The Nature of God’s Judgment

Transcript

GR 2208
06/02/2019
The Nature of God’s Judgment
Romans 2:4-11
Gil Rugh

We’re in the Book of Romans and so you can turn there in your bible, chapter 2, and then I plan on taking some time for questions after we look into Romans so you can keep that in mind as we work through this section. I have some questions you have submitted as well. Paul is establishing the gospel, the foundation for the gospel is the desperate need of humanity. Sin, sinners, the need of a Savior, so he starts out by establishing the fact that we are all sinners. That’s what we pick up with chapter 1 verse 18 and that will carry us all the way through chapter 3 verse 20 so that we have the conclusion we’ve noted in chapter 3. The section concludes that every mouth is stopped, every tongue is silenced, the whole world has been demonstrated to be guilty before God. And as you share the gospel, you confront the issue that people have a hard time admitting their sinfulness. You know, I may not be a perfect person, but I’m not that bad and certainly I don’t deserve hell. And I think I do enough good that I will be acceptable to God, these kinds of thoughts. And even we, as bible believing Christians, sometimes get soft or mushy, uncertain on the real condition of people. We get emotionally focused and think, well it’s hard for me to think that God would send them to hell. Hard to think that they’re that guilty before God, that sinful, but this is what Paul is establishing and through chapter 1 he established that the whole world is demonstrated to be guilty.

We are in verse 18 of chapter 1, under the “wrath of God” because we are “suppressing the truth” that God has revealed concerning Himself. Now we don’t want to hear what God says. We don’t want to know the revelation of God. We want to conjure in our own mind and our own thinking what is right, what is wrong. And we see the condition going on in our own country as well as the rest of the world but the focus where we are. Any concept of what is sin, what is wrong, it becomes offensive to tell people they are sinners that they are guilty before God. You become the bad person for telling them that. They don’t want to hear it and that’s the condition that’s been established in chapter 1 that includes everyone, but he’s primarily focusing on Gentiles in chapter one, the Gentile world. They didn’t have the Scriptures given to them, but they had the revelation of God in creation, what we call natural revelation. God revealed Himself in nature, what He created, and yet they reject that revelation, yet they’re very religious.

I don’t want to get confused here, the devil is a very religious being so what he desires is worship. Remember the offer he made to Christ in the temptation, showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and said I’ll give these to You if You’ll fall down and worship me. Now we oughtn’t to be surprised, that religious ideas and so on, but we have established down through chapter 1 to verse 32, “although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, they give hearty approval to those who practice them” and the Jews would have agreed wholeheartedly. Yes, the Gentiles are defiled sinners and we’ve talked about it, they wouldn’t eat with Gentiles, they wanted to remain separate. The Jews thought they were all right, we’re God’s people, we have the word of God. God has given His word to us, we have been chosen by Him, so being a Jew became synonymous with being acceptable to God. We are His covenant people, so chapter two is going to focus specifically on the guilt of the Jews.

Now Rome is a Gentile church and a Gentile city, but it obviously has a strong Jewish contingent because when we get to the end of this letter, he’ll have to deal with Jewish laws and food regulations and the confusion it’s causing. And that’s natural because, remember, the early church all the way up until Acts chapter 10, so from Acts chapter 2 up to Acts chapter 10, it is totally Jewish. Some Samaritans in Acts 8 but, basically, it’s a Jewish church until the Gentiles are saved at the house of Cornelius, and then Peter was called on the carpet for even going to the house of a Gentile to tell them the gospel. Their first response was, isn’t it wonderful Gentiles are getting saved. Their first response is, Peter, what in the world were you thinking, going and telling the truth of the gospel. And these are saved Jews, we’re not talking about unbelieving Jews. We’ve talked about saved Jews, so they then understood that this salvation work of God was so great, that it was going to reach out to the Gentiles and bring them to salvation in large numbers. In fact, because of Jewish sin, the sin of the nation in rejecting the Messiah, God’s focal point of salvation in the world would move from Israel, the nation, the Jews, to Gentiles and the establishing of the church so we come to chapter two and his focus is really on the Jews.

We talked about the opening verses. It starts out, “therefore,” in chapter 2 verse 1, “you have no excuse, every one of you who passes judgment.” Now this is getting right to the heart of the Jews because they pass judgment on the Gentiles. They are sinners, they are guilty. The way of salvation for the Gentiles was to become a convert to Judaism. Submit yourself to Jewish laws, circumcision, dietary laws. Salvation has to be, you Gentiles become proselytes to Judaism, so they sat in judgment of the Gentiles. They would have agreed with chapter 1, “you have no excuse everyone of you who passes judgment for in that you judge another you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things.” In other words, you’re just as guilty. You think because you point out the sin of others that makes you righteous? No, you have established the principle of, the necessity of, judgment when you judge another. You condemn yourself because you’re doing the same things. Some of these things would have been abhorrent to the Jews, but we know they end up being guilty of many. They murdered their own Messiah. Their sin is clear, they are doing basically the same things as the Gentiles. If anything, they have a greater guilt because they have a greater revelation.

