END OF THE WORLD
BIBLE STUDY
5 Principles for Interpreting Scripture
2 Tim. 2:15
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR: Lack of Appreciation
1. A collector of rare books ran into an acquaintance who told him he had just thrown away an old Bible that he found in a dusty, old box. He happened to mention that Guten-somebody-or-other had printed it.
2. "Not Gutenberg?" gasped the collector. "Yes, that was it!"
3."You imbecile! You’ve thrown away one of the first books ever printed. A copy recently sold at auction for half a million dollars!"
4. "Oh, I don’t think this book would have been worth anything close to that much," replied the man. "It was scribbled all over in the margins by some clown named Martin Luther."
B. TEXT
“Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a workman who does not need to be ashamed and who correctly handles the Word of truth.” NIV
“Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of truth.” KJV
C. DOOMSDAY, DEC. 21, 2012
1. We’re only 16 days away from the so-called end of the world, Dec. 21, 2012. There have been 1.9 Billion Google searches of this subject!
2. There’s no real threat on that date; it’s mainly a media event – to make a movie and to increase ratings of news outlets. The media loves a good crisis or controversy!
3. Here’s a few recent news stories showing the public panic:
a. “Russia attempts to quell end-of-the-world panic.”
b. “French officials ban access to sacred mountain which believers claim will be refuge.”
c. “Los Angeles survival groups brace for Dec. 21, 2012 and beyond.”
4. Someone is always trying to predict a “Doomsday.” As French Mayor of Bugarach village Jean-Pierre Delord told the Guardian, "This is the 183rd end-of-the-world prophecy since antiquity.” Obviously, the world is still here!
5. SOURCES.
a. This prediction is based on the supposed fact that the Chinese Calendar, the I Ching, created 5,000 years ago, ends on December 21, 2012.
b. This happens to coincide with the end of one of the cycles in the ancient Mayan calendar at the winter solstice in 2012 -- hence the predicted doomsday date of Dec. 21, 2012.
c. Some posts on the Internet claim that the Books of Revelation or Daniel support this prediction. That is absolutely NOT TRUE.
D. THESIS
1. Tonight I want to talk about 5 rules for interpreting the Bible that will help us interpret it correctly. These 5 principles form the acronym “LIGHT.”
2. The title of tonight’s message is “End of the World Bible Study: 5 Principles for Interpreting Scripture.”
First, to correctly handle the Word of truth, follow:
I. ‘L’: THE LITERAL PRINCIPLE
A. THE DIFFERENT SCHOOLS
1. Since the first century, there have been many "schools" of interpretation, such as the allegorical, literal, devotional, etc.
2. The Allegorical interpretation assumes a hidden meaning behind the actual versus. Thus, the book of Joshua becomes an allegory of the soul’s victory over sin and self. Obviously, this is not the literal meaning.
3. The Devotional interpretation places emphasis on the edifying aspects of Scripture. The problem of both is at the Bible is spiritualized and the same verse may be interpreted in quite opposite directions by different interpreters.
4. The Literal Principle means that we are to interpret the Word of God just as we interpret other forms of communication -- in the most obvious and natural sense.
5. The plain and proper meaning of a biblical passage must always take precedence over our theological persuasions, presuppositions, and paradigms.
6. We can’t interpret the Bible in a willy-nilly fashion (“a locust equals a helicopter”)or we’ll end up with a serious error. If a passage can mean anything, then it means nothing!
B. LET THE BIBLE SPEAK FOR ITSELF
1. Peter said, “Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit” 1 Pet. 1:20-21.
2. You can make the Bible say anything you want (especially apocalyptic literature) if you neglect the literal principle.
3. When our fertile imagination becomes the source of interpretation we are in dangerous territory. Let the Bible speak for itself and just admit up front that there is some you may not fully understand.
4. The task of the interpreter is twofold: to determine the original intended meaning of the verse or passage (what did it mean to them back then), and secondly, to translate the text to the 21st-century (what does it mean to us here and now?).
