Examining "A More Christlike Word"
by Brad Jersak
“For if someone comes and proclaims another Jesus than the one we proclaimed, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or if you accept a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it readily enough.” (Paul’s concern from 2 Corinthians 11:4)
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The False Filter |
The Biblical Filter |
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The word OR the Word |
The Word THROUGH the word |
BJ’s
Claim: “What I’m talking about is framing the Scriptures within the
gospel” (p. 96).
Monte’s
Reply: False. There is only way we can know what the gospel is: by reading
and hearing the way it is revealed in the Scriptures. The Scriptures are the
source, the gospel is the message. BJ has tried to put his “different gospel”
in authority over the Scriptures so he can change anything he doesn’t like. But
it is the Scriptures that are the authority on what the gospel of the kingdom
means.
BJ’s
Claim: “I’m sure you know Jesus’s parable of the prodigal son(s)9
– and that’s his gospel in a nutshell” (p. 96).
Monte’s
Reply: I’m only flagging this because it is incomplete. I do not believe
the parable of the prodigal sons is the gospel in a nutshell. It is a facet of
the gospel, but not the whole thing. Because we already know that BJ has tried
and failed to prove that Jesus was not punished (penal) as the substitute
(substitutionary) sacrifice for our sins (atonement), and that his view of the
gospel is outside the Scriptures rather than in them, I simply put up a warning
sign on this part of the trail. It is like someone noticing that there are too
many ingredients missing from a recipe to expect it to work, but the addition
of arsenic does suggest it could be deadly no matter how it tastes.
BJ’s
Claim: “If all Scripture is meant to be read in the context of the gospel,
and since the gospel is summarized so beautifully in that parable, why not try
the following experiment?” (p. 96).
Monte’s
Reply: It is weird thinking of the author using the imagery of an
experiment when he is presenting a sentence where the two components of the
equation are already WRONG! NO, Scripture is not read in the context of the
gospel, it is read in the context of the authority of God to speak to his
people. The gospel is learned from the authority of the Scriptures to tell us
what God himself breathed out in his own words through men carried along by the
Holy Spirit of Yahweh!
And,
NO, the gospel itself is not summarized so beautifully in that parable (knowing
what BJ is twisting about the gospel, that is), but the part of the gospel that shows
how God rejoices in sinners when they repent is beautifully portrayed in all
three of those parables. So, because BJ’s equation is wrong, and the elements
are in reverse order, I will watch the experiment from a distance (through
protective glass) so I’m not part of the explosion. Or would it be implosion?
BJ’s
Claim: Summary: to imagine that the whole Bible is portrayed in the parable
of the prodigal sons.
Monte’s
Reply: (First response) Nope. No one’s imagination is an authority. And, since “The heart is
deceitful above all things, and desperately sick;” instead of boasting in
having an imagination that can add that much to a parable, we ought to say, “who
can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9).
(Thinkin'-about-it response) I'm adding this note because I realize there's a bit of a "depends" to this claim. Are the three parables of finding lost things a beautiful picture of the gospel? Yes. Does the third parable of the lost sons have a distinctive beauty for all the relational details it adds? Yes.
Is it a nutshell summary of the whole gospel? Well, that depends. Are we talking BJ's "different gospel" that originates in false preconditions, tells Scripture what needs to be changed about God's breathed-out words, and erases "In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins"? Then absolutely not.
Or are we talking about the true gospel that connects God's plans from eternity to have a people in the image and likeness of his Son, a plan that included how "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, 'Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree'” (Galatians 3:13), and that "For our sake he (God) made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (II Corinthians 5:21)? Then the parable of the lost sons does give us a picture of the relational dynamic involved in bringing sinners home to this plan.
