Nepaug Bible Church - http://www.nepaugchurch.org - Pastor's Sermon Notes - http://www.nepaugchurch.org/Sermons/zz20070211.htm

THRU THE BIBLE EXPOSITION
1 Corinthians: Discipling Believers With Very Sinful Backgrounds
II. Overcoming Human Personality Followings
E. Heeding Written Scripture Ourselves As God's Top Authority For Us
(1 Corinthians 4:6)

Introduction: (To show the need . . . )

A wide difference of opinion exists among various parties as to what is the right route to take to gain an understanding of God's truths:

(1) Cathy Lynn Grossman's article, "Episcopal church's new dawn," in the February 5, 2007 issue of USA TODAY, claims Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, the new Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, " . . . sees two strands of faith: One is most concerned with atonement, that Jesus died for our sins and our most important task is to repent.' But the other is the more gracious stand . . . to talk about life, to claim the joy and the blessing for good that it offers . . .'"

So, opposite an individual Christian's reading of Galatians 6:14 where he sees Paul claiming, " . . . God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ . . .", the new head of the Episcopal Church asserts that Christ's salvation through His work on the cross is not the centerpiece of the Christian message'", but talking on life and claiming the joy and blessing for the good it offers, Ibid.

(2) Tom Krattenmaker's article, "The Bible vs. Science" in the same paper criticized Kurt Wide, "a Harvard-educated Ph. D. and director of the Center for Theology and Science at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary . . . because the Bible is his ultimate authority"! Krattenmaker complained that Wise, a "consultant to the Creation Museum" tries "to prove that countless scientists have somehow botched their reading of the fossil record" as they assert long ages of evolutionary time existed to explain that fossil record in contrast to Wide's literal view of Genesis 1 with its six solar days of creation!

Krattenmaker implies the view of evolutionary scientists is correct rather than the simple reading of Genesis 1 that Wide and any individual Christian reader would see Genesis 1 most clearly offers!

(3) Loraine Boettner's book, Roman Catholicism reveals that though the Catholic Church holds the Bible to be God's Word, many papal decrees, Church Councils and writings of church fathers are held to be equally authoritative, and that the lay Christian can not properly interpret the Bible for himself, but that he must lean on the Church's leaders to interpret it FOR his understanding, Ibid., p. 76-77!

So, with differing views on WHAT is the right WAY to FIND or to INTERPRET GOD'S TRUTH in the BIBLE, HOW may we INDIVIDUAL Christians be SURE that we KNOW it?!

(We turn to the sermon "Need" section . . . )

