Therefore if I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaketh a barbarian, and he that speaketh shall be a barbarian unto me, 1st Corinthians 14:11.
We will continue with the theme that if God never intended any other language than Hebrew and Greek to be used for inspired scripture, then his writings are barbaric to us. We cannot read, understand or converse in those languages. Bible colleges have devised a way to get around that. They teach those two languages to their students for about 3 hours a week for each language and keep that up for anywhere from two to six semesters. They then equip them with lexicons and dictionaries.
I want to get real about this for a moment. Students in high school who take French or Spanish get the same immersement in those two languages. For 3 hours a week, those students are taught one of those languages. They may be a few years younger but they are already at an age when they can grasp calculus and biology. They are not stupid. They also have the advantage over their Hebrew and Greek counterparts in that French and Spanish use our same alphabet.
My youngest son took five years of middle school and high school French and received good grades. You would not want him for an interpreter if you were going to tour Montreal. In fact, unless a high school student had prior knowledge of either language, there is no longer any real expectation that he or she would be conversant. At best, they could take a taxi, order a meal and maybe, just maybe if they were to stay overnight in a house, they could be polite and make themselves understood on a level to be polite.
Why do preachers come out of these Hebrew and Greek college classes and make us think that they have a grip on what God is saying? Truly, these are the Nicolaitans. But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate, Revelation 2:6. In my years roaming the streets of Athens, Greece, I have heard young boys taunt, "tha se nico su"; I will defeat you, or I will conquer you. The word "nico" has pretty well kept its meaning from Ancient to Modern Greek. The other root word to "nicolaitans" is "laity" which is well recognized as meaning the non-ordained people in a church.
Whenever a group of persons use leverage to dominate the common people in the church, they are practicing the doctrine of the Nicolaitans. They have conquered the laity. They have put themsleves above the common folk. What better way to do that than to tell people that you know what God is saying but they cannot. For just $19.95 you can give them tools by which they can get a shadow of the truth, but they must rely on you to go behind the veil of language and find out what God is really saying.
Our term "Hocus Pocus" sprang up in England during the reformation when the common people came to realize that the priest who was saying, "Hoc est enim corpus meum" was not really turning bread into Jesus. With mirth they realized that the man in the pulpit had no more power with God than they themsleves had. It was one of the great liberating moments to the English-Speaking people who have since then, taught the world liberty. Phony conjuring tricks have been called hocus pocus ever since.
If you ever truly want to be free, you need to understand that the man in the pulpit or writing an article has no more access to God than you do. There is absolutely nothing that God wants to reveal to man that is not written in a King James Bible, and there is nothing written in a King James Bible that God doesn't want you to know. The man pretending to go behind the veil of language is a phony. He is practicing hocus pocus. He is practicing the doctrine of the Nicolaitans.
I have had preachers ask me about my credentials in the languages. That has never happened except when a man was trying to exalt himself over me or to see if I was worthy to stand with him. The only man I allowed to do that and still have me speak respectfully to him was Dr. D.A. Waite who as I have said in other blog posts was kind enough to allow me to interview him. I kindly disabused him of the efficacy of Greek and Hebrew without showing disrespect. He thought for a moment and agreed.
For know-it-all smart alecks, it is the equivalent of taking a swipe at Chuck Norris in a bar to try to pin me with such an inquiry. They will not do it a second time, but if a tattooed, multi-pierced drug and alcohol sotted person asks me such a question, my heart is ever tender to such. These poor people for whom Jesus died and then called me to preach to them have been mislead into thinking that the truth is just out of reach. With great patience I show them the living words of the living God. To the glory of the great God of Israel, I have many such people who now live lives of honor. They have found the living words of the living God.
I am reminded of an Abraham Lincoln story. When he refused to sign the death warrant of some deserters, he said that it galled him to not be able to touch the head of the wiley agitators who enticed these boys to desert, but still have to shoot their victims. I feel the same for the great mass of people who have dropped out. They see no hope in a God who hides behind a veil. They would read the bible if they thought it was true, but the wiley agitator who shows them the bible warns them that it is not perfect. The notes in their bibles decry its inaccuracy, the men in the pulpits decry the inaccuracy of anything but their opinions of what the God behind the veil is saying, and these people just aren't as gullible as the people in the pews.
Or, their lives are so bruised and hopeless that the silly little salve offered in these happy sappy churches gives no relief. Jesus said that he was sent forth among other things, to set at liberty them that are bruised, Luke 4:18. By the grace of God, I give these people liberty when I show them the bible of their forefathers. Our church is known for lifelong depressed people who are now free from the need for such pharmaceuticals.
