Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas
Jeremy approaches Bible teaching with a passion for getting the basic doctrines explained so that the individual can understand them and then apply them to circumstances in their life. These basic and important lessons are nestled in a framework of history and progression of revelation from the Bible so the whole of Scripture can be applied to your physical and spiritual life.
Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas
NT Framework - From Word to Action
What does it mean to put words into action? In this session, Jeremy walks us through the revelation God provided at Mt. Sinai and how the Israelites were to respond to this spoken word and live their lives. We have a more complete revelation in the entire canon of Scripture and the Holy Spirit, definite advantages for the Christian today.
More information about Beyond the Walls, including additional resources can be found at www.beyondthewalls-ministry.com
This series included graphics to illustrate what is being taught, if you would like to watch the teachings you can do so on Rumble (https://rumble.com/user/SpokaneBibleChurch) or on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtV_KhFVZ_waBcnuywiRKIyEcDkiujRqP).
Jeremy Thomas is the pastor at Spokane Bible Church in Spokane, Washington and a professor at Chafer Theological Seminary. He has been teaching the Bible for over 20 years, always seeking to present its truths in a clear and understandable manner.
Welcome to Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas and our series on the New Testament Framework. Today, the full lesson from Jeremy Thomas.
Speaker 2:Here's a hint of what's to come. We're not talking about you had a feeling. Okay, we're not talking about you know, you contemplated your navel and had a mystical experience. We're not talking about that. We're talking about propositional speech, like I'm speaking to you.
Speaker 1:As a believer trying to navigate this complex modern world, I often wish that God would speak audibly to me, giving me some sort of direction, wisdom, guidance, insight into what I should do and how I should live my life. There was a time in fact, there were many times that God did speak audibly Mount Sinai, when he gave the law to Moses. You could hear his voice, it was there, he was there, it was clear, but we don't have that anymore. What we do have, though, is actually far superior. We have the completed canon of Scripture. Everything that God wanted to record for every human in every time, about him and how to live, is in the Holy Scripture, and since Christ has ascended to be in glory with his Father in heaven, we also have the Holy Spirit, and these two things are, in fact, everything we need to live this life well. We have God's law, his insight, we have a view of his nature and character, and we have the Holy Spirit to guide us and teach us, to convict us and to encourage us, and that's a very beautiful thing.
Speaker 2:Okay, so today we'll work on Mount Sinai and the conquest, but just as a brief review. In the framework, what we do is try to focus on the Bible as true historical events, to focus on the Bible as true historical events, and so the first four events all fall in probably the most controversial section of the Bible, genesis 1 through 11, which much of the church for the last 160 or 170 years has now basically said that it's not true history. But we maintain that it is true history and it's foundational for the rest of the Bible. So Genesis 1 teaches us the creation event and we learn three great doctrines at the creation event we learn who God is, we learn who man is, made in God's image, and we learn what nature is and how God created us for a purpose to rule and reign over this creation. And then we went on to the fall, and this is where sin enters the world right Through man, and the result of that is, of course, suffering, and that's where we talk a lot about suffering, patterns that are described in Scripture and how to cope with suffering, and so those are very important lessons for a lot of people that I've been involved with in ministry, because everybody's suffering and they need to understand why on some level, and they also need to know what to do about it or how do I cope with it. So if you're suffering and we all are in some respect and to some degree then those lessons are all very helpful.
Speaker 2:And then, of course, the flood, the global flood at the time of Noah and the doctrines. We learn there again, very basic doctrines that God judges and he saves, and this is a truth that's repeated at the Exodus. We saw last week At the Exodus the 10 plagues. Each plague is a judgment, but it's also a salvation. It's a judgment on Egypt, it's a salvation for Israel. And then, of course, we see that again at the cross and we'll see it again in the tribulation. All these are pictures of judgment, salvation.
Speaker 2:And fourth, the Noahic covenant that God made with Noah and his family as they stepped off the ark and all flesh. We learn about that covenant that God made where he would never flood the world again by global flood. Right, he'd never destroy all flesh by the waters of a flood. So we learn about who God is. We learn about who man is in the context of the new world that's a result of the flood and nature, that God has covenanted himself to man and nature. And so we'll talk more about covenants today, because we'll get to Mount Sinai and God makes a different type of covenant there.
Speaker 2:Noah with Noah in all flesh is an unconditional or unilateral covenant. God just says I'm going to do this. There's no conditions placed on men or animals for God to uphold His promise to never flood the world again. But at the covenant that God makes at Mount Sinai with Israel, it is conditional or bilateral. If you do this then I will bless you, but if you do this then I will discipline you, and so forth. So it's a different type of covenant that we will see today at Mount Sinai.
Speaker 2:And then, of course, the call of Abraham, and Abraham is a major figure in the Bible right Throughout the Bible. Whenever we find stories about Abraham in the New Testament, it's always revolving around his faith and the justification that occurred the moment that he believed. So we learn about him through the call of Abraham that God made a covenant with him too. But that's a different. That's like the Noahic. It's a unilateral or unconditional covenant to provide land, seed and worldwide blessing to Abraham and his descendants through Isaac and Jacob and the 12 tribes. And then the Exodus, which we studied again, judgment, salvation, just like the flood. So there's a parallel. See, you can teach all these to kids and, with this sequence of events and the fact that they're very picturesque in your mind's eye, you can easily teach these very concrete stories and link the doctrines to them in children's minds so that they grow to understand who God is and what God is doing. And that's, of course, what we need to understand, to understand why we are here and what we are doing. Right, how do I fit in the plan? And then Mount Sinai is what we'll cover today, so let's move on to slide 18 here, or 13. What is it? 13.? And the doctrines that are associated with Mount Sinai.
