The Bible is God-breathed and authoritative, with different levels of truth and application. While accurately recorded human statements are not inherently divine commands, God's direct pronouncements are. Scripture includes narratives where God neither approves nor disapproves, requiring discernment, and others where God's Spirit inspires actions and words, revealing His mind. Understanding these distinctions is vital for correctly applying Scripture, which serves as a guide and reveals divine truth.
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It seems different being here on a Wednesday night to minister the word. Let us turn to Second Timothy chapter three. We want to conclude a message I began well over a month ago on divine inspiration. I'll take a few moments to review what we've gone over and then we'll move into the conclusion of what's on my mind concerning divine inspiration. Second Timothy chapter three verse sixteen. All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect, truly furnished unto all good works.
May the Lord bless the reading of his words. Keep in mind the meetings on the Lord's Day. We're going to have a dear brother with us, Brother Les Rini. This man has done a work for God no matter where he's been. He's been in Rhodesia. He's been in a number of other countries in Africa and everywhere he's gone. He's done a work for God. He's done a work for God in Bermuda. And he was never there when I was there, however. He's done a work for God in various assemblies. in this area and also in Augusta, Georgia. So I thank God for this man. He's a good Bible teacher and a man who has a warm heart in the gospel.
So that's all I'm going to say. He will be with us Sunday morning and also Sunday night. Now let us look to the Lord in prayer. Our Father, who is like unto thee? Thou art perfect in holiness. and perfect in all your ways. For with the psalmist we can say, as for God, his way is perfect. And David said that on two occasions. And tonight as we were singing, all that thrills my soul is Jesus. The psalmist also could say, because thy loving kindness is better than life, my lips shall praise you. Tonight our lips would praise thee, the God of all grace.
because of thine infinite grace and thy matchless love. Who can be compared to thee in heaven above, though are peerless in thy character, in thine attributes, and in the revelation of yourself? But who could be like to thee on earth? And we thank you, our Father, tonight, that you have made us partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through us. We thank you for the privilege of interceding on behalf of others. And tonight is the night when we give ourselves the prayer and the ministry of the Word of God.
We pray for those with special needs. We think especially of Mrs. Summerow and ask you to graciously work in her life. Undertake for her. May she recognize that underneath are the everlasting arms upholding her as thy servant to continuously care for her. We thank you for those who wait upon us. We think of Mrs. Langley. Then we think of this brother Jordan there in the assembly with A.G. Sutton, Jr. And we ask you, the needs are different in each one that we mention. But our father, there's nothing too hard for these.
We thank you that we can come at all times, under all circumstances, and the difficulties of life are very bumps that we can climb on, and not be under circumstances, but be under thine authority, recognizing that our times are in your hands, and nothing is ever able to separate thy people from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. We pray for those that are bereaved, and we ask you to graciously work in our meeting. We ask you to, in a special way, minister to the missionary family, whether it's the Stefan family or Mrs.
Patterson, or Brother Charles Anderson in Africa, or whether it's the Hope family, or whether it's Sarah Murdoch, They're in various places. The needs are different. But one thing they do need, they need thy power. And they need to walk worthily of the Lord unto all pleasing and be fruitful in every good work. And the big thing about it is what they need, we need. And maybe we need it more so than they. For they may be in a more primitive culture.
where sin is not so deep and glossed over. And therefore we ask you to graciously speak to our hearts as we consider the meaning of the divine inspiration of the Scripture which makes them authoritative in the lives of thy children. Meet with us tonight, for we ask these things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. The last time we took up the subject of divine inspiration, that word inspiration simply means God breathed. God breathed. The scriptures are inspired by God, and because they are inspired by God, they are authoritative.
They are the source for the believers' obedience to God. We raised the question the last time, is everything in the Bible true? And the answer to that is yes and no. The lie of Satan is not true, so it's no. But it is recorded accurately, so the answer is also yes. This is what divine inspiration is about. It contains the mistakes of people. but they are recorded accurately. Inspiration carries absolute accuracy as to the historicity of the statements that it makes, but it lends no authority to the speech or behavior of the sinful beings who walk through its pages.
This is important. David sinned. And David's sin is recorded accurately. His confession is recorded accurately. And in his confession, we see the means of divine repentance and divine forgiveness and divine restoration for a believer who falls into sin. Now where God speaks directly in Scripture, and time and again in the first five books of the Old Testament we have the expression and the Lord spake unto Moses and you have this same truth in the New Testament in the book of Galatians chapter two Paul says the law I was taught by the Lord when I was in Arabia but in spite of all this that we have the expression the Lord spake and the Lord said in Amos chapter one God speaking directly through the prophet.
