Putting Words in God’s Mouth?

 A man told a friend, “My dad always said I loved alphabet soup growing up. But really it was just him putting words in my mouth.” Hmmm – I wonder if God might sometimes say that same thing about the things people say He said in His Word? The following (clearly fictional) story by James Meadows is a little lengthy but clearly illustrates the point. One Sunday, a minister was talking on baptism and illustrating that baptism should be performed by sprinkling and not by immersion. He said, “In the Bible where it says that John baptized in the River Jordan (John 3:23), it didn’t mean ‘in’ but close to, round about, or near by. Again, when it tells us Philip baptized the eunuch in the river (Acts 8:38), it didn’t mean ‘in’ but close to, round about, or near by.” When the service ended, one old fellow stopped by and said, “Preacher, that was the best sermon I ever heard, and it uncovered many mysteries of the Bible to me. For example, the Bible tells us Jonah was ‘in’ the belly of the great fish for three days and three nights (Jonah 1:17), but now I see he was not ‘in’ the fish, but that he was just close to, round about, or near by the fish floating in the water. Then there’s the story about the three young Hebrew men who were thrown into a fiery furnace but not burned and didn’t even get their hair or clothes seared. I thought that sounded impossible, but now I see they were not ‘in’ the furnace at all, but really were just close to, round about, or near by. But the hardest thing of all for me to believe was where Daniel was thrown into the lions’ den for a whole night but wasn’t hurt. Thanks to your sermon I now see he wasn’t ‘in’ the den but was close to, round about, or just near by, kind of like when you go to the zoo. The revealing of these mysteries was very rewarding to me. But the greatest comfort to me was because I have lived a wicked life and sinned much and the Bible tells me that the wicked will be cast into hell. But now I see I won’t really be case “into” hell at all, but just close to, round about, or near by. So every Sunday from    now on, I won’t have to be ‘in’ church, I can just be close to, round about, at the lake near by.”

The idiom “put words in someone’s mouth” is to suggest someone said or meant something that he or she did not actually say. Almost all believers agree that being saved from sin requires sinners to get “into” Christ. The spiritual blessings accessible to those “in Christ” are too numerous to list here. Ephesians 1:3 sums it up by saying God has “blessed us with every spiritual blessing in Him” (Christ]. So how does someone  “dead in sins” (Ephesians 2:1) come into Christ? The apostle Paul answers in Galatians 3:27 – “For as many of you as  were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” That verse follows hard on the heels of the statement in verse 26 that “you are all the sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus” (note Paul didn’t say by “faith alone”). Both statements are part of a long argument by the apostle that sinners are not saved by keeping works of the law of Moses or any other law whereby we can earn, pay for, and merit God’s salvation. But Paul, unlike many preachers and believers in Jesus today, had no hangups in saying that faith in Christ and baptism into Him are part and parcel of the package we call “salvation from sin.” There is no ambiguity if we take God at His Word — if we want to be “in Christ” and not just close to, round about, or near by, we must be baptized into Him. Those words are in and from God’s mouth. We best leave them alone.

  by: Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN

Loopholes in the Bible?

W. C. Fields (American actor and comedian) was a self-avowed Bible skeptic & atheist. On one occasion a friend entered Field’s dressing room and was shocked to find the famous old comedian reading a Bible. When asked why, Field’s quickly shut the Book, & looking rather embarrassed, replied, “Looking for loopholes, just looking for loopholes.” ("The Sinai Summit," Rick Atchley,  Sweet Pub’g, 1993, p 138). The website merriamwebster.com defines “loophole” as “an ambiguity or omission in the text through which the intent of a statute, contract, or obligation may be evaded.” Remember that definition as we think for a few moments about New Testament teaching about baptism. 

