Q&A on Canon and Predestination

Somebody said the other night, y 'all were talking about a couple of difficult subjects, and I enjoy engaging in difficult subjects with one simple request, that you listen. Because if all it's going to be is a tit-for-tat argument, I'm just going to go preach Galatians.

But if you're interested,.

And you have legitimate questions, two of the main subjects that I have spent the last 15 years studying and teaching on have been the subjects of Reformed theology revolving around the subject of God's sovereignty and predestination, and the subject of textual variation and the history of the transmission of the text of the New Testament specifically.

And I understand those are some places.

That you guys have questions.

So if you want to ask a question, or if you just want me to give an overview of those things, we can do that.

Bible Translation Methods and the Limits of Literalism

Yes, sir?

What Bible do you recommend to study from?

If you can, I recommend you study from the original languages. But because that eliminates about 99 of people, then I would say you need to use an English translation that you're able to understand that is translated in what we would call the equivalent or the literal translation, rather than a dynamic translation.

So for instance, if you look at the way Bibles are translated, you have to start with the question of what was the method of translation. And so when we talk about the method of translation, there is what I call the speedometer of Bible translations.

And it begins over here with what we call the absolutely literal. And then you have what's called the paraphrase. And then up here you have what's called the D .E. or the dynamic equivalent. Now, the dynamic equivalent is best understood in this regard.

If I were translating something from a language into another language, for instance, this statement, morning hours have gold in their mouths. That is a statement. That is a German phrase. Morning hours have gold in their mouths.

In English, that means very little to us. It doesn't make sense at all. It sounds kind of silly. However, if I were to say to you, the early bird catches the worm, you'd know exactly what I meant because that's the equivalent expression in English.

Understand? So when I'm translating, I have to decide whether I'm going to use a literal golden... morning hours have gold in their mouths would be the literal translation of the German term. And then it would be up to the reader to try to figure out what that meant.

Or, if I was trying to aid the reader in understanding, I would use an equivalent early bird catches the worm. How many of you have used the King James Bible? Everybody open up your Bibles to Romans chapter 6.

I should have got coffee this morning. Diet Coke just ain't doing it.

Do you need some?

No, I appreciate it.

I'll make the Diet Coke work for now. Alright, Romans chapter 6. Who's got it in the King James? Please read it to me in the King James. Chapter 6, verse 1.

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Romans 6?

6 -1, yeah. Okay, read verse 2 then.

God forbid, how shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?

Okay, thank you.

So it's verses 1 and 2. Alright, so, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? He says, God forbid.

Right?

That's King James rendered. Okay, somebody read it. What other translations have we got? You had your hand up, sir, in the back.

Okay, read it again.

Okay, alright.

What'd you got?

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means, how can we who died to sin still live in it?

Anybody got an ESV?

Is that what you just read?

That was what you just read?

Okay, alright.

Anybody got anything that says anything other than by no means?

What you got right here, brother?

What should we say then? Should we continue in sin so that grace may multiply? Absolutely not. How can we who died to sin still live in it?

Okay.

I got a new King James. It's different too.

Okay, what does the new King James say?

What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not. How shall we die to sin? How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Do we not know that as many as were baptized...

Oh, that's three, I'm sorry.

Yeah, no worries. Okay, so here's my point. The King James, when the question is asked, shall we continue in sin so that grace may abound,.

The King James says,.

God forbid, right? The ESV or the NIV say, by no means. Is there anybody who has a translation that says, may it never be? Does Holman say, may it never be?

That's what you read.

So here's the point. Here's the point. This particular phrase is the Greek me geneuta. Me geneuta. Geneuta is from the word gene, which means existence. Where you get the word gene, we get the word gene.

You talk about your genes,.

Where you're from, right? Your genes are what make you up. So geneuta refers to your existence. May is the adversative not. And so, in a translative sense, what it means is may it not exist. Existence, geneuta.

May is the adversative not. So the idea is may it not exist.

And the idea is,.

Shall we continue to sin so that grace may abound? May that not exist. May that not come into your minds.

Right?

That's what the Greek says. But the King James Version uses the dynamic equivalent, God forbid. There is no word for God. The word theos is not there. There is no word for forbid. It is not there. So there are those who would say the King James Version always translates everything literally.

