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Thy Word is Truth Part 2 By John McCallum

 From verse 28 through to the end, to the end of the chapter.
Daniel chapter 4, commencing from verse 28.
All this happened to King Nebuchadnezzar.
Twelve months later as the king was walking on the roof of the royal palace of Babylon,
he said, is not this the great Babylon I have built as the royal residence by my mighty power and for the glory of my majesty?
The words were on his lips when a voice came from heaven.
This is what is decreed for you, King Nebuchadnezzar.
Your royal authority has been taken away from you.
You will be driven away from people and will live with the wild animals.
You will eat grass like cattle.
Seven times will pass by for you until you acknowledge that the most high is sovereign over the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone he wishes.
Immediately what had been said about Nebuchadnezzar was fulfilled.
He was driven away from people and ate grass like cattle.
His body was drenched with the dew of heaven until his hair grew like the feathers of an eagle and his nails like the claws of a bird.
At the end of that time, I Nebuchadnezzar raised my eyes toward heaven and my sanity was restored.
Then I praised the most high. I honored and glorified him who lives forever.
His dominion is an eternal dominion. His kingdom endures from generation to generation and all the peoples of the earth are regarded as nothing.
He does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth.
No one can hold back his hand or say to him, what have you done?
At that same time, my sanity was restored. My honor and splendor were returned to me for the glory of my kingdom.
My advisors and nobles sought me out and I was restored to my throne and became even greater than before.
Now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and exalt and glorify the king of heaven because everything he does is right and all his ways are just.
And those who walk in pride, he is able to humble. Amen.
We turn this morning to the book of Daniel and in chapter 4 verses 34 and 35 we have the text that I want to draw our attention to in this session.
It forms the basis of our address now.
Verses 34 and 35, Nebuchadnezzar the king is speaking and recounting the experience that came upon him.
Daniel chapter 4 verse 34, and at the end of the days I Nebuchadnezzar lifted up my eyes unto heaven and my understanding returned unto me.
And I blessed the most high and I praised and honored him that lives forever and ever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion.
And his kingdom is from generation to generation. All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing and he doeth according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth.
And none can stay his hand or say unto him what doest thou.
Now these in many ways are remarkable words. They come from the heathen king Nebuchadnezzar.
Some commentators take the view that Nebuchadnezzar in fact was converted through this experience.
I think John Calvin is amongst those who take that view and whatever Calvin says is to be taken with his fierceness.
I don't know. I would like to think that Nebuchadnezzar was one whose heart was changed to believing in the living and true God.
Certainly the account here gives an impression that he was certainly changed and his views concerning God and other things were changed.
Whether he was saved or not we don't know. I like to think that he was. Some commentators say that he was not.
But what we have here is the confession of King Nebuchadnezzar after that very strange episode that came upon him.
You remember how in the fourth chapter in the book of Daniel we begin with Nebuchadnezzar's dream and Nebuchadnezzar was troubled by visions and he called for Daniel to interpret the vision and Daniel did.
And Daniel at first was reluctant because he recognized that the great tree that was in the dream of Nebuchadnezzar was in fact Nebuchadnezzar himself.
And that for a time at least Nebuchadnezzar who seemed to be so mighty and so permanent all the birds of the air coming and finding refuge in the branches of this mighty kingdom that he was going to be cut down.
And the kingdom was going to be taken from him for a while and all this we're told came upon Nebuchadnezzar in verse 28 at the beginning of our reading.
All this came upon the King Nebuchadnezzar at the end of 12 months later after the warning was given.
God had given him time to repent of his sins to break off his unrighteousness and to do righteousness.
Nebuchadnezzar perhaps was impressed for a while but he turned again to his old proud heathen heart and one day he was walking at his palace on the roof and looking at great Babylon that he had built.
And suddenly whilst the word was in the king's mouth even as he was speaking concerning his own pride and position the word of the Lord fell upon him.
There fell a voice from heaven saying, O King Nebuchadnezzar, to thee it is spoken, the kingdom is departed.
And then we read from verse 32 of how he was overtaken by this malady, lycanthropy or boanthropy.
Some kind of mental sickness whereby he was thinking and living just like an animal.
And for a period of seven times he lived thus.
And then at the end of the days we're told Nebuchadnezzar's reason was returned to him again and he praised God in the words of the text.
Now you might think, well what has this got to do with our study concerning the nature of the scriptures?
Well I think it has everything to do with the study of the nature of the scripture because Nebuchadnezzar here perhaps unwittingly is giving voice to the very things that the world at large finds offensive teaching in the word of God.
Nebuchadnezzar here in this confession is making a very good confession. He is making a confession in fact that any born again Christian could make without any sense of hesitation or reservation.
Nebuchadnezzar here is putting into bars the very things that men find offensive in the Bible.