The reason I am being cautious about this is simple: parables can NOT be turned into full orchestrations of a whole symphony. Each parable is likely not even a full “movement” in the symphony’s journey. Each parable says something about the kingdom, but none of them tell the whole gospel of the kingdom in a nutshell. Each one is like a facet of a diamond (the gospel) that gives us a distinct glimpse into the wonders of what God has done through the gospel, and if we have the whole diamond in mind when we are looking at that facet, it does seem like we are seeing one beautiful nutshell-summary after another. But ONLY if we ourselves already have the full gospel in mind. If we have in mind a "different gospel" with a "different spirit" and "another Jesus" than the one made known to us in the Scriptures, then we don't have a nutshell of the gospel at all, but someone who is just... well... NUTS (paraphrase for "foolish" in the Bible)!
To show that parables are designed to communicate a facet of the gospel and not the whole thing, let's look at what Luke says at the beginning of the three parables in Luke 15. Remember that all three parables tell us how God responds to sinners who repent. So why is Jesus making this focus at this time? Matthew writes this, “Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, ‘This man receives sinners and eats with them.’”
How
does Jesus respond to this familiar grumbling? “So he told them this parable…” (Luke
15:1-3).
This chapter flows from the first parable of a shepherd finding his lost sheep, to the woman finding her lost coin, to the father finding his lost sons. In each case, Jesus is responding to the criticism that he “receives sinners and eats with them”. In other words, he is making the religious elite think about what they were seeing. He used parables they could easily relate to. They could imagine how a shepherd would feel finding his lost sheep. A woman finding a lost coin worth 10% of her savings might be more relatable to them since they kind of had a love affair with money. And the very personal nature of a lost son coming home (they probably missed the point of the older brother) would give them a third illustration of the excitement a Father feels when his sinful child comes home. Yes, that is all a beautiful picture of one facet of the gospel. It's just not the whole gospel!
The whole point of these three beautiful parables is to answer the religious hypocrites about why he was so welcoming of sinners: because, when sinners repent and come home, there is more rejoicing in heaven, before the angels of God, by the Father, than over the righteous ones who have never known what it means to be home. And the religious elite would NEVER have imagined THEIR God REJOICING over sinners the way they saw Jesus welcoming them into his kingdom!
I’m
not going to respond to the details of BJ’s imagination that the parable of the
lost sons is the whole gospel. I know he doesn’t know the whole gospel. I know
his “different gospel” is (in his mind) in authority over the Scriptures, so I
simply point out that he has once again used imagination instead of revelation,
and I already do not like what he has imagined to help him twist the Scriptures
and peddle his “different gospel” for profit. I will see how he gets going in
the next chapter to see how this ties in with his poison-in-the-pudding
approach. In the meantime, here is a video message from Dr. Peter Williams that
speaks of Jesus as a Genius in the telling of his parables, including both the
smallest one in a single sentence, and the longest one in the parable of the
lost son. It will help to show what these parables communicate about the
Scriptures.[1]
Chapter 6: Gospel, Inspiration, and Translation (p. 99).
BJ’s
Claim: Using a quote from John Behr, BJ now states what I am already
challenging, “the link joining Scripture and the gospel points from the gospel
story to the Scripture and not from the Scripture to the gospel story” (p. 99).
Monte’s Reply: False. The truth is we only know the gospel story from the authoritative Scriptures. While the early church had people who heard the gospel from Jesus and from his apostles, the only way anyone knows the gospel now is through the Scriptures. Any gospel outside of the Scriptures is "a different gospel"!
BJ’s
Claim: Regarding “the first Christian interpreters,” he claims, “Before
trying to translate the Bible, they established in their hearts the gospel
revelation they had received through Jesus Christ and his apostles” (p. 99).
Monte’s
Reply: I am not downplaying that, once we know the gospel, we realize the
whole Bible is about God’s plan to have a people in his own image and likeness.
However, it would have been impossible for the “first Christian interpreters”
to begin with the gospel to understand the Scriptures because they already had
the Scriptures presenting the gospel! When Jesus explained what he was doing,
he went to the Scriptures first, showed what was already written, and then
pointed to what he was doing as the fulfillment. I will also point out that, at
this point in the journey, there is no evidence given to support that claim.
BJ’s
Claim: “They (the first Christian interpreters) believed the Scriptures
could not be understood, much less translated, unless the gospel unveils their
spiritual meaning” (p. 100).
