Happy New Year! 2020 has ended and many people are hoping the end of the madness of this last year has been is over. There is good news and bad news to each new year. The good news is the bad things from the previous year have passed and there will be good things coming this new year. The bad news is the good things from the previous year have passed and there will be bad things coming this new year. Guess what? No matter how crazy 2020 has been, this is the pattern of every year. There are good years and bad years and there are good parts to bad years and bad parts to good years. But what we as Christians can say throughout it all: God is good and everything that takes place is for His glory.
This post will conclude my series on the “Five Solas.” This week’s is “Sola Gloria Deus,” that is, “For the Glory of God Alone.” This is likely the least known of the Five Solas and at the same time, it’s likely the least practiced. While it is the least practiced, it is also the most directly taught. All that takes place is for the glory of God. Our very purpose and existence are for the glory of God. The creation is for the glory of God. The fall of man was allowed for the glory of God. The worldwide destruction of the Flood was for the glory of God, as was the preservation of Noah and his family. The separation of Abraham to start a new people who would be called by God’s name is for the glory of God. The enslavement in Egypt, the plagues, and the exodus were all for the glory of God. The conquest of Canaan was for the glory of God. The judges and the kings and the captivity were all for the glory of God. The four empires of Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome were established for the glory of God. Jesus came to this earth to die for our sins for the glory of God. He rose for the glory of God. The persecution of the church for 2000 years has been for the glory of God. The establishment of the nations from Rome to England to the U.S. to China to Iraq to Saudi Arabia and Brazil and Australia etc. has all been for the glory of God. And Jesus will return to bring judgment upon the wicked and to rescue His bride, all for the glory of God.
That’s world history. Let’s make it more personal. Your existence is for the glory of God. Your purpose in being alive is to give God glory. But there is a big question: how? How do we give God glory? The fact remains that God is going to get glory out of our lives no matter what we do. God is sovereign and is in control of every situation. He does not make our choices for us, but He sets up every situation and lays out every consequence for our choices. Let me boil it down to the ultimate outcomes: We will give God glory throughout our lives through our reception of His free gift of salvation and our walking in His paths, or we will glorify God as we burn and suffer in Hell under His wrath because of our sin. We will glorify God one way or the other. There is no choice in that matter. Every knee will bow, it’s just a matter of when. We will glorify God, it’s only a matter of how.
Many Christians will readily agree with this, but let’s make it more personal. Are we giving God ALONE the glory? It’s easy to say, “Give glory to God” but in reality, you aren’t give Him alone the glory. The are MANY people out there who try to share God’s glory. I have done this too, and in some areas I still do. What does this look like? There are many athletes who have a great platform and when they get the mic, they say: “This is all for the glory of God.” But is it really? I know for Tim Tebow it really was, because when he was snuffed unfairly from the NFL, he didn’t make an issue about it. He wasn’t concerned about his own platform. He wasn’t concerned that he wasn’t going to be the next Peyton Manning or Tom Brady. But how many others choose to share their platform for their own glory while “sharing” it with God?
The popular preacher has much to worry about in this issue. In an interview, Paul Washer stated that his greatest fear is that when his popularity as a solid preacher dims and he’s no longer followed, would he still be as passionate about preaching the truth and saving souls and making sure God’s name is glorified in his life without the fans as he is now? News flash! God is not going to share His glory with your kingdom, your ministry, your writing, your speaking, your teaching, your science, etc. If it is going to be for the glory of God, it had better be ALL for the glory of God. Hear me; I’m preaching to myself here. One of my greatest passions is that the integrity and the authority of Scripture is upheld, and I utterly despise hearing teachings, especially from other Christians, that undermine it. But when I go to defend Scripture, a battle rages within: whether I am doing this for God’s glory or for my own. How often do I pride myself as being a “champion of the faith”? Way too many times. I often tell myself that any and all that I know about Scripture and how it came about and why we can rely on it is a gift from God. Why? Two reasons: 1) If I don’t, it goes to my head too easily, and 2) I know how susceptible I was to false teachings if someone told me that person was trustworthy. What does this mean? It means any defense I can offer about God and His Word is from God and meant to go back to God.
