Some say there are no dumb questions. It’s also been said that for some questions there
are no answers. But, is it possible there
is no answer because the wrong question is being asked?
Maybe the question here should rather be: ‘What
does inspiration really mean?’ And, who’s
definition should one go by? A
definition according to the current culture?
Or, a definition according to…scripture, itself?
Below is a transcribed message delivered by David Reid
on November 4, 2012. It is not the ‘same
old, same old’ argument. The highlighted areas are some key statements I felt worthy of consideration. I hope it will be of help to you, dear reader,
as well.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
(to listen to the message, click on the title)
by David Reid
by David Reid
DOCTRINE OF
INSPIRATION
Man vs. God
This message will
discuss what men commonly say about the doctrine; and what scripture, itself,
says about “inspiration.” You will
notice that those two views are not the same.
Matt 22:29
Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures,..
Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures,..
When Jesus Christ
is dealing with people during his earthly ministry and they ask him various questions
to temp him, one of the things he says on more than one occasion is, “ You do
err…” (aka: ‘you are mistaken, you are
wrong’) ‘…and the reason why is you don’t know the scriptures, you don’t know
the word of God.’
That same
phenomenon occurs today, all the time.
They have notions in their head, they have ideas in their heads, they
have things they’ve heard people, they have things that are commonly believed;
but, they have errors. There are
mistakes for the simple reason that they have followed men’s thinking; they
have followed men’s traditions rather than the word of God
Mark 7:13
Making the word of God of none effect through your
tradition, which ye have delivered: and many such like things do ye.
Man developed
traditions—things that man thinks, things that man then follows. Those traditions are obviously not based on
the word of God. What often happens when
they don’t have the word of God, what do they go by? They go by their traditions. And, in going by
their traditions, they make the word of God of none effect. In other words, it’s of no consequence; it’s
of no importance in determining what they do—they go by their tradition.
What all this tells
you is that there are many
things popularly believed that are simply wrong. They are simply errors. Some of those things are so widely held that
when you simply say, or simply point out what scripture says, people think you
are crazy. Some of these traditions are
so wide spread and confusion is so broad that people think you are nuts to
point out what scripture says.
One Gospel
For example, it is
widely believed there is ‘only one gospel’ in the Bible. That view can be disproven in dozens of ways,
not the least of which there are verses where there is more than one gospel in
just that verse! And, yet people cling
to the idea there is just one gospel in the Bible. [e.g., Galatians
2:7 KJB]
A common thought is
that, ‘just as today where we are looking backward to the cross, everyone in time
past was saved looking forward to the cross.’
This is widely held, often repeated…but simply not true.
Matthew 19:16-17
And, behold, one came and said unto him, Good Master,
what good thing shall I do, that I may have eternal life? And he said unto him,
Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God: but if thou
wilt enter into life, keep the commandments.
When Jesus Christ
is asked the question, what good thing
shall I do that I may have eternal life, he says, keep the commandments (the Law).
Contrast that with Acts 16:31.
Acts 16:29
Then he [the Philippian jailor] called for a light, and sprang in, and came trembling,
and fell down before Paul and Silas, And brought them out, and said, Sirs, what
must I do to be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.
A ‘simple’ question for you: Do Matthew 19 and Acts 16 say the same
thing? They don’t! They say completely different things. Matthew 19, Jesus Christ says ‘keep the commandments(Law).’ In Acts 16, what is said is ‘believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shall be
saved’; this is not what is said in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The point is there are different gospels in
scripture; it is as plain as can be. You are better off to believe
the scripture rather than men’s tradition on the subject.
With that as
context, let us turn to the subject of inspiration. And, just as I have suggested to you that
there are widely held, but erroneously held views on subjects such as the
gospel, such as on salvation, the confusion about inspiration is so wide-spread that people do not
understand what the basic definition of inspiration is.
Man’s view of inspiration
Below are a couple
of fairly representative doctrinal statements of what men commonly articulate
as the meaning of inspiration.
Chicago statement
on Biblical Inerrancy, Article 6
We affirm that the whole of scripture and
all of its parts, down to the very words of the original were given by divine
inspiration. [7:50]
Moody Bible
Institute Doctrinal Statement, Article 2
The bible, including the old and new
testaments is a divine revelation. The
original autographs of which were verbally inspired by the Holy Spirit. (Footnote: The bible is without error in
all that it affirms in the original autographs and is the only guide for faith
and practice, and as such must not be supplanted by any other fields of human
learning.)