Speaker 2:So if you think about Mount Sinai, the first thing you want to do is just imagine in your mind's eye you are an Israelite, let's say, moses is your leader. He takes you, let's say, out of Egypt, right, you cross the Red Sea, you're on this wilderness journey and 50 days after your leaving of Egypt, you find yourself at the base of Mount Sinai. And you go there because this is where Moses met God in the burning bush, and you are going back with him now to meet God. And you might picture Charlton Heston right in the movie the Ten Commandments and he goes up. He's Moses and he goes up and God writes on the ten tablets, or the tablets, the ten words. So you have this whole event. Now, if you imagine all that the thunder, the lightning, the cloud upon the mountain Moses, up on the mountain Joshua, anxious to be close to God throughout all these ministry of Moses then what you're seeing and what you're hearing is revelation. In other words, it's a communication event.
Speaker 2:And so what we like to focus on at Mount Sinai is the communication doctrines, that is, that God, who is the creator, and man, who's a creature, and God, who is outside of space and time, speaks into space and time in verbal language that humans can understand. And if you were there and you'd had your iPhone or your Android, whichever team you're on, and you hit the record button at the foot of Mount Sinai when God spoke the 10 words, you could have actually recorded God's voice and you could have played it back generation to generation as long as the audio didn't decay. Right, that's what we mean by God speaking into history. We mean in the sense that it could have been captured on a recording device and his voice could have been understood what he was saying. So that's the story of Mount Sinai and that's what you have in your mind's eye when you think about that event. So that's why the three doctrines that are tied to Mount Sinai are three communication doctrines. So the first doctrine that we talk about is the doctrine of revelation, and secondly, inspiration, and third, canonicity. Revelation, inspiration, canonicity Notice, there's like a little you could remember RIC, r-i-c and that would help you always make a connection between that event and the doctrines that go with that event. So RIC okay, I don't know if that's the greatest acronym, but anyway it works.
Speaker 2:Revelation let's talk a little bit about Revelation and what is going on there. Well, first of all, before we talk about that, let's talk about this covenant I mentioned. There's covenants. Covenants are a huge thing in the Bible. If covenant's too religious for you, think of a contract. Or if that's too even strange for you think of cutting a deal, making a deal. When kids do this they might spit in their hand. Boys I don't know about girls, boys spit in their hand, you know, and they make a deal. Okay, and this is a serious thing, okay. So a covenant or contract or making a deal is sort of a serious thing in the Bible. Okay, the first one, of course.
Speaker 2:I already mentioned the Noahic covenant, right? God made that deal with all of mankind and all animals that have the breath of life that he would never flood the earth again. He has a sign of that. It's the rainbow, right. It doesn't depend anything on man, okay, it's totally dependent on God. We call that unilateral. It's just a one-way covenant. God says I'm going to do something. You can see there at the Noahic covenant he's very interested in preserving the human race and animals, nature. So it's very interesting that he does that. He wants to keep the human race around, and so he made that covenant.
Speaker 2:Then we saw the Abrahamic covenant, right, and now we're coming to the Mosaic covenant. Now, in all of these covenants there are four parts, so four basic parts to all covenants. First of all, there are the parties, that's, who's involved, right? This is the same as when you go down and make a contract to buy a house or a car or something like that. There's always parties. In the case of here at Mount Sinai, this covenant, god is one party and the nation of Israel is the other party.
Speaker 2:People wonder sometimes do I need to keep the Mosaic covenant, do I need to keep the Mosaic law? Do I need to keep the Ten Commandments? And let me ask you a question Well, were you party to the covenant? Are you a part of the nation of Israel? Okay, well, no, you weren't. So you're not a part of that deal.
Speaker 2:And you say but wait a minute, so many of the Ten Commandments we're supposed to follow those. I mean, it says don't murder, don't lie, don't commit adultery and so forth. Well, I totally agree that we should never lie, never commit adultery or any of those things. So you say well then, why are we not keeping the Ten Commandments? Because those are what we call moral laws. Moral laws are always in effect, whether God ever spoke the Ten Commandments into existence or not. For example, what is the one law that God gave Adam and Eve? Do not eat from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. From the day you eat it, you will surely what Die. Did he say? Thou shalt not murder. Was it wrong? Yes, and in chapter 4 of genesis we find out, when cain murders abel, that of course that was wrong, that was sinful. Why was it sinful if god never said don't do it, because it is part of the moral law of God. That stems from his nature, and moral laws are always in effect.
Speaker 2:So many of the Ten Commandments are moral laws, but not all of them. For example, sabbath Sabbath, a day of rest Is that a moral law or is that a ceremonial law? It's ceremonial only, so it's not a moral law. But all the others are moral in some way or another and thereby, of course, they are always wrong to break those. But it's not because we're under the Ten Commandments and we're not keeping them because they're one of the Ten Commandments. We're keeping them because they are contrary or inconsistent with God's moral character. So anyway, that was a little bit of a side, but we have to understand that first of all there's parties God and Israel at Mount Sinai, not us. The sign was the Sabbath, which again was ceremonial. That's the sign.
Speaker 2:And then the third part of a covenant is there are always legal terms. The legal terms are all the laws that are part of the Mosaic covenant. The covenant is basically like a constitution for the nation Israel, just like we have a United States constitution. We can come on Monday nights and do the meeting and learn more about our founding fathers in the documents. You know, if you're from China, you're not under the US Constitution, you're just not, but you're under whatever they have as a law. So the law and the terms of the law that God gave to Israel are what they were under. That's the third part of a covenant. The fourth part is there's always a founding sacrifice. You may remember Exodus 24 or 25. There, at the foot of Mount Sinai, there's some burnt offerings and sacrifices that are offered to the Lord, and the blood was put on the altar and Moses sprinkled it on the people, and the people said they're going to do this. So the sacrifice that was offered there and the blood was sprinkled on them, them were part of the ratification of the Mosaic covenant, and so you now have a legal relationship between God, the Father, and his son, israel. That's another thing I want to point out about these laws.