I’m not alone when I say this: if our top priority is to “win souls,” we’ll miss the point. Our top priority is the glory of God. That means any evangelism we do is not to win souls to our faith, but to proclaim the kingdom of God where His flag is denied from flying. We cannot win souls for Christ if Christ is not our end goal. Paris Reidhead learned this the hard way. He went to Africa so the poor, suffering people there could have hope where they had none. He found out they wanted nothing to do with God, and Reidhead thought he had been tricked. God got a hold of his heart and gave him this message which Reidhead paraphrased: “I didn’t send you to heathen for their sake. I send you there for Me. Am I not worthy of the reward of My suffering?” It totally changed his perception. He no longer went to evangelize and seek the lost so that they might go to heaven; he went out so that God might receive that which He is due. That is what it means to give God the glory. I strongly recommend you check out his sermon “Ten Shekels and a Shirt” because he blasts modern day humanism as it’s crept into the church and now all but taken it over in full force to where everything of Christian doctrine is preached for nothing but the happiness of man. And God is just a means to mankind’s end. He blasts such teaching out of the water, and so will I.
2021 is a new year. We are about to install a new president here in the U.S. (though as of the writing of this post, the election wasn’t fully decided yet). We will have a new set of challenges and a new set of blessings. Every one of them, while for our benefit, will be for the glory of God. However this year goes, let us stand out among all that we’ve seen or done in the past and let us use this year to give ALL the glory to God. Not merely lip service, but let us give him the true praise that we can possibly offer, not caring what we get out of it or what any other person gets out of it. As far as we are concerned, let 2021 be the year in which in all we do, we give the glory to God alone.
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Today is Christmas Day, the day that Christians around the world celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ. Of course, there is no formal evidence that this day is the day, but the birth of Jesus is one of the core events that changed the world. Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, one with God the Father and the Holy Spirit, came down to the earth, to live as a mere mortal man and for one primary purpose: to bear the sins of the world.
This is another central piece of the five “solas” of Christianity: “Christ Alone.” Again, this goes back to Martin Luther and what he saw with the Roman Catholic Church. They did not preach salvation by Christ alone, the one mediator between God and man. They preached salvation through Christ, but also through Mary, through the saints, through prayers/rites, and through the priests. Mary is held in an equally venerable position as Jesus Himself with her own Immaculate Conception, sinless perfection, and remaining a virgin, all of which Scripture vehemently denies and teaches the opposite. Jesus is the only Savior, the only one who could do it. Only one could open the scroll in heaven. John wept when he saw it could not be opened, but the Lamb who was slain showed up and He opened the scroll.
There is talk in numerous churches today about “unhitching” the Old Testament and only being concerned about the Resurrection. While Jesus’ death and Resurrection are indeed the central point and climax of this great epic of history, the reason He had to die is laid out in Genesis 1-3. The manner of which He would die is showcased throughout Israel’s history. The reason God waited around 4000 years from creation to the cross is to give snapshots throughout history of what Jesus would be like and what He would do, using physical images to showcase the spiritual side. Each of these snapshots, along with 300+ prophecies, make Jesus such a unique individual such that only one person could do it: someone who was God. It would be impossible for any man or group of men to intentionally plan someone’s birth and carry that person through the whole ordeal to “stage it.” God set it up that way on purpose.
Jesus is the only hope for salvation. God is a holy, pure, and righteous judge, and by His very nature and character, He must deal with sin as any good judge must issue a sentence for any crime against the state. The key difference is unlike our local, state, or national governments where there are different punishments for different crimes, the punishment for any sin against God is eternal damnation. And the key difference isn’t the level of crime. The key difference is the person or thing the crime is against. In “American Gospel: Christ Alone,” Sean Demaras put it this way. If you go outside and take a key and scratch a rock, there is no harm done. It’s a worthless rock. If you go to a junkyard and key a junked car, you’ll get fined for trespassing and minor vandalism. If you key someone’s new Toyota or Ford, that’s a higher level of vandalism. If you key a brand-new Mercedes Benz that’s still on the lot, the crime just became steeper. Why? Not because of the action. It’s the same crime in each case, but what changes is the value of that which the crime is committed against. And what could have greater value than the Lord of Glory? The reason a “finite” crime merits an infinite punishment is because the crime is against an infinite God. As a result, only the infinite God could pay that debt.
