WHAT IS TRUTH - Opinion Based on the Bible

New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 6)

May 29, 2024 / Leave a comment

ANSWERING AGAIN THE “WHAT TR?” QUESTION

Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five

1. God Inspired Specific, Exact Words, and All of Them.
2. After God Inspired, Inscripturated, or Gave His Words, All of Them, to His People through His Institutions, He Kept Preserving Each of Them and All of Them According to His Promises of Preservation.
3. God Promised Preservation of the Words in the Language They Were Written, or In Other Words, He Preserved Exactly What He Gave.
4. God’s Promise of Keeping and Preserving His Words Means the Availability of His Words to Every Generation of Believers.
5. God the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity, Used the Church to Accredit or Confirm What Is Scripture and What Is Not.
6. God Declares a Settled Text of Scripture in His Word.

THE APPLICATION OF THE PRESUPPOSITIONS, PRINCIPLES, AND PROMISES OF AND FROM SCRIPTURE (Part Two)

In five parts of this series, I first declared the scriptural presuppositions, principles, and promises that buttress the historical and biblical position. Then I stated the positive conclusion of the provided model, paradigm, or template that followed the six truthful premises. The underlying original language text of the King James Version is, as Hills asserted, its own “independent variety of the Textus Receptus.” It is essentially Beza 1598, but not identical to that printed edition. This conclusion fulfills the model, the biblical premises.

The Other Side Does Not Follow Scriptural Presuppositions

The other side, the critical text and multiple modern version position, does not follow scriptural presuppositions. It proceeds from naturalistic and relativistic ones. This is especially seen in the hundreds of lines of Greek text for its New Testament with no manuscript evidence. Critics pieced together lines of text that never existed in any copy anywhere and anytime. On the other hand, they commonly still make the claim that the underlying text behind the King James comes from just a “handful of manuscripts available at the time.”

A very common attack, which I anticipate again on this series, will skip all the presuppositions, principles, and promises and go directly to and then quote the concluding statement out of context. It would sound something like this: “Kent Brandenburg says, The perfect preserved text of scripture is ‘the underlying original language text of the King James Version.'” I took that from the above first paragraph of this post.

The opposition then treats that statement like it stood alone with no explanation. The enemies of the scriptural and historical position will provide strawman arguments. They won’t be the actual ones in these posts, and if they provide any of them, they’ll misrepresent them. You can count on this. I take this bow shot or preemptive strike as a warning.

Scripture reveals presuppositions, principles, and promises about God’s preservation of scripture. I could faithlessly ignore those. Instead, I could focus on the existence of textual variants and the relatively few variations between the printed editions of the textus receptus. Also, I could obsess over a couple individual words that critics say have little manuscript evidence. Those challenge the presuppositions, principles, and promises. I consider those minor challenges outweighed again by the presuppositions, principles, and promises.

Faith and the Model of Canonicity

Two verses that mean a lot to me related to the perfect preservation of the Greek New Testament is Romans 4:20-21:

20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; 21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.

The same type of challenge occurs with the belief in twenty-seven books. No verse says, “Twenty-seven books are in the New Testament,” just like no verse says that Noah’s ark is still on Mount Ararat. Do I have faith that Noah’s ark is up there? I believe it landed there and stayed.

Why the twenty-seven that we call the New Testament? Some disagree. Other opinions exist. The presuppositions, principles, and promises are the same for twenty-seven New Testament books. These were the ones the churches accepted, a testimony of the Holy Spirit through believers.

The Unacceptable Alternative

The alternative to this position I espouse here is unacceptable. It rejects these presuppositions, principles, and promises. Also, it leaves the church without verbal, plenary perfection of scripture. The position I take, as I see it and very strongly, is the best and really only position for a perfect scripture, what believers should expect. Because of that, I take it.

Through the years, I have considered the arguments for the other side. What I’ve seen is a regularly changing, morphing attack. It’s as though they just throw anything and everything, the proverbial kitchen sink. Their conclusion is the same: uncertainty, doubt, the denial of scriptural and historical teaching, loss of authority, an ever changing and mutating scriptural text, and the ultimate apostasy that goes along with what they consider reality.

Certainty Versus “Confidence”

You can hear professing evangelicals attempt to fortify against the problem they create. They can’t say “certainty,” and even mock “certainty.” I hope you have a hard time even imagining this. It does happen and is happening, but they ratchet down expectations with words like “confidence.” It’s not even scriptural confidence, just confidence falsely so-called. They create uncertainty and can’t be certain, so they adjust people’s mindset to a form of probability at a higher level of probability that they falsely label “confidence.” It should be sued for false advertising.

From where does this confidence come for professing evangelicals who embrace confidence rather than certainty? It comes from naturalism. Yes, naturalism. They think they can give a high level of proof from naturalism and rationalism. It’s like trying to convince people that the vaccination is safe. Yes, they rushed it out, but look, they’re even vaccinating the president. Evangelicals mock certainty in a nasty manner and then they focus on confidence.

Compare again confidence to a vaccination drive. Can you get confidence from something at 95 percent? We know God wants jot and tittle obedience. Jesus said that in Matthew 5:17-20. These evangelicals don’t offer jot and tittle certainty as the grounds for jot and tittle obedience. This is also why they accompany their confidence with scaled down obedience. Since their adherents can’t be sure of scripture, they emphasize non-essentials. No one should separate over eschatology, ecclesiology, and a mounting stack of teachings. Why? No one can or should ensure certainty. That’s not who we should roll with God’s Word.

What God Desires

The alternative to the truth also evinces the truth itself. The truth stands. Scripture teaches perfect preservation, availability, a settled text, and all the other of the six principles I listed in this series. These form the basis for a sure, certain text of scripture that results in the kind of obedience God proposes and desires.

Is what God desires extremism and dangerous? The side of uncertainty and doubt uses this kind of tactic, name-calling, labeling faith in scriptural teaching as extremist and dangerous. Don’t worry. That’s what they said about Jesus and the Apostles too.

I call on everyone reading to reject a critical, naturalistic text of scripture and the substandard probability, called “confidence,” that it engenders. Those pushing that view are part of the downward trajectory, the steady decline, seen everywhere today. They are part of what’s not getting better.

New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 5)

May 28, 2024 / Leave a comment

ANSWERING AGAIN THE “WHAT TR?” QUESTION

Part One Part Two Part Three Part Four

1. God Inspired Specific, Exact Words, and All of Them.
2. After God Inspired, Inscripturated, or Gave His Words, All of Them, to His People through His Institutions, He Kept Preserving Each of Them and All of Them According to His Promises of Preservation.
3. God Promised Preservation of the Words in the Language They Were Written, or In Other Words, He Preserved Exactly What He Gave.
4. God’s Promise of Keeping and Preserving His Words Means the Availability of His Words to Every Generation of Believers.
5. God the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity, Used the Church to Accredit or Confirm What Is Scripture and What Is Not.
6. God Declares a Settled Text of Scripture in His Word.

THE APPLICATION OF THE PRESUPPOSITIONS, PRINCIPLES, AND PROMISES OF AND FROM SCRIPTURE

God’s Word is truth. It provides the expectations for Christians, not feelings or experience. People can count on what God says. True believers go to scripture to get their views for things.

The Lord in His Word gives the expectations regarding the future of scripture. What would God do? If God says He will do it, then He will do it, and believers will believe that He did.

The presuppositions, principles, and promises of and from scripture provide a model, paradigm, or template for knowing what God’s Words are. The true view will follow a biblical model.

Epistemology

What I’m writing in this series considers how people know or can know what they know, what’s called “epistemology.” The critical text and its modern versions are different than the received or traditional text and the King James Version. They can’t both be right. Of the two, how do we know which one is right?

Knowledge starts with God’s Word. Faith in what God says is the primary way of knowing what people ought to know. Someone can open to Genesis 1:1 and know what it says occurred based on God saying it.

Only one text and version position fits the principles, presuppositions, and promises of scripture. The above six true principles lead one to the received text or textus receptus. Only the received text, the underlying text of the King James Version, corresponds to what God said would occur.

Which Textus Receptus?

Opponents or critics of the received text position, critical text proponents, very often ask, “Which Textus Receptus (TR)?” I saw someone recently mock the TR by calling it the “Texti Recepti.” The idea of this criticism is that there is more than one edition of the TR, so which one is it?

The textus receptus is a very homogenous text. All the varied editions are very close and essentially the same. However, the differences would contradict perfect, every word preservation and a settled text. This criticism becomes a major presupposition for a critical text position. It says, “No one knows what the text is, so everyone continues with textual criticism.”

Following the presuppositions, principles, and promises of scripture, one witnesses settlement on the text of scripture. Even though each of the twenty-seven books of the New Testament were considered scripture immediately, its aggregation or collation into one book took one or two hundred years. This occurred through the agreement of God’s people and the testimony of the Holy Spirit, termed “canonicity.”

History of the Received Text

Through church history, God’s people continued to ascertain and identify scripture in the keeping process. Churches kept agreeing on the twenty-seven books of the New Testament. They also received the words of the New Testament, the text of the New Testament. Churches had already been receiving the same text of scripture in the manuscript or hand-written era. A few years ago, I wrote the following.

Kurt Aland

The TR never meant one printed edition. Even Kurt and Barbara Aland the famed textual critics, the “A” in “NA” (Nestles-Aland), wrote (“The Text of the Church?” in Trinity Journal, Fall, 1987, p.131):

[I]t is undisputed that from the 16th to the 18th century orthodoxy’s doctrine of verbal inspiration assumed this Textus Receptus. It was the only Greek text they knew, and they regarded it as the ‘original text.’

