God Has Spoken B

God had some specifics to say.

Special revelation says those things. It tells about mercy, tells about grace, tells about forgiveness for sinners. It tells about the sacrifice of Christ. It tells about salvation. It tells about the church, the second coming. Everything from Genesis to Revelation is God's special revelation. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur.

I'm your host, Phil Johnson. It's hard to imagine living without electricity and automobiles, cell phones, the tools that solve so many modern problems. And yet for some people it's probably just as difficult to imagine a world without self-help books and psychology-based therapy to deal with their emotional and spiritual problems. The question is, to what degree can you really depend on man-made philosophies to deal with spiritual problems? What role does human wisdom play in God's work in your life, and when, if ever, is God's Word alone not quite enough? For answers, stay here for the next half hour as John MacArthur reinforces your trust in God's Word.

He's continuing his study called, Is the Bible Reliable? And now here's John with the lesson. In the concept of revelation, God has revealed Himself in two broad categories.

I want you to get these. First of all, He has revealed Himself through natural revelation, through natural revelation. Now what do we mean by this? Well, we mean apart from the Bible.

We can just put this aside for a minute. God has revealed Himself through natural revelation. What do you mean by that, John?

Well, two ways. Turn for just a brief moment to Romans 1, and I'll show you what I mean. Do you remember this verse? The heavens declare the glory of God and what?

The firmament showeth His handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech and night unto night reveals knowledge. In other words, you can't look at the daytime and you can't look at the nighttime and see the stars and all that God has made and the sun and all of its glory and not conclude that there's somebody who made that.

Not and keep your mental sanity and balance. So natural revelation comes in creation. Secondly, natural revelation comes in man. Look at verse 19 again. Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them.

It is in them. Now there's just something in a man that speaks of the fact that there's a Creator that should be obeyed and glorified. It's amazing, as I said, that you don't find any ten-year-old atheists.

They're not fighting atheistic philosophy. That is the most natural thing to tell a child that God made the world and that God cares about you, etc., etc. It's not until man grows up and gets educated and sophisticated that he decides he's going to be his own God. And the Bible says that they become vain, verse 21, in their imaginations.

You know what that translates out to in 20th century English? They have futile thinking patterns, futile thinking patterns. Their foolish hearts are darkened. Here he is surrounded by a revelation outside, revelation inside. Everywhere he sees the evidence of God, every bird, every rock, every tree, every flower, every star, everything that he sees reveals God's glory, God's deity, God's sovereignty, God's power, God's holiness. And he concludes that God doesn't exist. And if he does, it's because he has rejected the knowledge of God and he's worshiping himself. And the supreme egotist is the atheist. Next to him is the agnostic. If a man does accept natural revelation, is he saved? Is he saved if he just accepts natural revelation, like the guy who says, well, I worship God at the beach?

Yeah, well, I know there are times when I'd like to do that. Is that enough? Or like the native somewhere who just sees God in everything and it's rather undefined.

Is that enough? Is natural revelation enough to say, John 14, 6, Jesus said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. Then what did he say? No man comes unto the Father but by me. It's got to be more than natural revelation. Acts 4, 12, Peter looked at the Sanhedrin and said, neither is there salvation in any other.

There is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. In John chapter 3, Jesus said, you are condemned because you don't believe in me. There's got to be more than just natural revelation. I mean, let's face it, folks, if all the people need to have is natural revelation to get saved, we might as well just keep the missionaries home, right?

Because most natives don't have a problem. But if we introduce the gospel to them, then they've got to make a choice at that point and if they make the wrong choice, they're damned. Well, if you leave them alone and let them hang in there on natural revelation, they'll be all right. Well, how do you square that with the command of Jesus to go into the world and preach the gospel to every creature? If He said to tell every creature, then I'm going to take the assumption that every creature is going to need to know that revelation.

Faith in Jesus Christ is necessary. So that's why God didn't stop with natural revelation. Watch this, He gave also special revelation, special revelation.

Now this is a very interesting subject. Man is a sinner. He's spiritually dead. He's willfully blind.

