(Proverbs 27:17 - "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another." ESV)

In the process of getting my CDL license so I could drive our Church bus, I found myself in the bus yard of our local school system.  I was grateful that the school system was willing to be a testing/training facility for me to drive a church bus, but I couldn't help but consider the situation.

As a homeschool dad, I have seen that big yellow bus (that is very difficult to parallel park, I discovered) go right by our house and keep on going many, many days.  I have often wondered about the kids on the bus and what they would learn and experience at school on those days.

Sometimes, when I see the yellow bus, I think about why we started homeschooling our oldest about seven years ago.  We really started because we wanted to.  We weren't opposed to the public schools, we just really wanted to teach him at home.  Now we see the obvious problems with public schools, but we really homeschool still because we want to.  We want to control the content.  We want to be in charge of our own family schedule (those buses come early in the morning!) We want to spend time with the kids.  We want them to be able to learn at their own pace and not be accelerated or decelerated by a group.

I know many people accuse homeschool families of thinking that they are "better than everyone else."  Unfortunately, there are some homeschool Pharisees who face that accusation for good reason.  I think most Christian homeschool moms and dads we know humbly that they have a great thing going and they wouldn't trade it for anything. 

While at the school bus office, I saw an artsy, cutesy sign on the wall in a "country" motif (no doubt bought at one of those lame craft shows) that said something like, "If kids didn't go to school every day, then insane asylums would be filled with moms."  Sigh.   The sad thing is that some of those very nice people at the school bus office probably really believe that rubbish.  I know if my wife had seen that sign, she would have said, "I'm so sure!"

While I was there, waiting for hours to take my tests, I had lots of time to think.  Some in the homeschool community might thing I was in the dragon's lair, or at least in the dragon's bus barn.  But the real dragon is so much more complex than that.  The real dragon only needs the self seeking hearts of people to transport them from godliness to worldliness.  It's a short trip. 

2 Corinthians 10:3-5  For though we walk in the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ...

(Proverbs 27:17 - "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another." ESV)

A few months ago I posted this story on one of my other blogs - its worth recycling, I think.

I was trying to decide what we should do.  It was about 10:00 PM, and the kids were already in bed, but a very intense, tornadic storm was heading directly toward us.  We could have hid in the closet or even our skanky little cellar, but I didn't really like either idea.

The TV reports were coming in about 3 inch hail, and it made me cringe to think of our van being trashed by hail. The path of the tornado was heading just north of us, but close enough to make me know that it was time to jump in the closet or get out of dodge.

So I hastily decided that by driving just a few miles south, we would be out of the path of the storm and away from the hail. I told the boys (who were still awake and already scared since they had heard the sirens) we were leaving. They leaped from their beds with great joy and scattered to the van like rabbits.

I gave Jason the keys and told him to go unlock the van, while I started trying to wake the girls. Jenette had already taken Jenna out to the van, so I started by waking up Jordan. She gradually woke up (at this point I realized I should have done all this ten minutes sooner!), and after leisurely using the bathroom, dawdled out to the van.

Then I started trying to pick up Jewel, but I realized that she had wet the bed and she was completely soaked. She was totally asleep, so I just tried to strip her down as fast as I could.

We were going so fast that I picked her up, grabbed a clean blanket, and rushed her out to the van. Jenette was very surprised to see the poor cold little naked thing! Then I ran back in, grabbed Joy, and ran out to the van carrying her under my arm like a football, (she squealed every time I took a stride) and threw her in.

As we were rushing away from the storm's onslaught, it occurred to me that people in the area most likely had little else on their minds. We didn't have any problems or any damage at all, but it made me realize that when imminent danger is upon you, all other considerations are small. We left the lights on, the doors unlocked, and the poor dog still in her cage.

In doing my ministry to families, I wish more families would see the imminent danger of the godless popular culture. Instead of rushing out of danger, even so called "Christian" families are more like the scene in Independence Day where all the partiers are on top of the building looking up at the spaceships, saying, "cool" and "awesome" until the destruction rays started blasting them into oblivion.

