What is the gift of prophecy?

There seems to be a renewed interest in the more “supernatural” spiritual gifts among evangelicals. Mark Driscoll, who calls himself a “charismatic with a seat-belt”, is no doubt a contributing factor. I have recently posted about healing, miraculous gifts and speaking in tongues. What remains is prophecy.

Prophecy in the Old Testament

Deuteronomy 18:18 describes the role of a prophet like this: “will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.”

Good news is better than good advice

There is a VAST difference between good advice and good news.
When the company you’ve invested in goes bankrupt and their share price starts falling, it is good advice to sell your shares as soon as possible. When your mechanic phones you and says your car is starting to give up its ghost and things are starting to go horribly wrong, its good advice to sell your car. When the school phones you to say that your teenage son has been bunking again and been caught smoking at the local mall, its good advice for your son to mentally prepare himself for a good dose of discipline. Good advice, you see, is often the result of bad news.

Should every Christian speak in tongues? (Part 2)

I argued in my previous post that the speaking tongues in Acts was not the norm for all Christians, but the very specific and unique plan of God to demonstrate that there was to be only one church. Not a separate Gentile Church. Not a separate Samaritan church. One church made up of converted Jews, Samaritans and Gentiles. The pouring out of the Holy Spirit on all these groups demonstrated by the speaking of foreign languages (like at Pentecost, Acts 2) was evidence of this.

Should every Christian speak in tongues? (Part 1)

Many Pentecostal traditions teach that speaking in tongues is the definitive sign of being baptized with the Holy Spirit. This baptism or filling of the Spirit happens sometime after your conversion and is known as the “Second Blessing”. Every Spirit-filled believer, they would argue, should therefore speak in tongues. 

How do we give the devil a foothold?

Ephesians 4:26-27 says, ‘“In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.’

The Devil
The word “devil” only occurs again in this letter in 6:11 in the context of spiritual warfare against the “powers”. Paul, the author of Ephesians, believed that the “powers” were closely associated with the “devil”. Although the believers had been raised with Christ and seated in the heavenlies (2:6) they were still engaged in a struggle with the “powers” (6:12). 4:26-27 provides an example of one of the devil’s strategies (6:11) and how this warfare was to be fought against by believers.

Why Sundays are special

Eric Liddell, Scotland’s fastest athlete at the time and a Christian, refused to run in a heat in the 1924 Paris Olympics held on a Sunday and was forced to withdraw from the 100-metres race, his best event. The schedule had been published several months earlier, and his decision was made well before the Games. The Scottish media crucified him for being unpatriotic and narrow-minded.

Eric went on to compete in the 400m. He knew his chances of winning the 400-meter race were small because two of the runners in this race had set world record times. On the day of the race Eric was assigned the outside lane, the worst lane. However, one of the American team trainers had slipped Eric a piece of paper with a quotation from 1 Samuel 2:30: “Those who honor me I will honor.”

One of my favourite words in the Bible

In a little village in Germany in 1483 Martin Luther was born. Martin Luther was, under God, the instigator and one of the biggest drivers of the protestant reformation in Europe - with its subsequent break from the Roman Catholic Church. By the 15th Century Roman Catholicism was dominant religion in Europe. After school Luther went on to university and studied law. He decided to become a monk in one of the strictest orders in the Catholic Church. Priests taught Luther and the general public that one could save yourself by prayer, fasting and penance. The result being that Luther’s teachers were wearied by constant prayers, fasting and penance! Luther later wrote: “If ever a monk got to heaven by his monkery, it was I”. Yet he faced a long spiritual crisis, anxiously anguishing over how sinful man can come to a holy God. Luther finally experienced great joy and his eyes were opened to understand a radical, biblical truth. He wrote later, “I felt myself to be reborn, and to have gone through open doors to paradise.” What happened? What truth did he grasp?

Why trust the Bible?

