Examples of Changes in Scripture (03/25/2001)

Boy I wish we preached before Sunday school instead of after.

I guess it'd be worse after though.

I couldn't change my sermon that way.

We have to go again to Psalm 12, 6, and 7.

I think by the time this series is over we'll have this one memorized.

Psalm 12, verses 6 and 7, and we're

continuing our series on bibliology, the study of how we,

of what the Bible says about the Bible, and we're, we have discussed inspiration,

revelation, and now we're discussing preservation and have been on this topic for quite a few

lessons.

We continue with it today and probably complete it next Sunday, the Lord willing.

So follow along with me and let's read this Psalm together.

Psalm 12, 6, and 7.

The words of the Lord are pure words as silver tried in a furnace of earth purified seven

times.

Thou shalt keep them, O Lord.

Thou shalt preserve them from this generation and forever.

And so God has promised us that he is going to preserve his Word and

has preserved his Word for each generation of his people.

We've seen that his Word is secure eternally, his Word is settled, his Word

established, his Word is sure, his Word is pure, his Word is protected,

and we have that promise.

And based upon that promise, we've embarked upon this study.

According to Amos 8, 12, there is a day when they will look for the Word of God and will not be able to find it.

And it could be that we're in that day, actually, because there are many, very many people confused about

which version of the Bible is the best one.

In fact, when we went to California to Dr. MacArthur's church, one

of the lessons that was taught to the pastors was how to select a good version

to preach from.

It was interesting because the man who taught the session was one of the editors of the New

American Standard Bible, and so it was real interesting to get his viewpoint and hear him speak.

So today, last time we talked about the different

evidences that we have of the New Testament manuscripts and the different types

of manuscripts that we have, over 5 ,000 some -odd either

whole or fragments, parts of the New Testament or all of the New Testament.

Many, many, many of them.

And we talked about the different types and which ones are very, very important and so forth last

time.

This time, what I'd like to do is take some time to actually look through some specific

scriptures where some changes have been made, because we've spent quite a bit of time talking about these

changes.

We've talked about how, going all the way back to origin, that men began to say they were, quote,

correcting the Bible, and sometimes they would use that as excuses to change it to fit their doctrinal beliefs.

And we saw in Sunday school this morning that this has been going on, one of the verses in 2 Corinthians chapter 2,

I don't remember which verse, said that these corruptions have been, I believe it's the last couple of verses in the chapter,

that these corruptions have been taking place since the time of Paul, when Paul was writing that epistle.

It was already taking place.

Most of the worst corruptions of the scriptures probably occurred within the first hundred years after Christ

died.

And so, it's a very interesting study to do, and of course the question is, God promised us that

he would preserve his word to each generation.

The question is, how did he do it?

But isn't it wonderful that he did?

And we have the promise that he has done so.

So this morning I want to spend some time, and actually this may be all the time that we have, but I think you'll find it interesting

to go through and ask the question, one of the questions we'll ask is, older always better?

When you see in your margin in your Bible where it says the older manuscripts don't have this verse, or the word is

changed to this in the older manuscripts, does that prove anything?

Well, let me give you a couple of examples that show that it doesn't always prove a thing, because what's more

important than the age of the document is the source of it.

In other words, if you had a person who was a proven Arian, who claimed to be an Arian, who did not believe Jesus was

God, he did not believe he was the Son of God in the truest sense, such as origin, he was an

Arian, would we then think that a copy that we would find that would date back to his day

would be accurate simply because it's old, or would we maybe think that he had put some of his

Arian philosophies into the Bible by some subtle changes?

In fact, we know that those things took place, so the age is not the most important thing, and yet most

of the theories of modern biblical criticism believe that oldest is

better.

Let me just give you a very interesting example that's come to light in recent years that was probably we didn't

even know about back in the early 80s when I was studying this topic the first time through.

If you look at Acts chapter 8 and

verse 37, this particular

verse has been omitted by most modern versions

of the Bible.

I'd be interested, Brother Bill, to see if you could find it in that Revised Standard Version that I handed you in Acts

chapter 8 verse 37.

I didn't check beforehand, so it may or may not be in there.

I don't know.

If he's not reading it, it's a pretty good indication it's not there.

Now, do you see, there may be a verse 37, but it may be a different...

Okay.

Okay.

What about in yours, John?

