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Guidance and the Will of God (Pt 1) |
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There are two views among Christians on the subject of guidance. Some people think that God does not guide people today, and some people think He does!
Which view is right?
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The Little Boy and the Large Black Book |
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A little boy noticed a large black book covered with dust lying on a high shelf and he asked his mother about it. Embarrassed, she quickly said, ‘Oh, that's a Bible - that's God's book'. He thought for a moment and then said, ‘Well, Mum, if that's God's book, why don't we give it back to him - nobody here is reading it'.
If the Bible is God's Word, then what should we do?
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What's the Difference between a Monkey ... |
 and You?
(no offence)
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The Adulteress and Her Accusers |
INTRODUCTION
The non-Johannine origin of the Pericope Adulterae is considered a foregone conclusion by most textual critics. This is hardly surprising, considering the external evidence against it:
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The agreement of the most ancient MSS of John’s Gospel in omitting the passage: including P66, P75, Codex Sinaiticus (01), Codex Alexandrinus (A), Codex Vaticanus (B), Codex Ephraemi-Rescriptus (C), Codex Purpureus (N), Codex Borgianus (T) and Codex Washingtonianus (W) - all dating from the 3rd to the 6th centuries.
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The breadth of versional support is against the passage, most manuscripts of the Syriac, Coptic, Gothic, Armenian, Georgian and Slavonic Versions omitting the incident.
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The early Greek Church Fathers who provide commentaries on John omit it, including Origen and Chrysostom.
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The placement of the account in various positions, including at the end of John’s Gospel or at the end of Luke chapter 21 in some manuscripts.
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The marking of the passage as dubious with an asterisk or obelus in many manuscripts which contain it.
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Finally, the disturbed state of the text in the manuscripts that contain it, seen in the fact that various forms of the incident are found in the manuscripts. Von Soden classifies seven different versions of the text amongst the manuscripts.
Most modern treatments of the passage have tended to focus on this external evidence. However, internal evidence is also frequently claimed to be against the Pericope Adulterae and it is with the internal evidence that we shall primarily concern ourselves here. The two commonly-voiced internal arguments against the incident are (1) that its style and vocabulary differ from the rest of John’s Gospel and (2) that it interrupts the flow and themes of John’s Gospel. As we shall see, these arguments are rather dubious.
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One of the consequences of some sorts of modern attempts at evangelism has been the creation of a class of people who have made a decision for Christ but show no further signs of Christian life - their lives resemble those of the non-Christian population. Some use the term ‘Carnal Christians' to refer to these people. The word ‘carnal' means ‘fleshly' - in other words, these Christians live like those ‘in the flesh' (non-Christians) - their lives show little evidence of real Christianity.
However, other Christians deny that there is any such thing as a ‘carnal Christian'. For example, John Macarthur in his book, You Call Me Lord?, refers to ‘so-called carnal Christians' and writes, ‘Paul's words to the Corinthians, "Are you not carnal and walk as men?" (1 Cor. 3:3) were not meant to establish a special class of Christianity' (p97, footnote).
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Introduction
Interpretations of the Song of Solomon are many, but may be broadly divided into two classes: the typical and the literal. The typical approach sees in the Song a picture of Divine love, the basic theme of the Bible. Indeed, the Bible often compares God's love to the most intimate of human loves - that of a man and his bride. In the Old Testament, God's love for Israel is so described in Jeremiah 2:1-3, Ezekiel 16 and 23 and Hosea 1-3, whereas Christ's love for the church is seen in the New Testament using the same metaphor in 2 Cor. 11:2, Ephesians 5:25-32 and Revelation 19:6-8. Further, adultery is often used to picture spiritual departure from God; it is even used allegorically by Solomon in Proverbs 1-9 to picture the path of the person turning away from God's ways. Significantly, the only other love-song in the Bible, Psalm 45, is quoted in the New Testament and applied to the person of Christ1, thus showing that such a typical treatment of love is valid. The interpretation of the Song as allegorical may have ‘often given rise to the most extravagant fancies2, yet this has been by far the most common and oldest tradition in the interpretation of the Song. It was because the Rabbinical schools of Judaism recognised the Song as having a spiritual message that they defended its place in the canon and uttered curses upon those who would treat the Song as secular or sensual literature.
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