If you've ever been in a discussion
in which you and someone else disagree
about what the Bible says,
you've maybe discovered that
there's this handy little trick
you can use
to bring just about any debate to an immediate end.
No matter what point a person is trying to make,
no matter how well they are making it,
you can simply respond by saying,
"Well that's just your interpretation."
I mean, it's easy.
It's effective.
It practically guarantees
that you'll never have to
admit that you're wrong
and the other person's right.
But realize that it comes
at a pretty steep price.
First of all, the second you try and undermine
someone else's position
by referring to it as nothing more than
their interpretation,
you're really also admitting that your position
is nothing more than yours.
But even costlier than that,
if two Christians who disagree about God's word
simply chalk it up to differences in interpretation,
then someone else who is watching and listening
can say,
"See, even you Christians
can't figure out what God's Word really means
and so why would I have any interest
in hearing what it says?"
Does the Bible
require interpretation?
Is it possible to read the Bible
and come to a correct and reliable understanding
of what it really means?
You'd think that in order to answer that question,
we would need to dive
into a study of linguistics and communication
to figure out exactly what words are
and how words work.
Instead, this week
we're going to turn our attention
to an incident that happened
in the Old Testament book
of Genesis.
And as we do,
we'll see that when it comes to
whether or not we can understand the Bible,
the most important questions
that need to be asked aren't questions
about language.
They're actually questions about
God.
Questions like these:
Does God
want to
communicate with us clearly?
Is God
able
to communicate with us clearly?
And if so,
what would God use
that desire and that ability
to communicate with us
to accomplish?
The good news about asking those questions
is that I'm guessing
you maybe already know the answers.
You know the answers because
the events that give us the answers
are events that happened
and were witnessed
and were reported
and were talked about
and were established as true
all over the world,
long before anyone was reading about them
in what we know as the Bible.
Those events are simply these:
That Jesus lived.
That Jesus died on the cross.
And that on the third day,
Jesus rose from the dead.
If those things really happened,
then,
we can know with certainty
that we have a God
who would want to communicate
clearly with us,
who would be able to
communicate clearly with us
and who would do so
so that the salvation that
Jesus paid so dearly for
would be enjoyed
and shared
eternally by us.
In a court of law,
the prosecution tries to establish
three things about the defendant
in order to prove guilt
beyond a reasonable doubt.
Those three things are
means,
motive
and opportunity.
In other words,
did the person have
a reason to commit the crime?
And did they have the ability
to do so?
This week we're talking about
whether or not
the Bible can be read
and understood correctly.
And yesterday
I mentioned that one of the key factors
in answering that question is
determining motive.
Does God have a desire
to communicate with us clearly?
Do you know how far into your Bible
you have to read
in order to get an answer
to that question?
It's just a couple of pages.
When Adam and Eve fell into sin,
God didn't give up on them.
He didn't just flick them off the face of the earth
and start over with two brand new people.
No, instead he planned to send a savior.
And that was a plan that God needed
to communicate to them.
He wanted them to know
and understand his plans
so that they could put their trust in it,
and be saved.
And so that's exactly what happened.
God communicated his promise
to send a savior.
Adam and Eve
put their faith in.
And we're told that they
and their believing children
began to gather
around that promise.
It says,
They gathered together
to communicate to one another
what God had communicated
so clearly to them.
But we also find out that
that promise
was also accompanied by a command.
God had told Adam and Eve,
and later repeated to Noah,
that they were to multiply
and spread out
and fill the whole earth.
And it's easy to see how that
command and that promise
went together.
You see, if
people multiplied and filled the whole earth,
then, yes,
at some point
people would begin to fall away from faith.
But they would never be too far
from the community of faith.
See, God knew that people
would continue to be fooled
by the father of lies.
But his intent
was that they'd not be able to distance themselves
too far
from the children of the promise.
Both in his communication of the promise
and his communication of the command,
God's motive
is crystal clear.