Jesus is the only one who could do it. There is a big push within Christian circles to promote a teaching called universalism. It’s very strong in the Progressive Christianity circles. Rob Bell and Brian McLaren are just two of the big names teaching it. William Paul Young (author of “The Shack”) teaches it. Joel Osteen teaches at least some notion of it. Younger preachers like Todd White and Stephen Furtick have sat under the tutelage of these people and in particular Richard Rohr who has a lot more in common with New Age mysticism than actual Biblical Christianity. They all have something in common: they refuse to teach that the only way to heaven, the only way to right that which is wrong, is through Jesus Christ. They will readily make an excuse for anyone who doesn’t believe this truth which Jesus Himself declared. And even if they do let this truth cross their lips, they deny the deity of Christ, reducing Him to a mere man who was “raised” to God-like status, all the while teaching that we sinful wicked humans can likewise reach God-like status. This is blasphemy. Jesus and ONLY Jesus can save mankind. (Check out “American Gospel: Christ Crucified” to see these claims on display.)
Jesus is not like anything we’ve ever seen. The Jews were expecting a military general who could chase out the Romans. Why would they? In part because every deliverer they had prior was a military leader who beat their physical oppressors. Instead, Jesus showed up as a humble man, born in a stable to a poor family. His father, Joseph, was out of the picture so we don’t know where Mary was living. We can only guess with Jesus brothers. And He did things totally different from anyone’s expectations. This is part of what it means to be “holy.” God is “other than.” He is not like us. He is not like anything we could comprehend other than what He has revealed to us. He does things differently than we do or would think, which is why the crucifixion of a Savior is a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles. It doesn’t make sense to the natural mind. The only way it will make sense is by the supernatural illumination of the Holy Spirit, but once you have that illumination and you can see a lot more of the facts, it all makes logical sense. What this means is we must do things God’s way. He’s got the whole thing under control and knows all the facts. He does not defy logic and is a God of order, but man is not. We have to do things God’s way, or God will let the results of our way take its toll.
Only Jesus can offer salvation. Salvation is only accessible through Jesus. We cannot replace Jesus with anyone or anything and get the same result. Muhammad won’t save you. Buddha won’t save you. Science won’t save you. We cannot supplement Jesus with anything or anyone. Jesus doesn’t ask for Joseph Smith to give final approval for your salvation. He doesn’t give Mary or any saint or any priest permission or the ability to forgive sin. Only God Himself can forgive sin. Only God can heal the paralytic, cure the incurable disease with a touch, cast out a demon with a command, calm the wind and the waves with a word, or multiply food, let alone raise the dead. Jesus is the only one who can pull that off. He is the Savior. He is the only option we have that actually can work. And unlike any other savior or hero, Jesus never fails. There is not a single person who has completely and wholly trusted Jesus alone who ever regretted it.
Next week on New Year’s Day, I’ll kick off the new year with the conclusion to this series with “For the Glory of God Alone.”
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Third in the Five Solas is Sola Fide, or “Faith Alone.” We are saved by grace alone through faith alone. Grace is the gift; faith is the vehicle for how it is delivered and takes action. Now, many people have different ideas of about what faith is, so I am going to define what I am talking about here. Hebrews 11:1 gives the formal definition of faith. It is the substance of things hoped for and evidence for things unseen. Let’s break this down.
“Substance for things hoped for.” Faith is not wishful thinking. It is not blind. It has substance. Faith requires an object; it is trust in something or someone. If I promise to come and meet you at a certain place at a certain time and you come to the meeting place, you have put faith in my word that I will be there. You are trusting me that I will keep my word. You don’t know at the time if I will be there or not, but you have something to grab onto know if I will be there or not: my word.
