Today we are going to continue in our systematic theology overview looking at the attributes of Scripture known as the necessity and sufficiency of Scripture. Last week we looked at authority and clarity of Scripture. Anybody recall why these two attributes are so important, the authority and clarity of Scripture? Why does it matter? If Scripture is not true, if it doesn't have the authority of God as words from Him, if it is not understandable by His creatures, which is the reason that it was given, then God's character is called into question. And so as the overarching importance of the Word of God is, it is because it testifies to who He is as Creator, God, omniscient, benevolent God, and secondarily the benefit we derive from having that revelation. So today we look at the necessity and sufficiency of Scripture. And again they are two tightly coupled attributes that tie to themselves and they tie to the other two that we'll look at here in a little while. If any of these four attributes were determined to be false, it would call into question the entire canon of Scripture. We study these attributes because they are important reminders of the character of our God and because it will equip us to stand against the wily schemes of Satan and countless minions that he has working. So necessity and sufficiency of Scripture. Why is the divine revelation of Scripture necessary? Are we just not smart enough to figure it out on our own? Here's what our confession says. In chapter 1, paragraph 6, The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith, and life is either expressly set down or necessarily contained in the Holy Scriptures, unto which nothing at any time is to be added, whether by new revelation of the Spirit or traditions of men. Nevertheless, we acknowledge the inward illumination of the Spirit of God to be necessary for the saving understanding of such things as are revealed in the Word, and that there are some circumstances concerning the worship of God and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence according to the general rules of the Word, which are always to be observed. We can't know the mind of God if we don't have the Word of God. It is His revelation to us of Himself. And so it's necessary because without it, we're left to our own devices. And we'll see where that gets us. Hebrews 11 verse 6 says, without faith, It is impossible to please Him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who seek Him." No question about that, but how does one get this faith that is necessary? Romans 10 tells us in verse 17, faith comes from hearing and hearing the Word of Christ. The Word of God is necessary because in it is the revelation of the Redeemer who was promised in Genesis 3 and who came in the fullness of time and who ever now stands at the right hand of God interceding for those that God has chosen and is saving and calling to Himself through the proclamation of the Word by the agency of His Holy Spirit. If the Word of God had not been given, we would not know the gospel. So after the fall, this is our condition, right? We're born dead in sin and we need the saving agency of the Spirit of God and the Word of God. We're at war with the God we do not believe in. To have saving faith, one must hear the revelation of the redemptive work of Christ and be given ears to hear. But what about before the fall? How much was Adam in need of divine revelation? If God had not told Adam to name the animals, to populate the earth, to take dominion over it, to work the fields, to not eat of the one tree, would he have figured it out? We hear a no from over here. He did not get right what he was told. Ooh, there's a clue, isn't it? The biblical record shows us that man, at his peak of perfection, needed divine revelation. And without his nature being twisted from the womb by sin, as is the case with you and me, Adam took and ate the fruit offered him by Eve. Cursed was the human race and cursed was all of creation because of the sin of Adam. Romans 5.12 says, therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned. We're double whammied here. We are born in sin because of Adam, and as soon as we're breathing air, we are engaged in sin because it is inbred and woven into our very nature as human beings. And it's not just that mankind was cursed by Adam. Genesis 317, God speaking to Adam after the fall, after he's given the proto-evangel, he says to Adam, cursed is the ground because of you. Creation has been warped and twisted because of the sin of Adam. Once sin entered the world, by Adam, all of us were doomed to be at war with God, unable to please God, to be reconciled to Him. We need a Savior. We need divine help. We need revelation from God to know how to be reconciled to Him. If God didn't give us divine revelation, it would be a hopeless situation. But God is omniscient and is not responsive to history but is the author of history. Look into Acts chapter 2. We're going to read verses 22 through 36. It's on page 910. Acts chapter 2, 22 to 36. This is Peter talking to his own people. He says, "'Men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and signs that God did through him in your midst, as you yourselves know, this Jesus delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, You crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men. God raised him up, loosing the pangs of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it. For David says concerning him, I saw the Lord always before me for he is at my right hand that I may not be shaken. Therefore my heart was glad and my tongue rejoiced and my flesh also will dwell in hope. For you will not abandon my soul to Hades or let your Holy One see corruption. You have made known to me the paths of life. You will make me full of gladness with your presence. Brothers, I say to you with