Monthly Archives: October 2012

Resentment

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The Psychology of Resentment by seemingly unstoppable pull toward resentment. All you need to do is live a little in this fallen world. Before long you’re given a good solid reason to resent someone. Often someone quite close to you. Family member, spouse, parent, long-time friend, etc. It feels impossible to love that person.

What causes such bitterness? Why are our hearts so immovably deadened toward that person?

Well, they wronged you, so you resent them. They hurt you. They did what they should never have done. Or didn’t do what they should have done. And you bear the wounds.

Yes—but what’s the reason beneath the reason?

The fundamental reason is your God-given sense of justice—itself a good thing. You have been wronged, and you, created in God’s image and therefore with a rightly functioning sense of justice, of fairness, cry out that justice be done. The playing field must be leveled. Fairness demands it.

The trouble is that as a law-abiding citizen you know you can’t do something physically to them, as you may wish to (let’s just be honest here shall we?). And as a Christian you know you can’t verbally or publicly do something to them (perhaps simply because you would rather keep your reputation and leave them alone than exact revenge and lose your reputation; the greater idol outweighs the lesser).

So what happens? Where does a gospel-vacuous heart go in such a case? Here is what happens: instead of doing something externally to harm them you do something internally to harm them. You harbor bitterness. This is the psychology of resentment. You exercise emotional punishment toward them internally when actual punishment can’t be exercised externally. You set up a law-court in your heart since an actual law-court is unfeasible.

But here’s what happens. The bitterness you harbor, the emotional punishment you exact in your heart, has precisely the opposite effect, over time, than you think. Bitterness does nothing to the offender, while it quietly destroys the offended. Resentment kills, hollows out, the resenter, not the resented.

How then do we conquer bitterness?

By soaking in two realities.

One, God is the judge. He has a law court. A real law-court. And one day every person on the face of the earth who is not in Christ will be the defendant. The Bible even says that Christians one day will themselves assist God in judging the world, even judging the angels (1 Cor 6:2–3). Eventual fairness, justice, righting of wrongs, is gloriously inevitable. Your day of judging your offender is coming. But it is not today. You will take up the gavel. Just not today. If you seek to exact premature judgment, you destroy yourself.

Two, and most crucially, you yourself have offended God. And continue to offend him, in a hundred ways you are conscious of and a thousand you are not, every day. But he didn’t harbor bitterness against you. He didn’t resent you. He sent his Son for you. God decided to lay down every reason to resent you. Having been forgiven this, how in the world could we resent another?

Here’s C. S. Lewis, ‘On Forgiveness’–

To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you. This is hard. It is perhaps not so hard to forgive a single person great injury. But to forgive the incessant provocations of daily life–to keep on forgiving the bossy mother-in-law, the bullying husband, the nagging wife, the selfish daughter, the deceitful son–how can we do it? Only, I think, by remembering where we stand, by meaning our words when we say our prayers each night ‘forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us.’ We are offered forgiveness on no other terms. To refuse is to refuse God’s mercy for ourselves.

Miscellaneous Quotes (53)

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“Since Eden, there hasn’t been a single election that is NOT a choice of the lesser of two (or more) evils.” – Dan Phillips

“It is our firm belief, that what is commonly called Calvinism, is neither more nor less than the good old gospel of the Puritans, the Martyrs, the Apostles, and of our Lord Jesus Christ.” – C. H. Spurgeon

“What would have become of me, if the Lord had not stuffed that pillow with thorns on which I was disposed to rest?” – John Newton

‘Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.’ (Matt. 11:28)…. “You who please yourselves with being good enough now, who are not weary and heavy laden with a sense of your sins here, will be weary and heavy laden with a sense of your punishment hereafter.” – George Whitefield, ‘Christ the Only Rest for the Weary and Heavy Laden,’ in The Sermons of George Whitefield (ed. Lee Gatiss; 2 vols; Crossway, 2012), 1:360

“The Bible teaches that man’s will is enslaved to sin, incapable of submitting to God’s law, and dependent upon God’s regenerating grace.” – Dr. James White

In 1521 Martin Luther wrote a letter to his scrupulous friend, Philip Melanchthon. At one point Luther wrote: God does not save those who are only imaginary sinners. Be a sinner, and let your sins be strong; but let your trust in Christ be stronger, and rejoice in Christ who is the victor over sin… the Lamb who takes away the sin of the world. No sin can separate us from Him, even if we were to kill or commit adultery thousands of times each day. Do you think such an exalted Lamb paid merely a small price with a meager sacrifice for our sins?

