The Bible. You know… that book preachers keep going on about…
the one we put in the pews… the most purchased, least read book in the whole wide world. What about the Bible?
We’ve read the ‘Da Vinci Code’, we saw that documentary
on ‘The Gospel of Judas’, we’ve heard about ‘The Jesus Papers’… suggestions by some Christian
scholars that a lot of it isn’t what we thought it was… and then there’s folk who suggest the whole thing
was invented and distorted by the church…some even suggesting that Jesus never existed. Is
that true?
I’m here to tell you that it’s all true… I mean it’s
all true that people say all these kinds of things … but personally I do not accept their arguments. Let me give you a couple of reasons why before suggesting why the bible should be trusted.
The first thing you should
know about this current debate is that it’s as old as Christianity itself.
There is nothing new in any of it. Theories
about Jesus being married, about Judas being a good guy, about there being in existence other religious works about Jesus
that we need to take far more seriously than the books in the Holy Scriptures… all of this is old news.
For example, I have here a book written in 1973 by an author called
Donovan Joyce and titled ‘The Jesus Scroll’. Rather like the Da Vinci
code it claims to be a mixture of detective story and historical truth. On the
front cover it poses the question, “A Time-Bomb for Christianity?”
This is how the back cover reads: “In
1964 Donovan Joyce was asked to smuggle out of Israel a scroll stolen from the excavations at Masada. He was prevented from doing so, but piecing together
the startling evidence contained in the ancient parchment with research of his own, Joyce came up with an explosive theory.
The scroll was the work of Jesus of Nazareth, who did not die on the cross! Instead he saw his son crucified – the child born of his marriage to Mary Magdalene.
Jesus himself lived on to join the Zealots in their last defiant stand at Masada. Whether
these astonishing theories are true or mere fabrication, Donovan Joyce puts forward an intriguing argument”
That was the British edition. The
American version published just a couple of years later claims to be “Documentary evidence that proves that Jesus did
not die on the cross. The most sensational revelation of the Christian era.” Astonishing
how in a couple of years... no doubt in response to encouraging sales figures… it went from being a questionable ‘theory’
to being a ‘sensational revelation’.
Many of the elements of all the current books and documentaries are
in place: The conspiracy theory…The missing scroll…The deception of church authorities…The theories about
Jesus’ relationship to Mary…The denial of His death and His Resurrection.
Mix in a few chapters of the 1982 book ‘Holy Blood and the Holy Grail’, throw in a few anagrams and imaginative
theories about some famous art works, and you could have a best seller on your hands!
I’m working on my own revelatory book right now that links Reformer
John Calvin to Rock Group Z.Z. Top. I mean don’t you find it rather strange
that they both have those long beards? I saw ZZ Top at the West Virginia State
Fair, I’m an eyewitness authority, and I have a title and a degree from a recognized University.
Surely you are aware what the two Z’s in ZZ Top stand for? I don’t actually have a clue, but surely it has to be the King of the Greek gods
‘Zeus’ and the Feminine Roman God of beauty ‘Zana’. For
rumor has it that one time there was a girl who went backstage after a ZZ Top concert called ‘Genevieve’, a name
which has a linguistic similarity to ‘Geneva’ where Calvin was from.
So there’s definitely a connection as Geneva is in Europe which is where the surrealist painter Salvador Dali painted all those strange paintings with things like bent clock
faces hanging over tree limbs.
I know from a manuscript that a man slipped to me in a car park whilst
I was vacationing at Myrtle Beach during Bike Week that bent clocks symbolize the straining of time that seeks to subvert
knowledge of connections between people and beards, something the Vatican and EMI records have denied and sought to oppress,
in the interests of Britney Spears selling more albums than aging rock groups from Texas. And incidentally, you do realize that if you rearrange the letters of ‘Britney Spears’ they spell ‘Presbyterians’?
Furthermore the whole thrust of Calvin’s masterwork, ‘The
Institutes of the Christian Religion’ is responding to the love of God, whilst ZZ Top’s greatest hit was “Give
me all your loving.” I rest my case. There has to be a connection between
ZZ Top and John Calvin. And any documents that suggest otherwise are obviously
forgeries. Now... anybody want to buy the movie rights?
Sounds absurd, but that’s the sort of argument that lies behind
many of the theories that are flying around at the moment seeking to discredit the testimony of the Bible. They are built upon so many false statements and ‘What if’ scenarios, that whilst they make
for interesting fiction, to derive ones system of belief from them would be unwise.
Even making movies of such debates, like has been done with the Da
Vinci Code, is nothing new. In 1965 a guy called Hugh Schofield wrote a book
called “The Passover Plot” based, as always, on ‘scholarly information about the sources that lie behind
the gospels’. In this tale, Jesus is drugged before His crucifixion…
an act that enables Him not to die and is resuscitated a few days later by His disciples.
