The Heart of a Shepherd 1Thess2:17-20 Worship Service | The Vulgar Bible and the Big Picture, Part2

All right, Dave, are we ready to go? All right, please come in and find your place and have a seat for adult

Sunday school class. We're going to get started.

We have about 500 years of church history that we want to cover today. We did 1 ,000 years of church history last

Sunday, and we're going to slow down a little bit today in terms of the number of years, but we still have a lot of material that we're going to cover.

So let's begin with prayer, and then we'll get started. Father, we are so grateful to you for your goodness and your provision and for the mercy that is this day, that you've given us this time to be here, and you've called us to yourself.

We thank you for giving us this place to meet, and for all who are gathered here, we enjoy such rich blessings from your hand, and we thank you for them, and we pray that during our time here of study and reflection upon your work through history that you would help us to understand how it is that you have given us a

Bible in our own language, and we thank you that you are doing this work of spreading your Word throughout the world, and you are using your

Word to call your sheep to yourself. We are grateful for that and pray that you would continue to do that work and that you would help us to understand how you have worked through others to make it possible for us to enjoy this blessing.

Open our eyes to that and bless this time, keep us alert and fixated upon the truth, we pray in Christ's name, amen. All right, so just a little bit of review, we're doing

God Wrote a Book and looking at how we got our English Bible. For the sake of simplicity and to kind of make it easy for us to understand, we've sort of divided the last 2 ,000 years into three periods of history, the first period being the post -apostolic age from Paul to Jerome, covering about 100

AD to 400 AD, and that is the…we looked at how we got…how we went from Greek dominating the

English…the Greek dominating the language landscape to Latin being the language of the people, and so there was a need for somebody to translate the

Scriptures from Greek into Latin, and Jerome did that, and Jerome produced the Latin Vulgate, and that was the first major step in getting us a

Bible in our own language. From the second period was from 400 AD to about 1500, and this is the

Dark Ages or what we would call the pre -Reformation period of time, and that pre -Reformation period of time was the three key figures,

John Wycliffe, who's the morning star of the Reformation, Desiderius Erasmus who produced…and

Wycliffe started the translation of Scriptures into the English language, and that was the 1300s, and then

Desiderius Erasmus, he was the first one to produce a Greek New Testament, a

New Testament text in the Greek language which he put together from all of the various manuscripts that he had, and this of course was influential for the work of both

William Tyndale as well as Martin Luther. When we get to the Reformation, it's kind of as if our…when we get to the

Reformation it is as if our train tracks diverge as it were, they split apart. At the time of the

Reformation there were efforts to translate Scriptures into all kinds of languages, various different languages, and so we're just focusing right now on the

English language, keeping in mind that Luther would have used Erasmus' text to produce a German Bible and other people were working on French translations and Spanish translations, etc.

So we're just now kind of focusing in on the English Bible because that is what concerns us, how we got a Bible in our own language.

And then of course the third figure there was William Tyndale, he's known as the father of the English Bible, living from 1494 to 1536, and he produced an entire

New Testament in the English language, and that was his life's work, and eventually Tyndale was killed for his efforts at translating the

Bible into English. So now we are in Roman numeral number three, the post -Reformation era from Tyndale to you, that is from about 1525 to the present day.

One correction real quick before I move on, I had somebody email me this last week saying that I had mispronounced two words that caused them a great sense of joy, and so I want to…and then she was gracious enough to send me an audio clip of the proper pronunciation of these two words.

So I would like to play that for you. Dave, are you ready here? Check, check, check. Okay. Here we are. Gloucestershire.

Gloucestershire. Lollards. Lollards. Now you see that was not just the proper pronunciation but also in the beautiful accent that makes it sound so nice.

Did you notice the two words? I said lollards. Yeah, and it's not whoosh -ish -ish -shire but it's gloucestershire.

So here it is again. Gloucestershire. Gloucestershire. Lollards.

Not lollard. Lollards. There you go. You're welcome.

So now that the era is clear, another correction. Number three, the post -Reformation era.

So, we're going to cover today, and this is just hitting some high points here, and Paul Taylor knows a tremendous amount about English history and Wales and Scotland and that whole area, so if I'm making anything wrong here,

I will surely get a correction from Paul at some point during this. Beginning in the 1500s, there were many efforts taking place concurrently to translate the

Bible into the English language. Tyndale died in 1536, remember that date, 1536, but by the time that he was finally killed for his efforts at translating the

Bible into English, there was public sentiment that was beginning to change, both amongst the people as well as amongst government rulers.

Tyndale's work opened the door for a flood of Bible translations and translation work and Bible publications, and remember that prior to this, you also had the arrival of the printing press and the invention of the paper mill and the creation of paper, so it made publishing

Bibles and creating Bibles much easier and much cheaper than it had ever been up to that point. So, the first one after Tyndale was known as the

Coverdale's Bible. It began circulating in 1536, which was the year that Tyndale died.

It was published by Miles Coverdale, and he translated the Old Testament where Tyndale had left off. Remember, Tyndale completed the

New Testament translation, and he had done parts of the Old Testament, Genesis, Jonah, some of the Psalms, and a couple of other books.

Well, Miles Coverdale, who was a friend of Tyndale and an associate of Tyndale, he finished the Old Testament, and he was not a scholar like Tyndale was, which is something you would say of almost everybody who has lived throughout church history.

Do you remember Tyndale was fluent, a master of six different languages besides English, French, Greek, Hebrew, German, Italian, Latin, Spanish, and English, and he was fluent in all of those.

So Coverdale, many of the people who followed Tyndale did not have the intellectual heft that Tyndale had and his abilities with the various languages.

So the Coverdale's Bible contained Tyndale's New Testament virtually unaltered, and it offered a full translation of the

Old Testament. This translation was significant because it was the first to circulate without official opposition.

It was the first translation of the Bible to circulate without official opposition from government leaders or church leaders.

And in a political stroke of genius, Coverdale dedicated it to Anne Boleyn, who was one of Henry VIII's wives.

Remember Henry VIII? Henry VIII, I am. Rick, you're shaking your head. Henry VIII, I am,

I am. I got married to the widow next door. She's been married seven times before, and everyone's been a

Henry. She wouldn't have a Willie or a Sam. I'm her eighth old man. I'm Henry. Henry VIII, I am. Anybody else know that song or just me?

There's a couple. All of them older folks. That makes me feel horrible. Okay. All the young people looking at me like, what?

I didn't make that up. Okay, so that was the Coverdale's Bible. Then the Matthew's Bible.

It was published by a man named John Rogers under the pen name of Thomas Matthew. He was a converted chaplain of the

English house. Tyndale had stayed with Rogers before he was betrayed and then later arrested and executed.

He took Coverdale's Bible and he improved the translation because Rogers knew Greek and Hebrew, and that's something that Coverdale was not proficient in.

Coverdale did not know those. This Bible, the Matthew's Bible, contained Tyndale's New Testament, virtually unaltered, and it was the first Bible published with the king's permission.

Likewise contained a dedication, and likewise it contained a dedication to the king. If you want the king to not oppose and maybe even circulate what you've published, dedicate it to the king.

So there's a lot of political maneuvering going on, right? Dedicated to the king's wife, dedicated to the king. Hopefully it will be well received.

There's a little bit of that going on there. His name was not

James. We will get to King James here in just a second, but pace yourself, Rick, pace yourself. Henry VIII ran his eyes over Coverdale's Bible and Tyndale's name did not appear on it, and the bishops assured him, his bishops assured him, that they could find no error in it, so Henry gave his consent to it.

Henry then ordered that the Matthew's Bible contained the note on the bottom of the cover page, quote, set forth with the king's most gracious license.

And then on September 5th of 1538, Henry ordered every church in England to display, quote, one book of the whole

Bible of the largest volume in English. And the king commissioned Coverdale to revise

Matthew's Bible so that a single recognized edition could be publicly displayed, and this of course led to the great

Bible of 1539, which we'll get to in just a moment. The king ordered that a copy be displayed in every parish in the land under penalty of a fine of four times the cost of the

Bible for every month of delay. So you went from the king, the ruler, hunting down Tyndale and executing him in 1536, two years later, two years after Tyndale's death, the king was circulating the

New Testament in the kingdom and ordering that every parish in the land publicly display a copy of the

English Bible so that everybody could read it and see it. In November 14th of 1539,

Henry sent to all the printers and sellers of books royal encouragement for, quote, the free and liberal use of the

Bible in our own material, in our own maternal English tongue, close quote. So you remember what

Tyndale's prayer was when he died? Lord open the king of England's eyes, remember that?

Two years later, the king of England is ordering that every parish publicly display an

English translation of the Bible, both Old and New Testament. So that led to the Great Bible of 1539.

Having commissioned a revision of Matthew's Bible, the Great Bible was produced and this was the one that was ordered to be displayed in every parish and ordered to be read in all the services.

By 1540, so this is four years after Tyndale died for translating the Bible into English, by 1540,

Bibles were circulating freely with the king's endorsement. So we went from having the first Bible produced, the

Coverdale Bible, the first Bible produced without opposition, without official opposition, to having the first Bible actually mandated to be displayed amongst the people in every parish in the land in a matter of four years after Tyndale's death.