And I want this session to look with you at the reasons or some of the reasons. We of course can't deal exhaustively indeed with all of these things.
But I want to give to you some of the reasons why it is that men today and I suppose in every day have found the Bible offensive and they have rejected the teaching of the Bible.
They say we cannot believe that. We will have nothing to do with this. We won't live according to the Bible because we cannot come to terms with the Bible's authority.
Now when men reject the Bible they are of course rejecting the content of the Bible. It's not just the Bible. The Bible is the content of the Bible.
And so when men say that they don't believe the Bible that means that what they are saying is that they don't believe what the Bible is actually saying.
Now there are a whole host of things I suppose that men find offensive in the Bible and as I say we can only touch on some.
But it seems to me that when all the arguments are said and done as far as I can understand it from my reading around this subject.
Why do people in this our day and past days find the Bible's message offensive and we're not going to obey the Bible and they live according to it.
You find that when all the arguments are collated together and all the objections you find like every other sphere you can bring them down and boil them down to certain general principles.
And it seems to me that what Nebuchadnezzar is saying here is touching upon at least four of the main areas of opposition and offensiveness whereby the natural man
and even some people within the Christian church also they do not believe the Bible. Indeed they find the Bible repulsive and offensive in certain aspects of its teaching.
And as I say Nebuchadnezzar here is touching on at least four areas where we find that even today the world at large is finding the message of the Bible an offensive and therefore an unaccepted message.
And we've got to be clear as to the way people are thinking. Part of the Christian church's duty and obligation to the world in any generation is to understand the times in which we live.
And this is what our forefathers were doing when they were drawing up the creeds. They recognized where the areas of difficulties were in those critics of the Bible.
Martin Luther was in touch with the times in which he lived when he raised the issue of how can a man be justified before God. He was hitting on a sensitive point.
That's not the question that people are asking today. They are asking much more fundamental questions than that.
Many of them don't even believe in God and that there is such a thing as a legitimate concern in asking the question how can I be right indeed with this God.
They're not even thinking about God. They don't believe what the Bible has to say.
Well what are those areas then that Nebuchadnezzar is touching upon? Areas whereby men are offended at the teaching of the Bible.
And the first area that I would emphasize is this. It is the area of the Bible's teaching concerning God himself.
What is Nebuchadnezzar saying about God? Nebuchadnezzar here is saying something that the Bible everywhere says about God.
Nebuchadnezzar here is putting into words the Biblical's emphasis and re-emphasis concerning the God who is revealed in the Bible.
By the way if someone asks you the question what is the Bible about? You answer them very simply the Bible is about God.
God is the message of the Bible. The Bible is a book that tells us about God.
And whilst it is true that the heavens declare God's glory and the skies declare his handiwork and the things that are made reveal God in such a way as to leave all men
inexcusable nonetheless it is the law of the Lord that converts the soul. A man will never be converted by looking into the heavens.
I have never heard yet of anybody being converted by considering the creation.
But I've heard of plenty of people who have been converted by considering the message found in the Bible.
And so the God who is revealed in the Bible is revealed in very specific terms.
And if we are going to understand what the Bible is really emphasizing we have to begin with God.
The Bible begins with God. In the beginning God. Before there was anything else there was God.
And God is the one who began everything else. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.
We'll touch that just in a moment. But the fact that I want to emphasize is Nebuchadnezzar and his new understanding now of the personhood of God.
He says this, And I blessed the Most High and I praised and honored him that liveth forever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion and his kingdom is from generation to generation.
Now that is a tremendous statement about the God of the Bible.
And we're told here of how Nebuchadnezzar came to terms with that great truth.
In verse 32 also the Lord had spoken to Nebuchadnezzar before this illness came upon him.
We are told here in verse 32, And they shall hear the voice from heaven speaking, and they shall drive thee from men, and thy dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field.
And they shall make thee to eat grass as oxen, and seven times shall pass over thee until ye thou know that the Most High ruleth in the kingdom of men and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
Nebuchadnezzar is to learn something about God, something that he never imagined before.
And in verse 34 Nebuchadnezzar is articulating now what he has learned of God.
What has he learned of God? Well he's learned a whole lot of things about God.
He has learned that God is the Most High, but he has learned something else.
He has learned that God is everywhere, and I'm going to emphasize this because of the times in which we are living.
He has learned that God is masculine and not feminine.
He has learned that God is the God of Daniel, that God is the Most High God whom Daniel has been preaching in Babylon now for quite a number of years.
He has come to recognize that Daniel's God is the only God, that he is the Most High God, and that he is a masculine God with a masculine name.
And everywhere in the Bible masculine pronouns are used concerning God.
Now I'm emphasizing that because we are living in a day when men say,
Well God is what you want him to be, or she is as you want her to be.
God is whatever you want God to be.
And there are those Bibles being printed, I understand, even today where they are called gender neutral Bibles.
