Psalm 19:7-9 - “The law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever; the judgments of the Lord are true; they are righteous altogether.”
If God wanted to get a message to you, what would be the
best way for Him to do it? If you ask the question, “how does a person hear
from God?” Or “how does God speak to you?” The answers are many and varied. A
poll from the Barna research group reports that 77% of American adults say that
Jesus speaks to them. How does He do it? Around 40% said that the means by
which God speaks to them is through written Scripture. That leaves about 60
percent who are claiming to receive messages from God by some other means. In
this survey some said that God communicates with them by directly influencing
or connecting with their mind, feelings or emotions. Others said that He
communicates through some sort of sign, through miraculous circumstances and
outcomes, or through an audible voice or whisper that they could hear.
When it comes to hearing from God there is undue emphasis on
personal experience. There is a craving for the sensational, people want an
experience, they want something exciting that is going to send chills up their
spine. And for most people, the Bible doesn’t really fit what they’re looking
for. When you say that God has spoken and He has done it through this book,
that statement alone is enough to make people yawn. And though most of the
people who are claiming to hear from God won’t dismiss the Bible completely,
they do de-emphasize it. They say things like, “You know, the Bible is all well
and good, but for me personally, I have my own way of hearing from God.”
They’re looking for something more exciting, something sensational, and the
Bible, for many, just seems too boring and old fashioned. So what do we say to
that? How do we respond to that kind of thinking?
Well, first of all, this craving for personal experience is
nothing new. In Isaiah chapter 8 God addresses this very thing. Early on in the
Old Testament, before Joshua led Israel into the Promised Land, God warned the
people not to listen to diviners and those who practice witchcraft. He said
that those nations which surrounded them hold these people up as the source of
spiritual authority, but instead of listening to these people, God said, He was
going to raise up for them prophets to speak the Word of the Lord. Well, by the
time we get to Isaiah’s day the popular thing to do is not to listen to voice
of God through the mouth of the prophet, but to listen to these mediums and
spiritists, to have some exciting personal experience as your source of truth.
So God steps on the scene in Isaiah chapter 8 and He says in verse 19 - “When they say to you, “Consult the mediums and the spiritists who
whisper and mutter,”” This is what people are going to say to you. Consult
these people, it’s really exciting. God says “When they say to you, “Consult
the mediums and spiritists who whisper and mutter,” should not a people consult
their God? Should they consult the dead on behalf of the
living?”
Now, that’s a good point, isn’t it? God
says, “Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?” That doesn’t make much
sense. He says, “shouldn’t a people inquire of their God?” You want advice? You
want to know what God thinks? Well then, why don’t you inquire of Him? Oh,
okay, great idea. But hold on a second, where are we going go to inquire of
Him? How are we to know what God thinks? How are we to get His truth in this
matter? If we want to consult the dead we can go to the mediums and spiritists,
but if we want to inquire of our God where should we go? Answer: Verse 20 - “To
the law and to the testimony!” God says, go back to the written Word. Go back
to the written Scriptures, the law and the testimonies. And then He goes on to
say, “If they do not speak according to this word, it is because they have no
dawn.” “If they” the mediums and spiritists, the spiritual leaders, or anyone
else for that matter, “If they do not speak according to this word,” What word?
This word, the law and the testimonies, the written Scriptures. “it is because
they have no dawn.” If what anyone says doesn’t match up with what the
Scriptures say, it doesn’t mean that they’re more enlightened, no, just the
opposite. If they do not speak according to this word, it is because they have
no dawn. They are not holding forth the light of the Scriptures. “No dawn”
They’re still in darkness and have no light in themselves. That phrase at the
end of verse 20, “they have no dawn.” reminds me of Peters words in Second
Peter chapter 1 when Peter is writing about the origin of written Scripture and
he says that we have the prophetic word more sure, to which we would do well to
pay attention, as to a lamp shining in a dark place until the day dawns and the
morning star arises in our hearts. Pretty poetic and flowery language for a
fisherman, but he goes on to talk about the source of that light. The prophets,
they weren’t making this stuff up as they went along. No, no prophecy of
Scripture every had its origin in the will of men, but men spoke from God as
they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. It’s not their words, it’s His
Word.
