I'm saddened that there are some believers at my church, people I sincerely care about, that listen to my comments and what I have to say when in fellowship and conclude that I'm just simply an overly critical person. I sometimes use in my speech concepts from theology, church history, Christian authors and preachers from history, or arguments based on reasoning. I use a lot of scripture and making sweeping statements based on systematics. When I say these things, people just think that I'm “straining at words.” I could turn around and give them an accusation of not having any discernment. But, rather than imitate devilish behavior, I'd rather explain why it's necessary to be this way from the Bible using scripture. I think these believers haven't been taught to understand why the aforementioned concepts are important. The Bible does in fact call us to “strain at words,” to be “overly critical,” and “picky” about what people say, though these were used pejoratively. These all characterize a sense of discernment, which is what we are called to have towards everything outside of the Word of God. Being discerning is an attribute that should be desirable for us to have in our character as Believers who want to be conformed to the image of Christ.

(1) We're called to be critical. 1 John 4:1, "Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. (NIV)

In the very next two verses, John then turns to teaching the reader how to "recognize the Holy Spirit."

We're told, by apostolic authority in the New Testament, to test everyone in whether what they say or profess is genuinely from God or not. The objective, as John highlights, is to know the Spirit of God. The Bible says that the Holy Spirit is the author of scripture:
2 Peter 1:21, "For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." (NIV)

So, when scripture is properly interpreted, it is the voice of the Holy Spirit that is speaking. It's the very voice of God.

Conclusion: ALL believers are called to be critical. ALL believers are called to have a sense of discernment.

 

(2) The Word of God can be twisted into a message that God hasn't spoken. The Bible was written SO we can know truth from error, and was built in anticipation that we would carefully examine what was written word-for-word.

(a) 2 Peter 3:16, "He writes the same way in all his letters, speaking in them of these matters. His letters contain some things that are hard to understand, which ignorant and unstable people distort, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction." (NIV) This was written about the Apostle Paul’s writing by Peter in 2 Peter on the subject of the end times.

So, here Peter is saying that what Paul wrote is scripture (the New Testament). Then, he's saying that people, who he sees as ignorant and instable distort Paul's writings. Then, he adds, “to their own destruction!” They're hurting themselves and those that hear them because the message that they've derived from scripture isn't really from scripture. Thus, it isn't the teaching of God, but the teaching of men.

(b) The written scriptures were written to be examined word-for-word, critically:

2 Peter 1:19, "And we have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts." (NIV)

Proverbs 30:5, "Every word of God is tested; He is a shield to those who take refuge in Him." (NASB)

Psalm 12:6, "And the words of the LORD are flawless, like silver refined in a furnace of clay, purified seven times." (NIV)

The scriptures were written for our instruction:

Romans 15:4, "For whatever was written in earlier times was written for our instruction, so that through perseverance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope." (NASB)

It then says perseverance and encouragement of the scriptures... This points out that we're to go over the scriptures over and over again. The Word was written in anticipation that it would be read over and over. Scripture is very patient with its readers. The reader can read its contents again and again until they get what it has to say.

The Bible says that we're to compare one portion of scripture with another and cross-reference it:

1 Corinthians 2:13, "which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words." (NASB)

 

(3) The Bible tells us to guard sound doctrine and exhorts us to have discernment. Titus 2:1, "You must teach what is in accord with sound doctrine." (NIV) - This is instruction directed to Titus, but the New Testament is given to all believers. All believers are expected to teach sound doctrine.

Titus 1:9, "He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it." This is instruction to elders, but it applies to all Christian men because, in context, this was addressed to Titus on what he was to teach and to look for in an "elder," and elders were to be examples of all of these things to the rest of the body.

Conclusion: ALL believers are called to use scripture, to refer to the text, to learn sound doctrine from the New Testament, to use this as their basis and grounds for interpreting what's taught elsewhere.

 

(4) You're not accurately handling the Word unless you're being “critical.” I’m seen as one who is 'straining' at the words of scripture, but this is EXACTLY what the Bible calls us to do. And this is what Bible teachers and Ministers train to do in seminaries across the country, and have done for many generations. And that quality is exactly what makes a solid, discerning, mature believer. The Bible commends this believer:

Acts 17:11, "Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica; they received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so." (ESV)

Now, note the wording: they "received" the word. If that's all that were done, they wouldn't have been recognizable as "noble" by anyone. They wouldn't have been noble at all. But, no, they didn't stop there. They were ALSO "examining" (or judging, or discerning) the scriptures "daily" (all the time) to see if these things were so. They were cross-examining the teaching of even the Apostle Paul of all people! That's exactly what we're called to do when the Bible says:

2 Timothy 2:15, "Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth." (NASB)

The word "examining" in Acts 17:11 is also translated as "searching." So, just a daily reading of scripture isn't enough. We also need to be seeking to understand what we're reading by studying it if we are to mature as believers. We’re to go over it over and over.