And all those masculine references in the Hebrew language, God of Israel is never described with feminine pronouns.
And in the New Testament, again, the God of the Bible is never referred to by feminine pronouns.
And furthermore, neither is he referred to as being feminine in his attributes.
The only feminine deities that we find recorded in the Bible are without exception all heathen deities.
There were goddesses, and there are goddesses in some religions of the world even to this very day.
The God of the Bible is not a goddess. He is the Father, and he is the Son, and he is the Holy Spirit.
As he is finally and fully revealed in the New Testament, in the incarnation of Christ, and in the coming of the Holy Spirit.
And we are living in a world today when all religions, as far as men are concerned, are equally good, or equally bad.
They are equally accessible and acceptable, and Jesus may be the way for you or for me,
but Buddha is the way for someone else, and Allah is the way for someone else, and so it goes on.
There are many ways to God, so we are being told by leading churchmen today.
Our way happens to be the way of Jesus. He for us is the way, the truth, and the life.
But if you read the Bible, you will find that over and over again, especially in the Psalms,
you will find that God is compared to the idols.
And in the Scriptures, all those gods which the nations have made for themselves, they are nothing more than idols done.
Those who fear them are just like them, and they have made all these deities, gods and goddesses in their own image,
and they have made them immoral gods, they are cruel gods, they are gods who demand of their devotees that they sacrifice their blood.
Why do people invent that kind of god for themselves? Because that's the kind of people that they are, according to the Bible.
Those who worship these gods, they're just like them, and their gods have been made in their own images.
And if you ever read the history of religion, you will find that primitive religions, as far as I know, always have invented for themselves cruel gods.
You think of the old Maya religions, you think of the Aztec and Inca religions, where they were cruel gods demanding still pulsating human hearts.
Why did people ever imagine these attributes and requirements of their deities? Because that's the way they lived, that's the kind of people that they were.
Now why am I emphasizing this? Because in Babylon, in Nebuchadnezzar's day, there were all kinds of religions.
There was no particular religion that could be regarded as the state religion.
The Babylonian empire was like many other empires of the ancient world. It was a conglomerate of all kinds of nationalities.
And there was always room in the pantheon for some other god, and the Jews gods were welcome.
He was recognized initially in Babylon simply as another tribal deity.
But the gods of Babylon were stronger than the gods of Jerusalem, because Jerusalem had been destroyed by the Babylonians.
And the people had been taken captive. And in those days, as I suppose today, perhaps I don't know, the conflicts amongst men are seen in terms of whose side is God on?
Our God is on our side. All nations have that kind of mad philosophy undergirding their war-making.
It's the way that people think. And what Nebuchadnezzar here is saying is something very remarkable.
In the background, against the background in which he lived, he was used to a multiplicity of gods.
And this wasn't the first time that he had been confronted with the god of Daniel, you may remember, in the second chapter of the great, how he had the great dream again.
And in the third chapter, the golden idol, and the people of God remaining faithful to their god.
And Nebuchadnezzar was recognizing through these expatriate Jews that they had a god who seemed to be a god who was pretty powerful after all.
And he did seem to have certain advantages over their Babylonian tribal deities.
But Nebuchadnezzar is going beyond that here. He is saying he is the Most High.
And he is saying that he rules. And he rules over all things. He rules in the armies of heaven and amongst the inhabitants of the earth.
And he gives the kingdom to whomsoever he pleases. And Nebuchadnezzar is recognizing that there is no one can stop God's hands.
No one can challenge him and question his right or his ability or his liberty to do exactly as he pleases.
Now Nebuchadnezzar is dead right when he makes this confession.
This isn't just the sudden exclamation of an uninformed man.
This is a true representation of the god of the Bible who is alive today.
And he is as powerful today as he ever has been.
One of the great problems in the Christian church today, it seems to me, is that our god is too small.
We have inadequate and therefore we have inadequate thoughts of God.
We are thinking of God in terms of what he used to do in the Bible.
And we think of all those wonderful things that God did long ago.
And we are forgetting that this God is the same today.
And he deals with us essentially the same today, not with the same public display.
He doesn't reveal himself the same ways today in exactly the same formats today as he did previously.
But his power is not diminished, his right hand is not shortened, and his ear is just as open to our prayers today.
And furthermore, with all the chaos of our times, God is still in control today.
We listen to the politicians, and as I say, we see all the bad news, and we see the stockpiling of nuclear weapons.
And we imagine that somehow or other all things have gone to pot, and all things are out of control.
And that somehow or other God has either forgotten us or he has abandoned us,
and that he is no longer ruling in the armies of heaven and amongst the inhabitants of the earth.
But that is not so according to the scripture.
God is as he is revealed in Nebuchadnezzar's confession.
And the fact of the matter is, this is the God of the Bible.
