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In front of many of us, many of us were so encouraged by witnessing his love for the 00:00:09.960 |
word and his seriousness that he takes the call of elder to shepherd and to oversee this 00:00:21.400 |
He will do that also by feeding the sheep and helping us and training us and equipping 00:00:26.040 |
us so that we might be able to go and do the work of ministry. 00:00:30.200 |
And so if you don't know Elder James, you at the very least know very well his wife, 00:00:43.980 |
So they have been here at Berean, especially Elder James has been here for a very long 00:00:50.720 |
And Diane, did you guys get married and then you came out, Diane? 00:00:58.280 |
So it's not that you were coming out to Berean and then, okay. 00:01:00.360 |
So I don't know what came first, if she loves Berean more or her husband more. 00:01:04.760 |
So they are a great example of faith and even just the heart that they have, they pour their 00:01:13.840 |
And they have been a constant source of encouragement to me, both of them. 00:01:17.720 |
And so with that said, we're going to actually just be inviting Elder James to come up and 00:01:23.380 |
And then after a little break, we're going to be having a Q&A after that he as well will 00:01:28.760 |
So let's give him a round of applause as he comes on up. 00:01:39.600 |
So to answer that question, Diane definitely loves Berean more, but that's okay. 00:01:46.360 |
So as we begin this seminar, I want you to know that this is a very dense topic. 00:01:54.760 |
I'm going to do my best to break this down into elements. 00:01:58.800 |
I'm going to make it as elemental as possible so that it's easily digestible. 00:02:03.840 |
But I got to tell you, I can only do so much. 00:02:07.640 |
You are going to have to listen carefully and absorb what I'm telling you, digest it, 00:02:14.680 |
and then at that point, you'll glean from it. 00:02:18.520 |
But this is not something that will be understood unless you put your thinking cap on. 00:02:31.800 |
So based on that, I'm going to pray and I'm going to give you a little introduction. 00:02:36.560 |
Father God, as we tackle this subject, Lord, we know that this is foundational, Lord, to 00:02:49.780 |
My prayer, Lord God, is that for every brother and sister here who hears your voice, that 00:02:54.520 |
it will be clear that they would have conviction in your Word, that there will be an internal 00:03:02.840 |
renewing, Lord God, and reworking of their worldview if it is contradictory to one that 00:03:11.480 |
And so as we begin this morning, may you speak to your sheep. 00:03:15.960 |
We pray these things in the name of your Son. 00:03:19.480 |
So when I was in college, right, and I was once in college, a long time ago, I was a 00:03:31.560 |
We had gotten T1 cable, but no Wi-Fi, so I carried a cable around. 00:03:40.400 |
But that's when I began to take my faith seriously. 00:03:44.520 |
And one thing that I thought to myself was, "How do I know the Bible is true? 00:03:51.320 |
Why are there certain books in the Bible and not other books? 00:03:57.360 |
Was someone just there and said, "That's Bible, that's not?" 00:04:01.880 |
And I'm sure many of you guys had that same question too. 00:04:08.400 |
As we go through this material, if you have questions, I want you to write them down and 00:04:14.960 |
Not in the middle, because I might answer some of your questions as I'm going through 00:04:19.500 |
But I want your questions to be answered because I want your faith to be something that is 00:04:28.320 |
Not because you're here and you have friends here and it's just something that we do. 00:04:36.120 |
And God is not afraid to answer your questions. 00:04:40.480 |
So because God is not afraid to answer your questions, you should feel free to ask questions. 00:04:46.480 |
At the same time, like I said before, it's going to take some mental effort. 00:04:58.840 |
You can't just do calculus, maybe derivation. 00:05:03.160 |
You can't do integration just lying on your bed. 00:05:05.160 |
You got to sit up in your seat and you got to, wait, what comes second? 00:05:13.120 |
You have to sit there and you have to do the problem. 00:05:19.360 |
The other thing I want you guys to think about is this. 00:05:27.400 |
By nature, an inherent quality of truth is that it withstands the test of scrutiny. 00:05:37.600 |
You guys know what the word scrutiny means, right? 00:05:41.000 |
Everything that is true can withstand the test of scrutiny. 00:05:46.800 |
Let me give you an easy, now if you're taking BCC, you've heard me give this example before, 00:05:55.840 |
No matter how much you scrutinize it, it will always be four. 00:06:04.120 |
It doesn't matter whether you're here or in Cambodia or in Senegal or in, what's another 00:06:13.400 |
It doesn't, Antarctica, it doesn't matter where you are in the world. 00:06:20.580 |
In the same way, truth can withstand the test of scrutiny. 00:06:28.940 |
And because God's word is true, it can withstand the test of scrutiny. 00:06:34.100 |
If something can withstand the test of scrutiny, you're more likely to believe it internally. 00:06:40.660 |
You're more likely to believe it internally, right? 00:06:43.640 |
If something is not true, you might derive some other benefit from it and you might act 00:06:48.660 |
like you believe it, but you don't actually believe it. 00:06:54.820 |
But God's word is true and it withstands the test of scrutiny. 00:07:04.900 |
In BCC Lesson 4, I'm contrasting this with BCC Lesson 4. 00:07:10.540 |
In BCC Lesson 4, we tell you the word of God is true because of its textual reliability, 00:07:15.260 |
the number of existing manuscripts, the span of time between the original and the copy, 00:07:19.140 |
the internal consistency among existing copies. 00:07:22.360 |
Because of its extra-biblical witness, because of its archaeological confirmation, fulfilled 00:07:27.180 |
prophecies, consistent witness, and because it says so. 00:07:30.780 |
I'm not going to expand upon that because that's BCC Lesson 4, okay? 00:07:35.140 |
So if you ever want to know, like if you ever want to refresh your course, just come to 00:07:40.100 |
But we tell you that, that this is the outline, this is the skeletal outline of BCC Lesson 00:07:45.700 |
The canon of scripture is something a little different, okay? 00:08:01.460 |
Canon comes from the Greek word kanon, which means rule or rod. 00:08:05.420 |
This was specifically used in races where runners were supposed to stay in their lanes. 00:08:09.860 |
So in the Greek Olympics, right, the canon is the line separating the other runners. 00:08:22.420 |
So the canon of scripture refers to the books that are the authoritative word of God. 00:08:29.860 |
Which books are the authoritative word of God, and that's what it's referring to, okay? 00:08:36.180 |
Now this is easier if we go by Old Testament, and then we go by New Testament. 00:08:46.040 |
Why are the books that we have right now part of the Old Testament canon? 00:08:50.660 |
Why are the books that we have right now in the Old Testament the authoritative word of 00:08:55.140 |
Because there are other books that were left out. 00:08:57.980 |
Well, Christ confirms the Old Testament canon. 00:09:05.160 |
He says, "If he called them gods to whom the word of God came, and the scripture cannot 00:09:09.500 |
be broken," he didn't say, "If he called them gods to whom the word of God came, and the 00:09:14.820 |
scripture cannot be broken," except for this one book you have here. 00:09:18.620 |
You shouldn't have inserted this book into the Old Testament. 00:09:22.140 |
All he says is, "And the scripture cannot be broken," right? 00:09:25.860 |
He also says, "Now he said to them, 'These are my words which I spoke to you while I 00:09:29.580 |
was still with you, that all the prophets which are written about me in the law of Moses, 00:09:34.340 |
prophets, and the Psalms must be fulfilled.'" 00:09:40.300 |
Again, he's not saying, "Hey, you know the books that you consider the Old Testament? 00:09:48.380 |
Or he didn't say, "The law of Moses, the prophets, and the Psalms, but you forgot this other 00:09:54.540 |
This is actually also the word of God, and you forgot to include it." 00:09:58.860 |
And he would have done that if that was the case. 00:10:01.060 |
I don't think he's going around healing people, being the Messiah, and there's a book that 00:10:06.100 |
actually should have been included that he doesn't tell us about. 00:10:12.540 |
In actuality, he confirms the Old Testament canon, okay? 00:10:17.360 |
Another example, "But Jesus answered and said to them, 'You are mistaken, not understanding 00:10:24.860 |
He's again confirming the books that are part of the Old Testament canon. 00:10:30.540 |
Matthew 5, 18, 26, 53, 256, John 53, John 5, 39 to 47 say the same thing. 00:10:40.700 |
Christ confirmed Old Testament events and authors, right? 00:10:43.540 |
Here, he says Abel was real, talked about Noah and the flood, Daniel and Isaiah, that 00:10:48.780 |
Moses wrote the Pentateuch, Isaiah wrote Isaiah, Jonah wrote Jonah, Daniel wrote Daniel. 00:10:56.080 |
He didn't say, "Oh, that story about Noah and the flood? 00:11:03.900 |
It was actually James," or ... He doesn't say that, right? 00:11:08.780 |
He confirms all these events of the Old Testament. 00:11:11.980 |
If they were not real, guess what he would have done? 00:11:23.260 |
Bible discoveries confirm the Old Testament canon. 00:11:27.380 |
The Masoretic text, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Nash Papyrus, 00:11:41.020 |
The Masoretes were known to faithfully preserve the Old Testament. 00:11:46.700 |
They were kind of like a tribal clan that were devoted to making sure the scriptures 00:11:59.260 |
For a long period of time, the entire Old Testament canon was derived from the Masoretes. 00:12:11.100 |
The Masoretic text, though, dated back to about 1000 AD. 00:12:18.580 |
So kind of like instinctually you think, okay, it doesn't seem like it now. 00:12:25.220 |
There's no reason to not have faith in that for all the reasons that I will get into. 00:12:29.740 |
But it spans about a thousand years from the time of Christ. 00:12:46.140 |
And in caves, he found a treasure trove of scrolls dating back to the Qumran community 00:12:53.860 |
What's great about that is, what's great about that is, these manuscripts that go back to 00:12:58.060 |
the Qumran community, they date to before the time of Christ to right around the time 00:13:04.660 |
Which was, and that's great, because remember, Christ confirms the Old Testament canon, right? 00:13:11.620 |
So if Christ confirms the Old Testament canon, we just need to know, what was he looking 00:13:18.380 |
I hope everyone's following me with that, okay? 00:13:24.620 |
So if he confirms the Old Testament canon, what did he have at the time with respect 00:13:32.020 |
We go to the Dead Sea Scrolls, there's about a thousand manuscripts belonging to the Qumran 00:13:39.420 |
It just completely validates the Masoretic Text. 00:13:45.260 |
We already knew that, but the Dead Sea Scrolls, going back to the time of Christ, confirms 00:13:54.180 |
Now fundamentally, I want you guys to understand this, okay? 00:14:09.140 |
And Christ himself says, "If you don't believe me, at least believe because of the works." 00:14:24.240 |
This guy couldn't hear, and now he could hear. 00:14:30.440 |
My friend Lazarus over there, the guy you know, Lazarus, he was dead, but I raised him 00:14:36.360 |
So if he has shown you, okay, by this arsenal of works, then you can believe him. 00:14:46.660 |
Let me give you one that correlates to us, okay? 00:14:53.240 |
If I told you that I could fly, if I told you I can fly, nobody would believe me. 00:15:01.140 |
Or you would think maybe he has a Jetman Dubai pack or something, right? 00:15:13.740 |
The first best thing would be to show you, would just fly, right? 00:15:18.920 |
Then you might be like, "Oh, you can actually fly." 00:15:21.220 |
But you know what else I can do that might make you believe me? 00:15:24.800 |
I'll go out there, and I'll lift a car with one hand. 00:15:30.000 |
Now, that's not directly related to flying, but you'll be like, "Oh, this guy can lift 00:15:38.640 |
Things would start, like, loosening up to you, right? 00:15:44.780 |
In a similar way, in a similar way, when Jesus says, "I am the Son of God, and if you don't 00:15:50.120 |
believe me, at least believe because of the works," his situation was even more precise 00:15:55.200 |
because the Messiah was predicted to do what Jesus did. 00:16:06.400 |
And it's not like miracles are happening every day in the Middle East. 00:16:16.740 |
And so the validator, one of the validators of the Messiah was not only the fact that 00:16:21.720 |
he was going to be born here, he was going to be of this tribe, and he was going to be 00:16:31.540 |
But the other validator of the power of the Messiah was he was going to make the mute 00:16:37.440 |
speak, make the dumb hear, make the blind see, and raise the dead. 00:16:46.600 |
So when Christ does that, he's exhibiting his power. 00:16:50.420 |
So he's making a very logical argument to the Jews of the day, "You don't believe I'm 00:16:59.920 |
Because as you know, the Messiah was going to do all these works. 00:17:03.320 |
And that is the same thing, the same question that he posits to every unbeliever here today. 00:17:11.540 |
Everyone in the world, maybe even in this room. 00:17:14.860 |
If you don't think that he has the power to do that, then what do you make of every single 00:17:23.520 |
And you might say, "Well, there's a problem, Mr. James. 00:17:31.040 |
But a lot of people that saw the risen Christ perform these miracles recorded them. 00:17:37.020 |
Even those who were antagonistic to Christ the Messiah recorded that he did these miracles 00:17:45.840 |
People who saw the risen Christ perform these miracles were put to death because they couldn't 00:17:53.400 |
So I don't want to take anything for granted, but when I say Christ confirms the Old Testament 00:17:57.160 |
canon, there's a huge underpinning, there's a huge foundational understanding of why that's 00:18:07.700 |
And therefore, knowing who he is, if he confirms the Old Testament canon, then all we need 00:18:13.000 |
to do is find out what was the Old Testament at the time. 00:18:17.560 |
This tells us, the Masoretic text and the finding of the dead sea scrolls, it tells 00:18:22.800 |
us the Masoretic text at the time, excuse me, the Old Testament canon at the time is 00:18:28.960 |
It is the same Old Testament the Jews use today. 00:18:35.800 |
But I wanted to do that so that I take nothing for granted, okay? 00:18:39.000 |
That's the Old Testament canon, and I'm done with the Old Testament canon. 00:18:44.560 |
And the reason the Old Testament canon is a lot easier is this, okay? 00:18:50.160 |
The Old Testament canon is confirmed by Christ very explicitly, just like I told you, right? 00:18:55.680 |
But Christ dies, resurrects, and then the New Testament is written. 00:19:01.080 |
So the analysis is a little bit different, right? 00:19:04.240 |
