Satan’s Fools are Satan’s ToolsLet’s begin by defining a few basic

terms. A fool is one who confidently car-ries on concerning something he knowsnothing about. However, a fool is greatlysurpassed in ignorance by the imbecilewho assumes he has learned some greatesoteric truth while sitting at the feet ofthe fool. The moron, by way of contrast,doesn’t even bother to sit. Like a talkingparrot, he repetitiously recites—at themost appropriate (or, most often, inap-propriate) time—the trite phrases he hasheard the fool and the imbecile use.

The Church has seen its share offools, imbeciles, and morons over thepast two millenia. Yet during the pastthree centuries there has been a profoundresurgence of the spectacle whereinfools teach imbeciles whose rubbish isrepeated by a vast crowd of morons. Andeach new generation is just as firmlyconvinced as the last that they have, bytheir great erudition, somehow attainedsome worthwhile knowledge concern-ing the Truth of Scripture.

Satan, meanwhile, has been watch-

ing the proceedings with absolute glee.Like the father of fools that he is, he actu-ally believes he is going to triumph bymeans of the confusion generatedthrough the half-witted speculations ofthe best minds this world has had to offer.Amazingly, he has, until now, assumedGod’s Church was rapidly approachingits ignominious end. On the face of it, onewould have to agree with his assessmentof the situation. The evidence in theChurch would lead one to believe all thatremains to be done is to read the eulogyand lower the casket.

Anybody with a shred of commonsense can see that the Church today, in allits various and sundry forms, is nothingmore than a farce. It has become, under thestewardship of Satan’s agents, a mockingcaricature of the Church established by theApostles of Jesus Christ.

How did we get into such a mess?Contrary to what one might assume, itwas easy. All we had to do was, likemindless morons, repeat the folly of foolsand imbeciles who explained thingsabout which they knew next to nothing.As the ongoing accretion of various oraltraditions put forward by fools, theChurch today is, for the most part, the vis-ible product of our great confidence in ourability as rational beings. Unfortunately,that confidence is seriously misplaced.

God did not create us to find theTruth on our own. He created us to learnthe Truth from Him. If that were not thecase, the revelation He provided in theScriptures would not even be necessary.Therefore, those who have sought, or are

Some People Will MakeLight of Anything

Some of you have become my disciples over the three and a half years thispublication has been appearing. Others don’t quite know what to make of whatI’ve written. Most have no interest in anything I have to say. That’s as it shouldbe. To each his (or her) own. God never said everybody would be saved. In fact,Jesus indicated most would be lost.

For the benefit of those who read what I write in order to learn what Godhas called me to teach, I want to explain something now that you must under-stand before the events of recent history make much sense at all. Perhaps afterreading this article, you will better understand why I frequently say the impor-tant thing is not that you believe but what you believe. So here goes.

For centuries after the Church lost The Apostolic Teaching, Satan was ableto dominate and control the thinking of True Believers through the strangleholdimposed on them by the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church. The ordinarylayperson had no access to the Scriptures and was forced to seek God’s forgive-ness through cumbersome rituals devised by men.

The Protestant Reformation changed all that. The work accomplished bythe likes of Martin Luther and John Calvin dealt a devastating blow to Satan be-

INSIDE° Letters to the Editor . . 2

° Questions & Answers . 11

See Satan’s Fools on Page 3See Light on Page 13

Volume 5, Number 2 April 1994

As many of you will recall, LarryHarper had planned on writing an articleon Søren Kierkegaard for the October1993 issue. Well, the article you havebeen anxious to read is here. Kierkegaardwas responsible for the notion that a “leap

of faith” is all that is required for salvation. As you read this article, you willbegin to understand why for so many in the Church what you believe is notnearly as important as that you believe.

Current EventsThe seminar tape set, The Way, The Truth, The Life, was shipped this

quarter. That tape set provides the best source currently available for thosewho wish to understand what we believe. Evidently, our subscribers thinkso too as we have begun to receive gift orders for the set. If you have not al-ready ordered, I encourage you to get a set for yourself or for your friendsand family members. The information on these tapes provides a foundationfor the things you have learned and will learn from The Voice of Elijah andother publications from The Elijah Project in the months and years to come.

Speaking of other publications, work is progressing on The Mystery ofScripture, Volume 1. The final edit is close to completion and then all that re-mains is the printing. If all goes well, those who have been patiently waitingfor its release will have it in their hands before I write the next edition of thisletter. Please pray with us that there will be no further obstacles to delay thisproject.

As I mentioned in the last “Letter to the Editor,” we intended to begin aconcentrated mailing effort in January. And we did. The pace has notslowed since the new year began. In the first two months of this year wemailed more pieces than we did in the final six months of 1993. The re-sponses from this effort have been coming in daily, and our family of sub-scribers continues to grow. As the year progresses we plan to explore newways to increase our subscriber base and reach more people with TheTeaching they will need in these Last Days.

The number of our Monthly Contributors has grown considerably overthe last quarter as well. I told you in January to expect a letter in the mail con-cerning the Monthly Contributor program. Our thanks go out to those whohave joined us by becoming Monthly Contributors in response to that letter.We appreciate your commitment to helping us grow so that we can reachthose True Believers who are still out there searching for Truth.

As our base of contributors increases so too will our level of effective-ness. There are still so many we have yet to reach, so many who have nothad the same opportunity you have had to hear the Truth that is now avail-able. Your regular contributions will make it possible for us to continue ex-panding our outreach as we fulfill our mission to distribute the publicationsthat are available from The Elijah Project. I encourage anyone who hasbeen considering becoming a Monthly Contributor to take the time nowand fill out the Order Form at the back of this issue. Your support will beappreciated by those who benefit from it.

Until July,

2 April 1994

Published Quarterlyby Voice of Elijah, Inc.

M. H. Clay,

Executive Editor

Sara Brooks,

Managing Editor

Volume 5

Number 2

April 1994

All correspondenceshould be addressed to:

Voice of Elijah, Inc.

P.O. Box 28201

Dallas, TX 75228

Subscription rates:(1 year, U.S. Funds)

U.S. $24.00

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Articles publishedby permission ofThe Elijah Project.

Except when otherwise noted,Scripture taken from theNEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE,

© 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972,

1973, 1975, 1977, 1987, 1988.

The Lockman Foundation.

Used by permission.

Bolded Scripture reflects the em-phasis of the author.

Copyright © 1994, 2008by Voice of Elijah, Inc.

still seeking, to find the Truth for them-selves are nothing more than fools. Andnone are more foolish than those who takesuch great pride in their own stupendousmental capacity that they look for theTruth within themselves.

Satan’s FoolOne such sagacious fool was the

man Søren Kierkegaard (1813–1855).Kierkegaard was a Danish author whothought he was a genius. And the imbe-ciles who have sat at his feet over the pastcentury and a half, standing in awe ofwhat they see as his prodigious mental ca-pabilities, have unquestioningly acceptedhis own arrogant assessment of himself.

I could have said “the philosopherSøren Kierkegaard” but the term hardlyapplies. As a philosopher of any note, hequalifies only in the sense that he rivals thebest of them in his ability to use a tumult ofwords to obfuscate rather than to clarify.His one great claim to fame (as far as theChurch is concerned) relates specificallyto his introduction of the “leap of faith”nonsense you hear bandied about from thepulpit nowadays.

Søren Kierkegaard (I will call himS.K.) was a Pretender of the worst sort. Hisfollowers have claimed he was, and appar-ently even thought he was, a Christian, al-though he never claimed to be. Theconfusion arises because his followershave had a different view of what it meansto be a Christian than most who came be-fore them. Hence, the Pretenders sinceKierkegaard who have accepted his lunacyhave merely chosen to assume he was aChristian. Some have even accepted hisown misguided assumption that he was a“prophet.” Their estimate notwithstand-

ing, on his sudden demise in 1855 at theage of 42, S.K. was still, to put it in his ownterms, only “becoming a Christian.”

S.K. was certainly a unique individ-ual. There is no disputing that. However,whether his uniqueness was due to mentalillness is a point of some contention. I per-sonally believe he was insane. At the veryleast he was a manic-depressive who diedin a state of neurotic hatred and ill temper,estranged from more than a few of his for-mer friends and family members.

It is a well known fact that theKierkegaard family had a history of de-pression and suicidal tendencies. Thoseaffected included his father, his olderbrother and a nephew who actually suc-ceeded in killing himself. In his personaljournal S.K. records his own thoughts ofsuicide on several occasions. At one pointhe was apparently caught with a gun in hishand and had to be physically preventedfrom going through with the act.

S.K. also mentions having heard au-dible voices talking to him, which wouldindicate he was psychotic. My own pessi-mistic view of his unstable mental condi-tion comes from reading his writings.Any individual who had Satan sitting onhis shoulder dictating to him as S.K. mostassuredly did would have had to be some-what less than sane.

I mentioned above that S.K. was aPretender—that is, that he had never beenborn again. His father was a leader amongthe Moravian Brethren, a group whichemphasized that experience. And S.K.was himself a contemporary of the greatrevivalist Charles Finney (see “CharlesFinney: My Conversion to Christ,” TheVoice of Elijah, January 1992), so heknew something of the Holy Spirit’sworking in the Church. Yet S.K. rejectedthe revivalist movement. He condemnedwhat God was doing among True Believ-ers in his own day, choosing instead to be-

lieve the fabrication Satan whispered inhis ear.

For the most part, the widespread re-vivals of the Second Great Awakening by-passed Denmark. They touched theDanish church only through the person ofNikolai F. S. Gruntvig (1783–1872), aTrue Believer who had been born again in1811. Gruntvig proclaimed what he called“the great natural law of the spirituallife”—that is, “the necessity of the spokenword for the awakening of life and thetransmission of the spirit.” In other words,Gruntvig believed “faith comes by hear-ing, and hearing by the word of Christ”(Rom. 10:17). As a result, he was unable tosecure a pastorate in the Danish statechurch and worked for some years outsidethe organized church.

S.K. found the spiritual movementGruntvig established in Denmark to becompletely repugnant. From that we mayassume he did not believe the new-birthexperience was even a viable option.Now I ask you: If Kierkegaard had neverbeen born again, and did not accept thefact that one could be born again, what inthe world could he possibly have to teachany born-again Believer about the basisfor their relationship to God? As you willdiscover shortly, he had nothing at all.

The problem with which S.K. con-cerned himself in his later years was howto “become an individual” by “findingGod” intellectually within himselfthrough introspection. He has for that rea-son rightly been called “the father of exis-tentialism.” Yet what he advocated is adownright risky venture, isn’t it? What ifGod isn’t in there? What if Satan is? Youcan understand the risks a fool like thatwould run, looking inside himself forsome “subjective” Truth. (See “Mystics,

April 1994 3

Satan’s FoolsFrom Page 1 “Any individual who

had Satan sitting onhis shoulder dictatingto him as S.K. mostassuredly did would

have had to be some-what less than sane.”

“If Kierkegaard had never been born again, anddid not accept the fact that one could be born

again, what in the world could he possibly haveto teach any born-again Believer about the

basis for their relationship to God?”

Meatballs, and the Marvelous Works ofGod,” The Voice of Elijah, April 1993.)Nevertheless, the fellow took the risks,egged on by the master of delusion him-self. And he left a written record to adviseany other dolt who cared to (or dared to)follow in his footsteps.

The sad fact regarding this mad-man’s search for subjective truth withinhimself is the fact that his views have hada far greater impact on our generationthan they should have, or would have, hadit not been for the imbeciles who pickedup his idiocy and echoed the sentiment.His writings are significant only becausethey influenced the thinking of men likeMartin Heidegger (1889–1976) and KarlBarth (1886–1968). The writings of thesemen and those who were influenced bythem have, in turn, shaped the thought ofall Christians in our time, conservativesand liberals alike.

As True Believers, we should atleast seek to identify and root out the basicdistortions Satan successfully introducedinto the Church through the stupidity S.K.propounded concerning a subject aboutwhich he knew nothing whatsoever. Youwill, after all, encounter Pretendersthroughout the Church today who stillspout his insane conclusions as thoughthey are the Gospel Truth.

The LiarThe basic presupposition behind the

thought of S.K. is that “the truth” neces-sary to “find God” resides in every per-son. Consequently, Christian faith is notbased in objective Truth because the onlyvalid Truth resides within each individ-ual. The person has only to discover theTruth through his own insight and deci-sion to believe. Hence, there is no need for

anyone to teach any Christian doctrine asobjective Truth. As the idiot was fond ofsaying, “truth is subjectivity” and “sub-jectivity is the truth.” Listen to what hesaid:

Christianity has declared itself to be theeternal essential truth which has comeinto being in time. It has proclaimed it-self as the Paradox, and it has requiredof the individual the inwardness of faithin relation to that which is an offense tothe Jews and a folly to the Greeks—andan absurdity to the understanding. It isimpossible to express more stronglythe fact that subjectivity is truth andthat objectivity merely repels, even byvirtue of the absurd. And indeed itwould seem very strange that Chris-tianity should have come into the worldjust to receive an explanation; as if ithad been somewhat bewildered aboutitself, and hence had entered the worldto consult that wise man, the speculativephilosopher, who can help by furnish-ing the explanation. It is impossible toexpress with more intensive inward-ness the principle that subjectivity istruth, than when subjectivity is in thefirst instance untruth, and yet subjec-tivity is the truth.(S. Kierkegaard, “Concluding Unsci-entific Postscript,” R. Bretall editor, AKierkegaard Anthology, Princeton:Princeton University Press, 1946,p. 222.)

The folly of S.K.’s position lies inthe fact that, in making such statements,he has thereby presented the doctrine“subjectivity is truth” as objective Truth.So much for subjectivity being the Truth.Where can he and his moronic followersgo from there?

S.K. was not a Christian in anysense of the term. He certainly did not actlike one. Throughout his life he soughtout controversy and contention, lashingout bitterly in his writings against anywho disputed with him. Finally, he diedrefusing to admit those with whom he had

quarreled into his hospital room.Although S.K. piously proclaimed

Christian love as the ideal, he deliberatelyruined the reputation of one man, causinghim to withdraw to Spain in disgracewhere he died soon thereafter as a pauper.What sort of Christian love is that?

I mentioned above that the lunatichated the revivals he saw happening in theProtestant Church. More than that, how-ever, he apparently hated the Church it-self. He despised the success MartinLuther had achieved in establishing theLutheran Church as a counterbalance tothe error of the Roman Catholic Church.He laments the fact that Luther did not dieas a martyr before he could establish a fol-lowing.

Yet S.K. goes back even further inhistory to condemn the baptism of thosefirst True Believers who believed at Pen-tecost (Acts 2:41). How can one help buthear in this man’s craziness the whiningof Satan as he rails against the victoriesGod has achieved in history?