We know that “the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who practice such things. But do you suppose this O man,” and in is into a form of argument here of interacting as though he was in conversation or debate with another person, and so as he’s addressing these Jewish issues. It’s like I’m confronting you, here’s your argument, here’s my argument kind of thing. “Do you suppose this O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice such things, and do the same that you will escape the judgment of God?” I mean we’ve looked through some of these things; maybe they didn’t do some of them. The open immorality, sort of like some Christians today, that’s the bad sins, that’s the unforgiveable sins, those are….so we sell out. We can be like the Jews that’s for sure bad, but envy, arrogant, at the end of chapter 1, strife, well that’s not as serious a sin and besides we have sacrifices to offer and so on. Do you think you’ll escape the judgment of God?

Now here, “Do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience?” You note how he builds the words here that are really overlapping in meaning and the concept the kindness, the tolerance, the patience and it’s the riches of His kindness, this overflowing abundance of a kindness, and tolerance and patience of God, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance. You have the idea because he hasn’t brought devastating judgment on you, you’re okay. But really, what is happening is you are storing up the judgment that will come. “Because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you are storing up for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, ‘who will render to each person according to his deeds.’” and then he goes on to divide the two groups. Those who will experience eternal life, and those who will not experience it. So we understand what’s going on and we look at the world today and we say, I can’t believe God doesn’t bring judgment.

Now, how bad can it get, how open can people be in their rejection of God, but nothing is getting by so to speak. It’s just storing up judgment and we’ve made reference. Remember when God told Abraham you won’t be able to go into the land of Canaan for 400 years because they are not yet ripe for judgment. Well they were bad, but they weren’t to the point where God says now, and that’s the way the world is, it’s ripening for judgment. We shouldn’t be surprised, we’ve studied Revelation, we know where it’s going. The wrath of God is building, judgment is coming which will culminate in the final judgment that we saw in Revelation 20 with the great white throne and the sentencing to an eternal hell, so you’re storing up judgment. This is what the Jews were doing, they were ignoring the kindness of God to bring them to repentance so they could have the righteousness of God applied to them. Somehow, they made the transition that because they were Jews—again it’s not so different today. People think they are going to heaven because they are Roman Catholics. They think they’re going to heaven because they’re Protestants of one branch or another. They think they’re going to heaven because they’re good people. They think they’re going to heaven because there’s no God who would bring judgment.

Whatever their perspective, it all comes to the same that I will get by in this way, but the only way is the way God provides. So you’re storing up, you’re building it up, because what God is going to do verse six “He will render to each person according to his deeds, according to his works.” Now sometimes we get confused and we want to have the order clear. Works are involved in our salvation, not in bringing it about, but as a result. If you get the order mixed up, you are like the Jews that he’s talking about here. You can’t be saved by your works, but when you are saved, your works will demonstrate it. All the judgments of Scripture are based on works. This quote in verse 6 is from Psalm 62 as you have in the margin of your bible; verse 12 God, “will render to each person according to his deeds” according to his works. Well then therefore, we ought to work to get saved. No, what he’s demonstrating is no one can meet that standard, so he’ll say in verse 7 as he clarifies this and explains it. “To those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory, and honor, and immortality, eternal life,” that’s one class of people “to those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory, honor, immortality eternal life; but to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness wrath and indignation.”

Now one thing that’s clear before we talk about some of the details is, there are only two groups, only two kinds of people. We don’t want to blur things here, those in verse 7, who are going to end up with eternal life, those in verse 8 who are going to receive wrath and indignation at the judgment, there are no in-betweens. There are no gray areas. That doesn’t mean we have clarity on every single person and their true spiritual condition, but God who looks on the heart does, and so the whole world gets divided into those who are children of the devil and those who are children of God. Their deeds reveal what the basis of judgment will be because they reveal the condition of their heart. He elaborates, verse 9, “there will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also the Greek.” Now remember where salvation was, the same order in chapter 1, verse 16. “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek,” the non-Jew, so first in salvation the offer given to them, the provision made first in judgment and so there is no partiality with God.

