Danger Ahead
Notes
Transcript
Intro:
Intro:
AG:
TS: After the reign of Solomon, God tore part of Israel away from the house of David due to the sins of Solomon. Jereboam was appointed by God to be King of Israel. Immediately, he build two golden calf idols (seems to be their favorite) and places them in Bethel and Dan. He appointed non-Levites to serve as priests and instituted his own religious festivals.
This is the first of several kings of Israel and they ALL were pagans and rejected God.
God sent a prophesy through the “man of God” who foretold that a future king will defile the false alter Jereboam had built by burning on it the bones of the priests, and then God cracked the alter to prove it and cripples Jeroboam’s hand.
The rest of the story struck me this week as I was reading through Kings.
God had told the prophet to not eat while on this mission, yet another prophet convinces him to come back and eat with him.
RS: There is a lesson to be learned here about God and His word.
The Word of God
The Word of God
And behold, a man of God went from Judah to Bethel by the word of the Lord, and Jeroboam stood by the altar to burn incense.
Then he cried out against the altar by the word of the Lord, and said, “O altar, altar! Thus says the Lord: ‘Behold, a child, Josiah by name, shall be born to the house of David; and on you he shall sacrifice the priests of the high places who burn incense on you, and men’s bones shall be burned on you.’ ”
And he gave a sign the same day, saying, “This is the sign which the Lord has spoken: Surely the altar shall split apart, and the ashes on it shall be poured out.”
So it came to pass when King Jeroboam heard the saying of the man of God, who cried out against the altar in Bethel, that he stretched out his hand from the altar, saying, “Arrest him!” Then his hand, which he stretched out toward him, withered, so that he could not pull it back to himself.
The altar also was split apart, and the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of God had given by the word of the Lord.
Then the king answered and said to the man of God, “Please entreat the favor of the Lord your God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored to me.” So the man of God entreated the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored to him, and became as before.
Then the king said to the man of God, “Come home with me and refresh yourself, and I will give you a reward.”
But the man of God said to the king, “If you were to give me half your house, I would not go in with you; nor would I eat bread nor drink water in this place.
For so it was commanded me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘You shall not eat bread, nor drink water, nor return by the same way you came.’ ”
So he went another way and did not return by the way he came to Bethel.
EX: The Word of God was delivered by a man
“the man of God” a common expression in the OT designating a man with a message from God who spoke with authority on God’s behalf. We call them prophets.
The message:
The prophet foretold Josiah who in 300 years would rule in Judah and do exactly what is foretold here.
Moreover the altar that was at Bethel, and the high place which Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel sin, had made, both that altar and the high place he broke down; and he burned the high place and crushed it to powder, and burned the wooden image.
As Josiah turned, he saw the tombs that were there on the mountain. And he sent and took the bones out of the tombs and burned them on the altar, and defiled it according to the word of the Lord which the man of God proclaimed, who proclaimed these words.
The Command of God
But the man of God said to the king, “If you were to give me half your house, I would not go in with you; nor would I eat bread nor drink water in this place.
The man of God was supposed to not eat, drink and take another route back home.
MacArthur Study Bible NASB Commentary
The prophet’s divine commission expressly forbade receiving any hospitality at Bethel. It even required him to return home by a different route from the one by which he came, lest he should be recognized. The prophet’s own conduct was to symbolize the Lord’s total rejection of Israel’s false worship and the recognition that all the people had become apostates.
God’s word was just as clear in his instructions as the prophesy to Jeroboam was.
God declared His word to Jeroboam.
AP: Today, God speaks through HIS written word
Inspired
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 complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.
God-breathed
God gave the Scriptures to the men writing them.
Inerrancy
The Scriptures do not affirm any errors. The Bible does not endorse anything untrue. When it tells history, it tells us what actually happened. It may report on what a person said when he told a lie to someone else, but it does not endorse the lie. It is merely giving an accurate report of what the liar said. Where it speaks to science, it does not contradict God's revelation in the natural world. In sum, the Bible is entirely truthful and has no errors at all in the original manuscripts that the prophets and Apostles actually wrote.
