UNDERSTANDING THE SCRIPTURES
We resume our excursion through the Book of Acts. Here again are Dave and Tom: This is our Understanding the Scriptures segment, we’re in the Book of Acts Chapter 16, and Dave, we left off last week, we finished Verse 5, so we’re going to pick up with Acts 16:6. “Now when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia,-----Dave, that’s interesting.
Dave:
Yeah, on the one hand you think, Wow! You mean God doesn’t love the Asians, and He didn’t want the gospel preached there? It’s a matter of time. You can’t preach the gospel everywhere on this earth, there are some priorities. The gospel will go to Asia, in fact, the disciples were told by Jesus: Go into all the world and preach the gospel, but there were some other priorities. God wanted them to go somewhere else right at that moment instead of into Asia. It wasn’t that they were cutting Asia out of salvation, but it’s just a matter of where you are going to go first.
Tom:
Dave, you say timing, I’m thinking about God telling Abraham, showing him the Promised Land, said but not now, not yet, because the iniquity of the Amorites hadn’t reached a certain point of evil.
Dave:
Right.
Tom:
And of course it could have also been for their protection, that these people weren’t ready, and they would have been a great danger to them, I don’t know. Verse 7: “After they were come to Mysia, they assayed to go into Bithynia: but the Spirit suffered them not.” Now Dave, this is the King James English, but what does that mean, the Spirit suffered them not?
Dave:
Well, He didn’t allow them to do it. It’s the same thing that we had in Verse 6, you know. They were forbidden to go into Asia, and now the Spirit restrains them from going into Bithynia. And so they passed by Mysia, and they came down to Troas.
Tom:
Now Dave, before we get into it---Verse 8, “And they passing by Mysia came down to Troas.” Now, here’s a question. Some people say the Holy Spirit doesn’t lead or guide or direct today. We certainly have precedent for it, He’s leading and guiding the apostle Paul, or does that just work for apostles?
Dave:
Well, people would say, That was then, this is now. Well, Tom, it’s a question that has been raised by many people and it has caused great controversy. Does God speak today? Well, He certainly is not adding to the Bible. On the other hand, does He lead us? Well, if He doesn’t, we’ve got a lot of missionaries out there in foreign fields, just as an example, who, how do they know they should be there? There’s not a verse in the Bible that said Jones is supposed to go to Spain, or whatever. How about pastors who are in pulpits? Well, but I was led of the Lord to, you know, I believe that God wanted me to become a pastor, they would say. Well, how did He? There’s not a verse in the Bible that says that you should become a pastor. Okay. So, on the other hand, Tom, we’ve got to be very careful. I’ve been with people in the past where, I mean, almost every time you saw them---Dave, let me tell you what God told me for you. I’m sorry, He didn’t tell me, and I’m not following what you say. And there are some people who just think they’ve got to have a vision or a word from the Lord at every moment. They are not studying their Bibles as they ought to, but they want---If I could just have a neon sign up in the sky give me my orders for the day. You remember Pastor Buck? I mean, you’ve got more angels around there, they set up command posts, or let’s take Benny Hinn. He said his room, for an entire year, angels filled his room. Just kind of observing him, I guess, he said to the amazing man, that the angels gather around to watch him. I don’t read of that in the Bible. So, on the one hand let’s not say God can’t guide me except by His Word because He can’t speak to my heart. He can use circumstances, and I think you could almost say---“forbidden of the Holy Ghost to preach the word in Asia, that could almost have happened by circumstance. It just didn’t work out to go to Asia. And I’ve had that happen in my life so many dozens and dozens of times. I don’t look for God to do this, but He does. I mention it too often, the people that God sits me next to on airplanes. I don’t know how He does it, and I’m not asking Him to do it, but He does it.
Tom:
But you’re asking for opportunities to present the gospel as He provides the opportunity.
Dave:
That’s right. So, He does guide us, He does watch over us.
Tom:
But we can push it. Dave. do you remember, it was a number of years back, we got a letter from this guy who was trying to be as honest as he could. He said: I don’t go to work the same way each time. I stop at the stop sign, and if the Lord wants me to turn to the left I do that, if He wants me to turn to the right---Now, I don’t know what this guy’s record at work is, how often he gets there on time, but that’s not a good witness.
Dave:
No, that’s ridiculous actually. But anyway, Tom, these are interesting passages and they are here for our learning. We’re seeing God guide Paul, and I think He wants to do the same with us today.
Tom:
Right.
Dave:
Not that we are writing Scripture by any means.
Tom:
No. Verse 9: “And a vision appeared to Paul in the night; There stood a man of Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us. And after he had seen the vision, immediately we endeavored to go into Macedonia, assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us for to preach the gospel unto them.” Now, here again, Dave, we have God guiding and directing, only this time with a vision. Can these things happen today?
Dave:
Well, Tom, I think they could, I don’t see why not. In other words, again, we’re not writing Scripture, he’s not adding the Scripture, but guiding him. On the other hand, a vision in the night could be a dream. I have an awful lot of dreams, Tom. I had some that were rather insightful, but I wouldn’t want to try to follow every dream. There again we have people going to an extreme. You know that there are psychologists, psychiatrists recommending this.
Tom:
Dave, one of the biggest items in Christianity right now, there are many books out on interpreting their dreams. Many of them are based on the teachings of the occultist Carl Gustof Jung.
Dave:
Right, he was really into dreams. And it’s recommended keep a pencil and paper by your bed so you can write them down immediately because you tend to forget your dreams. Every dream does not have significance. And again, it would help us if we noticed how many dreams did Paul get? How many times did angels appear to Paul or to Peter?
Tom:
Or to the prophets, the Old Testament prophets waiting for a word from the Lord? It didn’t come instantly.
Dave:
Yeah. So the idea that every dream has some great significance is like reading tea leaves. It could be very dangerous. But can God guide us? I mean, can I get a dream that’s--wow! I had better be careful, but it just seems to me that this is significant, and let me pray about it and think about it, and it could happen today, but that’s not the way we run our lives.
Tom:
Right. Verse 11, “Therefore loosing from Troas, we came with a straight course to Samothracia, and the next day to Neapolis; And from thence to Philippi, which is the chief city of that part of Macedonia. And a colony: and we were in that city abiding certain days.”
Dave:
Tom, obviously this was not written centuries later like the critics or the higher criticism. People say, O, this was written centuries later, you know. No, it was written by an eyewitness, he’s on this trip, this is Luke who was with them. But this is a very interesting verse. Colony, the word in the Greek is Colonia, and that word signified a special status in the Roman Empire, and it was doubted. The skeptics Philippi never had that dignity. Well, what do you know, the archeologists, as they often do, came to our rescue and they found a medal that showed that Julius Caesar had, in fact, conferred this honor on Philippi. So once again the Bible is accurate. You couldn’t say somebody threw that in centuries later, how would they know that?
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 Bobgan 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 pseudoscience 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.
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Next week, we will continue our series of programs based on Dave Hunt’s book, When Will Jesus Come? and How in the world will the world unite? In Religion in the News, Robbing Religion. We’ll take a look at that story and address the question: Is worship becoming too relaxed? 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. In the meantime, 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 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. Join us again next week for Search the Scriptures Daily featuring Dave Hunt and T. A. McMahon.