confidence about the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God has sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne, he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption. This Jesus God raised up, and of that we are all witnesses. being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing. For David did not ascend into the heavens, for he himself says, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified." This passage shows us that God commands events in history. He does not respond to them. And it shows us that even those who had the very oracles of God, need to be confronted with his holy gospel in order to be reconciled to him. The Jews were at war with God, thinking they were the people of God. Wayne Grudem says that the Bible is necessary for a knowledge of the gospel to bring us to salvation, for maintaining spiritual life, and for obtaining certain knowledge of God's will. And he also points out that the Bible is not necessary for knowing that God exists or for knowing something about God's character. Let's look at Grudem's first claim, one that we should all agree with. We have been taught that the Proto-Evangel was given in Genesis 3.15, and we see in Scripture the progressive unveiling of God's redemptive plan as He gives more and more clarity to that as history unfolds. Hebrews 11.13, speaking of numerous saints, that were just mentioned in that passage tells us that these, all these Old Testament saints, all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. So we see by God's divine revelation, the Old Testament saints were saved according to faith and not according to the law of Moses. They were given insight to have faith in the Messiah that had been promised and not in their own ability to deceive themselves into thinking that they were keeping the law of Moses. Yet we have people who claim themselves, call themselves to be Christians that believe and teach that the Jews, however one defines a Jew these days, because the records are kind of lost, The Jews are either saved by keeping the law or they're automatically saved because of ethnic status. This belief is known as Christian Zionism. And the Houston Chronicle in its April 30, 1998 edition quotes one of their well-known leaders. He said, I am not trying to convert the Jewish people to the Christian faith. In fact, trying to convert Jews is a waste of time. Jews already have a covenant with God and that has never been replaced by Christianity. Yeah, they have a covenant with God and it condemns them. All people, including any ethnic Jews that we may run into, that may be able to claim their historical records, their genealogical records all the way back to Abraham, don't matter their status according to the flesh. They must be reconciled to God. And there is no difference between the Jew and the Gentile when it comes to being reconciled to God. This is what Paul is teaching through Romans chapters 9 through 11 when he's pouring out his compassion towards his fellow kinsmen of the flesh, as he calls them. The Jews need Jesus, just as you and I do. God is not a respecter of persons. There is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, no male or female, for all are one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring and heirs according to the promise." This is how we get to be made true offspring of Abraham, by faith in Christ, not by careful scrutiny of our ancestral records. And some say that this passage in Galatians that I just quoted from obliterates sexual identity and demands egalitarianism to the nth degree, but that's not what it says. It's simply saying that God does not respect people based on who they are in the flesh, their demographic, their ethnic, their sexual identity, their circumstances. These do not matter. God saves to the uttermost those whom were predestined to believe and hear the gospel and respond. There are also professing Christians who teach that being saved by grace through faith is essential but in a different way than what we do. The Roman Catholic Church claims to be Christian and they have dogma that pronounces anathema, curses from God, on anyone who believes in salvation by grace through faith alone in Christ alone. Council of Trent was written in the mid-1500s, never been retracted, still in effect as Rome seeks to fight back against the influence of the Reformation. It clearly teaches what many Roman Catholics don't know, that Rome holds to salvation by works and faith in the church rather than faith in Christ. Listen to a couple of statements from the Council of Trent. Canon 9, if anyone saith that by faith alone the impious is justified in such wise as to mean that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to the obtaining of grace of justification and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will, let him be anathema. Canon 12 says, if anyone say that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in the divine mercy, pardoning sins for Christ's sake or that it is by confidence alone by which we are justified, let him be accursed. Canon 24, if anyone sayeth that the justice received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works, but that the said works are merely the fruits and signs of justification obtained and not a cause of the increase thereof, let him be anathema. And then lastly, Canon 30, if anyone sayeth that after the grace of justification has been received to every penitent sinner, the guilt is remitted and the debt of eternal punishment is blotted out in such wise that there remains not any debt of temporal punishment to be discharged either in this world or in the next in purgatory before the entrance to the kingdom of heaven can be opened to him, let him be anathema. You see they have this consistent hammer beating on their people that works are required before you