 

(a) Remember the two disciples walking on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24? These two men were sad. Why were they sad? Well, they were met by a cloaked Jesus and told Him that they were sad because they suspected that this Jesus they were following was the Messiah (v. 19), but didn't understand whether or not he was just a Prophet or the Messiah because He was crucified (compare verses 19 and 21). So, what did the hidden Jesus do? He set out to show them from the scriptures them that these things were supposed to happen to the one who would be the Messiah and since those things happened to Jesus His crucifixion proved Him to be genuine. He corrected their understanding. But HOW did He do this? From the scriptures:

Luke 24:26-27, "Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself." (KJV)

The word 'expounded,' in Greek is 'diermeneuo,' from which we get our word 'hermeneutics.' Hermeneutics is the science and methodology of the interpretation of a literary work. Jesus went through all the Old Testament, systematically, and examined with them all the areas that showed that Jesus is the Messiah specifically because He was crucified and the scriptures said these things were supposed to happen. He examined things, He expounded things, He searched things... Jesus rightly handled the text. If this is in the example of Jesus, we're supposed to do the same. How unhealthy would it be to join the people of our generation who've turned away from this practice because it's 'too hard' or they're afraid of complicating things? Jesus was unafraid of complicating things because the scriptures declare it so clearly – the clarity of scripture.

(b) Let's look at another example.

 Matthew 22:41-46,

"While the Pharisees were gathered together, Jesus asked them, “What do you think about the Christ? Whose son is he?”
“The son of David,” they replied.
He said to them, “How is it then that David, speaking by the Spirit, calls him ‘Lord’? For he says,
“‘The Lord said to my Lord:
“Sit at my right hand until I put your enemies under your feet.”’
If then David calls him ‘Lord,’ how can he be his son?” No one could say a word in reply, and from that day on no one dared to ask him any more questions." (NIV)

In this instance of Jesus' teaching, it all came down to the examination of a simple phrase. Wouldn't Jesus be accused of straining at the words of scripture? He's reducing His argument to the Pharisees down to just a few short words in a single verse. Why is that important? It is because Jesus was "overly critical," and He set this as an example for us to follow.

(c) Jesus taught others that it was a great error to be ignorant of the scriptures:

Matt 22:29, "But Jesus answered and said to them, "You are mistaken, not understanding the Scriptures nor the power of God." (NASB)

It's also translated just as 'You are mistaken, not knowing the Scriptures,' but the problem wasn't knowing the scriptures as in knowing it by rote memory, it was not knowing (or understanding) the scriptures, as in not knowing what it means, or not perceiving what it means. (This was also the case with the disciples in John 20:9.)

(d) Jesus expected people to understand the scriptures:

"In a day when it is common for people to tell us how hard it is to interpret Scripture rightly, we would do well to remember that not once in the Gospels do we ever hear Jesus saying anything like this: ' I see how your problem arose - the Scriptures are not very clear on that subject.' Instead, whether he is speaking to scholars or untrained common people, his responses always assume that the blame for misunderstanding any teaching of Scripture is not to be placed on the Scriptures themselves, but on those who misunderstand or fail to accept what is written. Again and again he answers questions with statements like, 'Have you not read...' (Matt 12:3, 5; 19:14l 22:31), 'Have you never read in the scriptures...' (Matt 21:42), or even, 'You are wrong because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God' (Matt 22:23; cf. Matt 9:13; 12:7; 15:3; 21:13; John 3:10, et al)." Systematic Theology by Dr. Wayne Grudem

The Bible isn't written just to theologians, scholars, teachers, pastors, and preachers alone! It's written for every Believer! It's meant to be understood by every believer! We’re called to study it and be discerning.