Yes, of course.

Is yours New American Standard?

Well, try the New American Standard because a lot of folks use that one.

In fact, the gentleman that taught us down there in California was one of the editors of this book,

Acts 8 37.

I'll read the verse while he's looking to see if it's in that one.

It says...

Is it there?

That's

not what the verse says, is it?

All right.

Chapter 8 verse 37.

See marginal note.

That gives me a lot of security when it says, you might better check the margin on

this one.

It may not be here.

But the verse says, and Philip said, if thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest.

And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus is the Son of God.

Would you consider that an important verse?

The story of Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch is missing from

the modern versions.

And the claim in the...

Read your margin to us.

It says C margin.

What does he say in the margin?

But does it give indication why they took it out of this passage and put it in the margin?

Does he say anything about oldest manuscripts or...

Does yours...

Late manuscripts.

Now what that means is when they say late MSS, that means they believe that only...

They believe that none of the oldest manuscripts have this verse, only late manuscripts.

Like a Greek manuscript that was found, say, to date back to say 1500.

Only the late manuscripts, that's what that means.

So it leads you to believe that the oldest manuscripts don't have the verse.

And yet, let me tell you some facts about this verse.

Most...

It is true that most modern versions omit the verse, yet it is...

Now do you remember in our studies earlier we talked about the fathers, how you can go back and find sermons that they wrote and they had

verses quoted in their sermons?

And we have lectionaries where they had little orders of service with stuff the people would quote in the service

and they have Bible verses in them.

These date back much older than these quote oldest manuscripts that they're discussing in these margins.

They date back to as late as 150 AD, almost back to the time of the Apostles.

And while this verse is omitted from modern versions, this verse is mentioned by both

Irenaeus and Cyprian in their teachings in the 2nd and 3rd centuries.

That means 150 AD to 250 AD, which predates

these quote ancient manuscripts by a hundred or two years.

And they quoted this verse.

Now my question is, how did they quote a verse that didn't exist?

Prophetic.

But they didn't claim to be prophets.

So this proves that the verse must have been in the codices of both the Greek

and Latin churches, because that's where those two men were from, long before the Sonatic and

Vaticanus manuscripts were brought into existence, which of course are the two manuscripts that they

make the modern versions out of, which disagree with the received text in thousands of places and disagree with

each other in literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of places.

So this this this proof that I just read you comes from Cyprian testimonies book

3 and Irenaeus against heresies book 3.

So you can look those up in the library if you want to.

Now let me give you another example of how when they say, now you notice how in the margin of that Bible it says the old

manuscripts don't have this.

They neglected to tell you that Irenaeus and Cyprian quoted it in 150 AD, which is older than any

manuscripts on the face of the earth.

How did they get the verse if it weren't in the original Bible is the question.

Now let me give you another example.

Dr. Frederick Nolan in his Integrity of the Greek Vulgate,

pages 17 through 18, proved after 28 years of tracing the received text back to its

apostolic origin that the Bible of the Waldenses, who were lenial

descendants of the Italic Church, we've discussed all this already, was in line with the received

text and existed before Jerome's revised Latin Vulgate.

This places the received text in line with manuscripts which dated back to the 2nd century, well

before the existence of the Vatican and synodic manuscripts.

Here's an example, and I briefly mentioned this in a previous sermon, but I'll mention it again because it's such an interesting example.

John chapter 5 verse 2.

Look that one up if you would.

Now I want to make note that the verse that we studied previously in Acts 8 37

is found in the King James Version because it is in the received text, the Greek

manuscript line that is called the received text or the textus receptus.

Now in John 5 2, if you'll look at the one word Bethesda

in your King James Version which comes from the received Greek text, it's spelled B -E -T

-H -E -S -D -A.

How is it spelled in yours, Brother Bill?

Uh -huh.

Okay, and how is it spelled in yours?

B -E -T -H -E -S -D -A.

So it's the same, and Brother Bill's is different.

Okay.

Well, in the Vaticanus, in the Synodicus, it was

spelled this way, and it is spelled this way in some modern versions.

Some of you, if you have one, you may see this.

B -E -T -H, either Z as Brother Bill's has, or S -A

-I -D -A rather than B -E -T -H -E -S -D -A.

The point is that in both the Vaticanus and the Synodicus, it's spelled B -E -T -H -S -A -I -D

-A.

