Archives For Scripture

Carson on Jesus’ Drawing All in John 12:32

Joshua —  July 9, 2012 — Leave a comment

John 12:32 is often used as a prooftext for showing God has no particular love for a specific people. Many employ the verse to show that God equally loves all people by equally drawing “all men” to himself.

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“And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself.”

Is this what Jesus is communicating? Is there an immediate context regarding “people groups” that should be acknowledged when interpreting this verse? D.A. Carson addresses the text in his commentary on John: Continue Reading…

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31 Reasons Man Rejects the Bible

Joshua —  June 28, 2012 — Leave a comment

The Bible is rejected by natural man for many reasons. All of us who are born again believers can remember our own personal qualms that lead us to reject God’s Word. For me, I reasoned that one could never really know for sure that all the ancient testimonies written ages ago actually occurred. That was good enough reason for me to outright reject the Bible and God’s teachings therein.

Below is a list of 31 reasons the Bible is rejected, all with Scripture references. Continue Reading…

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Jason Hiles: Reflections on Summertime Missions and Salvation

Joshua —  April 27, 2012 — Leave a comment

Dr. Jason Hiles, Christian Studies professor at Louisiana College and the Associate Dean for Biblical and Theological Studies at the Louisiana College Caskey School of Divinity, recently wrote an article for the Louisiana Baptist Convention’s Baptist Message titled, Reflections on Summertime Missions and Salvation.

In the article, Hiles gives a biblical foundation for why we as Christians do missions and how God’s active work in salvation is achieved through the means of those sent to proclaim the glorious gospel of Christ.

Hiles corrects a common misunderstanding of many Christians regarding the “noble savage” and those who would charge God as being unfair if he did not give every rebel a “chance” or opportunity to hear the gospel and repent.  Continue Reading…

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Southern Baptist John Broadus’ Catechism: The Atonement

Joshua —  April 16, 2012 — Leave a comment

An influential founder of the Southern Baptist Convention as well as a founding professor of the first Southern Baptist seminary, John Broadus is one of the great Southern Baptists who we stand on the shoulders of today. Broadus, widely respected for his scholarship, was selected by the American Baptist Publication Society and the Sunday School Board (known today as LifeWay) to compose a Baptist catechism.

In 1892, A Catechism of Bible Teaching was published and widely used in Southern Baptist life and beyond. Today, Broadus’ catechism remains a helpful tool for the Christian and also serves as a great historical insight into the beliefs of the founding Southern Baptists. Continue Reading…

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Is the Bible merely cobbled religious traditions?

Joshua —  March 14, 2012 — Leave a comment

The Christian canon is not a fixed deposit of traditions from the past, but a dynamic vehicle by which the risen Lord continues through the Holy Spirit to guide, instruct, and nourish his people. The imperative “to search the Scriptures” reveals the need for its continuous interpretation. The activity of hearing, reading, and praying is required, indeed mandated by the Scripture itself. In every successive generation new light has been promised for those seeking divine illumination to provide fresh understanding, new application to changing cultures, and a call for repentance for persistent failure in living out the imperatives of the gospel. In this constant struggle to live a faithful Christian life, the Scriptures of the church afford the abiding context from which to grow into the image of Christ. It is thus a theological gyroscope for maintaining one’s direction when buffeted by the ever-shifting winds of change.

Childs, Brevard S. The Church’s Guide for Reading Paul: The Canonical Shaping of the Pauline Corpus (p. 26).

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Truett Seminary’s Roger Olson and His Bizarre View of the Old Testament

Joshua —  March 2, 2012 — Leave a comment

Recently, Truett Seminary’s professor of theology Dr. Roger Olson shed light on his low view of the Old Testament in a comment on his blog. Olson states:

I would go so far as to say that we should not focus on the cultural meaning, the circumstances, etc., except out of historical interest. Everything we need to know about God and salvation is in the New Testament. The OT was types and shadows. It provides some context for understanding the New Testament, but it provides nothing essential for doctrine or practice that Christians cannot find in the NT.

