Survey of the Pauline Epistles (Part 1)

Sovereign Grace Family Church

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October 8, 2020

The Pauline Epistles (Part 2)

00:00: Alright, so that was nothing to do with the class, that just happened to be on my mind.
00:03: We're going to start tonight with the quiz.
00:07: And I've already been asked, can you use your notes, can you use your book? As far as I'm concerned, you are welcome to, but I would prefer that you go through it without your notes and book, it's only ten questions, go through it without your books and notes first and see how much you remember.
00:28: Then, you know, after you've exhausted your memory, you can reference your book, or whatever you think you need to.
00:39: Alright, so, Brother JP, would you pass these out? Alright everyone, if we have done all we can do, and gone as far as we can go, please take your paper and trade with someone, just like in high school.
00:56: Are you going to trade with the person next to you? Again, if you're watching this by video, you're probably just coming in now, because I'm not going to post a twenty minute video of me just walking around.
01:19: So, if you're just coming into the video now, we started today with our quiz, and you can get a copy of the quiz from the website, it'll be posted on the website, and if you don't find it there, you can email me through the email that's on the syllabus, and I will send it to you.
01:37: So, if you're getting this in class, or rather, if you're getting this at home, do not watch this part until you've taken the quiz, because that would be cheating, and part of the rules of the class is academic integrity.
01:54: So, do not, if you're watching at home, pause the video, if you haven't taken the quiz.
02:01: Alright, let's go through the questions.
02:03: We have seven questions.
02:06: First one, which gospel writer is historically identified with the Apostle Peter? Mark, according to church tradition, and there is some internal evidence to speak to that as well.
02:20: So, Mark is most historically identified with the Apostle Peter.
02:25: Number two, which gospel is identified as the autopic gospel? John.
02:33: John.
02:34: What are the others called? The synoptic gospels, right? So, John is the autopic gospel, or the one that comes from a singular view.
02:43: Now, this next one, there can be a variety of answers, but I was looking for three particular answers, but if you gave other answers that are right, I would still obviously count it as right.
02:58: The question was, name three events from the life of Christ that show up in all four gospels.
03:04: What I was hoping that you would put is the death, the burial, and the resurrection, because all three of those are all in all four gospels, but did anyone have anything other than that? Yes, sir? Teaching.
03:19: Is what? Teaching.
03:21: Okay, Jesus certainly taught in all four gospels.
03:24: I'll accept that.
03:28: What's that? Was it the attitude? No, the attitude to be in Matthew, and there's a section in Luke's gospel where we have a certain one.
03:41: Anything else that somebody put that we need to address? Maybe you don't know? Okay, so we're good? Yeah, all right.
03:52: All right.
03:55: Why is the death, burial, and resurrection important? That's what Paul identifies as the gospel, right? That's what Paul identifies as, in 1 Corinthians 15, these things I deliver to you, you know, once we're all delivered, it's the death of Christ, the burial, and the resurrection.
04:15: All three of those are in all four gospels, because that really is the heart of the gospel.
04:21: All right, who was the first Christian martyr in the book of Acts? Stephen.
04:28: Stephen is the first one to give his life for Christ that we are given information about.
04:36: What was the purpose of the Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15? The issue was circumcision, and really it was the acceptance of Gentiles into the church, whether or not the Gentiles would be accepted, and without circumcision.
04:56: So it really, this, remember, and maybe you might remember this, I said I think that this is really important regarding how we date Galatians, because the whole book of Galatians is regarding the section or the issue of whether or not someone has to be circumcised to be part of God's kingdom, and Paul makes the argument that no, circumcision is not part of the gospel, and I think that argument would have been somewhat superfluous had it happened after the council, because the council declared that around 49.
05:28: Yes, sir, you had your hand up.
05:35: Yes, I would accept that, because it wasn't circumcision only, but circumcision immediately would be the first thing, but other Jewish laws, of course, as well.
05:51: Give him half a credit.
05:52: Give him half a point, because that's true, that was Paul's argument, but I want to hear something about Jewish law or circumcision, because that really was the heart of it.
06:01: So yeah, that's fine.
06:03: All right, number six, Acts focuses primarily on the ministry of which two apostles? Paul and Peter.
06:09: Peter and Paul, Paul and Peter.
06:11: For extra credit, how do you divide the book? Yeah, that's how we did it in class.
06:21: So yeah, that's what I was looking for.
06:22: Good.
06:22: I just watched the video.
06:26: Okay, okay.
06:28: Yeah, so the first 12 chapters primarily deal with the ministry of Peter, and the rest deal with the ministry of Paul.
06:34: All right, last question, number seven, how does the Bible describe the death of Paul? It does not.
06:42: It doesn't tell us.
06:43: Now, it does tell us he was imprisoned, and we can extrapolate that he died likely by martyrdom while imprisoned.
06:56: So if somebody has something about that, but the Bible doesn't say specifically how he died or when he died.
07:03: So that was what I just wanted to, honestly, the answer I was looking for is it doesn't.
07:07: It doesn't say, no.
07:08: But if there's something to that effect, I'm fine with it.
07:14: All right, hand them back their paper, and you can put that in your notebook.
07:25: That is for you for now to keep.
07:27: I will look at it when we have our notebook check.
07:42: All right, we have arrived at the midpoint of our survey of the New Testament.
07:50: And tonight, we get to talk about the Pauline epistles, and we're going to look at them in over a period of two weeks.
08:03: The reason for that is because Paul wrote of the majority of the books of the New Testament.
08:12: And so giving at least two weeks to his writing is certainly not unjust.
08:20: We should do that.
08:22: I want to read to you a quote.
08:24: The man known to us as the Apostle Paul began life as Saul of Tarsus.
08:30: The account of his radical conversion to Christ is found in several places in the New Testament.
08:37: And from the moment he was saved, he began preaching about Jesus.
08:40: Over the next several years, Paul traveled extensively, planting churches wherever he went.
08:46: And when not with those churches, he still carried the responsibility for them in his heart, like a father for his children.
08:54: Much of the New Testament is made up of his letters to some of those churches.
08:59: We know for certain that Paul wrote at least 13 letters that are included in the New Testament.
09:05: And we're going to talk in a minute about the question of the 14th letter, which would be Hebrews.
09:15: In our lesson on the book of Acts, we looked briefly at the significance of the Apostle Paul.
09:21: As we noted, the latter half of the book of Acts recounts his missionary work.
09:25: The book of Acts records three major missionary journeys of the Apostle Paul.
09:30: His first missionary journey is in Acts 13 and 14 with Barnabas.
09:33: The second missionary journey is Acts 15, 36 to 18, 22 with Silas to Asia Minor and to Greece.
09:40: And his third missionary journey is Acts 18, 23 through 20, 38.
09:45: And that is also primarily in Asia Minor.
09:48: Some people believe Paul took a fourth journey, but it is not explicitly recorded for us.
09:55: These missionary journeys are important because it is where we are introduced to many of the places where Paul's letters will be addressed.
10:03: Galatians was likely written to several churches in the southern region of Asia Minor.
10:08: Therefore, when you read about Iconium and Lystra and Derbe, when you're reading through Acts, that's the Galatian region.
10:18: That's so when you hear the churches of Galatia, it's not just one.
10:22: It's the Galatian region.
10:28: Corinth, Philippi, Ephesus and Thessalonica are all mentioned in Acts.