“The resurrection did not turn a tragic defeat into a happy ending. No, the resurrection demonstrated the cross was a victory.” – Terry Virgo

“Justice is what we deserve. Grace is always and ever undeserved. If we deserved it, it would not be grace.” – R. C. Sproul

“Doctrine is but the drawing of the bow, application is the hitting of the mark.” – Thomas Manton

“If Christ could make a complaint, it would be, ‘My bride never talks to me.'” – R.C. Sproul

“The fetus, though enclosed in the womb of its mother, is already a human being (homo), and it is almost a monstrous crime to rob it of life which it has not yet begun to enjoy. If it seems horrible to kill a man in his own house than in a field, because a man’s house is his place of most secure refuge, it ought surely to be deemed more atrocious to destroy a fetus in the womb before it has come to light.” – John Calvin, commenting on Exodus 21:22-25

“I’ve never read in the Old Testament where God shows up and the people are bored, or that anybody walks away saying, ‘this was irrelevant.'” – R.C. Sproul

“By entertaining of strange persons, men sometimes entertain angels unawares: but by entertaining of strange doctrines, many have entertained devils unaware.” – John Flavel

“Do not merely speak the truth, but live truthfully, openly and honestly with one another.” – Dr. Sinclair B. Ferguson

“If through a broken heart God can bring His purposes to pass in the world, then thank Him for breaking your heart.” – Oswald Chambers

“Any gospel which says only what you must do and never announces what Christ has done is no gospel at all.” – Kevin DeYoung

“As soon as you think God owes us mercy, you’re not thinking about mercy any more.” – R.C. Sproul

?”There is no more monstrous idea than the idea that you can fall away from grace, that you can ever be born again and then be damned. The character of God is involved! It is impossible. His object is not merely to save me, it is to vindicate His own being and nature, and I am being used to that end. The end is absolutely certain because God’s character is involved in it.” – D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

“Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced.” – James Baldwin

“Christ is much more powerful to save, than Adam was to destroy.” – John Calvin

“There is no refuge from God, but there is refuge in God.” – Alistair Begg

“Christianity is greatest when it is hated by the world.” – Ignatius of Antioch

“Next to the wonder of seeing my Savior will be, I think, the wonder that I made so little use of the power of prayer.” – D.L. Moody

“People who are in a hurry to get out of the university and start earning money or serving the church or preaching the gospel have no idea of the infinite value of spending years of leisure conversing with the greatest minds and souls of the past, ripening and sharpening and enlarging their powers of thinking.” – Charles Malik, “The Other Side of Evangelism,” Christianity Today, 7 November 1980, page 40.

“Cheap grace is the grace we bestow on ourselves. Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession…. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.” – Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Henry Martyn (1781-1812), Anglican missionary, was told by a Muslim friend about a painting of Christ bowing down to Muhammad, begging for mercy. Martyn tells what happened next:

“I was cut to the soul at this blasphemy. Mirza Seid Ali perceived that I was considerably disordered and asked what it was that was so offensive? I told him that ‘I could not endure existence if Jesus was not glorified; it would be hell to me if he were to be always thus dishonored.’ He was astonished and again asked ‘Why?’ ‘If anyone pluck out your eyes,’ I replied, ‘there is no saying why you feel pain; it is feeling. It is because I am one with Christ that I am thus dreadfully wounded.’” – Constance E. Padwick, Henry Martyn (London, 1925), page 265

Martyn did not lash out at his Muslim friend. He did not complain. He did not even judge the man. Martyn only felt within himself a personal wound that struck at his own heart, his deepest love. Union with Christ, to Martyn, was more than a doctrinal abstraction. It was his lifeblood, his very identity. He winced with pain, not disgust. He turned away with sorrow, not a burning sense of wrong. It was his Muslim friend that pressed the matter further, seeing that Martyn was “considerably disordered.” Then Martyn spoke, not to correct his friend but only to explain himself.

The gospel goes out in greatest power and purity through love for Christ.

