"Our concerning truth is an invevitable expression of our concern with God. If God exists then He is the measure of all things, and what He thinks about all things is the measure of what we should think. Not to care about truth is not to care about God. To love God passionately is to love truth passionately. Being God-centered in life means truth-driven in ministry. What is not true is not of God. What is false is anti-God. Indifference to the truth is indifference to the mind of God. Pretense is rebellion against reality and what makes reality is God. Our concern with truth is simply an echo of our concern with God." John Piper so well put it. Truth.
Fundamentalist, Evangelicals, Bible Believing Christians believe Truth about God, His Son Jesus Christ, and His Spirit, the Holy Spirit are found in the Written Word, we know as the Holy Bible.
You will not find a Baptist Preacher who will deny that the Bible is the very word of God. I grew up listening to J. Vernon McGee, and Oliver B. Greene. They both had this gift of teaching the Word of God, chapter by chapter. Oliver Greene would only use biblical illustrations to express the meaning of the text. To my ears in those early years of my life, they were teaching from the Bible the very word of God. What I was hearing was the explanation of the text. I really fell in love with reading the Bible. To know Jesus Christ, His Words, His Works, comes from the Bible. In our church, my dad would give teachers Harry R. Ironside's book on Hebrews to use as a guide in teaching the Book of Hebrews.
That was the purpose of going to Bible Baptist Seminary.
I wanted to know how to know what God was saying in the Bible. It's called "principles of biblical interpretation." I wanted the skill in understanding, interpreting, and applying the Bible as a preacher/teacher. I wanted to learn the techniques useful in understanding particular facets of the Bible. This process was called 123 Hermeneutics.
Before you can preach/teach you should know what God is saying about the subject. How did McGee know what Romans 1 was teaching? How did Ironside know the meaning of Hebrews. I had no clue. I could read his books. I loved reading, Spurgeon, Greene, McGee (pre-Seminary days).
I really did not know what I should know to understand the Bible. I did after all have a Scofield KJV Bible. While in Seminary I did buy "The New Analytical Bible" published by John A. Dickson.
Bible Baptist Seminary. The Seminary was a Bible and Baptist Seminary. In the three years I attended the Seminary, there was no question that the Bible was taught by some great professors. I was definitely taught what the professors believed the Bible was teaching. But I was never taught how they knew what the Bible was teaching. So I was in the same position after seminary. I didn't know how Spurgeon knew what he preached. I knew what these great men believed, but I wanted to know how they knew the truth of the Word of God.
Part Two later today......
Charles E. Whisnant August 27, 2006