For some time now I’ve been engaged in a study on truth, and
we’ve seen together from the Scriptures that truth originates with God, it
comes from Him. He is the foundation and source of all truth. And last time we
began to consider the question, “How does God communicate truth.” We recognize
that truth comes from God, but we’ve never seen God, how does He let us in on
His standard of truth? How does God reveal truth? And we considered what is
often referred to as “general revelation.” That is, the natural or common ways
in which God has made Himself known. We saw that God communicates through
things like creation and conscience. But the message that God communicates in
these general ways, it’s general, it’s natural, it’s common. In other words,
it’s not very specific or detailed. So, while Psalm 19 starts off by saying,
“The heavens declare the glory of God,” and “their voice goes out into all the
earth.” It goes on to say that there is something better than that. “The law of
the Lord,” the written Scripture, “is perfect.”
So now we’re going to move past general revelation and begin
to consider together what is often called “special revelation.” If general
revelation is the natural or common ways that God has revealed Himself then
special revelation is the specific or detailed ways in which God has made Himself
known, and there are several of these spoken of throughout the Word of God.
My goal is not necessarily to explore every facet of every
way that God has revealed Himself through history, but rather to encourage us
to think about the superiority of written Scripture.
If God wanted to get a message to us today, what is the best
possible way for Him to do it? I’m going to suggest that the best possible way
for God to communicate with us today is through written Scripture. And that may
seem like an obvious statement to all of us, “Duh, of course the best for God
to speak to us is through the Bible.” But that’s not an obvious statement to a
lot of people. You ask the average person on the street, “If God wanted to tell
you something what would be the best way for Him to get His message to you?”
Most people would not say, “through a book.” Maybe by an audible voice, maybe
with an angelic messenger, maybe something else, but I’m suggesting that the
written Word of God is the best way for God to get His message to us. If there
were a better way for God to pass His message down through time He would have
done it that way. But the way that God has chosen to communicate His truth to
us is through a written document. The question that we’re interested in is,
“Why?” Why the Bible?
Many would say that if you want truth, if you want God’s
thoughts on a matter, certainly there are better places to go then to that
antiquated book. If God were going to communicate with man, surely He would do
it in some other way, something spectacular, something exciting. Certainly if
God wanted to communicate with us in the 21st century, in our
advanced society, He wouldn’t use a book. There are much better ways of getting
people’s attention, spectacular visions, or voices from heaven, but a book? Not
only is that not spectacular, it’s also kind of old fashioned.
We’re going to consider briefly 5 means of special
revelation, that is, detailed or specific ways in which God has revealed
Himself. This isn’t a comprehensive or exhaustive list by any means, but we’re
going to look at 4 specific detailed ways that communicated with people in
Scripture, and then we’re going to wrap it up by looking at the Bible as the
written revelation of God.
Specific or detailed was that God communicates:
1) God Spoke:
God wants to communicate, how is He going to do it? God
speaks. Examples of this:
-
Adam - Go back in your thinking to the garden of
Eden, Genesis chapter 2. The Lord God has just formed man of the dust of the
ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a
living being. And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He
placed the man whom He had made. He also put in the middle of the garden a tree
called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Now, we get into the middle
of the chapter and we read that the Lord God commanded the man saying, “of
every tree in the garden you may freely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it, you
shall surely die.”
So God is communicating with man, and how is He doing it?
He’s speaking. God is saying something specific and detailed to Adam. God
spoke.
This is not the only instance of this in the Bible. But God
speaking in an audible way like this is more common in the early parts of the
Bible than the latter parts.