God had not given up on his people.
God still wanted their salvation.
So do you think God's motivation has changed?
If you're anything like me,
you've given God
more than a few reasons
to give up on you,
to maybe just flick you off the face of the earth
and direct his love
and his attention to someone else.
or maybe even just
to give you the silent treatment.
To stop
communicating his good commands
and his loving promises.
And yet the motivation
that we already see from God
on the very first pages of the Bible
is still there
on the very last one
and it's still there today.
God wants you to know
what he has done for your salvation
through His Son Jesus Christ.
He wants you to know
exactly where you stand
with him
and he wants you to cling
to his promises for dear life
so that you cannot be afraid of anything,
not even death.
And if that's God's motivation,
then why in the world
wouldn't we expect him
not only to communicate with us,
but to do so clearly
in a way that we can understand
exactly what he means.
It's hard for us even to imagine
the situation described in
Genesis chapter 11. It says,
So not only did everyone
speak the same language,
but everyone used the same words
for the same things.
There were no dialects.
There was no slang.
There was never a time
when a teenager said something
that made a senior citizen
scratch his head
or vice versa.
In those days,
communication was absolutely perfect.
And as we saw yesterday,
God had used that communication
for his saving purposes.
He had communicated his promise
to send a savior.
He had communicated the command
to multiply and fill the earth.
God wanted all people
to know
and to call on his name
and be saved.
Unfortunately, some of those people
were more interested
in building up a name for themselves
than bringing glory to God's name.
We're told,
So let me ask,
do you think they misunderstood God's command?
Do you think that maybe one day
someone said to his buddy,
"Hey, what do you suppose God meant
when he said,
'Fill the earth?'"
And do you suppose that when that person
responded, "Well,
maybe God wants us to go ahead and fill the earth,"
that first person replied by saying,
"Nah, that can't be it.
That's
just
your
interpretation."
No, God's command was crystal clear.
But even in a world
where there was just one language,
mankind proved
that he could use that language
for his own selfish,
sinful
purposes.
Today we certainly see
no shortage of disagreements
about what God's Word actually says
and means.
Some of those disagreements
are about how we are saved.
Some of those disagreements
are about how we are to live.
And make no mistake:
you can make God's word,
you can make the Bible say
just about anything you want it to say.
You can cherry pick
just the passages
that present your side of the story.
You can ignore
the ones that don't.
You can take a passage out of context
and twist it to say something that it doesn't.
No one is arguing that God's Word
can't be misunderstood.
But when it is,
let's just not pretend it's God's fault.
Rather, it's really that very same symptom
that showed itself in Shinar
rearing its ugly head
once again.
That all too often,
we are more interested
in making a name for ourselves
than we are in bringing glory to God's saving name.
But here's the
beautiful difference between us
and our God.
When we set out to make a name for ourselves,
it's only for selfish reasons.
It's only because we are thinking
of ourselves.
But when God sets out
to bring glory and honor to his name,
it's not for him.
It's not because he needs the pat on the back,
or the boost to his ego.
It's actually for us.
It's for our good.
It's because God wants nothing more than when
we stand before him in judgment,
to plead our case
that we would call on his name
and be saved.
I still remember the first time
I visited a foreign country
and was surrounded by people
who spoke a language
different from my own.
There was this thought
that just kept randomly popping into my head
and I couldn't figure out why.
As I listened to people talk with one another
on a crowded bus
or a busy restaurant,
I just
kept thinking,
"I think they're talking about me."
Sociologists know
why that thought
kept randomly popping into my head.
It's because when you can't
communicate with someone,
it automatically breeds distrust.
When you can't understand someone,
it sort of has a way
of making you naturally suspicious of them.
It's that distrust,
along with the language barrier itself,
that makes it so often so difficult
to cooperate with people
who speak different languages.
Of course, God has known that
from the beginning as well.
Which is why,
on that plain in Shinar,
where there was that group of people
who wanted to build a tower so high
that they would never be scattered
but would always be remembered,
God did what he did.