Now we may not like to think of God in terms of being ruler over all things,
but the Bible presents him as being the ruler over all things for the simple reason
that the Bible presents him as being the creator of all things.
We are told increasingly today that we cannot take seriously the issues that are raised in the opening chapters of Genesis.
We are told today, well we don't believe anymore that the world was actually made by God,
and all in the space of six days, and all very good.
Well I don't know about you, but I believe that it was made in six days,
and I believe it was made in six days, and that those days were similar to the days with which we are acquainted.
Because I do not know of anywhere in the Bible where the expression morning and evening taken together in conjunction with days
is ever used as far as I know in the Bible in any other way except as a normal morning and a normal evening.
Now we mustn't introduce such nonsensical statements into our understanding of God as the creator of the heavens and earth.
We mustn't introduce such statements as God's days.
There are those in churches who often know better, and they say, oh the days are God's days.
The Bible doesn't say that. The Bible doesn't say that those six days, oh they're really God's days.
It just says they're days, and they were days which were composed of a period of darkness and a period of light,
and there was morning, and there was evening, and every generation that the world will ever know as far as I know
is going to be familiar with morning and evening, completing and beginning the days of our lives.
And the Bible is speaking to us, and it's telling us that our world began when God spoke,
and the first day began to operate, and certain things began to come to pass.
And by the end of six days, God had completed the heavens and the earth.
He had made man on the sixth day, and everything was very good, and on the seventh day God rested from all his labors.
And so what we have in the Bible, whether men today like to believe it or not is not the issue.
What I'm emphasizing is the Bible says that God created all things, and that he made it out of nothing,
he made it by the word of his power, and he upholds it still by the word of his power.
And furthermore, the scripture tells us that God not only created all things, including you and me,
we have not evolved, as men would like to tell us, from primordial forms, the primordial chemical soup.
We are not related by natural ancestry to previous animal forms or fish forms.
We have been created according to the teaching of the Bible.
We have been created directly by a divine intervention of God,
and there was a divine council before man was created.
Of no other creature was it said, as far as I'm aware, that God held a divine council
and said within the confines of the Trinity, let us make man in our image.
Only man has that divine planning and a pre-preparation before he is made from the dust of the ground and so on.
But this God actually controls all things.
We believe that this world, with all the threats of nuclear holocaust,
blowing ourselves to smithereens with our nuclear thermonuclear bombs,
we believe that if that happens, I don't think it's going to happen, but I'm not a prophet,
but I think the Bible tells us how the world is going to end sufficiently clearly
that we don't need to go into the speculations as to how men might destroy themselves
with nuclear bombs or pollutions or overpopulation.
The Bible tells us that the world is going to end as the world began, by a divine intervention,
and God began it by doing something, and God is going to end it by coming and doing something again.
That's what the Bible says.
Now, I'm not saying that that's a popular message.
Indeed, I'm saying that that is an unpopular message,
because the moment that we give any credence to the fact that we might just possibly be created by God in some way,
at that moment we're obligated to him.
The moment that we recognize that God might just exist at that point,
we have to recognize if he exists, then we are to serve him.
But that's another issue, and I don't have time to go into all of that.
The point is that Nebuchadnezzar here is saying he does as he pleases
in the armies of heaven and amongst the inhabitants of the earth, and there's no one.
There's no power in heaven or in hell, the devil can say to God.
Remember this about the devil, by the way.
We as Christians, there are Christians today, and they speak about, oh, the devil.
Yes, we believe in the devil.
Jesus did, and you do if you're a Christian, so do I, because the Bible teaches it.
But let's not be over much on the one hand contentious of the devil.
He is, after all, like a roaring lion.
But let us not, on the other hand, be over much fearful of the devil,
because the devil has already overcome, he has defeated.
And the very first thing we're told about the devil in the Bible is that he's God's creature,
the serpent was more subtle than any other creature that God the Lord had made.
So when we're introduced to the devil, we're reminded he's just one of God's creatures,
and he is going to do God's will, just as every single other creature is going to do God's will.
Now I would emphasize to you that we are thinking of God as God being too small.
And it seems to me that one of the big problems in the Christian church today,
quite apart from the world, is that we're not thinking of God aright.
We've lost confidence in God.
We have lost confidence in the robust way in which the people of the Bible had their confidence in God.
Remember how the psalmist put it, the gods of the nations, they are all idols.
But our God made the heavens, he sits in heaven, he made everything.
And that's the way the psalmist speaks, and he speaks confidently.
What's the difference between the God of the Bible and every other God that you care to mention?
Our God made everything.
And his power overrules everything, and he sees the end from the beginning.
And there's none can halt him, and there's none can question his right.
Because what Nebuchadnezzar is saying here is this, that God has a right to do what he does.
None can say unto him, what doest thou?
Questioning his right, challenging his liberty.
If God wishes to control the world in such a way that men will fall into sin, then that's his prerogative.
