Category: Authority

Sermon Title: “He Added No More”

Heath Rogers’ sermon. A proper respect for the authority of God’s word will preclude us from adding to the commandments delivered for us. God has spoken, we must accept His word.

Sermon PowerPoint: Click Here .

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

Sermon Title: Proper Attitudes Toward Obedience

Heath Rogers preached this lesson, examining the proper attitudes we must have toward the commands of the God of heaven.

Sermon Audio: Click Here .

OSAMA BIN LADEN’S quotation that “Islam is the only source of the rulings and laws” (editorial, Jan. 4) is frightening in its total rejection of the principle of separation of church and state. But we should not forget that his ideology is founded on the belief, which is central to most all deistic religions, that “God” is the only true source of morality and moral behavior.

That erroneous idea is a potentially dangerous source of rigidity and absolutism in moral thinking and behavior, and readily leads to efforts to impose one’s own group’s “true” morality on others, or to regard the “infidel other” as not worthy of the beneficence of that morality.

As is all too obvious these days, wars are fought under the self-righteous and self-justifying conviction that “God is on our side.”

The rational, secular view of morality is that it is generated only in human minds and is shaped over time in the real world by negotiating competing needs and shared benefits. There is no “Big Daddy” or “Big Mommy” up there, or out there, to tell us how to behave, or to punish us with natural disasters if we go astray. There is, however, good reason to believe that, along with murderous aggressivity, some fundamental altruistic urges have been built into the human genome by Darwinian evolution.

Given a framework of secular civil laws and enforcement, human compassion, conscience, and “the Golden Rule” of “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” will take us a good long way.

RICHARD H. WOLFF
The Boston Globe

Analysis:

The Preceding opinion piece which appeared in the Boston Globe on January 10, proclaims the typical secularist attitude toward morality.

Continue reading “‘God’ Isn’t Only Source of Morality” →

[The following opinion piece, (edited for space) which appeared in the Arizona Daily Wildcat, written by columnist Matt Stone, establishes a typical flawed view of morality.]

Moralism represents the self-understanding of what constitutes decent and indecent behavior – each person one’s own judge and seeking respect in the appraisal of others.

Of course, the perception of “decent” or “indecent” behavior is fluid, allowing open-endedness for society to shape its own moral code: Whereas we abhor polygamy today, it was yawningly normal for Moses to have multiple wives. Dynamism, self-respect and the dignity of the individual are the cardinal tenets of moralism.

Continue reading “Your Morals – Or Mine?” →

The August 2005 issue of Reader’s Digest, a special issue that examines “14 Amazing Trends That Will Change Your Life”, identified as a societal trend the growth of Christian merchandizing.

From GodPods to holy golf balls, marketers have found religion

Note the following short excerpt from the feature:

A lot of conservative Christian’s don’t like the fuzzy line that’s been drawn between believers and nonbelievers. They want to be able to tell the secular from the sacred, Young says. But more and more young believers “enjoy obliterating the lines and appreciate the mystery in that and feel it gives a lesson in not judging.”

So Christian entrepreneurs have found their formula for success, and it’s in stretching the traditional bounds, if not obliterating them. For every person who fells that the shirts being sold – or the books or the gadgets – are a betrayal of the faith, there are plenty of others who see a faith that’s speaking to today. In this age of market evangelism, the ring of a cash register can be sacred music.

Page 185, August 2005 Reader’s Digest

Analysis:

“If anyone teaches otherwise and does not consent to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which accords with godliness, he is proud, knowing nothing, but is obsessed with disputes and arguments over words, from which come envy, strife, reviling, evil suspicions, useless wranglings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain. From such withdraw yourself… For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows” (1 Timothy 6:3-5, 10).

The report in Reader’s Digest is without bias, noting that some are agreeable to the merchandising of the gospel while others are not. As can be seen from the text above, the Holy Spirit is not so understanding. It is shameful that some are so ready to make a profit from faith. The Catholic church was doing it centuries ago with the sale of indulgences to fund the building of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. This is just more of the same. Those who do such things should be ashamed.

In our last article on authority, we documented several “digressions” which resulted from a lack of understanding of how Bible authority is established.  The three general apostasies we mentioned were: 1) The establishment of the apostate church (Catholicism); 2) The embracing of human creeds in the Protestant Reformation; and 3) The apostasy in the late 1800’s which led to the establishment of the Christian Church denomination.

