Bibliology | Revelation In The O.T. (12/03/2000)

Park Meadows Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:00

Amen. Thank you. Let's turn to Hebrews chapter 1.

00:15

Humans forget. Isn't that a message? But then we have

00:23

Miss B to remind us, so that's a blessing, too. Josh, would you like to come up and sing for us this morning?

00:33

All right. Well, I'd like to introduce to you Mr. Josh Cox, visiting with us from Mehar, Texas.

00:40

Glad to have you with us. Let's turn to Hebrews chapter 1 and verse 1 and just kind of hold the place open there.

00:50

And let me give you just a little bit of review. And we'll get into this message this morning. Let's have a word of prayer first.

00:56

Father, we thank you so much for the service already this morning. And we ask you to call our attention to your word at this time.

01:07

Thank you for the wonderful truths you've given us that guide us as a bright light.

01:13

That we might walk down the right paths. And that we might avoid the confusion of the author of confusion.

01:22

And that we might find our minds and hearts and families and our church to be in order as the

01:32

God of order would have it. And so, Father, we ask you to guide our minds into the heavenlies for the next few moments.

01:38

In Jesus' name, amen. We've embarked on a road down the path of doctrinal studies.

01:49

And let's just call it a study of systematic theology. Time before last, before Dr.

01:57

Ball was here, we talked about several existing attitudes towards theology. One is rationalism, which is very common today.

02:07

There are two forms of it. Extreme rationalism is a philosophy that there is no divine revelation and never has been any.

02:16

In fact, there is no God. And I think Dr. Ball set that to rest last week, didn't he?

02:22

He kind of blew away the theory of evolution. But there is a more moderate form of rationalism that may even be more dangerous.

02:31

Because it is a person who believes that part of the Bible is true and part is not.

02:37

In fact, the part that makes sense to his reason is true. And the part that doesn't make sense to his reason is not true.

02:43

So that actually places this person as God. Because he then decides which part of the

02:48

Bible is God's word and which part isn't. And he's smart enough to figure it out. That's a very dangerous person.

02:56

And yet that type of person is who has taken control of most of our seminaries in this country in the last 25 to 50 years.

03:04

And many of the pulpits across this land, and unfortunately it's filtered down to the pew in many, many circles.

03:11

People who don't believe that all of the Bible is inspired and all of it is God's word.

03:17

We would call them rationalists. Second form of attitude that can be a false attitude is called mysticism.

03:24

And it is quite a problem in our day. The charismatic movement has found its popularity in this area of false belief.

03:35

And it is that there can be a person who is a mystic. Who because of his separation from this world and his separation from the pleasures of this world.

03:45

Or other reasons that he may invent in his own mind. He feels that God has favored him above all people.

03:52

And gives him messages that the others cannot find in the word of God. And therefore folks must follow this person and learn from this person.

04:01

Because the word of God does not reveal all the truths that this person knows. And this is called false mysticism and it is a great problem in our day.

04:14

Jude 3, if you'd like to look that up in your private time later.

04:21

Dispels this error. Because it says earnestly contend for the faith.

04:26

Which was once delivered unto the saints. And the word once is the Greek word hapox. Which means once and for all.

04:34

So the Bible itself teaches that the faith was delivered once and for all. And it is not still being delivered.

04:41

A third form is called Romanism. Which is the Roman Catholic Church.

04:47

This is a prevalent attitude by many people in the world. And it is that salvation comes through the church.

04:55

And the sacraments rather than through the finished work of Christ. Also there is a great stress on the authority of the church.

05:04

And church tradition above the scriptures. And then there is the

05:10

Orthodox Protestant position. Which has these main tenets. That the

05:15

Bible is infallible. That it is the only rule of faith and practice. That human reason must be made subject to the scriptures and not vice versa.

05:26

That there is no inner light in any man that allows him to add revelation. Given beyond what is contained in the

05:34

Bible. And that no authority relative to forming truth. Has ever been committed to the church or to men beyond the

05:42

New Testament writers. Now you might say well I'm a Protestant then. Because I agree with all those.