can be reconciled to God. Works of your flesh, not works of Christ. He is insufficient. And millions are deceived. On one hand, you have professing Christians saying that some people don't need the gospel. On the other hand, some people claiming to be Christians are saying that the gospel is not needed by anybody because you can work it all out. We need the Bible, the inerrant word of God, to tell us we need the Bible. We need spiritual understanding which God gives to his elect when he calls them to new life in Christ in order to understand the spiritual truths of the gospel. Those who rely on what man says will fall away from what God has said. So we should never fall into the pit of thinking that there are people who need not the gospel of Jesus Christ to be made right with God. And we should never think that their salvation depends on our intellectual ability. God chooses to use the foolish things of this world, which includes you and me, to preach the gospel of Christ which is an offense to those who are perishing because it is the power of salvation to those who are being saved. Our confidence must be in God and in the revealed word that he has given us that it is necessary for our knowledge of how to be obedient and for the salvation of those that he is calling to himself. Next in Grudem's list, he says that we need the Bible for our spiritual life. What do you reckon he means by the phrase spiritual life? Say again please. Sanctification. Grudem draws an inference from scripture. Jesus when tempted by Satan in the desert quotes scripture declaring that man shall not live on bread alone but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Now we know plenty of men live long lives without caring one whit for the word of God. The Christian who is born again cannot live without the Word of God. The Christian who attempts to live in the flesh apart from the Word of God as the light by which he walks will end up like Lot and his daughters in the cave. Sin inhabits us and will shipwreck our faith if we are not in deliberate pursuit of the light of God given to us in His Word. Grudem warns us that to neglect regular reading of God's Word is detrimental to the health of our souls just as the neglect of physical food is detrimental to the health of our bodies. The Apostle Peter exhorts Christians, like newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk that you may grow up to salvation. To the masses in John chapter 6, Jesus said, I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall not hunger. Whoever believes in me shall never thirst. It is the spirit who gives life. The flesh is of no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. The Word of God is spirit and life. The Word of God tells us of Jesus. The Holy Spirit abides in us according to the Word of God, not according to an inner light that we think we have, that some people tell us we have. We get reminded each Lord's Day by the ordinary means of grace, the worship of God, the preaching of the Word, the hearing of the Word, the seeing of the Word, prayer. These things strengthen the souls of saints. We neglect the word and the ordinary means of grace that our God has given us. It's dangerous to our spiritual health. J.R. Miller in the late 19th century said, as we grow older, there should be a constant gaining, never a losing in our spiritual life. Every year should find us living on a higher plane than the year before. Old age should always be the best of life, not marked by spiritual emptiness and decay. but by nobler fruitfulness and more gracious beauty. Paul was growing old when he spoke of forgetting things which are behind and reaching forth to things ahead. His best was yet to be attained. So it should always be with Christian old age. We must ever be turning heavenward toward nobler life and holier beauty." Is that how you see old age? Your bones ache, your joints hurt, your muscles get weak, your mind fails, your eyes get weak, you need glasses, you need hearing aids? Is your life marked by a holy beauty that is an inward work of the Spirit? and you are drawn more to see Christ and depend on Him as your body decays and you long for redemption and the final adoption of your souls with Christ in glory. He is coming again to make all things new. Does that not thrill your soul? The more as you get old, as you see the degeneration and the decay of the natural order, twisted by sin, cursed by Adam. Brothers, we ought to be more and more yearning Psalm 92, 12 through 14 says, the righteous will flourish like a palm tree. They will grow like a cedar of lemon. That was a big, strong, long-lasting tree. Planted in the house of the Lord, they will flourish in the courts of our God. They will still bear fruit in old age. They will stay fresh and green. And that's the Christian life. in the court of God, depending on the power of God to keep us strong, to keep us useful, not depending on the flesh and looking at our physical strength and our mental intellect as the marks of how good we are to God or His people. I know the older I get, and I'm still young, no matter what vote he says, the less I can trust myself. we must learn to lean on, depend upon, run to, and trust in the risen and soon coming Jesus Christ. There is no hope in any one other. And I know of this hope and I know that this hope and we should grow strong in this hope by the power of the Holy Spirit, not as the Catholics would tell us by punishing ourselves through various means of penance. It is the Holy Spirit of God as He applies the Word of God to our souls that we grow in our inner beauty to be a trophy that Christ presents to God the Father on Judgment Day. That's what Grudem means by spiritual life. Thirdly, Grudem maintains that the Bible is necessary for certain knowledge of God's will. And here he's contrasting what the natural man