Speaker 2:If you look at the laws in the law of Moses, you'll find two types of laws. The first type of laws is common and we also have it in America. It's called case law. If so-and-so does this, then this is what shall happen. Okay, and these cases can be applied to a number of situations that are similar, right but the other.
Speaker 2:There's another type of law that we find in the Mosaic Law that you don't find in any other law codes in the world, and that is personal address. Laws of personal address are laws that are directed at the human heart. I'll give you one right out of the Ten Commandments Thou shalt not covet. Now, do policemen have access to see if you are coveting or not? Can they see into your heart? No, so this is a very interesting type of law to find in an ancient Near Eastern law code, because it's unlike, you know, the laws of Hammurabi or the laws of Eshnunna or any of the other ancient legal codes of that era, in that some of the laws do something no other law does and reach into the human heart. The reason is is because you have to view what's happening at Mount Sinai and the other laws that are being given after all, the other laws that are given in addition to the ten.
Speaker 2:As a father addressing a son Hopefully, fathers, some of you are fathers you don't just address the behavior of your children, but you also talk about what should be going on in their mind, what they're thinking about, how they are processing things like covening. You shouldn't covet, and why? Why, the law is addressed from a father to a son who wants his son to listen and to trust and obey. We sang the song today trust and obey, for there's no other way, right? Which is an excellent hymn, and this whole period of Israel's history is basically one big period of are you going to listen to what the Lord has said in the law, are you going to learn to trust him, that he has your best interest at heart and are you going to obey him? Therefore and that becomes very apparent in the period of Joshua and the judges that follow which way they're going to go.
Speaker 2:But that is the two types of laws that we find in the Mosaic Law Code. So you've got those four parts of a covenant. Remember, it's a if-then covenant. If you obey meaning you've learned to listen to what I said in the law, so you know the law, what it requires, you've learned to trust me and you obey, you keep it, and if you do that, you'll be blessed, you'll enjoy the land that I have promised to you. But if you disobey, you don't learn to listen to me, you don't trust me and you don't obey, then you will not enjoy the land, the land that I've given you. So these are the elements of a covenant, and it's called the Mosaic Covenant, and of course, it's a temporary covenant.
Speaker 2:We find out in Galatians and other places that the Lord Jesus Christ came not to abolish the law but to actually fulfill it, to keep it, and on the cross he rendered that covenant inoperative. Galatians 3 says it was given until the Christ would come and of course, therefore, it is obviously until the temporary word. So the law is only temporary. It was to show sin. It was to reveal that you can't keep the law and therefore you turn to faith in the promised one, the Messiah, who would be our righteousness right. So the law was never given for people to get right with God or justify before God. Law was never given for people to get right with God or justify before God. It was given, rather, to show sin that man could not keep the law. He falls short right For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And so, therefore, how are we going to get right with God if we can't do it ourselves, if we can't keep a law perfectly? The only way is for someone to come who does keep the law perfectly. His name is the Lord Jesus Christ. Right, and he pays our sin penalty for us and we trust in him and in exchange he gives us his righteousness to our account. So that is how we get right with God. So that's a little background on Mount Sinai and what is happening there.
Speaker 2:And now I want to talk about these three very important communication doctrines Rick, revelation, inspiration, candidacy, revelation. First of all, revelation is verbal. Now, what revelation? What do I mean? Here's the way I teach it to kids God speaks, because they get that. It doesn't have to be a big, hairy definition. God speaks. I'm get that. It doesn't have to be a big, hairy definition. God speaks. I'm not talking about natural revelation, of course that's there. The heavens declare the glory of God. The earth is handiwork, right? I mean, you just look out, everybody looks out, they see God. Romans 1, 18, 19, and 20. Men look out, they see creation, they see God clearly through what has been made. So there's no excuse, right? It's just obvious that God created this, even though it's a fallen world. It's just super obvious.
Speaker 2:But this type of revelation is verbal revelation. I'm talking about him speaking like he did at Mount Sinai. So it's verbal meaning okay, god, when God speaks in this way, we're not talking about you had a feeling. Okay, we're not talking about you. Know, you contemplated your navel and had a mystical experience. We're not talking about that. We're talking about propositional speech, like I'm speaking to you. I mean like God's saying thou shalt not murder. Okay, in the Hebrew language which people heard.
Speaker 2:So, first of all, revelation is verbal, in that sense it's words. Secondly, revelation is personal. If you're going to know a person, you have to have personal revelation from the person. So the law reveals who God is, especially, of course, that he's holy, but also that he's good, that he's loving, that he's also just and so forth. So God in the Mount Sinai event is revealing his part to the nation Israel. So it's personal, it's very, very personal. It's not just a law code like don't go over 55 miles an hour. No, it's a personal address. 55 miles an hour, no, it's a personal address.
Speaker 2:The third is revelation is intermittent. This one's one of the most interesting ones. The third point Intermittent, that means it doesn't happen all the time. In other words, god in history. If you study the Bible, you'll see that God speaks for a while and then he goes silent, and then he speaks some more, and he that God speaks for a while and then he goes silent, and then he speaks some more and he goes silent, and he speaks some more and he goes silent. This is the normal pattern, for example, in the book of Genesis. Here's a period of time when God was silent at the end of the book of Genesis. At the end of the book of Genesis, you have Jacob, you have Joseph. He's down in Egypt and the family comes and they go to Egypt, right?