I just proved to you that it doesn't.

Even the King James Bible uses what's known as dynamic equivalent. It is up to the translators how they translate various words and phrases. Now, the NIV is more of a dynamic equivalent in more areas.

It uses that same principle of dynamic equivalency than does the King James. And so when we look at the speedometer, the best way to do it is to say, okay, if we want to look at the literal, over here under the absolutely literal, we could put the King James.

We could put the ESV. We could put the NASB. And even down here, you could put the YLT, which is the Young's Literal Translation. Literal translation in that it is so literal, it's hard to read. If you've ever read the Young's Literal Translation, it's like it's really awful.

Because one, it was translated by one guy, and I do not like Bibles that are translated by one person. The Message Bible was translated by one guy, Eugene Phillips. The Young's Literal Translation was translated by one guy.

When you have a translation that is translated by one person, then you have no checks and balances. The King James Bible was translated by a committee of over 40 scholars. The ESV, the NIV, the New King James were all translated by teams of scholars.

Greek experts, Hebrew experts, language experts. When you have one guy translating a Bible, you have the opportunity for the introduction of bias in the translation without any checks and balances.

Understand?

Alright, so, when it comes to the translations that are literal, we have the KJV, the ESV, the NASB. They all attempt to make a literal rendering of the original language. Now, when we get to the dynamic equivalent, this is your NIV, your New Living Translation, and there are others, but those are probably the two most popular.

I actually like the New Living Translation. If I am looking for a dynamic equivalent, I think it's better than the NIV. The New Living, I like it. I think it reads easily. Again, when I'm studying the passage, I look to the original languages because that's where the answers are.

But if I'm just reading for devotional purposes, if I'm just trying to get a feel for the text, or if I'm trying to see how somebody else has translated the text in a different way, and you've heard me do that when I'm preaching through Galatians.

I'll say, this is what the ESV says.

Is what I use,.

And then I'll say, but this is what the KJV says, and this is what the NIV says, and this is what the NLT says, because I'm trying to show you how different teams have translated that particular text.

And then you have the paraphrase. What would be an example of the paraphrase? Living Bible. The Living Bible is actually an easy reading book, but it is very, very loosey-goosey when it comes to how it translates the text.

So you have to be careful. Now, if you're Reformed, the Living Bible does really have some places where it just... I mean, it's almost like it was a Calvinist writing it. Because there are some parts.

That are really...

Especially Romans. 9. It's like straight up.

It's like no question.

So get your Living Bible.

But the Living Bible, it's like the Calvinist version of the Message Bible.

Because the paraphrase,.

The other one would be the Message Bible. It may know what I call the Message Bible.

It may remember. The Message Bible.

Is the toothbrush Bible.

Because it's the only Bible I know of that mentions a toothbrush. When Jesus says, take for your journey no coat, and do not take two tunics, and all that.

Remember that?

When He's sending out the disciples to go and preach? There's a part in the Message Bible.

Where it says,.

Take your toothbrush. And I was like, you're trying to bring it to today. There's also one called God's Word on the Street. It's like a hip-hop Bible. And it uses like Jesus said,.

Yo-yo...

I mean, it is. It's silly. But that's just how far the range gets. And I do think that sometimes they get a little irreverent. But that's an example of to answer the question. I know I probably spent a lot more time on it than you intended.

The question of what Bible would I recommend? I would recommend one that is literal. If you are trying to get.

The true sense.

Of what the text said. If you're reading devotionally, I wouldn't necessarily have a problem with dynamic equivalent as long as you understand that you're getting someone's influence in the text. You're getting a commentary.

Along with the text.

That's what a dynamic equivalent is.

It's giving you a commentary.

As you're reading. But there's a broader question. And that is the question is which one is more accurate to the original? And that question actually raises a larger question. And that is the question of the issue of manuscripts and the history of the text of the New Testament.

Very quickly, how many books are in.

The New Testament?

27. Alright. So there's 27 books in the New Testament. There's four Gospels. That is our message about Jesus and His life. We have the book of Acts which is the history of the works of the Apostles.

It's actually called.

The Acts of the Apostles. And then you have beginning in Romans.

Through.

