CONFUSING GOD’S WORD
WITH MAN’S WORD
HOW SATAN LEADS
PEOPLE ASTRAY
A Study By
Gary Ray Branscome
“No truth of scripture comes from any private
explanation. // We have not written
anything to you,
other than what you read, (2Peter
God is not a fool who is unable to clearly
convey a
thought. On the contrary, the message that He wants us to get from His
Word is so
plainly stated that it needs no interpretation. In making that
statement I am
not denying the fact that many passages seem hard to understand, or
that men
may disagree on what those passages say. What I am saying is that God
means
exactly what He said, nothing more. So what if we do not understand
everything!
Instead of professing ourselves to be wise, and making up explanations,
we need
to pay attention to the things we do understand; knowing this, that
every
doctrine necessary to our salvation is so clearly stated in Scripture
that it
needs no interpretation.
The only meaning that God wants us to place
on His
words is the same meaning you are putting on my words as you read this,
the
plain grammatical meaning of the words. In other words, I am not
writing “anything
to you, other than what you read” (2Cor.
Because every doctrine necessary for our
salvation is
clearly and explicitly stated in Scripture every Christian ought to be
able
agree on what is taught. However, because of the blindness of the human
heart,
that is not the case and it is not likely to be (2Corinthians 4:4,
Jeremiah
17:9). Instead, Satan gets people arguing over all sort of trivial
matters.
Instead of concentrating on what the Bible clearly says, they sift
through the
hard to understand statements looking for words they can make up
explanations
for, words they can interpret to fit their own ideas. And, then they
pit those
man-made explanations against the plain words of Scripture, causing
controversy
after controversy until people who are fed up with controversy look for
some
other authority — looking outside of Scripture for truth while ignoring
what
the Bible plainly says. Therefore, my call is, “Back
to the Bible,” “Back
to the words of the text.” For it is the words of man, not the
words of
God, that are the source of controversy and division.
First of all, much of the misunderstanding that
engenders controversy
stems from the fact that the word, “literal” has changed meaning. When
Martin
Luther, and others living in that period, spoke of the “literal”
meaning of the
words of Scripture, they were talking about the grammatical meaning of
the
words, not some unrealistic surface meaning of the words that denies
any
legitimate figure of speech. Dr. Robert Preus
explains it this way.
The literal sense of Scripture is the
meaning, or
tenor, that the words directly and obviously convey. For instance, in
John 3:16
the literal sense is immediately clear. But there is also a literal
sense to
those passages that are tropical and figurative. Such passages we do
not read
superficially according to the surface tenor of the words, as when
Herod is
called a fox or when we are to cut off a hand that offends us — such an
interpretation would be absurd. In figurative statements of this kind,
not only
the words according to their native sense but also the thing or point (res) that the words express according to their
quondam
imagery must be considered. The literal sense, then, is the sense
intended by
the writer, whatever trope or genre is used. Figures of speech, words,
and even
ideas all have their literal sense. And the literal sense (meaning,
intention)
of a pericope is drawn from all these
ingredients. Glassius makes it quite clear
that the literal sense of a
Scripture passage or pericope is not
necessarily
identical with the surface meaning of the words, but the genre of the
text or
the tropes therein must also be ascertained, when necessary, to
determine the
literal sense of a text. (The Theology of Post-Reformation Lutheranism, Page 321-322).
The literal meaning is the same
meaning that words have in everyday conversation. As I said previously,
it is
the same meaning that you are placing on my words as you read them. It
is the
same meaning that any author intends for you to get from his words,
unless his
aim is to deceive. For that reason, Satan does
all he can to blind people to the plain
meaning of the words, causing them to imagine all sorts of other
meanings. False
prophets then twist those meanings as they attempt to make the Bible
say what
they want it to say. During the middle ages false prophets led the
entire
church into darkness by ignoring the literal meaning of the words while
exalting
allegorical meanings (dreamed up by men) as the highest wisdom.