Source: Regarding Old Testament “Texts of Terror”: Comment #25098

The post itself has many disappointing comments about the Old Testament and Olson’s “interpret everything through a lens of love” theologizing, but his comment in view shows where the rubber meets the Marcion-esque road he is traveling.  Continue Reading…

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John Gill: Having a form of godliness but denying its power

Joshua —  February 21, 2012 — Leave a comment

John Gill on 2 Timothy 3:5:

Having a form of godliness
Either a mere external show of religion, pretending great piety and holiness, being outwardly righteous before men, having the mask and visor of godliness; or else a plan of doctrine, a form of sound words, a scheme of truths, which men may have without partaking of the grace of God; and which, with respect to the doctrine of the Trinity, the church of Rome has; or else the Scriptures of truth, which the members of that church have, and profess to hold to, maintain and preserve; and which contains doctrines according to godliness, and tend to a godly life and godly edification:

but denying the power thereof;
though in words they profess religion and godliness, the fear of God, and the pure worship of him, yet in works they deny all; and though they may have a set of notions in their heads, yet they feel nothing of the power of them on their hearts; and are strangers to experimental religion, and powerful godliness: or though they profess the Scriptures to be the word of God, yet they deny the use, the power, and efficacy of them; they deny the use of them to the laity, and affirm that they are not a sufficient rule of faith and practice, without their unwritten traditions; and that they are not able to make men wise, or give them a true knowledge of what is to be believed and done, without them; and that the sense of them is not to be understood by private men, but depends upon the infallible judgment of the church or pope:

from such turn away;
have no fellowship with them, depart from their communion, withdraw from them, and come out from among them: this passage sufficiently justifies the reformed churches in their separation from the church of Rome.

View Gill’s entire Bible commentary here.

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Isaiah 9:6 – Christ Child as Everlasting Father?

Joshua —  December 25, 2011 — 1 Comment

In Isaiah 9:6, the child prophesied to be born will be called “Everlasting Father.”

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isa 9:6 NIV

At first look, the text seems to be calling Jesus, the second person of the Triune Godhead, the Father. However, there is no need for confusion or a perceived contradiction. John Gill explains:

The everlasting Father; which does not design any relation of Christ in the Godhead; and there is but one Father in the Godhead, and that is the first Person; indeed Christ and the Father are one, and the Father is in him, and he is in the Father, and he that has seen the one has seen the other, and yet they are distinct, Christ is not the Father; the Son and Spirit may be considered with the first Person as Father, in creation and regeneration, they being jointly concerned therein, but not in the Trinity: it is easy to make it appear Christ is not the Father, but is distinct from him, Continue Reading…

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Reclaiming John 3:16 from the Distortion of Emotionalism and Tradition

Joshua —  December 12, 2011 — 2 Comments


John 3:16 is one of the dearest of all Bible verses for many Christians. It is a great summary statement of the Gospel. But all too often the verse is miscited, misquoted, and mistranslated. The Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB) provides a clear reading of what the Greek text is communicating.

For God loved the world in this way: He gave His One and Only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.

The point of the text is that God showed his love by giving his son as the means of salvation to all who believe in him. However, this is not how many laymen and pastors alike understand the verse. Too often it is preached as, “For God so intensely loves you that He gave His only Son.” I suspect the New Living Translation (NLT) Bible has some responsibility in the matter. The NLT completely mistranslates the Greek:

For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

Beyond the NLT’s influence is most likely a deep seated sentimentalism and/or emotionalism pushed upon the very Word of God whereby the verse loses its intended meaning. In this month’s edition of SBC Life, the journal of the Southern Baptist Convention, former SBC President Dr. Frank Page misses the mark in quoting John 3:16. In the section, “A Word From Frank S. Page,” Dr. Page writes: Continue Reading…

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James P. Boyce: The Lord’s Day as a Means of Sanctification

Joshua —  December 11, 2011 — Leave a comment

The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary founder James Petigru Boyce addresses the means of sanctification in his Abstract of Theology. Boyce places the means of sanctification into two categories: primary and secondary. On the primary means, Boyce writes:

