Only the beginning (again)

Luke begins to talk about Zechariah and Elisabeth, the momma and daddy of John the Baptist. Jordan explains, “And he said, ‘The story I’m gonna tell you about John the Baptist’s birth, and his mom and dad, I’m telling you because I’ve been a historian. I’ve actually talked to the eyewitness accounts of these things who’ve had, from the beginning of those events, personal knowledge.’

“That’s one of those verses where you say, ‘Well, I thought he wrote by inspiration?’ Well, he did but he also wrote by historical inquiry. He wrote by inspiration, but when God wrote it down by inspiration He demonstrates the historical validity.

“What Luke is doing there is saying, ‘I was a good historian. You can go behind me and check the historical record and it’s exactly what I’m saying because what God is writing down here for you is what the evidence in the historical record sets forth.’ The Bible’s a very historic book.

“You go back in the Old Testament in Chronicles, or Kings and Samuel, for examples, you’ll find a list of about 15 different public chronicle records, or historical books that are not Bible and they’re not in the Bible; they’re in Jewish history at the time that you can check. The writer would refer to them.

“That’s a demonstration of the historical accuracy of the writer because if you challenge somebody to go and check the record, well you better be sure the record is there, No. 1, and then that it’s right and compatible with what you’re saying.

“So here’s a beginning that isn’t the beginning of eternity, it’s not the beginning of creation, it’s just the beginning of the earthly ministry of Christ. But if you really want to get it going look at Acts 11. Peter’s been over to Cornelius’ house and he comes back, gets called on the carpet, and he answers the people in Jerusalem in Acts 11:3: ‘Saying, Thou wentest in to men uncircumcised, and didst eat with them.
[4] But Peter rehearsed the matter from the beginning, and expounded it by order unto them, saying,
[5] I was in the city of Joppa praying: and in a trance I saw a vision, A certain vessel descend, as it had been a great sheet, let down from heaven by four corners; and it came even to me:
[6] Upon the which when I had fastened mine eyes, I considered, and saw fourfooted beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air.’

“When it says he rehearsed the matter from the beginning, what beginning is that? That’s not Gen. 1:1. That’s not Luke 1 either. He says, ‘Let me go back and tell you what happened,’ and it starts with the vision about Cornelius and he goes back and from the beginning of that incident, that historical event in his life, and he recounts things from the beginning of that. You understand that.

“Verse 15 is where it gets interesting: ‘And as I began to speak, the Holy Ghost fell on them, as on us at the beginning.’ What beginning is that? When did the Holy Spirit fall on Peter and the Jerusalem church? Acts 2. That’s Pentecost.

“So now here in the passage he says, ‘Let me tell you what happened from the beginning,’ and then he talks about the things and he says, ‘What happened over here is what happened to us back over there at the beginning.’ Which beginning? Pentecost. My point is you can use the term ‘beginning’ for a lot of different things. It isn’t just automatically the beginning from eternity past.”