Hank Hanegraaff

Using the Literal Principle to Understand the Literature of the Bible

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 19:39:00 +0000

You are called to interpret the Word of God just as you interpret other forms of communication in the most obvious, the most natural sense. As it has been well said, to interpret the Bible literally is to interpret the Bible as literature. Thus, when a biblical author uses a symbol or an allegory, we do violence to his intentions if we interpret him literally.

Consider, for example, the Lord’s words in John 2:19: “Destroy this temple,” said Jesus, “and I will raise it again in three days.” The Jews understood Jesus in a wooden, literal fashion. They thought He was saying that the temple, which had taken forty-six years to build, could be destroyed in three days, and rebuilt again in that period of time. Jesus, however, spoke figuratively, as John explained the temple He had spoken of was the temple of His body. Likewise, when the apostle John describes Satan as a dragon, or variously as an ancient serpent (Rev. 20:2), we’d be seriously mistaken to suppose that he intends to communicate that Satan is literally a smoke-spouting snake!

My point is simply this: a literalistic method of interpretation does as much violence to the text as does a spiritualized interpretation that empties the text of objective meaning. So to avoid either extreme, you as a believer need to adeptly employ the literal principle of biblical interpretation. You need to pay careful attention to what is called form, or genre, figurative language, and even the kind of fantasy imagery that the apostle John uses in the Book of Revelation. Now when we talk about Satan being a dragon, dragons are obviously the stuff of mythology, not the stuff of theology.

So you need to exercise your mind to grasp what the author is driving at. Metaphors, when we use them, even in common parlance, are used in ways that have significant meaning. They have sharp teeth. It doesn’t mean that when you use metaphorical language that you’re not pointing to something concrete, or something substantive; it means that you have to use your mind to get what the author is driving at. This is certainly true with biblical forms or figures of speech. As a believer you need to learn to read the Bible for all its worth.

Thus Far, No Further

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 16:01:00 +0000

I recently heard Speaker of the House John Boehner as he talked about the circumstances in our country, and the fact that we are mortgaging the future on the backs of our children. It was a pretty scary message. It was the first message that John Boehner gave outside of Washington since taking over his new post. I also recently participated in a celebration of the King James Version of the Bible. It’s been 400 years now.

I think all too often we take for granted the Bible. We take for granted men like John Wycliffe, who was willing to translate the Bible into the English tongue against opposition to the contrary. Some of you may recall that forty-four years after he had died, his bones were exhumed, his bones burned, and the ashes unceremoniously scattered to the wind.

No doubt some of those ashes made their way to a man named William Tyndale, who likewise began translating the Bible into the English language. He believed the boy who drives the plow should be as familiar with the Bible as was the pope. So he too suffered from the wrath of the Church. October 6, 1536, he was burned alive. While he was dying in flames, he cried out, “Oh God, open the eyes of England’s King!”

Tyndale’s prayers were answered, ironically, by King Henry the VIII, who had Bibles of largest volume chained to pulpits throughout the land. People would come and listen to the immortal words of Scripture.

Then in 1604 King James I commissioned the King James Version of the Bible, which was completed in 1611. There were three versions. I spent some time with a man who actually owns three original copies that were produced between the 1611 version and the 1769 version. What an incredible passion he had for the Word of God as he was collecting old Bibles and recognizing what people went through so that we could have the Bibles we have in every color, size, and shape—every kind of study Bible you can imagine. Yet the apathy in the Christian world towards the Bible is criminal, quiet frankly.

Now you have people who are trying to undermine the Bible in very sophisticated fashion. You have people like Bart Ehrman, Chair of the Religious Studies Department at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, who has written a book titled Forged: Writing in the Name of God--Why the Bible's Authors Are Not Who We Think They Are. Not only does he believe that the copyists who copied the manuscripts were animated by anti-Semitic motives, but he thinks that the very manuscripts that we hold dear were forged. I predict that his book will be another blockbuster bestseller and people will buy uncritically into his nonsense. All the more reason that people who genuinely love the Word of God must become equipped to communicate that nothing could be further from the truth. If you get into Ehrman’s arguments, even though they sound sophisticated, they’re really quite dumb. I point this out in my new book, Has God Spoken?, which is with the publisher and will be released in the autumn. It will be a good corrective to these kinds of attacks on the Bible.

Do you really love the Word of God enough, or do you just say you love the Word of God? Do you genuinely love the Word of God, or do you give mere lip service to it?

The secularists are saying that “we don’t even read the Bible we pretend to defend.” Maybe they have a point there. We are becoming a biblically illiterate church, and its time to stem the tide. Just as Boehner was talking about it being time for us to reign in our debt in the

U.S.

, it’s time for us Christians to say, “Thus far, no further.” We live in the shadow of the Bible, but we can get back to the Bible, and that’s what we’re called to do.

Just a few people can make a difference. Hopefully you’re one of them. That’s one of the reasons we ask you to stand with this ministry, because we’re willing to stand for truth no matter what the cost. If you examine what goes under the rubric of religious studies today, you might well think, “It’s a circus.” But we can make a difference. We can stem the tide. Just a few people willing to stand for truth no matter what the cost eventually became a catalyst for the Bible to be available to us today. Like those who lit the way many years ago, we can light the way today. It’s just a matter of whether we are willing to do for the truth what so many others are willing to do for a lie.

Is the Bible Just a Book of Parables?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 20:27:00 +0000

The pun-meister Bill Maher says some amazing things. “The Bible was not meant to be history; it was not meant to be literal,” he opines. “They were parables; people read it back then and read into it something that was not literal; we’re the dummies who read it literally.” Well, is he right? Is the Bible merely parabolic? Is it true that the Bible was not meant as history?

Interestingly enough, the answer is found in the word genre. Grasping genre or form is crucial in understanding what a text means by what the text says. In other words, to interpret the Bible as literature, it is always crucial to consider the kind of literature that you are interpreting. Where visionary imagery is the governing genre, it’s foolhardy to interpret it literally. On the other hand, where historical narrative is preeminent, it is imperative not to over-spiritualize. Bill Maher is right to associate parables with the Bible, but to do so exclusively is absurd.

No one, of course, applied the power of parable with greater effect than Jesus. Luke 16 chronicles the parable of a rich man and a beggar named Lazarus who was covered in sores and longed to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. In time both died. Their roles immediately reversed. The beggar found himself comforted in Abraham’s bosom. The rich man experienced the foretaste of eternal torment…

Too late…he paid attention to the beggar lying by his gate

Too late…he postponed repentance

Too late…he heeded the testimony of the Law and the Prophets

Too late…too late…too late…

Like a heat-seeking missile, the parable of Jesus Christ always hits its mark. Hopefully the heart of a pun-meister will be next.

The point here is to acknowledge that the Bible is replete with parables, but that is hardly the extent of the matter. Scripture is a treasure chest that abounds in literary genres, ranging from poetry to psalms to historical narratives, didactic epistles, and apocalyptic revelations. We must see the Bible once again as a treasure chest.

Tragically, our postmodern culture does not appreciate literature the way our ancestors did. We do science well, but we don’t do literature well. We know how to read Carl Sagan and Richard Dawkins, but seem ill-equipped to read William Shakespeare and Dante Alighieri.

