UNDERSTANDING THE SCRIPTURES
We resume our excursion through the Book of Acts. Here again are Dave and Tom: We are in our Understanding the Scripture segment, and we are in Acts Chapter 13. Dave, I think we finished Acts Chapter 13 Verse 12, and we will pick up with Verse 13: “Now when Paul and his company loosed from Paphos, they came to Perga in Pamphylkia: and John departing from them returned to Jerusalem. But when they departed from Perga, they came to Antioch in Pisidia, and went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and sat down. And after the reading of the law and the prophets, the rulers of the synagogue sent unto them, saying, Ye men and brethren, if ye have any word of exhortation for the people, say on. Then Paul stood up, and beckoning with his hand said, Men of Israel, and ye that fear God, give audience. The God of this people of Israel chose our fathers, and exalted the people when they dwelt as strangers in the land of Egypt, and with a high arm brought he them out of it. And about the time of forty years suffered he their manners in the wilderness. And when he had destroyed seven nations in the land of Canaan, he divided their land to them by lot. And after that he gave unto them judges about the space of four hundred and fifty years, until Samuel the prophet. And afterwards they desired a king: and God gave unto them Saul the son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, by the space of forty years. And when he had removed him, he raised up unto them David to be their king; to whom also he gave testimony, and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after mine own heart, which shall fulfill all my will. Of this man’s seed hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Savior, Jesus.”
Dave:
Everything you have been reading confirms what we have been talking about before, about prophecy and about the Messiah. The Messiah comes with a pedigree, he comes with a genealogy, he’s a man. To be a man he has to have ancestors! He doesn’t just drop out of the sky, and he comes, as we said, in fulfillment of prophecy. So here, Paul is laying it all out for them. He is telling them what their prophets said---well, he hasn’t gotten through all of it, but he’s telling them who they are. You are of the seed of David, and you know the Messiah is going to come, and he will be of the seed of David. Look, this is what we are basing it upon. We’re not making this story up. Everything that we tell you about Jesus of Nazareth is based upon scripture, and he’s the one who fulfilled it!
Tom:
This isn’t a new thing. Sometimes we hear, God is doing a new thing. No, he’s doing what he said he would do, fulfilling his promises.
Dave:
Yeah. How many years ago was it, I read a book by a Rabbi, and I can’t even remember the Rabbi’s name, but the title of the book was, The Myth Maker, and he accused Paul of making up Christianity. He said, O, Jesus didn’t talk about this, but Paul invented Christianity and he did things that Jesus---you know, he was a good man, and so forth. But this Paul, he made him out to be God, etc. Well, Paul himself, we quoted it earlier on the program, he says, This is the gospel of God that he promised before by his prophets in the holy scriptures. So, Paul didn’t make it up. And now, Tom, I like this, and sometimes my wife says, Well now, don’t try to be too dogmatic, don’t set rules. But I find that, as I read through the scriptures---well, the Book of Acts, this is how the apostles always preached the gospel. They always did it this way, they always proved---you go to Acts 18:28, and this is Apollos, and it says: He mightily convinced the Jews publicly proving from the scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah. Tom, we don’t want to forget that. We can stand up and preach Christ, and I believe the gospel is the power of God unto salvation, I believe that the word of God is the sword of the spirit, but we need proof, and they always proved it! Paul goes into the synagogue, he opens the scriptures, he proves from the scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah. So this is exactly what Paul is doing here. He’s saying, Guys, you know your history, you know the promise of the Messiah, you know who you are, chosen of Israel, okay, well now it has happened. What he promised he would do has come to pass and now the Messiah has come. Of this man’s seed, Verse 23, David’s seed, hath God according to his promise raised unto Israel a Savior, Jesus. Wow, the time has come! The Messiah has come! We talked about when will the Messiah come back. One of these days he’s going to come back, and this would be just as, almost unbelievable an event for these people. Wow, they’ve been looking forward to the Messiah, but how much did you really believe it? Well, you know, a theory here, that’s what they taught me in Sunday school. He’s here, says Paul! Exciting!
Tom:
Dave, by saying, the Savior, now it’s not just somebody who came along who is going to do something. Isaiah tells us that there is only one Savior, God alone is the Savior.
Dave:
Amen.
Tom:
So there’s some doctrine right here. Jesus, therefore, simple man, must be God, if there is only one Savior and he’s the Savior
Dave:
Absolutely, absolutely!
Tom:
Verse 24: “When John had first preached before his coming the baptism of repentance to all the people of Israel.” Now this is Antioch, not too far from Jerusalem, so they knew of John the Baptist.
Dave:
And he’s in the synagogue.
Tom:
“And as John fulfilled his course, he said, Whom think ye that I am? I am not he, but behold, there cometh one after me, whose shoes of his feet I am not worthy to loose. Men and brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among you feareth God, to you is the word of this salvation sent.”