He also wrote in his The Text of the New Testament (p. 11):

We can appreciate better the struggle for freedom from the dominance of the Textus Receptus when we remember that in this period it was regarded even to the last detail the inspired and infallible word of God himself.

Barbara Aland

His wife Barbara writes in her book, The Text of the New Testament (pp. 6-7):

[T]he Textus Receptus remained the basic text and its authority was regarded as canonical. . . . Every theologian of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (and not just the exegetical scholars) worked from an edition of the Greek text of the New Testament which was regarded as the “revealed text.” This idea of verbal inspiration (i. e., of the literal and inerrant inspiration of the text) which the orthodoxy of both Protestant traditions maintained so vigorously, was applied to the Textus Receptus.

I say all that, because Aland accurately does not refer to an edition of the TR, neither does he speak of the TR like it is an edition. It isn’t. That is invented language used as a reverse engineering argument by critical text proponents, differing with the honest proposition of Aland, quoted above. They very often focus on Desiderius Erasmus and his first printed edition of the Greek New Testament. That’s not how believers viewed what the Van Kleecks call the Standard Sacred Text, others call the Ecclesiastical Text, and still others the Traditional Text.

Metzger

Neither does Bruce Metzger refer to an edition of the Textus Receptus; only to the Textus Receptus (The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration, 4th ed. [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005], pp. 106-251):

Having secured . . . preeminence, what came to be called the Textus Receptus of the New Testament resisted for 400 years all scholarly effort to displace it. . . . [The] “Textus Receptus,” or commonly received, standard text . . . makes the boast that “[the reader has] the text now received by all, in which we give nothing changed or corrupted.” . . . [This] form of Greek text . . . succeeded in establishing itself as “the only true text” of the New Testament and was slavishly reprinted in hundreds of subsequent editions. It lies at the basis of the King James Version and of all the principal Protestant translations in the languages of Europe prior to 1881.

[T]he reverence accorded the Textus Receptus. . . [made] attempts to criticize or emend it . . . akin to sacrilege. . . . For almost two centuries . . . almost all of the editors of the New Testament during this period were content to reprint the time-honored . . . Textus Receptus. . . . In the early days of . . . determining textual groupings . . . the manuscript was collated against the Textus Receptus . . . . This procedure made sense to scholars, who understood the Textus Receptus as the original text of the New Testament, for then variations from it would be “agreements in error.”

The Textus Receptus does not refer to a single printed edition of the New Testament. The language of a received text proceeds from true believers in a time before the printing press in hand copies and then leading to the period of its printing.

Edward Freer Hills

Churches up to the printing press ‘received’ the “received text,” hence, “the received text” of the New Testament. This bore itself out in the printed edition era, as churches only printed editions of the received text. However, they didn’t permanently continue printing editions of the TR. They settled, as seen in the discontinuation of printing further editions after about a hundred years. This was a shorter period of time than the settlement or agreement on the twenty-seven books of scripture.

What I’m writing here corresponds to the now well-known position expressed by Edward Freer Hills in his book, The King James Version Defended. He wrote:

The King James Version ought to be regarded not merely as a translation of the Textus Receptus but also as an independent variety of the Textus Receptus. . . . But what do we do in these few places in which the several editions of the Textus Receptus disagree with one another? Which text do we follow? The answer to this question is easy. We are guided by the common faith. hence we favor that form of the Textus Receptus upon which more than any other, God, working providentially, has placed the stamp of His approval, namely the King James Version, or, more precisely, the Greek text underlying the King James Version.

King James Version Translated from Something

Some critical text adherents want to make Hills statement a “gotcha” or “aha” moment. “Look, this is an English priority!” I say, “No, the King James translators were translators, so they translated from something.” From which they translated is represented by the writing and teaching in all the centuries after the last printed edition of the textus receptus and the acceptance of the King James Version.

The King James Version translators translated from available words. They relied on the printed editions of the textus receptus. Their text was its own independent variety, like Hills said. However, that text pre-existed the translation, even if it wasn’t in one printed edition. Again, scripture doesn’t argue for the preservation of an edition.

Those translations forerunning the King James Version also relied on the textus receptus. The necessity of a settled text, that particular presupposition, looks on which the vast majority of believers settled. The concluding certainty comes from faith in what God said He would do.

Printed Editions of the TR

Almost one hundred percent of the words for the King James Version came from the printed editions of the textus receptus. Maybe two or three words total in the King James Version don’t appear in any printed edition of the textus receptus but had textual attestation elsewhere. A vast majority of true believers were not reading the Greek New Testament. They accepted or received the textus receptus by receiving the translation from the textus receptus. This helps explain the Hills statement of an “independent variety of the Textus Receptus.” It’s not unique though in a fair understanding of the word. It reflects what God’s people received as the text of the New Testament since its original writing.

In 1881, F. H. A. Scrivener took on the monumental project of printing the received text underlying the King James Version New Testament. For many decades the Trinitarian Bible Society has printed this edition of the textus receptus. The printing of this as its own edition suggests the independent variety of the Textus Receptus underlying the New Testament of the King James Version.

The Ecclesiastical Text

Some call the textus receptus, “the ecclesiastical text.” I don’t mind that title. It acknowledges the testimony of the Holy Spirit toward His words through the church. God uses the church to attest to the words of God as a means of settling the text. Naturalistic and rationalistic modern textual criticism does not settle the text. It uses naturalistic means as a basis for speculating the original text of the New Testament. It does not claim certainty or knowing what the text is. Because of its means or instrumentality, it doesn’t and can’t claim to know the original text. It also does not acknowledge the truth of the above principles, promises, and presuppositions.

I know I’m saved. Scripture assures me of my salvation. The Bible also assures me that I know what is the text of the New Testament. I know the New Testament text like I know the twenty-seven books of the New Testament.

Acting in Faith

Faith acts. It will bite down on what God said and what He said He would do. You don’t believe if you sit back and taste without swallowing. Faith isn’t a sample-fest.

On this subject, some are reticent to say what is the text of the New Testament. They anticipate the attack coming, including mockery. Those mocking do not bite down. They instead adjust based upon their naturalistic presuppositions. They say something like “confidence” instead of “certainty.” That doesn’t follow what scripture says about itself. This should embarrass them. I think it does many of them, which is why the angry reaction and the resultant mockery.

The trail of faith on this issue ends with the underlying text behind the King James Version. The closest to that is all the words found in the printed edition. That sort of settles, but it leaves wiggle room. It’s a harder-to-defend position, based upon the plain scriptural presuppositions.

More to Come

On the Lord’s Day, Turn Apps & Email Off On Your Cell Phone

May 24, 2024 / Leave a comment

On the Lord’s Day, consider turning off apps, email, and whatever else you can on your cell phone. The first day of the week, Sunday, is not the Sabbath, but there are principles from Israel’s Sabbath that are appropriately applied to the first day of the week, the day of Christian worship, the Lord’s Day (Revelation 1:10; Acts 20:7). How does the Lord’s Day relate to your cell phone? We discussed this issue previously in the post Social Media and Electronics: Addictive Drugs for Christians?. I want to say a bit more about it now.

The Westminster Larger Catechism gives a good summary of principles that are appropriate to set the Lord’s Day apart from the other days of the week (although it improperly equates the Sabbath with the Lord’s Day, as did the Puritans). Please consider the following statements thoughtfully and prayerfully:

What is required in the fourth commandment?

The fourth commandment requireth of all men the sanctifying or keeping holy to God such set times as he hath appointed in his word, expressly one whole day in seven … [since] the resurrection of Christ … the first day of the week … (Deut. 5:12–14, Gen. 2:2–3, 1 Cor. 16:1–2, Matt. 5:17–18, Isa. 56:2,4,6–7) … in the New Testament called The Lord’ s day. (Rev. 1:10)

How is … the Lord’s day to be sanctified?

The … Lord’s day is to be sanctified by an holy resting all the day, (Exod. 20:8,10) not only from such works as are at all times sinful, but even from such worldly employments and recreations as are on other days lawful; (Exod. 16:25–28, Neh. 13:15–22, Jer. 17:21–22) and making it our delight to spend the whole time (except so much of it as is to be taken up in works of necessity and mercy (Matt. 12:1–13) ) in the public and private exercises of God’ s worship: (Isa. 58:13, Luke 4:16, Acts 20:7, 1 Cor. 16:1–2, Ps. 92, Isa. 66:23, Lev. 23:3) and, to that end, we are to prepare our hearts, and with such foresight, diligence, and moderation, to dispose and seasonably dispatch our worldly business, that we may be the more free and fit for the duties of that day. (Exod. 20:8,56, Luke 23:54, Exod. 16:22,25-26,29)

Why is the charge of keeping the [principles of the] sabbath more specially directed to governors of families, and other superiors?

The charge of keeping the [principles of the] sabbath is more specially directed to governors of families, and other superiors, because they are bound not only to keep it themselves, but to see that it be observed by all those that are under their charge; and because they are prone ofttimes to hinder them by employments of their own. (Exod. 20:10, Josh. 24:15, Neh. 13:15,17, Jer. 17:20–22, Exod. 23:12)

What are the sins forbidden in the fourth commandment?

The sins forbidden in the fourth commandment are, all omissions of the duties required, (Ezek. 22:26) all careless, negligent, and unprofitable performing of them, and being weary of them; (Acts 20:7,9, Ezek. 33:30–32, Amos 8:5, Mal. 1:13) all profaning the day by idleness, and doing that which is in itself sinful; (Ezek. 23:38) and by all needless works, words, and thoughts, about our worldly employments and recreations. (Jer. 17:24,27, Isa. 58:13)

What are the reasons annexed to the fourth commandment, the more to enforce it?