One must remember that the language of Scripture is a heavenly condescension so that we might apprehend both the nature and purposes of an infinite God. Failure to consider genre leads to a host of unintended consequences. This is particularly so when it comes to apocalyptic portions of the Bible. When Jesus says that the stars are going to fall from the sky, He hardly intends to be taken literally. A single star, of course, would obliterate the earth, let alone a hundred billion stars. Instead, the Heir to the linguistic riches of the Old Testament prophets and a Greater Prophet than them all used the symbolism of stars to pronounce judgment within His own generation. Failure to consider genre might lead to laughs in a comedy routine, but from an eternal perspective the effect is not nearly as funny. We have to look at life, of course, with eternity in mind. If we do, the consequences are life with a Savior. If we don’t, the consequences are condemnation, as the rich man found out. There are only two kinds of people in the world, those who follow Christ and those who deny Christ— those who are Christians and those who are anti-Christians. Which one are you? If you are a Christian, are you committed to making your life count for time and eternity?

Clean Up Job of the Present Abortion Holocaust

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 15:37:00 +0000

For decades we have been sacrificing our children on the altars of hedonism. Even now the axe of God’s judgment has been laid to the root. 2000 years ago Christ warned, “the time will come when you will say, ‘Blessed are the barren, and the wombs that never bore, and the breast that never nursed’” (Luke 23:29). The present day abortion holocaust has driven those words home in dramatic fashion.

Think for a moment about what spiritual and secular leaders in our day are now saying. Beverly Harrison, a professor of Christian ethics, says, “Infanticide is not a great wrong.” Ester Langston, a professor of social work, says, “What we are saying is that abortion becomes one of the choices, and the person has the right to choose whatever it is that’s best for them in the situation which they find themselves, be it abortion, to keep the baby, to adopt it, to sell it, to leave it in a dumpster, to put it on your porch, whatever, it’s the person’s right to choose.” Margaret Sanger, who was the original founder of Planned Parenthood, famously said, “The most merciful thing a large family can do for one of its infant members is kill it.” Nobel Prize Laureate James Watson, co-discoverer of DNA—hardly fringe—said, “Because of the limitations of present detection methods, most birth defects are not discovered until birth; however, if a child was not declared alive until three days after birth, the doctor could allow the child to die, if the parents so chose, and save a lot of misery and suffering.”

While pondering this horrific reality, remember that the present-day holocaust is government funded. In other words, you and I are footing the bill. Now I’ve said this before and it made me controversial, but I’m going to repeat it, abortion is not the real problem. Abortion is the clean up operation. The real problem is sexual promiscuity. And sexual promiscuity is the direct result of how people view their origins—how one views their origins, determines how they live their life. If you believe you are a function of random chance, you’re going to live your life by a different standard than if you know you are created in the image of God and accountable to Him. If there is no objective North Star, morals and ethics are determined on the basis of the size and scope of the latest lobby group. When that happens, chaos breaks out in a culture. You have the sovereignty of self replacing the sovereignty of God. You have survival of the fittest, and the struggle for existence. And, yes, you have a sexual revolution that demands a clean up operation, which has led to a multi-billion dollar government funded plan of taking the lives of the most innocent and vulnerable among us. And now, we can even at times have the privilege of experimenting on them.

Do ideas have consequences? Yes! But we are not here to curse the darkness. The Christian Research Institute exists to equip you to make a difference while there is still time. You can make a difference.

Watching the Unrest in Egypt Remembering the Persecuation of Christians

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 11 Feb 2011 20:25:00 +0000

Hard to believe but we’ve already had a month and a week pass by us in the year 2011, and we are now glued to our television sets watching turmoil unfold in Egypt. I was arrested by an article in the forum of USA Today. That article by Joseph Bottum, by the way he’s a contributing editor to the Weekly Standard, says that, “Perhaps the situation in Egypt will resolve itself peacefully. Or perhaps we'll see a long stretch of public unrest before the nation finally stumbles its way into a new form of stable government. But there's one easy prediction to make: Whatever happens, Egypt's Coptic Christians are going to be hurt, unless the United States makes a major diplomatic effort to help them.” [1] The article goes on to say that “the current unrest, which began with a car bomb in Alexandria killing 21 at a Coptic church on Jan. 1 and continued through the massacre of 11 Christians in the village of Sharona on Jan. 30.” [2]

It was Ironic, just before I was reading this article I was thinking about some of the persecution I personally endured as a result for standing for truth no matter what the cost. Then I read this article. Immediately, I fell to my knees thinking, “There’s persecution and there’s persecution. Egypt’s Christians are hardly alone in their persecution. “Catholic bishop stabbed to Death in Turkey." That’s one of the headlines we read not all that long ago. Here’s another, "Islamist hard-liners in Indonesia target Christians." Here’s another "Iraqi Christians mourn after church siege kills 58." Iraqi Christians mourn after church siege kills 58. The Christmas season saw 48 killed in Muslim attacks in Nigeria.On Christmas Day, Iran opened its campaign against conversions by arresting dozens of evangelicals. Bombs left on the doorsteps of Christian homes in Iraq killed two and injured 14 on Dec. 30” [3]. That’s five weeks ago.

The article goes on to say that “the single most dangerous thing in the world to be, right now, is a Christian in a Muslim country…Up to 1.4 million of Iraq's Christians have fled since the war began in 2003…America foreign policy has been little concerned with religious persecution…Barack Obama has systematically watered down U.S. diplomacy: Where we once demanded ‘freedom of religion,’ a public liberty, we now speak only of ‘freedom of worship,’ a lesser and private right.” It then says, “Nearly every day since Christmas, Christians have been murderously attacked for the simple fact of being Christians,” and “Our willful blindness is shameful, and our inactivity is wrong. The United States must preface every diplomatic exchange with an Islamic country by demanding religious liberty and a halt to persecution. And we need to do it now — while there are still a few Christians left to defend in their ancient homelands.” [4].

All of us, as we participate on the Bible Answer Man broadcast today by listening or calling in need to be aware that even as we speak there is real persecution going on around the world. And we must not only pray for the pesecuted church, whether in Asia, or Africa, or even in America. We must pray for the persecuted church, and we must simultaneously recognize that the church has always been forged in the cauldron of persecution. That’s when real Christianity manifests itself. It’s when real Christianity impacts empires. It’s why in China right now there may be as many as 130 million Christians growing and thriving in the cauldron of persecution, not looking to mere earthly vanities, but elevating their gaze to eternal verities.

It is time for us in America to begin living with eternity in mind and, if we do, we may well make a difference not just for time but for eternity. If we do, we’ll stop listening to the conspiracy theorist, who are concocting all kinds of conspiracy theories on television, watched by millions of Christians, which are the kind of conspiracy theory that titalates. They’re sensational. They’re great for ratings. But they do very little for the cause of Christ.

1. Joseph Bottum, “Who will Defend Mideast Christians,” http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2011-02-07-column07_ST_N.htm

2. Ibid

3. Ibid

4. Ibid

Science and Religion Aren’t Friends?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 16:53:00 +0000

One of my habits every morning is to read through USA Today among some of the other newspapers that I peruse, and this morning I read the Forum in USA Today, and quite frankly did so before I had breakfast. I think that if I was eating breakfast at the time I would have had indigestion. I read the forum portion which was authored this time by Jerry Coyne, a professor of evolution at the University of Chicago, and I might be dealing with this article all week, there’s a lot to chew on here. The title is “Science and Religion Aren’t Friends.”[i] He says one relies on truth whereas the other relies on hope and obfuscation. Trying to equate the two or giving religion undue authority, does the world no good. I think the article would be better rendered “Naturalism and Religion Aren’t Friends.”

I want to read just the opening of this article, and make a couple of comments. Coyne says,

Religion in America is on the defensive.

