Lesson # 1 Introduction to the Bible (Fundamentals of the Faith by John MacArthur)

Alright lesson number one introduction to the Bible. We're going to look at 2nd Peter chapter 1 in a moment first. Second second Peter. Second Peter chapter 1 as you're turning there when thinking about the scripture.

There's three words. This isn't included in the the booklet, but there's three words that I want you to know. The first word is revelation the second word is inspiration and the third word is illumination.

So revelation inspiration and illumination. So revelation and has been said that Revelation is from God to man. Inspiration is from man to paper and then Illumination is from paper to the heart. Paul prays for the believers in Ephesus that God would give to them the spirit of wisdom and Revelation in the knowledge of him and he says that the eyes of your understanding Being enlightened that you may know.

What is the hope of his calling and the idea of being enlightened is that God opens your Understanding to the scriptures. So the Bible is a spiritually discerned book. I think some of you who read the column in the Greenfield Recorder were different ministers from these Liberal denominations they write in and it's amazing how someone who went to seminary can get it So wrong and they just they really they know what the Bible says.

But they don't really know what the Bible says so you have to have the Holy Spirit within for God to Illuminate his word to our understanding and to receive it in our heart. All right, let's look at 2nd Peter 1 20 and 21 and this class is going to depend on.

Your.

Questions and interactions, we're gonna go over the lesson, but the the purpose is not to just go over what we Did this past week? The purpose is for you to study it read a study come in with your questions and and we'll discuss what we're looking at.

All right.

2nd Peter chapter 1 verses 20 and 21. Peter writes knowing this first that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation for prophecy never came by the will of man. But holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.

So what is that verse saying? I think a lot of folks I I thought this way. At first when I first started reading the Bible. When you hear private.

Interpretation.

The Bible is not of any private Interpretation all that means it can't mean one thing to you you have your private Interpretation and then it means something totally different to me that we all have our own private interpretations.

I mean, that's true. That's not that's not good. That's not really what Peter is trying to communicate. What he's saying is that the source of Scripture is not man in his own private Interpretation the source of Scripture is who?

God, this is the Word of God. Every word in the Bible is the Word of God and Jesus affirmed that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every.

Word.

Okay, so the Bible is God's Word. It doesn't contain God's Word as some people would say that well God's Word is in there somewhere. You just have to sift through it. No, the whole thing is the Word of God.

Any questions or comments so far? All right, so obviously men wrote The Scriptures you'll hear people say this. Well, the Bible was written by man. Sometimes they'll tell us Evangelicals that well the Bible is a book written by man.

Well, yeah, we understand that men wrote the Bible, but what are they saying? That it's just a book right what and holy man it says yeah, holy men of God. But when you hear that usually what they're saying is it's just the Word of man.

Typically when people say that that yeah Peter is writing or you know, Moses was writing and they claim that it's the Word of God. But really it's just the words of Peter and really it's just the words of Moses and then of course these days you have people Debating whether or not Moses was a real historical figure.

So I just tune all of those people out and you have to understand the they're living in darkness. They don't have the Holy Spirit. They don't have faith. So you have to you know, don't get upset with them.

Just understand they were brought up. Maybe they even attend a church where they're taught this and that that's what they believe. So it's our job to believe the scripture and then tell people the truth.

And it's really God's job God the Holy Spirit to convince them because we in and of ourselves Are really not going to be able to convince anyone without God's help right, so It's the very words of God.

As Peter said that men were moved to write by God the Holy Spirit. So while Moses wrote Genesis He was inspired by God. How did God inspire His word we'll get into the book in just a second. But how did God do that?

Did God tell Moses? Hey Moses, here's what to write. I Actually think he did do that with Moses to a degree but when John wrote his gospel was God just speaking from heaven and John was writing it down like a secretary would just repeat word for word No, that's not how the scripture was inspired.

God used their own thoughts their own emotions their own Experiences to where yeah, it is John writing but it's also The source is God the Holy Spirit. So it's it's miraculous and it's mysterious at the same time.

Larry.

