So we've been introducing historical theology for the last three weeks. We're finally done with introduction. If you weren't here for that and you'd like to get caught up on that introductory, it's basically defining it and giving a defense for it of why it's not only proper, but beneficial for the Christian to study it. And that's all on Sermon Audio for free. No cost or obligation, as they say. I've told you we've been following the outline of this book by Greg Allison. It's quite the little tome, but it's written recently, so it's very understandable, has great referencing and that sort of thing. Those are some of the reasons why I chose to kind of use the basic framework of it. Here's the way it defines historical theology. I'll probably leave this one for a while, but all the rest of that introductory stuff is gone. Historical theology is not the same thing as church history, per se, right? It's the study of the way the church interprets scripture and formulates doctrine from scripture, the way the church of the past has done that. So, not gonna say any more about that. We've come to the most foundational, low size, they would call it, kind of area of study within the realm of historical theology. The place the church started at and the place we have to start at. And that's, of course, the doctrine of the word of God. So we're going to focus on the canon of scripture. I know what the word canon means. where you shoot balls at people to try to kill them, right? In this context, it means ruler authority, right? So when we talk about the canon of scripture, we're talking about those writings that are authoritative, right? That hold that authority. So here's the question that we're gonna seek to answer. This comes from Allison as he introduces it. How has the church come to believe what belongs in the Bible and what does not belong? Is that an important question? Do we need to know the answer to that? We certainly do, right? Now, why? Why do we have to start here? And why did the church, under the providential guidance, steering of the Holy Spirit, This isn't an age thing. I've had this all my life. I take allergy medicine every day. Particularly bad right now. Why? Like, why is this a necessary starting point? That's right, right? So, who remembers from last summer what epistemology means? That was Scott's class, not mine. That's how you know what you know, right? The study of knowledge. You remember what kind of epistemology do we subscribe to as Christians? Revelatory. Okay, what does that mean? It means our knowledge of the world, our ultimate knowledge of truth, comes through the means of divine revelation, right? So, with that as the foundation, We have to know then what is, what does constitute that divine revelation and what does not, right? So we gotta recognize those things. And so in that sense, like this is really the most foundational starting point for any kind of exercise in theology. And that's reflected in a lot of places. I'm gonna show you this. We're jumping way ahead, but this is from our own confession, or at least the one we subscribe to. And notice, it begins with this recognition. This is the starting point. Watch this. So this is from the 17th century. The Holy Scriptures are the only sufficient, certain, infallible standard of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience. They acknowledge the light of nature and the works of creation and providence so clearly demonstrate the goodness, wisdom, and power of God that people are left without excuse. So they're acknowledging that. But they say, however, these demonstrations through general revelation, the way God has revealed himself through creation, right? It's still revelatory epistemology. Right? But we call it general revelation. It says these are not sufficient to give the knowledge of God and His will that is necessary for salvation. Therefore, the Lord was pleased at different times and in various ways to reveal Himself and declare His will to the church. So we could never know ultimate truth. We could never know the way of salvation, the will of God, had He not condescended to Reveal it. See? To preserve, they go on, and propagate the truth better, and to establish and comfort the church with greater certainty against the corruption of the flesh and the malice of Satan in the world, the Lord put this revelation completely in writing. Okay? In writing. they're about to lay out a confessional statement of doctrine, right? That they think that this is a good summation of what Christians believe and teach. And my point is, This is where they're starting and why, right? Because if we can't, if we, until we determine this, you can't determine everything else, right? Is it hot in here at all? Burning up? I don't think I turned the air on. I forgot. Does anybody, what's that say? Set it to 60, so. Do you mind just doing it to cool and setting it to 71, it'll kick on, or 70, whatever you think. That one says 69. Sorry about that. Our math class went longer than I thought. We've got to talk about all the solutions. Just put it on 70, and I'll try to remember to keep somebody like that. All right, sorry, I saw red faces. I thought, I'm killing these folks. All right. Now, what's this? So to be perfectly clear about it, we're not gonna read all this, but I just want you to see where they go. Paragraph two, and