05:47

Well you're not if you're a Baptist. Because Baptists were never Protestants. Protestants actually came out of the

05:54

Catholic Church. And Baptists had a parallel line of history. That went along with the

06:00

Catholic Church. But they were never part of it. But our beliefs are very similar to those. The only thing that you would add to it is put a sixth thing is we dunk people.

06:09

We dunk them. We believe in baptism by total immersion. And that's the only biblical method of true water baptism.

06:19

And there are some other differences between us and Protestants. But in these main five tenets

06:24

I think we would agree completely. And with many other areas.

06:29

In fact there are far, far, far more areas where we agree with the Protestants. Than where we disagree with them.

06:35

The only main thing we disagree with is how many Baptists that they killed. But fortunately they're not still doing that.

06:43

Neither are the Catholics at least not in this country. Now then we talked about the different divisions of theology.

06:50

And the first one is called Bibliology. And that's where we find ourselves last time

06:56

I spoke and today. Bibliology is of course the study of the Bible. And that's a great place to start any study of theology.

07:05

So in the area of Bibliology there are several sections of study.

07:11

The first is called Revelation. And that's what we will study today. So let's think about the

07:19

Bible. Let's think about how the Bible was given. How God has revealed truths to man.

07:25

Now I want to start by asking you several questions. So listen to these questions and kind of begin to answer them in your minds.

07:34

And understand that the answers to these questions. Are not as simple to some or many as they might seem to you.

07:45

But in many Baptist churches and many other forms of churches all across this country.

07:51

The answers to these questions may not be obvious. I hope the answers are pretty obvious to you already.

07:58

But if not by the end of the day today I think they will be. The first question is this. Was God's method of revelation the same in the

08:05

Old Testament and the New Testament? The second question I want you to think about is this.

08:10

If it was not the same how was it different? What was God's method of revelation in the

08:16

Old Testament? And what was his method of revelation in the New Testament? Or of the

08:21

New Testament and of the Old Testament I should say. Another question is this.

08:26

Was the Bible completed by the end of the first century A .D.?

08:34

Was the Bible completed by the end of the first century A .D.? Or is it still being written?

08:42

And the fifth question you might ask is this. Is God still revealing doctrinal principles outside and independent from the revelatory information already given in the

08:52

Bible? Now that was a mouthful so let me read it again. Is God still revealing doctrinal principles outside and independent from the revelatory information already given in the

09:08

Bible? Now we're going to attempt to answer those questions. And we may not get them all answered today but we will answer them by the time we finish studying this idea of revelation.

09:19

So first let's compare and contrast the Old Testament and the New Testament method that God used to reveal each of those two parts of our

09:28

Bible. Let's look at the Old Testament method of revelation first. Look at Hebrews chapter 1. And I think as we read verses 1 -3 we will see the answer to the first question that I posed today.

09:40

Is there a difference between how the Old Testament was given and how the New Testament was given?

09:47

So follow along and I'll read Hebrews chapter 1 verse 1. I think that gives us an answer or a partial answer to the first question.

10:08

There seems to be some difference in the method by which God gave us the

10:13

Old Testament truths and the methods by which He gave us the New Testament truths.

10:18

Because He says very clearly in verse 2 that He hath in His last days spoken unto us by His Son.

10:25

Which seems to be in contrast to the way that He spoke in sundry times, in old times, when

10:32

He spake to us by the prophets. So let's continue here with verse 2. Whom He hath appointed heir of all things, that's

10:40

Jesus Christ, by whom He has spoken to us in these last days.

10:46

Heir of all things, by whom also He made the worlds, who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when

10:58

He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of majesty on high.

11:04

Now there's some things said about Jesus Christ in that last verse that certainly cannot be said of any of the

11:11

Old Testament prophets or the New Testament prophets. So we see there is a difference in the way that the

11:18

New Testament was given. In that it was given to us by His Son, who is the brightness of God's glory, and the express image of His person, and there is none other like that.

11:33

So there has to be a difference in the method by which it was given, if for no other reason because of the person by whom it was given to us.

