How to Study the Bible, Principles of Interpretation I: From Facts to Meaning

handout, I think for today, this is pages 35, 36 and 37. This is the one titled Principles of Interpretation One from Facts to Meaning. OK. We've got our snow crew here. Yeah. OK. Back at the outset. We had a chart. Let me see if I can grab it quickly so that I can point to where it is. You had a chart that looks like this, right? And then there was one right behind that that I want to draw your attention to.

Basically, what we're going to talk about is from this point on, how do we get from observation to interpretation? And what's the mindset that we have? And what's the heart set that we have? So anyway, we're keying off of that. We're going to kind of reintroduce some points and then go into more detail.

And some of the things that have to do, you know, how is studying the Bible different from just reading any other book? How is it different? Suppose I said, hey, here's your history book. The Bible is written in a different language. It's written in a different language, okay. That's one thing. What else? What else is different about it from some other book?

God's Word. It's God's Word, okay. And what do we mean by that when we say it's God's Word? He is trying to reveal Himself to us. Ah, okay. He has expressly revealed Himself through His Word. Yeah, key point. And by the way, we use the word, and we'll see it here, the word inspired.

How is that different from inspiring? Okay, one thing is it's past tense. And inspiring is more referring to our response, isn't it? When we talk about God's Word, we're talking about, if it's inspired, it's the God side of it. where he deliberately spoke through the authors to bring his word to us. We say it's inspiring, that's the human response. So it's in fact possible for something to be inspiring, but not be inspired.

One of the things that's popular this time of year is the Hallelujah Chorus. And you know, it's interesting, there have been atheists who have felt inspired by listening to the Hallelujah Chorus. I mean, imagine this immense production and it's just phenomenal. So an atheist can have a feeling of being inspired by the Hallelujah Chorus. This is quite different. It's God's side of it. By His intent, it has this message. So, big difference here.

1 Corinthians 4.1, here's Paul writing to the believers in Corinth and he's told them in the prior chapter, by the way, you're fleshly. Okay? So, he says, 1 Corinthians 4, verse 1, "...Let a man regard us in this manner, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God."

What is a steward? A keeper? Okay. What is a steward? Pardon? Alright, if I say, Doug, here I've got this check and I want you to hold it and five days from now I want you to give it to somebody and this is a check for $10,000. Okay? Yeah, and Doug will take it in a minute.

But the thing is, what happens, he's now a steward of that check. He has a particular responsibility. that he has accepted. It's been committed to him and he's accepted it. So he's taken on that responsibility. So he would be a steward in that particular transaction. So what he's saying here, stewards of the mysteries of God having a particular responsibility entrusted. That's a word that we use, entrusted. So that's what Paul's saying, he says, we have been entrusted by God with the message that God has. So that's what he's got here.

2 Timothy 3.16 and 17, all scripture is inspired. This is this one where it's the scriptures inspired, it's not that I look around to get inspired by it. That's my side. This is, in fact, the word translated inspired means God breathed. God breathed, okay? And profitable for teaching. It's not just, oh, that's God's Word, but I don't care. No, it says it's profitable. It is useful. It's worthwhile, okay? For teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that, so here's the end result, so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.

Ever struggle with feeling adequate for something? Well, I'm not adequate for that. Well, this says God's Word is essential and critical and right down the critical path for making the believer adequate. What is it God has in mind for you to do and to be? Adequacy is spelled out in His Word. Now, we've got this chart right below it. The other thing is the Bible is necessary for spiritual growth and understanding. Question. How important is spiritual growth? Is it a nice option? Desirable? Kind of a cool idea? You know, that's for a certain special group within the church. What does the spiritual growth thing mean? What's that about?

Pardon? It's the ultimate. Yeah. If you look at it, if a person is saved by faith, Between there and the time they see the Lord face-to-face, for some people that's real quick, and for some people it's a period of time. It's spiritual growth is key. That's the issue.

And we have on this chart here kind of four stages shown. Those are four stages that show up explicitly in Scripture. This newborn longing for the pyramid of the Word. Then you have the infant and three passages for that. This youth, a couple passages for that, and then mature. There is both maturity and growth. Both those words are used in the New Testament.

