"There's a spiritual problem that exists in the hearts of Believers where they've been taught not to believe God's Word absolutely. They've been taught to believe religion, a doctrinal statement, a church, a preacher, a historic Christian position. That's religion, folks.
"Someone asked me the other day, 'Is there a verse in the Bible that tells you the Bible is going to be translated into all the languages of the nations?'
Romans 16: [25] Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began,
[26] But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith:"God today commands that His Word, the scriptures of the prophets . . . you remember Ephesians 4: [11] And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers;
[12] For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ:"Paul was a prophet, but he was also an apostle," explains Richard Jordan. "He never wrote anything as a prophet. People take that verse and re-translate it and say it ought to be 'prophetic scriptures.' I'd like them to show me one epistle Paul wrote as a prophet. He wrote all of them as an apostle.
"You ask, 'Well what are the scriptures of the prophets?' I Corinthians 14:37: [37] If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord.
"One of the jobs of a prophet, all through Scripture, is to say, 'Thus sayeth the Lord.' He spoke for God. One of the jobs of the prophets in those churches Paul established was to say, 'This is God's Word.'
"You get a letter and it's signed from Paul. How did the church at Rome know that this was Scripture? I Corinthians 5:9: [9] I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators:
"Before you have I Corinthians, Paul had already written a letter to the church of Corinth. Where is it at? It's not in your Bible. So have we lost some Scripture? How do you know?
"If you got two letters from Paul and one is Scripture and the other isn't, who's to say? Well, hey, folks, that's why God put a prophet in the assembly. Gave him the gift of prophecy so that that prophet could acknowledge that the things Paul's writing--'This is Scripture; that one isn't.'
"By the way, II Thessalonians 2:2 has some people who were counterfeiting epistles. Writing them and saying they were from Paul when they weren't. But you see, the local church there had a prophet--a God-empowered person with a supernatural ability as a gift of that church to say, 'This is Scripture,' and to speak for God.
"That's what he's talking about in Romans 16:25. Paul says there are things God's going to use to establish you: 'One is my gospel, two is the preaching of Jesus Christ according to this unprophesied program that was kept secret but now is revealed and by the scriptures of the prophets.'
"Those prophets didn't just identify it was Scripture; they wrote them down. When he wrote to the Thessalonians he said, 'I want this epistle to be read by all the brethren.'
"He writes Colossians 4 and says, 'I want you to read the epistle I wrote to the Laodiceans and I want them to read the one I'm writing you.'
"You think the Colossians had an original copy that Paul sent them to the Laodiceans? Don't you think they went over to the Xerox machine and made a copy and sent it to them? What would you have done? I'd have been wanting a copy to take home with me myself and examine and study the thing.
"Who made the copies and how did you know they were right? They had someone in the church there who was supernaturally empowered by God, not simply to identify it, but to write them down. The prophets didn't originate the Scriptures; they were making copies of them that were just as authoritative as the original.
"There's a whole realm of doctrine in Scripture about how God's Word is not just written, but it's preserved. It's disseminated among people. Unfortunately, in most of the debate about the Bible, these things are just completely overlooked and ignored.
"All those copies of God's Word are to be taken and the commandment of God is that they're to be preached and they're to be made known to ALL nations.
"I want to use a verse in Israel's program about the millennial kingdom as an illustration of what it means to preach this stuff to all nations.
Zechariah 8:23: [23] Thus saith the LORD of hosts; In those days it shall come to pass, that ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you.
"They take a hold of the skirt of that Jew and say, 'Teach us God's Word.' That Jewish fellow who's going to have to teach those 10 different language groups God's Word will have to speak 10 different languages. God's Word is going to have to be taken out of the language he speaks and put into 10 different languages.
"Can you understand why that God gave to the apostles in the day of Pentecost the gift of speaking in tongues? They're flat going to need the ability to speak a lot of different languages.
Acts 2:4: [4] And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
[5] And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven."If you live in all the different nations under heaven, wouldn't that be the same thing as all the languages of the nations? You don't just live in the country; you go to speak the language.
[6] Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language.
"They're filled with the Spirit; they take God's Word and they translate it into all these different languages.
[7] And they were all amazed and marvelled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans?
[8] And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born?
" They say, 'How come all these dudes from up north can speak all these different languages?' Look at all those different languages!
[9] Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judaea, and Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia,
[10] Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and proselytes,
[11] Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues the wonderful works of God.
[12] And they were all amazed, and were in doubt, saying one to another, What meaneth this?
"They say, 'We're all hearing in our own native language. What in the world does all of this mean?!'
"When Paul says in Romans 16 'that by the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith,' he's expecting God's Word to be taken and to be placed in the languages of the nations so that they hear God's Word in their own language.
I Corinthians 14: [21] In the law it is written, With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people; and yet for all that will they not hear me, saith the Lord.
"Notice, God Himself can speak with other tongues. God speaks every language and when His words are placed in those other languages, it is as much the Word of God as it was in the original language, as far as He's concerned."
(new article tomorrow)
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