Speaker 2:The next thing you read about after that is about 400 years later, in the time when Moses is about to be born. It's about how many years later, about 400 years later? What did God say in there? Nothing, nothing, nothing. The first time when god speaks is when he meets moses in the burning bush. It's the first time god said anything into history in over 400 years.
Speaker 2:So the idea that god doesn't speak for long periods of time is not a new thing in scripture or a new idea. This is the common way. Then, of course. Of course, you've got Moses, joshua, you've got the judges, you've got the period of the kings, northern and southern kingdoms. It takes you down to the exile.
Speaker 2:And the last prophet of the Old Testament is a guy named Malachi. You all got it wrong. He's the Italian prophet. You know Malachi right? And Malachi is about 430 or so bc. Okay, and then is does god speak anymore? No, it's silent. They call it the intertestamental times, with another period of god's silence until you have an angel disclosing the birth of John the Baptist. So another 400 years of silence and then he speaks. And we have all this New Testament revelation Through the Lord Jesus Christ, through Peter, through Paul, through Mark, through John, through Matthew, and we have all these books that were collected at that time Because they're apostolic and they're added to the canon of scripture.
Speaker 2:The third thing we'll look at um, and then there's silence. Are we supposed to be surprised? I mean, the charismatics say we're supposed to be surprised. I mean god's always speaking, right. I mean that's the way they want it, okay, but it's normal for god to speak and then go silent, to speak and then go silent. I think right now we're in a period of silence and the next thing God's going to say to the human race is through the two witnesses in the book of Revelation. So revelation is intermittent. He's not speaking all the time. Okay, now what are we supposed to be doing when he's not speaking? Speaking, remembering what he said and what he did and trying to understand it.
Speaker 2:I don't know why people want new revelation today when they can't even understand what's already there. There is so much already here that you don't understand. Why is it exactly that you need to get additional revelation? That's like trying to take a test where you can't get better than a 20, and the teacher says well, let me give you some more problems that are more difficult on top of that. That's not going to help you improve your score. What you need to do is study those problems so you can ace the test.
Speaker 2:That's what we're working on now. We're trying to understand the Gospels. We're trying to understand the transitional book of Acts. We're trying to understand the epistles, 13 of which were written by Paul, and Peter said Paul wrote some things that are very hard to understand. Now, if Peter was having a hard time, I can almost guarantee you are having a much harder time. In fact, I'm quite confident of that, because I teach Acts and Paul's epistles at the seminary. In fact, I'm quite confident of that because I teach Acts and Paul's epistles at the seminary and it's not easy. It's a lot of stuff, so, at any rate, intermittent.
Speaker 2:The next thing is revelation is comprehensive. What do I mean by that? I mean he speaks to every area of life and with equal authority in every area. So what I mean is this If you look at the law of Moses, you'll find sanitation laws. You mean God is concerned about health and cleanliness. Yes, you mean that might actually have some implications for COVID. You mean, like the book of Leviticus might actually touch on quarantine type ideas? Yes, and it speaks to those things with authority. It gives us some direction on how to treat it and what to do about it, and especially things like, you know, like, wash your hands. Remember that.
Speaker 2:Remember, uh, simul vice the scientist, the guy who went around the wards on the hospital and he was the one I was. What year was simulvice? 1780s, 1800s, somewhere in there. And he says you know, I go and there's these dead bodies and we touch these dead bodies and then we go over to these ladies who are having babies or help us, and then these ladies get sick and they die. And he said you know, I think the problem is that what we need to do in between touching patients is we need to wash our hands, and people are no way. Are you crazy? We don't have time to do that. And so that guy, simul vice, ended up in an insane asylum because he could not convince people they needed to wash their hands before going to the next patient. This is only like two or three hundred years ago, folks. This is only like two or three hundred years ago, folks.
Speaker 2:And yet if people had just used wisdom and look at the law of moses, they find that it's a very good idea to wash your hands in running water. They may not have understood why they needed to do that, but the God who gave these laws did so. He's speaking to every area of life. There's laws about war and how warfare ought to be conducted outside the land versus inside the land. There's all sorts of laws that pertain. There's one that refers to parapets. I don't mean a pet like an animal, but a parapet is like if you had a porch on your roof. You need to build a fence around it so you're not negligent, and people fall off and die like kids who are playing with their Legos or something, or their race car runs over the edge and they fall over the law is therefore about architecture. That have implications for that and for negligence and the importance. So the god speaks to every area of life. That's what we mean by it's comprehensive fifth revelation is prophetic, meaning that the prophets, like moses, joshua, david and others, isaiah, jeremiah they spoke of things that were beyond human perception.
Speaker 2:They spoke of things out in the future that nobody could see yet. Right, nobody could taste, nobody could touch. Okay, and here's the interesting thing about the prophets in Israel that makes the Bible totally unique from all other so-called religious books, like the Book of Mormon, the Pearl of Great Price, the Quran, etc. Etc. This totally sets the Bible apart and makes makes christianity look totally different from all of these other things that are not really good. Um, fakes, okay, fake versions.
Speaker 2:There is an unbroken line of prophets in the old testament for 11 centuries, starting with moses. There is an unbroken line of prophets for 11 centuries. You don't find that in any other so-called religion in the world, for example Islam. What are we going off of? Oh, we're going off one guy named Muhammad who said he had a vision. And Did anybody else have visions and confirm these things were from God? No, it's just Muhammad. Same thing with Joseph Smith right and the golden plates and all this stuff. I mean, how many prophets do you have in a row who are confirming Joseph Smith? Zero, it's just one guy's word. But in the Bible, you're not going on just one guy's word. But in the Bible, you're not going on just one guy's word. You're going on 11 centuries of guys whose lives overlap, who check one another's work. They had a school under Samuel called the School of the Prophets. It started with Samuel. That wasn't like where you learn to become a prophet, but it was basically where prophets would bring their work and they would check the work. Does this line up with this? Is this orthodoxy?
