E256 | The Real Purpose of the Bible

Someone needs to have the gift of discerning spirits to go, that's the holy spirit and that's the devil. Because both are operating in the church at all times because Satan can't defeat the church, so he infiltrates it. That's what he does. But just to say that I need I need to be better at asking questions of our amazing staff and just our amazing leaders, because, and that's what John Maxwell said, that's where his books come from. It's not him sitting in a room thinking, what do I need to know?

It's going to people and asking, what do I need to know? And he's literally sold, I think, top 10 all time Amazon in his life Something. Time of books. It's

I do not understand this. Can you please explain this to me? I don't have any desire or plan to discuss this with him, but I am curious about it, especially as I came to Jesus through reading a version of the bible, the NLT, that I can actually understand for myself.

It's not an issue that's unique to the King James version of the Bible. It's an issue that the church has struggled with since the beginning. So we don't know for sure, you know, how Jesus preached. People speculate that he preached in Aramaic, but it could have been Greek. We we just don't know because we don't have a recording Mhmm.

Of his messages. We know that he said some things in Aramaic because they're translated in Aramaic. His last words on the cross, father father, why have you forsaken me? They put that in Aramaic, in a Greek text. So the Bible's the New Testament's written in Greek, but in that instance, this is what he said.

They they wrote it in Aramaic. So at first, the Bible comes to us not as a Hebrew document, not as an Aramaic document. It comes to us as a Greek document. So think about it. If you're a Greek person and you speak Greek, the Bible comes to us in a Greek context.

And then over time, as the world becomes dominated by Latin, by the Romans, the world shifts from speaking Greek to Latin, and especially, you know, West Of Greece, so Italy westward, and that's German, France, Spain, eventually England, they spoke Latin based languages, and Latin became the language. So there was a tension. The Greeks did not want to release the Bible to be translated into Latin. They felt like the Greek was the inspired translation, and then they translated into what's known as the Latin Vulgate by Jerome. He was a Catholic priest, he translated into Latin, and that really became the translation for a thousand years.

And then all of a sudden, Martin Luther, who started Lutheranism or the religion the Christian religion of Lutheranism, he wanted to translate it into Germanic languages so that people in Germany could understand that, and there was huge tension. Then English speakers, William Tyndale and others wanted to translate it into English, and there was huge tension there, because at the time it was thought the Latin Vulgate is the inspired translation. So then the King James version is not the original English version, but it became the most popular version over time, and there's multiple reasons for that. But it became very, very popular and it was consider and it was widely distributed in The United States Of America. And it became kind of the Bible that you got.

And then new translations began to come up with the living bible, the nineteen sixties, to kind of try to put the bible in language that, you know, hippies would understand. The new international version in the nineteen eighties, which is what I grew up with. And then modern translations because language changes. And so what your grandpa or excuse me, what your father-in-law and what many people believe is that the King James version is the only authorized translation. And it used to say that on your Bible, you would buy it in black and it would say the authorized translation.

Well, it was authorized by king James, who was probably not a Christian. So and people in England don't want to admit that, but but he probably was not a Christian. But he authorized the book to be translated by the king because in England, the king is the head of the church. Isn't that weird? So a lot of people don't know that, but the king or queen is the head of the Anglican church in England.

And the reason they did that is because at the time in Catholicism, the pope was not just a religious leader, but he was also the king of most of Italy. And a lot of people don't realize that. Matter of fact, when you and I went to the Vatican for the first time, we read about Popes who felt like their country had been stolen from them with the advent of the nation we all call Italy. Because their land was taken from them and now they just have that little area known as the Vatican, which is like the size of Riverside, would you say? I don't know.

It's a small area. So there's people that get attached to this and it's very meaningful, and Christians have always resisted a new translation. And that's just, that goes back two thousand years. And really it stems from not being great commission Christians, wanting to translate and push the Bible to be easily accessible in the native language of people, and I think the reason we have so many translations is in the end, missionaries need translations, cultures need it in their own context, in their own way, and so that's what we need. And even in our lifetime, you know, we're both in our fifties, language has changed, culture has changed, and so the original Greek manuscripts don't change, but the words that we use have changed.