The primary means which the Spirit uses for our sanctification, as both of these sources of information teach, is the truth of God. “Sanctify them in the truth; thy word is truth” (John 17:17), was the prayer of the Lord, in which the whole work, both of consecration and cleansing, is set forth as thus to be accomplished. (See also John 17:19). “Growth in the grace” is inseparably connected with growth” in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.” 2 Pet 3:18. (p. 313)

Continue Reading…

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DeYoung, Duncan, Mohler: What’s New About the New Calvinism

Joshua —  November 10, 2011 — Leave a comment

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The Baptist Faith & Message On Man – Full Scripture References

Joshua —  August 28, 2011 — Leave a comment

The Baptist Faith & Message 2000 (BF&M) is the summary of faith for the Southern Baptist Convention. Adopted by resolution on June 14th, 2000 at the SBC Annual Meeting, the purpose of the statement of faith is “to set forth certain teachings we believe.”[ref]SBC.net | The Baptist Faith & Message Introduction http://www.sbc.net/bfm/default.asp[/ref] These teachings, however, are not binding on Southern Baptists but are a “witness to the world” regarding Baptist tradition:

Baptists cherish and defend religious liberty, and deny the right of any secular or religious authority to impose a confession of faith upon a church or body of churches. We honor the principles of soul competency and the priesthood of believers, affirming together both our liberty in Christ and our accountability to each other under the Word of God.

Baptist churches, associations, and general bodies have adopted confessions of faith as a witness to the world, and as instruments of doctrinal accountability. We are not embarrassed to state before the world that these are doctrines we hold precious and as essential to the Baptist tradition of faithand practice.[ref]SBC.net | The Baptist Faith & Message Introduction http://www.sbc.net/bfm/default.asp[/ref]

It is worth noting that some colleges and seminaries within the SBC require the professors to teach “in accordance with and not contrary to” the BF&M, thus making it binding for employment within the academy.[ref]Louisiana College | Christian Commitment http://www.lacollege.edu/about/christian-commitment[/ref] [ref]SEBTS | What We Believe http://www.sebts.edu/about/what-we-believe/default.aspx[/ref]

The BF&M section on Man states:

Man is the special creation of God, made in His own image. He created them male and female as the crowning work of His creation. The gift of gender is thus part of the goodness of God’s creation. In the beginning man was innocent of sin and was endowed by his Creator with freedom of choice. By his free choice man sinned against God and brought sin into the human race. Through the temptation of Satan man transgressed the command of God, and fell from his original innocence whereby his posterity inherit a nature and an environment inclined toward sin. Therefore, as soon as they are capable of moral action, they become transgressors and are under condemnation. Only the grace of God can bring man into His holy fellowship and enable man to fulfill the creative purpose of God. The sacredness of human personality is evident in that God created man in His own image, and in that Christ died for man; therefore, every person of every race possesses full dignity and is worthy of respect and Christian love.

Genesis 1:26-30; 2:5,7,18-22; 3; 9:6; Psalms 1; 8:3-6; 32:1-5; 51:5; Isaiah 6:5; Jeremiah 17:5; Matthew 16:26; Acts 17:26-31; Romans 1:19-32; 3:10-18,23; 5:6,12,19; 6:6; 7:14-25; 8:14-18,29; 1 Corinthians 1:21-31; 15:19,21-22; Ephesians 2:1-22; Colossians 1:21-22; 3:9-11.

I thought it would be profitable to list in full all of the Scripture references given in the section on Man in order to understand what the BF&M is drawing from in an easy format. All verses are from the New American Standard Bible.