He doesn't resurrect, go to heaven, come back and say, "The New Testament that you have, 00:19:12.680 |
With the Old Testament, he said, "It's legit." 00:19:15.960 |
But he doesn't do that with the New Testament. 00:19:17.760 |
So our analysis is a little bit different in relation to the canon from the Old Testament 00:19:24.080 |
So the New Testament canon, let's talk about criterion, okay? 00:19:27.440 |
An evaluation of the canon must have established criteria. 00:19:32.600 |
But because the criteria is necessarily, in a sense, greater than what is being judged, 00:19:38.000 |
the model for the canon must be self-authenticating, okay? 00:19:42.160 |
I want to take some time to break this down, okay? 00:19:46.960 |
When you have a criteria, that criteria is usually greater than the thing being judged. 00:19:56.420 |
When you have a show like American Idol or whatever, Masked Singer or whatever these 00:20:00.840 |
The people that are judging these singers are usually professional singers, right? 00:20:05.320 |
And they're usually good professional singers, right? 00:20:07.880 |
It would be weird if you had someone who never sang a tune, who knew nothing about singing, 00:20:18.640 |
You take a judge who is experienced, because that person can be a faithful judge of what 00:20:30.960 |
When I say this, when I make this statement, the criteria is, in a sense, greater than 00:20:39.280 |
You might not cognizantly understand it, but we all kind of subtly understand it to ourselves 00:20:45.920 |
So because that's the case, because that is the case, the model has to be self-authenticating, 00:20:53.280 |
because what is greater than the Word of God? 00:20:56.760 |
There's nothing that's greater than the Word of God, okay? 00:20:59.800 |
Now in the past, a canon was validated using the following components. 00:21:03.160 |
First, first-perception, historical origins, okay? 00:21:06.600 |
What I mean by that is, traditionally, when we looked at the study of the canon, right, 00:21:12.680 |
we typically looked at the early church, what did they receive, and/or historically, what 00:21:20.720 |
Now, that's not necessarily wrong, but the problem is, the early church is not greater 00:21:27.880 |
Coming first in time does not make you greater than the Word of God. 00:21:33.160 |
I mean, if heresy sprouted up before the book of Revelation, that doesn't make, the heresy 00:21:37.960 |
is not greater than the book of Revelation, right? 00:21:40.880 |
So in of itself, that's not how you judge the canon, that shouldn't be how you judge 00:21:45.140 |
the canon, because that's not greater than the canon, okay? 00:21:49.480 |
The following components seem to emerge, okay? 00:21:53.480 |
Divine qualities, apostolic origins, and corporate reception. 00:21:58.800 |
So when we are doing a faithful investigation of the canon of Scripture, these are the three 00:22:06.600 |
I'm gonna explain each of them to you, and as I explain them to you, you're going to 00:22:15.680 |
Divine qualities, apostolic origins, and corporate reception. 00:22:23.600 |
Because something is self-authenticating does not mean it is unfair or cheap. 00:22:32.600 |
You think, "Oh, something is something because it says so." 00:22:41.560 |
If you were, okay, to judge whether or not this phone is actually real, your sensory 00:22:47.040 |
perception, you wanna judge whether your sensory perception is actually real. 00:22:57.660 |
You would ask someone else, "Do you see that phone?" 00:23:00.380 |
You would employ your senses because everything that is foundational is self-authenticating. 00:23:09.400 |
Everything that is foundational is self-authenticating, okay? 00:23:19.800 |
So not only with respect to the canon of scripture, anything that is true, any element that is 00:23:32.400 |
Prove that the number, prove that two is two. 00:23:37.800 |
It is a foundational requirement that two is two, right? 00:23:41.600 |
If you're an artist in here, primary colors, right? 00:23:45.700 |
You can mix other colors, but there are primary colors that are what they are. 00:23:50.740 |
You can't get more basic than the primary colors. 00:23:53.380 |
The other colors that come after the primary colors are based on the foundational colors, 00:23:59.620 |
In life, things that are foundational, not just the canon of scripture, anything in life 00:24:04.400 |
that is foundational is self-authenticating, okay? 00:24:17.980 |
When I say divine qualities, when I say divine qualities, right? 00:24:22.740 |
I don't mean good, I don't mean great, right? 00:24:25.860 |
I don't mean like a dessert you eat, oh my gosh, it's so divine, right? 00:24:30.300 |
When I say divine, I mean the word divine in its just pure intellectual sense, godlike, 00:24:39.660 |
So when you look at which scriptures are the authoritative word of God, they must exhibit 00:24:49.800 |
That's what I mean when I say divine qualities. 00:24:55.420 |
The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. 00:25:00.580 |
So that the natural attests to God, were not the scriptures, okay? 00:25:05.700 |
Since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes, his eternal power, and divine 00:25:09.860 |
nature would have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so 00:25:14.860 |
If general revelation speaks of God, how much more would special revelation? 00:25:19.820 |
If nature speaks of God, how much more his word, his explicit word, okay? 00:25:42.260 |
Again, when you look at scripture, it does these things. 00:25:46.780 |
There is no other work that does these things, okay? 00:25:51.580 |
Now the early church fathers agreed on the divinity of scriptures. 00:25:55.380 |
Now I know this might seem to have a little bit less weight, okay? 00:25:59.580 |
But the reason why it shouldn't is because when you look at that the early church fathers 00:26:04.240 |
are a fancy word for saying, you know, there's the apostles and there are the people who 00:26:09.220 |
are discipled by the apostles directly, okay? 00:26:12.380 |
And then there are people who are discipled directly by the people right underneath them 00:26:17.540 |
And you get to a point in time and it cuts off, but generally speaking, those are the 00:26:23.660 |
So for example, if you were an apostle Peter's small group, okay? 00:26:26.940 |
You would have been an early church, well, and you met the criterion for being elder, 00:26:31.660 |
at the very least you would need to do that and you could theoretically be an early church 00:26:35.560 |
Not that there was like a ad in the paper, that's not what I'm saying, but they're disciples, 00:26:43.840 |
So understanding the nature of scripture, right? 00:26:47.600 |
And being exposed, being the first one, so to speak, to be exposed to it are some of 00:26:52.520 |
So Jerome stated that Philemon was a document which has in it so much of the beauty of the 00:26:57.040 |
Clement stated that no one will be so impressed by the exhortations of any of the saints as 00:27:04.040 |
Origen defends Hebrews on the grounds that the ideas of the epistle are magnificent and 00:27:07.920 |
say that the gospels are accompanied with divine power. 00:27:10.400 |
Irenaeus said the gospels are always breathing out immortality on every side and vivifying 00:27:17.360 |
If you have spent time in the scriptures, then you know what I'm talking about. 00:27:24.960 |
There is no other document, there is no other work of antiquity that speaks to your soul 00:27:33.320 |
If you haven't, then this is just like, well, some men said so to you, okay? 00:27:37.080 |
I mean, I can't do much about that, but if you have experienced the power of God through 00:27:42.680 |
the scriptures, if they have brought salvation to you, if they have exposed you, right? 00:27:48.840 |
Exposed your sin, exposed your guilt, and at the same time healing you, you should understand 00:27:56.800 |
No man or woman could have written you a letter and have the same effect on you, okay? 00:28:02.800 |
Moreover, if you look at the doctrinal unity of scripture, the precise doctrinal unity 00:28:09.040 |
it gets right and is consistent with the nature of God, the nature of man, the nature of sin, 00:28:14.840 |
the authority of scripture, the nature of the church, the person of Christ, the work 00:28:20.960 |
These are topics that are not just broad in scope, but that are easy to be inconsistent 00:28:32.200 |
And not only are they so broad in scope, but man over the course of history, especially 00:28:39.040 |
in different time periods and different cultures, would not have doctrinal unity, okay? 00:28:46.120 |
What we thought in this culture, even in America, right, now in the 90s is completely different. 00:28:52.520 |
And I know, because I was alive at the time, right? 00:28:56.360 |
Even if you go back to the 80s, it was completely different, right? 00:29:00.480 |
And I don't want to get into politics, like, "Oh, it's more like left," or whatever else, 00:29:04.880 |
My only point is, it is what was acceptable today is not necessarily what was acceptable 00:29:10.880 |
And the same would have been true if you lived through the 90s, right? 00:29:14.520 |
What was acceptable in the 90s is not necessarily what was acceptable in the 70s, and so forth. 00:29:22.320 |
The ideals and values seem to change over time, especially across cultures. 00:29:30.040 |
The Bible, right, beginning from Genesis to Revelation, was written over a period of about 00:29:44.480 |
But there is this precise unity with respect to these topics. 00:29:50.960 |
And these topics are not, they're not like mathematical equations. 00:29:57.880 |
They are abstract concepts, but yet there is precise unity with them. 00:30:08.220 |
From Genesis to Revelation, the Bible is telling the same overarching redemptive story of God. 00:30:18.720 |
The Gospels seem to correlate with the historical narratives that recount redemption. 00:30:23.440 |
The Epistles and the Prophets seem to have similarities in their expansion upon God's 00:30:27.240 |
Revelation and Deuteronomy both speak of blessings and cursings, and the warning against editing. 00:30:32.680 |
When I say the Gospels seem to correlate with the historical narratives that recount redemption, 00:30:37.040 |
I'm going to talk about this more later, right? 00:30:39.680 |
But when you see the nation of Israel come out of Egypt, you have redemption, and then 00:30:54.840 |
You have the Gospels, and then you have the expansion of that work via the Epistles. 00:31:05.880 |
Moses, Elijah, David, the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms. 00:31:11.160 |
Plus Gospels, the Acts in General Epistles, Pauline Epistles, and Revelation would be 00:31:19.840 |
Seven is a number for completeness in the Bible. 00:31:29.440 |
So when you look at Moses, Elijah, David, right? 00:31:32.280 |
Plus the New Testament structure, it adds up to seven, right? 00:31:37.760 |
In Revelation, the number seven plays a key role. 00:31:47.320 |
In Genesis, you have the creation of the earth. 00:31:49.160 |
In Revelation, you have the recreation of heaven and earth. 00:31:57.040 |
In Revelation, you have the great wedding of the lamb. 00:31:59.160 |
In Genesis, you have the serpent's deception. 00:32:01.280 |
In Revelation, you have the serpent's destruction. 00:32:03.280 |
The curse upon the world, the curse is lifted. 00:32:05.600 |
Tree of life, tree of life, God dwells with his people. 00:32:14.160 |
The number seven plays a key role in Genesis. 00:32:16.680 |
The number seven plays a key role in Revelation. 00:32:19.800 |
There is the beginning with respect to the content of Revelation. 00:32:23.760 |
There is the redemption, the fulfillment, the end, whatever you want to call it, contained 00:32:28.960 |
within the structure and the content of the book of Revelation. 00:32:53.080 |
As I continue to speak about points number two and points number three, okay? 00:32:58.560 |
What I'm beginning to show you is, right, the word of God is the word of God because 00:33:08.360 |
And these three points are self-impressing on us, okay? 00:33:17.880 |
But I want to kind of get you in that mindset, okay? 00:33:21.200 |
The word of God, if the word was God, he's going to impress it upon his people, all right? 00:33:30.720 |
The old covenant was accepted as having been a compilation of documents. 00:33:35.960 |
It says right here, Exodus 24, the book of the covenant. 00:33:39.400 |
Exodus 34, he wrote the words of the covenant. 00:33:41.520 |
Deuteronomy 29, the covenant written in this book. 00:33:44.520 |
Paul calls the Old Testament the old covenant. 00:33:47.160 |
So the old covenant was a compilation of documents. 00:33:54.600 |
So it's not like when we get to the New Testament, it's like this new strange concept. 00:33:59.480 |
The skeletal structure for the New Testament canon is already there because in the Old 00:34:04.440 |
Testament, they understood it as a compilation of documents. 00:34:08.720 |
Second Corinthians 3.14 says this, "But their minds were hardened for until this very day 00:34:12.820 |
at the reading of the old covenant, the same veil remains unlifted because it is removed 00:34:18.520 |
The Old Testament is the old covenant, and the old covenant was a compilation of documents, 00:34:27.080 |
But the apostles were ministers of the new covenant, okay? 00:34:32.080 |
So you have the old covenant, it's a compilation of documents, and then you have the old covenant, 00:34:39.280 |
So if you're a Jew and you know that the Old Testament is a compilation of documents and 00:34:43.220 |
you're waiting for this new covenant, it's not gonna be a surprise to you that the New 00:34:47.600 |
Testament, right, the new covenant is going to be a compilation of documents, okay? 00:34:52.760 |
Jeremiah 31, "Behold, days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant 00:34:57.620 |
with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah." 00:34:59.660 |
Matthew 26.28, "For this is my blood of the covenant which is poured out for many for 00:35:04.940 |
Second Corinthians 3.6, "Which also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not 00:35:11.820 |
of the letter but of the spirit, for the letter kills but the spirit gives life." 00:35:16.240 |
The old covenant is a compilation of documents. 00:35:18.640 |
When you hear about this new covenant, it's going to also be a compilation of documents, 00:35:24.440 |
Consider the redemption motif in the Old Testament, okay? 00:35:39.560 |
So there's redemption and then there's words that are related to this redemption? 00:35:49.180 |
He saves you and after he saves you, he gives you instructions. 00:35:59.760 |
The promises of blessings and cursings, the copies of the covenant. 00:36:02.520 |
Isaiah was directed to write prophecies on scrolls. 00:36:05.080 |
The New Testament states that the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God, right? 00:36:12.420 |
Once there's redemption, God tells you about this redemption. 00:36:17.480 |
He gives you instructions and the prophets remind them of this when they fall, okay? 00:36:24.560 |
When we get to the New Testament, what do we have? 00:36:32.760 |