Dallas
Theological Seminary Doctrinal Statement, Article 1
We believe that all scripture is given by
inspiration of God, by which we understand the whole bible is inspired in the
sense that holy men of God were moved by the Holy Spirit to write the very
words of scripture. We believe that this
divine inspiration extends equally and fully to all parts of the writings historical,
poetical, doctrinal and prophetical as appeared in the original
manuscripts. We believe that the whole
bible in the originals is, therefore, without error…
Let me ask this question,
when those statements describe ‘inspiration,’ what is it that they are really
saying? It seems to me what they are saying is that the ‘original
autographs’ were inspired, and therefore ‘without error.’ Notice that the Chicago statement was:
“…down to the very words down, to the original
were given by divine inspiration.” The Moody statement was: “…the original
autographs of which were verbally inspired by the Holy Spirit.” The Dallas statement was: “We believe that the whole bible in the
originals is, therefore, without error…”
So what they are
saying is the ‘original’ (the very first) manuscripts written by Paul, Isaiah,
Hosea, etc. They believe the originals
[not the copies made from them] were in inspired and without error.
Here is the thing
you need to get: if you say “We believe that the originals were inspired and
therefore without error,” what are you saying about the copies? The implicit statement you are saying is ‘the
copies from those originals are NOT inspired.’
Something I’d like you to get is this: the typically-held view is that ‘inspiration’ is about
the originals, not about the copies.
And, because of the fact of “inspiration,” therefore, the originals were
without error. Think through what that
means as a practical matter. Does anyone
alive today have any of the originals?
No. So if freedom from error is
based upon inspiration of the original autographs and doesn’t extend beyond
that, then what do you have? You
don’t have something that is error-free, if those statements are true.
God’s view of inspiration
Up to this point,
we have looked at man’s view of inspiration, now we’re going to look at God’s
point of view on the subject of inspiration.
(The following is
remarkable, you need to test this and see if it’s true [Acts 17:11 KJB]) The bible uses the term “inspiration” only
twice. That’s it! My point is, this is one of the easier
studies you will ever do because there are two verses to look at and if you are going to have a biblical view of what inspiration is, it
shouldn’t take you long how to think about it because there are only two verses
you have to understand.) So, look
at…
Job 32:6-8
And Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite answered and
said, I am young, and ye are very old; wherefore I was afraid, and durst not
shew you mine opinion. I said, Days should speak, and multitude of years should
teach wisdom. But there is a spirit in man: and the inspiration of
the Almighty giveth them understanding.
The interesting
thing is in verse 8 where it says: ‘the
inspiration of the Almighty giveth them understanding.’ Now then, from verse 8, how is scripture
using the word ‘inspiration’? What’s the
Word using it to mean? Well, as you look
at it, it is pretty clear. From the first
part of the verse it says ‘…but there is
a spirit in man.’ Well then,
[biblically speaking] inspiration
pertains to God’s working in the ‘spirit of a man’ to give him
what? Understanding! So, the word is “inspiration.” And the first
part of the verse tells us there is a ‘spirit in man.’ Could it be more clear as to what is going on
there? What is going on is, the word ‘inspiration’ is being used to
describe the concept of God working in a man’s spirit to give him
understanding. Can everyone see
that?
Let me ask you a question;
does the word inspiration in that verse refer to the written scriptures? No, it
doesn’t. It doesn’t say anything about
the written scriptures. By the way, at the time of that verse, how
many written scriptures are there? None! (What is the first book of the bible
written? Job!) So, in Job 32 when that
statement is made, is the individual referring to written scriptures? He
can’t be—there was no such thing at the
time. So what I want you to notice from
Job 32, is if we go by the
biblical view of what inspiration is, it is: “God’s Spirit, working in a man to
give him understanding.” And, it is not solely tied to the written scriptures in that verse…[I
trust] you can see that.
Next, Second Timothy
3. (We’re half way there. Since there are only two verses that deal
with the subject of inspiration, how hard should it be for man to form a biblical view of this subject? Should it take 25 hours of study? Or should it be, you simply ‘read the verses
and believe what they say?’ It is curious,
because man has spent all this time in these man-made traditions when the truth
is rather simple and plain.)