Atheist books such as The God Delusion and The End of Faith have, by exposing the dangers of faith and the lack of evidence for the God of Abraham, become best-sellers. Science nibbles at religion from the other end, relentlessly consuming divine explanations and replacing them with material ones. Evolution took a huge bite a while back, and recent work on the brain has shown no evidence for souls, spirits, or any part of our personality or behavior distinct from the lump of jelly in our head. We now know that the universe did not require a creator. Science is even studying the origin of morality. So religious claims retreat into the ever-shrinking gaps not yet filled by science. And, although to be an atheist in America is still to be an outcast, America's fastest-growing brand of belief is non-belief.

But faith will not go gentle. For each book by a "New Atheist," there are many others attacking the "movement" and demonizing atheists as arrogant, theologically ignorant, and strident. The biggest area of religious push-back involves science. Rather than being enemies, or even competitors, the argument goes, science and religion are completely compatible friends, each devoted to finding its own species of truth while yearning for a mutually improving dialogue.

As a scientist and a former believer, I see this as bunk…[ii]

Now the article goes on, but I can’t get into the rest of it right now, I’ll leave that for tomorrow, and perhaps the next day, I want to point out that here again you have a supposed scientist making a dogmatic assertion rather than a defensible argument over and over and over again throughout the article, failing to recognize that science was invented in Christian universities, and it came out of the notion that reason devoid of revelation always ends up in the blind ditch of ignorance.

So Coyne says, “Recent work on the brain has shown no evidence for souls, spirits, or any part of our personality or behavior distinct from the lump of jelly in our head.”[iii] Kind of reminds me of nineteenth century science, in which a fertilized human egg was though of a microscopic blob of gelatin. We now know it’s among the most ordered complex structures in the entire known universe. But as so often happens in science reporting, the interpretation of the empirical facts is confused by Jerry Coyne with the facts themselves. Although he says recent research on the brain and human cognition proves that there is no material or I should say immaterial soul or spirit, he confuses his interpretation of the facts with the facts themselves. In truth, the recent work in brain research is quite compatible with anthropological dualism or body/soul dualism—it’s the idea that we have a soul or a mind distinct from the brain.

I’m not sure that Jerry Coyne has really thought out the implications of his paradigm from the perspective of logic or legal ramifications or even libertarian freedom. Because, from the perspective of logic we can demonstrate that the mind is not identical to the brain. We can do that by proving that the mind and brain have different properties. The subjective texture of our conscious mental experiences, like the awareness of color, is different from anything that is simply physical. If the world were only made up of matter the subjective aspects of consciousness simply would not exists. I think if Jerry Coyne would reflect for just a moment he would be convinced that the experience of color involves more than a mere wavelength of light.

From a legal perspective, if human beings were merely material they couldn’t be held accountable this year for a crime committed last year, simply because physical identity changes over time. So from a purely material perspective the self who did the crime in the past is literally not the same self who in the present is going to be punished. Legally and intuitively, of course, we recognize a sameness of soul that establishes personal identity over time.

If we were merely material beings, as Jerry Coyne supposes, then libertarian freedom or freedom of the will simply does not exists. Instead, we would be fatalistically relegated into a world in which everything is determined by mechanistic material processes. If I’m merely material, my choices are merely a function of genetic makeup or brain chemistry.

The implications of this worldview chronicled in the Forum in USA Today are profound. In a worldview that embraces fatalistic determinism, I can’t be held morally accountable for my actions. Why? Because reward and punishment make sense only if we have freedom of the will, and in a solely material world, reason itself is reduced to the status, well of conditioned reflexes. Even the very concept of love would be rendered meaningless.

I’ll tell you, I’ve said this many times right here on the Bible Answer Man broadcast, ideas have consequences. When Coyne says that “science is even studying the origin of morality,” he ought to think twice about what he’s talking about. There are all kinds of people buying into his worldview. Everything is a function of blind mechanistic material processes. What then grounds a moral position? There are people, like Ted Bundy, who confess to over thirty murders, who had a conversation with his victim, a girl that he was about ready to murder and rape, and he wants to take this idea, that idea that comes out of nothing producing everything—which is absurd notion—to its logical conclusion. Here’s what Bundy said—again he’s taking about a victim, in fact he’s specifically addressing a victim, think about your daughter, about to be raped and murdered—this is what Ted Bundy said, “I learned that all moral judgments…” in other words he was brought up the school of evolution. He learned that,

All moral judgments are value judgments, that all value judgments are subjective, and that none can be proved to be either right or wrong…I discovered that to become truly free, truly unfettered, I had to become truly uninhibited. And I quickly discovered that the greatest obstacle to my freedom, the greatest block and limitation to it, consists in the insupportable value judgment that I was bound to respect the rights of others…

Now as I’m recapitulating the words of Ted Bundy, recognize how eloquent they are, how precise they are, how erudite they are. He’s taking something that he’s learned, he’s no dummy, and he’s drawing it to its logical conclusion. He goes on to say,

I asked myself, who were these others? Other human beings, with human rights? Why is it more wrong to kill a human animal than any other animal, a pig or a sheep or a steer? Is your life more to you—

He says to this girl that he’s about ready to rape,

—than a hog's life to a hog? Why should I be willing to sacrifice my pleasure more for the one than for the other? Surely, you would not, in this age of scientific enlightenment, declare that God or nature has marked some pleasures as moral or good and others as immoral or bad? In any case, let me assure you, my dear young lady, that there is absolutely no comparison between the pleasure I might take in eating ham and the pleasure I anticipate in raping and murdering you. That is the honest conclusion to which my education has led me, after the most conscientious examination of my spontaneous and uninhibited self.

So on what moral grounds can someone like Jerry Coyne provide a response to Ted Bundy? In a materialistic world, how can you say that it was ok to speak out against slavery in Great Britain in the seventeenth century, after all it was completely culturally acceptable? My point here is simply to say ideas have consequences and the horrendous consequences of what people are buying into glibly when they read USA Today like this morning’s “Science and Religion Aren’t Friends,” are dramatic for how we view our world, but more than that what we do in our world. Jerry Coyne the evolutionist is simply wrong; in fact dead wrong; devastatingly wrong.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[i] Jerry Coyne, “Science and Religion Aren’t Friends,” USA Today, http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2010-10-11-column11_ST_N.htm

[ii] Ibid.

[iii] Ibid.

Snowflake Number 94

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 12:59:00 +0000

I have long said right here on the Bible Answer Man broadcast that it is an established scientific fact that human life begins at conception, that an embryo has a distinct human genetic code, that an embryo exhibits metabolism, development, the ability to react to stimuli, and that an embryo demonstrates cell reproduction; therefore, discarding embryos or destroying them through experimentation is the moral equivalent of killing innocent human beings. When you extract a stem cell from an embryo, you are killing a human being. I’ve always understood that intellectually, this weekend I began to understand that in a real life experience.

I met a little girl named Alysse. She is 4 ½ years old. She was a frozen embryo for two years. That embryo was thawed, implanted in the uterine wall of her mother, and she today is a beautiful, bright, bubbly little girl that I held in my arms, and I was able to read Bible stories to. If I ever had an experience of ideas having consequences, it was this weekend holding that little girl, and seeing that that embryo could have been discarded, except that her parents recognized the reality that life begins at conception. So they got involved in a snowflake embryo adoption program, and little Alysse, 4 ½ years old, is snowflake number 94. I met her, and I told her, “You know what my favorite number is? It’s 94.” And she smiled knowingly.