The reasons annexed to the fourth commandment, the more to enforce it, are taken from the equity of it, God allowing us six days of seven for our own affairs, and reserving but one for himself in these words, Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: (Exod. 20:9) from God’ s challenging a special propriety in that day, The seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: (Exod. 20:10) from the example of God, who in six days made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: and from that blessing which God put upon that day, not only in sanctifying it to be a day for his service, but in ordaining it to be a means of blessing to us in our sanctifying it; Wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath-day, and hallowed it. (Exod. 20:11)

Why is the Word Remember set in the beginning of the fourth commandment?

The word Remember is set in the beginning of the fourth commandment, (Exod. 20:8) partly, because of the great benefit of remembering it, we being thereby helped in our preparation to keep it, (Exod. 16:23, Luke 23:54,56, Mark 15:42, Neh. 13:19) and, in keeping it, better to keep all the rest of the commandments, (Ps. 92:13–14, Ezek. 20:12,19–20) and to continue a thankful remembrance of the two great benefits of creation and redemption, which contain a short abridgment of religion; (Gen. 2:2–3, Ps. 118:22,24, Acts 4:10–11, Rev. 1:10) and partly, because we are very ready to forget it, (Ezek. 22:26) for that there is less light of nature for it, (Neh. 9:14) and yet it restraineth our natural liberty in things at other times lawful; (Exod. 34:21) that it cometh but once in seven days, and many worldly businesses come between, and too often take off our minds from thinking of it, either to prepare for it, or to sanctify it; (Deut. 5:14–15, Amos 8:5) and that Satan with his instruments labours much to blot out the glory, and even the memory of it, to bring in all irreligion and impiety. (Lam. 1:7, Jer. 17:21–23, Neh. 13:15–23) (The Westminster Larger Catechism: With Scripture Proofs. (Oak Harbor, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1996), Questions 116-121)

Let’s consider how these principles relate to your cell phone. While there are many people who spend all day long trying to figure out how to keep you on your phone as long as possible, people who do not make money from such things know that our over-use of the cell phone is bad for us. For me personally, I want to make sure that I am not programming myself to constantly look at my phone whenever I have a free moment, like the average American who looks at his phone 344 times a day. I have therefore used a setting on the phone to make it so that on the Lord’s Day the vast majority of the apps on my phone and Ipad–including my Gmail e-mail app, YouTube, and browsers like Safari or Chrome, –are not accessible:

These apps–again, including Gmail, YouTube, and browsers–are not accessible in the morning before I have time to spend in God’s Word. I want to hear from the Lord before I hear from everyone else.

The only sorts of apps that are accessible on the Lord’s Day, before I am at work in the morning every day of the week, and after a certain time in the evening every day, are those like my Bible apps, Accordance and Logos, my calendar to remind me of responsibilities on the Lord’s Day, the map app for something like getting to church in case there is traffic, and such like. I don’t need to find out what the world news is by going to conservative political websites on the Lord’s Day. I don’t need to find out who just posted a new video on this or on that. Spending that time meditating on Scripture instead is far better for my spiritual health (and far better for my family and nation as well). If you need to reach me, you can call me.

It is a blessing to have these apps turned off. I am glad to do it. I would encourage you to think about doing something similar. You do not need to to exactly what I do–maybe having email turned off would prevent you from hearing from someone you would pick up for church, for example–but I would encourage you to consider the principles in the 4th Commandment and elsewhere and make the Lord’s Day distinctly different. Use God’s Day as a special opportunity to resist and fight back against all the app developers who spend big bucks and many hours doing everything they can to keep you on their app and on your device, not so that they can help you pursue or follow after holiness (Hebrews 12:14), but so that they can make merchandise of you. (They also could not care less if they turn the brains of your children into mush–worldly mush, at that–but you should, and so should keep real books in their hands, and devices out of their hands. The rod and reproof will give your child wisdom, Proverbs 29:15, but you just gain temporary quietness if you allow their brains to be sucked out through electronics.) Lay aside not only the sin which can so easily beset you, but also every weight (Hebrews 12:1) and run with patience towards your risen Lord, Jesus Christ.

–TDR

New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 4)

May 21, 2024 / 2 Comments on New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 4)

ANSWERING AGAIN THE “WHAT TR?” QUESTION

Part One Part Two Part Three

1. God Inspired Specific, Exact Words, and All of Them.
2. After God Inspired, Inscripturated, or Gave His Words, All of Them, to His People through His Institutions, He Kept Preserving Each of Them and All of Them According to His Promises of Preservation.
3. God Promised Preservation of the Words in the Language They Were Written, or In Other Words, He Preserved Exactly What He Gave.
4. God’s Promise of Keeping and Preserving His Words Means the Availability of His Words to Every Generation of Believers.
5. God the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity, Used the Church to Accredit or Confirm What Is Scripture and What Is Not.

Introduction to Point 6.

I hear many, what I would call, dishonest arguments. Those occur all the time from proponents of the critical text or multiple modern versions. Let me give you a couple, three, but with my focus on one in particular. One of these is the usage of the KJV translators for support of the critical text and modern versions. I agree the translators made room for improvements to their translation. They didn’t see the translation as the end of improvement in translation. They weren’t talking about improvements on the underlying text. That’s either incompetent or dishonest as an argument.

How can I be the dummy version of KJVO if I agree with the translators on the issue of improvement? I can’t be, yet this is what critical text or modern version people do all the time. Their posing as non-confrontational and with a cheery Christian spirit is nothing more than a ruse. They will treat you well if you budge to a significant degree toward their positions. That’s all. If you don’t, you get sent down the garbage disposal.

Pavlovian

There’s something Pavlovian to these modern version advocates. Young fundamentalists so want their favor, that they salivate to their positive reinforcement. This corresponds to turning on the light. The favor acts as a lure to behavior adjustment. Favored treatment is not an argument, yet is is the most convincing one in a feeling oriented world.

Can someone say the King James Version is inspired and support the 1769 update? I ask Ruckmanites this question all the time. Modern version advocates won’t acquiesce because they want to keep this second faux argument alive. If I approve a 1769 update, why would I not approve another one? Not doing an update is not the same as not approving of one. I’ve said often recently that King James Version advocates won’t update the King James Version under the pressure of modern version adherents, who don’t even use the King James. This really should be the end of this, but it won’t.

Latin Vulgate or Church Hierarchy Attack

The third bad argument from modern version proponents, the one on which I focus, has several layers. They say the King James is the Latin Vulgate to KJVO like the Latin Vulgate was to Catholics. This is to smear KJVO with Roman Catholicism. One of the layers is that it puts Roman Catholic-like power to the textual choices, putting the church over scripture. This is a category error.

Scripture, the authority, teaches that the Holy Spirit uses the church as the Urim and Thummim. God directs God’s people to the books and the words of the scripture using the church. The church is not taking preeminence over scripture by obeying scripture.

These false arguments remind me of the flailing of a losing boxer at the end of a match. Or, a basketball coach clearing the bench at the end of the game and the substitutes treating the final three minutes like they’ve won the game. No, they’re losing. These are not landing a single blow. They are what experts call “garbage time.” It’s just stat padding and not contributing toward winning at all.

6. God Declares a Settled Text of Scripture in His Word.

Settled Word

Scripture is not amoebic. Its boundaries don’t shapeshift like the Stingray nebula. The Bible doesn’t ooze and alter like the Hagfish. God declares in His Word a settled text of scripture. The Bible is a rock, not shifting sand.

God describes His Word as forever settled (Psalm 119:8-9). Deuteronomy 4:2 says:

Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.

Proverbs 30:6 instructs: “Add thou not unto his words, lest he reprove thee, and thou be found a liar.” At its very end, the Bible says in Revelation 22:18-19:

18 For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book: 19 And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.

One cannot take away or add a word to a text that isn’t settled. No possibility of guilt could come to a person for adding or taking away from something unsettled. These warnings assume the establishment of the words. All the principles, presuppositions, and promises from scripture relate to the settlement of the text of the New Testament.

Considering the Nature of God

What God says in scripture about scripture should make sense, considering the nature of God. In Malachi 3:6, God says: “For I am the LORD, I change not.” The immutability of God, one of His attributes, provides a basis for trusting Him. God communicates the trustworthy nature of His Words with relations to His preservation of them in Isaiah 59:21:

As for me, this is my covenant with them, saith the LORD; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth,, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed’s seed, saith the LORD, from henceforth and for ever.

Isaiah 40:8 says something similar: “The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever.”

Received Text Mindset

Modern version and critical text advocates know that printed editions of the received text of the New Testament in the 16th and 17th centuries have few and minor variations. When I say “few and minor,” I’m not making a point that those variants do not matter. They do. The attitude at the time sounded like what Richard Capel wrote:

[W]e have the Copies in both languages [Hebrew and Greek], which Copies vary not from Primitive writings in any matter which may stumble any. This concernes onely the learned, and they know that by consent of all parties, the most learned on all sides among Christians do shake hands in this, that God by his providence hath preserved them uncorrupt. . . .

As God committed the Hebrew text of the Old Testament to the Jewes, and did and doth move their hearts to keep it untainted to this day: So I dare lay it on the same God, that he in his providence is so with the Church of the Gentiles, that they have and do preserve the Greek Text uncorrupt, and clear: As for some scrapes by Transcribers, that comes to no more, than to censure a book to be corrupt, because of some scrapes in the printing, and tis certain, that what mistake is in one print, is corrected in another.

