Combating Modern Christian Spin
by Brian Lewis
Today more than ever so-called preachers are putting their own spin on the word of God. It seems that from every area of the Modern church men constantly insert thier opinion about the Bible. This is a great evil! Today everyone has an opinion about the Bible and what they think it says. However, if their opinion is not proven through the word of God then it is not true.
Today more than ever so-called preachers are putting their own spin on the word of God. It seems that from every area of the Modern church men constantly insert thier opinion about the Bible. This is a great evil! Today everyone has an opinion about the Bible and what they think it says. However, if their opinion is not proven through the word of God then it is not true.
I recall past bible studies in my college days where we would read a verse of scripture and then everyone would tell what it means to them as if there are several different meanings or interpretations to scripture. Hog wash! There is only one meaning! I heard a pastor of local church here in the Nashville area say "well the Bible has one interpretation but many applications". Ridiculous! It has one meaning and one application per doctrine. The Bible is not open to the interpretations of mean! The writers had certain intent in mind while writing the Bible! To understand that intent you must study to show yourself approve unto God 2 Timothy 2:15. You must stop trying to understand the Bible through a 21st century frame of mind and start looking at it through the lens of 2nd century Jewish culture and custom. This is the only way to arrive at the proper interpretation of the scripture.
Inserting opinion into scripture is not new. In fact, this was a problem in Jesus day as well. In Matthew 15 Jesus rebuked the Pharisees for following their tradition? However their tradition is not what most preachers today try to say it is. This section of scripture is talking about the Halakah and the hagadah. The Halakah was the verbal law of the Jews. Many of the Jews at that time believed that there was and additional law given other than the Law of Moses. They believed that it was an oral law that God gave to Moses and that it was passed down by word of mouth. However, in reality it was their opinion or spin on scripture or the actual written law (the hagadah).
Mt 15:2-9 Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders (the verbal or oral law )? For they wash not their hands when they eat bread. But he answered and said unto them, why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition (The verbal law or oral spin on the scripture)? For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death. But ye say, whosoever shall say to his father or his mother, It is a gift, by whatsoever thou mightest be profited by me; And honour not his father or his mother, he shall be free. (They were saying since we gave all our goods and our service to the temple they did not have to help their mother and father). Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition. ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.(They talk about God with thier lips they however put thier own spin on the word of God and instead of teaching the doctrine of the Bible they teach the doctrines of men).
If you really start to study scripture you will realize quickly that there is allot more to studying the Bible then just reading on the surface; men surely do not study today. If they did they would see that either the Bible is full of contradictions or they don't understand. Obviously, I don't believe the Bible contradicts itself. Though it does seem to on the surface. Allow me to explain. You can be reading through the Bible and come across John 3:16 which says "God so loved the world" but then you get into Romans 9 where it also says He "hates Esau" or even Psalms 5:5 "He hates all workers of iniquity". So I ask you which is it? Is this a contradiction? No! Yet many atheists have a time with this and many so-called Christians choose to ignore it. There are many more examples I could give of this. The point I am trying to make is that you must study more than on the surface to understand the scripture. We must not take scripture out of context and put our opinion or insert our spin on it. If we cannot prove it through scripture, Greek, Hebrew, context of scripture, original text of scripture (Textus Receptus), Jewish culture and custom, etc.... Then we must keep our mouth shut!
The Truth Zone
8 comments:
[sarcasm]
Oh come on Bill....don't you know that the modern...er ah...post modern church utilizes reader-response criticism to derive meaning?!?! it's all in how we feel about the text, any text, that determines its meaning!!
[/sarcasm]
LOL!!
LOL, What is funny about your comment, is that I have had others that I have been in fellowship with in the past, that would say, seriously, that the way they feel about the text is derived by what God tells them in the darkness of night. And that what God tells them could be different, then what God would tell someone else. Yet it would all tie together because it is what God told them. Thus, everyone in the same room discussing scripture would have a different spin on it..
"I feel the text is really saying this" "Thats what God told me"
And I know that you have heard much of this yourself... lol
Our land is full of "private" truth and interpretations and sadly the church is no different. Even in the charismatic church, I think the messages had more depth 15 yrs ago. Different messages creep in, like leadership and deeds, no creeds. Where is Cross of Christ, where is free Justification by faith alone? The modern evangelical church resembles the liberalism that they fought against in the last century and earlier. Christian Spin? It's just another attack on Sola Scriptura. It's just well masked in self-autonomy.
But, the Spirit of God will lead us into all truth..we don't need to study the bible...LOL
Amen, Ken, Amen
We must approach the text of scripture without our presuppositions in mind! We must never let our theology determine the meaning of the text, but rather the TEXT OUR THEOLOGY!
We must be convinced by God's Word and not our presuppositional thinking!
Peoples emotion's are often more important to them, than the Bible. What I mean is people often belief what their emotions dictate and not what the Bible actually says.
We must learn to think Biblical not Emotionally! If the word of God teaches it, we need to embrace it, regardless of our faulty tradition, presuppositions, and regardless of what the world thinks.
Believing truth requires a paradigm shift in the thinking of most; especially, those of us who have been in Charismatic type movements; because there is much to un-learn and then re-learn.
May God grant understanding to his elect.
well there are some or in the Reformed church that would pounce on anything that sounds Charismatic and aren't open to any kind of gifts, but it doesn't take long to look at the puritan who really applied Calvinism to their lives. Spurgeon asked, do you feel justified, is it something you've experienced... We are called to worship the Lord with everything and that includes our bodies and we've been creative just like God on a creaturely level with emotions and feelings, but at times or most of the time we must submit ourselves to the Word and be under it's govern.
The thing I love about Spurgeon, is that he was the most balanced preacher. Always reflecting on the scripture as the final authority and keeping balance and truth...
Spurgeon didn't use any spin.
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