By 1539, King Henry had received so many complaints because people gathered around the Bible and read it aloud during the mass.

Remember that everybody didn't have a Bible in their own hands in those days. It might be that the only

Bible that you had in your town was in the parish and it was publicly displayed there.

So people would come in for the mass and you would have people going forward and they would be reading the Scripture out loud to people because there was such a hunger and thirst for the

Word of God and this would cause, of course, many disturbances. The priest is up there trying to do his magic with the mass and people are coming up right at the front of the chamber and reading

Scripture aloud to people and they had a hard time dissuading people from doing that and quieting the people down because they hungered so much for Scripture.

So, the Great Bible became known as the Chained Bible because it was chained to the pulpit to discourage theft.

You only had one Bible in your town. Now, here's a question. If you had to steal a Bible to have a copy of Scripture in your home, would it be sin to do it?

I'm not even going to answer that question but apparently other people said yes so they chained the Bible to the pulpit in many of these parishes and so the

Great Bible became known as the Chained Bible. Henry died in 1547 but at the end of his life he turned against the

Reformation movement and then he ordered the destruction of translations by Tyndale and Coverdale. He ordered the death of anyone caught with him in his possession but by that time it was of no effect because the

Bible was everywhere. So even his efforts at the end to reverse what he had done earlier in his life ended up coming to nothing because the

Bible had been so widely distributed by that point. Next up is the Geneva Bible.

This requires a little bit of historical context to understand this.

Edward VI tried to offer alternative translations after the death of Henry VIII.

Now Henry VI ruled from 1547 to 1553, a very short period of time, six years, and he wanted to produce alternate translations, something other than the

Coverdale and the Great Bible. Mary I, who took over after Edward VI, she reigned from 1553 to 1558.

She persecuted Protestants and she tried to return England to Roman Catholicism. She's the one that is called

Bloody Mary. She burned at the stake John Rogers, burned 300 other people who remained faithful to the

Reformation, and her persecution of the Protestant faith and Protestant peoples ended up causing a mass exodus of linguistic scholars who fled

England with their Greek and Hebrew manuscripts and Latin manuscripts in hand, and they landed in Geneva.

What was going on in Geneva at the time? Anybody know who's a famous pastor in Geneva about this period of time?

John Calvin was there, and John Calvin obviously was very sympathetic to the Reformed doctrines. So all of these scholars went to a place where there was a pastor and a city very favorable to the

Reformation and to their theological convictions. So these linguistic scholars, with their manuscripts in hand, showed up in Geneva and found sanctuary there under the teaching of John Calvin.

They published the Geneva Bible in 1557. They printed the New Testament in 1560.

They printed the Old Testament. And here are a couple of the strengths of the Geneva Bible. The Geneva Bible used

Tyndale as their basis and revised his work for the better. They also used Theodore Bayes' Latin version of the

Scriptures as a reference. They had the latest Greek text of Robert Esteen, who was printed in 1550, and I remember

Erasmus had produced a Greek text of the New Testament, and later on Robert Esteen, he had produced a

Greek text of the New Testament as well in 1550. And so they had the latest available manuscripts to them, and they produced a

Bible that was very readable and very accurate. And here are a couple of notable features. It quickly became the first, the number one

Bible, and was so for 50 years. The Geneva Bible just dominated the landscape. It contained study notes that reflected strongly a

Reformed Protestant theology of Calvin. In fact, I think that the Geneva Bible was the first Bible to include the text of Scripture along with study notes.

You and I are used to having study notes next to our Bibles. The Geneva Bible was the first one to do that. It was the

Bible that was used, this was the Bible that was used by later Reformers, Puritans and Pilgrims who sailed on the Mayflower in 1620, it was used by Shakespeare.

During Shakespeare's lifetime, there were 142 different editions of the Geneva Bible that were printed.

That shows you its popularity. In fact, its popularity is seen in the fact that it was still being printed in 1644, which was 33 years after the

King James hit the market. It was that popular, the Geneva Bible was. Oliver Cromwell used the

Geneva Bible for his army in 1643, and 200 years later after Oliver Cromwell, it was distributed to federal soldiers in the

American Civil War. The translation, more than any other, built up the

Reformation efforts in the land of England and strengthened the Reformation in England.

About a half a million copies were printed in England among a population of only six million people. That means that there was one

Geneva Bible for every 12 people in England at that time. Geneva Bible was the first Bible to use verse divisions.

It was the first to use italics for words that were not in the original but that were added for clarification.

You kind of take that stuff for granted in your modern translations, right? The Geneva Bible is the first one to do that. It was the first one to contain cross -references in the margin.

Summaries were included at the beginning of each new chapter, and it was the first full translation of the

Old Testament directly from Hebrew. It contained maps illustrating the Holy Land and even locating the

Garden of Eden. I'm waiting for a response to that. Do we know where the

Garden of Eden was? We can't know why. Why? We can't know where. Why? Because the world was flooded and the whole topography of the entire planet has been changed.

But the Geneva Bible contained, I don't know if they were old earthers in those days, I doubt it, but they tried to locate it in the

Garden of Eden. Sometimes it is referred to as the Geneva Bible, this is. Sometimes it's referred to as the

Breaches Bible because Genesis 321 is rendered, quote, the Lord God made breeches of skin for Adam and his wife, close quote.

Do you know what breeches are? We call them breeches, right, pants. And so it's sometimes called the

Breaches Bible. Now while the Geneva Bible was being produced, in the meantime, Catholics were busy producing their own translation, which is the

Bishop's Bible of 1568, and this is letter F. The Bishop's Bible was commissioned by Elizabeth I in England as an answer to the

Geneva Bible. Elizabeth succeeded Bloody Mary and she reversed back toward Protestantism.

The Geneva Bible was not as popular with the English clergy since it was far more Protestant. The Geneva Bible was not popular with the

English clergy because it was far more Protestant, and so there was an effort made to produce the Bishop's Bible as sort of an answer to that.

Although it was a good revision of the Great Bible, which remember was the Coverdale -Matthews Bible revision combination, although it was a great revision of that, it did not match the readability of the

Geneva Bible. Translators of the Bishop Bible were outclassed by the greater ability, the translation ability of the

Geneva Bible translators, and it was unfortunately the Bishop's Bible and not the Geneva Bible that formed the basis for the next major revision, which was to enter the stage.

Does anybody know what that next major Bible translation was? Rick? The King James. But before we get to that, the

Rimes -Douay Bible of 1582. Now just in case I pronounced that wrong, Paul, how would you say that? Rimes -Douay?

Reams? Did I get Douay right? Okay, Reams -Douay.

So, the zeal… Some of these places overseas, you've got to get the people who came from overseas to answer the question.

The zeal of the people over the Protestant Bible translations forced the Roman Catholic Church to try and produce their own translation.

So, just think of this as an effort by Rome to counter the Geneva Bible and the

Protestant versions with their own Bible. An edition of the New Testament was produced in 1582 at the

English College of Reams, and an edition of the Old Testament was produced in 1609 and 1610 at the

College of Douay. The Reams -Douay translation was the first Roman Catholic edition of the English Bible.

It was produced as a reaction against the Protestant Reformation, and it was not produced from Greek and Hebrew text, but from, does anybody remember from last week?

The Vulgate, because the Roman Catholic Church will not authorize any translation that doesn't come from the Latin Vulgate. They're not interested in the

Greek and Hebrew, it's the Latin Vulgate, Jerome's Latin Vulgate that is their standard. So, the Reams -Douay translation was the first Roman Catholic edition of the

Bible, but it didn't come from the Greek and Hebrew text, it came from the Latin Vulgate. One of the principles of the translation for the

Reams -Douay translation was, if the Latin contradicts the Greek, you go with the Latin, not the original

Greek text. Letter H, the King James Version or the Authorized Version of 1611.

Now, here's a little bit of the historical context. See, we're moving through history now, we're taking smaller steps, but we're still moving through history at quite a pace here.

James I has succeeded Elizabeth in 1603, and he called a church conference to discuss the problems in the church and the issues of religious tolerance.

Why do we have all of these fights going on between Protestants and Catholics? Not being theologically educated, I don't think

King James understood what some of those theological issues were, but he didn't like the fact that everybody's fighting over these doctrinal issues.

So, like Rodney King, he was just saying, can't we all just get along? The only result, this was known as the

Hampton Court Conference, and the only result of that meeting that was worth noting was a resolution at the end, and it kind of served as a postscript to the meeting itself that read this, quote, that a translation be made of the whole

Bible as consonant as can be to the original Hebrew and Greek, that is as close or true to the original Hebrew and Greek, and this to be set out and pointed without any marginal notes and only to be used in all churches in England at the time of divine service, close quote.

So James wanted a Bible translation that would be accurate to Hebrew and Greek, in other words, he wanted it to be translated from those manuscripts and not the

Latin Vulgate. He wanted a translation without any marginal notes in it. Why do you think King James didn't want the marginal notes like the

Geneva Bible had? It's too Reformed. He didn't want the Reformed doctrines working their way in there.

He's trying to strike a middle road between Protestants and Catholics, and to do so you have to get rid of any notations in the text.

