“But By Every Word of God”
A few weeks ago in a sermon, I spoke about the Bible doctrine of inspiration. In that lesson we discussed how some people will accept some of the Bible as inspired, but not all of it. One sub-category of this group is individuals who say they believe the words of Jesus but not the words of the apostles. This idea sounds good to some, and it has appeal to those who are seeking to eliminate the Apostle Paul’s teachings especially in areas such as roles of women in the church and certain sexual sins.
Were the apostles words inspired or not?
However, if we simply go by the teachings of Jesus, we will find that this belief cannot hold true. In John 16:13, Jesus Himself had this to say about the teaching of the apostles: “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come.” In other words, the things that the apostles taught were from the same Holy Spirit that Jesus had in His life. The Holy Spirit brought the teaching that Jesus wanted the apostles to have, and led them into “all truth.” The apostles also were able to lay hands on others to give them the ability to prophecy (Acts 8:14-17).
We conclude that to reject the apostles is to reject the Holy Spirit, and to reject the Holy Spirit is to reject Jesus Himself. We cannot simply pick and choose which words we want to accept and which words we don’t want to accept because we will end up rejecting Jesus altogether. Let us resolve to love all of God’s word, not just the parts that we like. God bless you, and I love you.