I'm going to preach on the Word of God. We have a Bible at the New Testament Church. We saw how it started. We saw, you know, the beginning of it. There's different things we study. We study the Lord's Supper. James did a great job of that. And we study baptism and some other subjects of the Holy Spirit baptism. which I asked someone recently, I said, did you understand what I preached? I said, no. So I don't know. We'll have to revisit that again. But today we're going to preach on the Bible. And this is important. And best I know, we all use the King James. but it's important to understand why. Amen? So let's go to Lord in prayer and let's pray and then we'll get to the message. Father, thank you, Lord, so much for this time. Thank you for the subject at hand. Father, we're so thankful we don't have a hodgepodge of different Bibles and different interpretations and different beliefs. Father, best I know we all use the King James. If someone doesn't, today hopefully they'll make the change and start getting the word of God in them. And I pray that we'd be a Bible-believing church, we base everything on the Word of God, and I pray that you'd be glorified. I pray you bless this message, Lord, and we need to hear from you, need to have you speak to us, and I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Notice 1 Peter 1, verse 22. Now watch this. Seeing you have purified your souls. How? In obeying the truth. What's the truth? Word of God, right? Through the spirit and the unfeigned love of the brethren, see that you love one another with a pure heart fervently. Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away, but the word of the Lord endureth forever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. That's great, that last verse. It's all great. But the word of God endureth forever, so this book is gonna be around forever. And this word is which the gospel is preached unto you. Thank you, may be seated. Since the Garden of Eden, when the devil questioned the word, there has been a battle of the Word of God. The first recorded words of the devil was found in Genesis 3.1, yea, hath God said, you shall not eat of every tree of the garden. And so the question must be asked, is there a book which can be called the Word of God? Is there a book that we can state that God says and state it with authority? Is there a book that we may say, thus saith the Lord? Now, there are many who say that many Bibles contain the Word of God, but that doesn't interest me. I want to know, is there a perfect book? Is the Bible just a translation, or is the Bible the very Word of God? Now, is there a book that we can call with 100% assurance the Word of God? This is the Word of God. And some would say every version of the Bible is the Word of God. Things that are different are not the same. Now, someone told me not too long ago that, oh, that's just a word, a phrase that's used, but really all the Bibles are the same. They're not. And I can assure you, I've studied it. And they're quite different. There's some that leave out the blood. There's some that leave out the resurrection. There's some that leave out the word of God. They drop out almost whole chapters. They're not all the same, and that's why they're different. And things that are different are not the same. So is there a book we can call 100% assurance with the word of God? Now, some would say that every verse of the Bible is a word of God. Every Bible has differences in the words, in words. Some parts of chapters have been omitted. Some verses, some completely fail. bearing out the Word of God. Now, is there a Bible we can say with spiritual confidence, this is the Word of God? Now, if we don't have a Bible, we cannot know God. That's the bottom line. Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. And if we do not have the Word of God, we cannot have faith. Again, without faith, it is impossible to please Him. Now, if we do not have the Word of God, we have no salvation, no Lord and Savior, no promises, God not speaking to us, and no precepts from God. Now, if we do not have the Word of God, we have no answers to man's sin. And that's important, beloved. Not all men, but men want answers to sin. We have no answer to our origin. We have no hope when we die. I believe we do have the very Word of God. I believe that. I mean, I've studied it up. I believe the Lord has preserved His Word for us. in the authorized 1611 Bible. And I will strive to prove that. First of all, the Word of God is preserved. In 2 Timothy 3, verse 16, all scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. All scripture is given by inspiration of God. The word inspired or inspiration means God breathed or that God has breathed into his book and inspired it with unique and a miraculous way. In the Garden of Eden, the Lord foreman, Al the dust of the earth, and breathed into his nostrils, a man became a living, eternal soul. And God has breathed His Word, and the Bible is the living, external Word of God. Eternal, I'm sorry. And consider this verse in 2 Peter chapter 1, let's turn over there, 2 Peter chapter 1, and