“Evidence of things unseen.” This is just another way to say the same thing. But evidence is something concrete that you know it is trustworthy. This is usually expressed by experience. You have heard me give my word time and time again. While you do not have “proof” I will keep it this time, you have a reliable record that I do and will. There is evidence that you know and trust. That’s why we open up our computers, start our cars, sit on our chairs without wondering, “Will it work for me this time?” We don’t actually know if it will do it this time, but we’ve done it enough times to know it likely will. The less we trust it, the less faith we have it will work. But the more we trust it, the less we’ll question if we can use it.
Whole chapters and books have been written on this. If you want a good study on faith and what it looks like check out one of our books from former blogger Logan Ames, Heroes of the Faith. He did a full study on Hebrews 11 and what faith is and what it looks like. But now to our focus of study: our salvation, our hope is through faith alone.
It’s a “game of trust” if you could call it that. God isn’t asking us for works, good deeds, or great acts of heroism. All He really asks of us is to trust Him. Yes, it’s that simple. All God asks of us is to trust Him. That’s what faith is: trust. But there are works and deeds that come with it. James 2 is about demonstrating your faith through works. So, let me add this: faith requires action. Anyone can believe anything, but it’s not faith and I wouldn’t call it “belief” either until you take action that proves you believe it. You can mentally agree that an airplane can fly. You can sit at the airport watch every plane take off and land and know every detail about how a plane works. But you do not have faith in the airplane; you do not believe in the flight ability of an airplane until you get inside the airplane and go flying.
Christianity is like the airplane. Many people know all about God and they know about Jesus and they know the doctrines. It’s easy to play the intellectual game. Don’t get me wrong, you better know what it is you claim to believe. Many people claim the faith but don’t have the foggiest idea of what it is they have attached their name to. It shows not just on the intellectual side but also the practical side. You can know all about Jesus, but the only way it works is to “get in Him.”
Biblical faith requires complete reliance and dependence upon Jesus. It’s a child-like faith. As a child implicitly and naturally trusts his parents, so we are to trust God. This means you don’t pray for Plan A and then have Plan B in the back of your mind if Plan A fails. God does not honor back-up plans, because there’s no trust. There’s no dependance upon Him. God wants you to trust Him enough that you are putting your life on the line. That means you trust God so much that if He fails, you’re dead. That said, we are not to be presumptuous. God is only responsible for upholding the promises He made, not ones we proclaim “in His name.” That’s what Jesus addressed with Satan in the wilderness when He said, “Do not put the Lord thy God to the test.” You cannot force God’s hands. If you want to intentionally throw yourself off a cliff claiming God will save you or throw yourself into a pit of snakes and scorpions saying you’ll be safe from poison, God has no obligation to answer that. That doesn’t make God unfaithful; it makes you stupid. We should instead be as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, where we know full well God can save us, and we will take a position that even if He does not, we will still follow and trust Him.
Our salvation is acquired by believing Him. We may not have it in our hands just yet, but we are going to step forward, moving and acting and speaking as though it already is in our hands. Jehoshaphat demonstrates this. He was surrounded by three armies and cried to the Lord for help. A Levite, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, said that God would deliver them, and they would win without having to raise a sword. What did he actually have? Just a promise of victory. What did Jehoshaphat do? He brought his army out to the battle but led with singers and worshippers. He believed God. He had faith that the battle was already won, even though the three armies were still out there. He walked in faith that God’s word was true. And he got to see the three armies all defeat each other and never had to draw his sword.
Do we trust God? Is our faith truly in Jesus? Do our lives reflect such faith? It’s easy to claim, but here is how you can tell where your faith lies: by who you listen to. Is your faith in Jesus? Or is it in the scientists of our world? The media? The politicians? A pastor? Again, easy to claim. Whom do you trust to get you through Monday? What is your source of authority? What is your sustenance? Where does your energy come from? Your answer is where your faith lies. Do you have the right Jesus? The right God? Or is your faith in a figment of your own making?
