Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Bible on file in heaven before writers told a word

One of the great verses Bible defenders use to demonstrate God’s commitment to preserving His Word throughout time is Psalm 119:89: ‘Forever, O LORD, thy word is settled in heaven.’

The thing about it that's so profound, though, is the verse is saying God’s Word was ALREADY settled in heaven and existed in a written form BEFORE any of it was ever put down on paper on the earth!

In proving this point, California preacher John Verstegen points specifically to an amazing passage in Daniel 10 where the angel Gabriel is sent from heaven to convey information to Daniel in response to Daniel’s prayer to receive it.

Daniel 10: 10-12 reads: [10] And, behold, an hand touched me, which set me upon my knees and upon the palms of my hands.
[11] And he said unto me, O Daniel, a man greatly beloved, understand the words that I speak unto thee, and stand upright: for unto thee am I now sent. And when he had spoken this word unto me, I stood trembling.
[12] Then said he unto me, Fear not, Daniel: for from the first day that thou didst set thine heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come for thy words.

Verstegen explains, ‘The information Gabriel gave Daniel is the information in what you have as the Book of Daniel. But watch what he says as he’s telling Daniel this information. Verses 20-21:

20] Then said he, Knowest thou wherefore I come unto thee? and now will I return to fight with the prince of Persia: and when I am gone forth, lo, the prince of Grecia shall come.
[21] But I will shew thee that which is noted in the scripture of truth: and there is none that holdeth with me in these things, but Michael your prince.

“Do you see it says ‘that which IS noted’? He doesn’t say ‘that which you are then going to note in the scripture of truth.’ He doesn’t say ‘that which, Daniel, I want you to write down.’ The angel says, ‘I will show thee that which IS noted in the Scripture,’ and Daniel hadn’t written the Book of Daniel yet! That’s amazing. The scripture of truth was already noted before Gabriel even furtively told Daniel the information!”
*****
Jordan: “Brother Russ Hargett (preacher in Tampa, Fla.) made a comment a couple of years ago at a conference and I thought, ‘Wow, I missed that one! That was good!’

“In Isaiah 30, God tells Isaiah, ‘Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come for ever and ever.’
“Russ made the point, and he’s dead right about this, ‘Holy men of old SPAKE as they were moved by the Spirit of God.’ Inspiration is God putting His Spirit in the words. How did He do it? He spoke. He then caused those words to be written down so they could be preserved.

"So you know what the original writing of the Scripture was? It was an act of preservation. You follow that?!
"Everybody gets real mad when we talk about preservation, but the original writing down--script, what’s written--was the preservation of the SPOKEN Word of God!
“That’s why in Romans 16:22, Tertius could say, ‘I Tertius, who wrote this epistle, salute you in the Lord.’ Who wrote Romans? Well, the ‘amanuensis,’ or the secretary who took the dictation from Paul, was a guy named Tertius. But the Spirit of God spoke through Paul. All of a sudden this issue of inspiration and preservation becomes ALIVE to you because you’ve got God’s Word!
*****
Jordan continues, “Listen, we’re going to be living in a world that is more and more like the world Paul lived in. With cell phones and all most of us have instant communication but Paul didn’t have that. The issue is not how fast can I communicate; the issue is what am I saying.

“Acts 17 says, [18] Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans, and of the Stoicks, encountered him. And some said, What will this babbler say? other some, He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods: because he preached unto them Jesus, and the resurrection.
[19] And they took him, and brought him unto Areopagus, saying, May we know what this new doctrine, whereof thou speakest, is?
[20] For thou bringest certain strange things to our ears: we would know therefore what these things mean.
“Can I tell you that if you go out into the world you live in and ask 10 people, ‘Do you have any idea where you’re going to spend eternity; have all of your sins forgiven?’ six of them will let you tell them. They’re not telling you they’re going to believe it.

“You’ll find there’s a hunger in people just like with these dudes (in Acts 17). They want to know! One of the blessings for you here is Paul, up until the end of his ministry, never had to fight apostasized Christianity. You’re watching apostate Christianity fall on itself right now.

“By the way, the era of the megachurch is over, in case you hadn’t noticed. More megachurches went bankrupt in 2015 then were founded.
“Verse 21 says, [21] (For all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing.)

“The majority aren’t going to hear you but there’s going to be a remnant that does. If you want to see what the real church is going to be like next year and the next decade, read II Timothy.”
(to be continued tomorrow . . .)

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