thanks, James. The Holy Scriptures or the Word of God written, sorry. The Holy Scriptures or the Word of God written consist of all the books of the Old and New Testament. These are, Who knows the song? Right. So, da-da-da-da-da, da-da-da, the Protestant canon of scripture. And then they concluded, we're not gonna read all that, but the point is, like, they saw this as such a big deal to properly define the parameters of the canon of scripture, they went through the trouble of listing them out, not just making a reference to them, but saying it's these and these only, and saying all these are given, by the inspiration of God, to what end? To be the standard of faith in life, see? So that's why we have to start here. But like I said, we've jumped way, way ahead in that, because we've assumed a lot of assumptions. May not be apparently obvious, but when I point them out, I think it'll make sense. So two things that we need to back up and see. and we're gonna back way up and we'll spend probably several weeks on this, going through history, historical theology and scripture, of course, is our ultimate source. How did that list come to be recognized, right? We need to understand that, right? And we need to understand why. Any other writings, all other writings have been excluded from that list. Right? So we're going to dive into that in weeks to come. But before that, let me give you some qualifiers. One, I want to be clear here, I should have put some blank slides. hear me, nobody has the authority to create or decide the canon, decide what's in the canon. People make that claim. We're going to see biblically that prerogative is God's alone. The church's duty is to simply recognize and affirm what God has inspired. Does that make sense, the difference between recognizing and affirming and authorizing? It's a big difference, right? Two, and these are all interrelated. I just think they need to be articulated very specifically. The scripture is not dependent upon or reliant upon the testimony of men in order for it to be validated. No group of men. This is the slide that I put up before. The scripture is self-attesting. What does that mean? It speaks for itself. It testifies to itself. Our confidence in the Scripture doesn't come from the testimony of the church. There are billions of people on this earth that claim to be Christian, and some of them may be, but that make that claim right there and believe that way. Our confidence in the Scripture comes from, and I stole this from Sam Waldron, the self-authenticating character of its message. Think about that. I've chewed on that for 15 years now and it gets more beautiful every time I say it. More profound, I mean. Obviously not my articulation of it. The self-authenticating character of its message, right? That's what proves that the scripture is true. So it's an internal verification. And three, similarly, I didn't put these up there, there is no authority outside of the scripture to which the scripture has to answer. There's no standard, there's no metric that's imposed upon the scripture, other than what the scripture itself does, right, that it has to answer to. In other words, the scripture, sets its own criteria. You see that? The Scripture recognizes, affirms itself, sets its own criteria itself. Let me show you from the Scripture, just some examples. I want to get us in Scripture, even in this historical theology study, as much as possible. Because as helpful as it is, the Church's formulations of doctrine over the centuries is not authoritative, is it? What's authoritative? The Word of God, right? So we're going to have to compare all these things, all these historical formulations by the Word of God. 2 Peter, this is chapter 1, verse 20. No prophecy of scripture, Peter says, comes from someone's own interpretation. no prophecy, look at the language, was ever produced by the will of man. That's pretty plain, isn't it? No scripture came to be scripture because men said it was scripture. Rather what? men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit. So this is talking about the doctrine of inspiration of Scripture, right? At its most basic sense, or in its most basic sense. But I mean, the implications of that would certainly negate any idea that there's a group of churches or a group of clergymen that have the authority to say this is and this is not the Word of God, right? No prophecy was, produced by the will of man. But now watch this, and I don't know, maybe I shouldn't have attached this for sake of time, but notice that it's in, it's after he said that, right, about the divine authority and origination of Scripture, the divine attestation of Scripture, that he gives this warning that's so well known in that little letter. Notice the language of contrast. False prophets also arose among the people. They had a canon, the Old Testament canon, which hopefully we'll talk about later. He says, even then when they had that canon, there were those who said they spoke for God, who said they spoke on the authority of God, that arose among them and tried to deceive them, just like he's going to warn is going to happen with y'all. It says, but false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you who will secretly bring in destructive heresies. Guys, this is, I've told you before, like the church's attention to recognizing and speaking