10:34: And that's where we get 1 and 2 Corinthians, Philippians, Ephesians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians.
10:44: So that is, it really takes an understanding of Acts to be able to fit the books of Paul into a historical framework.
10:55: Because we see him going into these cities.
10:58: We see him raising up churches in these cities.
11:00: We see him departing from these cities.
11:02: And then, lo and behold, now we have a letter to these cities or to the churches in these cities.
11:08: And so we can at least extrapolate some historical context from Acts for these books that we study of the Apostle Paul.
11:19: So Acts is certainly important in our understanding of what Paul is writing in the historic context that they fall into.
11:29: Paul played a vital role in the church's early growth, primarily in explaining its doctrinal foundations.
11:39: As we already noted, he wrote 13 of the 27 books of the New Testament.
11:44: And some debate that he wrote Hebrews, which would make the 14th.
11:48: But when we get to Hebrews, I'll explain why I don't believe that's so.
11:52: That'll be two weeks from tonight.
11:53: We'll be looking at the general epistles.
11:55: And I will explain why I don't think Paul wrote Hebrews, even though I do believe Hebrews is thoroughly Pauline or Pauline.
12:03: I think that Hebrews has the theology of Paul, but the language of Luke.
12:07: So we'll look at that for a little bit in two classes from now, which would mean I would say it's probably a sermon preached by Paul, but recorded by Luke.
12:19: So we have 13 books for certain, and then one more that's possible.
12:28: Now, as I said, I've decided to dedicate two weeks of study to the Pauline corpus.
12:34: And as with all of our surveys, this will not in any way do justice to the content.
12:39: But we will be able to key in on some important aspects of Pauline theology.
12:43: And that's really my heart tonight.
12:45: I want to tell you, next week in our second half, we're actually going to take a closer look at the books that Paul wrote.
12:55: Tonight, we're focusing more on Paul and his theology.
13:01: And so I think that's important to really kind of understand.
13:08: But as your syllabus says, tonight is Romans to Colossians.
13:13: Next week is First Thessalonians to Philemon.
13:17: So I will at least be giving you a one-sentence survey of each of the books of Romans to Colossians tonight, because that's part of what was in the syllabus.
13:25: So I want to make sure I at least stick with that.
13:28: We're going to look at authorship, dating, and purpose, as we always do.
13:33: But we're looking at authorship, dating, and purpose, not just of one of Paul's books, but all of his writings.
13:40: And we're going to see his handprint.
13:43: I want to say something.
13:43: It's just on my heart.
13:44: It's been on my heart all day, as I've been thinking about getting ready for this class.
13:48: I love the Apostle Paul.
13:50: I've spent more time with this man and his writings than anybody else ever.
13:57: You know, any other biblical writer save maybe Luke.
14:05: So in this, you know, I'm reading a lot off my notes here, because I know how easy it would be for me to just start talking.
14:13: And go into, you know, a lot of things that would be not necessarily pertinent to the class.
14:19: But I've spent a lot of time with this man.
14:25: And he is the theologian of the ancient church.
14:28: He's the theologian that God chose to give us a full orb view of the gospel and to really exegete the life of Christ.
14:40: Paul, Paul provides to us an explanation of what Christ did.
14:47: You know, the the gospel writers and acts, the gospels and acts give us the history.
14:54: And Paul gives us the meaning of what that meant.
14:58: Why was it significant? And so his contribution to Christianity cannot be overstated.
15:12: And so I just as on a personal note, this is to me a very.
15:19: This is this is a lesson from the heart, if you will.
15:24: All right.
15:24: So let's begin with authorship.
15:26: We we've already noted we believe Paul is the author of these books.
15:30: But it is important to note that Paul did not write all of the letters.
15:34: Paul dictated them to what is known as an amanuensis.
15:39: An amanuensis is a basically like a secretary or a person who takes dictation.
15:49: And we have him reference this in a couple of his books.
15:52: In fact, you'll notice at the end of some of the books, the amanuensis will cite himself as the writer.
16:00: But the book came from Paul because it starts in the ancient world.
16:04: Letters began with the with the source.
16:07: Our letters now, it's always that we put the name at the end.
16:11: Sincerely, Kiefoski or whatever.
16:13: In the ancient world, it was Paul, an apostle.
16:16: The letter started with the person that it's coming from.
16:20: And so like in Romans, we have Paul's letter to the Romans.
16:24: But then at the end, you have this person come in who's, oh, I'm writing this.
16:30: You know, it's the amanuensis is making a note of his participation.
16:36: So there's several reasons people kind of try to determine why Paul would use an amanuensis.
16:42: He certainly was an educated man, certainly was an illiterate man.
16:45: A literate man.
16:47: I know that sounded like I said he was illiterate.
16:49: He was a literate man.
16:50: He was a skilled man in writing.
16:53: So people say, why would he use the secretary? I think there are there's some evidence that Paul may have had eye problems.
17:02: And there's some indicators of his eyes maybe giving him trouble, and that would have made it difficult for him to write.
17:09: And so that would certainly make sense.
17:13: There's some debate around that.
17:15: When Paul tells the Galatians that they would have gladly taken out their eyes and given to him.
17:20: You remember that? When he says, when I came to you, you would have gladly taken your eyes and given them to me.
17:24: I think that's a reference to a certain disability he may have had.
17:29: And but some people see that as more euphemistic.
17:33: You would have given me your eyes.
17:34: You know, it's somewhat hard to really nail it down for sure.
17:39: But I do think that, you know, what happened to him on the road to Damascus? He was blinded, right? And then the scales fell off.
17:48: Could there have been any residual effects? You know, we don't know.
17:52: You know, that's all kind of conjecture.
17:54: But it kind of leads us to some conclusions.
17:57: If we kind of carry that to its logical conclusion.
18:00: If he mentions eye problems in Galatians, we know he was blinded on the road to Damascus.
18:05: And he's using an amanuensis later.
18:07: We kind of create a scenario here that may be the reason for that.
18:18: Paul is described, as I said, as the source of 13 books throughout the New Testament.
18:23: But those 13 books are not without debate.
18:26: Of the 27 books of the New Testament, seven are accepted as being entirely authentic.
18:38: However, higher critical scholars argue that the rest are not authentic to the Apostle Paul.
18:45: I'll read to you from the Encyclopedia Britannica.
18:49: This is what it says.
18:50: It says, of the 27 in the New Testament, 13 or 14 are traditionally attributed to Paul, though only seven of these Pauline epistles are accepted as being entirely authentic and dictated by St.
19:00: Paul himself.
19:01: The authorship of the others is debated, and they are commonly thought to have come from contemporary or later followers writing in Paul's name.
19:07: I don't believe that.
19:08: I'm just giving it to you as this is one of the arguments, right? Paul didn't write 1 and 2 Timothy.
19:16: That's a huge thing among higher critical scholars.
19:19: They argue that the language is different.
19:23: They argue that the theology is somewhat more refined than what we see in other letters of Paul.
19:33: And so there is some argument about him being the author.
19:39: In fact, I'll give you this.
19:40: I'll tell you now.
19:41: If you choose, because you know you all get to choose a paper to write at the end of this course if you choose to try to apply for credit.
19:49: If you choose a debatable book such as 1 and 2 Timothy for your final paper, I would like you to make a point to provide evidence for Paul's authorship.