-
Noah - Another example of this is in Genesis
chapter 6 God speaks to Noah. In Genesis 6:13-21 God is giving Noah specific
detailed instructions concerning the construction of the ark. What did that
sound like? Was it a booming voice out of heaven? Was it a whisper? We don’t
know, we’re not told. But this is a specific and detailed message from God to
Noah concerning His plan for the future, concerning exact measurements and
plans for the ark, concerning the animals that are to be brought on the ark,
and so on. And, by the way, this was not something that Noah could get through
creation or conscience. This was something specific and detailed that God was
revealing to him.
-
Abraham - We see God speaking to Abraham
throughout his life, making specific promises to him, giving him specific
guidance on where to go and what to do. In Genesis 18 God enters into a
conversation with Abraham about the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and tells
Abraham that He is going to destroy them. And that’s the passage where it’s
almost as if Abraham is bartering with God, and they have a conversation back
and forth. God spoke.
Well, though it’s more common in the Old Testament for God
to speak in this way, there are a few instances in the New Testament where God
thunders His voice out of heaven.
-
You have the baptism scene in Matthew chapter 3
when the Lord Jesus comes up out of the water there comes a voice out of heaven
saying, “This is My beloved Son in whom I am well-pleased.”
-
You have the mount of transfiguration in Matthew
chapter 17 where God speaks out of a cloud and says “This is My beloved Son,
with whom I am well-pleased, listen to Him.”
-
And then there’s another instance in John
chapter 12 where the Lord Jesus says, “Father, glorify
Thy name.” And there came a voice out of heaven saying, “I have both
glorified it and will glorify it again.”
These are a few of the many times that God spoke. So, the first
means of special revelation is God spoke.
2) Dreams and visions:
The second way that God communicates in the Bible is through
dreams and visions. And if you want a non-technical distinction, a dream occurs
when you’re sleeping and a vision occurs when you’re awake. God has
communicated through dreams and visions. What are some instances of this?
-
Joseph - In Genesis chapter 30 Joseph has a
couple of dreams where God reveals to him some of the events of the future,
such as his brothers bowing down to him. God also enables Joseph to interpret
the dreams of others, like the baker and the cupbearer in prison, and later on
the pharaoh.
-
Joseph - When we come into the New Testament another
Joseph is given specific messages in dreams surrounding the incarnation of
Christ. In Matthew chapter 1 the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a
dream telling him not to be afraid to take Mary as his wife. He’s warned in a
dream to take his family to Egypt. He’s instructed in a dream to return to
Israel. God gives Joseph specific detailed messages through dreams.
-
Peter - In Acts chapter 10 we have an example of
a vision. Peter is awake in the middle of the day, he’s praying on a rooftop
and God gives Him a vision of a sheet coming down out of heaven with all kinds
of animals in it and a voice says to him in the vision, “what God has cleansed
no longer consider unholy.”
-
Paul - In Acts 16 Paul has a vision in the night
of a Macedonian man appealing to him to travel to Macedonia and help them. This
was the means of God leading him and his companions on the next step of their
journey.
3) Angelic Visitation:
In the Bible there are instances of God sending angels with
messages to certain people. Instances of this:
-
Lot - In Genesis 19 Lot is living in the city of
Sodom, two angels come to him with the warning that God is about to destroy the
cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and that he and his family need to leave town. The
angels end up having to grab the arms of Lot and his family and literally drag
them out of the city.
-
Zacharias - In Luke 1 the angel Gabriel appears
to Zacharias in the temple and tells him that his wife Elizabeth, though she is
advanced in years and barren, is going to conceive and give birth to a son who
is going to be the forerunner to the Messiah.
-
Mary - Gabriel then appears to a young virgin
girl a few verses later named Mary and tells her that she is going to conceive
a son who is going to be the Son of the Most High, the Messiah Himself. An
angel is bringing these messages.
-
Shepherds - You then come into Luke chapter 2
and you have angels announcing the news of Christ’s birth to a group of
shepherds.
God is giving specific, detailed messages through these
angelic messengers.