What is the secret? I take time to show them how to read the unusual patterns of speech in a King James Bible. Then, for themsleves they, May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, Ephesian 3:18. There is liberty in that. I have had social workers comment on the changes. I have seen family members of these bruised people in wonderment over the changes. I have seen these people find hope and establish real lives with order and love.
There are currently two competing memes on Facebook. Conservatives are rueing the undermining of social norms and societal good sense. They see these trends as the impetus behind mass shooters. Liberals are incensed at this. It is complete and utter nonsense to them. They think that they have elevated society and that Conservatives are absolutely nuts to blame their programs for the violence. To them the dissolution of the American home and the undermining of social norms has no effect at all upon bad behavior.
There is an analogy in that. Corrupters of the word of God simply cannot see the horrible damage that they have done. They cannot see the despair and hopelessness endemic to removing the word of God to arms length from where the common man can reach it. They cannot see the healing in tearing down the Nicolaitans' veil that they have constructed. Many years ago, when I was still lost and wondering about the many facets of Christianity, Peter Ruckman helped me with a simple statement.
He said that if he had the power to heal he wouldn't need to advertise. He said that he would simply go into a hospital and walk from bed to bed healing people. Before he got to the second floor of the hospital, the news vans would be there. He would not be able to get to his car for the press of people. That was so simple and so obvious that I never again considered the dubious claims of faith healers.
I don't need the pages of this blog to make my point. I don't need thousands of people to read my books. I have people sitting in pews who lift up holy hands without wrath or doubting. I have a hope that perhaps there is someone out there who will cast off the veils of the great delusion that has overcome Western Fundamentalism. The King James Bible issue and the needlessly confusing reliance upon the underlying Greek and Hebrew texts is just one aspect of depth of the deception that has destroyed our churches, our families, and our nations.
At least when men like John Wesley talked about the Greek text, they were actually competent in that text. These men today are poor pretenders. They have no power with God. Their power is based on deluding people into thinking that God inspired scripture at one time and then left it to the ravages of time and nature. They teach people that they are empowered by education to decipher those time ravaged texts and to tell us what God really said.
They are taught the skills of mass marketers. They have learned that people today are prone to react better to swaying music and gimmicks. I am personally sickened at the red-neck hillbilly character of music that Fundamentalists are using to entice families to stay. I am convinced that if a man shaved half his head, died his remaining hair black, pierced his nose and lips, played grunge rock, but wept and talked about the old fashioned preacher man and that old King James Bible, there are Fundamental Baptist churches dumb enough to accept it. That may seem farfetched but I have personally witnessed men dressed in glittering jackets, cowboy boots and hats using bass guitars for the lead just like a rock group would use a standard guitar and get old fashioned preaching tents a rocking.
The modern bible church boys have learned to fill whole stadiums with swaying bodies pledging themselves to Jesus Christ. They count the bodies and declare victory. It never occurs to them that the county or city they are in will not see one iota of change in the social service offices. The beer vendors will notice no change. The marriage and divorce statistics will not change. In our tiny little community here, there is a change. It's not huge, but people have noticed and commented. It's huge to the families that now love each other and the children who now go to bed at night with parents that love them and provide a truly stable environment.
I have a student in North Carolina who monitors a nearby Fundamental Baptist Church which publishes its soul winning statistics. He notes that every two or three years, the entire county has been won over to the Lord again and yet the church has no new converts learning the wonders of life in Christ.
I know that I told my readers that the next post would be about inspired English. For teasers, ask yourself this; When Jesus said, Heaven and earth will pass away: but my words shall not pass away, Mark 13:31, do we even know what language he was speaking? He certainly didn't say it in Greek like Mark recorded it. If the word of God can never be an inspired translation, then his words did pass away. He didn't say it in Greek. He said it in either Aramaic or Hebrew.
To listen to the average preacher explain how God gave us scripture and then left it up to the whims of history to preserve reminds me of the ostrich and her young.
Gavest thou the goodly wings unto the peacocks? or wings and feathers unto the ostrich? Which leaveth her eggs in the earth, and warmeth them in dust, And forgetteth that the foot may crush them, or that the wild beast may break them. She is hardened against her young ones, as though they were not hers: her labour is in vain without fear; Because God hath deprived her of wisdom, neither hath he imparted to her understanding, Job 39:13-17. What is holier, God's word or ostrich eggs? God accuses the ostrich of being without wisdom because she lays her eggs and leaves them to nature.
Are we to believe that God gave us his word and then abandoned it to nature? Or, isn't it far more likely that God would shepherd his word through the long corridors of man's depraved history?