And you've got this distinction, milk and solid food. What's the difference between milk and solid food when we're talking about God's Word? What's the difference? Yeah, milk is just, here's the basics. Here's just the very initial things. Whereas, the solid food, this is for substantial and continued growth. And one of the things that Paul, we mention in this 1 Corinthians passage, he writes them in the prior chapter, 1 Corinthians 3, and says, you know, you guys have been believers for a while and right now you're only ready for milk.

Still. So he said, you should be ready for solid food, but you're just not there. You guys just aren't growing. So. That Baptist church. Uh-huh. Yeah, it's unfortunately, it's fairly easy to think of places and churches and people that seem like they're just stuck in baby mode. You know, still babies after all these years. 1 Peter is interesting. We studied that in a prior elective.

1 Peter 2.2 says, like newborn babes long, and by the way, that's an imperative, as you must be longing for the pure milk of the Word so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation. It doesn't mean you get saved. But in order for you to start to grow, because you're talking to believers here, you need to grow in relationship with that salvation you already have.

And then 2 Peter 3.18, it's interesting, you use the exact same Greek word that talks about grow, but here it's grow as the imperative. You must be growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. You must be growing. You must be longing, 1 Peter. 2 Peter, you must be growing. Let's look at the top of page 36 here.

2 Corinthians 3.18, But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit.

We've talked about this one before. Glory to glory. is a phrase Paul uses like faith to faith, glory to glory, life to life, death to death. That kind of expression means a growing in whatever that is. Whether it's glory, faith, death, life, an increasing. That's what he's talking about here.

And the word mirror is used three places in the New Testament. Each place it means God's Word, looking at God's Word. And that's indicated most strongly in the book of James. So growing by beholding the Lord, being transformed by Him as we behold the Lord through His Word. That's what this is about. It's this growing principle again.

Now, the unbeliever and the out-of-fellowship or immature believer have limited understanding. Why would that be the case? Why would the unbeliever have limited understanding of what God's Word is saying? Why would the unbeliever have limited understanding of what God's Word is saying?

They're not tuned in the right station, yeah. Somebody has said that they're reading somebody else's mail. They don't get it because in order to fully understand, and this is key, when we say how to study God's Word, how to study the Bible, this isn't just a little cookbook. Open the thing up and there you do it.

Because the Holy Spirit is involved in the full utility of what's in His Word. The Holy Spirit is involved in the full utility of His Word so that we can understand it. The unbeliever, this is something we've talked about before, the believer, Hal went and listed about 22 ministries of the Holy Spirit in the believer. For the unbeliever, what's the primary ministry that the Holy Spirit has to the unbeliever?

Conviction. Okay? Conviction. Conviction. Because what's happening for the unbeliever, rather than shedding a light on the whole of Scripture, for the unbeliever, a light is being shed on those things that are important for salvation. They're not going to understand all this other stuff. And we can talk about spiritual growth and they go, huh? They have no idea what that's about. Not a clue.

Yes? Well, the Holy Spirit is a teacher. You don't have the Holy Spirit, you can't learn. With the Bible teaching. Yeah, that's right. Because that comes from the Spirit. Yeah, and basically the Holy Spirit is going to shed light for the unbeliever on just that one area. And all the rest of it, they'll be blind to it.

Now, how about the believer out of fellowship? They're a believer. They have the Holy Spirit. Why is the believer that's out of fellowship with the Lord limited in their ability to understand what Scripture is saying? Because of the flesh. What's the flesh doing?

The Spirit is revealing the truth of the Word and the depth of God's Word And the implementation, notice that 2 Corinthians 3.18 ends with the Spirit's ministry, right? Our spiritual growth is taking place and the enlightenment as to what God's Word means is taking place by ministry of the Holy Spirit.

The unbeliever has not the Holy Spirit, but the believer who is out of fellowship has got the sin nature calling the shots, and the sin nature has not got any part in revealing what God's Word means. The sin nature says, don't look at that. I've got other things for you, right? So, if we're responding to the sin nature, as these Corinthians were, that's what Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 3, responding to the sin nature, the sin nature is going to be pointing us in every other direction. but not to the depths of God's Word. That's the Holy Spirit's ministry uniquely. 1 Corinthians 2, 14-16, But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him.