And then third, he wanted it and only it, that is this translation that he was commissioning or requesting to be only available in all of the

English services. This translation, even though it is known as the King James translation, was no more a work of James I than Coverdale's Bible was a work of Henry VIII.

In other words, King James wasn't there overseeing the translation of the text. King James did not do that. It's known as the authorized version because of this commission from James I, even though it was never officially authorized by either the

King or the Parliament. The process of translation is very interesting. James I laid down some of the main requirements that he wanted that were to be followed.

First, as I already mentioned, there were to be no study notes. James was the son of Mary, the Queen of the Scots, and so the notes of the

Geneva Bible for him were way too Protestant, so he wanted those taken out. Yes. No, not

Bloody Mary. Mary, different Mary. It's like the New Testament, there's so many Marys it's hard to keep them all straight. So not

Bloody Mary. James wanted to get rid of all the notes because he was very sympathetic towards Roman Catholicism.

The translators began in 1607 and they set out not to do a new translation but to revise the

Bishop's Bible. Forty -eight choice scholars in Greek and Hebrew were divided into six groups, two groups each at Westminster, Oxford, and Cambridge.

Each group was assigned books to translate and the work of each group was reviewed by the other groups. Delegates from each group smoothed out the difficult spots in the translation so thus the translation was really the product of no individual group but a product of the reviewers as a whole.

So they divided them up and assigned books and then the review translation, the review committee then took all of that and sort of smoothed out some of the differences.

And this is why because it was translated by various different groups, this is why sometimes in some books you have a particular

Hebrew or Greek word translated one way and then the exact same word in a similar context translated entirely differently in another place.

We'll talk about some of the translation issues here in just a moment. The translators tried to steer a middle course between Protestantism and Catholicism and whether they were successful or not is a matter of debate.

So after two years and nine months of translation and work, in 1611 the King James Version officially rolled off the presses.

Now it was greeted with the same type of response that are typically greet new translation of Scripture.

Critics felt that there was no need for a new translation. They would say, we have the Latin Vulgate, why do we need another translation?

Or we have the Coverdale Bible, or we have the Geneva Bible, why do we need yet another translation? Or they would say if the

Geneva Bible is good enough for Paul and the Apostles, it was good enough for us. Right? That's kind of the attitude. Now keep in mind that these are the same things the

King James only advocates will say today of the King James Bible. If we have the King James and it's served us well for 500 years, why is it that we would need a whole other

Bible? Why do we need another Bible translation? The translators included a preface to the authorized 1611 version which answered the critics and sought to justify their efforts in producing yet another translation.

The new translations have always been met with these objections. For instance, Augustine objected to Jerome's translation of the

Latin Vulgate, Rome objected to Wycliffe's efforts to translate into English, critics objected to Tyndale's work.

Every translation has faced this criticism, even the King James translation. And today the people who object to any further modern

Bible translations will use the same arguments that were used against the King James in that day. Like every version before it, the

King James had its critics. Many had been used to the Geneva Bible. Dr. Hugh Broughton, recognized

Greek and Hebrew scholar of the time, he was not asked to be on the translation committee because he was working on a revision of the

Geneva Bible and Broughton hated the King James translation and he told the King so saying this, quote, "'The cockles of the seashore and the leaves of the forest and the grains of poppy may as well be numbered as the gross errors of this

Bible," close quote. So it had its critics, the King James translation did, and for some legitimate reasons because it's not a perfect translation.

So let's get into that, the good and the bad of the King James translation. And we'll get into this a little bit more as terms of the philosophy of translation when we get together in two weeks, no, two weeks from now is

Easter Sunday. There's no Sunday school that day, breakfast instead on April 11th when we get back in here we have one more lesson to do in this, we'll talk about modern translations.

Here are some of the bad with the King James translations. In some ways, the King James version was a step back from the

Geneva Bible because it had Roman Catholic sympathies and some word choices reflect that.

For instance, the Geneva Bible will use the word acknowledge where the King James uses the word confess, acknowledge or confess.

Now you can see how the idea of confessing your sin or confessing something kind of plays into the

Roman Catholic idea or doctrine of confession. The Geneva Bible would use the word love, the

King James used the word charity. Why is that significant? The word charity has the idea of doing acts of good work or of giving something to charity or doing charity, kind of communicates the idea of doing something, something over and above love.

The Geneva Bible would translate a word congregation and the King James would translate it as church.

So there are issues of Roman Catholic theology that played into the translation of some words in the

King James translation. Another example is John 10 verse 16, and other sheep

I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring and they shall hear my voice and there shall be one fold and one shepherd.

That's the King James translation. Well the Geneva Bible had used the word flock and Tyndale had used the word flock.

Why the difference between fold and flock in John 10? Anybody want to guess why that's a significant?

This is going to seem so insignificant to you and I, but keep in mind in the midst of the controversy between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism when wars were being waged over these issues, these theologies, these were significant issues of discussion at the time.

Why is fold more Roman Catholic than flock? What's that?

Fold is people? It goes back to what you said here, the idea of a sheep fold was a structure.

It was a visible structure. You communicate, you use the word flock and it has to do with just its people.

The people is the flock. Those are individual peoples, but in ancient times sheep would be gathered into folds which were structures where the sheep were kept.

Well Roman Catholicism was sympathetic to the idea of there being one visible structure that contained

God's people. And what was that one visible structure? The Roman Catholic Church. That was the one structure.

So that gives you an idea of how sometimes the word choices themselves were very sympathetic in the

King James toward Roman Catholicism. Here are some good points with the

King James translation. Despite the attacks, the King James surpassed the Geneva Bible in popularity and became the main

English translation for the next 350 years. So despite those attacks, it did become a standard in many ways for the next three centuries.

In all fairness, it is a solid translation. It is influenced by Greek and Hebrew texts. The text is for Septus, and so the

King James translation is not an evil translation. That's not what I'm saying. I'm not saying the King James is evil, that it's corrupt, that it's wicked, that if you read it for your devotional time that you're going to end up a

Roman Catholic. There are all kinds of independent fundamentalist Baptists who believe the King James, the King James, thank you

Josh, they believe the King James version is the inspired translation, the second inspired translation, who would also disparage the modern -day

Pope as the Antichrist. So just because you like the King James does not make you Roman Catholic.

It doesn't mean that you're going to hell, it doesn't mean any of that. So there are some good elements to the King James translation.

The translators did not see themselves as producing the last and greatest translation. And in their introduction to the revision of their translation, in answering their critics, they were open to the fact that their translation would be revised and improved over time as more manuscripts would be discovered and as the understanding of ancient languages would continue to develop and we would learn more about ancient languages and cultures.

In other words, the translators of the King James did not see themselves as issuing a new inspiration of a divine text.

They saw themselves as offering what they believed to be a very good solid translation and one that they were open to having revised over time.

They completely foresaw as a possibility and a likelihood and as a good thing modern translations that would come after the

King James. It had some issues. There were some poor wordings of the King James and some of them continue even through till today.

For instance, in Matthew 27 verse 44, it translates the word revile, the thief who reviled

Jesus, as, quote, cast the same in his teeth, close quote. Revile or cast the same in his teeth.

Do you think that there's a better translation of that phrase than that and yet it's persisted over all of this time?

In Romans 5 .22, Romans 5 .3, Romans 5 .11, the same word appears as rejoice, as glory, and as joy.

In other words, the same word in the same context having the same meaning is translated three different ways in the King James. Now, considering what they set out to do, which was to produce a middle -of -the -road

English translation and to revise the Bishop's Bible using the Greek and Hebrew text and considering the resources that they had, which was limited original texts that they had on hand, they had limited original texts as well as a far more limited understanding of ancient languages than we have today, they did a very outstanding job of producing a readable, glorious -sounding, high and lofty translation of the

English Bible. The King James is a good translation in that way. The King James was the first complete

Bible to be printed on our continent in 1871. And through the course of the various printings of the

King James, there have been some printing errors. For instance, Matthew 26 .36 in one printing read, then cometh

Judas instead of then cometh Jesus. One printing deleted the word not from the seventh commandment, so it read, thou shalt commit adultery, and that printing was titled,

The Wicked Bible. There were other printing errors including this, the deletion of no from no more see at Revelation 21 .1,

the unrighteous inheriting the kingdom at 1 Corinthians 6 .9 instead of the unrighteous not inheriting the kingdom.

Printers have persecuted rather than princes have persecuted at Psalm 119 .161. The use of sin on more rather than sin no more at John 5 .14.

The parable of the vinegar rather than the parable of the vineyard at Luke 20. Philip denying

Jesus rather than Peter at Luke 22 .34. The use of lions instead of loins at 1 Kings 8 .19.

The use of the fishes shall stand rather than fishers at Ezekiel 47 .10.

The switching of wife for life at Luke 14 .26. And the switching of camels for damsels with reference to Rebecca at Genesis 24 .61.

Those are various printing errors. On page, I don't know what page it is, but towards the end of the lesson, in fact the last page of this lesson, you can see a writing out there of the

English of the 1611 translation. You can see how much more difficult that is to read.