S.K. simply did not believe JesusChrist was God. Therefore, he set aboutcreating a counterfeit “Christianity” forthe benefit of those who, like himself,could not believe that particular doctrine.In other words, he was just another fooldoing Satan’s dirty work by creating a de-lusion. And imbeciles enamored by hiseloquently stated ignorance have carriedon his work after him. Consequently, to-day you can find all sorts of moronic Pre-tenders in the Church confidently holdingforth on a subject—what it means to be aChristian—about which they know noth-ing whatsoever.

S.K. often speaks concerning the“offense” of Christianity as though he un-derstands what Paul meant in the follow-ing:

4 April 1994

“As True Believers, we should at least seek to identify and root out thebasic distortions Satan successfully introduced into the Church.”

“S.K. simply did notbelieve Jesus Christ

was God.”

“S.K. was not aChristian in any sense

of the term.”

But I, brethren, if I still preach circum-cision, why am I still persecuted? Thenthe stumbling block of the cross hasbeen abolished.(Galatians 5:11)

The Apostle was referring to thedeath of Jesus Christ on the cross as one ofthe things that kept the Jews of his dayfrom believing the Truth of the Old Testa-ment Gospel of Jesus Christ. However,S.K. twists the terminology to suit hisown ends. He uses “offense” to refer tothe “stumbling block” one discovers inthe incarnation of Jesus Christ. He does sobecause he finds that concept particularly“offensive.”

Satan was able to use S.K. toachieve his own ends because the man ev-idently had some neurotic need to live upto his father’s expectations. Psychiatristshave suggested he secretly hated his fa-ther but publicly paid him homage be-cause of the guilt and shame his hatredevoked. To understand how Satan manip-ulated S.K., you must understand his fa-ther was a Pretender who wrestled with aninordinate amount of guilt. That feeling ofcondemnation drove him to impose aharsh Christian discipline on his children.His son Søren apparently rebelled againstnot only his father but also the Church.

In his early years, S.K. rejectedChristianity outright, finding he simplycould not believe Jesus Christ was God.Look at what he said:

What now is the absurd? The absurdis—that the eternal truth has comeinto being in time, that God has come

into being, has been born, has grownup, and so forth, has come into beingprecisely like any other individual hu-man being, quite indistinguishable fromother individuals.(Bretall, p. 220)

Later on, however, S.K. found him-self wresting with the same load of guilthis father carried. In desperation, hesought some way to believe in JesusChrist in spite of his unbelief. His contriv-ance is nothing less than Satan’s lie, but itis ingenious to say the least.

The LieChristianity has always said one

must believe in Jesus Christ to be aChristian. Yet S.K. realized he didn’t be-lieve. Therefore, our psychotic “genius”decided the only way to believe whenone did not believe was to subjectively“decide” to believe. That’s where his“leap of faith” nonsense comes into thepicture. If one can’t find any reason tobelieve, one can always just say they be-lieve. Isn’t that a marvelous piece of ba-loney?

Can you see how that sort of non-sense would lead to all sorts of Pretenderscoming into the Church in our own day?Doesn’t it also sound suspiciously like theambiguous “profession of faith” you hearsome preach today? If all those peoplewho “profess” to be Christian have actu-ally repented and been born again, whydon’t they just say so? It’s because theydon’t really believe. They only “profess”to believe. But why do they hide behind a“profession of faith”? That one is easy toanswer.

You see, Satan set out to accomplisha couple of specific objectives throughS.K. and his followers. First, he usedthem to argue that reason cannot be usedas a basis for Christian faith (belief). Theywillingly argued that case because theythemselves could find no reason to be-lieve historic Christian doctrines. How-

ever, you should keep one thing in mindin that regard. Their arguments, as sophis-ticated and abstruse as they are, don’t ac-tually demonstrate the fact that no rationalbasis for believing the historic tenets ofChristianity exists. They just demonstratethey weren’t smart enough to find it.

As I’ve said before and as you willundoubtedly hear me say time and again:Absence of presence is not the same asnonexistence. So the philosophers andliberal theologians of this and past centu-ries may well have shown that a rationalbasis for belief was absent at the time theyset forth their much ballyhooed rumina-tions. That doesn’t mean a rational basisfor Christian belief does not exist now,nor that it is not known to some. It justmeans they were too dumb to discover itthemselves in their own day.

We already know from the negativeattitude he had toward Martin Luther thatS.K. rejected the things accomplishedduring the Protestant Reformation andconsidered them contemptible. That be-ing the case, we should ask why he wouldtake up the most basic doctrine ofProtestant Christianity—salvation byfaith—and make it the basis for his owngoofiness. The answer lies in the fact thathe was driven to it by Satan, the author ofhis insanity. Satan wanted to use him todistort the Reformers’ doctrine of salva-tion by faith.

The founders of Protestant Chris-tianity held that the most logical position,and the only rational position, was beliefin the historical Jesus as the Son of Godwho died as an atonement for sins. In-deed, as I have shown in an earlier issue ofThe Voice of Elijah, John Calvin be-

April 1994 5

“The founders of Protestant Christianity held that the most logicalposition, and the only rational position, was belief in the historical Jesus as

the Son of God who died as an atonement for sins.”

“In desperation, he[S.K.] sought some

way to believe in JesusChrist in spite of his

unbelief.”

“Christianity hasalways said one must

believe in Jesus Christto be a Christian. YetS.K. realized he didn’t

believe.”

lieved the only truly rational person wasthe person who had been born againthrough faith in Jesus Christ. [See “TheNatural Man Is an Idiot (When It Comesto the Truth)” The Voice of Elijah, Octo-ber 1993.] You can see from that how, ifCalvin’s position is true, it completelyprecludes the idiocy put forward by S.K.that one could somehow “find God”within oneself as some sort of “subjectivetruth.” According to Calvin, the unregen-erate person lacks the ability to under-stand the Truth concerning God.

Although S.K. spoke in terms of sal-vation by faith, he did not base that concepton the thought of the Protestant Reform-ers. Instead, he accepted the philosophicalnonsense prevalent in his own day as avalid starting point. That included thethinking of the philosopher ImmanuelKant (1724–1804). Kant argued mankindhas no rational basis for knowledge ofGod’s existence or nature. At the sametime, however, he insisted that belief inGod was completely rational.

S.K. accepted Kant’s argument thatknowledge of God has no rational basis.But he took Kant’s position one step fur-ther. He argued that belief in the incarna-tion of Jesus Christ could only be valid ifit was “subjective”—that is, completelyirrational. He insisted that such belief canonly depend directly on what he called asubjective “leap of faith”—that is, on asudden subjective decision to believe.Here is some of his verbose discussion ofthe topic:

Without risk there is no faith. Faith isprecisely the contradiction between theinfinite passion of the individual’s in-wardness and the objective uncertainty.

If I am capable of grasping God objec-tively, I do not believe, but precisely be-cause I cannot do this I must believe. If Iwish to preserve myself in faith I mustconstantly be intent upon holding fastthe objective uncertainty, so that in theobjective uncertainty I am out “uponthe seventy thousand fathoms of wa-ter,” and yet believe.(Bretall, p. 215.)

S.K. held that the individual’s sub-jective decision to believe results in a per-sonal inward transformation whereby one“becomes an individual.” That soundssomewhat like the new birth. However, incontrast to John Calvin and the other Re-formers who knew the new birth was asingle act of self-surrender, S.K. con-tended it was a process—a continualstriving to bring the idea of God into ev-ery area of one’s existence. Knowingnothing whatsoever about the new-birthexperience, S.K. now proved himself tobe the ultimate fool, dogmatically ex-plaining something about which he knewnothing at all.

Having looked at how S.K. tried todiscredit reason as a basis for faith, let’snow take a look at the second thing Satansought to accomplish through his folly.Satan has used S.K. and the philosopherswho followed him to completely redefinethe term “faith.” He needed that done sothat he could blend their new definition ofthe term into the mysticism he was culti-vating among evangelical Christianscoming out of the revivalist wing ofProtestant Christianity. Satan knew that ifhe could put a variety of lies together inone big pot he would have concocted apotent witch’s brew he could use to com-pletely delude some future generation.Unfortunately for many in our time, thatfuture is now.

We’ll talk more about the Christianmysticism Satan has foisted off on evan-gelical Christianity some other time.Right now I want to show you how Satanused S.K. to twist the Truth of Protestant

Christianity into a weird distortion thatphilosophers and liberal theologians havesuccessfully disseminated throughout allsegments of the Church. Let’s look first athow Satan used his agents to question thevalidity of reason as a basis for faith.

S.K. intentionally distorted the his-toric meaning of the term faith. When herealized he did not and could not believethe Truth of Christianity, he merelychanged the rules of the game. He did thatby redefining the term faith, turning it intosomething it had never been.

Before S.K. advocated his warpedunderstanding of the term, Christian faithhad always been focused objectively inChristian doctrine. That’s because Chris-tians had always understood the termfaith in the Scriptures meant nothingmore than “belief.” Moreover, it was gen-erally understood by Christians that thecontent of Christian belief could be foundin specific theological doctrines. As amatter of fact, throughout the long historyof the Church from the time of JesusChrist and His Apostles, the term faithhad never meant anything other than be-lief in theological doctrine.

To be sure, there had been theologi-cal disputes among Christians over theappropriate content of Christian faith. Butthe debate had always been concernedwith which Christian doctrines were trueand which were false. Even during theyears when S.K. was postulating his ridic-ulous notions concerning faith, otherscholars were still debating whetherfaith—that is, belief in certain theologicaldoctrines—could have any rational basis

6 April 1994

“Knowing nothing whatsoever about the new-birth experience, S.K. nowproved himself to be the ultimate fool, dogmatically explaining

something about which he knew nothing at all.”

“S.K. intentionallydistorted the historic

meaning of theterm faith.”

“For S.K., faith wasnot being definiteabout what onebelieved, it was

being definite thatone believed.”

in empirical fact. S.K. sought to changeall that.

In Kierkegaard’s view, faith shouldnot be based in Christian doctrine at all. Itshould be founded on the belief that one is“becoming” what one ought to be. Listento this:

For Kierkegaard, what I recognize firstis not that I ought to accept certain doc-trines. Rather I recognize that I have anobligation to become something which Iam not and cannot become on my own;hence I must believe in the objective re-ality of the condition of becoming what Iought to be.(C.S. Evans, Subjectivity and ReligiousBelief, Grand Rapids: Christian Uni-versity Press, 1978, p. 121.)

Did you get that? Kierkegaard saidall you have to do to be a Christian is be-lieve you are becoming what you knowyou ought to be. If you do that, you be-lieve all that is necessary to be a Christian.Listen to me, True Believers! You knowmore than a few Pretenders like that to-day, don’t you? Now you know who theirspiritual father is.

For S.K., faith was not being defi-nite about what one believed, it was beingdefinite that one believed. In other words,if you can delude yourself completelyinto believing you believe, you are aChristian! All you have to do then is go onsaying you believe and everything will beokay. You True Believers can now under-stand how a vast majority of the Pretend-ers around you came to roost in theChurch.

S.K. insisted one could “find God”only by being totally honest with oneself.However, since he personally did not be-lieve in Jesus Christ, that became ratherdifficult. The only way he found he couldsay he believed in Jesus Christ was to lieto himself, telling himself he believedwhen, in fact, he didn’t. In other words, heconvinced himself via a multitude ofwords that he believed when he actuallydidn’t believe. If that isn’t the characteris-tic of a deluded individual, I don’t knowwhat is. Come to think of it, however, I’vemet more than a few “Christians” todaywho fit that description.

Do you know why people pretend to

be Christian? It’s because Satan’s agentsare still issuing the invitation: “Hey, Pre-tenders! Come on out and worship withus next Sunday. It doesn’t matter whatyou believe, it only matters that you sayyou believe.” Does that sound a lot likeSøren Kierkegaard? Sure it does. And itshould. Fools have been heeding his callin droves over the past century. As a re-sult, even conservative Christianity is nolonger what it was just thirty years ago.

The spiritual descendants of thisraving lunatic have no interest in learningthe Truth of the Scriptures because theyhave bought into the asinine conjecturesof one of Satan’s own. Don’t be deceived.The writings of Søren Kierkegaard havehad an impact on our generation moredeleterious than any the Church has everbefore experienced.

Had the matter been left up to him,S.K. would have almost certainly become

April 1994 7

During his relatively short life-time, Søren Kierkegaard managed toengage in bitter disputes with mostof the literary and religious figuresin Copenhagen. None of those dis-putes was more vicious than the onehe initiated with Copenhagen’s 19thcentury equivalent of The NationalEnquirer, a popular gossip magazinecalled The Coursair. Before the acri-mony died down, The Coursair hadpublished numerous caricatures ofKierkegaard like the one above.

As a result of the ridicule towhich he was subjected in this dis-pute, Søren Kierkegaard became theobject of public scorn. Prior to thedispute, Kierkegaard had been ac-customed to taking public walksaround Copenhagen every after-noon. Afterward, public ridicule re-stricted him to coach rides in thecountry. Worse yet, the name“Søren” became a euphemism for“stupid” as parents began to telltheir children, “Don’t be a Søren!”

a humanist. However, Satan had definiteplans for this bitter little man. He intendedto use him to cut the heart right out ofChristianity. To do that, however, heknew S.K. had to continue to argue thatsome part of Christian doctrine was true.That was the only way his humanist viewscould masquerade as Christian. That’swhy S.K. contradicts himself. Listen towhat he says:

Christianity is no doctrine concerningthe unity of the divine and the human, orconcerning the identity of subject andobject; nor is it any other of the logicaltranscriptions of Christianity. If Chris-tianity were a doctrine, the relationshipto it would not be one of faith, for onlyan intellectual type of relationship cancorrespond to a doctrine. Christianityis therefore not a doctrine, but the factthat God has existed.(E.L. Miller, Classical Statements onFaith and Reason, New York: RandomHouse, 1970, p. 167.)

Let’s ignore the fact that his rea-soning is a bit circular and that he is do-ing his usual philosophical “stand ’emon their head with ambiguous statementsthat are, for the most part, windbaggery”routine. He ignorantly (and quite confi-dently) states, “Christianity is thereforenot a doctrine, but the fact that God hasexisted.” Never once does he realize hehas made “the fact” a “doctrine” by set-ting it down in print. As one who hasthoroughly analyzed Kierkegaard’swritings put it:

His position was, indeed, one of themost paradoxical it is possible to con-ceive. In the very attempt to deny thattruth is doctrine, he set up the doctrinethat truth is not a doctrine! That truth isexistential is to be proved not by theprinted page, but by the life, and this ev-idence was sadly wanting in his case.(E.L. Allen, Kierkegaard: His Life andThought, New York: Harper and Broth-ers, 1935, p. 156.)

The point is, the existential philoso-phy S.K. sought to prove can only beproven subjectively if, in fact, “subjectiv-ity is truth.” If S.K. had wanted to be trueto his philosophical system, he wouldhave omitted all mention of God and spo-ken solely in terms of individual self-ac-tualization as the theoretical goal of allhumanity. However, that was not Satan’sintent for his “prophet.”