against this right here is what historical theology almost entirely consists of, is recognizing the church's attempts to watch out for false teaching and guard against heresy. Even denying the master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction, and look, many will follow their sensuality, and notice the ethical nature of false teaching, or the lack of the ethical nature of false teaching, and because of them, the way of truth, singular, will be blasphemed. So what's the antidote to that? The gift of discernment? Well, no! I'm not saying that wasn't a thing. I mean, he started with this, right? The commitment to the Word of God. He says, there's no private interpretations, right? There's no privacy. It's only what comes through the inspiration of God. All right, we'll see more about that. But my point, remember, in that is simply that if men can determine, even a group of men, can determine the Scripture for themselves, how do you prevent this from happening if the right men say it, the way of truth being blasphemed? You see what I'm saying? If we vest that authority in men on earth today, and they determine what the Scripture is, then What's to stop them from saying Mary was a perpetual virgin when the Bible says Mary had kids after Jesus? Or Mary was ascended into heaven? Well, it doesn't negate that, but I mean, you see my point? Okay, all right, one more thing here from the scriptures. I think we have very clearly portrayed in the scripture this idea of scripture being self-attesting in the scripture itself. Watch. We're gonna be familiar with this, Deuteronomy 12.32. Notice this, everything that I command you God told Israel through Moses, you should be careful to do. You should not add to it, you should not, now are you cold now? I'll turn this on. It knocked the chill off, I think you're not alone. I don't usually put it that low anyway, so. All right, so we're gonna read on, but what's this statement saying here? There's a very definite parameter. There are definite parameters to the canon of Scripture, the Word of God, right? And the duty of those to whom that Word was given is twofold. What? Don't fail to uphold and affirm and obey any part of it, and don't add anything to it other than what God has laid down, right? So it's only what's God's authorship that's acceptable. And everything that God has authored, has inspired, has to be upheld and affirmed. Same thing Peter said. Now, here's a good example that I think will help us to contextualize it. If a prophet, what's a prophet? Allegedly someone who speaks for God, right? If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder. What's a sign or a wonder supposed to be? It's supposed to be proof that this person's speaking for God. It's a miracle. Watch. And the sign or the wonder that he tells you comes to pass. Right? It actually does a miracle. But look, but he says, let us go after other gods which you've not known and let us serve them. So he says, I'm a prophet, I'm speaking for God. Here's the proof, I'm doing a miracle. But I say, I've changed my mind. Now we can worship the bells as long as we worship Yahweh too. He did a miracle, right? Of course, God through Moses says, you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer of dreams. Why? What does that tell us? Previous revelation, right? Contradicted previous revelation. So what's the ultimate authority? Codified canon of scripture, right? The written word is ultimate. Does it matter? I mean, really, it wouldn't matter if someone pulled up in the parking lot out there and lassoed the moon and landed it. If he tells us to go out and worship Baal, he's a false prophet. So what's going on? Well, he says the Lord your God is testing you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. In other words, God's allowing this miraculous thing to happen. Yeah, maybe it is supernatural. What of it? If it contradicts the Word of God, it doesn't matter what the prophet says if it goes against the previous Word of God. See why that forces us to define the limits of the canon of Scripture, to not define it ourselves, but to recognize that and affirm it? On contrary, you shall walk after the Lord your God. Fear Him. Look at the language. keep His commandments, obey His voice, serve Him, hold fast to Him, et cetera. How do we know how to do that? How do we know what that looks like? Revelatory epistemology, right? The revealed Word of God. So, it's not just important, it's crucial that we accurately recognize what the biblical deposit of truth is. And as I said before, that's one of the first things that your church undertook to do. We'll have to qualify that a lot, but any questions on any of that before I move on? Got some extensive quotations to come from, well, actually I broke it up to where we probably won't, but no questions so far? Okay. This is from Allison. And this will go fast, but I just want to make sure we're clear on this. The church has historically believed that a specific set of writings called the Canon of Scripture composes the Old and New Testaments. We're going to break up our study of those. The list of divinely inspired and authoritative, he describes them as the list of divinely inspired and authoritative narratives, prophecies, gospels, letters, and other writings that make up the Word of God. developed in the early church. Now he's