That's the 1611 text that you have in front of you. Now, King James Only advocates will say that which was published in the 1611, the authorized translation, that is

God's Word. And if you don't have this, and these are radical King James Only advocates, they'll say if you don't have that, you don't have

God's Word in your own language. That's the claim that they will make. I want you to know that I do not know nor have

I heard of any single 1611 King James Only advocate who reads the 1611

King James translation of the Scriptures. They don't because for many of them it would be almost unreadable.

The King James translation went through a number of revisions. Revisions came out in 1612, 1613, 1616, 1629, 1638, 1659.

Revisions were made by Whitby in 1703, by Wells in 1718 to 1724, by Mace in 1729, by Winston in 1745, and by Blaney in 1769.

In fact, most modern King James translations of the Scriptures come from what is known as the

Blaney translation or the Blaney revision of 1769. So the 1611 Only advocates, they're actually reading a 1769 translation of the

King James Bible. Since the King James of 1611, there have been discovered thousands of New Testament Greek texts including the

Codex Alexandrius, remember when we talked about the big manuscript families that have been found?

There have been thousands of Greek texts that have been discovered since the 1611 King James translation was made, including

Codex Alexandrius from 400 A .D. It contains the best copy of the book of Revelation that we have in existence.

And you remember, Desiderius Erasmus, when he produced his Greek translation, or sorry, his

Greek text, this was of course after Jerome, when

Erasmus produced his Greek text, the only copy that he had of Revelation was missing the last page, so you remember what he did.

He translated from Jerome's Latin Vulgate back into Greek and in the process made up a whole bunch of Greek words that are still in the

Textus Receptus. Well since that time, we have discovered all kinds of very good solid manuscripts of the book of Revelation.

The Codex Alexandrius was made available in the West in 1629, so it wasn't even discovered and made available until 15 years after the

King James version came out. Then there was Codex Sinaiticus, that dated back to 350

A .D., it's the earliest copy of the New Testament that we have and it wasn't discovered until 1844. Then there was

Codex Vaticanus from the 4th century, it was sought after but was never published until 1891.

So those three massive manuscript collections, those big codexes which account for a huge number of our ancient texts of the

Scriptures, the New Testament, those were discovered in some cases hundreds of years after the translation of the

King James Bible. Now what do King James only advocates do with the fact that we have discovered all of these great manuscripts, these great manuscript collections from the past?

What do they do with that? They have to undermine the manuscripts that we have discovered since then. So what they will say is that any collection or any bringing together of those

Greek manuscripts in the production of say a Greek New Testament or a Greek text today has been affected by Westcott and Hort, and there's all kinds of garbage accusations that are made against Westcott and Hort in an attempt to undermine any kind of Greek text that has been published since Erasmus' Greek text.

And of course we have discovered the Dead Sea Scrolls in the 1900s. So since the translation of the

King James we have discovered thousands of fragments, partial copies, lectionaries, Latin manuscripts, quotations from other ancient documents, and we have today a greater understanding of the use of Greek and Hebrew in ancient languages than they ever had at the time that King James authorized the translation.

And since 1885 there has been a proliferation of translations and paraphrases. So we start off with at the time of Tyndale, with Tyndale providing his translation,

English translation of the New Testament and portions of the Old Testament, and then this created really an explosion of attempts to translate scriptures into English.

And we've covered a number of those. Since the time of the publication of the

King James translation, actually since 1885, we have seen another explosion of English translations in our own language.

And I think, what did I say at the beginning of this lesson, let me go back. There are by some counts 350 different translations of the

Bible in English, 350 different English translations. Are there any questions?

So we have covered, just one second, so we have covered from, remember we had three periods of time, post -apostolic period of time, from Paul to Jerome, that's from Greek to Latin, then we go from the time of Jerome to the time of the

Reformation, Tyndale, and really that is going from the Latin into the English, translating that into the

English, and then we go from Tyndale to our modern day, which Tyndale, the father of the English Bible, he is the one that sort of started all of that, and due to him and his work, you can see how

God has given to us today a wealth of literature that we have in our own language, having Scripture in our own language. All right, so those are the three periods of time, yes?

Roughly define the difference between translation, revision, and version. I will do that next time. That is the last lesson that we do.

I'll put that off until then, because we are, we're going to talk about, in that last lesson we're going to talk about the different philosophies of translation, and we're going to talk about how some

Bible translations are trying to hold us far to one side of the spectrum and other translations go far on the other side of the spectrum, and where various translations fall into that spectrum of translation and paraphrase and dynamic equivalency and formal equivalency and some of that, so we'll cover the difference between those things next time.

Paul? What did I get wrong? No? Oh, man. Okay. Oh, yeah, thank you for that, yep.

So Paul just pointed out, for those who might be listening, Paul just pointed out that those, that translation committee authorized by King James had two committees doing the

Old Testament, one committee doing the New Testament, and one committee dedicated to translating the Apocrypha. Yes?

Yeah, I'll answer this quickly, and we'll talk about more about this the next time. I read from the pulpit in the

New American Standard, the NASB, the 1995 update. The why for that is a little bit more of a complex question, and I'll try and tackle that next time.

Basically, because the ESV was not yet produced and because the Legacy Bible had not yet been produced when

I started that back in 1998, or no, 2000, no, it was 2002 I made that transition from New King James to NASB, and I wish that the

LSB, I would switch over and start using the LSB, the Legacy Standard Bible, which is the update to the

NASB. I would start using that, except that most people here bring the NASB to church with them because that's what

I preach out of and they like to follow along with it. So, I'm not going to ask everybody to change now, it's just easier for us to stay.

Someday when the new pastor takes over, he'll do the LSB and we can all change together and start the next era. Yes, Ken?

Yeah, there was news last week, Jerusalem, was that Jerusalem Post article that you sent me,

Peter? Jerusalem Post article published, they are discovering caves under the

Dead Sea Scrolls or caves out in the Dead Sea where there are skeletons buried as well as more fragments of more manuscripts.

The work on the Dead Sea Scrolls that were discovered back in the mid -1900s has not yet been completed in terms of unrolling them and photographing them and scanning them and studying them, that work still has not been done, and yet they are just discovering more and more manuscripts.

Yeah, Peter? Yes, correct, they're discovering more copies, yeah.

Not discovering more like different books that should be in the Bible or anything like that, they're discovering more copies of those ancient manuscripts.

Any other questions? Yes? The Puritans who came over here in the early 1600s would have carried the

Geneva Bible with them. Yes. Yeah, the

Geneva Bible by the time they would have left would have been already widespread at that time because it was 1620 when they sailed, so you're talking about, by that time the

Geneva Bible was still being printed and still popular, especially amongst Protestants and that's who came over here from amongst the original

Puritans, so they would have had the Geneva Bible. The Geneva Bible was the first Bible to set shores on our continent. The King James was the first full

Bible to be printed on our continent. Any questions? More?

Okay, so where Calvin fits in is he is obviously a theological successor to Martin Luther, but he is in Geneva and pastoring a church there and doing a work in Geneva, so Calvin would have been there around the time that the mass exodus of scholars with their manuscripts left

England under the persecution of Bloody Mary. They left England and came back over to Geneva where they found really a sanctuary city that they could do their translation work, and of course you have

Protestants there who are landing in Geneva with John Calvin who really is the intellectual and theological and preaching mind of the

Reformation at the time. His influence was widespread, so their ability, his ability to use English scholars and Greek and Hebrew in Geneva to produce the

Geneva Bible for the Reformation efforts in Geneva as well as all over Europe was just by the providence of God.

I mean, he used the persecution under Bloody Mary to produce the Geneva Bible, which was a massive accomplishment.

You can see the hand of divine providence there in moving those people around. Yeah, so that's where Calvin fits into that.

Calvin is not the one producing the Geneva Bible. Calvin is the one providing the theological framework under which those people could work and the political sanctuary for them to get that work done, to accomplish that.

Of course, the publication of the Geneva Bible just lit a fire under the Reformation efforts all over Europe. Any other questions?

All right. I hope that by the end of this, now that we've kind of gone through the whole, we've talked about how

God wrote a book, right? We began with a theology of it. We talked about the process of textual transmission, copyist mistakes and errors and textual criticism.

We talked about some of those, and now we've just gone through in two weeks a whole history of the last 2 ,000 years of how you got a

Bible in your own language. I hope you have an appreciation for the providence and the sovereignty of God and how

He works in history to produce things like this. The Bible that you hold in your hand, remember, cost men their lives to make that possible.

People sacrificed greatly so that we could have a translation of Scripture in our own language. And you can see how

God worked through history, through Tyndale and then through the publication of a Greek text in Desiderius Erasmus, probably wasn't even a believer, but he produced a

Greek text, and then through, sorry, Wycliffe and then Erasmus and then Tyndale. And then how God moved all of those people, put those pieces into place, and then created a printing press and paper mills at the time so that there could be mass publication of these things.

Just His hand in history, it's difficult to see in the moment. When you're William Tyndale being strangled and burned at the stake, it's difficult sometimes to see what the fruit of your work is going to be, isn't it?

But looking back on it, you can see what God did through all of that. In the midst of suffering, it's never easy to understand what the purpose of that is going to be.

But sometimes the story of that suffering has to be told 400 years later through the blessing, the untold blessing that comes to us as a result of what those men did.

