The Only Legitimate Way

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. – Jn 1:1

20 Similarities between Jesus and the Word

1. Both are the Word of God.

The scriptures are the written word (Ex 31:18)

Jesus is the living word (Jn 1:14)

2. Both are eternal (1Pt 1:23 & Heb 13:8)

3. Both came from heaven (Ps 119:89 & Jn 3:13)

4. Both partook of the human and the divine (2Pt 1:20 & 1Tim 3:16)

5. Both are faultless (Pr 30:5 & 1Jn 3:5)

6. Both are sources of life (Heb 4:12 & Jn 14:6)

7. Both are sources of light (Ps 19:130 & Jn 1:4,9)

8. Both are absolute truth (Jn 17:7 & Jn 14:6)

9. Both provide food for the soul (Dt 8:3 & Jn 6:35)

10. Both provide cleansing (Jn 15: 3 & 1Jn 1:9)

11. Both produce fruit (Mt 13:23 & Jn 15:5)

12. Both give peace (Ps 119:165 & Jn 14:27)

13. Both are called wonderful (Ps 119:18 & Is 9:6)

14. Both are called the power of God (Rom 1:16 & 1Cor 1:24)

15. Both are like a sword (Eph 6:17 & Rev 19:15)

16. Both successfully complete their assignments (Is 55:10,11 & Jn 17:4; 19:30)

17. Both must be received for salvation (Jn 8:31,32 & Jn 1:12)

18. Both have been attacked by sinners (Jer 26:7,8 & Jn 10:31)

19. Both have been rejected by sinners (Mk 7:9 & Is 53:3)

20. Both will eventually judge all sinners (Rom 2:12; 3:19 & Jn 5:22)

The LORD never asks us to try to interface with Him directly through meditation as some Eastern and New Age religions do. Interacting with God is never a mystical experience. Christianity never asks people to try to make a direct contact with God; Christianity instead directs people to the Word. God and His Word are the same.

What the WORLD calls “meditation” is an exercise of emptying the mind through repetitious chanting or yogic breathing exercises. But in what the WORD calls “meditation”, the believer’s mind is to be actively engaged and focussed on God’s Word.

We don’t seek any “oneness” with the Universe, and we don’t seek to attain “God-consciousness”.  We’re content to stay with the Word. Because that’s where we find God; that’s where we find Life.

AMEN.

More Blessings await you today; you’ll not miss them in Jesus’ Name.

GREG ELKAN

Bible Scholars vs. Bible Fans

...Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. – 1Co 8:1.

What are the chances that a person who holds a Doctorate in “Religion and Critical New Testament Studies” will turn out to be a saved Believer? Very unlikely, (at least from my observations). It seems the more knowledgeable some people get about the Bible, the more atheistic they become. Yet some other persons study the same scriptures and become great blessings to themselves and to their generation.

I have categorised these two different types of Bible students into “Bible Scholars” and “Bible Fans”.

A “Bible Scholar” is one who studies the Bible for the sake of knowledge acquisition and mental stimulation. They are voracious and avid studiers of everything Scripture. They may be fluent in Koine Greek, ancient Hebrew and Aramaic, are up to date on Middle Eastern archaeological finds and are versed in all the various ancient manuscripts.

If you want to preach to a “Word Scholar”, the moment you mention “John 3:16”, they’ll quickly analyse mentally all that they know about that verse. This is because they’re already familiar with its historical setting, literary context and grammatical features. They’re also aware of the choice of words used by the author, the text genre, and parallel passages.

They probably have written dissertations on the Eschatological and Christological implications of John 3:16 and as true students of Church history, are conversant with what the writings of the Church fathers – Tertullian, Augustine, Kempis , Luther, Calvin, Wesley, down even to the Reverend Billy Graham – have to say on this most popular verse of scripture...

In short, a “Word Scholar” knows everything about everything and you have nothing to tell them.

A “Word Fan”, on the other hand, may possess all of the above knowledge, yet at your mention of “John 3:16” they get excited at what you have to say about that favourite verse. The fact that you’re not likely going to say anything is irrelevant to them; as long as it’s the Word of God, they want to hear it over and over again.

Knowledge does puff up (1Co 8:1), and Rom 1:22 speaks of those who Professing themselves to be wise, become fools. But God says “The meek will he teach His way” (Psa 25:9).

Which would you rather be then, a “Word Scholar”, or a “Word Fan”?

AMEN.

More Blessings await you today; you’ll not miss them in Jesus’ Name.

GREG ELKAN

Hollow 'Revs'

In his acclaimed work, Living By the Book, Bible professor Howard Hendricks writes of a certain time he overheard one person complaining to another about a teacher they had both just listened to. The complaint was that “He didn’t do a blessed thing but explain the Bible”.

That complaint is revealing of the impression people have of the work of preaching and teaching.

The job of a preacher is not to take a verse of scripture and ‘run away’ with it; or try to make a message out of it through some convoluted, mystico-philosophical extrapolations. The job of a preacher is to draw out the life-giving truths that are already in those words of scripture.