Meet Dr. James White

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Many of you know of Dr. James White and his ministry at aomin.org. He is a well known Christian author and apologist, as well as an elder at the Phoenix Reformed Baptist Church. He is also the busiest man I know. I am profoundly thankful for his ministry and count him as my friend. Here’s something of his personal story:

Preaching when unbelievers are present

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When it comes to how we preach when unbelievers are present to hear us (which I assume is any time we preach), there is a big difference between the approach of Ken Ham (of Answers in Genesis) and that of well known pastor, Andy Stanley (son of Charles Stanley).

For the record, I am 100% with Ken Ham on this.

Ken Ham:

Last week as I was giving a presentation I said, ‘In 2 Corinthians 11:3, Paul said….”. Then I stopped myself and said I wanted to reword this because of shocking trend I see in the church. I see more and more people looking on the Bible as just the word of humans–but it is not! As Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 2:13 “…you welcomed it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which also effectively works in you who believe.”

So I reworded my statement to make the point this way–“God, through Paul in 2 Corinthians 11:3 instructed us that…”

I had a few people comment to me about this because they are also noticing that increasing numbers of Christian academics/church leaders treat the Bible as if it is just the fallible words of men the somehow contain some ‘truth’ about God!

When I read this Christian Post article I’ve linked to, this reinforced for me that this is a problem in the church. I always warn that news articles don’t always give accurate accounts–though the Christian Post in the past has given quite accurate accounts of interviews with me etc.

We are waiting on the videos to become available so we can watch this particularly presentation by Andy Stanley for ourselves. But the way it is written here makes me very concerned indeed.

I am reminded of God’s Word in Luke 16:31–“But he said to him, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”

And God’s Word in Luke 24:27 concerning Jesus: “And beginning at Moses and all the Prophets, He expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself.”

We also need to remember : “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.” (Romans 10:17)

And also: “For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” (Hebrews 4:12)

I do give a talk that a Christian cannot give up our starting point of God’s Word when witnessing to non-Christians. There are only two starting points–God’s Word or Man’s Word. (Light or Darkness; For or Against Christ). There is no neutral position. When one gives up God’s Word as the starting point, then one has already lost the argument.

And we also need to remember that the ONLY INFALLIBLE RELIABLE WITNESS WE CAN TRUST IS GOD! And yes–He was a witness to the creation of Adam and Eve!

It is because increasing generations do not believe the history in Genesis concerning a literal Adam and Eve and a literal Fall that they do not understand what sin is, that they are sinners (as we are all descendants of Adam) and that is why God’s Son stepped into history to become our relative to pay the penalty for our sin. The gospel message comes from God’s Word and is rooted in the history concerning a literal first Adam and a literal “last Adam.”

Here’s the newspaper account of Andy Stanley’s message to pastors where he outlines his approach.

Friday Round Up

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(1) Please be praying for the Sproul family. Shannon Macfarlane Sproul, daughter of Dr. R.C. Sproul Jr. and granddaughter of Dr. R.C. Sproul, went to be with the Lord on Wednesday. She was just fifteen years old. It was only a year or so ago that R.C. Sproul Jr. lost his wife to cancer. Update here.

(2) “My memory is nearly gone; but I remember two things; that I am a great sinner, and that Christ is a great Saviour.” – John Newton (1725-1807)

(3) There’s a variety of resources in this week’s Friday Ligonier $5 sale worth considering, especially the Alaskan Cruise extensive series on election (eleven 45 minute messages) and the doctrines of Grace in John series by Dr. Steven Lawson (both are downloads). Other resources include material on preaching, Jonathan Edwards, Islam, Nehemiah, worldviews, God’s holiness, missions, and joy. They can be found here.

(4) Update: There is currently a 50% discount available on my new book, direct from the publisher here in the USA, Solid Ground Christian Books. For those who wish to order 10 or more copies there is a 54% discount. Both deals can be found at this link.

(5) Excerpt from THE NECESSITY OF THE SPIRIT’S WORK, NO. 251, DELIVERED ON SABBATH MORNING, MAY 8, 1859, BY THE REV. C. H. SPURGEON, AT THE MUSIC HALL, ROYAL SURREY GARDENS.

“And I will put My Spirit within you.” Ezekiel 36:27.

