The Good News of God's Authority

Friends, I'm going to read one additional text, and this will be the text that I will

be preaching on this morning.

It comes from 2 Peter chapter 1, starting in verse 16.

2 Peter 1 · chapter mention

For we did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming

of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of His majesty.

For when He received honor and glory from God the Father, and the voice was born to

Him by the majestic glory, this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.

We ourselves heard this very voice born from heaven, for we were with Him on the holy mountain.

And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention,

as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in

your hearts.

Knowing this, first of all, that 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.

The word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Well, let me say again, good morning.

I'm delighted that we can be here.

I'm delighted that we can spend some time talking about this very mysterious encounter that we

call the transfiguration and the implications of it.

This morning in the lectionary readings, we're actually going to be focusing on this reading

that you just heard from 2 Peter chapter 1, where Peter, who was a witness of the transfiguration,

2 Peter 1 · chapter mention

talks about how that transformed his understanding of Jesus, of the word of Jesus, and all of the

words of Scripture.

So in a nutshell, we're going to be talking about spiritual authority as it comes to us through

the Scripture, so the authority of Scripture.

And I know that for some of us, the moment I say the word authority, that is a trigger

word.

That in general, we as a culture, and some of us for very good reason, we resist the idea

of authority.

We live in a culture that is very, very, very resistant to the idea of any authority in

our lives.

You know, we live in a culture that very much values something that has come to be known

as expressive individualism.

The right that we perceive ourselves to have to be true to ourselves, the fundamental right

we have to pursue what we desire above all else.

The idea that anyone or anything would presume to have the authority to tell us how to live

our lives, to tell us anything about who we are, is anathema.

So this morning, we're going to be talking about knowing that that's the context, the authority

of Scripture and how that works out in our lives.

And my hope is that over the course of the next few minutes, that we come to see not only

that Scripture has authority, but that that authority is actually good news, that it's

actually tremendously good news over and above what we might believe about authority and

its place in our lives.

So we're going to see that the best life, the most liberated, the most free life is actually

found under the authority of Scripture.

So we're going to answer three questions this morning as we look at the text.

Scriptural authority, why do we need it?

Why do we need it?

Where does it come from?

And then how does it work out in our lives?

Let's pray.

Lord, you have made yourself known.

You're a God who spoke all existence into being.

Lord, you spoke and there was light.

You spoke and there was land and sea.

You spoke and we came to be.

And now we pray that you would speak again.

Just as you at one time created all things, we pray that you would recreate us.

That you would breathe new life into us.

That you would remake us according to your word, Lord.

We pray that so that we would benefit, become more fully human.

We pray that so that you would be glorified.

We pray this in your son's holy name.

Amen.

Amen.

So first of all, when it comes to biblical authority, scriptural authority, and our reaction may be this, why do we need it?

Why would it matter?

The reality is everyone lives under some form of authority.

Everyone answers to someone or something in their lives.

In traditional cultures, authority tends to rest with your family or your ancestors and the traditions that have been passed down to you.

Some of you may have come out of a more traditional culture, an Eastern culture where family and tradition matter most.

And you are strongly expected to honor the ways of your people, to be faithful to the traditions that have been passed down to you, to honor the ways of your family.

You live under the authority of family and tradition.

Everything else is meant to be subordinate to that in your life.

And if you break that, if you break from the traditions of your family, that's seen as heretical.

You're bringing dishonor to your family.

But, you know, most of us didn't grow up in a culture like that.

Most of us come from a more postmodern Western culture, which is in many ways the very opposite of what I just described.

If you think of a lot of the movies that we love, a lot of the stories that get told again and again in our society through books and movies and music,

the postmodern hero's journey is the person, the individual who has the courage to break from family tradition,

to break from mores and taboos, to break from the way things have always been done, and to forge their own new path.

To look within and to discern what is true for them, and then to have the courage to follow it out regardless of what it might cost them.

And we watch these stories, we read these stories, we absorb these stories, and it feels right to us because that's the authority that we are used to,

the authority of one's inner life, the authority of one's inner voice.

And so we love to think of ourselves as courageous heroes who forge our own path in the name of being free.

So people say, I am my own authority.

No one can tell me what to believe or how to live or who I am.

The question that I want to ask with all due respect is, how's that working out for you?

How's that working out for us as a society?

Are we truly as free as we believe ourselves to be?

I would suggest, number one, that I don't believe that we, and I'm including myself in this, are nearly as emotionally free as we might think we are.