Speaker 2:Orthodoxy is something that agrees with what has come before and obviously Moses is the precedent right Genesis, exodus, leviticus, numbers, deuteronomy those first five books, the Torah, the law, and any prophet or someone who claimed to be a prophet who came after that is to be measured according to Moses. Deuteronomy 13, deuteronomy 18, there were tests for a prophet. So you've got these prophets for 11 centuries. They're checking their work against one another. Yes, this agrees.
Speaker 2:No, that's not. That's a false prophet, and it was a very serious thing to be a false prophet, because a false prophet is somebody who comes along and says this, this is god's word, and then they tell you, and whatever they tell you, if that's really god's word, guess what? You have to do it or suffer consequences, right, because it's God's word. So it's not a light thing for anybody to claim to be a prophet, because that person is thereby claiming to speak with the authority of God himself, and he's the infinite personal creator, and that's all the authority that can possibly be imagined. And more so, revelation is also prophetic in that it speaks of things that are beyond human perception, and Israel had an unbroken line of prophets for 11 centuries. So that's the doctrine of Revelation.
Speaker 2:What we do, then, is we move to inspiration. Okay, and inspiration means God speaks and I just add these words for kids through men. In other words, I try to make it really simple for them Revelation God speaks. Inspiration God speaks through men. In other words, he uses humans to write the text. So, first of all, inspiration is verbal. Again, that means it's words, not just the concepts. I don't know if you've seen the movie Rudy. You probably have, because Rudy's an inspiring, you know, athletic movie, right? Well, rudy goes to this Roman Catholic University and he's got to get a couple years under his belt before he gets accepted to the big league. You know Notre Dame so he can hopefully go out and play for Notre Dame, right? Yes, rudy loves this, he wants to do this. He's a passionate individual In his classes to get qualified for Notre Dame.
Speaker 2:One of the classes you listen to the Roman Catholic priest talk about inspiration in Roman Catholic theology and he says not the words but the concept are inspired. The concept, not the very words, but the concept. That's one view of inspiration. It's not the actual words, it's the concept. Not the very words, but the concept. That's one view of inspiration. It's not the actual words, it's the concept.
Speaker 2:But Scripture seems to indicate, for example, in 2 Timothy 3.16, that all Scripture is God-breathed, that all, each, every we can discuss this word, but that it's discussing the very words of Scripture as being inspired. Not that the prophets and the apostles received words from God and then they translated those words into concepts that hopefully are good enough, but know that it's the actual words that are sourced in God. So the primary author and inspiration is God. Okay, and that means he is the source of what we have in the Scripture. Now the secondary author is man. God uses man, remember, that's the definition. God speaks through men. He decided not to write it all down Himself. He could have done that. He did that with the ten words at Mount Sinai, didn't he? He literally emblazoned the words on the stone that Moses then took down. Okay, but that's the only portion of Scripture that he did that with. The rest of it, he had it written through men.
Speaker 2:So human authors were superintended by God, the Holy Spirit, meaning watched over, let's say kept from error, so that they record the very words of God while at the same time preserving their style, their personality, their intellect and so forth. Because you read Peter, and it's not like reading Paul. You read Luke, and it's not like reading the author of Hebrews. Okay, it's like, hmm, somebody different wrote this. What you're seeing when you see that is you're seeing that God preserved's like, hmm, somebody different wrote this. What you're seeing when you see that is you're seeing that God preserved the personality, intellect and background of the individual authors, while making sure that every word that they chose was the words that he wanted us to have.
Speaker 2:Okay, and then, lastly, inspiration points to inerrancy. In other words, if God is the primary author and he ensured that his words would be written down through men, then the original manuscripts would be inerrant, right, I mean they'd have to be. I'm not saying the manuscripts we have today, I'm saying the original manuscript. You know the one that, paul, you know Mark, you know John, whatever, when they use the pen on the parchment, on the vellum, whatever they used to write it, on exactly that original manuscript, that first letter that was sent to the Ephesians or the first letter that was sent to the Galatians, that was inerrant. You say, well, it doesn't really matter, they were inerrant. But what about today? Let's just say they're very, very accurate. In other words, so accurate that there really is no contest between the Bible and any other ancient literature.
Speaker 2:And all, all secular, unbelieving historians agree with this entirely, because it's an undisputable fact. There are far more manuscripts of the Bible that we have access to that show the accuracy of the Bible than any other book. I mean by mile by mile. It's not close, there's no competition. I think Homer has the second most with like 800 copies. Our New Testament alone has almost 6,000 copies and over 25,000 fragments and Homer's at 800. So we're talking about we win by a mile as far as attestation and the accuracy is remarkable. Probably the New Testament more than 99%, the Old Testament somewhere in the range of 97 to 97.5% and those things that are you know where we find discrepancies and stuff like that.
Speaker 2:It's like it's stuff like this for example, I've got a student who just finished a paper and he kept writing the word fulfill, like this F-U-L-F-I-L, and I was like kept doing it and I was like, is that? I mean, is that how you would spell it, fulfill, f-u-l-f-i-l? No, you'd put another L on the end. Of course I'm the professor, I've got to make sure. So I look this up. In the UK and Australia they spell it with a single L. In the US the predominant is the double L. So it's right. But we don't really use that here. But I can't count it wrong, right?