They are moronic. That word there is moronic. They're moronic to him. They're like... And he cannot understand them. Now notice, it doesn't say he has a poor understanding. It says he just can't. He can't get there. Because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. The ability to evaluate. Hi, here's the handout over here. Make sure you grab hold of that. In 1 Corinthians 3, this is the chapter I was referring to here.

And I, brethren, could not speak to you as spiritual men. We're on the top of page 36, which is the second page, reading 1 Corinthians 3, 1-4. And I, brethren, could not speak to you as spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, for you are not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able. For you are still fleshly, for since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men?

For one says, I am of Paul, and another, I am of Apollos. Are you not mere men, following this person and that, instead of following the Lord? So here's Paul. What would Paul have wanted to do? What would he like to have done? with these believers in Corinth.

Talk to them as what? Talk to them one-on-one as spiritual people. People who are responsive to the Holy Spirit. People who are living with the Holy Spirit's ministry active and lived out in their lives. He says, then you could hear. As it is, you've got spiritual earplugs. Yep. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I think here's one of the things you look at.

Certainly, Paul is distinguishing that, isn't he? And in fact, in response to your question, it's one of the primary things that pastors and teachers need to do is to, where's the flock at? Where are they? What are they hearing and listening to? What are they responding to? There's a friend of mine that understands a lot of things that we're talking, including things about spiritual growth. He understands those very well.

And he taught on that, teaching through Ephesians when I was down there at seminary. He graduated, you know, same time I did. And he went off to this church in Pennsylvania, to make a long story short. And I bounced some stuff off of him about some spiritual growth material. And I said, what do you think about this? He says, this looks real good. He says, I sure wish the people here could even hear this stuff.

He had a sense, you know, they can't even soak it up. They're not there. They have no comprehension. So, yeah, it is something that really pastors and teachers need to be looking at. What are these people ready for? And Paul himself says, you know, you ought to be ready for solid food, but I'm still having to give you milk, baby stuff. And yeah, it is amazing. It's true. And that's what pastors and teachers need to be able to do. What do these people need? Where are they at? What's their next diet need to be?

It can vary substantially, but that's one of the things, while there's a lot of variation, you're right about that, there's also characteristics within a church body. It's like my friend there, this is a church that's been around a while, the church had been established, but basically nobody in the church, even the elders, understands what spiritual growth is. They do this church thing and they check off the checklist, but they don't understand what spiritual growth is. Just not a clue. He's in a situation where, is there variation? Yeah. But the very top end is they don't understand spiritual growth. That's as good as it gets. That's kind of amazing. You would think there would be more variation than that, but nobody here understands that. So that's kind of astounding.

Now, one thing that Paul says to Timothy, second Timothy 2.15, but be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth. The imperative there is on be diligent. You must be being diligent. Now, what's diligence? What's diligence? Is that stubbornness? What's diligence?

Pardon? Tenacity, yeah, you keep coming at it, okay? You ever have something, you try it and the first time it doesn't work and you got to continue to go at it and, oh, okay, now I got it. Yeah, and sometimes there are things like that. I don't have the answer instantly. One of the examples.

The King James is a study and what's interesting is the word study four centuries ago meant to be diligent. Yeah, well and that's one of the things if people are accustomed to the King James I'd say go ahead and stay with it. I generally don't advise people start with it if they're not accustomed and one reason is because there are about 400 words that have changed in meanings and in some cases even reversed. So, but that's one of them where the word study and we think, oh, I know what study is.

But actually the word was in four centuries ago meant to be diligent. So, now, what's be diligent mean? Yeah, perseverance and persistence. You keep at it, right? And to what end? Do you just be stubborn just because you're blindly stubborn about this thing? Or what's the goal? Why are you being diligent? What are you trying to get out of it? Pardon?

Okay, there's conformity to Christ. That's where you're ultimately getting, but where does he put it here in this verse? Ah, it's accurately handling the Word of Truth. Not reading something into it that's not there. Yeah, and let's take off on Doug's point. What are some of the possible errors that end up not accurately handling the Word of Truth? What are some of the possible errors that someone might make?

Hitler used the Bible. Everybody used the Bible. Sure. Yeah, using the Bible to make it say a message that you want rather than asking what message did God have. Then it's manipulation. There was a theologian back in the 1800s who said, give me five dollars and five minutes and I'll make the Bible say anything you want. Probably the price is higher now. Yeah, people go through and pick and choose what they want.