There's forgiveness of sins and then we have instructions. 00:36:46.080 |
How would this message go to the nations, right? 00:36:48.920 |
Jesus commissioned his apostles so that they might be with him and he might send them out 00:36:53.200 |
to preach and have authority to cast out demons, right? 00:36:57.320 |
He also said to the apostles that he was sending out his apostles as Jesus was sent out by 00:37:02.680 |
Peter stated that the apostles were chosen by God as witnesses. 00:37:15.080 |
Yes, they were with Christ as he's doing ministry. 00:37:20.400 |
But very specifically, Jesus is saying of his apostles that he's commissioning them 00:37:26.520 |
and he's giving them his authority that they're gonna be chosen by God as witnesses. 00:37:31.600 |
That's very directly what Jesus said about the apostles. 00:37:35.720 |
That is why apostolic origins is so important. 00:37:38.760 |
He didn't say, he didn't say that about everyone across time. 00:37:43.180 |
If he did, then we'd all be writing the New Testament. 00:37:49.480 |
The reason we're not doing that is contained within the parameters of scripture, okay? 00:37:55.760 |
I'm gonna go on and I'm gonna show you some more passages, okay? 00:37:59.720 |
The apostles were likened to the Old Testament prophets, which means they have the authority 00:38:07.400 |
You should remember the predictions of the holy prophets and the commandment of the Lord 00:38:25.000 |
They accepted them as messengers of God, right? 00:38:40.480 |
And the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles. 00:38:46.340 |
He puts the prophets on par with the apostles. 00:38:51.960 |
Right here in this passage, he's putting the prophets on par with the apostles. 00:38:55.960 |
He didn't say, "Trust the holy prophets and everyone who has the Holy Spirit that comes 00:39:03.620 |
There's a select group here, a select office here, the holy prophets, which you and I are 00:39:12.760 |
I'm talking about the Old Testament prophets, okay? 00:39:15.200 |
There are no more Old Testament prophets because the Old Testament is done. 00:39:20.040 |
There's Old Testament prophets and they are done, okay? 00:39:23.600 |
In the same way, and then he also says apostles. 00:39:29.160 |
There is no such thing as I'm an apostle of Christ. 00:39:36.160 |
Remember your word through the prophets and through the apostles, okay? 00:39:41.420 |
That's why apostolic origins is so important, okay? 00:39:44.440 |
The writer of Hebrews likens the Old Testament with the message of the apostles. 00:39:47.760 |
In Hebrews 2, 2-3, he talks about the Old Testament and then he talks about the New 00:39:57.600 |
The apostles say that the message they are conveying is really just a message of Jesus 00:40:04.840 |
When you and I say the word tradition, you and I mean like I have a tradition. 00:40:08.680 |
I go to Krispy Kreme after my finals every single quarter, right? 00:40:16.440 |
And then if you don't do it, it's not a big deal, right? 00:40:19.800 |
When the apostles refer to something like with respect to a tradition, what they're 00:40:24.160 |
saying is I received it from Christ and now I'm giving it to you. 00:40:28.840 |
It's not flippant like going to Krispy Kreme, okay? 00:40:31.880 |
This is I got the words of Jesus and now I'm giving it to you. 00:40:36.600 |
First Corinthians 11-23, "For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, 00:40:42.000 |
that the Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed took bread." 00:41:01.500 |
He received this directly from the Lord and now I'm giving it to you. 00:41:05.640 |
Second Thessalonians 3-6, "Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus 00:41:09.840 |
Christ, that you keep away from every brother who leads an unruly life and not according 00:41:14.040 |
to the tradition which you received from us." 00:41:16.680 |
Keep away from everyone who doesn't abide by the tradition that you received from us. 00:41:20.960 |
He's not saying keep away from everyone who doesn't go to Krispy Kreme with us after finals, 00:41:26.600 |
What he's saying is keep away from everyone from the tradition you received because that 00:41:34.160 |
That tradition that I'm giving to you, I received it from the Lord Jesus, okay? 00:41:39.400 |
Second Corinthians 15, "I deliver it to you as a first importance which I also received." 00:41:44.120 |
I delivered it to you and I just received it, right? 00:41:54.440 |
Luke 1-2, "Just as they were handed down to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses 00:42:01.040 |
You see this very large importance and I'm understating that, right, when he says large 00:42:08.480 |
This heavy responsibility that the apostles were privileged with having with respect to 00:42:16.400 |
They were receiving direct revelation from Christ and they were giving it to us, okay? 00:42:28.480 |
"The church was built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself 00:42:36.800 |
"Therefore, the apostles were to safeguard and vault the faith that was once for all 00:42:43.720 |
Jude only has one chapter, so verse 3, right? 00:42:46.600 |
In Jude verse 3, chapter 1 verse 3, Jude says, "The faith that was once for all delivered 00:42:54.760 |
Jude didn't say, "The faith that is ongoing and we're going to keep writing scripture." 00:43:00.120 |
The faith, it was once for all delivered to the saints. 00:43:10.640 |
Everyone else that comes after us preserves the faith that we have. 00:43:16.000 |
You don't write like, "Oh, I got a revelation from God. 00:43:19.160 |
You know, my name is Joseph Smith and I saw God." 00:43:28.080 |
There is no Mohammed, there is no Buddha, there is no one else. 00:43:33.560 |
This faith is once for all delivered to the saints. 00:43:36.880 |
The saints that come afterwards safeguard, they vault, they preserve, they get it right. 00:43:46.720 |
So given that the apostles were cognizant of writing the Old Testament, writing the 00:43:55.600 |
The apostles knew that they were writing the New Testament. 00:43:57.880 |
It wasn't like, you know, they were like walking, right? 00:44:01.120 |
And then Peter goes, "I need to use the bathroom." 00:44:15.000 |
Okay, 1 Timothy 5.18, "For the scripture says, 'You shall not muzzle the ox while it is threshing, 00:44:23.040 |
That first portion, "You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing," comes in Deuteronomy. 00:44:27.880 |
"The laborer is worthy of his wages," comes from Luke 10.7. 00:44:34.760 |
So in 1 Timothy 5.18, he's quoting Luke 10.7. 00:44:41.080 |
They already know from this point early on what is scripture, okay? 00:44:46.360 |
Second Peter 3.16, "As also in all his letters, speaking in them of things in which are some 00:44:52.000 |
things hard to understand, which the untaught and unstable distort, as they do also the 00:44:58.320 |
rest of scriptures to their own destruction." 00:45:08.000 |
"As they do also the rest of the scriptures." 00:45:17.080 |
They're just distorting Paul's letters, just like they do the rest of scriptures. 00:45:31.280 |
So it's not like he needs to say, "Oh, this is scripture?" 00:45:37.440 |
So because there was an understanding, at least just generally speaking, he's saying 00:45:41.680 |
this kind of almost offhand, "As they do the rest of scriptures." 00:45:45.720 |
John 21.24, "This is the disciple who was testifying to these things and wrote these 00:45:50.000 |
things, and we know that his testimony is true." 00:45:55.240 |
He's testifying to these things, and he wrote these things, and we know that his testimony 00:46:02.880 |
1 Thessalonians 2.13, "For this reason, we also constantly thank God that when you received 00:46:06.840 |
the Word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the Word of men, but for 00:46:11.800 |
what it really is, the Word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe. 00:46:19.280 |
I am glad that when you heard what I told you, you didn't accept it as the Word of men, 00:46:29.640 |
They were cognizant when they were writing the New Testament that this is God's Word. 00:46:34.440 |
Or else how would they know what is God's Word and what is not? 00:46:38.320 |
Because again, like I told you before, it's not like they were just walking around and 00:46:41.600 |
everything that's like, everything Apostle Paul said is God's Word, right? 00:46:50.400 |
2 Thessalonians 2.15, "So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which 00:46:54.400 |
you were taught, whether by word of mouth or by letter from us." 00:47:02.720 |
Again, when he says traditions, I just showed you a whole bunch of verses, right? 00:47:10.480 |
Not a tradition like, again, like you and me, every year we do this, every quarter we 00:47:15.440 |
But a tradition in this context is what did they receive from the Lord Jesus. 00:47:22.040 |
So hold on to the traditions because it is the Word of God. 00:47:26.880 |
1 Corinthians 14, "If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize 00:47:31.720 |
the things which I write to you are the Lord's commandment. 00:47:34.000 |
But if anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized." 00:47:38.560 |
So if you think you're godly, then you should recognize that what I'm saying to you is from 00:47:47.200 |
Paul's saying that right here in 1 Corinthians 14, right? 00:47:50.840 |
2 Corinthians 12, "Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations for this reason, 00:47:56.080 |
to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger 00:47:59.200 |
of Satan to torment me, to keep me from exalting myself. 00:48:02.400 |
Concerning this, I implored the Lord three times that I might leave me. 00:48:05.080 |
And he has said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.'" 00:48:11.760 |
Very specifically, Paul's saying here, "And he said to me, God said to me, 'My grace is 00:48:18.440 |
sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.'" 00:48:27.060 |
And all these thoughts are building upon that, okay? 00:48:35.320 |
What we heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we looked at and touched with our 00:48:38.840 |
hands, concerning the word of life, and the life was manifested, and we have seen and 00:48:42.800 |
testify and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested 00:48:47.480 |
What we have seen and heard, we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship 00:48:51.480 |
And indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ." 00:48:54.880 |
These things, these things, we, apostles, we write. 00:49:05.480 |
They were very cognizant that they were writing the new covenant. 00:49:10.040 |
Paul said, "We are the ministers of the new covenant." 00:49:13.540 |
Paul said, "You accepted it not as the word of man, but as the word of God." 00:49:17.340 |
Paul said, "You should recognize it that it's the word of God." 00:49:21.160 |
Paul said, "This is the tradition which I got from the Lord Jesus." 00:49:24.760 |
Paul said, "The Lord said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you.'" 00:49:29.240 |
The apostolic office was special and different from us. 00:49:34.960 |
We're actually receiving words from God and preserving it, vaulting it, putting it in 00:49:47.560 |
"The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his bondservants." 00:50:14.400 |
God didn't show it to you and me, not in this way. 00:50:29.600 |
Verse 3, "Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy." 00:50:35.560 |
How are you going to read something unless it's written down? 00:50:39.640 |
How are you going to read something unless it's written down? 00:50:43.920 |
"The Lord said to him, 'Who has made man's mouth? 00:50:49.040 |
Or who makes them mute or deaf or seeing or blind? 00:50:53.720 |
Now then go and even I will be with your mouth.'" 00:51:02.400 |
If God created the world, he created space, he created time, he can move mouths to make 00:51:17.120 |
Oh, how do we make sure that we got it right? 00:51:19.640 |
If God wants to get it right, he will get it right, okay? 00:51:23.360 |
Deuteronomy 18-18, 18 verse 18, "I will raise up a prophet from among their countrymen like 00:51:29.240 |
you, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command 00:51:44.320 |
If you've never studied Deuteronomy 18, this is referring to Christ. 00:51:47.480 |
"I'm going to raise up a prophet from among you. 00:51:56.160 |
John 14, "These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you, but the Helper, the 00:52:02.680 |
Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and 00:52:12.320 |
bring to your remembrance all that I said to you." 00:52:27.120 |
You guys are filled with sin, so you might get this wrong. 00:52:30.360 |
You guys are unfaithful, so you might get this wrong. 00:52:34.280 |
Apostolic origins is important not because of the greatness of the apostles, but because 00:52:43.760 |
He is telling them, "The Holy Spirit is going to teach you all things and bring to your 00:52:52.840 |
Now, I know when we read John 14, we think of it as individually, personally. 00:52:59.280 |
We read this passage and we think, "God is going to allow me to understand all things." 00:53:04.880 |
But he didn't promise you that you're going to take an exam and you're going to remember 00:53:12.680 |
He didn't promise you that you're going to read scripture and that you're going to remember 00:53:17.760 |
You do your devos and then in the afternoon you totally forgot. 00:53:22.400 |
You probably read something about anger and then you're ticked off in the afternoon. 00:53:27.520 |
John 14 is primarily not speaking about an individual relationship with God. 00:53:35.480 |
Now, I'm not saying that principle isn't there. 00:53:43.040 |
But firstly, Jesus is talking to his men and he's saying to them, "He's going to teach 00:53:52.240 |
you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you." 00:53:58.280 |
The things that you forgot that are important, Holy Spirit is going to remind you of those 00:54:03.760 |
In fact, there are things that you don't know, Holy Spirit is going to teach you. 00:54:08.120 |
John 16, "I have many more things to say to you but you cannot bear them now." 00:54:12.200 |
I want to tell you like, you know, the qualities of an elder, the qualities of a deacon, how 00:54:16.200 |
to run a church, but you can't bear them now because you're stressing out. 00:54:20.560 |
But when he, the Spirit of Truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth. 00:54:34.600 |
He's going to guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own initiative, 00:54:39.160 |
but whatever he hears, he will speak and he will disclose to you what is to come. 00:54:45.000 |
He will glorify me for he will take of mine and will disclose it to you. 00:54:48.000 |
All things that the Father has are mine, therefore I said that he takes of mine and will disclose 00:54:55.200 |
Everything that the Holy Spirit teaches to you will be from me. 00:55:11.160 |
Whatever he hears, he will speak and he will disclose it to you. 00:55:20.120 |
So you see why apostolic origins is so important here. 00:55:25.200 |