Right, right. Yeah every word. So if somebody believes the Bible. Love your neighbor as yourself. Yeah, I believe that or God so loved the world. Yeah, I believe that. But when it comes to God telling Joshua to enter into the land of Canaan and take the land.

Oh, I don't know. That's that seems very mean. God would tell what is that? What's what's the word for that? Or there's certain parts of the Bible. I can't accept that. Okay, selectively why yeah, I think of words like doubt and really it's unbelief.

The scripture is either all true. There's there's a famous pastor named Andy Stanley and he's really trying to convince people that you don't have to believe the Bible. Just believe in Jesus and the resurrection.

We don't have to believe the whole Bible and he really Discourages people from making statements like this, but I'm gonna make it anyways either the whole scripture is true all of it. Or if parts of it are not true that kind of clouds the whole thing.

Like how do you really know if parts of this book are false and unreliable? If you know somebody and they Consistently tell you things that are not true. It kind of clouds their whole testimony. So if the scripture is a package deal and that's my story and I'm sticking to it because that's what the Word of God teaches.

Despite what Andy Stanley says, yes Marcus.

Jesus is saying to his disciples, but when they deliver you up to not worry about how or what you should speak. For it will be given to you in that hour what you should speak. Mm-hmm.

Thank you, and we do believe that The Holy Spirit brought things to the Apostles remembrance. So there's that supernatural aspect, okay, let's go through the book. So if you have if you have the book and you filled it out.

We're just going to go through this and and ask questions as we go along because that's what we want to do. We want to generate some discussion and give you an opportunity to ask ask questions. So the Bible is the Word of God this is lesson number one the very beginning the Bible is the Word of God.

It claims to be the truth The message from God to man and then it references 2nd Peter 1 21. So the scriptures were written by about 40 different men. These men lived in several different countries and cultures.

They lived in different eras about 1400 BC through 90 AD. So it's a generally 40 different authors 1500 years and they wrote in three languages who knows what the languages are. Okay, so Hebrew Aramaic and Greek we all agree with that all right.

Coin a Greek. Yeah, it's not the same as modern Greek. Although I don't know if it's radically Different or not, but there is. Yeah, well Hebrew from what I understand was a dead language for a long long time.

This came up last time Where somebody had commented that because we just said the scripture is inspired by God. Amen. Is this book inspired by God? Is it? Inerrant and infallible.

Yeah.

Yeah, well if you look at our church doctrinal statement, it says that it is both inerrant, which means it's not wrong. And infallible, which means it cannot be wrong both inerrant and infallible in the original autographs.

That's in the church doctrinal statement. That's basically accepted by you know. Every pastor that I know unless they're King James only where they believe maybe there's some people who believe the King James version was sort Of re-inspired and we do not hold to that view, of course.

But this is troubling to some people. They say well. So the original autographs what you're saying. Is that when when Moses wrote. When Isaiah wrote. When Peter wrote. When John wrote? The scroll that they were writing that was inerrant infallible and inspired.

But not your modern translation. That's kind of troubling to people. Well, can how do we know that our modern translations are? Accurate and reliable.

How do we know that Marcus. Because God is is going to preserve it and has preserved it against all foes.

Yeah, it would have been pointless for God to inspire his word if he did not preserve His word. If you don't preserve it there and it's almost. Yeah, it was it was lost to history. Some people would say we don't believe that's true.

There are parts like if you have a King James version and someone else has an NIV or an ASB I don't want to pick on any one translations. Can I know this is a touchy subject. With some people you start talking about Bible translations.

I don't know what it is, but that topic more than just about anything Can make some people upset. But we know there are some slight differences a word here a word there. But we know all about that. And yeah, okay, there are maybe a few verses and a few different things.

But they don't affect any doctrine.

And.

We know that it's not some secret. The point is you can depend on the modern translations. So if no matter what it is. Well, there are some exceptions, of course. But you know King James New King James New American Standard and I be English standard the major translations are reliable independable.

Okay, so. Yes, Dwight just.