He can't understand. He rejects natural revelation and then maybe all of a sudden in his life he begins to kind of see that maybe there is a God. Maybe this natural revelation is revelatory. Maybe there is somebody up there.

But it doesn't do him any good to just grope around like that because he can come up with anything. So God says in addition to the natural revelation, let me give you the special revelation that will tell you all you need to know about this God. And this is never before understood information. God had some specifics to say. Special revelation says those things. It tells about mercy. It tells about grace. It tells about forgiveness for sinners. It tells about the sacrifice of Christ. It tells about salvation.

It tells about the church, the second coming. Everything from Genesis to Revelation is God's special revelation. It wasn't enough to have that broad natural revelation. God wanted specifics. God had something to say and God doesn't mumble and God doesn't speak in broad generalities. God said very specific things. In fact, you know, as we shall see in our study, the very tense of the verb, the difference between plurals and singulars, the very simplest choice of words, the choice of the proper case of a word indicates the exactness with which God speaks. Now how did God reveal Himself in special revelation? Well, there are many ways.

First of all, let me just give you a list of these. How did God reveal Himself in special revelation, not just the broad category of His deity being visible by the world, but how did He get special? Number one is, and I'll give you these that aren't in any order, but the first one is theophany. Have you ever heard of a theophany? That means a visible appearance of God in some form. God at times began to appear to people in form. You say, you're kidding. No.

In what form? Well, you remember Abraham? He had some visitors one day in Genesis 18.

You know who it was? God and two angels. And I said, hello. He said, you guests come to my house. And he said, Sarah, get in that kitchen and whip up something, you know.

And didn't have any hamburger helper in those days, so, you know, you had to start from scratch and go kill whatever you were going to eat, you know. And they entertained God and two angels. God was appearing in a theophany. That means an appearance of God in a form.

Now God is invisible and so God assumed some kind of form. You have another occasion of it in Exodus chapter 3. God appeared in the form of a burning bush, didn't He? That's a theophany. So God said some very specific things to Moses. God said some very specific things to Abraham in a theophany. And then you remember Jacob in Genesis 31 was wrestling with an angel and it really was God, wasn't it? It may be called a Christophany, a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ. So God did reveal Himself before Christ came in a visible way on several occasions.

He actually became visible in different forms. That's theophany and God said specific things. But every time God wanted to communicate specifics, He didn't have to appear. He could speak too and He had some vehicles through whom He spoke.

Do you remember who they were? Prophets. When God wanted to say something, He would speak through the mouth of a prophet. And the prophet would open his mouth and say, Thus saith the Lord and God would take control of his mind and his mouth and he would speak for God. In fact, sometimes as you study the prophets, you can't tell whether it's God talking or the prophet and that's the idea. God used men supernaturally and spiritually controlled to communicate. Now you know, it was amazing how God got His message across even in addition to the prophets. Sometimes God got His message across by casting lots.

You remember that? You remember Jonah chapter 1? God wanted a certain thing to happen. God wanted Jonah to take a short ride on a long fish and God wanted to be sure that it happened that way. So they cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah. God just made sure He got the short stick and God got a specific thing accomplished. In Leviticus chapter 16, God even gave instruction about casting lots. In Numbers chapter 26 verses 55 and 56, again you have the indication that God got His will across through casting lots. So God specifically gave His will in a theophany, through prophecy, through casting of lots, another one. He communicated His will through dreams, didn't He?

For example, you have in the book of Genesis in chapter 28, chapter 37, chapter 40 and chapter 41, the significance of dreams repeated. Who probably was really used of God more than anyone else in the area of dreams? Joseph. Joseph. God communicated His will through dreams.

I'll tell you, that's a very common way. Another very common way for God to communicate His will was through visions. Can you think of two Old Testament prophets who had visions? One was Ezekiel.

Have you ever read Ezekiel 1? Boy, that's a vision like no vision. Don't try to figure that out.

That's like trying to unscrew the unscrewdables. It's just there and you just say, praise the Lord, hallelujah, and go to chapter 2. It's been used by many people in modern times to be a so-called description of UFOs.