Eight times we read the expression, Thus saith the Lord. Thus saith the Lord. Now, when we have that expression, these are the very sentiments of God. He is speaking his mind, and he is speaking with authority. Therefore, when we come to the Word of God, we as God's children, in studying the Word, we must distinguish between accuracy and accuracy. an authority. In other words, what is accurately recorded doesn't necessarily mean that I have to obey what is written in us. I do not need, and neither did Eve need, to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Satan made the statement, it is accurately recorded that he lied. But that didn't mean that Eve had to obey that. She didn't. But when God speaks, thus saith the Lord, that calls for implicit obedience from the child of God. That is why studying the Word of God is so important, and knowing the Scriptures is so important. Otherwise, you can never enjoy the blessing of Proverbs chapter three, verses five and six, where it says, Trust in the Lord with all thine heart. and lean not unto thine own understanding.
In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy path. Now I want to move a little further in this tonight. I want to deal with three degrees of authority that you have in the Word of God. Three degrees of authority. In Scripture you have an authoritative narrative. where the sediments and acts are not sanctioned, and they may be disowned and even disapproved by God. Now, a great section of the book of Job is like this. All the statements of Bildad, of Elipaz and Zophar, the three miserable comforters who came to Job, and they ran their mouth, and Job had to say to them, Your miserable comforters are you all.
God disowned much that was said of those three men, but we have an authoritative record of what they said. So that's the first thing we need to remember. We may have an authoritative narrative. For instance, Elijah ran from a woman by the name of Jezebel, and he was under a juniper tree, and under the juniper tree he told God, you might as well take my life, I know better than the others in Israel. Now that does not give us authority to do the same. For God disowned what he said. God didn't take the life of Elijah. Instead he gave him a number of years to live, a number of years to minister, and then he took him home to glory without death.
So we need to keep that in mind. There's a second area of authority that we need to consider, and that is this, an authoritative narrative where sentiments. An act are not expressly approved and neither are they disapproved. And we must judge them by the standards of Scripture. Let me give you an illustration. At the close of Acts chapter twenty, Paul announces he's going up to Jerusalem. Remember that? And you remember the prophet Agabus coming as Paul journeys up to Jerusalem. It took place in the house of Philip, Acts twenty-one.
In the house of Philip the evangelist who had four daughters who prophesied, Agabus, the prophet, came and he found himself with Paul's girdle. And he said, this is what is going to happen to the man who owns this girdle at Jerusalem. We have Paul's trip to Jerusalem. We have God's They're in the life of Paul, and we have Paul, his saddled years at Caesarea Philippi, the journey to Rome, and we have the prison epistle. Now, with Paul right in going up to Jerusalem, there has been a big difference of opinion between good men on this subject.
There's some good men who feel that Paul was one hundred percent in the will of the Lord going up to Jerusalem. Now I'm in the group that feels that Paul made a mistake. He shouldn't have gone there when he did, the record of which you have in the twenty-first and twenty-second chapters of Acts and the twenty-third as well. I feel that he was out of the will of God. But you know, the only thing the disciples could say to Paul was the will of the Lord be done. Now when you read that, The will of the Lord be done. That does not mean that Paul is now moving in the will of God.
That means that now God is going to take and do with his servant and he must suffer the consequences of his act. In other words, you have a Christian family and you have a child that is exceedingly disobedient. There comes a time when the parents have to say the will of the Lord be done. And God puts them on the wheel and He grinds them down and brings them to obedience for His child. So you see here, the Scripture doesn't always say in these authoritative narratives of Scripture, and they're good men on both sides of the issue, and you have to come to a conclusion on your own.
But then there's a third area here. And this third area is where you have an authoritative narrative where the acts are inspired and controlled by the Spirit of God. And here these acts and words represent the mind of God. They represent these minds. Second Samuel seven is a great illustration. In second Samuel seven you remember David wants to build the temple at Jerusalem Nathan the prophet said you go and do whatever's in your heart and that night God came to Nathan said no Nathan David is not going to build the temple his son is going to build him but I'm going to build a house for David and here God directly says, no, David is not to build the temple.