THE miracles of Christ are remarkable for one fact, namely that they are, none of them, unnecessary. The pretended miracles of Mohammed and of the Church of Rome, even if they were miracles, would have been pieces of folly! Suppose that Saint Denis had walked with his head in his hand after it had been cut off—what practical purpose would have been served thereby? He would certainly have been quite as well in his grave, for any practical good he would have conferred on men! The miracles of Christ were never unnecessary. They are not freaks of power. They are displays of power, it is true, but they, all of them, have a practical end. The same thing may be said of the promises of God. We have not one promise in the Scripture which may be regarded as a mere freak of Grace. As every miracle was necessary, absolutely necessary, so is every promise that is given in the Word of God! And hence from the text that is before us, I may draw and I think very conclusively, the argument that if God in His Covenant made with His people has promised to put His Spirit within them, it must be absolutely necessary that this promise was made and it must be absolutely necessary, also, to our salvation that each of us should receive the Spirit of God! This shall be the subject of this morning’s discourse. I shall not hope to make it very interesting, except to those who are anxiously longing to know the way of salvation.

We start, then, by laying down this proposition—that the work of the Holy Spirit is absolutely necessary to us, if we would be saved.

I. In endeavoring to prove this, I would first of all make the remark that this is very manifest if we remember what man is by nature. Some say that man may of himself attain unto salvation—that if he hears the Word, it is in his power to receive it, to believe it and to have a saving change worked in him by it. To this we reply—you do not know what man is by nature—otherwise you would never have ventured upon such an assertion! Holy Scripture tells us that man by nature is dead in trespasses and sins. It does not say that he is sick, that he is faint, that he has grown callous and hardened and seared—it says he is absolutely dead! Whatever that term, “death,” means in connection with the body, that it also means in connection with man’s soul—viewing it in its relation to spiritual things. When the body is dead, it is power- less; it is unable to do anything for itself. And when the soul of man is dead, in a spiritual sense, it must be, if there is any meaning in the figure, utterly and entirely powerless and unable to do anything of itself or for itself! When you shall see dead men raising themselves from their graves; when you shall see them unwinding their own sheets, opening their own coffin lids and walking down our streets alive and animate as the result of their own power—then, perhaps, you may believe that souls that are dead in sin may turn to God, recreate their own natures and make themselves heirs of Heaven, though before they were heirs of wrath! But mark, not till then. The drift of the Gospel is that man is dead in sin and that Divine Life is God’s gift. And you must go contrary to the whole of that drift before you can suppose a man brought to know and love Christ apart from the work of the Holy Spirit! The Spirit finds men as destitute of spiritual life as Ezekiel’s dry bones. He brings bone to bone and fits the skeleton together and then He comes from the four winds and breathes into the slain and they live and stand upon their feet—an exceedingly great army—and worship God! But apart from that, apart from the vivifying influence of the Spirit of God, men’s souls must lie in the valley of dry bones, dead and dead forever!

But Scripture does not only tell us that man is dead in sin; it tells us something worse than this, namely, that he is utterly and entirely averse to everything that is good and right. “The carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the Law of God, neither, indeed, can it be” (Rom 8:7). Turn all through Scripture and you find continually the will of man described as being contrary to the things of God. What did Christ say in that text so often quoted by the Arminian to disprove the very Doctrine which it clearly states? What did Christ say to those who imagined that men would come without Divine influence? He said, first, “No man can come unto Me except the Father which has sent Me draw him.” But He said something more strong—“You will not come unto Me that you might have life.” No man will come! Here lies the deadly mischief—not only that he is powerless to do good—but that he is powerful enough to do that which is wrong and that his will is desperately set against everything that is right! Go, Arminian, and tell your hearers that they will come if they please, but know that your Redeemer looks you in the face and tells you that you are uttering a lie! Men will not come! They never will come of themselves! You cannot persuade them to come! You cannot force them to come by all your thunders, nor can you entice them to come by all your invitations! They will not come to Christ, that they may have life! Until the Spirit draws them, they neither will come, nor can they!

Hence, then, from the fact that man’s nature is hostile to the Divine Spirit; that he hates Divine Grace; that he despises the way in which Grace is brought to him; that it is contrary to his own proud nature to stoop to receive salvation by the deeds of another—hence it is necessary that the Spirit of God should operate to change the will, to correct the bias of the heart, to set man in a right track and then give him.

HT: Thom Cole

Christ is the very essence

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“Christ is the very essence of all delights and pleasures, the very soul and substance of them. As all the rivers are gathered into the ocean, which is the meeting-place of all the waters in the world, so Christ is that ocean in which all true delights and pleasures meet.” – John Flavel

A Powerful Testimony

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“On a different page today, that royally pissed me off. Sometime in August, twenty years ago, my mother was raped. 9 months later, I came into the world.

