A Journal Journey with Brad Jersak’s “Different” Jesus – Day 79

 

Examining "A More Christlike Word" by Brad Jersak

Day 79

“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)

The False Filter	The Biblical Filter
The word OR the Word	The Word THROUGH the word

   I have reached the marker of 75% of the way through the book! Yeeha!

   This a good time to remind those reading my sharing that when I began this journey I already believed Brad Jersak was a false teacher from things I had heard him say during interviews. In the early chapters, I could see that he was really as bad as I thought from what I had already heard him teaching. However, by the end of the first part of the book it became apparent that he was not only mistaken, but was consistently misrepresenting what Scripture said, and pointing to himself and others as authorities about what the Scriptures meant.

   When the apostle Paul warned that “evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived” (II Timothy 3:13), just before declaring that “all Scripture is breathed out by God” (vs 16), he clarified that these false teachers would be known by two things: they would go about “deceiving” people with their false teachings, but they themselves would be “being deceived” by the very lies they were preaching. This is what I can now confidently say is the issue with BJ and his kind, that they are deceiving people by misrepresenting the Scriptures to everyone, but they themselves are being deceived by one another, and by the father of lies, the devil himself.

   This is why I am including this reminder as we continue through the second part of BJ’s garden path.

The purpose of the BJs’ writings is to demoralize people’s faith in the authority of Scripture as the breathed-out words of God. They continue the serpent’s question in the garden, “Did God actually say…?” to replace what God said with what the “evil people and imposters” are peddling for unjust gain.

   Again, I would not have said this at the beginning of the book because I hadn’t done enough testing of BJ’s teachings for myself. But this far into the book, I have examined and tested what he teaches and am settled that we should be exposing false teachers in our day just like the apostles did in the early church.

   Before I could proofread my last day’s journal journey, I again had an exercise morning where I was able to listen to Scripture. I heard the last two or three chapters of Leviticus and got quite a few chapters into Numbers. Guess what! There are WAY too many details to possibly treat these books of the Bible as allegorical or figurative. Too many people. Too many instructions. Too many warnings. Far too many personal statements by Yahweh for someone in our day to claim that they were not what Yahweh said, did, warned, or planned back in their day.

   AND that is with not ONE correction of the Hebrew Scriptures from Jesus or the Apostles even though BJ claims his “another Jesus” corrects the Yahweh of the Scriptures.

   Here are a few things that stood out as a rebuke to what BJ is claiming, and it is my testimony of how spending time with God in his word (both in the micro-meditation on small passages of Scripture, or the macro-meditation on longer sections) gives us the big and small pictures of what God’s word really says, and what it really means.

   In Leviticus 26, God tells his people what will happen if they “walk in my statutes and observe my commandments and do them” (vs 3ff), and what will happen “if you will not listen to me and will not do all these commandments” (vs 14ff).

   He then clarifies what will happen “if you walk contrary to me and will not listen to me” (vs 21ff), and “if by this discipline you are not turned to me but walk contrary to me” (vs 23ff), and, “if in spite of this you will not listen to me, but walk contrary to me” (vs 27ff). This is such a clear claim that Yahweh is speaking, and no mention from Jesus to correct any of the “books of Moses”. Just a long list of the cursed things that will happen to the people of Israel if they violate their covenant with Yahweh.

   But then we come to this,

“But if they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers in their treachery that they committed against me, and also in walking contrary to me… then I will remember my covenant with Jacob, and I will remember my covenant with Isaac and my covenant with Abraham, and I will remember the land… But I will for their sake remember the covenant with their forefathers, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might be their God: I am the LORD (Yahweh)” (vss 40-45).

   Doesn’t that old covenant clarification sound a lot like the new covenant declaration: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (I John 1:9)?

   I’m simply pointing out that within books of the Bible revered by the Jews, affirmed by Jesus and the apostles, far too detailed to be allegory or figurative language, there are such comprehensive descriptions of the curses God will bring on his people when they turn from him and yet, without any evidence whatsoever (opinions of a kazillion people is still not evidence), the BJs claim we are not to take God at his word even though all the men who wrote down the breathed out words of God DID treat Scripture like the word of God. I’m not even going to say “I’m sorry…” on this one, because the Scriptures so clearly and precisely rebuke BJ and his kind that we must heed what Jesus and the apostles said about false teachers and turn away from their false teachings to the treasures of wisdom and knowledge in God’s words.