Satan wanted S.K. to create a philo-sophical delusion whereby he could con-vince himself he believed something hedid not actually believe. That way, hewould not only deceive himself, hisphilosophical goofiness could be used tocarry away millions in our own day. Satanhas been phenomenally successful in thatregard. Christians today who have neverheard of Søren Kierkegaard are seeingthings exactly the same way he saw them.

The AbsurdityS.K. liked to talk about the incarna-

tion of Jesus Christ as “absurd.” Yet, inseeking to discredit Christian doctrine asessential to Christian faith, he discloseshis own views are the absurdity. You see,our moronic “genius” overlooked thesimple distinction that exists betweenfaith (belief) and hope. The biblical viewconcerning the realtionship betweenthese two is that since we believe certainthings to be true, we have hope:

In the same way God, desiring evenmore to show to the heirs of the promisethe unchangeableness of His purpose,interposed with an oath, in order that by

two unchangeable things, in which it isimpossible for God to lie, we may havestrong encouragement, we who havefled for refuge in laying hold of the hopeset before us.(Hebrews 6:17–18)

Hope is the subjective inwardnessS.K. makes so much of. In his desperatedesire to get rid of the need for believingcertain things to be true, he rather stupidlydescribed an irrational hope as though itwere faith (belief). As one writer hasstated Kierkegaard’s views:

Faith operates on the farther side of ex-planation, and its motto is “I do not un-derstand, yet I trust.”(Ibid., p. 51.)

The same writer has summarizedKierkegaard’s position this way in an-other place:

The most the intellect can provide is agreater or less degree of approxima-tion to the facts. For we can put no trustin the sophism that “knowledge andbeing are one.” They never can be.There is always an ultimate residuumof uncertainty, a disquiet which onlythe “will to believe” can lay to rest. Wemust act even when we do not know,and we cannot wait till our knowledgeis complete, for long before that goal isreached death will have made uselesssuch poor knowledge as we have. Theintellect may guide us to within sight ofwhat we seek, but at that moment it willturn back, leaving us standing before a

8 April 1994

“The spiritualdescendants of this

raving lunatic have nointerest in learning

the Truth of theScriptures.”

“Satan had definite plans for this bitter little man. He intended touse him to cut the heart right out of Christianity.”

“Christians today whohave never heard of

Søren Kierkegaard areseeing things

exactly the same wayhe saw them.”

frightful chasm. The brave man willshut his eyes and leap. Truth is thenot-yet-proved over which a man cries,“This shall be true; for without this Icannot live.”(Ibid., p. 151.)

I’m sorry to have to tell you thisfolks, as enamored as this generation isby the folly of Kierkegaard and his ilk,but that’s not faith (belief). It’s hope. I’lladmit hope is a near kinsman to faith (be-lief). But that’s as far as I’ll go. I mayhope a rich uncle will die and leave mehis multiplied millions. That doesn’tmean I can somehow believe that willhappen without being a complete lunaticon the order of Søren Kierkegaard. Idon’t even have a rich uncle.

When you boil all of this fool’s pe-culiarly pious and pompous philosophi-cal pronouncements down to theirbasics, hope is about all you can come upwith. The “existential truth” he makes somuch of is nothing more than the defiantraging of a madman held prisoner by hisown pride and arrogance. Fortunatelyfor us, he has long since gone swagger-ing into hell saying, “I will be saved be-cause I hope I will.” Countless fools inour own generation willingly follow inhis footsteps because they have no con-tent for their faith (belief) and they wantnone. They would rather take this luna-tic’s “leap of faith” because it requiresthem to believe nothing more than thatthey believe. I have news for you folks.It’s a long leap across the Abyss.

The TruthNow I want to talk directly to those

of you who are True Believers. By that Imean those who have come to God onthe basis of fear, confessing your sins toGod with a contrite repentance promptedby an honest desire to avoid the wrath ofGod. I’m not talking to all those fools outthere who have believed Satan’s lie,which tells them God is not a God to be

feared. Don’t be deceived. The Scrip-tures plainly state God hates the wickedand plans to destroy them:

The LORD tests the righteous andthe wicked,

And the one who loves violenceHis soul hates.

Upon the wicked He will rain snares;Fire and brimstone and burning wind

will be the portion of their cup.(Psalm 11:5–6)

That’s reason enough for anyonebut the completely sinless person to fearGod. The only reason all those fools outthere won’t admit the fact that fear is nec-essary for anyone to come to God is be-cause they have never admitted they are apart of the wicked. In other words, like theidiot Kierkegaard, they’ve never beenborn again. I admonish you True Believ-ers. Wake up! Pretenders are all aroundyou!

Only an abject fool would claim theGod of wrath described in the Bible is nota God the wicked should fear. Ergo: A“Christian” who has never experienced“fear and trembling” is nothing but a Pre-tender:

So then, my beloved, just as you have al-ways obeyed, not as in my presenceonly, but now much more in my ab-sence, work out your salvation withfear and trembling.(Philippians 2:12)

Before the wicked person can re-pent, he/she must be given some reasonto repent. That’s logical, isn’t it? That’salso what the hellfire and brimstonepreaching of the great revivalists JohnWesley and Charles Finney was allabout. It gave the multitudes who cameto God through their preaching an incen-tive to repent.

Don’t be confused. The Pretenderstoday who preach “God is love” are Sa-tan’s own. They are the spiritual descen-dants of those who came out of the manycounterfeit “revivals” Satan has con-cocted over the past century and a half.You don’t have to be taken in by the Pre-tenders’ charade any longer. If they don’tbelieve in a God of wrath who will de-stroy those who fail to live a holy life be-fore Him, they don’t believe in the God ofthe Bible.

Just as a final word on the topic, youalso shouldn’t be put off by those mind-less slaves of Satan who toss out the fol-lowing verse as some sort of ridiculous“proof” of their inane position:

There is no fear in love; but perfect lovecasts out fear, because fear involvespunishment, and the one who fears isnot perfected in love.(1 John 4:18)

It has never occurred to them that, inwriting that statement, the Apostle Johnobviously understood some sort of fearthat “involves punishment” would ini-tially be present in the Believer’s life. Iffear were not present to begin with, howcould love ever “cast it out”?

Satan’s stooges are blind. Theyhave never, and will never, see the stupid-ity inherent in their absurd beliefs. Yet tobecome free from their delusion, youmust understand that Satan has, over thepast century and a half, been able to instillin us all a fundamental distortion of themeaning of the term “faith.”

April 1994 9

“When you boil all of this fool’s peculiarly pious and pompousphilosophical pronouncements down to their basics,

hope is about all you can come up with.”

“Countless fools inour own generation

willingly follow in hisfootsteps because they

have no content fortheir faith (belief) and

they want none.”

So What’sthe Big Deal?

Now that I have provided you someof the basic information you need to knowand understand in Not All Israel Is Israel,The Advent of Christ and AntiChrist, TheMystery of Scripture, and The Way, TheTruth, The Life seminar tapes, I want toput you on notice concerning what Satanhas been able to accomplish throughSøren Kierkegaard’s lunacy.

I’m sure most of you have heardabout Kierkegaard’s “leap of faith.” Youmay have even heard conservative minis-ters preach against it. That nonsense wasjust a diversionary tactic on Satan’s part.It was a strawman he set up to give con-servative Christian theologians some-thing to rail at while he tore up the veryfoundation of Christianity.

The postulate of Kierkegaard youprobably have never heard anyone argueagainst is the idea that faith is a subjectivedecision. That’s because that insidiousbelief has infiltrated all segments of theChurch through the notions held by soci-ety at large. It is a prevalent belief in ourtime because Satan has successfully in-stilled it not just in the Church but in thewhole of our society. Listen to peoplewhen they talk about faith. See if theydon’t understand faith to becontentless—that is, a subjective existen-tial act.

You see, Satan has known for sometime that God intends to restore The Ap-ostolic Teaching in order to provide asolid basis for the faith (belief) of thoseTrue Believers living at the time of theSecond Coming of Jesus Christ. Know-ing that, he set out to discredit the notion

that Christians must believe any definitetheological content in order to be saved.Nothing could be more warped and dis-torted. Yet you will find a multitude of“Christians” today who are willing to ar-gue that case.

The Pretenders in the Church willreadily admit that one must believe JesusChrist died for our sins. Some will evenargue vehemently for this theologicaldoctrine or the other, as though they arefirmly convinced that what one believesis supremely important. Don’t be de-ceived. The Book of Proverbs tells us theargumentative person is nothing morethan Satan’s fool (Prov. 13:10; 17:19; etal.). He is only interested in showing whathe knows.

Most Christians will also readilyand illogically grant (as Kierkegaard ig-norantly did) that one must believe somebare minimum of objective Truth in orderto be a Christian. Yet they will inevitablytry to restrict that Truth to the barest of es-sentials. Moreover, they will probablyalso view faith (belief) as a subjective de-cision that has no necessary connection tothe definite theological content they de-fend. That is all part of Satan’s lie.

The Truth is, we are saved by whatwe believe, not by the fact that we be-lieve. Everybody believes something.But only those who believe the Truth willbe saved. If that were not true, Christianmissionary activity would make no sense.A heathen person could, just asKierkegaard idiotically contended,“stand in relation to” the Truth withinthem just as easily as any Christian.

The Truth is, the only way anyonecan be born again is to come to God withfear and trembling, honestly confessingsins out of the belief that He is a God Whohas an absolute hatred for the wicked.That is one of the bare essentials of theTruth one must believe in order to besaved. Now can you understand why Sa-tan has fought so hard to instill in us thenotion of an all-forgiving god of love? Ifyou came to God out of fear, because of abroken and contrite heart, I have news for

you. You are part of a distinct minority inthe Church today. The Pretenders allaround you don’t believe in the same Godthat you do. Their god is a benign, benev-olent being they can spit on and curse atall week yet still approach without fear ofany kind on Sunday. That’s a comfortingdelusion, isn’t it? I wish them nothing butthe sweetest of dreams in the here andnow, because their nightmare has yet tobegin.

If one can only be saved by believ-ing the Truth found in Christianity alone,it makes sense that anyone who sincerelywants to be saved would be concernedabout whether or not what they believe istrue. I submit to you, therefore, that any-one in the Church who is not concernedabout such things is, by definition, a Pre-tender. However, having said that, I alsosubmit to you that anyone who wants toargue about such things is also, by defini-tion, a Pretender. The Christian life is not,as Kierkegaard would have us all believe,the mere confession that I know what Iought to be. Truth is something to be be-lieved and lived by. If someone knowswhat they ought to be, then that is whatthey ought to be if they actually believethe Truth.

A final word to you True Believers:If someone wants to believe the lies theyhave been taught by the Pretenders in theChurch, I suggest you not try to dissuadethem. The time is too far spent for theo-logical arguments. Believe those thingsyou know to be true and live accordingly.Otherwise you show yourself to be noth-ing more than Satan’s fool. And Satan’sfool is a ready tool to be used by himwhenever he so chooses. ■

10 April 1994

“We are saved by what we believe, not by the fact that we believe.Everybody believes something. But only those

who believe the Truth will be saved.”

“The Truth is, the onlyway anyone can be

born again is to cometo God with fear and

trembling.”

“The Pretenders allaround you don’tbelieve in the sameGod that you do.”

April 1994 11

Editor: We’ve seen much more activity around herethis past quarter than we have in the past. A lot of thatactivity involved deadlines you had to meet and, quiteoften, missed. Does the stress of missing deadlinessometimes get to you?

Elijah: It used to. But I can honestly say I’ve finallylearned how to handle it. When the amount of work in-creases and the number of people available to handle itdoesn’t, the time it takes to get it done is going to in-crease. There’s nothing I can do about it. I’m not go-ing to put unreasonable demands on myself or anyoneelse for the sake of some artificial deadline. All I cando is be diligent and keep working.

Editor: It must be frustrating to you, understandingall the things I’ve heard you explain over the years, tonot have people available to help so that you can justsit down and write day after day. How do you handlethat?

Elijah: I’ve been forced to accept the fact that God hasa definite timetable and nothing is going to change thattiming. When I started writing articles for The Voiceof Elijah, I had been trying to write Not All Israel Is Is-rael for more than six months just because I didn’tknow what else to do. I had already decided writingwas one of the most difficult things I had ever at-tempted. At the time, I couldn’t organize my thoughts.But that’s no great surprise either, considering the factthat I was just coming out of the stupor I had been in for

most of the ’80s, and I had all sorts of misconceptionsabout my calling and everything else I was about. Thatshould be obvious to anyone who has read the back is-sues of The Voice of Elijah.

Editor: You mentioned a “stupor” and your “mis-conceptions.” Can you tell us more about that?

Elijah: Well, first of all, let me make a confession. I’lladmit that I’m stupid. I’ll admit that I’m stubborn. I’lleven admit that I quite often forget things. But I don’tthink I’m stupid enough or stubborn enough to ever getinto a situation where I’ll forget what I went through inthe ’80s. I have only this past year begun to understandall the things God taught me during that decade. Andafter I’ve managed to sort all those things out, I don’tintend to ever forget what I’ve learned.

The thing about the confusion I went through inthe ’80s that gets me every time I think about it is thefact that in 1980 I already understood a lot of the thingsI’m explaining to people now. I had even begun to putsome of those things down in print. But unfortunately,it wasn’t God’s timing for me to write them down then.

The ’80s were completely different from anythingI had gone through before. All during the ’70s I waspursuing a degree of one sort or the other. That gaveme a definite focus for my life. I knew exactly whatGod expected me to do, so I did it. During that entiretime I assumed God had called me to teach in a Chris-tian college or seminary. So I didn’t think much aboutwhat would happen when I completed my studies.

My certainty about what I was supposed to be do-ing suddenly disappeared in 1980 when I was forced toadmit the fact that what I understood God had calledme to teach would never be acceptable in an academicsetting. That’s when I started writing down some ofthe things I understood. I’ve thought a lot about what Iwas thinking at that time, just trying to figure out howthings got so completely out of control over the nextseveral years. But I honestly don’t think my confusioncould have been avoided. I had lessons I needed tolearn, and some things can only be learned throughexperience.

Editor: I can understand why you would be confusedif you didn’t know what God expected you to do, butwhy would that confusion last for ten years?

The Voice of Elijah publishes articles based on thefindings of The Elijah Project, a private researchgroup headed by Larry D. Harper. In this column weseek answers to general-interest questions concerningthe findings, purpose and philosophy of this project.

uestions&

nswers

12 April 1994

Elijah: To tell the truth, I understood exactly what Godexpected me to do even then. I knew I was supposed toteach. But I didn’t understand who it was He had calledme to teach. I’ve known for a long time that all I amsupposed to do is provide information to those whohave been born again. My confusion stemmed from thefact that I found it impossible to believe so many peo-ple would claim to be Christian when so few have actu-ally been born again.