You know, for example, you might find the word gay in the King James version for happy. Might find that I'm not sure I would need to do a word search to find that. The word gay has changed. It used to mean happy, now it means same sex attracted, a part of the LGT LGTP LGTPQ plus. My goodness, I cannot say group.

And so words change. We also know that when the King James version of the Bible is translated, and this is not to knock on it, from time to time I use it because it's beautiful. It's really the pinnacle of English in a poetic form. It's Shakespearean. I mean, that's the height of the English language in purest form.

But we don't speak that way anymore because language continues to change. And so even in my own lifetime, I've seen that change. And so here's one of the challenges with the King James Version is they had a group of Greek manuscripts that they based the King James Version on. And we now know that we have better, newer, more accurate, and by newer, I actually mean older, older manuscripts because as we've pursued archeology, as we've uncovered things, we have found manuscripts all over the Mediterranean. And we've been able to put those things together and be able to see where the King James version has some, what I would consider, some mistakes.

And they didn't know that at the time because they had one major set of manuscripts to look at. Now we have multiple, and the way that we come at the accuracy of scripture is consider consider the bible like a puzzle. You're trying to put a puzzle together. Well, when you have extra pieces, you know where the problem lies. So that that's how we figure that out.

So Islam has a different problem. They say we have one one manuscript, there's one version of the Quran, which is not true, but they have eradicated, eliminated, burned the other copies, and persecuted other Muslims who have had different versions throughout history. That's so Muslim has Islam is not allowed for the free translation of manuscripts. Other supposed Christian organizations are like that today. Jehovah Witnesses.

They do not have an open translation process. It's a closed translation. We don't understand who the scholars are, how they do it, whatever. So there's an open translation, and so King James people feel like we've changed the text because what we've seen when we put the puzzle piece together, you can see where a scribe made a mistake, there was a misspelling, maybe there was a scribal note that became actually an inserted verse, and so there's some differences, and that's very offensive to original King James people. So, the new King James has attempted to keep the same beautiful language, but update it with the most recognizable accurate manuscripts.

And people are very offended by that. And so, I mean, I would just say, God bless You know, I humbly disagree. I think the King James is beautiful in a lot of ways. Mhmm. But I I think that, you know, our information has gotten better and we have more manuscripts now, and the translations that we have now, like, my translation that I use for my own personal Yeah.

I've actually heard a pastor say this. And again, you know, I don't mean to make fun of, but he said it, he posted it, so I'm going to quote it. But he said, I can interpret the Greek manuscripts with the King James. And that's silly because the King James comes from those manuscripts. And so people have idolized it and and almost made it a temple like thing, you know, an idol.

And you got to be really, really careful that you don't worship the scriptures, but you worship the one the scriptures reveal. We have to be very, very careful with that. So the Bible's important, but we do not worship it or a translation. We worship the one that is revealed in it. Jesus actually says this, you search the scriptures because you think in them contains eternal life, and yet he says they reveal me.

And those people that were masters of the scriptures murdered Jesus. So we got to be very, very careful. So I understand his argument. What I would just say is, God bless him. I'm so glad that God speaks to you through that.

I don't always agree with all the choices that they make. For Easter, I I'm not using NLT because of a choice that they made where it says Jesus said the law says, but that's not in the Greek, says you've heard it said. And I think it's important that we don't think that Jesus is saying the law got

Right? So so those would all be variations of dark. And so language can communicate something more passionate. So this week, Jesus says that, well, you're going to hear this after I've preached this, but he says, you've heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute The voice translation translates that line this way. I say love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you and are cruel to you.

Okay. Did Jesus say cruel? No. But nobody's really persecuted, but people are cruel.

My Greek is not that way. I can work with it. I can read it. I can understand it, and then I can parse it. And what that means is I can take it apart. Is it a noun? Is it first person, second person? Is it present tense? Is it past tense? So I have that kind of working relationship with Greek, but I can't use it.

