Author Archives: Steve Long

God’s Word

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2 Tim 3:16
All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness;

2 Pet 1:21
for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.

2 Sam 23:2
The Spirit of the LORD spoke by me, and His word was on my tongue.

Act 1:16
Brethren, the Scripture had to be fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit foretold by the mouth of David concerning Judas, who became a guide to those who arrested Jesus.

Act 3:18
But the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ would suffer, He has thus fulfilled.

Act 28:25
And when they did not agree with one another, they began leaving after Paul had spoken one parting word, “The Holy Spirit rightly spoke through Isaiah the prophet to your fathers,

These and other passages in the Bible make it very clear that the prophets, and indeed ALL of Scripture, is God’s Message, not just a “God approved” message from men. Today we see a movie or read a fictional book that is “inspired by a true story.” Someone gets an idea, or is “inspired” by something or someone, and develops the idea into something bigger. That is not the case with Scripture. God did not just ignite the spark of an idea and men ran with it, He provided the entire Message.

What I’m not so sure about, is whether God chose the specific words and sentence structure in the original language (divinely written–all the writer did was move the pen), or whether He gave the writer the liberty to choose how to phrase it (divinely inspired–the writer put God’s Message in his own words).

Homosexuality

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I’ve been thinking a little more about the distinction between “homosexual identity” and “homosexual activity.” I’m confident that the latter is wrong, and trying to figure out what the correct response should be to the former. However, I think it’s a mistake to try to shape my beliefs about identity solely based upon my beliefs about activity; that strikes me as a backwards approach. Our identity in Christ is not defined by a list of do’s and dont’s; rather, the commands that God gives to us are a result of our identity.

So, I don’t want to reach the conclusion that homosexual activity is wrong simply because the Bible condemns it. I would like to first ascertain what God’s intention is for our sexual identity, and then see what that tells us about proper sexual activity.

The Bible tells us right from the beginning that God created humans as either male or female (Gen 1:27), and it was intended that they be united as one (Gen 2:24). Jesus confirms this in Matt 19:4-5 and Mark 10:6-8, and Paul repeats it in Eph 5:31. Both Paul and Peter give instructions for proper husband and wife relationships on numerous occasions (I Cor. 7, I Cor 11, Eph 5, I Tim 2, I Pet 3, etc.). We also see marriage touched on in Proverbs and Song of Solomon; and through the prophets, some of Jesus’ parables, Revelation, etc., we see the symbolism that marriage gives us of our relationship to Christ.

Based on what I see in the Bible, it seems pretty clear to me that God has distinct roles for men and women, and intends for our sexual identity to be heterosexual in nature, and for marriage to be between a man and a woman. To behave otherwise distorts the proper view of ourselves, each other, and God. Hence, the verses that condemn homosexual activity are consistent with the sexual identity the God intended for us.

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Old Bible People

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How is it possible that people in Genesis lived 900+ years?

I do not necessarily see the need to prove the Bible scientifically, but I do belief that the Bible is accurate. Therefore, I believe that Adam, Noah, Methuselah, etc., really did live 900+ years. Whether or not there was some sort of water canopy or not, I don’t know, but it does appear that the reduction in life span started happening following the Flood, so the most likely explanation in my mind is that there was some sort of change that happened as a result of the flood.

If you follow the genealogies listed in Genesis 5, the Flood takes place 1656 years after Adam’s creation. There are 9 generations between Adam and Noah. Noah was 600 when the Flood began, so those 9 generations are spaced across approximately 1000 years.

After the Flood, there are another 9 generations from Shem to Abram. Using the ages listed in Genesis 11, these 9 generations span 450 years. Looking at the total lifespan of all these individuals, it’s relatively flat until Noah (although Lamech died a bit “young”), and then it starts a steep decline (see attached image; note: I left out Enoch since he didn’t actually die). It seems reasonable to me that the Flood during Noah’s time played a role in shortening the lifespans. If the shortened lifespans were due to the fall of man back in Eden, or the absence of the Tree of Life fruit, you should see a steady decline. It should also be noted that the scale of the curve may be deceiving. I show all the generations equally spaced, but in reality the “flat part” from Adam to Noah spans a time period more than twice as long as the “decline” from Noah to Terah. If I scaled the x-axis according to time, the drop-off would appear even more distinct.

On a side note…

Noah was 500 years old when he became father of Shem, Ham and Japeth (Genesis
5:32) – all in one year? Shem was 100 when he fathered Arphaxad (Genesis 11:10).

Genesis 11:10 also reveals that Arphaxad was born 2 years after the flood. Since the flood started with Noah was 600 years old, Arphaxad was born when Noah was 602 years old and Shem was 100 years old. That means Noah was 502 when Shem was born. Genesis 5:32 most likely means Noah was 500 years old when he became a father. Since Ham is referred to as the youngest in Genesis 9:24, and Shem was born when Noah was 502, the son he had when he was 500 must have been Japheth. The confusing thing is that some translations refer to Shem as the “older brother of Japheth” in Genesis 10:21, whereas other translations refer to Shem as the brother of “Japheth the elder.” While Japheth, Shem, Ham seems like the most likely birth order to me, that’s a topic for another thread.

This doesn’t have anything to do with WHY people lived a long time or what happened to change that, but here’s another interesting look at the various lifespans. Shem was still alive for another 150 years after Abram was born. I don’t have Isaac on the chart, but Abraham had Isaac when he was 100, so Shem was still around for another 50 years after Isaac was born. I don’t know if they lived in the same area or not, but it’s possible that Isaac knew his great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather. Shem could have even been at Isaac and Rebekah’s wedding (Isaac was 40 when they got married), but he missed Jacob and Esau by 10 years (Isaac was 60 when they were born).