What an incredible thing to see, a child that came out of a frozen embryo. What a warning to us that we should not in a cavalier fashion discard embryos as though they’re simply microscopic blobs of Jell-O. No. They’re among the most ordered complex structures in the entire known universe. David said it well,

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
When I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
Your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me
Were written in your book
Before one of them came to be (Psalm 139:14-16, NIV)

This is a warning to Christians, really quite frankly, that we need to know what we believe and why we believe it, because it has real practical implications. It’s not about ivory tower theories. No. What we believe has real practical dynamic and life giving reality associated with it. Know what you believe and why you believe it, particularly when it comes to the sanctity of human life.

Who Was Melchizedek?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 13:08:00 +0000

We start the broadcast today with a Facebook question from Richard who writes, “I would love help understanding what Hebrews 7:3 is communicating?” Of course that is the very enigmatic passage that you find concerning Melchizedek. He is described as “king of righteousness, and “king of Salem,” which means king of peace” (Heb. 7:2). He is also said to be “without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, like the Son of God, he remains a priest perpetually” (Heb. 7:3, NIV).

We should note immediately that the Bible not only designates Melchizedek as “king of righteousness,” and “king of peace,” but overtly tells us that he is without father or mother, he is without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, and that like the Son of God he remains a priest forever. So though he did not trace his descent from Levi, yet the Bible tells us that Melchizedek collected a tenth from Abraham, and then blessed Abraham who had the promises (Heb. 7:2, 4). And then the text tells us without a doubt the lesser person—Abraham—is blessed by the greater person—Melchizedek. In the one case, the tenth is collected by men who die and in the other case by him who is declared to be the living, so note that in contrast to men, who die, Melchizedek is declared to be the living (Heb. 7:5-10).

Despite of all the evidence, of course, over the years one word caused me to question Melchizedek as a Christophany or a preincarnate appearance of Christ. That word is the word “like.” I thought that this might have been an analogy for Christ or a type of Christ. But at looking at this more clearly, I discovered that “like” is hardly a game changer. That particular Greek word, by the way, is only used once in the entirety of the New Testament. (I’m not saying “like” in English, but the Greek Word that was translated “like” in this particular context.) Therefore, I think it is unwise to be dogmatic about the definition of that word as translated into the English language.

If “like” is properly translated it doesn’t negate the notion of Melchizedek as a Christophany. All you have to do is look at the words of Daniel, where Daniel says, “In my vision at night I looked, and there before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven. He approached the Ancient of Days and was led into his presence” (Dan. 7:13, NIV). And then contemplate the reality that despite the word “like” in that passage, Jesus combined this very passage with Psalm 110, which is that great coronation psalm, in evidence of the fact that He was in fact divine. And He used that argument before Caiaphas and the court that is condemning Him to death. So, again, the fact that the word “like” is there, shouldn’t cloud our understanding of the passage.

There’s little doubt in my mind in reading Hebrews 7 the great coronation Psalm 110 in which Melchizedek is also mentioned, and then the Genesis passage where Melchizedek appears to Abraham that this is a preincarnate appearance of Jesus Christ. It’s a Christophany very much like the Angel of the Lord appearing in the Old Testament.

What eventually changed my mind was looking at the biblical text. What initiated the looking at the biblical text was the Dead Sea Scrolls, quite frankly. The Melchizedek Scroll is a classic case in point where you find Melchizedek and the Almighty as words that are interchanged by the Essenes. So as they studied the Old Testament, they saw Melchizedek very clearly as the Almighty. Now the Dead Sea Scrolls are not the acid test, it is the Word of God that is the acid test, but it did cause me to look more closely at the biblical text.

Interpreting Scripture in light of Scripture, I think that it is very clear that Melchizedek is in fact a Christophany. He is in fact a preincarnate appearance of Jesus Christ.

Should We Control the Number of Children We Have?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 15:50:00 +0000

Let me answer a Facebook question from Alison, who writes, “Should we ever try to control the number of children we have? More specifically, should a woman ever have her tubes tied, or should a man get a vasectomy?”

I don’t know why people ask me these questions. I have twelve children, nine natural children and three adopted children, so this is probably not a question for me. But with respect to birth control methods that should be avoided at any cost are those methods that destroy or prevent the implantation of an embryo, because an embryo is a living growing human being from the moment of conception.

Openness to children is as well an built in protection against the abuse of sex for mere self-gratification, and it is absolute imperative that as Christians we view children as a blessing not as a blithe. Our attitude of seeing our children as a blessing is something that pleases our Heavenly Father.

I think it’s also significant to recognize what’s going on when you have a fertilized human egg. That’s the beginning for the tapestry of life unfolding with a single thread and then through a process of incredible precision a microscopic egg in one human being is fertilized by a sperm cell from another and that marks not only the beginning of a brand new life, but it also marks the genetic future that life will have. Think about this: A single fertilized human egg, a zygote, the size of a pinhead, contains chemical instructions that would fill more than five hundred thousand printed pages. And the genetic information contained in that encyclopedia determines the potential physical aspect of the developing human being from height to hair color. Of course in time, the fertilized egg divides into thirty-trillion cells that make up the human body. You’re fearfully and wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14). This includes twelve-billion brain cells, which form more than a hundred-twenty-trillion synapses or connections.

If you lived in Darwin’s day, you would think a human egg to be nothing more, for all practical purposes, than a microscopic blob of gelatin. But today we know in an age of scientific enlightenment that a fertilized egg is among the most organized complex structures in the universe. In an age of scientific enlightenment it is incredible to think that there are people who would snuff out that human life in an early stage of existence. And that is precisely what we’re talking about with birth control methods that actually abort a conceptus. So we need to be very careful to guard against that. As long as you’re using a birth control method that does not involve that it becomes a matter of prayer between you and your spouse recognizing the biblical principles that I outlined.

But I’ll tell you as a 60 year old man now with a lot of kids knowing my predisposition early on which was with all the ministry that I wanted to do I didn’t want to have a huge family but my wife did. I am so happy that I listened to the wisdom of my wife because I cannot imagine life without my kids today. So kids are a blessing, and you can’t presume on the future, you just don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, a lot of people who think they can’t afford kids fail to recognize that it’s not about the arm of flesh; it’s about the arm of God. God will give you, what you need. Not always your greed, but certainly He will provide for your needs.

Does God Harden Hearts?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 17 Aug 2010 19:27:00 +0000

On Facebook where we regularly post articles, discussion topics, and ministry announcements, Chris has this two part question: If God wants all people to come to Him, why does He in both the Old and the New Testaments harden their hearts? Or, as 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 says blind the minds of unbelievers and veil the Gospel to those who are perishing? So in essence Chris is asking: Why does God blind people’s hearts? Why does He veil the Gospel? Why does He harden people’s hearts, after all He wants people to come to Him, why would He do that?

Well, first of all, hardening—the first part of the question—is interesting in that if you read the Word of God, you will see that mercy from God becomes the occasion for hardening. The quintessential case in point is Pharaoh. Every time God showed mercy to Pharaoh, Pharaoh responded by hardening his heart (Exod. 3-15). So God’s mercy is the occasion for hardening, but as the text explicitly tells us, Pharaoh also hardens his own heart (cf. Exod. 8:15).