So I hope that that's one thing you can kind of learn from that survey of church history. If there are no other questions or comments, we will pray.

Just one quick update, next week Jess will be teaching Sunday school. The Sunday after that is Resurrection Sunday, so there's no

Sunday school. We have breakfast here, and if you plan on coming to that breakfast, pancakes, ham, and scrambled eggs, then please make sure that you sign up on the sheet out there so we know how many people to prepare for.

And then the week after that, we will finish up God Wrote a Book, and then I'll be done teaching Sunday school for the foreseeable future, thankfully.

So let's pray. Lord, we are grateful for how you have worked in history. You have worked through other people's sufferings, through their sacrifice, through their skills and talents, through persecution even, to accomplish this great work of giving us a

Bible in our own tongue. So thank you for that. That is such a blessing, and we thank you for those men, and we pray that we would have that perspective upon your

Word, that we would cherish it, that we would love it. If you have gone through such efforts and expended such work to make this happen, we just would pray that we would be good stewards of this gift we have been given, and we would see it as the treasure and value that it is.

Keep our hearts submissive to it and loving you through it. We ask your blessing upon our worship service and the preaching that is to follow.

In the name of Christ our Lord, amen. Good morning, good morning, and if you're outside, if you come in and join us, and if you would please stand, we're going to sing this morning,

Indescribable. From the highest of heights to the depths of the sea, creation's revealing your majesty.

From the colors of fall to the fragrance of spring, every creature unique in the song that it sings, all -exclaiming, indescribable, uncontainable, you place the stars in the sky and you know them by name.

You are amazing, God, all -powerful, untameable, awestruck we fall to our knees as we humbly proclaim, you are amazing,

God, who has told every lightning bolt where it should go, foreseen heavenly storehouses laden with snow, who imagined the sun and gives source to its light, yet conceals it to bring us the coolness of night.

None can fathom, indescribable, uncontainable, you place the stars in the sky and you know them by name.

You are amazing, God, unchangeable, you see the depths of my heart and you love me the same.

You are amazing, God, incomparable, unchangeable, you see the depths of my heart and you love me the same.

You are amazing, God. Take this time and greet each other.

Well, good morning, everyone. Just a couple of announcements here before we begin.

Easter breakfast is in two weeks, and so if you are hoping to come to that Easter breakfast meal in lieu of Sunday school that morning, please check your bulletin for details and note that there is a sign -up sheet on the table out in the foyer, so please sign up there for that so we know how many people to plan for.

That's two weeks from today. And then our conference registration is filling up, so if you are wanting to get in on being here for Phil Johnson's conference on the life and legacy of Charles Spurgeon, you will have the opportunity to sign up in the foyer out there.

I think we have something around 20 slots available, and then we have reached capacity. So if you are wanting to do that, now is the day.

Today is the day. Now is the time of salvation, and now is the time of signing up for that conference. And a

Scripture reading this morning. Oh, by the way, I'm holding the handheld mic because Cornell is going to be preaching this morning. Months ago, I promised you you'd start to be able to see some other folks in our congregation begin to preach, and Cornell is going to do that this morning.

I'm going to be gone next Sunday, so Dave Rich is going to be back, and he's going to be preaching next Sunday. And the

Scripture reading this morning is a little bit different. We're going to be reading from two different passages, and it's just two short passages.

It would take you longer to turn there than it would for me to simply announce the text. So unless you're really good with your smartphone and be able to find these, you're welcome to just listen to the references and listen as you don't have to turn there,

I guess is what I'm saying. First, from Ezekiel 34. We're reading verses 2 and 3.

Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel.

Prophesy and say to those shepherds, Thus saith the Lord God, Woe, shepherds of Israel, who have been feeding themselves!

Should not the shepherds feed the flock? You eat the fat and clothe yourselves with the wool. You slaughter the fat sheep without feeding the flock.

And then from the book of Acts 28. These are the words of the Apostle Paul to the elders at Ephesus.

Acts 20, 28. Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God, which he purchased with his own blood.

Will you stand with me as we pray? Let's bow our heads.

Father, it is all by your grace that we are able to be here. You, by your grace, have called us to yourself.

You have granted us the gift of salvation. You have brought us into your church and you have lifted our hearts today in adoration and praise to you.

We gather here because Christ is risen from the dead, because he died for our sins, and you have vindicated him and raised him from the dead for our salvation and our justification.

So we thank you that we can praise you, our great God, for your work of salvation, your gracious redemption, which you have accomplished on our behalf.

And as we gather together as your people, we pray that you would encourage our hearts by your word, that you would lift our hearts in praise and affection toward Jesus Christ, and that you would enable us by the power of your

Holy Spirit to pray, to preach here, to listen, to respond to your word in obedience, and to glorify you through our song and our affections.

We ask this in the name of Christ and for his sake. Amen. He is exalted, the

King is exalted on high. I will praise him.

He is exalted forever, exalted. And I will praise his name.

He is the love, forever his truth shall reign.

Heaven and earth rejoice in his holy name.

He is exalted, the King is exalted on high. He is exalted, the

King is exalted on high. I will praise him.

He is exalted forever, exalted. And I will praise his name.

He is the love, forever his truth shall reign.

Heaven and earth rejoice in his holy name.

He is exalted, the King is exalted on high.

He is exalted, the King is exalted on high.

Worthy of praise.

Holy and true. Great are you,

Lord. Most holy, Lord. Most holy,

Lord. You alone are praise,

O Lord. Most holy, Lord.

I sing. Worthy of praise.

Holy and true. Great are you,

Lord. Most holy, Lord. Wise in mind, inaccessible guess.

The ancient of days. Almighty, victorious. Wasting and silent as light.

Nor wanting or wasting, you rule as day and night. Your justice like mountains, high soaring above.

Your clouds with hardness have love and stall.

In the true life of all. We blossom and flourish, but quickly grow frail.

We wither and perish, but you never fail. First sight of day in splendor.

We see face to face. Most holy, most glorious.

The ancient of days. Almighty, victorious.

Your great name we praise. Most glorious.

The ancient of days. Most glorious.

Your great name we praise. How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me.

I once was lost, but now

I'm found. Was blind, but now

I see. T 'was grace that taught my heart to fear.

And grace my fears relieved.

How precious did that grace appear.

The hour I first believed.

My chains are gone. I've been set free.

My God, my Savior, has ransomed me.

I'll fly. His mercy reigns.

Unending, He's in grace.

All is good to me.

His word my hope secures.

He will my shield and portion be.

As long as life endures.

My chains are gone. I've been set free.

My God, my Savior, has ransomed me.

I'll fly. His mercy reigns.

Unending, He's in grace. My chains are gone.

I've been set free. My God, my Savior, has ransomed me.

I'll fly. His mercy reigns.

Unending love shall soon dissolve like snow.

For there to shall God be near me, though we'll be forever.

Since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in His steps, who did no sin nor was any deceit found in His mouth, who being reviled was not reviling in return, while suffering

He was uttering no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously, who

Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that having died to sin we might live to righteousness, by His wounds you were healed.

For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls.

Behold the wondrous mystery in the drawing of the

King. Be the theme of heaven's praises roped in frail humanity.

In our longing, in our darkness, now the light of life has come.

Look to Christ who, upon descending, took on flesh to ransom us.

Undismissed, He did a perfect Son of Man.

In His living, in His suffering, never trace nor stain of sin.

See the true and better Adam come to save the hell -bound man.

Christ, the great and sure fulfillment of the law, in Him we stand.

Behold the wondrous mystery

Christ, the Lord, upon the tree. In the stead of ruined sinners reigns the

Lamb in victory. See the price of our redemption, see the

Father's plan unfold, bringing many sons to glory, grace unmeasured, love untold.

Behold the wondrous mystery slain by death, the

God of life. But no grave could ever restrain

Him. Praise the Lord, He is alive. What a foretaste of deliverance!

How unwavering our hope! Christ in power resurrected, as He will be when

He comes. What a foretaste of deliverance!

How unwavering our hope! Christ in power resurrected, as He will be when

He comes. And for this reason, we also constantly thank

God that when you received from us the word of God's message, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe.

For you, brethren, became imitators of the churches of God and Christ Jesus that are in Judea. For you also endured the same sufferings at the hands of your own countrymen, even as they did from the

Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and drove us out. They are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men, hindering us from speaking to the

Gentiles that they might be saved, with the result that they always fill up the measure of their sins, but wrath has come upon them to the utmost.

But we, brethren, having been bereft of you for a short while in person, not in spirit, were all the more eager with great desire to see your face, for we wanted to come to you.

I, Paul, more than once, and yet Satan thwarted us. For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation?

Is it not even you in the presence of our Lord Jesus at his coming? For you are our glory and our joy.

Let's open in prayer. Lord, we come before your word this morning on bended knee, recognizing that it is for the teaching of doctrine, instruction, correction, and reproof.

And we submit to those four things this morning, excited that you have decided to change our hearts to believe in the

Lord Jesus Christ, to salvation, and that you have undertaken throughout our lives to bring us to glory to you, all of your doing.