In the more recent past God’s people have been troubled by digression.  In the 1940’s and 1950’s issues arose in the church, which led to division among God’s people. Continue reading “Institutionalism: An Abuse of Authority” →

In the past 2,000 years, since the church was established on the first Pentecost following our Lord’s resurrection, there have been many apostasies.  In every case, widespread apostasy has occurred because of either a lack of respect for, or misunderstanding of Bible authority.  This we will demonstrate momentarily.  Therefore, the principles of authority we have been establishing in this series of articles need to be instilled in each generation to avoid similar departures both presently and in the future. Continue reading “Historical Abuses of Authority” →

Consider the following scenario. A parent gives a child a ten dollar bill, and tells him to go into the store and buy a gallon of milk, and a loaf of bread. The child returns to the car with the milk, the bread, some change, and a candy bar. The parent tells the child, “I didn’t say you could get a candy bar!”, and the child replies, “You didn’t say I couldn’t!”

The child’s statement is true, but he quickly learns that the parent’s silence on the matter did not constitute permission to go ahead and buy the candy bar. From this example, we understand the principle that silence is not permissive.

The same is true with the word of God. Continue reading “The Silence of Scripture” →

In our last article we indicated that at certain times God’s commands are general in their nature. Such generic authority allows room to exercise discretion.

For example, in Matthew 28:19-20, Jesus gave his disciples instructions, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” The command to “Go”, given by Jesus, is generic in nature. Jesus did not specify the means of going, so the disciples had discretion in fulfilling the command. These areas of discretion can be categorized as expediencies. Continue reading “Expediency” →

A study of authority reveals that it can be categorized in two ways, Generic authority, and Specific authority.
By Generic we mean “general, opposite to specific” (Webster’s). So, Generic authority is inclusive. It includes all the methods or ways in which the thing authorized may be accomplished.

In contrast, by Specific we mean “precisely formulated or restricted; specifying or explicit” (Websters). So, Specific authority is exclusive. It only includes that which is expressly stated or specified.

On the surface, this may seem to be rather confusing. In reality it is a matter of simple common sense, and can readily be determined. Continue reading “Generic and Specific Authority” →

We have asserted that Bible Authority can be established from the written scriptures in three ways: Expressed Statement, Approved Example, and Necessary Inference. In this article we deal with the third means, Necessary Inference.

The concept is ridiculed by many as being a legalistic, and humanly devised means of establishing authority. We will show from scripture that this is not so. However, to begin, let’s note that we often learn things by inference. Continue reading “Necessary Inference” →

In our previous article, entitled Expressed Command, I wrote:

To properly understand how authority is established in religion, it is necessary to understand the nature of communication. God created man with the ability to communicate his will or desire to others. He chose to reveal Himself to man by the same methods. The divine hermeneutic (way of interpreting the Bible) is in accord with the logical rules of communication using written or spoken language.

One of these “logical rules of communication” can be identified as an approved example. The premise is simple. If in the New Testament we find Christians participating in an activity, and the example we find is spoken of as approved of God, we can rightly surmise that this practice is divinely authorized. Continue reading “Approved Example” →

To properly understand how authority is established in religion, it is necessary to understand the nature of communication. God created man with the ability to communicate his will or desire to others. He chose to reveal Himself to man by the same methods. The divine hermeneutic (way of interpreting the Bible) is in accord with the logical rules of communication using written or spoken language. Continue reading “Expressed Command” →

Jesus Christ is our source for authority today. Jesus said, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth” (Matthew 28:18).

However, none living today has ever seen Jesus. Also, despite claims to the contrary, Jesus does not speak to us directly today. So, how is it we are to know the will of Jesus? He is the authority, so how are we to know what he authorizes?

The New Covenant

First, note that the New Testament is the will of Jesus. Continue reading “The New Testament: Christ’s Authority Revealed” →

In Matthew 21:25, Jesus asked the elders of the Jews the question, “The baptism of John; where was it from? From heaven or from men?” The question put the elders in a difficult position. If they said it was from “heaven” (divinely authorized), then Jesus could admonish them for disobedience. “Why then did you not believe him?” (vs. 25). If they said it was from men to excuse their disobedience, they would run afoul of the people who counted John a prophet.

In this simple exchange a fundamental truth regarding the nature of authority is revealed. Continue reading “Christ, the Source of Divine Authority” →