2 Tim 3:15
And that from a child thou hast known the holy
scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which
is in Christ Jesus.
The ‘child’ in that
verse is obviously Timothy because that is to whom the book is addressed. Now then, the verse says, “from a child thou has known the holy
scriptures.’ Is that a reference to
the original autographs? It can’t be! Do you think Timothy’s mother was the one
person on the earth that possessed all the originals? No one believes that, do they? What they had was copies of copies. My point in telling you that is this, God viewed those copies as
sufficient. He viewed them as
authoritative. Let me put it this way,
there is never a time in Matthew, Mark, Luke or John that Jesus Christ says, “the
original sets.” Now if you listen to
radio or TV shows today, what you’ll hear all the time is a lot of people in
the pulpit saying, “Well, in the original, it says ‘such and such.’” Or, “In the original autographs it says, ‘this
and so.’” There isn’t any place in scripture, anywhere where anyone
says that! What you are observing when
you see that, is that you are observing the practice of men. You are not observing something that has been
influenced by how God thinks about the subject.
Let me put the
issue this way: If God created the
Universe out of nothing, which He did—Genesis 1 clearly states that. Therefore, is it hard for him to keep track
of the book he wrote? It’s not! In fact, he has kept track of the book he
wrote so that you and I would have the ability to read it and understand what
he would have us to do. By the way, if
he ‘lost’ the book [meaning: if errors crept in because, you know, he just
misplaced it, or was inattentive and people copied it wrong] then what do you
and I have? You’d have nothing! Right? If that book is wrong, what’s “the
answer” [to be found]? Is the answer in science? Is the answer in what men tell you? Aren’t
those completely and wholly inadequate? Does
Romans 3 read: “Let God be true and every man an authority?” Is that what it says? No! It says…“Every man…” a what? A LIAR!
You either have
God’s word or you have nothing.
Now let’s look at 2
Timothy 3:16…
All scripture is
given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for
reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
Let me pause
here. When it says ‘all scripture’ is it talking about the originals? Well, the first thing that should go through
your mind is what we just looked at in 2 Timothy 3:15 …from a child thou has known the holy scriptures. Was that taking about the originals? It certainly wasn’t! Again, did Timothy’s mom
have the originals? Did God choose
Timothy’s mom and say, “You are the one person on earth that I am giving
custody of the originals to? Please be
careful and don’t lose them.” I trust
you don’t believe that. Well, in 2Tim
3:16, the context tells
you that is not a reference to the original autographs. So then, notice carefully what 2 Tim 3:16
actually says:
All [not just some] scripture
is [NOTE: it doesn’t say “was”, it says
“is”] given by inspiration of God.
What that is a
reference to, is that God
gives man sufficient understanding, in order that the scriptures are as he
wants them to be. Let me ask you
this? Did God write the original
autographs, give them to man and just say: ‘Here it is, we’ll see how it turns out.
Maybe people will make faithful copies, maybe they won’t. We’ll just watch and see.’? Or, did God decide he would be actively
involved in the preservation process? Doesn’t God say in scripture, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my
words shall never pass away”?
Well, if that’s the case, doesn’t that tell you he is involved? Did he just create his word and then sit back
and then sort of twiddle his thumbs and watch?
He didn’t!
What verse 16 is
telling you is that God is
involved in his word throughout time and gives men sufficient understanding—not
that they are perfect, because they are not—but he gives them enough understanding so that his Word is as
he wants it to be.
Let me make this
point, people sometimes have the idea that the men were inspired and that they
were in this trance-like state and they would write down these things. The word ‘inspired’ is actually not a biblical word. We looked at the two verses and the word that
is used both times is ‘inspiration’. The
issue is not the men being in a trance, or the men’s wisdom. The issue is God giving them just enough understanding so that the Word
ends up just as God wants it to be.
In other words, I don’t believe that we have the Bible today because we
have the faithfulness of men throughout time (because men are imperfect, they
are sinners). What I believe is that when God promised to preserve
his Word, he in fact did so! And, God in his wisdom has the
ability to preserve his word even through imperfect instruments—because he has
the power to do that. “We have this treasure in earthen vessels…”
is what 2 Corinthians 4 says.
Now let’s read
verses 16 and 17 together because they are one sentence.