You know what I went through in 1981 and 1982. Iwas talking to people constantly, to people who saidthey wanted to hear what I was teaching, to people whoappeared to be interested. Yet the things those peopleheard made absolutely no difference in their life. Icouldn’t reconcile the fact that God had called me toprovide information that would completely transformanyone who believed it when all I saw around me werepeople who appeared to be accepting everything I said,yet went on living in sin. I look back at that now andmarvel at how dense I was. Good trees produce goodfruit. Bad trees produce bad. It’s incredibly simplewhen you know the Truth.

Editor: So when did you begin to see reality?

Elijah: That’s where God’s timing comes in. I hon-estly don’t believe it was a matter of me accepting any-thing. It was a matter of information becomingavailable that had not been available before that time. Idon’t believe I would have ever been able to look at thesituation logically had circumstances not changed.I’ve already written about the seven seals that havebeen on the Scriptures, so I don’t need to explain allthat here. But, if what I understand is true, the third sealcame off the Scriptures in April of 1988. The thirdmessage sealed by that seal is titled The Light. And thelight explained in that message is the same light I’vewritten about in one of the articles for this issue. [Edi-tor: See “Some People Will Make Light of Anything”in this issue.]

The fact is, prior to 1988 I was wrestling with anincredibly confusing set of circumstances because Iwas ignorant of the specific things I needed to knowabout Pretenders. To put it parabolically, I was livingin darkness. I’m convinced God allowed me to gothrough all that confusion to teach me the hazards ofaccepting the pretense of Pretenders who want to con-tinue in their deception. I have nothing to say that willhelp a Pretender. If they won’t repent and ask God forforgiveness, the best I can do is encourage them to lookelsewhere.

Editor: Pretenders are not a favorite topic with you,are they?

Elijah: I have nothing against Pretenders. We are whatwe believe. They’ve been taught the goofiness they be-lieve, so that’s what they are. But we can all becomesomething other than what we have been. It’s simply amatter of believing something different. In the case ofwhat I have been given to teach, however, a personcan’t honestly say they believe it until they are willingto come to God in humble repentance. That’s the caseonly because we all act in accordance with what we be-lieve. So if they believe what I teach, they will repent.

The problem with most Pretenders lies in the factthat they believe the most incredible lies. And havingbelieved those lies, they do the most ignorant things.Even then, I have no problem with what they do. It’stheir life. Let them live it as they see fit. However,many of them aren’t content with just living their ownlives. They have bought into Satan’s grand delusionthat we are somehow responsible for living other peo-ples’ lives for them as well. So they want to controlpeople, to tell them they must do this or do that. Thatkind of Pretender is an absolute moron. What a personbelieves is going to control them, one way or the other.The only issue worth discussing is whether or not webelieve the Truth.

Editor: Your use of the term moron brings up an-other issue. I’ve noticed you have gotten a harder“edge” in the articles you’ve written over the pastyear, especially in the articles in The Update. What’sthat all about?

Elijah: I’m just having a bit of fun mocking Pretend-ers. They don’t know that they don’t know. That’s whythey’re ignorant. But I would never call anyone a“fool” or a “moron” to their face or by name. If some-one wants to proudly wear the title by disputing whatI’ve written, that’s their choice. As long as they don’texpect me to stoop to their level by naming names, theycan assail me personally to their hearts’ content. Afterall, it’s a free country and, given the freedom, stupidpeople will do stupid things.

Editor: First you say you’re just having fun, then youtake off on the same tangent like you really mean it.Which is it?

Elijah: I know I understand the Truth. Thousands ofTrue Believers are going to come to that same conclu-sion over the next several years leading up to the Re-turn of Jesus Christ. Under those circumstances, whatdo you think? If people all around reject the Truth andcontinue to assume nobody knows the Truth, are theymorons or are they intelligent beings? ■

cause it shattered his control over TrueBelievers. The Reformers did that by re-covering essential Christian doctrinesconcerning the new birth and the needfor individual study of the Scriptures.

Over the centuries since theProtestant Reformation, millions of peo-ple have been saved through the hellfireand brimstone preaching of Evangelistslike John Wesley and Charles Finney.These humble Believers came to God onthe basis of an honest repentance, des-perately seeking forgiveness for theirsins because they understood God woulddestroy them if they refused.

Today, however, the flow of TrueBelievers into the Church has slowed to atrickle. That is the result of the messagepreached by Satan’s agents—that is, Pre-tenders who have infiltrated the Churchand, like Søren Kierkegaard (see “Sa-tan’s Fools Are Satan’s Tools” in this is-sue), encouraged people to “come toGod” on the basis of some silly “profes-sion of faith” rather than confession ofsin.

Because of Satan’s activity, mostof the people who “profess” to be Chris-tian today are nothing more than Pre-tenders. Yet God has still managed toaccomplish His objectives in spite of thebest that Satan’s agents could do. To thisvery day He has His Remnant—that is,True Believers who honestly want toknow and understand the Truth no mat-ter what it costs. And God will accom-plish His purpose through those TrueBelievers in these Last Days. You cancount on it.

To comprehend how Satan hasworked in the Church, you must first un-derstand how he operates as the mastermanipulator. He uses various entice-ments to get people to do what he wants.Yet he always approaches them with thesuggestion that they want what he has tooffer. Should you doubt that, take a lookat the temptation of Jesus (Matt. 4:1–11).That account reveals the invariablemethod Satan uses to get what he wants.

However, Satan has always hadone intransigent problem. His childrenare all stubborn and contentious. Theywill sometimes irrationally cut off their

nose to spite their face. In other words,while his agents have always done hisbidding, they have frequently preferredto do it in their own way. Consequently,Satan has quite often had difficulty get-ting his people to accomplish the preciseobjectives he set out to accomplish.

That’s why Søren Kierkegaard wasso valuable to him. (See “Satan’s Foolsare Satan’s Tools” in this issue.) Thatparticular individual was apparently un-der Satan’s complete control. I say thatbecause to read the wri t ings ofKierkegaard is to read absolute stupidity.When you get that close to such purity ofthought, you know you’re close to thesource. And Satan is the source of all stu-pidity.

Since Satan cannot always exert to-tal control over his agents, he has mostoften been reduced to using their ownstubbornness and contention to achievehis goals. Consequently he has resortedto advocating conflicting theologicaldoctrines in order to introduce confu-sion. That has been the case especiallysince the Protestant Reformation.

A brief survey of the past four cen-turies discloses a primary goal of Satanhas been to distort the Truth recoveredby the leaders of the Protestant Reforma-tion. As a result of his efforts, a growingplethora of “Christian” Pretenders haveadvocated a variety of different beliefs.The cacophony produced by advocatesof multifarious Christian doctrines hasproduced such a confusion that Pretend-ers have been able to easily hide them-selves in the delusion that they are“Christian” just because they say so.

Over the last few centuries, how-ever, Satan has also come to understandthat the time for the Second Coming ofJesus Christ is rapidly drawing near.Therefore, he has not only tried to distortthe Truth recovered during theProtestant Reformation, he has also un-leashed an all out assault against the veryfoundations of Christianity. By studyingthe history of the Protestant Church, onecan clearly see the tactics Satan has usedto accomplish that goal, and it is obviousSøren Kierkegaard led the charge.

Satan’s strategy has been incredi-bly deceptive. Time and time again hehas used diversionary tactics to draw at-tention away from the actual goals he hassought to achieve. Such has been the

case especially over the past century.While conservative theologians havefought valiantly to defend the historicChristian belief in the inspiration ofScripture, Satan has totally demolishedthe very foundation on which theProtestant Reformers based the doctrineof salvation by faith. The evidence ofthat sad fact can be seen today in thepresence of all the Pretenders who fill thepews every Sunday morning.

Until now, True Believers have notalways understood what all the fuss overtheological doctrine was all about. Theyunderstood the basic Truth that God re-quired them to hold to, so they held to it.And quite often, the commotion intro-duced by Satan’s agents was much adoabout nothing. But one thing you cancount on. It was always the visible evi-dence of the spiritual battle that is ragingyet today between the forces of light andthe forces of darkness.

Whether you like it or not, you are aparticipant in that battle. That’s why I’mwriting this article. By the time you fin-ish reading, the only question remainingto be answered will be, “Are you alliedwith the forces of light, or are you fight-ing desperately to remain in darkness?”Only you can answer that question. Andanswer it you will. Because, as they say,“Actions speak louder than words.”

Before you can comprehend theNew Testament statements made con-cerning the struggle that goes on be-tween the forces of light and the forces ofdarkness, you must first understand theterminology the Apostles use when theytalk about The Apostolic Teaching.

Where Do We Stand?I have explained elsewhere how

the Early Church lost the understandingof the message of the Hebrew Scripturesthat Jesus Christ revealed to the Apos-tles. (See “Did You Mean That Liter-ally?” and “The Origen of Folly” TheVoice of Elijah, January 1993 issue. Seealso The Way, The Truth, The Life semi-nar tape series.) I call the Early Chris-tians’ understanding of that message TheApostolic Teaching.

Under different circumstances, itwould be amusing to watch the theologi-cal gymnastics performed by tradi-tion-loving wags as they vehemently

April 1994 13

LightFrom Page 1

deny their spiritual forebearers lost TheApostolic Teaching. Unfortunately, un-der current circumstances the antics oftraditionalists are far from amusing. Theloss of The Apostolic Teaching cuts tothe very core of what is wrong withGod’s Church today. And the efforts ofSatan’s agents to cloud that issue areanything but funny.

Those who love tradition will illog-ically deny that the Early Church evenhad a coherent body of beliefs concern-ing the Scriptures, thinking they canthereby refute the claim that the EarlyChurch’s understanding of the messageof the Old Testament was lost by subse-quent generations. Nothing could bemore absurd. Whether true or false, ev-ery generation of the Church has had itsown understanding of the Scriptures. Tobelieve otherwise would be to argue thatthe Early Church had the Scriptures butunderstood nothing about them. Obvi-ously that was not the case.

Having determined that the EarlyChurch must have had at least some un-derstanding of the message of the Scrip-tures, the question then becomes, “Hasany one group of Christians maintainedthat understanding down through thecenturies?” Only a fool with no knowl-edge of Church history at all would at-tempt to argue that their particular brandof Christianity has done that. But foolsbeing what they are, I’m sure you willfind more than a few are willing to showhow stupid they are.

The Truth is, the most anyonecould argue is that their Christian de-nomination, organization, sect or splin-ter group has somehow managed torestore what the Early Church lost. AsI’ve shown previously, more than a fewProtestants have set out to do just that, al-though few of them understood whatthey were seeking to restore. Nonethe-less, most eventually came to the conclu-sion they had somehow accomplishedthe task. (See “Protestants All Agree onThis: Somebody Laid an Egg!” TheVoice of Elijah, January 1994.)

It should be obvious to all that theChurch lost the apostolic understandingof the message of the Scriptures. There-fore, the only remaining issue to be settledis whether that understanding was theTruth. I happen to believe it was. But I re-alize Satan’s agents will argue otherwise.

The more ignorant among us would hap-pily live with the delusion that an accurateunderstanding of the Truth of Scripturehas never and can never be known to anygeneration of Believers. I would readilyagree with that conclusion insofar as itpertains to them. However, God may nothave the same in mind for all.

I mentioned above “those who lovetradition.” You could assume from thatphrase that I have no great love for tradi-tion. You would be wrong. I love God’stradition, but I have no respect at all forany tradition of men that changes withthe fashion of the day. Truth doesn’tchange. If anyone claims their traditionembodies the Truth, let them show that ithas never changed.

Tradition Has Its PlaceWe are all aware that the Jews have

a tradition. Yet we are hesitant to applythe term to Christians. We should do sononetheless. Let me tell you why.

When we talk about tradition to-day, we normally talk in terms of thingsthat are done—that is, customs that areobserved. That’s because Satan has donehis best to instill in Christians the illogi-cal belief that external patterns of behav-ior—that is, religious rituals andcustoms—are all that a religion handsdown from generation to generation.That is a lie. It is impossible to handdown practices without including someaccompanying beliefs.

Every religious group believes andteaches its religious beliefs to the nextgeneration. If that were not so, everygeneration would be reduced to creatingits own religious beliefs anew. That isobviously not the case. So religious be-liefs must be part of every religious tra-dition.

The traditional beliefs one genera-tion teaches the next are usually called anoral tradition. Therefore, in discussingthe understanding of the Scriptures thathas been/is held by different groups ofChristian believers, we will use that ter-minology. For example, we can say theMethodists have one oral tradition (oneunderstanding of the message of theScriptures), the Baptists have another. Itshould be obvious that both the Method-ists and the Baptists believe their oraltradition is the correct one. If they didn’t

believe it was true, they wouldn’t believeit.

The reason you need to think interms of religious tradition as oral tradi-tion is simple. Satan has managed to con-ceal an essential Truth behind atraditional biblical translation. TheGreek term translated tradition in theNew Testament (paradosis) actuallymeans oral tradition. However, since itis usually translated tradition, Englishreaders are left thinking the New Testa-ment Scriptures must be referring tothings that are done. That is not the case.

The root form of the Greek termparadosis means to “hand over” or“hand down.” However, it is pointing tothe beliefs that are “handed down” fromone generation to the next as opposed tomeaningless rituals performed by men.You can see that is exactly how the termis used in the following passages:

See to it that no one takes you captivethrough philosophy and empty decep-tion, according to the tradition of men,according to the elementary principlesof the world, rather than according toChrist.(Colossians 2:8)

So then, brethren, stand firm and holdto the traditions which you weretaught, whether by word {of mouth} orby letter from us.(2 Thessalonians 2:15)

In The Way, The Truth, The Lifeseminar tape series, I mentioned that thePharisees were handing down an oral to-rah (teaching) that they believed hadbeen handed down to them from the timeof Moses. I also mentioned that the oraltorah of the Pharisees was not writtendown until it was recorded in the Mish-nah around A.D. 200.

Prior to that time, the Phariseeshanded down their oral torah from onegeneration to the next orally. They didthat through a process known asdiscipling. That is, a teacher (rabbi)would teach his understanding of theoral tradition (torah) to a disciple. (See“Where Are Jesus’ Disciples?” TheVoice of Elijah, April 1991.)