And a lot of times King James people, they don't do any of that, and here's why, they don't believe they need to, because they believe King James is the inspired version, so they don't feel like they have to work with the original text, which is really hard to do. And it's not something that's been easy for me. I don't want to pretend that it's been an easy thirty years. Language, we all know, is hard. And ancient languages are dead languages, and that's what the Hebrew that we have in our Bible and the Greek that we have in our bible are dead languages.

So if you go to Greece, they're not speaking Mhmm. The same Greek that we have in our scriptures anymore than if you met William Shakespeare. He would understand what you said when you're like, cool. Cool play, bro. Like, he's not gonna understand that at all. So language is constantly evolving and changing.

The accused to crosses. Nails were not typically used. However, we say that Jesus was nailed to the cross. Is there any significance to this? Also, the Romans used various types of crosses typically made to where they look like a t or an x. Do you have any evidence of how Jesus was actually crucified? All versions of the bible I have reviewed do not specifically say that he was nailed or the specific shape of the cross. Where did this come from?

That's in Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. Now that's not what it says in the Greek. So we just talked about interpretation. Don't know what it says in the King James. The problem is the interpretation of the Greek word, and I don't have my notes in front of me, so if I say this wrong and you're a Greek scholar, forgive me, but the Greek word is Satoro or sotro, I can't remember exactly.

But what it means literally is lifted up. So Jesus Christ was placed on a cross. He was lifted up on a cross. So it doesn't tell us specifically how he was lifted up on the cross. It says he was crucified, he was lifted up on a cross.

And crucifixion, I'm actually going to say this in my Easter message, is actually a very difficult word to translate because in the Roman world, and I mean, it's used as profanity. So in Pompeii, Pompeii is a Roman city that is destroyed instantaneously by volcano. So we get to excavate it and we get to look at the city like a photograph exactly the way it was before it was destroyed. They have found graffiti on the walls with the word go crucify yourself. Now, what word might we use in English?

Now people like to nitpick because they don't want to believe in Jesus, and so they say, we've never found any evidence of that, which iron, which is what they would have used as nails, rusts, it does not last, and so they're really hard to find. But we have found people with what looks like nail holes in their feet. So we do know that these people were most likely crucified and hung on something by the Romans. So when people say we have not found that, they found them in Jerusalem, they found them in multiple parts of the Mediterranean where Romans were. Not a lot, but a handful of feet, not hands, that were nailed to what we presume to be a cross.

So whether it was a tea like this, so watching online, you can see my hands. If you're listening in your car, I'm making like a capital t in the alphabet. That's probably what it looked like. Where did the lowercase t come from? It's just an artist rendering, you know, trying to make room for where they would have hung in the sign.

You know, behold king of the Jews, and it would have been in, I think Greek, Roman, and Hebrew, right? Those are the three languages that it was written in. So was Jesus nailed? John chapter 20, Thomas doubts, I will not believe, he says, until I touch holes in his hands.

And then all the other places where it says he was crucified, the word means he was placed on a cross. So they don't say specifically how he was. In John, it says he had holes in his hands, and he says, I won't believe until and Jesus says, Here they are, touch them. So it's most likely that the Christian tradition that we all believe is accurate, that he was nailed on the cross, fulfilling Jewish prophecy that said he will be pierced for our transgressions. So so that's my answer.

I think he was nailed. I don't know that it matters, but he was he hung on a cross. He was cursed on a cross for our sins. He died. He rose again from the third on the third day, proving that he was the Messiah.

Literally, you would die without air. So how they did that, whether they hung you on a stake like this or it was like this, would have been up to the Roman It

They could have nailed you to a tree. Like, know, if there was a tree present, they could do the same on any wooden object to lift you up. And so Interesting. And the problem is, you know, we we don't have an ancient cross somewhere where we go, oh, this is what it looked like because it's wood. It rotted. Mhmm.