2 Timothy 3:16-17
All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is
profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in
righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all
good works.
What verse 17 says is the reason why we’ve
been given the scriptures is that you would be perfect (mature), throughly
furnished until all good works. Does God
expect the saints to perform ‘good works?’ Absolutely! How is the saint equipped? How is the saint
‘furnished’ to do that? [Well, if we are
to believe God, it is] The word of God!
So, is it important that you have the word of God? Yes, since it is the source, it is the
power supply, it is the guidance as to how you are to perform those good
works! So, if you don’t have the word of God, then according to 2
Timothy 3 you are not actually furnished
to do that which God would have you to do.
All right, so let me make this point...
We looked at those
doctrinal statements that ‘men’ wrote—every one of them tied inspiration to the
originals. Is there any verse anywhere in scripture where ‘inspiration’ is about
the originals? We’ve already
looked at the two that are about inspiration.
In Job, the inspiration verse is before there are any scriptures at all. In
Second Timothy, the inspiration verse specifically refers to the “holy
scriptures” in v15 that belonged to Timothy’s mother, which weren’t the originals. It is a complete fabrication, it
is an invention, it is a hallucination of man to make ‘inspiration’ be about
the originals. There is no
scriptural basis for that whatsoever. Do
I think the originals were given by inspiration? Of course I do! But, what do I also believe? ALL scripture is given by inspiration, not
just some—there is a big difference between the two.
+++
I want to look now
through a number of verses to establish a point beyond doubt in your minds, and
that is this: God has promised to
preserve his word.
Matthew 5:18
For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass,
one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be
fulfilled.
So what is a jot or
a tittle? This is a reference to a part
of a letter. What Matt 5:18 is saying is
that no word will pass away, and it’s not just saying that no letter will pass
away, it is saying that not even part of a letter will pass away. (By the way, are there some letters that if
part of it disappeared you would lose the meaning of the letter?) So maybe this is a rather important
promise. What Matt 5:18 is telling you
is that God’s not allowing any part of his word to pass away.
Matthew 24:35
Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not
pass away.
Luke 16:17
And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one
tittle of the law to fail.
Know what he is
saying there? It is easier to destroy to Universe than for God’s
word to disappear. So do you have
God’s word(s)? Of course you have
it! On the authority of God’s integrity,
his faithfulness, his honesty, the fact that his word means what it says, it
has to be available. If it is not, then
he is wrong and he is untrustworthy. The
point is, you absolutely have the word of God because God has promised to
preserve it.
It is just a massive mistake to
focus the subject of inspiration on the originals is because God is not
concerned solely with the originals.
He is concerned about preserving his word throughout time, because if
the word is not preserved there is nothing to “throughly furnish” you as to the
good works he would have you to do. There is no source of truth in
your life if his word is not there.
I want to give you
a couple examples of some originals in scripture. When we looked at the doctrinal statements
that men wrote there was a great interest in the originals. Let’s see if God himself has such an
interest.
Exodus 32:19
And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the
camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he
cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount.
What did Moses just
do? He got upset and broke stone tablets
(“the originals”) just written by the finger of God. He destroyed them! Isn’t that what just happened!? (By the way, there is never a time in Exodus
that God got bent out of shape with Moses and said, “Moses, you destroyed the
originals and now no one is going to have my word!”)
Exodus 34:1
And the Lord said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of
stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words
that were in the first tables, which thou brakest.
So, did the
destruction of the originals in Exodus 32 pose any kind of problem? Obviously not. Let me ask you this, after God wrote the ten
commandments in Exodus 32, do you think he remembered what they were? Or, did he need those as a record of what he
had written?
Now listen, you’ve
had this happen, I’ve had this happen…have you ever wanted to look back at an
email or minutes of a meeting to recall what had happened? Of course, you
have. In fact, the basic reason you
write things down is so that you can remember what it was later. Well, does God have that shortcoming? Does he say, “Man, I wish I’d written that
down! I know I told Moses something
important…but it just isn’t there!” No,
he doesn’t need that. The point being,
if it is in the mind of God it is never very far away. It’s not as if it can be lost.