The saving faith isn’t a mere, “I believe Jesus died for my sins.” It’s much more than that. It is complete submission to Christ. Now none of us are perfect, but are we in process? If Jesus is just Savior and not Lord, then you don’t trust Him. You only use Him as a “get-out-of-jail-free” card and that’s not Christianity. The faith that God wants us to have is wholly, completely, nothing held back, no reserves, no second-guessing, full confidence that He is who He said He is and He does what He says He does. There can be fear and trembling and “uncertainty” to a degree, but it’s stepping out, trusting God, asking Him to help our unbelief, and obeying Him. The great thing about God is that when we trust Him, He can take us where we never could go on our own. He’ll take us through the fog at times, but when He does, it is either to protect us from the enemy (because if we can’t see him, neither can he see us in that setting), or it’s to position ourselves to do the impossible. And to this day, I have never met, heard, or read of a single person who ever devoted themselves completely to God, walking in true Biblical faith, who ever regretted it. I never will hear of one such case and by the grace of God, I’ll be yet another example for other to follow.
Next week is Christmas Day, and then we’ll examine the centerpiece of it all: Christ Alone.
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This is the second of the “Five Solas” of the Christian faith. Sola Gratia is Latin for “Grace Alone.” Our salvation is by grace alone. There is absolutely nothing we can do to earn it. When Martin Luther coined this phrase, it was in response to the Roman Catholic Church selling indulgences as a fundraiser for the Sistine Chapel and other things. By buying an indulgence, someone could “pay for their sin” in advance and not have to worry about confession. When Luther saw what the Scriptures actually taught, it infuriated him because the RCC was teaching a completely false doctrine.
Before I can move on, I have to deal with a lingering question: What is grace? Many people confuse this term with mercy. In the simplest form, mercy is the withholding of judgment which is due. Grace is unmerited favor. I want to emphasize on these two words: “unmerited” and “favor.”
“Unmerited” means you don’t deserve it. It is not owed to you. You have no right to claim it. You have it for only one reason: someone chose to give it to you. It is not because you were a good person. It is not because you did some heroic deed. It is not even because you restrained yourself from doing an evil deed. It is a gift completely by the will of the person who gave it without regard for what you have done.
“Favor” is along the lines of “pleasure.” When Nehemiah approached the king with his wish to deal with Jerusalem, he had the king’s favor. When Esther approached the king to expose Haman and save the Jews, she found the king’s favor. If you have the “favor” of someone, it means you are on their good side and they will do something for you. It’s not necessarily because you earn it or deserve it but because that person is pleased with you. Likewise, when we have God’s favor, it’s not because we are special. It’s because God is pleased with us.
IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU! I’ll emphasize this point more when I address “Sola Gloria Deus,” but this is about God and not about us. God doesn’t offer us salvation because of anything special about us. He offers it because HE gets the glory out of it. He grants us favor because it pleases Him that mankind might be saved. Now, don’t get me wrong; it also glorifies God to punish sinful, wicked humans. He has no obligation to grant us favor or to give us grace. Every single one of us have sinned and we all deserve death. The only thing we are ‘owed’ is death, and we must understand this if we are to understand the Gospel. Our salvation is a gift of the grace of God, not by our own works, lest any of us boast.
Now grace is something more than just a free gift. It’s also an empowerment. God doesn’t just offer salvation as a free gift; He also offers us the empowerment to actually live and walk in salvation. We all have our owns sins we constantly deal with. We know our propensities, but the grace of God is not merely about saving us from those sins. It is about giving us the power and ability to walk free of them. Now, I’ll be dead honest here. This is a truth I know but I haven’t yet fully grasped. There are areas of my life where I can definitely say I am not walking in freedom from sin. And I’m not talking about perfection here. And it’s going to be one of those things that when I ‘get it,’ I will be like, “It was that easy?” And the answer will be: “Yes.” And here’s why.
It’s not in our doing. All we have to do is receive and believe. It is a gift from God, and He does not desire that we walk lost in sin. He wants us to walk in freedom. The gift is there for us. But we have to receive it. This is a work we do, but not a wage-earning work. This is not a job that we do to where God owes us. When we work a job, we put in so many hours and our managers and bosses owe us the money that is agreed to in our contract. That is a works-based wages. We get paid for doing a job. But salvation is not works-based. There is no contract. It is a gift of God. But that gift is applied through the vehicle of faith. (I’ll address that more next week.) Any “work” we do is an outflow of the actual work that Christ did in us.