The variation did not yield an unsettled nature. No, “what mistake is in one print, is corrected in another.” They knew errors could come into a hand copy or even a printed edition. However, that did not preclude the doctrine of preservation and a settled text. God would have us live by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

More to Come

New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 3)

May 19, 2024 / 11 Comments on New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 3)

ANSWERING AGAIN THE “WHAT TR?” QUESTION

Part One Part Two

1. God Inspired Specific, Exact Words, and All of Them.
2. After God Inspired, Inscripturated, or Gave His Words, All of Them, to His People through His Institutions, He Kept Preserving Each of Them and All of Them According to His Promises of Preservation.
3. God Promised Preservation of the Words in the Language They Were Written, or In Other Words, He Preserved Exactly What He Gave.
4. God’s Promise of Keeping and Preserving His Words Means the Availability of His Words to Every Generation of Believers.

Introduction for Point 5, the Next Point

Long ago, I completed the answering of every question from opponents on the issue of preservation, versions, etc. Nothing new has arisen for many years. What keeps me writing is the accusation that our side does not answer questions. I have written long, very complete answers. The norm of the opposition focuses on one little piece of an answer and takes it out of context. This happens in a lot of debate situations, so I understand it.

This series of posts again tries to help someone understand, who still doesn’t. The writing through the years has helped some. They’ve testified of that. For most though, they don’t care. It seems like a waste of time to keep talking to them.

My Approach for this Series

My approach for this series of posts is presenting scriptural principles, presuppositions, or promises as premises to a conclusion. I could further show how that these points represent historical biblical doctrine, interpretation, or application, but I won’t for this series. I’ve done that many times. I want to keep it simple here.

What I’m writing for this series, I’ve never seen from the critical text and modern version side. I still have not read a work that attempts to lay out a doctrine or biblical defense of naturalistic textual criticism to prove it is the historical Christian position. None do that because it’s absent from scripture. I’m not a reconstructionist like him, but I agree with this statement by R. J. Rushdoony:

Consider what happens when the Received Text is set aside and scholars give us their reconstruction of the text. The truth of revelation has thereby passed from the hand of God into the hands of men. Scholars then establish the true reading in terms of their presuppositions…The denial of the Received Text enables the scholar to play god over God. The determination of the correct word is now a scholar’s province and task. The Holy Spirit is no longer the giver and preserver of the biblical text: it is the scholar, the textual scholar.

The critical text and modern version side just takes shots at our positions. They have written several books like this, among the notable by D. A. Carson, James White, faculty from notable Bob Jones University grads, and then the Central Baptist Theological Seminary faculty. They don’t show biblical presuppositions or a presence in historical theology, because they don’t exist.

Without further adieu, I continue.

5. God the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Trinity, Used the Church to Accredit or Confirm What Is Scripture and What Is Not.

In 2017, I wrote the following:

Evangelicals and fundamentalists argue for the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit. This is important to them. With the qualities of canonical books present, how would the church recognize them? Because men are depraved, they couldn’t assess the divine qualities of canonical books except by the internal testimony of the Holy Spirit. This is not as private revelation, but to help people overcome the effects of sin so that they might distinguish actual scripture. Even evangelicals believe that the consensus of the church is a key indicator of which books are canonical.

Scripture has divine qualities characteristic of its author, the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit indwells believers. Believers respond to what the Holy Spirit wrote, because He knows what He wrote. That’s how the argument goes. The Holy Spirit was not only at work in the origination of the Bible, but He also is at work within the people who receive the Bible. Donald Bloesch writes (p. 150, Holy Scriptures):

Scripture is a product of the inspiring work of the Spirit, who guided the writers to give a reliable testimony to God’s self-revelation in Jesus Christ. Its canonizing is to be attributed to the illumining work of the Spirit, who led . . . . the church to assent to what the Spirit had already authorized.

Spiritually Discerned

The Apostle Paul says that the things of the Spirit of God are spiritually discerned (1 Corinthians 2:14). God gives something to believers through the indwelling Holy Spirit to discern spiritual things. This is not mysticism. It fits with what Jesus told His disciples in John 16:13:

Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.

Unity of the Spirit

Over a year ago, I wrote the following:

Saints of the first century knew the books the Holy Spirit inspired and the ones He didn’t. They copied the ones He inspired. They received those as the Word of God. The saints agreed on what the books and the words were. They copied and distributed them.

The agreement of the saints or of true churches resulted in a multitude of almost identical copies. As history passed the printing press era, they agreed or settled on the text of the Bible. One could and should call the agreement, “the unity of the Spirit” (Ephesians 4:3). What is that?

Every true believer possesses the Holy Spirit in him. He guides, leads, reproves, teaches, etc. The Holy Spirit will not on the inside of a believer lead, guide, or teach in a different way. He won’t contradict Himself. He is One.

The same Holy Spirit, Who inspired the Words of God, knows those Words still. He does not need to reinspire Words. Instead, He can direct His people to the correct one, when a copyist errs. The churches for hundreds of years did not agree on the critical text. That text did not make its way to God’s people. They received the, well, received text. They thought that the work of the Holy Spirit.

What I just wrote above is not mysticism. It is what we read in scripture. It is how we see the Holy Spirit work. Providence and the inward testimony of the Holy Spirit fulfilled God’s promise of preservation.

Historical Agreement

Related to the above, The Westminster Confession of Faith of 1646 reads:

V. We may be moved and induced by the testimony of the Church to an high and reverent esteem of the holy Scripture; and the heavenliness of the matter, the efficacy of the doctrine, the majesty of the style, the consent of all the parts, the scope of the whole (which is to give all glory to God), the full discovery it makes of the only way of man’s salvation, the many other incomparable excellencies, and the entire perfection thereof, are arguments whereby it doth abundantly evidence itself to be the Word of God; yet, notwithstanding, our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority thereof, is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit, bearing witness by and with the Word in our hearts.

The Gallican Confession (1559) reads:

We know these books to be canonical, and the sure rule of our faith, not so much by the common accord and consent of the Church, as by the testimony and inward illumination of the Holy Spirit, which enables us to distinguish them from other ecclesiastical books.

Thiessen wrote in his Introduction to the New Testament:

The Holy Spirit, given to the Church, quickened holy instincts, aided discernment between the genuine and the spurious, and thus led to gradual, harmonious, and in the end unanimous conclusions. There was in the Church what a modern divine has happily termed an ‘inspiration of selection’.

All the above statements fall within the teaching of many different scriptures on the Holy Spirit and the Words of God. The Holy Spirit leads through the agreement of His people. This is a reason Paul tells Timothy that the church is the pillar and ground of the truth (1 Timothy 3:15).

How Does The Testimony of the Holy Spirit Work?

When believers recognize the work of the Holy Spirit, they attest to scriptural presuppositions, principles, and promises. Those will not contradict the Holy Spirit. This is the meaning of testing whether something is of the Holy Spirit. Naturalistic explanations don’t pass the test.

A true church is the temple of the Holy Spirit. The unity of Spirit is seen in the agreement of a true church. Churches received the received text (the textus receptus). At the end of an era, they agreed to stop publishing editions of the textus receptus. Was that the Holy Spirit testifying through the churches that believed and practiced the Bible? This fits the scriptural teaching and the model.

This principle, presupposition, or promise of the inward testimony of the Holy Spirit is not the only one of these. It is crucial though.

More to Come

Q, Synoptic Gospel Dependence, and Inspiration for the Bible

May 17, 2024 / 10 Comments on Q, Synoptic Gospel Dependence, and Inspiration for the Bible

Does it matter if one adopts a belief in “Q” and rejects the historic belief that the synoptic gospels–Matthew, Mark, and Luke–are independent accounts? What happens if one rejects this historic belief for the theory, invented by theological liberalism and modernism but adopted by many modern evangelicals, that Mark was the first gospel (instead of Matthew), and Matthew and Luke depended on and altered Mark, using a (lost) source called “Q” that just happens to have left no archaeological or historical evidence for its existence? What happens if we adopt source, tradition, and redaction criticism? Let me illustrate with the comment on Matthew 25:46 in John Nolland, The Gospel of Matthew: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2005), 1034–1037. Nolland is discussing how to go behind the text of Matthew’s Gospel to what the historical Jesus said (which he assumes is different); he is discussing what Matthew added and changed from what Christ originally said, which, supposedly, was handed down in little bits of tradition here and there, and which Matthew used, along with his dependence upon Mark and Q. I have added a few comments in brackets within Nolland’s commentary.

While the account has a totally comprehensible sense in its Matthean use, various unevennesses and tensions suggest a complicated history. At various points there seem to be Matthean accents and even quite Matthean features. [In other words, Matthew added and changed what the Son of God said.] … On the basis of the tensions and difficulties [which are not really there] in the account many scholars have held that Matthew has cobbled this account together [what a nice description] out of traditional fragments and OT resources. Others would be prepared to identify a remnant of a parable in vv. 32c–33 and a significant fragment of tradition in vv. 35–36. But perhaps even this is too pessimistic. [Perhaps? We aren’t sure?]

We have had cause to notice that the king in various of Jesus’ parables was originally God, but he has become Jesus himself in secondary use of the parable. [The Watchtower Society and the Unitarians would be delighted.] This is likely to be true of all three of the immediately preceding parables. In the other cases the adjustment is likely to be pre-Matthean, but this time it may be Matthew himself who is responsible for the change.