11:43

In the case of the New Testament, by the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. So, now let's look at the

11:51

Old Testament method before we get into the New Testament method. It says in verse 1,

12:06

Now we have to understand that this book of Hebrews in the

12:11

New Testament was penned shortly before the destruction of Jerusalem, which was dated 70

12:18

AD. Therefore it is one of the older books of the New Testament.

12:24

It is probably older than just about every other book and epistle other than the latter books that John wrote, which would be

12:35

Revelation and 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John. And so kind of keep that in mind.

12:41

But he says, Let's look at the key elements of this part of the scriptures this morning.

12:54

We're talking about the Old Testament, Revelation. First notice that it says,

13:01

Now look at Hebrews 1 .1 and I want you to notice, I believe in your Bible, does it have a comma after the word

13:08

God? Okay, there really are not any commas in the

13:13

Greek. But the thing is that as you read it in the Greek, you get the idea that the subject of the sentence is

13:20

God and the verb or the predicate is spake. And the little phrase who at sundry times in diverse manners is a parenthetical, kind of an adjective, right?

13:33

Phrase, I have to be so careful with her sitting on the front row. But so let's do this.

13:40

Let's put a parentheses around that phrase and remove it for a moment and we'll bring it back towards the end of the sentence.

13:46

We'll kind of play like we're diagramming this sentence. And this would be one of those things we might put down on the line underneath the main line that has the subject and the verb in it.

13:56

So let's look at what it really says. Leave out that phrase and read it this way. God spake in time past and to the fathers by the prophets.

14:04

So the first point is God spake. All right. Second, Timothy 316 says that all scripture is given by inspiration of God, which which

14:16

I wish that had been rendered literally. Because in the literal Greek language, it says all scripture is

14:23

God breathed. That is the very first lesson that we must understand if we're going to understand revelation at all.

14:32

When we say revelation, we're talking about things God has revealed to man that man could have never known had gotten had

14:38

God not revealed it. You can know God is there by looking at the trees and the waterfalls and the beautiful sky and and all of God's creation.

14:49

You can know he's there. But you can't know about his character completely by just looking at nature, can you?

14:56

So most of what we know about God, the only way we know it. In fact, most of what we know about truth and absolute truth in the whole world.

15:07

The only way we know it is because God has revealed it to us. And that's what we're talking about is how did he do this?

15:14

How did he reveal these truths to us? And slightly different, though very similar, but slightly different in the

15:20

Old Testament versus the New Testament. In the Old Testament, God begins by telling us it was me that spoke to you.

15:27

It was not Moses. It was not David. It was not

15:33

Isaiah. It was me who spoke to you. God is, in fact, the author of the

15:40

Bible. And that's why we call it God's word. There were humans who were penmen that God chose to use to express his word exactly as it had already been formed.

15:52

In that other dimension, which we call the outside of time dimension. It is an eternal book and it has always existed.

16:00

And God gave it down into time, into the dimension of time, through human penmen who operated exactly according to his will.

16:07

And according to as he breathed it into their hearts and minds and as their hand put it down on the paper.

16:15

Jesus Christ himself authenticated the Old Testament and said to the jot and the tittle.

16:21

Everything shall come to pass exactly as it is written. It is a perfect book, even though human penmen had something to do with it.

16:30

But the point is God is the author of it and it is written by God. We're going to find in a few minutes that's true of the

16:36

New Testament as well. Second thing we see now, look at this. It says God spake in time past.

16:45

I want you to think about that phrase in time past. It is the Greek word palahi, which means ancient times.

16:54

Or it can be translated and has been translated a great while ago or of old.

17:01

So it's saying that God spake a great while ago or in ancient times unto the fathers by the prophets.

17:08

And that's going to be contrasted with how he speaks to us now in the last days. So we have a contrast between the last days, which we find ourselves living in, and the ancient days, which is when the

17:20

Old Testament was written. And so God is the author, it is God who spake and he spake in time past.

17:28

Now let's look and see what the method was. In time past he spake unto the fathers by the prophets.

17:35

Notice this phrase unto the fathers. There's a lot taught in that phrase.