not saying those writings developed in the early church. What's he saying? The list, right? So in other words, the understanding, the recognizing all of them in the same list developed, right? The recognition. I'm gonna say that word till I'm blue in the face, okay? Recognizing and authorizing are two very different things, right? Okay. Here's what I was kind of getting to. Sorry about that. That one got past me. The canon of the Protestant church differs from that of the Roman Catholic church. We need to recognize that. The Protestant canon is composed of 66 books, while the Catholic canon is more extensive. It includes the Apocrypha, extra books in the Old Testament, Tobit, Judith, et cetera, and additions to certain Old Testament writings as found in the Protestant Bible. In other words, additions to Esther, Belle and the Dragon, etc. And guys, already this kind of proves my point. Why does the Catholic Church have a bigger canon? I mean, they're the ones who say, we gave you the Bible. Like, that's their talking point, but they got more of it. That's it, right? Those books, like you can find these books in the, like if you've got a facsimile of the King James 1611 or something, or in the old Vulgate or something, these books, but they were never recognized as canonical. They were like reference material in there, right? Because they were Jewish writings from the intertestamental period. They weren't recognized to be inspired by God. They don't have the self-authenticating a message whose character is self-authenticating. And if you read them, it's very obvious if you compare them to the rest of Scripture. But after the Reformation, right, where Rome had asserted these doctrines and dogmas that could not stand the scrutiny of Scripture, many of which had come from those apocryphal books, Part of their counter-reformation efforts was to say, okay then, we have the authority, we'll just canonize those books. Now you can't say that. Problem solved, if you don't fear the Lord, right? But, I mean, do you see how Pandora's box is open to anything if you vest that authority in any group of uninspired men, right? That authority's got to come from the scripture itself. You say, well, that's circular. I don't care. Scripture has to be self-attesting because there's no authority over it. Right? It's the word of God. There's no authority over God. Okay? Anywho, we need to understand that history. All right. If I confused anybody with that, because that's overly simplified, but that's the gist of it. I have confused you. No, I'm kidding. Andrew nodded like Melissa does. Okay, go on. All right. Let's see what time we got. We got time to go on. This is going faster than I thought. All right, so Allison begins his historical survey, if you will, with this. It's important. From its beginning, we're gonna get into a lot of scripture here. On the day of Pentecost, the church considered the Hebrew Bible to be the word of God. So what's he doing here? He's talking about provenance, the origins of something, right? He's saying, he's just saying the truth of the matter is we got our Old Testament from the Jews. And if you do, and if you, you know, just about any sort of Christian apologist is gonna make that, is gonna begin with that same statement right there. Now, what's assumed in that you know, already is a recognition that the same work of recognition that we in the New Covenant era have done to recognize and affirm what books are genuinely apostolic, i.e. our New Testament canon, like, you know, those things the Spirit of God has orchestrated providentially throughout the period of the Old Testament as well. If you're good with that, fine. It doesn't quite suffice for me. I think it's right, don't get me wrong. I just think like philosophically you could erode it. So I'm gonna go a little different route, but let me read on before I do. Bear with me. The writings that composed the Jewish scriptures, now called the Old Testament, were fixed and had been so for several centuries prior to the coming of Christ. So there was a completed, delimited Jewish canon recognized and affirmed by the Old Testament church, if you're comfortable calling it that, prior to Christ's first advent on the earth. Like I said, I think here, too, we've got to recognize the self-authentication, self-attestation of Scripture. And here's how I think we do that. And that's in that Jesus followed the line of thinking. Jesus and the inspired apostles recognized the Old Testament canon and affirmed it. And Jesus' words, and you've got to be careful with this because some people take this bad places, were validated how? By His resurrection. What did you say? You know, that's a good point. Actually, that is a part of that self-authenticating, self-attesting. Amen. So I'm saying even if, philosophically, you want to get outside of that and just have the starting point of Jesus and the incarnation and the resurrection, if Jesus says, my words are true, here's the proof that my words are true. Outside of anything else, it's what? I'm going to raise from the dead never to die again. And everybody's going to know it, right? Now, I'm not divorcing that from the canon of Scripture like the heretical little guy down in Georgia does. What's his name, unhitched from the Old Testament, tether of the faith and the resurrection guy? Andy Stanley. So if you