Within the The autographs and the manuscripts we don't have any original Autographs right, but we have close manuscripts Copies of the autographs of the original and we have more copies of those close Manuscripts than any other historical writing, right?

That's out there, right. And The the reality is is that the Bible is the most accurate Right historically literature that that's out there in any sense, right?

Just from.

From a human context of thinking about it. Yes. Yeah, it's like wow.

And isn't it amazing that historians and the fake scholars right. Marcus you listening fake scholars.

Okay, fake scholars fake.

Okay.

He said it. Okay. But they'll find some ancient document like one Copy and all we know this happened because we found this ancient document yet. You can have 5 ,000 copies of this, you know Old Testament book and all we don't believe that.

So, I mean there's an agenda going on there. We know that one last statement about this. It's better. It's actually a good thing that we don't have the original Autographs not only would people venerate them and worship them and you'd have cathedrals with a little Copy of a scroll and people would bow down to it.

No that would happen. But it's not just that if you had the original copy someone could tamper with it. But since they made copies thousands of copies and they went in every direction. Critical scholars.

They can take all the different copies compare them and there's a whole process. We can tell what's true. What is it. And the thing again the things that are debated are very small very small number of things.

Okay, let's continue number one the Old Testament books 39 books and all starts out section one part a the penitent five books. So pent, you know, right it means five like Pentecost is 50 days from Passover.

The first five books of the Old Testament were written by who? Around 1400 BC and they are often referred to as the five books of Moses or the penitent or sometimes also another term is.

The Torah.

All right. The first book is what? This is really basic Genesis. The book of beginnings where it talks about the creation man sin redemption. Second book Exodus. The third book Leviticus this is the book that people start their Bible reading and they get to Leviticus and then they quit right Numbers and Deuteronomy.

All right. So those are the first five books of the Bible. And then you go to the next section the historical books. How many historical books are there. Twelve. Okay now who filled them in that would like to read the historical books.

Yeah in order.

Jim.

Okay, you're going from memory. Yeah. Well, not. No Genesis through Genesis is could be considered historical. I mean I so but we're starting with Joshua. These are classified as the historical books.

And I don't blame you if you want to bail.

So.

Joshua judges First and second. Yeah, Ruth first and second Samuel first and second Kings first and second Chronicles Ezra Nehemiah and Esther. So those are the twelve? Historical books it says. The historical books were written between 1400 and 450 BC and described God's dealing with his chosen people Israel that is the Hebrew nation.

All right.

So we have the Pentateuch the first five books of Moses then the historical books and then the next category is the poetic. Books, how many poetic books are there?

Five.

Five.

Says the following five books are poetic describing in poetry and song God's greatness in his dealings with Men. And somebody had asked last week about the Song of Solomon. They said did they really talk like that back then?

And.

Probably. Well, it's poetry. It's like if you read a poem, no people generally don't talk like that, but it you know, it sounds really nice, doesn't it? And some of it is a little confusing at times, but the poetic books are Job Psalms Proverbs Ecclesiastes and the Song of Solomon.

A lot of people wouldn't think that Job Would be in there because it does seem more historical and obviously these are classifications that theologians and teachers came up with after the fact. But Job is actually considered one of the most the greatest work.

I don't want the greatest but one of the greatest works of poetry in the ancient world. All right. Next. What's the next section?

Major profits major.

Profits. So these are five Major profits. And why are they called major profits?

Five books.

Five books.

Yes, good good point.

So a prophet was a person commissioned by God to deliver his message to men. So if you want to think about it this way God is up here men are down here the prophet is in between and God speaks to the prophet who then delivers God's message to the people so it goes down he's a Intercessor or a intermediary.

With the priest same thing God's up here. The priest is in the middle God's people are down here that line goes up the people bring their requests and petitions to the priest and then To God that this is Old Testament in the New Testament.

We have it even better. Because we have the great high priest Jesus Christ as the one mediator, right? There's now there's one mediator between men and God the man of Christ Jesus. So now we can just go directly to God through the Lord Jesus, but I'm getting off topic.

