Sermon by Rick Warren as abridged and adapted for CCQF
Today we begin our 6 week
sermon series on “40 Days in the Word.”
Over the next 6 weeks, you will grow to learn the word of God like never
before, love the word of God like never before, and live the word of God like
never before. Today we are going
to learn to love the word of God because
God’s Word is trustworthy & true.
Now as an example, let’s look
at this tractor over here. This is a
used tractor that I am interested in purchasing. The salesman says that this tractor is a
great deal, and it would serve me for many years to come. But , how can I trust Him? (Questions—wait)
· History—track fax
· Consistency—Does it actually do what the instructions
claim that it will do?
//Test it.
· Expert Opinion—Brand?
, Mechanic Check It Out.
Well, in a similar fashion,
we can test the Bible to determine if it
is trust worthy. So, why can we trust
the Bible?
1.
The Bible is historically accurate.
So how do we know that the
Bible is historically accurate? By the
same way you know that any other history is accurate. You just go by the test of good history.
For instance, one of the ways
you test good history is, is it from eyewitness accounts? An historian would say is this written down
by somebody who saw it or is it second hand or third hand, or is it a legend
written down a hundred years later?
The Bible is primarily
eyewitness accounts. That’s why it’s
good history. Moses was there when the
Red Sea split. Joshua was there when the
walls of Jericho fell. The disciples of
Jesus sat in the upper room and saw the resurrected Jesus appear and then they
wrote down what happened and we read about it.
So its eyewitness accounts of what had happened.
Another proof is in
archeology. You look at archeology and
it proves again and again that the places and the people, all that the Bible
talks about are true. It’s not
fiction. You can go find these
places. We’ve dug up these places. I was privileged to visit the Pool of Siloam
where the blind man was healed.
One place that the Bible
describes where Jesus ministered was his home town, Capernaum by the sea. For
hundreds and hundreds of years skeptics said that this town was make-believe,
because no archeologists had ever found
it. 30 years ago, they found it. An ancient buried, beautiful ruined village
located just where it is described in the Bible. This is just one of hundreds of such stories.
2. We know we can trust the Bible
because it is prophetically accurate.
What does that mean? It means that the predictions in the Bible
always come true.
There are over three hundred
prophecies in the Bible about Jesus, the Messiah, up to a thousand years before
he was born. And over a thousand year
period, three hundred prophecies said things like, This is when he’ll be born,
this is where he’ll be born, this is how he’ll be born.
. This is how he’ll die, the manner he’ll die, and
what he’ll die from. Over three hundred
prophecies, all of which were proven by Jesus’ life.
What are the odds of me
making three hundred predictions about you and every one of them coming
true? The odds are so astronomical you
couldn’t write that number down. It
takes more faith to believe it was all just a coincidence than to believe that
God planned it. It takes enormous faith
to believe it’s all just random, that it all just happened, without a designer,
without a creator. A thousand years
before Jesus came and died on the cross, David in one of his psalms describes
what death by crucifixion is like. He
didn’t use the word “crucifixion” because nobody knew that word. But a thousand years before the Romans are
even thinking of crucifixion, David describes what the death of crucifixion was
like. How did he know that? Only God could have told him.
2.
The third way I can trust the Bible is because of
expert opinion. Now, I’m not talking about scholars,
theologians, or seminary professors. I
am talking of the one true expert whose opinion matters more of than everyone
else combined.
Jesus trusted the Bible. You
may have heard somebody say, you may have even thought, “I trust what Jesus
said, I’m just not so sure about those other guys.” Here’s the challenge to that: Jesus trusted
the rest of the Bible. So if I trust
Jesus then I have to trust the rest of the Bible, because Jesus trusted the
rest of the Bible. Jesus proclaimed the
Bible as a unique book above all others.
Matthew 5:18, Jesus speaks
about this. Pls repeat after me: “I’ll tell you the truth,/ until heaven and
earth disappear/, not the smallest letter,/ not the least stroke of a pen/ will
disappear from the Word,/ until everything is accomplished!”
Jesus looks at the Bible and
says, it’s going to last until the end of time.
It’s going to accomplish what God wants to accomplish in this
world. In John 10:35 Jesus said “Scripture is always true.” Jesus proclaimed the truth of the
Bible. And when Jesus talks about the
truth of the Bible, I’ve got to listen to that in my own life.
When Jesus talks about the
Bible, he doesn’t just talk about poetry and history. He talks about it as something that is life
changing. Luke 11:28 here’s what Jesus
had e true expert to say: “Blessed rather
are those who hear the word of God and obey it.” Do it. In
other words, trust the bible and be doers of the Bible.
Jesus, as he talked about the
Bible, he talked about it as a real book, talking about real people, and real
places by a real God who’s really at work in our lives.
Just a real quick list of
some of the people and places that the Bible talks about as real and Jesus also
confirmed as he taught that were real.
Jesus believed in the
prophets. He talked about all the
prophets being real. He talked about
Daniel being real. Jesus believed in
Noah, everything that happened with the flood.
He speaks about in Adam and Eve. Jesus believed in the tragedy of Sodom and
Gomorrah and what happened there. He
taught on that. For example, He believed
in Jonah, who was swallowed by the
whale..
Jesus believed they really
happened. In fact he used this story as an illustration of what was going to happen in
his resurrection. If Jesus really
believed in Jonah, I believe it happened.
I don’t know how God created a fish that could swallow a guy, but he
did. I trust in it because Jesus trusted
in it.
It sort of makes me smile
when two thousand or three or four thousand years later we look back at the
Bible and go, “I’m going to trust that part and I’m not going to trust that
part. Based on my subjective or
emotional feelings, I’m going to accept that part and I’m not going to accept
that part.” Jesus trusted it. Jesus trusted it, so we can choose to trust
it.
In so doing, we receive
immediate benefits.
No comments:
Post a Comment