Yes, men wrote word on the page, but God moved those men so that the words they wrote were 100% true and without error.
And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts;
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.
We have accurate copies of those manuscripts
Scribal Practices:
Jewish scribes solidified the following process for creating copies of the Torah and eventually other books in the Old Testament.
They could only use clean animal skins, both to write on, and even to bind manuscripts.
Each column of writing could have no less than forty-eight, and no more than sixty lines.
They must verbalize each word aloud while they were writing.
They must wipe the pen and wash their entire bodies before writing the word "Jehovah," every time they wrote it.
There must be a review within thirty days, and if as many as three pages required corrections, the entire manuscript had to be redone.
The letters, words, and paragraphs had to be counted, and the document became invalid if two letters touched each other.
The middle paragraph, word and letter must correspond to those of the original document.
The documents could be stored only in sacred places (synagogues, etc).As no document containing God's Word could be destroyed, they were stored, or buried, in a genizah - a Hebrew term meaning "hiding place." These were usually kept in a synagogue or sometimes in a Jewish cemetery.
The variation is original texts comes from finding these hidden copies of manuscripts. We know what the Bible said!
Infallibility
The word infallible means “incapable of error.” If something is infallible, it is never wrong and thus absolutely trustworthy
The Bible makes this claim of itself
Every word of God is pure; He is a shield to those who put their trust in Him.
The words of the Lord are pure words, Like silver tried in a furnace of earth, Purified seven times.
Translations
So then why do we have so many versions?
They are translations from the original language
The methods of the translators matter!
Formal Equivalency:
Formal equivalence is a literal, word-for-word translation. The goal is to stay as close to the original text as possible. The translation will preserve the lexical details, grammatical structure, vocabulary, and syntax of the source text. This assumes the reader knows the cultural and linguistic context of the source text.
Dynamic Equivalency:
With dynamic equivalence, the target audience is taken into account. The text will be translated in a way that may make more sense than a direct translation. Dynamic equivalence wants to preserve the response of the reader – that is, the reader’s response to the translation should be the same as the reader’s response to the original.
BMATS wrote an article worth the read if you want more detail
Google Bible Versions BMATS
God’s word says what it means and means what it says!
Next lets consider...
The Lies of the Deceiver
The Lies of the Deceiver
Now an old prophet dwelt in Bethel, and his sons came and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel; they also told their father the words which he had spoken to the king.
And their father said to them, “Which way did he go?” For his sons had seen which way the man of God went who came from Judah.
Then he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” So they saddled the donkey for him; and he rode on it,
and went after the man of God, and found him sitting under an oak. Then he said to him, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?” And he said, “I am.”
Then he said to him, “Come home with me and eat bread.”
And he said, “I cannot return with you nor go in with you; neither can I eat bread nor drink water with you in this place.
For I have been told by the word of the Lord, ‘You shall not eat bread nor drink water there, nor return by going the way you came.’ ”
He said to him, “I too am a prophet as you are, and an angel spoke to me by the word of the Lord, saying, ‘Bring him back with you to your house, that he may eat bread and drink water.’ ” (He was lying to him.)
EX: The old prophet lies to the man of GOD.
Probably a spokesman for the Lord who had compromised his ministry by continuing to live in Bethel, as a pagan religion was beginning to dominate Israel.
His actions reveal he was no longer a representative of God.
He lied to the Man of GOD!
He claimed a message from God and was writing it himself!
He directly contradicted the Word from God to the Man of God!
We aren’t given his motive. The “why” question is unanswered, but the what is clear.
He deceived the Man of GOD by claiming a newer updated revelation from God.
AP: False teachers do the same today:e
Claim to speak from GOD but are liars!
They lead their followers astray
Danger Signs:
“A new revelation”
God’s Word was complete at the end of revelation
Instead, they are making it up OR are hearing from demons!