hear any similarities in that, it's not intended. Mark and avoid that guy. And I say that carefully, but sincerely, he is bad fruit. But the fact that Jesus did prove the truth of everything he said in the resurrection means everything he said is true. Sorry, I'm stumbling here. And Jesus, and then later his authoritative apostles, who, by the way, performed the same signs and wonders that Jesus did, right? Okay? The same grade of signs and wonders, not like Benny Hinn stuff, but like can't explain it any other way kind of signs and wonders. They all affirmed the Old Testament canon as it was recognized by the first century Jews. You see what I'm saying? So again, we're not reliant simply on the Jews, are we? I'm not being antisemitic in that. I'm saying we're not reliant just on the Jewish canon because Jesus, who was raised from the dead to prove he's the son of God, testified to the Old Testament canon that he received, right? You following with me? Okay, great. Now, let me show you. So we're clear in ways that they did. I'll try to be quick. We probably won't make it any further than this though. Is anybody confused by what I've said so far? I wouldn't fault you if you were. It's hard for me to articulate. Speak freely. I won't be offended. Yeah, let me try to put it more succinctly. I'm saying Jesus proved that everything that he taught was true by the resurrection, right? And Jesus recognize and affirm the validity of the Old Testament. He said that's the Word of God. Referring, yeah, Jesus said the Old Testament is the Word of God and Jesus raised from the dead, like never to die again, right, of his own power, if you will. See the difference? Okay. Anybody else? Questions? OK. Let's look at something. Please. Just to get to the bottom of what he's trying to do. He's trying to frame an argument for why we believe the Old Testament. So we believe it because the man who attested to it not only died, but God had been incarnated, right? Raising him from the dead. So anything that man says, we'll believe. Because he's been vindicated. And miracles beforehand, signs of testing, plus being raised from the dead. I mean, there's lots of other evidence for that, like Mr. Rogers said back there, the fact that, you know, prophetic evidence is that Jesus fulfilled those scriptures for millennia before. And it certainly, the Old Testament too, has a self-authenticating message, like for sure. I was just saying like, in case anybody gets like really pressed on, why do you just accept the Old Testament? What if the Jews were wrong? I'm saying, well, here's a way to make sure we don't stumble on that, right? By seeing Jesus' affirmation of it. and He proved Himself to be the Word of God incarnate. Does that make sense? So it's not to detract from what He said at all, it's just to add something to it. Alright, Jesus said what? Almost immediately as He began His ministry, as far as we can tell. Don't think that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets. What's that? That's synecdoche for the Old Testament. He says, I've not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them, right? That's not only a recognition that they're the word of God, right? But he's saying like, I came to carry out what they say, right? So, I mean, it's even greater. And he said emphatically, until heaven and earth pass away, not neota, not a dot will pass away from the law, for the Old Testament until, or for the Mosaic institution there probably, until all is accomplished, right? Pretty clear affirmations. Luke 16, 17, I'll go through these quick unless somebody has a question. But it's easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void, right? So not only was it authoritative, it remains forever authoritative, right? it will come to its full fruition. But again, the recognition. This one's real important. Crazy stuff we just glance over sometimes. He said to them, these are my words, post-resurrection appearance to the disciples. I think this was on the road to Emmaus, right? I'll just read. These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me So now that's connecting the two deposits of truth inescapably. But look, in the law of Moses, the prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled. If you're familiar with the way the Jews divided up the scriptures, That's every part of the Old Testament, right? So in other words, he's not just saying, you know, the animal sacrifices and that part, the five books of Moses are valid, he's saying the Psalms, the Proverbs, the history books, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, don't know what to do with that, but he's saying, but if some, he's affirming the validity of that and he's saying, ultimately, I'm the fulfillment, I'm the plerao. of those things. So very clear affirmation, right? Of the validity of the Old Testament canon. We read this before. No prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation. No prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God and were carried along by the Holy Spirit. And then I'm going to couple that with this one and then ask a rhetorical question. 