Well, since those were the oldest, supposedly, were the oldest Greek manuscripts, most of the

modern Bibles have carried this spelling into this verse.

What's interesting about it, and it's under the theory that oldest is always better, what's interesting about it is there was a

German scholar named Joachim Jeremias, who has proven

in his book called The Rediscovery of Bethesda, he wrote a whole book about this one word, this one

name or town, that Bethesda is the proper reading.

In other words, B -E -T -H -E -S -D -A, as it is in the King James, is the proper reading.

The way he proved it was he produced this reading from the Copper Scroll from

Cave 3 at Qumran, dated A .D. 35 to 36,

even before the Apostle John passed away.

So this has been carbon dated, this is part of the Dead Sea Scrolls, it's been carbon dated back to 35

to 65 A .D. and it is spelled Bethesda, which means that the

received Greek text carried the proper spelling, even though the quote, most ancient

manuscripts don't.

Well, how do you answer that?

And then they argued about it for years until the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, which goes back even far more

ancient, back to the time of Christ actually, and the Apostles, and even before

John passed away, and it is spelled the same way as it is in the received

text.

Thus the reading of the majority text or the received text, which is not found in any extant Greek

manuscript before the 5th century, and that's what they mean by late manuscripts, has a

superior claim to originality than the older Vaticanus and Sinaticus.

So that is some very interesting proof that we have that proves that quote, the oldest does

not always mean the most accurate.

And if you remember, Dean Burgin made the statement that it is incorrect

to use the same critical analysis on the Bible as one would use on

profane literature, such as Shakespeare, or something like that.

Why is it not appropriate?

Because no one ever changed Shakespeare for doctrinal reasons.

So you can pretty well assume that if you found an older copy of a Shakespeare work, it

might be more accurate than a more modern one.

However, with the Bible, you can't make that assumption because whichever one you find, no matter what the day of the

manuscript, it might have been perverted to fit someone's false doctrine.

So it blows the whole theory of using that theory that has been used on all the modern versions.

So this is an interesting example, disproven by this German scholar,

Joachim Jeremias.

Now in the same chapter of John 544, it says, how can you believe which

receive honor one of another and seek not the honor that cometh from God?

Only the word God is omitted from P66, P75, B, and W, which are

some of the, what they might call some of the older manuscripts.

But all the other manuscripts have them.

And so it is not always true that oldest is better when you're studying manuscript evidence.

You consider all other things being equal, you would consider older better, but you can't

always make that assumption.

There are other tests that have to be undertaken before you can say that.

All right.

Let me get you men to help a little bit, and all the rest of you help me as well.

I want to look at a series of verses now at this time, actual verses in your Bibles.

And there are several different topics that I believe have been attacked by these corruptors of the scriptures.

And I want you to try to answer with me which Bible upholds these doctrines the

strongest.

We're going to discuss the doctrine of the deity of Christ.

We're going to discuss the doctrine of salvation itself, of the lordship of

Jesus Christ, and several other doctrines like that.

We won't have time for all that today, so let's just take a look at some salvation verses, just verses that have to do with salvation.

And we know what the scriptures teach about salvation.

And so let's look at these changes that have been made to the received text by the modern translators or correctors, as

they call themselves.

Look at Matthew chapter 9 verse 13, and I'd like for someone to read that in the King James

Version first.

Whoever gets there first can, as long as we keep order in the church,

not more than two or three at a time.

You have it, Brother Russell?

Go ahead and read Matthew 9 13.

Okay.

I am come to call sinners to repentance is the gist of the verse.

Now, Brother Bill, would you read Matthew 9 13?

What word is conspicuously missing?

The word repentance is not there.

Read yours, John.

So the word repentance is missing.

All right.

John has the New American Standard, and Bill has the Revised Standard Version.

Now let's look at some others.

Look at Matthew 12 35.

This verse is going to deal with the key doctrine that's necessary for anyone to ever understand

salvation, and that is the depravity of man.

If we can't understand the depravity of man, that man desperately requires and needs

salvation, then we can't understand salvation.

So someone read Matthew 12 35.

Okay.

Now John,

read

yours.

What word is missing?

The word heart.

They remove the heart, and Bill, I'm sure it's the same in yours.

I'll spare you on that one, but I'm sure it's the same.

