II Peter 1:21 Divinely Inspired

(soft music) - Welcome to Steadfast Hope. I'm Stephen Lawson, president of One Passion Ministries. And four times a week, I teach through a portion of scripture to encourage you in your Christian walk. Join me now for this brief devotion in God's Word. - Welcome to Steadfast Hope. I'm Steve Lawson, and I'm joined by Kent Stainback, who's always at my side. - Absolutely. - Absolutely. And we are coming to you from Herb South Dallas, Texas. You need to come join us sometime. And we are in Second Peter chapter one, and verse 21. If you have your Bible, please turn with me. To Second Peter one, verse 21, and the title of this devotion is divinely inspired. So, Peter writes, "For no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." The question that this is addressing Kent is, so how was the Bible produced? Was this drawn from human minds? Was this the product of human reasoning? How did we come by the Bible? And the scripture teaches that there's really two authors for every passage of scripture. There's the primary author who is God, and the secondary author who is man. And the Bible is the Word of God. And Second Timothy 3, 16, all scripture is God, breathed, God inspired. So it all comes from the mouth of God. Yet God used human instruments to record each book in the Bible. And what's interesting, Kent, as we read the Bible, there's a difference in vocabulary from Peter to Paul to John. They all have their own personality and their own way of expression, yet it all comes from God. And so there is a mystery to this, but what this passage addresses is how God moved upon the human authors to write and record what they did in Holy Scripture. They were under the power and the control of God. So let's just kind of walk through this verse that I just read, Kent. And he begins by saying, "No prophecy was ever made by an act of human will." When he says prophecy here, he's not talking about someone standing up, let's say in the first century and speaking. The context here as the previous verse notes is on Scripture, where he says, "No Scripture is a matter of one's own interpretation or no prophecy of Scripture." So when he begins verse 21, it says, "No prophecy was ever made by an act of human will." He's talking about the divine revelation that is recorded in Scripture. And what he is saying is what is written in the Bible is not of human origin, is not the result of man's thinking. He goes, "But men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God." And when he says men, he's referring to the biblical authors. He's referring to Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, Paul, Jude, et cetera, the author of Hebrews. These men, it says, "were moved by the Holy Spirit in order to speak to record from God." Now, what is interesting is this verb moved by, men moved by the Holy Spirit, which used earlier in the book of Acts in Acts 27, when Paul is on a ship headed to Rome, you remember he goes through the shipwreck, and the wind is blowing into the sails of that ship and is propelling the ship along and taking the ship in a certain direction that the wind will steer it. And so that very same word is used here that men moved by the Holy Spirit. It was like the wind of heaven blowing into the sails of the minds of the human authors propelling them and even directing them into what God desires to be written, yet everything that they write, their own minds are engaged and they're using their own intellect and background and manners of expression to record what God wanted to be written. So we have absolute confidence that the Bible is what it claims to be. It is the written word of God, yet he used human instruments. And a good analogy might even be Mary who was conceived in her by the Holy Spirit, yet God used her as a human agent to produce the sinless Son of God. So God can take fallible men, sinful men, and record a perfect book because the Holy Spirit was super intending the entire process of recording Scripture. So Kent, that's our devotion for this morning and that's why you and I love the Bible because it really is the truth of God, the mind of God, and yet as we study it, we can see how Peter frames certain arguments and doctrines that are unique to Peter that are different from, I just flipped here to Daniel that are different from other biblical authors. - Well, I think that there's nothing that gives us even more comfort to know that this word is directly from God, which is amazing. But also know that a lot of our listeners and there's a lot of people out there that don't like the fact that men may not have full control or it's God is working through men. In other words, Bethaudeus, do you think that as Peter grabbed his pen, he watched his hand just move on the board, right? Is that what you're saying here? That all of a sudden he grabbed his pen and his hand was just moving? - No, that's not it at all. In fact, even with Paul, most of his letters were dictated and not even written. So there's another dynamic that's going on there. - So it's not robotic. - It's not robotic. And sometimes I think people think about it this way that it was a dictation that God said in the beginning and in the beginning, God created the heavens there. And that the human author has totally taken out of this process of recording scripture, almost bypassing the mind of the human author. No, that's not it at all. And Kent, there is a mystery to this. We can't just narrow the gap on this into a tight little formula. We're just given the parameters of this. And inside these parameters takes place the mystery of the inspiration of scripture. Yet, Kent, as you and I read this book and you and I've read many other books, there's no book in the world like this book. I mean, it speaks not just to us, it speaks into us, it speaks through us. And it's been well said, I've read other books, this book reads me. I mean, this book knows all about me. It addresses the issues of my life, like no other book that I've ever read, that there is a supernatural dimension to this book because it is a supernatural book, a supernatural origin. It has come from God. - Do you think that this kind of reveals, well, two things, one is, we know this is from God. - Mm-hmm. - That's incredible. But also that we as humans try to put God in a box and we try to put a really a fence around him and say, well, this is the only way he can do it. Do you think this right here really elevates God and tells us again that we can't fully understand how he's doing all this? - Yeah, absolutely. For who's known the mind of the Lord or who's been his counselor? - And how does that help us in our lives? - Well, I think it really develops faith and develops trust because if we could figure God out, then we're on the same level with God. But the fact that he is so far beyond us and he's just pulled back the veil ever so often to allow us to peek into the kingdom with what he has revealed to us enough to make himself known to us and really certain aspects of how this book was produced. But it just keeps us in a posture of humility that God has so far elevated above and beyond us and can it really boils down to this too? It really is a step of faith. God working in my mind and in my heart to accept accept what this claims to be, the written word of the living God. That's good. And so it goes beyond my reasoning, though I can reason to a point, but only to a point. And from there I have to take a step of faith and trust that this book is what it claims to be. And even that faith that I have in this book has come from God. So we're dependent upon God for everything. We can't, I've loved this devotion this morning because it reminds me of the veracity of Scripture, the infallibility of Scripture. It is impossible for God to lie, the Bible says. So I want to encourage us all to be in the Word of God as much as we possibly can and to have full confidence that every jot and every title in this book is from God and will come to pass. Well, Lord's blessing upon you, I look forward to being with you, our very next opportunity. Thank you so much for joining me on this episode of "Steadfast Hope." If this was helpful to your Christian walk, please leave us a review wherever you listen to this show. And if you want to connect on social media, I can be found at Dr. Stephen J. Lawson or at One Passion Ministries. Thank you for listening. And I hope you will join me again for the next episode of "Steadfast Hope."