With respect to the second part of Chris’ question: context, context, context! 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 does not say that God hardens the hearts of people or veils their hearts or blinds them; rather, this passage says, “the god of this world” does those things (cf. v. 4a). For example, Paul says the Gospel is not veiled but the Gospel is set forth plainly in the very verses that precede the passage that is noted by Chris (cf. 3:12-4:2). So the Gospel is not veiled, it’s plainly revealed. That’s what the text says. And then the text goes on to say that even if it is veiled, it is not veiled because God is veiling it, but it is veiled because “the god of this world,” or Satan is veiling it. It is he who blinds the minds of unbelievers. And then, says Paul, Satan becomes the de facto ruler who all who willingly subject themselves to his masterful deceit.

If we don’t belong to God, the God of the ages, then we belong to the god of this age. If we don’t belong to the Sovereign of the universe, we belong to Satan. There are only two kinds of people in the world—those who love darkness and those who love light. Jesus said to Nichodemus, “Light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil” (John 3:19). In other words, they want darkness, they don’t want light.

Good question by Chris, but once again, it is not God who veils the Gospel, it is not God who blinds the mind, it is the god of this age, which is precisely what Satan is called.

Parable of the Workers in the Vineyard

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 16:27:00 +0000

I want to address an issue brought up on the Bible Answer Man broadcast, which is an issue I did not have the time to deal with completely. A caller named Patricia asked about the parable of the workers in the vineyard. Christ says,

The kingdom of heaven is like a landowner who went out early in the morning to hire men to work in his vineyard. He agreed to pay them a denarius for the day and sent them into his vineyard.

About the third hour he went out and saw others standing in the marketplace doing nothing. He told them, “You also go and work in my vineyard, and I will pay you whatever is right.” So they went.

He went out again about the sixth hour and the ninth hour and did the same thing. About the eleventh hour he went out and found still others standing around. He asked them, “Why have you been standing here all day long doing nothing?”

“Because no one has hired us,” they answered.

He said to them, “You also go and work in my vineyard.”

When evening came, the owner of the vineyard said to his foreman, “Call the workers and pay them their wages, beginning with the last ones hired and going on to the first.”

The workers who were hired about the eleventh hour came and each received a denarius. So when those came who were hired first, they expected to receive more. But each one of them also received a denarius. When they received it, they began to grumble against the landowner. “These men who were hired last worked only one hour,” they said, “and you have made them equal to us who have borne the burden of the work and the heat of the day.”

But he answered one of them, “Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?”

So the last will be first, and the first will be last.
—Matthew 20:1–16, NIV

Patricia was asking for the meaning of this parable. The parable of the workers in the vineyard is interesting in that those who worked all day long were actually envious of those who worked a fraction of the time. Why? Because they did not understand the concept of grace. They got what they bargained for. In other words, they got justice, though they accused the landowner of injustice. Those who do not understand grace and condemn the Grace Giver are not going to inherit the kingdom; for those who condemn grace, no grace will be given.

I remember reading R.C.H. Lenski, an expositor who once said, “The pearls of grace are never thrown before the wicked and self-righteous swine.”1 To accuse and condemn grace is the surest way to lose grace. Therefore, Jesus said, “the last will be first, and the first will be last.” No matter how good one believes that they are, grace is lost when grace is rejected.

____________

1. RCH Lenski, Interpretation of St. Matthew’s Gospel (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg Publishing House, 1943), 779.

Seeing the Unseen God

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 18:11:00 +0000

I am just back from Orlando, Florida, which is one of my favorite trips of the year as I participate in Student Leadership University. I did a series on worldview issues as well as answered questions for students, and one of the questions asked was “If you can’t see God, how can you really know that God exists?”

It is not uncommon for skeptics to suppose that we as Christians are irrational for believing in a God that we simply cannot see. In reality, it’s irrational for skeptics to presuppose that what cannot be seen doesn’t exist! The fact that something that cannot be seen does not presuppose that something doesn’t exist. We know black holes, electrons, the laws of logic, and the law of gravity all exist despite the fact we can’t see them! Indeed even a full blown empiricist holds fast to the law of gravity if he is standing on top of the Eiffel Tower.

Not only that, but as King David exudes, “The heavens declare the glory of God, the skies proclaim the work of his hands” (Psalm 19:1). Or in the words of the apostle Paul, “God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made so that men are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). If you want to put it another way, the order and complexity of the visible, physical, universe eloquently testify to the existence of an uncaused first cause.

One final point, God can be seen through the person and work of Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul explains that “in Christ all the fullness of Deity lives in bodily form” (Colossians 2:9). Indeed, it is the incarnation of Jesus Christ that is the supreme act of God’s self-revelation. Through the ministry of the Holy Spirit, we experience the power and the presence of God in a way that is more fundamentally real than even our perceptions of the physical world in which we dwell. Now we see but a poor reflection, just like in a mirror; but then one day in heaven we’re going to see face to face. Now we know in part, then we’ll know fully just as we too are fully known (1 Corinthians 13:12).

Redefining Tolerance

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 13:54:00 +0000

From a recent front page article in USA Today, we learn that evangelical Christians are leaving evangelical Christianity en masse, particularly children—70% of them leaving the Christian faith, no longer believing that the Bible is the infallible repository of redemptive revelation or that Jesus Christ is the only way to God.

Today, tolerance is being redefined to mean that all views are equally valid and all lifestyles equally appropriate. As such, the notion that Jesus is the only way is vilified as the epitome of intolerance.

Rather than capitulating to the culture, however, Christians must be equipped to expose the flaws of today’s tolerance, while simultaneously exemplifying true tolerance. To say all views are equally valid sounds tolerant but in reality is a contradiction in terms. If indeed all views are equally valid, then the Christian view must be valid. The Christian view, however, holds that not all views are equally valid. Thus, the redefinition of tolerance is a self-refuting proposition.

We do not tolerate people with whom we agree. We tolerate people with whom we disagree. If all views were equally valid, there would be no need for tolerance.

Today’s redefinition of tolerance leaves no room for objective moral judgments. A modern terrorist could be deemed as virtuous as a “Mother Teresa.” With no enduring reference point, societal norms reduce to mere matters of preference; and, as such, the moral basis for resolving international disputes and for condemning such intuitively evil practices as genocide, oppression of women, and child prostitution is seriously compromised.

In light of its philosophically fatal features, Christians must reject today’s tolerance, and revive true tolerance. True tolerance entails that, despite our differences, we treat every person we meet with dignity and respect due them as those created in the image of God. True tolerance does not preclude proclaiming truth, but it does mandate that we do so with gentleness and respect.

In a world that is increasingly intolerant of Christianity, Christians must exemplify tolerance without sacrificing truth. Indeed, tolerance when it comes to personal relationships is a virtue, but tolerance when it comes to truth is a travesty. As Jude puts it, “Be merciful to those who doubt; snatch others from the fire and save them; to others show mercy, mixed with fear—hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh” (vv. 22–23).

We should not be microcosms of the world—but change-agents within the world…because Truth matters.

Questioning the Question

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 20:23:00 +0000

In Proverbs 26 Solomon tells us that we are not to answer a fool according to his folly, or we’ll make fools of ourselves. On the other hand, Solomon continues, answer a fool according to his folly, or the fool will think he is wise in his own eyes (vv.4–5)—he’ll think he has uncovered some wisdom. We often find this sort of thing with questions that are raised in order to denigrate the notion of an eternal Being, an Intelligent Designer, or an uncaused first Cause.

One of those questions is “Can God create a rock so heavy that he can’t move it?” That question is a classic straw man that has most Christians looking like the proverbial deer in the headlights. At best, the question challenges God’s omnipotence; at worst, it undermines His existence.