Jeremiah 36:1-2
And it came to pass in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the
son of Josiah king of Judah, that this word came unto Jeremiah from the Lord,
saying, Take thee a roll of a book, and write therein all the words that I have
spoken…
So God tells
Jeremiah to take a roll of a book and write down everything that I’ve had you
to say. This roll suddenly comes into
the position of Jehudi, the scribe…
Jeremiah 36:23
And it came to pass, that when Jehudi had read three or
four leaves, he cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was on
the hearth, until all the roll was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth.
What’s happening
is, God’s word as recorded by Jeremiah as written in this roll, Jehudi takes it
and reads it to the king and they don’t like it. So what do they do? They take and cut off a few and throw it into
the fire; which is their act to say what they think of it. In other words, ‘Okay, Jeremiah, we have what
you’ve given us here, we aren’t impressed’ and they throw it in the fire. They are destroying the originals! Those are what came from the pen of Jeremiah.
Jeremiah 36:27-28
When the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, after that
the king had burned the roll, and the words which Baruch wrote at the mouth of
Jeremiah, saying, Take thee again another roll, and write in it all the former
words that were in the first roll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah hath
burned.
Let me ask you
this, do you think it is so simple that if man decides they don’t like God’s
word and they decide to destroy it that God is like, ‘Oh, okay.’ Do you think it works that way? Do you think that man can opt out of the word
of God and say, ‘we’re going to be done with it and destroy it and forget about
it? That’s not the way that it works!
Jeremiah 36:32
Then took Jeremiah another roll, and gave it to Baruch
the scribe, the son of Neriah; who wrote therein from the mouth of Jeremiah all
the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire:
…
So, did they lose anything?
No they didn’t! Then look what it says…
Jeremiah 36:32
…and there were added besides unto them many like words.
In other words,
‘Jehudi, you want to burn this? You’re getting the same thing and I may add
something.’ In fact, maybe he adds this
chapter right here [i.e., chapter 33] to record what happened. You can’t destroy the word of God, it is impossible!
Jeremiah 51:60-61
So Jeremiah wrote in a book all the evil that should come
upon Babylon, even all these words that are written against Babylon. And
Jeremiah said to Seraiah, When thou comest to Babylon, and shalt see, and shalt
read all these words;
Jeremiah has
written down everything that God has spoken against Babylon and put it in a
book and they are going to take it to Babylon and read it against the city.
Jeremiah 51:62
Then shalt thou say, O Lord, thou hast spoken against
this place, to cut it off, that none shall remain in it, neither man nor beast,
but that it shall be desolate for ever.
So that is the
pronouncement of judgment against Babylon.
Notice verses 63 and 64.
Jeremiah 51:63-64
And it shall be, when thou hast made an end of reading
this book, that thou shalt bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of
Euphrates: And thou shalt say, Thus
shall Babylon sink, and shall not rise from the evil that I will bring upon
her: and they shall be weary. Thus far are the words of Jeremiah.
Do you know what is
happening in that verse? They are actually commanding the
destruction of the original! ‘Go
read this to Babylon and when you are done, bind it up and throw it in the
Euphrates. (is the Euphrates a big river? Yes!)
Are they storing it there for safe keeping or are they getting rid of it
permanently? They are destroying
it! Now that didn’t affect the fact that we still have Jeremiah
to this day and that Jeremiah reflects exactly what God wants it to reflect. So, my point is don’t fall into this silly,
silly, silly notion that the destruction of the original words of God’s word
has anything to do with the preservation of his word.
Many of you have
probably seen this in Washington, D.C.
We, of course, have the originals of the Declaration of Independence and
the Constitution. And those are kept—and mostly as a sentimental matter—because
you know what has happened over time, there have been hundreds and hundreds of
copies of those documents. If those
documents were to perish in a fire, would we know what they said? Absolutely!
Because there has been widespread distribution of those documents. Well, guess what friends, do you know what is
the most published book in the world?
Yes, the Old and New Testaments!
If the originals were destroyed…and, by the way, they have been…we still
know what is being said.