Speaker 2:Those are the types of errors you find in the Bible. A lot of them are that kind of thing. Is that really going to shake the foundations of your faith? The other thing is they often to save paper. They didn't put spaces between words. I mean, you can still read that way if you write a sentence in English with no spaces between the words, but you know, sometimes a letter gets moved from the end of one word to the beginning of another word when you separate the words out, because if you put this letter, this S, over here, that actually makes another word. But you can tell right. I mean, you're not dumb, you know which word is supposed to be there. That's the type of errors you find in the Bible. Oh, ooh, now I don't believe in Jesus anymore, I quit. I mean silly stuff. So dittography, hypography, all these little words, but they refer to these types of minor discrepancies we find between the manuscript. There's really only three passages in the entire New Testament that are contested John 7, the adulterous woman, mark 16, the ending of Mark and the Johannine comma in 1 John 5, which is a small little section there. But those are the three major ones. All the rest are just pretty minor. Okay, that was a bit of an aside, but anyway, I hope you're enjoying Mount Sinai.
Speaker 2:Now we talk a little bit about the doctrine of canonicity, rick, revelation, inspiration and then canonicity. Okay, so if revelation is God speaks and inspiration is through men, then what do you think canonicity is In the Bible? Bible just means book, okay, right. Scroll in the Bible. Bible just means book. Scroll as to source for canonicity.
Speaker 2:What we mean by the word canonicity I say in the Bible, but technically it means like a rule, a measuring rod. It's a measuring stick to measure whether, what, whether something is true and from God or not. So something that's in the canon of Scripture, which would constitute the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 books of the New Testament. These are the canon. There's also canons in law and, as someone informed me one time, there's canons in Star Wars. Right, You've got certain little stories and so forth that they've made series into. Some of these are considered canonical and maybe others are not. So it's a really technical deal amongst Star Wars fans and stuff. Well, that's not canon. Well, we're the same way. Baruch is not canon, enoch is not canon, but Galatians is, malachi is, deuteronomy is. These are all canon.
Speaker 2:So these books were recognized very early as being ultimately from God. A prophet wrote them, as in the Old Testament or in the New Testament, an apostle. So these were recognized as to source, as being from God, and very early. So when the Roman Catholic Church came along, between 1546, the time of the Reformation and 1563, and they had this big council and they decide that they're going to put the Apocrypha in there, right, these 14 or 15 books that they added to the other 66. Is that very early? I mean, is that close to when these books were written? No, that's very late and books wouldn't be accepted that late, so they kind of went on their own.
Speaker 2:Then they went and they started doing their own thing. It was obviously a reaction to the reformers. They had to somehow support their indulgences, doctrines. They had to support their angel doctrines, they had to support some of their doctrines and they could only get that material really from the Apocrypha. They said, okay, now it's canon, 15 centuries later. Well, that doesn't really work. All these things were. These books were accepted very early.
Speaker 2:And lastly, the boundary, as I mentioned, and I'm already discussing the boundary is the 66 books of the Old and New Testament canon. So our Old Testament canon, by the way, is the same thing as for Jews and Judaism, exactly the same content. We're not doing anything different. We got it from them right and the New Testament just added on to that. So that's Mount Sinai. It's a speaking event. You learn about revelation, inspiration and canonicity. You can use the event and Charlton Heston and all that and the Ten Commandments and that movie as a peg for always as you think about that movie or think about this event, these three doctrines.
Speaker 2:Okay, what's important about it? The important thing about it is this God has spoken. He can reveal himself to human beings in human language, and he has done that and we have his word. You know, I don't think it's a mistake when you pick up a Bible and it says God's word on it. I think that is accurate even for a translation, because God is the one who divided the languages of Babel right the Tower of Babel. So I think he's capable, through good translators of the Bible, to actually give us his word.
Speaker 2:We can have confidence in our English Bible. As a people group and a language group of people, we have some of the best translations in the world. Maybe not all of them, but think, if you're from another country and you speak another language, you think they have as many translations as we do and have had as many scholars as we have. No, no other language in the world has had the Bible translated into it as often and as carefully as the English language. That's quite a gift. I don't think we should spurn that. God is obviously doing a work in America and in English-speaking countries in the world, and he has had an intense interest in the Bible in this language and people around the world can enjoy it. So don't question your Bible. I mean, you can study this issue, but I don't think there's any real reason to question it.
Speaker 2:The next great event in the Bible after Moses comes along. He dies, right, he's 120 years old. The guy never got beyond running outrunning, probably me, in other words, he was still young and virile when he was 120 years old, but he dies, right. Who becomes the leader after him? When he was 120 years old, but he dies, right. Who becomes the leader after him? Joshua. So, moses, they tried to go into the land and God said go. They said no, and then they said yes and God said no. And well, okay, now that's it. We're not doing that. You're going to wander around for 40 years. Joshua becomes the new leader, right?
Speaker 2:This is the story of the conquest, and this is found in Joshua and a little bit of early part of Judges, the book of Joshua, if you can think of it as the rugged terrain that Israel had to navigate as they went up to face enemies Now in battle, which way do you want to fight. Do you want to fight up and try to take your enemies out when they're up, perched on a hill, or do you want to fight down and it's easier to fight down? Right, I mean, just roll the logs down, you know, throw rocks at them, whatever. It's hard to fight up, it's easy to fight down. Right, I mean, just roll the logs down, you know, throw rocks at them, whatever, it's hard to fight up, it's easy to fight down. But if you look at the geography of the land of Israel in the book of Joshua, they're starting down at the Jordan River. Remember, god's going to divide the Jordan when the priests step in there with the Ark of the Covenant and everybody's going to pass through, right, they're going to cross over and obviously the Jordan is low because water runs through it. Now you've got to go up Jerusalem. Every time you read in the New Testament it says they went up, went up where. What do you mean Up? Jerusalem was up high, so was Jericho. It was higher than the Jordan River. And then I, the place they go next. It's high, it's up. I mean, they're working their way up.