I'm going to build a house for David. And in that passage, you have the great Davidic covenant and the promise of the king who's going to issue from the loins of David the Messiah, our Lord Jesus Christ. So here you have three areas of authority. They need to be recognized in the Word of God. So we have them. Number one. where we have an authoritative narrative where men express their opinions like in the book of Job, Bildad, Zophar, and Eliphaz, and yet they may be disowned of God. They have not spoken for him. God expressly says that in the book of Job.
Second, there's an authoritative narrative where we have the acts and statements of an individual. And God neither approves nor disapproves in a direct statement of their action. All that the man, the prophet Agabus, could say was he's going to be bound to Jerusalem. That happened. He was a prophet of God. He was bound to Jerusalem. So that's why scholars are at odds with each other as was he in the will of God or was he not. When God definitely speaks, as He does in II Samuel VII, and in multitudes of other passages in the Word of God, it carries authority.
Now here's the reason why it's important. If we fail to properly discriminate in matters such as these, controversy and needless confusion often results. And this has happened down to the history of the church. People have taken statements made by Elipaz and Zophar and Bildad, and they've tried to impress others with these statements. Now, however, because the Bible is inspired, every believer should constantly read the scriptures with complete confidence and surrender of his will to the Holy Spirit who alone reveals divine truth.
We should be doing this continuously. Why? Well, you take the book of Genesis. In the book of Genesis, we have the divine narrative. When we come to the New Testament, we have the person of Christ himself saying that these narratives are the Word of God. And the answer for that is Mark seven in verse thirteen. Turn to Mark chapter seven. March seven and thirteen. Our Lord is saying them, he's speaking to the Pharisees because of their ungodly act, avoiding that which was spoken in the law.
He says to them that they make the word of God of none effect to their traditions which ye have delivered and many such like things you do. In other words, our Lord says that the scriptures of the Old Testament, the books of Moses, And that includes Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Psalm ninety, and others. The books of Moses are authoritative. Furthermore, he goes further than that. He says anyone who does not believe the sayings of Moses will not believe the saying of Christ. Turn with me to the Gospel of John chapter five.
John chapter five. Our Lord is defending the scripture. And in this passage, our Lord has something very definite to say. Notice verses forty-six and forty-seven. He says, For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me, for he wrote of me. But if ye believed not his writing, how shall ye believe my word? We have people today who make the statement, oh, I believe the words of Christ in the New Testament, but I certainly don't believe the book of Genesis concerning creation. You can't have it both ways.
You either accept it all or you reject it all. That's the way it is. Our Lord says, if you don't believe Moses, you really don't believe me. If you accept me, the Lord says, you have to accept Moses. For Moses wrote of me. Now why is this important? It is important because of what the Word of God says about itself. And I want you to make note about the symbols in Scripture that the Spirit of God uses concerning the Word of God. The first one we all know. Psalm one hundred nineteen one oh five. thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.
Here the word of God is likened to a lamp. Now a lamp, a man walking on the mountain on a dark night, he doesn't need to see the bottom of every canyon. He doesn't need to see the summit of every peak. He only needs enough light for the next step. The word of God doesn't say, thy word is a lamp to my eye. It says it's a lamp to my feet. Why? It's the walk of the child of God that's important. It's our walk. And on our walk, we must be guided by the word of God. And if his word is a lamp to my feet, it means his word should direct where I put my feet down.
That's what he's saying under the metaphor of a lamp. Thy word is a lamp to my feet. and a light unto my path. Book of Jeremiah chapter twenty-three verse twenty-nine. Maybe you want to turn to this room. We sing of this occasionally in vacation Bible school. God's word is like a hammer that break us a rocky twain. And you see in Jeremiah twenty-three, twenty-nine we have both of them. But I have to find Jeremiah. Okay. I just read this chapter yesterday morning. In Jeremiah twenty-three and verse twenty-nine, it is called a fire.
He says in this passage, Is not my word like as a fire, says the Lord, and like a hammer that break up the rock in pieces? In this chapter, chapter twenty-nine, It is one of the most important chapters in the Bible for ministry, where through the mouth of Jeremiah, God reprimands the faithless shepherds, the shepherds who fleeced the sheep but didn't feed the sheep. And God says his word is like a hammer.
In other words, his word will consume the, or his word is like a fire. His word will consume the draw in the Lord's own people, and it will consume unbelievers. And that is a context in Jeremiah twenty-three. Now we may come to the metaphor of the hammer that's in the same passage. God is speaking to the false prophets who prophesied in the name of the Lord what they never told the people, what the Lord wanted the people to know. they told the very opposite. And God hates false preaching that tells his people that his word like fire and a hammer will break all that is contrary to him.