20:02: Ephesians is another one.
20:04: If you choose Ephesians or 1 and 2 Timothy, I want you to include in your paper an argument for his authorship.
20:12: Make that part of the paper.
20:15: Because I think that especially now in light of higher critical scholarship, that is one of the things that we as Christians should be able to defend is why we believe in authentic Pauline authorship of these letters.
20:32: So I know some of you are not doing papers.
20:35: Some of you are only auditing.
20:39: But if you are doing a paper and you choose those books, I'm going to expect that.
20:44: So keep that in mind.
20:47: And I think it will be helpful to you.
20:49: That research in and of itself will teach you some things about the mind of higher critical scholars, how they make their judgments and their decisions.
20:58: And remember this when I say there are some there are some higher critical scholars out there that are really just they don't believe anything in the New Testament is authentic.
21:08: I mean, if you ever hear somebody talk about searching for the historic Jesus, almost always that's a higher critical approach because they would argue that the historic Jesus is not the Jesus of the Gospels.
21:22: And so they're searching for what the Gospels doesn't tell us.
21:26: And they're trying to find something about Jesus.
21:29: You know, he was married to Mary Magdalene or had kids or something to try to throw away what the scriptures say about Jesus.
21:38: And the Jesus Seminar is a group of higher critical scholars that used to meet.
21:43: I don't know if they still do, but they used to meet to have those discussions.
21:47: And they really really had a weird process.
21:49: They had like this.
21:49: They had marbles that they would put in a box.
21:53: And the box was like, if Jesus really said this, you put your marble in this box.
21:57: If you think he didn't say it, you put your marble in this box.
22:00: If you don't know, you put it in this box.
22:02: And this is just sort of this odd, almost seemed almost like cultic practice.
22:07: And then they add up the marbles to determine whether or not Jesus really said.
22:12: And by the time they were concluded, Jesus didn't say anything that the Bible attributes to him.
22:18: Like one sentence in the Gospels is actually authentically from the mouth of Christ, according to these guys.
22:24: So when I say higher critical scholars think whatever, know that they're coming from a hyper skeptical perspective.
22:34: And that's important to keep in mind.
22:36: Do you have a question? What are the six books that people think that are not from Paul? You said 1st, 2nd Timothy, Ephesians.
22:45: I thought I had it on here, but I don't.
22:47: I had to get it for you, brother.
22:48: I know that it's 1st and 2nd Timothy, Ephesians.
22:53: I could probably figure it out if I sat here and look.
22:55: I think Colossians is one of them.
23:00: Let's see.
23:00: 1st, 2nd Timothy, Colossians, Ephesians.
23:05: I have to look for the rest.
23:07: Yeah, I'll get you the list, though.
23:08: I'll get you the list.
23:12: All right.
23:13: Do you guys have your handout from the first class where we talked about the order of when we believe the books were written? If you look at that list, JP, it's the later books.
23:30: Yeah, except for Philemon.
23:33: A lot of people believe that because it's so personal that that's Pauline.
23:38: But if you look, most people will accept the Pauline authorship of Galatians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, and Romans.
23:50: But then when you start getting into Philippians, Colossians, Ephesians, 1st, 2nd Timothy, Titus, that's where the questions really come up.
23:57: It's really early Paul versus later Paul.
24:00: But honestly, Galatians is not really a debate.
24:04: Almost everybody accepts the Pauline authorship of Galatians.
24:07: Almost everybody accepts the Pauline authorship of Romans.
24:11: So yeah, it's really the more later ones would be the ones that you would want to make a case for the authorship of Paul when you're doing your paper.
24:23: But the reason why I wanted you to pull out your handout, because I want to have you think on this.
24:28: Because one of the arguments is, well, Paul's, if you read 1st Timothy, the language and the theology is different than the language and theology of Galatians.
24:38: That's the argument, right? And so here's something you have to consider.
24:44: Look at the sheet and look at the time difference between Galatians and 1st and 2nd Timothy.
24:52: You're looking at a period of over a decade or more, up to almost two decades of time.
25:02: And I want to say this.
25:04: I know myself, my writing style has changed in 15 years.
25:11: My use of language has certainly matured in 15 years.
25:17: And someone might say, well, this is the Word of God.
25:20: How could you say that? No.
25:21: Remember, the Word of God is given through the instrument of the writers.
25:26: And the writers bring in their own use of vocabulary and their own use of structure.
25:33: And there's also a different purpose.
25:35: Galatians is the most passionate of Paul's letters, because he's mad.
25:43: You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Remember that? He's angry.
25:51: Galatians is the only letter that doesn't include any salutation.
25:56: It goes right into almost an attack.
26:00: He says, hi, I'm Paul, and you're doing bad.
26:03: I mean, it's not that easy.
26:04: But really, there's no, you know, he writes to the Corinthians, I'm so thankful for you.
26:09: I love you, and grace, and truth.
26:12: And you don't see that.
26:14: Galatians, the attitude is one of rebuke, because that's what it is.
26:21: And it begins and ends with that.
26:24: And so, if I were writing a letter of rebuke, I think my language would first certainly be a little different than if I were writing a letter of love and concern.
26:34: Yes? Since they didn't have the New Testament, like with you, there are things that you've changed on, stuff like that.
26:53: So I'm getting at, do you think maybe that is Paul's growth? Yeah, I would be careful, because I don't think there is a different theology.
27:06: The other thing I was going to say is, I don't think the theology of 1st Timothy or 2nd Timothy is different than Galatians.
27:11: I think it's a consistent theology throughout.
27:14: I was saying, I think his language matures.
27:17: But we do have to remember that he was receiving revelation from God in regard to his theology.
27:25: So I don't think that there was a wholesale change in his theology.
27:29: I do see, though, that there were, and I mentioned this, I think, a few weeks ago, I think that we do see a structuring of the ideas.
27:43: So Galatians is very powerful, but it's emotional, it's coming from this position of being upset.
27:52: Romans has the same theology as Galatians.
27:56: I mean, Romans and Galatians are sisters.
28:00: But the way that it is structured in Romans is almost like a theological textbook, whereas in Galatians, it's structured as a rebuke.
28:11: And so the theology is the same, but it certainly is presented in a different way.
28:18: Yeah, and God knows what his people need, right? We needed both.
28:24: Yeah, but yeah, I would say his theology was always right.
28:27: It just, you know, is better expressed maybe in the later letters as to structure.
28:34: Yes, sir.
28:44: Yeah, I think there's something to that.
28:49: You know, Romans is a masterpiece.
28:54: I mean, if the Bible were a wedding ring, Romans would be the stone.
29:02: And Romans 8 would be the shimmering part of the stone.
29:07: Romans 8 begins with no condemnation, ends with no separation.
29:11: And in between, you have the promise of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the adoption of sons by whom we cry, Abba, Father.
29:17: The promise that our present sufferings are not to be considered to the glory that has been revealed to us and that all things will work together for the good of those who love him and neither death nor life nor angels nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor height nor depth or anything else in all creation will separate us from him.
29:31: There's just so much.
29:34: And I know that's not the question you asked, but, you know, you think about Romans and obviously the amount of just powerful work that went into putting that together in the way that he did.
29:47: Yeah, I think that's a reasonable assumption that he had time.
29:51: I think that's a reasonable assumption.
29:54: All right, so we've looked at authorship.
29:58: We've looked at dating.
