Bible history's "tale of two cities" is represented by Antioch vs. Alexandria. Think King James Bible vs. all the others.
Luke the historian writes in Acts 13:1, “Now there were in the church that was at Antioch certain prophets and teachers; as Barnabas, and Simeon that was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen, which had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul.”
Jordan explains, “That was the church out of which the Apostle Paul’s apostolic ministry sprung up and it’s the basis of the operation from which his ministry expands. Antioch, through the first three centuries, was a powerful Bible center, a community of Bible-teaching, Bible-believing, Bible-centered activity and Paul’s basic missionary-ministry model is exemplified from Antioch.
“Now there was another town at that time interested in the Bible called Alexandria. Acts 18:24 says, ‘And a certain Jew named Apollos, born at Alexandria, an eloquent man, and mighty in the scriptures, came to Ephesus.’
“Alexandria, which is in Egypt on the Nile basin, was founded by Alexander the Great in the 3rd Century B.C. It had one of the seven wonders of the ancient world—the great lighthouse. But, more importantly, it had a great library with between 500,000 to 700,000 book volumes and was a great center of scholarship.
“It was the second largest city in the Roman Empire at the time of the writing of Acts and was the second largest city in the Western world. It was a center of great intellectual fervor and activity. It was the place that spawned the Septuagint legend that says a bunch of Jewish rabbinical scholars got together and translated the Old Testament into Greek.
“The authority to believe that (bunk) is a letter written by a guy who everybody says is a forgery. You read this stuff and you say, ‘Jay Leno couldn’t be this funny!’ People to this day agree to base all of their belief about the Old Testament text on a translation, the LXX Septuagint, that everybody agrees the story of how it came about is a hoax.
“I couldn’t sell you a glass of water on a hot day with that kind of a story but people say, ‘Well, the LXX. . . ’ Was there a Greek translation of the Old Testament? You bet your bottom dollar there was. Did it occur the way they say it did? Don’t bet your bottom dollar. But the point is Alexandria was a place where this was supposed to happen because it was an intellectual center of curiosity.
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As Acts 18:25 goes on to reveal that Apollos “was instructed in the way of the Lord; and being fervent in the spirit, he spake and taught diligently the things of the Lord, knowing only the baptism of John.”
Jordan says, “Apollos was eloquent, well-educated and knew how to communicate and was mighty in the Scriptures. You see, there was an interest in the Word of God at Alexandria. This man was instructed in the way of Lord, being fervent and teaching diligently, but what was Apollos’ big problem? He’s a teeny-bit out of date dispensationally. He’s only teaching the baptism of John! Well, there’s a whole lot of things that have happened since the baptism of John!
“For example, Jesus Christ has shown up. He went to the Cross, He died and was resurrected and ascended back into heaven; the Holy Spirit’s come. The next chapter you see some more of these guys—they don’t even know the Holy Spirit’s been given yet!
“Now, in my mind, it’s kind of hard to relate…how could you be that unplugged that many years after this stuff’s happened?! I don’t know; maybe the guy’s just been in the library studying or something.
“My point to you is there is real interest in Scripture in Alexandria but they’re really not interested in and have no concept of dispensational Bible study. If you don’t understand the Word of God dispensationally, you don’t understand God’s Word.
“And if you don’t understand God’s Word, then your ability to function successfully in being ‘the pillar and the ground of the truth’ is going to be hampered. In fact, it’s going to be undermined."
(new article tomorrow)
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