And what's he saying? There is a such thing as an accurately handling the word of truth versus just, okay, I came up with something. Ever been to a... What's that? Ah, yes. There is one correct interpretation. Why? Because there's one intended meaning. at a particular passage. You come to a passage and you find six different interpretations, it's possible that all six of those are wrong, but at best, only one of them is right. Because there was one intended meaning in what God said. There's one intended meaning for each passage.

That's a good point. This accurately handling is interesting. King James has that rightly dividing. And there's two particular cultural uses of that word that I think might be helpful. One was that word was used, this translated accurately handling or rightly dividing, was used by the Roman roadway engineers when they would set up the path for a road. And it's talking about how you cut the road. how you set the grade for the road and then cut the road into the area you're going to put it. So that was one way that the word was used. But there was another, and this may be Paul's more culturally suitable means, certainly spent a lot of time on Roman roads, but a tent maker's term. When you take the pattern for the tent and it's just cut carefully along all the pattern lines so when you put the tent pieces together, everything fits. No flaps, no gaps.

And that's more than likely what he had in mind here is using that term. So when he says, you're taking everything and you're looking at it so when it all comes together, everything fits. That's what I think he's really pointing to here. what he's really talking about. When you start looking at God's Word, you go, Aha! I see how this all fits together. I see how this makes sense. Okay? Accurately handling it. So that when you look at it, all the pieces, they come together and you say, Yeah, it all fits now. Okay? Yes. Okay? Workman. Okay? Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, in fact, that word workman is interesting. When I was going through, you know, engineering school and they had a class in specifications, one of the things they had in there is go ahead and write in everything must be done in a workmanlike manner. Okay.

Why? What are they looking for? They're looking for, you know, somebody who knows what they're doing. They're looking for somebody who does things, you know, so that you're not wasting things, putting people at risk, putting material at risk. Okay. A workmanlike manner.

How about the last part of that? Accurately handling the Word of Truth. Why is that phrase important? And notice, what's singular? Here we have the Bible in our modern translations, 1189 chapters. Roughly three and a half million words. Lots of words. But it's a singular, the Word of Truth. It's the whole message of God, or as Paul put it to the elders in Ephesus, the whole counsel of God. This is God's Word.

Don't go snipping and don't go gluing. Right? No snipping and gluing. That's right. As we say, how to study the Bible, key point, we're not there to make somebody else happy. And how much we know, that's not the point. Not there to say, well, I'll translate it this way because these guys will be cool with that. No. God is the one we stand before.

It's His Word. He is the one who inspired it. It's by His Holy Spirit that we understand it correctly. It is His message. It's the word of truth. Jesus Christ said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Very specific. So that's an excellent point. It is God who is the one who is evaluating these things. Not trying to keep somebody else happy or just asking, how does it make you feel? Ever been to a Bible study? What do you think? What thoughts does this make you have? That's the human side. It's not asking the question, what did God intend to say?

That's the critical point. Let's take a look there. We start with objective observations. And this is where we look at accurately handling. Look at the bullets we've got in front of us there. The observations need to be complete. There's no missing information. We talked before about this word adopted as sons or adoption as sons. And suppose that you went through and studied all the meanings of the words in a passage and you looked at the grammar and you looked at all kinds of things, but when it's all said and done, you didn't get the understanding that that word adoption means something different than just getting a baby in your family. So you have some missing information, wouldn't you? The observation don't include any misinformation, mistaken observations. Can you think of a mistaken observation? Somebody who misunderstands something about a passage. Can you think of a fairly common mistaken observation?

Yeah, biblically, in the Bible. People think, oh, I know this, but it's not really the case. One of them that we cautioned against early on, this was small detail, but the word dunamis, or dunameo, is the word from which we get our English word dynamite. And so people will sometimes jump to the conclusion, if we got our English word from that, then that's somehow what the word means. And so they think that somehow, you know, if God's power, which is oftentimes how the word is translated, is like dynamite, then it must be explosive and impressive, right?