"A new interpretation”
Give a new meaning or a meaning that isn’t what it says
Make every literal thing in the word mean something else
“A correction”
dangerous often used heresy today
The deny inerrancy and infallibility of God’s Word
Claim there were mistakes:
Paul was a chauvinist so anything he says about women is wrong
Claim it was only for a certain time and place
Dangerous: close to the truth
God’s marching orders to Israel in battle were for a certain people, in a certain time and place
They use this to twist scripture
Recently seen:
Only 2 commands today: Love God and Love Others
this was given in response to a message about sin. The implication is that only failing to love God and others are sins!
They just found a way to justify murder, theft, adultery, etc.!
What did Jesus actually say:
“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”
Jesus said to him, “ ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”
All the Law and Prophets hang on these 2
He never said all are rescinded and these 2 are all that remain!
Jesus also endorsed God’s commands
“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets. I did not come to destroy but to fulfill.
For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled.
Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.
He was the final sacrifice, thus the pictures of sacrifice from OT no longer need to occur, they were fulfilled
The moral code was never rescinded.
He often told people “go and sin no more”
The prophesies were partially fulfilled in His life, death, and resurrection, the rest will be fulfilled at His 2nd coming.
The Fateful Choice
The Fateful Choice
So he went back with him, and ate bread in his house, and drank water.
Now it happened, as they sat at the table, that the word of the Lord came to the prophet who had brought him back;
and he cried out to the man of God who came from Judah, saying, “Thus says the Lord: ‘Because you have disobeyed the word of the Lord, and have not kept the commandment which the Lord your God commanded you,
but you came back, ate bread, and drank water in the place of which the Lord said to you, “Eat no bread and drink no water,” your corpse shall not come to the tomb of your fathers.’ ”
So it was, after he had eaten bread and after he had drunk, that he saddled the donkey for him, the prophet whom he had brought back.
When he was gone, a lion met him on the road and killed him. And his corpse was thrown on the road, and the donkey stood by it. The lion also stood by the corpse.
And there, men passed by and saw the corpse thrown on the road, and the lion standing by the corpse. Then they went and told it in the city where the old prophet dwelt.
Now when the prophet who had brought him back from the way heard it, he said, “It is the man of God who was disobedient to the word of the Lord. Therefore the Lord has delivered him to the lion, which has torn him and killed him, according to the word of the Lord which He spoke to him.”
And he spoke to his sons, saying, “Saddle the donkey for me.” So they saddled it.
Then he went and found his corpse thrown on the road, and the donkey and the lion standing by the corpse. The lion had not eaten the corpse nor torn the donkey.
And the prophet took up the corpse of the man of God, laid it on the donkey, and brought it back. So the old prophet came to the city to mourn, and to bury him.
Then he laid the corpse in his own tomb; and they mourned over him, saying, “Alas, my brother!”
So it was, after he had buried him, that he spoke to his sons, saying, “When I am dead, then bury me in the tomb where the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones.
For the saying which he cried out by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel, and against all the shrines on the high places which are in the cities of Samaria, will surely come to pass.”
EX: The Man of GOD chose to ignore God’s instructions
HE was deceived, but bore the guilt because He had heard clearly from God and instead of obeying God, He obeyed the deceiver.
He should have at the very least turned to God for an answer.
In a surprising twist, God actually then spoke condemnation from the false prophet!
God’s word came true:
The Man of God was killed by a lion, but not devoured
Lion and donkey acted unnaturally.
the beasts bent to God’s will.
AP: We must obey God!
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
We must live the Word of God!
How do we avoid the same error today?
NEVER take someone else’s word for it
No person is perfect
Check what every teacher, preacher, musician, website says about God with the actual word of God.
Know the WORD of GOD for yourself!
Study it, memorize it, think on it for yourself
Go straight the source and do so regularly
Keep an open mind to others
Check out what you think it means with others
Far less accurate then the actual word, but when studying passages, if you are the only one to think is says something and the rest of the church thinks it says something else, rethink it!
Conc
Always be a student of the word and obey it!
Guard against deceit