Verse 9, “there will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also the Greek but glory, honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” “For there is no partiality with God,” verse 11, so we have an impartial God who is going to judge everyone, and it will be a judgment of the heart. We’ll get to this in Ecclesiastes when we get to chapter 12; we jumped ahead and when he’s concluding the matter, you’ll remember God will bring you into judgment for everything you do. Jeremiah 17, why don’t you turn to Jeremiah, I often quote it, passages that you ought to have marked in your bible and be ready to go to Jeremiah 17. You’ll note verse 5, not the verse we’re coming to, but it’s you see the context. “Thus says the LORD, ‘Cursed is the man who trust in mankind who makes flesh his strength,’” (humanity, another human being, himself, others) “and whose heart turns away from the LORD” Verse 7 “Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is in the LORD.” Verse 9 “The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick; who can understand it? I the LORD search the heart, I test the mind (now note this) even to give to each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds.”

Now you note He’s judging, but as Paul wrote to the Corinthians, “it’s a small thing that I would be judged by other men.” The one who will ultimately judge me is the Lord and that will come at a time when He judges the motives of men’s heart’s, so God not only judging the deeds, He’s judging the source of the deeds, the motivation of the deeds, the source coming from the heart that is deceitful and desperately wicked. I search the heart I test the mind even to give to each man according to his ways according to the results of his deeds so you see, ultimately the judgment will be a searching of the heart. What the deeds do is reveal what’s in the heart. It’s not complicated, we reveal what we are in what we do and what we say, because it comes out of the heart.

Come over to Matthew chapter 7, look at verse 21 and this whole context you have to verse 13 “enter by the narrow gate,” travel the narrow way that’s the way of life. Verse 14 the broad way, through the broad gate, traveling the “broad way is the way to destruction,” the same thing two and only two gates, only two ways. Warning “Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves,” you’ll know them by their fruits. Again the fruits, a different picture but the same point, what you’re producing. “Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles are they?” So, “every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. You’ll know them by their fruits,” so then he says, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, in Your name casts out demons, in Your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.’”

It is striking there are going to be people who are self-deluded, self-deceived, but they are guilty and accountable. Why, believe what God says, you’re lawless. I tried my best to be the best person, to be the best husband, to be the best father, to be the best wife, to be the best mother, to do the best at my job, I helped other people, I did many things of--wait a minute, the issue is the submission of the heart to God. Repentance, recognizing my sinful unworthy condition, so these self-righteous acts do not make it. All these religious acts.

I’ve shared with you, we had a neighbor many years ago, got up every morning to go to church and pray for her family, but she was lost. By God’s grace as Marilyn shared with her, she came to trust Christ in her elderly age but all those years. Ought to seem like a good person and you really care and you’re really concerned, and you want to be godly. The problem is, you have to come God’s way. It’s not a way of works. Wait a minute, it’s confusing. One time you’re saying that you know, you know them by their fruit and now you’re telling me the fruit must come from the heart. Hanging oranges on a pear tree doesn’t make the pear tree an orange tree or whatever. So that’s the picture, why you know it by the fruit and if it’s not bearing good fruit, it’s not a good plant.

And there can be things that look good but God’s looking on the heart. Remember Jeremiah 17, He’s looking at the mind the thoughts; He’s looking at the heart. Is this coming out of a heart and mind that has submitted themselves to Me? Recognize, acknowledge their sin their guilt, the unworthiness and cast themselves on My mercy, and say Christ is the only way for me. That becomes the issue, so they’ll be some there that say “Lord, Lord, look at all we did in Your name,’ and He’ll say, ‘I never knew you.’” We never had a relationship. Well that doesn’t seem fair. Well, it is. Why wouldn’t it be? God says come My way, cast aside everything you think you can do and place your faith in Christ, then I’ll make you new and you will produce, because of My power, works that are acceptable to Me.

There can sometimes be things that look similar. The devil is a counterfeiter. We have to be careful but there will be no excuse. Well I didn’t know. We already established that in Romans 1, even those who don’t have the Word of God don’t have any excuse. The Jews will have the Word of God, they have less excuse. We’ll have less excuse than any, we have the completed Word of God, we have it in our hands we have multiple copies of it, yet people sit, grow up under it. There’s no guarantee because you’re born in a Christian family, grow up with Christian parents, attend a Christian church, go to a Christian college, attend a Christian seminary or whatever else you do that that’ll get you to heaven. The only way to heaven is through Jesus Christ, that I bow before Him, God I’m a sinner. I am a sinner, I agree with Your evaluation of me, that’s where were going in Romans, so all these passages on works.