So the major prophets were who? Isaiah Jeremiah Lamentations is a book written by Jeremiah Ezekiel and Daniel and from what I understand. They're called major prophets because of the size of the books and how long they prophesied for.

So the next section you think of major prophets, what's the next section? And that means that these guys just weren't important that what they wrote just didn't really matter. Who reads the minor prophets there?

You just ignore this section, right? Yeah, that would be a Blasphemous statement, I think if that if if I were serious, which I am NOT. So these are the minor prophets next. Yes a good way to remember is five twelve five five twelve.

That's up to thirty nine five twelve five five twelve.

Is that helpful for people? Yeah, sometimes, you know your mind works in such a way to help you remember. Okay. Hey if that works great.

I was a parts man.

All right, the minor prophets so obviously their writings are just as much the Word of God as the writings of Moses just as much the Word of God as the major prophets their prophecies are just as.

Important.

So the minor prophets everyone there's one minor prophet that everybody knows. Who is that. Because they learned about him in Sunday school. They got swallowed by a great fish. Yeah, Jonah, everyone knows Jonah, but the minor prophets are Hosea Joel Amos Obadiah Jonah Micah Nahum Habakkuk Zephaniah Haggai Zechariah and Malachi and of course Malachi is the final Old Testament book.

Any questions about so it says the minor prophets these were written these books between 840 BC and 400 BC. Any comments on the minor prophets. You know and I was joking around earlier, but that is kind of the attitude that some people have, you know.

No Christian would put it that way, but these books do often Nick get neglected. But there's some great content. What's what's your favorite? Minor-prophet who wants to raise their hand and tell us who your favorite minor prophet is Daniel.

Daniel is considered major. Okay, he's your favorite prophet, okay. Minor who's your favorite minor prophet. Marcus Habakkuk. Habakkuk. Yeah, don't mess with Israel. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I preached through Habakkuk Jonah and Joel.

I think if I had to pick one book, that's my favorite it might be Joel but Zechariah has. Zechariah has great prophecy regarding the second coming of Christ so. Very important book, okay.

Okay, all right good.

Ezekiel most people agree. Ezekiel is the most difficult book to understand of the prophets. I'm sure I'm. Well, yeah. Yeah, it's it's a it's a difficult read but we should do it. You know any sometimes people I want to read the Bible.

Every Christian feels like well I should read the Bible, but when you start you get to books like Leviticus or Ezekiel and it is difficult. I mean, let's. Let's admit to that but you know life in life.

Sometimes you have to do difficult things. Sometimes you got to take on a challenge. So if there's anyone sitting here this morning who has never read the Bible cover to cover Let me challenge you and plead with you.

Read it cover to cover. I Promise it will change. Change your life change your outlook it'll change something because it's. It's the Word of God. I Believe God will see that and he will bless that when he sees your commitment to read.

It's a thing to all of that is that The more often you read it the more familiar you become of it and you come with it. And also it also gives you a Proud perspective of who God is what he's done what he wants to do and of course Jesus Christ.

Yep. So if you repeatedly read it year to year you say oh, yeah, I remember this for the last time.

And then.

Yeah, good you had your hand up. Yeah. When you said challenge and so forth I was thinking there's another good challenge and that is memorize the books in order.

Right. So we had a memory verse children and we have a memory verse. Yeah. So what was the memory verse? Second Timothy 3 16 and I botched it last week. Yeah, and there's any yes I was talking to Tanya.

I'm like, okay, make sure I'm getting it. All right, and she's no no, that's wrong wrong word. I'm like what? Yeah, it's the different.

Translation.

All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine reproof correction and instruction and righteousness that the man of God may be. Perfect thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Throw in 17 for good measure. Who memorized. So I shouldn't call on. I shouldn't call on people. Does anyone else want to give it a try? It's one thing to memorize it but to do it in front of a group of people is a whole different ballgame.

All right, all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for a proof for correction for instruction and righteousness. Hey JV.

And if you do memorize scripture. Just a word of advice stick with one translation. I read the King James Version up until whatever I was 25. So the verses I had memorized were all in the King James Version.

