Dealing With The 3 Major Claims Of The Da Vinci Code

Dealing With The 3 Major Claims of The Da Vinci Code

(This sermon uses ideas from the Grizzly Adams DVD, The DVC Deception, CH Spurgeon, Billy Sunday, & others. Precious few of these ideas, if any, are original to me.)

1 John 4:1-4

May 7, 2006 FBC, Chester Mike Fogerson, Pastor

I Introduction:

A Video clip "I Believe" from Sermonspice.com

1 Dan Brown has written a runaway best-seller call The Da Vinci Code

a Over 40 million copies sold

b Translated in over 40 languages

2 The story of intrigue, murder, & ecclesiastical conspiracy has many of the readers of The Da Vinci Code asking if the major claims of the novel are true.

a The Bible is unreliable, or incomplete at best

b Jesus wasn’t though to be divine until 325 AD

c Jesus was married & had a child

3 What do you believe?

B Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; 3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world. 4 You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world. 1 John 4:1-4 (NASB)

1 The early church was instructed to test the spirits to see if they were from God (essence of the text in a sentence)

2 Believers are to be prepared to determine if a teacher (teaching) is from God (essence of the sermon in a sentence)

C I hope you’ll be prepared to talk about the fantastic claims of The Da Vinci Code from the standpoint of a believer (objective)

1 How ready are you to engage your culture when they call in to question the most basic tenants of your faith? (Probing question)

2 Let’s learn to deal with the 3 major claims that The Da Vinci Code makes about the Christian faith.

3 Pray

II Is The Da Vinci Code a reliable source of world & church history?

A The Da Vinci Code is a novel-a work of fiction.

1 To use The Da Vinci Code as a source book for your view of world & church history is tantamount to going to Metropolis & looking for Superman. (Hunting permit for a unicorn, gas under $2)

2 Fiction/conspiracy theories are not history!

a A church cover-up for 2,000 years? Not likely.

aa Jesus married with children

bb Mary Magdalene the head of the church

b I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. Matt 16:18 (NASB)

For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. Eph 5:23 (NASB)

B The history of the Christian church is rooted in recordable fact (not fiction) & history (not conspiracy).

III Can we trust the Bible as God’s Word?

A The Da Vinci Code elevates a set of ancient writings (Gnostic Gospels), that were dismissed by the early church as heretical, to the same level of authority as the Bible in your hands now.

1 These writings were written in the 2nd, 3rd, & 4th centuries after the life of Christ.

a They carry names that call for our attention (Gospel of Thomas, Peter, Mary Magdalene, Judas)

b Written by & for a group called Gnostics

aa Early heresy that combined Greek philosophy & Christian thought.

bb They hated the flesh/physical world, knowledge/insight was theirs alone & Jesus was a conduit to this knowledge, light within, no pastor, etc.

2 These Gnostic writings were secretive, mystical, wildly different than the New Testament books.

B The books we have in the New Testament were written within a generation after the life of Christ (30-60 years after the resurrection, not hundreds of years).

1 The 27 books in the New Testament were written by the disciples who witnessed Jesus personally, or by the students of these disciples.

a What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and touched with our hands, concerning the Word of Life— 2 and the life was manifested, and we have seen and testify and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us— 3 what we have seen and heard we proclaim to you also, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. 1 John 1:1-3 (NASB)