You know when we get to the great white throne in Revelation chapter 20, come over to Revelation chapter 20, I know you have good memories, but I don’t trust your memory. Revelation chapter 20, it’s a reminder. I know you’re familiar with it but there are two sets of books here. Verse 12, “I saw the dead, the great and the small, standing before the throne, the books were opened; another book was opened, which is the book of life; the dead were judged from the things which were written in the books according to their deeds.” So here we are at the last judgment of Scripture, determining eternal destiny and where in hell people will spend eternity, and it’s on the basis of their works, but they’re not going to earn heaven by their deeds. Remember the books are opened; there is one special book, the book of life, because everybody here is going to hell. Anybody’s name that’s not in the book of life is not going to heaven. They’re judged on the basis of their works but is their name in the book of life?

And verse 14, “death and Hades” all those who had died, all those who were in Hades “were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. If anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.” The only way to have a name in the book of life is to be one whose faith is in Jesus Christ the salvation God provides. The works, they’re all here. Greater light brings greater responsibility. Those who had a fuller revelation from God will have a greater condemnation and Jesus established that principle. Those who knew the will of the master and didn’t do it are beaten with many stripes. Those who didn’t know but rebel, they’re beaten with less stripes, but the point is judgment will be fair, it will be according to works. The problem is, you can’t work your way to heaven but when you become a child of God, your works will indicate and manifest His work.

Come back to chapter 2 of Romans. You note some of the characteristic here as we’ve overlaid this perseverance, verse 7 in doing good because what, your focused on what God has promised, the “glory, honor, immortality, eternal life,” that’s the focus we have. Now the fruit of the Spirit that He’s producing in the new life God has given us as we’ve seen in Galatians 5 for example, will manifest itself. There’s a perseverance in faithfulness to God that becomes a characteristic of our lives. It doesn’t mean a Christian never sins, but the characteristic of the life of a true believer is consistency. Some of us were talking recently about some prominent people, some you can see on the Roman Catholic channel, who abandoned evangelicalism for Roman Catholicism. They manifest they never were truly God’s children. Time reveals true character.

There have been people who seem to run well and then they abandon it. Perseverance in doing good, those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, there it is foundational, when you present the gospel to them do they respond in faith to it, obedience to the truth. We are in Ecclesiastes, what is it in a true worship of God, you listen to Him. People have created their own way, they may mix Scripture in, the devil is very well versed in Scripture. He had the audacity to challenge Christ with Scripture in the temptation as Matthew records it. Here, do this because doesn’t the Scriptures say this? Doesn’t matter the fact that they incorporate Scripture in what they do; do they obey the truth, submit themselves to it? Is the Scripture, the Word of God the authority in their life because they’ve submitted to God’s authority, that’s the principle in view here?

Come over to 1 John, chapter 3. You know we see Scripture presents pictures that we have to keep clear on; we have to be careful of wolves dressed in sheep’s clothing. The devil’s plan is to send counterfeit believers even into the churches, what Paul had to deal with in the churches he established. The devil’s quick, infiltrated, provides counterfeits, and then begins to disrupt it and lead it away. John is writing in 1 John chapter 3 and he’s talking about the practice of sin. Verse 2 “beloved, now we are children of God it’s not yet appeared what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.” You see that perseverance we have of this fixed hope. “Everyone who practices sin practices lawlessness, sin is lawlessness. You know He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him, there is no sin. No one who abides in Him sins.”

The biblical doctrine of abiding is simple, and some have confused it. It’s not some Christians are abiding in Christ and some are not. Every Christian is abiding in Christ and Christ is abiding in Him. If you’re abiding in Christ, that’s where you live, and He lives in you and it’s a mutual abiding. We’re not going to take the time to look at that now. It’s a mutual abiding so no one abiding in Him sins and no one who sins has seen Him or known Him. Now I think the tenses here, these present tense, if sin is the characteristic and the practice of your life, you’re not a believer. That’s what he is saying. “Little children make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous just as He is righteous; the one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose to destroy the works of the devil. No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in Him, he cannot sin because he is born of God. By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious: anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one who does not love his brother.”

And he goes on to specific areas like the love of the brethren the consistency in practice manifests itself. None of us are perfect. There’s not a person sitting here, there’s not a person standing here, who has lived his life without sin, even since we’ve placed our faith in Christ. But the pattern of our life manifests God’s character, God’s righteousness, and if it seems we’ve departed and that pattern has become sin, then we have to challenge one another and say, my first question, have you truly been born again? Oh yes, I know I have. Well what’s the pattern of your life? Are you in the word? Ah, no not right now? Why are you doing this sin? It’s not enough to start out well, we finish well. That’s why perseverance. Perseverance, remember the book of Hebrews, “if your soul turns back I have no pleasure in you” in Hebrews chapter 10. That’s why I say those who have turned aside to go to a false religion, a pagan religion, God says I have no pleasure in them. They reveal what they really are. They had a good disguise that lasted for some time, but God says I have no pleasure in them, they don’t belong to Me. He’ll say I never knew you so the tenses here, it’s not that we never sin but the pattern of our life.

