*Hold Tightly to Revelation

The Bible is not against what we might call scholarship or intellectual pursuit. From all that history can tell us, the apostle Paul may have been one of the most intellectual men who have ever lived. II Peter 3:15-16 warns believers that Paul's epistles contain instruction so hard to understand that false teachers can easily twist them to say wrong and harmful things. Members of the church, made up of the weak of the world (I Corinthians 1:26-29), can be especially gullible when it comes to intellectualism, and some stumble.

Even so, Scripture displays no animosity toward the use of the intellect, nor is it against rational arguments and dispassionate reasoning. When used properly, these things are good. God Himself gave us these skills, and we must use these tools to understand God's way of life. In fact, He wants us to use them in our ongoing pursuit of the truth of God. The true teachings of God that we understand and believe have all undergone deep scrutiny by these means and methods—scholarship, rational arguments, and dispassionate reasoning—and they pass muster on all counts. The doctrines that we in the churches of God agree on are sound and biblically based.

While not condemned by any means, human reason, scholarship, logic, and abundant research must take a back seat to two important elements, both of which are given directly by God: divine revelation and the Holy Spirit. These two pieces must be present before the rest of the puzzle will fall into place. Revelation is God's gift to us of His truth through His Word, and the Holy Spirit must be used to understand it properly. Once we have this initial understanding, we can apply scholarship, rational arguments, and dispassionate reasoning to glean further understanding. The important thing is that divine revelation and God's Spirit must come first.

We tend to forget about divine revelation because it is right in our Bibles, right under our noses, and we take it for granted. Of course, we study it frequently, but we rarely think about how the words and the truths they form got there in the first place. They are there because God revealed them, they were recorded by willing minds, and transmitted down through the centuries, guided and protected by God Himself. That is an awesome thing to consider.

We need to be careful to understand that the revelation we interact with in our Bibles is not direct revelation, as experienced by the apostles and prophets in visions, dreams, and the actual appearance by angels or even God Himself from time to time (Hebrews 1:1). Direct revelation is exceedingly rare. What we have in reading God's Word can be called "general revelation." It is what is available to everyone generally.

Scripture contains all that we need to know about our salvation, about God's Plan, and about our parts in it. If it is not in the Book, we can be sure that whatever it may be is not necessary for us to know in terms of salvation. If a fact does not appear in Scripture, it probably does not have much bearing on our calling and our future in the Kingdom of God. Extra-biblical knowledge may be occasionally helpful, and it may even add depth to our understanding. However, when it comes to a conclusion about whether something is spiritually true or not, the words of the Bible itself must be the final arbiter short of a direct appearance from God.

Another way of putting it is that general revelation—what is contained in God's Word—trumps every other source of information available—even church of God publications. Many people have taken Herbert W. Armstrong's booklets and made them into the equivalent of the Epistles of Herbert, metaphorically stapling them at the backs of their Bibles. We should understand that, though inspired by God's Spirit, his writings are not Scripture (see Isaiah 8:16; the canon of Scripture was finished with the death of Christ's disciples, the original twelve apostles). While his works contain quotations from Scripture, they also contain a great deal of material that was simply his explanations of various topics. They should be accorded respect but not veneration.

The only real source of divine revelation that we have access to, then, is the Bible. Certainly, it is more conclusive a source than any Bible resource help, such as concordances, lexicons, commentaries, and Bible dictionaries. Those books can be helpful, adding information and perspective, but they are not the final word on a given topic or doctrine. That is the Bible's job.

In the same way, the Bible is more authoritative than Jewish sources like the Talmud, the Mishna, the Targums, or any Jewish tradition. It is far more trustworthy than any opinion from a sage, rabbi, priest, or historian. The Bible is simply the last word on any matter of true Christian doctrine or practice.

The Bible itself claims this position. Jesus, for instance, in John 17:17, while praying to His Father just before His arrest, says plainly, "Sanctify them [His disciples, including us] by Your truth. Your word is truth." In reality, we need to look no further for the truth—those truths that have to do with our salvation and future in the Kingdom are in God's Word. Our Savior said so.

In II Timothy 3:14-17, Paul instructs the younger Timothy on what is to be the basis for his ministry and preaching:

But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.

Timothy had learned the truth from Paul, who had learned them from Christ. There was a direct line of descent of truth from the Source. That same truth has been preserved and made available to us in our Bibles. In a larger respect, Paul tells us that the Bible—the instruction that we have received from the prophets, apostles, and Jesus Christ Himself—is all that we need to equip us completely for the Kingdom of God.

So, beyond learning and applying these things, what is our responsibility to the revelation given to us? In II Thessalonians 2:13-15, Paul answers this question:

God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth . . . for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold the traditions which you were taught, whether by word or our epistle.

The apostle warns that difficult times are coming, times of apostasy, so we must hang on to the revealed truths we have been taught, including the godly traditions we have learned. The revelation of God is precious and should not be sold for a bowl of soup. Do not let cunning arguments or even rational discussions, which may be completely bogus, take us off track. Stick to the pure words of the Book.

