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 - That dog won't hunt
When Jesus spoke of earthly things you and I can see and verify, and He was wrong, how on earth can we believe Him about spiritual things? Either Jesus was correct about everything He spoke on or nothing.
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 a smaller, bite-sized piece from the larger lesson. We hope you enjoy it.
Speaker 2:What's he doing? He's making the split, right. He's splitting between issues of faith and morals and issues of historical and scientific detail. And he's saying, ah, it's not at all the purpose of the Bible, see, to provide any kind of knowledge that might relate to science. It's just a book that's related to salvation and spiritual issues. So if Jesus erred on scientific details, for Burkhardt, see, that's no big deal. He thinks he can hold on to a Jesus who provides salvation for the world on one hand but errs in technical details of science and history, see, but he's got to do that to keep his academic status. Or he thinks he does.
Speaker 2:What do we do with some claims like Jesus made in John 3.12? Let's look at John 3.12. All this time I've been basically just trying to bring you into the discussion on infallibility and help us have a good understanding of it. In John 3.12, in the discourse with Nicodemus, right, he tells Nicodemus in verse 12, if I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe? If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? This has always been one of my favorite verses because my background was science, right Biology and chemistry mainly, but some physics and whatever else thrown in. If I tell you of earthly things and you don't believe, how will you believe me when I tell you about heavenly things? In other words, if I tell you details about things that you can investigate, they're on earth. You can, you know, check them out? We would say, and you can't believe me about what I say about that, how are you ever going to believe me about things in heaven, like things like if you believe in me you're forgiven Anybody got a rocket? You're going to go to heaven and check to make sure that in heaven you're forgiven Anyone? How can you know that's true If you don't even believe the things that he tells us that relate to this earth? It can actually be investigated. See for Jesus, like these two things were tied together Earthly and heavenly things. Whatever he said is true, right. It wasn't a split between faith and morals, the spiritual things and, over here, scientific and historic details. Jesus wouldn't be willing to make that split.
Speaker 2:Let's go on to Colossians 2.8. To one of the warnings that were given by the Apostle Paul Galatians, ephesians, philippians and then Colossians, colossians 2.8. Colossians 2.8. He says See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ, which he goes on then to describe in hypostatic union in verse 9. The fullness of deity in bodily form in verse 9. The fullness of deity in bodily form.
Speaker 2:How or has the church been taken captive by human philosophy by allowing this concept of erring on scientific and historical details to creep in? I'm bringing this up because this is exactly what has happened. Human philosophy, as I'm about to show you, crept in, it got its foot in the door, so to speak, and now we're in a load of trouble where we are today in the church. What are the 11 most attacked chapters in the Bible? Genesis 1 through 11, right, we all know the whole evolutionary creationist discussion that's transpired now over 240 years. Why do we have a divide in evangelicalism? Because of Colossians 2.8. If you allow human philosophy to come in, as I've been demonstrating, it has, so that now what we're doing with the Bibles, we're saying, yeah, it's true in the spiritual things, over here the heavenly things, but over here in the earthly things, technical errors, things like that, we can allow that After a while if you realize what you're saying, that the Bible does have errors over here, why believe any of it at all?
Speaker 2:I remember my mentor, charlie Clough, became a believer. He grew up in the Bronx, brilliant mind. He went to MIT. He got a degree in mathematics Kind of smart guy. He became a believer when he was on campus there. But when he became a believer he was in considering it, considering becoming a Christian. He was like. He came to this very logical conclusion. He said well, I mean, if this really is God's word, there can't be any errors in it because God doesn't err. So this is all true or none of it's true, and don't mess with it, it's a waste of time. That's what he meant. And of course he became convinced that the whole thing is true. And that's the way it is. You can't split and say well, the things it says about science and history when it touches on that, that's false. But the rest of the spiritual things are true. That dog won't hunt, as Stanley Toussaint used to say, that dog won't hunt.
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.