Psalm 12:6 says “The words of the LORD are flawless, like silver refined in a furnace of clay, purified seven times.”
God’s words (the text of the Bible), is like silver refined seven times

Why not just refined once once?

“Seven” in the Bible is the number for completeness and wholeness.  What Psalm 12:6 is saying is that God’s words are completely pure, without error and wholly reliable.

Yet, there may be more to the number seven:

The first refining fire was used to burn away the combustibles in the silver bearing rock.

Then the ore container (the clay pot) was sealed from the air, first having some material added, such as charcoal, which would chemically remove the oxygen from the silver oxide. This would result in silver metal flowing to the bottom of the container with the molten rock (the slag) above it. The process was repeated a few times so that all the reclaimable silver was removed from the valuable ore.

The next problem that had to be solved was to remove the impurities such as copper, arsenic etc. in the silver and because they have different melting temperatures, they had to be carefully removed in fires of different temperatures.

Also, because not much coal or coke was available, wood had to be used and this first had to be converted into charcoal to remove its impurities because any smoke resulting from say the wax or oil in the wood that reached the molten metal would cause further impurities in the metal.

Fluxes, such as beeswax were also discovered, which in certain circumstances formed a film over the surface of the molten metal, also causing impurities to separate and float to the surface.

Further, a blast of air had to be forced through the burning charcoal with the aid of bellows so that the fire would burn hot enough.

We see that the refining of silver was a fairly complex process - seven fires probably had to be used. Further, this process was learned over a period of many generations of metalworkers and silversmiths. If the wrong process was used, the resultant metal could have been copper instead of silver.  If the fire was not hot enough because of the laziness of the silversmith in using the bellows, impure silver would have resulted.

Here’s the bottom line: You can trust the Bible. It’s pure. There’s no errors.  It’s God’s words. 

(Thanks to Derek Prince for the insights.)

Lessons from stone tablets (Why God didn’t use YouTube)

God commanded Moses in Exodus 34v1 to make two more tablets of stone on which he (God) would write his law on. The Ten Commandments engraved on the stone tablets give us some helpful insights into the nature of God’s whole revelation to us contained in the Bible.

a. Human mediators are involved

The law came to Israel via Moses, a human being. God did not bypass humans and write the law in the sky with neon lights. So too, the Bible contains God’s words through the words and writings of human authors; nevertheless it is God’s Word.

b. It is complete and sufficient

Exodus 32v15 says that the Ten Commandments were “engraved on both sides, front and back.” In other words, there was no more space to write. The Law was complete and sufficient for life and godliness at that time in world history. Likewise, the Bible also contains all things necessary for salvation and Christian living, and should not be added to or subtracted from.

c. Authoritative

In Exodus 34v1 God said to Moses, "Chisel out two stone tablets like the first ones, and I will write on them the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke.” The Ten Commandments were not Moses’ words but GOD’s words. Similarly, the Bible is not the church’s word or the apostle Paul’s word or your pastor’s word, but God’s. It is because the Bible is God’s words that is has authority and must be obeyed. Our Sunday gatherings must therefore include an exposition of a passage in the Bible, not merely the pastor's thoughts for the week ahead or the pastor's "God-experiences" from the previous week.

d. Permanent

The Ten Commandments were engraved into the stone! They were not pencilled in or subject to alteration or change. God didn’t give the Israelites version 2.01 the following year. The Bible too is God’s permanent, unchanging, relevant, non-updatable message to us today. We are called to be faithful to the bible, not change the bible to suit our perceived needs.

e. God’s law comes through words

God wrote words for Moses. God did not do a drama or post a video on YouTube. Of course, drama and video may help to illustrate and explain the words, but can never replace the words. In the same way, the Bible comes to us in words to be read and studied and preached and listened to. We can never move on from the priority of a Word-based model of ministry. Explaining the Bible must take priority over drama, spiritual dancing and  video clips. (Although a good video clip may help at times. Not so sure about spiritual dancing!)