can discern and that which only the spiritual man can discern. This does not mean that believers will be able to detect what college God wants them to go to or where to live. Such personal details about temporal matters are not the point of Holy Scripture. But the Bible does contain much in the way of right and wrong, holiness and common, righteousness and sin. The difficulty for the person who reads the Bible is to determine what is instructional versus informative. As we noted last week, we need one another and the wisdom of the saints who have gone before to better understand what God has given all of his children. Grudem warns us against the false notion that just because we don't know all there is to know about something, which would be everything, that does not mean that we cannot know anything about something. And there are people that teach you since you can't know all there is to know about something, you can't know that thing at all. That ain't true. We can know the essential things with certainty. and at the same time we must recognize there are limits to our understanding. The knowledge of God and creation gained from scripture must be used to correctly interpret creation because only God knows all things and he has given us revelation of some things and so we look to what he has given us to know with certainty what he has created. not what man, groping in the dark, tries to figure out. We should learn to trust Him and to be content to walk in the light that He has given us. Two corollary points that Grudem brought out that I mentioned, that the Bible is not necessary for knowing that God exists and the Bible is not necessary for knowing something about God's character and moral law. We should be familiar enough with the first couple of chapters of Romans to know that these statements are true. You can't come to a saving knowledge of God through nature, but you cannot stand before God on judgment day and say, I didn't know you existed. Because all of creation testifies that there is a God and no man will be with any excuse on that day. So we've taken a look at three ways the Word of God is necessary. Who knows what they are? Three things we just talked about. Knowledge of the gospel, because we don't know how to get saved, right? Maintaining spiritual life. and obtaining certain knowledge of God's will. John Gill says this about the nature and necessity of God's Word. The light of nature leaves men entirely without the knowledge of the way of salvation by the Son of God. And even without revelation, angels of themselves would not be able to know the way of saving sinful men or how sinful men can be justified before God. Wherefore, in order to know this, they desire to look into it. Some have thought that Socrates had some notion of it, who was made to say, it is necessary to wait until someone teaches how to behave towards God and men. But then this respects only man's outward conduct and not his salvation. Nor does the philosopher seem to have any clear notion of the instructor or of the means he should use to instruct and still less of the certainty of his coming. And besides, the relator of this, Plato, might receive this as a tradition in the East where it is well known he traveled for knowledge. But the divine revelation gives an account of this glorious person not merely as an instructor of men in the way of their duty but as the savior of them from their sins and in what way he has wrought out salvation by his sacrifice, blood, and righteousness. The Word of God is necessary because without it, we as philosophers are more than able of coming up with all kinds of man-centered, godless theories on how we can be made right with this nebulous God that is probably out there somewhere. Let's move on then and quickly look at the sufficiency of scripture. Back to our confession, chapter 1, this time paragraph 10. Confession says, the supreme judge by which all controversies of religion are to be determined and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men and private spirits are to be examined and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Scripture delivered by the Spirit, unto which Scripture so delivered our faith is finally resolved." The confession tells us that the Scripture illuminated by the Holy Spirit is sufficient to test the decrees of councils, the opinions of writers, the doctrines of men, private spirits that people claim that they have visit by, all of these things and more. are to be tested by the Scriptures. Why? Because they're sufficient, not deficient. In our common use of the English language, sufficiency is a rather mundane term. It simply means adequate or good enough as if just barely. But when we consider this word in its biblical context as regard to the saving work of Christ or the provision that God has given us in His Scriptures, That common definition just doesn't have enough gravitas, as they used to say in the political world. The sufficiency of the death of Christ is such that it has been said that just one drop of the Savior's blood would be enough to save all of humanity. Christ's blood is sufficient. Wayne Grudem has a definition of this attribute. The sufficiency of Scripture, he says, means that Scripture contains all the Word of God he intended his people to have at each stage of redemptive history and that it now contains all the words of God we need for salvation, for trusting him perfectly and for obeying him perfectly. And he again points to 2 Timothy 3 wherein we're told that Timothy was trained in the Word of God from a young age and that the Word of God is able to instruct or guide one to salvation through faith in Christ Jesus and to equip us for every good work." Now, Grudem's definition doesn't say that we are able or empowered to obey perfectly and trust perfectly. It says that the Word of God is