When you say that you're your own authority, when you say that you want to be true to yourself and no one else,

how do you then go about deciding how to live?

How do you navigate your day-to-day life?

Life.

Most people end up following their feelings.

When we say, look within, what are you really, you're following how you feel.

You're following your desires somewhere.

So let's say we live that way for a while.

Where does that lead us?

Where do we end up?

Right?

What you find is that if you live that way for any amount of time,

if you're following those inner feelings and inclinations and desires,

they begin to lead you into certain things that start to take on greater and greater importance.

You start to come to depend on certain things.

Certain things start to be elevated until they start to become ultimate in your life.

You start to find things that you cannot live without or that you don't want to live without,

that life isn't worth living without.

Those things, in other words, start to become your master.

You start to live under the authority of these things.

Right?

So if you find yourself unable to stop eating the food that you know is unhealthy for you

and you're unable to force yourself consistently to eat the food that you know is healthy for you,

then perhaps food or certain kinds of food are becoming your master.

And you're not as free as you like to think to eat in ways that will allow you to live a healthy, fulfilled life

or to see your children graduate from high school.

Right?

If you can't stop losing your temper despite your best efforts,

you snap and you say hurtful things to the people that you love,

perhaps anger is beginning to be your master.

If you can't stop conforming to what other people expect of you,

if you can't say no when you really should say no,

if you can't have direct conflict with people but instead you go along to get along,

perhaps approval is starting to be your master.

If you can't stop working and put down your laptop and put down your smartphone for at least a few hours

or even maybe a whole day out of a seven-day week,

if you're working nights and weekends consistently,

maybe your career is starting to be your master.

If you can't stop hating the other political party and seeing them as subhuman,

right,

if you're filled with existential dread over the coming election,

maybe politics is starting to be your master.

If you can't stop scrolling on your smartphone,

then maybe dopamine is becoming your master.

You see the point I'm trying to make?

Live following those inner inclinations for any amount of time

and you will begin to find yourself seeding ground.

You won't be as free as you think you are.

One female writer put it this way,

whatever controls us is our Lord.

The person who seeks power is controlled by power.

The person who seeks acceptance is controlled by acceptance.

We do not control ourselves, she says.

We're controlled by the Lord of our lives.

So if we allow that inner world of feelings to lead us,

we will very quickly find ourselves

not free but actually something like a slave.

So we're not as emotionally free as we like to think.

I would also suggest, with all due respect,

that we're not as intellectually free as we like to think.

The unfortunate news is most of us are almost entirely defined

by the culture in which we live.

If you ask the average Westerner today,

what is life about?

You would probably hear something like what we've said,

that life is about being true to ourselves.

Life is about not letting any outside voice

like family or religion or social norms

tell you who you are, look within.

The thing we need to understand is

that would have sounded absurd to somebody

who was alive 500 years ago.

If you said that back then,

people would think that you were crazy.

Probably 100 to 200 years from now,

that idea will sound utterly absurd.

But in this particular cultural moment,

it seems to be the common sense answer

that everybody would say.

The thing that we need to understand is

these ideas themselves are the product

of certain influential thinkers who came before us,

who brought us to this particular moment in which we live.

People like Rousseau,

people like Darwin,

people like Sigmund Freud or Nietzsche

or Michel Foucault,

these European philosophers by and large

who brought about a certain movement,

a certain paradigm shift

that then got fed to us

in all kinds of cultural sound bites

until we absorbed it

and it became the common sense way to think.

To put a finer point on it,

if you say that you desire to be authentic

and true to yourself,

meaning you only want to live by the things

that authentically come from within you

and not any outside forces,

if that is your vision of life,

then that is itself inauthentic.

Right?

You've already failed at the task

because those ideas didn't come from within you.

They were fed to you from the outside.

In other words,

you're living your life according to the teachings

of a bunch of old, dead European white men.

I'm not sure you're being true to anything

inside yourself.

Right?

So what we need

is to recognize

that everyone lives under the authority

of someone or something.

And so the question is not

whether to live under the authority

of someone or something.

It's which authority

should I put myself under?

What is an authority

that will actually allow me

to be what I was created to be?

Allow me to live the life

that I was made to live?

To, in other words,

be truly free.

And this is what we see

in the Scriptures.

Every other source of authority

that we could talk about

comes from within the human condition.

It is a human-generated authority

and it has all of the limitations

that come with being human.

So they are all imperfect,

broken forms of authority.

This is why we have

so many abuses of authority

in our society.

But what we see here

is that the Scriptures

are utterly different.