Speaker 2:So what is this a picture of? This is a picture of our sanctification, our spiritual growth. I mean, is it easy? Is it easy? No, it's not easy at all. It's a struggle, it's a fight all the way, and the stories in the book of Joshua are teaching us how, during that struggle, to grow and to conquer our enemy. So there's a lot of imagery here about sanctification.
Speaker 2:In the spiritual life, for example, there's enemies the world flesh, the devil Ephesians 6,. What do we have to put on every morning? Get up and we put on the armor of God. Why? Because we're going to battle. See, the spiritual life is a spiritual battle. It's spiritual warfare and that's what you're seeing in the book of Joshua. Right, and the good news about our battle is we're not having to fight up like Joshua. It says that we've taken the high ground in Christ and we're just supposed to defend that ground. So we already have the high ground in Christ. That's the good news. So when we go back and read Joshua, we read man, this was tough, but they're going to have to learn to do three things Listen to the Lord, what he said in the Mosaic Covenant, the law that we just discussed. Listen to that so they can learn it. Trust him and his strategies for defeating their enemies, like the inhabitants of Jericho or wherever and obey.
Speaker 2:They go into the land. Everybody knows the story, right, joshua? And he goes up to Jericho and there's this lady there. Two spies went in. She's a keeper of a whorehouse. Okay, great, that lady's in the line of Christ. By the way, that lady's in the line of Christ, she'd heard about what God did for them at the Red Sea and she said everybody in this land is shaking in their boots because of you guys. So the spies find out hey, this is what's going on. They're already psychologically totally defeated. So they go back.
Speaker 2:They tell Joshua Joshua, I'm sure, is sitting there making his battle plans. Here's how we're going to take Jericho. And then there's this guy standing there in the midst of the camp, and he wasn't an Israeli soldier and he had a sword. And Joshua says to him whose side are you on Right? And he basically says I'm on my own side. What, what? Who are you? This is the pre-incarnate Christ right. Who are you? This is the pre-incarnate Christ right. And Joshua recognizes it.
Speaker 2:And Joshua is then given a strategy, a battle plan for taking Jericho. It is the silliest plan in all of military history. I want you to basically all get out there. I want you to walk around this city once a day for six days. On the seventh day, I want you to march around it seven times and I want you to yell. And if the kids were here we'd say and what happened? And the walls will come tumbling down right. Does that sound like a good military strategy to you? So what did you have to do? You had to listen to what the lord said. You had to trust him that his strategy is going to work. And then you had to obey, listen, trust, obey. And they did it.
Speaker 2:Joshua led the people and went back. He gave them this battle plan and he said this is what we're going to do. And the people said we're going to follow you as we follow moses, so we will follow you. They said in joshua one. And so they all line up and they do this thing On the seventh day, after seven times, they all yell, the trumpet's blast and what happened? The walls came tumbling down. They didn't fall in, they fell out and the people ran straightway it says up into the city, and they destroyed every man, woman and child and beast in the city of Jericho. God gave him victory. Yeah, that's not very nice. You're in spiritual warfare too. You're going to be nice to Satan. You're supposed to be buddies with Satan. God already said in Genesis that these people he was giving 400 more years.
Speaker 2:He says the iniquity of the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Jebusite. It's not full yet, but a time is when their iniquity will be full and that's when I'm going to judge. See, because God always gives grace before judgment, right, grace before judgment. How many times have we learned that he was giving those people grace before judgment? But it was time to judge. But guess who didn't get judged Right here? Why? Because she believed in the God of Israel. See, there's always a way of escaping the judgment. That way is always by grace, through faith. Okay, and she found it. Okay, and anybody could have been saved in the land. Okay, she's a picture of that. It's a marvelous thing. But judgment, it was time for judgment. Okay, this people group the Canaanites, jebusites, so forth, canaanites, all these group the Canaanites, jebusites, so forth, canaanites, all these. They had filled the cup of iniquity.
Speaker 2:I mean, we have a pretty bad culture. There's a lot of terrible things out there. I loved, at the end of Titus, how it described the culture is basically like they just. I mean, you can see that, well, these are nice people. I work with some nice people. These are nice people. Everybody are nice people, everybody's nice. They let me out when I need to get out of the parking lot and I'm driving Nice people.
Speaker 2:Titus says it's basically like a thin veil and if you pull it back you'll see extreme nastiness. And that's exactly the way it is. If you live in this world long enough, you find that to be true. They're one little curveball their way. Everything changes, just like that. And a little bit scary, okay, but this culture is probably not. We're not probably where Canaanite culture was.
Speaker 2:Yet we have a ways to go. That's a little scary, isn't it? We have ways to go. That's a little scary, isn't it? We have ways to go. Um, so it was time. It was time for them to be judged.
Speaker 2:So what can we learn here? The doctrine of sanctification. Um, we're not gonna have time to go through them all because I spent way too much time on mount sinai, but it's important. The, the Word of God is truth. We have to have that. We're going to talk about the phases, the aim, the means, the dimensions and the enemies. I've already mentioned some of these.
Speaker 2:Just to mention, to polish things off, number two aim. I mean, what are we going for in sanctification? Are we going for I will never sin again? If you go for that, you're going to fail. Okay, that's the first thing. You're going to fail. You're going to sin again before you get a resurrection body, so you're not going for that. If you go for that, what you're doing is you're looking at sin actually and you're saying I'm not going to do that, I'm not going to do that, I'm not going to do that. But what happens when you look at sin? You do it. So what are you aiming for here? You're aiming to love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, mind, soul and strength.
Speaker 2:Another way to put that is loyalty. I use the word loyal for love, because if you say love in today's culture everybody's like wee flowers, pillows, wee. I love Jesus. If you love me, he said, you will what, keep my commandments. I mean love is not, that's not a feeling, it's obedient, listen, trust, obey. It's that. Third one obey.
