DON'T BE FOOLED BY THOSE WHO ONLY SAY THEY LOVE SCRIPTURE
By Ken Silva pastor-teacher on Dec 17, 2008 in AM Missives, Current Issues, Features
But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT PROCEEDS OUT OF THE MOUTH OF GOD’… If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”
(Matthew 4:4; John 8:31, NASB)
Jesus Is The One Who Taught Sola Scriptura And Led His Reformers To Recapture It
Men and women, as the Emerging Church rebellion against Sola Scriptura gains strength within mainstream evangelicalism, and it will only continue, you are going to have learn to listen closely to what people say concerning their view of the Bible. Just because you hear someone tell you how much they respect God’s Word and/or how important Holy Scripture is to them it does not then follow they are approaching it in the way Jesus would have His Christians do so.
For example, listen to the following from liberal theologian John Shelby Spong who rejects the inerrancy of Scripture, the Virgin Birth and Deity of Christ, the vicarious penal substitutionary atonement Jesus on the Cross and the Bodily Resurrection of Christ. The following is from a transcript I have from The John Ankerberg Show called Spong/Martin Debate On Sexual Ethics. Spong says, “I read the Bible every day of my life. It is the most important book in my life.”
Well, sounds great, right? Wrong; because here comes the neo-Gnostic double-talk:
But I think it’s important that we understand it… I’m not a biblical “literalist,” and if we define biblical “fundamentalism” to be literal belief in every word of the Scripture being without error, I would say I’m not – neither is the [Episcopal] church that I represent. But I do take the Bible seriously, and I believe that I meet the living Word of God in the words of Holy Scripture – that’s why I study this book every day of my life…
But in the first century and in the early second century, authors who felt they were true to the writings of their mentors would use their mentors’ names. I don’t know any New Testament scholars, for example, that think Paul wrote the pastoral epistles but a disciple of Paul wrote the pastoral epistles and used Paul’s name. It’s a very different Paul that you meet… (The John Ankerberg Show, transcript, 3, emphasis theirs)
Spong’s view expressed above is that of the destructive higher criticism of liberal theology with a touch of mysticism and neo-orthodoxy. He is telling us unenlightened ones “it’s important that we understand” how these spiritually elite Gnostics in their supposedly superior erudition have come to realize that one must move beyond the mere text of Scripture down into the message they then allegorize into it. You’ll get an even better picture of what I’m talking about in the following from so-called Progressive Christian Dr. Marcus Borg.
Borg, who like Spong denies virtually every doctrine of the historic orthodox faith, sounding in the beginning just like a real Christian as he says in his book The Heart of Christianity, “Christianity is centered in the Bible. Of course, it is ultimately centered in God, but it is the God whom the Bible speaks and to whom it points.” But Borg gives, and then, he takes away:
God is also known in other ways and other religions, I am convinced, but to be a Christian is to be centered in the God of the Bible. This is a mark not of Christian exclusion, but of Christian identity. The Bible is for us as Christians our sacred scripture, our sacred story. Yet the Bible has become a stumbling block for many. In the last half century, probably more Christians have left the church because of the Bible than for any other single reason.
More precisely, they have left because the earlier paradigm’s way of seeing the Bible ceased to make sense to them. Contemporary biblical literalism—with its emphasis on biblical infallibility, historical factuality, and moral and doctrinal absolutes—is an obstacle for millions of people. (43)
No, God is not known within other religions outside of the unique revelation of His Holy Scripture contained only in the Bible. And as seducing spirits will in their doctrines of demons there is a smidgeon of truth that “the Bible has become a stumbling block for many.” However, it isn’t the Scriptures themselves over which they stumble but rather it is the Rock of Jesus Christ who crushes those who refuse to worship Him as Lord and Savior.
And as a wolf in sheep’s clothing it’s little wonder that Marcus Borg finds the Bible’s “moral and doctrinal absolutes” to be an “obstacle” for him. God has already told us of false prophets like Spong and Borg — a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised (1 Corinthians 2:14). Jesus will tell you — Leave them; they are blind guides (Matthew 15:14).
Singing: “Me, Me, Me…”
As we close here’s one an excellent example of the neo-orthodox approach to the Bible where unlike Spong/Borg one does, in a way, take a bit more of a literal approach to Scripture. However in this view, following the dream of neo-orthodox theologian Karl Barth, one attempts to “sense” the voice of God within the texts of Scripture, which become inspired for the individual as the Holy Spirit illuminates it to them personally.
The following is from “cultural architect” and “distinguished futurist” Southern Baptist pastor Erwin McManus from an interview with Relevant Magazine. Sadly, this is also the approach of far too many in the evangelical community today in their sordid lust affair with the corrupt Counter Reformation Contemplative Spirituality/Mysticism gleaned from apostate Roman Catholicism and repackaged by Living Spiritual Teacher and Quaker mystic Richard Foster:
Knowing God, knowing His heart, knowing His character is really about falling passionately in love with God and experiencing His love. Of course, there are dynamics to that: the Scriptures are essential. God speaks through the cosmos, God speaks through creation, God speaks through human experience and conscience, God speaks through everything, yes—but I do see the Scriptures as the primary access, a portal into God’s presence. I began to have a clear sense of God’s voice in my life through reading the Scriptures and hearing God’s voice through the Scriptures.
RM: You’ve said in the past that “Scripture is God through the improvisation of people’s lives.”
EM: Well, I build my life not on the Word of God, but the voice of God. The Scriptures are to me the instrument that God has placed in history for me to learn the voice of God. I treasure the Scriptures. (Online source)
Your key to understanding where McManus jumps the track is his highly subjective statement, “I build my life not on the Word of God, but the voice of God.” Again, as the Devil does he takes us into a very fine difference; but, it’s a critical one. The voice of God is the Word of God in the text of the Bible and we must always go by what the text itself says, and not what we think it means. However, because of years of Bible studies where people sit around discussing “what a verse means to me” many in the Body of Christ have forgotten that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation ( 2 Peter 1:20, NASB).
Pastor Bob DeWaay will help you understand what this means as he says:
The meaning of the Scripture is determined by the Holy Spirit inspired author. In other words, these writers were inspired by the Spirit, and so [what they wrote] didn’t come from their will, it came from the Holy Spirit Who spoke from God. So therefore the interpretation of the Scripture is to determine the meaning of the Holy Spirit inspired author.
Now your own interpretation would be the postmodern idea that reader determines the meaning. A private interpretation is “this means this to me.” Have you ever been to a Bible study where they do that? Everybody gets their Bible. “Read a verse.” And you read a verse. [Then someone asks], “What’s that mean to you?” [Looking around the room], “What’s that mean to you? What’s that mean to you?” [And so on]. “Okay, next verse.”
Well, what do you have but private interpretation? Somebody’s saying I’m going to infuse my meaning into the Scripture rather than finding out what the Holy Spirit said to me through the Holy Spirit-inspired author. (Faith at Risk 3 Conference, “How to Discern A True Work of the Spirit,” DVD Chapter 5, 12:38-13:57)
As I leave this for now I give you a very pertinent warning: If you can’t tell the difference between fleece and fur today, then you’re going to lose your spiritual arm right up to the elbow.
See also:
ON RECLAIMING THE BIBLE AS THE WORD OF GOD
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