So where does this authority come from

if it doesn't come from us?

2 Peter 1.

Peter says that the Scriptures

are utterly unique.

Unlike any other source

of authority out there,

and this is for at least two reasons.

Number one, he says

the Scriptures were written,

the New Testament in particular,

by eyewitnesses

of the Son of God.

When he says,

we did not follow

cleverly devised myths,

he's talking the we

is referring to Peter

and the other apostles.

We did not follow

cleverly devised myths

when we made known to you

the power and coming

of our Lord Jesus Christ.

And he says,

but we were eyewitnesses

of his majesty.

He's referring to himself

and the other authors

of the New Testament,

and he's referring to the fact

that the books

of the New Testament

were written by people

who either witnessed

Jesus,

his death,

his resurrection,

personally.

These are people

who knew Jesus,

who saw it happen,

and who wrote it down.

Or in some cases,

they were people

who recorded

all of the eyewitness accounts

they could.

They gathered them together

and wrote down

all of these accounts

as well as they could.

He's saying,

these are not things

that we heard,

these are not myths

that were handed down to us.

I saw with my own eyes

what I'm,

I'm just writing down

what I saw.

And he specifically references

the transfiguration,

which is very appropriate

for today,

which he personally witnessed,

where Jesus takes

three of his disciples,

Peter, James, and John,

up on a mountain,

and there Jesus

is transfigured,

and it is as though

for a moment

the veil is pulled back.

The veil is pulled back,

and they're allowed

for just a moment

to see Jesus

in his glory.

He becomes radiant,

and Elijah and Moses

appear standing

on either side of him,

and God speaks and says,

this is my beloved son.

Listen to him.

In other words,

he has authority.

Peter's saying,

this is not a myth.

We saw and heard

for ourselves

these things

that we're telling you.

And then number two,

the second reason

why the Scriptures

have authority

is that the Scriptures,

all of the Scriptures,

New and Old Testament,

were inspired

by the Holy Spirit.

He goes on

as though immediately,

it's as though

he's aware

of a possible objection

where people say,

okay, well,

you're eyewitnesses,

and you wrote

the New Testament,

great,

but what about

the Old Testament?

Does that mean

that the Jewish Scriptures

are rubbish,

and we should only

pay attention

to your letters?

And Peter says,

no.

No prophecy in Scripture

comes from

someone's own interpretation.

He's talking about

the prophets,

the Old Testament writers.

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.

And I love this.

It's referring to

what we commonly talk about

as the doctrine

of divine inspiration.

And there are a lot of people

who think of divine inspiration

in a kind of wooden way.

This idea that God

sort of is coming along

and He's like,

you know,

I've got something

I really want to say.

You.

Take this down.

And that the person

sort of is taken over

and all of a sudden

they just start writing

like a human word processor.

And then when God's done,

He says,

all right,

and they're kind of released

and then they kind of

go about their life.

That's not how it works at all.

It's much more human

to be totally honest.

Peter gives us

this wonderful way

of thinking about it.

Human beings

as they were carried along

by the Holy Spirit.

The same word carried along

shows up in Acts chapter 27.

Acts 27 · chapter mention

Paul and his companions

are in a boat

and they're in a boat

and they have in mind

the direction they want to go

and they're like,

let's go that way.

But there's a strong wind

and the wind blows them that way.

They have in mind

they want to go here

but the wind says

you're going to go this way.

And Paul says,

or Peter says,

this is how you can think

about the writing

of the scriptures.

Human authors

are like people in a boat.

Right?

They have their life.

They have their personality.

They have their personal agendas.

They have all of the things

that make them human beings.

And they have in mind

when they sit down

to write that letter

a direction

that they want to go.

And they put up their sail,

so to speak.

Right?

They're putting pen to papyrus.

But the Spirit of God

carries them along

in the direction

that God wants them to go.

And sets the true course

of their writing.

And what we see

is this incredible interplay

between the human

and the divine.

You have human beings

genuinely speaking

their own words

in ways that reflect

their family,

their culture,

their education,

their environment,

their personality quirks,

their temperament.

But the words

they use also

are just those words

that God wanted them

to use.

We talked about this

in our adult Sunday school

class this morning,

how even between

the gospel writers

you can see

vast differences.

The Greek

that Mark uses

is very abrupt.

It's very basic.

It's very immediately

this happened

and then immediately

this happened

and it's immediately

this happened.

Mark is very to the point.

He's very action oriented.

He doesn't have time

to waste with details.