Without vv. 31–32a, ‘by my Father’ in v. 34, and ‘my brothers and sisters’ in v. 40, the account could be focussed on God and not on Jesus. [Note how he is willing to cut out portions of the Word.] With some brief, now-lost beginning to introduce the king, the restored parable is free of the tensions and difficulties that have been identified in the Matthean account. With the loss of vv. 31–32a the account will be of the eschatological judgment of Israel rather than of all nations. So we can now make sense of the unquestioning recognition of the status of the king by those on the left and the assumption that they would have served him if it had been visible to them that that was what was involved. Both those on the left and the right are Israelites who in principle recognised God as their ultimate king. … Various other Matthean features noted above may also betray his intervention, [of course, all of what he is saying is speculative.] but these do not disturb the basic functioning of the narrative. … Matthew has bundled a lot of cross referencing into his account [in other words, he assumes Christ did not refer back to His earlier teaching, but Matthew changed it so that it referenced back to earlier passages] in a manner reminiscent of his development of 9:27–31. It remains an open question whether the fourfold repetition of the list is a pre-Matthean feature. It is reminiscent of the repetition involved in the inclusion of 25:16–18, which was judged above to be pre-Matthean but not original. [“Not original” means Christ did not actually say it.]

The pre-Matthean account that emerges is still not a parable, only an account of the judgment that makes use of a comparison (if this is not Matthean) and speaks of God as ‘the king’. But could there be a genuine parable further behind this? A lot depends on the missing beginning. But the other places where the narrative world of a parable about a king is broken are vv. 34, 41, and 46, and we would have to give up ‘your brothers and sisters’ suggested above for the pre-Matthean account. A possible beginning sentence for a parable might be something like ‘There was a king who entered into judgment with his people’ (all the future tenses of the account would need then to become past tenses). If in v. 34 ‘Come, you blessed ones’ was followed by something more appropriate to the narrative world, and similar adjustments were made to v. 41, then the narrative world of a parable would be complete (while v. 46 completes the narrative logic, it is not strictly necessary, but it could be adjusted in a corresponding manner).

There is one important proviso here to describing both the Matthean and, behind that, the immediately pre-Matthean account as ‘an account of the judgment’. We have already noted the tension between 24:31 and 13:41, where the angels respectively gather the elect and take off the wicked to punishment. Mt. 25:31–46 offers a different picture again. Not the angels, but Jesus/God acting like a shepherd makes the division himself (perhaps the angels might be used for the initial gathering), and the two groups are arranged on either side of him. … The further along this track behind the Matthean material we go, the more our account of it becomes necessarily speculative. [My note: No kidding!] But there appears to be no insurmountable barrier to tracing the origins of the Matthean account back to the historical Jesus. And the original that we might attribute to the historical Jesus offers the same challenge about the importance for judgment day of God’s profound self-identification with his people.

Nolland-who is considered “conservative,” not a liberal, by many, and his commentary in the NIGTC series representative of a broadly “evangelical” commentary series–makes the common and unreasonable assumptions that Matthew, who would have been there to here Christ teach and who was controlled by the Holy Spirit, needed to depend upon tiny fragments of tradition passed down here and passed down there by who knows who, and also borrow from Mark (who was not there, like Matthew was). Through this whole process what Christ actually said got changed, and so we need to attempt to reconstruct what Jesus Christ actually said by going behind Matthew’s Gospel to the hypothetical, reconstructed words of the historical Jesus.

This anti-inspiration nonsense affects evangelical apologetics. When I debated Shabir Ally he could not believe that I denied that there was a “Q” document and that the gospels were dependent on each other. Other Christians that Shabir debated accepted that these lies were true.

This sort of anti-inspiration and anti-historical nonsense about Q, sources, and redaction is all over evangelicalism and just about completely controls theological liberalism. It even infects portions of those who call themselves fundamentalist, chiefly among those who deny the perfect preservation of Scripture and so are not King James Only. Beware of “evangelical” commentaries on the Gospels and “evangelical” leaders who adopt critical methods and deny the Biblically faithful and historically accurate view that the synoptic gospels are independent accounts and give us eyewitness testimony.

–TDR

New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text (Part 2)

May 15, 2024 / Leave a comment

ANSWERING AGAIN THE “WHAT TR?” QUESTION

Part One

1. God Inspired Specific, Exact Words, and All of Them.
2. After God Inspired, Inscripturated, or Gave His Words, All of Them, to His People through His Institutions, He Kept Preserving Each of Them and All of Them According to His Promises of Preservation.
3. God Promised Preservation of the Words in the Language They Were Written, or In Other Words, He Preserved Exactly What He Gave.

Ahhh certainty, what some people call “epistemic hubris,” but I digress. One thing that modern version and critical text supporters are certain about? You can’t be certain about the text of the New Testament. They’re certain of that. And how do they know with such certainty so as to call people dangerous and extremist, who are certain? They know the same way that any one of you are certain that Covid arose from an animal in a wet market in Wuhan, China. You can’t be certain about the text of scripture even though scripture teaches certainty on the text of scripture. No, only a degree of confidence somewhere less than the efficiency of Tide detergent.

So I can get behind a keyboard and be a tough guy. That’s easy. But what about putting a blog where my mouth is. Let us continue.

Meaning of Kept

In His high priestly prayer in John 17, Jesus says in verse 6, “They have kept thy word.” “Kept” is the Greek word tareo, which BDAG says means:

1. to retain in custody, keep watch over, guard . . . . 2. to cause a state, condition, or activity to continue, keep, hold, reserve, preserve someone or something.

Jesus uses the word tareo a few verses later in verse 12, saying:

While I was with them in the world, I kept them in thy name: those that thou gavest me I have kept, and none of them is lost, but the son of perdition; that the scripture might be fulfilled.

The word kept that Jesus uses in verse 6, He defines in verse 12. Twice he says He “kept them.” And then He says, “None of them is lost.” If someone keeps something or someone, then nothing or no one was lost. If something or someone is lost, it or he was not kept. Let’s say Jesus originally saved 100,000 people, but in the end only 99,995 or so were saved. He couldn’t say, “None of them is lost.” Five of them were lost. If you were one of the five, you would take a change in the definition of “kept” very seriously.

Consider this dialogue.

“I gave you those fifty marbles. Did you keep them?”

“Yes.”

“So how many do you have?”

“I have 48 of them.”

“I thought you said you kept them.”

“I did.”

“No you didn’t; you lost two of them. That’s not keeping the marbles. That’s losing.”

That’s a basic tutorial on the concept of keep or preserve.

Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic Words

The Bible promises preservation of what God gave, inscripturated, or inspired. What He gave were words almost exclusively in Hebrew and Greek, and a few in Aramaic. What He gave He also kept or preserved. God didn’t give, inscripturate, or inspire English words. He gave Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic words and those were the ones He also kept or preserved.

What Jesus said in Matthew 5:18 corroborates this obvious idea of kept or preserved. Jesus said:

For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

Jesus was speaking of the Old Testament and a jot and a tittle were both Hebrew letters, not some other language. Again, this was not a promise to preserve one particular manuscript or physical scroll. In its context (Matthew 5:17-20) it did mean that scripture, its letters and words on pages, would remain available to read and heed.

4. God’s Promise of Keeping and Preserving His Words Means the Availability of His Words to Every Generation of Believers.

Availability or General Accessibility

Keeping means availability. Availability means general accessibility. Scripture shows this again and again. God kept the words for people to know and obey. Keeping them for His people to whom He gave them means their availability for those people to use.

Saying “general accessibility” means that someone may not have his own copy of scripture at home. The words were available in general for believers in general. Words not generally accessible were not the words God kept for His people. Because a single ancient manuscript was on earth somewhere does not mean it was available or generally accessible. It wasn’t. God’s people did not have it to read and heed.

Versus Buried Text View

A doctrine of availability accompanies a true doctrine of preservation. I call the alternative a “buried text view.” Critical text proponents are still searching for lost hand copies and ancient translations for the sake of restoring a lost text. Every time a person or organization announces that he or it found a very old page of scripture, critical text scholars relish with great expectation to find new information for possible purposes of correction.

Those who believe in perfect preservation for every generation of believer do not expect to find a buried or lost text that will correct the present text of scripture. They believe in preservation and availability. That lost copy was not available. It couldn’t be what God preserved or kept.

New Testament Language of the Received Text

The language, “received text,” elicits the truth of availability. Something not available was not received by anyone. “Received text” itself, as a description of the preserved New Testament text, comes from scripture.

Gospels

Matthew 13:19-20, 22-23, “When any one heareth the word of the kingdom, and understandeth it not, then cometh the wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which received seed by the way side. But he that received the seed into stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it.

He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful. But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.”

Luke 8:13, “They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away.”

John 17:8, “For I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee, and they have believed that thou didst send me.”

Acts

Acts 2:41, “Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.”

Acts 8:14, “Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John.”

Acts 11:1, “And the apostles and brethren that were in Judaea heard that the Gentiles had also received the word of God.”

Acts 17:11, “These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.”

Epistles

1 Thessalonians 1:6, “And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost.”

1 Thessalonians 2:13, “For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.”

James 1:21, “Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.”

How could believers or churches receive God’s Word or Words if they were not available? They couldn’t. But this was not the case. They could receive His Words because of the general accessibility of them for every generation of believer.