So the word, the phrase of the heart is missing, so it does not emphasize that evil,

that evil comes from the heart of man.

I'm not sure.

You probably, you may have a New American Standard, or you probably have a King James.

Anyway, in the King James Version, it says of the heart, out of the good treasures of the heart.

I think Papa's said that one.

Now let's go to Matthew 18 11.

I want Deborah

to read this one.

Okay.

That's kind of a soul -winning verse, isn't it?

Now, John or Bill, if you have Matthew 18 11, would you read it?

Oh, you don't have verse 11.

My, my.

What about yours, John?

What was that?

Okay, John, what about yours?

Matthew 18 11.

It does have it?

That surprises me.

But it's out of yours.

It's not in, it's lacking from yours.

Okay.

All right.

Well, that surprised me.

I thought it was missing from both, but so we have half, half of them have it and half don't,

apparently.

But it removes one of the stronger verses on witnessing and, and the purpose that Jesus

came to the world for.

Mm -hmm.

Okay.

Which, which verse now?

Matthew 18 11.

Let's see what mine says.

No, mine doesn't.

Does anybody?

Does yours?

Brother Otis?

No?

Well, there may be another verse that says that.

I think there is another verse that says, uh, that, uh,

I think there's another verse similar to this.

The son of man has come to seek and save that which is lost.

That's in a different gospel.

You're right.

That's probably the one brother Otis is referring to.

Yes.

Okay.

Uh, look at, uh, Mark two 17.

Well,

mine read was

it.

I don't remember it.

Mike, I don't remember.

We can look it up after a while.

Okay.

Uh, Paul, do you have Mark two 17?

Read it.

I come not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.

Uh, Bill, do you have yours?

You just tell what word's missing.

Doesn't have leaves.

Does it leaves the word to repentance off like the other?

And John, what about yours?

So

it leaves off to repentance.

So that's twice now we've seen the omittance of the word to repentance.

So obviously we're not wanting to emphasize to repent.

We want to emphasize, just believe, believe, which is the modern gospel today,

by the way.

And Dr. MacArthur talked about that an awful lot last week or week before last when we were out there at how it's,

everybody just says, you know, just believe and they want to leave repentance out.

Well, you know why they're doing it.

Their version, their modern version of the Bible leaves repentance out.

Okay.

Now look at, uh, Mark nine 42.

These are all verses.

Anytime you pick up a Bible, uh, you can use these verses to check to see if the

Bible is from a corrupt, uh, Greek manuscript or a good Greek manuscript.

These are all little checks you can use.

Mark, uh, nine 42, who has that one?

All right, Dennis.

Okay.

If you offend one of these little ones that believeth in me, uh, it's better that you're cast into the sea.

Bill, what does yours say?

Okay.

Yours is in line.

Now what about yours, John?

What words did it leave out of yours, John?

Very important words.

In me.

You surprised me on yours, Bill.

It's in line with the received text on that verse.

The reason sometimes that happens, by the way, is because the Sinaticus and the Vaticanus disagree with each other in hundreds of

places.

And, and your version comes from a different set of scholars than John's and they chose, they either lean

more towards the Sinaticus, which sometimes the Sinaticus will favor the deity of Christ

more than the Vaticanus.

And then in other places, it agrees with the Vaticanus against the deity of Christ and some of these things.

But in John's work, the New American Standard, it does not speak of believing in Jesus at all.

It just says if you make one of these stumbles that believes, uh, you'll go into the sea.

Well now that fits the modern gospel that's coming about where, uh, I was, many of y 'all have the

books for your little children about the, what's it called?

The blue, that blue dog.

The blue, is it a dog?

Blue?

Blue's Clues.

You know what I'm talking about.

Oh, is that Ben that reads those?

I thought it was you.

That's Ben that reads.

I'm teasing.

Obviously it's not Paul, it's Ben and his dad that read it.

I was reading it last night.

But in that interesting little book for children, it was talking about at Christmastime and they were

gonna go in and visit homes and give gifts to their friends.

So they went into one home that was supposed to be a Christian home and

it worded it this way.

These are believe, people who believe in the

religion and emphasize life.

Didn't say anything about salvation or Jesus Christ, just said we believe in the miracle of life.

When it went into the Jewish home, they believed in the miracle of light.

And then went into the, what's the one the black people are doing now, the black holiday, Kwanzaa.