What an unbelievable gift this is. Might we never lose sight of that. And as we look into your word today, would you teach us,

Lord, and remind us the humility that comes, that should come before a

God that has done everything. And we thank you in Jesus' precious name. Amen. So when

I began this book in 1 Thessalonians, and it's been a while, for those of you who are paying attention or thinking about it, this started in February of 2017.

So I think I'm working at beating Jim and taking a long time to go through a book, but for a different reason.

So we don't look at the 23 ,000 meanings of each word, which I love, but we have long distances of time in between the preaching.

And so be that as it may, I will give a short review, because I think it's a bit necessary to keep the context from chapter 1 on through, because Paul, in this incredible epistle, which is famous in some ways, in many ways, for introducing end times theology, is also a manual for under -shepherds.

Now, for purposes of the message today, whenever I use the word shepherd referring to an elder or a pastor in the church, please look at it as a slip -up and re -translate it as under -shepherd, because there is only one shepherd of the church, and that is the

Lord Jesus Christ. And those of us who have been given the opportunity and the privilege and the responsibility to serve under Him are under -shepherds, with heavy emphasis on the word under.

So Paul wrote this epistle probably 50 -51 AD, and it was not necessary for him to defend his apostleship as he does in other epistles, although there are challenges in Thessalonica.

He presented himself to the Thessalonians, he reasoned with them, and they responded quickly to the message, to the gospel.

God had opened their hearts, had changed, had regenerated them, and they became genuine, bona fide followers of the

Lord Jesus Christ. They were chosen by God individually to be the sheep of the

Lord Jesus Christ. They were convinced of the truth, Paul reasoned with them, and they were convinced of the truth, and the truth of the

Scripture was lived out in their lives. And this is one of the most important evidences of a believer, that the truth of the word of God is lived out in their lives.

That was what we looked at the first time together. Then in May of 2018, we began chapter 2, verses 1 -6, and Paul reminded the

Thessalonians about how he came to them, continuing the theme of being a servant, an under -shepherd, a caretaker of the church of God.

It seemed like his leadership was under question at the time, and so he gave them some historical checkpoints to remind them how he came to them.

He came to them dedicated, determined, dependable, direct, and deferential.

He was humble, and he did the things that were necessary to make certain that God's word was spread among the church of Thessalonica.

So chapter 2 is something of a manual of leadership. Now, leadership properly defined in the church of God is servanthood.

For he who would be first must be last, must be last. We must remember that.

So leadership is comprised of those characteristics, or servanthood is comprised of them. And so those are some of the character qualities that Paul mentions in chapter 2, reminding the

Thessalonians how he came to them. He also, this is the kind of leadership or servanthood he practiced over all the churches, in all the churches that he served.

So those six verses built on the last six verses, Paul continued with a mini laundry list of character qualities that make up a good under -shepherd.

In this section in chapter 2, Paul used some metaphors. He was no stranger to metaphors.

He used them liberally throughout his writings. In Galatians chapter 4, he pictured himself as a mother who delivers spiritual children, and then he remained with them until they attained spiritual maturity.

In 1 Corinthians 4, he is a spiritual father. In fact, all of the New Testament writers used metaphor occasionally.

Peter used it in his epistle, reminding, and John, the shepherd, using it as the metaphor of the shepherd.

John uses it in Revelation, and the Lord Jesus Christ himself famously used them.

One of the most famous was comparing the different people. One would build their house on sand, and one would build their house on a rock.

Then in 2019, we looked at verses 7 through 12. Paul was shown as a gentle, giving guide to the church of Thessalonica.

As mentioned, those verses were something of a manual of leadership or servanthood.

Everyone that God puts in this position of serving in the church should evidence these qualities, gentleness, giving, and with an ability to guide.

So the Thessalonians received the message of the good news and contrasted with the Jews, who having, for centuries of Revelation, spent most of their time in disobedience to God, and indeed those qualities, eschewing those qualities of gentleness, giving, and ability to guide.

So the Thessalonians embraced them, embraced the gospel, and were changed and saved, and began to live accordingly.

Then when we were last together in December of 2019, we looked at chapter 2, verses 13 through 16.

So Paul had received an encouraging report from Timothy about the church of Thessalonica, and he was grateful, thankful for that report.

The Thessalonians had received Paul's preaching as it was intended, to be understood that the words were the words of God.

The apostles understood that what they were doing at this time in history was they were delivering to the church the words of God, which became our

New Testament. They understood that, and the Thessalonians received it, and they grew, and this was a pure evidence of their receiving of the word of God.

They grew in a manner that demonstrated that belief. They endured suffering, yet they continued to grow.

And in this growth, by the way, the Thessalonians discovered one of the fruits of salvation, the fruit of being persecuted by the world.

Oh, that the church in America would discover this fruit and learn to truly follow.

I say church, meaning the church as a whole. We've had it easy, have we not?

It's been a fairly easy road to take in the United States. Persecution in the church today takes the form of nasty statements on Facebook.

In this time, people were killed, they were murdered, their families were destroyed, their homes were taken, and persecution was real.

Not that I'm asking for that, don't misunderstand me, but sometimes a stomping on,

I'm trying to think of a good metaphor without being too obviously awful, we just need to be prodded into following Christ more effectively.

And so that's what happened to the Thessalonians. They suffered persecution, and they came through it following Christ. So, in this section, chapter 2, verses 17 through 20, this could be looked at as a hard look at the heart of a true shepherd.

And there are plenty in the church today who do not reflect the spirit that Paul is putting forth here.

As a matter of fact, in some churches today, you might hear something like this. Imagine me coming up here this morning and starting out this way.

Today, then, I come to you as an apostle of Christ. You must not question what

I have to say, for God does not want you to touch His appointed and anointed messengers.

And I have direct communication from Him. Today, we will take dominion over the kingdoms of this earth, whether they are education, entertainment, business, family, or religion.

Today, you will see a manifestation of God like you have never seen. We will participate in a great awakening that will bring the kingdom of God to earth.

We will learn about unity, unity at all costs, no matter what we read, even in Scripture.

And we will see that there are great things waiting for us that even the Bible does not talk about. Great things that you need me for.

You need me to teach you about things that have been reserved for this day. So, if I actually came up here this morning and started out like that, you should be asking yourself three questions.

Jim's a roofer. Does he still have any tar? Where can we get real feathers?

And how hot can you heat tar before it kills an idiot and make the feathers stick?

But fortunately, you don't. I was actually going to start out that way, and there was great concern that you might actually take that advice.

So, I was counseled by my sweet wife to lead into it, so that there would be no consternation that I'd become a

NAR apostle. For that, by the way, if I had started that way, that's what you should do to me for adulterating and destroying and misusing the

Word of God. So, today there are multiple ministries that move in this, so -called, that move in this direction.

They slander the Word of God, and they elevate men at the expense of the Lord Jesus Christ.

They malign the all -sufficient and completely perfect Word of God, but fortunately, we have that Word of God.

How many copies of the Bible do you think you have? Two? Three?

Four? How many of you have a smartphone? That's like 87 copies right there, or whatever.

What a precious treasure we have that we can imbibe in every day whenever we want to.

So, today we're going to be looking at the heart of an undershepherd as they are given by the

Lord Jesus to the church to serve the church with emphasis on the word serve.

Indeed, these last four verses in Chapter 2 will be an introduction to the heart of an undershepherd which really is fleshed out in the first ten verses of Chapter 3, which we will get to sometime in this millennium.

All the way through Thessalonians, up to this point, we have seen the heart of a loving undershepherd, all the way through.

From early in Chapter 1 where Paul reminded the Thessalonians that he brought the gospel to Thessalonica and watched the church bud and grow gloriously under the power of the

Holy Spirit. Not under his power, under the power of the Holy Spirit. They became an example and Paul was thrilled to see them bless others because of their taking hold of the gospel and living it out.

He reminds them earlier in Chapter 2 of their careful ministry. Indeed, all the way through and up to what we will be looking at today we have a clear picture of what it is to be an undershepherd serving the church and the gospel.

Jim read from Ezekiel and in Ezekiel the shepherds were fleecing, that's where we get it I think, fleecing the flock.

They were taking advantage. They were elevating themselves. They were enriching themselves.

They were feeding. They were glorying. They were gloating. And the flock of God was suffering. And God looks on that with a very angered countenance.

So here's what it means. These are the four verses. We're going to read these again because as Jim has pointed out, if you leave this morning with nothing but a remembrance of the reading of the

Word of God, then you have been enriched. 1 Thessalonians 2, 17 through 20, But we, brethren, having been taken away from you for a short while, in person, not in spirit, were all the more eager with great desire to see your face.

For we wanted to come to you, I, Paul, more than once, and yet Satan hindered us. For who was our hope or joy or crown of exultation?

Is it not even you in the presence of our Lord Jesus at his coming? For you are our glory and our joy.

So in verse 17, Paul uses a very strong word here for describing being forced away from the

Thessalonians. The Greek word is aporophanidzo. Aporophanidzo or aporophanidzo. And it means to be orphaned.

It means to lose both of your parents at one time in one fell swoop. To be immediately orphaned.

He was orphaned from the Thessalonians. This construction connotes the idea of the desolation that would attend a child at losing both of their parents.

A child who would understand what was going on. An older child. Whatever it was that caused the parting here, it left a sense of anguish in Paul's heart.