Speaker 2:This is where you learn loyalty to God. What did they tell Joshua when he went into the land? What did the Lord tell Joshua? He says meditate on my word day and night. Do not turn from it to the left or the right, but meditate upon it and keep it. See, it's about obedience. Learn loyalty to me and I will make your paths straight, right. I will give you victory. So the aim there is to learn loyalty to God. That's what we're aiming for. Don't put your sights on stopping sinning. Put your sights on trying to learn loyalty to God through His Word.
Speaker 2:Another one we've already mentioned to polish off is the enemies. I mean, you have enemies, right. It's not flesh and blood, it's the prince and principalities of darkness, which says a lot about politics. I just said a whole six-week series in that sentence. The princes and principalities of darkness are behind the governing rulers of this world, making chaos. We see that in Daniel 10, in Iran, okay. Ancient Persia, okay, is described.
Speaker 2:There Is there a certain angel demons that are trying to keep out good angels because of the influences that they're having upon the political leaders to accomplish their will in this world. Our battle is against them, because Satan wants to destroy your spiritual life. He doesn't want you to grow. He's already lost the first battle. If you believe in the Lord, jesus Christ, you belong to him. You are now saved forever. Right, you're justified, credited with Christ's righteousness, but the rest of the battle is keeping you from growing, making you an impotent Christian, making you not light in this world but darkness, along with the rest of the bill. And he's pretty successful, right, because a lot of Christians don't want to fight this fight, because I mean even the Israelites.
Speaker 2:Did they finish the conquest? Did they completely take the land? Or did God pronounce doom on them at Bochum and say you're not going to take the land? They didn't finish and their enemies remained in the land and they grew up around them and the Israelites became idolatrous, just like them. They sent their children right into the fire, offered them a moloch.
Speaker 2:You say I'd never do that. Oh, really, you're absolutely out of your mind if you think you would never. You're absolutely out of your mind. I could never do that. You say you are absolutely out of your mind. I could never do that. You say you are absolutely out of your mind.
Speaker 2:Paul, at the end of his life, says I have finished the race. I have kept the faith right. In other words, he was worried up until that time that he wouldn't do it. He said but I could never do that Solomon starts off on a great foot. This guy had more wisdom of anyone in the world until Jesus Christ. That's a long time. That's a pretty wise guy, but look what he did. He threw it all away. For human wisdom, for power, for money, for fame, for sex. He threw it all away.
Speaker 2:And the moment you think you're exempt from that, not only are you denying the examples of Scripture, but you're absolutely insane. That is why we have to stay in the Word. We have to keep learning loyalty to God through His Word. There is no other substitute. You can't, you know, do like the book of hebrews did those believers in the book of hebrews and say you know, I just don't think we're going to do this jesus thing for a while because we're getting persecuted. Let's go back to the temple, let's do those sacrifices and not suffer severe divine discipline, which they did. You are fully capable of doing these types of things, like Israeli culture did, and become just like the world around you.
Speaker 2:I'm still safe, but you don't want to fight. You don't want to fight the good fight. You don't want to finish the race, you don't want to run the course. See, I know it's difficult, but here it is. Here's the thing You're not going to do it in your own strength. That's the bottom line. Let's finish.
Speaker 2:You're not going to do it in your own strength because, on the means, here you've got two means the law, that was the law of Moses for them. For us, it's the law of Christ. Galatians 6, 1 Corinthians 9, the law of Christ. Okay, that's what we're supposed to keep, that's what we're supposed to obey. But is that all there is is just law, just commands? No, the second part of the means is grace. His grace is sufficient for them. It's his enablement. You're not going to do it in your own strength.
Speaker 2:What does he say in john 15? The vine and the branches. He says apart from me, you can do what? Nothing. Why? Because you need his life flowing through you. You need His grace to accomplish these things. Is it fully possible? Yes, it is fully possible. We can live by grace, enjoy His enabling power by means of the Holy Spirit, and keep His commandments, the law of Christ, and enjoy these things and grow spiritually. Okay, but we'll come back and we'll finish up the phases and so forth next week and discuss a little bit more about this.
Speaker 2:But it's that rugged struggle of sanctification and the enemies that are out there. Don't walk out the door thinking everything is just beachy and everything's going to be fine. No, you have enemies. That's why I always say one of the things you do every morning is you put on the armor of God. You consciously, mentally, walk your way through that, the helmet of salvation, you know, the shield of faith. How am I going to live today? You live by faith. Why? Because that extinguishes all the arrows of the evil.
Speaker 2:One right, I got to put my boots on, you know, because they're going to give me stability. Okay, stability to stand and be firm. Right, I'm going to put a belt of truth on, which is the idea of being a person with integrity, living an honorable, integrity, upright life. That's the idea of truth. What are you going to do in the workplace? Do what everybody else does, or have integrity. There's hardly any left in the world. I tell young Christians today all you have to do is be integrity, be honest, show up on time on work and guess. What you have to do is be integrity, be honest, show up on time on work and guess what. You'll be successful in the world. You won't have a problem at all. Because? Why? Because there's no integrity out there. That's why Christians ought to be shining in today's world, because all they have to do is just basically just show up, because nobody else is showing up. It's easy, you got it made Just trust the Lord and walk.
Speaker 1:Thank you for joining us on Beyond the Walls with Jeremy Thomas. If you would like to see the visuals that went along with today's sermon, you can find those on Rumble and on YouTube under Spokane Bible Church. That is where Jeremy is the pastor and teacher. We hope you found today's lesson productive and useful in growing closer to God and walking more obediently with Him. If you found this podcast to be useful and helpful, then please consider rating us in your favorite podcast app, and until next time, we hope you have a blessed and wonderful day.