30:00: And we see the dating is, you know, Galatians, Thessalonians, Corinthians are the earlier books, Romans and Philippians, Colossians, the middle point.
30:09: And then you have Philemon, Ephesians, Timothy and Titus pulling up the rear.
30:17: But now let's talk about the purpose of each of these books, because the purpose of Paul's writings is contextual.
30:24: They are written always to a specific audience.
30:29: We often refer to them as books, but they're not books.
30:33: They're actually letters.
30:35: They are epistles.
30:36: That term epistles just simply means letter or message or dispatch.
30:45: And the vast majority of the New Testament books that we call them are actually epistles.
30:50: 21 of the 27 books of the New Testament are actually epistles.
30:57: And Paul's epistles were written either to a specific church or to a specific person.
31:04: This is what separates them from what is typically called the general epistles, because Hebrews and James and 1st, 2nd, 3rd John and Jude and 1st and 2nd Peter don't have a specific audience that they're pointed at.
31:19: They're more general, so therefore referred to as general epistles.
31:23: But the Pauline epistles will always have a specific audience in mind.
31:32: Some of them were actually even written in response to other letters that we don't have.
31:38: That's an interesting reality that we have to accept, is that Paul speaks in Corinthians of having received a letter and he is responding to it.
31:50: That's 1st Corinthians 7.1.
31:52: He says, now concerning the matters about which you wrote.
31:57: Okay, what does that tell us? It tells us that they wrote him a letter asking him questions.
32:02: We don't have that letter.
32:03: That makes 1st Corinthians a response and therefore we have to, in a sense, try to determine what the question was so that we can arrive at a right understanding of the answer.
32:16: What's 1st Corinthians 7 about? Marriage and divorce.
32:21: It's where Paul says some of the most difficult things that he wrote on the subject.
32:25: Particularly, it's good that a man not be with a woman but be single as I am.
32:31: And somebody says, wait a minute, Paul.
32:33: God said it's not good for a man to be alone.
32:34: Are you contradicting God in the garden? No, Paul is dealing with a particular situation in Corinth that needed to be understood.
32:45: I believe this is the situation Paul is dealing with.
32:50: The Corinthians, many of them had come out of slavery.
32:53: Many of them had been married and divorced while in slave conditions and therefore many of them had been married and divorced several times.
33:03: And I think Paul is saying it'd be better if you could just stay unmarried if you're not married, if you can.
33:09: But what is he going to say? It's better to be married than to burn with desire to be married.
33:14: So if you want to be married, there's no sin in that.
33:17: So he's dealing with a particular situation and a particular historical context.
33:23: And again, because we don't have the initial letter, we have to sort of reverse engineer the question.
33:31: What do we think is the situation? And the historic context leads us to, at least me, to that particular understanding of why Paul would say some of the things that he did that are somewhat hard for us to understand.
33:45: So there are other times where other letters are mentioned.
33:50: Paul says in 1 Corinthians 5, 9, I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with the sexually immoral people.
33:57: We don't have that letter.
33:59: Paul says, I wrote to you in my letter.
34:02: That was the first 1 Corinthians.
34:04: We actually, our 1 Corinthians is the 2 Corinthians because that's the first letter that he wrote.
34:08: We don't have that.
34:09: That bothers some people.
34:11: They say, oh, is that a lost book of the Bible? No, if it was supposed to be in the Bible, we'd still have it.
34:15: That comes down to the doctrine of providence.
34:17: And you say, well, that's too simple.
34:18: That's too simplistic.
34:19: No, I think it's theological.
34:21: The answer is, does God desire that we know what his word is? Yes.
34:25: Does God intend that his people have his word? Yes.
34:29: Therefore, would God have providentially ensured that his word would be in our hands? Yes.
34:36: Therefore, we don't have the letter.
34:37: Therefore, we don't need it.
34:39: This is the whole issue that, you know, some people ask about the book of Enoch or other things like that.
34:45: And they say, are we supposed to have that? No.
34:47: We can say emphatically, no, it's not.
34:51: For no other reason than we would have to then assume that God does not have the power to maintain the integrity of his word.
35:00: And so I think that we have to at least believe that God has the power to do that.
35:07: Yeah, go ahead.
35:07: I like what you said.
35:08: You told me this before, that even if we found the letter tomorrow, that it still would be scripture.
35:14: That's right.
35:15: We wouldn't add another book to the New Testament.
35:19: It would be interesting.
35:20: I'd love to read it if we unearthed Proto-Corinthians, if we want to call it that, or First First Corinthians.
35:27: I'd want to know what, you know, what Paul said.
35:30: And it would certainly have great value.
35:32: But for me, it would sit on the same shelf as the Epistle of Barnabas or the Shepherd of Hermas or any of the other extra biblical New Testament times.
35:42: Books from the New Testament times are not New Testament books, but there are extra biblical literature from that time.
35:47: A lot of it, actually, but it's never been recognized by the church universal.
35:52: Therefore, I would not believe it to be scripture.
35:57: So I'll give you a good example.
35:58: If you have your Bible turned to Colossians 4.16.
36:02: And Colossians 4.16, Paul makes reference to something that's very interesting.
36:25: Someone give me a...
36:26: Somebody read it.
36:37: Yeah.
36:38: All right.
36:39: So when this letter, which is the letter of Colossians, the letter to Colossae, he said, when this letter is read among you, pass it on to the Laodiceans and get the letter that was sent to them and read it.
36:52: And everybody's going, where's Laodicea chapter one? It's not in your Bible.
36:57: So there is a letter to Laodicea that either was written by the Laodiceans to Paul or to Paul to the Laodiceans.
37:06: We don't know because of the way the Greek works there, it's a little ambiguous.
37:10: And that's why if you notice the way you read it, it actually sounded like it's from the Laodiceans.
37:15: Could be.
37:16: Some people think that that may be the book of Ephesians, because Ephesians, even though it was written to Ephesus, had a universal aspect to it.
37:29: It was it was sent out more than just to the Church of Ephesians.
37:31: So some people think that Ephesians went to Laodicea and now it's going to go to Colossae.
37:36: And so that's that's and that's possible, right? Could be that could be the letter to the Ephesians, and therefore we do have it.
37:42: It could be a book that we don't have that Paul wrote, or it could be a book that the Laodiceans wrote to Paul that we don't have.
37:51: Either way, we don't have it, but it's mentioned.
37:54: So this is an important reality, right? Because a lot of people say, well, the Bible mentions it's got to be part of the Bible.
37:59: Not necessarily.
38:00: The Bible mentions the writings of Epimenides, who is a Greek philosopher.
38:06: So does that mean we go find all the writings of Epimenides and put them in the Bible? No.
38:10: Just because the Bible mentions a book or a writer does not mean that that book is supposed to be part of our New Testament.
38:19: Yes, sir.
38:27: Yeah, absolutely.
38:28: Absolutely.
38:28: But we don't have them anymore.
38:30: So again, it would be great if somebody, you know how they found the Dead Sea Scrolls, right? The kid threw a rock in a cave.
38:39: They heard a crash and went and looked in.
38:41: And there's these giant pots.
38:42: It's got these scrolls nobody had seen for a thousand or for well, for 2000 years.
38:47: The Nag Hammadi texts, which are the Gnostic texts, were found by a couple of brothers.
38:54: They thought they'd found buried treasure.