notice verse 20. And the Bible says, knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. So you and I don't have a right. No one has a right to go into the Bible, as the Roman Catholics did, and say that the church was built on Peter. Because they took a verse, not considering the context, they took a text, and they twisted it. They rest it to their own damnation. where they said, now our Peter upon this rock, and Peter is the rock, and below he is. The Bible tells us in John chapter one, he's a stone. There's a difference between a stone, a pebble, and a massive rock. Jesus didn't build a church on Peter, he built it on himself. In verse 21, for the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man. But what kind of men? Holy men. Not that they were perfect, but they were holy. They feared God. They had reverence for God. Spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. So holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. In Psalm 119, verse 89, forever. O Lord, thy word is settled, where? In heaven. That's where the Word of God is, it's in heaven. And we believe that Bible is, in its original manuscripts, was absolutely the pure, unadulterated work of the Almighty God in Hebrew and Greek. I believe that with all my heart. I believe there were 66 books that God breathed, but the earthly originals were destroyed by man. God promised us that he would preserve his word, did he not? And Luke 1, verse 70, as he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began. In Psalm 119, verse 60, thy word is true from the beginning, and every one of thy righteous judgments endure forever. In Matthew 24, 35, heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. Now, you understand that? The whole world is going to pass away. God's going to destroy this world. But God's Word is not going to disappear. It's not going to pass away. God's Word has been fought since the eternity past when Lucifer rose up against God in heaven and went against what the Lord established by His Word in the Garden of Eden. when Satan introduced in Genesis chapter 3, he questions, attacks the validity of God's word. And the Lord gave his word in 66 books. And there are two major sections known as the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Bible is called the word of God and also the scriptures. The Bible is written chronologically, not topically. That's important to understand. Really one of the earliest books is the book of Job. Before really Exodus and so on. But God didn't write chronologically, he wrote it topically. And this is not a book, but it's the book. It's the Bible. It's the scriptures. And it shall not be made up by men. The Bible tells us, come not by the will of man, rather, but holy men of God spake. God authored the book, and they were moved by the Holy Ghost. So this is a God-breathed book. It is. I can't say that about all Bible, I can say that about the authorized King James. And the Lord used 40 men, or different men, from all walks of life to pen down the Bible. And this was done over a period of 1,500 years. A man says that the Bible becomes the word of God when it speaks to you personally. All scripture is given by... Then some say the Bible contains the word of God, meaning that these are parts of which are not God's word. All scripture is given by inspiration. Now, how much? All scripture. In Psalm 119, verse 160, thy word is true from the beginning, and every one of thy righteous judgment endureth forever. How do we know that we have the word of God? We realize that everything was believed in the Christian life is believed by faith. So I believe in God by faith. I believe in creation by faith. No, I know that there are creation groups that are out there promoting. That's not why I believe in creation. I believe it by faith. I believe God's word. I wasn't there. No one's there but God. I believe it happened exactly the way that God said it. God created in six days, and on the seventh he rested. I believe in the miracles by faith. I believe the Son of God by faith. I believe in eternity, heaven and hell by faith. I believe in the Bible by faith. In Psalm 12, verses 6 through 7, the words of the Lord are pure words, as silver tried in the furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O Lord. Thou shalt preserve them from this generation forever. So I believe that there's a Bible in the world that's preserved. It may not be in the Greek and Hebrew, or Hebrew and Greek, but rather it could be in another language, but I believe it's preserved. And God's word was given in the Old Testament to Israel and written in Hebrews, known as the Masoretic Text. A new text was given to the Lord's churches, written in Greek, some Aramaic. It's known as the Textus Receptus, or the Received Text. Now this is important. It's gonna become a little technical, but stay with me. The Old Testament is Masoretic Text. The New Testament is Received Text, or the Textus Receptus. And it's one of two lines of text which all Bibles come from. Now, someone said to me not too long ago, he said, that's not true. It is true. There's a