5. A. text cannot mean what it never could have meant to its authors or its readers. The Book of Revelation never said anything about Dec. 21, 2012!
6. As Mark Twain said, ““It ain’t those parts of the Bible that I can’t understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.”
To correctly handle the Word of truth we mustn’t violate:
II. ‘I’: THE ILLUMINATION PRINCIPLE
A. THE NECESSITY OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
1. The Bible is alive! It speaks to us today because its "words are Spirit and they are life" John 6:63. But not everyone can understand what’s written in the Bible. Paul says that it takes the Holy Spirit’s illumination to understand it:
2. “we speak…in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him…because they are spiritually discerned” 1 Cor. 2:13-14.
3. But Jesus said, "But the Comforter, which is the Holy Spirit... He shall teach you all things and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said to you" John 14:26.
B. THE H.S. DOESN’T CONTRADICT HIMSELF
1. This doesn’t mean that the Holy Spirit supplants the rules of interpretation; rather, He provides insights to what’s in the text.
2. However, since the Holy Spirit wrote the Bible, He will never contradict the Bible. Any new "insight" that goes against the literal interpretation of Scripture is wrong, unless the passage cannot be interpreted literally.
3. Beware of “new” interpretations claimed as a revelation from God that don’t line up with the Word. “The Holy Spirit always operates within the parameters of the Word.”
To correctly handle the Word of truth, follow:
III. ‘G’: GRAMMATICAL PRINCIPLE
A. NORMAL RULES OF GRAMMAR APPLY
1. As with any literature, the Bible should be interpreted using the normal rules of linguistics. God wrote the Bible using language and intends it to be understood with those tools.
2. You need to identify what type of literature it is. That tells us a lot about how to interpret it. There are 5 broad
genres or literary styles in the Bible:
a. Historical (i.e. Kings, Chronicles, Acts),
b. Dramatic Epic (i.e. Job),
c. Apocalyptic (i.e. Daniel or Revelation),
d. Poetry (i.e. Psalms),
e. Wise Sayings (i.e. Proverbs).
3. You wouldn’t read a book of poems with the same approach that you read the front page of the newspaper, or the prayers and praises of the book of Psalms. Each must be recognized and interpreted within its literary type.
B. SPECIAL GENRES REQUIRE EXTRA
1. There are two types of rules for interpreting the Bible: 1). Those applied to the Bible as a whole (general hermeneutics), and 2). Those rules which apply to special parts of Scripture -- parables, prophecy, poetry, proverbs, etc. (special hermeneutics). 2. Most of the Bible falls under the category of general hermeneutics and should be interpreted in a straightforward manner using the literal, historical-grammatical method.
3. The special forms (parables, prophecy, etc.) should be studied using the rules that apply to them. Parables usually convey one central truth. The historical events surrounding prophecies and the prophet must be considered.
4. Was the message predictive or didactic (teaching)? Was the promise conditional or unconditional? Was it fulfilled or unfulfilled?
5. JOKE. One pastor was asked what he thought was the greatest translation of the Bible. He replied, "My mother’s translation." The goal is to translate the gospel into practical application in our daily lives.
To correctly handle the Word of truth we must:
IV. ‘H’: HISTORICAL PRINCIPLE
A. THE CONTEXT
1. The Christian faith is historical and evidential. The biblical text is best understood when the customs, culture, and historical context are considered.
2. Who is the author? When and where did he live? What was going on at that time? What is his purpose in writing? Whom is he writing to?
3. Many times the apostle Paul wrote to churches, such as Corinth and the Galatians because there were specific problems with those churches that he was correcting.
4. The same is true with the Colossians. Understanding what Paul is getting at when you read those letters makes all the difference, to both understanding them, and applying them to your life.
B. WAS IT TRANSCULTURAL?
1. What were the customs of that culture? How did the described events affect that culture? What was the geography of the country, the cities, the body of water?