This is not a promise to every believer through the history of time that they're going to 00:55:34.600 |
What he's saying here is he's saying to his men that the Holy Spirit is going to disclose 00:55:45.680 |
I want to tell you these things right now, but you can't handle it. 00:55:50.280 |
But when the Holy Spirit comes, you'll be able to handle it. 00:56:00.400 |
And all they knew for the last three years was Christ. 00:56:03.480 |
The last three years, all they knew was Christ. 00:56:05.760 |
And as long as they're with Christ, they're victorious. 00:56:18.480 |
As long as they're with Christ, things are good. 00:56:27.520 |
So Christ is saying, "I got more things I want to tell you, but you can't bear it right 00:56:35.040 |
The Holy Spirit's going to come, and he's going to guide you, not into some truth, but 00:56:44.320 |
So what about the books that were not penned directly by the apostles? 00:56:47.760 |
Well, Luke was a close traveling companion of Paul through Acts. 00:56:53.400 |
Mark is mentioned as a son of Peter in 1 Peter 5.13. 00:56:57.480 |
James was recognized nearly from the beginning as a leader. 00:57:02.960 |
And Hebrews was actually recognized to have Pauline authorship early on. 00:57:05.920 |
I know we debate about that, but at least early on, it was recognized to have Pauline 00:57:11.960 |
So every single book in the New Testament is either penned directly by an apostle or 00:57:17.760 |
with someone with close association to an apostle. 00:57:20.640 |
You can consider it apostolic literature because of the closeness of their relationship. 00:57:37.760 |
Divine qualities, apostolic origins, and corporate reception. 00:57:45.120 |
These have been, so far, our criteria for the canon of Scripture. 00:57:55.040 |
They are self-authenticating because God's Word has to be self-authenticating. 00:58:01.360 |
The reason God's Word has to be self-authenticating is because there is nothing greater than God's 00:58:10.560 |
So if you're going to authenticate God's Word, it's going to come in the fashion of an attribute. 00:58:20.120 |
So when I say the criteria of the canon, criteria for the canon of Scripture, a better word 00:58:26.160 |
is actually attributes of a canon of Scripture. 00:58:29.960 |
The canon of Scripture exhibits these three qualities. 00:58:38.680 |
But I'm trying to press upon you, okay, why it has to be self-authenticating, why being 00:58:47.560 |
self-authenticating is remarkably impressive, right? 00:58:52.520 |
And with respect to anything, not just God's Word. 00:59:02.880 |
We're not giving like a separate, "Oh, God's Word gets special treatment." 00:59:07.760 |
Anything that is fundamental and anything that is foundational is going to be self-authenticating. 00:59:14.160 |
And I just used the example of sensory perception to you, right? 00:59:17.400 |
I used the example of the laws of logic, okay? 00:59:29.080 |
If God's Word has divine qualities, if it has apostolic origins, then it's going to 00:59:40.400 |
Why is it going to be received as God's Word? 00:59:46.660 |
If the Holy Spirit dwells in you, it's not so much you recognizing that it's Scripture, 00:59:52.840 |
it's the Holy Spirit within you hearing Scripture and recognizing it, okay? 01:00:09.200 |
And then you embark on the road of sanctification. 01:00:14.720 |
Well, it's the Holy Spirit within you, right? 01:00:22.040 |
But outside the power of the Holy Spirit, you would succumb to your flesh. 01:00:26.560 |
So it's similar in that sense where God is working all aspects. 01:00:31.680 |
Every single aspect, He's working it by Himself, okay? 01:00:37.640 |
And regard the patience of our Lord, 2 Peter 3.15 to 16, right? 01:00:45.680 |
But look at it within the lens of corporate reception. 01:00:48.700 |
And Peter says here, "As they do also the rest of the Scriptures," right? 01:00:55.720 |
There's the angle in which it is apostolic origins because he's likening Paul, right, 01:01:06.820 |
But the other angle to it is that Peter's audience understands that this is Scripture. 01:01:17.640 |
Like, by the way, Paul's letters are Scripture for these reasons. 01:01:23.200 |
He's just kind of saying it casually, like an offhand comment, right? 01:01:27.800 |
He's just saying, "As they do the rest of Scriptures." 01:01:30.280 |
That only works if they already received it as Scriptures. 01:01:35.720 |
That only works if they already received it as Scriptures, right? 01:01:39.580 |
If I were to say to you, right, if I were to say it to you, right, yeah, like, you know, 01:01:44.160 |
it's like, you know, like, you know, blah, blah, like, you know, blah, blah, is the goat 01:02:01.100 |
If I were to say that to you and no one, like, pushes back, it's because we all agree that 01:02:09.520 |
In the same way, greatest of all time, in the same way, when he says, "The rest of the 01:02:18.760 |
He's not saying, "And let me give you a reason why, like, Paul's letters are--" He's not 01:02:24.040 |
And the reason he doesn't have to do that is because they already accepted it as Scripture. 01:02:29.160 |
So you know that the audience, from this very early point on, they've already received it 01:02:36.080 |
Peter claims apostolic authority and calls Paul his brother, right? 01:02:40.120 |
This will lend itself to the idea that Peter is also writing Scripture. 01:02:43.920 |
First Timothy 5.18, I know I'm quoting the same verses again, or at least some of the 01:02:48.120 |
same verses, but I want you to see it in a different angle, okay? 01:02:53.240 |
If he's just quoting Scripture, he says, "For the Scripture says," right? 01:02:58.920 |
"For the Scripture says, 'You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing. 01:03:04.520 |
The audience must have understood this as Scripture because he's not giving a defense 01:03:10.880 |
What that means is that from the earliest point on, from the very earliest point on, 01:03:22.520 |
Second Peter 3.2, prophets and apostles are juxtaposed, right? 01:03:30.400 |
"Yeah, you know, you should listen to us because Jesus said so." 01:03:35.640 |
He just says, "Listen to the holy prophets and listen to us," right? 01:03:41.660 |
So then we know that the audience must have understood that and received that because 01:03:51.320 |
First Corinthians 14, "If anyone thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize 01:03:54.720 |
that things which I write to you are the Lord's commandment." 01:04:00.640 |
Hebrews 2.2-3, "For the word spoken through the angels proved unalterable and every transgression 01:04:07.560 |
How will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? 01:04:10.200 |
"After it was at first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who 01:04:20.360 |
The word spoken through the angels, Old Testament. 01:04:24.120 |
That's another way of saying the Old Testament, okay? 01:04:28.400 |
How are we going to neglect so great a salvation after it was first spoken through the Lord, 01:04:33.560 |
that's Jesus, and confirmed to us by those who heard? 01:04:43.200 |
Because this, what the writer of Hebrews is saying is, "This is greater." 01:04:48.200 |
If those guys didn't escape judgment, how are we going to escape judgment? 01:04:54.480 |
So very early on, right, we know that they understood this as Scripture. 01:04:59.920 |
First Timothy 3.15, "But in case I am delayed, I write so that you will know how one ought 01:05:09.040 |
First Peter 2.5, "You also as living stones are being built up as a spiritual house for 01:05:13.080 |
holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ." 01:05:22.040 |
Corporately, you and I are being built up by the Holy Spirit. 01:05:33.640 |
How is that going to work unless the church receives God's Word? 01:05:44.120 |
The church will receive God's Word because you and I are living stones. 01:05:49.040 |
First Corinthians 12.13, "For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether 01:05:54.960 |
Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit." 01:06:02.200 |
All of us, every single one of us, baptized by one Spirit. 01:06:05.480 |
Of course, of course the church is going to receive His Word. 01:06:15.520 |
all baptized into one body. Let me give you another example of corporate 01:06:21.340 |
reception, okay? New Testament public reading can be traced to the public 01:06:25.160 |
reading of the Old Testament texts, okay? What do I mean by that? In the old test, 01:06:29.960 |
in the synagogue, you know what they would do? They would kind of have, like, 01:06:34.440 |
something like sermons. And they would read the Old Testament. They just read it. 01:06:39.540 |
They would just read it. Boom, read, read, read, read, read. Oh, but then a special 01:06:45.680 |
instruction came about. Oh, what was this? Have my letter read among you. That's 01:06:52.680 |
interesting. This began to replace the Old Testament reading of text. 01:06:59.680 |
Colossians 4 16. When this letter is read among you, have it also read in the 01:07:03.520 |
Church of the Laodiceans, and you, for your part, read my letter that is coming from 01:07:07.080 |
Laodicea. I urge you by the Lord to have this letter read to all the brethren. 01:07:12.120 |
Blessed is he who reads and those who hear the words of the prophecy, and 01:07:15.600 |
heed the things which are written, for the time is near. Until I come, give 01:07:21.120 |
attention to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and teaching. 01:07:26.920 |
That is significant because the Old Testament practice was to read God's 01:07:33.520 |
Word. When you and I read this, we just think, "Hey, Paul has an update." You know 01:07:37.800 |
like when the missionary comes up and he kind of gives you an update? No, it's 01:07:40.240 |
not the same thing. Okay? The public reading of Scripture was reading God's 01:07:45.520 |
Word. But something, ouch, something is beginning to replace the reading of Old 01:07:54.520 |
Testament texts. That ain't gonna happen unless it's the New Testament. You guys 01:08:05.320 |
are following me, right? When public reading of Scripture, okay, it is not like 01:08:11.840 |
you and me, missionary comes up, he gives an update, blah blah blah. Okay? Public 01:08:18.320 |
reading of Scripture is like, instead of Pastor Peter speaking, have someone else 01:08:22.280 |
speak. You're gonna take that as a sermon. That's gonna be a sermon to you, 01:08:27.800 |
right? So in here, when there was the Old Testament reading of public 01:08:33.200 |
reading, it was of Scripture. But this began to take its place. So corporately, 01:08:40.680 |
very early on, they received it as the Word of God. Okay? The apostolic fathers 01:08:49.520 |
acknowledge apostolic authority and the authority of the New Testament. Okay, 01:08:52.920 |
apostolic fathers is a very fancy way of saying the people who were in the 01:08:58.120 |
Apostle small group. Okay? So whoever was in, like, that's, okay, they're disciples. 01:09:03.360 |
Okay? So Apostle Peter's disciple. Apostle John's disciple. Paul's disciple. Matthew's, 01:09:14.640 |
Nathanael's disciple. Like, they're disciples. Okay? Collectively as a group, 01:09:20.000 |
right, were the apostolic fathers. When I say early church fathers, it's like a 01:09:25.880 |
time period. There's like generations. Okay? And you can kind of cut it off at some 01:09:30.040 |
point, but like, that's what I'm talking about. The early church fathers. So 01:09:34.040 |
apostolic fathers go within the group of the early church fathers. But the 01:09:38.640 |
apostolic fathers are the ones who learned directly from the Apostles. 01:09:42.840 |
Directly. Okay? So Clement says, "Take up the epistles of the blessed Apostle Paul. 01:09:48.080 |
To be sure, he sent you a letter in the spirit concerning himself and Cephas and 01:09:52.280 |
Apollos. The Apostles received the gospel for us from the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus 01:09:57.080 |
Christ was sent from God. The Christ, therefore, is from God and the Apostles 01:10:00.880 |
from Christ." So very early on, they were taught that the Apostles were speaking 01:10:08.560 |
the Word of God. And they were taught that because the Apostles taught them 01:10:14.560 |
that. The Apostles taught them that because Jesus said it would happen. So 01:10:21.840 |
the power doesn't come from the Apostles. The power comes from God. So let me go 01:10:28.400 |
back here. Okay? So I don't want anyone to miss this point. We talk about divine 01:10:32.880 |
qualities. We talk about apostolic origins. And we talk about corporate 01:10:36.800 |
reception. Those three points are important because God has said so. Okay? 01:10:44.080 |
Jesus comes on the scene. He confirms the Old Testament. Right? If the Old Testament 01:10:51.280 |
at the time wasn't the Old Testament, he would have said, "Take Job out. Take Psalms 01:10:55.800 |
out. Take Deuteronomy out." He doesn't do that. Okay? And remember, this is the same 01:11:01.640 |
man who made Lazarus rise from the dead. Do you want to know if Jesus is an 01:11:06.560 |
actual historical figure as opposed to a myth? Everyone that saw Jesus, okay, 01:11:14.480 |
couldn't deny who he was. Historians who hated Christians wrote that Jesus 01:11:21.760 |
existed. Do you know why? Because they couldn't deny who he was. Let me give you 01:11:26.680 |
an example. If you're a hardcore Republican and you hate Barack Obama, can 01:11:31.120 |
you deny that he was the president? No. No. You can't deny that he was a president. 01:11:36.200 |
If you're a hardcore Democrat and you hate Donald Trump, can you deny that he's 01:11:40.560 |
the president? No. You can't deny it. You can say, "I don't like him," but you can't 01:11:44.400 |
deny it. It's the same thing with Jesus. There were historians commissioned by 01:11:48.920 |
Rome who hated Jesus, who hated Christians, but they couldn't deny that 01:11:55.360 |
he existed. They couldn't deny it. Do you know why? Because he did everything in 01:11:59.840 |
public, which is in direct contradiction to every single religious figure that 01:12:06.040 |
has existed through time. No one, not all religions are equal, not all ideas are 01:12:12.520 |
equal. That is malarkey. All men are created equal because we're all men and 01:12:17.560 |
women, because we're made in the image of God, but not all ideas are equal, not all 01:12:21.760 |
religions are equal. The reason Christianity stands in stark contrast to 01:12:25.560 |
every other single religion is because of Jesus Christ, okay? So what happened, 01:12:31.200 |
okay, what happened was people would see the risen Christ. He's obviously God 01:12:36.600 |
because he's raising people from the dead. You guys can't deny it. Rome can't 01:12:40.680 |
deny it. After the fact, they want to squash Christians, so they say, "Deny the 01:12:46.080 |
fact that Jesus is the Christ or you die," and you know what a lot of people 01:12:49.800 |
chose? They chose death. These are historical facts. So a lot of people who 01:12:56.000 |
saw the resurrected Christ said, "I'm not gonna deny him," and they just died. Some 01:12:59.960 |
of these people were thrown into the Colosseum. Some of them were lit on fire, 01:13:03.800 |