When I was 15, my sister told me I was a “rape baby.” Naturally, I didn’t believe her. But my mom confirmed it. And I would just like to say this: I am NOT worth less than a non-rape baby. I am NOT a burden to my mother. I AM wanted, by many. I am NOT emotionally traumatized, I do not blame myself, and I am beyond grateful to be alive. Those women said they were thinking for their children. I can say, for a fact, their children would rather be alive with that knowledge than murdered for something they had no control of.”

via Life Begins at Conception!

Please pray for God’s comfort for the Sproul family

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Dr. R. C. Sproul, Jr, wrote this today, “My precious girl Shannon’s mute tongue is now loosed, though once lame she now leaps for joy. She and her mom are held by our Lord.”

May God bring His comfort and peace to all the Sproul household.

Back in June, R. C. Jr wrote the following at the Ligonier website:

It had been my plan to be in Virginia this week, teaching what we call Couples Camp, a small group gathering where we talk for a few days about the sovereignty of God, the family, and the kingdom of God. I looked forward to the trip, my old stomping grounds, visiting dear old friends, talking about issues that matter to me. In God’s providence I am not in Virginia. I am not teaching, but am learning. I am not talking so much as listening. And worst of all, I am in some old stomping grounds, roughly 100 yards from the hospital room where my beloved spent much of the last months of her life.

Five days ago, concerned over a radical increase in seizure activity, and a frightening lethargy I called Shannon’s neurologist. Shannon is my 14 year old daughter. Her brain did not develop properly, and she has the mental capacity of a toddler. She also suffers from seizures. The nurse with whom I spoke had no uncertainty with her advice- call 911 and get her to the emergency room. She has been wonderfully cared for. Sundry experts have run their tests. Nurses have loved on her. Visitors have come to cheer her. And, by God’s grace it looks likely she will get over this, and in a day or two we will go home. Why then is my heart so heavy?

Because I don’t trust my Father as I ought. I know that the fear that raced through me for those long hours when I didn’t know if she would make it, that fear was medicine for my soul. That is, I know that the immediate hardship I have been through this week is strong plant food for spiritual fruit. I trust Him to break my heart for the sake of making me more like Him. I trust in turn that He loves my little girl with a perfect love, that she, because she is my spiritual better, feels His loving arms holding her every day, in sickness and in health.

It’s my other children I weep for. When their mother was dying, they had, by and large, their father with them. When she passed, I was there. The children have their physical needs cared for. The older children are amazing- giving, loving, and diligent. Meals are being brought in. We have help for this need and that. But my children, who love their sister as tenderly as their dad does, worry without me there. They have no mother to comfort them. I am not there to remind them how to trust, to model faith before them. That this breaks my heart, however, reveals my awful lack of faith.

I am here and not there because He has brought this to pass. I am here for Shannon’s sake, for her good. I am here for my own sake, for my good. And I am here for the sake of Darby, Campbell, Delaney, Erin Claire, Maili, Reilly and Donovan. My Father knows what each of my children need. He knows how to grow the fruit of the Spirit in each of them. He knows precisely what they each need to become more like Jesus. And He has the power to bring this to pass. What they need right now if for me to be here.

Loss of a mother, worry for a sister are not emotional meteorites hurtling haphazardly toward the psyches of my children. They are the plans He has for them, plans to prosper them and not to harm them, plans to give them hope, and a future (Jeremiah 29:11). Which, by His grace, are the same plans He has for me. By His grace I will hope in Him and praise Him, for the help of His countenance (Psalm 42:5).

But to all who did receive him

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“But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” – John 1:12-13

“But who receive Him thus? Not all by any means. Only a few. And is this left to chance? Far from it. As the following verse goes on to state, ‘which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God’ (John 1:13). This explains to us why the few ‘receive’ Christ. It is because they are born of God. Just as verse 12 gives us the human side, so verse 13 gives us the Divine.

The Divine side is the new birth: and the taking place of the new birth is ‘not of blood,’ that is to say, it is not a matter of heredity, for regeneration does not run in the veins; ‘nor of the will of the flesh,’ the will of the natural man is opposed to God, and he has no will Godward until he has been born again; ‘nor of the will of man,’ that is to say, the new birth is not brought about by the well-meant efforts of friends, nor by the persuasive powers of the preacher; ‘but of God.’