And so here's what I kind of do when do that. So I believe you should read all of scripture, and I'm going to pivot in a second and talk about where you should start. But eventually you need to read all of the word of God. You can't say that you believe at all if you haven't read it all, and so I want to encourage you to read it all, and it's all God's word. But what the list of names reminds me is that my life and the life of all the faithful are important.

And so we need to remember that none of us stands alone, that we all stand on the shoulders of those who came before us. And so, you know, I remember when I was ordained, and you were there, and only our girls were there, they were little. And I remember this old man, and I don't remember his name, but he was a prominent pastor, and for whatever reason he was at my ordination, and he said, I run my race, my time is up, now is your time. He said, don't fail. And I was like, you know?

And I felt that mantle as he laid his hands on me and he finished the race faithfully. And so it reminds us that these people have really struggled and they've really gone through something and we need to appreciate that. And I think it helps alleviate our own anxiety over our life and our own structures, and it kind of takes the attention off us a little bit and say, look, people have always struggled. And so we need to read those things. In terms of the temple, you know, it was really important when it was written because those were the specifications for them to actually build it.

Now we believe that we are the temple of the living God right now because Jesus resides in us, but you need to know that those measurements reflect something that's actually in heaven. So it's literally reflecting something is on God's throne. And that's the idea is that the temple is this portal between heaven and earth. Okay? Mhmm.

So right? So we live on earth and there's heaven, and we're divided by that by sin. And this temple is this portal, and they would not have used that word, but I'm using that word, where the two interact and connect. So that should freak us all out because we're born again Christians, right? So when we become a born again Christian, we become a portal between the eternal and the flesh, between heaven and earth, and the spirit of God resides in us, and we are something that is called to be holy.

And that should freak you out a little bit with what you do, what you say, how you live. So I understand. I I don't get super excited with the measurements of the ark. Okay? The ark of the covenant. And what? I didn't have to build it. Know, the Lord did.

Because it's the book that Jesus quotes the most. So I would go Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy. Then I would go to Joshua to understand the conquest of the land, then I would go to Judges, what it looks like when we have leaders without God, it's a mess. Then I would do first Kings and second Kings to kind of realize why we don't want a king, we want Jesus. And so I would go I would I would really have a working knowledge of those seven books.

I think you should read them all, but you really need to master those seven books and have a deep understanding of them, then you understand the prophets and why they're so mad and why they're so frustrated and why, you know, the Jewish people were, you know you know, so pagan, even though they were called to be monotheistic in their religion. And really focus on those. And then I would go to the New Testament and I would read the Gospels. I would have an understanding of the book of Acts and really have a working knowledge of the New Testament. Then I would jump into, you know, some of the wisdom books, Proverbs, and here's where so many Christians get messed up.

Proverbs aren't promises, and that's why so many Christians are mad. Raise your children up in the way that they should go and they shall not depart from it. It's not a promise, it's a proverb. And a proverb is something that tends to happen when applied. So, right?

So lazy people go hungry, that's a proverb. So it's it's not a promise, it's a proverb. So and then eventually, would try to work through the entire bible. And then what I've done is I've tried to work through all the writings, you know, the Apocrypha, the book of Enoch.

And you're seeing the work that God did in their lives, how he made such beauty from just like brokenness Yeah. And chaos. And and Jesus came from that, and it was exactly what had always been predicted to And so to me, some of, like, going back later and going through the so and so begat so and so, you're just like, oh, like, this is a story. Yeah. This is, you know, these were real people, and it's all part of the, like, the inner workings of God's plan all along. So Yeah.

And so those boring passages, I would say that's where you really need the preacher to bring something out. Because I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've heard a sermon, I'm like, how on earth did they get that out of that? And I'm just always reminded when Jesus says, who do people say that I am? And Peter says, you are the Christ, the son of living God, and Jesus says, you didn't get that from yourself. You know, that came from heaven.

Yeah. And that's what God does. And so all of God's word's important. The difficult passage of scripture, we need we need to listen to the preachers that God has called because he's called preachers to help us understand. In the same way he's called doctors to help us understand medicine. Yeah. So Yeah.

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