38:56: And then they opened it up and it was just a bunch of books.
38:59: It was still treasure, but it wasn't what the treasure they thought it was, right? So there's likely, I mean, there's a chance that tomorrow some archaeologist is going to shove his spade in the ground and is going to come out with a letter to the Laodiceans.
39:13: And it would certainly be something worth our time to examine.
39:17: It would give us historical information.
39:19: It would give us a lot of good information.
39:22: We would be fools to say it doesn't have any value.
39:25: But I don't think that that would mean that we should open the canon up and shove in the 28th book of the New Testament.
39:33: That's the distinction, right? God has ensured that we have what we need.
39:37: And so both historically and theologically, I think we can stand on the 27 books and be confident in what we do have.
39:47: All right.
39:48: If I were to ascribe an overall purpose to Paul, because this is what we've been talking about the purpose, I would say that his epistles are pastoral in nature.
40:00: Now, I'm not saying that because there are three of his epistles are actually called the pastoral epistles.
40:06: 1st, 2nd Timothy and Titus are called the pastoral epistles.
40:09: But I would say all of his epistles have a pastoral quality because Paul has planted these churches.
40:15: He's now gone on and he's writing to them trying to correct and rebuke and encourage and exhort.
40:24: You know, and we see that that's that's the job of the shepherd.
40:27: That's the job of the pastor.
40:28: So I think all of his letters have a pastoral heart, but not necessarily would we call them all the pastoral epistles.
40:36: In fact, just to keep in mind, there are two there are two subsets of Paul's epistles.
40:42: We would say that they're the prison epistles that is Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians and Philemon.
40:49: And then there's the pastoral epistles, which are 1st and 2nd Timothy and Titus.
40:56: And then they can be broken down.
40:58: The easiest way to break it break down his letters are the ones written to churches and ones written to individuals.
41:04: Obviously, Romans, 1st and 2nd Corinthians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, these are written to churches.
41:09: But then you get to Titus, Timothy, Philemon.
41:12: These are written to individuals.
41:13: So if you if you were creating a chart, the first the first subset of the chart would be to the churches to the individuals, and you do that way, then you'd say, OK, these are the pastoral epistles.
41:24: And the three of the ones that were individuals would be the pastoral epistles.
41:28: So that, you know, in your mind, I don't have a chart.
41:30: I didn't make a chart.
41:31: But you kind of got the idea of how to how to break down what what he's doing.
41:39: So that brings us to the theological insights.
41:46: And this by far would be the part that I would want to spend the most time in.
41:53: Because Paul is the theologian of the early church.
41:57: When I say the theologian of the early church.
42:02: Therefore, it is difficult, if not impossible, to describe the full weight and breadth of his theological contribution.
42:10: This makes sense because Paul had training as a Pharisee.
42:15: Philippians three, five tells us that.
42:18: But Paul does not appeal to his training.
42:21: This goes back to the question you asked, Bobby, about Paul, you know, his information.
42:26: Paul never appeals to his training as the source of his theology.
42:30: Paul always appeals to revelation as to his source of his theology.
42:36: Galatians one, verse 11, for I would have, you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel.
42:44: For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it.
42:48: But I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.
42:51: So so and that, again, I believe is his first letter.
42:54: And I think and that's in the first chapter of the first letter.
42:57: He's starting off by saying, what I'm telling you is not from men.
43:03: I didn't learn this, you know, because he studied at the feet of one of the greatest rabbis, Gamaliel.
43:08: He was the student of this rabbi.
43:11: But he's saying, I didn't get this from Gamaliel.
43:13: I didn't get this from the Pharisees.
43:15: I got this directly from Jesus Christ.
43:18: And so that doesn't mean that his former training didn't serve him well.
43:24: It doesn't mean that his former training didn't have any benefit.
43:30: But what we need to remember is Paul's writing is not Paul's interpretation of the events.
43:38: It's God's revelation of the events.
43:42: Paul's not looking at the life of Jesus and interpreting them through his grid as a Pharisee or his grid as a theologian.
43:49: Paul is interpreting or Paul is writing the revelation of God that he is receiving from God himself.
44:03: When it comes to theology, I think the two books of Paul, which are most to be considered in that regard would be Galatians and Romans.
44:12: I've already said those two books are sisters.
44:17: Galatians stands as Paul's first letter.
44:21: As I said, it's corrective in nature.
44:24: Its tone is different.
44:25: It does not contain the usual pleasantries found in his other letters.
44:29: And Romans is Paul's magnum opus.
44:32: It's the closest thing to a systematic theology we possess in the New Testament.
44:36: And in it, Paul outlines doctrines such as sin, justification, sanctification, election, and adoption.
44:46: These two books would go on to have a profound impact on Martin Luther and the Reformers.
44:53: Both letters stood at the center of the Reformation protests that rocked and eventually split the Christian church in the 16th century.
45:00: In fact, the beginning of the Reformation can, with some justification, be traced to Martin Luther's lectures on Romans between 1515 and 1516 and Galatians, which is 1517 to 1518.
45:13: So if you look at what Luther was doing prior to the Reformation and at the beginning of the Reformation, he was exegeting Romans and he was exegeting Galatians.
45:25: So these two books together are the sisters, if it will be, of the Reformation.
45:35: Now, one could argue that Paul's most important contribution to theology regards our understanding of justification.
45:57: When you discuss the theology of the Apostle Paul, it is impossible that you would not consider what he says about the subject of justification.
46:11: Justification is the doctrine of how a sinful man is made right with a holy God.
46:19: This is a question which has plagued man since the Garden.
46:24: God is holy, man is sinful.
46:29: How can that be reconciled? And that is Paul's, that is the heart of Paul's theology.
46:41: This is the question, as I said, which has really plagued man in all of his dealings forever.
46:48: And Paul explains that the work of Christ is what brings about the reconciliation of man and God.
46:58: And Paul is the one who expresses to us the doctrine that really has to be understood to understand justification, and it is the doctrine of imputation.
47:19: And Paul's doctrine of imputation is threefold.
47:22: There is a threefold imputation.
47:24: And by the way, if you don't know what imputation is, let me very quickly just explain it.
47:28: Imputation means to credit to someone's account or to charge someone with something.
47:38: If in the easiest way, you've probably all heard me say this at some point.
47:41: If you have a ledger book and your ledger is empty, someone else has a ledger book and their ledger is full and they take what's in their account and they put it into your account and now your ledger book is full and their ledger book is empty.
47:54: That is imputation.
47:57: That's taking from one account and imputing it to the account of another.
48:02: And there is a threefold imputation taught by the Apostle Paul.
48:05: First is Adam's sin is imputed to all of his posterity.
48:11: So there is the imputation of Adam's sin.
48:22: Then we have the imputation of the believer's sin to Christ.
48:30: That's the second part of imputation.
48:35: Our account has been given the sin of Adam.
48:40: And of course, we include our own sin as well.
48:43: We add to the sin of Adam with our own sins.
48:45: And so our ledger book of sin is full.
48:48: Our sin in the account is transferred to Christ.
48:52: Christ takes our sin upon himself.
48:55: The imputation of sin from our account to his account.
48:59: And he bears the weight and the guilt and the burden of our sin.
49:04: And so that's the second doctrine of imputation.
49:08: The second part of the threefold.
49:12: And the third is the imputation of the righteousness of Christ to the believer.