(e) This was also the practice of Paul.We return to 2 Peter 3:16 once again. 2Peter 3:15-16, “And count the patience of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.” (ESV)
Again, Paul here is saying that there are some things in Paul’s writings that, at first, are difficult to understand. He said that they were hard or difficult, not impossible, to understand. The subject Peter was referring to was Paul’s teaching on the end times. He was basically saying Paul’s eschatology was hard to understand, yet he points out that Paul taught it to the churches anyway. What was difficult to understand was still very well worth their time and effort to learn and understand. Just think of who is writing this epistle. This is an Apostle writing this – someone who’s followed the living Jesus around, who heard every word of His teaching, who saw Him perform signs and wonders, who himself performed signs and wonders, who walked on water with Jesus. This is the Apostle Peter, who was a well-familiar witness of Jesus’ ministry since the Wedding at Cana and all the way up to His victorious ascension into heaven. He saw everything! Yet, even he says that Paul’s letters are difficult to understand! However, we have the authentic Word of God that says that scripture is clear to the Believer – to he that has eyes to see and ears to hear.

What was the solution Peter offered? Let’s continue to read at 2 Peter 3:17-18, “You therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.” (ESV)

Peter didn’t disparage the accumulation of knowledge of God’s Word. He didn’t think that learning scripture or studying about the teaching of Jesus in the scriptures was adding undue complexity to the Gospel. He encouraged learning. He talks of stability – in the Greek this means a steadfastness of mind. This is a person with discernment – they know enough of the Lord Jesus to have something to confess, yes, but they also know well and are firm in what they confess.

These words – grow, “carried away,” error, knowledge – they are reminiscent of another passage in scripture. Ephesians 4 is describing the authoritative leadership roles with which God has gifted the Church.

Eph 4:13-15, “until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,” (ESV)

Verse 13 mentions unity. Believers never have a problem with unity. However, they often see the more discerning ones as obstructions to it. With their doctrine, their heavy study, their quotations of writers from church history (which are the pastors and teachers mentioned in Ephesians 4:11 of the same chapter)… They’re always talking about “doctrines,” people say. “Doctrine” in Greek is transliterated as didaskalion, which means instruction or teaching. Why should bible teaching ever be a hindrance to Christian unity? Shouldn’t the discussion of the scriptures be the magnet that draws us together and glues us to one another? We should be unafraid to discuss doctrine. “Doctrine divides,” has become a popular church-phrase. On the other hand, the Bible declares that doctrine unites.

However, there’s a difference between sound doctrine and false doctrine. Verse 14 speaks of every wind of doctrine. Doesn’t that remind you of 1 John 4:1-3 – believe not every spirit? We’re not to be carried away with all kinds of teachings, but to know the one body of true, solid, sound teachings of scripture.

If we know the Word and understand it we will be “equipped” with what we need to know be taken by the cunning craftiness and deceitful schemes of men, such as from the epistle to the Galatians where they were being overtaken by the false teaching of the Judaizers who taught that they had to be circumcised to be a Christian. They made the teaching of the grace of God through faith alone justifying a man void. The problem was that it not only contradicted what we read in Ephesians 2:8-9, but that since it wasn’t found in scripture the teaching was the teachings of men, of “human cunning” and not of God. This reason alone should compel us to know our Bibles well – that we’re not overtaken by any man’s craftiness to manipulate the Word of God to get us to believe things that aren’t taught by God. But people are against this because it defeats their idea of “simplicity.” It wasn’t the case when you read Paul’s heart-work in the epistle to the Galatians. He didn’t waste any time rebuking their false understanding (Galatians 3:1-3). Paul regularly used and quoted the Old Testament as an authority for his teachings, not including his use of people, places and events from the Old Testament. Isn’t this a practice that we should copy from the Apostle Paul?

Everyone wants the unity mentioned in Ephesians 4:13. However, what about Ephesians 4:14 where we’re told that the obstruction to true unity is that we’re children? How about growing up spiritually? True unity will never happen if we’re still children in the faith. Growing up and being a child no longer comes with discernment. In Hebrews 5 and 6 we’re told that this is the case. The antidote to our childishness (rather than Child-likeness that Jesus encouraged) is discernment, as we read here:

Hebrews 5:14, "But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil." (NIV)

Straining at works = Being Critical = Practice = Constant use! The writer of Hebrews was rebuking their audience for carnality. Let’s skip back a few verses to get some more of the context.

