The divine origin of Scripture

So we're cruising through 2 Peter, three chapters, done by the end of the year. Jeremy covered up through 18 last week though, right? Chapter 1. So this week we're going to look at verses 19, 20, and 21. So let's see here. I'll read them. So we have the prophetic word made more sure, to which you do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star arises in your heart. But know this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. OK, Tom. Alright, so that's what we're going to try to go through, verse by verse, word by word.

But, let's remind ourselves of the context here. If you look back a couple of verses into 12, 13, and 14, Peter is reminding them again of these truths. He tells them in 14 that he's going to be leaving. His time on earth is over and he knows it. And then in 15, he again tells them he's going to remind them of the things that he's taught them and he's going to try to preserve it.

Did he know that his very letter would be part of inspired scripture? I don't know. But he was intending to write this so that it would be recorded and remembered for generations to come. And then he says something kind of interesting in 16 about this.

He says that we did not follow cleverly devised tales when we make known to you the power and the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. But we're eyewitnesses of his majesty. And he's talking about, as Jeremy went over last week, he's talking about the transfiguration. In verses 16 and 17, and in our verse, in the second slide there, he's telling them that his teaching of the Millennial Kingdom, which is the power, the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, were not by cleverly imagined fables for three reasons.

A. He himself saw Christ, Messianic Glory on the Mount of Transfiguration. Remember, think back. We're part of the Church today. We often talk about the Millennial Kingdom. It just depends on what book of the Bible we're studying. But there is a future Kingdom coming. For the Church, we'll be a part of that. But our next event is the Rapture. But when we read the Old Testament, full of verses and books that are talking just about the kingdom.

And so that was a big part of what Peter and the New Testament apostles taught the early church. They knew this stuff too. So Peter is just telling them, hey look, we didn't make this up, but we even saw Christ's glory. Then B, we heard the Father's voice. And then three, that event is confirmed by Old Testament prophecy. And that's what brings us into verse 19. That event of transfiguration, which is where Christ's glory was revealed, was confirmed by Old Testament prophecy. So we'll move on here.

So go over to page 3 of your notes. Yes, Tom? Page two. Well, I guess you chart three. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. Right. Thanks. Thank you. I have the same problem. You have to try to pay to. Oh, that's good. Like always. All right. So I will just speak through this. And please interrupt me and tell me what you found when you studied it.

So the other thing you may notice, and it might annoy you, but when I go through these verse by verse, I like to go through it in the order that the Greek showed up, just because it doesn't really matter. But just for your information, oftentimes the importance of a Greek word is revealed by where it shows up in the order of the sentence. So anyway, so the verb we have. we have is just present tense.

We are having right now the prophetic word made more sure. And this is the word that we'll go ahead and interpret confirmed on the bottom here. And it's an adjective. So it means stable, fast, firm, sure, trusting. We have the prophetic word confirmed. And I like what Gableine says, it must be understood in the sense of attesting or confirming the word of prophecy.

The transfiguration confirmed the prophecies in the Old Testament. You could look at this and you could kind of, you could interpret that differently. But I think that after looking at it a lot, I think that makes the most sense. The transfiguration confirmed the prophecies in the Old Testament. And let's look back at one for example. Turn to Daniel chapter 7. And let's look at starting in verse 9. Keep your finger in Matthew and Daniel 7. I want to real quick read to you Transfiguration. There's only a couple verses here.

Matthew 17, six days later, Jesus took with him Peter, James and John, his brother, and led them up on a high mountain by himself. He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and his garments became as white as light. And behold, Moses and Elijah appeared to them, talking with him. And Peter said to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you wish, I will make three tabernacles here, one for you, one for Moses, one for Elijah. While he was still speaking, a bright cloud overshadowed them. And behold, a voice out of the cloud said, this is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased.

Listen to him. When the disciples heard this, they fell face down to the ground and were terrified. And Jesus came to them and touched them and said, get up and do not be afraid. And lifting up their eyes, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone. So that's what we were talking about. So over to Daniel 7, starting in verse 9. Anybody want to read? Feel like reading? Feel like it? Want to? OK. Will you read verses 9 through 14, please?