So, ways that God has
communicated, number 1, God spoke; number 2, dreams and visions; number 3,
angelic visitation. Many of these are happening, by the way, before there is
written Scripture. If Lot had had a Bible he would have known that he should
get out of town. Actually he would have known that he probably shouldn’t be
there in the first place. But he didn’t have a Bible.
4) The Lord Jesus:
A fourth way that God communicates is in the person of His
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.
-
In John chapter 1 the Lord Jesus is called the
Word of God. What are words used for? To communicate. He is the communication
of God to man. The idea is, if you want to know what God is like just watch Him
and you’ll find out.
-
Hebrews chapter 1 says that God has spoken to us
in His Son. The Lord Jesus is the incarnate Word, God in the flesh. He Himself
is the revelation of the eternal God.
Now, there’s much more that could be said on each of these,
but I want you to think about God communicating in each of these ways. God
really spoke in each of these ways; He spoke in an audible voice, through
dreams and visions, angelic visitation, and through the human life of His
incarnate Son. If you stop to consider these passages that I just referenced,
and put yourself in the shoes of the one who is hearing from God it must have
been pretty awesome, pretty spectacular. And since God can communicate in these ways and He has revealed Himself in these ways in the past, the question
arises, wouldn’t it be better for Him to communicate with us in this way too?
I mean think about it, God thunders His voice out of heaven;
that would get your attention, wouldn’t it? Or how about an angel appearing to
you and bringing you a message from God? How amazing would that be? Often when
people see angels in the Bible, the sight is so awesome that they can’t even
stay on their feet, they immediately fall down. Or wouldn’t it be better for
God to speak to us through dreams and visions? That would certainly be a lot
less work on our part. If we want to understand a certain teaching of the
Scriptures it takes a lot of work, a lot of time and study on our part. But if
God could just give it to us in a dream while we’re sleeping, wouldn’t that be
better? I need direction for my life, “I guess I’ll just go to sleep and see
what God has to say.”
These methods of divine revelation seem really spectacular,
but I am going to suggest to you that for God to communicate with us through
His written Word is actually better than any of these other ways.
The Bible is better, the Scriptures are superior.
Although God has spoken in all these ways, the most common and
the most significant way in which God has spoken is through a special group of
guys called the Apostles and Prophets. And in their case He not only spoke His
message through them, but He used them to write the message down.
5) The Bible - The most significant revelation of God to
men.
- 2 Timothy3:16 - “All Scripture is breathed out by God.” The
Bible is a God breathed book. The whole thing, “all Scripture,” is God’s Words,
it’s breathed out by Him, and it’s profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for
correction, and for instruction in righteousness.
- Psalm 19:7 - While Psalm 19 starts off by talking about
the testimony of creation declaring the glory of God, it goes on to say that we
have a better testimony - “The Law of the Lord is perfect.”
- Ephesians 2:20 says that we, the church are built upon the
foundation of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus Himself being the
very cornerstone.
- Hebrews 4:12 - says the Word of God is living and active.
It’s not like any other book. It is breathed out by God, so it has His life and
power behind it. It’s not a dead book.
- Psalm 119, the longest chapter in the Bible is all about
the centrality of the written Word of God.
Now, this may not make sense to us at first, that God would
speak through a book. Don’t you think that it would be better if God would come
and talk to us like He did to Abraham? If God spoke directly to us like He did
to Noah? Or if God came to us in dreams like He did with Joseph, that would
really be something, right? Or what if He sent us an angel to talk to us? That
would be pretty awesome, wouldn’t it? But my claim is that it’s actually better
that God speaks to us through the Bible. The way that God has chosen to reveal
His truth is actually the best possible way. If there were a better way for God
to pass His message down through time He would have done it that way. But He
has chosen to do it through a book. Now, that may not make sense to us. We may
be tempted to think, “Boy, if only God would thunder His voice from heaven and
speak to people, that would be really great. That would be a way for God to
speak that would be undeniable. ” But I want to look at a time when God did
speak directly from heaven and see the reaction that people had.