Knowledge of the facts concerningthe Pharisees’ transmission of their oraltradition becomes crucial to our under-

14 April 1994

standing of the New Testament message.It is obvious God expected the EarlyChristians to follow exactly the sameprocess the Pharisees were using as theyhanded down The Apostolic Teaching asan oral tradition to subsequent genera-tions (Matt. 28:18–20). Therefore, wecan begin by looking at what the textsays concerning the Pharisees. Markmentions their oral tradition in a contextwhere you can clearly see the Greek termnormally translated “tradition” actuallymeans oral tradition:

And the Pharisees and some of thescribes gathered together around Himwhen they had come from Jerusalem,and had seen that some of His discipleswere eating their bread with impurehands, that is, unwashed. (For thePharisees and all the Jews do not eatunless they carefully wash their hands,{thus} observing the traditions of theelders; and {when they come} from themarket place, they do not eat unlessthey cleanse themselves; and there aremany other things which they have re-ceived in order to observe, such as thewashing of cups and pitchers and cop-per pots.)(Mark 7:1–4)

Even from this English translationyou can see Mark understood that thePharisees did the things they did—“ob-serving the traditions of the el-ders”—because of “things which theyhave received to observe.” The thingsthey did were not the traditions he had inmind. The traditions were “the thingswhich they have received.” In otherwords, the traditions were the things theelders taught—that is, the doctrines thePharisees were handing down verballyfrom one generation to the next throughthe discipling process.

To fully understand what Mark hasstated in this passage, you must first un-derstand a couple of technical terms re-lated to the Greek concept of oraltradition. The verb translated “observe”in verses 3 and 4 (Greek: krateo) has ameaning similar to the verb translated“receive” in verse 4 (Greek:paralambano). Both verbs have the basicmeaning of “to take.” However, krateohas more the sense of “grasp” or “seize.”

How do these two verbs have any-thing to do with oral tradition? Well,think of an oral tradition as a batonhanded down from one generation to thenext in a relay race. Both generationshave responsibility for seeing that the ba-ton is handed down without mishap. Theolder generation must see to it that thebaton is made available so that it may beeasily grasped. However, the new gener-ation must take the baton and seize itfirmly.

The technical terminology relatedto the handing down of an oral traditioncan be seen in what the Apostle Paulwrote to the Corinthians concerning TheApostolic Teaching:

Now I make known to you, brethren,the gospel which I preached to you,which also you received, in which alsoyou stand, by which also you are saved,if you hold fast the word which Ipreached to you, unless you believedin vain. For I delivered to you as offirst importance what I also received,that Christ died for our sins accordingto the Scriptures, and that He was bur-ied, and that He was raised on the thirdday according to the Scriptures.(1 Corinthians 15:1–4)

You can see from this passage thatPaul is speaking in terms of “the Gos-pel”—that is, The Apostolic Teach-ing—as an oral tradition. He states inverse 1 that the Corinthians received(Greek: paralambano) the Gospel fromhim and were expected to hold fast(Greek: katexo) to what they had heard.Moreover, in verse 3 Paul indicates healso received (Greek: paralambano)what he taught the Corinthians fromsomeone else, although he doesn’t indi-cate how or when that happened. Notice,however, that Paul used exactly the sameGreek verb (paralambano) when he re-ferred to his own and to the Corinthians’reception of The Apostolic Teaching.

In verse 3, Paul uses still more tech-nical terminology related to the transmis-sion of an oral tradition. He says he“delivered” his knowledge concerningthe death and resurrection of Jesus Christto the Corinthians. Here he uses a Greekverb (paradidomi) from the same root asthe noun (paradosis) we earlier saw trans-

lated as “tradition.” The text literally sayshe handed down the Gospel to them.

Paul does not tell us in 1 Corinthi-ans 15:1–4 who handed down to him theoral tradition he claims he received.However, in other passages Paul lets usknow that he and all the other Apostleshad received (Greek: paralambano) theoral tradition of The Apostolic Teachingthrough revelation from Jesus Christ. Hetells us that using exactly the same tech-nical terminology we have already seenis related to the handing down of anyoral tradition:

As we have said before, so I say againnow, if any man is preaching to you agospel contrary to that which you re-ceived, let him be accursed. For am Inow seeking the favor of men, or ofGod? Or am I striving to please men?If I were still trying to please men, Iwould not be a bond-servant of Christ.For I would have you know, brethren,that the gospel which was preached byme is not according to man. For I nei-ther received it from man, nor was Itaught it, but {I received it} through arevelation of Jesus Christ.(Galatians 1:9–12)

This passage tells us preciselywhere Paul got the things he taught theEarly Church. In verse 9 he indicates theGalat ians had received (Greek:paralambano) the Gospel from him asan oral tradition. In verse 12 he says hereceived the things he understood aboutthe message of the Scriptures from JesusChrist, Who handed down (1 Cor. 15:3)that information to him through super-natural revelation. So Paul’s use of thetechnical terminology related to thetransmission of an oral tradition con-firms what we learned from 1 Corinthi-ans 15. The Apostles were, through theprocess of discipling others, handingdown The Apostolic Teaching as an oraltradition.

Paul uses the same technical termi-nology in other passages where he men-tions the revelation he received fromJesus Christ. For example, he talks aboutit in the following passage and confirmsagain that he understood Jesus Christ in-tended The Apostolic Teaching to be anoral tradition:

April 1994 15

For I received from the Lord thatwhich I also delivered to you, that theLord Jesus in the night in which Hewas betrayed took bread; and when Hehad given thanks, He broke it, andsaid, “This is My body, which is foryou; do this in remembrance of Me.”In the same way {He took} the cup also,after supper, saying, “This cup is thenew covenant in My blood; do this, asoften as you drink {it}, in remembranceof Me.” For as often as you eat thisbread and drink the cup, you proclaimthe Lord’s death until He comes.(1 Corinthians 11:23–26)

This passage corroborates what welearned from the last two passages. Ittells us Jesus Christ explained to Paul themeaning of the parabolic pantomimesHe had conducted during the time of Hisministry here on Earth. We know that be-cause, in verse 23, Paul tells us he re-ceived (Greek: paralambano) thesethings from Jesus Christ Himself. Hestates immediately thereafter that he hadalready handed down (Greek:paradidomi) those things to the Corin-thians.

Earlier in that same chapter Paulmentions the same thing. His use of thetechnical terminology related to thetransmission of an oral tradition lets usknow that is exactly what he is talkingabout:

Now I praise you because you remem-ber me in everything, and hold firmlyto the traditions, just as I deliveredthem to you.(1 Corinthians 11:2)

Here Paul has used three Greekterms related to the transmission of anoral tradition: katexo is translated “holdfirmly”; paradosis is translated “tradi-tion”; and paradidomi is translated “de-livered.” There can now be no doubtPaul understood The Apostolic Teachingwas an oral tradition the Early Churchwas supposed to hand down from onegeneration to the next.

All these passages together tell usPaul understood The Apostolic Teachingwas an oral tradition the Apostles hadreceived from Jesus Christ by revelation.Paul also knew he and the other Apostles

had been charged with the task of hand-ing down The Apostolic Teaching to theEarly Church through their teaching.One would naturally assume, therefore,that the Early Church was expected tocontinue handing down The ApostolicTeaching to subsequent generations.However, that assumption isn’t neces-sary since Paul confirms it in a letter toTimothy:

And the things which you have heardfrom me in the presence of many wit-nesses, these entrust to faithful men,who will be able to teach others also.(2 Timothy 2:2)

Writing sometime in the early tomid-second century, the author of the ap-ostolic writing known as “The Epistle toDiognetus” uses the same terminology(paradidomi) and thereby confirms thatat least some in his day still understoodthe task the Church had been assigned:

Mine are no strange discourses nor per-verse questionings, but having been adisciple of Apostles I come forward as ateacher of the Gentiles, ministering wor-thily to them, as they present themselvesdisciples of the truth, the lessons whichhave been handed down.(J.B. Lightfoot, “The Epistle ofDiognetus,” 11:6, from his work TheApostolic Fathers, London: Macmillanand Company, 1891. See also TheVoice of Elijah Update, February1994, p. 11.)

What a shame! If the Early Churchhad not failed to do as Paul admonishedTimothy, it would not even be necessaryfor us to restore The Apostolic Teachingtoday. But no need to cry over spilledmilk now. What’s done is done. And“what if” is nothing more than Satan’ssnare.

Let me show you how neatly Godhas managed to tie up all the loose ends.If the Early Church got its understandingof the message of the Scriptures from theApostles, and the Apostles got their un-derstanding of the message of the Scrip-tures from Jesus Christ by revelation,where did Jesus Christ get His under-standing of the message of the Scrip-tures? Well, He tells you:

“All things have been handed over toMe by My Father, and no one knowswho the Son is except the Father, andwho the Father is except the Son, andanyone to whom the Son wills to reveal{Him}.”(Luke 10:22)

The word translated “handed over”in this verse is the Greek verbparadidomi—“handed down.” And, aswe saw above, Jesus Christ revealed“who the Father is” to His Apostles.

Just a reminder before we move on.The technical terms I have pointed out sofar are important. Keep them in mind.You can use the Scripture referenceslisted in the “Tradition References” tableon the opposite page to conduct yourown study of the Scriptures. We’ll talkabout how these terms are used in someof the other passages you find listed therelater on. Right now I want to introduceyou to another perspective, a slightly dif-ferent Way of looking at the things youfind stated in the Scriptures.

The Living Word of GodEvery oral tradition (understanding

of the message of the Scriptures) in theProtestant Church today is (or at least pre-tends to be) based on the Scriptures. Solet’s think of those oral traditions in termsof the Word of God. We can begin by call-ing the Scriptures the written Word ofGod.

Now we all know that, in contrastto the written Word of God (the Scrip-tures) which never changes, every oraltradition (understanding of the messageof the Scriptures) is subject to constantchange. That is, every generation posesthe distinct threat of adding to and takingaway from the oral tradition they havereceived from an earlier generation. Forexample, the Methodists today don’t ac-tually believe the same things about themessage of the Scriptures that Method-ists believed two centuries ago.

Therefore, since every oral tradi-tion (understanding of the message ofthe Scriptures) tends to change overtime, let’s call oral tradition the LivingWord of God. There is a basic reasonwhy you should start to think in terms ofthe written Word of God and the Living

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Word of God. You see, the written Wordof God is an objective entity that existsoutside the person. It can be viewed, han-dled and read by all. The Living Word ofGod is entirely different.

In contrast to the written Word ofGod which stands alone, the LivingWord of God resides in each person asthe understanding the individual has re-garding the meaning of the written Wordof God. That Living Word of God ishanded down from one generation to thenext and comes to reside in the personwho receives the spoken explanation ofthe Scriptures they hear taught verballyby a Teacher from the earlier generation.They receive the Living Word of Godwhen they believe what they have beentaught. Therefore, we can think of it asliving within Believers.

In the Church today, the LivingWord of God (the Believer’s understand-ing of the message of the Scriptures) dif-fers from individual to individual. Thatwas not the case in the Apostolic Age.The Apostles taught the Early Churchonly one understanding of the messageof the Scriptures. Anyone who arguesotherwise obviously has not studied theScriptures. The Apostle Paul makes thatpoint emphatically in the first two chap-ters of the Book of Galatians.

As we saw above, Paul says inGalatians 1:11–12 that he received hisunderstanding of the message of theScriptures from Jesus Christ by revela-tion. He goes on to say in Galatians 2:7–9that the other Apostles recognized thatJesus Christ had given Paul exactly thesame understanding of the Gospel mes-sage as He had revealed to them earlier(Luke 24:27, 32, 44–45).

If God revealed the message of theScriptures to the Apostles and theytaught that message to the Early Church,the Living Word of God known to thosefirst two generations of Believers musthave been the Truth. Obviously, I realizeSatan’s agents will ignorantly disputethat. But look at it logically. Why wouldthe God of Truth reveal a lie to His Own?

If the Apostles’ understanding ofthe message of the Scriptures was true, itdoes not make sense that God would everexpect any subsequent generation tochange that oral tradition in any way.Why would He? Truth is Truth. AndTruth does not change. If you change the

Truth, you make it a lie. Therefore, Godmust have intended the Early Church tohand down the oral tradition they had re-ceived—that is, their understanding ofthe message of the Scriptures—to eachnew generation of Believers just as theyhad received it from the previous genera-tion. Why wouldn’t He? The only otheroption is that they say nothing and let thenew generation fend for itself.

The Truth is, the Apostles gave theEarly Church an accurate understandingof the message of the Scriptures but theEarly Church failed to do as God in-tended. God expected the Church tohand down that Living Word of Godfrom generation to generation as an oraltradition in the same way that everychurch, denomination, sect and splintergroup hands down their own oral tradi-tions today. The only difference was,God did not expect the Church to changethe Living Word of God He had deliveredto the Apostles.

As I have stated repeatedly, by A.D.200 the Church had essentially lost TheApostolic Teaching. Therefore, everygeneration since that time has had some-thing less than the totality of the LivingWord of God. At best, they have had onlybits and pieces of the Living Word of God

that existed in the Early Church as an oraltradition. Yet the point to be rememberedhere is that, for as long as the Truth of TheApostolic Teaching was known and un-derstood, it existed in every True Believeras the Living Word of God.

The Apostolic TeachingThe predicament the Church faces

today lies in the fact that, after 2,000years of intense spiritual warfare, Satanhas finally managed to obscure vital in-formation concerning the link that existsbetween the written Word of God and theLiving Word of God. Without that link,the Church today—being a mere shadowof itself, full of sound and fury, signify-ing nothing—has little, if anything at all,to offer those who would be saved.

You see, I had ulterior motives indescribing The Apostolic Teaching asthe (Living) Word of God. That’s termi-nology the New Testament uses to referto the oral tradition Jesus Christ re-vealed to the Apostles. It does so becausethe image of the Word of God is a part ofthe parabolic message hidden in TheTeaching of Moses.

Although the Prophets discuss theparabolic imagery of the Old Testament

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Tradition Terminologyparadosis = “tradition/oral tradition”Matt. 15:2–3, 6; Mark 7:3, 5, 8–9, 13; 1 Cor. 11:2; Gal. 1:14;Col. 2:8; 2 Thess. 2:15; 3:6

paradidomi = “deliver/hand down”Matt. 11:27; 25:20, 22; Mark 7:13; Luke 1:2; 4:6; 10:22;Acts 6:14; Rom. 6:17; 1 Cor. 11:2, 23; 15:3; 2 Pet. 2:21;Jude 1:3

paralambano = “receive”Mark 7:4; John 1:11; 1 Cor. 11:23; 15:1, 3; Gal. 1:9, 12;Phil. 4:9; Col. 2:6; 4:17; 1 Thess. 2:13; 4:1; 2 Thess. 3:6;Heb. 12:28

katexo = “receive/hold fast”Luke 8:15; Rom. 1:18; 1 Cor. 11:2; 15:2; 2 Cor. 6:10; 1 Thess.5:21; 2 Thess. 2:6–7; Heb. 3:6, 14; 10:23

dexomai = “receive/hold fast”Matt. 10:14; Luke 8:13; Acts 8:14, 11:1, 17:11;1 Thess. 1:6; 2:13; James 1:21

krateo = “observe/hold fast”Mark 7:3–4, 8; Col. 2:19; 2 Thess. 2:15; Heb. 4:14; 6:18;Rev. 2:14–15, 25; 3:11

Gospel of Jesus Christ at some length intheir writings, I’m not going to explainanything at all about The Teaching of Mo-ses, or The Teaching of the Prophets, orThe Apostolic Teaching in this article. ButI do want to show you what the Apostleshave said concerning the oral traditionthe Early Church called the Word of God.Perhaps you will then better understandhow far down the Church has come to itspresent condition.