That's one theory you can immediately reject. Another prophet who dealt in visions was Daniel. And Daniel dealt as a secondary figure in visions because the visions often came to somebody else and he would interpret the vision. So God communicated through dreams and visions. There were other times when God communicated by speaking. The Bible says, and God said. Did you know that God came to Abraham and said, Abraham, get out of the Chaldees and go to a land that I want to send you to?

And he just talked to him and he talked to him and he talked to him and clear through chapter 15, he talked to him again on into 17, 18. Sometimes God just flat out spoke. Well you can think of the Apostle Paul on his way to Damascus and all of a sudden the Lord talks to him right out of heaven.

What a fantastic concept. And imagine what kind of a loudspeaker system they had up there. God could send His voice across the sky from wherever heaven is and communicate verbally and He did it. There's another interesting thing that in the Old Testament it says that sometimes God communicated face to face. Now you say, well God doesn't have a face.

No, so we know it doesn't mean literal face to literal face. But it means that God actually came down somewhere and just stood nose to nose with the prophet and they just talked. They weren't just all edicts coming out of the sky, you know, and God thundered.

Boom, you know. But sometimes God came down in a face to face communication. So you see, God wanted to disclose Himself. All of these are simply media by which God communicates. Another thing God used, I think this is most significant, another thing God used to communicate is miracles.

You say, what did miracles do? They just communicated that God was involved, that God was present, that God was active. And watch, God used miracles to attest to the preaching. The old Elijah would come around and he'd start announcing what God said and everybody would say, ah, how do we know you're true? And then he'd raise somebody from the dead.

They'd say, maybe the guy's right. Pretty classy signs. You come to Peter and Peter stands up and preaches the gospel, then he heals everybody that's sick and he's going to make some people wake up and say, this guy may really be from God. You see, God in the New Testament particularly as well as in the Old Testament era, at least in two different periods of the Old Testament, God literally accompanied His Word with signs in order that men might know that it was His Word.

Because Paul would preach and Peter would preach or whoever it was, even Jesus. And God attested to Jesus' truthfulness by signs and wonders, didn't He? In 2 Corinthians 12, 12 it even talks about the signs and wonders and mighty deeds of the apostles to confirm the Word. So miracles were to prove God was speaking. So God acts and so God speaks. Now the result of all of God's acting and all of God's speaking was His revelation. You say, well, John, how come we have this Bible?

What is this? This is the recording of all of those acts and speakings of God. You say, well, is everything that God ever said that God ever did here?

No. Some of His revelation didn't get into the written revelation. Did you know that John the apostle said in chapter...at the end of his book he said, chapter 21, that I suppose that all the books of the world could not contain, right, the things concerning Christ. So God did many things that aren't here. But God wanted of all of His revelation to capture the main part of it and put it in writing. And that's the Bible. Now God wanted to preserve His revelation, so He had it written down. Now friends, writing down the revelation is important.

Do you know why? Passing on oral communication gets really sloppy. God knew that oral communication is very risky and God wanted a written truth and God had it written down. And Jesus said this, Matthew 5 18, verily I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass away from this law. He said, God wrote it this way, it'll never be changed. God wrote it down this way. The original word then that we have here is the record of God's revelation.

In fact, do you know what God said to Moses in Exodus 17 14? God said, Moses, write this for a memorial in a book. God wanted His revelation written down. You say, why did He want it written down? Well, because first of all a book groups all the messages together. I mean, wouldn't it be horrible if you had to trail around to find people who had bits and pieces of the oral communication? If the only authority we had was that somebody told somebody and this is what I got from them and I guess this is how it is.

Help. A book gathers all the message together. First Corinthians 10 11, these things happened to Israel by way of example. Listen, they were written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the ages are come. The things that happened in Old Testament time to Israel were written down for us today. It groups them all together for our admonition. God wanted us to have them all.

These things are by way of example. Another reason that God wrote it down is not only because the written word preserves the original and the written word gathers it all together, but the written message is independent of the orator and the writer and that's good. People come to me and they say, well, the other night in such and such a devotion I had an ecstatic experience and God spoke revelatory words to me and revealed great truth to me. No, God doesn't do that. God isn't in the business of giving private revelation. God has gathered it all together and God wants it independent of the orator and the writer and that's the beautiful part. Let me illustrate that to you, Jeremiah 36. And Jeremiah is a good illustration of a revelatory tool because God continually spoke to him and he continually says, the Lord said.