Well, they've made a false connection. The way we use a word is not necessarily the right understanding of it. The proper understanding, the way Paul wrote and the other authors of scripture wrote, they meant it has to do with ability, not explosiveness, not impressiveness. Ability. Able. That's the idea. So a wrong understanding would be this jumping to conclusions. Oh, that's explosive or that's dynamite. It's impressive. Well, not necessarily. Paul said that he was, and he uses the word dunamis, that he was empowered by God, and yet he himself would say, I'm not very impressive. He certainly never wrote that he was explosive.

So people can have a wrong understanding of something. How about observations not include any from outside the context of language, history, and culture? In other words, it's really outside the Bible. Can you think of some people who have authorities that they bring to the Bible that are really outside the Bible? And there's actually a bunch of different examples. Most denominations have some kind of an authority outside of the Bible. Yeah, you look at, we've got, you know, the Pope says this or we've got our tradition and it says that. All those are authorities outside the Bible. Right? Catechism. Yeah, here's our catechism, you know.

Infant baptism. It's an authority outside the Bible. Infant baptism came in about 220 A.D. John, the last apostle, had been dead for over a century. That's when infant baptism and baptism becoming effective beyond just being a symbol of your being saved and that was also at the same time that the Lord's table began to be seen as affecting something instead of picturing something.

Yeah, that's added. What else? Can you think of some other things where people add to the authority in Scripture. Yeah, you have these guys coming to your door, knocking on the door two by two. Almost every one of those guys have some kind of something that they use outside of Scripture to add to it. Book of Mormon, Doctrine and Covenants, Pearl of Great Price, all their Mormon Scriptures. the Jehovah's Witnesses will say, well, it's only the Watchtower folks that can tell us what the Bible means. Right? So what do they do? They have an outside authority. Yeah. Yeah. What tribe? Yes. What tribe? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, they, they, uh, that, that might stump them. They have a tough time with that question.

Most Jewish people have no idea. And some of them have a clue possibly in their name, but it's not certain. Like if you ever run across anybody with the last name Levi, Levitt, those kinds of names, you know, Levy, and those are all possible indications. Cohen, that they might be priests or Levites, but not certain. Let's think. Here's some other things. You ever run into somebody who's a five-point Calvinist? Tulip? Have you ever heard of that little acronym?

Essentially what they have done is they've used a system of logic to build a system that's outside of Scripture and then read it back into Scripture as an outside authority. And the same is done with the Arminians on the other end who talk about loss of salvation.

Yes, we have a doctrinal statement that for most churches is extraordinarily detailed. We've got quite a bit on it. Here's the difference. What we're saying in our doctrinal statement is this is what the Bible says. What happens with the whole tulip thing is they develop a system based on logic and assumptions and then they read that back into the scripture. Let me give you an example.

In Calvinism, one of the things that they do is they'll say, God is sovereign. Everything gets pinned on that. And they'll say that God elects people. Some even go to the point to say that God elects those who are going to hell. You're going to heaven and you're going to hell. That's double predestination it's called.

So they start doing that and one more thing, they also say, they don't say death is separation, they say death is out on a slab, cold dead, spiritually speaking, unable to respond. And so they go through this logic, they say you're out on a slab, cold dead, unable to respond, and therefore you can't believe. Yeah, you can't believe, even though, you know, here's what Paul says to the Philippian jailer, right?

Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ? Well, Paul should have said, you know, well, you can believe only if God has elected you. And then the next part in the sequence is God has to make you alive because you're elect, and then Once you're made alive, then you can't believe. He has to give you the gift of faith. So you're sovereignly made alive, then He gives you the gift of faith, and then you believe because He's made you alive and been given the gift of faith, and then you're saved.

So that's the Calvinist sequence. And so they say if you haven't been elected by God, it doesn't matter if you try to believe because you can't. because you're unable to respond, you're dead. And that's their logic. The problem is, there's several different things. One is death is separation, not inability to respond. Death is separation. That's one key point. Yes? Several different passages.

One of them you'll find is Romans 7, first six verses. death is separation and so that's that's one place another place that you'll find it is in Ephesians chapter 2 verse 10 verses and then you continue on in verses 11 through 13 and continue it even says in Ephesians 4.18 unbelievers are separated from the life of God Excluded from the life of God. And it's the same word used in Ephesians 2.