Today, when we think about theWord of God, we immediately think interms of the written Word of God—that is,the Scriptures. That mind-set automati-cally carries over when we study theScriptures themselves so that when weread the phrase Word of God in the NewTestament, we subconciously think writ-ten Word of God. I want to show you thefallacy in that viewpoint as yet anotherexample of how Satan has deluded us intobelieving things that are patently false.

At the time of Jesus Christ peoplehad various ideas concerning the “word”(Greek: logos) as it applied to God. Wecould, for example, look at the term asthe speculative philosophers—that is,the Greek sophists, Socrates, Plato, theStoics and Neo-platonists, used it to dis-cuss the nature of God. Or we could in-vestigate its use in the Greek MysteryReligions where the one in whom the“word” dwells is a son of god. We couldgo even further and discuss its use inHermeticism, where the god Hermes isthe messenger who reveals the “word.”If one were so inclined, we could evendiscuss how the Jewish philosopherPhilo of Alexandria incorporated theconcept into his understanding of themessage of the Old Testament.

Without going into the specifics re-lated to any of these Greek ideas aboutthe “word” (logos), it is sufficient topoint out that they all agreed on one fun-damental point: The “word” (Greek: lo-gos) pertains specifically to “what issaid.” To the mind of those alive at thetime of Christ, the logos was a living en-tity. It had direct connection to the Liv-ing God Who was, as the source of allTruth, a Word.

The Greek mind-set has relevanceto us only because, if we want to under-stand what the Prophets and Apostleshave written, we must understand thethings they have written in terms of the

time in which they wrote. (See The Way,The Truth, The Life seminar tape series.)In saying that, however, I realize there aremany in the Church today who would ar-gue against any such notion. They want tobe free of any such constraints. In otherwords, they do not want the Scriptures tomean what their authors meant to say;they want them to mean only what theyare willing to understand. Such people arenothing more than Satan’s pawns.

The Greek concept of the logos(“word”) involves not so much what isspoken as what is said. That is so becauseone may hear what is spoken without ac-tually understanding what is said. Forexample, one may speak in a languagethe listener does not understand. In suchcases, the person listening has not actu-ally heard the logos (“word”). They haveonly heard meaningless sounds.

The basic point at issue regardingthe Greek concept of the Word (logos) ofGod is not whether something has beenspoken, but whether a transfer of mean-ing has occurred. At its very heart, theterm logos relates to hearing with under-standing. We must keep that in mind aswe look at the New Testament record leftus by the Apostles because their everymention of the Word of God carries thatbasic Greek understanding of the term.

When we hear the phrase Word ofGod today, however, we immediatelythink of the Scriptures—the written Wordof God. The Apostles would agree withthat designation only if it is clearly under-stood one must hear what the Scripturessay—that is, one must read them with un-derstanding. In other words, the Scrip-tures contain a message—the Word ofGod—that they intend the reader to un-derstand. If the reader has not understoodthat message, they have not actuallyheard the Word of God.

Satan has (as usual) sought to con-fuse this issue as well, although I don’thave time to explain the matter fully here.Conservative theologians are today pre-pared to argue against the explanation Ihave just given because Satan’s agentshave already introduced the silly notionthat the Scriptures contain the Word ofGod, thereby making subjective revela-tion necessary if one is ever to gain under-standing while reading the Scriptures.That’s nothing more than Satan’s non-sense.

The fact that the message of theScriptures is the Word of God has noth-ing to do with the issue of whether or notthe Scriptures themselves are objectiverevelation. They are indeed objectiverevelation. However, only an idiotwould argue that such objective revela-tion obviates the need for subjective un-derstanding in the Believer. It is notpossible for one to read a written text andthoroughly understand it without goingthrough some mental process of inter-preting what is read. If that were not so,everybody would have exactly the sameunderstanding of the revelation found inthe Scriptures just by reading it. That iscertainly not the case.

The process of interpretation as ameans of understanding the Word of Godis precisely where the Apostles wouldcondemn what has gone on in the Churchover the past 1,800 years since the Churchlost The Apostolic Teaching. You see, theApostles did not get their understandingof the message of the Scriptures by meansof interpretation. As Paul plainly tellsyou in the first two chapters of Galatians,they got it by revelation.

Thus, when the Apostles mentionthe Word of God, they are referring to theunderstanding of the message of theScriptures that they got from Jesus Christby revelation. Since all other Believersin the Early Church received the Word ofGod as it was handed down to them bypeople who had been taught by someonefrom an earlier generation, there wasnever any need for interpretation of theScriptures until after the Church lost TheApostolic Teaching.

The Word is theWord, is the Word …

Let’s pause here and do a bit of re-view. First of all, I said above that everyreligious group/individual (whether theywant to admit it or not) hands down someparticular understanding of the messageof the Scriptures as an oral tradition.Then I showed you that, when the NewTestament uses the term tradition, it is ac-tually referring to an oral tradition. And Iintroduced you to some of the technicalterminology the New Testament uses torefer to the transmission of The ApostolicTeaching as an oral tradition.

18 April 1994

Then I suggested we talk in termsof oral tradition—that is, a particular re-ligious group’s understanding of themessage of the Scriptures—as the Wordof God. And I recommended we callsuch an oral tradition “the Living Wordof God” to distinguish it from the Scrip-tures, which are the written Word of God.

Next I explained how the Apostles,being members of the Greek culture, re-flect a thoroughly Greek understandingof the Greek term logos that we findtranslated “word” in the New Testament.As you may have noticed, at that point Idropped the term Living and started talk-ing only in terms of the Word of God.That was intentional. I was just easingyou into the terminology the Apostlesuse in the New Testament when they re-fer to The Apostolic Teaching.

In contrast to the distorted under-standing of the phrase “the Word ofGod” that Satan has successfully foistedoff on the Church, the Apostles nevertalk about the Hebrew Scriptures as theWord of God. They only use that rubricwhen they are referring to the under-standing of the message of the Scripturesthey got from Jesus Christ by revelation.So what do they call the Scriptures? Takea look. Jesus called the Scriptures “theScripture/the Scriptures”:

“Have you not even read this Scrip-ture:‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS

REJECTED,THIS BECAME THE CHIEF

CORNER {stone}.’”(Mark 12:10)

“You search the Scriptures, becauseyou think that in them you have eternallife; and it is these that bear witness ofMe.”(John 5:39)

Luke called the Scriptures “theScripture/the Scriptures”:

And Philip opened his mouth, and be-ginning from this Scripture hepreached Jesus to him.(Acts 8:35)

And beginning with Moses and with allthe prophets, He explained to them the

things concerning Himself in all theScriptures.(Luke 24:27)

The Apostle John called the Scrip-tures “the Scripture”:

When therefore He was raised from thedead, His disciples remembered thatHe said this; and they believed theScripture, and the word which Jesushad spoken.(John 2:22)

The Apostle Paul called the Scrip-tures “the Scripture/the Scriptures”:

For what does the Scripture say? “AND

ABRAHAM BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS

RECKONEDTOHIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS.”(Romans 4:3)

For I delivered to you as of first impor-tance what I also received, that Christdied for our sins according to theScriptures.(1 Corinthians 15:3)

James called the Scriptures “theScripture”:

Or do you think that the Scripturespeaks to no purpose: “He jealouslydesires the Spirit which He has made todwell in us”?(James 4:5)

Finally, Peter also called the Scrip-tures “the Scripture/the Scriptures”:

“Brethren, the Scripture had to be ful-filled, which the Holy Spirit foretold bythe mouth of David concerning Judas,who became a guide to those who ar-rested Jesus.”(Acts 1:16)

Therefore, beloved, since you look forthese things, be diligent to be found byHim in peace, spotless and blameless,and regard the patience of our Lord {tobe} salvation; just as also our belovedbrother Paul, according to the wisdomgiven him, wrote to you, as also in all{his} letters, speaking in them of thesethings, in which are some things hard tounderstand, which the untaught and un-

stable distort, as {they do} also the rest ofthe Scriptures, to their own destruction.(2 Peter 3:14–16)

We can see from this brief surveythat Jesus and the Apostles used a consis-tent terminology when referring to thewritten Word of God. That same consis-tency is evident in the terminology theyuse when referring to the oral tradi-tion—the understanding of the messageof the Scriptures—that Jesus Christ re-vealed to them and told them to teach thenext generation (Matt. 28:18–20).

When the Apostles talk about theWord of God, they invariably mean TheApostolic Teaching. And they alwayscall it “the Word of the Lord,” “the Wordof Christ,” “the Word of Truth” or someother similar designation. Quite oftenthey simply call it “the Word.” But TheApostolic Teaching is always in view.They never use any such rubric to refer tothe Scriptures. However, there is an in-teresting thing you need to know aboutthe way the Apostles refer to the Word ofGod. When talking about the Word ofGod, they sometimes use the same tech-nical terminology we have already seenthem use in connection with the oral tra-dition Jesus Christ established by reveal-ing The Apostolic Teaching to theApostles. Notice what Paul says:

And for this reason we also constantlythank God that when you receivedfrom us the word of God’s message,you accepted {it} not {as} the word ofmen, but {for} what it really is, theword of God, which also performs itswork in you who believe.(1 Thessalonians 2:13)

The Greek verb translated received(Greek: paralambano) in this verse is thesame verb translated received in theverses quoted above. So we know thatPaul is here referring to the fact that theThessalonians received the Word of Godfrom him as an oral tradition when hepreached “the Gospel” to them. How-ever, the verb here translated accepted(Greek: dexomai) introduces a new tech-nical term related to the transmission ofan oral tradition. That term is the onemost often used to describe Believers re-ceiving the Word of God (in the sense of

April 1994 19

believing it). For example, we find itused that way in the Book of Acts:

Now when the apostles in Jerusalemheard that Samaria had received theword of God, they sent them Peter andJohn.(Acts 8:14)

Now the apostles and the brethren whowere throughout Judea heard that theGentiles also had received the word ofGod.(Acts 11:1)

I won’t go into all the occurrencesof the Word of God and its related men-tions in the New Testament. You can usethe list of references in the “Word Termi-nology” table on this page to study thesubject on your own. As you’re readingthrough the passages, however, noticehow many times “speaking,” “hearing,”“teaching” and “preaching” are men-tioned. That’s because the Word was anoral tradition that was to be handeddown from generation to generationorally.

The last reference in the “WordTerminology” table tells all there is totell about the futility of the great “hope”of Pretenders like Søren Kierkegaard.(See “Satan’s Fools Are Satan’s Tools”in this issue):

Every good thing bestowed and everyperfect gift is from above, comingdown from the Father of lights, with

whom there is no variation, or shiftingshadow. In the exercise of His will Hebrought us forth by the word of truth,so that we might be, as it were, the firstfruits among His creatures.(James 1:17–18)

If you are a True Believer, youwere born again through one incrediblysimple process. You heard one small bitof the Truth of The Apostolic Teachingthat, by God’s grace, still remains in theChurch today. Having heard that Truth,you believed it, and responded in totalrepentance with a humble confession ofyour sins, asking God to forgive you.

The Pretenders in the Church todayknow nothing at all about what you expe-rienced. What it means to be born againtotally eludes them. You and I know onlybecause we have been born again. Andwe know that our experience came aboutbecause, at some point in our lives, wefirmly believed God was a God of wrath,a God to be feared—that is, a God Whowould destroy us if we continued livingin sin. That is exactly what was happen-ing in the Early Church.

The point I am making here relatesto the fact that we heard and believed anoral tradition that still remains in theChurch, an oral tradition that still con-tains some of the Truth of The ApostolicTeaching. Having been born again be-cause you once believed just a small bitof the Truth and accepted God’s offer ofsalvation, you were transformed. Youbecame something other than what you

had been before:

Therefore, if any man is in Christ, {he is}a new creature; the old things passedaway; behold, new things have come.(2 Corinthians 5:17)

The Pretenders in the Church—Sa-tan’s agents—want you to think of thenew birth you have experienced as noth-ing more than a mystical experience.They do that because that’s all their fa-ther Satan has ever given them—mysti-cal experiences. But you have somethingfar greater than they. You have withinyou the Living Word of God:

Since you have in obedience to the truthpurified your souls for a sincere love ofthe brethren, fervently love one anotherfrom the heart, for you have been bornagain not of seed which is perishablebut imperishable, {that is}, through theliving and abiding word of God.(1 Peter 1:22–23)

Peter is talking about The Apos-tolic Teaching as an oral tradition thatlives in the Believer. You probably have-n’t noticed it before, but the Apostlestalk in those terms on various occasions.Take a look:

Let the word of Christ richly dwellwithin you, with all wisdom teachingand admonishing one another withpsalms {and} hymns {and} spiritualsongs, singing with thankfulness inyour hearts to God.(Colossians 3:16)

I have written to you, fathers, becauseyou know Him who has been from thebeginning. I have written to you, youngmen, because you are strong, and theword of God abides in you, and youhave overcome the evil one.(1 John 2:14)

Although you may not have con-sciously thought about it, the challengeyou have faced since being born againhas been continuing to believe the Truththat came to live within you when youfirst believed the Truth and responded toit. That is where, whether you knew it ornot, you became Satan’s target in the bat-

20 April 1994

Word TerminologyWord of God:Matt. 15:6; Mark 7:13; Luke 5:1; 8:11, 21; 11:28; John 10:35;Acts 4:31; 6:2, 7; 8:14; 11:1; 12:24; 13:5, 7, 46; 17:13; 18:11;Rom. 9:6; 1 Cor. 14:36; 2 Cor. 2:17; 4:2; Col. 1:25;1 Thess. 2:13; 1 Tim. 4:5; 2 Tim. 2:9; Titus 2:5; Heb. 4:12;13:7; 1 Pet. 1:23; 1 John 2:14; Rev. 1:2, 9; 6:9; 19:13; 20:4.

Word of the Lord:Acts 8:25; 13:44, 48, 49; 15:35–36; 16:32; 19:10;1 Thess. 1:8; 4:15; 2 Thess. 3:1

Word of Christ:Col. 3:16

Word of Truth:2 Cor. 6:7; Eph. 1:13; Col. 1:5; 2 Tim. 2:15; James 1:18

tle that rages between the forces of lightand the forces of darkness. You see, bybeing born again, you allied yourselfwith the forces of light:

For He delivered us from the domainof darkness, and transferred us to thekingdom of His beloved Son, in whomwe have redemption, the forgiveness ofsins.(Colossians 1:13–14)

Have you ever wondered why theNew Testament authors talk about theGospel in terms of light and darkness?They do that because that is part of theparabolic imagery found in The Teach-ing of Moses, The Teaching of theProphets, The Teaching of Jesus and TheApostolic Teaching. I’m not going to ex-plain anything concerning any of thoseTeachings here; I just want to explainwhat the Apostles were talking aboutwhen they mention light and darkness.Keep in mind what I have told you onother occasions: A parable only tells youwhat something is LIKE. That is, it de-scribes one thing in terms of another.