He's just like this

and then this

and then this

and then boom.

That's Mark.

Luke is the most

educated writer

in the New Testament.

Incredibly highly educated

form of Greek

that he's using.

It's a completely different,

it's a completely

different experience.

Right?

Both fully human,

both working within

the limits

of their education,

both with their own

agendas and audiences.

Very different in form.

Both carried along

by the Holy Spirit.

Right?

In other words,

the Bible is just like Jesus.

It is fully human

and it is fully divine.

And we get into trouble

if we forget

either one of those things.

Right?

If we start to forget

that the Bible

is fully human

when there are differences,

say when there are

chronological differences

between one gospel

and another

and we say,

well did this happen

in the early

in Jesus' ministry

or later,

if you have a very

literal wooden

understanding of

divine inspiration,

you see something like that

and your faith starts

to fall apart.

Well this must not be inspired,

there's a contradiction here.

But if you understand

that these are fully

human writers

and that this author

may be very concerned

with chronological accuracy

and this author

isn't at all concerned

with chronology

because he's writing

thematically,

he loves the metaphors

and the imagery

and the double meanings,

you begin to say,

oh well these are just

two very different

human beings.

Just like I'm very different

from other people.

Likewise,

if we forget

the divine element,

it can be very easy

when we come across

a place in Scripture

that is troubling

or unsettling

or challenging

just to write it off

and say,

well this probably

wasn't even Paul

who wrote this.

I'm not even gonna.

It tends to be Paul

who angers people.

That's why I'm using

that example.

Well Paul clearly

just didn't write this

so we're just gonna

ignore that.

No, what he's saying

is every word

of Scripture

was written

as the prophets,

as the writers

were carried along

by the Holy Spirit.

Every word.

Not just the red letters.

All the letters.

So this is a source

of authority

that comes from

outside all human cultures

so it's not limited

by our bias.

It's not limited

by our blind spots.

It's not limited

by the particular

cultural moment

in which it was written

and yet it's been written

by a chorus

of human voices

so it's fully accessible

and understandable.

It's written by humans

for humans

which is incredible

but it's not limited

by humans.

And because this

unlike other sources

of authority

comes from outside us,

from outside the human condition,

from God himself,

it's meant to have

the final word

over all earthly forms

of authority.

Right?

So some other sources

of authority

might be tradition

as we said.

Might be science

and reason.

Might be your feelings

in your personal experiences.

All of these carry

certain amount of authority

and we should pay attention

to all of them.

But the scriptures

according to this

are meant to have

the final word

over all of these

other sources of authority

and thank God for that.

That is good news.

Why?

Well, we see examples

all through history

why this is good news.

When tradition,

when tradition dictated

in the Roman world

that life was about

personal power

and glory

and that if you were

poor or destitute

you were probably

getting what you deserved.

The scriptures

called people

to love

and to care

for the poor

and the vulnerable.

The scriptures

compelled people

in the subsequent centuries

to build hospitals

and orphanages.

It transformed

the western imagination

and how we think

about the poor

and the vulnerable.

That would not be

our first instinct

in this century

had it not been

for the authority

of the scriptures

2,000 years ago

overruling human tradition

and saying

this is the way

to be a human being.

It wouldn't have happened.

When science,

when science

during the enlightenment

created a hierarchy,

a racial taxonomy

that said

certain races

are evolutionarily

superior

over other races

and so it is beneficial

for those subhuman races

to have masters

and when

well-known scientists

were speaking

from the position

of science

and saying

this is what we've determined

through our scientific rigor,

the scripture said

no.

Every human being

is created

in the image of God

and therefore

no human being

can be the property

of another.

You know,

the first person

in history

that we know of

to directly challenge

slavery as an institution

was Gregory of Nyssa

in the fourth century.

He's looking at slavery

which is universally practiced.

He's looking at the scriptures.

He's looking at slavery

and he's looking at the scriptures

and he's saying

this doesn't add up

and he's choosing

to allow the scriptures

to have authority

over that institution.

So I say this

to say now

let's get a little personal.

In our lives

when society

is telling me

that I should be defined

by my feelings,

by my sexual desires,

by my inner inclinations,

that I should follow that

over and above

everything else,

the scriptures say

beloved,

no.

You're meant to be defined

by so much more

than that.

You've been created

by the God

of the universe.

He's made you

as an image

of His glory.

He's poured His Spirit

into you.

His desire for you

is that in everything you do

you bring glory to Him.

What greater purpose

could there be?