Monte’s Reply: Says who? Where is he getting this? So we’re back to that false notion that “unveils” in II Corinthians 3 is what happens when Christians read the Scriptures when Paul put “unveils” as what happens to everyone who “turns to the Lord” in salvation (which requires the Scriptures).
So, to correct BJ, the gospel doesn’t merely unveil
the spiritual meaning of the Scriptures, it unveils hearts that are dead and
blind to Christ so they can see him, hear what he is saying, and follow him
where he leads. There is no doubt we need salvation to understand the
Scriptures and the gospel. But I stick with what is written, that “faith comes
from hearing, and hearing from the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17). First we
have “the word of Christ” which is now in the Scriptures. Then people “hear” in
the way Jesus described as, “he who has ears to hear, let him hear,” and John
added, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the
churches” (Revelation 2:7, et al.). When Jesus’ sheep “hear” his voice in “the
word of Christ” (I love the way this all weaves together), we come to “faith”.
Scripture gives hearing, and hearing leads to faith, and faith attaches us to
Christ. Again, I am waiting to find evidence for this claim.
BJ’s
Claim: “Indeed, Christians could only regard the Hebrew Scriptures as
inspired in the illuminating light of who Christ was and what he taught” (p.
100).
Monte’s
Reply: This I know is absolutely FALSE! By the time of Christ, all the Jews
knew that their Scriptures were “breathed out by God”. All the writers of those
Scriptures were considered authorized by God because they would have been
stoned if they were tested and shown to be false prophets. The writers
continually referred to what they were saying as the word of Yahweh. All the
first Christians were Jews who honored Scripture as the word of God. This was
in place hundreds of years before Jesus appeared. Even the true Emmaus Road Way
that is in the Scriptures shows Jesus using the Scriptures as authoritative in
telling disciples what he had done for them before they even recognized it was
him and he was alive! And, at some point, the only way anyone could have known
“who Christ was and what he taught” was by reading or hearing the Scriptures!
BJ’s
Claim: After continuing with synonymous expressions of the same fallacies, there
appears to be a bait-and-switch going on: “In this chapter, I will offer three
examples of how Bible translations both form and are formed by the gospel we
preach”.
Monte’s
Reply: I say this is a bait-and-switch because we have been talking about
the relationship between the gospel and the Scriptures, but now we are directed
to the relationship between the gospel and translations. Seems like a big
difference to me.
BJ’s
Claim: His “exhibit A” for showing how translations both shape and are
shaped by our understanding of the gospel, is Isaiah 53:10.
KJV: “It pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief.”
NIV: “It was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer.”
LXX: “the Lord wishes to cleanse Him of His wound.”
Monte’s
Reply: It is notable that the author, in seeking to instruct us about how
translations both shape and are shaped by what we believe concerning the
gospel, is trying to shape what we believe by leaving out the most IMPORTANT
part of the picture: the HEBREW SCRIPTURES!
In
other words, BJ is speaking of translation from the Scriptures, but he only
gave us three translations! What everyone should be wondering is, what does the
Hebrew text say?!
Because
I am clearly no more a scholar than BJ, I rely heavily on tools. So, when I
look up this text in Logos Bible Systems, I’m given the definitions/senses of
the words used in the Hebrew using the Bible Sense Lexicon. Here they are in
order using the ESV for the English:
“Yet it was the will”: “to delight (take) v. — to take a high degree of pleasure or mental satisfaction in.”
“of the LORD”: “Yahweh n. — the name the God of Israel gives to the Israelites through Moses.”
“to crush him”: “to hurt ⇔ crush v. — to hurt someone, conceived of as crushing or breaking something into pieces.”
At
this point, it is important to point out that it appears to be a habit of BJ’s
to avoid… (drum roll please)… CONTEXT!
So,
while the author avoids the rest of the sentence, and because Hebrew loves
rhyming thoughts, what comes next?
“he has put him to grief”: “to afflict (physical) v. — to cause physical pain, suffering, or illness.”