I watched till thrones were put in place, and the Ancient of Days was seated. His garment was white as snow, and the hair of his head was like pure wool. His throne was a fiery flame, its wheels a burning fire. A fiery stream issued and came forth from before him. A thousand thousands ministered to him. Ten thousand times ten thousands stood before him. The court was seated and the books were opened.

I watched then because of the sound of the pompous words which the horn was speaking. I watched till the beast was slain and his body destroyed and given to the burning flame. As for the rest of the beasts, they had their dominion taken away, yet their lives were prolonged for a season and a time. I was watching in the night visions, and behold, one like the Son of Man coming from the clouds of heaven.

He came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought Him near before Him. Then to Him was given dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which shall not pass away, and His kingdom the one which shall not be destroyed. Alright, thanks.

So, the first few verses there refer to God the Father, the glory of heaven, the glory of God, and Christ. And notice the light associated with that, brightness. And then you have Christ coming up to him, verses 13 and 14, and receiving the kingdom. And so, that glory of Christ, related to his kingdom, is what we see in the Transfiguration. And then if you look over in Matthew chapter 16 verse 28, this is in our Bible the chapter before the transfiguration happened. Matthew 16 verse 28. Actually even the verse before. So this is Jesus talking to his disciples.

He says, Truly I say to you, there are some of those who are standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. In the very next verse. is what I read in Matthew 17, where the transfiguration takes place. So Peter, Peter, James and John, they saw the glory of Christ, they heard it, and the events confirmed by scripture. kind of a baby postscript that is mentions certain of the beast having a time later on for them to be judged, but that they were let go for a while. I suspect that they were kept there for the final rebellion at the very tail end of history. That's a neat book.

Revelations kind of goes together. Alright, so now this prophetic word, we have confirmed the prophetic word, and we're just talking about what the prophets have said, and so it seems like it's referring to the Old Testament in general at times, in fact the context of 2 Peter, the very next chapter lists a lot of different things that happened, not just in the prophetic portions of the Old Testament, but in the Old Testament in general. So I listed a couple of them there. There's false prophets in general, rebellion of the angels, the flood of Noah, salvation of Noah, destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, rescue of Lot, even the story of Balaam and his donkey.

So the Old Testament is in view here. Now, so it says, to which you do well to pay attention. And so this pay attention is Prosecco, to hold the mind towards, to pay attention to, to apply oneself to, to adhere to. So it could mean several different things depending on the context. So we have the prophetic word, and it's good if we pay attention to it. And we've kind of been talking about that for a few weeks.

We study God's word not to be better Christians in the sense to try to make our nasty flesh more presumable to God. That's not why we study God's word. We don't study God's word to get bonus points. We don't study God's word to look better than the guy that didn't show up this morning at Sunday school. That's not why we're here.

We're here because we want to get to know Christ better. If we don't know, if we don't crack the spine on this, then God isn't going to talk to us today. This is how He's talked to us today. He's revealed His word to us today, right here. And that's how we open it up. That's how we get to know Him. We open up with Jesus. And then He makes it real to us. He teaches it to us. He gets to know Christ through it. So this is a starting point and a foundation for our knowledge about God and our relationship with him. So it's good, we do well, if we pay attention to it. That's what he's saying here. And then he gives us this phrase, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your heart.

So this lamp is just a lamp or a candle. And I think I recently saw one. I don't know if it's Courtney or Ingrid or Bernard or Nancy brought them back from Israel, but somebody, one of those little lamps they brought back from Israel recently, but just a little, clay lamps, so that's what this is, and it's shining in a dark place. Psalm 119 verse 105, your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. So, your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. We do well to pay attention to it. A lamp as to a lamp shining in a dark place.

Josiah, just thinking about, we have a myriad of information out there today, in all forms, electronic, paper, the whole works, and God's Word stands out above all that. So in a way, and that's darkness too, all that information out there can be, there can be some good stuff out there, but to a large extent it's darkness. And what stands out from that, is God's Word, it stands out, and as we interact with it, it changes us. It's incredible. That's neat. Think about philosophy. I was kind of thinking the same thing, but not in the same words.

Just take a person, maybe devoid of any information, where are they going to learn something? Where are they going to get truth? Where are they going to learn what's right and what's wrong? And then think of yourself as you study God's Word, and then you go to work or do something out in society and something happens and you read it wrong but you get discernment from it and you know.