It says,
So instantly,
two people who had been working together
side-by-side for months
on that Tower,
now not only couldn't understand one another,
they no longer trusted each other.
That's why that tower came to be known
as Babel,
and why the people had no choice
but to do what God originally intended,
to spread out out and scatter
over the face of the whole earth.
Does that strike you as cruel?
You read through the Bible
and you find no shortage of examples
where God intervenes and disrupts
human history.
But when you really think about it,
it's, it's not cruel.
In fact, it's kind.
When we set out to pursue our own
self- glorifying purposes,
it's actually a blessing
that we run into frustration,
and setback
and failure.
In fact, the specific action
that God took at Babel
means that as we set out
on Operation Self-Glorification,
as we so often do,
there's just only going to be
so many people that we can find
who will cooperate with us.
In fact, the ultimate punishment
would be if God did the opposite.
If as we set out to pursue our own aims,
satisfy our own desires,
bring glory to our names,
God would just let us
have it our way,
that we would encounter nothing
but success and good fortune.
So instead, he curbs.
He restrains.
He intervenes.
He lovingly,
even if at times painfully,
shows us that a life
pursuing glory for our own name
is really no life
at all.
He continually closes down the paths
that we pursue
all the while
pointing us to the path
that leads us to him.
And at least in this instance,
he demonstrates
one more important thing
that we're going to be talking about tomorrow.
In pursuit of his saving purposes for us,
God demonstrates that he is in
complete control of language.
Not only does he have the desire
to communicate with us clearly,
as we'll see tomorrow,
he has the complete ability
to do so.
You might be tempted to think
that God hadn't thought this all the way through.
At the tower that came to be known as Babel,
he confused people's languages
and forced them
to scatter over the face of the whole earth.
But now what?
God still wanted people
to know
and call
on his saving name.
But how would he
communicate that name to people?
It seemed as though God had opened Pandora's Box
and any and all hope of communicating with mankind
had gotten out.
Well, centuries later,
God proved otherwise.
The people that had been scattered
at Babel
were regathered in the city of Jerusalem
and the confusion that had been introduced at Babel
was interrupted by clarity.
Jesus' disciples were given the ability
to declare
the saving acts of God
in every language under heaven.
And we're told
that 3,000 people
believed and were baptized.
At Babel,
mankind had demonstrated that
even in a world of just one language,
they could still use that language
for sinful, selfish purposes.
But on the day that we know as Pentecost,
God demonstrated
that even in a world of countless languages,
he can still use those languages
for his saving purposes.
So God has demonstrated
his desire
to communicate with us clearly.
He's demonstrated
his ability to communicate with us clearly.
What's left for us?
Does reading and understanding the bible
require interpretation?
Well, I suppose.
But not in the way people normally mean it.
Instead, most often interpreting the bible
goes something like this.
Imagine that I say to you:
Last night,
I ate ice cream
for dessert.
I'm guessing you know exactly what I mean.
When I say, "I,"
you know that I mean myself
and not the part of my body
that I use to see things.
When I say, "ate,"
you know that I mean the past tense
of the verb "eat,"
and not the number that comes between 7 and 9.
And finally when I say, "dessert,"
you know that I mean something sweet
that comes after a meal,
not a verb that means to abandon or leave behind.
You did all of that interpreting
to understand what I mean,
probably without even thinking of it.
So are there passages in the Bible
that are difficult to understand?
Well, sure.
And are there sections of God's Word
that people of equal intelligence
and equal sincerity
will come to different conclusions about?
Well, sure.
But the vast majority
and the main messages of the Bible
usually sound like this,
Did you hear that?
That's God proving
his desire to communicate with us clearly.
That's God proving
his ability to communicate with us clearly.
That's God continuing to send his Holy Spirit
through his word
to accomplish his ultimate desire,
that those who hear it,
would call on his name
and be saved.
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