At the very outset, however, we should recognize a problem with the premise of the question. While it is true that God can do anything that is consistent with His nature, it’s absurd to suggest that He can do just anything. God can’t lie (Hebrews 6:18). God can’t be tempted (James 1:13). God can’t cease to exist (Psalm 102:25–27).

Furthermore, just as it is impossible to make a one-sided triangle, so it is impossible to make rocks too heavy to be moved. What an all powerful God can create, He can obviously move. Put another way, not even an omnipotent God can do the logically impossible.

A wide variety of similar questions are raised to undermine the Christian view of God. Therefore, it’s crucial that we learn to question the question, rather than simply assume that a question is valid

The Myth of the “Dark Ages of Christianity” is No Laughing Matter

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 17:39:00 +0000

Most of you can remember exactly where you were when you first heard the tale of Christopher Columbus and his raw courage in the face of mutinous sailors who were in mortal terror of sailing over the edge of a flat earth. Who among us is not familiar with the term “Dark Ages”?

Sociologist Rodney Stark points out in his book The Victory of Reason that what we’re largely unfamiliar with is the reality that far from being “benighted fanatics clinging to Scriptural claims that the earth was flat” for the “first fifteen centuries of the Christian epic, nearly unanimous scholarly opinion pronounced the earth spherical.” Likewise, only in the revisionist history of skeptics like John Stewart and Stephen Colbert are the “Dark Ages” dark and the Renaissance enlightened.

What really happened is a matter of history and evidence. The millennium that encompassed Greek and Roman history is more correctly characterized by irrational superstition than rational supposition. Greco-Roman thought was shackled to the illogical presupposition of an eternal universe that was ministered by moody gods. Little wonder that almost a thousand years after Aristotle, Roman aristocrats, spoon-fed at the table of Greek enlightenment, dwelt in drafty domains and never dreamed of a coming Christian epic in which the invention of chimneys, clocks, and capitalism would revolutionize Western Civilization.

In place of a rational God who orders the universe according to knowable principles, Greek sages and their Roman counterparts fixated on the capriciousness of the gods. As such, Socrates would render astronomical observations a “waste of time,” and Plato persuaded devotees to “leave the starry heavens alone.” They obsessed on astrology, but left astronomy an unexplored domain. They mastered the magic of alchemy, and remained blithely ignorant of the majesty inherent in chemistry.

Even more shamefully, “enlightened” Greco-Roman civilization had scant regard for human equality. As a slave master, Plato reasoned that “nature creates a slavish people lacking the mental capacity for virtue or culture, and fit only to serve.” And Aristotle famously remarked, “some are marked out for subjugation, others for rule.” Of course, women fared no better, for in Rome female babies routinely expired in the shadow of Nero’s image—their tragic cries a testimony to the terrors of sexual inequality.

Here’s my point: The notion that the enlightenment of the Greco-Roman world was separated from enlightenment in the modern world by the Dark Ages of Christianity is nothing more than useful propaganda. It was Christianity and Christianity alone that shattered the superstitions of the Greco-Roman world. An unbiased reading of history demonstrates conclusively that the rise of Western Civilization is inextricably linked to the DNA of a biblical worldview.

Well, today, that biblical worldview is mocked by culturally corrosive comedy, and our children are at stake, because for every five-hundred hours they spend in church, a 17 year old has spent more than fifty-thousand interacting with the mass media.

For more on culturally corrosive comedy, listen to my interview with Ted Baehr, co-author (with Tom Snyder) of “Culturally Corrosive Comedy: The Daily Show and The Colbert Report,” Christian Research Journal 33, 2 (2010).

Listen to the show

The Book of Mormon: NOT Another Testament

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 17:47:00 +0000

Open the Book of Mormon and the very first words that you will encounter are the following:

“The Book of Mormon is a volume of holy scripture comparable to the Bible. It is a record of God’s dealings with the ancient inhabitants of the Americas and contains, as does the Bible, the fullness of the everlasting gospel.”

The Book of Mormon goes on to say that it is the record of two great civilizations. One came from Jerusalem in 600 BC, whom afterwards separated into two nations known as the Nephites and the Lamanites. The other great civilization is known as the Jaredites. After thousands of years, all were destroyed except the Lamanites, and they are the principle ancestors of the American Indians.

The last survivor of the war between the Nephites and the Lamanites was a military commander named Moroni. Following his death and resurrection, Moroni appeared to the prophet Joseph Smith and instructed him relative to the ancient record and its destined translation into the English language. That very day, September 21, 1823, Moroni told Joseph Smith the location of golden plates that were inscribed in “reformed Egyptian” hieroglyphics. He had abridged these plates allegedly with the help of his father Mormon.

Smith not only secured the golden plates, but along with the plates, a pair of magical eyeglasses. And with the eyeglasses, he translated the “fullness of the everlasting gospel.” Upon the culmination of this, the most miraculous a feat, Smith said, “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than any other book.”

Here’s the problem, there is no archeological evidence for a language such as “reformed Egyptian” hieroglyphics. There is no archeological evidence for lands such as the land of Moron, which is described in Ether 7:6 of the Book of Mormon. There is no archeological evidence to buttress the notion that the Jaredites, Nephites, and Lamanites migrated from Israel to the Americas. Indeed, archeology and anthropology demonstrate conclusively that the people, places, and particulars chronicled in the Book of Mormon are little more than the product of Joseph Smith’s fertile imagination.

What about the Bible? What if through anthropology and archeology there was demonstrable, conclusive evidence that the Bible is not the Word of God, that like the Book of Mormon it is replete with mythology? If that were to happen it would be an absolute game changer, because, like Mormonism, Christianity would lose all its credibility. But exactly the opposite has happened. With virtually every turn of the archeologist’s spade, there is more and more evidence that the particulars, the people, the places, the details, the descriptions found in the Bible are in fact painstakingly accurate, meticulous, and true.

In an age in which the Mormon Church is attempting to pass itself off as mainstream, Christians must learn to recognize the counterfeit gospel of Mormonism by recognizing the Mormon mirage for just that. It is crucial that Christians are equipped to scale the Mormon language barrier and use Mormon doctrinal deviations to effectively communicate the everlasting Gospel of the historic Christian faith. And we say it’s “historic” because it’s rooted in history and evidence. Mormons need to know the truth.

Seeing Old Testament the Shadows of Temples, Sacrifices, and Diets Fulfilled in the Light of Christ

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 18:54:00 +0000

Over the last couple of days, so many people have been calling in and vociferously communicating that we need to continue adhering to the civil and ceremonial laws we find in the Old Testament. I’m surprised at how popular that sentiment is in modern evangelical Christianity.

I was in fact discussing with one man just the other day Jesus Christ’s words, “Do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from the outside cannot defile him, because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and is eliminated?” (Mark 7:18-19a). Jesus Christ in saying this meant it is not shellfish that makes you unclean; rather, it is those things that proceed from the heart. Mark, of course, parenthetically adds in saying this, Jesus “declared all foods clean” (Mark 7:9b). Well, the man’s response was that’s a parenthetical remark and therefore it holds no weight whatsoever. But that is a most egregious error. We should never revert back to Old Testament types and shadows, which have been gloriously fulfilled in Jesus Christ.

In Christ the Old Covenant order, including temple sacrifices are obsolete. They disappeared in the light of Jesus Christ. The type and shadow of the first and second temples, they don’t find their substance in some kind of Tribulation temple followed by another temple—a Millennial temple. They find their substance in a church built of living stones comprised of both Jew and Gentile with Jesus Christ Himself the capstone. Jesus made this typological relation to the temple when He said “one greater than the temple is here.” All Old Covenant types and shadows, including the Holy Land, the Holy City, and the Holy Temple have been fulfilled in the Holy Christ. There is no need or use for a rebuilt temple with reinstituted temple sacrifices. There is no need to go back to type and shadow.

