Rev. David Holwick A
Boothbay Baptist Church
Boothbay, Maine
February 23, 2020
1 Thessalonians 2:13-16
GOD'S WORD OR OURS?
I. Do you remember your first Bible?
A. I got this in the second grade. (hold up KJV Bible)
1) It is from the Nelson Presbyterian Church in St. Louis,
Missouri, which no longer exists.
2) I had to memorize the Lord's Prayer in order to get it.
3) I got one and my sister got one; we went home, paged through
them to see the pictures, and never opened them again.
4) Some of you probably have that attitude toward the Bible:
it is old-fashioned, out-of-date and is only useful for
gathering dust.
B. This is the Bible I read in high school. (hold up The Way)
1) In my junior year a backslidden Baptist told me about Jesus
and challenged me to read the gospel of Matthew.
2) I read it with no pre-conditions - if anything, I was
biased against it.
3) But what it said about Jesus fascinated me and within a
few months I surrendered my life to Jesus as my Savior.
C. The Apostle Paul took half a Bible to the Thessalonians.
1) There was no New Testament yet - this letter may have been
the beginning of it - but he preached the gospel to them.
2) One of the things that thrilled Paul was that they accepted
his message not as human wisdom, but as God's Word.
3) Notice that they didn't just say, "This is true."
a) It was working in them.
b) They believed in it and it was changing them.
c) Books cannot change you. When God's Word grabs your
heart and soul, that is what changes you.
4) Has this happened to you? COULD it happen to you?
II. Does God really communicate in words?
A. Modern attitude - they wrote their best thoughts about God.
1) Modern people stand in judgment over it.
2) We can pick-and-choose what we like and discard the rest.
3) Our skepticism is due in part to the multiplicity of
religions and their "scriptures."
B. The prophets, the apostles - and Jesus - believed in revelation.
1) God revealed himself by giving them a message.
2) They didn't make it up. It came from God himself.
3) God communicated with a variety of methods - a divine voice,
personal meditation, visions while they slept.
a) The only consistency is its origin - the mind of God.
C. The Word of God usually comes through ordinary people.
1) God rarely speaks directly to people.
a) Only 3 times in the gospels does God speak to a crowd.
b) He prefers to use spokesmen like Paul.
2) The personality of the writers of the Bible comes through.
a) Most were not popular but hated, rejected people.
b) They felt compelled to present their message.
1> Jeremiah - God's word is fire in my bones. Jer 20:5
2> Paul - woe to me if I don't preach. 1 Cor 9:16
c) 1 Thess - Paul equates his preaching with OT Scripture.
1> The good news about Jesus was God's new revelation.
2> Thessalonians heard it so clearly it was like
hearing it directly.
3> The Israelites had the same reaction to Moses.
D. Preachers and the Word of God.
1) Are my sermons the words of a man, or word of God?
Plenty of people have doubts about it.
The oil billionaire John D. Rockefeller, Sr., was a devout
Baptist but most of his children were not as sure.
In 1910 his daughter Edith had a crisis of religious faith.
For a long time, she had suspected that preachers dressed up
their personal beliefs as gospel truth.
She once said, "I never heard a Baptist minister say anything
from a pulpit that convinced me he was Divinely inspired."
The upshot, she recalled, was that, "as the minister finished
his sermon one Sunday I walked from my pew and out into the
air vowing never to return and I kept that vow."
#4773
a) My sermons are just human words but the gospel is of God.
b) If my sermons communicate the real gospel, the good news
about Jesus, God will use it to touch people's lives.
2) There is a danger - revelation can be faked.
a) Others have claimed to be preaching divine revelation.
1> Mohammed and the Koran.
2> Joseph Smith, with gold tablets and the Book of
Mormon.
b) Why is ours right, and theirs wrong?
III. Clear evidence of the Word of God.
A. Bible is absolutely accurate.
Several years ago the magazine U.S. News & World Report
had a striking cover.
Alongside a painting of Adam and Eve, the cover asked the
question, "Is the Bible True?"
You might be surprised to find their answer was a confident
"yes!"
The article summarized exciting archeological evidence that
confirmed the historical accuracy of the Bible.
If all you know about the Bible comes from Sunday School, you
probably assume King David was a great king, no problem.
Scholars disagreed - many believed he was just a myth.
But a few years ago, a group of archeologists found an
Assyrian stone tablet in Northern Israel dating from the
ninth century before Christ.
The tablet listed Assyria's foes and included the words
"king of Israel" and "house of David."
Skeptics had pointed to the lack of any reference outside the
Bible to David in the archeological remains from Assyria,
Egypt, or Babylon.
The legend of King David was created to produce a glorious
past for Israel that never really existed.
But now archeology has given proof that King David was an
historical figure after all - exactly as the Bible teaches.
Smaller characters have been vindicated, too.
Last year archeologists in Jerusalem uncovered a small clay
seal inscribed with the name "Nathan-Melech."