The tornado of culture creates a wide swath of destruction to children and families, but instead of getting out of dodge, so many people I know are driving their families right into the hook echo. Sigh.

Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. Ephesians 4:14-15

jc

(Proverbs 27:17 - "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another." ESV)

http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v24/i3/eisegesis.asp

What a great, great article.  Every Christian should read this.  Every homeschool family should understand this concept and apply to their study of the Bible!

jc

(Proverbs 27:17 - "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another." ESV)

Wisdom, Knowledge, and understanding come from His MOUTH.

God is infinitely smarter that we are, yet He chose to give us His infinite wisdom through a specific delivery method: speaking in a language we could understand. Now God does not literally have a “mouth” with physical lips and teeth and a tongue like we do, but the point is that God’s truth was spoken so that we could hear it, understand it, and apply it.

Hebrews 1:1-2 says 1In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, …

We are living in the last days – and in these last days God has spoken to us through His Son Jesus. How do we know what God has spoken through Jesus? We need to know all the red words in the book – and all the others as well, because Jesus confirmed the truth and sufficiency of the Old Testament in the Gospels. Peter and Paul and the other New Testament writers confirmed the truth and sufficiency of the entire Bible when they wrote, and they testified that God himself breathed into or inspired the writings of the Bible. (See 2 Timothy 3:16 – All Scripture is God-breathed, and is useful for…)

So God’s specific method of delivering His Wisdom to sinful man was human LANGUAGE, compiled by the Apostles and the prophets into a collection of books we now call the Bible. Frail humans like Moses and David and Matthew and Mark took their pens and wrote the words –each adding their own style and experiences, but all of it guided and inspired in its truth, accuracy, completeness, power, and sufficiency by the mouth of God.

Please meditate on this Proverb: God has given it to us, and he has given it to us by the way that we can most easily ACCESS it: he has spoken it in understandable human language. God could have kept his wisdom to himself! Or He could have delivered it in some unintelligible code, but He didn’t. And how powerful is that today, two thousand years after Jesus walked this earth, that we have God’s wisdom, knowledge, and understanding presented to us in the most effective communication device ever – a book in a language we can understand.

Books are great because, once they are printed, books don’t change. Books don’t walk away (unless someone takes them for a walk!). Books might get a little faded and torn up, but you can replace your copy. Books are handy to take anywhere. Books don’t need sleep, and they don’t have expensive parts to replace. Books don’t have to be fed, they don’t need batteries, and praise God they don’t need anything from Microsoft.

But there is a problem with books, especially the Bible. It’s really a problem with us, not the Bible itself. The problem is MISINTERPRETATION.

I am convinced that the single most important issue that the Church needs to address today is how to interpret the Bible correctly. One church says that the Bible means this – the other church says the Bible means that. Nearly every disagreement between churches and denominations is in some way related to the interpretation of the Bible.

The Bible is the most widely read, most misunderstood, book that there is. And I think there is really one main reason for that:

The main reason God’s Word is so misunderstood is that we want to put our words in God’s mouth, instead of letting His mouth speak His wisdom, His knowledge and His understanding to us. The key is that it is given to us by the Lord from His mouth. Don’t you hate it when someone puts words in your mouth? When they make it sound like you said something that you would never say? Unfortunately, we spend an awful lot of time and energy putting words into the Lord’s mouth. We need to let the Lord say what He wants to say instead of forcing a preconceived opinion onto the Bible.

The difference is basically reading an idea “into” the Bible, verses reading an idea “out” of the Bible. Putting words into the Lord’s mouth is called “EISEGESIS” – reading into the Bible what we already think beforehand. Allowing God to speak what He wants from His Word is called “EXEGESIS” – reading out of the Bible what it says. We want to preach and teach exegetically – our church is committed to interpreting the Bible this way.

Ken Ham on his Answers In Genesis.org website has an excellent article about the difference between “eisegesis” – reading into the Scripture man’s fallible ideas, verses “exegesis” – reading out of the Scripture what God wants to say.