And that's his right.
And if God chooses to rule the world in such a way that men will be terrified at the prospect of thermonuclear destruction, then that's his right.
But there's even something more offensive about the God of the Bible.
And that is he gives the kingdom to whomsoever he pleases.
He ruleth in the kingdom of men, verse 32, and giveth it to whomsoever he will.
Now Nebuchadnezzar was given a great kingdom by God.
And Nebuchadnezzar was recognizing that his kingdom, his rule in Babylon, was indeed God's gift and God's privilege to him to rule in righteousness.
That's the whole purpose of this vision.
Nebuchadnezzar was ruling as a cruel tyrant, heathen, for his own glory.
And God was reminding him, Nebuchadnezzar, I have raised you up in order that you might reign in righteousness.
But there's another kingdom, and God gives it to whomsoever he pleases.
And that's the kingdom of salvation.
And that, I think, is one of the most offensive tenets of the Christian gospel.
Because we believe that if men are going to go to heaven, it's not on the basis that they do something for God.
It's on the basis of what God will do for them.
And the Christian gospel emphasizes such a doctrine as predestination.
Now I'm not here to preach to you the five points of Calvinism.
That's not my intent.
But my intent is to remind you that the kingdom of God is given to those to whom God chooses to give the kingdom of God.
And you and I are sometimes perplexed, and I suppose it is natural and proper that we should have a certain concern and a perplexity
at the massive indifference and unbelief and anti-Christian thinking and living in the world today.
But remember something.
God is not disturbed by these things.
God is not surprised at the massive unbelief and apostasy of our day.
God is not surprised by the multiplicity of religious opinions and the backsliding of his church.
God gives to the kingdom his own people.
He has a church, he has a people, he has a bride, he has those chosen ones, and they shall inherit the kingdom.
Why? Because so it seems good in his sight.
You remember how that occasion when our Lord Jesus Christ heard the response or the report of his disciples when they came back
and they told him of how they had been able to perform these miracles and signs and so on.
And some had believed and some hadn't believed.
And do you remember what Jesus did?
Was he listening to the report and when he was hearing of conversion saying, oh, that's really good,
and when he was hearing of the gospel being rejected, he was falling down in discouragement.
No, not at all.
In that hour we're told Jesus rejoiced in spirit and said, I thank thee, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,
that thou hast hidden these things from the wise and the prudent and revealed them unto the babes.
Why was he rejoicing?
Because so it seemed good in thy sight.
Now, I'm not saying that I appreciate all this.
There are times when I grumble, too, at the sovereignty of God and I question his rights.
And I say to God at times, as probably you say, Lord, if I was ruling the world, I would do it differently.
And so I would.
And I would have all my friends in heaven and I would have all my family and everybody who crossed me,
I'd keep them out of the kingdom.
That's not the way that God does it.
And he does as he pleases and what he does is right.
There is an inherent rightness.
And all I can say, and I don't have time to go into this because time flashes past up in these little pulpits.
But the, but the, sorry.
But what, I also forget what I was going to say now.
You've broken my thought.
You've done it.
What I was going to say was, oh, I'll just forget what I was going to say.
The offensiveness of the Bible is because the Bible presents God as masculine.
He is the God of Israel whose name is Jehovah.
He is not just any God.
He is described in terms of his attributes as revealed in the scripture.
He created everything.
He knows everything.
He gives the kingdom to everyone that he pleases to.
And if he doesn't choose to give us the kingdom, he has a right to keep us out of it.
There is an inherent rightness.
It would be wrong for God, according to the Bible's understanding of righteousness,
it would be wrong for God to save those who are ultimately lost.
And it would be wrong for God not to save those who are ultimately going to be saved.
I don't know why God saves me and not others and you and not others.
I don't know why.
I have no answer to the question why any individual except it is right in his eyes.
And we will know one day why it is that God has saved us if we are saved and not others.
We don't know.
The fact is we don't know what God is doing except that the Bible is saying he does what is pleasing in his own eyes.
Now that is offensive to the world today because the politicians want to dictate
and the armaments manufacturers and the humanistic thinkers, they want to tell us what is right
and they want to plan the progress of the world and explain to us how the world began and how it is going to end.
And the Bible says no, it cuts right across it all.
God began it.
God rules it.
And he does as he pleases and you can huff and puff and pant all you like.
It makes no difference.
He does as he pleases.
In the armies of heaven and none can stay his hand and challenge him.
Now that is the God of the Bible.
And that is the God that the Christian church has got to come back to because our God so often is far too small.
And our problems would dissipate overnight if we could have a fresh view of just who God really is according to the Bible.
There is a second area of offense in Bible teaching that is offensive to men.
And that is not only the Bible's teaching about God but the Bible's teaching about man.
Look how Nebuchadnezzar speaks here.