Thirty years ago in 1976 the book was made into a movie that was nominated
for an Academy Award for ‘Best Costumes’. It may not have been a
very good movie or even a plausible story, but at least the characters were well dressed!
The most interesting thing about the movie ‘The Passover Plot”
and such books as “The Jesus Scroll’ from many decades ago is that today hardly anybody has heard of them. At the time they were dismissed as being the kind of nonsense that belongs on the
pages of the National Enquirer rather than the subject of so called enlightened discussion by scholars of note.
A second thing you should know is that at the heart of all these so called new revelations there is the purpose of contradicting two pillars of Christian
doctrine, namely the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ
Something that unites second century Gnostic heretics, Donovan Joyce,
Dan Brown and Michael Baignet, a contributing author to ‘The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail’ and author of ‘The
Jesus Papers’, is that their world view has no room for the Easter story. They do not believe that Christ rose again,
so the only alternative they can find which can account for the growth of Christianity is to say that Jesus never died.
On
a recent edition of ‘Dateline’ Michael Beignet was challenged by correspondent Sara James: “You believe
that much of what we think we know about Jesus is a lie?” He replied, “It’s a lie. It’s an obvious lie.”
Of
course he is not the first to make such a claim. Matthew’s gospel tells
us that following the resurrection the soldiers who had been at the tomb were given money to spread a lie that 'His disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep.' (Matthew
28:13). There is absolutely nothing new in suggesting that the death or resurrection
of Jesus Christ was a deception.
Even
if we were to discount Matthew’s Gospel (and there truly is no reason why we should) there is Paul’s statement
to the Church in Corinth, a statement that biblical scholars are virtually unanimous in agreeing represents an early authentic
Christian tradition: “For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in
turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he was
raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Peter, then to the twelve.”
We
need to understand that those who seek to discredit the gospels have an agenda. They
want us to believe in their story, not in the historic drama of Christian history. By
implication they want us to accept that every noble Christian action has been the result of a deluded belief in Jesus Christ,
who did not die for anybodies salvation, nor was raised to give any single soul in creation new life.
When
you think about the founding of this nation and the contribution made by people of Christian faith, about the influence of
Christian faith in shaping democracy and the procedures of government…when you drive throughout this nation and see
how many medical institutions are named after some church or saint…how many of the great educational institutions in
this nation and throughout the world would never have come into existence without the contribution of biblical Christian belief,
then to claim that such has been an exercise stemming from delusion and conspiracy is ludicrous.
Today,
here and now, in Beckley, think about the different organizations that help some of the least fortunate that pass through
the town: Helping Hands, the Carpenters Corner, the Salvation Army, the Women’s Resource Center, the many, many forms
of practical assistance and outreach that take place day by day, year by year, often unsung and unnoticed through the smallest
and largest of Christian congregations.
Who’s
doing it? Who is taking the time to care?
Mostly people of faith. The kinds of people that Michael Baignet implies
are deceived and believe in lies. You ask some of the folk involved in reaching out to others in need in this town. They’ll be quite open in telling you that they see their work as a mission that
God has committed to their hands. That because of the Easter story, because they know Christ died for them and was raised
to bring new life, they are motivated to reach others with God’s love.
So,
“What about the Bible?”
There
is such a clear connection between Christian action and biblical belief that surely I don’t have to spell it out. Throughout history and continuing today, the message contained within the Scriptures
is transforming people’s lives. Through encountering the Biblical witness,
the 66 books that have been held as the canon of Scripture for two millennia, people have, are, and will come to faith in
Jesus Christ as one who died for them, was raised for them, and who is sent the Holy Spirit to help them be the sort of people
God wants them to be.
The
Biblical witness has a purpose. It witnesses to Jesus Christ. There is a reason why the books that are in the Bible are the ones that are in there and others that were
around at the time are not in there. The ones that didn’t get in there did not reflect nor generate faith that impacted
the lives of the disciples; they didn’t fit in with what the first apostles taught about Jesus Christ or the beliefs
that founded the earliest Church. They gave a false impression and picture of
God and of Christ and of the work of the Holy Spirit and were rightly rejected.
Don’t
be taken in by the deception of these so called modern theories. Firstly, there
is nothing new about any of them. They’ve been around for a while and they
are not going to go away. Secondly recognize that at the root of them is disbelief
in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Thirdly, recognize that the process
by which the 66 books of the ‘The Bible’ became authentic within the life of the church had nothing to do with
plots or cover-ups, but everything to do with their capacity to generate faith that was in line with that which impacted the
lives of the first apostles of Jesus Christ.
John 20:31 “These things are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the
Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.”
In Jesus name I believe in the witness of those who knew Him best.
To God’s name be the glory.
Amen.
Rev. Adrian J. Pratt