Need: "As various authorities imply I should adopt THEIR view of what constitutes God's truths, HOW may I know WHERE to TURN to FIND let alone DEFINE GOD'S TRUTHS?!"
  1. In 1 Corinthians 1:10-4:21, Paul opposed the personality followings in the Corinthian Church, Ryrie St. Bib., KJV (1978), p. 1620-1625.
  2. In doing so, he urged his readers at 1 Corinthians 4:6 to put NO authority above what the WRITTEN BIBLE taught (as follows):
    1. 1 Corinthians 4:6a,b KJV reads: "And these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred to myself and to Apollos for your sakes; that ye might learn in us not to think of men above that which is written . . ."
    2. However, the Greek New Testament omits the words "think of men" and literally has the latter phrases cited above as reading: " . . . that you might learn in us the Not above the once-for-all written' . . . " (cf. U. B. S. Greek N. T., 1966 ed., p. 586)
    3. For clarification, we suggest that it read: " . . . that you might learn in us the [the saying]: [Do] not [go] above the once-for-all written [Old and New Testament Bible]", and we support our stance as follows:
      1. The words, "once-for-all written" are from gegraptai, the same verb in the same perfect tense that Jesus used in Matt. 4:4 to refer to Deut. 8:3 (Abbott-Smith, A Man. Grk. Lex. of the N. T., p. 95f).
      2. Thus, gegraptai in such contexts depicts Old Testament Scripture!
      3. Now, at 2 Peter 3:16, Peter put Paul's letters on par with "the other scriptures," revealing the New Testament was equal in divine authority to the Old Testament, Ibid., Ryrie, ftn. to 2 Peter 3:16!
      4. Also, Jesus held the Apocrypha was NOT Scripture in Matt. 23:35:
        1. Abel was the first martyr and Zacharias the last in the 39-book Old Testament that was then arranged as starting with Genesis and ending with 2 Chronicles, Ibid., Ryrie, ftn. to Matt. 23:35.
        2. The Apocrypha's last martyr came centuries after Zacharias, so Jesus' words show He held the Apocrypha was not Scripture!
    4. In summary, 1 Corinthians 4:6 holds "lay" believers responsible not to let anything supplant the authority of the Old and New Testament Bible so that their divisive personality followings might end as THEY shifted from relying on men to unite by heeding the Bible!
  3. Paul's claim gives PROFOUND implications on the "LAYMAN'S" FINAL AUTHORITY for UNDERSTANDING GOD'S TRUTHS:
    1. Paul's phrase, "that you might learn in US" in the context shows he expected his "lay" readers not to go above what Scripture taught in viewing or relating to him as an Apostle, 1 Corinthians 4:6; 3:4-5.
    2. Also, neither did Paul direct his "lay" readers not to go above what he as an Apostle interpreted the Scriptures to mean FOR them, but he rather left THEM RESPONSIBLE and thus implied that they were ABLE to INTERPRET Scripture for THEMSELVES, 1 Cor. 4:6!
    3. These facts in view of the extended 1 Corinthians 1:10-4:21 context shows Paul would hold that any "lay" Christian could interpret the Bible apart from any pope, council, patristic writings or traditions:
      1. As we saw in a past sermon in this series, in his long 1 Corinthians 1:10-4:21 context on this matter, along with Apollos and himself, Paul twice included "Cephas," the Aramaic word for [the Apostle] "Peter", Bible Knowledge Com., N. T., p. 276; 1 Cor. 1:12; 3:22.
      2. Paul would then teach that Peter's authority or interpretation of Scripture was not to be put above what the Corinthian "laity" could read for themselves in the 66-book Bible, 1 Cor. 3:4-6, 22!
      3. By way of application, since the Roman Catholic Church sees Peter as the first pope upon whom the rest of its hierarchy is built (Ibid., Boettner, p. 104-105), 1 Corinthians 4:6 reveals that no pope or Church council or Church writing or Church tradition can replace the authority of the 66-book canon of the Bible as it is understood by any "layman" who READS it FOR HIMSELF!
    4. Yet, this application broadens further, for Paul did not qualify any other entity as needing to be considered as the "layman's" authority for knowing God's truths! 1 Corinthians 4:6 then reveals that NO OTHER AUTHORITY, be it a scientist or scientists, or a religious or civil person or group in Protestantism or any other entity can define God's truth for any "layman" ABOVE what he can read in the 66-book Bible and so himself understand to be God's truth!
Application: As we personally know from John 3:16 that salvation is by faith in Christ, may we TRUST in Him to be saved! (2) Then, may we trust GOD to LEAD us to be SURE of His truth as, by God's help (1 Cor. 2:12) we READ it in the BIBLE and (3) let NOTHING REPLACE that MEANS of KNOWING God's truths!

Lesson: GOD wants EVERY believer to be SURE he CAN KNOW God's TRUTHS by what he HIMSELF READS in the BIBLE'S OLD and NEW TESTAMENTS, and that he is NOT to let ANY OTHER entity USURP this means for his DEFINING and UNDERSTANDING God's TRUTHS!

Conclusion: (To illustrate the sermon lesson . . . )

In our sermon introduction, we noted that Tom Krattenmaker's article on "The Bible vs. Science" in the February 5, 2007 issue of USA TODAY complained about Kurt Wide's stand that the Bible was his final authority over even what many secular, pro-evolutionary scientists have stated regarding the fossil record.

However, a close examination of the fossil record reveals that great problems exist in it for the scientist who holds to the evolutionary theory! Luther Sunderland, an aerospace engineer for General Electric wrote the book, Darwin's Enigma (Santee, California: Master Book Publishers, 2nd. ed., 1984) for the New York State Board of Regents where he showed the fossil record gives big problems for evolutionists.

On page 52, Sunderland noted: "So there is no evidence whatsoever of how a single-celled organism might have converted into multicelled organisms. The metazoa just abruptly appear in the fossil record with every organ and structure complete. Some of the most complex structures are present in the Cambrian organisms, such as the eye of the squid, which is very similar to the human eye." (Sunderland reports on his chart supplied on page 43 in this same book that the Cambrian level is [allegedly] the oldest strata with life forms, Ibid.)

However, Sunderland then divulged that Charles Darwin himself, the key uniformitarian evolutionist, "wrote that the eye turned him cold all over when he pondered its origin. He said: To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I confess, absurd in the highest degree.'" (Ibid., p. 52-53, citing Benjamin Farrington, What Darwin Really Said (New York: Schocken Books, 1982), p. 48-49)

Thus, in the alleged oldest levels of geological strata where fossils exist have fossilized forms been found containing eyes so complex that Darwin himself admitted it seemed "absurd in the highest degree" to say they evolved! The fossil record is not a problem for a creationist like Kurt Wide, but it is a huge problem for evolutionists!



May we hold to what WE OURSELVES READ in the BIBLE as AUTHORITATIVE above ALL OTHER sources for God's truth that we might SURELY KNOW God's TRUTHS!