17:40

And the main thing we need to understand is that God's word was written by God for God's people.

17:49

It was not a book that could be understood at all by those who are not saved.

17:55

And is totally undiscernable, if that's a real word, by the lost.

18:01

Let me give you a couple of verses that prove that in the New Testament. 1 Corinthians 2 verse 14 says,

18:09

But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God. For they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

18:20

Neither can he know them. The lost natural man cannot discern anything about the word of God.

18:28

Even though God wrote the book, and even though he has given it into this dimension.

18:34

Those who are not saved cannot understand anything spiritual from it. It can be nothing other than a history book to them.

18:41

Perhaps a book that contains some scientific information to them. But not a book that they can learn about God from.

18:49

Isn't that amazing? These things, they may not know them because they are spiritually discerned.

18:55

But he that is spiritual, judges all things. You can judge and discern and know spiritual things if you've been born again.

19:03

Let me give you another passage. Matthew chapter 13 and verses 13 through 16.

19:08

And we're discussing this word where it says, God spake in time past unto the fathers.

19:15

It says who he spoke to. He didn't speak to the world, he spoke to his people.

19:21

Which we now call our fathers, our spiritual fathers. The Old Testament saints. He spoke to them.

19:27

Matthew 13 verse 13 says, Therefore speak I to them in parables. Now Jesus is speaking.

19:33

And this fits the New Testament as well. But it's also true of the Old Testament. At least the principle is true.

19:39

I speak to them in parables because they seeing, see not. And hearing, they hear not.

19:47

Neither do they understand. Now how do we know that can apply to the Old Testament? It seems that Jesus is applying this to his own words.

19:53

Well we know that because he's quoting the Old Testament when he says it. In fact he mentions it in verse 14.

19:58

And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah. Which saith, by hearing ye shall hear and shall not understand.

20:05

And seeing ye shall see and shall not perceive. For this people's heart is waxed gross.

20:12

And their ears are dull of hearing. And their eyes they have closed. Lest at any time they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears.

20:19

Should understand with their heart. Should be converted and I should heal them. But blessed are your eyes for they see.

20:27

And your ears for they hear. That implies very strongly that the eyes of the lost don't see.

20:34

And their ears don't hear. And so God has given his book to his people.

20:42

In the Old Testament we call them now the fathers. It means those who were saved before us and who led the way for us spiritually speaking.

20:51

Now let's go on back into Hebrews 1 .1. It says God spake and time passed unto the fathers. And now it gives the method.

20:57

It says by the prophets. Now let me give you an important definition. I want you to jot this down if you would.

21:03

Because there's some controversy about this in theological circles today. And many of the commentaries that you will read that we would recommend.

21:10

The good commentaries. There is a slight point that I differ with them. And you can take their side if you want to.

21:16

But I'm just going to give you this definition and let you decide. Many would say today that there are still prophets.

21:22

And that the word prophet simply means to speak forth God's truth. If that is true then I'd have to say that any preacher is a prophet.

21:29

And if you use that definition then I would allow you to say there are still prophets today. But the problem with that is

21:35

I don't believe that is a proper definition of the word prophet. Either in the

21:41

Greek language or in the context of the entire Bible. Let's look at the Greek language first.

21:47

The word prophet is translated from the word prophetes. And it comes from two smaller words.

21:58

The first one is the word pro which means for. F -O -R -E. For. In front of or prior.

22:07

For. The second word is femi. Which means to show.

22:13

And so prophetes comes to mean a foreteller. Or a foreshower.

22:21

A foreteller is what a prophet is. By analogy the

22:28

Greek language definition would say he may also be an inspired speaker.

22:34

Now I'm here to tell you today that there are no inspired speakers left on the face of the earth.

22:40

During the church age. The last one died when the last apostle died. And so by a true definition of prophet there are none today.

22:49

There are no literal prophets in the true sense of the Bible. Now I said not only is it true that the definition in the

22:58

Greek means that. But I did a study one time because I was puzzled with why some of the commentators seem to say.