And I have a choice.

Which authority

do I allow

to be my ultimate authority

in telling me

who I am

or why I'm here?

Right?

So it's good news

that the scriptures

have authority.

Now how does this work out

in our lives?

What does it actually mean?

Peter says in verse 19,

the scriptures are like

a lamp illuminating

the darkness.

We live in a world

of darkness.

It's more than just

there's no light.

It means we can't think

our way out of our own problems.

Right?

Our thinking

has been darkened.

We can't get out

of this on our own.

We don't know

up from down,

right from left

on our own.

We need an orientation.

We need something

to show us

the way things really are.

That's what light does.

It shows you

the way things really are.

So God has given us

a lamp to live by.

Without it

we would be engulfed

in darkness.

So Peter's saying

the whole course

of our lives

needs to be governed

by scripture.

Every step we take

we want to make sure

that we are

allowing the scriptures

to illuminate the path.

Right?

One step at a time.

But how does that work?

Right?

Because here's the thing.

The Bible is not just

a list of things

to do and not do.

It's not just a list of

you know,

do this,

don't do that,

do this,

don't do that.

The Bible isn't

a list of doctrines.

Believe this,

don't believe that,

believe it.

Most of the Bible

comes to us

in the form of stories.

So how do you live

under the authority

of a story?

You go to the Ten Commandments

and you're like,

that's reasonably clear.

Some of the writings

of Paul,

pretty clear.

He exhorts us

to do this

and not to do that.

But how do you live

under the authority

of a parable?

How do you live

under the authority

of the book of Judges?

Have you ever read that book?

How do you live

under the authority

of that story?

So what do we do?

Right?

There are people

like the late

Rachel Held Evans

who write books

you know,

about living

by every word

of the Bible

and they sort of

take the Bible

and they draw out

all the rules they can

and they're funny

to read, right?

I think it's like

a year of biblical womanhood

I think.

And it's a fun read

because she sort of

takes this very

wooden approach

and so,

you know,

when Proverbs 31

says that

a woman's husband

is respected

at the city gate,

she goes out

to the highway

next to the entrance

to her town

and she holds up

a sign that says

Dan is awesome.

That's her husband's name

and it's funny

but obviously

that's not what

that passage means,

right?

She's taking a very

literal approach to it.

So how do we actually

do this?

Most of the time

what we do

is not too far

from what Evans did,

right?

We take these stories

and we extract

from them rules

or principles

to live by

and honestly,

preachers are among

the worst of sinners

when it comes to this.

It makes for a good sermon

to just say,

you know,

here's the application,

da-da, da-da, da-da, da-da,

right?

We extract it out.

But here's the problem

with that.

It's not that it's

totally wrong

but here's what

N.T. Wright says,

the New Testament scholar.

He says,

that whole approach

implies that we have somehow

that God has given us

the wrong kind of book

and it's like our job

to turn it into

the right kind of book.

It's like,

thanks God,

we'll take it from here

and we sort of turn it

into something

that we can actually use

and Wright says,

you know,

that's actually

a low view of Scripture.

A high view of Scripture

would ask,

how does someone

live under the authority

of a story?

How do we take the book

as it has been given to us

recognizing that there are

a lot of little stories

and they all make up

one big story

that goes from Genesis

to Revelation

and how do we live

under that story?

And so Wright goes on

to give us

this beautiful image.

He says,

imagine finding

an unfinished

Shakespearean play

and deciding

that you want

to perform it.

The script gives us

the first four acts.

The fifth act

is missing

and so it would be

up to us

if we want to perform

this play

to figure out

how to live out

and perform

that fifth

and final act.

And he says,

you know,

in order to do that

it's going to require

a couple of things,

continuity

and improvisation.

You have to

immerse yourself

so deeply

in those first four acts

that they just become

second nature to you.

You have to study

every word

until you're just

immersed in it,

until you can

channel it,

speak it effortlessly,

you're a part

of the story,

you're living in it.

And once you have

that continuity

then you would

have to improvise

because the fifth act

has not been written.

You would truly

have to improvise

but in a way

that maintains

continuity

with everything

that came before it.

And he says,

that's what we have

with the scriptures.

It's as though God

has given us

this four act play.

Right?

Act one,

creation.

Act two,

the fall.

Act three,

the story of Israel.

And all that they

were called to do

and all that they

failed to do.

Act four,

Jesus,

the true Israel

coming to do

what Israel

never could have

done for the world,

to bring God's

blessing to the nations.

And then we have

act five,

scene one.