More to Come

New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text

May 13, 2024 / 1 Comment on New List of Reasons for Maximum Certainty for the New Testament Text

ANSWERING AGAIN THE “WHAT TR?” QUESTION

Sixty-Six Books

Many evangelicals claim maximum certainty on sixty-six books of the Bible. “Are you certain there are sixty-six books of the BIble?” “Yes.” “What verse in the Bible says to expect sixty-six books?” “None.” “So what is your basis for sixty-six books of the Bible?” Many of their reasons would match what I would give for certainty on the text of the Bible, certainty on what the exact words are.

The reasons for certainty on both the books and the words relate to biblical principles for canonicity. Nothing in the Bible states how many books one should expect though. And yet these evangelicals still declare maximum certainty about “sixty-six.” Sixty-six came from God. No verse saying that, but they still rely on scripture for their certainty. They don’t have mere confidence for sixty-six books. They have certainty.

Very often the same evangelicals’ direct inquiries to me about where the Bible says God would preserve the textus receptus, those particular Latin words. In addition they ask for a verse with the exact words, “King James Version” in a scriptural promise somewhere. They consider these to be “arguments.”

The question arises, “How do we know, for instance, the epistle of James is in the Bible or Galatians or any other single book?” What gives the certainty for inclusion of particular books? How do we know when we’re reading Hebrews that it is in fact the Word of God, more than a mere ancient, naturalistic book?

The Preservation of Words

On the other hand, does God promise to preserve His Words perfectly in a single printed edition of the New Testament? This gets to the crux of the “which TR” question. Scripture teaches perfect preservation of scripture, but how do we know what the words are? How do we know what the books are? The answer is the same to those last two questions. In fact, scripture talks about words and not about books. It’s easier to prove the preservation of words from scripture than it is books.

The Bible doesn’t provide naturalistic rules for deciding on the words of the Bible, ones like shorter or more difficult reading and older manuscript. Men made up those rules and with them, they added, “You can’t be certain.” God’s Word though says you can and should be certain. You expect certainty based upon scripture. The Bible also provides criteria not in the nature of rules, but in presuppositions, promises, and principles. Scripture provides a template, paradigm, or model for what to expect from God and His preservation of scripture.

I want to review the right presuppositions again. Again. I’ve done this a lot, but here we go again, because based on information from my critics, no one answers this. [Not liking the answer does not qualify as not answering.]

I’m going to give a list, because obviously lists are greater click bait. And if I don’t have a list, I shouldn’t say “list” in my click bait title.

1. God Inspired Specific, Exact Words, and All of Them.

Not Just the Gist

Someone named Eugene Peterson did a paraphrase of the Bible, called The Message. That’s very often how people want to deal with scripture. It’s a message and so the very words don’t matter so much, as long as you get “The Message.” What’s God saying to you? Here’s the gist of it, that’s all that matters. And part of the gist, of course, comes from Eugene Peterson’s brain.

I say, get the gist of scripture. It’s important. But that’s not all that matters. God gave words. Every one of them matter. You don’t get the gist without words and God said this in many different passages. I’m not going to review those with you on this point, but it is true.

Some people miss the gist, and that’s too bad. They need to and should get that too, but God first gave words. Christians have believed that every word matters. God gave specific, exact ones. He delivered them to His institution. They received them (think Textus Receptus here).

All of Them

I added, “and all of them,” because God’s Word, the Bible, or scripture is not 50 percent of the exact words or even 95 percent. It is all of them. I’m happy to have 10 percent of them, but He gave 100 percent. I should expect 100 percent. God even uses the word, “all.” He gave each Word and then all of them.

God inspired only one Bible. There are not two. People don’t have options as to what the Bible is. It isn’t a multiple choice. The question, “Which Bible do you use?” does not reflect what the Bible says about itself. This kind of idea, which is prevalent now in evangelicalism, is destructive and it comes from unbiblical presuppositions about the Bible.

2. After God Inspired, Inscripturated, or Gave His Words, All of Them, to His People through His Institutions, He Kept Preserving Each of Them and All of Them According to His Promises of Preservation.

Expectations

One can and should expect this second point in the list because God said He would do it. He promised it. Evangelicals or modern version proponents very often say God didn’t say “how” he would do it. But He also did say how he would preserve His Words. Believers should have those scriptural expectations. This is part of living by faith.

Preservation of scripture means God keeping each of the words and all of them that He gave. Keeping them then means their being available to every generation of believers.

The preservation of scripture means what the Bible says that preservation of scripture means. It does not mean keeping every word in one particular physical handwritten copy that makes its way unblemished down through the following decades, centuries, and millennia or the annals of history. Every word and all of them would remain available for God’s people. There isn’t a peep about variants and manuscript evidence.

Not Naturalistic

Before someone goes anywhere else in answering questions about manuscripts, printed editions, and translations, he must settle on the first two points of this list. He should start with what the Bible says. He should not begin with an observation of history, “external evidences,” and naturalistic occurrences to which to conform his belief. The Bible explains its own inspiration and preservation in a very clear way. It’s not hard to understand. Everyone will get the text and version issue wrong if he does not get these first two points of this list right.

What I’ve witnessed for decades now exclusively with modern version and critical text adherents is the absence of a biblical presupposition about the preservation of scripture. They don’t want to touch that. If that is their basis for how they approach their outcome, they know it will contradict what they’re saying. What I’ve seen instead is that they start with a criticism or refutation of what has already been published and propagated on the doctrine of preservation through church history.

Presuppositions

Instead of starting with a scriptural position themselves, modern textual criticism proponents begin with naturalistic presuppositions like modernists of the 19th century did. Based on those, they saw we can’t believe perfect preservation, because it didn’t happen. They know it didn’t happen because variants exist between manuscripts. It’s far worse than that even. Their position starts with tests normally applied to secular literature, which have no promise of preservation because they’re solely of human origin.

Some critical text and modern version proponents straight out deny preservation. Others don’t have a theology of no preservation of scripture. They’d be too embarrassed to say that. Instead they leave their audience with ambiguity, leaving their listeners confused on the subject, playing a shell game. God’s Word doesn’t teach that. Anything they call their biblical position arises to criticize someone who starts with a biblical doctrine with the purpose of either denying it, confusing it, or muddling it.

The elimination of a biblical doctrine of preservation affects the authority of scripture. Critical text and modern version proponents are eradicating the doctrine or preservation ironically to preserve their preference. In so doing, they cause people to take the Bible less seriously. When people are not sure whether those are the actual words of God, they are less likely to believe and then keep what they say.

More to Come

Reformed Systematic Theology v. 1, Joel Beeke & Paul Smalley

May 10, 2024 / 25 Comments on Reformed Systematic Theology v. 1, Joel Beeke & Paul Smalley

I recently finished reading Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology vol. 1: Revelation and God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019). I had purchased it on Logos Bible Software and, because I thought it had lots of good features, also purchased a physical copy with Reformation Heritage Books (which may be cheaper than getting it on Amazon, which I linked to above with an affiliate link. They currently have the entire four volume set at a heavily discounted price. I have not read volumes 2-4 (yet!) so I cannot comment on their quality.) I read almost all of the 1158 pages of the book on my phone in small snippets of time, such as when going up and down in an elevator, or standing in a line, and so on. I am about 60 pages into volume two, reading it in the same way. Let me commend to you being purposeful with the time God gives you; there are many time-suckers on a typical cell phone and on the Internet, but you can choose to avoid them and do something useful when you have a minute or two or five here and there.)

Positive features of Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology vol. 1: Revelation and God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019).

There are many positive features of volume one of Reformed Systematic Theology. These include:

1.) The book consistently seeks to make doctrine practical. While it seeks–and achieves–theological precision, it consistently applies doctrine to life. The book does not just seek to increase one’s mental comprehension of Biblical teaching, but seeks to be the instrument of the Holy Spirit in applying the truth of Scripture to transform the whole man. As Dr. Beeke is the president of the Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary, we should not be surprised that, as an heir of the Puritans, he seeks to apply doctrine practically to life. The authors explain their purpose in writing as follows:

This systematic theology explores the classic teachings of the Reformed Christian faith from a perspective that is biblical, doctrinal, experiential, and practical. Today’s churches need theology that engages the head, heart, and hands. Too often, we have compartmentalized these aspects of life (as if we could cut ourselves into pieces). The result has been academics for the sake of academics, spiritual experience without roots deep in God’s Word, and superficial pragmatism that chases after the will-o’-the-wisp of short-term results. The church has suffered from this fragmented approach to the Christian faith. However, we have learned from the Reformers, the British Puritans, and the Dutch Further Reformation divines an approach to Christianity that combines thoughtful exegesis of the Holy Scriptures, rich exploration of classic Augustinian and Reformed theology, an experiential tone that brings truth into the heart, and practical applications for life.

Joel R. Beeke, “Preface,” in Reformed Systematic Theology: Revelation and God, vol. 1 (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019), 17–18.

This practical emphasis is commendable, and it makes the book an edifying read.

2.) Reformed Systematic Theology is consistently conservative, evangelical, and Reformed in its theology. While Scripture does not teach Calvinist soteriology, if one is aware of the standard imbalances in Reformed doctrine, there is not much else in terms of “bones” to spit out while one eats the meat. There are no unexpected strange doctrines, but a solid presentation of the doctrines of revelation and of the infallible, inerrant Bible and of the God of Scripture, with the only things that are off being the standard errors of Reformed theology (in terms of theology proper, getting too close to making God the author of sin by saying that He decrees sin and justifying the horrifying Calvinist doctrine of reprobation). While I would not just hand this book to a new Christian and tell him to believe everything it says, I would not be concerned about giving it to someone training for the ministry who knows the problems with Reformed doctrine and is inoculated against them from Scripture. I believe people in the latter class could be greatly blessed by much good Biblical explanation and practical application in this book.