It would seem that at this time, since the New Testament was not yet complete, and while the ministry of the Holy Spirit was somewhat expanded due to that at that time, there's also a number of people who would only be convinced by logic alone in that they are told, keep listening, keep watching, look at God's Word. It's under development, but it's coming to your eyes. Totally, like the worry star rising in your heart.

Josiah, I noticed that the word for lamp is in Revelation 21-28 and it says that the lamp of it is the lamb. It's the same word. The lamp of it is the lamb. Oh, what verse is that? Revelation 21-28. Twenty one, twenty three. And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon. Shine it for the glory of God. Enlightenment of a lamp is a light.

OK. I had a note in my margin from a previous study on second Peter. That's good. Pay attention to that. But it is the same word. And he is. Yes, he is. And all that other stuff out there that Roger mentioned is only valuable or true if it's supported by this. There's some more here. Let's go to the next slide. This dark place.

This is a Greek word that only shows up right here in the New Testament. It's not used at all in the New Testament. It's used elsewhere, of course, in Greek literature. I'm not going to say this one, it may or may not. So it means a dry, literally a dry, arid place, and hence neglected, dirty, dark. So it's probably, in context, it's referring to the world, right? This is a dark place. And that's why we have this word of God. It's trustworthy. We do well to pay attention to it. It's to a lamp-shining and dark place.

In the interlinear I have, it mentions the word, their translation of the word for it is murky. So you get an essence of weak light in a murky place, but it's not really all together clear yet. There's kind of different, different, different words that could be used for murky, dry, dirty, dark. They're all those are all different.

So John one five. Let's go and look at that. There's a couple verses right around this in John chapter 1 that sort of give us a similar picture here and relate to Revelation 21-23 too about the Lamb being the light. So, verse 4, in him, we're talking about Jesus was life, and the light was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. And it goes on, there came a man sent from God, his name was John, John the Baptist. He came as a witness to testify about the light. So then skip to verse 9. There was the true light which was coming into the world, enlightens every man. So here, yes, Jesus is the light. But here, specifically, it's referring to the Lord God being our light. But he's the word. Jesus is the word.

John Darby said, prophecy was a light that shone during the dark ages of the night, but there was another light for those that watched. Can you think of the Old Testament prophets who were waiting for Jesus to be born? So it says, until the day dawns and the morning star arises, this little heos, until when the Haos and the Haas are put together. It just is referring to future time.

And that's how it shows up. We translate the word until, but it's really those two words put together that add a bit of magic to it there. What we're going to see here. This, pay attention, we're going to see here in a minute. It seems like this word in your heart, this phrase in your heart, references to pay attention. Modifies pay attention. So, pay attention in your heart as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises.

The Day of Dawns, this is a reference to the Day of the Lord coming. This is where I landed on it. The Day of the Lord refers to the Tribulation, the period post-Rapture. So the Tribulation and the Millennial Kingdom, the Day of the Lord. encompasses the rapture, not the rapture, but the tribulation and the kingdom.

It's the word for day, Greek word for day, hamera. And then the dawn, this is the only time this word, dawn, is used. I don't know how you say that one either. It's a funny one. Dia hogazo. So that's a verb, to dawn. Compounded of through and sunlight, carrying the picture of light breaking through the gloom. Over in Romans chapter 13, verse 12, Paul says something very similar to this. Romans 13, 12. He says, the night is almost gone and the day is near.

Therefore, let us lay aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. But if we go back to Isaiah chapter 60, let's read a couple of verses here. These are going to be a couple of verses that talk about the day of the Lord. And what I'm going to say here as we go through this is that the day is referring to the day of the Lord, in a technical sense.

And the morning star is referring to the rapture. The morning star, which we'll get to in a moment, precedes the dawn. And I happened to be out in Washington state this week, all week, for meetings. And so, in order to exercise, I had to get up very early, because people were running. And all I saw running east toward Idaho was the morning star. I never saw the dawn. I was back at my hotel getting ready for the meeting when it dawned, but there was the morning star. It was not even getting light yet, but I knew dawn was almost here because the morning star was there. But this day in Isaiah 60, It says, verse one, arise, shine, for your light has come. There's the theme for it.

