what? They will learn to make mature decisions so that when they are whatever age is adult they don’t have to come and ask you every question. Not that we don’t sometimes consult with one another but the goal is maturity. We learn how to handle things. That’s why younger Christians go to older Christians and what? Sometimes you talk to them about how to work through, trusting the Lord. The Scripture is practical in and of itself.

In my earlier period of time in the ministry, even here people would come and tell me, “I want something more practical.” Not any of you but some of those. “I want something more practical. We get a lot of doctrine. We need something practical.” I don’t know what to say. You are telling me God is not practical? What He said is very practical. What I learn about His sovereignty is very practical in the application of my daily issues, isn’t it? I face something very difficult tomorrow, I am encouraged to know my God is sovereign. Things aren’t out of control. He is directing. Lord I can walk in confidence. Give me the wisdom to know how to handle this situation and so on.

So the Scripture is very practical. The more mature I am in my walk with the Lord in the knowledge of His word and understanding of it and applying of it in my life, the more prepared I am to deal with life. So that is the application but we don’t start here.

It is easy as a pastor to become authoritative in the wrong way. The only authority I have is the Word of God. The pastors become great in telling people what they should be doing because they are the pastor. I can tell you what the Word of God says and in personal situations there are different ways you implement it in what you are dealing with. If you are going to have major surgery this week and knowing that the will of God for you is perfect, knowing that He will guide even an unbelieving surgeon who is operating on one of God’s children, everything is okay. Can’t guarantee the outcome but we can be assured the outcome will be God’s outcome. And these things, well this is different than someone else that is going to be buying a new car tomorrow. They are looking to God for a different kind of wisdom. So every situation is personal and different and we are God’s children. He wants us matured in His Word and then we are sensitive to the leading and guiding of His indwelling Holy Spirit.

So that is the application of the Word. That is down the road and sometimes we talk about it because it does apply. Now I talk about application when you teach the Word to someone you talk about how it might be applied in a situation but if they don’t have much knowledge of the Word they don’t have a foundation to go from. It is like your youngest child. You have more input in what they have to do and how they should do it but you don’t want that same kind of input when they are 30. Those are decisions they have learned to make and developed in.

You say, well that’s clear. Why doesn’t everybody take the Bible literally? You know why? It is too simple, too simple.

Let me read you something. I have read some of this before. If I read you the same stuff I don’t have to go and get it out of a different source. This is written by a professor at Wheaton College. I am not sure if he is still there. The book is several years old now. He is adamantly opposed to literal interpretation. “If you interpret the Bible literally you have destroyed the mind. There is no opportunity for your mind to expand and grow and be creative. One of the additional consequences of the dogmatic kind of Biblical literalism that gained increasing strength among Evangelicals toward the end of the 19th century was reduced space for academic debate, intellectual experimentation and nuance discrimination between shades of opinion.”

What am I going to do with my great mind if you just interpret the Bible literally? Average Christians will know what the Bible says. What about us scholars? “It leaves reduced space for academic debate.” Of course it does. When God speaks there is no room for debate. It drives him crazy. “There is no room for intellectual experimentation.” That is not the goal of Biblical Christianity. So that is his problem with literalism.

He is talking about in the book this is the scandal of the evangelical mind because literal interpretation has just destroyed the mind of evangelicals because what? You just take it at face value, read it, what does it say? Well, we have to understand when you look at it scholarly with an open mind there is room for experimentation. It might mean this but it might mean this and we have some creative insights here now and now the scholar can be turned loose but this wasn’t written to please the wisdom of man. It was written to reveal the wisdom of God and isn’t it amazing the wisdom of God? The mind of God is revealed through the work of the Spirit so we average and less can understand it.

He talks about literal interpretation. Here is what he says, “It was calculated to attract the uneasy and comparatively illiterate in Biblical lore but wholly unimpressive to one looking for genuine scholarship. If intellectual life involves a certain amount of self-awareness about alternative interpretations where a certain amount of tentativeness in exploring the connection between evidence and conclusions, it was hard to find any encouragement for the intellectual life in the self-assured dogmatism of fundamentalism.” When he talks about fundamentalism he is talking about the literal interpretation. He just shut the door. You say, “Well here is what it says. This is what it means.” And you could go and talk to this scholar and tell him here is what the Bible says and you are not saying what the Bible says, you are wrong. Well you’ve got the Biblical or illiterate. They are illiterate because they are not scholars. They think they have a fixed interpretation. Well I could read you a lot but I won’t.