He loved the Thessalonians and he appreciated them and he wished to be with them. Now what I'm trying to give you is this is what a proper undershepherd should be thinking and feeling and acting on.

These are the kinds of things that should be going through his heart, through his mind. And you can use these things as the church of God as kind of checkpoints.

Hmm, is this what our undershepherds do? Is this how they respond? Is this how they react? Because our only source of truth is the word of God.

And that's where we get this. So this left a great sense of anguish in Paul's heart.

He loved the Thessalonians, he appreciated them and he wished to be with them. He wanted to get back to them.

The separation created an even greater desire to get back with them. This particular verb, by the way, is used only here in the

New Testament. It's the only place it's used. He was separated physically, but as he points out, never spiritually or emotionally.

And his heart was with them always. This must have been a great encouragement to the

Thessalonians to know that he wished to be with them. So the likely history that Paul is referring to is actually in Acts 17, verses 1 -10.

And we can quickly read that. It says, Now when they had traveled through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica, and there was a synagogue of the

Jews. And according to Paul's custom, he went to them, and for three Sabbaths reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and giving evidence that Christ, the

Christ, had to suffer and rise again from the dead, and saying, This Jesus whom

I am proclaiming to you is the Christ. And some of them were persuaded and joined

Paul and Silas, along with a large number of the God -fearing Greeks and a number of the leading women. But the Jews, becoming jealous, and taking along some wicked men from the marketplace, formed a mob and set the city in an uproar, and attacking the house of Jason, they were seeking to bring them out to the people.

When they did not find them, they began dragging Jason and some brethren before the city authorities, shouting,

These men who have upset the world have come here also. And Jason has welcomed them, and they all act contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king,

Jesus. They stirred up the crowd, and the city authorities who heard these things, and when they had received a pledge from Jason and the others, they released them.

The brethren immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived, they went into the synagogue of the

Jews. So it appears that the Thessalonians, as a result of this riot, hid

Paul and his co -workers, and then they had to post bond, essentially, against the damages caused by the riot.

So what happens in our modern day world, there is nothing new going on, nothing new under the sun.

So then the Thessalonians later secretly spirited them out of Thessalonica into Berea.

So now Paul makes every effort to be back with them. We don't necessarily know what that all means, but the word translated, the word here, it says, he says,

I, Paul, more than once, I was eager with a great desire to see your face. So the word translated desire is the same word that is used often in the

New Testament to translate, is translated as lust. This is one of the few places where it has a positive connotation.

It is not too much to say that Thessalonica, in Paul's heart, was a home away from home.

There would be many reasons for this, but prime among them would be the way the Thessalonians received Paul, and prime would be the way they believed the gospel, and prime would be the way they lived out that believing.

It's always a great encouragement to those who bring the gospel to see the positive, wondrous effect it has on those who hear it and believe it.

They grow, their lives change. What a blessing it is. One of the great things, this is just, you're going to think it's weird, but I love to watch you all.

Now, don't get self -conscious, but sometimes I just sit back there and I watch the way you are with each other on a

Sunday morning, and it is such a blessing to see the heart of believers knit so closely together.

You're laughing, you're crying, you're praying, you're concerned with one another. That, brothers and sisters, is what a true body of Christ does, and it is

Christ who builds that church the way he does. Now I lost my place. A genuine biblical pastor, under shepherd, does not seek to lord it over those whom he has been called to serve.

He does not call them to support a lavish lifestyle. He does not harangue them about not calling him to account should he be found biblically inaccurate, even if he pronounces a word wrong, or misidentifies a certain species of fish.

And what a good thing it is to know that those who teach are teachable. All kidding aside.

Because we never in this life get to the place where we don't need teaching.

Never. He does not attempt to entertain them with engaging stories where he is often the hero, when he should be preaching the word of God to them.

He delights in them and he wants to serve them. Indeed, he will go to whatever length is necessary to bring biblical truth, comfort, and blessing to those whom he has been called to shepherd, those whom he has been called to serve.

This is what Paul and his companions did in Thessalonians. He prefers their company to their absence.

He prefers their remonstrance for mistakes, for false teaching, for incorrect statements, to their false approbation.

He prefers that. He looks for growth and he delights in it. He will view obedience to the word of God as a demonstration of love to the

Lord and disobedience as a reason for counsel and concern. He longs to see the actual person and not just hear them.

Paul here indicates his desire. He says, I have a great desire to see your face. You'd think this was really timed well, wasn't it?

For our time in history. Now I'm not going to build some weird theology of seeing your face.

But Paul uses the word for the front of the head. The whole front of the head.

This part of your face. So I thought, what does that mean? How does that all work out?

So much study has been done of the three V's of communication. And you'll hear all different kinds of percentages.

And just in case you're wondering, you need to know this, 46 .251 % of all statistics are made up on the spot.

Visual communication is supposedly 55 % of communication. Vocal communication is apparently 38 % and verbal is 7%.

A great deal could be said about this, but suffice it to say that visual cues are a huge component in our ability to understand what others are saying.

For example, if I use the two words, excuse me, yeah, the two words, that's great.

To respond to your statement that you were just given a job at teaching children, they could convey all different kinds of responses.

I can communicate true delight because I believe you'll be an excellent teacher.

That's great. And you look at my face and you go, well, he's ugly, but I understand what he means. Or I can communicate concern.

That's great. Because I'm concerned about your ability with children. Or I can communicate sarcasm.

That's great. And so we see that a lot of how we communicate is visual as well.

Paul wanted to see the faces. And that's where this morning and previous

Sundays, watching your faces as you love one another is just a delight to watch.

It's just an encouragement. So with facial expressions, you can communicate all different kinds of connections and responses.

Modern technology has really damaged that, I think. And I'm not saying I'm anti -technology, but a couple of other things

I discovered. In telephone use, the listener loses the opportunity to observe body language and facial expression.

Our vocal tone takes on even more importance. Then there's email correspondence.

There is no vocal tone or visual cues. We may resort to capitalization or emoticons to convey emotion.

This is a breeding ground for many miscommunications. How many times have you misinterpreted or had an email of yours misunderstood?

I'm thinking half the time at least, but I just made that statistic up. Maybe we should memorialize it.

50 % of the time. Text messaging. Especially when you use voice text messaging.

We lose visual, vocal, and even some verbal aspects of the message. Certainly, spelling and grammar are modified, and who among us has not been startled by what autocorrect did to our attempt at clear communication?

The other day, I was talking to someone about Rust Vulture. What came across was

Rust Vulture. And I didn't pay attention before I sent it.

And I realized that the person on the other end was probably going, Who?

Tweeting. We are limited by the 140 characters or whatever it is now. And verbal, grammar and spelling, visual, body language and expression, and vocal are all lost or compromised.

There's nothing quite like face -to -face communication. There's nothing quite like being able to visit with people and shake their hands, and if you're like Thomas, hug them 17 times.

You okay with that, Thomas? And I don't need a hug after church, so. Visual communication is what

Paul wanted. He wanted to go back to the Thessalonians. He wanted to be with them. He loved them, and it was important to him.

So Paul didn't have to worry about the interposition of technology in his day, but we do. Paul longed for an opportunity to again see the faces of those whom he loved.

This is the desire of one who has been given the privilege of shepherding an individual, unique flock of Christ.

Paul's desire to see the Thessalonians again was intense. It was accentuated by his love for them. These are some of the characteristics of the relationship that should exist between a shepherd, an under -shepherd, and those that they have been called to serve, to serve and love, to serve and love.

Paul desired to be accessible to the Thessalonians. This too is the responsibility of those who shepherd the flock.

Peter, who was another of the under -shepherds that God called to serve the body of Christ, said this in 1 Peter chapter 5,

Therefore, verse 1, I exhort the elders among you as your fellow elder and witness of the sufferings of Christ and a partaker also of the glory that is to be revealed.

Shepherd the flock of God among you. Care for them. Shepherd them in the right direction using the word of God.

Shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but voluntarily, according to the will of God and not for sordid gain, but with eagerness, nor yet as lording those over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock.

This then characterizes the relationship between the shepherds and the sheep. It should be one of love, service, sacrifice, and blessing.

So in verse 18, Paul says, For we wanted to come to you, I Paul, I Paul, more than once, and yet Satan thwarted us.

So there was a great desire on the part of Paul and the other ministers to come back to see the

Thessalonians. He had every intention to do so and he wanted to stay longer but they were forced to leave by that mob.

It is particularly interesting to know in this epistle that Paul uses the plural we pretty much throughout.

But here, in this little sentence, he changes the pronoun to the personal

I to communicate that he did everything he could to come back and see the

Thessalonians. He made every effort. He made numerous efforts. Apparently there were those who tried to subvert

Paul's ministry in Thessalonica by reporting to the Thessalonians that Paul didn't want to be with them. He didn't want to be around you guys.

If he did, he'd be here. Don't you think? This would be like a dagger through the heart of a shepherd who loved the body he was called to serve.

So Paul names the adversary that stopped them from coming back to see the Thessalonians.

He names him Satan. He's not talking about some metaphor for difficulty. He is speaking about the evil being that is opposed to God and has been opposed to God from time immemorial in every good work.