3.) Reformed Systematic Theology uses the King James Version as its base Bible version. I believe that Dr. Beeke preaches from the KJV, so this is not surprising, but it is still refreshing to not have to read lots of quotations from inferior modern Bible versions. On occasion the ESV is quoted, but the large majority of the time it is the KJV, which is a blessing for King James Only Christians.

4.) Interestingly, Paul Smalley is a Reformed Baptist, while Joel Beeke is a Reformed paedobaptist. I cannot agree with the paedobaptism, but I am thankful that at least one of the two authors is a minister in a Baptist church, even if it is a Reformed Baptist congregation.

5.) When it is appropriate Beeke and Smalley make warnings such as: “Worldliness diminishes a man’s soul and makes him petty; knowing God ennobles a human being.” (Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology: Revelation and God, vol. 1 [Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019], 509). It is great to read a systematic theology that warns against worldliness and points one, instead, to knowing God as the cure for it!

6.) The book discusses doctrines, such as Divine simplicity, that I am afraid that graduates from many Baptist Bible colleges and institutes will give you a blank stare if you ask about them. (Do you know what Scripture teaches about Divine simplicity? If not, maybe you should read the part of Reformed Systematic Theology about that doctrine and find out what it is.)

7.) My physical copy of Reformed Systematic Theology is a quality hardcover book that is well-made and easy to read. It is also written in well-written and engaging English. It is scholarly and excellently done.

Concerns with Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology vol. 1: Revelation and God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019).

1.) My major concern is, naturally, that the Bible does not teach unconditional election and reprobation, limited atonement, or irresistible grace in salvation (and, depending on how one defines things, total depravity and the perseverance of the saints could also have problems). Reformed Systematic Theology is unabashedly Reformed. One who has not already read independent Baptist systematic theological works such as Robert Sargent’s Landmarks of Baptist Doctrine from Bible Baptist Church Publications would be well-advised to start there before reading a Reformed systematic theology, even one that has the commendable features mentioned above.

2.) While I am thankful that Reformed Systematic Theology uses the Authorized, King James Version, it does not have a section on the preservation of Scripture. The book’s outline on the doctrine of revelation is at the bottom of this blog post (please see down there).

You can see that there is a lot of good stuff in there. However, there is nothing either supporting or denying the perfect preservation of Scripture. One who recognizes that he has all of God’s Words in the Old and New Testament Textus Receptus will not have his faith attacked, but neither will he have it confirmed.

3.) I also do not want people who read this book and are encouraged by its good English, its many edifying and encouraging practical applications, and its solid theology in many areas to become improperly enamored with Reformed paedobaptist theology. I do not doubt that Dr. Beeke is a sincere and converted man whom I expect to see in heaven, but the special presence of Christ is not in his Reformed paedobaptist organization. If you can explain and defend why Reformed soteriology is wrong and why, in the doctrine of God, Scripture does not teach that God ordains sin or unconditionally reprobates people for His glory (!!), you may get many blessings from this book. Maybe you will even find it engaging enough to read the whole thing on your phone while waiting in lines and going up and down in elevators and the like.

–TDR

Here is the outline of the section on the doctrine of revelation. I did not take the time to re-introduce all the tabination, so please pardon the fact that everything is just in a straight line.

X. Theological Fundamentals of Divine Revelation
A. Biblical Terminology of Divine Revelation
1. Old Testament Terminology
2. New Testament Terminology
B. Basic Biblical Perspective on Divine Revelation (Genesis 1–3; Psalm 19)
1. The Revelation of the Sovereign God to His Image Bearers
2. The Revelation of God by His Creation (General Revelation)
3. The Revelation of God by His Word (Special Revelation)
4. The Response of God’s Servants to His Word (Applied Revelation)
C. Summary Statement on the Biblical Doctrine of Divine Revelation
X. General Revelation
A. General Revelation: Biblical Teaching
1. Revelation around Man in Creation
a. General Revelation of the Divine Nature
i. It Reveals God to a Limited Degree
ii. It Reveals God in an Open and Plain Manner
iii. It Reveals God according to His Will
iv. It Reveals the Invisible God
v. It Reveals God’s Divine Nature
vi. It Reveals God throughout History
vii. It Reveals God through His Created World
b. General Revelation of Divine Wrath in a Fallen World
2. Revelation within Man
a. General Revelation according to the Image of God
b. General Revelation via the Human Conscience
3. The Use and Efficacy of General Revelation
a. The Universal Knowledge Granted through General Revelation
i. God Exists, and Created All Things
ii. Atheism Is Folly
iii. God Has a Unique Nature as God
iv. Idolatry Is Wicked
v. God Holds Man Accountable to His Moral Law
vi. Sinners Are under God’s Wrath and without Excuse
b. The Universal Response of Mankind to General Revelation
c. The Proper Christian Use of General Revelation
i. The Church’s Missiological Use of General Revelation
ii. The Church’s Doxological Use of General Revelation
B. General Revelation: Philosophy and Science
1. Christianity and Rational Philosophy
a. Not Necessary in Order to Know and Glorify God
b. Teaches Some Valid and Useful Truths
c. Proposes Systems of Thought Antithetical to the Gospel
d. May Be Used Only with Radical, Biblical Critique
e. Recognizes Legitimate Methods of Reasoning
2. Christianity and Empirical Science
a. Operates with Delegated Authority
b. Can Investigate Nature with Confident Rationality
c. Must Work from a Posture of Intellectual Humility
d. Must Realize That Its Conclusions Possess Only Human Certainty
e. Should Pursue Knowledge with Prayerful Dependency
f. Limited by Its Ultimate Insufficiency to Make Us Wise
g. Must Work with God-Fearing Integrity
h. Should Make Use of Its Findings to Promote Grateful Doxology
C. General Revelation: Natural Theology and Theistic Arguments
1. Various Rejections of Natural Theology and Theistic Arguments
a. Karl Barth
b. Cornelius Van Til
2. Toward a Biblical, Reformed Approach to Theistic Arguments
a. God Testifies to Himself through the Natural World
b. Belief in God Is a Valid Presupposition of Human Thought
c. The Proper Posture of Human Reason Is to Fear God as His Servant
d. The Sinner’s Mind Is Alienated from God, and Cannot Reason to Its Creator
e. The Philosophy of Non-Christians Is Distorted by Satan
f. A Right Use of Reason Depends upon the Spirit-Illuminated Word
g. Christians May Make Rational Arguments from Creation to God
h. Christians May Use Arguments to Show the Foolishness of Those Who Deny God
i. The Wise Use of Theistic Arguments Varies with Culture and Education
j. Christians Should Beware of Glorying in Human Wisdom
k. Theistic Arguments Are Appeals to Divine Witness in Creation
l. Theistic Arguments Are at Best Like the Law That Convicts but Cannot Save
D. Some Historical Perspective on Natural Theology and Theistic Proofs
1. Ancient Roots of Natural Theology
a. Pagan Literature: Varro, Plato, Aristotle, and Zeno
b. Early Christian Apologists: Aristides, Justin Martyr, and Tertullian
c. Early Greek Fathers: Athanasius, the Cappadocians, and John of Damascus
d. Latin Christianity: Augustine
e. Assessment of Ancient and Early Christian Natural Theology
2. Medieval Development of Natural Theology
a. Muslim and Jewish Scholarship: Avicenna, Averroes, and Maimonides
b. Christian Medieval Scholasticism: Anselm and Thomas Aquinas
c. Assessment of Thomist Natural Theology
3. The Reformation’s Critical Interaction with Natural Theology
a. Critique of Natural Theology: Luther and Calvin
b. Critical Appropriation of Theistic Arguments: Vermigli, Junius, and Turretin
c. Assessment of Early Reformed Views of Natural Theology
XI. Special Revelation: Theological Introduction
A. Special Revelation: Biblical Teaching
1. The Trinitarian, Mediatorial Work of Special Revelation
a. The Son Is the Only Mediator of Divine Revelation
b. The Father Is the Sovereign Author of Divine Revelation in the Son
c. The Spirit Is the Effective Agent of Divine Revelation in the Son
2. The Finite Human Character of Special Revelation
3. The Manifold Historical Modes of Special Revelation
a. Supernatural Verbal Revelation
b. Supernatural Visual Revelation
c. Supernatural Providential Revelation
d. Supernatural Incarnational Revelation
4. The Personal, Propositional Content of Special Revelation
B. Errors Regarding Special Revelation
1. Special Revelation Extended to Hierarchical Tradition
2. Special Revelation Subordinated to Human Reason
3. Special Revelation Diffused to Harmonize All Religions
4. Special Revelation Redefined as Holy Encounter
5. Special Revelation Confined to Historical Events
XII. The Bible as the Word of God
A. The Word of the Prophets and Apostles Is the Word of God
1. The Word of God Preached through the Prophets and Apostles
2. The Written Word of God: The Old Testament
3. The Written Word of God: The New Testament
B. The Spirit’s Inspiration of the Written Word of God
1. The Reality of Verbal Inspiration
2. The Extent, Meaning, and Implications of Inspiration
a. Extent: Plenary Inspiration
b. Meaning: God-Breathed Word
c. Implications
i. Authority
ii. Veracity
iii. Sufficiency
iv. Clarity
v. Necessity
vi. Unity in Christ
vii. Efficacy
XIII. The Properties of the Written Word
A. The Authority of the Bible
1. The Source of the Bible’s Authority
2. Biblical Authority and the Church
3. The Authentication of the Bible
4. Biblical Authority versus Personal Autonomy
5. Practical Implications of Biblical Authority
B. The Clarity of the Bible
1. The Perspicuity Controversy
2. Practical Implications of Biblical Clarity
C. The Necessity of the Bible
1. The Necessity of the Gospel for All Mankind
2. The Publishing of the Gospel in Written Form
3. The Preservation of the Gospel to the End of the Age
4. Practical Implications of the Bible’s Necessity
D. The Unity of the Bible in Christ
1. The Great Theme of the Bible
2. The Manifold Forms of Christ’s Revelation
3. Practical Implications of the Bible’s Unity in Christ
E. The Efficacy of the Bible by the Spirit
1. The Word and the Spirit of Conviction
2. The Word and the Spirit of Life
3. Practical Implications of the Bible’s Efficacy by the Spirit
F. The Inerrant Veracity of the Bible
1. Inerrant Veracity Defined
2. Inerrant Veracity Clarified
3. Biblical Teaching on Scripture’s Inerrant Veracity
4. Practical Implications of the Bible’s Veracity
5. Objections to Inerrancy
a. Human Fallibility
b. History Is Not Essential to Religion
c. Contradictions with Modern History and Science
d. Contradictions in the Bible
e. Theological Novelty
H. The Sufficiency of the Bible
1. Biblical Sufficiency Defined
2. Biblical Sufficiency Clarified
2. Biblical Teaching on Scripture’s Sufficiency
3. Practical Implications of the Bible’s Sufficiency
XIV. The Cessation of Special Revelation
A. Arguments for Charismatic Continuationism
1. God’s Ancient Promise
2. The Eschatological Last Days
3. Cessation at Christ’s Second Coming
4. The Spirit’s Ministry to the Body
5. Edification of the Saints
6. God’s Command
7. Historical Movements
8. Personal Experiences
9. The Reality of the Supernatural
10. The Silence of Scripture
B. The Uniqueness of the Apostolic Age
1. The Apostles of Jesus Christ
2. A Biblical Pattern of Miraculous Ministry in History
3. Apostles in Pentecostal and Charismatic Churches Today
C. Practical Implications of the Apostles’ Ministry
1. We Must Receive the New Testament as the Word of God
2. We Should Distinguish between Modern Teachers and the Apostles of Jesus Christ
3. We Must Beware of False Apostles and Prophets Working Wonders
4. We Must Seek the Power of the Holy Spirit
D. The Cessation of Revelatory Gifts Such as Prophecy
1. The Finality of Christ
2. The Foundation of the Apostles and Prophets
3. The Fallibility of Modern “Prophets”
E. Pastoral Concerns about Evangelical Prophecy
1. Continuationism Tends to Put People in Bondage to Individual Leaders
2. Continuationism Tends to Put People in Bondage to Presumptuous Beliefs
3. Continuationism Tends to Put People in Bondage to Human Thoughts, Impressions, and Feelings
XV. Applied Revelation for Practical Fruit
A. Personal Fruit of Applied Revelation
1. Personal Faith in the Scriptures
2. Personal Study of the Scriptures
3. Personal Experience through the Scriptures
B. Familial Fruit of Applied Revelation
C. Ecclesiastical Fruit of Applied Revelation
1. Transformation in Corporate Life
2. Balance in Pastoral Ministry
3. Zeal in Evangelism
4. Dependency in Leadership
5. Priority in Education
6. Saturation in Worship
D. Societal Fruit of Applied Revelation
E. International Fruit of Applied Revelation
F. Doxological Fruit of Applied Revelation

Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology: Revelation and God, vol. 1 (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019), 29–35.

Normal Now Extreme and Dangerous

May 8, 2024 / Leave a comment

Part One

Extremism

In the first year of living back in Indiana, my wife and I tried fried chicken at two regional, renowned restaurants. When I say that, get in your mind very homey places like Wagner’s Village Diner in the small town of Oldenburg. It won the James Beard award in 2023 for its chicken. Why do these restaurants do better than others? They are extremists, compared to others. Each goes to far reaches to prepare the best chicken.

In reading through the Bible again, today I read in 2 Chronicles, where my schedule has me. In 2 Chronicles, Solomon builds the temple and at the dedication he offered God 22,000 oxen and 20,000 sheep. I was thinking, “That’s extreme. . . . in a very good way.”

Where I left off in my Bible reading today in 2 Chronicles 15, it says in verses 15-16:

15 And all Judah rejoiced at the oath: for they had sworn with all their heart, and sought him with their whole desire; and he was found of them: and the LORD gave them rest round about. 16 And also concerning Maachah the mother of Asa the king, he removed her from being queen, because she had made an idol in a grove: and Asa cut down her idol, and stamped it, and burnt it at the brook Kidron.

Today most people would call that extreme. Yet, it’s what God wanted — what should be normal behavior, but isn’t.

Extremism, a Pejorative

What is extremism anyways? Like when someone such as Mark Ward calls a godly individual an extremist and dangerous? Extreme compared to what?

In general, when someone calls someone extreme, he means it as a pejorative, a personal shot, probably implying some craziness to the person. However, Christianity has so declined, what was once normal is now extreme. Regular preaching of the gospel in our community, I’ve found, is extreme where I live in the Bible belt. For sure, it was extreme in California.

I attended public elementary school. My fifth grade teacher had a paddle hanging from his wall. He regularly swatted students for bad behavior. Now no public schools do that. Our Christian school was the last one to use corporeal punishment in California, a state of almost 40 million people. It’s considered extreme.

A “Balanced Approach”

One of Mark Ward’s favorites, Mark Minnick, preaches that ladies must wear head coverings in church. In 2015, he did an eight part series on it and is a favorite in “the head covering movement.” Is that practice extreme? Really, what Ward expects for non-extremism is something he wrote in support of fundamentalism in the MarchApril2017 of the FBFI magazine:

I am not willing to say that all Christians who listen to contemporary styles of Christian music are living in active, conscious rebellion against God. I do not believe that every Christian whose church has a praise band, a drum set, and tattooed worship leaders that I must abandon to Satan a la 1 Corinthians 5.

1 Corinthians 5, I agree, isn’t the best passage to use for separation over false worship, that is, offering the thrice holy God fleshly and worldly music as worship. He could use 2 Thessalonians 3, 1 Timothy 6:3-6, or 2 Timothy 2:20-22, because among other places that church violates Romans 12:1-2, 1 Peter 2:5, and 1 John 2:15-17 among other places. I know though. What I now believe and practice, men like Ward call an extreme form of separation. Expect more rock bands in church with the association of Mark Ward and others. It’s too extreme now to stand up against that like his alma mater once did. Now they take, what their newest president calls, a “balanced approach.”

Anyone who isn’t “balanced” is now extreme. Balanced means that you look at the “extremes” and find the sweet spot in the middle. The Bible doesn’t teach that. Interestingly, it’s only one extreme that gets most of the attention even from evangelicals such as Ward, who slides further from even a former fundamentalist mooring.

Jesus the Extremist and Danger to Religious Society

Jesus, while on earth, told people these things:

Matthew 5:19, “Whosoever therefore shall break one of these least commandments, and shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the kingdom of heaven: but whosoever shall do and teach them, the same shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.”

Luke 14:26, “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.”

Matthew 22:37, “Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.”

Mark 9:42, “And whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea.”

So much of the Bible is extreme compared to what people teach or say today. Jesus was considered an extremist by the religious people of his day.

When someone is dangerous, I believe Mark Ward means that he’s leading someone astray from the truth into something harmful. Nothing is more harmful for someone than eternal damnation. Thomas Ross mentioned how that Ward works for Logos Bible Software as a “ministry.” Logos publishes “Roman Catholic, Seventh Day Adventist, theologically modernist, and other damnable heresy.”

Ross is exactly right. Apparently Ward sees those groups as part of “the church” that Logos equips to grow (his words). They get silence, while those propagating and protecting faith in the perfect preservation of scripture receive reproach. This manifests the priority of keeping together ungodly coalitions instead of the truth. To use KJV terminology, making money off a false gospel is “greedy of filthy lucre.”

The Divine Expectation

Jesus in His culture was an extremist and dangerous. He was dangerous to the religious leaders. He threatened their popularity with the people and brought potential wrath of the Roman Empire. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus provided the Divine expectation of every “jot and tittle” of His Word. The Pharisees diminished the Divine standard so they could attempt to keep it on their own. Jesus illustrated the paucity of the Pharisaical approach in Matthew 5 and 6. It wasn’t just the keeping of God’s Word, but also the internal attitude and motive. You could murder someone by hating him in the heart and treating him with contempt.

I’m sure Ward would agree with the above verses from Jesus: their practice in real life though, extreme and dangerous. This is not believing what Jesus and the Apostles said. The author of Hebrews writes in 13:13: “Let us go forth therefore unto him [the Lord Jesus] without the camp, bearing his reproach.” I invite others to go forth unto Jesus without the camp and bear the reproach of “extremism” and “dangerous.” Return to normal and stand against the decline of true, biblical Christianity. While those reproaching double down on their reproach, remain steadfast in God’s will for the cause of Christ.

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Positive features of Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology vol. 1: Revelation and God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019).

Concerns with Joel R. Beeke and Paul M. Smalley, Reformed Systematic Theology vol. 1: Revelation and God (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019).

Extremism

Extremism, a Pejorative

A “Balanced Approach”

Jesus the Extremist and Danger to Religious Society

The Divine Expectation

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