The end of His works. You have Paul's writings. And people question whether Hebrews, that's why I said I didn't want to mention Hebrews.

Because I don't know if.

Some people believe Paul wrote Hebrews. I don't. But whether or not Paul wrote Hebrews is irrelevant to this discussion because Paul wrote what we call the Pauline Epistles. And then you have the General Epistles which are those that are written by others to the general church.

And then you have of course the book of the Revelation.

Which is the.

Apocalyptic book. So within the New Testament,.

How soon.

After the writing of the New Testament.

Were those books.

Collected and put into one group? Hey, I hear crickets. Okay, good.

Alright.

That's an important question, right?

It should be a question.

Christians should know.

Because you say.

The Bible is the Word of God,.

How do you even know the 27 books are the right ones? And how many books are in the Old Testament? Depends on whether you're Catholic or not.

Right?

Because if you're a God-fearing Baptist,.

You know there would be.

39 books in the Old Testament.

And by the way,.

If there are 39 books in the Old Testament and you times that and you get 27.

And there's your New Testament.

Hey, what do you think about that?

It's actually pretty cool.

There's 39 books.

In the Old Testament.

3 times 9 is 27. That's how many books are in the New Testament. But that's just a way to remember. That is, I'm not teaching numerology. That's just a little side thing.

Yes, sir.

Raise your hand. Or you raise your hand.

Sorry.

I was raised Roman Catholic. I went to a lot of Christian when I was younger and stuff like that. I've just always said, I was talking to someone I swear I've always said difficulty is why Catholics believe that you pray to saints and stuff like that because in the Bible it doesn't say that.

God literally, Jesus states, look to me, don't look to... because all the disciples and all that, they're preaching His Word. They're not saying to pray to my disciples. As they talk, they're saying this is what God said.

This is what the Holy Spirit,.

Jesus,.

Proclaimed in the Gospel. So why do they believe that?

The Roman Catholic Church has a massive amount of bad theology and it really stems from a misunderstanding of authority. The Roman Catholic Church believes in two equally level perspectives on authority.

The Protestant Church believes in one sole authority for the church, the Word of God. We believe in something called sola scriptura. The Bible alone is the only infallible rule for faith and practice.

That's the doctrine of sola scriptura,.

The Bible alone.

But the Roman Catholic Church believes in the equal authority of the Bible and tradition. And the tradition is determined by the magisterium of the church. The magisterium is the teaching authorities of the church, including the Pope, the bishops, and all of the priests.

They make up the magisterial authority of the church. And therefore, they are able to determine what is and what is not authoritative because.

They are the ones.

Who are assigning what is and is not tradition. And when you have two equal authorities, one will always tend to overcome the other in some way. And what has happened in Roman Catholicism is the authority of the church has overcome the authority of the Bible and in those places where you see them going outside of the Bible,.

They say,.

Yes, but that's tradition.

For instance,.

The veneration of Mary. The Bible nowhere says that we should pray to Mary, that we should say, Hail Mary full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Pray for sinners now at the time of our death. That's the rosary.

The Bible never proclaims that we should ever pray to Mary or any saint.

But yet,.

That is a tradition that has arisen in the Roman Catholic Church. It didn't arise for almost a thousand years after Christ.

And yet,.

It still arose within the church during the Middle Ages. And since it arose during the Middle Ages, it became part of tradition that was recognized and understood and accepted. Because it was recognized and understood and accepted, the church went along with it and now believes it to be part of the truth.

That's part of the reason for the Reformation. The Reformation was the idea of going back to the Bible. It happened during the time of the Renaissance. What was the Renaissance? The Renaissance was the recapturing of the ancient works, the ancient writings, the ancient documents, the bringing to light the things that had been put aside.

And so,.

One of the great things about the Reformation was that they were no longer reading the Bible only in Latin,.

But that they were.

Reading the Bible in the original languages, Greek and Hebrew and Aramaic. And they were able to translate the Bible in its original languages. And they were able to understand it.

And they said,.

Hey, you're right. We shouldn't be praying to saints. We shouldn't be paying for indulgences. We shouldn't be going to the priest and asking forgiveness.

For sins.

We should be going to Christ who is our only High Priest. And so there was a lot of false theology. And that was the reason for the division between the Catholic Church.

And the Reformed Church.