The resurrected Jesus

commissions the church,

fills the church

with the Holy Spirit

fulfilling all of

those Old Testament

promises,

ascends to the throne

in heaven

and says,

now is the age

of the church

to go and to be

the hands and feet

of Christ filled

with the Holy Spirit

preaching and teaching

the gospel,

bringing healing

to the nations.

But it hasn't been

written.

Or more accurately,

it's being written

right now.

How do we do that?

Continuity

and improvisation.

We immerse ourselves

in the scriptures.

We have all the way up

through act five,

scene one.

And then we have

a little preview

of how it's going to end

all the way over here

in Revelation.

Revelation.

Somehow,

between here and there,

all of the heavens

and the earth

will be joined together.

Everything will be

made new.

There will be

no more tears.

There will be

no more death

or suffering

or injustice.

The King of the universe

himself will come

and dwell in the midst

of his people.

There will not even

be a need for lights

because the glory

of the Lord

will illuminate it all.

So somehow here

in the midst

of all of this

suffering and uncertainty

and injustice

and struggle

and strife,

somehow we get

from here to there.

So we know

where it's going.

So what does this

look like in here?

That's how we

immerse ourselves

in the story

of scripture

so that we can live

under the authority

of scripture.

And we say,

well, how could we

possibly do that?

And I think

if Peter were here,

he would say,

just as the Holy Spirit

carried the authors

along as they

wrote the scriptures,

so you should trust

that the Holy Spirit

will carry you along

as you seek to live out

the authority of scripture.

Final question

as we come to a close.

As we consider

all of this,

why in the world

would any sane person

allow an ancient book

written thousands

of years ago

to have the true

final say

over every aspect

of our lives?

And verse 19

shows us

there's only really

one reason

why you would be

crazy enough

to do that.

And that's

if you are someone

in whose heart

the morning star

is rising.

The morning star

is a reference

to Venus,

you know,

because when you

could see Venus

in the ancient world,

Venus was a sign

that dawn

was not far off.

You see Venus

and you knew

dawn was coming.

Peter's using this

as a metaphor

for Jesus Christ

rising in the hearts

of his people.

Right?

We don't believe

in Jesus

because of the Bible.

We believe in the Bible

because of Jesus.

And we've encountered

Jesus

and we see

the reality

of the resurrection.

We recognize

he's the most important person

who has ever lived

that when he gives

his life for us

that that kind of love

cannot be found

anywhere else

and we give ourselves

to him.

And then we say,

well,

how do I live

the way Jesus

calls me to live?

And the plain truth is

no one held

a higher view

of Scripture

than Jesus himself.

In the wilderness

when Jesus

is being tempted

by the devil,

he responds

by quoting

from the Scriptures,

Deuteronomy 8.

You know,

man does not live

by bread alone

but by every word

that comes

from the mouth

of the Lord.

He viewed all Scripture

as coming

from the mouth

of the Lord.

You know,

Jesus knew

the Scriptures

by heart.

He quoted

the Scriptures

throughout his

entire ministry

and there are

so many places

where he says

this needs to happen

in order that

the Scriptures

might be fulfilled.

If this doesn't happen

then how could

the Scriptures

be fulfilled?

That was his

chief concern.

His words

as he hung there

dying on the cross

were not simply

his words

in the moment.

He's quoting Scripture.

Scripture.

So this is how

Jesus viewed the Bible

and the hard truth is

if we don't like that

then we need to

take it up with him.

Because saying

that you believe

in and follow Jesus

but then rejecting

the authority

of Scripture

that's not possible.

So Jesus himself

tells us why Scripture

is such good news.

He says this in John 8,

If you abide in my word

you are truly my disciples

and you will know

the truth

and the truth

will set you free.

Don't make the mistake

of thinking

that if you go out

and try to be

your own authority

you're going to be free.

You're not.

Jesus is telling us

this is how to be free.

God's authority

has the power

to set us free

to be who we were

created to be.

Let's pray.

Lord we thank you

for your word

and Lord

may this not simply be

may this not simply be

a few ideas

to consider.

I pray that your Holy Spirit

would press this

radically

and deeply

into our souls.

Lord we

we are crying out

and longing

for liberation.

We know that's why

you have come.

You've come to set us free.

Lord that we might

no longer submit

to the yoke of slavery

but rather

as Paul says

by becoming slaves

to Christ

we might find

in that

our true freedom

to live

as truly human

people

in the world

for your glory.

We pray this

in your son's

holy name.

Amen.