2. Is what’s being taught culturally relative? Hair length, holy kisses, footwashing, silence of women in the church, head coverings, etc.?
3. If it’s a command or doctrine, was it universally taught to the believers of that day? The Bible often relates things, like Lot’s incest with his daughters, Judah’s going to prostitute (Gen. 19:36; 38:15), or Solomon’s taking many wives, without giving a moral reprimand, but it’s not intending that the reader follow their example!
4. Only if the Bible actually tells us to do something -- and it’s found in more than one place -- should a person feel the responsibility to obey that teaching.
To correctly handle the word of truth we must never violate:
V. ‘T’: TEST OF HARMONY PRINCIPLE
A. UNITY = ORTHODOXY
1. The whole of Scripture is greater than the sum of its individual passages. You cannot comprehend the Bible as a whole without comprehending its individual parts, and you cannot comprehend its individual parts without comprehending the Bible as a whole.
2. Scriptural harmony demands that individual Bible passages may never be interpreted in such a way as to conflict with the whole of scripture.
3. Nor may we assign arbitrary meanings to words or phrases that have a clear referent in biblical history. The
biblical interpreter must keep in mind all Scripture has one single Author.
B. SCRIPTURE INTERPRETS SCRIPTURE
1. Doctrine can’t be built from evidence outside the Bible. Difficult or unclear passages should be interpreted by the clear passages.
2. Doctrines shouldn’t be based on a solitary or unclear verse. The truth, when correctly arrived at, will form a system, with which all Scripture will agree.
3. We do not force Scriptures to conform to our system; rather, we derive our system from the Scriptures. “Every matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses” 2 Cor. 13:1.
4. JOKE.
a. Two old friends met one day after many years, one rich and the other in debt. The indebted one asked the successful one, "How has everything been going with you?"
b. "Well, one day I opened the Bible at random, and dropped my finger on a word and it was oil. So, I invested in oil, and boy, did the oil wells gush. Then another day I dropped my finger on another word, and it was gold. So, I invested in gold and those mines really produced. Now, I’m as rich as Rockefeller."
c. The indebted man was so impressed that he rushed to his hotel, grabbed a Gideon Bible, flipped it open, and dropped his finger on a page. He opened his eyes and his finger rested on the words, "Chapter Eleven."
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION: Junk
1. For twenty-five years Fred Schwartzwalder’s hobby had been collecting rocks. Weekend after weekend he had roamed the Rockies, bringing home new samples for his collection. He filled up his basement and then his backyard with rocks.
2. Then came 1950 and the growing public interest in radioactive minerals. Schwartzwalder bought a Geiger counter for $100, which was like $1,000 today.
3. Time magazine tells how he poked the Geiger counter around his backyard rock pile. Immediately, it began to jitter excitedly.
4. But when Fred located the radioactive rock and dug it out, he couldn’t remember where he’d found it, except the region. For three months he retraced his steps through the hills until at last, late one afternoon, he discovered the spot where he had broken off the sample from an outcropping on Indian Head Mountain."
5. The Geiger counter went wild and the happy explorer felt sure he had found a major source of uranium. Three weeks later he learned that he’d hit upon "one of the most significant uranium deposits" in the United States.
6. That long-forgotten rock in his back yard has made him wealthy beyond his wildest dreams.
7. It is amazing what riches are sometimes found close at hand. It is said that the first diamond of the famous Kimberly mines was picked up outside somebody’s home and thought to be a pebble.
8. And nobody needs a Geiger counter to lead him to the greatest treasure of all--the Holy Bible. Through this Book men are led to the Rock of Ages, the Source of power immeasurable and wealth incalculable. Arthur S. Maxwell
B. THE CALL
1. “Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the Word of truth” 2 Tim. 2:15.
2. Let’s determine to become more diligent in our study and application of the Bible in our daily lives!
[This sermon is adapted from of Ken Pell’s message “The L*I*G*H*T of Scripture.”]
