SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 8/14/2016 7:00 AM
I promised
to look at a section of a sermon by John MacArthur to give further insight into
John 10:34-38 and I found what I was looking at and so I will quote from the
sermon “I and the Father are One PT-3.”
And He causes them to have to think. And He does a really
interesting thing with their own law. Look at verse 34. Let’s be
rational. Stop the violence. Let’s be rational. Jesus
answered them, “Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods?’ If
he called them gods, to whom the Word of God came (and the Scripture cannot be
broken), do you say of Him, whom the Father sanctified and sent into the world,
‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God?’” This is just
such an interesting thing. He says, “Could you just be objective for a
minute? Can you just think with me for a moment? Can you set aside
your fury, the emotion, the hate? Stop and consider the Old
Testament. Why are you so inflamed that I am calling Myself God? When
in your own Scripture, men are called gods.”
Wow.
I mean, this shows the mental alacrity (swiftness) of Jesus, which would be
unparalleled in any human being who ever lived, to scour in an instant the Old
Testament and pluck out an obscure section. Not even from the law and the
prophets, but the psalms.
Go
back to Psalm 82, because that’s what He quoted. Psalm 82. And
Psalm 82 is a judgment by God on the rulers of Israel. Verse 1.
“God takes His stand in His own congregation.” God shows up in Israel,
and He’s not happy. “He judges in the midst of the rulers.” So
we’re talking about rulers. And by the way, rulers were judges.
That’s essentially what they did. They were judges. They
adjudicated issues, solved problems. Says to the judges, “How long will
you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked?” You’re
corrupt. You are partial to the wicked; because of your corruption you
have an affinity for the corrupt. “Vindicate the weak and
fatherless.” You’re supposed to be their protectors. “Do justice to
the afflicted and destitute” the plaintiffs. “Rescue the weak and
the needy,” implied from the oppression. “Deliver them out of the hand of
the wicked.” That’s what you’re supposed to do. “But they do not
know nor do they understand. They walk about in darkness; all the
foundations of the earth are shaken.” Listen, everything that holds
together society is rattling loose because there’s no justice.
Verse
6: “I said, ‘You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most
High.” What does He mean? He means look, small G. You are
gods, because you are the representatives of the one true God. You are
God’s agents in the world. You are the sons of the Most High. He is
delegated authority to you, and you receive His Word. That’s what it says
over in John 10. If He called them gods to whom the Word of God came,
they were the ones who were to teach, and apply, and uphold the Word of
God. “Nevertheless, you will die like men.” And there’s some irony
and some sarcasm in use of gods. He may be saying, “And you think you are
gods, you think you are more than you really are.” But you will die like
men, “and fall like any one of the princes. Arise, O God, judge the
earth! For it is You who possesses the nations.”
In
the Old Testament, Jesus says, “Corrupt judges were called gods.” Maybe
sarcastically, maybe ironically. But the word was used for them because
they received the Word of God, and they were the instruments of God, and the
agents of God. And there’s a sense in which that’s true, with a small
G. Well, if those corrupt judges could be called gods, if He called them
gods, God Himself in Scripture called them gods, to whom the Word of God
came. Do you say of Him, whom the Father set apart, and sent into the
world, “You are blaspheming because I said, ‘I am the Son of God?’” You see the
analogy.
Make
a comparison, He says. “If I do not the works of My Father, don’t believe
Me; but if I do them, though you do not believe Me,” believe the works so that
you may know and understand that the Father is in Me, and I in the
Father. This is an amazing argument. He goes right into the Old
Testament to make His case. Certainly, if the term “gods” could be
applied to corrupt rulers, it’s not a stretch for the incorruptible, perfect,
sinless, righteous, Son of God to be called God. Think what you’re doing
before you start throwing stones. Think what you’re doing.
A
footnote: In this encounter, Jesus makes an amazing statement that,
basically, the translators have put in parentheses in verse 35. It’s so
unique that it shows up here. He says, “To whom the word of God came,”
and by the way, “the Scripture cannot be broken.” There are a couple of
things going on here. The
Word of God and the Scripture are parallel. Did you see that? They’re synonyms.
The Word of God and Scripture are synonyms. Therefore, Scripture is the
Word of God. Therefore, the Word of God is Scripture. The Holy
Spirit, here, inspires John to write the words of our Lord Jesus accurate, and
the Lord Jesus equates the Word of God with the Scripture, the Scripture with
the Word of God.
Now,
that one phrase has massive, massive importance. While in the discussion,
it’s merely a footnote, a kind of digression, it is a treasure that needs to be lifted out.
What does He mean? Scripture cannot be broken? The word for broken,
it’s not a word like broken in English. The word is luō in the
Greek, a very, very familiar Greek word to all Greek students because it’s the
model of verbs that are conjugated. So everybody knows about luō.
Luō means dismissed, dissolved, removed, released, annihilated, or
eliminated.
So
what is our Lord saying? Scripture cannot be changed. Scripture
cannot be loosed, released, removed, dismissed, or nullified. This
passage is Christ’s view of Scripture, that it is a seamless chain, and not one
link can be pulled out. Not one. The passage itself in Psalm 82 has
no connection to His deity, but He uses that word, “gods,” there to make a
point from the lesser to the greater, as very often rabbis did, and He
did. But He stops in the middle of that and makes this powerful,
overarching statement that Scripture cannot be broken. And while He’s
very busy proving that His claim to deity is valid by His works, He doesn’t try
to prove this statement. He doesn’t prove it. Scripture cannot be
broken, period.
Why
doesn’t He prove it? Because they don’t question that. They
understand that. It’s a chain. All the links have to be in
place. Scripture is the final word. They knew it. You can’t
tamper with Scripture. In fact, He makes His whole argument on one word
in one obscure verse in a Psalm. You can’t touch a word. You can’t
loosen up a word and pull it out. That’s because all Scripture is given
by inspiration of God: Second Timothy. That’s because no scripture comes
by any private interpretation, but holy men were moved by the Spirit of God to
write: Second Peter 1. You can’t have a more elevate view of
Scripture than Jesus has.
So, whenever we get into discussions
about the authority, the inerrancy, the accuracy, the inspiration of Scripture,
I like to start with: what did Jesus think of Scripture? Because I want
to have His view. And if you don’t have His view, I’m sticking with
Him. There’s a book that’s come out recently called “Five Views on
Inerrancy.” There aren’t five views of inerrancy. There’s one, and
then there are four lies. It’s either inerrant, or it isn’t. It
can’t be broken. If it’s broken, it’s broken. That’s a
violation. You can’t touch a word. You can’t pull a word out.
And our Lord, in a discussion about the most serious claim He could ever make,
turns His argument on one word. On just one word. This was His view
of Scripture.
8/14/2016
7:04 AM
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