Textus Receptus, and I'm going to say this for the sake of argument, there's the Westcott and Horton. These are two men. who were Roman Catholics, but they also involved witchcraft. Surprise, surprise. And this is known as received text. This is known as the minority text. And what it was was majority text was majority of scholars. These are not men that are saved, but these are men who study the languages. And they study Hebrew and Greek. and the Aramaic, and they said, this, these texts are the correct text. The minority text is just a small amount of text, but they're not necessarily the Word of God. They omit some of the Word of God. They add to the Word of God. It's called the Westcott and Hort. It's a minority. The minority of scholars would say this is the Word of God. Stay with me. So the majority text is the perfect Word of God, Hebrew and Greek scholars. And then the minority is their mistakes not in the Word of God. Now, majority text is found at a, it came out of Antioch in the Bible, Acts 13. The minority text came from Alexandria, Egypt. What does that represent? The world. So Acts 13 was really the mission center, the world. They were sending out missionaries. Egypt was known as the world. And all modern translations, all modern translations come from this minority text. the Received, the Revised Version, Good News from Modern Man, the New American, Jerusalem Bible, the New International Version, and so on. There's one that comes from the Majority Text. That's the Authorized King James Bible, 1611. And so people say, well, these mistakes, show me one. Show me one. I've heard this for 40-something years. Oh, there's mistakes in the King James. Show me one! I can show you there's other versions where there's plenty of mistakes. This is God's Word. This is what the Bible wanted to say in the Greek and Hebrew says in the King James. I believe it's the Word of God. I believe it with all my heart. You couldn't convince me otherwise. And why? Because I'm ignorant? No. Because I've studied it. I've studied it. I've put 42 years of my life in the King James. And there's no contradictions. There's no mistakes. And the way this was written, just like the Corning Greek was at its peak when it was penned down in the New Testament, the King James Bible was at its peak The English language, they don't speak like I did, or you. But it was at its greatest point. It was great, the language, the understanding, the beauty of it. And that's when God had it translated. God's preserved word for English-speaking people is the authorized King James Bible. This is God's Word. I say it with all confidence. I say it with all confidence. This is the Word of God. And I believe this to be the Word of God first because of the testimony of Jesus Christ. Jesus called Moses' writings the Word of God in Luke chapter 24. Let's turn there, Luke 24, and notice verse 27. Luke 24 and notice verse 27. And the Bible says in verse 27, beginning at Moses, and all prophets, he expounded on them all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. So what did Jesus look upon? He looked upon Moses and the prophets as the Word of God. Now, number two, the crowd, the ground of fulfilled prophecies, we see it in Christ and we see it in the cross. Isaiah 53 tells us about the cross when Jesus died. and shed his blood. The Bible says he was wounded for our transgression, bruised for our iniquities, our sin. Over and over and over in the Bible, the Old Testament, the New Testament, they speak about fulfilled prophecies. Then third of all, the ground of unity of the books. Now this is interesting. Approximately 40 men, over 1,500 years, period, the 15-year period, by men who, in the most part, did not know each other. They didn't know who they were. But these are men inspired, led by God's spirit, what to pen down. It's like this. I've used this many times. If I had a pen, I had one. Here we go. So the Holy Spirit took men. Just like I'm taking this pen and I'm going to write something. I'm going to write my name. That's what God did. He took men and led them by his spirit what to pen down. And that's how simple it was. Not that it was simple, but that's a simple explanation of what took place. And most of these men didn't know that yet they had different areas of the world, different traditions, different kings. Some of them were fishermen, some were farmers, et cetera. Yet it's complete and perfect unity. There's no contradictions. Now, I'm going to say right now, there are harebrains that may say, oh, well, I read, you know, this book. I'm sorry. First of all, I'm sorry you ought to read this book. Amen? You know, you get the books that fight against the Bible. You know what they're usually fighting against? They're fighting against the Roman Catholic religion. That's usually the case. It's not the Bible. It's the false religion that everyone says, oh, that's Christianity. It's not. Far from it. Roman Catholicism is a pagan religion. And most of its belief system comes from Babylon. Fourth of all, the ground of immeasurable superiority of the teaching of the Bible is to those who say other in all other books. In other words, the Bible is the truth. 