Hebrews 5:11-14, “About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.” (ESV)

The entire epistle to the Hebrews is just rich with teaching. Before the passage the writer just finishes explaining the teaching of Melchizedek from the book of Genesis. Then, now in verse 11 of Chapter 5 the writer of Hebrews is now saying that they would teach more on this matter if it weren’t for the fact that his audience was dull. Dull of what? Dull of hearing. This dullness wasn’t a mechanical issue – there wasn’t anything wrong with their ears or eyes. Nor is he suggesting that they couldn’t read or intellectually comprehend what he was saying. He’s saying that they were no longer discerning (verse 14). It’s possible to read scripture every morning or regularly every day and not be in any wit discerning. They should have been teaching the doctrines of the faith themselves, but they needed to go over again the basic teachings of the faith! Their carnality blinded them from these truths! Carnality is accompanied by a lack of discernment. Let this generation of the Church not be accused with the same. Today, we’re dull of hearing in that we outright refuse to see doctrinal teaching as important. And as a result, the Church has become prey to counter-Christian cults, spurious teachers, false revivals, heretical movements, and all manner of false teachings.

I never knew how important the doctrine of the Trinity was until I had to defend it against Jehovah Witnesses, Oneness Pentecostals, United Pentecostals, and the International Church of Christ who all deny it. Before, I had this crazy idea that the doctrine of the Trinity, an essential teaching to the Faith, was a paradoxical teaching that had no real explanation and was impossible to understand. This is so far from the truth – if it wasn’t meant to be understood, then why is God telling us about it in the Bible? Wasn’t it John who wrote, “In the Beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” who also wrote, “but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name?” (John 20:31) If these things were written for us to believe, shouldn’t we try to understand them? The answer to that question isn’t as clear-cut to some as there is a trans-dimensional rift between faith and reason. To the contemporary mind the two cannot coexist. One gets this anti-intellectual idea that reasoning is bad from the presuppositions and preconceived misconceptions that accompany the 21^st century point of view. If we’re to be discerning, there is a clear mandate from the scriptures we have examined to “reason through” the Faith, accompanying our affirmation of its truths with meditative thinking, so that we understand what we are affirming, and take the time to see that the Faith is in fact reasonable. Faith really is the evidence or substance of our hope, and if so then of course it stands the test of scrutiny and reason. When truth is tested, it proves true. The Bible is clear and makes sense, and God is no author of confusion. The Bible declares itself coherently. God’s thoughts aren’t like our thoughts, but when He conveys them to us in His Word, we should at least try to understand them.

Understanding shows us the weight of the scriptures. The whole earth is filled with God’s glory… There is none righteous… The whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one… Believers in Christ are no longer under the law… Believing these truths should radically change our perceptions of our present day and age. So, studying them and putting thought to what God’s said about them should give us just a sample of how big and weighty those truths are. For example, just think of when someone begins to believe and come to faith in Christ. The weight of their sins, for the first time, shows them their desperation and need for a Savior and so they see the need for faith in Christ. They understand the Gospel. They then see themselves regenerate and recognize the spiritual reality of God’s Word. Yes, the Gospel is indeed the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes as Romans 1:16 declares for us, but what does “salvation” mean, what does “Gospel” mean, and how do I know when I’m “believing” it? It isn’t enough to just quote this scripture verbatim if we are to properly understand it. We should to go to 1 Corinthians 15:1-4 to define the Gospel, all of Romans to define Salvation, and 1 John to know what it means to truly believe. We need a more comprehensive understanding of scripture as a whole, really, to fully understand what we’re reading in Romans 1. I’m not at all saying that this one verse is difficult to understand by just a cursory reading. I’m saying that this verse wasn’t meant to be wrenched out of its literary context and stand alone without the supporting co-text surrounding it in Romans.

I wholeheartedly and enthusiastically forgive everyone who pejoratively says that I’m overly critical. For me, this is a compliment because as we've seen from scripture, this shows I'm only following in Jesus' footsteps and am getting closer to being more like the Lord Jesus Christ since He Himself set this example for every believer to follow.  I would encourage you to do the same! Someone may think that I'm prideful, or that I'm being harsh, and get away with it, but no one can truly say that my “criticism” is because I'm in some way an intellectual, and simply naturally analytical, or that it all proceeds from some OCD-like ability to be too detailed about everything, or that it's all of the flesh. Being discerning, really and truly, isn’t about being overly critical, or intellectual, it's about being biblically sound. I’ve labored in study to be this way, and I think we should work hard to follow this biblical pattern. I hope what I've written has shown that difference a little more clearly.

Thank you for your attention to this letter.

Isaac D.
Slave of Jesus Christ (Following Paul's Example)