sufficient for perfect obedience and perfect trust. The Word of God is complete and sufficient. You and I are not. We're not able, we're not sufficient to trust perfectly, to obey perfectly. But the deficiency is in us, not in the Word of God. The emphasis in Grudem's definition is on what the Word of God declares about itself. Scripture is sufficient to guide us to salvation and to equip us for every good work. And as proclaimed in Ephesians 2, chapter 10, we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. So where does one go to discover God's will for his life? To whom does one turn to find out what good deeds are to be done? Can any man add to the wisdom of God? When we go apart from the Word of God to determine what good deeds are, where the boundaries for morality are with regards to behavior. We're trusting in the wisdom of man rather than in the revelation of God. And the scriptures say that the foolishness of God, if there could be such a thing, is wiser than the wisdom of man. Who do we think we are thinking that we can discern apart from God's word, God's will? But yet, is that not the common condition of man, trusting himself rather than God? Grudem goes on to explain three areas in which the sufficiency of Scripture is key. First, he says we can find all that God has said on particular topics and find answers to questions. We all want answers to questions. But the Bible doesn't have the answers to the questions we tend to want answered. Grudem doesn't mean that we don't need to read thousands. He says we don't need to read thousands of volumes of Christian history and commentary to know what God has said about a given topic. And while many good and faithful authors help us understand what we read in the Scriptures, no man's work adds one whit to what God has revealed therein. So all the commentaries, all the history that you read, they may widen and broaden your understanding, but they will not add to the content of what the Spirit put in the Scriptures. Taken with the doctrine of perspicuity, sufficiency of Scripture means that we can determine what God has said about the atoning sacrifice of Christ and comprehend His redemptive plan. We can know these things from what Scripture tells us if the Spirit of God abides in us. Again, the Roman church falls away from the orthodox Christian framework by claiming certain church teachings and traditions fulfill Scripture, giving additional information on what God has said and imposing additional requirements for right living on her subject. as her subjects. The Bible is insufficient in the theology of Rome just as the sacrifice of Christ is insufficient in their system. Our use of historical accounts and commentaries should be only to aid us in understanding what God has given us in Scripture, never to add or contradict what the Lord of heaven has declared. Scripture is sufficient to reveal everything God has said to us. Everything man writes is insufficient for this task. Secondly, Gruden says that the amount of Scripture was sufficient at each stage of redemptive history. This is a key point, one that ought to keep us humble. On this side of history, all that God condescended to reveal to man has been given to us. Here we sit with many translations of the Bible, each with its various strengths and witnesses. We have digital copies everywhere so that we are never without a copy of the Word of God. Do we hold all of this with the understanding that to whom much is given, much will be required? We have been given much just in the availability and the accessibility of God's Word. Do we cherish that? Do we hunger for that? Do we deliberately pursue time with God in His Word that we may be built up, fit for service? Are we negligent more times than we care to admit? Contrary to Scripture, you and I are not always sufficient. This is one of the reasons why God calls us together in local churches, because in our solitary lives we will tend to justify our sin. And we need to come together as God has called us together in this church to be reproofed, encouraged, and exhorted so that we don't forget these things that God has told us. As redemptive history unfolded, we can be sure that God gave enough light for the ancient saints to walk in. We wonder, at least I do, Would we have understood the promise given in Genesis 3.15? It was the first mention to man of the predetermined plan of God to rescue sinners. It wasn't new to God. It wasn't news to God. Predetermined, Peter said, right? What did Adam and Eve think? I bet you when the first time you read Genesis 3.15, the weight of it didn't sink in on you, didn't me. What did Adam and Eve think? They had been caught? They blamed everybody under the sun? God sacrifices animals to make them clothes? God gives them curses? Gives them a promise? This is a couple that had communion with God, untainted by sin up to a point in time. They knew intimacy with God that we cannot presently comprehend. How much did they realize about the promised seed that would crush the serpent's head? We don't know, but we can trust in God and know that they had enough light to walk in for that day in which they lived. We know, reading in the New Testament, that these Old Testament saints had faith in the One who was promised, enough for the day that they lived in and enough that they would be reconciled to God the Father. We may not see enough information in Scripture to know just how much information did Adam and Eve understand about the gospel. How much information did Noah have about the gospel, or Job, or Abraham, or Isaac, or Joshua? But these, the Bible is very clear, believed in the one who was promised. But see, carnal man is not satisfied with the sufficiency of Scripture. And people that are not satisfied with the sufficiency of Scripture will invent doctrines that will intrigue and enslave foolish