They believed in getting together, community getting together.

And so just, it didn't matter what you believe, it's just everybody believed.

Well that's how this verse reads in the New American Standard.

It just says, if you make anyone who believes stumble, well that means that you cannot give the gospel

to an Islamic person because you're gonna make him stumble if you give him the gospel.

Because he doesn't believe in it, but he does believe and that's not what God was saying.

The key words there are if you believe in me, Jesus said.

Now this is interesting, Mark chapter 9 verse 44 and verse 46.

One of the key parts of the gospel is that there is a literal hell, wouldn't you agree?

You remember the verse that says save some with fear?

So someone read verses 9, 44 and 46 from the King James for me,

okay?

All right, what about reading chapter 9 verse 44 and verse 46 for me, Brother Bill?

Probably gonna be a problem for you to do that.

So that entire concept of a literal hell is missing.

What about yours in the New American Standard, John?

Oh, is there a reason?

Okay, the best, not just the most ancient, but the best

ancient manuscripts.

Okay, no reason for its omission.

Okay, well, okay, so we remove

hell.

Now you say, well there are other places in these versions where it teaches the doctrine of hell.

That's true, there are.

What does that prove?

You know, if they didn't have 90 % of the Bible in them, you couldn't even call them a Bible.

So they all have the doctrines in them.

What we're discussing is if someone would corrupt manuscripts, who would do it and

why?

And if so, how could we tell the difference?

I mean, that's what's important.

John, what did you have?

Okay, are they?

Read

verse 48.

Okay,

so it is the same, and so God would not want to use repetition,

would he, when he's talking about hell?

They're all there.

Right, you knock two out of three out, it's not

hard to get the other one.

That's a good point.

Well, I've often, you've heard me, if you've been around here very long, I've often said that Jesus talked about

hell more than he talked about heaven.

You've heard me say that, because he doesn't want you to go there.

He wants you to know about the place.

Well, if you start removing the places where he talks about hell, then my statement won't be true anymore, will it?

You just, now it's equal.

I don't know.

I have a problem with removing verses like that.

What about Mark 10, 21?

Yes,

all right, take up the cross and follow me is how it ends.

John, how does yours read?

All right.

Bill, would you read yours for me?

Mark 10, 21.

Okay, so

it leaves out, take up thy cross and follow me.

All right, so that removes the idea of the fact that we're crucified in Christ.

What about Luke 24, 40?

I think you'll find this a fascinating omission.

Luke 24 and verse 40.

All

right, John, would you read Luke 24, 40?

And the reason?

Oh, so it's not in the originals, it's been added later.

Okay.

All right, Bill, same thing, so it

omits it.

So here, where we're dealing with historical evidence and proof of the

resurrection, the entire verse has been omitted, and the quote scholars who have

made these corrections say that it's because the older manuscripts, oh no, it

says the later manuscripts added it.

So the theory is that this was not in the original and someone added it later.

Oh, it said some ancient have it.

Now that's, does it say the word ancient?

Okay, let's see, that's very revealing because the Revised Standard people were a

bit more honest than the New American Standard.

They led you to believe it was the more modern ones that added it.

Yours actually says some of the ancient ones added it.

Now my question is, why don't they use the same theory consistently?

If older is always better and the ancient one had it, why is it that the ancient one

added it?

How do we know that the ancient one didn't always have it and the later one subtracted it?

Because to me, if you think about it, when we're dealing with Scripture,

if I am a person who does not believe in the bodily resurrection, which by the way is one of the most ancient

heresies, that they did not believe in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ, then I

would tend to omit verses that talk about it.

I certainly wouldn't add verses, it wouldn't be a thing to add.

I mean, I'd have to be cutting with scissors.

I couldn't be adding verses that teach that there is no bodily resurrection.

So my tendency would be to cut the verse out, not to add the verse later,

unless what I was trying to prove is that there is a bodily resurrection.

Well, why would a heretic want to prove that?

You know, because it's the truth.

Okay, so it's omitted from the modern versions.

Some add and some omit and subtracting.

So in that case, just because they're ancient, they don't buy them.

Do you see the problem?

Do you see the inconsistency?

And this has been brought, if you want to read a great book, read Dean Burgin's books.