Divorce

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I think the strongest case against divorce is to look at what marriage symbolizes. God uses imagery to help us understand our relationship with Him. We relate to Him as children to a parent or as servants to a master. We understand these relationships because we experience them every day on earth. There is no greater image of our relationship with God than that of a husband and wife. Of all the parallels that are drawn in scripture, this is the one that gets the most attention and the one that comes the closest to reflecting what our relationship with God was designed to be.

God says He will never leave us or forsake us, and scripture is filled with His continual pursuit of His chosen people (despite their desertion and unfaithfulness). For a husband or wife to divorce their spouse, flies in the face of all that marriage is supposed to signify.

I find it interesting that Matthew, Mark, and Luke all record the occasion when the Pharisees questioned Jesus about divorce, but Matthew is the only one who mentions the exception for maritial unfaithfulness. Clearly, while Jesus made this allowance, the thing that really stuck out was His emphatic insistence that husbands and wives should never separate (“what God has joined together, let man not separate”).

When it comes to “what’s done is done, can I get remarried?” I think there are a couple of slippery slopes to be avoided. One is the idea that as long as the other party gets remarried, and therefore “becomes unfaithful,” you are therefore free. This would open the door to marry and divorce willy-nilly provided you always make sure your ex gets remarried first. It also places a great deal of importance on timing; ie., who was unfaithful first. It essentially means two people can take the exact same actions, but one of them is guilty of adultery and the other gets off scot free. This clearly is not what God had in mind. I think the allowance for divorce in the case of marital unfaithfulness is restricted to when it occurs in the context of the marital relationship. I don’t think it is a “way out” for two people who have severed their relationship, regardless of whether they are technically (either legally or in God’s eyes) still married or not.

I also think the “lust = adultery = just cause for divorce” concept is a slippery slope. When Jesus said in Matthew 5:28 that lust is equivalent to committing adultery, the word for adultery is moicheuo?. In Matthew 5:32 and 19:9, the word for unfaithfulness or fornication is porneia. Even without looking at the Greek words, I would have a problem with this concept because it again opens up a huge “loophole” to allow unhappy people to get out of their marriage, and I don’t believe that’s what God had in mind.

Does that mean someone who made a mistake and married the wrong person, or made a mistake and got divorced when they should have stayed married is doomed to suffer the consequences for the rest of their life? Well, at the risk of sounding harsh, I definitely think it’s a viewpoint that should be considered. Nowhere does God promise to remove the consequences of our own sin, or even the sin of others. He is more concerned with our holiness than He is with our happiness. The truth of the matter is, we are most likely to be happy when we are holy.

Here are links to scriptures that talk about divorce and scholarly articles on the subject:

Nave’s Topical Bible

Torrey’s Topical Handbook

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: Divorce in the OT

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia: Divorce in the NT

Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary

Chick Tracts

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I like the idea of putting Bible doctrine and gospel messages in comic book style tracts. I haven’t read all of the Chick tracts, but I assume there are some that I could give to someone without any qualms. However, there are also some that I would never give to anyone. “Angels?” (about Christian rock) and “The Attack” (about the KJV Bible) are two that are utterly ridiculous.

All (or at least a lot) of the tracts can be read at www.chick.com. I looked at one about Mormonism, and all the claims are footnoted. Anyone who cares to investigate the claims can go to the LDS sources to see if they are taken out of context or come from legitimate LDS authorities or just random LDS adherants.

Let’s look at a couple specifics of The Attack.

He calls the Alexandrian Manuscripts “satanic.” You can argue that they aren’t as accurate, but to call them “satanic” is ridiculous. He says the Alexandrian Manuscripts “down-play the diety of Christ, the virgin birth, salvation by grace through faith, etc.” This is a bogus claim. The only way to support this claim is by taking isolated verses and comparing them to the KJV, with the assumption that if it doesn’t match the KJV it’s corrupted. This is circular reasoning. Every translation of the Bible I have seen affirms the diety of Christ, the virgin birth, salvation by grace through faith, etc.

He claims that the NASB “denies the virgin birth” by changing Luke 2:33. First off, the NASB doesn’t “change” anything. They simply translated the Greek word “pate?r.” If you want to argue that the word was changed in the version of the Greek manuscript they used, fine, but don’t blame the NASB translators for the change. It’s also false to say the NASB denies the virgin birth. If they were going to do that, they would also have changed Isaiah 7:14 (“a virgin will be with child and bear a son”), Matthew 1:18 (“before they came together she was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit”), Matthew 1:23 (“the virgin shall be with child and shall bear a son”), Matthew 1:25 (“but kept her a virgin until she gave birth to a Son”), and others. If you want to be picky about calling Joseph Jesus’ father, let’s see what the KJV has in Luke 2:48. Mary says to Jesus, “thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.” Mind you, this is the KJV, and Mary obviously knows that Jesus is not Joseph’s biological son, and yet she calls Joseph his “father.”

He goes on to accuse other Bible versions of being “corrupted” and “tampering” with Scripture for leaving out the Comma Johanneum in 1 John 5:7. He doesn’t bother to tell you that of the 8 Greek manuscripts that have these words, it was written in the margin by a later hand on four of them. That doesn’t speak well to it’s authenticity. (http://www.bible-researcher.com/comma.html)

Now that I think about it, his willingness to twist the truth and spread misinformation would cause me to have some qualms about handing out even some of the tracts that have only good content. I wouldn’t want someone to think that Chick Publications was a trusted authority on Biblical issues and be misled by some of their outlandish teachings.

I don’t mind someone defending the KJV as the “best” translation, but when they attack any other translation as satanic, they go overboard and lose their credibility.