God hates his people or God hates false preaching that denies that truth of the fact that God's word is like a fire. And like a hammer. You have it in that chapter. A number of years ago, a certain person was having marital difficulties. And this person was taking up a lot of my time. A lot of my wife's time. This person was seeing a psychiatrist on a weekly basis. And coming to see me. And I got a little tired of this.
I said to this person, if you want to see me again, you've got to fire your psychiatrist. That's exactly what I said. You can't see me again unless you fire your psychiatrist. You go see him and you pay him thirty-five or fifty dollars a half an hour. And you come to me for free. Now, I don't want anything for your coming. But the fact is, I'm telling you the very opposite of what he tells you. Right or wrong, tell me. I said, you're right. So I said, why waste my time if you're going to go to him? If you want to go to him, go to it. But if you want to know what God's word said, I'll tell you.
And it's free. The false prophets were prophesying in their own name. By the way, that marriage was healed within two weeks. She fired a psychiatrist. God's word, a fire and a hammer. In Ephesians chapter six and verse seventeen, God's word is likened unto a sword, a sword. It is an offensive weapon in the hands of a believer. In other words, it is a sword of the word of God that enables the believer to carry the battle to the very camp of the enemy.
And I'll tell you this, whenever you get into the enemy's camp, You can expect a battle. You can expect trouble. Let me give you an illustration. I was speaking in Morgantown, West Virginia, a number of years ago, and Brother Herman Lung, and I went to visit numerous people every afternoon, and we were in a trailer of one of the young doctors, a mobile home of one of the young doctors who was studying at West Virginia University. And they're two small children. And I was opening the Word of God with this wife of the young doctor and presenting the claims of the gospel.
And just when we got down to the real issues of life and death of eternity, boy, the baby started to squeal. You couldn't even talk. The mother's attention was off the scriptures. on their children. Herbert said to me, I wanted to take those two children and carry them outside. He said, but you can't do it. You can't do it. We carry the battle into the very camp of the enemy. His word is a sword. Furthermore, in James one, verses twenty three and twenty four, the word of God is likened unto a mirror, a mirror in which we see ourselves.
This is perhaps the reason that the Bible is the most hated and yet the most loved book in the world. The ungodly hates the Scriptures. The press hates the Word of God. The child of God loves the Word of God. Now the reason for it, it's a mirror, and it shows the horrid image of what a person really is. But there's also... the Word of God as a mirror, and it enables us as His children to see progress that we're making in the Holy Spirit as He transforms us into the image of Christ. Now, the Bible speaks of itself as a diet.
Now, here's one you can go on and eat all you want. It speaks of itself as milk. Second, first Peter, two, verse one, or is it, verse two, it says, as newborn babes, desire, desire, The sincere milk of the word. Good diet. Father more. And by the way, when you go to the milk of the word, God doesn't take ninety-eight percent of the good stuff out of the milk and give you two percent and charge you for it. He gives you pure milk, sincere milk of the word. And you can tell that I don't care too much for that two percent stuff.
that my wife gives me. I still have a lot of problems with it. I can't imagine God making a natural food that men have to take the best part out of it so it doesn't hurt these creatures. I have awful difficulties with that. Their mental difficulties I have with that. They could be said about eggs, brother. But we'll move on. The Bible not only speaks of itself as sincere milk, it speaks of itself as strong meat in Hebrews chapter five and verse twelve, strong meat that makes a child of God spiritually strong.
And we as believers must study the great truths of Scripture in order that we attain the stature of the fullness of Christ. Now the Bible speaks of itself as a two-edged sword in Hebrews chapter four and verse twelve. The Word of God is living in powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword. Here's the only sword that can bruise you and bless you at the same time. It's the only sword that can cut you and cure you at the same time. The Word of God. It's living in powerful. Now finally, the Bible speaks of itself as the seed of life.
James Of his own will, begat he us, with a word of truth. See, First Peter one, verse twenty three says, Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the word of God, which will live it, and abide it forever. When we talk about divine inspiration, friends, the Bible is all these things. It is a lamp. It is a fire. It is a hammer. It is a sword. It is a mirror. It is a diet. It is a two-edged sword. It is a very seed of life.
All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine. There's a lot of teaching that can be formed even from the statements of Bildad, which God disowned. And Elipad. And so far, when we recognize them for what they are, in relation to the full revelation that God gives in the book of Job, we find that the scriptures are inspired and they're profitable for teaching.