And the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For behold, darkness will cover the earth, and deep darkness the peoples. But the Lord will rise upon you, and his glory will appear upon you. Again, this is the glory of the memorial kingdom. Exactly what we've been talking about all morning. Verse three, nations will come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising. And that wasn't the verse that talks about the day of the Lord. Sorry about that. But it talks about the coming of the kingdom.

So that's the day that's dawning. And then this morning star says, and the morning star arises. This is Phosphoros, which is light. planet Venus, the morning star. In Revelation 22, 16, Christ uses it to refer to himself. I am the bright morning star. Different Greek words, but the same idea. Numbers 24, 17. Numbers 24, 17 says, I see him, but not now. I behold him, but not near.

A star shall come forth from Jacob, a scepter shall rise from Israel and shall crush through the forehead of Moab, etc. So the reference to, I believe a reference to Christ coming. This is this ironically is I think something Balaam said when Balaam was trying to get him to curse the Jews. So anyway, that shows up in the same context. In Revelation 22-16, Jesus says, I am the bright morning star. So I am pretty sure that this is a reference to the rapture of the church.

And I like that a couple of Greek scholars were pretty confident that in your hearts modifies the verb pay attention to. So pay attention to, in your hearts, this, this word of God. So there's other Bible students and teachers that look at it differently and say, no, this is the morning star rising in my heart.

For me, that's too metaphorical and spiritual. I don't think it says that. I don't have a problem with metaphorical and spiritual. I just don't think it says that here. But Peter Diderak was coming. And Paul talks about it mostly, but I think this could be a reference to it. So this is just the Word for Heart, Cardia.

And we already looked at John 1.4 and John 1.9, but let's peek at John 8.12. Maybe one of you would like to read it.

And spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. All right. So there's the word that you read earlier. He's referring to himself as light. And that's who we're waiting for in the rapture, is Jesus. He's going to come and take us out of this mess. So to me, it fits. The context fits the theme. And it even fits what he said.

We're going to pay attention to the written word until the day dawns and the morning star arises. What I didn't include, I think I have a couple more verses to get to, but I did not include those verses that talk about the day of the Lord, so we'll just have to skip that. William Kelly, Peter's point was that until the Lord returns, his readers should give attention to the Old Testament and to the apostles' teaching, especially since false teachers were perverting them.

And that's the immediate context after this. It's in the immediate context. False teachers are out there, and they're working. But we have God's word. So verse 20. says, but know this first of all, and but isn't in the Greek at all. I think translators put it in a smooth bit.

So it says, know this first of all. And I like what Vern says down here in his notes on this. Peter told his readers that they would keep the principle that he was about to spell out as first and priority. The principle was not to be forgotten or reduced in priority, but kept central in his readers' thinking and mindset. And that's why he's writing all this. He started out with a review of the context. He was writing to remind them. He wanted them to have this to remember in the future. And this is first in priority.

The word translated no, gnosko, in view of the context, indicates the mindset that believers are to continue having with regard to prophetic passages. So, here's what we need to remember, first and foremost, when we consider scripture. Notice, that no prophecy of scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation. Verse 21 says, For no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. These two verses are important to keep together, because they get taken out of context. Notice, first of all, that all prophecy of scripture, and we're referring to the Old Testament, but in context, this principle is true of all of God's written word. No scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation.

So this little adjective, one's own, what is it? idios. That means one's own. This is my Bible, my own Bible. That's the kind of adjective it is. It was the mark of a false prophet to speak of his own thing from himself. We're going to look in a minute or two at a passage in the Old Testament where it talks about some false prophets. We'll just wait for that.

Scripture doesn't come from a man. It's not a matter of... We're talking about source here. We're actually not talking about the study of hermeneutics, but we're talking about where it comes from. It's source. You see that really in verse 21. But this word interpretation is not our Greek word hermeneutics. It's the Greek word epibusetos. And it means releasing, solving, explaining, interpreting. The word almost comes to mean inspiration. It's not that word, but it's close. Inspiration is God-breathed. That's used in Timothy. We'll see that later. But this word, epilusis, is like explaining, interpreting. But again, the context is the source.