But a most interesting portion in 36 too. Now listen to what the Lord says to him. This is really good. The Lord said, take a scroll of a book and write in it all the words that I have spoken of you, that I have spoken unto thee against Israel, against Judah, against all the nations from the day that I spoke unto thee from the days of Josiah even to this day. He says Jeremiah, write everything down.

Write it all down. Verse 4, then Jeremiah called Baruch the son of Neriah and Baruch wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the Lord. Now my friend, there you have one of the greatest pictures of what inspiration is it you'll ever find in the Bible.

Do you know what that verse is? It says Baruch wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah the words of the Lord. God literally spoke through the mouth of Jeremiah. And he wrote which he had spoken unto him upon the scroll of a book. He wrote it down.

Now you know what was beautiful about it? You say, why did God want it written down? Because look at this, verse 5. And Jeremiah commanded Baruch saying, I am restrained.

I cannot go to the house of the Lord. You know why? He was a prisoner. Now if the prophet's in jail, the prophet's not going to be any good for the people, right? So God says, write it down.

Why? So that the word would be independent of the writer and independent of the speaker. So that if the speaker's in jail, the word still goes on. So he says in 5, write it all down because I am restrained. Therefore go and read in the scroll that which thou hast written from my mouth the words of the Lord in the hearing of the people in the Lord's house upon the fast day. And thou shall also read them in the hearing of all Judea who come out of their cities.

He says, I'm a prisoner. You take God's word and take it all over the place and read it to everybody. Now you see God wants it written because it becomes independent of the one who happens to be in prison and can't get around.

Simple point. Another thing that that point brings up is that God wants his revelation written because that way it is mobile, it is enduring and it is far reaching. Do you realize the prophets are gone now?

But do you know something though? The prophets are gone. Here I am in America, clear halfway around the world from the land of Israel where those truths were dictated and I've got it in my hand right here. I don't need the prophet. This book is mobile. It transcends his lifetime.

It is enduring. You know how they had a revival in Nehemiah's time? You say they got a prophet. No, they didn't get a prophet. In Nehemiah chapter 8 verse 1 we have a fantastic thing that happened. Nehemiah 8 and 1, all the people gathered themselves together as one man into the street that was before the Watergate and they spoke unto Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses. You know what they did? They got out Moses' writings.

Now they were in bad shape at this point and they're going to have a revival here. Going to be something exciting, spiritual revival and so they got the book of Moses. Isn't it wonderful that they could have it? Moses is long gone. That's why God wanted his revelation written down and Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation of the men and women all who could hear with understanding upon the first day of the seventh month and he read from it facing the street that was before the Watergate from the morning till midday before the men and the women and those who could understand and the ears of all the people were attentive. Boy, I'm telling you, you could stand there from dawn till midday attentive to the Word of God. The Lord's doing something. And Ezra the scribe stood upon a pulpit of wood which they had made for the purpose and some folks stood beside him and I'm not going to attempt to tell you who they were. And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people where he was above the people and when he opened it the people stood up.

And Ezra blessed the Lord the great God and all the people answered, Amen, Amen, lifting up their hands and they bowed their heads and worshiped the Lord with their faces to the ground. Boy, they heard the Word and they got right with God right on the spot. Verse 8, so they read in the book in the law of God distinctly, now watch this, and gave the sense and caused them to understand the reading. There's the greatest Old Testament verse on expository preaching right there. You read it, you give the sense of it, then you help the people to understand it. That's how to preach. And they had a revival and the book was mobile and they didn't need the prophet and they didn't need Moses. Another thing I think that is important and the reason maybe that God wanted His message written down is because a written message makes everybody responsible.

It does. It's written, everybody's responsible. Listen to the words of Jesus, Luke 16, 29. Listen, they have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them. Jesus says they're responsible. You've got the book, friends, you're responsible. You know, that brings up a tremendous point. You know, there are many homes in America that have Bibles.