Those Who Love DarknessLuke tells us that Zacharias, the fa-

ther of John the Baptist, prophesied con-cerning his son’s ministry and said this:

“And you, child, will be called theprophet of the Most High;For you will go on BEFORE THE LORD

TO PREPARE HIS WAYS;To give to His people {the} knowledge

of salvationBy the forgiveness of their sins,Because of the tender mercy of our God,With which the Sunrise from on high

shall visit us,TO SHINE UPON THOSE WHO SIT IN

DARKNESS AND THE SHADOW OF

DEATH,To guide our feet into the way of

peace.”(Luke 1:76–79)

Laying aside for now the issue ofJohn the Baptist giving the Jews “aknowledge of salvation,” I want to keyon the fact that Zacharias was speakingin terms of the parabolic imagery of The

Teaching of the Prophets when he talkedabout the “Sunrise from on high.” Noticethat he quotes Isaiah 9:1–2 to tell us thepurpose of that “Sunrise” was “to shineupon those who sit in darkness . . . toguide our feet into the way of peace.” Inmentioning “the Way of peace” Zacha-rias alerts us to the fact that he is talkingin terms of the Hebrew idiom “walk inThe Way.” I have already discussed thatidiom at some length in The Way, TheTruth, The Life seminar tape series;therefore, I won’t go into any great detailhere except to say that The Way is TheTeaching. So Zacharias is talking about“walking in The Teaching.” And he hasjust told us the purpose of the light Godprovided is to make it possible for peopleto “walk in The Teaching.” Keep that inmind as we go along.

Matthew tells us Jesus moved toCapernaum so that when He began topreach, the prophecy of Isaiah that Zach-arias mentioned would be fulfilled.

{This was} to fulfill what was spokenthrough Isaiah the prophet, saying,“THE LAND OF ZEBULUN AND THE

LAND OF NAPHTALI,

BY THE WAY OF THE SEA, BEYOND THE

JORDAN, GALILEE OF THE GENTILES—

THE PEOPLE WHO WERE SITTING IN

DARKNESS SAW A GREAT LIGHT,

AND TO THOSE WHO WERE SITTING IN

THE LAND AND SHADOW OF DEATH,

UPON THEM A LIGHT DAWNED.”(Matthew 4:14–16)

That tells us the ministry of Jesuswas intended to provide light. But whatwas that light? Again, Luke records an-other prophecy, the prophecy of Simeon,and tells us what we need to know:

“Now Lord, Thou dost let Thybond-servant depart

In peace, according to Thy word;For my eyes have seen Thy salvation,Which Thou hast prepared in the

presence of all peoples,A LIGHT OF REVELATION TO THE

GENTILES,And the glory of Thy people Israel.”(Luke 2:29–32)

Notice, the light Jesus Christ pro-vided was a “light of revelation to the

Gentiles.” That not only tells us the lightwas revelation, it also tells us when thelight was given. The only revelation anyGentile ever received from Jesus Christwas mediated through the Apostle Paul.Therefore, this passage points directly tothe revelation Paul mentions he received(Gal. 1:9–12; 1 Cor. 11:23–25; Eph.3:3). So the image of light must be a par-abolic description of the content of TheApostolic Teaching. Let’s see if that con-clusion doesn’t withstand closer scru-tiny. Have you ever read this passagebefore?

In the beginning was the Word, andthe Word was with God, and the Wordwas God. He was in the beginning withGod. All things came into being byHim, and apart from Him nothingcame into being that has come into be-ing. In Him was life, and the life wasthe light of men. And the light shinesin the darkness, and the darkness didnot comprehend it. There came a man,sent from God, whose name was John.He came for a witness, that he mightbear witness of the light, that all mightbelieve through him. He was not thelight, but {came} that he might bearwitness of the light. There was the truelight which, coming into the world,enlightens every man. He was in theworld, and the world was madethrough Him, and the world did notknow Him. He came to His own, andthose who were His own did not re-ceive Him. But as many as receivedHim, to them He gave the right to be-come children of God, {even} to thosewho believe in His name, who wereborn not of blood, nor of the will of theflesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.And the Word became flesh, anddwelt among us, and we beheld Hisglory, glory as of the only begottenfrom the Father, full of grace and truth.John bore witness of Him, and criedout, saying, “This was He of whom Isaid, ‘He who comes after me has ahigher rank than I, for He existed be-fore me.’”(John 1:1–15)

Did you notice what he said aboutthe Word? He said:

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There was the true light which, cominginto the world, enlightens every man.(John 1:9)

The Apostle is speaking paraboli-cally concerning Jesus Christ as light—theLiving Word of God that comes to dwell inthose who believe The Apostolic Teaching.But notice that he said the light “enlight-ens.” That Greek term (photizo) meansboth “to illuminate” and “to makeknown/teach.” That’s why he said:

He came to His own, and those whowere His own did not receive Him. Butas many as received Him, to them Hegave the right to become children ofGod, {even} to those who believe in Hisname.(John 1:11–12)

You may have already guessed thatJohn is talking in terms of Believers re-ceiving (Greek: paralambano) the Wordof God as an oral tradition that enlight-ens them concerning the Truth. He is do-ing that because what he has written isnothing more than a statement made inthe parabolic imagery of The ApostolicTeaching. It is meant to mock what theancient Greeks believed concerning Godas a Living Word.

It is important to note that John wasnot the only Apostle to use the parabolicimage of The Teaching as light. All of theApostles use the image because it is partof The Apostolic Teaching. John, how-ever, seems to have had a fondness for it.He has recorded in His Gospel numerousoccasions on which Jesus talked para-bolically about Himself as the Light:

“For God so loved the world, that Hegave His only begotten Son, that who-ever believes in Him should not per-ish, but have eternal life. For God didnot send the Son into the world to judgethe world, but that the world should besaved through Him. He who believesin Him is not judged; he who does notbelieve has been judged already, be-cause he has not believed in the nameof the only begotten Son of God. Andthis is the judgment, that the light iscome into the world, and men lovedthe darkness rather than the light; fortheir deeds were evil. For everyone

who does evil hates the light, and doesnot come to the light, lest his deedsshould be exposed. But he who prac-tices the truth comes to the light, thathis deeds may be manifested as havingbeen wrought in God.”(John 3:16–21)

All that believing sort of makes youwonder, doesn’t it? What must one be-lieve in order to be saved? That’s some-thing Satan doesn’t want you toconsider. That’s why he has workedthrough the goofiness SørenKierkegaard introduced into the Church.(See “Satan’s Fools Are Satan’s Tools”in this issue.) Satan wants you to think ofthe new-birth experience as nothingmore than a mystical experience thatcame about through a completely sub-jective decision to believe anything at allabout God. That concoction is a lie. Aperson cannot be born again without be-lieving the Truth.

You were born again because youbelieved the Truth and acted according toit—that is, you confessed your sins andrepented. That’s why, after talking aboutbeing “saved,” Jesus goes on to talk aboutthe light. You see, those who hear theTruth and refuse to believe it have chosento remain in darkness. That’s becauselight is the Truth of The Apostolic Teach-ing and darkness is any lie that contradictsthat Truth. That’s what Jesus was talkingabout when He said this:

“The lamp of your body is your eye;when your eye is clear, your whole bodyalso is full of light; but when it is bad,your body also is full of darkness. Thenwatch out that the light in you may notbe darkness. If therefore your wholebody is full of light, with no dark part init, it shall be wholly illumined, as whenthe lamp illumines you with its rays.”(Luke 11:34–36)

Jesus is speaking parabolically. Helets us know that by using a Greek parti-cle of comparison: “as when the lamp il-lumines you with its rays.” In talkingabout The Way we “see” things downhere, He is telling us people choose to be-lieve what they choose to believe—thatis, they “see” things the way they chooseto “see” them. Those who choose to be-

lieve lies when confronted with the lightof The Teaching, however, have chosento remain in darkness.

John records yet another occasionwhen Jesus talked about the need for be-lieving the light of the Truth one can findonly in The Teaching:

“If I {alone} bear witness of Myself, Mytestimony is not true. There is anotherwho bears witness of Me, and I knowthat the testimony which He bears of Meis true. You have sent to John, and hehas borne witness to the truth. But thewitness which I receive is not fromman, but I say these things that youmay be saved. He was the lamp that wasburning and was shining and you werewilling to rejoice for a while in hislight. But the witness which I have isgreater than {that of} John; for theworks which the Father has given Meto accomplish, the very works that I do,bear witness of Me, that the Father hassent Me. And the Father who sent Me,He has borne witness of Me. You haveneither heard His voice at any time, norseen His form. And you do not have Hisword abiding in you, for you do not be-lieve Him whom He sent. You searchthe Scriptures, because you think that inthem you have eternal life; and it isthese that bear witness of Me; and youare unwilling to come to Me, that youmay have life.”(John 5:31–40)

Don’t be confused by all the seem-ingly intricate statements in this passagethat mention “witness,” “bear witness,”and “testimony.” Just convert thosewords to ordinary phrases like “a personwho knows the Truth,” “talk about” and“what was said.” That way you can easilyget the essential drift of what Jesus said.He has merely told us John the Baptist, asa “person who knows the Truth,” “talkedabout” Him. Therefore, John’s teachingwas light in which the Jews rejoiced for awhile. But God is also a “Person Whoknows the Truth,” and Jesus received thethings He “talked about” from God.

Jesus also mentions in this passagethe fact that God gave Him parabolicpantomimes to do as a part of His minis-try—“the works which the Father hasgiven Me to accomplish.” He then says

22 April 1994

those parabolic pantomimes also “talkabout” Who He is. The Jews, however,refuse to believe what Jesus says verballyor through His parabolic pantomimes be-cause the Word of God is not in them. In-stead, they go to the Scriptures lookingfor the Word of God, not knowing that theScriptures “talk about” Jesus Christ.

Jesus said all these things to theJews in order to mock their stubborn ig-norance. The incarnate Word of God wasstanding right in front of them, and theyrefused to believe what the Word wasteaching. The Teaching of Jesus pro-vided light so anyone who believed itcould have that Light within them toshow them The Way in which theyshould walk. That is just a parabolicstatement made according to the para-bolic imagery of The Apostolic Teach-ing. However, you can find the samething stated in The Teaching of Jesus:

Again therefore Jesus spoke to them,saying, “I am the light of the world; hewho follows Me shall not walk in thedarkness, but shall have the light oflife.”(John 8:12)

“While I am in the world, I am thelight of the world.”(John 9:5)

The disciples said to Him, “Rabbi, theJews were just now seeking to stoneYou, and are You going there again?”Jesus answered, “Are there not twelvehours in the day? If anyone walks inthe day, he does not stumble, becausehe sees the light of this world. But ifanyone walks in the night, he stum-bles, because the light is not in him.”(John 11:8–10)

The multitude therefore answeredHim, “We have heard out of the Lawthat the Christ is to remain forever;and how can You say, ‘The Son of Manmust be lifted up’? Who is this Son ofMan?” Jesus therefore said to them,“For a little while longer the light isamong you. Walk while you have thelight, that darkness may not overtakeyou; he who walks in the darknessdoes not know where he goes. Whileyou have the light, believe in the light,

in order that you may become sons oflight.” These things Jesus spoke, andHe departed and hid Himself fromthem.(John 12:34–36)

And Jesus cried out and said, “He whobelieves in Me does not believe in Me,but in Him who sent Me. And he whobeholds Me beholds the One who sentMe. I have come {as} light into theworld, that everyone who believes inMe may not remain in darkness. Andif anyone hears My sayings, and doesnot keep them, I do not judge him; for Idid not come to judge the world, but tosave the world. He who rejects Me,and does not receive My sayings, hasone who judges him; the word I spokeis what will judge him at the last day.For I did not speak on My own initia-tive, but the Father Himself who sentMe has given Me commandment, whatto say, and what to speak. And I knowthat His commandment is eternal life;therefore the things I speak, I speakjust as the Father has told Me.”(John 12:44–50)

You have probably already de-duced that the word translated receive inJohn 12:48 is referring to the receptionof an oral tradition. That’s true. It is.However, it is not the compound verbparalambano that we have seen previ-ously, it is the simple verb lambano. Thatpresents no problem. We saw the twoused as synonyms in John 1:11–12:

He came to His own, and those whowere His own did not receive Him. Butas many as received Him, to them Hegave the right to become children ofGod, {even} to those who believe in Hisname.(John 1:11–12)

The Greek verb in verse 11 is thecompound verb paralambano. The verbin verse 12 is the simple verb lambano.Their parallel usage in this context dis-closes their synonymous meaning whenthey are used to refer to the reception ofan oral tradition. Therefore, we knowJesus had in mind the acceptance of anoral tradition in John 12:48 where Heused only the simple verb lambano.

Just a FewBurning Embers

Having taken this quick survey ofthe things Jesus said about Himself aslight—the Living Word of God that dwellsin those who believe—let’s now turn tothe things the Apostles said concerninglight. We will find they used exactly thesame parabolic imagery and they under-stood it in exactly the same way. For ex-ample, they saw themselves just as Jesussaw Himself, as a source of light thatmade salvation possible for those who be-lieved what they had preached:

And Paul and Barnabas spoke outboldly and said, “It was necessary thatthe word of God should be spoken toyou first; since you repudiate it, andjudge yourselves unworthy of eternallife, behold, we are turning to the Gen-tiles. For thus the Lord has com-manded us,‘I HAVE PLACED YOU AS A LIGHT FOR

THE GENTILES,

THAT YOU SHOULD BRING

SALVATION TO THE END OF THE

EARTH.’”(Acts 13:46–47)

The Book of Acts contains theApostle Paul’s own description of theoccasion on which Jesus Christ calledhim to preach the Gospel. He says Jesusdescribed his calling in terms of light anddarkness.