He wrote, back when this controversy first arose, when that one that Bill is holding came out, the

Revised Standard Version, he was in the thick of the battle to fight it at that time, and I believe he won the fight.

But they've buried his works, and none of the modern scholars want you to even read them.

But he is a powerful man at arguing against these modern

translations that come from the other, quote, most ancient manuscripts.

They don't even follow their own tactics consistently, because if they're an Arian and they don't want the

deity of Christ there, they remove it, even if the ancient one has it.

We've already shown examples where the Dead Sea Scrolls have certain words that they've removed.

It really should be there.

Now, what about, let's go into John chapter 3.

This is kind of an important part of our Bibles, wouldn't you say?

John chapter 3, 15 and 16, 18, and even on down to John

3, 36, you're going to find some interesting dealing with our most popular and famous

verses on salvation.

John 3, 15, would you read that for me, Brother Russell?

All right, Brother Bill, read

yours.

What did leave out?

That you should not perish.

So you say the positive, but you omit the negative, whereas God gives you the positive and the

negative.

He says, not only are you saved forever, but it's impossible for you to lose your salvation.

So eternal security is attacked in that verse by omitting should not perish.

Now, I find this very interesting as well.

Read verse 16, Russell.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.

Read yours, Brother Bill.

His only son, so he's not begotten anymore.

Is that a fact?

Well, read verse 18, Bill.

All right, read yours,

Russell.

Seems to be an entire phrase missing from yours.

Okay, so the phrase is there.

Some of the phrase is there.

It's hard to read because it's in paragraph form.

So the phrase is there, but the word begotten is missing again.

So it's missing from verse 16 and verse 18.

So that's not just an oversight.

They're both removed.

Now this is very fascinating to me.

Look at John 3, 36.

This is one that's not even in any of the books I've studied.

I just happened upon this one myself one day back in the early 80s when I was

studying this topic.

I guess by accident I found this.

You believe that?

But anyway, read John 3, 36, Russell.

You see how it has both the positive and the negative, and both are conditioned upon the

one condition of salvation, which is belief.

Now, John, read yours.

I

don't want to embarrass Brother John, but did you notice how he said it's the same?

Alright, because if we're not careful, we'll think that.

Read yours again.

Listen very carefully.

Read yours again, Russell.

What's the condition for having life?

Alright, now read the second part.

So what's the condition for going to hell?

Not believing.

What's the condition in yours for going to hell?

Obeying.

Not obeying.

Is there, is that a significant difference?

So if now our salvation depends on not obeying, do we not have a works salvation?

And yet, if you're not very, very careful, it sounded the same, didn't it, John?

I mean, it's just one word changed.

Only one word.

But it changed it from belief to obeying.

That is a great verse to use to check your modern version out, is John 3, 36, right there.

It'll either have works salvation or it'll have grace.

And the King James and the received text has grace throughout.

Alright, what about John 6, 47?

John 6, 47.

Now, we've seen this little problem in an

earlier verse.

Who would read that in the received text for me?

Is that verse, is that verse 47?

Yeah, 647.

I don't think that's it, Papa.

Read it, Russell.

I think you may be in the wrong chapter.

You see that one, Papa?

I think you were one chapter over.

Chapter 6.

Chapter 6, verse 47.

The Lord Jesus said, he that believeth on me hath

everlasting life.

John, what does yours say?

Okay, so does it matter who you believe in?

Not in that Bible, it doesn't.

It can be Kwanzaa, is that it?

Or it can be, I need to get with Ben more often, I'm forgetting my doctrine from his little child's book.

Remember what we said about books in Sunday school?

You got to watch those children's books too.

Makes good firewood though.

Alright, how about this?

This one will astound you.

Look at Acts 837.

Acts 837.

And you realize I'm just picking a few out of hundreds.

Literally there are 5 ,000 changes, over 5 ,000.

5 ,700 and some odd changes in the New Testament alone between that version John has and the

one that the received text has.

So keep that in mind.

We're just studying five or six or ten and there are over 5 ,000 of these changes.

All the doctrines are there, yeah, but do you think 5 ,000 changes could make a difference to an antichrist who wanted to

read from a Bible?

I think it could.

Look at Acts 837.

Russell, read that one for me.

Now we already had one change in that little same passage, but this time he says, I believe that Jesus

Christ is the Son of God.

And what about Acts 837 in yours, Brother Bill?

So it's omitted.