He is the tempter of chapter 3, verse 5. He is the evil one of 2 Thessalonians 3, 3.

He is the false angel of light of 2 Corinthians 11. He is the resistor of Zechariah 3.

He is the conjurer of lies in Acts chapter 5. He is the activator of evil in John 13.

He is the accuser of Job chapter 1. But he is also the one whom the

Son of God will destroy as Scripture speaks of in 1 John 3, 8. Paul knew

Satan's power, but he also knew Satan's limits. The church of God should be aware of and on the lookout for Satan, calling out where Satan compromises the unity of the church, where satanic acts have been observed.

But we should never be fearful and we should certainly never hold back because of Satan's attempts to destroy unity and love in the body of Christ.

The word Paul uses here that is translated thwarted is a military term that describes an army digging a trench, a big deep trench across the road so the opposing army could not advance.

It's a military term. Never forget that God's power fills in ditches very easily.

So there's one commentator put it this way because never forget that every act

Satan perpetrates against the church of God is used by God to strengthen his church, to build his church, and to strengthen believers.

And one commentator put it this way. He said, this by no means excludes divine providence which rules in the midst of our enemies.

Satan entered the heart of Judas so that he made plans to betray Jesus. And God permitted the betrayal for his own divine and blessed ends.

So Satan succeeded in frustrating Paul's two plans to return to Thessalonica. But only because this accorded with God's own plans regarding the work

Paul was to do. Satan has brought many a martyr to his death and God permitted it. The death of these martyrs was more blessed for them and for the cause of the gospel than their life would have been.

It is ever so with Satan's successes. No thanks to Satan, his guilt is the greater.

It was due to Satan that the Thessalonians suffered just as the original churches in Judea had to suffer.

Although God permitted the suffering. Jim has been talking in Sunday school about the sweep of history and the translation of the

Bibles into English. And how many men lost their lives for simply wanting to bring the word of God to people.

And at that time, we were talking about this, those men may not have seen through, well they most certainly didn't see what was going to come because of their death.

But God used their deaths to bring the word of God to more people than ever. And so it is with God's work.

Nothing can subvert, nothing can stop what he has planned. Nothing. So then in verse 19,

Paul says, For who is our hope or joy or crown of exultation? Is it not even you in the presence of our

Lord Jesus at his coming? So what's the gold and silver of a true shepherd of Christ? So when

I get to work in the mornings, sometimes I go to kitco .com and I look up gold and silver because I let people pay for stuff with gold and silver and then

I resell it and make money, you know, because I'm a capitalist. But the true golden shepherd of the church, of the shepherds, of the under shepherds of God, are the blessed, beloved believers of God who hear the word of God, believe the word of God, live out the word of God, and change the world one person at a time.

By God's grace. It is the body of Christ that the shepherd serves.

It is not monetary gain, a big house, extra jets, extra jets? I've got a

Lego jet. I think I made a movie about it. Fame, book royalties, or adulation in general.

It is simply the body that they serve. Look for that. Shepherds who care only about the body that they serve or care mostly,

I should say. Of course, they take care of their families and there are other responsibilities. But that is their delight, that is their desire.

It is the flock, it is the flock that demonstrates love for the Lord Jesus and is obedient to the word as faithfully taught.

It is the knowledge that those whom the Lord has directed He serve will be present with the

Lord at His coming. So, imagine that for those who have been called to serve, what it's going to be like to see people with the

Lord Jesus that they were able by God's grace to minister to. What a delight that's going to be.

That's going to be so exciting. And it's something far beyond monetary and worldly gain. Here, by the way, is proof positive, again, as scripture offers, that we will be together and we will know each other when we are with Christ.

He says, Who is our hope and joy? Is it not even you in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming?

Now, he uses the word crown here, crown of exaltation. There's two words in the

Greek for crown, diadem and Stephanos. The word here is

Stephanos and it refers to the crown of victory in the games, especially the games of the

Roman Empire at the time. The crown of exaltation that Paul was speaking of is the one he was most looking forward to.

So these will not be literal crowns, but will be figurative in the sense that each believer in glory will have eternal life joy, permanent righteousness, perfection and glory.

So the believer's crowns are an imperishable crown in 1 Corinthians 9 .25 and that is for leading a disciplined life.

A crown of rejoicing in 1 Thessalonians 2 .19 here for evangelism and discipleship.

A crown of righteousness for loving the Lord's appearing in 2 Timothy 4 .8. A crown of life for enduring trials in James 1 .12

and Revelation 2 .10. And a crown of glory for shepherding the flock of Christ, for shepherding

God's flock faithfully which is 1 Peter 5 .4. So these crowns themselves are gifts from the

Lord Jesus Christ and from the Father of lights and are in fact a result of the work of God in our lives.

He said, I will continue the work in you and can finish it at the coming of the

Lord Jesus Christ. Who's going to finish that work? Not the shepherds, not the under shepherds. The shepherd will finish that work.

Paul says here in this verse that the most important crown to him is being in the presence of the

Lord Jesus at his coming with those that he had the privilege to lead to Christ, to reason with in the

Sabbath, in the synagogue as it says in this verse, in this section and in Acts.

He was reasoning with them and many believed. Those are the people he will be delighted about. Those are the crowns that he looked forward to.

This is the joy of a genuine shepherd of Christ. This should also have been a great comfort to the

Thessalonians. Paul was telling them that the Lord is coming back and that they would be together at the coming of the

Lord Jesus. By the way, this is the first mention of his return in the New Testament. So Thessalonians, the book of 1

Thessalonians especially has quite a reputation for being a primer if you will on the second coming.

This is the first place it occurs. The word parousia which is his coming essentially means presence.

That's what it means, his presence. But it came to become a technical expression in the New Testament church of the royal visit of Christ at his second coming.

So that's what Paul is referring to. Then the last he says here in this chapter, for you are our glory and our joy.

So Paul finally says it straight out. Those whom he served are both his joy and his glory.

So these four verses are actually an introduction to chapter three which is appointed gaze into the heart of an under shepherd of God.

Paul and all true servants of the church find their glory, that is their praise, their honor, and even one of the reasons for worship which are all parts of the word for glory in the fellowship of the saints.

And I dare say that the four that God has appointed for service here love the fellowship here, love the fellowship of the saints here.

So how does this square with Paul's statement in Galatians 6 .14 where he says, Be it far for me to boast except in the cross of our

Lord Jesus Christ through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world. He says that you are our glory and our joy and our crown of exultation in verse 19.

That sounds like bragging to me. So how does it square with that verse in Galatians 6?

Well first the context there gave rise to this statement because the Judaizers in Galatia were looking to boast in their accomplishments and thus lead people into their way of thinking, in their law keeping.

Paul was stating to those legalists that only the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ is worthy of being an object of boasting so called if you will.

Here the Thessalonians that Paul had preached the gospel to had come to Christ because of what? Because of the cross of Christ.

Because of his death on the cross. Because of his burial and because of his resurrection. And as such they were part of the result of the cross of Christ and as such a true and glorious I'm going to make up a word here braggable result that's along with those statistics

I made up. It is the Thessalonians in the presence of Jesus at his coming that is worthy of boasting by Paul.

And what are those Thessalonians if they are not a work of Christ? Who saved them? Did Paul save them?

Did Silas? The Lord Jesus Christ saved them pure and simple by and of his own work.

These then are the marks of a true shepherd and a shepherd of God to the church. They are eager to be with those they serve.

They will do everything they can to know, serve and be with the flock God has entrusted to them. They will find their joy and if you will even their crown in the relationships they have with the body of Christ individually.

They will not lord it over those whom they are called to serve and they will not fleece them either. They will not lie to them about the things that Scripture does not teach but will be faithful to study and understand the word of God so that they can faithfully explain it to those they serve.

They will be available loving, teachable and kind. Much more could be said but the study of these four verses yields a great treasure of information about the heart of a shepherd.

The heart of an under shepherd. So may God remind his under shepherds everywhere of these truths.

Let's pray. Lord we thank you that in this world we live in which has its difficulties and its problems you have seen fit to give under shepherds to bless, to serve, to encourage.

Might every one of those under shepherds that you have tasked with the responsibility of serving your flock serving your church whom you will build might each one of them take seriously and carefully the responsibility they've been given.

Might they lovingly serve the flock you have given them as Paul, not given them but entrusted them to serve.

Let me put it that way Lord. Might they all do that in the same way that Paul evidences here in this book in this epistle.

For you have given your word for instruction and it is this instruction we seek to follow. Thank you for your love.

Thank you for saving your church. Thank you for bringing them to glory to be with Christ when he comes.

And we give you the glory in all that ensues in Jesus name. Amen. Please stand.

Early thou to receive glory

Glory and honor Glory and honor

And power For thou hast created

Hast all things created Thou hast created

All things And for thy pleasure

They are created Thou art worthy

O receive glory

Glory and honor Glory and honor

And power For thou hast created

Hast all things created Thou hast created

All things And for thy pleasure

They are created Thou art worthy

O receive glory Have a great week. It's not in the council we can

Nor stands in the way Sinners nor sits in the seat

Scoffers but his delight is in Adam He meditates day and heat