What makes that possible, verse 9 “no one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him.” You see we must be born again. That’s foundation. This is what the Jews are missing. They had turned God’s grace in revealing Himself to them into a system of works. It never was salvation by the Law, and when we get to Romans 4 that will be, clearly pointed out. How did Abraham get saved? By faith, Abraham lived 500 years before God gave the Law to Moses. He wasn’t saved by keeping the Law, Abraham believed God.

The Jews have abandoned Father Abraham. They think they’re going to be saved because they’re Jews, and when people go to church, they’re going to be saved because they’re Lutheran, they’re going to be saved because they’re Presbyterians. We went to a Methodist church. My parents had me baptized as a baby, as a Methodist. Why? Well they wanted their baby to go to heaven. My parents had no clue, no concept they were not saved until later as adults. I was already a young person before they were saved, but they were going through the motions. The transformation, you need the seed of God in you as Peter writes, we “become partakers of the divine nature.” We don’t become divine, but the very character of God is supernaturally planted within us. That’s what he said, we’re to be born again, now we are children of God. Now we are different. Now we have different desires. My theology professor in seminary says when God saves you, He saves your wanter. You now want to do the things that please God and its true His seed abides in us. That’s the difference, that’s why we always want to bring people back to the basic facts of the gospel.

Come back to Romans 2. So the principle of judgment is going to be established here and we’ll pick up. He’s going to talk about the Law in a moment. We won’t do it tonight but as he writes it, it’s the next thing picking up with verse 12 of chapter 2. Then when you get down to verse 17, he’ll clearly say it’s you Jews that I have in mind, but “if you bear the name “Jew” and rely upon the Law and boast in God, and know His will and approve the things that are essential,” and on and on it goes. You know what, you can rail against adultery, you can all this, but you’re just as sinful as those you are condemning, because you haven’t come to God by faith, so that’s where he’s going to bring the Jews to, so he builds his case with this argument and clarifying.

And then it’s like he says and your trusting the Law, but you’re no different than the Gentiles, because the Gentiles have a law also, and we’ll talk about that. When you talk about the external creation now is the creation of God, there’s something going on internally that also makes men accountable and aware before God, and so the Jews have a greater condemnation. The Gentiles will have natural revelation and as we’ll see the image of God in them if I can say it that way for now. The Jews have both of those things and also the written Word of God, given to them and yet they’re missing it just as much as the Gentiles, they’re just as lost and just as much under the condemnation of God as the Gentiles. All right let’s have a word of prayer and then I want to talk about some questions you’ve had.

Thank You Lord for Your word, Father, even as Your children we need to be reminded of the seriousness of sin, what the root problem is, so much going on in the world disturbs us, distracts us. We get disillusioned, disappointed, we wonder what is happening even in our own country, more open displays of rejection of You. More open defiance and sometimes we begin to lose heart. Lord, this is the world in which we live, this is the reality, this is the condition from which we’ve been rescued. Lord, we remind ourselves that we are not here because we are different or better than the lost around us, but we are trophies of Your grace. And we are lights in the darkness, and we have the message that people need to hear so that they might turn from their sin to the Savior. The only Savior, the only salvation, so that they can be turned from the rejection of Your kindness and patience, and tolerance to enter into true forgiveness and cleansing, and new life and thus escape coming judgment. Continue to use us to bring this message to others we pray in Christ’s name. Amen.

Okay I have some questions and then maybe you have some you want to bring, so I’ll start us off with a couple and that gives you time to think.

One, this goes back to when we had our men’s retreat. I don’t know that I have a good answer for you, but what is the purpose behind the Indian Hill’s men’s and women’s conferences and seminars? Should they focus on the different roles as outlined in the bible? Consider the recent men’s seminar, the topic was of interest to women, yet they were not welcome.

That’s because it was a men’s seminar but none of the men were welcome at the women’s either, so we try to be equal in our offenses. This was especially unfortunate for women outside of our local body who wanted to hear the speaker. Perhaps the seminars should be role specific in the teaching. I felt bad, some people did come from out of town. They watch the schedule of the speaker and saw he was speaking and came with their husbands and wanted to come in and they couldn’t come to the men’s. Part of the purpose is to provide opportunity for the men to get together as men. We don’t always address subjects that are just for men, but it is a time for men to be together as men.