   As I listened to the first seven chapters of Numbers, there were so many details about how God was preparing his people for going into the Promised Land that there is no way any of that was figurative. It was an amazing message of what it looks like for God to require his people to perform the righteousness needed to walk with him (very different from the new covenant!).

   However, there was a clear thread of reminders of how God’s relationship with his people included protection for Israel but destruction to enemies, something that rebukes BJ for claiming that sinners were never God’s enemies.

   But look at what stands out:

For all the firstborn among the people of Israel are mine, both of man and of beast. On the day that I struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt I consecrated them for myself, and I have taken the Levites instead of all the firstborn among the people of Israel (Numbers 8:17-18).

God was doing something with his people at that time that spoke of what he had done in Egypt as… (drum roll please…) HISTORY! Yes, Yahweh, Jesus’ Father, was speaking of what he did in Egypt as history, not allegory, not figurative language, and he says this after so many chapters with so many details that were showing none of it could be allegorical or figurative. And remember, when Paul said that something could be taken allegorically, that did NOT mean the initial situation was allegory. It meant that these historical revelations of God at one time also served as lessons illustrating other things further down the road of history.    

   Where I ended my listening to God’s word during my exercise time was with this:

“And I have given the Levites as a gift to Aaron and his sons from among the people of Israel, to do the service for the people of Israel at the tent of meeting and to make atonement for the people of Israel, that there may be no plague among the people of Israel when the people of Israel come near the sanctuary” (Numbers 8:19).

   There it is again, that word that rebukes BJ’s claims that Jesus was not the atoning sacrifice who propitiated the wrath of God against our sin. I have already explained that in detail, but it stood out again how many times the Scriptures speak of the sacrificial system as Yahweh’s design for the old covenant, and that the sacrifices, and the Levites in offering the sacrifices, were atoning for the people of Israel then, and prefiguring the atonement Jesus would secure through his death and resurrection. It exposes BJ's claim that the sacrifices were man's invention as bogus.

   After all these things stood out in my listening to God’s word, I read the sharing from our home church and this is what one of our members was reading. 

  The LORD is a jealous and avenging God;
the LORD is avenging and wrathful;
the LORD takes vengeance on his adversaries
and keeps wrath for his enemies.
   The LORD is slow to anger and great in power,
and the LORD will by no means clear the guilty.
His way is in whirlwind and storm,
and the clouds are the dust of his feet.
   He rebukes the sea and makes it dry;
he dries up all the rivers;
Bashan and Carmel wither;
the bloom of Lebanon withers.
   The mountains quake before him;
the hills melt;
the earth heaves before him,
the world and all who dwell in it.
 
   Who can stand before his indignation?
Who can endure the heat of his anger?
His wrath is poured out like fire,
and the rocks are broken into pieces by him.
   The LORD is good,
a stronghold in the day of trouble;
he knows those who take refuge in him.
   But with an overflowing flood
he will make a complete end of the adversaries,
and will pursue his enemies into darkness.
(Nahum 1:2-8) 

   Once again, this is a very specific description of Yahweh in his judgment against the criminal nations. What he will do to his enemies is real. And how that applied to the nations then will be applied to the return of Christ where he will judge the nations with the same justice as was expressed by his Father.

   Another member shared from Hebrews 9:24 “For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf.”

   Here it is clear that the real Tabernacle and Temple of the old covenant times prefigured the spiritual realities of the heavenly realm. We are shown the realities of these “copies of the truth things” so we would recognize the glory of Jesus Christ coming to fulfill those copies with the real things. But both the copies, and the fulfillment in Jesus Christ, were real history, not allegory, not figurative illustrations, no moral of the story lessons that can be twisted and peddled to the deceivers’ heart’s content.

   This morning, I continued in my journey through Mattew, today in this passage:

And as Jesus was going up to Jerusalem, he took the twelve disciples aside, and on the way he said to them, “See, we are going up to Jerusalem. And the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death and deliver him over to the Gentiles to be mocked and flogged and crucified, and he will be raised on the third day” (Matthew 20:17-19).