okay? Let me further this for you. I say the same thing in 01:13:09.880 |
BCC Lesson 4, but let me give you this other example, okay? If you and I saw the 01:13:14.000 |
risen Christ, right, if you and I saw the risen Christ and we don't believe in him, 01:13:17.520 |
there's no actual faith, okay? If you put a gun to my head and you say, "Deny Christ 01:13:22.520 |
or I'm gonna shoot you," I don't care if it's true. I don't care. I'm just gonna 01:13:28.120 |
say, I'm just gonna say, "I deny him." You know why? Even though it's true, I don't 01:13:35.760 |
want to die. I don't want to die. So I'm gonna be like, "Yeah, I saw him do all 01:13:42.080 |
that, but I don't really care. So yeah, Jesus, yeah, he's, I don't, like, whatever 01:13:45.920 |
they're saying, I disavow everything that they're saying." You and I are gonna do 01:13:51.440 |
that. But for some reason, this figure, this man, is different. For some reason, 01:13:59.760 |
people saw him, right? People saw him. He claimed he was God. He claimed he was the 01:14:05.960 |
Messiah. He claimed that he will give you life. He claimed that you should follow 01:14:10.960 |
him. And after that, he rose from the dead and people said, "What do you want me to 01:14:18.920 |
do?" The man rose from the dead. "So I'm gonna trust him, even though you kill me. 01:14:25.320 |
Just kill me." "Well, I'm gonna throw you and your kid into the Coliseum. I'm gonna 01:14:31.200 |
light you on fire, and I'm gonna light your kid on fire." "Well, this is kind of hard." 01:14:36.920 |
But I saw him rise from the dead. I saw him rise from the dead. And he told me that 01:14:43.800 |
you would kill me. He told me that you were gonna do this to me. I don't want to 01:14:49.560 |
die. I don't want to see my kid burned. But I can't deny him. And so a lot of 01:14:54.840 |
people face that. So when I tell you Christ confirms the Old Testament canon, 01:14:59.440 |
that's the power behind it. Okay? He's not just some other guy, "Oh, this is church, so 01:15:06.120 |
when he says Jesus, every correct answer is Jesus." That's not what I'm saying. Okay? 01:15:10.720 |
There's a lot that goes into Christ confirming the Old Testament canon. Okay? 01:15:15.760 |
If you just reduce it to, "Oh, this is church, so he can say Jesus," right? That 01:15:21.560 |
is extremely anti-intellectual. That is extremely anti-intellectual. It is 01:15:26.960 |
unfaithful to reason, and frankly, you just probably don't want to believe in 01:15:31.480 |
God, and that's why you think that. But it is not because you're intellectual. It is 01:15:37.480 |
not because you're intellectual. In fact, it is the exact opposite. Okay? That was a 01:15:41.840 |
little pause right there, because I felt like I had to do it. Alright? So let me go 01:15:45.040 |
on here. Point number two. The Didache was an early Christian manual of church 01:15:49.880 |
practice. Okay? So the Didache, right, is like a manual. It's like an instruction 01:15:55.200 |
guide, right? And it had all this scripture in it. It had all this 01:16:00.000 |
scripture in it. Tons of scripture. From very early on, let me go back to 01:16:05.400 |
something Jude said in verse 3. Chapter 1. There's only one chapter. Verse 3. Right? 01:16:10.440 |
It is once for all delivered to the saints. Once for all. It's not this 01:16:14.400 |
ongoing thing, "Let's all write scripture. You write scripture. I write 01:16:18.060 |
scripture." No. It is once for all delivered to the saints. Right? The fact 01:16:22.520 |
that the Didache, going back to about a hundred AD, encapsulates this. Right? Okay. 01:16:30.840 |
Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, said, he quoted various parts of the New Testament as 01:16:36.600 |
saying, "It is written." You only say, "It is written," as if it's God's Word. Polycarp, 01:16:41.680 |
quoted from various parts of the New Testament. Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, 01:16:46.200 |
also quoted parts of the New Testament. Okay? You see the apostolic fathers, they 01:16:51.240 |
quoted the Gospels and the Apollonian Epistles more frequently than any other work. 01:16:55.200 |
They rarely quote outside of the New Testament. Rarely. Christianity was 01:17:03.840 |
distinguished from other religions in that it was prolific in the production 01:17:07.280 |
of manuscripts. Christianity was interesting. Okay? It was very, very 01:17:13.960 |
bookish. Very bookish. When you look in Acts 17, when Paul is on Mars Hill and 01:17:19.600 |
he's like saying, "Oh, you guys are all religious," and the philosophers of that 01:17:23.200 |
day, they love philosophizing, they love hearing new ideas, and they speak, they 01:17:26.920 |
speak, they speak, they speak. That's what they do. Right? Christians, for some reason, 01:17:31.080 |
they come on the scene, this weird sect of Judaism, they come on the scene, right? 01:17:36.160 |
And they're all about writing. Christianity was distinguished from 01:17:40.120 |
other religions and other philosophies of that day in that sense. Other people 01:17:46.680 |
groups noted that about Christians. Okay? So by about the fourth century, major 01:17:51.760 |
biblical codices contain 27 books of the New Testament we have today. 01:17:54.880 |
Sinaiticus, Vaticus, Alexandrus. Okay? The Codex was favored among the parchment 01:17:59.360 |
because one could contain multiple works bound together. It also allowed certain 01:18:03.040 |
books to be grouped together and certain ones to be left out. Parchment. Right? 01:18:07.600 |
Kind of like what you see, like in video games, like when you get a scroll, the 01:18:11.000 |
scroll of power or whatever you get, like, you know, you get an upgrade, it's like a 01:18:14.920 |
scroll, right? Like it's like you roll it up. You guys have seen that before, right? 01:18:20.240 |
But Christianity comes on the scene and it favors a codex. A codex is more like a 01:18:27.840 |
book that we have. Think of like a photo album. Put stuff in, take stuff out, has a 01:18:32.760 |
has a binding here. Christianity seems to favor that. Why is that? On a parchment, 01:18:39.240 |
you can carry so many books, right? It's not very efficient, right? Like it 01:18:45.080 |
preserves what's inside, so that's great, right? But I mean, how are you gonna carry 01:18:50.840 |
like, like 27 parchments? But with a codex, oh, with a codex you can do that. With a 01:18:59.040 |
binding, you can actually do that. For some strange reason, Christianity comes 01:19:04.600 |
on the scene and immediately favors codices. Immediately. That is consistent 01:19:12.360 |
with the compilation of the New Testament. That is consistent with the 01:19:19.120 |
140 AD, Marcion the Gnostic appears in the scene and states that the canon 01:19:25.320 |
consisted of an edited version of Luke and 10 of Paul's epistles. So this 01:19:29.840 |
dude named Marcion, right? We'll just call him Mark the Heretic, okay? Mark the 01:19:33.520 |
Heretic, he comes on the scene and says, "This is the Bible. This is the Bible." 01:19:37.280 |
About 140 AD, right? So around that time, right, generally people already understood 01:19:43.480 |
what the New Testament was. But this dude comes on the scene and says, "This is 01:19:46.960 |
actually the Bible." So now Christianity is being challenged, right? So because of 01:19:51.560 |
this man's heresy, they got to prove that this man's heresy is not truth, right? So 01:19:58.120 |
because of that, they engage Marcion, okay? By 200 AD, as a result of, probably as a 01:20:04.760 |
result of that, the New Testament was already established and we know that in 01:20:08.160 |
the Muratorian Fragment. The Muratorian Fragment contains, it's like a list, right? 01:20:12.880 |
So there's this fragment, goes to about 200 AD, and it lists all the books of the 01:20:19.960 |
New Testament. Guess what? It validates our New Testament. And it was probably a 01:20:25.480 |
result of Marcion's heresy. So because of this guy's heresy, someone's like, "Prove to 01:20:32.880 |
me that this isn't the Bible. Prove to me," right? So because of that, they're like, 01:20:37.040 |
"Well, let's get organized and let's deal with this knucklehead," right? And so these 01:20:42.680 |
lists start to form. In the early 300s, Origen's list also contains our New 01:20:47.700 |
Testament, while noting that some of the epistles were debated. Around the same 01:20:52.600 |
time as Origen, Eusebius also lists much of our New Testament. In 367, 01:20:56.920 |
Athanasian's letter contains our New Testament today, which is corroborated by 01:21:01.720 |
Jerome and Augustine. Council of Hippo and Carthage also confirm the New 01:21:05.880 |
Testament we have today. And this makes complete sense if one understands the 01:21:09.080 |
history of the Church. The first 300 years of the Church, there was intense 01:21:14.080 |
persecution. It wasn't like they're doing nothing. They're just like, "Oh, like, hey, 01:21:18.160 |
what should we do today?" There's intense persecution. The moment they 01:21:22.120 |
get under that, you see this consensus with respect to the New Testament, okay? 01:21:25.960 |
Now, when I say consensus, let me say that again. You see this apparent organized 01:21:30.560 |
consensus. The consensus already existed, okay? The consensus already existed, right? 01:21:36.400 |
We see that with the Didache. We see that with the Apostolic Fathers. So the 01:21:40.880 |
consensus already existed, but then the heretics, or the ones that 01:21:45.400 |
actually had some juice to them, started to appear. And so you see this 01:21:51.120 |
godly reaction to combat the heretics, okay? Okay. So there's this chart that I 01:22:00.920 |
just ripped off a book, right? So divine qualities, apostolic origins, and corporate 01:22:06.840 |
reception, right? If you see that graphic right there, right? They represent the 01:22:11.000 |
attributes of canonicity, right? And it is within the context of the Holy Spirit. 01:22:16.120 |
That's why it is self-authenticating, okay? I want you to remember something. 01:22:20.440 |
John 1.1, "In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was 01:22:25.960 |
God." If the Word was God, what is greater than God that can authenticate God? 01:22:34.080 |
There's nothing greater than God. That's why it has to be self-authenticating, 01:22:38.760 |
right? He says it another way. Hebrews 6.3, "Since he could swear by no one greater, 01:22:44.040 |
he swore by himself." Himself. What's God gonna swear by when it 01:22:54.040 |
comes to his Word? "I swear to you that this is true." There's nothing 01:22:59.240 |
else he could swear by. When he says something's gonna happen to give you and 01:23:03.280 |
I comfort, he says, "I swear by who?" There's no one greater than God. He has to swear 01:23:07.560 |
by himself. If the Word was God, okay, the Logos, right? And he could swear by 01:23:15.200 |
himself, of course the attributes of the Canon, of course the criteria of the 01:23:22.000 |
Canon, of course it's going to be self-authenticating. There's nothing 01:23:26.360 |
greater than God. Let me say this again. It is not cheap. It is not intellectually 01:23:32.920 |
cheap. Everything that is foundational is self-authenticating. Everything that is 01:23:39.200 |
foundational. Everything is self-authenticating, okay? If you want to 01:23:46.400 |
hit me up and get into a philosophical discussion about that, I will, okay? 01:23:53.680 |
What is Scripture's position on Scripture? "For no prophecy was ever made 01:24:00.320 |
by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." That is 01:24:05.960 |
Scripture's position on Scripture. Men didn't write it, God wrote it. "I testify 01:24:10.800 |
to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to 01:24:14.120 |
them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book. If anyone takes away 01:24:17.400 |
from the words of this book of this prophecy, God will take away his part 01:24:20.160 |
from the tree of life and from the holy city which are written in this book." 01:24:27.680 |
That's four o'clock. John 10 27. "My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they 01:24:35.240 |
follow me." That's what Jesus said, right? "My sheep hear my voice, I know them and 01:24:40.400 |
they follow me." So wouldn't the people who are going to be Christian validate 01:24:46.800 |
God's Word? Jesus said, "My sheep hear my voice, I know them and they follow me. A 01:24:53.240 |
stranger they simply will not follow, but will free from him because they do not 01:24:57.240 |
know the voice of strangers. The church will receive his Word. They will be able 01:25:03.840 |
to deduce what is not God's Word." Okay? Romans 15 4. "For whatever was written in 01:25:10.440 |
earlier times was written for our instruction so that through perseverance 01:25:13.360 |
and encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope." Whatever was written in 01:25:16.320 |
earlier times was written for our instruction. We will have God's Word. All 01:25:24.720 |
Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and 01:25:28.280 |
training. If all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, 01:25:32.720 |
correcting, and training, would he not give it to us? Would we somehow mess this 01:25:38.080 |
up? We're not gonna mess it up. Not because we're great, but because Christ 01:25:43.920 |
promised. John 14 and John chapter 16. Isaiah 55, just to reinforce this point. 01:25:50.960 |
"So will my word be which goes forth from my mouth. It will not 01:25:56.720 |
return to me empty without accomplishing what I desire and without succeeding in 01:26:01.280 |
the matter for which I sent it. All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted 01:26:06.480 |
as nothing, but he does according to his will." You think man can stop God from 01:26:14.000 |
giving his word to his church? I don't think so. Ephesians 1, "Also we have 01:26:21.360 |
obtained inheritance having been predestined according to his purpose, who works all 01:26:24.400 |
things after the counsel of his will." He works all things. All the inhabitants of 01:26:30.760 |
the earth are accounted as nothing. His word will not return void. It will 01:26:37.200 |
succeed. With respect to the canon of Scripture. Okay? With respect to the canon 01:26:47.640 |
of Scripture, if it has divine qualities, it will also have apostolic origins and 01:26:54.720 |
the church will receive it as such. With respect to the canon of Scripture, I'm 01:27:00.720 |
pretty proud of that. If it has apostolic origins, it will have divine qualities 01:27:05.240 |
and the church will receive it as such. Because his sheep hear his voice. 01:27:14.040 |
Who wrote the first five books? Moses. Was Moses around when he wrote when 01:27:21.800 |
God created the world? No, he wasn't around. He wasn't like observing God. 01:27:25.120 |
That's cool you like made Adam. That's cool, right? Because Adam was the first 01:27:29.040 |
man, right? So it was given to Moses. I'm using this Old Testament example because 01:27:34.480 |
it's not anything new in the New Testament, right? So when Christ 01:27:38.120 |