He says here in verse 35, all the inhabitants of the earth are as nothing.
They're reputed as nothing.
Now that's not the way that men think.
Six billion people upon the earth, each one important, each one with his rights, each one going to stand on his or her honor,
each one with entitlements.
So we're told each one going to carve out his own little place in the sun.
That's the way the world thinks and the politicians will tell us and the wise thinkers of the world will tell us.
You've got rights son, don't you let anyone trample on you.
And you've got feelings that need to be.
And if it feels good for you then you do it.
Well done son, you're just a little angel.
You're the most beautiful little girl that ever lived.
You're the cleverest little boy.
And the Bible doesn't flatter when it says no, they're nothing but God's creatures.
And fallen creatures at that.
Creatures who have rebelled.
Creatures who have said yes to self-will and no to God's will.
Children, sons of Adam and daughters of Eve, every one of us born with a curse,
with a heart that is polluted and devious and so dark the heart of man is so deceitful above all things it's desperately wicked.
And so wicked is our heart and so deep in its deceit we can't even plummet the depths, we don't even begin to understand it.
And I don't know how deceitful my heart is.
And there are times, as you well know, when we get a fresh revelation of ourselves.
We do something, we think something and we're shocked.
We're used to our inner life of sin and self and we all have our little selfish and sinful lustful thoughts.
Longings looking here and grasping there and avarice and jealousy here and anger when there's no right to be.
And all those things where self must assert itself.
And there are times when we're shocked, we suddenly think something, we long after something, we lust after something, we tell lies as soon as it's convenient.
And we're amazed at how deceitful we are.
And that's Christian people, men and women, we're all potential adulterers and murderers and liars if it was convenient.
If there were no witnesses and the opportunity was right and we felt inclined, we're all the same.
Now that's not very flattering, I'm not trying to discourage you.
I'm trying to encourage you to look unto Christ because we need him.
And if we don't have him we've got no hope whatever.
To be without Christ is to be without God according to the scripture.
And that's not some easy matter.
It's not some addition.
Christ isn't some addition to our righteousness.
He is our whole righteousness because we have none of our own.
All the inhabitants of the earth, there's none accepted.
All have sinned and come short of the kingdom of God, of the glory of God.
And all those mighty ones appearing on our television screen, all the beautiful people, all the wise ones telling us of how great they are and what their achievements are.
Have you ever noticed in those great ones of the earth they give their life story
and how they roll their tongues around their achievements?
And the Bible says you're nothing.
You're flesh and you're going to return to corruption.
And before very long your body is going to be rotting and stinking in a grave.
And your soul unless you turn is going to be in a lost eternity forever.
Now that's not a flattering picture.
But that's the Bible's picture.
And the Bible doesn't alter that right up to the very end of the Bible.
We find the same picture in the book of Revelation.
We find those people who are called the inhabitants of the earth.
And they're worshipping the beast.
And they're following and they're amazed with all the deceitful philosophies of the world.
And they're all following after what the present trend and opinions of the times are.
And they don't serve God.
And even when God pours out his plagues upon them we're told in the book of Revelation.
Yet they still did not repent of their fornications and their idolatries and all the other things that are mentioned.
Now that's you, that's me, that's our wife, our husband, that's our children.
Our children are like we are as we are like our forebears were.
Right back to Adam and to Eve.
And death has come upon us all and brought terrible corruption.
The Bible speaks of sin in terms of lawlessness.
It speaks of sin in terms of unbelief.
But it speaks of sin even in more serious terms than that.
It speaks of sin as pollution, uncleanness.
We are vitiated.
We are spiritually deviants.
And we are spiritual bankrupts.
And that is not flattering language.
And if we're going to be saved it must be on the basis of God coming down and rescuing us out of our miry pit.
And raising us up again because we can do nothing to save ourselves.
And this is part of the great tragedy of the inhabitants of the earth.
They're nothing.
They can't save themselves.
They don't know the right hand from the left.
The politicians.
I keep going on about the politicians.
Why?
Because politicians in Australia have got a far higher profile I think than politicians back in my native land.
The politicians here are almost like superstars.
Back home they're not so regarded I can assure you.
But here they're on the television every day all the time.
And they're so wise and they're so winsome in their sayings.
And they're full of good things.
You vote me in and boy we'll give you the goods.
Don't fall for any of it.
Because they're nothing.
They can't control.
If the Lord wills we will do this or that.
And so it goes on.
I don't have time to press this any further.
The Bible is offensive.
And if you're not a Christian this morning there are things that I'm saying here and you don't like them.
And you don't like the Bible's insistence when it says to you you must never commit adultery ever.
Never ever ever ever ever.
You must never tell lies ever.
And you say but I want to.
I want to Lord.
And the Bible says thou shalt not.
It doesn't flatter us and say well that's alright.
Circumstances after all determine.