Nevertheless,
all of the explanations that men have dreamed up are the word of man,
not the
Word of God. And, no truth of Scripture comes from such explanations
(2Peter
One argument that Satan uses to lead people
away from
God’s Word, is the claim that Scripture alone is insufficient, because
it makes
no mention of such important doctrines as the “Doctrine of the
Trinity”. Satan
even sends cult people door to door trying to sell that idea to the
public. Yet
nothing could be further from the truth. While it is true that the
word,
“Trinity” is not found in Scripture, that word is simply the name we
ascribe to
a body of doctrinal truths that are each clearly and explicitly stated
in
Scripture. For example.
1- The words, “Don’t we all have one father?
Hasn’t
one God created us,” give us the doctrine that the Father
is God (Malachi
2- The words,
“We are in the one who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true
God,
and eternal life,” give us the doctrine that the Son is God
(1John
3- The words, “Why has Satan filled
your heart to lie to the Holy Ghost… you have not lied to men, but to
God,” give
us the doctrine that the Holy Ghost is
God (Acts 5:3-4).
4- And, the words, “There is one God;
and there is none other but he,” give us the doctrine that there
is only one God (Mark
In stating those four doctrines I in
no way want to imply that the passages I quoted are the only passages
of
Scripture that teach those doctrines. Nor do I wish to imply that those
four
doctrines are all there is to the doctrine of the Trinity. There is far
more.
Nevertheless, those four doctrines constitute the heart and core of the
doctrine
of the Trinity. And, the point I want to make is that each of them is
clearly
and explicitly stated in Scripture.
I also want to call attention to the
fact that those doctrinal truths are not all found in one place, but
are
scattered through Scripture “here a little and there a little”. For it
is
written, “To whom can he teach knowledge? and
who will
he enable to understand doctrine?… for truth must be upon truth, truth
upon
truth; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a
little,”
(Isaiah 28:9-10).
Why did God scatter the doctrinal
truths through Scripture that way? So that those who “would not hear…
might go,
and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and taken” (Isaiah
28:12-13).
And, that is exactly what has happened to all of the cults that have
rejected
the doctrine of the Trinity.
Another
line of deception that Satan uses over and over again in leading people
away
from the literal truth of God’s Word, is the question, “Surely you
don’t
believe that the Book of Revelation
is to be taken literally? Do you?” The people who repeat that question
generally assume that it would be foolish for anyone to take the Book of Revelation literally. However,
they are failing to make an important distinction, and that brings me
to the second point that I want to
make. In understanding God’s Word, it is important to distinguish
between the
meaning of the words, and the meaning of dreams and visions described
by those
words.
For
example: Genesis 41:1-7 describes a dream in which Pharaoh saw seven
thin cows
eat seven fat cows. There is nothing figurative about the words of the
text.
Those words give us a straightforward literal description of what
Pharaoh saw
in his dream. However, that does not mean that the dream itself is a
literal
description of the events which were to take place. On the contrary,
the dream
was highly figurative as Joseph’s interpretation revealed.
The same
holds true when it comes to interpreting the dream or vision described
in the Book of Revelation. For example: in Revelation
13:1 we read, “And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast
rise up
out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns
ten
crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.” In reading those
words, the
first thing that I want to call to your attention is that there is
nothing
figurative about the words of the text. On the contrary, those words
give us a
straightforward literal description of something John saw in his dream
or
vision. However, that does not mean that what John saw is to be
interpreted
“literally,” or that he was seeing future historical events. On the
contrary,
the Bible itself tells us that John’s dream or vision was highly
figurative
when it tells us that the seven heads of the beast, “are seven
mountains,” (Revelation
17:9). For that reason, when someone makes up an explanation, saying
that the
beast John described is really a man, and the antichrist, that is not
an
interpretation of the words, but an interpretation of the dream. And,
as such
is just something someone made up, not something the Bible says. The
text says
no such thing! Yet we have people who are so mixed up that they claim
to be
interpreting the Bible literally when they make up such stories. That
is why we
need to stick to the words of the text. Any explanation of John’s dream
or
vision that is not plainly stated in the text is the figment of someone’s
imagination. Therefore, I stress again that it is
important to distinguish between interpreting the words of the text,
and interpreting dreams or visions described in the text. When it comes
to
interpreting dreams, unless the Bible explicitly gives us the
explanation – as
it did in the case of Pharaoh’s dream (Genesis 41:25-27) – any
explanation that
men come up with is the word of man, not the Word of God. And, because
such
explanations are the word of man, they should never be taught as
doctrine (2Peter
That brings us to the third point that
I want to make.