commissions his apostles, the Holy Spirit, John chapter 14, John chapter 16, he's 01:27:43.920 |
going to teach you all things. He's going to guide you into all truth. He's gonna 01:27:47.680 |
make you remember everything I said. I want to tell you more but you can't bear 01:27:50.760 |
it now, right? But you're going to do this. The Apostle said, "I received this from 01:27:55.920 |
Jesus." Right? You have divine qualities. You have apostolic origins. And then the 01:28:02.080 |
church, Jesus said what? "My sheep hear my voice. My sheep hear my voice." Who dwells 01:28:08.560 |
in you? God dwells in you. God is going to react to his word. Divine qualities, 01:28:14.760 |
apostolic origins, corporate reception. That's that in a nutshell, okay? Because 01:28:23.480 |
Christ said it. Because Christ said it, right? And if you don't believe him, this 01:28:30.200 |
is a very logical argument from Christ. "At least believe me because of the works 01:28:34.480 |
that I do." That's what Jesus said. You don't believe me? Then how in the world 01:28:39.400 |
am I doing all this, right? If you don't believe him, at least believe the works. 01:28:43.160 |
And go read a book, take a look at history, and take a look at all the 01:28:47.760 |
people, all the men and women that died because they saw Christ, right? Okay. 01:28:51.520 |
That's enough of that, alright? So that's the canon of 01:28:55.400 |
Scripture. Okay. I'm gonna answer one question here, right? What about the 01:29:00.400 |
Catholic Bible? What about the Catholic Bible, right? Okay. The Catholic Bible 01:29:04.840 |
contains what is known as the Old Testament Apocrypha. There is a New 01:29:07.640 |
Testament Apocrypha, but no one accepts the New Testament Apocrypha, okay? Just 01:29:10.280 |
throw that out the door, okay? The Catholics have other books within the 01:29:13.600 |
Old Testament, okay? Tobit, 1st and 2nd Maccabees, and some others, okay? That's 01:29:20.640 |
where they get the idea of purgatory, from the Apocrypha. But you don't see the 01:29:27.000 |
idea of purgatory in any other book except the Apocrypha. It fails the test 01:29:31.560 |
of doctrinal unity. Number two, did Jesus ever quote from any book of the 01:29:36.600 |
Apocrypha? No. No. He never quoted from the Apocrypha. Do you know why? Because 01:29:43.760 |
it's not God's Word. Because it's not God's Word, okay? 01:29:48.880 |
Number three, okay? Early on, they were not accepted. Now you might find, you might 01:29:56.200 |
find, this could be God's Word, but generally speaking, they were not 01:30:00.720 |
accepted as God's Word. You know what else? You know what else? Even the 01:30:06.160 |
Catholic Church, although they recognized the Apocrypha, they, the Catholic Church, 01:30:11.040 |
I'm not talking about the, some council here, some council there, I'm talking 01:30:14.680 |
about the Catholic Church at the time did not recognize the Apocrypha as God's 01:30:18.320 |
Word. That happened in the 16th century, okay? So from very early on, the Apocrypha 01:30:24.520 |
was not counted as God's Word, from very early on, okay? And when you look at the 01:30:29.120 |
quotations, that it is written and stuff like that, they come from our New 01:30:33.120 |
Testament, from the early Church Fathers or whatever else, okay? The early Church, 01:30:36.680 |
so the Apostolic Fathers, and there's ones after that. Is there a 01:30:41.880 |
document somewhere that says the Apocrypha is God's Word? Yes. Yes. There 01:30:50.380 |
is documents out there, okay? But if you look at it in its totality, right, there's 01:30:56.600 |
a lot of forgeries out there, and the way you can siphon out the forgeries from 01:31:00.400 |
what's actually God's Word is there's, there's, there's an analysis to this, 01:31:03.760 |
right? Does it have doctrinal unity? How many copies are there, and how many times 01:31:08.160 |
are they quoted as Scripture? If you do the analysis, it's the New Testament and 01:31:12.920 |
the Old Testament that we have today. You know what's another, like the final nail 01:31:17.600 |
in the coffin? The Old Testament that the Jews use, Israel uses, is the Old Testament 01:31:25.080 |
that we use, not the Catholic one. Alright? So that's, that's, that's the Apocrypha. 01:31:31.400 |
Okay. I want to take questions. Don't be afraid. Ask me questions. Yes. 01:32:00.760 |
Oh, I see, I see your question. I do know why. They were, I want to make sure I get 01:32:13.880 |
this right, they were eventually conquered. And I want to make, I don't 01:32:20.040 |
want to give you fake news, and I don't want to, because there's a lot of tribes, 01:32:23.600 |
but if I remember correctly, they were, they were conquered. And so that, and 01:32:27.640 |
that was, that was the reason why they were eventually dispersed. So the copies 01:32:57.280 |
So which manuscripts does our English Bible use? Is that the question? 01:33:03.840 |
Yes. Let me, let me say this, okay? There are two kind of general codices, two 01:33:15.200 |
general ones, okay? So these two general ones are slightly different, okay? So then 01:33:21.400 |
you have the King James and the New King James kind of using this one, and then 01:33:25.320 |
you have like nearly all the other translations using this one, okay? Without 01:33:31.920 |
getting into the weeds too much, they're generally identical, but the one that the 01:33:38.960 |
King James and New King James uses, right, they have a couple more verses. One 01:33:44.960 |
example is in 1st John chapter 5, when it talks about the Trinity, and King James 01:33:49.920 |
and New King James, I think it's chapter 5, it directly says there are three that 01:33:53.640 |
testify, the Father, God, and the Holy Spirit, right? Now that's, that's like a direct 01:33:58.400 |
statement of the Trinity, right? The, the text that we use, it doesn't have that 01:34:03.720 |
verse, okay? So the two major codices have like a couple verses that are different, 01:34:10.840 |
right? So then the one we use, for various reasons, that, the one we use seem to be a 01:34:16.800 |
little bit more accurate. And then if I, to do the analysis of that, we'll take a 01:34:21.400 |
little bit of time, but to answer your question, yes. Yes. That, that codicy is 01:34:28.400 |
based upon the compilation of the manuscripts that we have, also the copies 01:34:34.680 |
of the manuscripts that we have. That makes sense. So there, there aren't any 01:34:40.040 |
like original letter, they're all, they're all destroyed. Like, we don't have the 01:34:45.440 |
original Colossians. Like, we don't, we don't have that, right? But the fact that 01:34:51.560 |
we don't have like an original copy doesn't mean that we don't have the 01:34:55.960 |
original content. And the reason that's not true is because we know that this 01:35:00.360 |
letter was disseminated and we know that it was copied, and when, remember, when they 01:35:04.480 |
copied it, they knew it was the Word of God. So there were all these copies, right? 01:35:08.960 |
So theoretically, just keep this in mind, if you have the Word of God and they 01:35:15.120 |
understood it to be the Word of God, and there's a hundred copies of this, but we 01:35:19.520 |
don't have the original. But everyone's saying there's a hundred copies and 01:35:23.200 |
they're all identical, right? Do you think the hundred copies that are like word 01:35:27.360 |
for word, letter for letter, identical? Is that a copy of the original? Yeah. Yeah. 01:35:33.000 |
It definitely, it's not gonna be like a hundred different copies and they're all 01:35:37.320 |
wrong, but the original is now gone, so we're just, we're just toast, right? That's 01:35:43.240 |
not the case at all. So we don't have any originals, but we have copies, right? And 01:35:49.440 |
then copies upon copies, right? And then there's like, like the earliest ones, they 01:35:54.280 |
have them like, they give them like P, P designations, like P52 and the fragments 01:35:58.760 |
of John, and that's kind of getting into the weeds. Just, just generally speaking. 01:36:05.280 |
The New England translation claims to use the same codices as in major 01:36:11.760 |
translations, but then they add in their own words. They like, they're different. 01:36:16.120 |
So they say like, we're using this codicy, right? We're using this 01:36:20.360 |
codex, right? We're using this, and then they just add words. It literally comes 01:36:25.040 |
from nowhere. Like it straight up comes from nowhere. I'm not just saying that 01:36:28.960 |
because I'm not a Jehovah's Witness. I'm saying that because that's intellectually, 01:36:32.080 |
factually correct. Like they'll, they'll like, they'll read a text and they'll 01:36:36.280 |
just like insert a word in there and say, well that's, that's what the Bible says 01:36:39.560 |
and that's not true. Like it's, it's really that simple. Yeah. Yes. 01:36:48.200 |
The Dead Sea Scrolls, right? Yeah. The Cumbrian community, so they were, they were 01:37:00.320 |
also a, a kind of like, think of like monks. They were kind of like monks and 01:37:07.520 |
they were all about like, we're gonna separate ourselves, we're gonna live in 01:37:11.120 |
these caves, we're gonna have the Word of God, that, that's the community. And so 01:37:14.800 |
they kept all these scrolls. So they were like, we're gonna preserve God's Word, 01:37:18.240 |
come out of the world, we're not gonna associate with them. So they're all about 01:37:22.240 |
like, you know, keeping God's Word and obeying God's Word, except that they were 01:37:26.280 |
kind of like, just did it in a monkish way, right? It is from that community that 01:37:31.600 |
we find texts that validate the, that validate the Masoretic text. 01:37:51.200 |
Yes. He wrote them because he says, because of what he says. If, if anyone 01:38:00.640 |
thinks he's spiritual, let him recognize what I'm writing to is God's Word. Yeah. 01:38:06.840 |
Oh, so if you study those books, if you study those books, they speak of 01:38:21.800 |
doctrinal disunity. Like, so like, the teaching of purgatory comes from Tobit, 01:38:30.120 |
which is a book of the Apocrypha, right? And other books too. I'm pretty sure, 01:38:35.040 |
but it comes from the Apocrypha, right? And so when you look at the 01:38:41.440 |
Apocrypha and you see what they teach, it doesn't come from any other book. You 01:38:46.160 |
don't, you don't see a purgatory in any other book except the Apocrypha. Yeah. So 01:38:51.960 |
so that, that's, that's one example. But that's a, that's a huge example, you 01:38:56.720 |
know, like, because the Scripture is talking about it's once and for all. You 01:39:01.520 |
die, there is no second chance. Like, oh I messed up and now I'm gonna be for real 01:39:05.720 |
good. There's nothing like that, right? But the Apocrypha speaks to a different 01:39:10.800 |
destination than the rest of the books, right? So with the Apocrypha, you have the 01:39:16.200 |
argument from doctrinal disunity, but you also have the argument from the fact 01:39:19.920 |
that it's not from apostolic origins, right? And on top, well, it's all times, so 01:39:25.400 |
prophetic origins, right? Which is the corollary of apostolic origins. And on 01:39:29.880 |
top of that, they didn't receive it as God's Word. The Jews didn't receive it as 01:39:34.880 |
God's Word, right? Going back to the fact that the Jews today, they, they also don't 01:39:41.040 |
recognize the Apocrypha as part of God's Word. The other interesting factoid about 01:39:45.120 |
the Apocrypha is that, I think all of it, yeah, all of it was written within the 01:39:50.720 |
intertestamental period, right? That period after Malachi, but before John the 01:39:57.060 |
Baptist. Malachi's the last prophet, right guys? Malachi's the last Old Testament 01:40:00.640 |
prophet, and then there's radio silence. No one's, there's no, God doesn't send 01:40:05.560 |
anyone, right? And then John the Baptist occurs. So the, the Apocrypha is from this 01:40:10.600 |
time when God is silent, right? So that's also interesting, because God is silent. 01:41:12.340 |
Well, it is true that there is variance, like, within, like, everyone who calls 01:41:17.740 |
themselves a Jew, but generally speaking, they go by the same Old Testament that 01:41:22.900 |
we have. Like, just, just, just, like, just generally speaking. They do have other 01:41:27.900 |
texts that are, could be seen as authoritative depending on, like, what kind 01:41:31.380 |
of Jew you are, like, what kind of, like, like, yeah, like, kind of, like, their own, like, 01:41:37.180 |
kind of version of, like, denominations. But as a whole, the Old Testament that we 01:41:44.580 |
have is the one they have. So they typically won't necessarily give 01:41:49.140 |
credence to texts that are outside, with the caveat that there are some who, like, 01:41:55.300 |
really uphold some, like, rabbinical writings, right? In theory, just 01:42:03.580 |
cerebrally, they'll say that that's not God's Word, but, like, sometimes in 01:42:07.440 |
practice, they, they treat it as such. I mean, yeah, I, I guess my approach would be, I 01:42:18.940 |
guess my approach would be, if I were arguing, if I was talking to someone who 01:42:25.020 |
treated a non-canonical Old Testament book as canonical, like a Jew, I would 01:42:33.780 |
remind him that it was not spoken of by a prophet. That's what I would do. 01:42:39.120 |
That, I would just say it's not spoken of by a prophet. That's, that's kind of, like, 01:42:42.620 |
how I would leave it as. And it might have been tradition that you guys 01:42:45.780 |
accepted as such, with such high regard, but it is not spoken of, it's not in the 01:42:50.180 |
same vein as an Isaiah or a Daniel, yeah. But I see your point, though. If you want to, like, 01:42:54.380 |
argue with someone about why Christ is the Messiah, you have to look at the 01:42:59.960 |
texts from the Old Testament that we share. So I understand why you'd ask that 01:43:05.020 |
question, yeah. Okay. I'll take more. I'll take more. Okay, I want, okay, you know, 01:43:17.180 |
I want to ask you guys a question. Does anyone, and I don't want you to feel like, 01:43:24.540 |
"Oh my gosh, I'm not a good Christian," okay? Don't feel like that, because I want you 01:43:28.140 |
to not hide, like, if you have a question and, like, I can answer it, I want to 01:43:34.060 |
answer it, because if you have a question, maybe someone else has the same question 01:43:37.380 |
but they're afraid to answer. Don't be like, "Well, you know, they're gonna think I'm 01:43:40.220 |
not a good Christian." Don't think like that, okay? Does everyone, does 01:43:44.940 |
everyone understand why the canon has to be self-authenticating? And if you 01:43:50.980 |
understand why the canon has to be self-authenticating, why it is still 01:43:57.020 |
extremely powerful that it is self-authenticating? Is everyone 01:44:02.020 |
with me on that? Does anyone think, "Well, it's self-authenticating so it's 01:44:07.260 |
cheap." Does anyone, like, honestly, if you feel that way, just 01:44:11.140 |