2 Timothy 3.15, from childhood, Paul writing, you've been, so that was Peter before, here's Paul, from childhood you've been acquainted with the sacred writings, what's that word sacred? Holy, the holy writings, meaning what? They're different than all other writings, right? They're in their own category, what makes them sacred? They're the words of God, right? Which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus, And then he says next verse, all scriptures breathed out by God. Now, guys, what scripture did they have? The Old Testament at this time, right? They were creating the New Testament, apostles and apostolic partners, right, that are operating as the emissaries of Christ, who was the fullness of God's revelation. I don't think I have that, no. I think the Hebrew's one thing, right? The supremacy of the revelation in the Son, God in former times and former ways, I can't think of it, diverse manners. The King James says, spoke to our fathers through the prophets, but in these last days, he's spoken to us. in his son, right? And so there's a fullness of that, but he, so that was being created at the time this was written. This was part of it. But so, but when he says scriptures breathed out by God, he's talking about the old Testament and he's taught any look away, says the old Testament, just a side note is sufficient to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus. See all that again, tying all that together, Jesus, the sum and substance. Alright, yeah, do we need Rome's permission or approval or authority to recognize the Old Testament as the Word of God? Do we need that same authority or approval or permission from Constantinople, Eastern Orthodox? We don't, right? Christ has affirmed it. His apostles have affirmed it infallibly, right? And we can rest our confidence, this is as far as we'll get, it's already 7.32, but that indeed the Old Testament is the Word of God. And we'll try to see that Our early church fathers recognized that right out of the gate. And they were quite sola scriptura too, actually. I'll try to show you that a lot. I'm talking about the early, second century guys. The century after Christ, right out of the gate, sola scriptura. They didn't know the word, but the concept was there. Hopefully we'll do a similar survey of the New Testament next time. That'll probably take a few weeks. It's a complicated matter in the sense of seeing how the church's recognition developed. you probably don't want me even to start giving you a preview of it, because there's no way, there's no short version of it. But, you know, like, that's what we want to know, learn, the kind of things we want to learn from this study, right? We want to, we want to learn the past and why we believe what we believe, or why we articulate it the way we do, and a lot of things like that. And we'll try to always trace it back to the Word of God. Because if we can't trace it back, if we can't defend it from the Word of God, it doesn't matter what Irenaeus, or Ignatius, or Polycarp, or Justin Martyr, Augustine, doesn't matter, does it? If it's not borne out by the Word of God. But, seeing the Holy Spirit work through all of those men is... going to be a beneficial study to us as long as we um judge it all by the word of God. So, any questions? Has that been more confusing to anybody than you were when you came in today on the subject? A little bit. Yeah. Madison's honest. I mean, I get it. I I try to go through it fast, you know, but and I Okay, okay. I'll tell you, I think I've told y'all this before, I can't remember. My first church history class was Sam Waldron was the teacher and he's very dry, very academic, but very smart. And you know, he was just like, know, drinking from a fire hydrant of just, like, facts about philosophy and Greek people and just all, and you just didn't, like, where is this? You know? But, like, He eventually took it somewhere that changed my life. Even in that early church history class, it just at first seemed so boring and confusing and academic. Probably one of the biggest takeaways from that was understanding why we have the New Testament canon we have. and what the criteria for that was and how that came to be recognized and all that, that's been life-changing to me. And that's a lot of the areas where skeptics and cults attack the true Christian faith. is trying to undermine the credibility. So I think if we know that, we know the truth, we know the real history behind it and all those things, and we understand that he's the one who taught me that concept, the self-authenticating character of its message. That's revolutionary, right? That stops all of that dead in its tracks. It's so foundationally important. So what seemed like a grievous burden to me at first, it came to be a great blessing. So I hope it'll be the same for y'all. I'll try not to be dry and academic. I don't think I have the capacity to do that. I have the capacity to be dry. I don't have the capacity to be very academic like him. So I just don't know what he knows. All right. No questions? Be merciful and let us go. All right, Brandon, will you dismiss us in prayer? Yeah, let's pray, yeah. Father, we thank you that we can see your hand at work throughout history. We thank you that you've come to this place. It's all of your sovereign hand, your sovereign choice, and the grace that you've bestowed upon us. We thank you that you have the need to build yourself to us, and that we can read your very words, and we can let you impact our lives and mold us into your image and to your color. Thank you for all these things.