23:04

That they talked of preachers as being prophets today. And I thought they were being a little bit lazy with their speech.

23:11

And so I went and looked every place in the entire Bible Old Testament. And knew where the word prophet is used. And I couldn't find one place where it was not either explicitly stated or implied.

23:20

That this was a person who could tell the future. Because God gave him the ability to do that.

23:27

Now that is the difference. Now we need to understand that as we go on into our study of what the prophets are.

23:34

So we see then in Hebrews chapter 1 and verse 1. God spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets.

23:45

These prophets were unique individuals. And so don't think for a minute that they were just preachers.

23:51

Because they were not. They were far more than that. They were foretellers. They were people who had the ability given to them by God.

24:01

To see things that God had revealed to them about the future. And about his word and about what to write.

24:06

And how to pin the very truth that he wanted us all to learn. Now let's go back to that little parenthetical statement that I told you to take out just a few minutes ago.

24:17

It says at sundry times and in diverse manners. That's how he spake to us by the prophets.

24:25

Sundry times is a little bit of the old English I believe. And let me just tell you it comes from a

24:32

Greek word. Which means in many ways.

24:39

And in many times. And then when it says in sundry times in diverse manners.

24:44

The phrase diverse manners is another word that has really the same first part of the word is the same.

24:49

It's poly which means many. But it's tropos which means modes or styles.

24:55

So what it is saying is that God spake to the fathers in the old times by the prophets.

25:01

In many times in many different ways. And with many different styles.

25:08

But it was God that was speaking. And it gives you a lot in that little phrase that describes for us how

25:14

God accomplished this. Michael made it safely. I've already introduced you so everyone knows you.

25:21

And you have to memorize their names at lunch. So good to have you. I'm glad you made it safely.

25:28

We're in the New Testament in Hebrews chapter 1. So Papa didn't bring his Bible back there. But that's alright.

25:35

He's got it memorized. Just ask him if you need to know where we're headed next. Okay. Now.

25:44

Let me give you another verse to think about. Hebrews 1 .1 says God spake.

25:50

And I'm going to paraphrase it now according to the definitions we just learned. God spake in ancient days.

25:57

Unto his people. By the foretellers. The prophets.

26:03

At sundry times. Different times. And in different ways.

26:10

Turn with me if you would to 2 Peter chapter 1 in verse 20. Give you another verse that talks a little bit about how

26:17

God revealed himself to us in the Old Testament times. 2

26:22

Peter chapter 1 in verse 20 says. Knowing this that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.

26:30

Now that would blow away most of modern theology. Especially the charismatic theology. The modern tongues movement.

26:37

I call it the false tongues movement. The faith healing movement. All of the quote new doctrines that are coming out of the charismatic movement.

26:45

This verse, verse 20 would do away with them. Because it says no prophecy is of any private interpretation.

26:51

That means no man has the right to privately invent new things that God is saying.

26:59

Now of course this is written to us in the New Testament times. This is written to us at a time after the apostles had given us the

27:08

New Testament even. But it says even in that day none of that prophecy was given by private interpretation.

27:13

I'll tell you this, there is a principle in the Bible. And that is that the prophets were always the ones who discerned the prophets.

27:22

Does that make sense to you? Let me tell you a new way or a modern way we can think of it. Now that we have the word of God.

27:28

Let the Bible interpret the Bible. There is no place that if it is true will be contradicted by any other place in the

27:37

Bible. If some man stands up and tells you this is what's true now. Because I've seen this,

27:43

God has shown this to me. If you can find one place in the word of God that contradicts what he's saying.

27:49

Then it's not part of it. And the fact is now after we get through with this study.

27:54

You'll be able to say just the fact that he said that proves it's not part of it. Because he's not an apostle. He's awfully old, he's nearly 2 ,000 years old if he is one.

28:04

And so we see here then that there is no scripture given by private interpretation.

28:10

All of the scriptures will fit all of the other scriptures harmoniously. If it's given by God.

28:17

And if it's not given by God it's not scripture. Because it started out saying God spake to the fathers.