Does that make sense?

Yes, sir.

So it's kind of like you could use a diagram here. It's kind of like we could look at the government and check some balances.

Yeah, the Roman Catholic Church had all authority. And this was an interesting thing because during the height of the power struggle.

In Rome,.

There was a time when there was actually three different popes. Because the papacy, which was situated in Rome, had moved to Avignon, France. And because the pope had moved to Avignon, France, there was a pope in France.

Well, that pope became somewhat of a despot. Somewhat of a power-hungry person. And so they elected a new pope in Rome. So now you've got two popes. This one excommunicates this one. This one excommunicates that one.

So now you've got two warring positions for who's the most powerful person in the Christian Church. Well, a council comes along,.

Excommunicates both of them,.

And elects a third pope. So now there's three people with three different popes. Finally, that was squashed,.

Put to bed,.

But that's called the Babylonian captivity of the Church. It's a historical blip on the radar that's very important to know about because it's at that moment that it demonstrated the fallacy of the papacy.

That the pope is not.

A legitimate actor.

In the history of the Christian Church. The pope himself is a usurper of Christ's authority. He calls himself the vicar of Christ.

Vicar means.

The one who stands.

In the place of another. A vicarious one. So the vicar of Christ.

Is the one who's standing.

In the place of Christ. And it's a false understanding. And as the person who stands in the position of Christ, he's able to speak what's called ex-cathedra,.

Or from the chair.

The cathedra is the seat. He speaks from the seat of the Apostle Peter, and he speaks with authority. And he's supposed to speak infallibly. The problem is this pope says something, and then a pope later says something else.

Who was authoritative? Who was infallible? If this guy's saying one thing, and this guy's saying something else, and the Roman Catholic Church says, well, you're not in the position to question him. You're not in the position to scrutinize him.

Because he's infallible!

And along comes Martin Luther and changes the world.

Alright.

Oh yeah, absolutely. Okay, hand up back there.

What's up?

Alright, well,.

We weren't done.

With the Bible translations. But very quickly, let me just say this about the Bible translation before you go to predestination, because that's a bigger one. When it comes to Bible translations, there's also the question, because I did ask, when was the Bible codified?

It took time for books to be recognized as part of the canon, to have been recognized as being God's writings. In fact, what was the last book to be accepted as part of the Christian Bible canon? What was the last book to be truly recognized as authoritative?

Revelation.

Why?

Not really. It was the last one, but that wasn't the reason why.

The reason why.

Is because that book would be crazy.

You read it. It's got ten-headed dragons.

I mean, people read it and they're like, wow! This is wild! And so it demonstrates that there was some discernment that was used in the early church. They didn't just accept everything that came along.

There's all kinds of writings that were supposed to have been written by Paul and Peter and John. But they weren't. They were what we call pseudepigrapha or false writings. Have you ever heard of the Gospel of Thomas?

The Gospel of Thomas.

Is a false book written by someone other than Thomas, but it used his name to try to gain some legitimacy.

If you've ever read the Gospel of Thomas,.

It'd be crazy. It's nuts! It talks about how if Mary Magdalene wanted to be saved, she has to become a man.

Read it. Go look it up.

She has to become a man because women can't be saved. It's nuts! So again, I encourage you,.

Don't always...

If somebody says,.

Oh, there's missing books in the Bible.

Hogwash.

Hogwash, I say. It's garbage.

It's not true. The Bible, the early church was very discerning in how it understood what was and what was not authoritative, what did not and did not come from the hands or through the hands of the apostles.

And so I do believe with all my heart that what we have is what we should have because God is sovereign. And God has established for Himself that His people will know His Word and my sheep will hear my voice.

They will know me and I will know them. And so it's an issue of sovereignty as to why we believe.

We have the right Bible.

Now the question of translation and the question of passing through time and manuscript evidence and things like that, that's a lot longer study. But ultimately, I think we can trust the Bible that we have in our hands as being what God has preserved for us.

Yes sir, your hand's up. Can you explain to me.

What is the book of Q? Yes.

Q is a... It's not a book. It's a theory because there is no evidence for Q. Q is a... Matthew and Mark are so close in their writings that it seems as if there has to have been some way in which the two of them were writing in conjunction.