That
is enough for me to see that BJ has again misled everyone. First, he provided
three translations as his proof of something being translated without showing
what the Scriptures said. If we are testing to see how someone’s translation
reflects what they already believe, or how it expresses what the text states,
we must see the text!
And,
when we see the text of the Hebrew Scriptures, as verified by the Dead Sea
Scrolls, it affirms the consensus of the English translations, that God was
pleased to provide his Son as the atoning/propitiating sacrifice for our sins.
ESV: “Yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief”.
NIV: “Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer”.
KJV: “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief”.
NKJV: “Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief”.
NASB: “But the Lord desired To crush Him, causing Him grief; If He renders Himself as a guilt offering”.
What
we have here is the Hebrew Scriptures contradicting the LXX “translation”. Five
of the most popular translations say essentially what I showed from the Bible
Sense Lexicon’s senses of the Hebrew words. Feel free to go to a Bible search
site like www.biblegateway.com and do your own search through the
translations of Isaiah 53:10. Not only is BJ very outnumbered in using
translations (even his LXX translation was contradicted by the two others he
used!), but the Hebrew text also completely disagrees with him, and the rhyming
thought that comes immediately after what he said also supports what the
English translations agree is the meaning of the text. Here is a great article
that explains this very clearly, denying BJ’s claim.[2]
I will
close with this:
BJ’s
Claim: While admitting that the first two translations he shared point to
God being pleased to present his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins, BJ
then adds more poison-to-the-pudding. He states, “This may serve the vision of
penal substitutionary atonement, but it’s a galaxy away from the nature of God
revealed in Jesus” (p. 100).
Monte’s
Reply: SAYS… WHO!!!!!!!
You
see, we are back to whether the Scriptures are authoritative and teach us
everything about Yahweh and Yasous (Jesus, just playing with transliterating
Greek for special effect). If we agree with God’s word that “all Scripture is
breathed-out by God,” then there isn’t one attribute of the nature of God in
the Old Testament that is different from the attributes of Jesus Christ in the
New Testament.
However, this is why the author needs us to believe that the “gospel
framework” interprets Scripture, rather than that Scripture gives us our gospel
framework. Take away “the whole counsel of God”, and we are at the mercy of
whatever “another Jesus”, “different spirit”, and “different gospel”, any ol’
peddler of God’s word twists and distorts for their own gain.
So,
let’s have another reminder of why BJ keeps heading in the wrong direction.
Here is where the Bible puts “inspiration”, the breathing out of God’s words
through men who were carried along by the Holy Spirit:
When we understand that God breathed out his words through the biblical writers, what we have in the Scriptures, as now collected in the Bible, is “God’s word”. It is authoritative. It tells us who God is, what he is like, and what his point is in creating everything. We get our gospel framework from the Scriptures as God tells us what the good news of the kingdom is all about.
On the
other hand, BJ contradicts what is written with his own authoritative claim
that we can put his idea of inspiration as something that happens between the
Scriptures and the reader, allowing for any manner of interpretations.
This opinion results in a “hybrid” belief that is a mix of what God tried to say, what man failed to get right, and what the reader can interpret as he pleases. We have already seen this just in today’s journey, that BJ has told us what to imagine, and how to interpret a Scripture without even showing us what the Hebrew text gave us. When we are determined to water the Bible down to such a man-dependent hybrid, there is absolutely no authority for believing anything at all.
Nothing BJ wrote about in this section gave any evidence that we must
change our view of inspiration to match his. In fact, the evidence did expose
that BJ doesn’t have any evidence! So I will let the Scriptures tell me what to
believe about Jesus, just as Jesus did on the Emmaus Road Way.
© 2024
Monte Vigh ~ Box 517, Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8
Email: in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted, Scriptures are from the
English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text
Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of
Good News Publishers.)
A More Christlike Word © 2021 by Bradley Jersak Whitaker House 1030 Hunt
Valley Circle • New Kensington, PA 15068 www.whitakerhouse.com
Jersak, Bradley. A More Christlike Word: Reading Scripture the
Emmaus Way. Whitaker House. Kindle Edition.
Definitions from the Bible Sense Lexicon (BSL) in Logos Bible
Systems
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