“Evangelicals almost totally replace respect for creation with a contemplation of redemption.” Well we do start with redemption. “When evangelicalism passed through dispensational pre-millennialism (that’s what you come to when you interpret the Bible literally), the result was a fundamentalism that passionately defended the book, the blood, the blessed hope.” Well we defend the full inspiration of Scripture, the blood atonement of Christ, His death on the cross, the blessed hope which we are looking forward to but that is not scholarly. Basic people who haven’t even got advanced degrees can understand that. My mother didn’t finish high school but she corrected me on some things I was being taught in College. That can’t be right, that is not what the Bible says. Mom, you’ve never been to college, what would you know? It was humbling when I had to go back and say, “You know Mom, you were right.”

It is amazing! God brings His wisdom and He brings it to us. “If evangelicals continue to be influenced by historicists, dispensationalism there is little intellectual hope for the future.” I mean this guy is serious. Here to just take the literal interpretation of Scripture as the dispensationalist does, there is little hope for the intellectual future of evangelicals.

What is his problem with interpreting the Bible literally? I mean how do you interpret the Gospel? We get fuzzy on this. That is why Wheaton now is on an issue because they want to fire a professor who wants to say the Muslims are worshipping the same God as a Christian. How do we get to that point? Fuzziness, keep an open mind. You can’t stop it. He is backing up. If you don’t have to interpret the Bible literally here, we don’t have to interpret it literally here. In interpreting literally allows for figures of speech, metaphors and all of that but it doesn’t allow you to make the Bible just one big metaphor.

I am just reading this. You see, why do we have different interpretations, why don’t all Christians come to the same conclusions on Israel and the church? Note here, this gets tied to creation and he says this. “A Biblical literalism has fueled both the intense concern for human origins and the end times. Literal readings of Genesis chapters 1 – 3 find their counterpart in literal readings of Revelation chapter 20 with its description of the 1,000 year reign of Christ.” Isn’t that terrible? And you know what the alternative to that is? Non-literal readings of the opening chapters of Genesis lead to non-literal readings of the end of the book of Revelation. Well if it is not literal in the beginning it is not literal in the end just who is the authority to say what is literal in the middle? And that middle continues to shrink. That is why I am adamantly opposed to Covenant Theology. It is not enough to say I believe in the full inspiration of Scripture. You must also be committed to interpret Scripture consistently otherwise you end up making it say something else than it actually says.

“Eschatology in other words implicates their holders in a wide range of stances including human origin. If you believe in a literal interpretation of prophecy you will believe in a literal interpretation of creation.” That is what he says. It drives him crazy. Where is the scholar’s mind? This is the scandal of the evangelical mind that there are people in evangelicalism who want to take the Bible literally.

“If the consensus of modern scientists who devote their lives looking at the data of the physical world is that humans have existed on the planet for a very long time it is foolish for Biblical interpreters to say that the Bible teaches the recent creation of human beings.” What about the scientists who study so much of creation and life say the idea of miracles is foolish? The idea of a body being raised is foolish when it is decayed and been eaten by worms or fish or whatever, that is just not scientific. Miracles by definition are contrary to what we say the laws of science. But what has become our authority? “If the consensus of modern scientists is that human beings have been here a long time, the opening chapters of Genesis aren’t true, well then we would be foolish as Bible interpreters to say that the Bible…”

Well, what did we find out? The natural man does not understand the things of the Spirit of God. They are foolishness to him. Now we have put the natural man, scientists, in the position of authority to tell us what we can believe in the Bible or not. How long are you going to believe about miracles? I say this because this is a man in an evangelical school teaching your kids who go there.

Here he goes, “While the question of Old Testament Israel’s relationship to the New Testament church might be worth further debate in narrow theological terms, evangelicals who have made progress in using the Christian faith as a guide to political thought has simply assumed that the whole Bible is relevant to the whole human history and experience.” In other words we just open it up. You might want to talk in a narrow way about the distinction between Israel and the church and find out. But that is not really how the evangelicals who have made progress in using the Christian faith as a guide to political thought. Well who has said that is the purpose of the Bible? Cause us to understand how to make progress in political thought. What am I as a professor going to do?

