Jesus' thoughts on the Bible - How God Speaks, Part 2

John 5:31-47

(2) How God speaks.
* (Quick Disclaimer - if you have a hard time with this post PLEASE wait until the next post to see it in its context before judging it)

Out of the three evidences the scripture is given the lion’s share of weight. It is the only one that is claimed as the “Father’s testimony.”

We learn important things here about Jesus’ view of scripture. It is a little indirect but it is there. Directly He is attacking the Pharisees/these "Bible studiers" use of scripture but in the process we get Jesus' view of scripture.

We get at least two things:
1. Jesus said that the scripture is Divine and not human. He does not say it was not written by human beings (“Moses wrote of me”), but in V34 He says that human testimony is not enough and so then in 37 He says He is going to give the Father’s testimony and then in 39 He gives scripture.

The Bible often is declared as man’s search for God. Jesus says it is from God. ‘Yes Moses wrote it, but it is actually the Father’s testimony.’ This is not man reaching up for God, it is God reaching down to us.

In Matthew 19 Jesus quotes God and what He quotes is Genesis 2:24. But if you go back to Genesis you will see that the author of the book wrote that, not God, as a comment on what just happened. But Jesus can quote what the author of Genesis wrote as from God just like He is doing here with Moses. ‘It is the Father’s testimony.’

2 Peter 1:20, 21 - “no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

Jesus and Peter are both saying that what you have in the Bible, though humans wrote it, is the testimony of God.

2. Another thing Jesus says is that not only is this a divine revelation, it is the most sure divine revelation. Jesus is saying that ‘you have not heard His voice nor seen His form... yet you have the testimony.’ Or in other words, you have never had a vision or heard God’s voice, but you have His testimony anyway.

In 2 Peter 1 - Peter is saying a few verses before twenty that He heard a voice, He saw a vision, but yet the scripture testimony is more sure. Paul in Galatians 1:6-9 says that even if an angel from Heaven came and declared a different message you can dismiss it if it is against Jesus being our full and complete atonement. You can just throw the angel out at that point, even with the ground shake and lightning coming down from the sky!

Jesus, Peter, and Paul are saying that the Bible is better than a vision. I think because honestly there are only three possibilities if you have such a vision: 1. It is a human source, you are making it up in your head or it is a fraud; 2. It can be supernatural outside of God; or 3. It can be a supernatural source from God. If you have a vision or hear a voice you only have a 1/3 chance that it was not a mistake. But with the Bible you are batting 1.000. Jesus is saying you have the real testimony of God in the Bible.

(On my next post, I will get into the fact that you cannot bat 1.000 by simply using the Bible if you use it as an end in itself and not a means in pointing beyond itself or in other words if you don't see the point of the Bible...)

And if this the Scripture sits in judgment against voices and angels from the sky then you have to ask yourself this question: Is your heart going to sit in judgment against the Bible or is it going to sit in judgment against your heart? Listen closely to the authority that Jesus gives the Bible.

Jesus is saying that this is the only way you can really know that God is speaking. What this means is this: You cannot have relationship without believing in the complete authority of the Bible.

I am finding that many people today talk about the Bible like this: ‘If you think of the Bible as truth then you are not having a conversation or intimacy with God because the Bible just has a lot of laws and rules and you cannot have intimacy or a conversation with that. Let us realize that the Bible is not always true, we are enlightened today and we are able to now judge on what parts of the Bible are right and wrong, and only when we do that can we actually have real intimacy or a real conversation with God.’

The Stepford Wives movie is a good example of a point here. I saw the remake years ago. The movie was not good, but I think a good principle can be taken from it. The movie is basically about the husbands of this town are replacing their wives with robots. The robots are programmed to be the ‘perfect’ wife. Relationship and intimacy are the farthest things away from what those couples in the movie had at that point... When you have people that you can turn off whenever they say something that offends you, when you are surrounded by people that only say ‘Yes dear’, when you are surrounded by people that never contradict you, that never challenge you - then you are NOT having a conversation, you are NOT having intimacy. You are not having a personal relationship at all.

When you come to something that offends you in the Bible and say in a sense, ‘I can’t believe in a God that would send people to Hell, I can’t believe in a God that would say that is wrong!!’ When you get to a place where God contradicts you in the Bible, but then say I can’t accept that because it offends me, what you have then there is a Stepford god. It is a god according to your rules, how you think. If you don’t take the Bible as anything but Truth you will not have a conversation, you will not have intimacy.

You cannot ‘know’ Jesus and not have His view of the Bible? Jesus’ view of the Bible was the very foundation on which His entire life was based. He is constantly saying: “It is written...” or talking about the scripture being “fulfilled” while dealing with temptation in the desert, to Peter before the Roman soldiers who are about to take Jesus away... with the cross on His back (Luke 23), on the cross as He is dieing (Psalm 22).

If you say you want Jesus AND you DO NOT want a Bible that you have to obey no matter what it says, what you are really saying then is that you don’t want the real Jesus, you want a Jesus that you can make up, that you can program and turn off. You can’t have Jesus and deny the very basis of His life. Jesus says that the Bible is TESTIMONY - it is personal to Him, testimony is a personal account.