Situational ethics apply.
It says no.
The Bible speaks in terms of black and white.
And it's offensive.
In its doctrine of man.
As it is in its doctrine of God.
And then there's a third area that I want to emphasize where the Bible is offensive.
And that's in the area of prophecy.
What has that got to do with this episode that I'm speaking about?
Well God had told Nebuchadnezzar before it came to pass that he was going to send this ailment upon him.
And for seven times it would come and remain until he learned his lesson.
That was what the dream was all about.
Giving him a premonition and a warning.
And that was how Daniel interpreted the vision.
This is what God is going to do.
Now the Bible is full of prophecies.
And we thank God that the Bible is full of prophecies.
And we're living in an age you know when in the church and in the world.
Men are saying to us the Bible prophecy.
Ah history before hand ha ha ha.
But the fact of the matter is that is what prophecy happens to be.
God is telling us what's going to happen in history before it comes to pass.
And we thank God today.
I thank God as a Christian.
And so do you Octu.
Thank God as a Christian that the Bible is so full of prophecies right from the very beginning.
The first prophecy of the Bible begins in Genesis chapter three at verse fifteen.
That's the fountain head of all prophecy.
And it begins you remember there shall come the seed of the woman.
And he will undo the work of the servant.
And his heel will be bruised but the serpents head will be crushed.
That is a messianic prophecy.
It's called the proto evangel.
The proto evangelium.
The first promise of hope given to our fallen parents in the garden of Eden.
And the Bible unfolds that promise.
Have you ever noticed how over and over again God reminding successive generations of his people
says according to my promise.
You and I have a good hope tonight.
Today.
Not because hope rises eternal in the human breast.
We're human and after all we do like these words of the poet.
But because God has promised it.
I will create a new heaven and a new earth.
And it will remain before me and you will rejoice in it.
I will raise my people from the dead.
I will give them Isaiah.
He will come the first time and I'll send him back the second time to complete the work of self.
These are all prophecies.
Now you see it is all written here.
He does as he pleases.
I'll do it according to his will in the army of heaven.
Not in terms only of things past.
But in terms of things to come.
If you're a Christian this morning you have a good hope.
I look forward to the future.
And I don't know what dark days must lie ahead.
But I do know this.
That the days ahead for a Christian are bright.
Because God according to his many great and precious promises has told us.
Have you ever noticed in the Bible how often, indeed always as far as I know.
All the great things that God says.
All the great things that God does for his people.
He tells them he's going to do it.
His people in Egypt he told them that would happen.
His people coming out of Egypt he told them that would happen.
His people in the desert he told them that would happen.
If they obeyed him they would be blessed.
If they disobeyed him they would be touched.
That happened.
The exile he told them that would happen.
And the return again he told them that would happen.
And the coming of Christ he said that's going to happen.
And he's going to be raised again from the dead.
He's going to be.
He always speaks and prepares us for what lies ahead.
So that when it comes we can recognize it is the doing that is going to happen.
For what lies ahead.
So that when it comes we can recognize it is the doing of the Lord.
Remember Daniel in the ninth chapter.
His great prayer.
Daniel was reading in the book.
We're told in the ninth chapter.
In the book of Jeremiah.
And there was the promise you remember of the seventy years of exile.
As Daniel was reading.
No doubt we can just picture him there.
An old man by this time ninety odd years of age.
And he was sitting there saying no sin.
That's a silver cut.
It's time now for God to fulfill his promise.
And so Daniel prayed that God would fulfill his promise.
According to his plan.
Because Daniel recognized that the time was coming now.
For the seventy year exile to come to an end.
And the time for the people to return.
It's now coming.
According to God's promise it was.
Lord do it.
According to your plan.
And so it is we to recognize.
But I want to emphasize something.
And I've got to press on.
This is kind of going on.
But I want to emphasize.
The future.
And the prophecies of the Bible.
They are not simply telling what men are going to do in the world.
Wars. Rumors of wars.
The book of Revelation.
The beast.
And all the kingdoms of the earth.
From living to this final realm of anti-Christ.
And economic control.
And all these things.
It's not just what men are going to do.
It's what God is going to do.
Why is it that the beast is going to come?
And the anti-Christ is going to come in his final form.
Why?
Because God has determined that it shall be.
Let me remind you of something.
An unusual plant.
According to Paul writing to 2 Thessalonians.
Reminding the Christians there.
Remember in the second chapter.
They had some confusion over the events on the second coming of Christ.
And Paul says now let me put this first.
The day of the Lord will not come except there comes the falling away first.
And that man of sin be revealed.
Now notice carefully what Paul is doing.
He's encouraging those Christians.
He's saying to them.
When the man of sin comes.
When the powers of this world seem to be in their acme of power and antagonism to the gospel.
Paul is saying to the Thessalonians.
That's not a bad sign.