In 2 Kings 23:11 King Josiah is on a campaign to purge
Jerusalem of idols.
Some of the idols were stored near the room of an official
named - Nathan-Melech.
We now have proof he really existed. #66164
These discoveries aren't the first time the evidence has
confounded the skeptics.
For instance, Kenneth Kitchen, an Egyptologist at the Univ. of
London, told U.S. News about a detail in Genesis.
In the story about Joseph, his brothers sell him into slavery
for twenty silver shekels.
Documents recently discovered in Syria agree that this was
the price of a slave in 1500 B.C.
In later centuries, the price typically paid for slaves in
Israel was ninety to one hundred shekels.
If the biblical account was made up later, as skeptics have
argued, then the authors would have picked a sum much
closer to the going rate at the time.
Secular scholars approach Scripture from a naturalistic
perspective that denies the supernatural.
Since the Bible records miracles as though they really
happened, the Bible is simply rejected out of hand.
The Bible is reduced to stories that merely illustrate
theological points, while containing little that is
historically accurate.
But, as the U.S. News article illustrated, this distinction
is crumbling under the weight of evidence.
Yes, the Bible IS true.
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B. The Bible changes people. 2:13b
Most people have heard of the Mutiny on the Bounty.
Do you know the rest of the story?
Nine mutineers with six native men and twelve Tahitian women
put ashore on Pitcairn Island in 1790.
One sailor soon began distilling alcohol, and the little
colony was plunged into debauchery and vice.
Ten years later, only one white man survived, surrounded by
native women and the children they had had.
In an old chest from the BOUNTY, this sailor found a Bible.
He began to read it and then to teach it to the others.
The result was that his own life and ultimately the lives
of all those in the colony was changed.
Discovered in 1808 by the USS TOPAS, Pitcairn had become a
prosperous community with no jail, no whisky, no crime,
and no laziness.
#4811
C. God's Word can cause conflict.
1) The Bible makes exclusive claims about what is true.
a) The New Testament clearly says Jesus is the Son of God.
b) It also says he is the Way, the Truth and the Life; no
one can come to God the Father except through Jesus.
John 14:6
c) If your religion doesn't teach that, you are not going
to like it.
2) Look what happened to Paul as he preached about Jesus.
a) When he preached in Thessalonica he had success with
both Jews and Gentiles, but non-believing Jews
caused a riot.
Acts 17:1-10
b) He escaped to a new town, Berea, where the local Jews
welcomed his message & checked it out in their Bibles.
Acts 17:11
1> He commends them for this.
2> Then Jews from Thessalonica followed him there and
Paul had to flee again. Acts 17:14
c) Perhaps this personal history influenced what he says
next.
IV. The New Testament's harshest passage against Jews.
A. It has been used through the centuries to beat up Jews.
1) January was 75th anniversary of liberation of Auschwitz.
2) The Nazis justified their attempt to exterminate Jews by
quoting the Bible, among other things.
3) You can see how they might like this passage:
a) Jews killed Jesus.
b) They resist Christians and are hostile to everyone.
c) They deserve God's wrath.
4) The Old Testament book of Deuteronomy is just as harsh.
a) As Moses sums up his charge to Israel, he announces
blessings and curses on them, depending on their
behavior. Deuteronomy 28
b) The potential curses are four times longer than the
blessings. 13 verses on blessings, 53 on curses!
B. This passage must be balanced with Paul's other statements.
1) Seven years later, Paul wrote the book of Romans.
a) Romans 3:1 - there is much advantage in being a Jew.
b) Romans 9:3 - Paul would accept a curse for them.
c) Romans 10:1 - his heart's desire is for them to be saved.
2) And, of course, Paul was a Jew himself.
a) He was proud of his Jewish background and thought of
himself as being a cut above most other Jews.
b) He opposed a religion based on rules and laws, as Jesus
did as well.
c) But he loved the Jews.
C. Hardening, then revival among Jews is predicted. Rom 11:25-29
1) Paul realized that the Jewish resistance to the gospel was
part of God's plan.
2) A day would come when the opposite will happen, and they
will embrace Jesus.
a) He even says in Romans 11:26, "ALL Israel will be saved."
b) Zechariah 12:10 says they weep over one they pierced.
3) After they turn to the gospel, Jesus will return to earth.
4) Signs of softening are happening even now.
Jews for Jesus, Chosen People ministries, and messianic
synagogues are just some of the signs.
Baptists don't have popes but we do have area leaders.
In New Jersey, our state leader was Lee Spitzer.
Lee was a very dynamic guy, a successful pastor in Nebraska,
the Executive Minister of NJ who turned the state around,
then the leader of the entire American Baptist
denomination.
He wasn't born into a Baptist family - he was born Jewish.
His family was not very religious and rarely attended
synagogue.
Lee had a bar mitzvah party, but no bar mitzvah.
His dad said the synagogue charged too much for the ceremony.