God’s grace is also a protection. This one we really don’t understand until we’ve been around the block a few times and have learned what is out there. God has protected me from many things in which I look back and I realize I shouldn’t still be here. I can picture two occasions where a stranger drove up and asked me for personal information about where I lived or directions, and being as clueless as I was then, I gave it. Looking back, those could have been people who’d have kidnapped me and done unspeakable things to me. I also know how God has protected me from letting my sinful side turn loose. Let me make this clear: it is God who restrains the sinful nature in man, not man’s self-control. And more and more, God has been releasing His hand of restraint in society, turning society loose. It is the grace of God that enables life and it’s also grace that protects.
Don’t confuse grace-empowered works with man’s works. John MacArthur in an interview with Todd Friel some years back was discussing MacArthur’s book The Truth War. In the interview, MacArthur mentioned how he spoke with the Mormon head honchos at Brigham Young University about salvation by grace. The Mormons agreed that salvation was by grace. MacArthur then asked how it worked and the Mormons said, “Well, it’s salvation by works, but isn’t it gracious of God to let us do it.” I see this issue FREQUENTLY. We use the same terms and same vocabulary, but when it comes to how it plays out and how it is practiced, obviously we aren’t using the same dictionaries. So be watchful that when someone proclaims the same creeds of historical Christianity, he/she may not be thinking the same thing we are. So, ask them what they mean and how it works. If they know the real thing, they’ll reveal the real thing. If not, they won’t.
Next week, I’ll examine the vehicle by how the grace of God is delivered and received: the vehicle of faith.
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The entire Gospel can be summarized in five statements: Our salvation is by “Grace Alone,” through “Faith Alone,” in “Christ Alone,” according to “Scripture Alone,” and for the “Glory of God Alone.” In the original Latin they are: “Sola Gratia,” “Sola Fide,” “Sola Christus,” “Sola Scriptura,” and “Sola Gloria Deus.” These statements were initially coined by Martin Luther during the Reformation, but they are central teachings that have been taught throughout the millennia in the church. While these statements are easy to learn and easy to memorize, the depths of them are inexhaustible. I am going to change the order of the statements around and do “Sola Scriptura” which is “Scripture Alone” first for two reasons: 1) this is the foundational tenant for which all other tenants get their base from, and 2) so that “Sola Christus,” (“Christ Alone”) is published on Christmas morning. So without further ado, let’s dig into “Sola Scriptura.”
First, here’s a little background into how and why Luther coined the phrase “Sola Scriptura.” He had come out of a Roman Catholic background, which at that time was selling indulgences (ultimately a fundraiser for the Sistine Chapel), and people could come to the church to buy an indulgence which would allow them “free sins” by confessing in advance. The practice then, as it is now, is that there are three authorities in the Roman Catholic Church: the Bible, the church Tradition, and the Magisterium, comprised of the Pope and his high council. What Luther realized is the Bible alone gives the authority to all things, not traditions or man-made council.
Todd Friel in his “Drive By Theology” teaching series with Steven Lawson makes the observation that many of the major creeds and confessionals that many churches use begin with the Bible. That means each tenant and statement don’t come from their church traditions or elder councils but from Scripture. I’ll go even further to state that unless we truly believe and operate with “Sola Scriptura,” we cannot believe the other major tenants of our creeds. How do we know that salvation is by grace alone? Simple, because Scripture teaches it. How do we know that Jesus is the only way to heaven? Simple, because Scripture teaches it. In everything, Scripture, the inspired, inerrant, sufficient, and superior Word of God, must be the standard. It must give the foundation. It must give the framework. You can see the Scripture and writings on that in the links provided.
