Text:Matthew 24:35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.
As Jesus and His disciples came out of the temple, they asked him three question back in verse 3. When shall the temple be destroyed? What shall be the signs of His coming? and the end of the world?
In the rest of the chapter, Jesus answers these questions, and then in verse 35, He says these words will not pass away, the things I said will happen, will come to pass.
You and I live in a world where things are passing away such as our land, our water, our moral values, our beloved country, even our very bodies. But here is a promise of endurance, the Word of God.
The Bible is so important to the Christian for it is his food(Deut.8:3), his guide(Psa.119:105), his purity(John 15:3), his protection(Psa.119:11), his love(Psa.119:140), and his hope.
We got some funny so-called Christians these days. Some people who call themselves saved, yet they have no regard for God’s Word. It is said that a man in New York robbed a bank and said, God told him to do it? A woman also said, Jesus told her to be stripper? and another said Jesus told him to divorce his wife? These actions do not measure up to God’s Word.
A Christian’s life is not based on his or her feeling or Joe Blow’s thoughts but on the Word of God, God’ s wonderful book.
I-CONSIDER THE WONDER OF ITS PURITY:
Proverbs 30:5 Every word of God [is] pure: he [is] a shield unto them that put their trust in him. {pure: Heb. purified}
1-This means it is truth not mixed with error. A soldier would not want to go to war with a defective weapon, and the same is with a Christian soldier, he doesn’t want a defective Bible.
2-A Christian can trust the Bible for we have a Bible worth believing. It contains 66 books, 1,189 chapters, 31,175 verses all which are the inspired Word of God without any error. It is all truth.
3-Some say the Bible contains the Word of God, that it is inspired in some spots? Well the trouble is who is going to tell us which spots are inspired? If one part of the Bible is not true, how can we trust the rest to be truth?
4-It is like the man who had a watermelon patch. He tried everything to catch the person who was stealing his watermelons but to no avail. He put up a sign in the middle of the patch which said, “one of these melons is poison”. But the thief came and put up a sign also which said, “now two of the melons are poison”. The poor farmer had to throw away the whole patch.
5-So it is with God’ Word, if two of its chapters are not right, then all of it is dangerous, but the truth is that , all of God’ Word is ok, in fact it is not dangerous, but is a delight to read and trust it words. Jesus said, “Thy Word is truth”
6-Some critics have said that at the north end of the Red Sea there is an area called Bitter Lakes. Between the Bitt11.htmlometer missing , but his house also. The barometer needle had been right, there was a hurricane! Yet how many Christians there are who seem to regard the clear fingers of prophecy in the Word of God with like
indifference and disdain. 2
III-CONSIDER THE WONDER OF ITS POWER:
Jeremiah 23:29 [Is] not my word like as a fire? saith the LORD; and like a hammer [that] breaketh the rock in pieces?
1-The Bible is a powerful book. It is the power of God unto salvation according to Paul in the book of Romans.
2-This Book is abandoned in the home, thrown out of our schools, and by our judges, and denied in many pulpits, yet it the only Book that is alive and able to give life to the sinner.
3-When people read the Bible and believe its savior , and do what it says, they will find a supernatural power to put away bad habits, love their neighbor, change their personality, and find peace of mind.
4-Accordiang to Peter, the Bible is like a seed. A seed look like nothing for it look dead and little, yet when planted in the ground, it produces life. So it is with the Bible when planted in a human heart.
5- When Jacob de Shazer went as one of Jimmy Doolittle's raiders on Japan the day of April 18, 1942, he was an atheist. He was captured and imprisoned by the Japanese. He saw two of his companions shot by a firing squad. He saw another die of slow starvation. During the long months he pondered the question of why the Japanese hated him and why he hated them. He began to recall some of the thing he had heard about Christianity. Boldly he asked his jailers if they could get him a Bible. At first the laughed boisterously, as at a good joke, and grew ugly and warned him to stop making a nuisance of himself. But he kept asking. A year and a half later - May 1944 a guard brought him a Bible, flung it at him, and said, "Three weeks you have. Three week, then I take away." True to his word, in three weeks the guard took the Bible away, and de Shazer never saw it again. In 1948 de Shazer, his wife, and infant son were on their way back to Japan as missionaries, all because he asked for a Bible and a Japanese guard gave him one for three weeks. 3
IV-CONSIDER THE WONDER OF ITS PRESERVATION:
Isaiah 40:8 The grass withereth, the flower fadeth: but the word of our God shall stand for ever.
1-It has been cussed and discussed, analyzed and ridiculed, yet it stands above every other book. It is obvious that someone, somewhere is protecting this Book and that person is God.
2-You and I have an English Bible in our possession largely because of a man named John Wycliffe. He was known not only as a builder, producing the first English text of the Bible, but also as a fighter. What a leader! When he died, his enemies burned him at the stake and took the ashes of his body and sprinkled them over the Thames River in London. "Forever, we're rid of Wycliffe!" his enemies must have thought. They were wrong. The product of his labors, the English Bible, is with us today because he did more than fight. He stayed at the task. 4
3-Castro of Cuba when taking over Cuba, took a shipload of Bibles on a ship in the harbor and has then processed back into paper pulp and had communist literature printed on them. But that has not destroyed the Bible in Cuba, for it still survives.
4-Dr, Amos R. Wells said, “If I would work, the Bible is my tool; Or play, it is a harp of happy sound. If I am ignorant, it is my school; If I am sinking, it is solid ground. If I am cold, the Bible is my fire; And wings, if boldly I aspire. Should I be lost, the Bible is my guide; Or naked, it is raiment, rich and warm. Am I imprisoned, it is ranges wide; Or tempest-tossed, a shelter from the storm. Would I adventure, 'tis a gallant sea; Or would I rest, it is a flowery lea.
V-CONSIDER THE WONDER OF ITS PRESENTATION:
John 5:39 Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
1-The Bible present a message of salvation through Jesus to you and I who are deserving of nothing but hell.
2-It tells us of the great love the Lord has for us , and His desire for us to be saved.
3- Dr. Jerry Vines Said, “The Bible is a love letter. It is a love letter from God to us. Now you know that one of these days one of these teenage girls is going to receive a love letter. They are going to go out to the mailbox, and inside is going to be a love letter from some snaggle-toothed, freckle-faced boy. Can you imagine them coming back inside and saying, "Mama, I have a letter from this boy. I'll tell you what I'm going to do, Mama, I'm going to take this letter and put it back over here under some magazines and next New Year's Eve I'm going to get that letter out and read what that boy has to say." Is that really what she'll do? Why of course not. She'll reach in grab that letter and come running into the house. She is going to shout, "Mama, Mama, Mama, I got a love letter. She's going to run into her room and slam the door. Then she's going to tear the letter open and read it. She will say, "That's sweet, did he really mean that! Oh, how wonderful." Then she's going to read it again and again until she has the letter memorized. You want to know why? Because it's a love letter. Yet God has written a book to us to tell us how much he loves us and how many of us never take the time to read it! “
Conclusion-Martin Luther said, "For several years I have read the Bible through twice in 12 months. It is a great and powerful tree, each word of which is a mighty branch. Each of these branches have I well shaken, so desirous was I to know what each one bore and what it would give me. And the shaking of them has never disappointed me."
1.Bible Illustrator
2-Knight’s Illustrations
3.H. Fickett
4.Knight’s Illustrations
5.Bible Illustrator