There are many people that have Bibles. You have the book, listen to it, hear it. And so, there was no need for a big dramatic miracle. There's no need for this guy out here to be getting prophecies from God and uttering so-called visions and all of this kind of stuff. Here it is, friends, right here. God wrote it all down.

It's all here. You say, well, maybe God didn't put it all in there. Well, I think He did. I think at the end of the book of Revelation, He says, if you add anything to it, it should be added unto you the plagues that are written in it.

I get the impression He doesn't want anything added to it. There's no miracle needed, friends. You don't need some great divine miracle to tell whether I'm telling you the truth or not. You know how you know whether I'm telling you the truth?

How do you know? Read the Bible, find out. You can tell a false prophet today that fast. All you've got to do is check him with the Scripture. It's all there, God's revelation. So the Bible is a culmination and the product of God's revelation. It's the embodiment of God's disclosure of Himself to us.

That's the revelation. You can trust God's Word in every circumstance. That's John MacArthur's focus in his current series titled, Is the Bible Reliable? Along with teaching here on Grace to You, John is also Chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary. Well, John, as you said today, God gave His Word to us in written form because that was critical for preserving His revelation to us.

Oral tradition would never cut it, and Grace to You is committed to helping people understand the written Word and committed to actually putting excellent versions of God's Word into people's hands. It's obvious to anybody who's looking at the evangelical movement in our current time that experience has trumped truth. People come together for some kind of light and music show and looking for a feeling, looking for an emotion. Those things are created by external stimuli. It's often called worship.

It may have nothing to do with that. What these churches have done is substitute a quasi-spiritual experience for the truth of the Word of God. The greatest thing that could possibly happen to anyone is to understand the Scripture. Not to feel something, but to understand the Word of God. That is what has driven this ministry for its entire life. And by the way, for more than 25 years, the MacArthur Study Bible has been the tool that has been the flagship resource of this ministry. Twenty-five thousand footnotes along with the text of the Bible so that you can know what the Bible says and what it means by what it says. But now there's a marvelous new edition of the MacArthur Study Bible that uses the Legacy Standard Bible text.

I can't tell you how thrilled I am that this is finally available. The MacArthur Study Bible featuring the Legacy Standard Bible text. And it builds on the heritage of the New American Standard and it refines it, consistently rendering God's name in the Old Testament.

His name is Yahweh. The acrostic poetry in the Old Testament, each section is clearly labeled with the respective Hebrew letter and English transliteration, consistent translation of doulos, the word slave in the New Testament, many more features. And here's the good news. If you receive my monthly letter, be looking for the one coming in October, with that October letter will be an offer for a free copy of the Legacy Standard edition of the MacArthur Study Bible. If you currently do not receive my monthly letter but would like to receive the offer for the free Legacy Standard MacArthur Study Bible, you need to contact us by no later than Friday, September 13 and ask to receive my October letter with the free offer. That'll be the best way for you to be among the first to receive the new MacArthur Study Bible based on the Legacy Standard Bible text. Thanks, John. Friend, that deadline to get on the mailing list again is Friday, September 13.

So make sure you are set to receive John's October letter. Contact us now. You can call us during our normal business hours.

That's Monday through Friday, 730 a.m. to 4 o'clock p.m. Pacific Time. Our number here, 800-55-GRACE. That's 800-55-GRACE. Or go to our website anytime, gty.org. Now besides the free offer for the Legacy Standard edition of the MacArthur Study Bible, there are other reasons that you will benefit from John's letter in October and every month after. In fact, you'll receive an offer for a free resource with every letter. That typically includes John's latest books whenever they're published, and John's letter itself is his opportunity to speak in detail about the latest news at Grace to You and also to talk about important topics that affect the Church. So ask to start receiving John's letter when you call us at 800-55-GRACE, or send your request by email to letters at gty.org, or go to our website, gty.org. Now for John MacArthur and our entire staff, I'm Phil Johnson. Remember to watch Grace to You television this Sunday, that's DirecTV Channel 378, and then be here Monday as John continues answering the vital question, Is the Bible Reliable? It's another half hour of unleashing God's truth one verse at a time on Grace to You.