28:24

So it has to be God's word or we don't count it as part of God's word. Now look at verse 21. Now it begins to show some more about the method that God used in the

28:32

Old Testament. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man.

28:38

Now there's a lot of scriptural doctrinal quote truths. That are coming out now by a lot of the new charismatic preachers.

28:49

That seems to be coming by the will of man. They're teaching us things that they in their own will decide they want to teach us.

28:57

A great example of that that's not so recent is the book of Mormons. When Joseph Smith wrote the book of Mormons.

29:05

He claimed that it was part of God's word. But the truth is he wrote it by the will of man.

29:10

Which means he accomplished something that he desired. Which was to have more than a dozen wives.

29:16

So he wrote a book claimed it was from God. That said it's okay to do that. And problem with it is it contradicts the

29:23

Bible in hundreds of places. So it cannot be part of the canon. But he claimed it was. And a few gullible people believed it.

29:30

And their children believed it. And their grandchildren believed it. And so now we have a fairly large movement based on a man who wrote something.

29:38

According to his own ideas. They were private interpretations. They were according to his own will.

29:43

That's just one example. But there's far more damage being done by modern preachers today. As they get up and preach what they think is the truth.

29:51

And it may not fit what the whole word of God says. So the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man.

29:58

It was never done that way. But holy men of God spake as they were moved by the

30:06

Holy Ghost. Now what does that mean? Holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the

30:12

Holy Ghost. Let me give you a very simple verse that will clarify exactly the mechanics behind this.

30:18

Turn with me to Acts chapter 1 verse 16. And there are many verses like this. But this one is so clear.

30:25

Because this one takes an actual portion of scripture. Part of the

30:30

Psalms. And we say that David. King David is the author of most of the

30:36

Psalms. And when we say that we really mean he's the penman. Because God is the author. And you'll see that very clearly in this verse.

30:44

Now if it is truly done according to God's methods. Then the prophecy was given by first of all a holy man.

30:51

Isn't it interesting that most of the cults if you study them. And you look at the life of the founder of the cult.

30:58

Many times they were adulterers. Or adulteresses. And they were a part of uncleanness in their lives.

31:05

This verse says they must be holy men. And then secondly. It says that God spake to them as they were moved by the

31:15

Holy Ghost. Now let's look at Acts chapter 1 verse 16. This shows exactly how God did this. And it uses

31:21

David as an example. And we're talking about part of the Psalms. And it says.

31:27

Men and brethren this scripture must needs have been fulfilled.

31:32

Now look at this phrase because it teaches the method. Which the Holy Spirit by the mouth of David spake.

31:42

Now if you go back to your grammar that you had in grammar school. When you had to diagram the sentences.

31:49

You remember that? That's fun isn't it? When we all like to go out and have to do about 20 of them. Before supper time.

31:56

Well she's just smiling down here. She gets a kick out of it. Assignments like that.

32:02

But how would you diagram this? If you said that this scripture must be fulfilled.

32:10

Which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake. Who is the subject in that last phrase?

32:17

Where it says the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake. Was it the

32:22

Holy Ghost or was it David who was speaking? The Holy Ghost is the subject.

32:28

And what's the verb? Spake. So the Holy Ghost spake. The Holy Spirit of God spake.

32:34

But how did he do it? Through the mouth of David. The word by can be translated through many times.

32:40

Most of the time in the New Testament it's through. So the Holy Spirit spoke through David's mouth. That's how we got the

32:47

Psalms. And we say David is the author of Psalms. No he's not. He's the secretary.

32:52

He was God's secretary. He typed it. He wrote it. He penned it. But God was the author of it.

32:59

And so we see through and through as we study. How the Old Testament was given. That that is the method.

33:04

Now many parts of the Old Testament. That are contested by modern scholars.

33:10

Now remember back when we reviewed. A few moments ago. Some of the elements.

33:19

Of modern theology. And. What different types of rationalism did we have?

33:31

There was the extreme type. Which is a person who doesn't believe there is a God. But there was the dangerous type.

