GRACE FOR TODAY Radio Message #504

           

            WHAT IS THE BIBLE ALL ABOUT?

           

            Pastor Don Fortner

            Grace Baptist Church of Danville

            2734 Old Stanford Road

            Danville, Kentucky 40422-9438

 

The Bible, the Word of God, is in its entirety a Book about the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible is not a Book about morality, or a Book about science, or a Book about politics, or a Book about theology. The Bible is a Book with one Subject, and that subject is the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ is the Living Word of God, of whom the written Word speaks. This is what our Lord himself says, "Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me" (John 5:39). After his resurrection, we are told that our Lord "Beginning at Moses and all the prophets, expounded unto them in ALL THE SCRIPTURES the things concerning himself...Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures" (Luke 24:27,45). Christ plainly told his disciples that all the Scriptures were written concerning him. THE CENTRAL AND THE CONSTANT THEME OF HOLY SCRIPTURE IS JESUS CHRIST AND HIM CRUCIFIED. The whole Bible may be briefly summarized in three statements. Reader's Digest has recently published a "Condensed Bible", in which men dared to take away from the Word of God. That sort of presumptuous irreverence I abhor. But the principle truths of the Bible may be set forth in these three statements:

 

1. THE OLD TESTAMENT TELLS US THAT THE REDEEMER IS COMING. No sooner had Adam sinned against God and plunged our race into spiritual death and sin under the wrath of God, than God graciously promised that he would send his own Son to redeem sinful man. God spoke to the serpent and said, "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her SEED: and IT shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise HIS heel" (Gen. 3:15). Through-out the ages the promise of Christ's incarnation and redemptive work became clearer and clearer, until at last the prophet Isaiah wrote, "It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous Servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities"(Isa. 53:10-11). Taking God at his Word, the Old Testament saints were saved by faith in that Redeemer whom God had promised.

 

2. The FOUR GOSPELS AND THE BOOK OF ACTS TELL US THAT THE REDEEMER HAS COME. This is what old Simeon said as he held the child in his arms - "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy Word: for mine eyes have seen thy SALVATION, which thou hast prepared before the face of all people" (Luke 2:29-31). He blessed God and said, THE REDEEMER HAS COME! Peter said the same thing after the Holy Spirit fell at Pentecost - "This is THE STONE which was set at nought of you builders, which is become THE HEADSTONE OF THE CORNER. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved"(Acts 4:11-12).

 

3. THE EPISTLES AND THE BOOK OF REVELATION TELL US THAT THE REDEEMER IS COMING AGAIN. One day soon, at the time appointed by God, the Lord Jesus Christ shall return to this earth, to gather his own elect and to take vengeance upon his enemies. "Behold, HE COMETH with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also which pierced him: and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen" (Rev. 1:7).

 

AMEN.