The new birth is a Divine work. It is accomplished by the Holy Spirit applying the Word in living power to the heart. The reception Christ met during the days of His earthly ministry is the same still: the world ‘knows him not;’ Israel ‘receives him not;’ but a little company do receive him, and who these are, Acts 13:48 tells us — ‘as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.'”

– A.W. Pink

C. H. Spurgeon brings out another truth from the same verses:

“Believe the doctrine of the Fatherhood of God to His people. Abhor the doctrine of the universal Fatherhood of God, for it is a lie and a deep deception.

It stabs at the heart, first, of the doctrine of adoption, which is taught in Scripture, for how can God adopt men if they are all His children already?

In the second place, it stabs at the heart of the doctrine of regeneration, which is certainly taught in the Word of God. Now it is by regeneration and faith that we become the children of God, but how can that be if we are the children of God already? ‘But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God’ (John 1:12-13). How can God give to men the power to become His sons if they have it already?

Believe not that lie of the devil, but believe this truth of God, that Christ and all who are by living faith in Christ may rejoice in the Fatherhood of God.”

– C. H. Spurgeon, ‘Our Lord’s Last Cry from the Cross.’

“Regeneration is the work of God’s invincible power and mere grace, wherein by his Spirit accompanying his Word he quickeneth a redeemed person lying dead in his sins and reneweth him in his mind, his will and all the powers of his soul, convincing him savingly of sin and righteousness and judgment, and making him heartily to embrace Christ and salvation, and to consecrate himself to the service of God in Christ all the days of his life.” – David Dickson, Select Practical Writings of David Dickson, Vol. 1 (Edinburgh: Printed for the Assemblies Committee, 1845), p. 211.

A Thirst for Hermeneutics

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We would be horrified to hear of a surgeon who had just two weeks of training operating on someone’s brain. As important as brain surgery is, I believe the job of the Gospel preacher is far more important. Eternal souls hang in the balance, healthy and accurate. A teacher of the Bible needs rigorous training in the science of biblical interpretation (hermeneutics). But that’s not just true for the preacher; everyone of us needs to know how to gain an accurate knowledge of the Word of God.

Some people think that if God wants you to know something about the Bible, He will just reveal it to you supernaturally. Unfortunately, that’s how a lot of cults get started. 1 Tim 5:17 says, “Let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and doctrine.” Correct interpretation requires work; sometimes, a great deal of hard work.

We are also told to “be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” (2 Tim. 2:15). Without diligent study, it is easy to wrongly divide the word; to believe and to teach error. The main way this takes place is because we draw illegitimate inferences from the text – when we read into the text things that are not actually said by the text, and draw out of the text things that are actually not there (known as eisegesis). Sadly, this happens all too frequently.

Though there may be many applications of a text or passage of Scripture, there is only ONE correct interpretation. In other words, it doesn’t mean one thing and the exact opposite thing at the same time. Scripture is consistent. Scripture was written down by men, but in reality, there is only one Author, God Himself. God does not contradict Himself; He is not the author of confusion. Though, at times, we may be confused about what a passage means, God is never confused, and it is precisely because the Bible has a God inspired consistency that we can study it to find out what it means.

Because Scripture has only one correct interpretation, we can learn to be consistent in our interpretation of biblical texts by following some basic rules. These include reading any text in its context, finding out the meaning of the original words and grammar, and following the basic rules of English – verbs always stay as verbs, nouns as nouns, etc,.

Let us dispense with our traditions whenever we encounter them. What matters is not what we have assumed that a text says, but what it actually says. When the plain meaning of the text says something that challenges our traditional assumptions, we have a choice. We can say “it can’t mean that because of” (and we immediately take refuge in our traditional assumptions about what Scripture says), or we can be willing to bow the knee to God and His Word. Obviously, we should do the latter. The Word of God is right, when our traditional assumptions about it are wrong.

The law in this country gives us the right to interpret the Bible anyway we want to, without fear of prosecution. Thank God that we don’t have to go to jail or be burnt at the stake if our interpretation is wrong (as in former eras). Yet we should always remember that God never gives us the right to interpret His word incorrectly.

We must allow the Word of God to sit in judgment on us, rather than for us to sit in judgment on the Word of God. When the Judge comes into the courtroom, don’t be found sitting in his chair!