Genesis 1:26-30 - 26Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”27God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.28God blessed them; and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and Continue Reading…

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The Sign of Jonah the Prophet – Matthew 12, Jonah 1

Joshua —  July 7, 2011 — 3 Comments

In Matthew 12:38, the scribes and Pharisees ask Jesus for a sign to which he answers in verse 39, “An evil and adulterous generation craves for a sign; and yet no sign will be given to it but the sign of Jonah the prophet.” The “sign of Jonah” Jesus speaks of is commonly interpreted through the proceeding verse, Matt 12:40, which reads,”for just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

In his recently published book The Twelve Prophets in the New Testament, Dr. Michael B. Shepherd disagrees that the “sign of Jonah” Jesus mentions is “an analogy between Jonah’s stay in the belly of the fish for three days and nights and that of the Son of Man in the heart of the earth for the same period of time” (Shepherd, 13). Regarding Jesus’ citation of the book of Jonah in Matt 12, Shepherd writes on page 13:

Immediately after Amos and Obadiah in the composition of the Twelve, Jonah continues the theme of the inclusion of the Gentiles. What Edom was to Amos and Obadiah, Nineveh is to Jonah. Nineveh is “the great city” in Jon 1:2; 3:2; 3; 4:11. Comparison with the use of this phrase in Gen 10:12 suggests that its meaning has more to do with importance in the Gentile world than with size. That is, the city of Nineveh is an appropriate candidate to represent the nations in Jonah. Throughout Jonah the faith of the Gentiles (Jon 1:16; 3:5; cf., Matt 8:5-13; 15:21-28) contrasts with the disobedience of the prophet (Jon 1:3; 4:2). Then in the final rhetorical question of Jon 4:11 God expresses his right to have compassion on the Gentiles. This stands in remarkable contrast to the only other biblical book that concludes with a rhetorical question—Nahum. In Nahum the city of Nineveh is not the representative of believing Gentiles but the representative of the unbelieving on whom judgment will come. Nahum 1:2-8 makes the scope of this judgment worldwide so that the historical destruction of Nineveh serves as a prefiguration of things to come. Once again the decisive contrast is not between Israel and the nations but between believers (Israelite and Gentile) and unbelievers (Israelite and Gentile). Continue Reading…

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F.F. Bruce – The Formation of the Septuagint

Joshua —  July 1, 2011 — 1 Comment

I have wondered, more than once, why the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) is named the Septuagint. I reasoned that it must have something to do with the number 7, beyond that I had no clue. F.F. Bruce writes clearly on the formation of the Septuagint and how the Greek translation received its name in his book on the canon of scripture, aptly titled The Canon of Scripture.

 

The Greek translation of the scriptures was made available from time to time in the third and second centuries BC (say during the century 250-150 BC). The law, comprising the five books of Moses, was the first part of the scriptures to appear in a Greek version; the reading of the law was essential to synagogue worship, and it was important that what was read should be intelligible to the congregation. At first perhaps, the law was read in Hebrew, as it was back home in Palestine, and someone was appointed to give an oral translation in Greek. But as time went on a written Greek version was provided, so that it could be read directly.

In the course of time a legend attached itself to this Greek version of the law, telling how it was the work of seventy or rather seventy-two elders of Israel who were brought to Alexandria for the purpose. It is because of this legend that the term Septuagint (from Latin septuaginta, ‘seventy’) came to be attached to the whole of the Old Testament in Greek, and the original legend of the seventy was further embellished. The legend is recorded originally in a document called The Letter of Aristeas, which tells how the elders completed the translation of the Pentateuch in seventy-two days, achieving an agreed version as the result of regular conference and comparison. Later embellishments not only extended their work to cover the whole Old Testament but told how they were isolated from another in separate cells for the whole period and produced seventy-two identical versions — conclusive proof, it was urged, of the divine inspiration of the work! Philo, the Jewish philosopher in Alexandria, relates how the translators worked in isolation from one another but wrote the same text word for word, ‘as though it were dictated to each by an invisible prompter’; but both he and Josephus confirm that it was only the books of the law that were translated by the elders. It was Christian writers who extended their work to the rest of the Old Testament and, taking over Philo’s belief in their inspiration, extended that also to cover the whole of the Greek Old Testament, including those books that never formed part of the Hebrew Bible (Bruce, 44).

Bruce, F.F., The Canon of Scripture. 1988

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An Exegesis of John 10:34

Joshua —  May 30, 2011 — Leave a comment

Dr. James White exegetes John 10:34 for a caller on his biweekly webcast The Dividing Line.

John 10:34 - Jesus answered them, “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I SAID, YOU ARE GODS’?

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