"Potential Persons" and "After-birth Abortions"

The latest abomination to come down the medical-ethics pike is the February 23, 2012, publication of “After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?” in the Journal of Medical Ethics. This article is written by two ethicists, Alberto Guibilini and Francesca Minerva, both of whom are now working in Melbourne, Australia—he, at Monash University, and she, at the University of Melbourne. Both have ties to Oxford University in Great Britain.

The abstract of their article runs as follows:

Abortion is largely accepted even for reasons that do not have anything to do with the fetus’ health. By showing that (1) both fetuses and newborns do not have the same moral status as actual persons, (2) the fact that both are potential persons is morally irrelevant and (3) adoption is not always in the best interest of actual people, the authors argue that what we call ‘after-birth abortion’ (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled.

Yes, they actually wrote that in a scholarly, peer-reviewed journal. These two ethicists—who do not deserve the title—advocate infanticide on the same level that abortion is “largely accepted.” They generally conclude that the same arguments that can be marshaled in support of killing a fetus in the womb can be applied just as well to killing a child who has recently left the womb. Without apology, they argue that since, in their way of thinking, fetuses and newborns are only “potential people” and not actual ones, “the interests of actual people (parents, family, society) to pursue their own well-being” override any rights the fetuses and newborns allegedly have.

They go on to say that adoption is not a valid alternative to infanticide because “the interests of the actual people involved matter.” Thus, for example, since the birthmother may suffer “serious psychological problems due to the inability to elaborate [her] loss and to cope with [her] grief” in giving her baby up, her interest trumps the newborn’s right to life. Does that make any sense at all? To them, it does because they do not believe that the newborn is a person capable of having interests. In their minds, the newborn is sub-human, to borrow a term from eugenics, for in calling them “potential persons,” they are assigning them not-quite-human status.

We might think that their logic is horribly convoluted, but it is actually quite “sound” in the sense that they are not guilty of employing any readily apparent logical tricks. They are simply following accepted definitions and practices to their “logical” conclusions. What is wrong—indeed, terribly evil—are the foundation and suppositions of their philosophy. Since the original beliefs and assumptions are false, all of their subsequent conclusions take them further from the truth, though they may be ably reasoned using the accepted rules of argument.

As Jesus Christ admonishes us in Matthew 7:24-27—His parable of building on the rock—our beliefs must be solidly built on a true and immovable foundation. The thinking of Guibilini and Minerva is akin to the “foolish man who built his house on the sand: and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall” (Matthew 7:26-27). In this case, the house is liberal Western society, and under beliefs like “after-birth abortion,” it will come crashing down in utter ruin.

A reading of the article brings out that the authors ignore the foundational question of the sanctity of life. They make no argument regarding the salient question, “When does life begin?” It is apparent that they have already resolved and accepted the position that embryos, fetuses, and newborns do not have a right to continued life unless “actual persons” grant it to them. “God is in none of [their] thoughts” (Psalm 10:4). Having rejected God’s very existence, and thus His revealed instructions for abundant living, they have set themselves—human beings—up as the highest authority, arbiters of life and death. With such power, they can decide by their own values and reasoning processes how and when any biological entity becomes a person deserving of a future existence.

What a brave new world men and women have created for themselves in their desire to live without God!

The sixth commandment, “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13), covers this transgression quite adequately once we accept that the newborn child is certainly a living human being—and has been for many months. While the Bible contains no direct statement that life begins at conception, many passages show that God is involved in people’s lives before they are born (see Psalm 139:13-16; 51:5; Isaiah 49:5; Jeremiah 1:4-5) and that the fetus is aware and responsive to God (Luke 1:41, 44). God even commands life for life if a fetus is miscarried after a fight (Exodus 21:22-24). The weight of biblical evidence falls on the side of life and full humanity for fetuses and newborns.

Actually, this brave new world of abortion and infanticide on demand is simply the modern equivalent of ancient pagan practices like the abhorrent idolatry of the Canaanites in Old Testament times. Pagans would sacrifice their children to their gods to “ensure” that the living would have better lives. They would make a child “pass through the fire to Molech” (an act obviously forbidden by God; Leviticus 18:21) to supplicate the god to give them fertile fields, victory in battle, or some other blessing. Ironically, these ancient people held the life of a child as more dear than today’s uber-selfish individuals do, as the latter most often abort babies merely for their own convenience.

Concerning this horrible sin, God says of the people of Judah in Jeremiah 32:35, “And they built the high places of Baal which are in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire to Molech, which I did not command them, nor did it come into My mind that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.” As punishment, Jerusalem was “delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence” (Jeremiah 32:36). When such practices become commonplace, the society is ripe for destruction, as God intimates in Genesis 15:16 and Leviticus 18:24-29; 20:22-23.

There is nothing ethical about “potential persons” and “after-birth abortion.” They are the products of the twisted thinking of human beings tuned in to the broadcasts of a hateful Satan the Devil (Ephesians 2:2-3). He wants to destroy human life. Hundreds of millions of abortions are not enough to sate his appetite, so he has deceived people into taking the next step toward annihilation, infanticide. Could there be any better reason to increase our prayers to God to send His Son soon?