Okay, so it takes it out of the Bible and puts it as a footnote and says,

other ancient manuscripts add this verse.

So the fact that Jesus Christ is the Son of God is removed.

Is it removed from yours, John?

A footnote.

Do they say why?

Late manuscripts insert it and Bill says ancient manuscripts inserted it.

Somebody is not doing their scholarly work right.

Okay, I was going to show you a devastating one in Acts chapter 9, verse 5 and 6.

For those of you who believe in the sovereignty of God and election and that God, where

Jesus Christ said that no man comes to me unless the Father draws him and you believe that he meant that when he said

it.

Acts 9, 5 through 6.

That's the end of the verse.

That's it.

Does it say anything about anything missing from that one?

No footnote or anything.

He just removes it.

Bill, does yours have a footnote on that or marginal reference to why that part's missing?

So it does not mention, Jesus does not say to Paul, it's hard that you kick against the pricks.

And Paul does not say to Jesus, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?

Which is our only indication that he got saved at that moment.

It's gone.

So he may or may not be saved at that moment.

I

don't, you mean in verse 5?

I don't even have the verse.

I'm reading from this little, okay, so it's Paul saying it.

That's interesting, isn't it?

Well now, let's look at another interesting thing.

Look at Acts 17, 26.

How many of you would agree that the blood is important to our

salvation?

Acts 17, 26.

Russell, do you have it?

How

many of you think the sovereignty of God is important?

How many of you think the fact of the first chapters of Genesis are important?

They go back to the creation of everything, including man and where all the races came from.

And read, read verse Acts 17, 26,

John.

Okay,

so he put, he made from one instead of one blood.

So that's, that's pretty similar actually.

I don't know, I mean, I don't like the fact that,

and Bill, is yours is similar to that at least?

Okay, well look at, let's

see, let's look at Colossians 1, 14.

Colossians 1, 14.

Russell's ready, read that one for us.

For whom we have redemption through his blood.

And Bill?

No blood.

And John?

Mm -hmm, Colossians 1, 14.

So

there's no redemption through his blood mentioned there.

All right, well let's try 1 Peter 4, 1 then, and see if we can find

any help with salvation.

1 Peter 4, 1, Brother Russell.

Okay,

so he suffered for whom?

For us.

Now go up to the first verse of that chapter, and I'm, I don't have it in front of me,

but read the first verse of chapter, 1 Peter chapter 1.

I'm sorry, where was I?

Okay, I'm in, I'm in the wrong verse.

You did read it.

All right, well I

need John to read it.

Okay, so he suffered in the flesh, but not for us.

Same with yours, Bill?

Now the interesting thing is, if you read 1 Peter, you'll find throughout that entire book that it's written to the

It's written to God's people.

And when you leave the phrase for us out, you don't know who he suffered for.

You say, well I do too.

Well that's because you've been in the Word, but if it's missing and you can't read that, then you, you have a

problem.

Look at Colossians 1, 14.

Did we do that one already?

I think we did.

Let me see which one I was looking for here.

Did we do 1 Corinthians 5, 7?

Let's do 1 Corinthians 5, 7.

It's amazing how small, seemingly

insignificant words, if they are omitted, can make a huge difference in the doctrinal understanding.

1 Corinthians 5, 7, Russell.

Okay, read just the last part of that, John, in 1

Corinthians 5, 7.

So it leaves out for us again.

You see how this would lead one to believe in unlimited atonement rather than

limited atonement.

So that's an Arminian omission.

All right, let's see, 136.

Let's go back to another hit at the concept of hell.

Look at 2

Peter 2, 17.

2 Peter 2, 17.

Russell.

Okay,

so there are apparently people who are false prophets who God has reserved

hell for them forever.

Now that teaches election.

It teaches negative election, doesn't it?

It just teaches God's in control.

I mean, God was in control of Pharaoh.

Even though Pharaoh was a lost evil person, God used him for his purposes and for his glory.

But look at it in the New American Standard Version, John 2 Peter 2, 17.

So

the black darkness is reserved but not forever.

Now you can't prove that that's an illusion to hell or an illusion to hell, I should say.

I'm sorry, illusion to hell, if you don't have the word forever.

And I'm sure Bill's probably reads similar.

It leaves off the word forever.

So it's darkness.