49:20: So to just maybe give a diagram, if you consider the believer and his ledger, if you will, you have Adam who imputes his sin to the believer.
49:43: Christ takes that sin upon himself on the cross.
49:49: And then his righteousness is then given to the believer.
49:55: So we have a threefold doctrine of imputation.
49:58: And this is the process by which God is both just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Christ.
50:07: That's what it says in Romans 3, right? God is just because the believer's sin has been paid for.
50:15: And God is the justifier because the believer has been given the righteousness in Christ and therefore been made right with God.
50:23: Yes, sir, you had your hand up, brother.
50:29: Christ's righteousness is imputed to the believer.
50:32: Yeah, so you have the imputation of Adam's sin to us.
50:38: You have the imputation of our sin to Christ.
50:42: You have the imputation of Christ's righteousness to us.
50:46: If you do not have a doctrine of imputation, you do not understand Paul's theology.
50:54: Paul's theology is rooted and steeped in the doctrine of imputation.
50:59: It's where we get justification.
51:02: Does that make sense? If you want some passages for further study, I would encourage you to read Romans 3, 21 to 26.
51:12: Second Corinthians 5, 21.
51:15: That one is probably the one you all remember.
51:17: God made him who knew no sin to become sin for us, that we can become the righteousness of God in him, right? That's the great transaction.
51:25: Our sin is on him.
51:26: His righteousness is to us.
51:29: And then Galatians 2, 15 and 16.
51:32: And if you want to study further the relationship of Adam's sin to us, that would be Romans 5, 12 to 18.
51:43: What's interesting is Paul spends so much time in his letters talking about the doctrine of justification.
51:52: But the word justification in regard to a person being saved is only used once by Christ.
52:04: Anybody happen to know where it is? Two men went to the temple to pray.
52:12: One was a Pharisee, the other a tax collector.
52:15: And one went home justified and not the other.
52:18: It's the only time the term justified is used of Christ to apply to anyone.
52:23: And how was the tax collector justified? By faith.
52:29: It's very important.
52:31: The only time Jesus mentions justification in regard to an individual, he uses the word justification in other contexts.
52:37: Jesus said, wisdom is justified by our children.
52:40: The word justified is used.
52:42: But in regard to someone being right with God, the only time we see that with Christ is in that parable.
52:49: And it is by faith alone.
52:53: That's such an important parable.
52:54: Don't forget it.
52:55: All right, take three minutes break.
52:57: And when we come back, we're going to look at the The difficult interpretive challenges.
53:06: All right, everyone, we're going to finish up with the interpretive challenges.
53:12: Now, as I said, I did tell you I was going to do this.
53:15: I'm going to give you one sentence, a one sentence description of Romans, Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, because that's really what we're supposed to cover tonight.
53:26: Here it is, if you want to write it down.
53:27: Or if you don't want to write it down, you can just take a picture of my notes with your phone afterwards if you'd like.
53:32: But because this might be a little bit too right.
53:34: Romans, the one sentence description is it is the saving power of the gospel.
53:41: First Corinthians, the absolute necessity of love.
53:49: Second Corinthians is the ministry of reconciliation.
53:55: I'm not saying this is one verse.
53:57: I'm saying this is the tenor of the book.
54:02: Second Corinthians, the ministry of reconciliation.
54:08: Galatians, I'll give you two for this one.
54:11: You could say freedom in Christ, or this is what I prefer, the Magna Carta of Christianity.
54:21: Because it's Paul's explanation that we are free from the ceremonies of the old covenant.
54:30: Ephesians is the riches of God's grace.
54:37: Philippians, I have two for this one as well.
54:39: Philippians could either be the value of humility or joy and suffering.
54:44: Philippians is often called the joy book.
54:46: It has the word joy or rejoice throughout.
54:49: And it's interesting when you realize Paul's writing it from prison to know that he has joy in a horrible circumstance.
54:57: And finally, Colossians is the supremacy of Christ.
55:10: Now let's talk about interpretive challenges as we finish out tonight's lesson.
55:17: Probably the most important interpretive challenge regarding the writings of the Apostle Paul come in the form of what is typically referred to as the new perspective on Paul.
55:32: Now I provided you a handout.
55:39: This handout is actually simply a photocopy of two pages, or rather three pages, three and a half, from the book Introducing the New Testament by Doug Moo and D.A.
55:51: Carson.
55:51: If you have the book, you don't have to keep the handout because you have it in the book, but I would note this page in the book.
55:59: I would make a note of it and read it.
56:02: I want to read to you just the first paragraph on page 76.
56:09: The New Perspective on Paul and Judaism.
56:12: First century Judaism played a critical role in the development of Paul's theology, both in his upbringing and his interaction with various Jewish and Jewish Christian viewpoints.
56:23: This interaction is most obvious in Galatians and Romans, but it is present in varying degrees in all the letters.
56:31: Determining just what the Judaism of Paul's day looked like is therefore quite significant for accurately interpreting Paul's letters.
56:41: So here's the argument basically, and I do encourage you to read this.
56:46: But the argument, which if you've ever heard of N.T.
56:49: Wright, N.T.
56:51: Wright is probably the most famous proponent of the new perspective, but he is not the first, neither is he the only.
56:59: And also to say new perspective is a little unfair because there is no new perspective on Paul, there are perspectives.
57:07: Because if you consider Wright and James D.G.
57:10: Dunn and a few others, you will note that they don't always agree with one another.
57:15: But the gist of it, if I may try to be so bold as to give you a short gist, is this.
57:22: That Paul's Judaism, or rather the Judaism of the first century, which would have been Second Temple Judaism, was not a legalistic religion.
57:36: It was a religion of grace.
57:40: And therefore, Paul's response to the Jews of his day was not to argue that salvation, your relationship with God and your heavenly home is based on your justification, but rather your relationship with the covenant community is based on whether or not you have to keep the law.
58:07: Now, maybe that was a little confusing, let me try to clear it up.
58:09: When we talk about justification, what do we care about? We care about how we're made right with God.
58:16: The new perspective says, no, that's not what Paul cares about.
58:20: Paul cares about the covenant community and how someone is made right within the covenant community.
58:25: Because everybody believed that you went to heaven by grace.
58:30: You see, for the new perspective, they're saying that it's not about how you get to heaven, it's about how you are made part of the covenant community.
58:38: So therefore, grace, salvation is something the Jews believed.
58:47: Now, right away, I want to give you where this really works out for a lot of folks from my side, because I am a student of and a product of Reformation teachings.
59:01: Someone like N.T.
59:02: Wright would say the Reformers got it wrong.
59:06: Because the Reformers were looking at the legalism of Rome and they were applying that anachronistically to the Jews of the first century.
59:18: Now do you see how it starts to make sense? Because they're saying Paul's issues with the Jews was not the same as Luther's issues with Rome.
59:30: And Luther interpreted Galatians and Romans through the lens of his relationship with Rome, and therefore he misinterpreted Paul's relationship with the Jews of the first century.
59:44: That's a pretty big accusation.
59:46: Because it's saying essentially all of Reform theology, particularly everything I taught in the last half hour regarding justification, is completely wrong.
59:56: So the New Perspective is no small argument.
01:00:00: And it has implications that are widespread.
01:00:04: But let me just say it like this.
01:00:07: The New Perspective, I believe, is incorrect.
01:00:11: In fact, I will tell you this, John MacArthur says this, N.T.