The teaching that the temple must be rebuilt and that temple sacrifices must be reinstituted not only stands in direct opposition to the Book of Hebrews but it undermines the central hope of the Christian faith, which of course is the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ for all sins—past, present, and future. If our evangelical death march towards the endgame of Armageddon is to be subverted it will be because believers recommit themselves to faithful exegesis to mining what the Holy Spirit has breathed into the text as opposed to superimposing our models onto the text.

My prayer, of course, is that the Holy Spirit gives us clear minds and open hearts as we plug into the power of Scriptural synergy daily by interpreting Scripture in light of Scripture. At the end of the day we must always ask ourselves the question: “Are we willing to sacrifice our treasured traditions on the altar of biblical fidelity, or has tradition become our god?” Perish the thought.

Rediscover the Word

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Thu, 20 May 2010 18:45:00 +0000

If you’re in the Legacy Reading Plan, we’re right in the middle of spring, and during the month of May, we read through 1–2 Kings and 1–2 Chronicles. I just finished the book of Kings.

It is quite stunning to read about how in 2 Kings 22-23 that Josiah finds the Book of the Law in the Temple, and tears his royal robes because he is undone by the fact that from the time of the judges the kings did not celebrate Passover. Israel is called to be a light to the nations and through types and shadows demonstrate to the world that God had provided a plan of redemption through a coming Christ. Yet, the very ones who are called to bring this light to the nations had forgotten the Book of the Law.

So you read in 2 Kings 23 that Josiah gave the order to all the people to “Celebrate the Passover to the Lord Your God as it is written in this Book of the Covenant. Not since the days of the judges who led Israel, nor throughout the days of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah, had any such Passover been observed. But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was celebrated to the Lord in Jerusalem” (2 Kings 23:21–23, NIV).

Of course, we know the rest of the story, just as the Northern Kingdom had gone into captivity, so the Southern Kingdom would soon forget the Book of the Law again, and go into exile in Babylonia.

Think about today. The biggest problem we face is the problem of biblical illiteracy. It is not a problem, it is the problem. If we forget the Book of the Law—if we forget the Law that God has in fact inscribed upon the very tablet of our consciousness—we are guilty before the Lord. We are those whom God has revealed Himself to, and we are called to be priests to the people around us. It is no longer necessary to have a priest, we are the priesthood of all believers, and therefore we are called to be witnesses for Christ to a lost and searching world, which of course is the mission of the Christian Research Institute—equipping God’s people so that, first and foremost, they become so familiar with truth that when counterfeits loom on the horizon, they know it instantaneously, and to equip God’s people for works of service so that the body of Christ might be built up and strengthened.

A Legacy Altar

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 20:27:00 +0000

This month in the Legacy Reading Plan we’re in the book of Joshua, which is such an exhilarating book. We so often talk about the time the Israelites left Egyptian captivity, and crossed over the Red Sea with God parting the waters to make way for them upon dry ground (Exodus); yet, so often we forget that after they left exile and crossed the Red Sea, they likewise entered Paradise, or the land of Palestine, by way of crossing the Jordan River, and God performed the same miracle! He parted the waters of the Jordan which were in flood stage. The Jordan in flood stage during the harvest was very wide, and impassible; yet, as soon as the priests who carried the Ark of the Covenant reached the Jordan, and their feet touched the water’s edge, the water from upstream stopped flowing, and the water flowing down to the sea—the Salt Sea—was completely cut off, and the people of Israel went through on dry ground into the Promised Land (Joshua 3:1ff).

What I find fascinating is this: if you keep reading through Joshua, not long after the time God allows them to enter into the Promised Land, we see Joshua lying facedown, and crying out to the Lord, questioning why He led them to the land, saying, “Why did you ever bring this people across the Jordan to deliver us into the hands of the Amorites to destroy us? If only we had been content to stay on the other side of the Jordan!” (Joshua 7:7, NIV).

Joshua had come into a difficult situation and immediately was thinking about how wonderful it once was in the desert, just as the desert Israelites were thinking how wonderful it was back in Egyptian exile. They essentially forgot that God had provided a way for them, and they longed for what was before.

God, however, commands the people to build an altar—to signify a way of remembering His salvation (Joshua 8:30–35). It’s similar to what I call a “legacy altar,” where you set aside a record of the significant moments in which God sovereignly provides for you, where His grace is bountiful, where His mercy is overflowing, and His love has been most clearly demonstrated in your life.

Like Joshua, you too must remember the faithfulness of the Lord in your situation, because so often we forget—and I can tell you that that’s true of me, just as it’s true of you—and, therefore, it’s so good to record the faithfulness of God, so you can go back to that altar as a memorial, a remembrance, of God’s faithful provision.

“Our Father in Heaven…”

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 20:12:00 +0000

To the disciples, the first words of the Prayer of Jesus must have been nothing short of scandalous. Of all the things they had ever learned about prayer, this was certainly not one of them. They were not even permitted to say the name of God aloud, let alone refer to him as “our Father.” Yet, that is precisely how Jesus taught his disciples to pray.

There was, however, a catch. As John explains, only those who received Jesus and believed in his name have the right to refer to God as “our Father” (see John 1:12) In fact, Jesus made it clear that there are only two kinds of people in this world: Those who should refer to Satan as “our father” and those who may refer to God as “our Father” (John 8:44-47). There are no other options.

In one sense, Jesus is the only one who can legitimately address God as Father, for he is the unique Son of God and has been so throughout eternity. However, as Paul explains in Romans 8, those who are led by the Spirit of God are no longer illegitimate children. Instead, they too are sons and daughters by adoption in faith in Jesus. Thus, they can legitimately refer to God as “our Father.”

Jesus continues the pattern by teaching his disciples to qualify the phrase “our Father” with the words “in heaven.” In doing so, he is teaching us that God transcends time and space. We can address him with intimacy but never with impudence. He is the sovereign Creator and we are but sinful creatures. Addressing God as “our Father” makes us ever mindful of our relationship with God. It also underscores the fact that I do not come before him in isolation, rather, I come as part of the community of faith. Thus, adding the phrase “in heaven” reminds us of the reverence due his name.

[Excerpt from Hank Hanegraaff’s The Prayer of Jesus pp. 36-38.]

Writing the Word on the Tablet of Your Heart

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 13:16:00 +0000

If there is one thing preserved in the text of Scripture, it is the injunction to record God’s words upon the tablet of your heart.

One of the best things that happened to me as a new believer was being told that all Christians memorize Scripture. By the time I found out that not all of them do, I was already hooked. Now, as I look back, I can truthfully say that nothing compares with the excitement of memorizing Scripture. Charles Swindoll summed up my sentiments in this regard when he wrote:

I know of no other single practice in the Christian life more rewarding, practically speaking, than memorizing Scripture. That’s right. No other single discipline is more useful and rewarding than this. No other single exercise pays greater spiritual dividends! Your prayer life will be strengthened. Your witnessing will be sharper and much more effective. Your counseling will be in demand. Your attitudes and outlook will begin to change. Your mind will become alert and observant. Your confidence and assurance will be enhanced. Your faith will be solidified. (Charles R. Swindoll, Seasons of Life [Portland, OR: Multnomah Press, 1983], 53, emphasis in original)

Despite such marvelous benefits, far too few Christians have made Scripture memorization a lifestyle. For the most part, it is not because they don’t want to, but because they have never been taught how to. While they may think they have bad memories, the reality is they simply have untrained memories.