Well, we know that false prophets are in darkness, but we don't know from that verse that

hell is reserved forever for them.

And so that one word forever is very important, but it's omitted by these

manuscripts.

Now as far as dealing with the salvation, doctrine of salvation, that's all that we have that I wanted to

point out.

Next time we'll go into some more of our study.

We won't do only this like we did this time, but we'll put a few more of these because I want you to see some of the

attacks on the deity of Jesus Christ.

Some of the many, many times that it omits the word begotten.

We already looked at one of those today, omits that he's the begotten Son of God.

The modern versions say quite often that Joseph is his father, whereas the

received text always says that he'll just say, marry his mother.

It will never say Joseph is his father, because if Joseph is his father, then

God is not his father.

And so we'll take a few verses next time, take a little bit of time out of Next Time Sermon to look at some attacks on the deity

of Christ and the lordship of Christ, where many times they will, if you have the word Lord Jesus Christ, the phrase

Lord Jesus Christ, you'll either remove the word Lord or the word Jesus Christ, so that you don't have

Jesus and the word Lord together in the same verse very often.

And that, of course, is a modern doctrine, and they discussed that up here at our conference we went to, how people

today don't want to think of Jesus as Lord.

He's the Savior, but he's not your Lord.

In fact, later on you can make him your Lord.

That's false, because that's another Jesus.

That's not even the Jesus of the Bible.

The Jesus of the Bible is Lord.

You cannot remove his lordship from him.

It's part of his being.

So when you receive him, you receive the Lord Jesus Christ, and yet in the modern versions, normally you only receive the Lord, or

you receive Jesus Christ, but not both, because they separate the lordship and the salvation

part as often as possible.

And it's so interesting to look at the very things that these great

students of modern society, such as Dr. John MacArthur, who studies our society against the Bible,

and he'll point out the falseness in the gospel.

The presentation of the gospel is is watered down, and he points all that out, and yet if you go to the modern

versions that most of the preachers are preaching from, that's where they're getting it, because they're not even reading it.

It's not in their heart and mind, so it's very easy to forget it.

And Paul was continually reminding us, let me bring you to remembrance

of these things, and yet these versions would have us forget some very important things.

So we'll stop now for today.

Next time we'll conclude this study the best we can.

There's no way to totally conclude it, because it's so immense, but we'll conclude it for purposes of our

theological studies, and we will talk about a few verses that destroy the deity of Christ.

Let me say this, I am not one of the proponents of the King James Only movement, which

is a very divisive group of people.

They won't even fellowship with you if you use a different version.

That's not where this study is coming from.

This study is simply looking really at the Greek manuscripts, not even the English translation.

We're looking at the Greek manuscripts behind the English Bibles.

And even Dean Burgin himself, the most eloquent defender of the

received text, said, I'm not really defending the received text.

What I am saying is it's far superior to any Greek text anyone's ever come up with,

and I can prove it.

And that was his whole thesis.

And he says, as far as them proving that the received text is wrong, they've failed in their proof.

They haven't given us any proof.

And you see the the conflict Dean Burgin brings us up many times that we saw between those two versions.

One of them would say the later manuscripts omit these or add these.

The very scholars that did the same changes from the same version said the more ancient ones added

or omitted these.

And he points out they don't even agree in their own philosophy of how to approach this, and they're not

consistent.

Where they can remove something that they want to remove, even if the ancient one has it, they remove it.

Where they want to remove something that's not in the ancient one but it's in a later one, they'll say, well it's because it's a later

manuscript.

So they're not consistent, which tends to prove they're trying to make it read like they want it to read.

That's not a Bible I want.

To me that's a paraphrase.

I want to get something that's what God preserved to my generation and to every

generation between mine and the first one.

He promised he'd save it to every generation, and that's the one that we want.

So we'll conclude this next Sunday.

Let's stand and have prayer together.

Hope the chicken ain't cold.

Father, we thank you for your word and what it speaks of itself and the great encouragement that you give us when you

say you preserve your words to each generation.

We know that you have, and in our hearts we know that we have it.

And we thank you for it, for we would truly be in utter darkness without your word.

And thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ who came and was the revealer of the Father.

And thank you that in these last days you have revealed yourself unto us by the Lord

Jesus Christ.

We ask you to go with us into our time of fellowship and bless our meal, and we ask it in Jesus' name, amen.