In order to faithfully teach what the Bible says, we must distinguish
between what
the words actually say, and man-made stories or explanations invented
to
support a particular idea or interpretation.
Jesus condemned one such man-made explanation
when He
said, “Moses said, Honor your father and mother; and, Anyone who curses
his
father or mother, let him be put to death: But you say, If
a man will
say to his father or mother, It is Corban,
that is a
gift, by which you might profit by me; he shall be free. And you no
longer
allow him to do anything for his father or his mother; Making the word
of God
of no effect through your tradition,” (Mark 7:9-13).
I want to call your attention to the
fact that the Pharisees, to whom Jesus was speaking, had replaced the
sound doctrine
stated in Scripture with made-up explanations [fables] aimed at getting
around what
God said (2Timothy 4:3-4). And, we have evidently not learned a thing
from what
Jesus said, because modern-day Christians do the same thing. For
example:
If the words, “I buffet my body, and
bring it under my control: lest there be any way that I, after having
preached
to others, might be castaway,” upset them, they simply explain those
words away,
(1Corinthians
Another example is the claim that the
words “Come up here,” in Revelation 4:1 are calling believers from the
grave.
There is absolutely nothing in the text to support such a claim. Those
words
are addressed to John alone! That story has been invented to get around
Christ’s own words which tell us that His “kingdom is not of this
world,” and
that He will raise up believers “on the
last day” (John
18:36, John 6:39-44).
A third example is the so-called
“Gap Theory”. Those
who hold that view claim that the words of Genesis 1:2, “And the earth
was
without form, and empty,” should be translated, “And the earth became
without
form, and empty”. Now, any discussion about whether the Hebrew word hayah should be
translated “was” or “became” has to do with the meaning of the text.
However,
when gap-theorists make up a story about a long period of time
transpiring
while “the earth became without form,” or a story about Satan and his
angels
living on the earth and even fighting wars during that time, that is
just a
man-made story. A story that has been invented to get around what the
Bible
says about the age of the earth. Moreover, because it is just a man
made story,
those who pass it off as God’s Word are
adding that
story to God’s Word. And, because God has told us not to add to His
Word we
know that story is not from God. It either comes from the flesh or the
devil,
or both, but not from God. Furthermore, because it is religious
fiction, it is
not substantially different from the religious fiction contained in the
Koran
or the Book of Mormon. It is just the figment
of someone’s imagination,
and as such should hold for us about as much credibility as the story
of Snow
White and the Seven Dwarfs. That holds true for all of the other
stories
invented to get around what the Bible says about the age of the earth.
Of such
made-up stories Dr. John Theodore Mueller had this to say:
In
whatever matter
Holy Scripture has definitely spoken the Christian theologian must
suppress his
own views, opinions, and speculations and adhere unwaveringly to the
divine
truths revealed in Holy Scripture. In no case is he permitted to inject
into
the body of divine truth his own figments
and fabrications, and at no
time must he allow his reason the prerogative of doubt, criticism, or
denial,
but every thought must everywhere be brought into captivity to the
obedience of
Christ, 2Corinthians 10:5. 2
Conclusion
How on earth
can we expect unbelievers to take the Word of God seriously if
Christians do
not take it seriously? When God tells us
that he created all things “in six days,” shouldn’t we take those words
seriously instead of trying to get around them? (Exodus 10:11). When
Jesus
says, “My kingdom is not of this world,” shouldn’t we take His words
seriously
instead of trying to get around them? (John 18:36) When Jesus tells us
that He
will raise up believers “on the last day”
shouldn’t we
take His words seriously instead of trying to get around them? (John
6:39-44) Whenever
the Bible says something, shouldn’t we take it seriously instead of
trying to
get around what is said? Christians need to stop trying to get around
God’s
Word and come, “Back to the Bible,” “Back to the words of the text.”
References
Preus,
Robert 1970. The
Theology of Post-Reformation Lutheranism. (Page 321-322) Concordia Publishing House,
Mueller,
J. T. (1934) 1955 Christian
Dogmatics. (Page 39) Concordia
Publishing House,