No prophecy of scripture is of one's own reasoning and explaining. But it is the prophet's grasp of prophecy, not that of the reader's, that is here presented as the next verse shows. My next slide just mentions that this verse that we just looked at, taken out of context, has been used in quite a few different ways by Christians. It's been used to support the view that only the church interprets scripture. So, that this is one verse they go to, ignore what it says around it, and say that you can interpret scripture. We got the copyright.

Yeah, and it says it right there. But of course that's not what it's saying. And then, others and good guys, in my opinion, a lot better than me, have said that this verse supports the view and teaches that scripture has to interpret scripture. It doesn't really say that either, although that's true, scripture does interpret scripture, but that's not really what this is saying. This is talking about the source of God's Word. It's trustworthy because it comes from God in the next verse.

It doesn't come from one's own reasonings. See, another BJP quote here. Not even the prophets themselves could claim to have that personal power of interpretation and insight, since the scriptural passages themselves were given by the Holy Spirit's Word. That's the point. Now, verse 21. So verse 21 is pretty short. It's better understood by looking at 21.

For no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, that men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. For no, and that's just a little purporting and conjecture with regard, the reason for the previous statement, that no prophet starts He is not a self-starter. The reason for the previous statement was that no prophet starts prophecy himself.

By an act of human will, this is our noun for will, telema, and then man, anthropos, right? So this is the will of man. And no true prophecy comes from man, originates with man. Prophecy has come from man. men and women, but they're not real, they're not true, they're not from God.

And so I thought we'd just peek at one. You know the whole Testament is full of those stories, but let's look at Jeremiah 23, verses 16 and 17. This is what the Lord of hosts says. Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesied to you. They are making you worthless. They speak visions from their own minds, not from the Lord's mouth. Keep on saying to those who despise me, the Lord has said, you will have peace. They have said to everyone who follows the stubbornness of his heart, no harm will come to you.

Thanks. So that is actually pretty good. I probably found that one in a book. But that's, you see how it even mentions, they speak a vision of their own imagination. So the source for verse 20, is from their own, from themselves. Today, we have a lot of deceivers. A lot of people lie to you. They lie to me. And it's all the time and it drives me nuts. But how do you know if someone is lying to you? It's hard. The only way you know if someone is lying to you is A, you distrust the person's character anyway because you know them. Or B, You may know the truth. And so I read a way to detect what they told you is not true or see you just have to wait and see, you know, you can if you don't body language, you can understand. Right.

That that can help. Kind of like if you read Animal Farm and the pig does certain things, it sounds so it looks so convincing. Body movement of this is for that sort. And so the rest of the animals totally believe. Yeah. So. I'm not familiar with that, but I've heard of that.

Anyway, it was also maybe easy to be a false prophet in the Old Testament. But if what they said didn't come true, and the godly people around were paying attention, believe their penalty was death. They had to be 100% right. That would be kind of cool today if people had to be 100% right. So scripture is trustworthy because it comes from God.

And then he's going to describe it further here. So it was never made, or you could say no prophecy was ever made, by an act of human will. So it was never made. There's two verbs here, in the first part of this verse, and in the latter part of this verse. And they're both the verb pharaoh. Pharaoh, not pharaoh. Pharaoh. Pharaoh. And it means to carry, to move along. To bear. And here, this English word, made, was made, is actually that. That word, pharaoh. To bear along.

It's the same word that's translated move right here. but they're used differently in the same verse. I'm sure it's just a play on words like here. So here in the first part, no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will. This word is used in Acts 27, 15, and 17 of a ship being carried along by the wind. So again, we have the idea of the source of something here. So X 27 15 17. Let's look at that. This is when Paul is a prisoner on the way to Rome and he's in a bad storm. That's 27 15.

When the ship was caught in it, the violent wind, and could not face the wind, we gave way to it and let ourselves be driven along. For sixteen, running under the shelter of a small island called Clawda, we were scarcely able to get the ship's boat under control. After they had hoisted it up, they used supporting cables and undergirding the ship. And fearing that they might run aground on the shallows of Sirtis, they let down the sea anchor and in this way let themselves be driven along. So that's how the word is used.