With one another.

I mean, there's just certain sentences that are written exactly the same way. And if you were a teacher and you were grading a test and two guys handed in a test and they had an essay and the essay had the exact same language, you would accuse them of collusion, right?

You'd say, these two guys, there's no way.

That they didn't have some influence.

On one another, right?

And so the theory of Q is that there was an earlier gospel that Matthew and Mark both drew their language from. That's the theory. The problem is there's no evidence for that. There is no evidence. Now, when we get to Luke, see, Luke is written later and John is written much later.

Luke actually says, I have compiled this from other sources. If you read the first chapter of Luke, my doctoral dissertation was on the gospel of Luke, and he says in the first chapter, I have spent the time, oh dear Theophilus, who was the guy he was writing to, I've spent the time studying and researching and gathering this information.

So the fact that Luke has things that are from the other gospels makes perfect sense. So there's likely a chance that he had taken some, at least some liberty in using their language, right? But the question is, who came first, Matthew or Mark?

I'm a Matthew guy. I think Matthew was written first. But the scholarly consensus.

Is that Mark was written first.

I tend to think Matthew was written first, but again, I base that on some stuff I don't really want to get into right now. Whether you're Matthew in supremacy or Mark in supremacy,.

It's not a big issue,.

But it's just a question of why. Why you think one would be first. But the issue is, the question is, was there something that came before that both of them drew from? There's no evidence that there was, and the reason why people believe there was is because there's so much agreement between Matthew and Mark.

And you come back and you say, but wait a minute, the Holy Spirit's involved too. If the Holy Spirit is the one who's superintending the writing, then that could be part of the reason for so much agreement, and that the language is so close.

So, the Q theory really is an anti-supernatural theory. And what I mean by that, that's a secular theory. How do you get agreement between two guys? Well, you have to have another source.

That they're both drawing from.

The Christian says, how do you get the agreement between two guys? You've got the Holy Spirit superintending both of them. So the question is, whether you're taking an anti-supernatural view.

Or a supernatural view.

So, I take the supernatural view. I think the Holy Spirit is superintending this, and that's why you have so much language agreement.

Between the two of them.

Because there are things that they don't agree on. And they don't contradict.

But there are areas.

Where Mark and Luke and Matthew are saying the exact same thing, and then one goes this direction, one goes this direction, one goes that direction. It's like, wait a minute! If they're all drawing from the same source, then why do they all go in different directions?

Yeah, but if they're all just copying Q, which is what the Q theory is. There's this hidden gospel out there that they're all copying from. If they're all copying from the same thing, there would be a lot more agreement.

But there's actually a lot more disagreement. So I would deny Q. There's no evidence, no reason to believe in it,.

Except for the theory.

Okay?

Okay. Before we get to predestination, I have one more question.

Okay.

I know you guys, you were talking just about apocryphal stuff. And as it's referenced, although it seems to be probably real,.

I mean,.

You seem to believe that one Enoch is true, however it's just not necessary for... That's a big one.

No, it's not.

It really isn't. Because he issued the book of Enoch. A couple of things you have to consider. Just because the Bible mentions a book does not mean that that book.

Is authoritative. For instance, if you go back.

To the book of Acts in chapter 17, the apostle Paul mentions the writings of the Greek philosophers. Does that mean the writings of the Greek philosophers.

Were authoritative?

No, it doesn't. So that being said, if a book is mentioned in the Bible, it doesn't mean that that book is necessarily meant.

To be in the Bible.

You go back to the Chronicles and the Kings and the Old Testament,.

They mention several books.

The books of the wars and all this. Those are books.

That are not in the Bible.

But those are books.

That they reference. So just because a book is referenced in the Bible does not mean it's supposed to be part of the Bible.

Second,.

When it comes to the book of Enoch, there is no copy of the book of Enoch available today that goes back to the time of Enoch.

The only thing.

That we have today is a false pseudo-Enoch that was created.

To give rise.

To the reason for that. So the one that is in circulation today is not real. If I remember correctly, it's less than a few hundred years old. It was created to give answers to people who say, oh, we need the book of Enoch.

Where is it?

Oh, here it is. It's got all this weird information in it.

That's not true.

So you've got to be able.

To trace history, right?

How do we know.