let me know and I want to kind of walk you through why. No one feels that way? 01:44:19.380 |
Okay, yeah, I'll walk you through why. Thank you. So I want to go back to foundationally, 01:44:28.460 |
okay? Foundationally, right? We talk about Jesus Christ being the center, right? And 01:44:33.900 |
He is the center, okay? Jesus Christ is the absolute center. What's the 01:44:39.380 |
difference between a Jew and a Christian? If Isaiah, the prophet Isaiah, if he were 01:44:44.660 |
alive today, if the prophet Daniel were alive today, right, he would believe in 01:44:50.060 |
Christ because he is the Messiah. Isaiah, Daniel, Joel, Malachi, they were all Yahweh 01:44:56.540 |
believers. They were all God-fearers. If you are a God-fearer, you will believe in 01:45:02.340 |
Jesus. There is no difference in philosophy with respect to Judaism and 01:45:08.020 |
Christianity. The difference is Jesus Christ. What do you do with Jesus? Jesus 01:45:14.620 |
is the central figure. He explained to mankind what is good and what is evil. He 01:45:21.520 |
explained to mankind where you are from and where you are going. He explained to 01:45:26.340 |
mankind what is meaning in life. And He explained all of that to mankind. He 01:45:32.380 |
paved the way. He was the way. He was God. Jesus is the central figure. He proved 01:45:39.220 |
that. He proved that by performing miracles. But his last miracle was he 01:45:45.860 |
rose from the dead. You want to see power? Rise from the dead, right? That is the 01:45:52.460 |
ultimate power. He actually rose from the dead. Nothing beats that, right? You can 01:45:58.180 |
you can't even kill a Superman, right? I mean, nothing beats that power, right? He 01:46:02.080 |
actually rose from the dead, okay? So Christ rises from the dead, okay? That's 01:46:08.340 |
the power that this man had. This man, Jesus, confirms the Old Testament that we 01:46:14.620 |
have today. He confirmed it. I went through it. I showed you how he confirmed it. He 01:46:19.260 |
confirmed it. Old Testament that you have, that's the Old Testament. Give you the 01:46:23.540 |
thumbs up, okay? So the Old Testament we have is the Old Testament, right? And then he says, 01:46:27.580 |
"These guys are gonna write the New Testament. You're gonna write the New 01:46:32.140 |
Testament. You're gonna write the New Testament." The guys who wrote the New 01:46:35.220 |
Testament said, "We received it from the Lord. We received it from the Lord. We 01:46:39.100 |
received it from the Lord," right? And then Christ also said, "Those who receive you 01:46:43.420 |
receive me," right? When you tell people of what I tell you, they're gonna know 01:46:48.600 |
it's from me. And then what happened? The Apostles told the Word. The Church 01:46:54.420 |
received it as from Christ, because my sheep hear my voice, right? So you have 01:46:59.820 |
Christ saying, "These guys are gonna, you guys are gonna write the New Testament," 01:47:03.140 |
and those other guys that you tell, if they're my sheep, they're gonna hear my 01:47:08.020 |
voice. The Apostles, what do they do? They tell. And what do the sheep do? They hear 01:47:13.380 |
the voice. Who does the glory go to? Jesus. Jesus. Because he's the key. He's the key 01:47:20.940 |
to the canon. No one is greater than Jesus, so it has to be self-authenticating. 01:47:25.820 |
It has to be. There isn't some outside source, right? And if you want to get 01:47:30.260 |
technical here, yeah, I guess God, because he said, "This is my son in whom I'm 01:47:33.900 |
well-pleased," right? But Jesus is God, right? So without like splitting 01:47:37.940 |
hairs here, right? Christ is the key to the Old Testament canon. That's why it must be 01:47:42.300 |
self-authenticating, because no one is greater than God. And that is why, that is 01:47:46.920 |
why it is not intellectually dishonest. It is not intellectually dishonest, 01:47:52.020 |
because how are you going to prove sensory perception? By employing your 01:47:56.380 |
sensories, your sensory, your senses, excuse me. How would you, how would you 01:48:02.980 |
define sense? You have to employ it. And by the virtue of employing it, you see if 01:48:06.980 |
it works. That's how you do. How do you prove that two is two? It is 01:48:11.420 |
foundational. It's just, it's foundational. How do you prove that two is two? That you 01:48:16.740 |
just make a point. When you use the number two as two, did it work? You were 01:48:21.020 |
able to make a point, because it corresponds with reality. So anything 01:48:24.980 |
that is foundational is self-authenticating. Anything. God is 01:48:29.700 |
foundational. So the Word of God must be self-authenticating. Okay? That's super 01:48:35.360 |
dense, super dense, but it's in Scripture, right? God swore by himself. It's in 01:48:41.420 |
Scripture. He doesn't say it like that. He doesn't, God doesn't say, "This is super 01:48:44.060 |
dense, guys, so get ready." He doesn't say it like that, right? But he did tell us. 01:48:47.500 |
Just in a different way. Thank you. Okay. Question, yeah? 01:49:08.940 |
Where are contemporary commentaries rooted from? Okay. So generally, 01:49:16.220 |
contemporary commentaries, okay, so there's like different types of 01:49:20.020 |
commentaries, but generally speaking, what a commentator will do, and I don't 01:49:24.860 |
want to say all commentators, but generally speaking, what a commentator 01:49:27.500 |
will do is he will look at the language, like the original language, but he will 01:49:31.700 |
also look at different verses that relate to this verse, right? So for 01:49:37.540 |
example, for example, right, a lot of what you see in Revelation, like a lot of what 01:49:42.460 |
you see in Revelation is talked about in the book of Daniel. So they will go to 01:49:47.340 |
the book of Daniel and try to understand it, and that helps kind of like your 01:49:50.980 |
understanding of Revelation, right? So you have the language, you have, you have the 01:49:56.100 |
Scripture by Scripture comparison, analogia Scriptura. It's just Scripture 01:50:01.980 |
by Scripture, right? And then thirdly, what you will, what they will typically do is, 01:50:05.780 |
if it's a good commentator, is how did the audience receive it at the time? So 01:50:11.020 |
you go to culture, right? Like, like you and me, we say, "What's up, dog?" Like, we don't 01:50:15.140 |
mean like an actual, like, poodle, right? We just say, like, "What's up, friend?" Right? So 01:50:19.580 |
like, you know, like, look at the cult, like, you look at the culture, right? So a good 01:50:22.860 |
commentator will do that, and then that's it. The commentators, what they speak 01:50:28.540 |
is not from God, yeah. But they can, they can give you their insight, and that's, 01:50:32.060 |
that's really it. It's the Holy Spirit in you that helps you to understand. Great 01:50:38.460 |
question. That's a great question. Do you have a question? 01:50:42.540 |
Yes. The 27 books in the New Testament is because it fulfilled the criterion that 01:50:53.820 |
we went over, or the attributes that we went over. They had divine qualities. They 01:50:58.900 |
had apostolic origins, and they had corporate reception. Those are the books, 01:51:03.140 |
those are the books that have the doctrinal unity. Those are the books that 01:51:07.540 |
have apostolic origins, right? All those books have apostolic origins. The five 01:51:12.300 |
that were not directly penned by an apostle have close association with 01:51:15.700 |
apostles, as if they were penned by an apostle, right? Thirdly, thirdly, they were 01:51:21.140 |
received as such. As, those are the books that were received as such by the 01:51:25.740 |
audience, right? So what that means is that if they were received by such as 01:51:29.540 |
the audience of the apostles, they were received as such because the apostles 01:51:33.900 |
told them, right? And Jesus said, "These are the guys that are going to tell you. 01:51:38.780 |
These are the guys." Now you might say, "Well, well the apostles are sinful. The 01:51:43.100 |
apostles could have gotten it wrong, right?" Yes, they're sinful. Yes, they're 01:51:47.980 |
sinful, right? But when it comes to the canon of Scripture, you have to remember 01:51:53.540 |
who God is, right? God said this was going to happen in this way. So if God said 01:51:59.540 |
it's going to happen in this way, it's going to happen in this way, no matter 01:52:03.260 |
how sinful I am, right? If God said, "James is gonna be the one to save all you guys," 01:52:08.780 |
and you guys are like, "Oh my gosh, why James? He's not that strong. He's old," right? But 01:52:14.660 |
don't look at the man. Don't look at me. Look at the person who said it. God is 01:52:21.020 |
the one who said, "I'm gonna save you guys." So it's not James is gonna save us, is 01:52:24.900 |
God is the one saving us. James is just the instrument. So those are the books 01:52:29.940 |
that fulfill all that criterion. Those are the books. There's no other books 01:52:53.820 |
The answer is yes. It did not fulfill the qualities that are being included. That 01:53:05.500 |
letter is lost, okay? And the reason it was lost is because it was not a part of 01:53:09.660 |
Scripture. And the reason it was not a part of Scripture, the reason it's not a 01:53:13.060 |
part of Scripture is because there were many copies of it. When you look at one 01:53:17.740 |
of the attributes of what was Scripture, when they knew it was Scripture, they 01:53:21.500 |
were like, "OMG, this is Scripture. Everyone needs it. Make copies." That was 01:53:27.020 |
what they did. That's just what they did. Like beginning with the Old Testament, 01:53:30.340 |
it's not like we get to the New Testament, like there's this new practice, 01:53:33.100 |
right? If it's God's Word, copy it accurately and copy a lot of it and give 01:53:37.980 |
it to people. That's what they did. With that letter, it didn't happen. And 01:53:42.580 |
there were other letters too. Didn't happen, right? So that's how we know. 01:54:14.180 |
That all Scripture is God's Word and that it's also spoken by men? Is that... 01:54:21.260 |
Okay. That's a good question. I mean, I would answer it like this. The idea of 01:54:28.420 |
direct revelation is not new. It's not a new idea. When it comes to the New 01:54:33.140 |
Testament, it's not like we got this new idea here, right? Prophets were already 01:54:36.460 |
doing it. Isaiah said this, right? Jeremiah said this. Joel said this. So it's not 01:54:41.220 |
like new. So when you get to the New Testament, it's not like, "Well, let's try 01:54:44.660 |
this new idea of direct revelation." So that's not the case, right? It's already 01:54:48.620 |
been done, right? Direct revelation has already been done, right? So Paul says, 01:54:53.060 |
"We're ministers of the new covenant." So remember, the Old Covenant, right? You have 01:54:57.580 |
redemption. We're free from Egypt. And then after we're free from Egypt, let me 01:55:01.780 |
tell you about salvation. Let me tell you about what you're gonna do. Compilation 01:55:04.940 |
of documents. Compilation of instructions. Same pattern in the New Testament. Paul 01:55:09.500 |
says, "We're ministers of the new covenant." We're ministers of the new covenant, right? 01:55:14.180 |
So then he gets direct revelation. Then he has to write the New Testament, and so 01:55:18.200 |
do some of the other apostles, right? So this idea of direct revelation, I would 01:55:22.740 |
say, kind of like the underpinning of it, the underpinning is that it is not a 01:55:27.500 |
novel idea, right? Once you understand that it's not a novel idea, it really 01:55:32.580 |
helps to accept the fact that it happened in the New Testament, right? You couple 01:55:36.660 |
that with the fact that Jesus said this was going to happen. So it 01:55:41.820 |
hinges on Christ. The canon hinges on Christ, right? Like our salvation, I mean, 01:55:47.660 |
everything about our salvation hinges on Christ, so does the canon, right? And I am 01:55:52.020 |
going to trust the guy who rose from the dead over the scholar over here, right? 01:55:57.020 |
G.K. Chesterton said, "We need education to help us from the intellectual elite." 01:56:00.540 |
Right? That's very interesting, right? Because you would think that the 01:56:04.020 |
intellectual elite will give you truth, but we need education to guard ourselves 01:56:07.660 |
from the intellectual elite, right? I look at Christ, he rose from the dead, he said 01:56:11.960 |
this is gonna happen. It's not anything new. I'm completely fine with it. One other 01:56:16.940 |
thing, well one other thing. I also look at the nature of God. If God said that he 01:56:22.300 |
can make anything happen, that's despite sinful man. Despite sinful man, he can 01:56:28.380 |
make anything happen. Can he form the New Testament canon? No problem. Easy peasy. 01:56:36.180 |
Well when you say exact, that could be a term of art, right? It is via the Holy 01:56:51.540 |
Spirit. It's clear that they were cognizant when they were receiving 01:56:57.620 |
tradition or when they were receiving direct revelation. They were 01:57:02.220 |
apparently cognizant of that. So that's as exact as I think we can get to. 01:57:10.020 |
That they knew and that it was via the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Great question. Great 01:57:18.940 |
Tacitus. Tacitus describes Jesus and his miracles. The record of the Christian 01:57:30.740 |
martyrs also. Because although no one took down their testimony, it is clear 01:57:37.300 |
that they were killed because they were Christians. And it is clear that they 01:57:40.860 |
wouldn't die if they denied their faith. Yet they died. So though speaking, they live. 01:57:53.500 |
There's one other one. I forget. Lucian. Lucian. 01:58:21.300 |
Great question. Great question. Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit. And the reason I know, the 01:58:28.900 |
reason, one of the major reasons I know is my study of the Gospels. 01:58:36.300 |
After I studied Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, like there is so much design. So 01:58:44.980 |
much like just impeccable intentionality and design with each of the Gospels. 01:58:50.900 |
Right? You could ask me this. You could ask me this, right? How do I know that 01:58:57.260 |
that my my iPhone 11 Pro, this is iPhone 6, I'm just saying iPhone. My iPhone 11, how do I 01:59:04.140 |
know that someone made this? How do I know that someone, how do I know that 01:59:07.540 |
someone just didn't spill like a bunch of tools and then this just like popped 01:59:11.740 |
up out of nowhere? Right? I'd be like, well let me see. I can load apps here. Like I, 01:59:17.340 |
you know what I mean? I mean to tell you, right, when I study Matthew, Mark, Luke, and 01:59:22.180 |
John, and I study the precision and the design in which each of the Gospels are 01:59:31.460 |
written in their respective viewpoints, I see the mark of God. It just kind of 01:59:37.580 |
like screams it in the same way Apple designed an iPhone. And like to me, in an 01:59:43.140 |