people. The Roman Catholic Church has the teaching of Fatima, apparitions of Mary that occurred in 1917, which they used to self-validate their teaching about what they call the Queen of Heaven. They teach this, quote, pray the rosary every day in honor of our lady of the rosary to obtain peace in the world for she alone can save it. God has placed in her hands and it is from the immaculate heart that men must ask it. Every rosary increases Mary's power to crush the head of the serpent and to destroy his evil power in the world, end quote. I don't know what to say to that. They got a different seed that they're looking to. They're not looking for the promised seed that we see replete in Scripture, the one who is coming that would rule with a rod of iron that will crush the head of the serpent. They think that a sinner has an immaculate heart that stands between man and the Redeemer, that that person's going to crush the head of the serpent. And when you repeat this pagan prayer called the Rosary, you increase her power? It sounds like the force from Star Wars. It doesn't sound like biblical Christianity. If the Bible is not sufficient, men will invent various religious schemes that will intrigue and enslave foolish people. But for God's chosen people, the word that was given to them by God is sufficient. We read briefly from Hebrews at the start of the lesson. Old Testament saints had faith given them by God and trusted him for fulfillment of the promise. Abraham set out to a place not revealed to sacrifice to God, not knowing what was going to be sacrificed. He considered that God was able to raise Isaac from the dead, which Hebrews said he figuratively did. Abraham had enough light for the day in which he lived. Noah, it hadn't reigned in the history of the planet. Noah is told to build a giant boat in the middle of dry land. By faith, being warned by God of the coming judgment, the scripture says, Noah built the ark and he and his family were saved. Simple people made wise by God. When modern people complain that they don't know the will of God for their lives, they are really saying they are not content with His Lordship or His revelation. The Bible contains all we need for life and godly living. Is that not enough for us? The Bible doesn't say anything about the important issues that consume so much of our thoughts. The lack of instruction in the Bible about where you should live and work, who you should marry, what the lottery numbers are that you should pick, this doesn't mean that the Bible's insufficient. It means that these lesser temporal things are in large measure things that we are to sort out using the intellect he has given us, using godly counsel he has given us, using principles of moral living. He has given us all these things. And by working out decisions in this way, we reflect some of the image of God that we carry in us. God doesn't make decisions whimsically. Every decision that He has made is based on who He is, what His character is, and what He has decreed to be right and honorable. God has made us in His image, and He's given us certain capacities to analyze and think. And if we are redeemed, He's given us certain spiritual understandings so that we might not be intrigued or enslaved by doctrines of men. None of us do our children any good by always giving them the answers to problems. We like to teach them how to make thoughtful, sound, moral decisions. That's what good parenting is all about, right? In a nutshell. It's a similar way with God and us. In this way, we are being sanctified. We figure out how to make good, moral, God-honoring decisions as we go through life. because we have sufficient light for the day in which we live. When you and I get lazy, discontent, and we want more revelation from God that He has condescended to give us, we should ponder a few verses from Scripture, because it's sufficient to encourage and instruct us in this matter. Deuteronomy 4.2 says, You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you. Deuteronomy 12.32 says, Everything that I command you, you should be careful to do. You should not add to it or take from it. Proverbs 35 and 6 says, every word of God proves true. He is a shield to those who take refuge in him. Do not add to his words, lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar. And then in Revelation 22, I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in the book. And if anyone takes away from the words of God in this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book. Now, of course, each of these passages must be taken in its context to grasp the total meaning of what the Word is saying in each case. But do you not see a common emphasis here? Do not add or subtract from what God has said. Proverbs, if you do, you will be found to be a liar. The Word of God reminds us that the Word of God is authoritative, it's clear, it's necessary, and it's sufficient. Grudem lastly provides some practical applications of the doctrine of sufficiency. And this brings in what I mentioned a minute ago about making proper use of our minds and thinking things through as we make godly decisions. And we are reminded that principles for doing these things are found in scripture, even if scripture doesn't always give us the easy answer we're looking for. All cults and sects and false religions violate this principle. I've made note of the Roman Catholics, but Mormons, Christian scientists, Jehovah's Witness, and countless others have extra-biblical documents that are elevated above Scripture. For all of these people and religions, Scripture is not sufficient. For us, this doctrine reminds us that we are not bound to believe religious teachings not found in the Bible. Scripture is sufficient. So when somebody comes to your door and they want you to believe something that they say is from God, but it's