33:37

Which is a person that believes there's God. And that he spoke to us. And some of it's in the Bible. But some of the rest of what the

33:43

Bible says. Is probably not true. Because it doesn't match my reason. Well that type of person.

33:51

Has infiltrated our seminaries. And they are the people in many cases.

33:57

Who teach our young preachers how to preach. And they totally strip them of any faith.

34:02

That they may have had when they went to seminary. Many times. I don't mean in all cases. But many times this has happened.

34:08

And it's still happening. And they even go. In fact I can say it by experience. Because when

34:13

I went to Baylor University. I was not a Christian yet. I thought I was. But I wasn't one. But I vividly remember sitting in the required.

34:23

Theology classes that you had to take. One of my professors was named Dr. Christian.

34:28

And he taught that none of the miracles in the Bible really happened. Thought his name was kind of ironic.

34:34

Should have been called Dr. Devil. But he was Dr. Christian.

34:39

And he taught that none of the miracles happened. And that you could explain all of them through natural phenomena.

34:47

Now. He probably would not believe. That a real fish swallowed a real man named

34:53

Jonas. Would he? Let alone that Jonas was spit out.

34:59

Three days later. And was alive. And went and preached in a city. A literal city.

35:05

He probably wouldn't believe that. Would he? But let's look and see what the Lord Jesus Christ. Said about that very event.

35:10

And what I'm pointing out to you right now. Is that Jesus Christ. Himself authenticated the Old Testament.

35:16

He not only said it. But he never said it was a book of good sayings. He said it is the

35:22

Word of God. And it is absolutely accurate. To the jot. And the tittle.

35:28

Which to them was the cross of the T. And the dot of the I. But he authenticates.

35:33

Portions of the Bible. That modern scholars say never even happened. In Matthew chapter 12.

35:38

In verse 40. Jesus said this. He said for as Jonas. Just as Jonas.

35:45

Was three days and three nights. In the whale's belly. So shall the son of man.

35:50

Be three days and three nights. In the heart of the earth. Do you see how that. If you could be a skeptic.

35:56

And say that it was impossible for Jonah. To be in the stomach of a fish. And be regurgitated three days later.

36:03

And still be alive. All the sudden if that's impossible. Then you have just said that it's impossible.

36:08

That Jesus was in the grave three days and three nights. And came back alive. Because Jesus said it's the same.

36:15

He said just as that happened. That's what's going to happen to me. And so Jesus authenticated.

36:23

The story of Jonah and the whale. And said it was a literal story. In Matthew chapter 23 verse 35.

36:31

Jesus Christ authenticates the entire Old Testament. Because he mentions righteous

36:36

Abel. Who is found in the first book of the Old Testament. Genesis. And he goes all the way to the blood of Zacharias.

36:43

Which is found in the last book of the Hebrew Bible. The Hebrew Old Testament. Zacharias is the last book.

36:51

And so he gives you the first book of the Old Testament. The last book. And everywhere in between.

36:57

And he says these things are the word of God. In Matthew 5 .18. Jesus himself said.

37:03

For verily I say unto you. Till heaven and earth pass. One jot or one tittle.

37:09

Shall in no wise. Pass from the law. Till all be fulfilled.

37:14

Does that sound like a man. Who thinks you can pick and choose. Little parts of it you want to believe. He says you better believe every period.

37:22

And every I that's dotted. And every T that's crossed. Because not one bit of it.

37:27

Is going to go without being fulfilled. Jesus said. Now that gives us the idea.

37:33

Of the revelation of the Old Testament. When we come back after lunch. Here in a few moments.

37:39

We're going to talk about the slight difference. About an important difference. About how the

37:44

New Testament was given. So don't go away. Because you'll miss that. And it is slightly different.

37:50

And we need to understand the important difference. And then we're going to try to answer. The rest of those five questions.

37:57

That we asked when we started. So please stand. And have a word of prayer together. And we'll be dismissed. And come back at 1 .15.

38:03

Brother Otis is going to give me. The afternoon session today. So we'll continue this.

38:12

Brother Clarence. Would you pray. And ask the Lord to dismiss us. And bless the meal.

38:17

about to have together. Amen.