Lee remembers that he often felt like an outsider, such as
when his school sang Christmas songs at a holiday assembly.
Yet he was very proud to be Jewish.
During the Six-Day war between Israel and the Arabs in 1967,
he avidly followed the news of Israel's huge victory.
In his young mind, it was like God had delivered them from
Pharaoh all over again.
Lee knew about the Old Testament prophets, especially Ezekiel.
Ezekiel predicted a renewal of Israel and the defeat of its
enemies.
A messiah would bring it about.
When he was 7 years old, Lee had a dream.
Probably inspired by Ezekiel, he dreamed that he was taken to
a mountain where he saw all the enemies of Israel gathered.
Up in the sky, he saw a man riding on a white war horse.
He pointed to him and said, "That's my messiah!"
Then he woke up.
There was something else in Ezekiel that bothered Lee.
The prophet talked a lot about sin.
Lee was a pretty straight-laced kid, but he knew he fell far
short of God's ideal.
How could a holy God forgive him?
The Jewish Bible had animal sacrifices but that didn't seem
possible or desirable today.
Lee wrestled with the idea of atonement.
It all clicked for him on December 23, 1971.
He was bored and watching TV. Only Christmas movies were on.
He watched two versions of Dicken's "The Christmas Carol."
During the second one, he felt a PRESENCE in the room.
He started to tingle.
He searched all the closets to see if someone else was there.
Lee said out loud, "What should I do now?"
To his utter astonishment, he heard a strong voice.
The voice said, "Pick up that book!"
His eye caught a book lying on his brother's bookshelf.
He picked it up. It was a Bible.
Lee had never seen a New Testament before.
He turned to the last pages and his attention fell on this
passage in the book of Revelation:
"I saw heaven standing open and there before me was a white
horse ... His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head
are many crowns...
On his robe and on his thigh he has this name written:
KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS."
(Revelation 19:11-16)
Who was this guy?
The voice spoke to him again: "Turn to the first page of the
New Testament."
Lee had to go to the table of contents. Matthew was the first
book.
He turned there and read, "A record of the genealogy of Jesus
Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham..."
It dawned on Lee - Jesus was Jewish!
He was the rider on the white horse.
He has the power to forgive sins.
He is the Messiah Lee had been waiting for.
Lee was moved to pray, and he acknowledged Jesus as his
"master and messiah."
He concluded his prayer by telling God he wouldn't evangelize.
Jews hate evangelism.
Yet within days he was telling his friends about Jesus.
God had truly invaded his life.
#66327
Has he invaded yours?
V. God will take severe measures to awaken people to reality.
A. Wrath at last.
1) Paul has more to say about this at the end of his letter.
2) He foresaw what was coming in A.D. 70, the destruction
of the temple in Jerusalem, and indeed the Jewish nation,
by the army of Rome.
3) They did not return to control Israel until our generation.
B. Christians are not immune to judgment.
1) Letters to churches in Revelation: God can remove them.
2) Peter - judgment begins with house of God. 1 Peter 4:17
C. My feeling is that the church is in for rough times.
1) We live in a "Post-Christian" world.
2) Just look at how many churches in our area have been
converted into homes and stores.
3) The world is too big & too smart for our old-fashioned God.
4) Just remember that the Messiah who returns to earth on
that white horse is coming to divide those who believe
in him, from those who don't.
Which side will you be on?
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SOURCES FOR ILLUSTRATIONS USED IN THIS SERMON:
This sermon is a reworking of #19834, preached on October 31, 1999 at
Ledgewood Baptist Church in Ledgewood, New Jersey.
The first half of the sermon borrows from "The Mysterious Word," a sermon
by Rev. Ray C. Stedman, December 20, 1987, #4091 in the Peninsula Bible
Church database at http://www.pbc.org, and Sermon #5460 in the Kerux
Database.
# 4773 "Titan - The Life Of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.," by Ron Chernow,
1998, page 597.
# 4811 "Old Time Religion," based largely on "Final Authority", by
William P. Grady, in Australia's Fair Dinkum E-zine;
http://members.iweb.net.au/~dinkum/dink43.htm, editor Andrew
Craig.
# 4912 "Written In Stone: Archeology & The Bible," by Charles Colson,
Breakpoint Commentary, October 27, 1999. His article alludes
to "Is the Bible True?" by Jeffery L. Sheler, U. S. News &
World Report, October 25, 1999.
#66164 “Small Seal, Big Deal: Archaeology Confirms The Bible’s Details,”
by John Stonestreet with G. Shane Morris, BreakPoint Commentary,
May 2, 2019.
#66327 “He Had a Vision of the King of Kings,” by Rev. David Holwick,
modifying the testimony of Rev. Dr. Lee Spitzer (Illustration
#66319, "Being Jewish At Christmas").
These and 35,000 others are part of the Kerux database that can be
downloaded, absolutely free, at http://www.holwick.com/database.html
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