not found in the Bible, it's not supported by anything taught in the Bible, you're not bound to believe that because God has not said it. The Gnostic Gospels, Thomas, Mary, Peter, and 49 others rail against the sufficiency of Scripture, its authority, and its clarity. Listen to the voices of the Magdalene community who gather around the Gnostic gospel of Mary right here in Houston, led by an Episcopal female priestess. They say this, we believe that Mary Magdalene is a liminal figure who calls us out. She is the threshold of the new paradigm. Does anybody know what liminal means? I had to look it up. It means between states, in transition, ambiguous. Mary Magdalene, she's a liminal figure. The community, this Magdalene community, is inclusive and open to all world religions, genders, and faiths. We are a place where the individual meets at the group consciousness. It sounds new agey to me. They say we share the child of true humanity within us and it, that true child of humanity, is the connecting link between us. The community honors feelings and intuition, respecting the voice of each member and acknowledging the voice in our own being and in our own voice of truth. The truth is in you. Just let it bubble right on out. Lastly, they say that we embrace the historical and scholarly study. While we embrace the historical and scholarly study, we recognize that Mary Magdalene is the mystical something that was left out. She's the liminal figure. She's the missing link because as the people in Colossae were talking amongst themselves and what prompted Paul to write to them with such emphatic declaration of the sufficiency of Christ, they were murmuring amongst themselves, Jesus is just not enough. There's got to be something more. That's the craving that these people are responding to. Jesus is not enough. There must be something more because Jesus, the perfect atoning sacrifice, doesn't demand that I stand up, that I perform, that I get rewarded for my performance because look how I'm gifted. The saving gospel of Christ brings a man low as we recognize that we have nothing that we were not given. and that all goodness comes from God and not of ourselves. This same website posts a reading from the Gospel of Mary. It's a catechism type thing. Here's a quote, what is matter? Will it last forever? The teacher answered, all that is born, all that is created, all the elements of nature are interwoven and united with each other. All that is composed shall be decomposed. Everything returns to its roots. Matter returns to the origins of matter. Let those who have ears, let them hear." Matter bubbles up, matter falls away. What? There's hope in that. A mindless cosmos that Carl Sagan, while he yet breathed, could embrace. There's no saving action from an omniscient God there. It's just a mystical pile of goo. If scripture is not sufficient, there are no limits to the depth of error that man can sink to. The sufficiency of Scripture gives us clarity of thought and action when culture and government demand that we disobey God or they forbid our obedience to God. Those are the two markers in which we live. And we see this in Acts chapter 4 as John and Peter are hauled into the local court. verses 13 to 20. Now when they, the Sadducees, saw the boldness of Peter and John and perceived that they were uneducated, not that they couldn't read or write but they didn't have the sophisticated Greek rhetorical learning that the people in the court did, they were astonished and they recognized that they had been with Jesus. But seeing the man who was healed standing beside them, they had nothing to say in opposition. Facts are hard things, I heard someone say one time. But when they had commanded them to leave the council, they conferred with one another, saying, what shall we do with these men? For that a notable sign has been performed through them as evident to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem. We cannot deny it. But in order that this may spread no further among the people, let us warn them to speak no more to anyone in this name. So they called them and charged them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. Okay, so the government and the rulers said, don't preach in that name, boys. But when Peter and John answered them, whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge. For we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard. Having seen the living word of God and lived and served with him for three years, having witnessed his resurrection and ascension, these men knew what was true about God and they would not be shut up by those who were teaching a false religion. The word of God is the anchor that holds. It is the rock of truth upon which we must base our lives. All men have error and those who are not content with the Word of God will intrigue and enslave foolish people with vain fables and the worship of things created by their own hands and by their own minds. Scripture is the Word of God. It is authoritative. Scripture is the Word of God. Its meaning is clear. Scripture is necessary because men need to hear from God to be saved. And Scripture is sufficient because it is from God and He desires to communicate with us and because all other revelation is from man or demon and will only lead us astray. Let nobody put doubts into your mind as to the character of God and the character of His Word. It is authoritative. It is clear in its essential meaning. It is necessary. We cannot live apart from it. And it is sufficient. You don't need secret knowledge from the Magdalene community. The Word of God given to His people, illuminated in our understanding by the Spirit of God, it has all authority provides all clarity. It is what we need and it is sufficient. We need nothing beyond it. Brothers and sisters, trust the Word of God. Trust God. Let's pray.