Dave:
Well, this is God’s word, it’s what God has said from Genesis on---the New Testament had not yet been written here, and he is simply going back to the prophecies, and the history. This is the basis of Christianity. It’s not something that Paul made up, or anybody made up. It’s not a question, as we saw this atheistic professor is joining the church. Well, the church is now defining faith much more widely. Tom, that’s ridiculous! I have a degree in mathematics, and I would scarcely know what to do with most mathematics now, I’ve forgotten it all, but I took math as pre law, actually as training for the mind. It trains you to think logically, and you can’t just make it up as you go along; our bridges would collapse and our buildings would fall apart, we would never get to the moon. There are rules that God has made in this universe, okay, and you’re going to follow them. You are not going to break the rules; they will break you. You can’t break the law of gravity; it will break you, okay. So now Paul is laying it out: Look, this is what God said. Faith has been broadened? No, faith has to have an object. You would be a fool to believe what you are not certain is true! So, faith is based not on some whim of fancy or, I’d like to believe that, I mean, the man says, We’re in a search, Saint Andrew’s Presbyterian church is a safe place to get into this search. But he is not searching for God, it is all laid out here, and Paul says, You who fear God, you know that what we are saying is true. That’s it, period, you don’t broaden it. Jesus said, Strait is the gate, narrow is the way that leads to life and few there be that find it. He said, I am THE way, THE truth, THE life, no man comes to the Father but by me. So you don’t broaden that. He said the broad road was the one that led to destruction.
Tom:
Verse 27: “For they that dwell at Jerusalem, and their rulers, because they knew him not, nor yet the voices of the prophets which are read every Sabbath day, they have fulfilled them in condemning him.” There’s a wow---Wow!
Dave:
Yeah, so they fulfilled what the prophet said because they didn’t know what the prophet said. And you get to 1 Corinthians Chapter 2, Paul says: If the rulers of this world had known, they wouldn’t have crucified the Lord of glory. Amazing, Tom, we’ve got to come back and talk about that next week.
Dave and Tom will resume their discussion on the topic of salvation next week, we hope you can join us. This is Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call.
For nearly two thousand years the church of Christ has provided comfort and counsel to believers experiencing mental, emotional and behavioral problems by using the teachings of the scriptures, and the power of the Holy Spirit until psychology and psychotherapy arrived on the scene. Contemporary Christianity has embraced this science, so called. In the last fifty years multitudes of pastors have added clinical counseling degrees to their theological credentials . Psychological theories have been preached so often from so many pulpits that they are accepted without question by increasing numbers of Christians as Biblical doctrines. The Christian church in the United States has become a major referral service for clinical psychologists and psychiatrists . Is there something wrong with this picture? Join host, T. A. McMahon, in this new ground breaking documentary from The Berean Call, Psychology and the Church, Critical Questions, Crucial Answers. Also contributing to this latest TBC production are Dr. Martin Bobgan and Deidre from Psychoheresy Awareness Ministries, Dr. Tana Dineen, author of Manufacturing Victims, and Dave Hunt, author of Judgment Day. Executive Director of The Berean Call and co-author of The Seduction of Christianity, Tom McMahon: For years believers, both pastors and those in the pews have been intimidated by the pseudo-science of psychological counseling, and the result has been they have backed away from their God given mandate to minister to one another. My hope and prayer is that this video will expose the myths of psychology and encourage the church to return to God’s way of counseling, through his word, by his Holy Spirit, and with the help of fellow believers in him.
This powerful new DVD is now available from The Berean Call, Psychology and the Church, Critical Questions, Crucial Answers, information on how to order in just a moment.
And now to tell you more about our ministry, here’s TBC Executive Director Tom McMahon: The name The Berean Call is taken from the Book of Acts, Chapter 17, verses 10 and 11, where we find the apostle Paul entering the synagogue in the Greek city of Berea after he had just come from Thessalonica. To these Bereans he preached that Jesus was the long awaited Messiah sent from God. They were commended for being noble or fair minded, not only for their willingness to hear what Paul had to say about the matter, but more specifically, because they searched the scriptures daily to find out whether or not what the apostle was saying was found in God’s word. That’s what we hope to encourage through this ministry. Our mission is to alert believers in Christ to unbiblical teachings and practices impacting the church. We want to exhort believers to give greater heed to Biblical discernment and truth regarding what they are accepting as spiritual. We hope to supply those who profess to be Biblical Christians with information and material that will encourage the love of God’s truth. Hopefully, we can help mobilize believers in Christ to action and obedience to the scriptural command to earnestly contend for the faith found in Jude 3. And finally, our prayer is that we can be used of God to stimulate Christians to look to the Bible alone as their rule of faith, authority and practice in living lives pleasing to our Lord and Savior. Gary.
Would you like to expand your knowledge of God’s word? We offer a wide variety of items that will greatly assist you, from books and tracts to audio and video recordings, CD-ROM, our internet website and much more. For a complete list of materials, or to get a copy of today’s broadcast, write to us at POB 7019, Bend, Oregon 97708. Call us at our toll free order number, 877-882-4253, that’s 877-88Bible, or visit our website at www.thebereancall.org. If you would like a copy of this broadcast on tape or compact disc, ask for Program #1806, and be sure to mention the call letters of this station. Get a pen or pencil ready, we’ll repeat our contact information in just a moment.
Next week we will continue our series of programs based on Dave Hunt’s book, When Will Jesus Come? and, What is the Purpose of Prophesy? In Religion in the News, Muslims don’t like Jesus film. We’ll take a look at that story and address the question: How does God use evil people? We hope you can tune in. If you have questions or comments about this program we urge you to contact our offices. Search the Scriptures Daily Radio Ministry is made possible by God’s grace, your prayers and your financial support. I’m Gary Carmichael, and for Dave, Tom and everyone here at The Berean Call, I would like to thank you for joining us, and invite you to tune in again next week. Until then, if you desire to know God’s truth, search the scriptures daily. You’ve been listening to Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call. For more information about The Berean Call, write to us at POB 7019, Bend, Oregon 97708, call us toll free at our order number 877-882-4253, that’s 877-88Bible, or visit our website at www.thebereancall.org.