We try to make clear this is a men’s seminar. We did keep this speaker over for Sunday, and his messages were available, and everybody could come to those. I don’t see anything contrary. We don’t keep the women to always having to be something that’s only addressed to women. Sometimes they’re addressing things that would be true for men as well, but it’s a women’s conference. I think you bring a little different dynamic when you include both sexes together. If you see the condition of the men at the men’s conference, you’d probably be glad you weren’t invited ladies. They don’t even think they have to comb their hair when they get up but, at any rate, you know the men get together, sometimes their open to talk about things that they might not otherwise, it’s just a different dynamic, and the same for the women, so we try to make clear this is a men’s conference.

I don’t check when we’re having an outside speaker. Does he put on his schedule, he maybe puts I’ll be speaking at Indian Hill’s Community Church for example, not specifying on Friday and Saturday it’ll be a men’s conference. So, I can understand, and I wish there wasn’t the confusion, but he could help that by letting his followers know. I don’t want to call them groupies but there are people that appreciate certain people’s ministry, and they do try to catch those ministries when they’re around. Perhaps he should say I’ll be speaking at the Indian Hill’s Men’s Conference on Thursday and Friday and at Indian Hill’s Community Church on Saturday, Sunday rather. I don’t know, we put in our material we have a men’s conference, and the same we do with the women. I think it becomes more an issue as I’ve never had any men who wanted or at least expressed their interest in attending the women’s conference.

But I just think its part of the purpose to bring men together, and sometimes we will address things particularly relating to men, and sometimes the conversation that goes around the table and all is more focused on things that are directed to men and involve men. We have plenty of opportunities for people getting together in mixed audiences, so I don’t have any problem. I don’t know how to correct it when people are following a particular speaker and if he just says he’s coming to Indian Hills and will be speaking on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, I can understand the confusion but that doesn’t mean we will change the way it’s structured. Wherever you go, bring a book and that way if you end up sitting outside you can read the book. We don’t like to have people offended, and I felt bad for the ladies who came with their husbands and were disappointed they couldn’t come into the conference. What can I say, I don’t like to end it by saying that’s the way it is, but that is the way it is.

Okay, this is a different one and I think just address it. Maybe that’ll open it up. This is about attending Sunday school classes, and we have great Sunday school classes, and they attend a great Sunday school class. They don’t say which one but we’ve made great relationships, but sometimes we think that maybe we would like to go and sit under another teacher and get to know some others, but we feel awkward because we feel if we leave our class people will think we didn’t like the teacher, we don’t like the people anymore.

That is a problem. We’d like to encourage, There, for a while, we went to an elective system, remember, maybe to help people do that. You could say well now we’re going to change here, and if you want to go to this class by this teacher, you do it. Every system has its own positives and negatives. I’d just encourage you, if you think you’d like to go into another class you might share it with the teacher. You know Marilyn, when she has taken a break, I think it’s in the summer, I can’t remember, but she’s not in the nursery. She made a practice of attending a different Sunday school class every week, and she’d tell them, you know I really enjoyed it. You know every teacher is different, but every teacher is in the Word. So you may just tell your teacher, “you know I don’t want you to think I don’t like your teaching, and I enjoy the people here. But I’ve been under this for many years and I have to hear Gil every week, I just would like some difference in my life, so I’m thinking of trying another class. Maybe I’ll visit a couple classes, and I may settle into another class and I may end up back here.” I guess just be honest and if that happens, don’t take it personally if you’re a teacher and if you’ve been part of it, that doesn’t mean you still can’t be friends with that person. But, feel free, you all have to come hear me.

Okay, before I go into some others, anybody here have something they would like to ask. Well thanks I uh I wanted to bring up as far as the Bibles, the different interpretations and stuff like I’ve even got the Evidence Bible I even have a Jewish bible and the NIV but is there any problem as you can see with interpretations of different bibles? I was reading some other things and I was wondering, well it’s put in a different light or a different way, it’s saying the same thing but different, like the GNT do you even, okay, do you have any problem with those?

Okay, you know the problem. The Bible was written in languages we don’t use, you know Greek and Hebrew and some Aramaic in the Old Testament, so we’re dependent on a translation and there is a certain subjectivity because you’re going from one language to another. You know how it is with English, we use the English language and sometimes when you’re talking to some that English is a new language to them, they don’t structure the sentence quite right or they’ll use a word, and you can see their using it in that way. We’ll, say well, that word wouldn’t be used quite that way in this sentence so you have that, so sometimes there may be help if you don’t know anything about the language. I prefer to stay as close to a regular translation. You get more into the paraphrase translations, you get more subjectivity into the interpretation. As they expand it to make it, more understandable they want to take out anything that may be harder to understand so they bias it for you if I could say it that way, so I’d be careful.