   One of BJ’s deceptions is to claim that Jesus’ death was not the predetermined plan of God. I’m not sure what wording captures what the BJ’s really believe about this. It may still come up in the book more clearly. All I know is that BJ has tried to portray the Scriptures as NOT prophesying penal-substitutionary-atonement even though they clearly show Jesus being punished (penal) in our place (substitutionary) for our salvation (atonement). He has also twisted Isaiah’s prophecy that Jesus would suffer by the Father’s will, claiming a different reading than what is written, something the rest of Scripture refutes.

   I have already dealt with that each time he presented Scriptures with his pretzel-interpretations (that’s allegorical for “twisted”). My point in sharing what I was meditating on this morning is to show that simply by spending time in God’s word each morning, praying through the words and seeking to attach to God through his word, I can’t escape how clearly Jesus was preparing his disciples for what was going to happen to him. This is the third time Matthew records Jesus talking to his disciples about what was going to happen in Jerusalem, each time with more clarification. And what is clear is that it is exactly what Isaiah described. It includes how he would be viewed by the Jews. It includes the stripes and piercing Isaiah prophesied. And it includes the resurrection Isaiah highlighted.

   Once again, we do NOT see Jesus correcting anything from the Hebrew Scriptures (our Old Testament), but we see him again speaking of what would happen in complete conformity to what is written. No contradictions. No corrections. Just preparations based on revelation.

   Also the way God ministered to me through this Scripture this morning lifted me from some overwhelming emotions that I share just between me and God, and truly returned me to joy as I considered what Jesus did for me, but also how he prepared his disciples for what was to come. It was quite amazing, and I can’t imagine missing out on anything God has written in his word because some false teachers insist that they have more authority than the Scriptures that are the “living and active” word of God.

   Because this day’s journal journey is a spotlight-focus on God and his word rather than BJ and his word, I will share more of the testimonies from our home church fellowship.

   First, there was this passage from Nahum 2:

Desolate! Desolation and ruin!
    Hearts melt and knees tremble;
anguish is in all loins;
    all faces grow pale!
Where is the lions' den,
    the feeding place of the young lions,
where the lion and lioness went,
    where his cubs were, with none to disturb?
The lion tore enough for his cubs
    and strangled prey for his lionesses;
he filled his caves with prey
    and his dens with torn flesh.
 
Behold, I am against you, declares the LORD of hosts, and I will burn your chariots in smoke, and the sword shall devour your young lions. I will cut off your prey from the earth, and the voice of your messengers shall no longer be heard (vss 10-12).

   Isn’t it sadly fascinating that BJ insists God isn’t against anyone, doesn’t carry out justice against his enemies, doesn’t separate the goats from the sheep and send them to their judgment, and who knows how many other Scriptures must be denied and explained away to avoid the obvious: God is just, and he will carry out justice. He disciplines his people. He saves his people. He destroys his enemies. And the fact that we who have turned to Jesus in repentance and faith were once his enemies, but on the cross he demonstrated his love for us in that while we were sinners Jesus died for us, is unthinkably glorious in the grace, love, and mercy of God for his beloved children.

   And one more return trip to Hebrews:

Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself (Hebrews 9:25-26).

   Once again, the old covenant sacrificial system is presented as God’s provision, but always with a sense that it could never do what the Christ would accomplish. The writer is contrasting how Jesus did not need to offer himself repeatedly, as an earthly high priest had to do, nor did he need to “suffer repeatedly” the way sacrifices had to be repeated. Instead, with what the old covenant prefigured, Jesus fulfilled all the old covenant sacrifices “by the sacrifice of himself”. The old covenant was God’s creation; the new covenant is God’s creation. All is historical. All is real. And all of what God has done in Christ gives real eternal life, not figurative or allegorical life (which is allegorical for delusional because it doesn’t really exist!).

   I will call it a day’s journal journey with this. I’m 75% of the way through BJ’s garden path, and the difference between reading his book with all its incomplete Scriptures, twisted meanings, man-dependent interpretations, and fabricated conclusions, and reading God’s Book with all its interwoven themes, prophecies and fulfillments, and consistent revelation of the Triune God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is so glaring that I share the wonders of walking with God through his word privately, and in fellowship with other believers, in the hope that a “few” will return to the narrow way, hear what their shepherd is saying through his word and by his Spirit, and follow him with fear and trembling in the obedience of faith to the glory of God and the good of his people.

 

© 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