His article has some great illustrations. Eisegesis – putting words in the mouth of God - looks at Genesis one (and the rest of the Bible) with a marker, ready to mark out what you don’t like. The Hebrew word for “day,” “Yom,” cannot mean “day,” because everyone knows that the earth is millions and millions of years old. That is “reading into” the Scripture a human bias. That is putting words in the mouth of God that He never intended to say.

Exegesis – “reading out of” looks at Genesis one with a magnifying glass. It is an honest, humble approach. We look at the Hebrew word “Yom,” and we find out it means, guess what, “Day.” But we look at the grammar and the style of literature and by honestly studying God’s Word, we “find that whenever yôm (day) is qualified by a number or the phrase evening and morning, it always means an ordinary day. Thus, critically looking at the text and then reading out of Scripture, one cannot come to any other conclusion except that these days were ordinary (24-hour) days.” –Ken Ham

Ken Ham says in his article that…”Understanding the difference between ‘eisegesis’ and ‘exegesis’ is really the KEY to the effectiveness of the church in today’s culture. “ I totally agree with that statement. All over this country and the world, Christians are being taught to interpret their Bibles by throwing out the highlighter and grabbing the black marker – saying “this can’t be true” because we are foolish enough to attempt to put words in the mouth of God. How effective are churches going to be working off of human wisdom?

But when we train Christians to properly listen to the mouth of God speak what He wants to say, we as a whole body have the discernment to judge the theories and ideas of fallible, sinful, treacherous humans like ourselves in light of what the Scripture clearly says. Like Mark Twain said, “it’s not the parts of the Bible that I don’t understand that bother me, it’s the parts of the Bible that I DO understand that bother me.”

We don’t change the meaning of Scripture based on cultural whims – the meaning of Scripture should be changing cultural whims as Christians fulfill their calling to be salt and light in a wicked world. We don’t adjust the truth of God’s Word – it adjusts us. In fact, you could even go so far to say, that we don’t even interpret the Scripture, but the Scripture INTERPRETS us.

We need to understand that there is only one “meaning” of Scripture – that is what the author intended to say. (It is from the Lord’s mouth, not mine, or anyone else’s!) Any other meaning than the author’s meaning is wrong. The ultimate author is the Lord, and His meaning is the right one. We need to constantly analyze our study of Scripture to make sure our thinking and our methodology is correct. Maybe you have heard this question: “What does this Scripture mean to you?” That question should be banned in our study of Scripture because it leads us to put words in God’s mouth that He did not intend.

Instead we should ask, “What is the author trying to say here? And a good follow up question would be, “How does this Scripture apply to your life?” A great thing to remember in studying Scripture is, “Am I getting the AIM – the AUTHOR’S INTENDED MEANING? Or am I putting words into God’s mouth?”

Now someone might say, “Are we not supposed to listen to preaching and teaching of the Bible?” Well, God’s Word tells us that we need to listen to the preaching and teaching of God’s Word – in fact, we as a church need to seriously grow in our commitment to studying the Bible.

Growing in our knowledge and understanding of the Bible is not an option for the maturing Christian. We use the authority of God’s Word to preach - not our own authority. God’s Word gives us the wisdom to give to other people.

I am nothing by myself, just like everyone else. I am a wretched sinner, saved by God’s grace alone, through my active, living faith. The authority to preach or teach lies in the Word of God itself spoken from the mouth of God. My job as a teacher is to accurately present to you the whole counsel of God. Your job as church members and listeners is not to sit there and be sleeping sheep, but to be active participants – to realize that the wolf is always about looking for some sleeping sheep to munch on.

As a church body, we need to seriously commit ourselves to be like the Bereans in Acts 17. In Acts 17, Paul preaches the gospel in Thessalonica, and then gets run out of town by a very irate mob. He then goes to preach in Berea, and listen to what the Scripture says about the Bereans in Acts 17:11:

11Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.