It says, you Gentile unbelievers were separated from the life of God. And so you get that. Any place where you have an unto translated in Scripture, and what do I mean by that? You have died unto the law. That is a death of separation. And so you'll see that. And that's Romans 7, 1 through 6. Galatians 2, 19, you've died to the law. What does that mean?

It's a death of separation, not simply a death of termination, cessation, annihilation, and inability to respond. 1 Peter also has a, you have a died to, I think it's 1 Peter, I think it's 2.24, or 1.24, but that also has a died to sins and alive to righteousness. That, that death to, is this death of separation. So, the wrong assumption about, they don't understand death of separation, Secondly, what they do is they assume that you have to be made alive and then be given the gift of faith and then you believe and then are saved. But wait a minute. Paul wrote the Gospel of John that believing you may have life through his name. Wrong sequence. I'm not made alive so I can believe. I believe so that I can be made alive.

So what they do is they have to take the logical system and override the direct revelation of Scripture. Here's an instance where they do it in 1 John. It says, Christ is the propitiation, that is the satisfaction of God's character, not only for us, but for the whole world. So what do the Calvinists do? Oh, they say, well, that's only the whole world of the elect.

God, John 3.16, okay, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son. The Calvinist interpretation of that is God so loved the world of the elect that he gave his only son to die only for the world of the elect. So I can't come up to everybody on the street and say Christ died for you because I don't know that. I've got to limit it.

If you're elect, Christ died for you. If you're not elect, I'm wasting my breath. I have no good news for you. What must I do to be saved? Well, there's nothing you can do, because you've got to be elect, and you've got to be made alive, and you have to be given the gift of faith, and then you'll believe. So don't worry about it. You're either elect or not. And if you're not elect, you're just going to hell. So that's the message.

Screwy, isn't it? Yeah. Yes, it's terribly depressing. Yeah. John 10, 28, Jesus says, I am constantly giving my sheep life and they shall never, and that's umme, not of the slightest chance, they shall never of the slightest chance perish of their own doing. Middle voice. They can't lose their own salvation. Okay. And no one will pluck them out of My hand. And My Father gave them to Me and no one will pluck them out of His hand."

So there's the other part of it. The Arminian who argues with the Calvinist. The Arminian says you can lose your salvation. And they have to go and look at verses like that and ignore it, scratch their head. Because it says, not even of the slightest chance will you lose your salvation of your own doing. You can't do it. Not even sort of.

Paul said twice in Ephesians 2, for by grace are you saved. He used the perfect tense, implying permanence each time. Dumb deal. Christ also used the perfect tense when he said, it is finished. Completely. Scripture is very definite on this. And so we can come up with systems that we say, is that in Christianity?

Yeah, but the system is messed up. I had a conversation via email with another pastor in town who was a hardline Calvinist. Two days of steady back and forth emailing and he talked the whole time from his system. The whole time when I was giving him this verse and that verse and what not, he sent me one scripture reference out of Leviticus the whole time and the rest of it he didn't even talk from scripture. He talked from his system. It's adding the scripture.

That's your point, it's all these denominations. But Luther said, but Calvin said, yes, we've always done it this way. And so what happens is all these different groups, it may not be something that says they're not saved, but it will diminish their capacity for spiritual growth. Why? Because they're fiddling with God's Word.

Christ would say, you know, as a matter of fact, that one John 10, 28, where you can't lose your salvation even of your own doing, that was Jesus' response when they asked Him, tell us plainly that you're the Messiah. And that was His answer. I am constantly giving them life and they will never, not of the slightest chance, lose their salvation of their own doing. That was his answer. So, if you believe that someone can lose their salvation, do you have a problem with Jesus being the Messiah? What is it you don't believe? So, we've got to be careful looking at, do I have some authority outside of Scripture that I'm relying on? My own logical system? Some other book? Some tradition? What is it?

Instead of God's Word and God's Word alone. The other thing is to look at these things. We talk about elements of language right below here. Jesus spoke to the Sadducees and he proved them wrong with a verb tense. What was that? It says, You are mistaken, not understanding the Scriptures or the power of God. For in the resurrection, remember the Sadducees denied the resurrection. Weirdly enough, they thought there was no afterlife. When you're dead, you're dead. When you're done, you're done. For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like the angels in heaven. But regarding the resurrection of the dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God?