In John chapter 12 verse 28 the Lord Jesus is praying to the
Father, and He says “Father, glory Thy name.” and the Father responds to Him out
of heaven so that everyone can hear. He says “I have both glorified it, and
will glorify it again.” So God thunders His voice out of heaven; what do you
think that those standing nearby thought when they heard that voice? Verse 29
says - ”The multitude therefore, who stood by and heard it, were saying that it
had thundered;” So even when God spoke
out of heaven the multitude dismissed His voice as thunder.
On another occasion when God spoke from heaven, in Matthew
17, He said concerning the Lord Jesus, “This is My beloved Son, with whom I am
well-pleased; listen to Him!” When God thundered His voice from heaven this was
His message, “Listen to Jesus.”
Oh, okay then, I guess that makes sense, maybe we don’t need
to hear a voice from heaven. But He said to listen to Jesus, so if only Jesus
would come and speak to me, that would be better. When God spoke from heaven He
said to listen to Jesus, so if Jesus came and appeared to us, that’s what I
really need, right? Think about this, after the Lord Jesus died and rose again
He appeared to two of His disciples who were traveling from Jerusalem to a city
called Emmaus. When He came to them they didn't recognize Him. They didn’t know
it was Him. And instead of saying to them "Look guys, it's Me!" What
did He do? Luke 24:27 - "Beginning with Moses and with all the prophets,
He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures."
He opened the Bible to them. He began to bolster their confidence in God's
written Word. He deferred to written Scripture.
Furthermore, when you read through the gospels you discover
that Jesus was always quoting the Bible.
The Lord Jesus was constantly turning back to the written Scripture
as the source of authority. Think about this, as God Himself He could have
simply answered people’s questions by saying, “Look, I’m God. This is the way
it is…” But He didn’t do that. Time and again when people would question Him, He
would respond by saying something like, “It is written…” Or “Have you not read
the Scriptures?” And then He would quote the Bible. Every time that Christ was
tempted in Matthew chapter 4 He met the temptation by quoting the Scriptures.
In Matthew chapter 22 He is asked a question by the Sadducees about the
resurrection, and He answers in verses 31-32 by saying - “But regarding the resurrection of the dead, have you not
read what was spoken to you by God: ‘I am
the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? He is
not the God of the dead but of the living.” He quotes Exodus chapter 3.
And notice that in His response to them the Lord
Jesus makes it personal. He says "Have you not
read what was spoken to you by God?" And then He goes on to quote
from the book of Exodus. Now, wait a minute. These things weren't spoken to
these people, were they? Didn't God speak these words to Moses from the burning
bush centuries before? And yet Jesus says "Have
you not read what was spoken to you by God?" Jesus
was always quoting the Bible.
We’re pretty good at forgetting things, or remembering
things different than the way they actually happened. If God spoke from heaven,
or in a dream, or sent an angel, it’s possible that I could forget what He
said. Or maybe tomorrow I’ll think, “you know, I was pretty tired yesterday,
maybe I was just hearing things. Or maybe it was that pizza I had before I went
to bed, it’s giving me really weird dreams. Or maybe it just thundered and I
thought I heard a voice.”
With God’s written Word that’s not going to happen. Why not?
Because it’s there in black and white; it’s going to say the same thing
tomorrow that it says today.
Isaiah chapter 40 verse 8 says that the Word
of our God stands forever.” The psalmist writes in Psalm 119:89, “Forever,
O Lord, Your word is settled in heaven.” When you and I are dead and
buried, the Bible is still going to be here, unchanged. Some of the Scriptures that Jesus was quoting
were 1500 years old. In all that time God’s truth hadn’t changed.
And another thing, how do we know that God has
communicated in all these different ways? How do we know that God spoke? How do
we know that angels brought messages to people? Because these things are
recorded for us in the Bible. The Scriptures record that God spoke in all of
these ways. We didn’t hear God telling Noah to build the ark, but we can read
about it. We didn’t experience the angels bringing the message of Christ’s
birth to the shepherds, but we can read about. Why? Because God has
communicated His truth to us in writing.
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