Then I first time I read through the Bible is the NIV and then memorizing some from the NIV. Then I permanently switched to the New King James, which I've been on ever since. Remember so now. Yeah, it kind of messes you up.

So I would stick with one translation. That's my advice. Yes, Jim.

Because all like you I learned all my verses in King James, right? Well, I came time to do the paper. I did it from memory, but I use the I use the NA speak. Yeah.

Now there are 16 verses in the NIV that you won't be able to memorize because they're not there. And there are some other translations that have verses removed. But yeah sticking with one translation is helpful.

And then one other thing. Because let's say you you can quote scripture like that. But you never really spend the time to think about it meditate about what it means. So we would kind of look foolish if we just rattled off quoting scripture and then somebody yeah.

But what does that mean and you're like a deer in the headlights? So also if you're gonna memorize the passage know the context know what it means. That's really helpful. As well. Yes Marcus.

You can find someone else Who wants to memorize scripture and you're going to have to. You're gonna have to go along with their version. Yeah, if you are that lucky I do have that person. Giles is that person?

For me, but he's a King James only and he doesn't under. I have to translate.

Good to have that accountability with somebody else. Okay. Now, let's move to the New Testament books. How many New Testament books are there? 27 so 39 and 27 equals 66 books. Says the New Testament or New Covenant and really the terms are Interchangeable, although when someone says New Testament, they're often talking about the scriptures.

Rarely would anyone use New Covenant to talk about the scriptures, but really it means the same thing New Testament or New Covenant reveals Jesus Christ the Redeemer of men in it. We find in the New Testament.

We find the life of Christ the way of salvation. The beginning of Christianity, which would be what book? Acts acts of the Apostles. Instruction for Christian living. Which would be the Epistles. And then God's plan for the future.

And you know what that book is Revelation. Although there are people that would say Revelation is not a book of future prophecy. We are futurists. Here at Morse corner church. There's more and more churches.

Abandoning that viewpoint or they look at the book of Revelation. They interpret it differently. We believe that is future Prophecy the first three chapters. Yeah are in the past John writes to the seven churches.

But starting in chapter 4 and onward chapter 6 through 19 speak of the Great Tribulation, which we believe is future so I Think as time goes on we find ourselves in the middle in the minority. Of the two billion people or so on earth who profess to be Christians those who believe that Revelation is future prophecy we are the minority.

Still the majority within evangelicalism perhaps but. So that kind of grieves me a little bit because I you know. Again, it's sort of like the scripture being inspired. Well, what good would it be to inspire it?

If.

You didn't preserve it.

Well.

Well, anyway, I'm gonna I'm not gonna go off on that history, let's let's. Let's move on. Five books of history. The Gospels. The first four books. Everyone knows the Gospels. Matthew Mark Luke and John.

Two of these men were not Apostles which meant men were not Apostles.

Okay.

Right.

Luke and Mark so Matthew Talks about the life of Christ written especially for the Jews Revealing Jesus Christ as their long-awaited Messiah Mark reveals the life of Christ his. This is how it's broken down.

Matthew writes to the Jews portrays Jesus as King. Mark writes to the Romans portraying Jesus as a servant. Luke writes to the Greeks portraying the humanity of Christ. John writes to the whole world portraying the deity of Christ.

That's usually how it's broken down. All right here. Here's a question. What two reasons are given for the writing of John's Gospel. So I don't want someone who filled that in to raise their hand and give me what you wrote.

Two reasons are given for the writing of John's Gospel. What are they? Hold on hand we got a hand Brad.

Yep.

And.

Okay good and that's that's based on John 20 verse 31. Did anyone else have anything different?

All right.

Next history of the early church, so there's only one. There's 12 historical books in the Old Testament. Only one historical book in the New Testament. And what is it? Right. The Acts of the Apostles.

Some would argue it could be or should be called the Acts of the Holy Spirit. But traditionally it's been called the Acts of the Apostles. This is the one Historical book. It says the beginning and spread of the Christian Church.

It could be called the Acts of the Holy Spirit and was written as an evangelistic tool. An Evangelistic tool. Why. Why would that be?