01:00:14: Wright is N.T.
01:00:14: wrong.
01:00:15: But that's maybe a little too silly.
01:00:17: But that R.C.
01:00:19: Sproul, I encourage you, look up his video on N.T.
01:00:21: Wright.
01:00:22: It's only two minutes long.
01:00:23: He was asked in a conference, do you think that N.T.
01:00:28: Wright's theology of justification is heresy? And R.C.
01:00:33: Sproul's answer was very simple.
01:00:35: He said, if it's not, there is no such thing as heresy.
01:00:40: He says, if N.T.
01:00:41: Wright's understanding of justification is not heretical, he said, then there is no such thing as heresy.
01:00:49: That comes from the mouth of Sproul himself.
01:00:51: I encourage you to look it up.
01:00:52: See that I'm not exaggerating.
01:00:54: Because the other guys on the dais, the other guys that were sitting with him, all were very nervous.
01:00:59: Because N.T.
01:01:00: Wright is one of the most respected historians and theologians in the world.
01:01:03: And R.C.
01:01:04: Sproul called him a heretic on stage.
01:01:10: I mean, that's a very serious accusation.
01:01:14: I ain't saying it.
01:01:16: The late and good Dr.
01:01:17: Sproul said it.
01:01:18: So, but I want to just say this about it, though.
01:01:23: I think that there is ample evidence that there was legalism in the first century Jewish community.
01:01:30: And I think it comes from the words of Jesus himself.
01:01:34: Was it not Jesus who said to the Pharisees that they seek to establish their righteousness based on their works? Wasn't it Jesus who said that of the Pharisees? You seek to establish your own righteousness based on...
01:01:52: What's the definition of legalism? To establish your righteousness based on your works.
01:01:58: Jesus called out the legalism of his own day.
01:02:02: And I think if we read Paul rightly, we will see that there were those in the Jewish community who believed that their standing before God was not of grace, or not of grace alone, but was of grace and law.
01:02:19: And Paul said, no, it is by grace through faith alone, and not by works of the law.
01:02:28: So my position on New Perspectivism is I think it is wrong, but I do appreciate at least that they are trying to be fair to first century Judaism.
01:02:39: I do imagine there were first century Jews who believed in grace, just like I believe there's Roman Catholics who probably believed in grace.
01:02:46: You understand what I'm saying? I think it's important that we do try to be honest historically.
01:02:52: But to say that no first century Jew was a legalist, or to say that the Jewish community did not have a problem with legalism, I think is to deny much of what the scripture says very clearly.
01:03:04: Yes, sir, please.
01:03:10: They were basing this off of intertestamental Jewish literature? Yeah, not the Bible.
01:03:17: Right.
01:03:17: When more study was done, it's such a wide field of what they actually believed.
01:03:22: If you can't really even bog us down, that's actually really, really big.
01:03:26: That's right.
01:03:27: To talk about Second Temple Judaism as a monolith is false.
01:03:31: There is no monolithic Second Temple Judaism belief system.
01:03:35: It was all over the map.
01:03:36: This is why you had the Essenes, which had separated themselves from the Jewish community in Jerusalem, because they said, those are the heretics, and we're the real guys.
01:03:47: That's the ones who we believe wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls.
01:03:49: You know, certainly there was a divergence there.
01:03:52: I mean, even within the Bible, we see that the Pharisees and the Sadducees, there was division on how they understood the proper application of the law and things like that.
01:04:01: So yeah, absolutely.
01:04:02: So I want to make a reference to something on this sheet.
01:04:05: I added on the back page.
01:04:09: I said, this is from Introducing the New Testament by Carson and Moe.
01:04:12: Read this.
01:04:13: But also, if you have access to YouTube, I think most of you do, there are two videos here.
01:04:19: Now, I have the links, but typing that link out might be difficult.
01:04:23: If you just look up Phil Johnson, that says John, that's wrong.
01:04:26: It should say Phil Johnson.
01:04:27: Phil Johnson, A New Perspective on Paul.
01:04:31: Just look that up on YouTube.
01:04:33: He gives a 55-minute lecture, and I think he knocks it out of the park.
01:04:37: I think he gives a very simple, concise lecture.
01:04:40: And if you don't know who Phil Johnson is, he's second in command of grace to you to John MacArthur.
01:04:45: He's John MacArthur's right-hand man.
01:04:47: So that's who Phil Johnson is.
01:04:50: And the other one is D.A.
01:04:51: Carson, who wrote, obviously, the book that many of you have.
01:04:56: His New Perspective on Paul does a three-hour lecture.
01:04:59: So if you really want to dig in, you can look up D.A.
01:05:03: Carson's New Perspective on Paul there.
01:05:06: But if you were to ask me, what do you think about the New Perspective on Paul? As I said, I think that it does ask some important questions, but I think it gives us wrong answers.
01:05:16: I think it gives wrong answers to possibly insightful questions.
01:05:22: And I think it all comes down to it.
01:05:24: In my heart, I think it all comes down to trying to eliminate that doctrine of imputation.
01:05:29: N.T.
01:05:29: Wright does not believe that Christ's righteousness is imputed to us.
01:05:39: I'm not exaggerating.
01:05:40: He would tell you.
01:05:42: He does not believe the righteousness of Christ is imputed to us.
01:05:44: Him and John Piper had a massive debate over this in the back-and-forth writing many years ago, where they went back and forth on this subject.
01:05:56: In fact, there's a little book by Piper called, oh, is it called The Righteousness of Christ or The Imputed Righteousness? It's a little book that he describes sort of the interaction and why it was so important.
01:06:13: So while I do think, based on listening to Wright and obviously reading his work, I do think that he would at least say our sin is imputed to Christ.
01:06:27: Christ's righteousness is not imputed to us.
01:06:29: That's the big issue for me, is understanding the righteousness of Christ as our standing.
01:06:37: Paul says, I have a righteousness that is not my own, but comes through faith in Jesus Christ, right? The righteousness of God, which comes by faith, not a righteousness of my own.
01:06:51: And so that's a huge deal.
01:06:54: All right, a couple other things just for your own, for your notes.
01:06:59: And I'll ask for an extra five minutes since we did the, since we did the, we started with the quiz.
01:07:06: So I got, that took away about 20 minutes of lecture time.
01:07:09: So a couple of things to consider, other interpretive challenges.
01:07:14: Peter speaks of Paul's writings in 2 Peter 3, 15 and 16.
01:07:21: 2 Peter 3, 15 and 16, I want to read this to you.
01:07:25: Count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters.
01:07:36: There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction as they do the other scriptures.
01:07:44: That is a massively important passage from the writing of Peter for several reasons.
01:07:49: Number one, it tells us that some things that Paul wrote are weighty and hard to understand.
01:07:55: He said, he said, there are some things in Paul that are hard to understand.
01:08:00: Doesn't say it's impossible, but he says the, what does he say? He says that the ignorant and unstable twist them.
01:08:09: I'll give you an example of what I think one of those things is.
01:08:11: The example, someone who would use grace as a license for sin.
01:08:15: I think that is an unstable person who is twisting Paul's words to their own destruction.
01:08:22: But another thing we see here is that Paul's writings are understood as scripture.
01:08:28: Because he says, as they do with all the other scripture, that phrase other scripture means that Peter already recognizes that what Paul is writing is scripture.