Now the skeptic to this will quickly ask: “Are you a geo-centrist?” Just in the past few weeks, I have received this specific question from believers when I speak about Scripture being the authority. Where are they coming from? They are confusing numerous things here. First, the Bible never actually teaches geo-centrism. There is no set of verses that teaches the sun moves around the earth. All we have is observations from the people just as our modern weathermen speak. Yes, Joshua asked the sun to stand still. Does that teach geo-centrism? Actually no, it doesn’t, not any more than your weatherman giving us the sunrise and sunset times. But what are they really aiming at? They are suggesting that we actually use our “modern science” to interpret the Bible on this issue. And they use this with the intention of saying that we can’t use the Bible to dictate the history of the universe. It’s comparing apples to peanuts, not even similar enough to compare both topics to fruit. The geo-centrist debate is a scientific model we use with our observations NOW, and it has nothing to do with the historical account of Genesis. And Genesis is a historical account. The models of how it actually took place are secondary to this. So, the argument doesn’t actually do what they want it to do.
Now, the Bible does not give us the details of the galaxies or microbiology or Newton’s Laws or chemical reactions. It’s not a science book. And those who accuse me and those who believe the historical account of Genesis of trying to make it a science book need to learn what science is and what it isn’t. But that said, the Bible gives us the framework through which we are to see everything. Not every detail, but the framework. Anything outside that framework is not of God and not valid. So when the Bible gives the history of how long God took to create the universe and how much time has passed since and what kind of events took place (sin bringing death, a Global Flood, the Tower of Babel dispersion, the Plagues, the Exodus, the Conquest of Canaan, all the way through Jesus’ birth, death, burial, resurrection, and return), that means that all our studies MUST includes all these factors. If we do not take the Bible’s account as the primary authority, then we are not doing a Biblical study nor operating out of a Biblical worldview.
When I teach about worldviews, I address five major questions: Where did I come from? Why am I here? Who am I? Where am I going? Who do I listen to? I make an emphasis that each of these questions MUST be answered from the Bible’s perspective or it is not a Biblical worldview. The depth of these questions is bottomless and each one is inseparable from the other. You will always answer one holistically with the others. Origins includes our views of creation, what’s wrong with the world, how did I get here, what is my personal background, etc. Purpose includes my reason for existing, my role in life, and where I belong. Identity is who I am as an individual and who I am in the collective. Destination includes where I am going in 5, 10, 20 years, heaven/hell, how will what is wrong be made right, etc. Authority deals with which voices I will listen to: parents, family, peers, teachers, elders, pastors, scientists, media, God/Bible, etc. If we are not answering these questions by the Bible, then we are missing something and our worldview will be broken, backwards, and more than just “wrong.”
Now, can we include other sources of authority? Science, psychology, math, history, literature, etc. The answer is “Yes!” Without question. However, each one of these must be submissive to what the Word of God teaches or it is a false authority. I love math and when practiced I can do calculus in my head. The Bible doesn’t teach calculus, but it does give the framework that enables calculus to work. That said, I also have learned this phrase: “Math doesn’t lie, but wrong equations do.” If the mathematical construct we derive is not based on the accounts given by Scripture, it is not a Biblical construct, nor will it likely produce anything of real value.
If Scripture does not explicitly talk about it, at the very least it cannot disagree with any statement the Bible makes. That’s why all “Deep Time” models suggesting millions to billions of years of the earth’s history are totally wrong. Not only are they merely mathematical constructs (no science is ever used to show Deep Time, only math is), but they are based on equations that purposefully and intentionally leave the Biblical account out of it, if not intentionally trying to refute it. These models directly contradict what is explicitly given in Scripture (6-day creation, only about 6000 years having passed, and a global flood) and were initially created for that purpose. So, any such model is not part of a Biblical worldview nor is it part of a practice of “Sola Scriptura.”
The Bible must be our authority – our first, foremost, and final authority. When anything is in conflict with the Bible, that anything must go for inspection first. Where is the flaw likely to be found – in the scientific models or the “interpretation” of Scripture? Frankly, I’ll hedge my bets that man’s opinions are the flawed ones, not the clear reading of Scripture. And I’ll be right every time, even when I am the one who doesn’t have the correct doctrine. I’ll be right that the Bible had it right every time. I am wrong often, that’s why I don’t put a lot of weight to my opinions, but I go by what Scripture says. And it is Scripture that teaches that our hope is by the Grace of God alone, and not by any of our efforts. That is for next week.
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