100%, others have errors, mixed truths, fantasies, false doctrine, and so on. People say, what about the new King James? The new King James has the idea that baptism saves. Now this doesn't teach it, but the new King James does. It's not new, it's not King James. Fifth of all, the history of the Bible, it's victory over attack. It's a book of liberty and freedom. Emperors have sought to ban it and burn the Bible. Diocletian of the Roman Empire failed to destroy the Bible. The Dark Ages in the Inquisition sought to ban and burn all scripture. The Bible stands. Listen, those people who try to burn the Bible, try to destroy the Bible, they're all dead and gone. And they're probably in hell. But the Bible stands. It'll always stand. Because of the Word of God. Then number six, those who accept and those who reject the Bible. They add to it, they take it out, they take scriptures out. They add to the word of God, they take out scriptures. Then the influence of the Bible is life-changing power. I could spend the rest of the time, beloved, and just speak about your lives, how God has resurrected your life and God changed your life. There's God giving you a new life. where you're born from above, where you're converted to Christ. Many of you can give testimony of that today. And then there's those down through history. Yesterday I listened to a story about John Newton, who at one time was a drunkard, and he was a libertine, he was just a loose living man. He was a slave trader at one time. And God, by his grace, saved that man, changed his life, put him in his right mind, and he became a preacher of the gospel of Jesus Christ. He lived out the rest of his days, converted Christ, and preached the gospel of Jesus Christ. Well, why? Because that's what God does. He loves everyone, and he has mercy on people. So we see the life-changing power of this book, and then the inexhaustible depth of this book. You're never gonna get to the bottom of it. I've been studying the Word of God for 42 years, which is not a long time. And I'm telling you, the things I come up with brand new, I say, I never saw that before. Anyone ever experienced that? I never saw that before. Never saw it like that before. Praise the Lord. And you're going to learn about the Bible forever and it's always going to be brand new to you in some ways. You're never going to get to the bottom of it. And then number nine, the teaching of holiness and the condemnation of man. Now what book teaches that besides the Bible? If man writes it, he's gonna promote man. He's gonna exalt man. He's gonna say man is a God and so on. They're fools. They worship the creature more than creator. I just, I gotta get this in real quickly. I think it was this morning before I went to bed last night, on channel 12, they were saying that there was a kitten thrown out a window of a car. And then it got run over by another car. I don't want to see that happen. I don't. But this went on for a couple minutes, talking about the fine of that person, $2,000. And I'm thinking, isn't it funny what we do? Just like the Bible says, we love the creature more than the creator. And yet people get abortions all the time. There's no outrage. People aren't bothered. There's no fines of $2,000. There's a video that just came out about abortion. I don't know who these people are, but I'm telling you, I wouldn't want to be in their shoes at the Judgment Day. They took aborted fetuses, and the fetuses, they had them dancing. They were both, they both perished. They're both dancing on this tray that they had them on. Tell them in a hard heart. Talking about demented. Talking about sick in their soul. That was a human life, friend. That's a human life. The praise of the Lord, they went to heaven. Such callousness. Such indifference. Evil. You know when the Bible says that in chapter 6 of Genesis, that the evil continued in the heart, or they had evil in their thoughts continually? That's our age. That's our age. And then His own proclamation. I mean, the Word of God is said to be Scripture, it's the Holy Writ, it's the Word of God, it's what the Bible says, it's thus saith the Lord, both Old and New Testament. Now, we see the Word of God is powerful. Let's go back to our text, we'll close, 1 Peter 1, and notice, if you would, verse 22. The Bible says in verse 22, So we see the essentials of salvation, and then the effect of salvation, where we've been converted, we've been raised to a new life, we live resurrected lives. And if you don't have one, friend, you've never been born again by the Word of God, you've never been born from above, you never have received the Word of God, which changes your life. And may I say this, the results are always the same. You may be a different age, we all may be different cultures, we may be different, but there's always the same result. We're born from above, you become a servant of God, you're fruit on a holiness, and the end everlasting life. Amen? All right, let's stand on our feet, heads bowed, eyes are closed, no one looking around.