It takes us from the life of Christ in the Gospels, okay.

Yeah, this is something that people often point out. I would consider the book of Acts a transitional book. There's the transition from the Gospels to the epistles, but it's also a transition from Old Covenant to New Covenant a Transition from Israel to the church from Jew to Gentiles, so we would consider it a Transitional book.

If you don't remember anything else about the book of Acts remember that. Write it down. Who's takes notes. It is a transitional Book. Is that a hand or you just take notes? Okay, all right now we move on to the letters.

Or the epistles. How many? Epistles are there. Says these books were written to individuals to churches or to believers in general. The letters deal with every aspect of Christian faith and responsibility.

List them in order. Somebody could do this from memory. I mean that would be impressive. And here's another thing not only Read the Bible cover to cover.

Be.

Challenged to memorize the books of the Bible in order, you know Genesis Exodus Leviticus Numbers Deuteronomy Joshua Judges. Ruth, you know. You say I I could never do that. Yes, you can you absolutely could do it.

Right, yeah, I mean it's a lot of a lot of kids learn that in Sunday school. And it's like a lot of things if you don't kind of refresh your memory every once in a while. You'll start to lose it. But hey, yeah.

Hey, that's why we're here. And that's why we're here. You say well, I think I know everything that we're talking about. This is all pretty basic. Well, yeah in some ways this is basic information. But if you're not in church, and you're not Going back to the basics every once in a while Then it gets a little rusty because it's our job to be able to communicate all of the basics to.

To other people. Yeah, Larry.

Deal with every aspect of Christian faith and Responsibility. Each one of us are responsible for our lives and How we use God's Word to reach out? To others and If you have not taken the time to listen to John MacArthur's Teaching here for the first.

For this lesson. Yeah, do it.

It brings out some things that I have never really considered the sermon you're talking about. Yeah. Above the Bible and On Sunday evenings when we go to the Moldovan church every time they read scripture they stand.

You know and that's hard to get used to but you know, what a reference because this is God's Word, right? It's not.

Yeah.

Yeah, there is a sermon. It's about 54 minutes long. I think. Download it from gty .org.

Forward slash fof.

So that's part of it. Listen to that. There's a new one every week. Memorize the verse fill it out come in with your questions. I saw it. Yeah, Stacey.

As far as yes, this is basic and yes, we need refreshers. We always need to remind ourselves, it's it's the foundation of what we learn. But I think it's also dangerous to assume that everybody knows what you know, right?

Yeah, so.

Everybody's at a different place right and so to go through this you're either going to get refreshed.

Or.

Somebody's gonna learn something that they hadn't known right?

Absolutely, very good point. Yes.

Just like using your biceps strengthening your biceps using your brain to memorize. And it's called Renewing your mind. Well to renewing your mind and that's what we're doing man.

All right, we got about three or four minutes left. So only questions from this point forward. Paul's letters the 13 Books are Romans 1st and 2nd Corinthians Galatians Ephesians Philippians Colossians 1st and 2nd Thessalonians 1st and 2nd Timothy Titus and Philemon.

There's different ways you can categorize these there's the prison epistles Which are Ephesians Philippians Colossians and Philemon, there's the pastoral epistles first and second Timothy and Titus then there are the general letters Hebrews James first and second Peter for second third John and Jude.

The last book of the New Testament tells of future events the return of Christ the reign of Jesus Christ the glory of Jesus Christ and the future state of Believers and unbelievers. This book is called Revelation.

All right going over to the next page. Why is the Bible important? Is there a hand? No hand. Okay Why is the Bible important says when tempted by Satan? Jesus alluded to Deuteronomy 8 verse 3 Which says man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

And he asked the question, what does 2nd Timothy 316 say about the Bible. Some here's the four options some of the Bible is inspired by God. There are a few parts that are not inspired. Option three the entire Bible is inspired by God.

Or number four only those parts that speak to us in a personal way are inspired by God, which is correct.

Right.

All scripture the entire Bible is inspired by God. Amen, and all God's people said.

All right.