That's a good sign.
Because it means that Christ is coming to them.
So when you see the world in its unbelief.
Worshipping the beast.
Falling into apostasy.
Disarray in the church.
Only a few remaining faithful.
That's a good sign.
Says the Apostle Paul.
Because it means that Christ is coming to them.
Look at it that way.
Because what God is telling us is not just what's going to happen to the world.
And what men are going to do.
He's telling us what he's going to do.
And he's doing it all for the salvation of his own people.
Because at the heart of everything that God does is this one great principle and purpose.
All things work together for good to those who love God.
To those who have a cause according to his purpose.
Now I don't know what God is saying with the world.
I can't even begin to imagine why God does what he does.
And doesn't do what I would want him to do.
But I do know this.
That all things are working for good.
And God has prophesied and repeated over and over again those prophecies and predictions.
That he will bring it all ultimately to a saving end of his people.
Where do we find that message?
In the Bible.
A final area, and I'm going to quote on this.
I believe the time should be 11.55.
It's now 11.55.
I'll just give you a couple of minutes and we're done.
So the first area of offense in the Bible is the biblical doctrine of God.
The biblical doctrine of man.
The biblical doctrine of prophecy.
And finally, the biblical doctrine of the supernatural or miracle.
You see what happened to Nebuchadnezzar?
Lycanthropy, philanthropy.
Was it just that he took some mental illness?
That's not the emphasis of the passage.
This was the doing of the Lord.
God brought it upon him.
God intervened.
What happened to Nebuchadnezzar belonged to the realm of miracle.
And when Nebuchadnezzar's reason and understanding was restored,
it wasn't just that the physicians in Babylon gave him some purity.
It was that God restored him.
Because God recognized that Nebuchadnezzar had suffered enough to learn his lesson the hard way.
If he wouldn't learn it one way, then he'll learn it the other.
It's the doing of the Lord.
Now the people of the world today, they say prophecies and miracles.
Ha ha.
We don't believe in those miracles of the Bible.
The Bible's full of miracles.
We say, well actually the Bible's not full of miracles.
There's only about 100 miracles recorded in the Bible.
All told roughly.
50 roughly in the Old Testament, 50 in the New.
40 approximately recorded in the Gospel, 10 in the Acts of the Apostles.
And that's all.
The Bible is not full of miracles.
And miracles are not always happening according to the Bible.
They happen at certain periods.
They happen with quite a number of miracles recorded in the book of Daniel.
There were miracles at the time of the Exodus.
There were miracles in the ministry of Elijah and Elisha.
And an occasional one in other prophetic ministries.
There was an upsurge of miracles.
John the Baptist didn't perform any miracles.
But when Christ came, there was an upsurge of miracles
that is more than any other period recorded in the Holy Spirit.
No one according to the Bible performed as many miracles as Jesus did.
And the apostles didn't.
So there was an upsurge.
And then miracles ceased.
And that's all the Bible has to say about miracles.
But these miracles are not given to help people.
And I'm just giving you this because often criticism is made against the miraculous element of the Bible.
Well, why don't we see miracles today? Why?
Because God's not speaking to us today. That's fine.
But it's not one miracle recorded in the Bible that has been recorded
at the hands of anyone who is not a preacher of the Gospel.
Miracles are always at the hands of those who are the bearers of God's message.
Not every preacher performs miracles.
But every miracle worker is a preacher.
You won't find any miracle recorded by an ordinary believer,
let alone an unbeliever.
Indeed, the scripture recognizes false signs and wonders.
But these are not miracles. These are imitations.
These are the works of wizardry and crinkling.
But they're not the works of the Lord.
And they're different from the miracles of the Bible.
The Bible tells us why miracles are past.
John tells us at the end, you're a member of this Gospel, and I must close.
I know you're very patient.
And I'll come to an end.
The Gospel of John tells us at the end of chapter 20, these things, these facts,
there are other signs, miracles that Jesus did, which are not written in this book.
But John has recorded seven miracles, including the rising again from the dead.
These are written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God,
and that believing you might have life as he is born.
Elijah, remember, when he performed that miracle in the house of the widow,
raising her son, now I know that you are a man of God,
and that the word of the Lord is in your mouth.
Now I know it, because he performed a miracle.
Psalm 74 says, we see no signs, and there are no prophets in the land.
Miracles and revelation go together.
And yet men can't believe that we don't believe the Bible, because we don't see miracles today,
therefore miracles don't happen, and at the end, they forget miracles don't happen today,
but they did happen when God was revealing himself in those days,
when through prophets and apostles and supremely his Christ, he was speaking to men.
Now these are the areas I put to you, where the world today finds the Bible offensive,
and many Christian people, too, find the Bible offensive because of what it says about God,
what it says about man, what it says about prophecies, and what it says about miracles.
I'll stop there. May God bless us. Thank you.