Now please chew on this for a second. If the Bereans were commended and encouraged for daily searching the Scriptures to see if what Paul said was true, how much more so should we be daily searching the Scriptures if some "schmoe" like me is preaching? How much more should we daily search the Scriptures to see if what the TV and radio preachers are saying is true? How much more should we daily search the Scriptures to make sure we are not putting our words in His mouth?

Paul was an Apostle with a capital "A." Paul wrote most of the New Testament. Paul took the gospel to the entire world of His day. Paul is undoubtedly the greatest pastor, missionary, preacher, scholar, writer, and teacher in Christian history other than Jesus himself- and the Bereans are COMMENDED for digging in their Bibles and checking Him out. They weren’t prideful and arrogant about it – they had a noble character – they received it with great eagerness.

That word translated “examined” in Acts 17:11 means much more than mere reading. They carefully investigated the Scriptures – it is the same word used when a judge is INVESTIGATING a case before Him. What I wouldn’t give to hear the conversations they must have had. Can you imagine them? Staying up all night long talking and arguing about these things – and then coming back the next day to Paul. Can you imagine Paul having to preach to these guys? Talk about a smart crowd! They were not going to be deceived – they had a Godly discernment and they knew their Bibles.

Guess what they found out? They found out that Paul was right! They found out that Paul was right because Paul was proclaiming God’s Wisdom spoken from God’s mouth and not Paul’s own opinions. They did not wait to be spoon fed – they were active participants in the learning process.

Where do you go for your answers? Life is a difficult, messy business. God’s Word is fully sufficient to deal with the tough issues in every day life.

(Proverbs 27:17 - "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another." ESV)

The Lord GIVES wisdom.

The Bible repeatedly states that God Himself is the source, the origin, and the creator of everything that is true and right and wise. Wisdom, knowledge, and understanding do not originate with humans, but with God. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 1:19-20

19For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
20Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? …. 25For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.

Even the greatest foolishness of God (if there could even be such a thing) is much greater and much wiser than the greatest, wisest thing man could ever come up with. We think that in this day and age that our technology is going to solve every problem. We foolishly believe that we are smarter than God. The passage in 1 Corinthians goes on to say that the ultimate expression of the wisdom and power of God is Christ himself, and the PREACHING of the gospel message – is the ultimate in foolishness to the world. Wisdom, knowledge, and understanding are from the Lord, not from us.

Have you ever paused to consider the result of what God creates verses the result of what people create? Sometimes during the fall our family will go out and pick up walnuts. In just a few hours under two or three trees, we can fill up a whole trailer.

We also pick up trash beside the road at times. When we do this, my boys work diligently and with good attitudes, but there isn’t much joy in it. It doesn’t take long to collect a whole trailer load of stinky, disgusting trash in just a small area! As we work, sometimes we talk about littering, laziness, and how gross trash is. We talk about beer and whiskey and driving drunk - we always find more beer cans and bottles than anything else on the road right by our house.

We were doing the same action: picking up a great abundance of stuff off the ground, but there was a key difference between the two: God made the walnuts, and provided a blessing. Humans made the trash, and provided a mess to clean up. That’s the difference between God’s wisdom, and man’s wisdom. James 3:13-15 says:

13Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show it by his good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. 14But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. 15Such “wisdom” does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, of the devil.

Where do you find the answers to your questions? Really! Where do you go? Do you go to the Lord – the source of wisdom and walnuts – or to man – the source of treachery and trash?

I want to warn you to stop listening to human wisdom. Human wisdom says we’re all OK – Human wisdom says God’s a great guy – he’s not going to send people to hell. Human wisdom says don’t admonish people for their sin, but just build up their self-esteem. Human wisdom, at its core, is wisdom that is WISE in its own EYES. God’s wisdom is objective and absolute – it is outside of us – God sees us as we really are – desperate sinners in need of grace.

Proverbs 3:7 Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and shun evil.

Proverbs 26:12 Do you see a man wise in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.

Proverbs 28:11 A rich man may be wise in his own eyes, but a poor man who has discernment sees through him.