I think the best thing is probably use a very good translation and then have a commentary that helps with the interpretation because if you don’t know anything about the language and you have, you know four translations before you, how are you going to decide what is the best when all’s said and done. Now sometimes when you read them together you can realize, yeah, I think they’re saying the same thing but this one helps maybe clarify it. But I’ve found that if you’re using multiple translations sometimes it’s more confusing because I don’t have any ability to decide which translation is the best. I go with the New American Standard because almost everyone agrees it is the most literal in staying with word for word. Even those commentaries that don’t use it as the basis for their commentary will often say, you know the New American Standard would--now it’s not as popular a translation. The New English Version, English Standard Version that has become popular is not quite as, I don’t want to say literal as the New American Standard, but it’s a good translation. The New International, it’s a little further out and has more interpretation. I talked with a person who does Bible translation and I said I read your book on translation and I just don’t agree. You think it’s good to take the liberty and decide for the reader how this ought to be interpreted. I think you’ve taken maybe it could be taken two ways; you decide to take that possibility out of the text. He said well I think it makes it more understandable for people. We take these kinds of decisions out of it, we’re probably better able to make it for them. I don’t think so.

So, if the Bible, sometimes I’ll say a passage, it could be taken this way or this way, we went through that, we’re doing that in Ecclesiastes. Some people would translate hebel as vanity or worthlessness. Some translate it as a breath temporal, but it does make a difference and what the whole emphasis of Ecclesiastes is, so that’s where you’re almost better to have a good solid translation and then maybe a commentary to help interpret it for you. I’d prefer that but some people are using the English Standard Version Bible, it’s become more popular. The problem with the New American Standard, it was owned by the Lockman Foundation, and they were very tight, they wouldn’t let anybody print it, they wanted to control the printing of it. They printed their own and so people went to others and they could be difficult to work with, and so their translation got overrun by the others. And they can’t recover, but it’s still, I think, recognized as the most accurate if you want to study the details of Scripture.

What exactly is the GNT, I just ran into that last week in some interpretations?

If it’s the Good News Translation, those tend to be paraphrases more than translations. You know the paraphrase bible, they take a lot more liberty so they’re more interpreting it for you. They’re almost more like a commentary than a translation because they’re deciding what this means and explaining it in their translation, so they tend to be expansive like paraphrases do. So, you know you read them you get an idea, but I wouldn’t depend on it because I always feel I’ve got to go find out what this really says, then you’ve got to go to a more literal translation. I think there’re pluses and minuses on translations. It’s become a market and I don’t know that it helps. Everybody’s selling a bible and a translation, and it can become more confusing than helpful, but I also don’t want to shut the door. It’s what it is but we have all kinds of translations. You know some of you do Scripture Memory. It’s hard to do Scripture Memory where there are so many translations. When I went from the King James Bible to the New American Standard Bible, you know all the verses I’d memorized in King James, so then I’m to put them out and updated and so I end up giving the gist of verses and I’ll say another verse. It goes like this. (First of all, I heard it was the Gil’s New Translation, the GNT. It is Good News, I looked it up.

I have a question that someone texted in Gil. How can we best confront a close friend or family member when dealing with the issue of pride? You know it’s good, and I have another question similar to that in dealing with those close to you that are not where they need to be spiritually and emotionally.

It’s hard to deal with someone else’s problem but I can do what I can to keep it being a problem for me and for my family. I have to decide, there are certain lines that have to be drawn and even for family members or close friends. If they are going to be a problem, I’ll probably have to distance myself from them. I don’t want to be mean to them, but I just can’t maintain a close relationship with a person who’s going to persist with a conduct that is contrary. Now if they’re a believer, I may look for an opportunity to talk to them. Family members and those real close to us usually are not open. It’s sometimes harder to talk to someone else than it is your own family member because “who are you to be telling me?” If it’s a brother or a sister, you’re just my brother or sister. You know Christ couldn’t talk to His own family. His brothers and sisters didn’t believe in Him so it can be a problem. I don’t know that you can change friends and family, the pride that rules them. It’s a spiritual problem. If they claim to be believers, sometimes you can look for opportunity to talk to them about it. You have to approach it rightly, but this is a problem. You come across very arrogantly. You function in a way that your pride seems to dominate what you do. It creates and it does hinder our relationship, but you have to be ready for the consequences of that. They may decide then, okay, we won’t have anything to do with each other, good-bye, so you want to be careful that your heart’s right, you pray for them but nothing else and this I’d tie it to another question I had related to that.