It is unfortunate that some persons of the pulpit feel there legitimacy is threatened if they are not able to whip up some unique twist or bent to a Bible passage. They want to have a reputation as the man or woman of Rev, which is slang for ‘special revelation that no one else has thought of’. A cursory look at the heretics of church history shows us that they all started with this penchant.

I am of the opinion that only someone who isn’t intimate with the Bible will bother to whip up Revs from it. We already need an eternity and a half to exhaust the treasures of God’s Word, why on earth would anyone want something ‘new’. Ps 119:96 says there’s a limit to everything human, but God’s commandment is “exceedingly broad.”

So when a preacher is handed, for example, “John 3:16” as their anchor text, they should, like the Psalmist, cry out, Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law (Ps 119:18). Rather than resort to gimmicks and metal gymnastics, like trying to point out “the philosophical and prophetic significance of the numbers 3, 1 and 6”.

Such fake Revs have a tendency to excite the mind but carry no attendant power to change lives. James, our Lord’s brother and leader of the early Church has a message to such preachers and to US as well:

“Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls. – Jas 1:21

AMEN.

More Blessings await you today; you’ll not miss them in Jesus’ Name.

GREG ELKAN

“Your heart Will Thank You”

Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all. – 1Tim 4:15.

Have you ever thought about we English language users and our obsession with Bible translations? It will interest you to know that there’re at least FOUR HUNDRED different English translations of the Bible (up to 900 if you loosen your definition of “translation”). No other language in the world comes even close to that amount. Apparently, there’re 400 different ways for English speakers to say “theos agape estin” (“God is love”, 1Jhn 4:8).

One of the demerits of this glut of “modern” translations that we have is that they give a false sense of simplicity to the words of scripture that are sometimes absent in the original documents. For example, the 1st century Believers would have required a little more than an average knowledge of Greek to understand Luke’s words in Luke and Acts; but such a difficulty is hardly noticeable to the modern English reader.

This super simplification and easy-reading smoothness that has crept into the reading of God’s word has given us the impression that we KNOW what the writer is saying by just browsing through the text like a news article. We expect the translators to have done the hard work of EXEGESIS for us.

And to make it worse, some of us depend primarily on the so-called “Amplified” and “Expanded” versions to get our Bible truths; forgetting the fact that the amplifications and expansions are additions made by mortal, fallible persons like us.

Is it any wonder then that the regular believer today struggles with dogma, doctrine and truth?

The job of a Bible translation is to tell us, in our language, what the original human writers said in theirs. Getting the life-saving truths of those words engrafted into our hearts, however, requires a deliberate application of the mind to the text at hand, along with the help of the Holy Spirit (the Inspiration of the Bible writers, – 2Tim 3:16).

Yes, it sounds like hard work, but if you do it, you’ll be better off spiritually for it. Or, as a popular cooking oil ad here in Nigeria would say, “YOUR HEART WILL THANK YOU”.

AMEN.

More Blessings await you today; you’ll not miss them in Jesus’ Name.

GREG ELKAN

This Present Famine

Behold, the days come, says the Lord GOD, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the LORD. – Am 8:11

Recently, the country of Chile was in the news for a peculiar reason. It was experiencing severe water shortage because of – wait for it – “massive rainfall and flooding.”  I was confused at first; how could they be suffering from water shortage when they were literally swimming in it? Then I saw the news footage: dozens upon dozens of Chileans waiting in line, buckets and other assorted containers in hand, in front of a water tanker. Around them, flowing unimpeded, were small streams and rivulets - remnants of the flood. The waters were brown with mud, and laden with driftwood, house furniture, dead matter and sewage.

Truly, one can be surrounded by water and still be thirsty.

Chile’s picture is illustrative of the condition the church is in today. There is an abundance and glut of preaching but a scarcity of nutritious, wholesome spiritual food.

Moreover, in areas where we do find healthy nutrition, it’s mostly baby food: effete, canned, 'milk' teaching/preaching meant for spiritual babies alone.

The church is not a nursery, it’s a barrack. The church does not need overindulged, pampered spiritual babes; the church needs strong, well-armed and well-equipped soldiers of the Cross.

We need to get back to the Word.

Believers today cannot feed themselves. They subsist essentially from Pastor’s revelation. Even their Bible readings and prayer points have to be prescribed. Give an average Christian a book like Nahum and they’ll struggle to make head or tails out of it. They have no direct relationship with the Word.

While the whole of creation is waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God, we’re busy running spiritual nurseries. In the book of Acts, a common deacon (Stephen) was arrested and his defence evinced a thorough familiarity with scripture that his detractors had to stop their ears! (Acts 7:57).

We need to end this present famine. And that means we need to get back to rigorous study and feeding on the Word.

AMEN.

More Blessings await you today; you’ll not miss them in Jesus’ Name.

GREG ELKAN