I am, this is the present tense I am, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. He is not the God of the dead, but of the living. I am right now the God of Abraham. Not I was. Right now. And I am right now the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. Right now. There's also a clear reference to cultural things in scripture. We have the example that starts on the bottom of page 36 and ends on 37.

This Paedagogos that we looked at, the slave tutor, that shows up in the book of Galatians in chapter 3. And it goes this way in 3.24 and 3.25, therefore the law has become our tutor. This is the slave tutor to lead us to Christ so that we may be justified by faith.

But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. And talking about another authority. Ever talk to Christians or heard pastors and they go and lay law on you? Right here. It says we're no longer under the tutor. And the tutor is exactly what he spells out there as the law. Now that faith has come, we're no longer under this law, Tudor. Right now.

Alright, we proceed by logic to the one correct interpretation of those objective, now notice that, one correct interpretation of those objective observations. So we go from this completely set of accurate observations, free of extraneous non-biblical observations, and we then logically draw out the one correct interpretation of the passage. Are we looking at it square on? Are we coming to the passage with a set of presuppositions and human inventions and forcing that back on the passage? Somebody will come to a passage and they'll have something, boy, I'm determined to put this meaning into the passage. Here's a, for instance, we talked earlier about the Jehovah's Witnesses.

When we were studying Revelation, there's a passage in Revelation where it describes these scorpion-like creatures torturing unbelievers for a period of five months. And the scorpion-like creatures are fallen angels released from the abyss for a five-month period of time in these scorpion-like creatures to torture the unbelievers on earth. Okay? The Jehovah's Witness interpretation is that that's happening right now and they are the scorpion-like creatures.

And we Christians are the ones they're stinging. Okay? So that's their... Pardon? Oh, they have to wipe that away because they've been bothering us for a lot longer than five months, right? So they have to just kind of look away at that. I look at their, I have their commentary. I look at it and they don't do anything with the five months part. So that's the thing, they have to ignore something in order to make it fit.

The other thing is it's these demonic creatures coming out of the abyss. that are allowed to be in these, you know, scorpion-like bodies. And so that doesn't quite make sense either. You know, why are the creatures coming out of the abyss fallen creatures that are held for condemnation? Why is that these saved Jehovah's Witnesses?

I don't know. So, at any rate, We've run out of time here. But thoughts, comments, questions? I'll let you follow through reading the rest of it. Ponderings? Exasperations? Yeah. I think God wants everyone to know the truth. Yeah. You know, all these denominations, everything, I mean, even from accepting the growth truths, the believer's not accepted. Yeah, you know, Marian's bringing up the point, you know, God wants us to know the truth. He has one intended meaning. How come everybody's all over the place?

When we talk about Jehovah's Witnesses, but even among those, we would say these are Christian denominations. People that, maybe they're off this and that area, but, you know, you think that they're saved, or at least their gospel is a saving gospel. And yeah, it's a real wonder. You get people that come here to Holly Hills and they hear us talking about spiritual growth and they look at us like we're nuts.

We've had people just talk about grace and they go, oh man, there's something wrong with that. You've got to have law. Yeah, that's right. I want some grace but not that much. So yeah, it's amazing. People will often force their own ideas. I've got this tradition. We've always done it this way. My pastor says this. Our group has this particular interpretive body in there and they tell us what it means.

Yeah, yeah, it ends up being controlled. But you notice that passage we looked at earlier, approved by who? By God, yeah. And I think for a lot of people what's happening is they're trying to look at who else, who am I approving? Who am I getting approval from?

Churches that'll go out and they'll do a poll and say, you know, what do you want in the way of music and what do you want in the way of teaching? And they let everybody else just kind of vote. Christian, non-Christian, they don't care. They just let everybody else vote. So it's not what does God approve of, it's what does everybody else approve of.

Yeah. It's bizarre. In the end, we stand before the Lord. It's His approval that's what counts. Yeah. Let's pray. Lord, as we look at these things, what an amazement it is. Your intent is that we understand your intended meaning, the message that you had in mind for us.

And yet here it turns around, astounding and amazing how easy it is to just try to please other people, to please ourselves instead of looking to be approved by you. And we just pray that you would bring our hearts and minds, Lord, to the truth undistracted. by what distracts so many.