even more, in an even more precise way. Yeah. So I would say firstly, Jesus said 01:59:54.000 |
so in John 14 and John chapter 16. And secondarily, the divine qualities that I 01:59:59.500 |
get from, that I see from studying the Scriptures. That that would be my answer 02:00:05.020 |
Great questions, by the way. Great questions. I want you to ask me these 02:00:12.020 |
questions because I want everyone to leave here with like, God's Word is God's 02:00:16.660 |
Word. And I, and if you have a question about something, I guarantee you someone 02:00:21.260 |
else has a question. Don't be afraid of man. Don't be like, oh, like they're gonna 02:00:25.540 |
think I'm a bad Christian. No one's gonna think you're a bad Christian, okay? If you 02:00:28.060 |
don't ask me a question and you have a question, I'm gonna think you're a bad 02:00:30.780 |
Christian. So just ask me that question. That's right. 02:00:48.500 |
Okay, so yes. So Hebrew was thought to have Pauline authorship from a very early 02:00:57.620 |
point on. Like, the general consensus is now we don't know for sure. Early on, it 02:01:02.580 |
was thought to have Pauline authorship. So that takes that out. James was the 02:01:05.580 |
brother of Jesus. So he was a leader, right? And when you think like apostles, 02:01:09.940 |
when you think like, like it's not necessarily the people that were with 02:01:17.100 |
Jesus. Like, James is the brother of Jesus, half-brother. So he was the recognized 02:01:21.740 |
leader of Jerusalem from early on, right? So he wasn't necessarily with one of the 02:01:25.580 |
twelve. But then he's, depending on how you define it, he fits a definition of a 02:01:31.620 |
canonical apostle, okay? Mark was known as a son of Peter in 1st Peter 5. So, and 02:01:39.660 |
even if you look at the Gospel of Mark, like, there's kind of this like Peter-like 02:01:45.300 |
domination with respect to how he's portrayed and when he's portrayed that 02:01:50.020 |
clearly showed his association with the apostle Peter, right? But other than that, 02:01:54.540 |
1st Peter 5. I mean, he calls him his son, right? Mark, James. Oh, Jude is also a 02:02:01.180 |
brother. Jude is also a brother. So it's Mark, James, Jude. Hebrews. What am I 02:02:12.460 |
Oh, Luke. Sorry, yeah, Luke. I was like, what am I leaving out? Luke was known as a close 02:02:25.700 |
traveling companion of Paul. That's, that's in Acts. That's, I think that's on your sheet, yeah. 02:02:29.980 |
Colossians 4, 2nd Timothy 4, and Philemon. Yeah. So it's very well likely that, like, 02:02:40.980 |
it doesn't have to be even that an apostle like sat there and he wrote it, 02:02:44.980 |
right? Even like a Jeremiah, oh gosh, he was, was it Jeremiah Baruch, right? Yeah, 02:02:53.460 |
Jeremiah Baruch, right? It wasn't necessarily that. I don't, I won't get this wrong. 02:03:00.580 |
Was it Isaiah or Jeremiah? Jeremiah. It was Jeremiah. Yeah, it's Jeremiah. So it wasn't 02:03:05.380 |
necessarily that, like, he had to have sat there and then penned it. Like, that, that, 02:03:09.100 |
that's not necessarily what has to happen for, to have, like, an apostolic 02:03:12.380 |
origin, right? Paul could have even dictated some of this stuff to Luke, 02:03:15.460 |
right? Like, so, and so, like, this is, this is what happened. This is what I got 02:03:21.220 |
received from the Lord. Could have easily had done that. That, that wouldn't have 02:03:24.860 |
been too hard. So, and remember, Paul was a lay convert, but he received from the 02:03:31.380 |
Lord Jesus. He received it in the same way that, like, Moses wasn't around for the 02:03:36.020 |
creation of the world, but he received Genesis. Like, he wasn't there to witness, 02:03:40.660 |
oh God, you're doing all this great stuff, and there's Adam, but he received it. He 02:03:44.340 |
wrote about it because he received it from God, right? So you don't have to 02:03:47.500 |
necessarily witness the event, right? You don't think this, you just need to be a 02:03:51.660 |
part of, like, Jesus's direct, when John 14, and John chapter 14, and John chapter 16, 02:03:58.020 |
you need to be a part of that group, right? And obviously, the other two that I 02:04:02.700 |
mentioned, the divine qualities and the corporate reception, because his sheep 02:04:40.260 |
Mm-hmm. I think you take them piece by piece. I think you take them piece by 02:04:48.100 |
piece. So, if you want to talk about a tribe that was annihilated, the biblical 02:04:53.780 |
definition of annihilated doesn't necessarily mean that every single one 02:04:56.740 |
of its, every single one of the persons in the tribe is killed and murdered. 02:05:00.260 |
That's not necessarily the case. Annihilation means, for all intensive 02:05:03.900 |
purposes of being a people group, you are no longer a people group. That's, that's 02:05:07.740 |
what annihilation means. So, you can still have, like, one dude, and then he can, like, 02:05:11.300 |
he can still propagate his DNA into, like, you know, and find it, like, way later on. 02:05:15.700 |
So, with respect to anything that's, like, a seeming inconsistency, like, that would 02:05:22.980 |
be that example, and then depending on which other example that we're talking 02:05:26.980 |
about, I would take it piece by piece. With respect to measurements or 02:05:34.580 |
geographical regions or anything like that, there were a lot of 02:05:39.540 |
things that, in certain points in history, that were thought to be a certain way, 02:05:44.140 |
that turned out to be different later on, right? One example that I can think of 02:05:48.580 |
that I don't remember the chapter in Psalms right now, but it's, he spins the 02:05:53.620 |
earth on its, like, a wheel, like, I'll have to find it, right? But for a long 02:06:00.020 |
time, science thought the earth was flat. I mean, that's just all of science, that 02:06:06.260 |
the earth was flat, right? Psalms portrayed something differently, right? 02:06:09.580 |
Now, later on, we learn that the earth is actually not flat, right? So, there are 02:06:16.060 |
things like that I think the Bible has vindicated over time, that I think 02:06:19.380 |
certain things that, when you look, like, at a static moment, oh, it seems like the 02:06:24.140 |
Bible is incorrect, but later on, the Bible seems to outlive its pallbearers, so to 02:06:27.780 |
speak, right? So, the Bible has a history of kind of doing that. So, my answer to 02:06:32.500 |
that would be, depending on, like, what we're talking about, I would tackle it 02:06:36.380 |
differently. I, you know, it just depends on what we're talking about, so, yeah. 02:07:00.260 |
You know, I actually would, and I actually would, because there is a communion of 02:07:06.780 |
consciousness, and I'm not saying it's, like, the greatest factor, but I 02:07:11.060 |
definitely think it's a good factor that, throughout time, the saints have seen 02:07:16.140 |
these books as the authoritative Word of God, and if His sheep hear His voice, then 02:07:23.500 |
having a communion of consciousness is consistent with Jesus saying, "My sheep 02:07:28.300 |
hear my voice." So, yes, I would say that that is a great witness to the 27 books 02:07:47.740 |
Not primarily. Not primarily. Correct, correct. 02:07:57.740 |
Great question. That's a great question. Whenever you get to a passage, 02:08:02.340 |
whenever you get to a passage, right, one of the first things that you need to do 02:08:07.020 |
is you need to understand what Jesus is actually saying to the hearer, or the 02:08:12.820 |
author's, like, what is actually being told to the hearer, right, first, before you 02:08:17.740 |
pluck yourself in the situation, right? Because if you pluck yourself in the 02:08:20.900 |
situation, right, it's not gonna make the, you're not interpreting it 02:08:25.820 |
correctly, right? So, before we understand something individually, the 02:08:31.580 |
first thing that we need to understand is what is being said objectively? What is 02:08:36.860 |
being said objectively? And objectively, Jesus is speaking to his dudes, I mean, 02:08:42.620 |
his men, right, and he's saying, "Look, Holy Spirit's gonna come. The better I go. 02:08:47.980 |
Holy Spirit's gonna come. He's gonna teach you all things. He's gonna guide you into 02:08:51.380 |
all things. He's gonna teach you all truth." That is the first thing that he's 02:08:54.380 |
saying to his men, right? And so, that is the first interpretation. That is, that is 02:09:01.620 |
the first thing that we need to glean off, because that is the primary thing 02:09:04.660 |
that he's saying, right? After that, after that, there are other verses that speak 02:09:10.180 |
about us having the mind of Christ, us understanding all truth, us having this 02:09:15.760 |
light. Like, there's passages then that refer to us. So, I look at those 02:09:19.580 |
passages that refer to the individual, then when I look back at John chapter 14 02:09:23.620 |
and John chapter 16, ah, okay, I can see what he means. The Holy Spirit's gonna 02:09:29.060 |
behave this way with his men. It's gonna behave in a similar way with me, right? 02:09:33.380 |
But I look also at Jude, who says, "The faith was once for all delivered to the 02:09:40.020 |
saints." It's already delivered to the saints. It's already delivered, right? How 02:09:44.540 |
does the Holy Spirit behave with me? He doesn't write the New Testament with me. 02:09:48.380 |
He wrote it with them. He wrote it with me. So, yeah, great question. That's a 02:09:54.460 |
great question. Again, we're analogia scriptura, right? Scripture upon 02:10:28.500 |
Um, yeah. Yeah. So, I'm not gonna say that it's like the devil himself, because the 02:10:37.020 |
devil is not, he can't be everywhere at once, right? But is it his influence? Is 02:10:43.140 |
it his influence? Yeah, because sin works best because it seems sublime. It seems 02:10:50.980 |
morally pure. Sin seems morally pure, right? If the devil appeared to you and 02:10:56.860 |
me, like in a pitchfork, like with horns and with like a tail, it's like, "Dude, yeah, 02:11:00.660 |
I'm not gonna follow anything you say," right? But if it appears as an angel of 02:11:05.100 |
light, okay, then I might believe you. I might actually, because you, you, you, you 02:11:09.940 |
looked the part. You looked the part, right? And that's why I go back. That's 02:11:14.300 |
why I go back. Subjective experience is not the final criterion for what's the 02:11:22.040 |
canon, see? Your friend, he's not stating it in this way, but what he's saying is, 02:11:28.000 |
subjectively, because I feel this way, it must be the Word of God. That's what he's 02:11:33.540 |
saying. He's not, again, he's not articulating it that way, but that is 02:11:36.980 |
essentially what he's saying. The Word of God impresses itself upon its believers, 02:11:42.820 |
right? And you know the Word of God is the Word of God when you go back to 02:11:47.700 |
Christ. You go back to the person of Christ, right? He never said that Joseph 02:11:53.380 |
Smith was gonna write New Testament. Never said that. Search all of his words. 02:11:58.260 |
He never said, you know, 1,600 years later or whatever it is, there's gonna be some 02:12:03.220 |
dude in like the Zion area that's gonna, I'm gonna give him like more, no, he 02:12:07.780 |
never said that, right? In fact, Jude says the opposite. It was once for all 02:12:13.380 |
delivered to the saints. So what, like you and I can feel one way, but what matters 02:12:19.820 |
is how does God feel? I mean, there are times in my life before I was a Christian 02:12:23.500 |
where I thought certain things were okay. I don't think they're okay anymore, right? 02:12:26.740 |
Same, I would like, it's, it's a matter of objectivity as opposed to subjectivity. 02:12:32.660 |
Yeah, a matter of, quite frankly, a matter of reason versus a matter of emotion. 02:13:08.740 |
That's a great question. That's a great question. I can't deny someone's feelings, 02:13:14.940 |
right? So if someone were to argue with me and say, "Well, I feel this way," right? I 02:13:19.660 |
can't deny your feelings, right? But I would ask that person, I would ask that 02:13:25.220 |
person, given that you feel the way that you do, given that you, are there people 02:13:30.860 |
in the world, not you, I'm not talking about you, this is what I would say to 02:13:33.820 |
the Mormon, I'm not talking about you because you, you, you're from God and you 02:13:37.060 |
got it, I get it, but are there people in this world who are deceived? Yes. He would 02:13:41.140 |
say yes, right? Okay. Are there people in this world who are deceived but who 02:13:45.580 |
don't think they are deceived? Answer would be yes, right? And do those people 02:13:50.260 |
think I could never be deceived? There are people who think that, like, other 02:13:54.180 |
people are deceived but not me, right? The Mormon guy would say yes, right? Okay. So 02:14:00.020 |
he, other people are deceived but I'm not deceived, okay. But it's not you, right? No, no, 02:14:03.660 |
it's not me, it's not me, okay. How do you know that? Well, because I feel this way. But 02:14:09.380 |
this guy feels that way, right? This guy feels that way. This girl feels that way, 02:14:13.100 |
right? Okay, okay. So then how do we know? How do we know? You say two things, say 02:14:20.540 |
two things, or generally two things. We don't know, then, okay, that's pretty 02:14:25.380 |
hopeless, right? We just can't know? Like, it doesn't sound like God to me. The God 02:14:30.260 |
I know sounds like he would want his children to know. So this is a new God 02:14:34.520 |
that you're preaching, so I, you know, like, if he says we don't know, then 02:14:37.260 |
that's, that's, that's, okay, we don't know, right? The other thing he would say, the 02:14:41.740 |
other thing that he would say is he would appeal to someone. We know because 02:14:45.700 |
some higher authority. Oh, we know because of some higher authority. Who is your 02:14:51.220 |
higher authority? Joseph Smith? Who is he gonna say? Jesus? And then this 02:14:57.260 |
applies to anyone. Buddha? Like, who is your higher authority, right? If he says 02:15:00.680 |
Jesus, then I go down, I go down like history, right? If he says Jesus, right? If 02:15:06.300 |
he says Joseph Smith, okay, you believe in Joseph Smith, what can I do? Like, 02:15:10.900 |
that's, that's fundamental to you, right? I believe in Jesus. Joseph Smith didn't 02:15:16.100 |
rise from the dead. He's dead, isn't he? He's dead, yeah. Did he make anyone else 02:15:19.220 |
rise from the dead? No. Okay. I mean, I don't know what to tell you, bro, like, 02:15:22.900 |
Jesus rose from the dead, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna go with Jesus. I don't know, I'm 02:15:26.140 |
gonna go with the guy that rose from the dead, so, I mean, it really hinges upon 02:15:30.140 |
that. It really does hinge upon the person of Christ. Yeah. That's how, I would 02:15:35.260 |
roughly go about in that way. I would bring it back to Jesus. Great questions. 02:15:44.700 |
If you think of a question, you know where I go to church. Thank you, guys.