“And when we had all fallen to theground, I heard a voice saying to me inthe Hebrew dialect, ‘Saul, Saul, why areyou persecuting Me? It is hard for you tokick against the goads.’ And I said, ‘Whoart Thou, Lord?’ And the Lord said, ‘Iam Jesus whom you are persecuting. Butarise, and stand on your feet; for thispurpose I have appeared to you, to ap-point you a minister and a witness notonly to the things which you have seen,but also to the things in which I will ap-pear to you; delivering you from the{Jewish} people and from the Gentiles,to whom I am sending you, to open theireyes so that they may turn from dark-ness to light and from the dominion ofSatan to God, in order that they may re-ceive forgiveness of sins and an inheri-

April 1994 23

tance among those who have beensanctified by faith in Me.’ Consequently,King Agrippa, I did not prove disobedi-ent to the heavenly vision, but {kept} de-claring both to those of Damascus first,and {also} at Jerusalem and {then}throughout all the region of Judea, and{even} to the Gentiles, that they shouldrepent and turn to God, performingdeeds appropriate to repentance. Forthis reason {some} Jews seized me in thetemple and tried to put me to death. Andso, having obtained help from God, Istand to this day testifying both to smalland great, stating nothing but what theProphets and Moses said was going totake place; that the Christ was to suffer,{and} that by reason of {His} resurrec-tion from the dead He should be thefirst to proclaim light both to the {Jew-ish} people and to the Gentiles.”(Acts 26:14–23)

Did you notice what Jesus said? Hedescribed the new birth as “opening theireyes.” That makes sense, doesn’t it? Thedarkness isn’t just darkness around us, itis also darkness within us. Before wewere born again, we were blind! Ah!Now we can understand! That’s why Je-sus talked about the importance of our“eye” being “clear” so that the lightwithin us not be darkness (Matt. 6:23;Luke 11:35). He said that because blindpeople have cloudy eyes. And, just forthe sake of you True Believers, I remindyou there will be many in the Last Dayswho claim to “see” what you and I “see”yet they have nothing but darknesswithin them. Beware especially of those:

And this is the message we have heardfrom Him and announce to you, thatGod is light, and in Him there is nodarkness at all. If we say that we havefellowship with Him and {yet} walk inthe darkness, we lie and do not prac-tice the truth; but if we walk in the lightas He Himself is in the light, we havefellowship with one another, and theblood of Jesus His Son cleanses usfrom all sin. If we say that we have nosin, we are deceiving ourselves, andthe truth is not in us. If we confess oursins, He is faithful and righteous to for-give us our sins and to cleanse us fromall unrighteousness. If we say that we

have not sinned, we make Him a liar,and His word is not in us.(1 John 1:5–10)

Did you understand all that? He hasjust said that those who say they believeyet don’t show evidence of their beliefare liars. That’s why he mentions lightand darkness as well as “walking in thelight.” You need to keep that in mind.The only way we can ever do what Godrequires is if we have “the truth” dwell-ing “in us.” If we say we believe yetdon’t “walk in the light,” “His Word isnot in us”—that is, we don’t really be-lieve. John returns to the same imagerylater in his epistle:

Beloved, I am not writing a new com-mandment to you, but an old com-mandment which you have had fromthe beginning; the old commandmentis the word which you have heard. Onthe other hand, I am writing a newcommandment to you, which is true inHim and in you, because the darknessis passing away, and the true light isalready shining. The one who says heis in the light and {yet} hates hisbrother is in the darkness until now.The one who loves his brother abidesin the light and there is no cause forstumbling in him. But the one whohates his brother is in the darknessand walks in the darkness, and doesnot know where he is going becausethe darkness has blinded his eyes.(1 John 2:7–11)

John’s mention of blindness re-minds us again of what Jesus said to Paulwhen He called him. Paul said he wascalled to go to the Gentiles and “opentheir eyes” (Acts 26:18). In that same pas-sage, however, Paul also said that Jesuswould “proclaim light both to the {Jew-ish} people and to the Gentiles” (Acts26:23). That not only confirms the lightwas the spoken message of The ApostolicTeaching, it also explains what Paul wasgetting at in the Book of Romans:

But if you bear the name “Jew,” and relyupon the Law, and boast in God, andknow {His} will, and approve the thingsthat are essential, being instructed outof the Law, and are confident that you

yourself are a guide to the blind, a lightto those who are in darkness, acorrector of the foolish, a teacher of theimmature, having in the Law the em-bodiment of knowledge and of thetruth, you, therefore, who teach another,do you not teach yourself?(Romans 2:17–21a)

In this passage Paul mentions notonly the darkness all around us but alsothe need that we have, as blind people,for someone to lead us to the light. Heuses that same parabolic imagery inwriting to the Corinthians, where he tellsus the “blindness” is a blindness of ourmind and the light is one that “has shonein our heart”—that is, in our mind:

And even if our gospel is veiled, it isveiled to those who are perishing, inwhose case the god of this world hasblinded the minds of the unbelieving,that they might not see the light of thegospel of the glory of Christ, who is theimage of God. For we do not preachourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, andourselves as your bond-servants forJesus’ sake. For God, who said,“Light shall shine out of darkness,” isthe One who has shone in our heartsto give the light of the knowledge ofthe glory of God in the face of Christ.(2 Corinthians 4:3–6)

Now Paul has told us specificallywhat the light is. It is “the light of the gos-pel,” “the light of the knowledge of theglory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”Fools will automatically assume they un-derstand what Paul has said here, not real-izing that “the glory of God” refers back tothe parabolic imagery of The Teaching ofMoses. Since I am not going to delve intothat in this article, it is enough to know thatlight is a parabolic image that depicts acharacteristic of knowledge. Specifically,it is a characteristic of the knowledge of thethings that are explained in the Gos-pel—that is, in The Apostolic Teaching.

Now we know exactly what thelight is. It is knowledge of the Truth. So itmakes sense that darkness is lack of aknowledge of that Truth. That’s where be-lief comes in. What we believe is what weknow. It is impossible to know somethingwithout first believing it. I realize there

24 April 1994

are more than a few idiots who would ar-gue against that, but what do they know?They refuse to believe much of anythingthey didn’t come up with themselves.

Armed with an understanding ofwhat light is, we can understand why Paulused the parabolic image of light anddarkness when he talked about the needto beware of false teaching that wouldlead Believers back into darkness:

Let no one deceive you with emptywords, for because of these things thewrath of God comes upon the sons of dis-obedience. Therefore do not be partak-ers with them; for you were formerlydarkness, but now you are light in theLord; walk as children of light (for thefruit of the light {consists} in all good-ness and righteousness and truth), tryingto learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Anddo not participate in the unfruitfuldeeds of darkness, but instead even ex-pose them; for it is disgraceful even tospeak of the things which are done bythem in secret. But all things becomevisible when they are exposed by thelight, for everything that becomes visi-ble is light. For this reason it says,“Awake, sleeper,And arise from the dead,And Christ will shine on you.”Therefore be careful how you walk, notas unwise men, but as wise, making themost of your time, because the days areevil.(Ephesians 5:6–16)

Have you noticed how many timesin the passages where we have seen lightmentioned we have also seen an allusionto the Hebrew idiom “walk in The Way”?(For an explanation of the idiom, see TheWay, The Truth, The Life seminar tapeseries.) That’s because the two—imageand idiom—are intricately related in TheTeaching of Moses. Jesus and the Apos-tles repeatedly talk in terms of “walkingin light” and “walking in darkness” be-cause they were thinking in terms of thatparabolic imagery. That explains whyPaul alludes to the idiom “walk in TheWay” in the following passage:

This I say therefore, and affirm togetherwith the Lord, that you walk no longerjust as the Gentiles also walk, in the fu-

tility of their mind, being darkened intheir understanding, excluded from thelife of God, because of the ignorancethat is in them, because of the hardnessof their heart; and they, having becomecallous, have given themselves over tosensuality, for the practice of every kindof impurity with greediness. But you didnot learn Christ in this way, if indeedyou have heard Him and have beentaught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus,that, in reference to your former mannerof life, you lay aside the old self, which isbeing corrupted in accordance with thelusts of deceit, and that you be renewedin the spirit of your mind, and put on thenew self, which in {the likeness of} Godhas been created in righteousness andholiness of the truth. Therefore, layingaside falsehood, SPEAK TRUTH, EACH

ONE {of you}, WITH HIS NEIGHBOR, forwe are members of one another.(Ephesians 4:17–25)

Paul is speaking parabolicallyabout Jesus Christ as the Living Word ofGod that dwells in the Believer. He isemphasizing the need for Believers to al-low the Truth of The Apostolic Teachingto renew their mind so that they view thislife from an entirely different perspec-tive—so that they “walk in The Way.”

What Paul has said here is nothingcomplicated. He has merely told us thatthose who don’t know the Truth of TheApostolic Teaching are ignorant. Thenotion of ignorance, however, brings upthe issue of the fool—that is, the personwho is firmly convinced he knows some-thing worthwhile when he knows noth-ing at all. You may not have noticed thatPaul mentioned foolishness in the pas-sage from Romans quoted above (Rom.2:20). It was on his mind because dark-ness, ignorance and foolishness are allthe same thing.

Getting back to the issue of falseteaching, Paul understood the True Be-liever is engaged in a constant battle withthe forces of darkness. That is, he/shefaces the ever-present danger of beinglured out of the light of The ApostolicTeaching and into believing somethingthat isn’t true. That’s why he uses thesame parabolic imagery when he refersto the battle that goes on between theforces of light and the forces of darkness:

Finally, be strong in the Lord, and in thestrength of His might. Put on the full ar-mor of God, that you may be able tostand firm against the schemes of thedevil. For our struggle is not againstflesh and blood, but against the rulers,against the powers, against the worldforces of this darkness, against the spir-itual {forces} of wickedness in the heav-enly {places}. Therefore, take up the fullarmor of God, that you may be able toresist in the evil day, and having done ev-erything, to stand firm.(Ephesians 6:10–13)

Paul is talking about “standingfirm” in the Truth of The ApostolicTeaching. Unfortunately, the EarlyChurch failed to “stand firm.” Conse-quently, before very long, they lost TheApostolic Teaching. Can you guess howthat happened? It happened becauseagents of Satan infiltrated the Church,introducing lies into The ApostolicTeaching. The Apostles knew that wouldhappen in spite of their best efforts be-cause, when Satan wants somethingdone, he sometimes does it himself:

As the truth of Christ is in me, thisboasting of mine will not be stopped inthe regions of Achaia. Why? Because Ido not love you? God knows {I do}! Butwhat I am doing, I will continue to do,that I may cut off opportunity from thosewho desire an opportunity to be re-garded just as we are in the matterabout which they are boasting. Forsuch men are false apostles, deceitfulworkers, disguising themselves asapostles of Christ. And no wonder, foreven Satan disguises himself as an an-gel of light. Therefore it is not surpris-ing if his servants also disguisethemselves as servants of righteous-ness; whose end shall be according totheir deeds.(2 Corinthians 11:10–15)

It is too bad the Early Christians lostThe Apostolic Teaching. If they hadn’t,True Believers today wouldn’t be cling-ing to scattered bits and pieces of theTruth. They would instead be “walking”in the full light of day. But who knowswhat God has planned for His Own inthese Last Days?

April 1994 25

I have already told you God calledme to restore The Apostolic Teaching.(See “Protestants All Agree on This:Somebody Laid an Egg!” The Voice ofElijah, January 1994.) To be quite hon-est about it, I don’t really care whetheryou believe that or not. It’s your loss ifyou don’t. Besides, it doesn’t matterwhat I claim concerning my calling be-cause “the proof is in the pudding.” Yet,if what I say is true, there are going to bemore than a few in these Last Days whowill be “walking in the light” when JesusChrist returns for His Own.

Now, we all know the Scripturessay Jesus will come suddenly, “like a thiefin the night,” without warning (Matt.24:43; Luke 12:39; 2 Pet. 3:10; Rev. 3:3;16:15). Yet it’s clear from what Paul saysin the following passage that he believedthose who understood the Truth of TheApostolic Teaching in that Day wouldknow full well what was going to happen:

Now as to the times and the epochs,brethren, you have no need of anything

to be written to you. For you your-selves know full well that the day ofthe Lord will come just like a thief inthe night. While they are saying,“Peace and safety!” then destructionwill come upon them suddenly likebirth pangs upon a woman with child;and they shall not escape. But you,brethren, are not in darkness, that theday should overtake you like a thief;for you are all sons of light and sonsof day. We are not of night nor of dark-ness; so then let us not sleep as othersdo, but let us be alert and sober. Forthose who sleep do their sleeping atnight, and those who get drunk getdrunk at night. But since we are of{the} day, let us be sober, having puton the breastplate of faith and love,and as a helmet, the hope of salvation.For God has not destined us for wrath,but for obtaining salvation throughour Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us,that whether we are awake or asleep,we may live together with Him.(1 Thessalonians 5:1–10)

That “peace and safety” garbagesounds a lot like what the Pretenders arepreaching in the Church today, doesn’tit? What could be more peaceful and safethan to be in the comforting arms of anall-forgiving god of love? Unfortu-nately, that god doesn’t exist. He’s just afigment of their foolish imagination.

On the other hand, the God ofwrath does exist. He’ll be coming alongshortly in the Person of Jesus Christ,filled with an awesome burning rage,fully intent on destroying those whostubbornly refuse to believe the Truth (2Thess. 2:10; Rev. 6:16–17). But whyshould we talk about that? It might dis-turb the Pretenders’ sense of security.We sure wouldn’t want that now, wouldwe?

What a shame! Millions are headedfor “destruction” just because fools arepreaching “peace and safety” instead ofkeeping their mouths shut. That’s thetrouble with fools. They always want to“show what they know.” They do, too.Trouble is, they know nothing at all. ■

26 April 1994

Where Did That Come From?

� How did the novel notion that God loves everybody find its

way into fundamentalist beliefs?

� Where did Dispensationalism originate?

� How did it come to be a part of fundamental doctrine?

� How did Fundamentalism become identified with

ignorance and narrow-mindedness?

� What did William Jennings Bryan, former Democratic Party

leader, presidential candidate, and Secretary of State for

Woodrow Wilson, contribute to the Fundamentalist image?

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What You Don’t Know Can Sometimes Hurt You!Did you know that for over one hundred and fifty years all the leaders of the Early Church

understood there was but one correct understanding of the message of the Old Testament?Were you also aware that all Christians in the Early Church respected and recognized theirleaders as having the God-given authority to teach the correct understanding of God’s Wordto His People? Can you believe none of these men interpreted Scripture for themselves?

Obviously, that doesn’t describe the Church today. With a church on every cornerpreaching a different interpretation of Scripture and believers picking and choosing asthey deem fit, it doesn’t seem possible it could have ever been otherwise, does it?Yet it was a reality in the Early Church for well over a century. So, what happened?

If you thrive on the constant bickering and fighting found in the Church of today, thatquestion isn’t even relevant. Obviously, you believe you can go right on arguing your wayto the Truth. But some of us don’t.

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Thy Word have I hid in mine heart,That I might not sin against Thee.

Psalm 119:11

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Here for the first time ever, in simple, easy-to-read English, one book finally explainsthis intricate message of Scripture hidden for so long in the Hebrew idiom. Read anddiscover for yourself how Not All Israel Is Israel.

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Who is Israel?

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ElijahProject

What if all Israel was “cut off?”

John the Baptist warned it could happen. (Matt. 3:10)The Apostle Paul said it did happen. (Rom. 11:11–24)

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