I am convinced that anyone, regardless of age or acumen, can memorize Scripture. God has called us to write His Word upon the tablet of our hearts (Proverbs 7:1-3; cf. Deuteronomy 6:6), and with the call He has also provided the ability to do so. Your mind is like a muscle. If you exercise it, you will increase its capacity to remember and recall information. If you don’t, it will atrophy. Here are a few practical tips to get you started:

• Set goals. He who aims at nothing invariably hits it.

• Make goals attainable. If your goals are unrealistic, you will undoubtedly become discouraged and give up.

• Memorize with a family member or friend. One of my treasured experiences was swinging back and forth on a hammock, memorizing Proverbs 2 with one of my children. Memorizing with someone else is enjoyable and will also make you accountable.

• Use normally unproductive time to review what you have memorized, such as while waiting in lines, or falling asleep. Remember, there’s no time like the present to get started! A good place to begin is Psalm 119. In fact, committing verse 11 of that passage—”I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you”—to memory may well encourage you to make Scripture memorization part of your lifestyle.

While you’re at it, you may also wish to consider memorizing Joshua 1:8. These wonderful words remind us that memorization facilitates meditation: “Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.” If you want the formula for genuine prosperity, there it is!

Meditating on God’s Word and Effective Prayer

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 19:22:00 +0000

Hard as it is to believe, we are already in the spring of the second decade of the 21st century! If you are with me following the Legacy Reading Plan, you are already reading the Book of Joshua. This is a fascinating book. It is the first of the twelve historical books—Joshua through Esther—that forges a link between the Five books of Moses and the remainder of Israel’s history.

God’s plan for redemption becomes a tangible reality in the Book of Joshua. We see that Joshua is chosen by the Lord to lead the children of Israel into the land of promise. The wanderings of Adam, Abraham, and Moses finally give way to rest on every side.

The intrigue this month that will become palpable before spring gives way to summer is that we will encounter the people of the promise living in servitude inside the Persian Empire. Why? How could God’s promises, which reach their zenith under Solomon, have ended in exile and humiliation? Well, the answer is that they forgot the Word of God: They began to do what is right in their own eyes. This of course is precisely why I have purposed to tackle the problem of biblical illiteracy during our jubilee year—our fiftieth year of ministry—for without the Word, we too will surely lose our way, and without the Word, we have no road map for the journey of life.

The Word of God is not only a light to our path; I believe that meditating on the Word of God is the missing link between the intake of Scripture and an effective prayer life. As I have sought the Lord’s face in prayer, I have become absolutely convinced that we need to see the connection between prayer and reading the Bible. Our devotion to the Word of God drives us into the presence of God through the practice of earnest meditative prayer.

If you’re like me, you probably pray backwards. You hurry into God’s presence with a laundry list of prayer requests, and before your knees ever touch the ground, you’re already thinking about getting back into your frenzied lifestyle. Often we treat God no better than we treat our families. We want relationship but without the discipline of investing quality time. So the first step toward intimacy with God is to make prayer a priority.

Intimacy: That is precisely what prayer is. Once we grasp the significance of a dialogue with God, prayer will no longer be a mere duty or discipline, it will become a delight. For prayer is the very means of bringing us into the presence of the one who saved us by His grace.

What gives life meaning to you?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:57:00 +0000

Right now I am reading through Ecclesiastes, and it’s riveting! The author examines the utter futility and folly of living for oneself and hoarding riches. What’s the point in chasing after that which is but for a short time? Naked we came into the world and naked we will leave.
The key word in Ecclesiastes is vanity, which is defined as “the futile emptiness of trying to be happy apart from God.” The author looks at life “under the sun,” and from the human perspective declares it to be empty. Power, popularity, prestige, pleasure—nothing can fill the God-shaped void in human life except God himself, the author of all life!
A word of caution here: you absolutely must read this book in light of the future judgment and eternal life in Christ, and you should read it in one sitting. To read this short book in bits or apart from our assurance in Christ may leave you in despair, for it contains passages written solely from a human point of view, such as, “Man’s fate is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath; man has no advantage over the animal. Everything is meaningless” (3:19).
You need to keep reading to find out that once God enters a believer’s life, everything you do “under the sun” takes on meaning and purpose, from work, to relationships to play to worship. And when that happens, skepticism and despair melt away.
Listen to the author’s conclusion: “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.”

Why Must We Participate in Church?

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 17:33:00 +0000

To gather with God’s people in united adoration of the Father is as necessary to the Christian life as prayer.
-Martin Luther

Will you show up for an Easter worship service this year out of guilt, childhood habit, or is it your weekly routine? I am often asked on the Bible Answer Man broadcast, “Why should I attend church services?” More to the point: “Why join a church?” Today, I want to explain the importance of committing to and joining with a local church.

Let me clarify: joining a church should not be approached as an obligation or duty, such as registering to vote, supporting the public library, or taking the trash out. No, joining a local church should be considered a great joy and sacred privilege.

Let’s consider why.

First, throughout the Bible, we see that the believer’s life is to be lived within the context of a family of faith (Ephesians 3:4–15; Acts 2). Indeed the Bible knows nothing about lone-ranger or “closet” Christians! Far from being born again as rugged individuals, we are born into a body of believers of which Christ is the head. A friend of mine aptly remarked, “When we are born again, we are born into a ‘forever family.’”

Furthermore, spiritual growth is impossible apart from membership and participation in a healthy, well-balanced church. It is in the church that we weekly receive the Word and sacraments as means of grace. Recall the early Christians who “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer” (Acts 2:42). Moreover, belonging to a body of believers also allows for accountability. The Bible requires that believers respectfully call attention to patterns of persistent, sinful behavior on the part of a member (Matthew 18:15–17).

Finally, while it is in the church that we enter into worship, experience the fellowship of believers, and become equipped to witness, church membership itself does not save us. No, we are rescued from God’s wrath, forgiven of all our sins, and declared positionally righteous before God solely by grace, through faith, on account of Jesus Christ (Romans 1:17; 3:21–4:8; Ephesians 2:8–9).

Triumph out of Tragedy

noreply@blogger.com (Unknown) — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 17:05:00 +0000

For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth!—Job 19:25

Are you with me in the Legacy Reading Plan? We wrap up the “Winter” Season by reading three books in March: Job, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon. We’ll return to Joshua at the edge of the Promised Land in April!

Read this familiar verse again with me: “For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that in the end he will stand upon the earth!” In the midst of great personal pain and suffering, Job cried out with astonishing words of hope. Would you or I be able to do the same?

In brief, the book of Job tells the story of a man who loses everything—his precious family, his great wealth, and even his health are compromised. Through these many trials, Job wrestles with the question, “Why?” Or more accurately, “Why me?”

Job’s story opens with a heavenly debate between God and Satan, in which God grants Satan limited access to affect Job’s life and then moves through three cycles of earthly debates between Job and his friends. While Job’s friends and comforters actually accuse him of sin, and though Job himself finds himself doubting God, he maintains his faith through his ordeals. And at the conclusion of the story, Job humbly acknowledges God’s sovereignty over all of life.

The lesson here for us is profound, for the solution to our disappointments in this life is not found in asking the question, “Why?” It is found in trusting God in the midst of our whys. In other words, God does not protect us from difficulties, but He promises to see us through them, providing the needed strength as we rest and trust in Him.