01:08:41: And remember at that time, the term scripture would have applied to the Old Testament, not to the new.
01:08:46: So this tells us that even during the lifetime of Peter, there's a recognition that what Paul is writing is scripture.
01:08:54: So that's important.
01:08:55: You have Ross, you have a question? I thought you, okay.
01:09:02: So that passage in Peter, I think is important when thinking of the writings of Paul.
01:09:08: Something else.
01:09:09: Paul at times seems to indicate that he is speaking on his own accord, which caused some people to question the inspiration of those passages.
01:09:18: Most specifically, 1 Corinthians 7, 10 through 12, where Paul says this, to the married, I give this charge, not I, but the Lord, the wife should not separate from her husband.
01:09:28: But if she does, she should remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband.
01:09:31: And the husband should not divorce his wife.
01:09:33: To the rest, I say, I, not the Lord, that if any brother has a wife who is an unbeliever and she consents to live with him, he should not divorce her.
01:09:41: The main issue of that is when Paul says, I'm saying this, not the Lord.
01:09:47: And some people assume that what Paul is saying there is this is my own opinion.
01:09:51: This is not from God.
01:09:53: Or this is my own opinion.
01:09:54: This is not inspired by God.
01:09:56: In fact, I had a lady at our church say that one time.
01:09:58: Now, this was back when I first became the pastor and had a lot of, in those early years, there was a lot of contention.
01:10:05: And I was really contending for the inerrancy of Scripture and the authority of Scripture.
01:10:09: And that was really what we were, I was hoping that this church would be built upon.
01:10:13: And I believe that it is.
01:10:15: But there was a time when, you know, there was a lot of, Bobby remembers, there's a lot of fussing going on.
01:10:21: And one of the things I remember somebody said, well, Paul says himself that he's writing his own opinion, not from the Lord.
01:10:29: And I said, where do you get that? I said, oh, it's right here.
01:10:32: And I said, that is not what that means.
01:10:35: What Paul is saying is that there are things that Jesus addressed specifically.
01:10:41: And there are things that Jesus did not address specifically.
01:10:44: And he is giving additional revelation to what was already given through Christ in the Gospels.
01:10:52: Because if you read it again, when he says, the Lord says, if a woman divorces her husband, she should remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her husband.
01:11:01: The husband should not divorce his wife.
01:11:02: That is basically a statement from Matthew 19.
01:11:06: I mean, it's basically rehearsing what Jesus said in Matthew 19, Matthew 5, which refers to marriage.
01:11:12: So he's basically quoting Jesus.
01:11:14: Jesus said this, not me.
01:11:16: But then he goes on to say, I, not the Lord, also add this.
01:11:22: And you say, well, does that mean the Lord's not giving him the inspiration? No, he's saying Jesus didn't say this, but I'll say this as well.
01:11:28: And he goes on to say that if a brother has a wife who's an unbeliever and she consents to live with him, he shouldn't divorce her.
01:11:35: And this is what he says at the end.
01:11:36: This is the part that they always forget, is at the end of that chapter, Paul says, I too have the Spirit of God.
01:11:47: That's verse 40.
01:11:50: Why would he say, I too have the Spirit of God? Because he's referring to himself as having the authority to say these things.
01:11:58: He's not denying his authority as an apostle.
01:12:00: He's affirming his authority as an apostle.
01:12:04: So he's not saying this is not given by inspiration.
01:12:07: He's saying he's not directly quoting Christ in this passage.
01:12:15: Paul has the authority of an apostle and he has, he's writing with the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
01:12:21: All right, question time.
01:12:24: Does anybody else, because that's the end of my notes, except for my last statement, which I'll hold for the end.
01:12:29: Does anybody else have any questions from the writings of the Apostle Paul, maybe from particularly from Romans to Colossians that you were hoping I would address tonight and I didn't? You might say that's a lot.
01:12:44: Yeah, it is a lot.
01:12:45: But maybe I didn't know if, how about anything from your reading? This week you read some pretty heavy stuff.
01:12:51: Oh, yeah.
01:12:55: Okay.
01:12:57: I read it, but.
01:13:01: Okay.
01:13:01: I mean, I guess it's a simple statement, but they were so simple, it was very hard to do that.
01:13:07: Well, that's not MacArthur's commentary.
01:13:10: But it was said in the writers.
01:13:11: Yeah, it was saying something like, you know, it was a mystery.
01:13:14: Still, we're not, as far as election responsibility goes.
01:13:18: And then she submerged, submerged about what Christ said about it.
01:13:23: You know, those who are true followers will follow you.
01:13:27: Well, let me give you this very important breakdown that was given to me years ago.
01:13:34: And it's helped me very, very extensively.
01:13:38: And I'll make it quick.
01:13:39: And I think this is bore out in your commentary.
01:13:42: But what we are saying is that the two issues at hand are the sovereignty of God and the responsibility of man.
01:13:55: And Arminianism says, because man is responsible, God is not fully sovereign.
01:14:03: Hyper-Calvinism says, because God is fully sovereign, man is not completely responsible.
01:14:11: And the biblical record says that God is fully sovereign and man is still fully responsible.
01:14:18: And that's where Calvinism lies.
01:14:21: See, that's why we're not hyper-Calvinists.
01:14:23: But we believe in the full sovereignty of God and the full responsibility of man.
01:14:31: And that's why I wanted you to read that article.
01:14:33: And I am glad you asked, because.
01:14:38: Yeah, I think we have to believe in the responsibility of man, because man will go to hell because of his sin.
01:14:46: He is responsible.
01:14:49: And this is a mystery, but it is not an irreconcilable one.
01:14:53: It is a difficult one, though.
01:14:55: That's why I wanted you.
01:14:56: That book is not a, quote unquote, Calvinistic book.
01:15:00: But I think it does do a good job of trying to explain where the issue lies.
01:15:05: I heard it like this years ago.
01:15:07: And I really do wish this class were 16 weeks, because we maybe could spend two weeks on election and really flesh it out.
01:15:14: But I heard it said like this, and I do think it's an interesting way of looking at it.
01:15:19: It said, above the door of heaven, there is a sign.
01:15:23: And the sign says, all who will may enter.
01:15:26: But once you pass under the sign and turn around and look, it says that you have been chosen before the foundation of the world.
01:15:37: Did you put that on Facebook? No, I made some.
01:15:41: Maybe somebody else did.
01:15:42: Huh? Was it? OK.
01:15:46: Yeah.
01:15:46: So that idea is that God has.
01:15:50: God has, from our perspective, given a invitation.
01:15:56: Whosoever will come may come.
01:15:59: But we know that no one will come apart from the gracious drawing of Almighty God.
01:16:04: And therefore, we see in that a bit of a mystery, but not an irreconcilable one.
01:16:10: We are unable to come until God draws us.
01:16:13: And when he does, we will come.
01:16:14: And in eternity, no one will be able to say, I came without the gracious drawing of Almighty God.
01:16:23: No one came without the effectual grace of God.
01:16:28: And again, given time, we could flesh that out more.
01:16:32: Yeah.
01:16:33: Are we done? Any questions? Let's pray.
01:16:36: Father, thank you for this time.
01:16:37: I pray that it has been fruitful and encouraging for your people.
01:16:40: And I pray that you'll bring us back next week hungry to continue to learn.
01:16:44: In Christ's name, amen.