So no true prophecy of scripture ever came from a man, was ever brought forth by a man, his own will. But by the Holy Spirit, man is opened up. So now this word, but, this is Allah. This is the strong objection. And so it's to provide a contrast. In other words, Peter is trying to make a point and emphasize that prophecy doesn't come from man's own will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit who spoke of God. So, Holy Spirit, we know who He is. He's a member of the Trinity.

God permanently dwells with every believer from the moment they're saved on to Now, what's interesting here is this is a participle. Okay. So it's a noun, a verb and noun form. And so it's the, let's see here. I think the way this gets translated. Yeah. It's the ones being moved. Okay. So At the end of this phrase, we're going to have the comment, men spoke from God. But men spoke from God. Right now, we're seeing that he's saying there were ones moved by the Holy Spirit. Those moved by the Holy Spirit, those men spoke from God.

So it's a participle. And it's passive. It's a verb present participle. It's passive. So the Holy Spirit is the one who is moving these men along. And these men spoke from God. I always like this. This is a beautiful verse. I always think about the fact that the Holy Spirit is moving men along.

If you think about it in the analogy of the boat situation. There might be several ways to get to the dock. So you might have Peter, he writes this way to get to the dock, and John writes that way to get to the dock, but they both get to the dock. So God allows for men how he created them, and they're different, but he gets them to the same place with the same information.

It's a marvelous picture, just so exciting how God can use men and still get his message accurately. and without error. It's interesting to hear what Wiest says about how the Holy Spirit impels these men to write prophecy and how they get the grammar just right. They didn't, but the Holy Spirit did. It's incredible. They get it with the right tense, and whether it's the Holy Spirit moving them along, it's just mind-boggling.

I'm sure they didn't all know the parts of speech and all of it. The rules are pretty granular. They know we'd be dissecting everything and saying, what's the present? That's a past. They didn't know that down the road men would be looking at what they said and be able to, because God wrote it, it's going to be precise and accurate. They spoke in the Old Testament about current events that they were seeing, and yet there was an application that they didn't really understand for the future.

Yes, that's right. Yeah, and I think, where is it? I can't think of a verse that says they were searching, you know, searching the scriptures. Yeah, it's neat. And it's a miracle. Inspiration is a total miracle. That's what you guys are describing. I'm thinking of that phrase, that you search the scriptures because in them you think you know the Word of God. So, at the very end here, he introduces another noun, but it's actually the subject of the sentence, men spoke from God. I kind of misspoke there. You search the scripture because in them you think you have eternal life. And they all point to that. So they were searching scripture, but they were missing the word. So, lastly here, there's another really good verse. So this is a key verse when we talk about inspiration of scripture. This is a key verse that we studied this morning.

There's also another one, 2 Timothy 3.16. We'll peek at that.

This says, 2 Timothy 3.16.

All scripture is inspired by God. That's the Greek word, literally means God breathed. All scripture is inspired by God, and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for doc, for correction, for training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped, present. So all scripture, all of it, is God breathed. Its source is from God.

And that's similar to what this is saying. So we know that every word of scripture is God-breathed, and all of it comes from God. Not just some of it, not just the idea, the general idea of the verse or the book is God mixed in with a lot of errors. That's not the position we hold. Every word is God-breathed, and yet it was done in this way that's miraculous to be described. And so men spoke, but yet God spoke through them. Did they know that God was in the process of inspiring their words and documents?

I doubt it. I don't know. Maybe they did. I don't know. We don't know that. But this is an important concept to understand because a lot of Christianity doesn't really care about this. They don't care about all that detail. This isn't a mountain they would die on. They should. So they allow room for error in God's Word. And God's Word doesn't allow error for itself. But once you open that door, then you go for the whole can of worms. So let's pray.

Let's thank God for really the miracle of His written Word and for preserving it through the years. That's something that we've seen for the last 2000 years and then before that in the Old Testament. These documents were preserved. And that was God's superintendent over the events of the world. Through world history he preserved this thing.

Dear God, we do thank you for doing that for our benefit. So that we could sit here today in 2015 and read your written word and get to know you and get to know truth. And please do, let us fellowship with you and not just get heads full of knowledge and get puffed up and draw attention to ourselves. But give us daily freedom from the indolence in nature and live your life through us. And give us good fellowship this morning with each other. And Jesus name. Amen.