Now you might be wondering, “Jim, are you saying we shouldn’t ever get advice from anyone? If people are so messed up, how do we know who to LISTEN to?” Here’s the deal: you had better know the worldview of the person you are seeking counsel from. What is your potential counselor’s STARTING point – the source of truth? Does that person get their answers from God’s Word, or from somewhere else?

Does that person have a growing maturing RELATIONSHIP with Jesus Christ? Isaiah calls Jesus the wonderful counselor. Does that person have the FRUIT of the Holy Spirit in his life? John 14 says the Holy Spirit is our counselor who lives in us and will guide us into all truth.

One of the reasons that God gives His wisdom to people is so that we can SHARE it with others. But we had better make sure we are giving and listening to Godly wisdom instead of worldly wisdom.

Psalm 1:1 says; "Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked…"

Wisdom, knowledge, and understanding come from a holy and perfect God, but here is the great part: He chose to give it to us. The Lord gives wisdom. God could have made us to be dumb animals, but He made us in His own image, so that we could learn who he is and have a relationship with Him. God didn’t have to give us anything; He chose to give it to us.

So how exactly does God give His wisdom? Check out the next post for the next reason.

We talk a lot about the truth of Scripture. We talk about the importance of Scripture. We talk about the power and the inspiration of Scripture, but do we really, at the core, believe in the sufficiency of Scripture? Do we really, at the core, practice the sufficiency of Scripture? Do we really rely on the full sufficiency of Scripture in everyday life?  Do you?

I believe this may be the most important question we should ask, and answer appropriately, for Christians living in today’s culture. Do you go first to God’s Word for answers, or do you go elsewhere? I started listing this week all the issues where people elevate Man’s truth over God’s Wisdom, and guess what? The list includes everything.  Christians should take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ – every issue in life needs to be processed Biblically. But tragically, many Christians do not “think like a Christian.” Instead, many of them think like the world.

There are at least three top “worldly thinking” sources of information:

People trust their FEELINGS for answers. If it feels right, then it must be right. If I feel like I can fly like superman, I must be able to. If I feel like I can overcome the forces of gravity, then I must be able to. Feelings are a very treacherous source of answers.

People trust other peoples’ OPINIONS. If Dr. “So and So” said it then it must be right. He’s an expert on the matter. But whose opinion do you value the most? Did you know that there are over 250 different viewpoints on human psychology? Which one is right? Can they all possibly be right?

We also put our trust in SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE. If science has proven a certain thing to be true, then we must trust it, right?. Now science is very helpful and certainly has it’s place, but unfortunately, much of what is called science is not based on observation and repeated experiments; much of it is really someone’s opinion and it’s falsely called science.

We've seen these three "sources" played out so much recently in the DaVinci Code hype and the Gospel of Thomas nonsense.  (And those three sources are frequently cited or quoted from "experts" who explain why homeschooling is so terrible!)

I’d like to suggest that we trust in God’s Revelation for our answers. I want to suggest two reasons why we should fully rely on the sufficiency of Scripture in every day life. These two reasons are found in Proverbs 2:6: For the LORD gives wisdom, and from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.

See the next post for the the first reason:

This is the fourth blog I have started - My first dedicated to Homeschooling and on homeshoolblogger.  This is truly an awesome blogging site. More to come!

jc

           How  many gs can you find. answers only available to friends.

 ( answers only available to friends means you have to be my friend to see them)

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• legos
• thinking
•  reeding
•  soccer
•  tinkering with elliktronics
•  monopoly
•  risk
•  computer gaems
• star wars
• lord of the rings
• caving
• jumping off of swings and doing triks

Have you ever played tic-tac-toe?  Something is telling me you have at least once and if you haven't (which I thing is highlynonprobable) then you probably will sometime anyway, I know some tricks to winning, losing and making it a cats eye. I am stille trying to decide if I am going to tel you what those triks are, so what do you think? Should I tel you what those tricks are? how about this if you put a comment on my blog then I will put a comment on your blog with one (1) of the secrets.