Now he does admit, “The result of this assumption are by no means uniform. There are all kinds of interpretations now floating out there.” But that is alright. The only one that he is opposed to is the literal interpretation. “These diverse approaches to the Bible leaves evangelical political thoughts scattered all over the map. What these serious minded efforts have in common however, is the repudiation of dispensational squeamishness about the relevance of previous Biblical epics for today.” In other words, all these diverse opinions come from just taking a general open view of Scripture. They are better than the dispensationalists, the literalists interpretation. I mean the literal interpretation talks about Israel being Israel and what was addressed to Israel was addressed to Israel even though we can see application we are not Israel. Well we don’t want to do that but however you see Israel and we can see that it all applies to today so we are back to you can do social action, you can do social justice because all of that if you are just going to take a general view.

With every kind of interpretation he admits we just come with a presupposition that we are not going to interpret it literally.

Okay, one more. I venture to say people think, well do we have to be so firm? You understand how firm they are. He writes a book and won an award from evangelicals. This is a book of hermeneutics that was recommended to me by a former member of Indian Hills indicating the position he now held is being taught in this city. This is Gospel Centered Hermeneutics and he is a Covenant Theologian and he believes that with the coming of Christ you can reinterpret the whole Old Testament. “The coming of Christ means you no longer have to take the Old Testament literally. Now everything can be interpreted in light of the coming of Christ.” One theological journal that reviewed this book, I have to say and it is not a dispensational place says “I don’t even know what he is talking about with Gospel centered hermeneutics.” He is going to give examples of “hermeneutical approaches which I believe are not consistent with the Gospel but which you could be confused into accepting. The hermeneutical approaches are not acceptable with the Gospel, literalism, or evangelical Zionism.” In other words interpreting the Bible consistently literal is not consistent with the Gospel but he would claim to interpret the Gospel literally.

“It seems to make sense that we must interpret the Bible literally but if we believe that literalism is the way to go just what do we mean by it?” In other words he says, “We don’t know really what literal means. Thus literalists claim to take the promises concerning the restoration of Israel, Jerusalem and the temple at their literal face value.” What can be wrong with that? Well for the start determining what the literal meaning is can be problematic. Now you see why I say these kind of hermeneutics are the road to liberalism because if you can’t determine what it means to be literal, how can you be sure Christ was literally raised from the dead? We don’t know for sure what literal means. Then we for sure don’t know what the resurrection of Christ means. Maybe Karl Barth was right. It’s not a physical resurrection. We are talking about something supra resurrection. It’s some kind of spiritual existential reality.

How can we determine the literal meaning? How can we even talk about it? I assume he is expecting those who read his book to take it literally but don’t we have a problem? We don’t even know what literal means. What is literal? This is not an unusual book. It was reviewed positively in Bibliotheca Sacra which is a theological quarterly. Every pastor and Bible student ought to read this book that teaches contrary hermeneutics, contrary to what we have taught. “The New Testament clearly does not support such a simplistic hermeneutic as literal fulfillment of prophecy. The literalists must become a futurist since a literalistic fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy has not yet taken place.” No problem with that. We interpret prophecy literally. We don’t believe we are in the kingdom. He says that is where a literal interpretation will take you.

So this is what goes on. I want us to be clear. I scratch my head when I hear of people who have attended Indian Hills and are now going to covenantal churches. Didn’t you learn anything? What are you doing there? Why did the person who recommended this book on hermeneutics say I am no longer a dispensationalist, I no longer interpret the Bible literally, read this hermeneutic book. This is what I now believe. How did you get so far off track?

We want to be solid and clear. The Bible is clear. We as believers ought to be clear. Not everyone who is a believer, now be careful. Don’t go away and say I said everybody who doesn’t hold our view of prophetic matters is not saved. But they are in a very delicate position because they have adopted a method of interpreting the Bible that leaves open the door who says it ought to be interpreted literally regarding the Gospel? Well we have different things. We have different genre, all of this. No, the Bible was written under the direction of God to express the very words of God so that we might understand the will and purpose of God average people, you and me and others. It befuddles the wisest of the world but it educates the simple believer. That is the beauty of it. That is why we study it together.

Let’s pray together. Thank You Lord for the riches of Your Word. We are in awe that You in Your mercy and grace have called us to Yourself. Lord the beauty and wonder of the revelation You have given in Your Word, the ministry of Your Spirit in our lives, Lord may we passionately commit ourselves to this truth. May we hold fast to it. May we stand against all who would oppose it. May we desire to honor You with our obedience. May we manifest our love to You by our submission to it. May we be bold in telling others of the Gospel that can bring salvation; that can bring light and life and hope to their hopeless lives. Use our lives as a testimony for You in the week before us we pray in Christ’s name, amen.