Brother Edward Wharton wrote: “According to the New Testament writers’ own statements of its purpose, baptism, preceded by repentance, is an expression of faith in Christ to receive forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38) and to bring us into union with Christ (Romans 6:1-7) . . . It is, then, at baptism that the lost sinner is united with Christ as His own possession” (commentary on Galatains, "Freed For Freedom," p 118). Jesus taught baptism is involved in saving us after we believe the gospel (Mark 16:15-16). Both men and women in Samaria were baptized “when they believed Philip” as he preached the gospel in their city (Acts 8:18). When Lydia heard the gospel preached by the apostle Paul, her heart was opened to heed and “she and her household were baptized” (Acts 16:15). Later in Acts 16 a Roman jailor came to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and was baptized after midnight (verses 25ff, esp’ vs 34). Saul of Tarsus (who became Paul the apostle of Christ) was confronted by Christ for persecuting Christians in Acts 9:1ff. After being without sight and neither eating or drinking and praying for three days, a disciple named Ananias was sent to Saul by Jesus to tell him what the Lord wanted him to do (Acts 9:9-11). Years after those dramatic events, Paul testified that when Ananias came to him, he said, “And now why are you waiting? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord” (Acts 22:16). The apostle Peter wrote that baptism is involved in saving us (1 Peter 3:21), not  from any dirt on our bodies, but from sin on our souls. Colossians 2:10-13 teaches we are “buried with Him [that is, Christ] in baptism” and then “raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.” Baptism is a work, yes it is! But it is not the penitent sinner who works nor the baptizer. Rather, the apostle declares, God is working, excising a person’s sins in a “circumcision made without hands,” making the baptized person “complete in Him” and “alive with Christ” and “forgiving you all trespasses”!! Galatians 3:26-27 declares, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ” [the NIV says “clothed yourselves with Christ.” In these passages, the purpose and place of baptism in the conversion process is clear.

Here’s the take-away point. All these words about baptism are inspired by God (2 Timothy 3:16). What preachers’ and theologians’ say about them are not! Look, and look long as you want, but there is no “faith alone” loophole that allows us to evade or escape inspired teaching about baptism. God’s pronouncements are clear, not ambiguous. Baptism was an essential and beautiful part of the plan Christ and His apostles taught. There are no loopholes in God’s Word. God help us to faithfully proclaim the same gospel they did.  

       by: Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN 

The Tree That Can Set You Free!

The greatest story ever told doesn’t begin, ‘Once upon a time.’ It begins, ‘Once upon a tree.’” I heard that ear-grabbing statement nearly 45 years ago from Irish preacher Jim McGuiggan, and like an annular nail driven into a piece of hard oak, they have stuck fast in my head and heart throughout the years. McGuggian was referring of course to the fact that Jesus Christ died on a cross for our sins. The image of the cross as a tree is a very Biblical one. Let me cite one passage and note a few others.

In Galatians 3:13-14 we read these amazing words: “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”), that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.” The apostle’s reference to one who hangs on a “tree” is from Deuteronomy 21:22-23. In that passage the Law of Moses legislated that the body of one who was stoned for a capital offense, that is “a sin deserving of death” (verse 22) would be hung up on a tree as evidence that “he who is hanged is accursed of God” (verse 23).

New Testament images of the cross as a “tree” can be found not only in Galatians 3:13, but also at Acts 5:30 * Acts 10:39 * Acts 13:29 * 1 Peter 2:24. The 1 Peter 2:24 passage is specific that Christ “Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree ... by whose stripes we were healed.” The verse also calls Christians in response to this to die to sin and live for righteousness. This passage provides what amounts to inspired commentary and keen insight on the apostle Paul’s declaration in Galatians 3:13 that Christ has “redeemed us from the curse of the law.”

We don’t stone people for sinning these days, but that doesn’t mean the penalty of death has been lessened, for God’s word still declares “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23a), that is estrangement and separation from God in hell (Isaiah 59:1-2). This is the “curse of the law” Paul mentions in Galatians 3:13. From that estrangement and from that curse, Paul claims Christ has “redeemed” us, that is (we don’t have space to study it out), paid the price / cost to buy us back and set us free the guilt and condemnation of sin (see Acts 20:28 * 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 * 1 Peter 1:18-19 * Ephesians 1:7). How did He do that? Paul is blunt: He “became a curse for us” and gave His life for us.

We’ve only skimmed the surface here. But you don’t have to be a trained theologian to understand that, whatever the more technical nuances and meanings of words in these verses may be, one truth is crystal clear — God is dying to save you! I read a story (fictional but helpful) about a young man, twice-convicted for a lesser offense, on trial for yet a third time for murder. Terror washed over him as he surveyed the jury in the courthouse. Positive he’d never beat the murder rap, he managed to get a message to one of the kinder-looking jurors & bribed her with a large amount of cash through an anonymous person, asking her to go for a manslaughter verdict. Sure enough, at the end of the trial the jury convicted him of the lesser charge, saving him from the death penalty. Tears of gratitude spilled from his eyes, and he managed a moment with the juror before being led away to serve 20 years in prison. “Thank you, thank you, thank you — how did you ever pull it off?” The juror admitted, “It wasn’t easy. The rest of them wanted to acquit you.” That’s what Christ wants to do for you!  Praise God for the tree that can set you free!  (see Galatians 3:26-29.

    by: Dan Gulley, Smithville, TN