Let me put it to
you this way, let’s say that I had some evidence as to some mob criminal
activity and I wanted to make sure to get it to the hands of the authorities
and they were out to get me. (So, think
of a typical movie scenario.) It’s real simple what I would do today. I wouldn’t focus on hiding the evidence in a
safe, know what I’d do? I’d attach it
to an email and send it to those in my Address Book. Now you know what happens? You can NEVER get it back. Know why you shouldn’t post stuff on
Facebook? (Okay, I’ve left preaching and
have gone to meddling…) What you post on
Facebook is there forever. You can
delete it, but that doesn’t mean someone hasn’t copied it and printed it out,
that’s the way it works. So, if I had
information I really, really wanted to preserve, I wouldn’t focus on getting it
in the securest safe in the world. I’d
focus on distributing it as broadly as possible. Because, once I put it in an email and send
it to my whole address book and you read it and it says, ‘Hey this is important
information, please store in a safe place’ and you download a copy, do you know
what happens? It quickly becomes
impossible for anyone to get that back.
And, by the way, that’s the pattern for the distribution of God’s
word!
The way God’s word has been
perpetuated and preserved has been bible-believing saints who read God’s word
and make a copy of it and then they make copies to give to others. And then
they translate them into other languages to give to other people as well. Let me share with you, just within the last
couple weeks there is a young couple that has decided to go back to their
native European country and they’ve taken the time to translate the King James
Bible into their own language. They are
going to take it there, make copies of it and distribute it and no one will
ever be able to get that back because it has been put out into circulation. That’s the way that it works.
There are no dumb questions, just wrong
ones.
So let me ask you
this question. Sometimes people mock the
King James position with, ‘Were the King James translators inspired?’ Well, the first thing you need to understand
about that is they are
using a word that’s not in the bible.
So, is the word ‘inspired’ in the bible? No! The word ‘inspiration’ is. So the real question should be, ‘Was the King
James Bible given by inspiration?”
Well, what did
Second Timothy 3:16 say? “ALL SCRIPTURE
IS GIVEN BY INSPIRATION…” So, any
particular document or version you have, if it is scripture, what is true of
it? It was given by inspiration! If you don’t think it was given by
inspiration, you don’t think it’s scripture.
Right? So what that tells you is
simply this: if the King James Bible is
scripture, which it obviously is, then it was given by inspiration just as all faithful versions of the word of God in
any language are given by inspiration because [biblically speaking, as shown
above] ‘inspiration’ is
God’s spirit working in a man to give him understanding so that his word would
be as he wants it to be.
Let God be true and every man a liar
The first thing you
need to take away from this is, you are better served in life if you make the choice to think about
things the way God’s word thinks about them, rather than the way men think
about them. Men have all their
traditions, all their sayings and, frankly, their confusion. You would be better off tuning that out and
believing what God says on the subject.
There will be a test
The second item is
this, you have God’s word
in your language available to you and God will hold you accountable to it. Let me ask a question. If you show up at the Judgment Seat of Christ
and you [in life] didn’t have any source to tell you what God wants you to do, do
you know what you could say? You could [legitimately]
say: “I didn’t know.” Right?
At the Judgment
Seat of Christ are you going to say, “You know, the bible had errors in it, it wasn't available to us. How were we
supposed to know what you wanted us to do!?”
What would he say then?
Well, what he is
going to say is: ‘It was available. Right there!’
Romans 10:6-8
But the righteousness which is of faith speaketh on this
wise, …what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in
thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach;
Mankind has the idea
that “Truth is elusive” “Difficult to find” “It’s out there, [but] who can know
it?’ Do you know what scripture
says? It says: “It’s nigh thee!” It’s even “in thy mouth!”
An example of ‘in
thy mouth’ is …the world is all the time verbalizing sayings that testify to
scriptural truth—whether they know it or not.
So the world says “out of the frying pan into the fire.” That’s Revelation 20. The world says, “We rob Peter to pay Paul,”
that’s the book of Acts.
So the world has
all these sayings where they unwittingly testify to the truth of the
scriptures. They may have no idea that
that is the case but the point is, is God’s word “elusive and so far away” or is it so close that people
repeat it without even knowing it!?
…is nigh thee, even in thy mouth.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
“Were the King James translators inspired?”
Could it be simply that a definition of terms,
honesty of heart and prayerful consideration are needed so as to come to grips
with the issue? If this question is
asked by one truly seeking an answer, I believe, God will honor it with an
answer. But, if such a question is only to challenge (i.e., stemming from the heart of a bible doubter or a bible corrector
to begin with), I fear they will have more difficulty overcoming the "subtil" echoing
of “Yea, hath God said.”
For who hath known the mind of the Lord,
that he may
instruct him?
but we have the mind of Christ.
[1 Corinthians 2:16
KJB]