Believing family members here that maybe are in an emotional turmoil and should they be allowed to come and spend time at your house? I’m primarily responsible first for myself before the Lord and then the family, my immediate family, my wife, my children and that sphere. I move out from there, brothers, sisters and you know I have to always respect my parents, but if my parents were being a disruptive influence, I’m probably going to spend less time with them. I’ll still honor them, I’ll still have responsibilities to see they’re taken care of, but you I can’t allow them to come in and disrupt my family. So I think we have to decide this is what is right. I have to do it with the right attitude. I have to be careful but I’m not going to be close to even a family member who’s driven by arrogance. It’s just not going to happen. We can’t be close because I’m not going to adjust to being like you and I don’t want your influence in my life or the life of my family.

And an arrogant person is a disruptive person because they are a selfish self-centered person, so distance is better. That can happen for other reasons, a person that’s in emotional turmoil. You profess to be a believer, you’re in emotional turmoil. Here’s how to handle, I give you instructions from the word, I’ll share with you Philippians 4. No, you can’t come into my house. You can’t bring turmoil to my home. I’m sorry. If you’re serious about it you can fix your situation before the Lord, but you know the pressure put on. Well if you really loved me, if you really cared you’d take me in, and …. no, I love you too much to do that. And I love my family, so we have to take the responsibility we have. That’s all I can deal with and I can’t always fix them, so I have family members I’d be closer to, family members I’m not as close to, that’s fine, and friends that aren’t close friends that their probably far enough away that they aren’t even friends but whatever.

I have another question for you Gil. Okay, in Ecclesiastes and this morning was chapter 5. I think you mentioned in verse 7 that the word “emptiness” there was “hebel” or a derivation of the word hebel. Are there any cases in Ecclesiastes where it does refer to emptiness or vanity in the sense we understand it?

You know a word like that like our English word sometimes in a certain context it can mean one thing and another context it can carry another connotation so there is discussion on that. And we read in certain context you say, well I can see it could mean worthless or empty, of no value, but what I look for is, is it possible for it to be interpreted in a consist way. And so, in Ecclesiastes in verse 7 if I can just thumb over there, because that is a good question and since were studying this when he says, “in many dreams and many words there is emptiness,” even here they move from their word vanity, because if you go to the dictionary like any of our English words you get a whole range of meanings. And so, the context we’ll say usually determines the meaning and so in a sense here you could say, well these are emptiness, they don’t provide anything and that could be true, but it’s also true that could fit with that. This may be the most obvious place where that word hebel could carry a connotation of emptiness or vanity because that would fit well. Many dreams, many words, there’s nothing of value in that perhaps, but it would also fit they’re just temporary things. We’re in the worship of God focusing on that, which is eternal. We’re dealing with the eternal God and His eternal word not these transitory things, not even the good ideas that men might come up with. You know sometimes people come up with things for the church, oh, wouldn’t it be good if the church did this? Well in one sense, it might be good but it’s not what God’s word instructs us to do so I still prefer that word temporal, brief because of that. It makes clear _____ well isn’t it nice if we would do social things to help people. Yeah, I think and there are things we all do things if you have a neighbor that is going through trial, you might make a dinner for that neighbor and take it over. You may cut their lawn, we’ve about talked that. Now to bring that over to the church, something to do, I would say well, that’s a good thing but that’s not a church designated activity. So that’s why I prefer to stay with temporal, transitory fits here well and we don’t bring our ideas to worship. We submit ourselves to what God says and that keeps the emphasis on God’s eternal word but yeah, I wouldn’t permit someone to use that translation of that word there. I would say but I like the consistency and it fits and keeps the focus.

Good, okay we’ve passed 7:30, thank you. I’ll do some of this off and on and I have some of your questions, some things will come up as we move along in Romans and then anything you submit I’ll try to fit in as well. We do keep a record of those. I have a question on James. It’ll take a little longer. I’ll maybe address that in the coming weeks here on James 5.

Okay let’s have another word of prayer: Thank you Lord for the blessing that’s ours to have Your word. How rich it is to have Your very words as our possession. This is the word of the living God. It is a word that’s alive, and powerful. It’s a word that can work in our hearts and minds into our innermost being like nothing else can. Lord, what a rich privilege is ours as those who have come to salvation through the gospel, through the truth given in this word concerning Your Son. And Lord, we want this word to be taken in, to become a very part of our being. We want it to control our lives in all ways in every area so that we honor You. Bless the week before us. May we serve you faithfully wherever we are we pray in Christ’s name? Amen.
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